Congress, Obama playing with dynamite, CEOs say of “fiscal cliff”

BOSTON (Reuters) – Corporate America is raising the volume of its plea that the U.S. government avert a year-end “fiscal cliff” that could send the nation back into recession, but chief executives aren’t pushing the panic button just yet.

With a heated election season in the rear-view mirror, executives are calling on the White House and congressional leaders to head off a self-imposed deadline that could bring $ 600 billion in spending cuts and higher taxes early in 2013 if they are unable to reach a deal on cutting the federal budget deficit.

The Business Roundtable on Tuesday kicked off a print, radio and online ad campaign on which it plans to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars featuring the chiefs of Honeywell International Inc , Xerox Corp and United Parcel Service Inc calling on lawmakers to resolve the issue.

In an opinion piece published on Tuesday evening on the Wall Street Journal’s website, Goldman Sachs Chief Executive Officer Lloyd Blankfein urged the business community and the Obama administration to compromise and reconcile so as not to derail the fragile recovery.

One of the more dramatic warnings of the consequences of allowing the U.S. economy to go over the fiscal cliff came from Honeywell CEO David Cote.

“If the last debt ceiling discussion was playing with fire, this time they’re playing with nitroglycerin,” Cote said in an interview. “If they go off the cliff, I think it would spark a recession that’s a lot bigger than economists think. Some think it would just be a small fire. I think it could turn into a conflagration.”

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that the U.S. economy would contract 0.5 percent in 2013 if the government fails to stop the budget cuts and tax increases – far below the 2 percent growth economists currently forecast.

A failure in Washington to solve the crisis by the year’s end could prompt major companies to curtail investment plans, said Duncan Niederauer, CEO of NYSE Euronext , operator of the New York Stock Exchange.

“We simply won’t be investing in the United States. We will be investing elsewhere where we have more certainty of the outcome,” Niederauer said in an interview.

About a dozen top U.S. CEOs, including General Electric Co’s Jeff Immelt, Aetna Inc’s Mark Bertolini, American Express Co’s Ken Chenault and Dow Chemical Co’s Andrew Liveris are scheduled to meet with President Barack Obama on Wednesday to discuss the issue.

The four are members of “Fix the Debt,” an ad-hoc lobbying organization that this week launched an advertising campaign that advocates long-term debt reduction.

UNCERTAINTY FACTOR

Bank of America Corp CEO Brian Moynihan said on Tuesday that worries about the cliff have companies holding off on spending.

“That uncertainty continues to hold back the recovery,” Moynihan said, speaking at an investor conference in New York.

Sandy Cutler, CEO of manufacturer Eaton Corp , shared his concern.

“Until we solve the fiscal issues (in the United States and Europe), you’re not going to get back to normal GDP growth,” Cutler told investors on Tuesday.

CEOs are not alone in this worry. The CBO report warned that failure to reach a deal could push the U.S. unemployment rate up to 9.1 percent, the highest since July 1991. It is currently 7.9 percent.

Obama and the Republican leadership of the House of Representatives have signaled a more conciliatory tone since last week’s election, when Obama soundly defeated Republican challenger Mitt Romney, whose party retained a majority in the House.

Wilbur Ross, an investor known for taking stakes in distressed companies, is bracing for higher tax rates in 2013.

“We, like many people, have been trying to utilize gains this year. It does seem that the probability is that rates will go up,” Ross said in an interview with Reuters Insider. “We don’t have a “for sale” sign on anything. But we are mindful that there is a benefit to concluding things this year rather than next.

NO SIGNS OF PANIC

Concerns about the cliff have not prompted customers to cancel orders, though they have added to an overall level of uneasiness that has companies wary of making large capital purchases or hiring significant numbers of new workers.

“We haven’t seen the panicking, like, ‘I’m not going to order something because of the fiscal cliff,’” said Steve Shawley, chief financial officer of heating and cooling systems maker Ingersoll Rand Plc . “Customers are being very judicious with their orders.”

Likewise, JPMorgan Chase & Co CEO Jamie Dimon last month told investors he did not expect the negotiations to hurt lending in the fourth quarter.

“The fiscal cliff isn’t going to change us,” Dimon said, referring to JPMorgan’s commercial bank, which loans money to businesses. The bank’s investment banking side could be more vulnerable if the debate makes investors jittery, he allowed.

WEAPONS, MEDICINES IN THE CROSS-HAIRS

The defense and healthcare sectors are the most vulnerable to the fiscal cliff, as they face the threat of sequestration — automatic, across-the-board cuts to their funding.

Makers of weapons systems note that they have long been preparing for declining sales as the United States winds down two long wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The industry has already shed tens of thousands of jobs and closed facilities.

Lockheed Martin Corp’s new president and chief operating officer, Marillyn Hewson, told analysts on Monday her company had been preparing for tighter defense budgets for years, even before the sequestration deal.

“We aren’t going to see a major change,” said Hewson. “We’ve been very proactive as a leadership team in taking actions in recent years to address our cost structure, to look at how we can make our product more affordable.”

Automatic cuts to the federal budget could reduce federal health spending by $ 21.5 billion in 2013, potentially affecting everything from Medicare to the Food and Drug Administration, according to an analysis by PwC’s Health Research Institute.

Vincent Forlenza, the CEO of Beckton Dickinson & Co , said the labs he supplies have held off on buying new instruments because of the threat of spending cuts.

“If we don’t get to a deal we will have another year of paralysis and putting off research,” Forlenza said. “The impact of uncertainty on the (National Institutes of Health) budget is causing our research customers to put off research.”

(Additional reporting by John McCrank, Nick Zieminski, Caroline Humer, Jed Horowitz, Sharon Begley and Daniel Wilchins in New York, Rick Rothacker in Charlotte, North Carolina, Nichola Groom in Los Angeles, Andrea Shalal-Esa in Washington, Debra Sherman in Chicago and Anna Driver in Houston; Editing by Patricia Kranz and Steve Orlofsky and Carol Bishopric)

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Head of Microsoft’s Windows unit steps down

(Reuters) – Microsoft Corp said the head of its flagship Windows division and the driving force behind Windows 8, Steven Sinofsky, will be leaving the company with immediate effect, days after the software giant launched the Surface tablet.

Sinofsky, who presented at the launch of the Windows 8 operating system in New York City last month, will be succeeded by Julie Larson-Green, who will head the Windows hardware and software division, the company said in a statement.

Tami Reller will remain chief financial officer and chief marketing officer and will assume responsibility for the business of Windows.

Both executives will report directly to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, Microsoft said.

At the launch event in October, Sinofsky and his team showed off a range of devices running Windows 8 from PC makers such as Lenovo Group Ltd and Acer Inc, but devoted most of their energy to the second half of the presentation and the Surface tablet, the first computer Microsoft has made itself.

(Reporting by Sakthi Prasad and Nicola Leske; Editing by Edmund Klamann)

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Storm volunteers mingle with stars at Glamour fest

NEW YORK (AP) — Sandra Kyong Bradbury was star struck. She had just spied Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg a few feet away.

“How can you top that?” asked Bradbury, a New York City neonatal nurse who had helped evacuate infants from a hospital that lost power during the height of Superstorm Sandy. She was amazed that she was being honored at the same event as a Supreme Court justice — the annual Glamour Women of the Year awards, where stars of film, TV, fashion and sports share the stage with lesser-known women who have equally impressive achievements to their name.

Few events bring together such an eclectic group of honorees, not to mention presenters. At the Carnegie Hall ceremony Monday night, HBO star Lena Dunham, creator of “Girls” and a heroine to a younger generation, was introduced by Chelsea Handler and paid tribute in her speech to Nora Ephron, who died earlier this year. Ethel Kennedy was praised by her daughter, Rory, who has made a film about her famous mother. Olympic gymnast Gabby Douglas, 17, was honored along with swimming phenom Missy Franklin, also 17, and other Olympic athletes, introduced by singer Mary J. Blige and serenaded by American Idol winner Phillip Phillips. Singer-actress Selena Gomez was lauded by her friend, the actor Ethan Hawke.

But the most moving moments of the Glamour awards, now in their 22nd year, are often those involving people of whom the audience hasn’t heard. This year, the most touching moment came when one honoree, Pakistani activist and filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, brought onstage a woman who’d been the victim of an acid attack in her native Pakistan. Obaid-Chinoy won this year’s documentary short Oscar for a film about disfiguring acid attacks on Pakistani women by the men in their lives.

The evening carried reminders of Superstorm Sandy, with Newark, N.J. Mayor Cory Booker introducing some 20 women who’d been heavily involved in storm relief work. “They held us together when Sandy tried to blow us apart,” Booker said. The women worked for organizations like the American Red Cross, but also smaller volunteer groups like Jersey City Sandy Recovery, an impromptu group formed by three women in Jersey City, N.J., who wanted a way to help storm-ravaged communities.

Singer-rapper Pharrell Williams introduced one of his favorite architects, the Iraqi-born Zaha Hadid, 62, who designed the aquatic center for the London Olympics and is now at work on 43 projects around the world.

Activist Erin Merryn was honored for her work increasing awareness of child sex abuse — a horror she had endured during her own childhood. A law urging schools to educate children about sex abuse prevention, Erin’s Law, has now passed in four states. “I won’t stop until I get it passed in all 50 states,” Merryn insisted in her speech.

Vogue editor Anna Wintour saluted a fellow fashion luminary, honoree Annie Leibovitz, the creator of so many iconic photographs over the years. Jenna Lyons, the president of J. Crew, got kind words from her presenter, former supermodel Lauren Hutton. Chelsea Clinton brought up a stageful of women from across the country who had been involved in politics this year, noting that, while there is still a long way to go, progress was made in 2012.

The lifetime achievement award went to Ginsburg, 79, who made a few quips about being honored by a fashion magazine. “The judiciary is not a profession that ranks very high among the glamorously attired,” the justice said. She also noted that although she was only the second female Supreme Court justice (Sandra Day O’Connor came first), she was the first justice to be honored by Glamour.

An affectionate tribute to the late Ephron followed, with three actresses — Cynthia Nixon, and two Meryl Steep daughters, Mamie and Grace Gummer, reading from a graduation speech she had given at Wellesley College.

Actress Dunham, in her speech, touched on politics and expressed her own relief that President Barack Obama had won re-election, saying she felt it was crucial for reproductive freedom and other issues of women’s rights. “I wanted control of my womb before I really knew what my womb was,” she quipped.

After the ceremony, which was presided over by Glamour editor in chief Cindi Leive, honorees and presenters headed to a private dinner. There, Sandy volunteers mingled with the stars. One woman, Lynier Harper, had spent six nights during Sandy at the Brooklyn YMCA where she works, taking care of other people. “When I finally went back home, my house was totally destroyed,” she said. She has moved in with her sister while she seeks a new home.

A group of seven nurses came from New York University’s Langone Medical Center, which lost power during the storm. The neonatal intensive care nurses had to carry the babies down nine flights of stairs, in the dark, squeezing oxygen into their lungs, to get them to safety.

And there were the three women from Jersey City Sandy Recovery, sinking in the proximity to the so many impressive people.

“I just shook Ruth Bader Ginsburg‘s hand,” exulted one of them, Candice Osborne. “How awesome!”

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Glitch prevents trading in over 200 stocks on the NYSE

NEW YORK (Reuters) – NYSE Euronext on Monday suspended trading in over 200 stocks on the New York Stock Exchange due to a technical problem with a server, though the stocks in question were still trading actively on other markets.

There will be no closing auctions in the affected stocks, and a list of the official closing prices for the securities, based on the consolidated last sale, will be distributed via email and NYSE’s website, the exchange operator said.

NYSE first alerted traders it was having problems with one of its cash equity matching engines at 9:38 a.m., and it said it would not publish quotes on a total of 216 stocks, including CVS Caremark Corp and Lazard Ltd .

Nasdaq OMX Group , BATS Global Markets and Direct Edge exchanges stopped sending orders to the NYSE, declaring “self help” against the exchange.

“Orders were coming in, but those who were issuing the orders were not getting their confirmations or their reports, so we felt it was best to zero it out, if you will, and then to suspend trading of those stocks on our market,” said Rich Adamonis, an NYSE spokesman.

NYSE said that any open orders should be considered canceled.

Adamonis said the server issues were still being investigated at around 3 p.m., but said they came as the issues were being moved over to a new trading platform.

NYSE is in the process of moving all of its markets – including bonds, options, futures and cash equities – in the United States and Europe to a universal electronic trading platform.

The New York-based company’s European markets have been fully integrated with the new system, and the exchange is now in the process of moving over its roughly 3,800 U.S. cash equities issues to the new platform, with about 800 having been migrated so far, Adamonis said.

The migration will continue to be rolled out through the rest of the year, he added.

(Reporting By John McCrank; Editing by Leslie Adler)

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U2′s Bono to urge U.S. politicians not to cut aid programs

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Irish rocker and anti-poverty campaigner Bono will appeal to Democrats and Republicans during a visit to Washington this week to spare U.S. development assistance programs from cuts as Congress tries to avert the looming “fiscal cliff” of tax hikes and spending reductions early next year.

The U2 lead singer’s visit comes as the Obama administration and congressional leaders try to forge a deal in coming weeks to avoid the economy hitting the “fiscal cliff” – tax increases and spending cuts worth $ 600 billion starting in January if Congress does not act.

Analysts say the absence of a deal could shock the United States, the world’s biggest economy, back into recession.

Kathy McKiernan, spokeswoman for the ONE Campaign, said Bono will hold talks with congressional lawmakers and senior Obama administration officials during the November 12-14 visit.

During meetings he will stress the effectiveness of U.S. foreign assistance programs and the need to preserve them to avoid putting at risk progress made in fighting HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, she said.

Bono, a long-time advocate for the poor, will argue that U.S. government-funded schemes that support life-saving treatments for HIV/AIDS sufferers, nutrition programs for malnourished children, and emergency food aid make up just 1 percent of the U.S. government budget but are helping to save tens of millions of lives in impoverished nations.

The One Campaign would not elaborate which lawmakers and senior Obama administration officials Bono will meet.

On Monday, Bono will discuss the power of social movements with students at Georgetown University. He will also meet new World Bank President Jim Yong Kim for a web cast discussion on Wednesday on the challenges of eradicating poverty.

(Editing by W Simon)

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Spinal steroid shots may have little effect on sciatica

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Despite the growing popularity of steroid injections to treat various kinds of back pain in recent years, a new review of past research finds the shots do little to alleviate sciatica, a common condition that causes leg and back pain.

Analyzing results from nearly two dozen clinical trials on thousands of patients, Australian researchers found that epidural injections (into the spine) of corticosteroids had no long- or short-term effect on sciatica back pain, and such a small short-term effect on leg pain it would make no difference to the patient.

“I think it’s pretty clear that this treatment is not good to do,” said Chris Maher, of The George Institute for Global Health in Sydney, Australia, who worked on the study.

Nonetheless, the use of epidural steroid injections to treat back pain of all sorts among Medicare patients nearly doubled from 741,000 in 2000 to about 1,438,000 in 2004, according to the researchers.

In the U.S., the cost of one shot can be several hundred dollars.

And a tainted supply of one of the steroids included in the trials under analysis – methylprednisolone – recently caused a nationwide outbreak of fungal meningitis that infected 400 people and led to 31 deaths, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

For sciatica, which is thought to be caused by nerve damage, past studies have already questioned the effectiveness of spinal steroid shots.

In April, for instance, a study of 81 people found that whether they received steroids or a placebo for sciatica, their condition ended up improving about the same amount. (see Reuters Health article of April 16, 2012.)

Maher and his colleagues set out to see whether past studies supported the use of epidural corticosteroid injections to help manage sciatica, and collected results from “gold standard” randomized controlled trials.

Overall, 23 trials were included in the final analysis, which represented about 2,300 patients, whose pain was ranked on a scale from zero to 100 – with higher scores representing worse pain.

For the back pain component of sciatica, the researchers found that the injections didn’t seem to make a difference over short or long periods of time.

When it came to leg pain, there was no difference a year or so after the injection, but there was a statistically significant six-point drop in pain scores over the short term – about 2 weeks to 3 months.

But that, according to Maher, is not enough to mean anything to a doctor or patient.

“You can appreciate that six points on a hundred-point scale is a tiny difference, and in our view that is probably not clinically important,” he said.

‘QUESTION IS CLOSED’

“We really think the question is closed,” said Maher. “So in terms of our research agenda, we’re moving on to other treatments for sciatica.”

Maher told Reuters Health that, instead of steroid injections, people suffering with sciatica should consult their doctor, but other options include simple pain relievers, such as acetaminophen, drugs that treat pain by working throughout a person’s nervous system and, as a last resort, surgery.

Not everyone agrees that steroid injections should be excluded from the hierarchy of treatments for sciatica.

“In general, I think we’ve learned over the years that the epidural injections are turning out to be less and less successful… but there are times when they should be considered,” said Dr. Kirkham B. Wood, chief of the orthopedic spine service at Boston’s Massachusetts General Hospital.

He told Reuters Health that he believes an injection should be considered, for example, in someone with sciatica resulting from a relatively recent herniated disc, “who time and medication has not helped.”

Wood does believe, however, that the injections are overused, and said there was a time when the injections were the go-to treatment for simple back pain.

“I think the pendulum is certainly swinging away from their broad use,” he said.

The meningitis outbreak in the U.S. will also likely dampen enthusiasm for the shots, researchers acknowledged.

“If this was a treatment that worked, then you’d have to weigh the benefits and the harm,” Maher said, but it doesn’t work (for sciatica), he emphasized.

Maher and his team, who published their results in the Annals of Internal Medicine on Monday, hope doctors will pick up on their findings.

But Maher told Reuters Health that it may take some time to change how doctors see the injections.

“It’s been around for decades and it will take a while to stop,” he said.

SOURCE: Annals of Internal Medicine, online November 12, 2012.

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New Greece plan ’32bn euros more’

12 November 2012 Last updated at 17:39 ET

A draft document prepared for eurozone finance ministers suggests that Greece should be given two more years to meet budget goals, but that this will add 32.6bn euros ($ 41.4bn) to its bailout.

Eurozone finance ministers have met in Brussels to discuss new targets for Greece based on the report.

The ministers also delayed a decision on whether to release the latest 31.5bn euro tranche of bailout funds.

They said they would meet again to discuss the issue on 20 November.

Greece has been pushing for the funds after passing a tough budget for 2013 on Sunday.

Greek PM Antonis Samaras has warned that without the new tranche the country will run out of money within days.

But the eurozone ministers said Greece needed to implement a “few remaining” prior actions to allow the process to move forward.

‘Smoother path’

The draft document on the pace of Greek economic reform was prepared by the so-called “troika” – the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank and the European Commission.

The troika has already pledged 240bn euros in bailout loans to Greece.

The two-year extension would give Greece time to achieve a primary budget surplus – a figure that would not include debt-financing costs.

Continue reading the main story

• Retirement age up from 65 to 67


• A further round of pension cuts, of 5-15%


• Salary cuts, notably for police officers, soldiers, firefighters, professors, judges, justice officials; minimum wage also reduced


• Holiday benefits cut


• 35% cut to severance pay


• Redundancy notice reduced from six to four months

The document says: “Our revised fiscal programme targets the 4.5% of GDP primary surplus target by 2016, two years later than foreseen.

It adds: “The smoother path will help to moderate the impact of fiscal adjustment on the economy.”

The extension would cost an additional 32.6bn euros and comes with “very large” risks, the report says.

Those risks include the uncertain political support for the programme within Greece, the possible negative effect on the economy of the fiscal consolidation and possible court challenges to the measures.

The BBC’s Chris Morris in Brussels says the original intention was for debt to be reduced to 120% of GDP by 2020 but that this is no longer feasible and a new target needs to be agreed by everyone.

He says this means more uncertainty, at a time when many Greek citizens believe they have taken all the austerity they can swallow.

Market fund-raising

Eurogroup chief Jean-Claude Juncker had earlier expressed optimism about the troika report.

“The basis is positive, because the Greeks have really delivered,” he said.

Greek MPs approved the 2013 budget, which includes further cuts to pensions and wages, in a vote on Sunday night.

More than 10,000 people joined demonstrations outside Greece’s parliament to protest against the cuts.

The passing of the budget was a pre-condition for Athens to be granted the next tranche of 31.5bn euros of EU/IMF loans necessary to stave off bankruptcy.

Greece faces a repayment deadline for 5bn euros of debt on Friday.

However, eurozone ministers had indicated it was unlikely a decision on the disbursement of the tranche would be made at Monday’s meeting.

The funding will have to be approved first by some national parliaments, including Germany’s.

“We all… want to help Greece, but we won’t be put under pressure,” German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble told the weekly newspaper Welt am Sonntag.

On Tuesday, Greece will make an urgent bid to raise funds from the financial markets in case it does not get the tranche of bailout money.

The national economy is expected to shrink next year by 4.5% and public debt is likely to rise to 189% of GDP, almost double Greece’s national output.

This year, public debt stood at 175%.

The head of Syriza, a left-wing opposition party, said the budget cuts would leave Greeks unable to afford essential goods this winter.

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Canada seen needing to spell out rules for natural gas projects

CALGARY, Alberta (Reuters) – The fate of a handful of liquefied natural gas projects planned for Canada’s Pacific coast may depend on the Canadian government‘s willingness to spell out rules for foreign investment in the country’s energy sector, according to a study released on Thursday.

Apache Corp, Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Petronas, BG Group Plc and others are in the planning stages for LNG projects that would take gas from the rich shale fields of northeastern British Columbia and ship it to Asian buyers.

But the federal government’s decision last month to stall the C$ 5.2 billion ($ 5.2 billion) bid by Malaysia’s state-owned Petronas C$ 5.2 billion for Canada‘s Progress Energy Resources Corp could lessen the appetite of Asian buyers for Canadian LNG, energy consultants Wood Mackenzie said.

“Some potential off-takers of Canadian LNG like the idea … because it’s perceived as having low political risk, and another reason is because they see the potential for investment opportunities,” said Noel Tomnay, head of global gas at the consultancy.

“If there are going to be restrictions on how they access those opportunities, if acquisitions are closed to them, then clearly that would restrict the attractiveness of those opportunities. If would-be Asian investors thought that corporate acquisitions were an avenue that was not open to them then Canadian LNG would become less attractive.”

The Canadian government is looking to come up with rules governing corporate acquisitions by state-owned companies and has pushed off a decision on the Petronas bid as it considers whether to approve the $ 15.1 billion offer for Nexen Inc from China’s CNOOC Ltd.

Exporting LNG to Asia is seen as a way to boost returns for natural-gas producers tapping the Montney, Horn River and Liard Basin shale regions of northeastern British Columbia.

Though Wood Mackenzie estimates the fields contain as much as 280 trillion cubic feet of gas, they are far from Canada’s traditional U.S. export market, while growing supplies from American shale regions have cut into Canadian shipments.

Because the region lacks infrastructure, developing the resource will be expensive, requiring new pipelines and multibillion-dollar liquefaction.

Still Wood Mackenzie estimates that the cost of delivery into Asian markets for Canadian LNG would be in the range of $ 10 million to $ 12 per million British thermal units, similar to competing projects in the United States and East Africa.

($ 1 = $ 1.00 Canadian)

(Reporting by Scott Haggett; Editing by Leslie Adler)

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Ads are Invading Gadgets and Apps that You Already Paid For

Most of us are used to seeing ads on stuff that we get for free, like smartphone and tablet apps or online news websites. But you’re probably also used to being able to pay to remove ads, whether by getting the premium version of an app or even upgrading to a new computer that doesn’t have so much garbage on it.

As it turns out, this strategy doesn’t work so well anymore. That’s because companies are starting to put “special offers” all over things that you buy … and this time, it’s not just the usual preinstalled trashware. Here’s a look at some of the latest strikes in the war for your attention.

​Microsoft: Xbox Music and Xbox Live

Last year’s redesign of the Xbox 360 dashboard featured prominent ads, including videos that played automatically, even if you were paying for a $ 60/year Xbox Live Gold membership. This year, Microsoft introduced its new Xbox Music Pass, which allows you to stream millions of songs to your Xbox 360 or Windows 8 PC. It has an ad-supported free trial mode, which lets you listen to songs (and ads) for free for the first six months before imposing a monthly listening limit.

But according to Neowin.net editor Owen Williams, the ads stay even if you pay $ 99 per year for the subscription service. On top of that, you can’t use Xbox Music on the actual Xbox at all (beyond a 30-day trial) unless you ​also​ pay for an Xbox Live Gold Subscription. That’s almost $ 160 per year for two separate subscriptions, and in return you apparently get twice the ads.

​Microsoft: Windows 8

If the ads in the Xbox Music service aren’t enough, Microsoft has also put ads all over its Windows 8 operating system. Whether you buy a new Surface tablet or you pay for the upgrade from Windows 7 such as through buying a separate boxed copy, you still have to contend with ads in “many of the bundled [Modern] UI applications,” according to Williams.

​Amazon: The entire Kindle lineup

Amazon began selling Kindle e-readers with “special offers” a while back. These appeared on the lock screen, and replaced the normal screen saver, which was more literary.

When Amazon announced its new lineup of Kindle Fire HD tablets not too long ago, it turned out that every single one of them had advertisements. Not just on the lock screen, but now even in a corner on the home screen while you’re browsing through your books and apps.

At the time, Amazon wasn’t offering any way to get rid of these ads on the new Kindle Fire HD, but the company now gives people the option to buy Kindles sans ads for an extra $ 15. That won’t help you with in-app ads, though, if you use free apps.

Jared Spurbeck is an open-source software enthusiast, who uses an Android phone and an Ubuntu laptop PC. He has been writing about technology and electronics since 2008.

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FDA find bugs, flying bird, at affiliate of meningitis pharmacy

(Reuters) – U.S. inspectors found bugs, a flying bird and other unsterile conditions at Ameridose LLC, an affiliate of the New England Compounding Center at the heart of the deadly meningitis outbreak.

A report from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration detailed a list of failures at Ameridose that also included a failure to appropriately classify patient complaints and the use of “vague, canned language” when describing adverse reactions to its drugs.

The company said it is in the process of preparing a full response to the FDA.

(Reporting By Toni Clarke; Editing by Alden Bentley)

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