Is Facebook Worth $100 Billion

February 3, 2012 4:36:32 PM

$100 billion: That's the number that has been tossed around Wall Street in recent weeks as the social-networking juggernaut quietly began the process of becoming a publically traded company. Yesterday, investors finally got the information they needed to make a more informed choice as Facebook filed papers with government regulators declaring its intent to sell stock to the public.

Facebook's Closely Guarded Secrets

Facebook's hotly anticipated initial public offering (IPO) filing briefly crashed the Securities and Exchange Commission's website last night, as gaggles of investors and financial journalists downloaded the massive S-1 document.

Facebook's S-1 was full of information and little factoids that, up until now, were closely guarded secrets of the notoriously enigmatic Silicon Valley phenom. For the first time, the public saw how much money Facebook has made over the years  – and how it spends it. With this information finally public, investors can now come up with their own valuation for Facebook.

A $100 Billion Valuation

Founder Mark Zuckerberg (along with a whole slug of investment banks and big private investors) think that a $100 billion valuation is right on the money for the company. That would mean Facebook, an eight-year-old company, would have a higher valuation than more-established giants, like Goldman Sachs or Amazon.com. Zuckerberg would become worth around $26 billion if the $100 billion figure came true, making him one of the world's richest men at the tender age of 27.
Determining the value of Facebook is equal parts art and science; there are thousands of things to consider and hundreds of moving parts. But at its core, a company's stock price is basically worth the present value of its future cash flows, augmented by the firm's propensity to grow is revenues.

How Does Facebook Stack Up?

Well, the firm is rapidly growing its revenues, which is a good thing. But revenue growth, although still rapid, has started to show signs of slowing down. In 2010, Facebook's revenues jumped up 154% from the previous year to $1.9 billion, as the firm started to rapidly expand across the country. But last year, revenue growth was up by just 88% from 2010 at $3.7 billion. The slowdown in growth is very troubling, as it means that the firm's earnings potential may not be as great as some might have hoped.
Investors are happy to pay a premium for a company if they see it rapidly expanding. While Facebook is expected to continue growing its revenues, it may not be as fast as some investors expect, given the high valuation that the company claims. After expenses, Facebook made $1 billion in profits last year (valuing the company at 100 times earnings). Multiples that high have not been seen since the dotcom heyday of the late 1990s. To put it into perspective, Google currently trades at 20 times its current profits.

Trouble Ahead?

It's hard to really make out the firm's future potential earnings power given some uncertainties. The company warned in its S-1 that users may eventually lose interest in the website (remember MySpace and Friendster?).
Additionally, Facebook depends on advertising to supply 85% of its revenues, with one company, Zygna, the online social-gaming company, providing 12% of that revenue. A slip in advertising dollars could send revenues plummeting. To make matters more complicated, Facebook is concerned that more and more people will choose to access Facebook via their mobile phones. That's a problem, as they have not developed a way to advertise neatly through smart phones just yet.

Will Investors Agree?

Facebook's valuation will ultimately be determined in April when its shares hit the market for the first time. The bankers will announce Facebook's initial stock price usually the day before the stock goes on sale to retail investors. The firm valued its class B stock at around $30 a pop in December. It will be interesting to see if investors agree with that number.

Discretionary Dough - Infographic

February 3, 2012 4:42:56 PM

A recent study by Experian breaks down how much discretionary income Americans have and what exactly they are doing with it. All in all, Americans spend an estimated $1.47 trillion annually on discretionary goods and services. For most, the money after taxes, bills, and basic needs are covered is hard to come by, which means that a select few are spending some major bucks.

Click on "Launch Infographic" to find out where Americans are spending their discretionary dough.

Infographic by Ross Crooks

Seattle Library Lets Man Watch Porn On Computers Despite Complaints

February 3, 2012 4:45:04 PM

Seattle Library Lets Man Watch Porn On Computers Despite Complaints 189

The Lake City library is making news for their staunch position on the First Amendment, censorship, and the right to watch porn in the library . The problem started when library patron Julie Howe found a man watching some questionable material and asked him to move to another computer. The man refused and the librarian also refused to intervene when asked saying that the library doesn't censor content. "We're a library, so we facilitate access to constitutionally protected information. We don't tell people what they can view and check out," Seattle Public Library spokeswoman Andra Addison told Seattle PI. "Filters compromise freedom of speech protected by the First Amendment. We're not in the business of censoring information."

February 3, 2012 4:47:12 PM

Lawsuit: You Can't Charge Me With Downloading Porn Because You Can't Copyright Obscenity

For the first several years of the entertainment industry's crackdown on online piracy, American pornographers did very little to go after the people who filled up gigabyte after gigabyte of hard drive space with bittorrented x-rated material. But in recent years, realizing there is money to be made by merely threatening "John Doe" defendants with making their names and downloading habits public, that has begun to change. But one California woman is fighting back, claiming that the porn she didn't violate copyright laws because the porn she's accused of downloading isn't copyrightable.
First off, the plaintiff in the case says she never downloaded the particular flesh flick she's been accused of acquiring illegally. And even if she had bittorrented the movie, she says that she and others being targeted by a litigious porn company did nothing wrong in the first place.
The woman goes all the way back to the Founding Fathers for her explanation of why copyright law doesn't pertain in this case.
From the lawsuit:

Article I, Section 8, Clause 8 of the United States Constitution, known as the Copyright Clause, empowers the U.S. Congress "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings."
Thus, copyright is authorized only for works which promote the progress of science and the useful arts.
Horizontal Stare Decisis or Circuit law binds all courts within a particular circuit, including the court of appeals itself… "[T]he first panel to consider an issue sets the law not only for all the inferior courts in the circuit, but also future panels of the court of appeals… Once a panel resolves an issue in a precedential opinion, the matter is deemed resolved, unless overruled by the court itself sitting en banc, or by the Supreme Court" or "unless Congress changes the law.")
Early Circuit law in California held that obscene works did not promote the progress of science and the useful arts, and thus cannot be protected by copyright.
Subsequent non-en banc decisions by the Ninth Circuit failed to follow this prior circuit decision in California.
Given the absence of any subsequent en-banc Ninth Circuit decisions, Supreme Court precedent, or changes in the Constitution that copyright is authorized for works which does not promote the progress of science and the useful arts, the subsequent Ninth Circuit decisions are void and do not constitute binding precedent.
[Defendant]'s work does not promote the progress of science.
[Defendant]'s work does not promote the useful arts.
[Defendant] has judicially admitted that its work is adult pornography.
[Defendant]'s work depicts obscene material.
Plaintiff is informed and believes, and thereon alleges that to create the work, [Defendant] and its agents and/or its employees violated laws which prohibited pimping, pandering, solicitation and prostitution, including any claims of conspiracy.
[Defendant]'s work depicts criminal acts and/or conduct.
[Defendant]'s work is not copyrightable.

She also alleges that the pornographer knowingly allowed users of bittorrent sites to post this movie and others without issuing a DMCA take-down notice, thus turning these sites into "honeypots so they could continue to log IP address[es]" of users for future litigation.
Once porn companies put a name to that IP address, it's not uncommon for them to threaten litigation that would seek six-figure penalties and result in the public knowing that defendants downloaded x-rated films. Many defendants settle for a few thousand dollars with the hope that they remain listed as "John Doe."

Is Pornography Copyrightable? [Courthouse News]

February 3, 2012 4:49:20 PM

We need new privacy policies for a new world

In a major update to its privacy policy and the addition of "Search Plus Your World ", Google has managed to attain the consensus from the tech-enthused world that it is way beyond the innocent baby days of "don't be evil". Matt Honan of Gizmodo  signalled the privacy shift as the end of Google's "don't be evil" promise, which the company built its business on, and Sarah Lacy of Pando Daily  shared similar sentiments, though hers was related to the Search Plus Your World outcry.
In a nutshell, one of the biggest sore points that people are having with Google's new privacy policy is the fact that it permits the search giant to utilize your basic profile information and extend it across your identities when using your other Google services. These changes aren't so much evil, but adaptation to our merging online and offline identities.

Change is Inevitable
Amidst all the opposition, I think it all alludes to a larger trend in technology as a whole that people aren't readily willing to accept, yet will undoubtedly be the social media revolution that the advent of the Internet had begged from the very start. The Internet was built as a means of quickly sharing and bringing together the vast expanse of human knowledge — the clincher is that we can't expect to share our knowledge without sharing a portion of ourselves. Even just a little bit.
"It's a small world" is a common saying, which points to various inventions of the past such as the telephone, aviation and motorized travel, all of which funnelled towards the fundamental idea of making human contact all the more easier. The Internet took that a step further with email. MSN Messenger took it another step further. Myspace, Facebook and Twitter took the small world concept even further, such to the point that the world can quite literally be at the doorstep. Or in a Skype video conversation, right in front of you.
Clearly the concept of privacy takes on an entirely new dimension in a world where human contact is effortlessly easy with anyone anywhere.
It's not just Google that is changing its privacy policies to keep up with a transforming world, Facebook is doing a lot of the same thing. Facebook's recent Timeline feature allows users to place important dates and milestones in their lives in somewhat of a virtual calendar, and to fill in the big events of one's life that may have occurred before Facebook was invented.
Even more crucial though is Facebook's new Open Graph feature, allowing apps to share data to one's Facebook Wall without even having to ask. If you go on a run and a smartphone app tracks all the contextual metadata, such as your calories burnt, heart rate and distance, it's immediately on your Facebook Wall for people to see. If you're listening to a song, it will show up on your Facebook wall. Of course, the app has to ask once, the first time, but from there on it's all free flowing.

Unifying Identities
There's a noticeable trajectory here, by eliminating these walls of permissions that have been the dividing lines between what happens in real world and what subsequently occurs in our online lives, Facebook is making its service all the more seamless and our online identities all the more important. If Facebook's Open Graph goes so far as to make our Wall in perfect sync with every activity of our waking lives, it's not ridiculous to say that online identity is on par in pertinence with our real lives.
Perhaps the term "real lives" needs some redefining at this stage.
Which brings me back to Google and its decision to rewire and unify user identities across products and services. If social media has reached such a point that online identities are comparable with real life identities, then it's high time they started acting that way.

People don't walk the streets with a generic gender avatar for a face, a pseudonym for a name and hide behind an uncrackable block of pixels — they shouldn't on the Internet. Sure, pseudonyms are good for brand and identity building in platforms like YouTube, but everywhere else, in front of every online persona there should be a face and a name. Anonymity is an impossibility in real life, its use should be limited, too, in the online world.
The real crux though for many users isn't having themselves linked to a profile, but having that profile visible to anyone who so happens to stumble across them, or know their email address. But this fear of discovery can be traced back and compared to our real lives once again with the understanding that we are constantly being discovered. People learn about us by seeing us on the train, through word of mouth between friends of friends or through direct contact by meeting and interaction.

Man on a Train
But it's a smaller world with the Internet — the equivalent of being discovered on the train may be a man who stumbles across our Google+ profile while on a train in another country. The equivalent of word of mouth between friends of friends could be word of instant message, and direct contact may be a Google+ hangout with someone a 12-hour flight away.
It's a smaller world so we should expect  to be found in new ways and in greater numbers.
Privacy concerns are all valid, but the privacy concerns of today are quickly becoming redundant as the world quickly shifts into tomorrow, imputed by the fast progressions of the Internet and social media. People have embraced social changes in the past with email and of course the telephone, but the online identity is a lot more difficult to grasp given it's so abstract. It's almost philosophical. But to be brutally frank, those who can't seem to see the idea and value behind the public and discoverable online identity really shouldn't be on Google+ and Facebook in the first place, where it's habitual to give one's information and life story away like garbage.
Google's not evil, the company is simply growing out of old ideas and moving forward in a manner that can't fit old molds anymore. Until we all recognize that, we'll all be living in a world that won't even exist anymore.

Five Repeating Home Maintenance Tasks

February 3, 2012 4:51:28 PM

Whether you're renting or you own a home, it's easy to let repeated tasks of home maintenance slip your mind. Over on Apartment Therapy they've outlined the five repeating home maintenance tasks most people forget and a simple way to remind yourself to do them.
The tasks you're probably forgetting are:

1. Flip the mattress (every three months).
2. Replace batteries in your smoke alarm (every three months).
3. Change your water filter (every two to six months).
4. Change your air filter (every two to six months).
5. Clean your fridge coils (once a year).

These tasks are difficult to remember because they're so infrequent, but keeping up on the maintenance will not only extend the life of your appliances, but it will also help them run more efficiently. To remind yourself to do them, Apartment Therapy recommends setting up an email reminder, which we covered a few ways to set up in the past , or by making a note on the calendar of your choice. Photos by John Bracken ,R/DV/RS , Richard Smith , Amy West , and Bruno Longo .

Set Regular Email Reminders for These 5 Home Maintenance Tasks | Apartment Therapy

February 3, 2012 4:55:44 PM

Bake an Egg in an Avocado for a Fast and Healthy Breakfast Treat

Avocados are amazing things—they're delicious on their own, but they also have a lot of healthy fats, dietary fibers, and vitamins, and despite their high caloric value, they're remarkably easy to prepare. If you have an avocado that's too firm to use for something else, or you're just in the mood for something new and healthy for breakfast, slice it in half, remote the pit, and carve out a little space in the center. Crack an egg where the pit was, and bake. In a few minutes, you'll have a delicious, protein and vitamin-packed breakfast treat that's rich enough to keep you going all morning.
The recipe itself is pretty simple, and comes to us thanks to the blog The Family Kitchen . Just prep the avocado as described and put it in a 350-degree oven, or as the site describes, put it in a skillet on medium heat and cover it for about 2-3 minutes. When the egg has set, a little salt and pepper and you're good to go. Avocados are used in all sorts of breakfast dishes, but this is a great example of using the avocado asa breakfast dish, and pretty tasty one at that.
Do you have any other quick breakfast tricks you'd like to share? Interested in giving this one a try? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Breakfast Fun: Baked Eggs in Avocados | The Family Kitchen

Stephen Colbert's SuperPAC vs United States Supreme Court

February 4, 2012 8:25:52 AM

Stephen Colbert's SuperPAC hurts the Supreme Court's feelings?

Stephen Colbert's SuperPAC hurts the Supreme Court's feelings?

In Slate , Dahlia Lithwick examines the impact that Stephen Colbert's SuperPAC is having on public perception of the Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United , which establishes that "corporate personhood" means that corporations can make unlimited contributions to political campaigns. Dahlia implies that the Court, which has always maintained an aloofness from public life (no cameras, no press office) is smarting under Colbert's withering sarcasm, and that people are responding as well. For example, Colbert's SuperPAC backed Herman Cain (not a candidate) in the South Carolina race, and the voters put him ahead of Rick Perry, Jon Huntsman, and Michele Bachmann.

Then last June, like a winking, eyebrow-wagging Mr. Smith, Colbert went to Washington and testified before the FEC, which granted him permission to launch his super PAC (over the objections of his parent company Viacom) and accept unlimited contributions from his fans so he might sway elections. (He tweeted before his FEC appearance that PAC stands for "Plastic And/Or Cash.") In recent weeks, Colbert has run several truly insane attack ads (including one accusing Mitt Romney of being a serial killer). Then, with perfect comedic pitch, Colbert handed off control of his super PAC to Jon Stewart (lampooning the FEC rules about coordination between "independent PACS" and candidates with a one-page legal document and a Vulcan mind meld). Colbert then managed to throw his support to non-candidate Herman Cain in the South Carolina primary, placing higher on the ballot than Rick Perry, Jon Huntsman, and Michele Bachmann.
The line between entertainment and the court blurred even further late last month when Colbert had former Justice John Paul Stevens on his show to discuss his dissent in Citizens United. When a 91-year-old former justice is patiently explaining to a comedian that corporations are not people, it's clear that everything about the majority opinion has been reduced to a punch line.

Colbert v. the Court (via 3 Quarks Daily )

Bonsai Information

February 4, 2012 12:37:36 PM

The History of the Bonsai - 1800flowers.com

Art from the East

Bonsai is a well-respected and time-honored art form that originated in the Far East more than one thousand years ago. The art and mystery of the form involves training young trees and plants into miniature, stylized, majestic versions of fully mature specimens. Developed in China by Buddhist monks seeking to bring nature inside their temples, its influence and tradition spread easterly, arriving in Japan by the 12th century.

Bonsai translates literally from both the Chinese and Japanese to "little trees in pots". Alongside the development of bonsai, Chinese ceramics played an integral role in its aesthetic evolution. Container pots are typically shallow trays, chosen to complement the shape and artistry of the tree. In this way, a harmonious, grounded sense of landscape is created for the bonsai.

The Form

The challenge for the bonsai designer is to tease each tree or shrub into revealing its innermost essence and fundamental nature. Each artisan works within a set of traditional aesthetic guidelines and proscribed techniques to create the most artistic form possible. The qualities most admired in bonsai cultivation can also be seen as a part of the larger culture's ideals. These embody a reverence for three basic virtues: truth, goodness, and beauty. In addition, the Zen-like quietude of the art form is a reflection of Eastern philosophies regarding harmony between man, spirit, and nature.

Appreciation

For the viewer, the bonsai represents an opportunity to experience moments of quiet, peaceful reflection within the natural world. When one gazes upon a bonsai, a calming sense of timelessness, stability, and peace pervades. And since a bonsai is dependent upon its owner for its life, it has become a symbol of friendship, since relationships need to be tended and nurtured, just like the bonsai. Over time, bonsai grow more interesting, personal, and valuable. In Japan today, there are beautiful examples of old bonsai that are considered national living treasures. Given proper care, a bonsai can live for hundreds of years, but age is not essential for a bonsai to be deemed worthy of praise and admiration.

Bonsai Styles and Types

Bonsai styles refer to the classical aesthetic traditions of form and shape; bonsai typesrefer to the individual species of tree, plant, or shrub.

Bonsai Styles

There are a wide variety of classical bonsai styles that careful training, pruning, and sculpting can create. Each style seeks to replicate an aspect of tree growth found in nature. Some are simple in shape, while others need advanced expertise and skill to achieve. All require years of patient tending as the bonsai grows into its idealized form.

Below we describe a few of the most popular, time-honored bonsai styles available in our gallery:

Formal Upright

The Formal Upright or chokkan style is very common and characterized by a singular straight, upright trunk that tapers towards the top. Branches form at orderly intervals and are thicker at the bottom, becoming shorter and finer towards the top.

Informal Upright

A common style known as the Informal Upright, or moyogi , features a slight curvature in the trunk of the tree, giving its branches a sense of movement. The free-form boughs and trunk lend this bonsai a more relaxed or casual appearance

Broom

The Broom style, or hokidachi , is well suited to deciduous trees with leaves. This bonsai is characterized by an upright trunk with multiple fine branches growing upwards to form a leafy ball-shaped crown.

Slanting

The shakan or Slanting style lends itself to coniferous tree species. The tree is grown at a slanting angle, with the first branch pointing opposite the direction of the leaning trunk, to cultivate an element of harmony and balance.

Windswept

Windswept bonsai, also known as fukinagashi , emulate a tree exposed to sustained winds, as might be found on a rocky cliff face. Branches all point in one direction, as if the growing environment bore consistent, strong, directional winds.

Species Types

Different species of trees, shrubs, and plants render diverse types of graceful bonsai forms. Below we outline the different species types we carry in our gallery, and give a few prime examples of the wonderfully varied kinds you will find within each category:

Deciduous

Deciduous plants bear leaves that are typically shed during the fall (or, in tropical climates, during the dry season), and include trees, shrubs, and herbaceous specimens. After the leaves drop they go into a period of dormancy before a new growth cycle begins in the spring.

• Sago Palm

  This is an exotic, tropical tree species millions of years old, native to the islands of the East and South China Seas. While not technically a palm, it bears lush, dark-green palm-like fronds from its rounded, textured trunk. The Sago Palm makes a very interesting and unique ornamental bonsai.

• Golden Gate Ficus

  Our Golden Gate Ficus features a lovely Informal Upright style bonsai design, with a slight curvature trained into the trunk. This indoor bonsai's small, spritely leaves offer a lush sense of nature's greenery and a beautiful, sculptural form. The ficus is actually a kind of fig tree; much can be said about this tree's symbolism in the Old Testament bible.

• Ginkgo

  The Ginkgo is an ancient tree species dating from the time of the dinosaurs. Their characteristic leaves are unlike any other on earth, with a classic bi-lobed fan-shape and a brilliant green color. In the East, it is considered a sacred tree, and a symbol of love.

Evergreen

The evergreen plant has leaves that literally stay green in every season. These can be both trees and shrubs types, from conifers with needle-shaped leaves such as pine and junipers, to oak and holly trees. Most evergreen bonsai require a winter dormancy rest period to keep them healthy.

• Juniper

  The juniper is one of the most popular and common bonsai species. It has a lightly scented, dense needle foliage and a trunk that can be trained into expressive, sculptural forms. This craggy evergreen lends itself to perfect miniaturization, making it a beautiful symbol of nature's indomitable spirit and strength.

• Mugo Pine

  This pine species is a naturally occurring dwarf pine, featuring short, deep-green needles. In its normal habitat it grows in high mountain regions, making it an exceptionally hardy, cold-winter tolerant outdoor bonsai specimen. This general sturdiness and adaptability to harsh conditions has made the pine a symbol of immortality and longevity.

• Podocarpus

  Podocarpus are relatives of the decorative yew tree and evergreen pine, with conifer-type short, flattened needles creating a delightful fringe-like appearance. Ours is an Asian varietal sculpted in the Informal Upright style of bonsai, featuring a gently curved trunk. Both the yew and the pine are symbols of longevity.

Flowering

Flowering bonsai trees come in many different varieties and produce lovely blossoms, making them a favorite ornamental. Since the art of bonsai recreates the essence of a plant in miniature, flowering specimens are highly prized for the beauty, color, and scent they bring to outdoor and indoor landscapes.

• Gardenia

  Gardenias possess sensuous white flowers with a luxurious suede-like texture. Its glossy dark-green foliage creates a beautiful contrast to its pure white blossoms. The flower's legendary scent has been in prominent use for centuries to create luxurious perfumes.

• Azaleas

  Azaleas are one of the most popular bonsai due to their generous production of bright pink blossoms and the length of their bloom time. But their beautiful green leaves will make a lush and pleasing outdoor ornamentation, even without the blossoming.

• Camellia

  One of the most elegant flowering bonsai specimens is the Camellia. They produce their characteristic showy pink blossoms late fall through early spring. Because they bring bright spots of light and color to winter's gray months, Camellias are one of the most popular bonsai.

Fruiting

Some of the most appealing bonsai are those that bear fruit. Many varieties of fruit can be exquisitely cultivated into a sculpted miniature size. And fruiting bonsai will give two seasons of delight: first when it flowers, and again as it yields edible fruit. They're also a special educational treat for children, who can take interest in watching their full growing cycle.

• Pomegranate

  The pomegranate is a lovely deciduous plant bearing gorgeous, vibrant-red flowers that ripen into a delectable, exotic fruit. It was renown throughout ancient Persia and Rome for its beauty as well as its medicinal and culinary purposes. And with its abundance of seeds, it's easy to see how it became a traditional symbol of fertility and prosperity.

• Manderin Orange

  Citrus oranges trees are a delight to behold: lovely green leaves frame tiny, waxy, white flowers which develop an intoxicating fragrance. After blooming, the bonsai will fruit with small edible oranges.

• Grape Vine Bonsai

  A seasoned vine will bear fruit: our lovely Sonoma Valley Grape Vine bonsai bears tiny, edible cabernet grape clusters. Fruiting bonsai, like this vine, are happiest in full sun sites. Watch it flower in spring, and shed its leaves late in the fall.

How to Organize and Declutter Your Entertainment Center

 

If your entertainment center looks like a fire hazard, it might be time to get the cord clutter under control and hidden away. It's not as easy as organizing your computer cables, but it can still be done without spending a lot of money.
Regardless of the amount of devices you're working with, it's easy for cables to get bunched up, cluttered, and messy. No matter how carefully you put everything together you almost always end up with a mess. It's actually very easy to minimize the clutter and organize everything. Let's take a look at the steps you need to do it.

Step 1: Disconnect and Clean Everything

Hopefully your entertainment center doesn't look like it housed an army of cats like mine in the picture above, but chances are it's still a bit dusty back there. Disconnect all your cables and clean everything off.

Step 2: Organize by Endpoint on the Floor

Next, lay out your cables on the floor in front of the entertainment center so you can get an idea of where everything needs to go. Since even on the simplest setup, half are going to the TV and the other half to a power outlet, organize them by end point so you know where each cable is heading. For instance, set all your HDMI, component cables, and coaxial cables together. Set all you power cords aside as well. This also means setting aside the cables that connect to the stereo or other auxiliary devices like a Wii's motion sensor bar or Kinect.

Step 3: Connect the Power Cords To Your Power Strip

There's no exact order you need to go in, but if you consider the power cords the foundation of your setup, it helps get the organization process started. They're all heading to the power strip, so it makes sense to start there. Plug everything into the power strip and lay it out where your devices are.

Step 4: Connect Everything to Its End Point

It's easiest to start at the end then work your way to the device it's coming from. For instance, you want to start by connecting your HDMI cables to the TV, the Ethernet cables to your router, and everything else you have at its destination. Once connected, lay them out approximately where your gadgets are.

Step 5: Shorten Your Cables

Using twist ties , cable ties , or Velcro , shorten your cords so that they are the exact length between the two devices they need to be. You can do this by wrapping the cable around your hand and tying it off with the tie of your choice. Shorter cables are easier to manage and hide away.

Step 6: Wrap Like-Cables Together

Once your cables are shortened, the best way to keep everything from ending messy again is to wrap everything heading the same direction together. For instance, if you have three HDMI cables heading to the television, tie all three together with your cable ties. The same goes for every other cable you have. You're going for an effect like these cord organizers . The idea is that you're tying everything together in bulk to make it look like one large cable instead of three.

Step 7: Connect Your Devices

Once everything is tied and cleaned up, your entertainment should be looking a lot better. Go ahead and plug in all your devices and slide them into the entertainment center. Depending on the size of your setup, you may have a lot of excess cord or small bundles everywhere. If it looks fine to you, then you're done. But if you want to hide and organize a little more, here's a few suggestions.

Organize Everything Further if You Need It

If you want to step up the organization there are a few extra steps you can take to hide cables or make it all look a little better.

• Binder Clips : Yes, binder clips work behind your television just as well as your desk. If you have a lot of cables, you can use binder clips to keep all your cables in a neat row or help keep them propped up if they need to cross over everything else. This keeps the cables from dangling or hanging awkwardly across other cables.
• Hide your power strip: If your power strip is full, you probably have power cables going everywhere. You can purchase a box that hides it away and organizes the cables out of a singular small hole, or you convert a shoe box to do the same thing.

• 

• Replace a fiberboard back with peg board: If you have a home entertainment center that has a fiberboard back, rip it off and replace it with a piece of peg board. This gives you a way to easily hang and organize the same way you would with your computer . This method is especially helpful if you have extra game controllers or remotes lying around and want a basket to stuff them in. A peg board is also handy because you can use a tool holder to organize cables.
• Skip hiding everything and embrace the look : Alternately, you can always just embrace the fact you need cables running everything and mount everything to the wall in a decorative pattern. This takes a lot of work, but the effect can be better than hiding everything away.

Beef Prices Expected to Balloon in 2012

Snacking on steak sandwiches and biting into burgers is going to hit you where it hurts, in your already moaning and groaning wallet. Ground beef prices are already at a record high and are going to keep soaring, and the cost of steak is on the uptick too. Time to go vegetarian!
USA Today blames the price increases partly on severe drought on the plains where cattle herds roam, bringing the number of beef-giving cattle to the lowest levels since 1952. The Agriculture Department says there are only about 91 million head of cattle in the country on Jan. 1, a 2% decrease from last year.


Another contributor is the skyrocketing price of corn, which ranchers use to bolster the diet of their cattle. When there's no grass, corn is expensive and land comes at a premium price, ranchers end up selling their cattle to feedlots or slaughterhouses if they can't afford to feed them. Many animals were sold to feedlots or slaughterhouses.


Ground beef could go up 4-5% this year from $2.87 a pound to $3.55 per, and steak is skyrocketing 14% to more than $6.00 a pound, after a previous increase of 10% last year. Makes you want to rethink those weekly barbecues, or at least reach for the ground turkey.

Smallest U.S. cattle herd in 60 years may raise beef prices [USA Today]

January 30, 2012 11:21:52 PM

Use Your Hand to Estimate Your Portions [Diet]

lifehacker.com

When you're staring down the barrel of a new diet, your portions are one of the most difficult things to measure and keep track of. Your kitchen scale may be great in the comfort of your home, but it's not practical to carry with you all day. Instead, just get to know the rough estimates with your hand.

If the idea looks familiar, that may be because earlier this month Melanie walked through the basics of this idea, highlighting its usefulness for cooks. This morning, while signing up for Weight Watchers (yeah, that's right, Weight Watchers—I've used it before, and it works really well if game mechanics work on you, and even if you're not looking to lose a lot of weight, it's good at keeping you healthier), I stumbled onto the handy cheatsheet in the image above.

• 1 cup = your first
• 1 ounce = the meaty part of your thumb
• 1 tablespoon = your thumb, minus the meaty part
• 1 teaspoon = the tip of your index finger
• 1 inch = the middle section of your index finger
• 1-2 ounces of a food like nuts or pretzels = your cupped hand
• 3 ounces of meat, fish, or poultry = the palm of your hand

Obviously these are rough estimates, and their accuracy will vary based on the size of your hand, but it's not a bad starting point. If you happen to have a kitchen scale at home, you could use that and some measuring spoons to determine just how well these measurements work with your hand and set your own baselines if any of the measurements are considerably off. As I said, Mel covered these basics a couple weeks back, but I found the Weight Watchers diagram very helpful.