Yearly Archives: 2013

Don’t Make it Easy for Governments to Compile Your Digital Dossier – Part II

"The Onion Router (Tor) was originally a research project of the US Naval Research Laboratory and was developed as a third generation anonymity software. Today, the Tor Project is an open source application and is used worldwide by private citizens, the military, journalists, law enforcement officers, and activists. Tor is arguably one of the most anonymous Internet anonymizers available. As the above diagram illustrates, users, via a Tor client, make a random connection to the first of three remote servers. The remote servers can be operated by anyone – virtually anywhere in the world. The three servers, also known as nodes, are encrypted." Continue reading →

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The Best Quality Of Life In The World: Residency & Citizenship In Austria

"This country offers an excellent quality of life as well as a safe and healthy environment. In fact, Austria boasts one of the highest standards of living of any country in the world. The Mercer Consulting group, in particular, has ranked Vienna, as the city with the world’s highest quality of life for the past three years running. Note that Austrian residency and citizenship bring other, more practical advantages. Austria is one of 25 European states that are part of the 'Schengen agreement.' A resident or citizen of one Schengen country enjoys visa-free travel to all other Schengen countries. In addition, an Austrian passport has a very good global reputation." Continue reading →

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The Top 10 Companies With The Best Business Outlook According To Employees

"Following Google’s I/O conference and its share price breakthrough this week, it looks like techies and shareholders may not be the only ones feeling the energy around the company’s business. We look at the Top 10 Companies with the Best Business Outlook, according to employees, and Google stands out at number one – 86% of employees believe the company’s business outlook will improve in the next six months. The online company review survey that employees voluntarily and anonymously complete includes the question: 'Do you believe your company’s business outlook will get better, stay the same or get worse in the next six months?'" Continue reading →

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Secrets From The Sexist Pitchbook Of One Of Wall Street’s More Notorious Firms

"BuzzFeed has obtained the 'Golden Pitchbook' used by top brokers at John Thomas Financial. In its pages: How cold-calling brokers pressure prospects to buy stocks from the troubled firm. The aggressive pitch tactics in the book and supporting JTF documents, such as what one scenario described by the source as 'Don’t Pitch The Bitch,' have caught the attention of the FBI, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority." Continue reading →

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Get Ahead of the Pack and Unload Bonds Now

"Why oh why does this love affair continue? Some of it is inertia. People just don’t want to sell what worked for them in 2009, 2010, and early 2011 … even if it isn’t working any more. Some of it is fear. Investors were burned so badly by the 2008 stock market crash, when Treasury bonds were about the only asset class that went up in value, that they’re willing to buy bonds at almost any price. And some of it is the fault of central bankers worldwide. They’re essentially cornering the bond market, making the Hunt Brothers’ infamous cornering of the silver market in the late 1970s and early 1980s look like child’s play." Continue reading →

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Japanese Stocks Plunge 1000 Points; Central Bank Injects 2 Trillion Yen

"Japan’s Topix index fell almost 7 percent, the most since the aftermath of the March 2011 tsunami and nuclear disaster, as financial companies plunged amid rising bond yields. The rout triggered a halt in Nikkei 225 Stock Average futures trading in Osaka." Continue reading →

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The Words That Sent the Stock Market Tumbling

"Stocks closed down nearly 1 percent in a volatile session after the minutes from the last Fed policy setting meeting suggested the Fed is divided on when it may start to pull back on its monetary stimulus. The market had moved higher earlier in the session when Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke reiterated that tapering bond purchases will depend on an improvement in the economic data. But then during the Q & A, Bernanke said that the Fed could decide to scale back the pace of bond purchases at one of the 'next few meetings' if the economic recovery looked set to maintain forward momentum." Continue reading →

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Sealand to adopt bitcoin?

"We’ve seen bitcoin gaining traction among companies ranging from porn merchants through to car dealerships. But this may be the first time we’ve seen a country adopting it as a currency – well, a country of sorts. The Principality of Sealand has expressed an interest in adopting bitcoin. 'Prince Michael' Bates, of the quirky, self-proclaimed independent state, expressed interest in the virtual currency during an interview on the Reddit site. The son of Sealand founder Roy Bates was asked if the state could print its own money. 'Yes, we are looking at ways to do it securely. Also bitcoin sounds really interesting if they stabilise,' Bates said." Continue reading →

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Bitcoin more powerful than fastest supercomputers

"The power of all the computers networked together to maintain the digital currency's system far exceeds the combined processing strength of the top 500 most powerful supercomputers. Easily. The matchup isn't even close. At any given moment, Bitcoin's peer-to-peer network contains thousands of computers linked together to generate more than 1,000 petaflops of raw computing power. To put that in perspective, the world's fastest supercomputer, Titan, runs at less than 18 petaflops. The Bitcoin network is sucking down nearly $200,000 a day in electricity costs. That's stunning for an 'economy' that sprang into being just four years ago." Continue reading →

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Cold fusion reactor independently verified, has 10,000 times the energy density of gas

"Against all probability, a device that purports to use cold fusion to generate vast amounts of power has been verified by a panel of independent scientists. The research paper, which hasn’t yet undergone peer review, seems to confirm both the existence of cold fusion, and its potency: The cold fusion device being tested has roughly 10,000 times the energy density and 1,000 times the power density of gasoline. Even allowing for a massively conservative margin of error, the scientists say that the cold fusion device they tested is 10 times more powerful than gasoline — which is currently the best fuel readily available to mankind." Continue reading →

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