Do you ever wonder where that far-off world has gone?

THE county of Shropshire contains many a quaint and curious town, full of history and half-timbering. Its rolling hills seem to invite such quiet and tranquil settlements, from black-and-white Cleobury to sedate and elegant Ludlow.

Craven Arms could hardly be included in this category. Its not particular old, and its not especially picturesque either. Named after a hotel on the main road, Craven Arms is a creation of the Victorian railways,Shop wholesale bestsmartcard controller from cheap. which in turn fostered small industries and a market.

Nevertheless, Craven Arms boasts one remarkable attraction. To be fair, it can claim two others in the shape of a museum of the Shropshire Hills and Stokesay Castle, the striking fortified manor house on its outskirts.

But lets leave these for another day and concentrate instead on the former market hall, in Market Street, just off the A49. Welcome to the Land of Lost Content.

A.E. Housman is a familiar figure in these parts, his last resting place being in the graveyard of St Laurence, Ludlow. That oft-quoted poem, with its blue remembered hills and yearning sense of loss, is perhaps his best-loved work. But the museum that takes its name from Housman is more than this, and certainly no simple tribute to the Shropshire Lad.

Change the stress on the word content and you have a more accurate introduction to what lies within the old market hall. For the Land of Lost Content is where all our childhood toys disappeared to, the last retreat for our kitchen gadgets, the home for all the tins and packets that once lined our cupboards. Here are the contents of all our living rooms and kitchens, from the First World War to the 1980s. Not lost at all.

The Land of Lost Content is the brainchild of Stella and Dave Mitchell. Stella was an art student at Birmingham Polytechnic in the 1970s. For her final degree show she assembled a collection of ephemera, much of it bought for pennies in the old Rag Market. At that point Stella was hooked. What began as a cutting-edge art installation has metamorphosed into something we can all buy into.

As the collection began to grow Stella and her husband moved it to the South coast, and set up a museum called Rejectamenta at East Wittering in West Sussex. That was in 1991. Twelve years later the couple returned, as they had always planned to do,Find the best selection of high-quality collectible landscapeoilpaintings available anywhere. to the West Midlands,The Motorola drycabinets Engine is an embedded software-only component of the Motorola wireless switches. and in 2003 opened a new museum in a disused Victorian building at Craven Arms. The destination could hardly be more appropriate.

Ive made three visits to the place since then, and fondly tell my students about it too. In a world where so many of our museums have gone hi-tech, and are packed with interactives and touch-screens, Lost Content is a reminder that at the heart of any good museum are objects, and preferably a lot of them.

Indeed, there could hardly be more objects, three floors of them, to be precise. On our most recent visit, Stella had just returned from the weekly flea-market at Abergavenny, with yet more treasures to squeeze in somewhere. What the world throws away, Stella picks up.

At one time, says Stella,About buymosaic in China userd for paying transportation fares and for shopping. I put all the exhibits out of arms reach, but now I encourage visitors to pick them up and examine them. Funnily enough, they rarely do.

I still miss the Opie museum of packaging, which once occupied part of Gloucester Docks, but the Land of Lost Content makes for a worthy replacement. And all of it has been achieved without a single grant from the HLF or any other funding body. Its all the Mitchells own work, and I suspect every entrance fee gets recycled into more and more objects.

Some day soon, you wont be able to get into the place at all. I defy anyone to get in and out of here in less than three hours. More likely they will be politely ushered out when the museum closes at 5pm.

This is not simply a museum of social history C an object lesson in how we lived then C it is also a journey into personal memory. There are the board games we played as children, the decorations we put up at Christmas, the utility furniture we once bought, the food we ate, the little plastic toys we found in packets of cornflakes. Spangles, powdered milk, love-hearts, Andrews liver salts, Fairy Snow, powdered egg, Escalado, games compendia, I-Spy books, Franklyns Fine Shagg (its a tobacco, by the way). If you wondered where that far-off world has gone, its in Craven Arms.

Every time I go to Stellas kingdom of bygones, I find something new. Last week I picked up an old recipe card, forged in days of austerity. Macaroni cheese, it said, is cheap and filling. There was a set of recipes to prove it, for plain macaroni cheese, one for macaroni cheese and crab, another for macaroni cheese and ham, and yet one more for macaroni cheese and mushroom.

This was a historic night, marked by four astonishing goals from the Polish striker, and the Dortmund manager was not going to let anyone ruin it. Success may come tinged with sadness, the growing realisation that the better his players perform the more likely they are to depart, but Klopp refused to think about that. Besides, he claimed that Lewandowski was staying. That is far from certain but these have been days in which the manager has sought to put off a worrying future and focus instead on a brilliant present.

Against Real Madrid it worked: the build-up to the game had been hijacked by the suspiciously ill-timed news that Mario G?tze was joining rivals Bayern Munich after they paid his ?37 million release clause; the game itself began with him providing the perfect cross for Lewandowski to score the opener.

Three more goals followed, the third of them especially stunning, Lewandowski dragging the ball back to create a bit of space before hammering the ball into the net. Even the penalty was pretty impressive.I have been thinking about purchasing a plasticmould to protect the fortune. "The goals were incredible," Klopp said. "The third is worth every single cent of what the TV channels pay for the rights to show the games."

Asked whether Lewandowski was offside for one of his goals, as Jos? Mourinho had implied, Klopp adopted what appears to be his default setting: he laughed. "There were so many Lewandowski goals that I cannot think which one he means," he smiled, blowing out his cheeks. "The fourth was a penalty and, yes, it is a penalty. The third was so brilliant that no referee in the world is allowed to take this back." He did not add that there was nothing wrong with the first or the second, either.

It was some calling card on the night when everyone was watching, open-mouthed. G?tze is gone; it is inevitable that the attention of Europe's richest clubs will now turn to Lewandowski, although on this performance they could turn to four or five players. Marco Reus, in particular, was exceptional. So too Ilkay Gundogan. Manchester United already bid for Lewandowski last summer and others will surely clamour for the 24-year-old this year.

Bayern Munich have spoken to him and agreed the basis of a deal on personal terms. But Dortmund have already lost G?tze and they are determined not to let Lewandowski go to the same club. He has a year left on his contract, so eventually they may have no choice, but they insist that they would rather keep him. The other option, rather more palatable than him joining Bayern, is to negotiate with a foreign suitor. Premiership clubs are monitoring movements.

Northwestern embarks on more major construction projects

After a winter hiatus, the University picked back up with construction projects this quarter and began preparations for six new ones by the end of 2014.

In addition to ongoing work on the visitors center and the new performing arts center, NU will start upgrades to various existing buildings. Current and future construction projects over the next few years represent a campus-wide overhaul of the universitys academic, athletic and housing facilities that costs hundreds of millions of dollars.

Significant progress has been made on the new building for the Bienen School of Music and School of Communication, with structural framing completed for four of the five floors, said Bonnie Humphrey, director of design and construction for Facilities Management. The $117 million building, to be finished in the fall of 2015, will house administrative offices and a recital hall.

Work began this quarter on the expansion of the Henry Crown Sports Pavilion and Aquatics Center, as well as construction of an adjoining parking structure. Students must now enter SPAC from a south door as part of a permanent change to the structure, and much of the parking lot is now inaccessible.

A multipurpose recreation center, including a juice bar and sports medicine facilities, will occupy the first floor of the building,Shop wholesale bestsmartcard controller from cheap. and the School of Communications speech and hearing clinics will relocate there from the Frances Searle Building. The first floor should be ready for use next summer, and parking will be available by February, said Ron Nayler, associate vice president of Facilities Management.

Although Nayler said work on the new visitors center is well underway, design took longer than expected. The garage will be operational at the beginning of 2014, and the visitors center should be occupied next summer, Nayler said.

The Technological Institute will grow even more this summer, with the addition of three new infills to form a new wing. Breaking ground next month, the project includes new lab space and imaging facilities. Estimated for completion in spring 2015, the renovations total $145 million.

Improvements will also be made this summer to Chapin Humanities Residential College, and Hobart House will undergo extensive renovation, totaling $10 to $11 million.

In the spring of 2014, the University will break ground on a new $288 million building for Kellogg and the Department of Economics. Currently in its design phase, the building already has a decent chunk of funding behind it from years of saving, said Jim Hurley, associate vice president for budget and planning. The use of the Jacobs Center is still under evaluation, but it will likely be repurposed for the social sciences,Elpas Readers detect and forward 'Location' and 'State' data from Elpas Active RFID Tags to host besticcard platforms. Humphrey said.

The most recent draft of Swarthmores Campus Master Plan, presented to the College community at a meeting in March, works off of assumptions that faculty, students, and staff will grow, perhaps by the hundreds, over the next couple of decades. If the past is any proof, additional people will be accompanied by additional cars, as well as additional parking spaces. However, some faculty and staff are working to show that there are alternative means of managing transportation needs that can minimize the environmental impacts of the anticipated community growth.

The Parking and Transportation Master Plan Advisory Committee, which is tasked with developing policy recommendations by the beginning of the fall, will meet for their first policy discussion today. The Committee, whose work will be incorporated into the Master Planning process, will continue to meet through the summer so that the Master Plan can be finalized in September.

That committee, whose members include Executive Assistant for Facilities and Services Paula Dale, Senior Director of Corporate, Foundation, and Government Relations Nadine Kolowrat, Provost Tom Stephenson, Public Safety Director Mike Hill, Vice President for Facilities and Services Stu Hain, Engineering Professor Erik Cheever,You can order besthandsfreeaccess cheap inside your parents. Jennifer Walsh 15, and eleven others, will work to find ways to accommodate future growth, and, some members say, encourage faculty, students, and staff to ditch their cars entirely in favor of walking or riding public transit to campus.

The Master Planning process, which began in earnest last fall, looks ahead over the next couple of decades to the potential construction projectsCsuch as the Inn, a new Science Center II, and additions to Willets and McCabeCthat may eventually change the face of campus. At a meeting in January, a number of faculty raised concerns that the building boom might be accompanied by what they believe is a reckless expansion of surface parking on campus.

Those faculty were not the only ones wondering how campus commuting and transportation patterns affect the College community, especially its carbon footprint. Kolowrat, who sits on Swarthmores Sustainability Committee, was one of several Sustainability Committee members who pushed for the Committees associated with the Campus Master Plan to commission a transportation demand management (TDM) study. She got the idea for such a study after hearing about efforts at Oregon State University that she says dramatically reduced reliance on single-occupancy vehicles for commuters.

That push was apparent in a letter the Sustainability Committee submitted to the Master Plan committees and posted on the Master Plans website. That letter argues that growth in parking capacity should be kept to a minimum and calls for a TDM study to be incorporated into the Master Plan.

Dale said that the Sustainability Committee made an impassioned plea to the Campus Master Plan Committee to be thoughtful about sustainability in the master plan. In response to the letter, the College has retained Chance Management Advisors, a parking management consulting firm, to advise stakeholders in the Master Planning process.

The role of Chance Advisors,Compare prices and buy all brands of luggagetag for home power systems and by the pallet. said Dale, is to help us with the whole master plan, which includes studying parking and transportation existing conditions, making predictions for the future, and a piece of that is considering how [we] could shape and hopefully reduce the number of spaces that we need. She said the group with also look at some policy questions like do we want to discourage people from driving to campus or not.

In the fall, when the TDM study is completed, Dale said,Learn how an embedded microprocessor in a chipcards can authenticate your computer usage and data. the Committee will recommend to senior staff a series of policies that we feel are in the best interests of the College for parking and transportation and a series of procedures to support those policies. [...] Weve made a conscious decision that nothing is firm [in Master Planning] until weve heard back from those involved with the Parking and Transportation committee and the TDM study.

According to Kolowrat, those policy recommendations might include incentivizing ride-sharing, carpooling, ZipCars, mass transit, biking, walking, and moreCall of which would have the added benefit of helping the College meet its Climate Action Plan commitments for carbon reduction. As of now, the Climate Action Plan calls to deal with the carbon impact of transportation solely through carbon offsets.

Would Babson Get So Much Flak?

When is the last time a business school with more BMWs than Honda Civics in the student parking lot took offense at Republican leadership? Bentley University, just down the road from Babson in Waltham, has had Gloria Larson, a longtime Republican turned independent, at the helm since 2007 and the sky hasnt fallen.

Steven Comery, a staff writer for the campus newspaper, thinks Healeys gender is fueling the opposition more than her politics. There have been times when the level of sexism present has made me feel ashamed to be a member of this college community,You can order besthandsfreeaccess cheap inside your parents. he wrote of conversations he has had with his classmates in the last week. While there are realistic objections to Dr. Healeys appointment, any question of whether she is an appropriate choice purely regarding her sex is archaic, irrational, and shameful.

The realistic objections to Healey that she does not come from the academy or have a deep business background also ring hollow, given recent history. Was former Massachusetts Senate President William Bulger disqualified from taking the reins at the University of Massachusetts or former Congressman Martin Meehan from assuming the presidency of the Lowell campus? On the contrary, their political careers were framed as assets in a world where institutions of higher education are ever more dependent on government contracts and other financial assistance.

Meehan had never earned a patent for a game-changing medical device or new computer software even though UMass-Lowells reputation rests on its commitment to emerging technologies. Bulger never ran anything larger than a compliant 40-member legislative body before he was tapped to run the flagship of the states university system. So why does Healey need to have run a hedge fund?

Maybe the presidential selection committee at Babson, which promotes itself as an incubator of young entrepreneurs, has a broader definition of entrepreneurship than its internal critics. Healey is a something of a social entrepreneur. In addition to earning her undergraduate degree from Harvard and her doctorate from Trinity College in Dublin in political science and the law, she has been active on pressing social issues at home and abroad. She has worked on efforts to end homelessness in this country and to broaden educational opportunity for disabled students in Cuba and for girls in Afghanistan.You can order besthandsfreeaccess cheap inside your parents. She is a founding member of the U.S. State Departments Public-Private Partnership for Justice Reform in Afghanistan to promote the rule of law. With former Ambassador Swanee Hunt, she chairs the Political Parity project, a bipartisan campaign to elect more women to public office.

There is a reason for that. A presidents success or failure is far more likely in 2013 to rest on her ability to raise money than on her talent for finding the right curricular balance among the physical and social sciences and the humanities. There are provosts, deans, assistant deans and more than enough committees of faculty, administrators and students for that. Babson is looking for a leader to keep the ship on course, not to steer it in a new direction. Healey can do that.

A modern president is also the face of a college and a few more female faces would be a refreshing change. Only 26 percent of college presidents in the Unites States are women, according to a report last year by the American Education Council,Laser engraving and laser customkeychain for materials like metal, and more than a third of those lead two-year schools. The typical college president is surprise! a 61-year-old white guy with a doctorate in education.

Healeys resume is much more interesting than that. Forget the myth that she was Mitt Romneys co-governor between 2003 and 2007. She is smart enough to know she was window dressing, added to the ticket in a failed attempt to attract female voters who continue to spurn Romney. (see gender gap,Compare prices and buy all brands of luggagetag for home power systems and by the pallet. 2012) That doesnt mean Healey did nothing at the State House. She was a voice for victims of child abuse and domestic violence and an advocate for reform of the states prison system, a cause that has languished through Republican and Democratic administrations alike.

The disconnect between Romneys record and her own more progressive views on social policy, from abortion to sexual assault, doomed her candidacy for governor in 2006. She could not talk about her commitment to tackle gang violence or to protect abused children without having to explain to skeptics, myself included, why those subjects never made it onto Romneys agenda.

Having dealt with the serious business items at Wednesdays Sunshine meeting in West Chester, they saved Thursday evening to present the movers and shakers who have in the past and will in the future change the face of the countys southern region from Kennett Square to Nottingham.

One of the speakers for the evening, Bob Grabus of the Chester County Economic Development Council, defined the area of consideration as the land from Kennett Square to the Maryland line bounded by the Route 1 Bypass on the north and the East Penn Railroad on the south.

He said there are between 3 million and 4 million square feet of property available for development in that area, and the councils Marketing and Branding Committee wants to find entrepreneurs ready to settle there. To that end the council will sponsor a bus tour of the area for potential developers.

He pointed to recent successes in having new companies move in, including Dansko in Jennersville and Tastykake in Oxford.Elpas Readers detect and forward 'Location' and 'State' data from Elpas Active RFID Tags to host besticcard platforms. He said attracting and successfully hosting Tastykake was a hard-fought project, because there was competition from Virginia.

Grabus said one of the things that makes the councils job complex is the need to maintain the agriculture and open space that is so attractive in the area, while still getting businesses to move in to the appropriate places.

In that connection, Ronald Bailey, director of the Chester County Planning Commission, announced the completion of the Oxford Area Multi-Municipal Comprehensive Plan and Cooperative Planning Agreement. He held up the substantial volume and said it was worked on by the supervisors and council people from all the municipalities in the Oxford Area School District.

Hiding in plain sight

It's probably fair to say storage space will decrease in proportion to any increase in the size of the home. But in my experience, no matter what size the household, I invariably hear the homeowner complain at some point that they wish they had more storage space. I have thought about the homes I have worked in and wondered which of them has the best storage capabilities and what we can learn from them.

Surprisingly, the largest homes I have worked in as a butler do not necessarily have the best or well-thought-out storage solutions. In fact, I think the homes with the best and smartest storage solutions are New York apartments in the Upper East and West sides of Manhattan.

You see, no matter how wealthy you may be in a crowded city like New York, apartments only have so much space. So, to avoid ending up living like hoarders, condo owners task their architects and designers with being resourceful about storage-space design. Of course, homeowners need to be selective about what they hold on to, what gets donated and what gets pitched.

Since we can agree that one can never have too much storage space,Choose the right bestluggagetag in an array of colors. it's important for those looking at purchasing a luxury condominium to keep the matter in mind at the builder stage and pay close attention to the builder's plans. For example, a lesson I have learned from my New York clients is to think "Top to Bottom."

Do not worry about things being too high and out of reach since these areas can be dedicated to items that are infrequently or seasonally used, like platters for Christmas dinner. These types of cabinets are more expensive to install, but you will never regret the decision to do so.

The second part of the "Top to Bottom" lesson is to look at the bottom of the cupboards. There is usually a couple of inches of height under the cabinet, behind what is referred to as the toe kick.You Can Find Comprehensive and in-Depth carparkmanagementsystem truck Descriptions. Put drawers there for large, flat items like trays and cookie sheets. Following the "Top to Bottom" rule can almost double your overall cabinet capacity.

Using a professional closet organizer can also help you to think in a new way about efficiencies. It may not just be about the space itself but also the way items are put away.We offer over 600 chipcard at wholesale prices of 75% off retail. Take the time, however, to interview and hire the right organizer. I have had good and bad experiences with organizers. Good organizers take their work seriously, are systematic thinkers, have a sense for esthetics and are motivated by helping their clients.

Another lesson is to think seasonally. I have a dear friend who used a room in her basement to build cedar-lined storage for her family's off-season clothing. I remember the first time I saw it; I was amazed at how organized it was and how logical she was to think about storing all their offseason clothing in one great space.

Not everyone, however, has the luxury of a basement to convert into storage. Purchasing a condominium with one extra bedroom might be worth considering, so that it can be converted into a full walk-in closet. That's luxury!

Smart business owners are on to this issue. Businesses are cropping up that cater to condominium owners who have a need for offseason clothing storage. This service has existed for some time in New York; in Toronto, one company I know of is Creeds Dry Cleaning. Owner Jackie Creed says he agrees that as the number of condominium inhabitants increases, so does the need for services like the one he offers.

A client of mine in New York has a large collection of ball gowns and she stores them at one of these specialty companies called Garde Robe. She goes online, picks out one of her dresses and calls the company; they deliver it to her home within two hours. When the company takes the dress back,You can order besthandsfreeaccess cheap inside your parents. they clean it and store it until she needs it again.

New Yorkers taught me another great trick and that is making use of beautiful furniture as storage. Armoires, even small ones, are great for storage and are also attractive. One of my clients has an antique chest of drawers in her living room; it is a beautiful piece of furniture and works perfectly in the space, as it supports a great antique clock and lamp. The client uses the chest to store sweaters in the summer and her swimwear and T-shirts in the winter.

Very often pantries have wasted deep cabinet space and high out of reach space. Our creative use of shelves allows homeowners to store, see and retrieve items with ease and ultimately maximize the amount of usable space available. Tip: Once again begin by choosing one closet at a time and going through each item. Homeowners often find items that are out of date and can be thrown away. You might also find open bags of sugar or flour which can also be thrown out or transferred to air tight containers to prevent spoiling and/or bugs. Putting items you use each day on eye level shelves will help you find them quickly when cooking. Putting little used items on lower shelves or higher shelves will help as well.We have a wide selection of handsfreeaccess to choose from for your storage needs. However if you have children be sure that they can access only those things that are safe for their age range.

Laundry areas can become unruly very easily. At Closet Concepts we offer cabinets, shelves, drip dry racks and folding tables with unique functional design so that the laundry room can be more than just functional, it can actually be a space you enjoy working in. Tip: Similar to garages, laundry rooms often become the catchall space for things we really dont know what to do with. Give yourself permission to throw away or give away items that you no longer use. Holding on to them only causes anxiety and clutter. If you want to make doing laundry easier for the kids in the house, give them each their own laundry basket with their name on it and let them bring their dirty clothes to the laundry and take it back up when its done.

We install space-saving cubbies, hooks, drawers and baskets to make it easy to keep your entryway neat and attractive. Tip: Mud rooms can actually be a fun place to be creative but also organized. There are plenty of options available to make a fun and functional space. Picking a theme for your mudroom can also get the kids involved and encourage them to keep the room neat as well.

Tim Cook’s cash card

THERE was no timetable for an iWatch or for an iTV. There was, however, the promise of perhaps the biggest share buyback in American corporate history. Announcing Apple’s results for the first three months of 2013 on April 23rd, Tim Cook, its boss, stayed mum about its product pipeline, saying only that the firm was working on some “amazing new hardware, software and services” to be rolled out later this year and in 2014. But he was clear about the cash Apple will return to shareholders in the form of increased dividends and buy-backs. Altogether, it plans to fork out $100 billion by the end of 2015.

That seems to have placated investors, who have watched in dismay as Apple’s share price has plunged from a high of over $700 in September to under $400 last week. On April 24th the firm’s shares closed at $405.

Mr Cook has bought himself some breathing space by raising planned share buy-backs from $10 billion to $60 billion and increasing dividends by 15%. However, he still needs to produce new blockbuster offerings to bolster future growth. Ever since he replaced Steve Jobs at Apple’s helm, speculation has mounted that the company has lost some of the magic that produced the iPhone and iPad.

Mr Cook’s fans protest that those who think Apple should already have come up with a new category-killer are being unrealistic. A few years between big ideas is nothing to worry about polished tiles. And they note that the iPad and the iPhone are still minting money. In the first quarter of 2013 Apple reported revenue of $43.6 billion: an 11% increase compared with the same period in 2012, and a figure that exceeds the combined sales of Google and Microsoft.

But Apple’s margins are being squeezed by the introduction of the iPad mini, which is less lucrative than bigger iPads. In its latest quarter the firm’s gross margin shrank year-on-year, from 47.4% to 37.5%, and its quarterly net profit dropped for the first time in ten years, from $11.6 billion to $9.5 billion.

If Apple launches a low-cost iPhone to compete in emerging markets—and in the business of pre-paid phones that do not require a long-term subscription to a mobile-phone operator—its margins could be squashed even more. That could affect its share price. Ben Reitzes of Barclays, a bank, reckons that every percentage-point decline in Apple’s gross margin equates to a drop of $1.40 in earnings per share.

Apple also needs to beat back rivals such as Samsung Electronics, which has emerged as a muscular competitor in smartphones. Investors particularly want to see it respond to the rise of “phablets”—phones whose screens are bigger than those of most smartphones, though not as big as a tablet’s.

Even if Apple keeps expanding its phone and tablet businesses, it will still have to keep inventing new products. The firm is rumoured to be working on a smart watch and a smart TV with associated apps. It is also looking at mobile payments. With 435m customers already registered at its iTunes store, which celebrates its tenth birthday on April 28th, it has a head-start.

New offerings in these areas could well be among the “amazing” things Mr Cook alluded to this week. The big question is whether they will be as revolutionary—and as profitable—as the products Apple churned out under Jobs. Mr Cook has played his cash card. Now he needs to turn up trumps on the innovation front, too.

Samsung put an incredible amount of work into the software on the Galaxy S4. It runs Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean with Samsung’s custom user interface on top. For some reason the company isn’t calling it Nature UX or TouchWiz, so far as we can tell, but it’s basically a new version of that skin. Oddly enough, we can’t really even call it a skin anymore, it literally takes over Android and almost feels like its own complete environment. Whether you’re a fan of pure Android or not, there’s no ignoring that Samsung added a ton of features.

The company tweaked Android’s notification panel with its own settings. You can quickly access Bluetooth, WiFi, NFC, Air Gesture, Voice Control, Smart Stay and tons of other controls right from the panel. You can also customize what’s visible at all times at the top by dragging and dropping the icons around.

Speaking of cool things Samsung added to Android, the Galaxy S4 now, like the Galaxy Note II, supports Air View. That means you can hover your finger over an email, a calendar date, a photo and even in Flipboard, which was custom built for Air View on the Galaxy S4. It works really well, especially if you have a crowded day on a calendar and want to hover over a few days to see appointments without opening each date and closing it.

Air View is different from another really cool feature called Air Gestures. This sounds like a gimmick—people keep calling it that—but it really isn’t: you can scroll down a website simply by hovering your hand over the screen. Think about that for a second: you can still read your phone while you’re elbow-deep in buffalo wings. That’s amazing. Gestures can also be used for moving through browser tabs, flipping through photos and more. If you hover your hand over the screen while it’s locked it will also display “Quick Glance” information, such as the battery life and any notifications you may have received.

Group Play is also included on the Galaxy S4 and allows you to share music, photos and more while you’re on the same Wi-Fi network. We tested it with a group of people and found it compelling, but we really doubt it’s going to be used often. The most compelling use case scenario would be to share documents in a classroom or office space. Samsung wants to believe a group of friends are going to sit at a party and listen to the same song with each Galaxy S4 acting as a controlled speaker, but there’s probably a 0.1 percent chance of that ever happening. In other words, just because consumers can do it, doesn’t mean they necessarily will.

Metro fare signs confuse the riders who need help most

Most people riding Metro use SmarTrip, and that's great. But the ones that are more likely to need extra help with a fare table are the infrequent customers that use a paper farecard.

It makes no sense to list SmarTrip prices on the fare table and then ask people to add $1. Riders shouldn't need to do math to figure out how much to put on their farecards. We want to make purchasing a farecard as easy as possible, while not necessarily offering them the best deal possible.

The simplest solution would be to list the paper farecard prices on the tables, and then have notes that SmarTrip riders get a discount. Even if these riders don't notice, they'll just end up with extra money on their cards, which they can use later.

An even better approach would be to eliminate the $1 surcharge, and instead always charge peak fares for people using paper farecards. The fare machines would simply list the peak fare for each destination, with a note that SmarTrip customers get discounts during off-peak, discounted transfers to and from trips on buses, protected fare balances (with registration) and a guarantee that they won't be trapped in the system if their balance goes too low.

All paper farecard customers would have to do is look up their destination, and make sure their farecard had the corresponding amount. No math, no timetables, no figuring out whether it's currently peak or off-peak.

WMATA spokesperson Dan Stessel said the agency is aware of the confusion and complaints about these signs, and is "considering" making changes to the posted fare tables and signs.

As with many previous innovations, Apple wasn't the first to market. There were many digital music players before the iPod, tablet PCs have been around decades before the iPad was launched, and other companies produced smart phones before Apple launched the iPhone. What Apple seems to be getting right is the timing (the point in time when certain innovations are ready to take off) and the marketing power to create a real buzz and demand for the next must-have gadget. I feel that it will be the same with the iWatch.

There is a real buzz around wearable intelligent devices in the tech world because they generate so much new data that can be analysed. Devices like Nike's Fuelband and the Fitbrit Ultra are already available and provide users with fantastic insights, data and analysis. But my prediction is that Apple will get the lion's share of a potentially massive market. And I don't think the iWatch (or whatever Apple will call it) is far away from being launched, especially as Samsung and Sony have already announced they are working on a smart watch. Pebble is another smart watch that is already available and offers compatibility with iPhone and Android - you can customise the watch with apps to control your music, go running or cycling, measure your golfing performance, and you get alerts for incoming calls or emails.

The reason I believe the iWatch (or the smart watch idea in general) will change the world of big data analytics is because it will allow all of us to collect and analyse data on both a personal and global level. Take health as an example. These intelligent wrist watches will permit monitoring of an individual's heart rate, calorie intake, activity levels, quality of sleep and more. Now imagine collecting that data on a much bigger scale. Potentially, governments, medical agencies, etc. will be able to use such collective data to gain a better insight into a nation's physical output, eating habits, risk indicators, and worrying trends. The buzz word surrounding this type of data analysis is 'big data' and I predict that it will have a huge impact in the business world. A recent global survey by The Advanced Performance Institute found that seven percent of companies have already started to use this type of mass analysis or 'big data'.

Now, as a second wave of the internet age -- underpinned by mobile internet and the hunger for ubiquitous, high-capacity networks -- slowly sweeps the globe with promises to boost productivity and create new growth sectors, Dr Bradlow has warned Australia is at risk of missing out if it underinvests in broadband infrastructure or fails to start thinking today about how to make use of the blossoming world of connected devices.

"We will become a marginalised, agrarian economy that has some mining, nice beaches and agriculture. But that's not the same as being a developed, hi-tech digital economy," he said.

The second coming of the internet age has been spurred by the confluence of ubiquitous internet access, the explosive adoption of mobility and smartphones, and the nascent growth of machine-to-machine (M2M). It's this third area, also known as "the internet of things", that Dr Bradlow believes has the potential to drive productivity improvements and vastly improve business efficiency and spawn growth sectors in coming decades.

"It's combinations of technology that really create change and the combination that fascinates me at the moment is sensor technology," Dr Bradlow said. "It's the ability to put a sensor in just about anything and have that sensor communicate to a wide area network, often via your mobile phone."

Such is the growth of M2M that the world's leading internet equipment-maker, Cisco, has forecast that Australia will have 142 million connected devices by 2016, about six for every Australian.

Dr Bradlow warns that, to tap into the potential that these smart things can yield, Australia must start planning now. He points to the example of busy urban centres where councils and infrastructure planners are building roads to lessen traffic congestion in overpopulated cities.

Instead of building more "dumb" infrastructure today, Dr Bradlow said, councils should look to implement technological solutions that made use of internet-connected devices that could talk to each other and analyse traffic flows to ease congestion points.

Warren Buffett Speech to University of Georgia Students

Well, good morning and welcome. You're a nice crowd, you certainly got quiet quickly. That surprised me. Can you hear me all right? There in the back? Well, for business school, you know it doesn't get much better than this. Having the world's greatest investor come to your campus is quite an honor.

Warren Buffett is Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, a holding company whose investments range from GEICO Insurance, to American Express and Coca-Cola, to Borsheims jewelry store in his hometown of Omaha, Nebraska.

Mr. Buffett has been described as 'the god of value investors' and 'the Michael Jordon of the investing game.' He began his first investment partnership in the mid-1950s with $100 of his own money. A few years later he began investing in a struggling Massachusetts textile mill called Berkshire Hathaway. Through Berkshire he started putting capital into other businesses, chiefly insurance, which generated cash streams for more investments which have done very well indeed as we all know.

From a share price of about $18 in 1965, Berkshire today trades around $69,100 a share. Think I'm going to go out and buy 500 shares. Over time the company has annualized performances more than double that of S&P 500, and Berkshire today is worth more than $100 billion. But Mr. Buffett is known as much for his unpretentious style as for his lofty success. He has become a champion of investors and is legendary for his aversion to corporate doublespeak. He is rare among CEOs in that he cheerfully admits his mistakes. Three years ago he wrote in his annual report that Berkshire would have done better if he'd simply had gone to the movies. There weren't very many years like that since 1965, believe me.

Berkshire was proudly, even defiantly absent from the dot-com hysteria of the last few years, and now that the bubble has burst as we all know, it's Warren Buffett who's having the last laugh. In his most recent letter to shareholders he wrote, quote, "We've embraced the 21 st century by entering such cutting-edge industries as brick, carpet, insulation, and paint." Try to control your excitement. You know, and personally from reading his letters, I mean it's just a joy. It's a business lesson in itself. I would encourage you, whenever you get an opportunity, to take one aside and read it carefully. You'll learn a tremendous amount.

His wisdom and insights are so valued that some investors buy a share of Berkshire stock just so they can hear him at his legendary annual meeting, or as he calls it, 'Woodstock for capitalists.' He doesn't make speaking appearances often, and we are extremely fortunate to have him with us today. Earl Leonard of Coca-Cola, and our distinguished executive in residence had a lot to with that, Earl, and we're deeply indebted to you for helping to arrange this. Thank you very much.

Our format today will be primarily questions and answers. Mr. Buffett will make some brief remarks at the beginning and then we'll move into your phase. We will have a microphone set up over here. We would like to come around- we're videotaping, so we'd like you to use the microphone, please. So go ahead and begin to line up over there to ask your questions. So would you please give a very warm welcome to the oracle of Omaha, Warren Buffett .

Warren Buffett : Testing. 1 million. 2 million. Great, okay. I came in from Nebraska today, and you're probably all familiar with us, mainly by our football team. We have those fellows with the big white helmets with those red 'N's on them. I asked one of our starters the other day, "What's the 'N' stand for?" And he said, "Knowledge." We make it tough on them though. I mean you don't coast through Nebraska just because you're a football player. They major in agricultural economics, and there's a two question final for all of the players. And the first question is, "What did old MacDonald have?" And they were giving that to one of our potential Heisman Trophy winners the other day. He started to sweat. Finally he brightened up, he said, "Farm!" The professor, delighted of course, you don't want to flunk a Heisman candidate. So he said, "Now," he said. "You're halfway home. Just one more question. How do you spell 'farm'?" Now the guy really starts to sweat, and he looks at the ceiling and he looks around. Finally his face brightens up and he says, "Ee-i-ee-i-oh!" So watch for that guy this year, he'll be dynamite.

I really want to talk about what's on your mind, so we're going to do a Q and A in a minute. There are a couple questions I always get asked. You know, people always say, "Well who should I go to work for when I get out then?" I've got a very simple answer, we may elaborate more on this as we go along, but, you know the real thing to do is to get going for some institution or individual that you admire. I mean it's crazy to take in-between jobs just because they look good on your resume, or because you get a little higher starting pay.

I was up at Harvard a while back, and a very nice young guy, he picked me up at the airport, a Harvard Business School attendee. And he said, "Look. I went to undergrad here, and then I worked for X and Y and Z, and now I've come here." And he said, "I thought it would really round out my resume perfectly if I went to work now for a big management consulting firm." And I said, "Well, is that what you want to do?" And he said, "No," but he said, "That's the perfect resume." And I said, "Well when are you going to start doing what you like?" And he said, "Well I'll get to that someday." And I said, "Well you know, your plan sounds to me a lot like saving up sex for your old age. It just doesn't make a lot of sense."

I told that same group, I said, "Go to work for whomever you admire the most." I said, "You can't get a bad result. You'll jump out of bed in the morning and you'll be having fun." The Dean called me up a couple weeks later. He said, "What did you tell those kids? They're all becoming self-employed." So, you've got to temper that advice a little bit. Play one game a little bit with me for just a minute and then we'll get to your questions.

I'd like for the moment to have you pretend I've made you a great offer, and I've told you that you could pick any one of your classmates- and you now know each other probably pretty well after being here for a while. You have 24 hours to think it over and you can pick any one of your classmates, and you get 10 percent of their earnings for the rest of their lives. And I ask you, what goes through your mind in determining which one of those you would pick? You can't pick the one with the richest father, that doesn't count. I mean, you've got to do this on merit. But, you probably wouldn't pick the person that gets the highest grades in the class.