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Chesapeake Energy drops legal fight over natural gas leases in New York state

“Landowners in Broome and Tioga counties, who had leased acreage to Chesapeake over the past decade, had battled the pioneering oil driller in court to prevent it from extending the leases under their original terms, many of which were agreed to long before a boom in hydraulic fracturing swept the United States. ‘I can renegotiate with other companies now,’ said Frank Laskowski, who owns land in Broome County. ‘Before that we were tied up with Chesapeake at $3 an acre and 12.5 percent. Most people are getting much more than that.’ One landowner in Broome County said he now hoped to secure up to $3,000 an acre.” Continue reading →

Swiss bank UBS pays $50 million to settle SEC charges from 2007 financial meltdown

“UBS agreed to pay nearly $50 million to settle charges over its disclosures related to a money-losing 2007 investment vehicle linked to sub-prime loans, a US agency announced Tuesday. UBS presented inaccurate or incomplete information about upfront payments in marketing literature to investors and in submissions to the CDO’s directors, the SEC said. When the CDO was liquidated in 2007, outside investors lost approximately $130 million in the CDO, according to an SEC administrative order. In the settlement, UBS agreed to pay about $50 million in disgorgement, interest and penalties. The bank did not admit or deny the SEC’s findings.” Continue reading →

Chinese baby ‘sold by doctor’ reunited with parents

“Zhang Suxia, the doctor responsible for the birth, allegedly persuaded the parents to give up their child last month after informing them he had serious congenital diseases. The paper reported that a farmer with three daughters bought the baby boy from the alleged traffickers for 60,000 yuan ($9,800). Trafficking of children is a serious problem in China, blamed in part on the ‘one-child’ policy which has put a premium on baby boys, with girls sometimes sold off, abandoned or put up for adoption. Chinese police rescued 89 children and arrested 355 suspects in December after breaking up a series of child trafficking rings.” Continue reading →

French woman offers to breast feed gay couples’ babies for $130 a day

“A woman has posted an offer on a French website to breast-feed babies of homosexual male couples for 100 euros ($130) a day, stirring up media interest just weeks after a divisive same-sex marriage law was passed. The offer, addressed to male homosexual couples who can marry legally in France since May, promises up to 10 breast-feeds a day. Alexandre Woog, chief executive of the e-loue website, said staff had no doubt about the seriousness of the proposal. ‘Our legal advisers are sure of this. It’s illegal in France to sell maternal milk but this is a person proposing a service, not selling the milk in flasks,’ Woog told Reuters.” Continue reading →

Obama administration task force wants to make unauthorized streaming a felony

“The U.S. Department of Commerce wants to crack down on the unauthorized streaming of video and audio content by reviving a provision of the Stop Online Piracy Act. In a report released last week, the Commerce Department’s Internet Policy Task Force called for the unauthorized streaming of copyrighted works to become a felony. ‘While the willfully infringing reproduction and distribution of copyrighted works can be punished as a felony, willful violations of the public performance right are punishable only as misdemeanors,’ the report stated. ‘This discrepancy is an increasingly significant impediment,’ the report continued.” Continue reading →

Most Americans fear anti-aging technology is luxury for the rich

“Most Americans do not want to live beyond age 100, and a poll out Tuesday suggests many worry that anti-aging technologies may end up being a luxury for the rich. A majority of US adults (56 percent) said they would not ‘choose to undergo medical treatments to slow the aging process and live to be 120 or more,’ said the Pew report. The median, or midpoint, for ideal lifespan was 90, or about 11 years longer than the current US average. Asked whether current medical treatments are worth the costs, 54 percent agreed and 41 percent disagreed on grounds that modern medical advances ‘often create as many problems as they solve.'” Continue reading →

Amazon launches online art gallery

“The 19-year online retail juggernaut, which began as a bookseller but now does everything from groceries to patio furniture, launched ‘Amazon Art’ to market works from galleries in Miami, San Francisco, New York and other US cities. The site showcases more than 40,000 works from over 150 galleries and dealers that run the gamut as far as subject, genre and period are concerned. Works range from modest canvasses like a $44 cat portrait to Norman Rockwell’s ‘Willie Gillis: Package from Home,’ which retails for $4.85 million. ‘From gallery walls to your walls,’ boasts the site, which enables users to quickly click through works by period and genre.” Continue reading →

Appeals court reverses course and says poker is gambling, not game of skill

“Poker may be a game of skill, but that does not protect a man who hosted games of ‘Texas Hold ‘Em’ from being prosecuted under an anti-gambling law, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday. The ruling by the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York reversed a decision last year that said Lawrence DiCristina could not be prosecuted because ‘Texas Hold ‘Em’ was a game of skill rather than chance. DiCristina was convicted under the law for running games of ‘Texas Hold ‘Em’ at a warehouse in Staten Island, New York, which he publicized by text message and word of mouth. DiCristina faces 10 years in prison.” Continue reading →