Port strike for east and gulf coasts averted for 30 days, talks continue

A looming longshoremen’s strike set for midnight Saturday, which threatened havoc at 15 ports along the eastern seaboard and Gulf Coast, has been averted for at least a month.

The two sides, the International Longshoreman’s Association and the U.S. Maritime Alliance, announced Friday morning they would continue to negotiate after a couple of days of tense mediation.

After eight months of talks the sides went their separate ways Dec. 18. But talks picked up again this week in response to pressure from port directors, retail federations, even the White House.

The longshoremen, a group of 14,650 workers, some who operate the giant gantry cranes at the nation’s ports, threatened to walk out on contract talks early Sunday morning if the U.S. Maritime Alliance didn’t back off its demand that the union stop receiving royalties, or bonuses, for each container leaving or loaded onto a ship. In many cases those bonuses allow longshoremen to double their salaries to more than $100,000 a year.

Port directors throughout the nation have expressed concern that a strike would virtually halt economic activity throughout the country. It would affect mostly non-perishable goods like clothing and televisions. PortMiami does close to $20 billion a year in container business.

The longshoremen’s contract actually expired at the end of September, but the sides agreed to continue talks for 90 days.

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Exclusive: Taio Cruz's Acoustic 'Fast Car' Performance

Watch an exclusive video of mega-platinum artist Taio Cruz performing his latest single, Fast Car, acoustically on the roof of Drai's in Hollywood – only on ETonline!

Related: Demi Lovato and Taio Cruz Reveal Top Nominated AMA Artists

Taio is well-known for posting a series of amazing acoustic performances online, starting with simple homemade videos of him doing covers of Adele and Rihanna. Now he's doing higher-quality versions, covering Bruno Mars and performing unique acoustic versions of his biggest hits, Break Your Heart and Dynamite (which is the biggest-selling song in the history of his label, Island Def Jam, and the original video has more than 121 million views!).

Watch, listen and enjoy!

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Health of George H.W. Bush 'improving'

HOUSTON — Former President George H.W. Bush remains in intensive care at a Houston hospital, but he's improving.

Bush family spokesman Jim McGrath said Friday that the 88-year-old former president is continuing to improve. He says Bush is "alert and, as always, in good spirits."

McGrath says Bush's conversations with doctors and nurses at Methodist Hospital now include singing.

He says physicians remain "cautiously optimistic that the current course of treatment will be effective."

Bush has been hospitalized since Nov. 23. He was moved into intensive care on Sunday for treatment of a fever following a bronchitis-related cough.

FilmMagic

Former President George H.W. Bush

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Crime Watch: New computer for Christmas? Use it safely

Last week I received several emails from readers who wanted me to write again about computer safety since many got a computer for Christmas. Therefore, I pulled some information from one of our crime prevention partners, The National Crime Prevention Council, and here are tips you need to take seriously whether you are a senior or a parent:

• Use anti-virus software and keep it up-to-date. The software is designed to protect your computer against known viruses but, with new viruses emerging daily, anti-virus programs need regular updates. Check with the website of your anti-virus software company to see sample descriptions of viruses and to get regular updates for your software. I do updates on my computer every other day.

• Don’t open emails or attachments from unknown sources. Be suspicious of any unexpected email attachments even if they appear to be from someone you know. Should you receive a suspicious email, the best thing to do is to delete the entire message, including any attachment.

• Protect your computer from Internet intruders by using firewalls. These create a protective wall between your computer and the outside world. They come in two forms, software firewalls that run on your personal computer and hardware firewalls that protect a number of computers at the same time. Firewalls also ensure that unauthorized persons can’t gain access to your computer while you’re connected to the Internet.

• Use hard-to-guess passwords. Mix upper case, lower case, numbers or other characters, and make sure your passwords are at least eight characters long. Don’t share your password and don’t use the same password in more than one place. Don’t use your maiden name or the names of your mother, your children or your spouse’s family. Those are easy to figure out.

• Disconnect your computer from the Internet when not in use. This lessens the chance that someone will be able to access your computer. Also, if you haven’t kept your anti-virus software up to date or don’t have a firewall in place, someone could infect your computer or use it to harm someone else on the Internet.

• Check your security on a regular basis. You should evaluate your computer security at least twice a year.

• Back up your computer data on a thumb drive, just in case we have a hurricane, you can take it with you. There is nothing worse than losing pictures, information and work when a computer crashes.

Last, I want to remind all parents, if you gave a computer to your child, no matter what age, please make sure that the computer is somewhere you can see it.

In closing, I want to wish everyone a blessed 2013, I wish you the best of health and happiness!

With that said, I must remind everyone that there are crazy people out there that like to shoot guns into the air, a deadly habit, therefore the first shot fired you hear please call the police immediately. You might think it’s fire crackers, but it may not be so please stay away from windows or outside at midnight. Remember what goes up must come down, and that is when people get hurt.

Have a great week!

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Apple CEO’s pay takes big hit vs. record 2011 package

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Apple Inc CEO Tim Cook’s 2012 compensation package of just over $ 4 million is a huge cut on paper for the top executive of the most valuable U.S. corporation, after a 2011 package fattened by more than $ 376 million in long-term stock awards.

Cook received the largest single pay package awarded to a company CEO in about a decade when he replaced Apple‘s legendary co-founder, Steve Jobs, shortly before Jobs’ death in October 2011.

The maker of the iPhone and iPad made the 2012 compensation disclosures in a regulatory filing on Thursday. Cook, who is in his early 50s, joined Apple in 1998 and became CEO in August 2011.

Virtually all of Cook’s $ 376 million bonus in 2011 was in stock awards that will vest in two chunks – one in 2016 and the other in 2021. This structure was intended to keep Jobs’ longtime lieutenant at the helm for many years.

In terms of base salary, Cook actually received a 50 percent increase to $ 1.4 million for 2012, and the same 200 percent bonus that other top Apple executives like CFO Peter Oppenheimer earned, Apple said in a regulatory filing on Thursday.

The 2012 compensation package for Cook also pales in comparison with his 2010 pay, which was 14 times higher, when he served as chief operating officer.

But Tim Ghriskey, chief investment officer of Solaris Group – which counts Apple stock as the biggest holding among the approximately $ 2 billion it manages – said Cook’s package was “normal CEO compensation.”

For example, Yahoo Inc’s CEO, Marissa Mayer, a former Google Inc high-flyer hired this year to try to turn around the struggling Internet icon, won a pay package worth more than $ 70 million. Despite her lack of a CEO track record, her basic pay is comparable to Cook’s, with about $ 1 million in annual salary and up to $ 2 million in an annual bonus.

Oracle Corp’s Larry Ellison, one of the most highly paid chief executives in the United States – and also the world’s sixth-richest man, according to Forbes – received total compensation for the year ended May 31, 2012, of $ 96.2 million – almost all of it in stock options.

That compared with $ 77.6 million for Ellison in the prior year.

Cook’s longtime boss, Jobs, famously received $ 1 a year in salary in the three years before he stepped down, though in 2000 he too received a stock option that analysts say was valued at almost $ 600 million at the time.

Cook will not receive any stock awards for 2012, Apple said in Thursday’s filing.

The 2012 package includes a salary of $ 1.4 million and a nonequity bonus of $ 2.8 million. Cook’s base salary actually increased in 2012 from the $ 900,000 he earned in 2011.

While Apple’s shares are roughly 35 percent higher than when Cook became CEO, they have fallen more than 27 percent since October, when they hit a $ 700.10 high. The stock has declined amid investor worries about intensifying competition in the mobile phone market and growth prospects in important markets including China.

Apple shares were down 1.3 percent at $ 506.35 on the Nasdaq on Thursday afternoon.

(Reporting by Sinead Carew and Liana Baker in New York, Jim Finkle and Tim McLaughlin in Boston and Edwin Chan in San Francisco,; editing by Kenneth Barry and Matthew Lewis)

Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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The Best of 2012 Red Carpet Fashion

From Angelina Jolie's glamorous Atelier Versace Golden Globes dress, to Sofia Vergara's gorgeous glittery teal Zuhair Murad gown (that ended up giving her one of the most memorable wardrobe malfunctions of all time) at the Emmys, the year was full of buzzworthy red carpet fashion moments.

Pics: 2012's Top 12 Amazing Gowns

Check out the video to see the best of the best, and to relive star-making moments such as Jennifer Lawrence in her gold cut-out Prabal Gurung gown at The Hunger Games premiere and Anne Hathaway's dramatic Tom Ford Les Miserables look that's sure to go down in the history books!

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Sales contracts for houses and condos in Miami-Dade rose in November

Homebuyers continued to sign contracts to buy homes and condominiums in Miami-Dade county at a brisk pace in November.

Pending sales for an existing single-family home or condominium spiked 52 percent in Miami-Dade in November to 3,374 units from 2,226 a year earlier, according to the Miami Association of Realtors.

The volume of pending sales – reflecting a sales contract signed on a transaction that hasn’t closed – fell 19.1 percent in November from October, the Realtors’ group said.

Pending sales for single-family homes rose 73.8 percent in November from a year earlier, while that for condos increased 37.4 percent year over year, Miami Realtors said.

The group said Miami-Dade is on track to hit a new sales record existing homes and condos for 2012.

With exceptionally tight inventory of residential property on the market and rising demand, properties are selling at closer to their asking prices. Single-family homes sold in November got 93.7 percent of the original listing price on average, while condominiums fetched 96.2 percent, Miami Realtors said.

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Outdoorsy fun for the New Year’s holiday

So, as Miss Ella once sang, What Are You Doing New Year’s Eve?

Many of you, of course, will ring in 2013 with champagne and dancing at one of the clubs in Miami Beach or downtown Miami — and many of these same people will wake up with a hangover Tuesday only to wonder why they spent $2,000 to be in the same space as R&B/hip-hop act Drake and a DJ at the Fontainebleau or depressed that they spent $1,500 for a VIP table at the Catalina’s Studio 54 party to hear ’70s disco when they could have played Donna, Gloria and the Village People at any old time on iTunes for a few houseguests.

Clubbing not your thing? Good thing you live in South Florida, where going outside generally makes sense at this time of year. Here are some suggestions for activities, with an accent on the great outdoors and even a little fitness thrown in for good measure.

King Mango Strut

The annual spoof of the Orange Bowl Parade — or whatever some politician wants to call it now, as in ‘La Gran Naranja’ — has been “putting the ‘nut’ back in ‘Coconut Grove’ since 1981,” its ads tout. This time around, being an election year should provide plenty of fodder, and not just the silliness going on in West Kendall and Brickell, where some people are still waiting to cast a vote in the presidential race. (Obama won, go home.) The snarky parade pokes good-natured fun at the people and things behind the events that made the news snap during the year. This year’s grand marshal will be Clint Eastwood’s chair, fresh from the Republican National Convention.

This year’s parade takes place at 2 p.m. Sunday in downtown Coconut Grove on the corner of Commodore Plaza and Main Highway. The wacky participants turn left onto Main Highway and then left onto Grand Avenue at CocoWalk. Get comfy along the street and prepare to giggle. Call the Mango Hotline at 305-582-0955 for information.

The orange rises

You can go traditional and watch the ball rise in downtown Miami at the Bayfront Park Amphitheater New Year’s shindig, La Gran Naranja. The free event features music and the midnight countdown for the climb of the Big Orange along the side of the Hotel InterContinental, followed by fireworks. Be there at 301 N. Biscayne Blvd. Call 305-358-7550.

Just want the fireworks part? Miami Beach’s New Year’s Eve Party offers a free fireworks celebration at midnight on the beach near Ocean Drive and Eighth Street, if you can tear yourself away from Carl Cox at Mansion and Calvin Harris at Liv. Call 305-673-7400.

Bike It

Shark Valley, on the Tamiami Trail about 35 miles into the Everglades, is a real South Florida experience. Cycle amid gators — and we’re not talking the University of Florida variety. Alligators, wading birds and turtles frolic freely in the greenery along the 15-mile round-trip bike path. A multilevel observation at the midpoint offers a nice break spot for a boxed lunch or photo ops. There are no shortcuts, but you can opt for a tram tour. Call 305-221-8776.

Other leisurely bike rides around town include the shaded 13 or so miles of the Old Cutler Trail in South Miami, and you can pop over to Pinecrest Gardens for the Sunday Green Market, one of South Florida’s best farmers markets. North Dade residents aren’t too far from the restored Hollywood Beach Broadwalk for some nice ocean views while cycling or strolling.

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Netflix blames Amazon for Christmas Eve outage

NEW YORK (Reuters) – An outage at one of Amazon‘s web service centers hit users of Netflix Inc‘s streaming video service on Christmas Eve and was not fully resolved until Christmas Day, a spokesman for the movie rental company said on Tuesday.

The outage impacted Netflix subscribers across Canada, Latin America and the United States, and affected various devices that enable users to stream movies and television shows from home, Netflix spokesman Joris Evers said. Such devices range from gaming consoles like the Nintendo Wii and PlayStation 3 to Blu-ray DVD players.

Netflix, which is based in Los Gatos, California, has 30 million streaming subscribers worldwide, of which more than 27 million are in the Americas region that was exposed to the outage and could have potentially been affected, Evers said.

Evers said the issue was the result of an outage at an Amazon Web Services‘ cloud computing center in Virginia and started at about 12:30 p.m. PST (2030 GMT) on Monday and was fully restored before 8:00 a.m. PST Tuesday morning, although streaming was available for most users by 11:00 p.m. PST on Monday.

The event marks the latest in a series of outages from Amazon Web Services, with one occurring in April of last year that knocked out such sites as Reddit and Foursquare.

“We are investigating exactly what happened and how it could have been prevented,” Evers of Netflix said.

“We are happy that people opening gifts of Netflix or Netflix capable devices can watch TV shows and movies and apologize for any inconvenience caused last night,” he added.

Officials at Amazon Web Services were not available for comment. Evers, the Netflix spokesman, declined to comment on the company’s contracts with Amazon.

(Reporting by Sam Forgione; Editing by Leslie Gevirtz and Matt Driskill)

Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Harrison Ford Feeds Homeless on Christmas Eve

Harrison Ford and his family helped spread Christmas cheer on Monday, serving meals to the less fortunate.

RELATED: Harrison Ford on Raiders Stunt in Vintage Footage

The Oscar nominee and his son Chef Ben Ford volunteered at the Los Angeles Mission's Christmas Eve dinner on Skidrow.

Ben, the Executive Chef and proprietor of Ford's Filling Station restaurant in Culver City, CA, cooked over 4,000 chicken dinners for the event, calling it "one of [his] favorite days of the year" in a Facebook message posted Monday.

"Looking forward to sharing this special day with my family," Chef Ben added.

PICS: Celebrities With Santa

Forming the perfect magnanimous tag team, Harrison passed out food while the chef kept busy in the kitchen.

Mayor Anotonio Villaraigosa, Harry Hamlin, Lisa Rinna and Melissa Gilbert also braved the rain to volunteer.

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