A Blog Journal on Business & Finances

Solar's Next Level

2006-10-29T05:49:00.000-08:00

[Quote]
"Ami Elazari has been a solar freak for decades. The 56-year-old computer and communications engineer outfitted his house in 1991 with a photovoltaic thermal (PVT) energy system."

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Google AdSense for Audio Coming

2006-10-28T16:10:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"Google plans to release Google AdSense for Audio to monetize podcasts sometime this quarter, according to sources."

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How Wall Street can wreck your life

2006-10-27T05:18:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"Those who are successful on Wall Street and Main Street -- indeed in any high-stress job -- are often the most susceptible to depression and self-sabotage."

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The Secret World Of Domainers

2006-10-25T18:16:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"A look at the world of "Domainer", people who make huge money on buying, selling and developing domain names. Find out how they do it."

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Hamburger: $0.12; car: $600; house: $9,000

2006-10-25T16:33:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"What if the money supply had been fixed since 1959 and the economy remained on a steady growth path? An economist crunches the numbers and find price heaven."

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Intense Competition Hurts Profits At Intel And AMD

2006-10-25T08:48:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"2006 has been the year of the price war between rivals AMD and Intel. Naysayers claim that neither company wanted to do that, mainly because no one ever wins a price war. That may be true, but as the most recent financial results from these two companies show, that doesn't mean you can stop the shooting."

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A Look at the Numbers: How the Rich Get Richer

2006-10-24T13:33:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"How the rich get richer. See Sources"

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Enron's Skilling Sentenced to 24 Years in Prison for Fraud

2006-10-24T07:48:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
""Jeffrey Skilling, Enron Corp.'s former chief executive officer, was sentenced to 24.3 years in prison for his role in the securities fraud that led to the energy trader's collapse." - Bloomberg. It's about time this guy paid for his crimes. I think 24 years is a little too short of a sentence."

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CNBC and MSNBC Won't Merge, Says Top Exec

2006-10-24T07:03:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"NBC Universal is planning to make severe cost cuts. But CNBC's top business news exec Jonathan Wald says: "I see opportunities." He emphatically discounts rumors that siblings CNBC and MSNBC will merge someday: "I don't think that's ever going to happen.""

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Ford reports $5.8 billion 3Q loss

2006-10-24T04:18:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"Ford said Monday its loss widened to $5.8 billion in the third quarter, weighed down by the costs of its massive restructuring plan aimed at reshaping the company and cutting expenses so it can compete better against lower-cost rivals from overseas. It was the largest quarterly loss for the nation's second biggest automaker in more than 14 years."

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The Best Business Schools of 2006 by BusinessWeek

2006-10-24T02:33:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"BusinessWeek ranks the top MBA programs by measuring student and recruiter satisfaction. And, for the first time, Chicago came out on top."

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Halliburton Earnings Continue To Climb

2006-10-23T23:18:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"Halliburton Co , the world's No. 2 oilfield services group, on Sunday posted a 25 percent rise in earnings, beating Wall Street forecasts, on robust spending by producers on oil and gas output, particularly in North America."

[Read More]

Google stock reaches new high

2006-10-23T16:48:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"Wow, $500 a share is quickly approaching. "Google shares traded past the $475.11 level set on January 11, 2006, and reached as high as $476.75 in midday trading on the Nasdaq." Currently at $477.30."

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Ikea : How the Swedish Retailer became a global cult brand

2006-10-23T16:03:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"More important, says CEO Anders Dahlvig, is that "awareness of our brand is much bigger than the size of our company." That's because Ikea is far more than a furniture merchant. It sells a lifestyle that customers around the world embrace as a signal that they've arrived, that they have good taste and recognize value. "If it wasn't for Ikea,""

[Read More]

Tony Hawk’s New Trick: 2 Marketers in 1 Advertising Campaign

2006-10-23T09:01:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
""How much merchandise could Tony Hawk hawk if Tony Hawk hawked merchandise for two marketers at once?" A new Rolling Stone ad tests this with one ad for two companies..."The timing suits Activision and Jeep because each is now bringing out a new product: a video game called Tony Hawk?s Project 8 and the 2007 Jeep Wrangler Unlimited.""

[Read More]

After 1400 Years, the World's Oldest Business Has Shut Its Doors

2006-10-22T11:46:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"The oldest company in the world, which was founded in 578 in Japan by a group of people from the ancient Korean kingdom of Baekje, will go into liquidation in January."

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Who Had It Better: Our Parents or Us?

2006-10-21T22:34:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"Much adieu was made this week about the U.S. population crossing the 300 million mark on Tuesday, Oct. 17. The latest report from the U.S. Census Bureau sparked a flood of news articles on the population debate and not a few discussions on how our present standard of living has changed over the years."

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How much 'actual' news does CNN have on their homepage? Not much.

2006-10-21T10:03:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"Using photoshop and some analysis this article shows how much actual news CNN features on their homepage. Once you strip out the advertising, sensationalist stuff, YouTube-like stuff and look at the actual news coverage you may be surprised. 5 whole headlines in small font for this version of the page..."

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How to avoid service in Iraq, get heavily into debt

2006-10-20T21:03:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"High levels of debt are costing thousands of military personnel their security clearances and preventing them from serving critical overseas duty."

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YouTube can avoid 'Napster's fate'

2006-10-20T17:48:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"Internet law professor Michael Geist argues that YouTube will avoid the fate of the original Napster. He also argues that recent deals could foreshadow the industry not just dabbling in online distribution, but finally embracing it."

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What's Holding Up a Pretexting Law?

2006-10-19T16:13:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"The HP spying scandal has shown why federal legislation is needed to crack down on data thieves who impersonate people to get their personal information. So why are advocates of the law still getting a busy signal on Capitol Hill?"

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Google Rivals Eyeing Digg, Facebook, CNET

2006-10-19T13:03:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
""Google Inc.'s $1.65 billion acquisition of Internet video site YouTube Inc. has turned up the pressure on rivals to keep pace in a rapidly changing online environment. (...) Still, deals are likely to get done. Another likely target is Digg Inc., an Internet news site that lets people post stories they find online." Read on"

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Dow rocks past 12,000!!!

2006-10-18T16:48:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"The Dow Jones industrials jumped past the 12,000 mark for the first time in history Wednesday as a tame reading on inflation, surprisingly solid housing numbers and strong earnings pushed stocks higher."

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20 top tips for surviving life in the workplace/office

2006-10-18T13:18:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"#2 Ignore all emails: If you let them sink to the bottom of the pile and go unanswered they will eventually become irrelevant. #16 Ignore consultants: A consultant is someone in business with an ego so large it takes more than one company to support it."

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A MySpace for job seekers

2006-10-18T12:20:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"Blue Chip Expert is a new startup that would like you to think of it as a MySpace for top-level job seekers, except its creator is offering thousands of dollars to any user who makes a successful referral. As he says, "viral networks don't have to happen by accident.""

[Read More]

Audi: The luxury car brand nobody knows

2006-10-16T17:32:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"After years of erratic efforts, Audi tries to crack the U.S. market - again."

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Wal-Mart to RIAA: We're not gonna take it!

2006-10-15T02:33:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"It appears that the cheap retail giant is tired of selling overpriced CDs and wants to cut the prices and still maintain a profit. Kudos to Wal-Mart on this one, we all know that CD prices have been out of this world for sometime."

[Read More]

New Law Cripples Internet Gambling

2006-10-14T16:18:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"Placing bets over the Internet was effectively criminalized by the federal government yesterday, as lawmakers work to eliminate an activity enjoyed by as many as 23 million Americans who wagered an estimated $6 billion last year."

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Is Renting Really Throwing Money Away?

2006-10-13T22:48:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"When I was renting I couldn?t keep track of the number of time my parents told me I was throwing away money. I was paying someone else?s mortgage, they would tell me. At first, this seems to make sense. Why pay $1,500 a month for rent when you can pay $1,500 a month for a mortgage and own your own home? There is one major flaw with this argument."

[Read More]

The Fraudulent Tax

2006-10-10T06:47:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"Larry Vance finds that the advocates of the FairTax have backpeddled on many of their most far-flug claims for the merits of their plan. But they still aren't admiting just how terrible this idea is, nor that the US government should never pass a budget that is in the trillions. With taxes, it is size, not the type of tax system, that matters."

[Read More]

Fibonacci FOREX Indicators [Beginner's GUIDE]

2006-10-09T16:33:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"The Fibonacci number pattern was developed by Leonardo Fibonacci sometime around 1200 AD. For inexplicable reasons, these numbers play a meaningful role in the technical analysis of financial markets. Four main Fibonacci indicators: Fibonacci Fans, Fibonacci Retracements, Fibonacci Time Retracements and Fibonacci Arcs."

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Cover girl under-age? Farewell liquor ads.

2006-10-09T13:02:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
""Liquor companies will not advertise in magazines if the face on the cover cannot legally drink. So when the editors at FHM decided to put a scantily clad Brooke Hogan, the 18-year-old daughter of the wrestler Hulk Hogan, on their November issue, they were forced to notify liquor advertisers, and lost those ad pages in the issue.""

[Read More]

Experts Say HP Not Alone With

2006-10-08T17:03:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"To think Hewlett-Packard Co., the world's second-largest computer company, is alone in pursuing aggressive internal investigations would be naive, say HP's former chairman, experts and lawyers; they do it all the time."

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A beginers guide to mortgages

2006-10-08T16:05:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"Mortgages should be straightforward - you borrow money to buy a house and pay interest on the loan. Clearly this isnt the case. This is an article explaining the basics of a mortgage."

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Illegal Immigrants Sue Wendy's

2006-10-08T14:02:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"A group of illegal immigrants who worked for Wendy's International Inc. is suing the restaurant chain because the company fired them after discovering it had missed a deadline for joining a federal program that would have helped them attain legal status. The immigrants, who worked for Cafe Express, are seeking unspecified damages."

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Why OPEC's $60 Strategy might Backfire

2006-10-06T10:45:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"The first is that, by keeping prices in the $60 range, OPEC is encouraging oil production in other, more expensive places, thus continuing to add to supply"

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Wal-Mart: The Incredible Shrinking 'Comp'

2006-10-06T04:47:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"Lower sales growth in September sends the retailer's shares to a second session of selling Thursday."

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The Next YouTube?

2006-10-06T04:17:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"It may be too early to tell whether YouTube is a billion-dollar business or a dot-com bomb. In the meantime, every media mogul worth his salt wants some of its viral video glow--or at least some of the next overnight Web sensation."

[Read More]

Airbus CEO: 15 Years Behind Boeing

2006-10-05T18:49:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"It could be 15 years before Airbus overtakes Boeing in terms of product development, the company's Chief Executive Christian Streiff said in an interview published in The Financial Times. "This is such a long-term business. We must catch up. In 15 years I hope we are ahead of Boeing again," Streiff told the newspaper."

[Read More]

Lenders Gone Wild! Never before have so many people owed so much $$

2006-10-05T07:35:00.000-07:00

[Quote]
"Wall Street is at an all-time top; apparently investors are as fearless, or as clueless... as consumers. That no one seems to register any fear is remarkable - given the catastrophic consequences of any misstep. Never before has there been so much debt...and never before have so many complicated, contradictory debt-backed investments been stretch"

[Read More]

Dow Hits All-Time High As Oil Drops

2006-10-04T12:06:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"The Dow Jones industrial average hit an all-time high on Tuesday, surpassing the previous record made in 2000, as investors bet that sliding crude oil prices will stimulate consumer spending and boost corporate profits even as the economy slows."

[Read More]

Dow Passes Intraday High

2006-10-04T05:35:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"The Dow Jones industrial average surged past its all-time trading high of 11,750.28 Tuesday, taking yet another step in its recovery from seven years of market turmoil. The index of 30 blue chip stocks moved into uncharted territory, rising as high as 11,754.55 shortly after 12:30 p.m."

[Read More]

Can You Live Long and Prosper?

2006-10-02T05:17:00.001-07:00

[Quote]
"Here's a scary thought: Saving for retirement is the easy part. Making your money last 30 or 40 years after you stop working--now that's a neat trick to pull off."

[Read More]

Oil's not the only thing Chevron's been pumping

2006-09-27T11:49:00.000-07:00

Big Oil is raking it in these days, and Chevron is one of the companies reaping the bounty of record profits. But, the way Chevron sees things in Richmond CA, where one of the company's oil refineries is located, it's paying too much in taxes and the local government owes it money.

You can read more about it here.

India outsourcing firms may process 30 percent of US transactions by 2006

2006-09-27T01:36:00.000-07:00

India's outsourcing industry has the potential to process up to 30 percent of banking transactions in the United States by 2010, but tightening data security is key to realizing that aim, a trade body said Tuesday.

You can read more about it here.

The Internet

2006-09-26T12:04:00.001-07:00

A list of the top 8 Google AdSense income earners. Digg founder Kevin Rose is at number 2!

You can read more about it here.

Americans excited, and suspicious, about the recent slide in gasoline price

2006-09-25T23:02:00.001-07:00

Almost half of all Americans believe the November elections have more influence than market forces. For them, the plunge at the pump is about politics, not economics... others believe there is no mystery behind the change,

You can read more about it here.

U.S. foreign debt shows its teeth

2006-09-25T17:17:00.001-07:00

Over the past several years, Americans and their government enjoyed one of the best deals in international finance: They borrowed trillions of dollars from abroad to buy flat-panel TVs, build homes and fight wars, but as those borrowings mounted, the nation's payments on its net foreign debt barely budged. Now, the easy money is coming to an end.

You can read more about it here.

Lesson for Students: The Best Debt Is None

2006-09-24T06:48:00.000-07:00

We're told over and over again that student loans are good debt. The conventional wisdom says that, like a home loan, student loan debt will turn into an asset. But what happens when it doesn't turn out that way? What happens when people take on tens of thousands of dollars in loans that may take decades to pay off?

You can read more about it here.

Trading hours for the dollar

2006-09-22T18:33:00.001-07:00

There are many ways to make money in this world. By far the most common is trading hours for dollar, also known as a job. Trading hours for the dollar is like the worst possible method of earning a living one can make. Here?s why.

You can read more about it here.

NASDAQ Sends Dell Delisting Notice

2006-09-22T00:48:00.001-07:00

NASDAQ has alerted Dell and Novell, two tech stalwarts, that it is starting delisting procedures. NASDAQ told Dell it has failed to meet requirements for continuing to be listed on its exchange. Dell faces a number of investigations into its financial reporting and accounting methods.

You can read more about it here.

Test Posting

2006-09-21T22:43:00.001-07:00

This is a test post. Ignore.