Monday Brief: New RIM CEO, iPad textbooks, Iconia A200, new webOS czar, Windows Phone to overtake iPhone?

Video: Roundtable: Scarborough, Murphy, Kay and Todd talk S.C.

A Second Take on Meeting the Press: From an up-close look at Rachel Maddow's sneakers to an in-depth look at Jon Krakauer's latest book ? it's all fair game in our "Meet the Press: Take Two" web extra. Log on Sundays to see David Gregory's post-show conversations with leading newsmakers, authors and roundtable guests. Videos are available on-demand by 12 p.m. ET on Sundays.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032608/vp/46090684#46090684

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Kate Schermerhorn: Newt Gingrich Needs An Open Mind More Than An Open Marriage

Newt Gingrich may be a shameful excuse for a husband, but I can't help but think that he is also a perfect example of how we could all benefit from more creative thinking about marriage as a whole.

Newt apparently views marriage and fidelity as something to stick with just until the whole 'in sickness and in health' agreement becomes a drag or a younger, newer model offers herself to you. And at that point you ask for an open marriage... or bail out altogether. While to you and me this might seem like a despicable choice, to Newt, it obviously seems like a valid and sensible idea.

Well, if ol' Newt were a little more innovative and insightful, he might realize that not only would the countless gay Americans he rejects benefit from an updated, more expansive and creative view of marriage, but so would he.

Newt's second wife Marianne said in her ABC interview that an open marriage is not a marriage. While I have no respect for the way her former husband treated her or her predecessor, I have to disagree with her statement. An open marriage clearly isn't the one she signed up for. And suddenly proposing an open marriage after 18 years together, while you are already sleeping with some blonde, is not a good idea. But an open marriage is as valid an idea as any, if it works for the two people involved and if it fits with what they wanted going in.

Marriage has been evolving and changing from its beginnings, and that evolution isn't going to stop any time soon. In its current form, marriage is an institution that only works about 50 percent of the time. And fewer people are choosing to take part in it (while others are fighting for the right to marry all the while). Why can't the next incarnation of marriage include more tailor-made unions that work better for two individuals (of any gender)? We could make it look any way we choose -- open marriages for people like wandering-eyed Newt, others that aren't intended to last forever (also perfect for Mr. Gingrich), or renewable time-limited marriage contracts that last for five, 10, 20 years, depending on individual desires or needs, like, say, if a spouse plans to run for president and needs you by his side during the election campaign but not beyond it. The key is, both parties need to be honest with themselves and each other about what they want out of the marriage and what they want the relationship to look like.

The possibilities are as endless as they are initially shocking. But if we get over the instinctive attachment to the way marriage should be and move on, instead, to thinking about the way it could be, it becomes clear that this may very well be the only viable way forward for the otherwise stumbling institution of marriage. And this could prove to be a good thing for all, even Newt. As it stands now, he, on his 3rd marriage, has a 70 percent chance of divorcing (1st marriages -- 50 percent failure rate, 2nd -- 60 percent, 3rd -- 70 percent). Some creative thinking might give Newt and Callista a better chance for the future, especially once her Botox stops working its magic.

?

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kate-schermerhorn/newt-gingrich-needs-an-op_b_1220197.html

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Blues singer Etta James dies at 73 (Reuters)

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) ? Etta James, the influential 1950s rhythm-and-blues singer best known for her show-stopping hit "At Last," died on Friday from complications of leukemia in a California hospital surrounded by her family. She was 73.

Her death prompted tributes from numerous musicians and artists who were influenced by her singing, from pop star Mariah Carey to Aretha Franklin and legendary rock band The Doors.

James died in her home town of Riverside, California, east of Los Angeles, said her manager and friend of some 30 years, Lupe De Leon. She would have turned 74 on Wednesday.

"She passed away this morning. She was with her husband and her sons," said De Leon.

James was diagnosed with leukemia two years ago and had been in failing health for a number of years. Her live-in doctor said in December she was terminally ill with leukemia. James also suffered from diabetes, kidney problems and dementia and was hospitalized late in 2011 because she was struggling to breathe.

The three time Grammy-award winning R&B singer saw numerous ups-and-downs in her career and personal life. She struggled with obesity and heroin addiction, ran a hot-check scheme and had troubled relationships with men, including some gangsters. Her weight ballooned, and in 2003 she underwent gastric bypass surgery and lost more than 200 pounds.

Yet in the music industry, among fellow R&B artists and rock icons, James' career was legendary. With songs like "The Wallflower" and "Good Rockin' Daddy," the three-time Grammy winner was a key figure in the early days of rock 'n' roll, and her signature song, the 1961 ballad "At Last," proved her mastery of the blues.

Carey, one of dozens of musicians paying tribute on Twitter on Friday, said, "Rest in peace to one of the world's most influential singers Etta James, you will be missed."

Beyonce, who was slammed by James in 2009 for singing "At Last" at the inaugural ball for U.S. President Barack Obama, said on Friday she was fortunate to have met "such a queen."

"Singing her music inspired me to be a stronger artist. When she effortlessly opened her mouth, you could hear her pain and triumph," Beyonce said on her official website.

Aretha Franklin called James "an American original." "When Etta SUNG, you heard it!" Franklin said in a statement.

The Recording Academy, which gives out the Grammys, said James left behind a dynamic legacy. "She will forever be remembered for her timeless ballad 'At Last,' and a powerful voice that will echo around the world for generations to come," academy president Neil Portnow said in a statement.

Other tributes came from LeAnn Rimes, Pink, Kings of Leon drummer Nathan Followill, Chaka Khan, Simon LeBon of Duran Duran, hip-hop producer Russell Simmons and British blues-rock singer Steve Winwood. The Doors called James "one of the world's legendary R&B icons."

POWER AND PAIN

James sang with a mixture of power and pain that led veteran musical producer Jerry Wexler to call her "the greatest of all modern blues singers ... the undisputed Earth Mother."

But throughout her long career she diversified into mainstream blues, soul and R&B. She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1993.

"Etta James is simply one of the best singers I've ever heard," singer-guitarist Bonnie Raitt wrote in Rolling Stone magazine. "... Etta is earthy and gritty, ribald and out-there in a way that few performers have the guts to be."

James' last album, "The Dreamer," was released in 2011. She spent the latter part of her life at home in California.

She was born Jamesetta Hawkins in Los Angeles on January 25, 1938, to an unmarried teenager who told her that her father was legendary pool shark Rudolph Wanderone, better known as Minnesota Fats. James told CNN she introduced herself to Wanderone in 1987 but was unable to confirm he was her father.

James sang gospel in the church choir and stood out even as a 5-year-old. By 1954, she recorded "Roll With Me Henry" with two other girls in a trio called The Peaches.

The group was discovered by bandleader Johnny Otis, and their song, renamed "The Wallflower," topped R&B charts in 1955. The Peaches eventually split up, but James continued recording and later that year "Good Rockin' Daddy" hit the charts.

Otis died on Tuesday in the Los Angeles area, age 90.

In the 1960s, James signed with Chicago's legendary Chess Records label and sang songs like "At Last" and "Trust in Me" that were backed by orchestras. But she never strayed too far from her gospel roots, as evidenced by 1962's "Something's Got a Hold of Me."

Over the decades, James' hit the R&B charts with 30 singles, and placed nine of those songs in pop music's top 40. She has often been cited as influencing singers including Raitt, Janis Joplin and Tina Turner.

James won her first Grammy in 1995 for her album, "Mystery Lady: The Songs of Billie Holiday." She also won Grammys in 2003 and 2005, as well as a lifetime achievement award in 2003 from the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, which gives out the Grammys.

She is survived by her husband, Artis Mills, two sons Donto and Sametto who played in James' backing band, and four grandchildren.

(Reporting By Bill Trott and Alex Dobuzinskis; Editing by Jill Serjeant and Bob Tourtellotte)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/cancer/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120120/en_nm/us_ettajames

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Neil Young journeys to Utah with new concert film (AP)

PARK CITY, Utah ? Neil Young recalls how his first concert film with director Jonathan Demme was a lush, stately tribute to country music.

He says their latest, "Neil Young Journeys," is more like an electric bolt, with a "grinding, blinding beauty to it."

Their 2006 film "Neil Young: Heart of Gold" premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and was a reflective, comforting chronicle of two shows Young performed at Nashville's Ryman Auditorium alongside such longtime musical comrades as Emmylou Harris, Ben Keith and Spooner Oldham.

"Journeys" is a raw, thunderous counterpart, filmed by Demme at Toronto's Massey Hall during the closing shows of Young's solo tour last year. Solo often implies intimate and acoustic, but Young wails away on electric guitar, harmonica, piano and organ throughout the show.

The new film played Saturday at the Slamdance Film Festival, a rival showcase to Sundance. Demme says it was a fitting place because both Slamdance and the film share something of a "bad-boy" attitude.

"'Journeys' is so different from `Heart of Gold.' It's like the other side of the universe," Young, 66, said in an interview alongside Demme. "'Heart of Gold' was a massive production with great caretaking to present this whole image of this forgotten style of presenting music, in this great old chapel of country music. ...

"This film we just made is so opposite of that. It's just one person. The sound is completely different and the attitude of it is different. The look is different. ... The sounds are kind of enveloping. You get to move way inside, whereas, `Heart of Gold,' you're way back, going, `Oh, it's beautiful seeing it from the back, seeing all these beautiful people, these great musicians.' And this one here, you're like inside my instrument, inside the distortion of the guitar. There's nothing in the way."

Demme and Young seem to be on a never-ending film journey. The new movie marks the fourth film collaboration between Young and Demme, the Academy Award-winning director of "The Silence of the Lambs."

Young earned an Oscar nomination for the title song of Demme's 1993 AIDS drama "Philadelphia," and in between "Heart of Gold" and "Journeys," the two made the 2009 concert film "Neil Young Trunk Show."

"Journeys" premiered at last September's Toronto International Film Festival and has since been picked up for theatrical distribution by Sony Pictures Classics.

The film includes extreme close-ups of Young captured by a tiny camera mounted on his microphone. The camera was so close its lens catches globs of spit from Young as he's singing, adding a bit of a psychedelic tinge to the images.

"It's more distorted and funky. It's a little bit more in your face," Young said. "It's like zooming in on something, losing everything that's usually around it, and you're just losing everything else. There's no bass, no drums, there's no other guitars, there's no other voices, there's no synthesizers, there's no echo. There's just this thing. It's a big sound, because you're right up on it. It's like a fantastic voyage into your guitars."

Along with songs from Young's 2010 album "Le Noise," "Journeys" features such classics as "After the Gold Rush," "Ohio" and "Down by the River."

Intercut between the songs in "Journeys" is a road trip Young takes to one of the Toronto shows from his northern Ontario hometown of Omemee, cruising with Demme in a 1956 Ford Crown Victoria and commenting on how the towns and landscape have changed.

"This whole world of cars and music, that's a big chunk of Neil's DNA. He's all about cars and driving and music in motion," Demme said. "I don't think we had any discussions. It was just like, well, we're going to Canada to shoot the concert in Toronto. Obviously, we'll drive down there from Omemee and take a look and see what's changed, and kind of just discover the past in the present. The same way the songs are very often kind of reflective. ...

"It put a lens up to his life. He's a medium for all of our lives. Certainly, our generation, whatever Neil's been singing about for the last 40 years or whatever, it's like, `Thank you. That's exactly what I was feeling. You've put it into words and music.'"

___

Online:

http://www.slamdance.com

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/entertainment/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120122/ap_en_ot/us_film_sundance_neil_young

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HBO's "Treme" won't be back until fall (omg!)

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - Don't book your ticket to New Orleans just yet. At least not as far as the HBO drama "Treme" is concerned.

The network has confirmed that season three of the David Simon series won't hit the airwaves until sometime in the fall. A specific premiere date has not been announced.

The fall premiere date is a departure from the norm for the series. The show's previous two seasons had April premiere dates.

In a tell-tale sign, the show was MIA on a HBO scheduling announcement for April premieres of shows including "Game of Thrones" and "Veep."

"Treme" chronicles the efforts of residents to rebuild a New Orleans neighborhood in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

(Editing by Chris Michaud)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/entertainment/*http%3A//us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/external/omg_rss/rss_omg_en/news_hbos_treme_wont_back_until_fall231522001/44236958/*http%3A//omg.yahoo.com/news/hbos-treme-wont-back-until-fall-231522001.html

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'American Idol' Already Belongs To Phillip Phillips

Season 11 contestant is a mashup of every male winner in show's history.
By Jim Cantiello


Phillip Phillips on American Idol's season premiere
Photo: FOX

Last night's 14-hour "American Idol" premiere presented the usual suspects of hopefuls. To paraphrase judge (and hideous eyewear collector) Randy Jackson at the end of the Savannah, Georgia, trip, "We came, we saw, we mocked immigrants' accents, we patronized and lusted after hot girls, we competently read off of producers' notes, we conquered."

Then, just as the expected parade of planted craycrays and daughters of sports athletes wrapped up, "Idol" introduced its eventual season 11 winner, Phillip Phillips.

First let's talk his name. It's so ridiculous, it's awesome. You'll never forget it. Not to get all numerologist on you, but for season 11, a digit comprised of "one" repeated twice, a name like Phillip Phillips is destined to end up on top. At least he is in a pretentious overwritten novel.

But Phillip Phillips' unavoidable victory truly comes into focus once you realize that he's a tried-and-true mashup of every male winner in the show's 10-year history.

Musically, Phillip2 is a Dave Matthews worshipper (hi, season nine's Lee DeWyze!) with the Joe Cocker mannerisms of season five's Taylor Hicks. His first audition song was a Stevie Wonder classic. (Sophomore class president Ruben Studdard made his first impression with a Stevie song, too.) And just when you thought fellow contestant Colton Dixon had the David Cook fans in his corner by singing the season seven winner's "Permanent" (and sharing a passion for haircuts tragique), Phillips rocked a "Thriller" of an encore: a white-dude twist on a Michael Jackson fave à la Cook's "Billie Jean."

Then there's the look. He showed up wearing the uniform of two different male victors: reigning champ Scotty McCreery's jeans and sandals combo and the "um, bro, I think you still have three more buttons to utilize on your plaid shirt" shtick of season eight's pocket-sized Idol Kris Allen.

It's no wonder "Idol" producers are drooling over this dude. Notice how Phillip2 was magically allowed to play the guitar for J. Lo, Steven and Randy, even though past seasons have forbidden instruments at this point in the audition process? Nigel Lythgoe knows that this dude with boyish good lucks from a small Southern town who works a boring-but-memorable day job is going to have the "Idol" superfans (myself included) making embarrassing homemade signs, leaving lengthy comments on blogs, tweeting hashtags that only a few dozen people understand and bitching about how overproduced his major-label debut will be. It's the same formula movie producers use when adding a "2" to the end of a hit movie title. We're sheep, guys.

So go back to the woods with your giant boyfriend, Tent Girl. And to the 17-year-old lady-killer who was compared to a young MJ but reminded me more of the woman who played Gary Coleman on Broadway's "Avenue Q," better luck next year. My personal fave, funky nutjob Ashlee Altise? Your joy-hop dance is about to turn into a depressed stomp.

This is Phillip Phillips' now. Cue the confetti.

So ... when's "The Voice" start again?

Get your "Idol" fix on MTV News' "American Idol" page, where you'll find all the latest news, interviews and opinions.

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1677534/phillip-phillips-american-idol.jhtml

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Gingrich, Santorum spar about years in Congress (AP)

CHARLESTON, S.C. ? Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum are sparring over each other's roles in Congress.

In a debate Thursday, Santorum said Gingrich was undisciplined as House speaker and couldn't enact legislation despite coming up with an "idea a minute."

Santorum, a former Pennsylvania senator and congressman. said he exposed a scandal in the early 1990s involving members of Congress bouncing checks at the House bank. Santorum said Gingrich never spoke out about that at the time.

Gingrich said he challenged his own party to push for reforms that eventually succeeded in Republicans winning a majority in the House in 1994.

Santorum said he wasn't as flashy as Gingrich but was steady and could get things done.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/gop/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120120/ap_on_re_us/us_gop_debate_congressional_histories

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Apple's Sweatshop Problem: 16 Hour Days, ~70 ... - Yahoo! Finance

We love our iPhones and iPads.

We love the prices of our iPhones and iPads.

We love the super-high profit margins of Apple, Inc., the maker of our iPhones and iPads.

And that's why it's disconcerting to remember that the low prices of our iPhones and iPads ? and the super-high profit margins of Apple ? are only possible because our iPhones and iPads are made with labor practices that would be illegal in the United States.

And it's also disconcerting to realize that the folks who make our iPhones and iPads not only don't have iPhones and iPads (because they can't afford them), but, in some cases, have never even seen them.

This is a complex issue. But it's also an important one. And it's only going to get more important as the world's economies continue to become more intertwined.

(And the issue obviously concerns a lot more companies than Apple. Almost all of the major electronics manufacturers make their stuff in China and other countries that have labor practices that would be illegal here. One difference with Apple, though, is the magnitude of the company's profit margin and profits. Apple could afford to pay its manufacturers more or hold them to higher standards and still be extremely competitive and profitable.)

Last week, PRI's "This American Life" did a special on Apple's manufacturing. The show featured (among others) the reporting of Mike Daisey, the man who does the one-man stage show "The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs," and The NYT's Nicholas Kristof, whose wife's family is from China.

You can read a transcript of the whole show here. Here are some details:

  • The Chinese city of Shenzhen is where most of our "crap" is made. 30 years ago, Shenzhen was a little village on a river. Now it's a city of 13 million people ? bigger than New York.
  • Foxconn, one of the companies that builds iPhones and iPads (and products for many other electronics companies), has a factory in Shenzhen that employs 430,000 people.
  • There are 20 cafeterias at the Foxconn Shenzhen plant. They each serve 10,000 people.
  • One Foxconn worker Mike Daisey interviewed, outside factory gates manned by guards with guns, was a 13-year old girl. She polished the glass of thousands of new iPhones a day.
  • The 13-year old said Foxconn doesn't really check ages. There are on-site inspections, from time to time, but Foxconn always knows when they're happening. And before the inspectors arrive, Foxconn just replaces the young-looking workers with older ones.
  • In the first two hours outside the factory gates, Daisey meets workers who say they are 14, 13, and 12 years old (along with plenty of older ones). Daisey estimates that about 5% of the workers he talked to were underage.
  • Daisey assumes that Apple, obsessed as it is with details, must know this. Or, if they don't, it's because they don't want to know.
  • Daisey visits other Shenzhen factories, posing as a potential customer. He discovers that most of the factory floors are vast rooms filled with 20,000-30,000 workers apiece. The rooms are quiet: There's no machinery, and there's no talking allowed. When labor costs so little, there's no reason to build anything other than by hand.
  • A Chinese working "hour" is 60 minutes ? unlike an American "hour," which generally includes breaks for Facebook, the bathroom, a phone call, and some conversation. The official work day in China is 8 hours long, but the standard shift is 12 hours. Generally, these shifts extend to 14-16 hours, especially when there's a hot new gadget to build. While Daisey is in Shenzhen, a Foxconn worker dies after working a 34-hour shift.
  • Assembly lines can only move as fast as their slowest worker, so all the workers are watched (with cameras). Most people stand.
  • The workers stay in dormitories. In a 12-by-12 cement cube of a room, Daisey counts 15 beds, stacked like drawers up to the ceiling. Normal-sized Americans would not fit in them.
  • Unions are illegal in China. Anyone found trying to unionize is sent to prison.
  • Daisey interviews dozens of (former) workers who are secretly supporting a union. One group talked about using "hexane," an iPhone screen cleaner. Hexane evaporates faster than other screen cleaners, which allows the production line to go faster. Hexane is also a neuro-toxin. The hands of the workers who tell him about it shake uncontrollably.
  • Some workers can no longer work because their hands have been destroyed by doing the same thing hundreds of thousands of times over many years (mega-carpal-tunnel). This could have been avoided if the workers had merely shifted jobs. Once the workers' hands no longer work, obviously, they're canned.
  • One former worker had asked her company to pay her overtime, and when her company refused, she went to the labor board. The labor board put her on a black list that was circulated to every company in the area. The workers on the black list are branded "troublemakers" and companies won't hire them.
  • One man got his hand crushed in a metal press at Foxconn. Foxconn did not give him medical attention. When the man's hand healed, it no longer worked. So they fired him. (Fortunately, the man was able to get a new job, at a wood-working plant. The hours are much better there, he says ? only 70 hours a week).
  • The man, by the way, made the metal casings of iPads at Foxconn. Daisey showed him his iPad. The man had never seen one before. He held it and played with it. He said it was "magic."

Importantly, Shenzhen's factories, as hellish as they are, have been a boon to the people of China. Liberal economist Paul Krugman says so. NYT columnist Nicholas Kristof says so. Kristof's wife's ancestors are from a village near Shenzhen. So he knows of what he speaks. The "grimness" of the factories, Kristof says, is actually better than the "grimness" of the rice paddies.

So, looked at that way, Apple is helping funnel money from rich American and European consumers to poor workers in China. Without Foxconn and other assembly plants, Chinese workers might still be working in rice paddies, making $50 a month instead of $250 a month (Kristof's estimates. In 2010, Reuters says, Foxconn workers were given a raise to $298 per month, or $10 a day, or less than $1 an hour). With this money, they're doing considerably better than they once were. Especially women, who had few other alternatives.

But, of course, the reason Apple assembles iPhones and iPads in China instead of America, is that assembling them here or Europe would cost much, much more ? even with shipping and transportation. And it would cost much, much more because, in the United States and Europe, we have established minimum acceptable standards for the treatment and pay of workers like those who build the iPhones and iPads.

Foxconn, needless to say, doesn't come anywhere near meeting these minimum standards.

If Apple decided to build iPhones and iPads for Americans using American labor rules, two things would likely happen:

  • The prices of iPhones and iPads would go up
  • Apple's profit margins would go down

Neither of those things would be good for American consumers or Apple shareholders. But they might not be all that awful, either. Unlike some electronics manufacturers, Apple's profit margins are so high that they could go down a lot and still be high. And some Americans would presumably feel better about loving their iPhones and iPads if they knew that the products had been built using American labor rules.

In other words, Apple could probably afford to use American labor rules when building iPhones and iPads without destroying its business.

So it seems reasonable to ask why Apple is choosing NOT to do that.

(Not that Apple is the only company choosing to avoid American labor rules and costs, of course ? almost all manufacturing companies that want to survive, let alone thrive, have to reduce production costs and standards by making their products elsewhere.)

The bottom line is that iPhones and iPads cost what they do because they are built using labor practices that would be illegal in this country ? because people in this country consider those practices grossly unfair.

That's not a value judgment. It's a fact.

So, next time you pick up your iPhone or iPad, ask yourself how you feel about that.

Aaron Task interviewed Mike Daisey last year. WATCH:

Mike Daisey Says Technology Is a New Religion

The Darker Side of Apple: The Human Cost of Your Apple iProducts

SEE ALSO: The Shocking Conditions Inside Foxconn [PHOTOS]

Source: http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ticker/apple-sweatshop-problem-16-hour-days-70-cents-172800495.html

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