As others pull back, Vegas amps up gun promotions

This July 28, 2012 photo provided by Bob MacDuff shows Lindsae MacDuff holding an automatic weapon at the Gun store in Las Vegas after her "shotgun wedding." One Las Vegas shooting range is selling ?take a shot at love? packages that include 50 submachine gun rounds. Another is offering wedding packages in which the bride and groom can pose with Uzis and ammunition belts. And a third invites lovebirds to renew their vows and shoot a paper cutout zombie in the face. (AP Photo/Bob MacDuff)

This July 28, 2012 photo provided by Bob MacDuff shows Lindsae MacDuff holding an automatic weapon at the Gun store in Las Vegas after her "shotgun wedding." One Las Vegas shooting range is selling ?take a shot at love? packages that include 50 submachine gun rounds. Another is offering wedding packages in which the bride and groom can pose with Uzis and ammunition belts. And a third invites lovebirds to renew their vows and shoot a paper cutout zombie in the face. (AP Photo/Bob MacDuff)

This July 28, 2012 photo provided by Bob MacDuff shows MacDuff holding an automatic weapon at the Gun store in Las Vegas after his "shotgun wedding." One Las Vegas shooting range is selling ?take a shot at love? packages that include 50 submachine gun rounds. Another is offering wedding packages in which the bride and groom can pose with Uzis and ammunition belts. And a third invites lovebirds to renew their vows and shoot a paper cutout zombie in the face. (AP Photo/Bob MacDuff)

LAS VEGAS (AP) ? One Las Vegas shooting range is selling "take a shot at love" packages that include 50 submachine gun rounds. Another is offering wedding packages in which the bride and groom can pose with Uzis and ammunition belts. And a third invites lovebirds to renew their vows and shoot a paper cutout zombie in the face.

Never known for its understatement or good taste, Sin City is bucking the national trend of avoiding flippant gun promotions after the Newton, Conn., elementary school shooting. Instead, it is embracing tourists' newfound interest in big guns the only way it knows how: by going all in.

The newest crop of outlandish Valentine's Day offers is no exception.

Capitalizing on the state's relaxed gun laws, shooting ranges offer an armory of military-grade weapons that aren't accessible in other states. And because this is Las Vegas, they also allow customers to destroy photographs of exes, make souvenir T-shirts full of holes and shoot fully-automatic weapons in barely-there bachelor party man-kinis.

Some gun control advocates say the promotions trivialize the dangers of high-powered weapons.

"These gun stores and shooting ranges offer bad puns in poor taste in their efforts to put a happy face on firearms, yet each day more than 86 Americans die from gun violence," said Newtown native Josh Sugarmann, who is executive director of the Washington D.C-based Violence Policy Center.

"While Las Vegas gun promoters present assault rifles with high-capacity ammunition magazines as harmless Valentine's Day props, the vast majority of Americans understand their true role: military-bred weapons that threaten police and public safety," he said.

At least half a dozen ranges opened in Las Vegas last year, triggering a marketing arms race.

Before visitors even pick up their bags at McCarran International Airport, they are confronted by ads for the Gun Store, Las Vegas' most venerable shooting range. One ad features a blonde posing with an MP5 submachine gun under the words, "Try one."

Machine Gun Las Vegas, which opened last winter, hires former go-go dancers as hostesses and sells its "femme fetale" package with the slogan, "There's nothing like the scent of Cordite in a woman's hair." (Cordite is an alternative to gunpowder).

"We give what people are asking for, whether it's the 'mob experience' and they want to test a Tommy gun, or a bachelor package, and they want a limo to take them to the club afterward," said Lianne Heck, marketing director at Range 702, which opened in October.

This year, gun ranges are extending their tongue-in-cheek promotions to Valentine's Day, always a moneymaker in this matrimony-and-sex-obsessed town.

The Guns and Ammo Garage is offering free vow renewals by the "Pistol Packing Preacher" for one day only. The Gun Store has built a permanent "shotgun weddings" chapel, because nothing makes a memory quite like the sound of gunfire.

Bob MacDuff said his "I do's" there last July before posing with AK-47s for wedding pictures and going shooting with his 25 guests. He encourages others to celebrate their love with weapons in hand.

"For people who are gun people, you can't find a better option," said MacDuff, of Alberta, Canada.

In the wake of the Dec. 14 shootings, many companies curtailed their activities to avoid giving offense.

Groupon, the online coupon giant, halted gun-related promotions, video game company Electronic Arts scrubbed its website of links to weapons retailers and the 3-D printing company MakerBot began removing blueprints for guns from its database.

Fox pulled episodes of "Family Guy" and "American Dad" that made jokes about the punishment of children.

British tabloids chided Las Vegas gun ranges for failing to follow suit.

"What hope for the US when couples can now get married with weapons?" read the headline of a Jan. 7 article in the Sun reporting that that no couples had canceled their shotgun weddings after the national tragedy.

The finger wagging rankled Emily Miller, wedding officiant and head of marketing for the Gun Store, who said the high-powered weapons allow tourists to live out a wild-west fantasy.

"People always want to put a spin on it like it's a hostile or angry thing," she said. "Really, customers just want to have fun. It's like a bucket list item."

At least one gun control advocate agrees with her.

In what might be called a Valentine to the shooting range industry, a spokesman for the Washington D.C.-based Coalition to Stop Gun Violence said Vegas' public embrace of shooting might cause people to associate it with other Sin City favorites like gambling, benders and ill-conceived hook-ups.

"If anything, this will maybe enforce the image of guns as something that are bad for you," he said.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2013-02-14-Valentine's%20Day%20Guns/id-2acce9e99e914b468efca4a3c9f318f0

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Apple Seeking Fix for Blurry iPhone Pics

Apple Seeking Fix for Blurry iPhone Pics

Published on 02-14-2013 11:26 AM

It's a phenomenon we've all experienced: blurry iPhone pics - usually, when we're actually trying to capture a memory of lasting value.

Aware of this commonplace occurrence, Apple is purportedly working on a fix for fuzzy images captured by the otherwise high-quality cameras built into our iDevices. This much is evident in a new patent filing by Apple coming to light this week.

Details gleaned from a U.S. Patent and Trademark Office filing show that Apple is working on a method by which iPhones will capture a series of images within a single snapshot to determine which image is the highest quality of the bunch, based on a number of variables factored into the equation.

The method can include storing a predetermined number of the sequence of images in a buffer. The device can receive a user request to capture an image. The method can automatically select one of the buffered images based on one or more parameters. For example, the selection may be based on an exposure time of one of the buffered images and optionally an image quality parameter (e.g., image contrast). Alternatively, the selection may be based only on the image quality parameter. While it remains to be seen if and how Apple will implement this technology in the next-gen iPhone, the filing was made by Apple in October of 2012. As a result, the timing may be right for the improved image capturing capabilities to turn up on the next iPhone refresh.

Source: USPTO

Source: http://modmyi.com/content/10043-apple-seeking-fix-blurry-iphone-pics.html

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"Blade Runner" Pistorius charged with murdering girlfriend

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South African "Blade Runner" Oscar Pistorius, a double amputee who became one of the biggest names in world athletics, was charged on Thursday with shooting dead his girlfriend at his upscale home in Pretoria.

Police said they opened a murder case after a 30-year-old woman was found dead at the Paralympic and Olympic star's house in the Silverlakes gated complex on the capital's outskirts.

Pistorius, 26, and his girlfriend, model Reeva Steenkamp, had been the only people in the house at the time of the shooting, police brigadier Denise Beukes, told reporters, adding witnesses had been interviewed about the early morning incident.

"We are talking about neighbors and people that heard things earlier in the evening and when the shooting took place," Beukes said outside the heavily guarded residential complex. Earlier, police said a 9mm pistol had been found at the scene.

Beukes said police were aware of previous incidents at the Pistorius house. "I can confirm that there has previously been incidents at the home of Mr Oscar Pistorious, of allegations of domestic nature," she said.

Pistorius, who uses carbon fiber prosthetic blades to run, is due to appear in a Pretoria court on Friday.

"He is doing well but very emotional," his lawyer Kenny Oldwage told SABC TV, but gave no further comment.

A sports icon for triumphing over disabilities to compete with able-bodied athletes at the Olympics, his sponsorship deals, including one with sports apparel group Nike, are thought to be worth $2 million a year.

South Africa's M-Net cable TV channel said it was pulling adverts featuring Pistorius off air immediately.

"WE ARE ALL DEVASTATED"

Steenkamp's colleagues in the modeling world were distraught. "We are all devastated. Her family is in shock," her agent, Sarita Tomlinson, tearfully told Reuters. "They did have a good relationship. Nobody actually knows what happened."

Pistorius, who was born without a fibula in both legs, was the first double amputee to run in the Olympics and reached the 400-metre semi-finals in London 2012.

In last year's Paralympics he suffered his first loss over 200 meters in nine years. After the race he questioned the legitimacy of Brazilian winner Alan Oliveira's prosthetic blades, though he was quick to express regret for the comments.

South Africa has some of the world's highest rates of violent crime, and many home owners have weapons to defend themselves against intruders, although Pistorius' complex is surrounded by a three-meter high wall and electric fence.

In 2004, Springbok rugby player Rudi Visagie shot dead his 19-year-old daughter after he mistakenly thought she was a robber trying to steal his car in the middle of the night.

Before the murder charge was announced, Johannesburg's Talk Radio 702 said the athlete may have mistaken Steenkamp for a burglar.

Recent media interviews with Pistorius revealed he kept an assortment of weapons in his home.

"Cricket and baseball bats lay behind the door, a pistol by his bed and a machine gun by a window," Britain's Daily Mail wrote in a profile published last year.

Pistorius was arrested in 2009 for assault after slamming a door on a woman and spent a night in police custody. Family and friends said it was just an accident and charges were dropped.

"He's very quiet and very modest but he's a big party animal," one of South Africa's top runners, who knows Pistorius, told Reuters. "I've been with him when we've been smashed and he never seemed violent," said the runner, who declined to be named.

OLYMPIAN UNDERGOES POLICE TESTS

Steenkamp, a regular on the South African social scene, was reported to have been dating Pistorius for several months.

In the social pages of last weekend's Sunday Independent she described him as having "impeccable" taste. "His gifts are always thoughtful," she was quoted as saying.

Some of her last Twitter postings indicated she was looking forward to Valentine's Day on Thursday. "What do you have up your sleeve for your love tomorrow???" she posted.

Pistorius was on Thursday being processed through the police system. "At this stage he is on his way to a district surgeon for medical examination," the police brigadier said.

"When a person has been accused of a crime like murder they look at things like testing under the finger nails, taking a blood alcohol sample and all kinds of other test that are done. They are standard medical tests," Beukes said.

Pistorius is also sponsored by British telecoms firm BT, sunglasses maker Oakley and French designer Thierry Mugler.

"We are shocked by this terrible, tragic news. We await the outcome of the South African police investigation," a BT spokeswoman said before Pistorius was charged.

A Nike spokesman in London said before hearing of the murder charge that the company was "saddened by the news, but we have no further comment to make at this stage".

Pistorius also has a sponsorship deal with Icelandic prosthetics manufacturer Ossur.

"I can only say that our thoughts and prayers are with Oscar and the families involved in the tragedy," Ossur CEO Jon Sigurdsson told Reuters. "It is completely premature to discuss or speculate on our business relationship with him."

Neighbors expressed shock at the arrest of a "good guy".

"It is difficult to imagine an intruder entering this community, but we live in a country where intruders can get in wherever they want to," said one Silverlakes resident, who did not want to be named.

"Oscar is a good guy, an upstanding neighbor, and if he is innocent I feel for this guy deeply," he said.

(Additional reporting by Sherilee Lakmidas, David Dolan, Ed Cropley, Jon Herskovitz, Keith Weir and Kate Holton; Writing by Ed Cropley; Editing by Will Waterman and Peter Millership)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/paralympic-star-pistorius-shoots-girlfriend-south-africa-media-064211619.html

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14 Eye-Opening Stats You Probably Didn't Know About Spam

14 Eye-Opening Stats You Probably Didn't Know About Spam

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You can run, but you can?t hide. Even with all the tools we have at our disposal to help us block out these annoying messages, you?ve probably seen spam from marketers weasel its way into your mailbox, your inbox, your news feed, or your phone.

To assure you that you?re not alone, we?ve assembled 14 shocking statistics about spammy marketing to make the case for why all of us (consumers and marketers alike) need to take notice of the implications of spam.

Scaling Social Media Selling - Online Marketing Blog

Interest in scaling social media sales has increased significantly over the past year and in 2013 it be even more so. ?Organizations of all types and sizes are coming to terms with the need to better monetize their investments and one of the most compelling opportunities to do so is through helping sales leadership develop their personal brands online.

It?s understandable why: A recent study reported on by eMarketer?indicates that 67% of BtoC marketers and 44% of B2B marketers saw leads generated through social media channels.

Many companies are investing in social media listening for things like buying signal keywords to engage with prospects and creating content specifically to address the kinds of questions that lead to inquiries. However, there?s only so much a community manager or social media strategist can do.

In situations where organizations have sales teams that are not kept entirely busy by the marketing department, (shame on you!) some of the more enterprising sales and account executives will create social profiles and even blog.

Establishing an online presence to build their personal brand amongst a community of prospective customers can help them stand out and attract new business. For the right kind of sales person, building up individual brand can be instrumental for creating awareness that lowers barriers and facilitates reputation, credibility, trust that result in shorter sales cycles and an increase in inbound inquiries.

When sales organizations can facilitate this activity so that it helps individual sales executives build their online footprint at the same time as building trust in the overall brand, then it?s a win all around. People buy because they like you and what better way to communicate personality and ?likeability? than through useful social media engagement?

As our agency works more and more with companies on content marketing strategy that impacts revenue, interest in helping sales executives undertand how content and social media can increase individual sales has become increasingly important. Here are a few steps to consider for doing that.

Understand the importance of a social presence in your industry ? Leverage social media monitoring, customer surveys and industry research to get a broad view of what role social media plays in the brand and prospect relationship. Talk to social savvy sales people to get their first hand perspectives and ?identify what?s working.

Conduct a self-assessment ? While marketing should have a benchmark for the overall brand, it?s also important for the sales organization to determine the current social and online content participation of individuals. Who has profiles and how are they using them?

Embrace a model to attract, engage and convert ? Provide sales teams with the ?why? of using social media and content. Set expectations for time investment and time to see a return. A model that shows a path for social sales development and what that means for individuals will be instrumental for identifying training and successful implementation.

Identify tools ? Efficiency and scale are essential for effective social selling, so identifying tools like blog publishing platforms, social media monitoring and promotions will be important.

Understand social audiences ? Social listening and community participation will provide insights but helping sales executives see both short term engagement opportunities as well as long term nurturing will help avoid scenes like the?biscuit?in Tommy Boy.

Being useful is the most valuable sales tactic on the social web, not explicit sales pitches. ?By figuring out how your target audience discovers, consumes and acts on information through the social web, you?ll be able to connect and build trust more quickly. This kind of connection is about being genuine, relevant and timely to build trust.

Create a personal brand content plan ? With an understanding of why and what, the how for building a personal brand online is an important next step. ?Think about what you stand for. ?That?s your brand promise. Then follow through on that promise with useful, relevant and timely content. ?Doing so will build trust that?s?contagious

Practically, the hub and spoke model works as well for individuals as it does for companies overall and making a connection between personal brand building and that of the overall organization is key. ?This plan covers topics, keywords, types of content, social networks, promotions and engagement tactics. ?It also identifies the content that the brand can create to be repurposed ?by sales teams for congruent messaging and efficient content marketing.

Monitor success and optimize performance - Leveraging social media monitoring tools, web analytics and the sales performance data that comes from marketing automation services can all provide?crucial?feedback for social sales performance optimization. It boils down to: knowing your target audience interests/pain points/goals that are solved by the solution you?re selling.

Be the ?best answer? for information on those topics in a way that attracts mentions, social shares, links and discussion. The result will be prospects seeking you out more than you scrambling for where your next customer is going to come from.

There?s a lot more to a framework for enabling sales organizations with individual content and social media plans that are good for both individuals and the overall brand, but these are some important considerations to get started. ?Everything from where to find the time to create content and engage on social networks to addressing the fear of a sales person publishing things they really shouldn?t can be addressed with the right plan and resources.

Here are a few practical?social media tips for sales people that want leverage social media to build their personal brand online.

Every organization will have a few cowboys (or cowgirls) that go off and do their own social media thing. ?But a smart and adaptable social content plan plus good training can empower entire sales teams to scale a company?s social media sales efforts and boost performance of both individual sales executives and the overall brand at the same time.

Does your organization enable sales execs with blogs, or social media sales training? If you work for a business in a sales executive capacity, does your company support social media and content publishing by the sales organization?

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Source: http://www.toprankblog.com/2013/01/scaling-social-media-selling-7-steps-to-building-trust-credibility/

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Legal Shelf Company ? LLC Basics for Foreign Investors

A Limited Liability Company, or LLC, is a legal structure that provides asset protection and personal liability protection for its owners. It is available to use in all 50 states. When you hold assets in a U.S. LLC, and the LLC is sued, your personal assets held outside of the LLC are not at risk.

Holding real estate inside of an LLC is an excellent way for a foreign investor to both protect their US assets, as well as enter the US tax system easily. Having an LLC allows you to jump to the head of the line in terms of applying for your US ITIN (individual taxpayer identification number). In turn, your ITIN allows you to avoid the 30% flat tax you will otherwise pay on your US-sourced income.

You can own multiple LLCs, if you have a lot of properties, or you can own just one LLC and put multiple properties inside it. Each has their own advantages. It is certainly simpler and more economic to have just one LLC. There is no bar on where an LLC may own property, so if you have properties in two or more states, you can use the same LLC to hold your ownership.

On the other hand though, holding all of your US properties inside one LLC can have some risk, too. If someone wants to sue the LLC, as owner of a property, then everything else the LLC owns is also potentially at risk. Having multiple LLCs can be a safer bet, as something that happens inside one LLC stays there. Even if you may be the only owner of multiple LLCs, that doesn?t mean someone suing one LLC has the right to sue the rest.

Additionally, if you have multiple properties you can protect them by holding them in separate LLCs. In the case of the story told a few pages ago, if the owner had held each of his apartment buildings in a separate LLC, the risk would have been much less for his assets.

The US tax and legal system is complicated. That?s why you need a powerful and knowledgeable ally. With LegalShelfCompany.com, you don?t have to worry. We can help you through the tax, legal and other requirements to holding and operating US property from overseas. To learn more, pick up our free eBook, Buying US Real Estate: What Foreign Investors Need to Know or watch our FREE webinar at www.legalshelfcompany.com/international

Categories: Blog
Tags: foreign investor, foreign investor US taxes, foreign investor USA

Source: http://www.legalshelfcompany.com/international/blog/llc-basics-for-foreign-investors/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=llc-basics-for-foreign-investors

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THE RESET: Obama now must move on 2nd-term agenda

President Barack Obama now faces the heavy lifting of trying to move ahead on the lofty second-term vows and declarations he laid out in his inaugural address.

He presented a muscular retooled agenda that includes addressing climate change, controlling health care costs, advancing gay rights and tax fairness, overhauling the immigration system and curbing gun violence. And it comes amid a series of looming new fiscal fights.

The president will outline specifics in his State of the Union address Feb. 12.

The day after his second and final inauguration, Obama on Tuesday attended the National Prayer Service at Washington National Cathedral. He did not speak.

He and first lady Michelle Obama also were to preside over a final inaugural ball in the evening for White House and campaign staffers. It was to feature singer Lady Gaga.

Meanwhile, the House is to vote Wednesday on a GOP leadership-proposed measure that could keep the government ? temporarily ? from running out of borrowing authority.

The government already has hit its $16.4 trillion debt ceiling, and Treasury Department officials say ways to pay all the bills will be used up as early as mid-February. The congressional measure would suspend the debt ceiling until May 17, and it appears to have wide support in both House and Senate.

Meanwhile, leaders of both parties are urging political reconciliation.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., denounced the "sharp political divides" of the last Congress and said in a Senate speech that he hoped the new 113th Congress "will be characterized not by our divisions but by our renewed commitment to cooperation and compromise."

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said, "Republicans are eager to work with the president" on achieving common goals. And House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said it's time to "renew the old appeal to better angels."

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Follow Tom Raum on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/tomraum

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/reset-obama-now-must-move-2nd-term-agenda-175037411.html

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