AT&T Galaxy S III shipping date slips a week

Just a quick heads up that while we're waiting on official word from AT&T regarding actual availability of its Galaxy S III (you'll recall that Sprint and possibly T-Mobile have pushed things back a little), do note that the arrival date for preordering devices is now showing "on or before June 28" instead of June 21. (It's unknown whether that affects previously preordered devices, or new ones. We'll update you here when we find out.)

We'll likely be told any change is due to the unprecedented popularity of the phone. Or, if you're like us and would really like to give someone some money for a phone or two, you'll start to wonder what the holdup is, and whether it links back to previous production problems.

Anyway, looks like we'll be waiting an extra week on AT&T.

More: AT&T Galaxy S III

rambus rambus pabst blue ribbon pabst blue ribbon mac miller omarion gabby

Aid team to evacuate hundreds from Syria's Homs

Red Cross aid teams stood ready on Wednesday to enter the contested Syrian city of Homs to evacuate people trapped and wounded by 10 days of fighting between rebels and forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad.

1. Only on msnbc.com

   1. In police call, Trayvon Martin's father frets about son
   2. House Republicans vote to cite Holder for contempt in 'Fast and Furious' scandal
   3. 1.5 million children could starve to death in W. Africa
   4. Court: Mom's punishment over daughter's kiss too harsh
   5. Defense abruptly rests without calling Jerry Sandusky
   6. Ai Weiwei warned not to attend own court case
   7. With docket filling for the fall, high court looms over 2012 election

Both sides had agreed to a temporary truce, the International Committee of the Red Cross said from Geneva.

Teams from the ICRC and its partner the Syrian Red Crescent were ready to go into Homs as soon as possible, pending final arrangements.

"Fighting has been raging for more than 10 days between the Syrian Army and armed opposition groups in several neighborhoods of Homs city," said B?atrice M?gevand-Roggo, the ICRC's regional head of operations.

"Hundreds of civilians are stuck in the old city of Homs, unable to leave and find refuge in safer areas, because of the ongoing armed confrontations."

Pro-opposition Homs residents said rebels and troops were still locked in fierce battles on Wednesday evening in the neighborhoods the ICRC wanted to enter.

"They are still firing mortars and missiles into the city and there is heavy fighting in al-Qusour, al-Qarabis and al-Khalidiya," said activist Abu Yazen.

Russian shipment of attack helicopters for Syria halted off Scotland

Homs has been at the center of the 15-month revolt against Assad and became the focus of world concern in February and March, when opposition-held neighborhoods endured weeks of government bombardments and sniper fire in which hundreds of people were killed.

A Homs resident said a similar evacuation agreement was reached a few days ago but collapsed when shots were fired by Assad's forces. The government said on Tuesday it was trying to evacuate civilians and blamed rebel fighters for obstructing efforts to get people out safely.

In other action, rebels stormed an army barracks in the northwestern province of Latakia overnight and killed at least 20 soldiers, the pro-opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The rebels had captured some soldiers, including a colonel, and seized machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades, it said.

Latakia, a Mediterranean coastal province and home to Syria's main port, was relatively free of warfare until the past month.

As the action unfolded in Syria, world leaders aired their differences over the conflict at the G20 Summit at the Mexican resort of Los Cabos.

U.S. President Barack Obama said Assad, whose family have ruled Syria for four decades, had lost all legitimacy and that it was impossible to conceive of any solution to the violence that left him in power.

But Russian President Vladimir Putin told reporters at the end of the summit: "We believe that nobody has the right to decide for other nations who should be brought to power, who should be removed from power."

Alarmed but apparently impotent to resolve the crisis, the outside world is deeply divided in its response to the increasingly sectarian conflict that threatens to become a proxy war for regional powers.

Western nations and their Sunni Muslim allies in the Gulf and Turkey seek Assad's overthrow but are wary of intervention, while Russia, China and Shi'ite Iran - Assad's strategic ally - have protected Assad from a tough international response.

The United Nations says more than 10,000 people have been killed by government forces during the conflict, while Syria says at least 2,600 members of the military and security forces have been killed by what it calls foreign-backed "Islamist terrorists".

What began as a peaceful protest movement has developed into a civil war between the armed factions, marked by a campaign of repression by Assad's forces that has been internationally condemned for its ferocity.

More world news from msnbc.com and NBC News:

Follow us on Twitter: @msnbc_world

(c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2012. Check for restrictions at: http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp

buffalo sabres texas news kim mulkey sarah palin today show dallas tornado video 1940 census instagram for android

Lease Accounting Update: Where Do the IASB and FASB Stand ...

The matter of serious contemplation of significant changes to lease accounting rules arose in 2010, with the IASB (International Accounting Standards Board) and FASB (Financial Accounting Standards Board) proposing lease accounting changes, with an impact on lessee.

Background

The IASB and FASB had, as intent, the objective of having lessees show on their balance sheets greater amounts of lease assets and liabilities than presently exist. This would occur via capitalization of operating lease payments, adding significant leverage to balance sheets. While the objective was transparency, the proposed changes have been criticized for a slew of potential unintended consequences. For example, the effects of capitalizing previously off-balance sheet transactions on company leverage ratios will create the real possibility of an impact on debt covenant compliance for many without any true change in the company?s ability to make good on its obligations.

Further changes affecting lessees were criticized for their stringency, creating more rigorous stressing of company balance sheets than those required in credit rating analysis by the rating agencies. For example, historical behavior would be used to dictate balance sheet treatment, thus turning the potential decision of a lessee to structure post-primary term payments into current liability reflected on its balance sheet. Additionally, a use of the longest possible lease term that was ?more likely than not? occurring, a forecast of ?most likely? lease renewals, contingent rental payments, residual value guarantees, and purchase options, and rental escalations would all be lumped into a capitalization formula to be applied.

An onerous compliance burden was included in the proposal and would include complex calculations for booking immaterial lease transactions requiring additional subjective judgment. Additionally, periodic adjustments during a lease term were proposed based on lease payment estimates expected to adjust in each reporting period based on an anticipated end term decision of the lessee.

Equipment Finance Industry Response

The IASB and FASB had received significant opposition to the draft proposal, including the preliminary June 2011 timetable set forth by the two Boards for the adoption of a new standard. Subsequent meetings were set, to deliberate on the issues involved and also a new timeline for the project.

The Equipment Leasing and Finance Association (ELFA), a trade association that represents more than 600 financial services companies and manufacturers in the more than $500 billion U.S. equipment finance sector, has released on its popular website www.elfaonline.com material covering these proposed changes to the area of lease accounting and financial reporting, including the impact on the leasing and finance industry.

By mid-January 2011, ELFA had received over 700 comment letters from members and others concerned with the proposed changes to lease accounting rules. Many responses were critical of the lease term and variable lease payment provisions in the proposal, pointing out that they would be too costly and complex to apply and would not provide the most relevant financial information. Some responses questioned whether requiring lessees to recognize liabilities, and lessors to recognize assets that include payments that could be avoided would meet the definitions of assets and liabilities under the conceptual framework

Some Progress Has Been Made

The result of the January 2011 meeting was a change to the proposed model for lease accounting as initially set forth by the boards, with a tentative agreement to revise proposed definitions of lease terms and treatment of variable lease payments. The boards remained committed to the position that all leases be recognized on balance sheets, but were open to re-deliberation and reconsideration of an income and expense recognition pattern, the definition of lease, and a lessor accounting model.

By February 2011, resulting from the many comments in letters, the FASB and IASB decided to change the definition of a lease term. Other issues were still deliberated.

Without final agreement on all issues, leasing standards were still being delayed in April 2011; the June 2011 target date for implementation was pushed back to allow for more feedback, for example. By May 2011 Financial Watch was reporting the efforts of the boards to change standards, the progress that had been made, and what was still being debated and considered.

At the end of May 2011, the FASB and IASB reversed prior tentative decisions in the lease accounting project, tentatively deciding on lessee P&L parameters, and changing its stance on a retrospective accounting methodology. The new method would utilize an incremental borrowing rate to calculate adjustments when lease term assumptions changed. At that time, short-term leases were not made exempt from capitalization and a lessor accounting method was still undecided.

A Very Active ELFA

By July 2011, in response to the May 2011 position of the Boards, ELFA (together with numerous other interested organizations and parties) expressed concern that failure to consider public comment and inconsistent decision making was reflective of a ?weakening of due process? and the board virtually ignoring the substance and merits of the matters being considered. The ELFA then requested an economic impact study, full field testing, and re-exposure of the lease accounting proposal in an effort to create a standard that would meet the marketplace tests and fulfill stakeholder needs.

Month after month, the ELFA continued to press the boards. By October 2011, the boards had made major changes to the lease project, in response to the issues raised by the ELFA comment letters and those of other interested parties. Most negative issues were reconsidered with a favorable result including less burdensome proposed changes that would lessen the financial and compliance impact.

Still, several major issues were still outstanding. Three of the major issues not adopted were straight line lessee P&L cost, the retention of sales type lease accounting, and the retention of leveraged lease accounting.

In November 2011 a Project Update was released, and also a statement that a new draft on accounting for leases was set for issuance in March or April 2012 with a 120 day comment period.

A study of the economic impact of the proposed changes to lease accounting standards was released in December 2011. This comprehensive document assessed strengths and weaknesses of the proposed changes and the impact on the economy and equity in U.S. companies, with a potential reduction of $96 billion in reduced equity. It also found that there would be an estimated $2 trillion added to balance sheets of US corporations and a reduction of pre-tax income. The study found that there could be significant but unintended consequences resulting from the proposed changes including a clear change in lessor-lessee dynamics. It was portended that a front-loading of leasing costs would take about five years or so to reverse direction and, in general, the new accounting model would have a long-term negative impact on the equity reported by companies on their balance sheets.

So Where Does This Leave Us?

In March 2012 the IASB and FASB were differing on how to approach certain operating expenses and leases. By April 2012 lessee accounting approaches were still being considered by the two boards. At the end of May 2012 the boards had dropped two of four possible approaches and alternatives to lessee/lessor accounting, as being too complex.

Last week saw a compromise between the IASB and FASB that may suggest movement toward an approach that would be less burdensome on equipment finance companies. The two accounting standards boards agreed that lease accounting rules would include two types of leases: one to be treated like financing and the other to be treated as straight-line expense.

It is possible that a final version of the rules could be available sometime next year and perhaps go into effect as early as 2016. Still at issue is coming to agreement as to how to determine which treatment a lease should get. This is not yet clear, but the fact that the boards recognized that all leases were not created equal is very encouraging.

?

lionel richie morosini death kenny rogers avatar the last airbender david wright cory booker cj wilson

SmartMoney to close print edition, boost online

LOS ANGELES (AP) ? After three-straight quarters of steep advertising declines, SmartMoney's print magazine is ceasing publication and switching to an all-digital format aimed at online users.

Dow Jones & Co., a unit of News Corp., said 25 positions at SmartMoney will be eliminated. It will increase SmartMoney.com's staff from nine to 15 editorial employees.

Dow Jones Editor-in-Chief Robert Thomson said the move will address "the need for rapid delivery of personal finance intelligence" at a time of volatile financial markets.

The publication found that readers were increasingly going to the Web for up-to-date information and analysis. SmartMoney content will be melded more closely with MarketWatch.com, another Dow Jones property that is available for free online.

Dow Jones sells ads across several websites that it calls The Wall Street Journal Digital Network. The network includes sites for The Wall Street Journal, Barron's magazine and AllThingsD. Both The Wall Street Journal and Barron's require paid subscriptions for full online access.

Circulation at SmartMoney held relatively steady over the years ? at 815,154 per issue in the last six months of 2011 compared to 815,951 in the same period in 2006, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations. But ad revenue was dropping quickly. It was down 19.3 percent from the previous year in the quarter through March at $6.9 million, following a 22.3 percent drop in the quarter through December and an 11.7 percent drop in the quarter before that, according to the Publishers Information Bureau.

Meanwhile, ad revenue for U.S. magazines overall fell at a slower rate of 8.2 percent in the quarter through March.

Print publications have been losing revenue and readers as more content and advertising moves online. Some publishers have chosen to cut costs by slashing their print runs. This month, Advance Publications moved to lay off about 600 employees at newspapers in Alabama and Louisiana, including The Times-Picayune in New Orleans, as it prepars to cut the print run from daily to three days a week in the fall.

Rick Edmonds, a media business analyst at The Poynter Institute, a prominent journalism school, said the change didn't convince him that the publication had a bright future because online ads typically generate less revenue than print ads.

"I can see the savings, but if their print advertising is still at a higher rate, the question is, 'Where is the money coming from?'"

Merging SmartMoney with MarketWatch may provide some protective cover. SmartMoney had just 2.5 million monthly visitors, but MarketWatch's online audience has grown 50 percent over the last 12 months to 17 million, Dow Jones said.

The Wall Street Journal's chief revenue officer, Michael Rooney, said in a statement that SmartMoney's content and innovative online tools "will be a needle-moving addition to MarketWatch's already strong portfolio of content."

SmartMoney's last print issue, the September edition, will hit newsstands on Aug. 14.

SmartMoney was launched jointly between Dow Jones and Hearst Corporation in 1992. Dow Jones acquired Hearst's 50 percent interest in 2010.

Dow Jones said laid-off employees will be able to re-apply for SmartMoney.com jobs and elsewhere in the company.

Associated Press

state of the union sotu boehner john boehner demi moore hospitalized james farentino somali pirates

NJ sheriff's office creates 'Facecrook' site (Providence Journal)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories Stories, News Feeds and News via Feedzilla.

thanksgiving appetizers greg jennings thanksgiving recipes thanksgiving recipes mashed potato recipe mashed potato recipe cranberry sauce

Suu Kyi walks on with 'star-struck' Bono

DUBLIN (AP) ? Aung San Suu Kyi and Bono joined forces Monday as the Myanmar democracy activist's European tour moved from the home of the Nobel Peace Prize to the land of U2.

The pair spent more than an hour answering questions at an Oslo conference of peace mediators at the end of Suu Kyi's four-day visit to Norway. Then they jetted together to the Irish capital, Dublin, for an evening concert in her honor.

Irish Foreign Minister Eamon Gilmore and a trio of children, two of them Burmese nationals, offered Suu Kyi flowers as she arrived at Dublin Airport. After meeting Irish President Michael D. Higgins, she arrived at a riverside theater to thunderous cheers and applause, with Bono and Nobel laureate poet Seamus Heaney walking alongside her down the red carpet.

Inside, Amnesty International organized a three-hour show of songs, poems and speeches in her honor featuring top Irish stars, and set against a backdrop of a wall of opened birdcages symbolizing her freedom from house arrest in 2010.

The Riverdance troupe got proceedings off to a foot-stomping start. Folk guitarist Donal Lunny led the audience in a soft musical chant of Aung San Suu Kyi's name lasting several minutes. Irish actress Saoirse Ronan read a poem, followed by English actress Vanessa Redgrave reading one of Heaney's, "The Republic of Conscience." Dublin folk rocker Damien Rice sang his hit "Can't Take My Eyes Off of You" to a spare cello accompaniment.

Redgrave and Bono then presented Suu Kyi with another of her long-postponed awards, Amnesty's Ambassador of Conscience. Bono had announced the award at a Dublin U2 concert in 2009 during a worldwide concert tour that highlighted demands for her freedom.

"Everybody's here to sing for you tonight, but it's your song that everybody wants to hear," Bono said as he invited Suu Kyi on to the stage to a two-minute standing ovation.

"This has come as a surprise to me, and a very moving one," said Suu Kyi, who got laughs by observing that the British used to consider the Burmese "the Irish of the east" ? because they never gave the British any peace, both liked a drink and were very superstitious.

Bono, who also wrote the 2000 hit "Walk On" in praise of Suu Kyi's long exile from her family, had never met her before. He admitted, during his first news conference alongside Suu Kyi in Oslo, that he found her a wee bit intimidating.

"I'm star-struck ... but I'm managing to get over it," said the 52-year-old Bono, who donned his trademark yellow-tinted wraparound glasses and high-heeled boots.

Suu Kyi, in turn, said Bono had hit the right note with "Walk On," which was written from the point of view of her husband Michael Aris. Myanmar's military rulers refused to let him see his wife from 1995 to his death from cancer in 1999.

"I like that song, because it's very close to how I feel, that it's up to you to carry on," said Suu Kyi, who turns 67 on Tuesday. "It's good if you have supporters, it's good if you have people who are sympathetic and understanding. But in the end, it's your own two legs that have to carry you on."

Following the Dublin concert at an outdoor rally, Suu Kyi is to sign the roll of honor proclaiming her a Freewoman of the City of Dublin, an honorific title bestowed in her absence in 1999.

Amnesty officials also plan to give her a birthday cake and lead the crowd in a chorus of "Harry Birthday."

Bono said Suu Kyi was exceptionally philosophical and spiritual for a politician. And he expressed admiration over how she had stuck to a position of nonviolence throughout her 15 years in detention.

"It's really her nonviolent position that I find so impressive because perhaps I find it hard to fathom," he said, adding: "I think she will be remembered for that kind of spiritual insight really, as much as the sort of nitty-gritty of her politics, because she's a tough customer, too."

Suu Kyi spent much of her final hours in Oslo focused on that nitty-gritty: the challenge of coaxing Myanmar's military-controlled government toward democracy without alienating militants from warring ethnic groups who demand immediate change.

Her party, the National League for Democracy, won elections in 1990 only to see the result annulled. It boycotted the next elections in 2010, and today has just entered Myanmar's legislature as a small opposition force.

Ireland's foreign minister, Gilmore, said he hoped "that the recent positive developments in Burma, including Ms. Suu Kyi's election, herald the real beginning of a new era of peace, democracy and human rights."

But Suu Kyi noted that any changes to the country's laws of government would require more than 75 percent support in the legislature ? and army members represent a blocking 25 percent of votes.

"We will need at least one army representative to vote for amendments. So we have to work with the army. ... We don't want to be in conflict with them, we want to achieve a consensus," Suu Kyi said in response to a question from The Associated Press.

Earlier, she told the audience of international conflict mediators that building unity among Myanmar's many warring ethnic groups meant she must remain open to talking with those still committed to violence.

Suu Kyi said she wouldn't "disinherit or disown" militant groups based along Myanmar's borders in Thailand and Bangladesh "because we share the same goals" of creating a proper democracy that respects minority rights in Myanmar. Nor, she said, could she promise them that such goals could be achieved without violent rebellion ? but they had both a moral and practical obligation to try.

She said her National League for Democracy could "not let go of our conviction that change could be brought about through peaceful means, and in the long run that would be better.

"The wounds that are opened up by violent conflict take a long time to heal," she said. "And while the peaceful way might take longer, in the end there are fewer wounds to be healed."

___

Associated Press writer David MacDougall in Oslo, Norway, contributed to this report.

___

Online:

Freedom of the City of Dublin, http://bit.ly/KWmFT6

donald glover julio cesar chavez jr jason segel turducken power rangers jungle fury power rangers jungle fury ufc 139 fight card

Sly Google wields the knife in Chinese Internet censorship tussle

Google has introduced a new feature for Chinese users that will pull back the curtain on Chinese Internet government censorship.

By Peter Ford,?Staff writer / June 1, 2012

In this March 2010 file photo, flowers are placed on the Google logo outside Google China headquarters in Beijing.

Ng Han Guan/AP/File

Enlarge

This week the search engine giant Google kept a polite smile on its face as it stuck its shiv in up to the hilt, introducing a feature to its Chinese site that tells users exactly when the censors have blocked a search word for being too ?sensitive.?

Skip to next paragraph Peter Ford

Beijing Bureau Chief

Peter Ford is The Christian Science Monitor?s Beijing Bureau Chief. He covers news and features throughout China and also makes reporting trips to Japan and the Korean peninsula.

Recent posts

' + google_ads[0].line2 + '
' + google_ads[0].line3 + '

'; } else if (google_ads.length > 1) { ad_unit += ''; } } document.getElementById("ad_unit").innerHTML += ad_unit; google_adnum += google_ads.length; return; } var google_adnum = 0; google_ad_client = "pub-6743622525202572"; google_ad_output = 'js'; google_max_num_ads = '1'; google_feedback = "on"; google_ad_type = "text"; google_adtest = "off"; google_image_size = '230x105'; google_skip = '0'; // -->

The Chinese government keeps its list of banned search terms secret; Google is now revealing them. But not once did Google Vice President Alan Eustace mention the word ?censorship? in his blog introducing the new feature.

Instead he noted that users in China ?are regularly getting error messages? when they search for ?a particular subset of queries.? He mentioned the word ?jiang? as a case in point ? but did not explain why such a common surname that also means ?river? should be a banned search term.

It?s because ?jiang? is the surname of former president Jiang Zemin, about whom the censors don?t want Chinese citizens to find out much because most of what is written about him on the web concerns his allegedly poor health and his role in succession struggles within the ruling Communist party.

The problem for Google users in China, and Google, is that whenever a user searched for a banned word not only would the search yield only an error message, but the connection to Google would be lost for a minute or so, which is highly inconvenient.

No wonder that Google has only 16 percent of the Chinese search engine market, way behind local competitor Baidu, with 78 percent. Baidu self-censors, so its users have no problem searching ?jiang.? Google has refused to self censor since 2010, when it withdrew from the mainland and based itself in Hong Kong.

Google?s new feature, designed, says Mr. Eustace, to ?help improve the search experience in mainland China,? will warn users when they are searching for a banned word that will cut their connection, allowing them to re-define their searchwords.

Google has identified the ?dangerous? words after analyzing the censors? response to 350,000 of the most popular search queries in China, Eustace explained. And now it is telling its users what those words are, in defiance of the Chinese government?s policy of keeping them secret.

But not too defiant. The tone of Eustace?s blog could not have been smoother nor its references to censorship more roundabout. Google, it seems, does not want to upset Beijing too much.

Perhaps that is because although the US company is pretty much out of the search engine market here, and the censors block or mess with all its products except Gmail, Google still has a big commercial interest in China.

The firm is pushing its Android mobile phone operating system hard, and successfully, with Chinese handset manufacturers. Last month it won Beijing?s approval for its $12.5 billion purchase of Motorola Mobility, a wireless device maker. Under those circumstances, it is probably best not to be too blunt when you are challenging the authorities. A polite smile to mask the knife thrust seems a wise idea.

bo jackson weather houston weather houston small business saturday small business saturday hank baskett beyonce dance for you