Volunteers walk to raise money for local woman’s cancer treatment
Asbury Park Press - The family is hoping to raise enough money for the treatments within the next two months and has kicked off those efforts with the walk around Weatherly today. Volunteers paid $20 each to participate in a walk around the neighborhood off Whitesville

Market Maker
American Reporter - In other words, more money is made this day by shifting money around than in making things. And the FIRE sector no longer represents a group of institutions designed to raise capital for investment in productive activities; it is wealth generated

Masked men in pub heist
News.com.au - Hotel, in Glenorchy, about 1.30am (AEDT) today, demanding cash from a staff member while his colleague and five pub patrons watched. The staff man was forced to empty a safe and hand over cash drawers from the tills. One robber stashed the money in a

Municipal bonds offering more than just tax advantage
Chicago Tribune - Although muni bonds historically offer about 80 percent of a comparable Treasury’s yield, today their yield is about the same Columnists Stocks Your Money Auto news Entertainment • • • • • • • • • • Politics/Elections Travel Living Health

Gov. Rendell Says New Performance Report Shows Taxpayers How PA Uses
Forbes - Rendell this day said Pennsylvanians who want to know how their tax dollars are being used can find answers in the first I want taxpayers to be able to see how their tax money is being used and what the commonwealth is doing to make our say

Photo Release — Adm. Mullen Says Northrop Grumman-Built and Newly
MSN MoneyCentral - For today’s top Money video click here News Providers Associated Press bizjournals.com Briefing.com BusinessWeek Wall Street Journal PASCAGOULA, Miss., Jan. 26, 2008 (PRIME NEWSWIRE) — In a traditional U.S. Navy ceremony here Saturday, the U.S

Former trustee for James Brown’s estate avoids jail, for now
Houma Courier - Bayou Business Review MarketWatch Obituaries Police Reports Weather Multimedia Today’s Pics Pic Reprints RSS Feed Judge Jack Early ordered Cannon to pay the money, most of which was to go to a company that loaned Brown $21 million in 1999

GateKeeper USA, Inc. Announced Today Stock Symbol Change and Effective
MSN MoneyCentral - For today’s top Money video click here News Providers Associated Press bizjournals.com Briefing.com BusinessWeek Wall Street Journal GateKeeper USA, Inc. (Pink Sheets:GKPR), announced this day that the 1 for 4 stock split, previously publicly

N.J. weighs new way to pay for roads
USA This day - Corzine wants to use money earned from the deal to pay at least half of $32 billion in say debt and fund transportation for Conversation guidelines: USA TODAY welcomes your thoughts, stories and information related to this article. Please stay on

Latino workers flee as Arizona immigration crackdown bites
Japan This day - what is rss? Japan This day Mobile About Us Terms | Moderation | Privacy Copyright ©2008 The underground economy is going to take hold now, and there will be less money for the say,” Reza stated. Ten men were laid

Fla. mall builds museum-caliber art collection
USA Today - It’s really more about the impact it will have on the public rather than money.” So, Fletcher has spent the last two years Conversation guidelines: USA TODAY welcomes your thoughts, stories and information related to this article. Please stay on

Polar Bear Plunge Raises More Than $2M
WTOP Radio - ANNAPOLIS , Md. (AP) - Hundreds of people are jumping in the Chesapeake Bay this day to raise money for Special Olympics Maryland, and organizers say the fundraiser has already netted more than $2 million dollars. The Polar Bear Plunge at Sandy Point

DAVOS-UPDATE 1-Buyout firms see smaller deals, higher defaults
Reuters - Those (big) buyouts will come back in time, but money over the next few years will be made not by doing new deals, but by improving companies they already have,” he stated in a panel discussion with other industry veterans including Clayton

Ex-PUC chief defends pricing
Dallas Morning News - Wood faults them for being too lazy to save money. Residential customers are paying more this day – an average of 12.48 cents per kilowatt-hour – than they did when the competitive market opened in 2002, when the average

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Filed under: Law, Scandals, Headline news

The New York Times headline blares “French Trader Is Remembered as Mr. Average,” and goes on to describe a mid-level employee with nothing in his background to recommend that he would become possibly the biggest rogue trader in the history of the world. The Times reported that:

He failed in a bid for town council in his 20s; he never rose higher than a green belt, a mid-level rank, after years of judo training — because of his bad knees; and he attended an average college where he earned respectable but unremarkable grades.

It’s anticlimactic in a way. We expect crooks and fraudsters to fit a certain image: brash, arrogant, reckless, charismatic. But few people know fraud better than Barry Minkow; in his teens and early 20s he perpetrated the infamous Zzzz Ideal fraud, spent seven and a half years in prison, and has since helped regulators uncover over a billion in fraud — and he wouldn’t be surprised.

In an interview earlier this year, I asked him about the psychological profile of a con-man. Here’s what he wrote back:

Consider two swift examples that could be readily multiplied. Jose Gomez, the partner at Allow Thornton sentenced to 12 years for taking a bribe of 200K was a classic accountant introvert while I was an arrogant extrovert. Or how about the case of Jim Donahue, the Stanford mathematician (Masters Degree) and brilliant fund manager who I met in prison at FCI Englewood was a total introvert who plead guilty to a 100 million dollar fraud? … People can be very passionate about their company and not be crooks and introverts who are not the so-called “charismatic con-men” can and do commit big white collar frauds. My point? Never make the mistake of trying to profile subjectively what the typical corporate thief or “thief to be” may look like — but rather use objective criteria to establish “red flags” or high likelihoods for fraud to occur.

The message for investors is this: To protect yourself from fraud, you’re going to have to dig into financial statements and learn to spot red flags. Don’t anticipate con-men to “look” or “act” like con-men. They come in all kinds.

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Filed under: Management, TV, Employees, Headline news

In reading of all the hoopla and viewing the photos of rows of carefully lettered picket signs, this brain of mine keeps telling me that The Writer’s Guild of America isn’t necessarily accomplishing exactly what it has set out to do. Yes, they may garner for their writers, producers, directors, and production people a bit of additional coin in respect of the flow of broadcast media into the web zone, but I’m thinking that they are looking much too closely at few very picayune trees as the broad leafed forest looms glowering above them.

You see, television production people generally seem to think that the internet is an extension of their own video media world. However, if there’s one thing we’ve learned over the past five years, it’s the fact that television and the internet are two distinctly different worlds. The screenwriters and their compatriots have no corner on the market for producing acceptable media content, no matter how much they wish to believe that they do. In a thought, what they’re doing with their strike right now is something akin to the habits of a trapdoor spider. That being, they have temporarily exited their lair to grasp their quarry only to withdraw back into their den with a few temporarily satisfying morsels.

Had it been my decision to make, I would have handled things quite differently. Rather than making noise about how seasoned writers weren’t getting paid for their world wide web exposure, I’d have kept quiet for a while longer. In the mean time, I would have begun assembling media production companies independent of mainstream televised media. Then, when the time was right, I’d have dropped the bomb on the massive television production companies. That bomb would have taken the form of independent, first-rate competition for air time dollars … exclusive full length world wide web video content vs. main stream TV shows. The massive production companies would have never seen it coming, and this world wide web is just about ready for it.

As it stands right now, we who are maintaining the internet may actually score large in the Writer’s Guild row. You see, all those high-dollar television production people continue to be relegated to somewhat staying out of our way. We have the ability to keep having fun here while generating multi-millions of advertising dollars with our high-quality content. I suppose duty dictates that I should now mention that our own staffs are well seasoned with very talented video production people and we’re beginning to mobilize them in that capacity.

We have writers and producers. We have camera operators, directors, wardrobe specialists, and makeup artists. We have people who are actors and people who do stunts. As a matter of fact, some of our associates already appear on television on a regular basis and I already work for some first-rate content producers.

So, please do keep that writer’s strike going. Do make that noise and demand those dollars. In the mean time, those of us who have been lovingly nurturing the web, shall continue to do so. Perhaps some day the Writer’s Guild of America shall realize that they’ve passed up the orange while seeking a piece of the peel. For my sake, I hope they don’t figure it out one moment too soon.

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Barking up the right aisle at Petco
South Coast Today - Owners spend lots of money on their pets, especially at Christmas,” he said. Mr. Pearson, who has worked for Petco for 10 years in several stores throughout Southern New England, stated he has never witnessed a dog fight at any of those stores. “The dogs

Larrie Rose, President of Belden Europe, Will Retire
MSN MoneyCentral - For today’s top Money video click here News Providers Associated Press bizjournals.com Briefing.com BusinessWeek Wall Street Journal ST. LOUIS, Jan. 25 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Belden BDC this day announced that D. Larrie Rose, Vice President

Shenandoah Telecommunications Company Adopts New Shareholder Rights
MSN MoneyCentral - For today’s top Money video click here News Providers Associated Press bizjournals.com Briefing.com BusinessWeek Wall Street Journal EDINBURG, Va., Jan. 25 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Shenandoah Telecommunications Company SHEN announced today that its

Mid-market shoe sellers feeling the pinch
Daily Telegraph - Verdict Research, specialist mid-market chains’ share of the footwear market has shrunk from 50pc in 2001 to just 42pc this day You’re here: Telegraph > Money > Business

Mint.com Soothes the Holiday Spending Hangover
Forbes - MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Jan. 25 /PRNewswire/ — Mint.com (http://www.mint.com), the fresh, free, easy and intelligent way for people to manage their money on the web, this day announced its “Holiday Spending Hangover Cure,” a contest to help ease the pain

Ex-PUC chief defends pricing
Dallas Morning News - Wood faults them for being too lazy to save money. Residential customers are paying more this day – an average of 12.48 cents per kilowatt-hour – than they did when the competitive market opened in 2002, when the average

Milwaukee statue will ‘Bronze the Fonz’
USA Today - Winkler was in Milwaukee on Friday morning when organizers officially announced the money had been raised. Plans call for Conversation guidelines: USA TODAY welcomes your thoughts, stories and information related to this article. Please stay on

Stocks in Focus on Today’s Edition of ‘Before the Bell:’ PHM, TOL, DHI
MSN MoneyCentral - For today’s top Money video click here News Providers Associated Press bizjournals.com Briefing.com BusinessWeek Wall Street Journal NEW YORK, Jan. 24 /PRNewswire/ — “Before the Bell” is a daily podcast hosted by editor, Bobby Ilich that airs

Spare time rocket science
Seattle Times - For Tryon, a lot was at stake this day. Time, money, but mostly pride. Could he move up to the huge leagues? Could he be certified, in essence, as an extreme rocketeer? Did he have the right stuff? “If I have a catastrophic failure, I’ll just have to

TABLE-U.S. M-2 money supply down $16.9 bln Jan 14 week
Reuters - DIARY - This day in Washington - Jan. 25 M-2 money supply fell by $16.9 billion in the January 14 week to $7,440.8 billion, the Federal Reserve stated on Thursday. The

(Adds CEO comments, money market asset details)
Reuters - BOSTON, Jan 24 (Reuters) - Janus Capital Group Inc (JNS.N: Quote , Profile , Research ) posted a lower fourth-quarter profit on Thursday, injured by a charge related to its printing business, but results at its money managing operations pleased analysts

British tycoon held in Zimbabwe
Peterborough Evening Telegraph - During the swoop on Thursday, police found pornographic material featuring Van Hoogstraten and a 22-year-old Zimbabwean woman. The alleged offences carry the penalty of a fine and forfeiture of money held in violation of the nation’s currency laws.

Citing principle, Braman relishes the fight
Miami Herald - Twenty-six years ago, his first public campaign stopped Miami from using public money to renovate the already crumbling Orange Bowl. This day, the once-glorious OB is set for demolition to make way for the new Marlins ballpark. In 1982, Braman’s friend

Stansted price plans face revamp
Daily Telegraph - Such a cap could reach £8.70 per passenger by 2013/14 compared to today’s £6.44. More radical options included You’re here: Telegraph > Money > Business

Pasadena action sports web site sells to USA Today
MSN MoneyCentral - For today’s top Money video click here News Providers Associated Press bizjournals.com Briefing.com BusinessWeek Wall Street Journal USA This day is tapping into gnarly-ism. The paper is acquiring Banquet, whose action-sports Web site BNQT.com , covers

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