PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) ? President Barack Obama plans to visit privately Saturday with relatives of former South African President Nelson Mandela, but doesn't intend to see the critically ill anti-apartheid activist he has called a "personal hero."
The White House did not disclose any details for Obama's plans to meet the family in a brief statement issued upon Obama's first morning in South Africa during a weeklong tour of the continent. The statement simply said that Obama and his wife would offer their thoughts and prayers at the family's difficult time.
"Out of deference to Nelson Mandela's peace and comfort and the family's wishes, they will not be visiting the hospital," the statement said.
Obama told reporters on the flight to South Africa Friday that he was grateful that he, his wife and daughters had a chance to meet Mandela previously. Obama hangs his photo of the introduction he had to Mandela in 2005 in his personal office at the White House ? their only meeting, when Obama was a senator.
"I don't need a photo op," Obama said. "The last thing I want to do is to be in any way obtrusive at a time when the family is concerned about Nelson Mandela's condition."
Obama will be just a couple miles from the hospital where 94-year-old Mandela has been for three weeks after being admitted with a lung infection. The U.S. president has a bilateral meeting and news conference with President Jacob Zuma at the Union Buildings, where Mandela was inaugurated as the country's first black president in 1994 after 27 years behind bars under racist rule.
Obama has said the imprisoned activist's willingness to risk his life for the cause of equal rights helped inspire his own political activism. Obama said his message during the visit will draw on the lessons of Mandela's life, with a message that "Africa's rise will continue" if its people are unified instead of divided by tribe, race or religion.
"I think the main message we'll want to deliver if not directly to him but to his family is simply a profound gratitude for his leadership all these years and that the thoughts and prayers of the American people are with him and his family and his country," Obama said on his flight into the country.
Obama also is paying tribute to the fight against apartheid by visiting the Soweto area Saturday afternoon for a town hall with students at the University of Johannesburg. At least 176 young people were killed in Soweto township 27 years ago this month during a youth protest against the apartheid regime's ban against teaching local Bantu languages. The Soweto Uprising catalyzed international support against apartheid, and June is now recognized as Youth Month in South Africa.
The university plans to bestow an honorary law degree on the U.S. president, while protesters are planning demonstrations against U.S. policy on issues including the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the war in Afghanistan and global warming. Hundreds marched to the U.S. Embassy on Friday, carrying signs that read: "No, You Can't Obama," a message inspired by Obama's "yes, we can" campaign slogan.
Obama, the son of an African man, has been trying to inspire the continent's youth to become civically active and part of a new democratically minded generation. Obama hosted young leaders from more than 40 African countries at the White House in 2010 and challenged them to bring change to their countries by standing up for freedom, openness and peaceful disagreement.
Obama wraps up his South Africa stay Sunday, when he plans to give a sweeping speech on U.S.-Africa policy at the University of Cape Town and take his family to Robben Island to tour the prison where Mandela spent 18 years.
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Follow Nedra Pickler on Twitter at https://twitter.com/nedrapickler
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy has denied a request from Proposition 8 supporters in California to halt the issuance of same-sex marriage licenses in the nation's most populous state.
Kennedy turned away the request on Sunday with no additional comment.
Same-sex marriage opponents asked him to step in on Saturday, a day after the federal appeals court in San Francisco allowed same-sex marriages to go forward. Numerous weddings were performed at San Francisco City Hall following the court decisions.
The opponents said the appeals court had acted about three weeks too soon. Proposition 8 supporters could continue their efforts to halt gay marriage by filing their request with another Supreme Court justice.
Apple?s ?Designed by Apple in California? dubbed a flop by many, is getting plenty of publicity. But not in the way Apple likely intended. The ad received a viewer score of 489 out of 900 based on the Ace Metric scale. This low-scoring commercial, compared to Apple?s 26 other ads this year, has created quite the buzz on Bloomberg, LA Times, Ad Age and various other sites.
Why the low score?
First, is it really a low score? The industry average is 542 making the Apple ad not far from status quo. By contrast, Apple?s most popular ads scored around 700. More importantly, Samsung?s commercials have been ranking above 600.
You might be surprised to know it wasn?t the company?s philosophy that viewers didn?t like; it was the lack of information and the sad tone to the commercial.
Apple is known for cutting edge technology. Perhaps viewers were disappointed that the commercial was focused on branding versus one of Apple?s new devices.
Why the change?
It?s a simple answer, really. If a well-known brand is losing market share to stiff competition and doesn?t have any new products to debut, what do you do? You do the branding thing in an attempt to energize your loyal fans with strong company values.
A secondary reason could be to remove any lingering bad rapport about Apple?s working conditions in China which was heavily criticized last year. Since then, the company has taken strides to move some production into the United States. This, coupled with a seemingly intentional shift in focus from manufacturing to design, is likely a major reason the brand went with ?Designed by Apple in California.?
Flop or famous?
If the commercial?s goal was to draw attention away from Samsung?s new products and back to Apple, they got it. Just not in the way they intended.
Sometimes an attack on a much loved brand is exactly what is needed to energize loyal consumers. Keep in mind, low scores on ad surveys are not always indicative of consumer purchase patterns.
What are your thoughts on the commercial? Do you think this will hurt their new product launch coming up?
This guest post was written by Alicia Lawrence, content coordinator for WebpageFX and blogs in her free time at MarCom Land.
This entry was posted on Saturday, June 29th, 2013 at 5:23 PM and is filed under Marketing Flip.
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Ex-Zynga co-founder and godfather of metrics-based game development Eric Schiermeyer is now an investor and advisor to Bee Cave Games, makers of play-money gambling Facebook game Blackjack Casino. Schiermeyer left Zynga a while back. Bee Cave Games CEO Erik Bethke tells me Schiermeyer's advisor gig is a weekly role and his investment is part of a forthcoming funding round in the low millions.
The hair of mummies from the town of San Pedro de Atacama in Chile reveals the people in the region had a nicotine habit spanning from at least 100 B.C. to A.D. 1450.
Additionally, nicotine consumption occurred on a society-wide basis, irrespective of social status and wealth, researchers say.
The finding refutes the popular view that the group living in this region smoked tobacco for just a short stint before moving on to snuffing hallucinogens.
"The idea was that around A.D. 400, people in San Pedro de Atacama (SPA) smoked tobacco in pipes, and then after that time, they gradually switched to inhaling dimethyltryptamines in snuffing trays," said study co-author Hermann Niemeyer, an organic chemist at the University of Chile in Santiago. "What we show is that's not correct." [See Images of the Chilean Mummy Findings]
Smoking and snuffing
The practice of smoking and snuffing hallucinogens was deeply rooted in the culture and thinking of many pre-Hispanic societies. In the south central Andes, two plant sources of hallucinogenic compounds exist: nicotine-containing species of Nicotiana (tobacco) and tryptamine-containing species of Anadenanthera (cebil).
"The proposal one most often reads is that [the hallucinogens] were used mainly by shamans," Niemeyer told LiveScience. The witch doctors sometimes used the plants as psychoactive compounds to connect with the gods and spirits from beyond. At lower concentrations, the substances became the ingredients for remedies for diseases, sleep problems and other ailments.
"The shamans were supposed to not only cure things by directly using something that attacked the illness, but also by contacting spirits through ceremonies," Niemeyer said.
Evidence in mummy hair
To get a better understanding of hallucinogen use in SPA throughout the ages, Niemeyer and his colleague Javier Echeverr?a analyzed hair samples of 56 mummies from the Late Formative to the Late Intermediate periods of SPA (100 B.C. to A.D. 1450). The mummies, Niemeyer explained, were in good condition, preserved naturally from the high temperatures, extreme dryness and high soil salinity in the Atacama Desert. Depending on the site, the mummies were either interred in the ground or entombed in "some sort of stony environment made for them."
A range of different objects were buried along with the mummies, such as jewelry, weapons, ceramic objects, raw metals, textiles, vases and various snuffing paraphernalia, including mortars, trays and tubes. The researchers used the number and type of objects as a proxy for the mummies' social and wealth statuses.
The team found nicotine in the hair of 35 mummies, spanning the full range of years. "The finding of nicotine was definitely unexpected," Niemeyer said. In the archaeological record of SPA, smoking pipes are gradually replaced by snuff trays after around A.D. 400 ??previous studies found evidence of nicotine in smoking pipes, but not in snuffing powder or snuffing paraphernalia, which were often associated with tryptamine alkaloids.
The team didn't find traces of tryptamine alkaloids in the hair samples, though this doesn't necessarily mean people didn't consume the cebil compounds. "When you inhale dimethyltryptamines, the body takes care of destroying it before it gets to the hair follicles," Niemeyer said.
The traces of nicotine weren't related to the presence of snuffing paraphernalia in the tombs, suggesting shamans, who are typically associated with such objects, weren't the only ones to consume the psychoactive alkaloids. Moreover, nicotine-laced hair wasn't related to the diversity of funerary objects or the presence of valuable gemstone necklaces.
The results, which will be detailed in the October issue of the Journal of Archaeological Science, suggest nicotine consumption in pre-Hispanic SPA occurred continuously for hundreds of years and was performed by people of all social and wealth statuses, Niemeyer said.
Follow Joseph Castroon Twitter. Follow us @livescience, Facebook?& Google+. Original article on?LiveScience.com.
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Linda Pescatello, Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor of Kinesiology and senior editor of the American College of Sports Medicine?s Guidelines for Exercise Testing and Prescription, ninth edition. (File photo)
A prescriptive handbook widely used in medicine, athletics, and fitness programs, was recently republished in its ninth edition, edited by UConn kinesiology professor Linda Pescatello.
The latest edition of the American College of Sports Medicine?s Guidelines for Exercise Testing and Prescription seeks to remove barriers that often delay or prevent healthy individuals from starting beneficial exercise programs.
The book is the most widely circulated set of exercise guidelines in the world, the ?international gold standard? for all professionals conducting exercise testing or exercise programs, says Pescatello, senior editor of the ninth edition, and also associate editor of the eighth edition, published in 2009.
Previous editions of the ACSM?s Guidelines recommended a medical examination and physician-administered exercise testing, or stress testing, as part of health screening prior to starting vigorous-intensity exercise for individuals at moderate risk of cardiovascular disease, in order to identify those at risk for a sudden adverse cardiac event during exercise.
The new edition of the Guidelines, presented by Pescatello at the ACSM?s Health Fitness Summit in Las Vegas in March and ACSM?s annual conference in Indianapolis in June, still recommends both a medical exam and physician-administered stress testing for individuals at high risk of, or with known, cardiovascular disease before they begin either a moderate or vigorous-intensity exercise program.
But the Guidelines no longer recommend these steps for individuals at moderate risk before they start a progressive exercise regimen, and no longer recommend stress testing for the same group before starting vigorous-intensity exercise.
The benefits of exercise far outweigh the risks.
ACSM?s Guidelines for Exercise Testing and Prescription is based on the most current evidence in the field, including ACSM position and statement stands, says Pescatello, UConn Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor of Kinesiology and a principal investigator at UConn?s Center for Health, Intervention, and Prevention (CHIP). She has focused her career on examining the connection between exercise and health.
?The updated guidelines for pre-participation health screening remove unnecessary and unproven barriers to starting an exercise program, and reinforce the public health message that the benefits of exercise far outweigh the risks,? she says. ?At the same time, the guidelines place a stronger need on identifying those clients with known disease, because they are at the highest risk for an exercise-related cardiac event.?
In place of previous emphasis on medical evaluation, the new pre-participation health screening guidelines place a greater emphasis on self-guided screening methods, encouraging all individuals who want to begin a physical activity program to complete a health risk appraisal questionnaire at a minimum, Pescatello said. The need for and degree of follow-up required can then be guided by the responses to the questionnaire.
?There are multiple considerations that have prompted these different points of emphasis,? Pescatello explains. ?The risk of a cardiovascular event is increased during vigorous-intensity exercise relative to rest, but the absolute risk of a cardiac event is low in healthy individuals. Recommending a medical examination and stress test as part of the pre-participation health screening process for all people at moderate to high risk prior to initiating a light- to moderate-intensity exercise program implies that being physically active confers greater risk than a sedentary lifestyle.?
Hartford Hospital cardiologist Dr. Paul Thompson, a research collaborator of Pescatello since 1998, served as associate editor of the new Guidelines and wrote the introductory chapter for the book emphasizing the safety and benefits of exercise. He also authored what Pescatello describes as the ?long overdue? second chapter, which contains the new pre-participation health screening recommendations.
Other new features of the ninth edition of the Guidelines include a new chapter about proven theory-based behavioral methods to increase adherence to exercise programs; more specific information about working with special populations, such as those who have had bariatric surgery or who have multiple chronic diseases and health conditions; and a new automated reference system that was developed by UConn medical librarian Jill Livingston.
Also for the first time for the ninth edition, Pescatello invited a clinical pharmacist ? UConn assistant clinical professor of pharmacy practice and CHIP affiliate, Thomas Buckley ? to prepare the appendix on commonly encountered medications among people that exercise.
Pescatello?s work on the ninth edition of the Guidelines began almost as soon as her work on the eighth edition ended.
?It is a professional honor to be selected as editor of the ACSM?s Guidelines for Exercise Testing and Prescription because of the significant impact they have on the work that we do in our field,? she says, ?and it is a labor of love.?
Can You Be Addicted To Carbs? Scientists Are Checking That Out Researchers are trying to figure out if it really is possible to be addicted to food. A study of brain activity finds there's more going on in areas linked to reward and addiction after people drink a shake with lots of refined carbohydrates. But it's not clear how that factors into overeating.
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LISBON, Portugal (AP) ? A national strike against austerity measures by Portuguese labor unions on Thursday shut down many public services, but the government showed no signs of backing down from the pay cuts, tax hikes and layoffs it insists will help restore the bailed-out country's financial health.
Most services operated by the national train company CP, the Lisbon subway and city bus companies ? all of them state-run ? were cancelled during the 24-hour walkout, forcing commuters to use their own vehicles and congesting traffic in the capital Lisbon and Porto, the second-largest city. Airport management company ANA reported that 37 flights were cancelled by early afternoon, 32 of them at Lisbon airport, and many delays.
The protest went to the heart of the current debate in Europe over whether to ditch debt-reducing austerity policies and adopt more growth measures to pull the group of 17 European Union countries that use the euro, including Portugal, out of recession.
Portuguese business leaders and opposition political parties have joined labor unions in appealing for a change in course, but the government said it won't budge from an austerity strategy it insists will pay off in the long term.
It is preparing a new raft of reforms to cut public spending that are expected to further reduce living standards and stoke a record level of unemployment, even as Portugal weathers a forecast third straight year of recession.
"The country hasn't ground to a halt" Cabinet spokesman Luis Marques Guedes said of the strike after a meeting of government ministers. "The government believes that work is what the country needs to do."
The General Confederation of Portuguese Workers and the General Workers' Union, which together represent about 1 million workers in this country of 10.6 million people, want the center-right coalition government to ease off its spending cuts and take more steps to create jobs. Thursday's walkout was only their fourth joint protest in 25 years.
Some health centers around the country stayed shut, Portuguese media reported, while hospitals rescheduled operations and medical appointments. Many government offices had fewer staff but few private companies reported walkouts.
Portugal's European partners are keen for it to stick with its cost-cutting drive, which is viewed as vital if heavily-indebted eurozone countries are to put their three-year-old financial crisis behind them. Portugal's government debt stands at almost 124 percent of gross domestic product, the third-highest in the EU after Greece and Italy.
Also, the austerity program is a demand of foreign creditors ? Portugal's EU partners and the International Monetary Fund ? who lent it 78 billion euros ($102 billion) in a financial rescue two years ago. If Portugal doesn't stick with the planned cuts the creditors can stop disbursements of the bailout funds, leaving the country at risk of bankruptcy.
Nevertheless, the outlook for Portugal is grim. The jobless rate, currently at a record 17.8 percent, is forecast to hit 18.5 percent next year. The bailout creditors predicting a contraction of 2.3 percent this year after the Portuguese economy shrank 3.2 percent in 2012. The budget deficit stood at 6.4 percent of annual GDP in 2012 ? higher than the 5 percent target for that year though much lower than the 10.1 percent recorded in 2010.
Already, the government has raised sales tax to 23 percent from 13 percent, while income tax hikes have costing many middle-class workers more than a month's pay. A European Commission report published Wednesday forecast further declines in household income this year and next.
Unions are also angered by the government's latest plans, which include increasing the working time of state employees to 40 hours a week from 35; increasing their monthly pension deductions while lowering their pension entitlements; and laying off some 50,000 government workers out of the total of about 583,000.
The crunch won't stop there, however.
The government, which has to find another 3.4 billion euros of savings in 2014, is due to present next month details of a deep and broad reform of how the state is run. The proposal is expected to order a further streamlining of state services and will likely fuel more protests.
NASA's venerable Voyager 1 probe has encountered a strange new region at the outer reaches of the solar system, suggesting the spacecraft is poised to pop free into interstellar space, scientists say.
Voyager 1, which has been zooming through space for more than 35 years, observed a dramatic drop in solar particles and a simultaneous big jump in high-energy galactic cosmic rays last August, the scientists announced in three new studies published today (June 27) in the journal Science.
The probe did not measure a shift in the direction of the ambient magnetic field, indicating that Voyager 1 is still within the sun's sphere of influence, researchers said. But mission scientists think the spacecraft will likely leave Earth's solar system relatively soon. [NASA's Voyager Probes: 5 Surprising Facts]
"I think it's probably several more years ? 2015 is reasonable," said Voyager project scientist Ed Stone of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, lead author of one of the new studies and co-author of another.
"But it's speculation, because none of the models we have, have this particular region in them," Stone told SPACE.com. "So none of the models can be directly and accurately compared to what we're observing. What we're observing is really quite new."
A new region of space
Voyager 1 and its twin, Voyager 2, launched a few weeks apart in 1977 to study Saturn, Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune. The probes completed this unprecedented "grand tour" and then kept right on flying toward interstellar space.
Voyager 1 should get there first. At 11.5 billion miles (18.5 billion kilometers) from Earth, the spacecraft is the farthest man-made object in space. Voyager 2, for its part, is now 9.4 billion miles (15.1 billion km) from home.
Both probes are currently plying the outer layers of the heliosphere, the enormous bubble of charged particles and magnetic fields surrounding the sun. But things are really getting interesting for Voyager 1, the new studies report.
On Aug. 25, 2012, the probe recorded a 1,000-fold drop in the number of charged solar particles while also measuring a 9 percent increase in fast-moving particles of galactic origin called cosmic rays.
Those are two of the three phenomena that Voyager scientists expect to see when the spacecraft crosses over into interstellar space. But Voyager 1 still hasn't observed the third one ? a shift in magnetic-field orientation, from east-west within the solar system?to roughly north-south outside of it.
The magnetic field "did not change direction. All it did was get compressed, so it's stronger now than it was," Stone said. "That's what one would expect if, in fact, the energetic particles, which were providing the pressure, suddenly left."
Overall, researchers said, Voyager 1's new data suggest that the spacecraft remains within the solar system, though it appears to be in a sort of interface region connecting the heliosphere and interstellar space.
Keep on trucking
Mission scientists will keep an eye on the magnetic-field readings over the coming months and years, Stone said.
"If there's a dramatic change, like there was last Aug. 25, that will be very exciting," he said. "If it's a gradual change, well, it'll just take us longer to realize what's happening."
Stone and his colleagues hope that Voyager 1 leaves the solar system before 2020. The probe's declining power supply will force engineers to shut off the first instrument that year, and all of them will probably stop working by 2025.
There's no reason to think anything will go wrong before 2020, since the spacecraft remains in good health despite its advanced age. But the mission team knows there are no guarantees.
"Something could break. That's what you can't predict ? the random failure," Stone said. "So far, we've been lucky. There haven't been any catastrophic random failures."
Follow Mike Wall on Twitter?@michaeldwall?and?Google+.?Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook?or Google+. Originally published on SPACE.com.
Copyright 2013 SPACE.com, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
That's right Canucks, Kickstarter'slaunching in your neck of the woods before the midnight sun sets for the season. The crowdfunding site released a teaser page today, announcing that it'll open up to Canada-based projects later this summer. It's not the first site of its kind to accept submissions from north of the border, but if Indiegogo hasn't been drawing in the results you need, you'll soon be able to give it a go on another platform. The Kickstarter team is mum on an exact launch date, but with a bit less than three months left in summer, the clock is ticking.
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In their zeal to defend the name Redskins against disorganized and scattered opposition that gradually is becoming more organized and less scattered, the NFL team bearing that name has had a tendency to seize in knee-jerk fashion upon anything that supports the position that the name isn?t offensive.
The two primary tactics having entailed citing the various high schools that still use the name (there are fewer all the time) and trumpeting the opinions of Native Americans who have no problem with the name, and who ostensibly would regard as a compliment the greeting, ?What?s up, redskin??
As explained by Dave McKenna in an item published earlier today by Deadspin (yeah, I know that one of the morons who works there recently called me a moron . . . again), a supposed Native American Chief whom the Redskins recently trotted out in support of the name isn?t a Chief, and may not even be a Native American.? But the Redskins, who apparently have chosen to dispense with steps like vetting a guest, put the guy on their in-house web show, described him as a Chief, and had him explain why he supports the name.
And, yes, the guy actually said that Native Americans on the ?reservation? actually great each other with, ?Hey, what?s up, redskin??
Complicating matters for the league is that Commissioner Roger Goodell recently pointed to the same non-Chief-possibly-non-Native-American in a letter to member of Congress defending the ongoing use of the name Redskins.
The full item is worth a read, even though it?s a little lengthy.? Also, it probably should include a disclaimer that the author once triggered a defamation lawsuit from owner Daniel Snyder, which gives McKenna a natural bias.
But the point has been made.? Yet again, the Redskins end up looking bad while trying to make their name look good.
If nothing else, we now know why they?ve hired Frank Luntz.? Then again, maybe they think he?s a Chief, too.
Last year, Sony overhauled basically its entire line of cameras from the very bottom to tippiest top. Surprisingly, the most exciting of the bunch weren't mirrorless cameras or DSLRs, but fixed-lens Cyber-shots: The RX100, a point-and-shot superior to all others, and the RX1, a compact full-frame sensor camera priced for professionals. Sony's expanding on its success on both cameras with some well-considered fine-tuning.
MOSCOW (Reuters) - China and Russia rejected U.S. accusations they helped a former U.S. spy agency contractor escape prosecution in the United States, deepening a rift between powers whose cooperation may be essential in settling global conflicts including the Syrian war.
Edward Snowden, charged with disclosing secret U.S. surveillance programs, left Hong Kong for Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport on Sunday. The U.S. State Department said diplomats and Justice Department officials were holding discussions with Russia, suggesting they were looking for a deal to secure his return to face espionage charges.
An airport source said the 30-year-old American, who has asked for asylum in Ecuador, had flown in on Sunday and had been booked on a flight to Cuba on Monday but had not got on board.
Journalists camped out at the airport have not spotted him inside, or leaving, the transit area, and say a heavy security presence has been relaxed for the past 24 hours. He has not registered at a hotel in the transit zone, hotel sources say.
A receptionist at the Capsule Hotel "Air Express", a complex of 47 basic rooms decorated predominantly with grey carpets and grey walls, said Snowden had turned up on Sunday, looked at the price list but then left.
U.S. officials admonished Beijing and Moscow on Monday for allowing Snowden to escape their clutches but the United States' partners on the U.N. Security Council, already at odds with Washington over the conflict in Syria, hit back indignantly.
"The United States' criticism of China's central government is baseless. China absolutely cannot accept it," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said in Beijing, also dismissing U.S. criticism of Hong Kong, a Chinese territory, for letting Snowden leave.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov denied suggestions Moscow had helped Snowden in any way, including by allowing him to fly into Sheremetyevo.
"He chose his itinerary on his own. We learnt about it ... from the media. He has not crossed the Russian border," he said. "We consider the attempts to accuse the Russian side of violating U.S. laws, and practically of involvement in a plot, to be absolutely groundless and unacceptable."
Lavrov's insistence Snowden had not entered Russia implies he has not left the airport transit area, used by passengers flying from one non-Russian airport to another without going through passport control or requiring an entry visa.
The transit area is Russian sovereign territory, but it could be argued that in staying there Snowden had not formally entered the country - a move that could implicate President Vladimir Putin in helping a fugitive.
Interfax news agency quoted a source "in the Russian capital" as saying Snowden could be detained to check the validity of his passport if he crossed the Russian border.
Snowden is travelling on a refugee document of passage provided by Ecuador, the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks said.
Putin is not shy of celebrating people who challenge Washington, but has an interest in keeping relations with the United States on track as both sides try to improve security cooperation and arrange a peace conference on Syria.
U.S. DISCUSSES SNOWDEN WITH RUSSIA
Jay Carney, a spokesman for the White House, said it was Washington's assumption that Snowden was still in Russia.
Snowden, whose exposure of the surveillance raised questions about civil liberties in the United States, flew to Moscow after being allowed to leave Hong Kong even though Washington had asked the Chinese territory to detain him.
Snowden, until recently a contractor with the U.S. National Security Agency, had been expected to fly to Havana from Moscow on Monday and eventually go on to Ecuador, according to sources at the Russian airline Aeroflot.
There is no direct flight from Moscow to Quito, which has said it was considering Snowden's asylum request.
Ecuador, like Cuba and Venezuela, is a member of the ALBA bloc, an alliance of leftist governments in Latin America that pride themselves on their "anti-imperialist" credentials. The Quito government has been sheltering WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange at its London embassy for the past year.
The airport source confirmed Snowden was travelling with Sarah Harrison, a legal researcher working for WikiLeaks.
"She (Harrison) came together with Edward Snowden from Hong-Kong on June 23 around 5 p.m.," the source said. "He had a ticket to go to Havana on the 24th, but he did not use it. She also had one, but she didn't use it either."
DEFIANCE
With Snowden's whereabouts a mystery, U.S. President Barack Obama, may face prolonged embarrassment from a young man leading the world's lone superpower on a global game of hide and seek.
Obama told reporters his government was "following all the appropriate legal channels working with various other countries to make sure the rule of law is observed".
But U.S. officials said intelligence agencies were concerned that they did not know how much sensitive material Snowden had in his possession and that he may have taken more documents than initially estimated.
He could publish more documents or they could get into the hands of foreign intelligence. The Kremlin denies knowledge of any contacts between Russian officials and Snowden, despite media speculation the security forces could be questioning him.
Carney said his escape would damage U.S.-China relations and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Snowden's activities could threaten the security of China and the United States.
"People may die as a consequence to what this man did," he told CNN. But to his supporters, Snowden is a whistle blowing hero who exposed the extent of U.S. surveillance activities.
(Additional reporting Gabriela Baczynska and Lidia Kelly in Moscow, Alexandra Valencia in Quito, Mark Felsenthal, Paul Eckert and Mark Hosenball in Washington and Katya Golubkova in Havana, Writing by Elizabeth Piper and Timothy Heritage, editing by)
There's no denying that MediaTek is becoming mainstream these days, to the point that even Sony finally decided to join the party. The manufacturer's first attempt in this space is the Xperia C (S39h), a 5-inch qHD phone with dual-SIM capability (WCDMA and GSM) destined for China Unicom, and it'll come in either black, white or purple. Like many flagship devices from Chinese brands these days, the device packs a quad-core MediaTek MT6589 SoC, along with an 8-megapixel camera -- Exmor R, specifically -- with voice shutter function. On top of the hardware, users in China will also have access to 3 million tracks from local music content provider Duomi. There's no price or date just yet, so we'll be keeping an eye out for further announcements.
The Voting Rights Act has been America?s most effective tool to eradicate racial discrimination in voting. Today, a sharply divided Supreme Court has thrown the future of this critical tool in limbo by striking down a key provision. It?s now up to Congress to revive the act.
By Myrna P?rez,?Op-ed contributor / June 25, 2013
Voting rights activists gather in front of the Supreme Court this February as the court heard arguments in the Shelby County v. Holder case on the Voting Rights Act. Op-ed contributor Myrna P?rez writes: 'It is fair to question whether congressional dysfunction will stall a legislative response to today?s ruling. But on an issue as important as the fundamental right to vote, advocates remain confident America?s leaders can come together in a bipartisan way.'
Gary Cameron/Reuters/File
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For nearly five decades, the Voting Rights Act has been America?s most effective tool to eradicate racial discrimination in voting. Today, a sharply divided Supreme Court has thrown the future of this critical tool in limbo by striking down a key provision of the act. It?s now up to Congress to revive the act.
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The court upheld the act?s core ? known as Section 5 ? that requires jurisdictions with a history of racial discrimination in voting to gain federal approval before changing their voting laws. But it struck down the formula that determines which jurisdictions are covered by Section 5, which as a practical matter means they do not require pre-approval at this time.
The majority held that the formula was based on old data, but it dismissed in essentially one paragraph the vast record Congress considered ? about 15,000 ? which supported its conclusion that certain jurisdictions needed to be targeted
In light of the Supreme Court?s second-guessing of Congress, lawmakers must act in a decisive and bipartisan way ? as they did when reauthorizing the law in 2006 ? to protect voting rights of countless Americans and ensure that elections remain free, fair, and accessible.
In effect, Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act blocks discrimination before it occurs. This landmark law was passed in 1965, but there is ample proof it is still critically important today. States across the country introduced a wave of voting restrictions since the beginning of 2011. With the help of Section 5, citizens, courts, and the Department of Justice were able to stop changes in voting laws that were discriminatory. For example, Section 5 blocked Texas?s strict voter ID law and its redistricting plans. It also helped drastically improve South Carolina?s voter ID law by expanding the ?reasonable impediment? exception to allow citizens without an ID to vote.
Without a robust mechanism like Section 5 to block and deter discriminatory voting changes, voting rights advocates will need to be even more vigilant. After this decision, states and localities may attempt to revive blocked laws or implement changes that have been passed but not yet submitted for federal approval. For example, Texas?s attorney general said today his state?s strict voter ID law, which was blocked by a court because of the discriminatory effect it will have on minority voters, can now go into effect.
Further, some jurisdictions may seek to enact new restrictive laws or try to put in place blocked changes that, despite not being in effect, technically remain on the books. For instance, a 2007 Texas provision, which limits eligibility for a position of supervisor of a water district to landowners that are registered to vote, is still on the books.
The court?s decision does not mean states or other jurisdictions are free to enact racially discriminatory measures, and voting rights advocates will work tirelessly to push back against laws that are discriminatory. But, we have lost an important and effective tool. Congress must act swiftly to put a new coverage formula in place to avoid the fallout that may result from today?s decision.
In 2006, Congress voted nearly unanimously to reauthorize the Voting Rights Act for another 25 years. The vote ? 98-0 in the Senate and 390-33 in the House ? came after more than 20 hearings and thousands of pages of evidence showing the continued need for the critical provision of federal approval. Since then, the Justice Department has formally blocked 31 voting changes and Section 5 has deterred countless more.
It is fair to question whether congressional dysfunction will stall a legislative response to today?s ruling. But on an issue as important as the fundamental right to vote, advocates remain confident America?s leaders can come together in a bipartisan way. They must.
?Myrna P?rez is deputy director of the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York Univeristy School of Law.
Click Here for your FREE 30 DAYS of The Christian Science Monitor Weekly Digital Edition
Capt. Jeff Hink says 38-year-old Bobby Darren Reynolds of Gardena was killed Friday night outside the building while visiting family.
Hink said Reynolds was shot multiple times at close range and appeared to be specifically targeted.
Witnesses reported seeing two men fleeing in a Chrysler 300 sedan which was found abandoned blocks away from the shooting scene.
Investigators identified the car's owner, 27-year-old Erick Julian Ortega, as a person of interest in the case and want to talk to him. They said Ortega has a criminal record with prior arrests for robbery and drug offenses.
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - A last-minute no-show by Pope Francis at a concert where he was to have been the guest of honor has sent another clear signal that he is going to do things his way and does not like the Vatican high life.
The gala classical concert on Saturday was scheduled before his election in March. But the white papal armchair set up in the presumption that he would be there remained empty.
Minutes before the concert was due to start, an archbishop told the crowd of cardinals and Italian dignitaries that an "urgent commitment that cannot be postponed" would prevent Francis from attending.
The prelates, assured that health was not the reason for the no-show, looked disoriented, realizing that the message he wanted to send was that, with the Church in crisis, he - and perhaps they - had too much pastoral work to do to attend social events.
"It took us by surprise," said one Vatican source on Monday. "We are still in a period of growing pains. He is still learning how to be pope and we are still learning how he wants to do it."
"In Argentina, they probably knew not to arrange social events like concerts for him because he probably wouldn't go," said the source, who spoke anonymously because he is not authorized to discuss the issue.
The picture of the empty chair was used in many Italian papers, with Monday's Corriere della Sera newspaper calling his decision "a show of force" to illustrate the simple style he wants Church officials to embrace.
Since his election on March 13, Francis, the former cardinal Jorge Bergoglio of Argentina, has not spent a single night in the opulent and spacious papal apartments.
He has preferred to live in a small suite in a busy Vatican guest house, where he takes most meals in a communal dining room and says Mass every morning in the house chapel rather than the private papal chapel in the Apostolic Palace.
The day before the concert, Francis said bishops should be "close to the people" and not have "the mentality of a prince".
On Saturday, while the concert was in progress in an auditorium just meters (yards) away, Francis was believed to be working on new appointments for the Curia, the Vatican's troubled central administration.
The administration was held responsible for some of the mishaps and scandals that plagued the eight-year reign of Pope Benedict before he resigned in February.
Francis inherited a Church struggling to deal with priests' sexual abuse of children, the alleged corruption and infighting in the Curia, and conflict over the running of the Vatican's scandal-ridden bank.
Benedict left a secret report for Francis on the problems in the administration, which came to light when sensitive documents were stolen from the pope's desk and leaked by his butler in what became known as the "Vatileaks" scandal.
The Vatican source said he expected Francis to make major changes to Curia personnel by the end of the summer.
Anger at the mostly Italian prelates who run the Curia was one of the reasons why cardinals chose the first non-European pope for 1,300 years.
The key appointment will be the next secretary of state, sometimes referred to as the Vatican's prime minister, to succeed the Italian Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, who has been widely blamed for the failings of the Curia.
(Reporting By Philip Pullella; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)
La Jolla Institute discovers new player critical to unleashing T cells against diseasePublic release date: 23-Jun-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Bonnie Ward contact@liai.org 619-991-0868 La Jolla Institute for Allergy and Immunology
Nature-published study reveals previously unknown role of septin proteins
SAN DIEGO (June 23, 2013) A major study from researchers at the La Jolla Institute for Allergy and Immunology provides new revelations about the intricate pathways involved in turning on T cells, the body's most important disease-fighting cells, and was published today in the prestigious scientific journal Nature.
The La Jolla Institute team is the first to prove that a certain type of protein, called septins, play a critical role in activating a calcium channel on the surface of the T cell. The channel is the portal through which calcium enters T cells from the blood stream, an action essential for the T cell's survival, activation, and ability to fight disease.
Patrick Hogan and Anjana Rao, Ph.D.s, are senior authors on the paper and Sonia Sharma and Ariel Quintana, Ph.D.s, are co-first authors. Drs. Sharma, Rao and Hogan are former researchers at Harvard Medical School with high-level genetics expertise who joined the La Jolla Institute in 2010. Dr. Quintana conducted advanced microscopy that was a major aspect of the study.
Dr. Hogan describes the discovery as another important step in understanding the overall functioning of T cells knowledge from which new, more precisely targeted drugs to treat diseases ranging from cancer to viral infections can emerge. "It's like working on an engine, you have to know what all the parts are doing to repair it," he says. "We want to understand the basic machinery inside a T cell. This will enable us to target the specific pressure points to turn up a T cell response against a tumor or virus or to turn it down in the case of autoimmune diseases."
The findings were published in a Nature paper entitled "An siRNA screen for NFAT activation identifies septins as coordinators of store-operated Ca2+ entry."
"We have found that the septin protein is a very strong regulator of the calcium response, which is essential for activating immune cells," says Dr. Sharma, who was recently appointed to a faculty position, and now leads her own independent laboratory at the La Jolla Institute, in addition to serving as scientific director of the newly established RNAi screening center.
Dr. Hogan says the discovery took the research team by surprise. "We knew septins existed in the cellular plasma (surface) membrane, but we didn't know they had anything to do with calcium signaling," he says. Septins are known to build scaffolding to provide structural support during cell division.
This finding builds on Dr. Rao and Dr. Hogan's groundbreaking discovery in 2006 showing that the protein ORAI1 forms the pore of the calcium channel. The channel's entryway had been one of the most sought after mysteries in biomedical science because it is the gateway to T cell functioning and, consequently, to better understanding how the body uses these cells to fight disease.
To the research team's surprise, the septins were forming a ring around the calcium channel. "We aren't sure why, but we theorize that the septins are rearranging the cellular membrane's structure to "corral" the key proteins STIM and ORAI1, and maybe other factors needed for the calcium channel to operate," says Dr. Hogan.
Dr. Sharma adds that, "essentially we believe the septins are choreographing the interaction of these two proteins that are important in instigating the immune response." Without the septins' involvement, T cell activation does not occur.
In the study, the researchers devised a simple visual readout of activity in a main pathway responsible for activation of T cells the same pathway that is targeted by the immunosuppressive drug cyclosporin A that is used clinically and looked for impairment of the activity when individual genes were, in effect, deleted. After sorting through the roughly 20,000 human genes, they turned up 887 gene "hits," says Dr. Hogan.
With further experiments, they should be able to classify those hits into genes that affect the calcium channel itself and genes that act later in the pathway. "We are hopeful that one or more of these genes can be used as a clinical target for new drugs to treat transplant rejection and immune diseases, some of the same indications now treated with cyclosporine A," adds Dr. Hogan. He believes that a medication aimed at an early step of calcium entry through the ORAI channel could be more effective and have fewer side effects than cyclosporin A, which targets a later step in the pathway and can cause complications such as kidney disease.
###
About La Jolla Institute
Founded in 1988, La Jolla Institute for Allergy and Immunology is a nonprofit, independent biomedical research institute focused on improving human health through increased understanding of the immune system. Its scientists carry out research seeking new knowledge leading to the prevention of disease through vaccines and the treatment and cure of infectious diseases, cancer, inflammatory, and autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, type 1 (juvenile) diabetes, Crohn's disease and asthma. La Jolla Institute's research staff includes more than 150 Ph.D.s and M.D.s. To learn more about the Institute's work, visit http://www.lji.org.
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
La Jolla Institute discovers new player critical to unleashing T cells against diseasePublic release date: 23-Jun-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Bonnie Ward contact@liai.org 619-991-0868 La Jolla Institute for Allergy and Immunology
Nature-published study reveals previously unknown role of septin proteins
SAN DIEGO (June 23, 2013) A major study from researchers at the La Jolla Institute for Allergy and Immunology provides new revelations about the intricate pathways involved in turning on T cells, the body's most important disease-fighting cells, and was published today in the prestigious scientific journal Nature.
The La Jolla Institute team is the first to prove that a certain type of protein, called septins, play a critical role in activating a calcium channel on the surface of the T cell. The channel is the portal through which calcium enters T cells from the blood stream, an action essential for the T cell's survival, activation, and ability to fight disease.
Patrick Hogan and Anjana Rao, Ph.D.s, are senior authors on the paper and Sonia Sharma and Ariel Quintana, Ph.D.s, are co-first authors. Drs. Sharma, Rao and Hogan are former researchers at Harvard Medical School with high-level genetics expertise who joined the La Jolla Institute in 2010. Dr. Quintana conducted advanced microscopy that was a major aspect of the study.
Dr. Hogan describes the discovery as another important step in understanding the overall functioning of T cells knowledge from which new, more precisely targeted drugs to treat diseases ranging from cancer to viral infections can emerge. "It's like working on an engine, you have to know what all the parts are doing to repair it," he says. "We want to understand the basic machinery inside a T cell. This will enable us to target the specific pressure points to turn up a T cell response against a tumor or virus or to turn it down in the case of autoimmune diseases."
The findings were published in a Nature paper entitled "An siRNA screen for NFAT activation identifies septins as coordinators of store-operated Ca2+ entry."
"We have found that the septin protein is a very strong regulator of the calcium response, which is essential for activating immune cells," says Dr. Sharma, who was recently appointed to a faculty position, and now leads her own independent laboratory at the La Jolla Institute, in addition to serving as scientific director of the newly established RNAi screening center.
Dr. Hogan says the discovery took the research team by surprise. "We knew septins existed in the cellular plasma (surface) membrane, but we didn't know they had anything to do with calcium signaling," he says. Septins are known to build scaffolding to provide structural support during cell division.
This finding builds on Dr. Rao and Dr. Hogan's groundbreaking discovery in 2006 showing that the protein ORAI1 forms the pore of the calcium channel. The channel's entryway had been one of the most sought after mysteries in biomedical science because it is the gateway to T cell functioning and, consequently, to better understanding how the body uses these cells to fight disease.
To the research team's surprise, the septins were forming a ring around the calcium channel. "We aren't sure why, but we theorize that the septins are rearranging the cellular membrane's structure to "corral" the key proteins STIM and ORAI1, and maybe other factors needed for the calcium channel to operate," says Dr. Hogan.
Dr. Sharma adds that, "essentially we believe the septins are choreographing the interaction of these two proteins that are important in instigating the immune response." Without the septins' involvement, T cell activation does not occur.
In the study, the researchers devised a simple visual readout of activity in a main pathway responsible for activation of T cells the same pathway that is targeted by the immunosuppressive drug cyclosporin A that is used clinically and looked for impairment of the activity when individual genes were, in effect, deleted. After sorting through the roughly 20,000 human genes, they turned up 887 gene "hits," says Dr. Hogan.
With further experiments, they should be able to classify those hits into genes that affect the calcium channel itself and genes that act later in the pathway. "We are hopeful that one or more of these genes can be used as a clinical target for new drugs to treat transplant rejection and immune diseases, some of the same indications now treated with cyclosporine A," adds Dr. Hogan. He believes that a medication aimed at an early step of calcium entry through the ORAI channel could be more effective and have fewer side effects than cyclosporin A, which targets a later step in the pathway and can cause complications such as kidney disease.
###
About La Jolla Institute
Founded in 1988, La Jolla Institute for Allergy and Immunology is a nonprofit, independent biomedical research institute focused on improving human health through increased understanding of the immune system. Its scientists carry out research seeking new knowledge leading to the prevention of disease through vaccines and the treatment and cure of infectious diseases, cancer, inflammatory, and autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, type 1 (juvenile) diabetes, Crohn's disease and asthma. La Jolla Institute's research staff includes more than 150 Ph.D.s and M.D.s. To learn more about the Institute's work, visit http://www.lji.org.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Residents look out from Scholten Hill as water floods an area of the River Flats in Medicine Hat, Alberta. on Sunday, June 23, 2013. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Medicine Hat News, Emma Bennett)
Residents look out from Scholten Hill as water floods an area of the River Flats in Medicine Hat, Alberta. on Sunday, June 23, 2013. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Medicine Hat News, Emma Bennett)
Cpl. Brett Martens from CFB Edmonton helps a resident clear out damaged debris from their home near downtown Calgary, Alberta, on Sunday, June 23, 2013. About 65,000 residents of Calgary were being allowed to return to their homes Sunday to assess the damage from flooding that has left Alberta's largest city awash in debris and dirty water. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Jonathan Hayward)
Homeowner Glenn Tibbles looks at the damage done by floodwaters to his home near downtown Calgary, Alberta, on Sunday, June 23, 2013. About 65,000 residents of Calgary were being allowed to return to their homes Sunday to assess the damage from flooding that has left Alberta's largest city awash in debris and dirty water. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Jonathan Hayward)
A flooded downtown Calgary, Alberta is seen from a aerial view of the city Saturday, June 22, 2013. The two rivers that converge on the western Canadian city of Calgary are receding Saturday after floods devastated much of southern Alberta province, causing at least three deaths and forcing thousands to evacuate. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Jonathan Hayward)
A flooded downtown Calgary, Alberta is seen from a aerial view of the city Saturday, June 22, 2013. The two rivers that converge on the western Canadian city of Calgary are receding Saturday after floods devastated much of southern Alberta province, causing at least three deaths and forcing thousands to evacuate. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Jonathan Hayward)
CALGARY, Alberta (AP) ? About 65,000 residents of Calgary were being allowed to return to their homes Sunday to assess the damage from flooding that has left Alberta's largest city awash in debris and dirty water.
Some were returning to properties spared by flooding, but others were facing extensive repairs to homes and businesses.
About 75,000 people had to leave at the height of the crisis as the Elbow and Bow rivers surged over their banks Thursday night. Three bodies have been recovered since the flooding began in southern Alberta and a fourth person was still missing.
"We've turned a corner, but we are still in a state of emergency," Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi said. "Our hearts and thought and prayers are with our colleagues downstream."
People in the eastern part of the province headed for higher ground as the flood threat remained. In Medicine Hat, Alberta, thousands of people have left their homes as water levels rose on the South Saskatchewan River. The river was not expected to crest until Monday, but by Sunday morning it was lapping over its banks in low-lying areas and people were busy laying down thousands of sandbags.
In Calgary, Nenshi said crews were working hard to restore services and he thanked residents for heeding the call to conserve drinking water.
He had already warned that recovery will be a matter of "weeks and months" and the damage costs will be "lots and lots."
While pockets of the city's core were drying out, other areas were still submerged. The mayor didn't anticipate that anyone could return to work downtown until at least the middle of the week. The downtown area was evacuated Friday.
The city's public schools were also to remain closed Monday.
Nathan MacBey and his wife found muddy water had risen to about kitchen counter level in their Calgary home at the peak of the flooding. His basement was still swamped and the main floor of the home was covered in wet mud.
"This is unprecedented," said the father of two, his voice cracking with emotion. "Not being able to give our kids a home, that's tough. ... We can survive, it's just the instability for the kids."
Alberta Municipal Affairs Minister Doug Griffiths said that 27 communities in Alberta were under states of emergency ? with some areas slowly starting to emerge from the watery onslaught and others still bracing for it
Griffiths said no place has been hit harder than the town of High River south of Calgary and it will be some time before residents there will be allowed back.
The waiting and worrying were causing tensions and emotions to run high, but Griffiths said virtually every home in the town of 18,000 would need to be inspected.
More than 2,200 military personnel were involved in flood relief efforts, along with nine helicopters. Soldiers were helping evacuate an area around the mountain town of Canmore, laying down sandbags in Medicine Hat and assisting in road repairs in Kananaskis Country, west of Calgary.
In High River, about 350 members of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry from Edmonton have been assisting police in reaching homes that still haven't been checked. Armored vehicles have been churning through submerged streets and Zodiac watercraft have been used to reach the hardest-hit areas.
High River Mayor Emile Blokland said the town's infrastructure has been dealt a critical blow and there is no timeline for when citizens can return.
Royal Canadian Mounted Police Staff Sgt. Brian Jones said the atmosphere was "surreal."
"We're finding a great deal of mud, a great deal of sludge on the streets. The homes are secure. It's almost like time stopped," he said.
Back in Calgary, the water has taken a toll outside residential neighborhoods as well. The Saddledome hockey arena, home of the National Hockey League's Calgary Flames, was extensively damaged. The team said boards, dressing rooms, player equipment and several rows of seats were a total loss.
The rodeo and fair grounds of the world-famous Calgary Stampede were also swamped, although Nenshi was optimistic that things would be cleared up in time for the show to open July 5.
Nenshi said Sunday that all the major hotels in the downtown were closed and advised visitors to plan accordingly.
The federal Conservative party had planned to hold a policy convention in Calgary next weekend, but that's been postponed and a new date hasn't yet been set.
Canmore was one of the first communities hit when the flooding began on Thursday. Residents there have been allowed to return to 260 evacuated homes, but the Royal Canadian Mounted Police says 40 more are too damaged to allow people back.
In Saskatchewan, efforts are under way to move more than 2,000 people from their homes in a flood-prone part of the province's northeast.
Ex-Zynga co-founder and godfather of metrics-based game development Eric Schiermeyer is now an investor and advisor to Bee Cave Games, makers of play-money gambling Facebook game Blackjack Casino. Schiermeyer left Zynga a while back. Bee Cave Games CEO Erik Bethke tells me Schiermeyer's advisor gig is a weekly role and his investment is part of a forthcoming funding round in the low millions.
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Public release date: 23-Jun-2013
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