Monkey business hard to sustain in slump, Goodall says

By Candida Ng
SINGAPORE (Reuters Life!) - Chimpanzees, long under threat from humans encroaching on their habitat, are now facing another risk caused by that same member of the Great Ape family: the global economic crisis, says primatologist Jane Goodall.
Funding to the Jane Goodall Institute, a nonprofit organization that aims to conserve primate habitats and increase awareness of animal welfare activities, has declined by about 10 percent since the financial crisis hit.
"Money that came in last year was less than we had expected," Goodall told Reuters in Singapore while visiting for events related to World Environment Day. "The private donors and some of the foundations pulled back."
The institute, which has an annual budget of $10-11 million which funds its activities in Africa, has had to dig into its endowment fund to keep some of its programs running. Some projects were cut and staff laid off.
Goodall, who rose to fame in the 1960s through her ground-breaking study of chimpanzees in East Africa, said the root cause of most problems was overpopulation and the materialism of most human societies.
"Underlying everything is the sheer number of people on the planet," said 75-year-old Goodall. "We take far, far, far, far more than our fair share of these precious natural resources."
"We have to help people understand that enough is enough. We have so much more than we need, we have a throwaway society."
Such strident demands on the environment have seen previously forested areas being taken over by humans for housing, agriculture and business, leading to a dwindling population of chimpanzees and other animals in the wild.
Goodall estimates there are currently there are about 300,000 chimpanzees spread across 21 nations in Africa, down from the 1-2 million in 1960.
The animal rights activist, who fulfilled her childhood dream to live in the wild and write books, spends 300 days a year on the road using her personal story and fame to inspire youth to become more environmentally responsible.
"Root & Shoots," a youth organization she started with 12 high-school students in Tanzania in 1991, now involves people from pre-schoolers to university students and prisoners across 111 countries. It aims to raise awareness about the planet.
"People understand a lot more, but it doesn't mean they always change their behavior though," Goodall said. "The last hurdle is to get people not only to understand, but take action. The bigger problem is that again, again and again that people honestly cannot believe that what they do makes a difference."
(Editing by Miral Fahmy)

Source: Reuters

Belgrade's vast underground world a mystery to most

By Aleksandar Vasovic
BELGRADE (Reuters Life!) - Only a few patrons enjoying drinks at Belgrade's Underground club know that a Medieval mass grave lies just beyond the bar's walls.
To repel Turkish invaders in 1440, Christian defenders of the city used a giant gunpowder mine to blow up hundreds of attackers digging tunnels beneath the city. Turkish bodies remained in the rubble that sealed one of the tunnels, meters (yards) away from the club's bar.
"I know this place is old and sometimes eerie, but I only recently read a history book about what happened here," said student Ivana Jovanovic, 23.
Over the centuries, attackers and defenders have carved a vast network of underground tunnels, fortifications, storage areas, command posts and bunkers. Today, only the occasional tourist, archaeologist or historian knows about the hidden world below Serbia's sprawling capital.
"We explored and mapped about 15 km (9 miles) and have only scratched the surface," said Vidoje Golubovic, a Belgrade-based historian who occasionally hosts guided tours for enthusiasts.
The city's tumultuous history accounts for the unusually rich honeycomb of tunnels below.
It was just a decade ago that Belgraders most recently went into underground basements and bunkers, this time to avoid NATO bombs during the war involving Kosovo.
In Belgrade's more than 1,000-year history, Celts, Romans, Huns, Slavic tribes, Byzantines, Hungarians, Ottoman Turks, Serbs, Austro-Hungarians and Germans have tried to dominate the strategically important confluence of rivers Sava and Danube, considered the gateway to Europe.
Underground Belgrade usually comes to light only during construction when heavy machinery breaks through the brick walls or limestone caverns, sometimes even exposing waterways dating back to Roman domination of the Balkans.
"Wherever one digs, there's a probability of hitting a tunnel of sort. Belgrade's hollow like Swiss cheese," Golubovic said.
WARTIME MENACE
Most of the tunnels, wine cellars, underground bakeries, wells, and a World War Two German command outpost in the Kosutnjak neighborhood overlooking the city are now abandoned and closed to the general public.
Pushing open a rusty door, just steps from modern apartment blocks in the Kosutnjak neighborhood, Golubovic lowered himself down rusty ladders to a dark hallway where steel bed frames were still attached to walls.
"From this vantage point, Germans had perfect command of the area," he said.
A few World War Two veterans still remember the menace of Belgrade's underground world. Continued...
Source: Reuters

White collar boxers learn to roll with the punches

By Dorene InternicolaNEW YORK (Reuters Life!) - When Muhammad Ali advised: "Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee," he probably wasn't talking to hedge fund managers.
Nevertheless, bankers, Wall Streeters, attorneys and teachers, all kinds of professionals, male and female, are putting on boxing gloves for fitness, escape, release and fun.
"There's as much chance of meeting a CEO in a boxing gym as on the golf course," said Peter DePasquale, whose book, "The Boxer's Workout", lays out for everyone the methods boxers use to get in shape.
"Boxers call it working the floor, shadow boxing, hitting the heavy bag, jumping rope," DePasquale explained.
"The routine is an outstanding workout, simultaneously cardio, strength, multiple arms and legs together, and hitting something for stress relief," he said in an interview.
The word has spread.
At a Crunch fitness center in the trendy West Village of New York, personal trainer Rob Piela was grinning from ear to ear about the huge boxing ring that suddenly appeared in the exercise room.
"There's nothing better than putting on those gloves," Piela, a former Golden Gloves semifinalist, said. "But of course it's not the same as walking into an old stinky boxing gym."
For that experience Piela visits Gleason's Gym, across the river in Brooklyn. The oldest boxing gym in the country, it literally reeks of atmosphere.
"Everyone tells me it smells, but I don't smell it. There's no air conditioner. I don't have great ventilation. I don't paint the walls, I don't paint the floors," said owner Bruce Silverglade.
Gleasons, founded in 1937, has hosted most of the boxing greats. It's also where Robert De Niro trained for the film "Raging Bull" and Hilary Swank for "Million Dollar Baby".
And where, Silverglade says, over 330 women now train alongside professionals and serious amateurs.
"Boxing gyms are surviving because of the business people," he said.
"Women have much better attitudes than the men," he added. "Women say 'teach me.' Guys are macho and think they already know how to fight."
Piela says it's become common to see women enter Gleason's toting Louis Vuitton bags and wearing stiletto heels. Continued...
Source: Reuters

Singapore artist DNA tests trees to reveal wood origins

By Gillian Murdoch
SINGAPORE (Reuters Life!) - If a tree falls in one of Southeast Asia's rainforests, is smuggled overseas, made into a table or chair, and years later thrown into the street, can the pieces be put together again?
Singapore artist Lucy Davis says the question may seem childish, but with rainforest wood from Southeast Asia a hot seller in the city-state and overseas, she felt driven to investigate how to tell legal wood, from certified companies which sell plantation-grown timber, from the illegal variety.
"The endeavor to put the wood back "together again" is a necessarily impossible, childlike dream," Davis, an associate professor at Nanyang Technological University, told Reuters.
"(But) rainforest wood products are still extremely popular in Singapore. There are countless furniture stores (here) promising the best Burmese golden teak, or who promise, if you seem interested enough, that they can still get large pieces of (illegal) teak or ramin wood from Indonesia or Cambodia."
Singapore's timber trade has been scrutinized by green groups for decades. The Environmental Investigation Agency accuses its ports of "greenwashing" illegally cut rainforest timber from neighbors such as Indonesia, where the World Bank estimates up to 80 percent of logging is done illegally.
Singapore's Ministry of Trade and Industry told Reuters strict controls cover all imports and exports of rare timbers protected by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). It said action would taken against offenders if evidence was found.
Davis' one-woman investigation, elements of which are on exhibit at a Singapore museum, took her from the streets, where she joined trolley-pushing collectors who search for discarded tables, chairs and even rolling pins, to a DNA testing laboratory that is seeking a scientific solution to illegal logging in the region through DNA analysis.
Paternity-testing timber is more difficult than for humans or animals, as the dead-wood tissue is already degraded. But checked against a database of DNA from legal plantations, the results are an almost foolproof test for illegals, the laboratory said.
While DNA testing confirmed Davis' wood was from rainforests in the Philippines, Malaysian states Sabah and Sarawak, and Indonesia, the pieces' different ages meant that pinpointing whether it was illegal or not to cut them at the exact time they were harvested was problematic.
Despite that fact, posing the question was important, she said. "I hope that the meta eco-political framework is clear -- that the timber ending up in Singapore comes from a whole load of possibly dubious origins," Davis said.
(Reporting by Gillian Murdoch, Editing by Miral Fahmy and Neil Chatterjee)

Source: Reuters

Youth may be challenge for Ahmadinejad in poll

By Zahra Hosseinian
TEHRAN (Reuters) - The young Iranians cruising noisily around upscale northern Tehran in cars plastered with election posters have only one thing on their minds: denying President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad a second term.
Millions of reform-minded Iranians stayed away from the polls in 2005, disillusioned by how hardliners had stymied former President Mohammad Khatami's liberal initiatives.
Ahmadinejad's political fate may well hang on how many of those jaded voters turn out on June 12 -- if only to thwart him.
"I will vote, but only because I want to see anyone but Ahmadinejad win. He has ruined the country," said Mina Sedaqati, a 25-year-old sociology student at Tehran University, over coffee and doughnuts with friends in northern Tehran.
More than two-thirds of Iran's 70 million people are aged under 30, making them too young to remember life before the 1979 Islamic revolution that toppled the U.S.-backed Shah.
All four presidential candidates are wooing youthful voters in speeches and campaign messages and have used popular networking and content-sharing sites such as Facebook to target young people.
More than 150,000 Iranians are Facebook members, and young voters make up a huge bloc which helped Khatami win elections in 1997 and 2001. Access to Facebook was blocked for a few days last month, suggesting government concern at its influence.
But analysts say the anti-Ahmadinejad vote is likely to be split between the radical president's two moderate rivals, ex-Prime Minister Mirhossein Mousavi and former parliament speaker Mehdi Karoubi.
Karoubi, the only cleric in the race, has even met one of Iran's best-known underground rap singers, Sasy Mankan.
Mousavi and Karoubi's posters adorn the cars of the middle-class youngsters eager to stop Ahmadinejad out of fear he will lead Iran on a collision course with the West and further erode social freedom.
Ahmadinejad also faces a conservative challenger in Mohsen Rezai, a former Revolutionary Guard chief, but the president has his own support base among young people who admire his defiant nuclear rhetoric, simple lifestyle and devotion to Islam, as well as his pledges of social justice.
"I will vote for Ahmadinejad because his policies in the past four years have been a return to the fundamental values of the Islamic revolution," said Mohammad Reza Baqeri, 24, a member of the Basij, a religious militia group, who criticized previous governments for neglecting the poor.
"Ahmadinejad is a hero. He stood against those who were Iran's enemies for years, but in return he befriended other nations," said the religious studies graduate, referring to ties the president has forged with U.S. adversaries such as Venezuela and Bolivia.
An Iranian political analyst, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of Iranian politics, described the election as a referendum on Ahmadinejad. "Some people, especially among the young, are for him and some are only voting to prevent his re-election," he said.
POST-REVOLUTIONARY GENERATION Continued...
Source: Reuters

UAE issues guidelines to improve workers' housing

DUBAI (Reuters) - The United Arab Emirates, criticized by rights groups for its treatment of migrant laborers, Monday outlined standards for workers' housing, but employers still have five years to comply with the rules.
It was also not clear what consequences employers would face if they failed to abide by the guidelines.
The majority of the Gulf Arab country's 4.5 million population are foreigners, many of them Asian construction workers hired to develop the UAE's modern cities.
"Each facility operating in the country should upgrade its current workers' accommodation conditions to comply with these standards. Employers are given a maximum period of five years, commencing on the day the decision comes into force," the cabinet said in a statement.
The new manual for employers says rooms should have three square meters per worker and no more than 10 should live in one room.
The manual also includes standards on sewage systems, air conditioning, building materials, indoor air quality, elevators, emergency exits, green spaces, shops, toilets, television rooms and medical facilities, it said.New York-based Human Rights Watch has criticized authorities over Saadiyat island in Abu Dhabi which is planned to be the center of a prestigious cultural district. The developer says workers' accommodation standards will be exemplary.
The UAE is trying to fend off criticism over human trafficking, including maids and other workers trapped into paying fees while their passports are confiscated. A labor ministry official said last month that as well as encouraging "model" housing, the UAE would set up labor courts and allow workers to switch jobs if employers delay wages by two months. It was not clear when this would come into effect.
The government says workers can rest for several hours in the middle of the day during summer, when temperatures and humidity in the Gulf hit dangerous levels.
In recent years workers have gone on strike over late payment of wages. Monday's statement said workers can now report delayed salaries through a Ministry of Labor website.
(Reporting by Andrew Hammond; Editing by Thomas Atkins and Jon Hemming)

Source: Reuters

Domestic abuse plagues India's upper crust

By Matthias WilliamsNEW DELHI (Reuters) - With stylish sunglasses on her head, brightly painted nails and dressed in black designer gear, the woman sitting at a trendy New Delhi cafe might not look like a battered wife.
But the woman, who asked that her name be withheld to protect her identity and that of her children, was abused for years by her husband, a lawyer.
"He strangled me, he spat on me, he slapped me," the woman, a 37-year-old mother of two who grew up in a wealthy London-based Indian family, told Reuters in an interview.
She is among millions of Indian women, from all classes, who are abused by their husbands. A recent government survey said one in three Indian women were victims of domestic violence.
Her education and status among India's elite gave little protection against her well-heeled and well-connected spouse.
After years of abuse, she took her husband to court under a landmark domestic violence act meant to protect battered wives and give stiff penalties to abusers, but so far to no avail.
"This law, which is enacted by the parliament in 2006, has not been taken seriously," her lawyer, K.K. Manan, told Reuters. "On one pretext or another, the case is being adjourned."
A total of 185,312 crimes against women were reported in India in 2007, compared to 164,765 in 2006. Rights groups say many more cases go unreported.
Domestic violence has long been in the public eye and the media regularly features cases of wife-beating over issues such as dowry, as well as torture and killings of women, especially in poorer households.
India's economic boom has brought a rise in affluent women, often with careers, who enjoy greater freedom than their parents' generation. They dress in Western clothes and visit restaurants, bars and night clubs.
These changes sometimes clash with hardline elements of what remains a largely conservative society. Even among India's upper crust, women's freedom can be superficial.MONEY AND POWER
The domestic violence act was meant for the first time to give protection and compensation for all kinds of abuse in the home, including physical, sexual, verbal, emotional or economic.
Previously, for example, husbands could not be prosecuted for raping their wives, unless the wife was under the age of 15. The new law aims to pass sentence within 60 days of the first hearing.
But more than a year later, the woman's case is still bogged down and in early March she had to make yet another appearance at a special Delhi women's court. Continued...
Source: Reuters

Firefighters most trusted group in Europe and U.S.

LONDON (Reuters Life!) - Firefighters are the most trusted professionals in Europe and the United States, and politicians the least, with bank employees considerably less trusted than a year ago, according to a survey out on Friday.
After a year in which much of the world slid into recession led by a crisis in the financial sector, just 37 percent of respondents to a survey by market research institute GfK said they trusted bankers, compared with 45 percent a year ago.
Firefighters were trusted by 92 percent of respondents, and politicians by 18 percent.
Some of the biggest variations between the countries included in the survey -- 16 European countries and the United States -- were found in levels of trust in the church, the police and judges.
The clergy is trusted by 88 percent of Romanians but just 26 percent of Greeks, for example, while just 37 percent of the Russians surveyed said they trusted the police, compared with 88 percent in Germany.
Bulgarian judges won 31 percent approval, while in Poland 86 percent said they trusted judges.
Overall, teachers came in third, followed by postal workers, doctors and the armed forces in joint third place.
Politicians were least trusted in Greece, with just 6 percent of the vote, and even in the top-rated country for politicians, Sweden, they won only 38 percent approval.
Advertising professionals were second-least trusted after politicians, and top managers third-least.
Journalists were the sixth-least trusted of the 20 professions covered by the survey, with a 41 percent rating.
GfK surveyed 17,295 people in February and March 2009 for its annual poll.
(Reporting by Georgina Prodhan, editing by Paul Casciato)

Source: Reuters

Carlos Santana happy to be a hippie in Las Vegas

By Alex Dobuzinskis
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Guitarist Carlos Santana has an answer for anyone who questions what a self-proclaimed hippie is doing playing a months-long residency in Las Vegas: He doesn't buy into anyone's illusions of who he is.
Santana opened his new show last week at the Hard Rock Hotel -- 40 years after the guitarist thrilled the crowds at Woodstock -- becoming one of the biggest music-makers from the generation of peace and love to take up digs in Sin City.
The 61-year-old Mexican native told Reuters this week that he does not care about anyone who might criticize him for straying from his hippie roots by taking the gig in Las Vegas.
"I don't buy into other people's illusions about who I am," Santana said. "First of all, they don't even know about what I do with my money."
Santana, an 11-time Grammy winner, said he has a long history of supporting political causes, such as Nobel laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu's fight against apartheid in South Africa, and charities, such as earthquake relief in Nicaragua.
He noted that fellow 1960s superstar Bob Dylan, with whom Santana has toured in the past, will play at minor league baseball parks this summer. "What's the difference if I play at a parking lot, Woodstock or Las Vegas?" Santana said.
Santana, whose hit songs include "Smooth" and "Black Magic Woman," opened his show "Supernatural Santana" on May 27 at The Joint at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, in the first of 72 shows he will play this year and next at the venue.
Music critic Ann Powers of the Los Angeles Times wrote that Santana's show opened with video images from Woodstock and it seemed an odd fit for Las Vegas' crowd of weekend revelers.
"The fact that Santana's show worked in this setting proves what an unusual rock icon he is," Powers wrote.
'IDOL' MOMENT
A week before opening in Las Vegas, Santana performed on the finale of top-rated talent show "American Idol" on the Fox network, and gave advice to the singing contestants.
"You have to make ugly faces to make pretty notes," Santana said. "The first thing I noticed at rehearsal is they looked really good, like models, and they were sucking their cheeks and looking like they belong in an agency for beauty."
"I couldn't feel the notes, so I said you need to start making ugly faces," he said.
Raised in Tijuana, Mexico, Santana learned his own musical lessons from his father, Jose, a mariachi violinist. As Santana tells it, he once saw his father on the violin play call-and-response with a bird in the backyard.
"And he goes, 'See if you can talk to birds, you can definitely talk to people's hearts,'" Santana said. "That was the biggest lesson that he taught me." Continued...
Source: Reuters

Footballers' lives: Player lives in designer store

By Marie-Louise Gumuchian
MILAN (Reuters Life!) - Soccer players may be known for their extravagant homes, but Italian footballer Andrea Vasa has trumped his peers by living in a somewhat unusual location -- a designer store.
Since late February, 30-year-old Vasa, a defender for Milan's Brera team, has slept, washed, dressed and chilled out at the flagship store of Belgian menswear designer Dirk Bikkembergs in the city's exclusive Golden Quad area.
His surroundings include a ground-floor leather sofa and TV area, a bedroom, gym and large bathroom plastered with pages of Italy's "Gazzetta dello Sport" paper -- all spread out in the store and easily seen by shoppers. A small kitchen is there too.
Huge windows look out onto the busy square outside, and a soccer shoe-shaped entry phone adds the "home" touch. Personal pictures and some books adorn the shelves where clothes from the Bikkembergs main line are exposed.
"Clients go in as if it were my own wardrobe," Vasa, originally from Sardinia, said while walking around the store.
"Before I used to live in a one-room apartment -- there is just no comparison. It was 40 square meters (431 sq ft), here the bathroom is that size." Bikkembergs has said the store was designed for and inspired by the lifestyle of "passionate sportsmen."
The shop, spread over three floors, sells the Bikkembergs menswear collections as well as travel bags, sunglasses and sport shoes. The top two floors double up as Vasa's home with a spot for his car, a white Porsche.
Shoppers walk around as Vasa sits on the sofa watching TV or playing video games and on some occasions, they have walked in the bedroom while he was still in bed.
"Some people don't believe it, others are surprised or they don't expect it," he said.
"Some have even asked if they can live here too."
Despite the luxury surroundings, there are some limitations. The shower can be seen, so washing needs to be done carefully.
"Someone who is more extrovert would shower or do it in swimming trunks," Vasa said, adding that he also hides his shampoo and shower gels, leaving only his toothbrush and toothpaste exposed.
"Some people would actually open the bottles to check whether they were real," he said.
The store is open from 10:30 a.m. (0830 GMT) to 19:30 p.m. (1730 GMT), meaning privacy starts in the evening. A guard is on watch during the night.
Vasa, who had modeled for Bikkembergs before moving in, said he was shortlisted for the project after volunteering with others. The location and the car were definitely a draw. Continued...
Source: Reuters

Tough times prompt transgender job fair in L.A.

By Dan Whitcomb
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Sydney Dupree came to Los Angeles because, as a young male-to-female transsexual, she found Memphis hostile. She came to the transgender job fair because jobs are hard for her to find, even in Los Angeles.
Dupree has been frustrated by discrimination and employers who turn skittish when confronted with documents identifying her as male, both typical reasons why the transgendered struggle to find and keep jobs, especially during a recession.
Until now the 23-year-old, who came to the job fair at the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center dressed conservatively in tan slacks, a beige top and heels, has supported herself largely through adult films.
"I did what I had to do to survive," Dupree said with a shrug. "I had to get out of Memphis. I just left on a bus."
The fair featured 17 public and private employers willing to reach out to the transgender community, held in the center's small courtyard after a morning rain cleared.
It was organized as part of the center's annual Trans-Unity Pride celebration, billed as the nation's largest, and began with a seminar educating employers on the legal rights of transgendered employees and such tricky issues as restrooms.
"Some questions are not appropriate for the workplace," Masen Davis, executive director of the Transgender Law Center, instructed a group of managers at the seminar. "For example: 'Is your surgery complete?' or 'Do you have a penis?'"
Drian Juarez, manager of the center's Transgender Economic Empowerment Project, said young people who are transitioning to another gender can't get work because they don't quite "pass" yet and a background check by employers won't match their identity.
Some end up on the streets, working as prostitutes because they "can't even get a job at McDonald's," Juarez said, even in largely liberal Los Angeles, which considers itself on the vanguard of such issues.
Kimorah London, 20, works at Target and said she has found her bosses very accepting, possibly because "there's another tranny who works there" and she was upfront about her gender.
"I'm making money and I'm not prostituting myself like a lot of these girls," London said. "I'd rather have a guaranteed paycheck than a hope and promise of money from some man."
But Jaklyn Keen, who came to the fair with Dupree, her friend from Memphis, said she began transitioning from male to female about a year ago after leaving a job at a hair salon and hadn't been able to get work since.
She said a hair salon where she had worked previously refused to hire her back because of the gender change and that her job search had been fruitless.
"The name change has been a pretty big deal," said Keen, dressed in a black blouse and tan skirt with heels. "It's a lot of work and (managers) just don't want to deal with it."
(Editing by Eric Walsh)

Source: Reuters

Just a few on Twitter do all the tweeting: study

By Erin Kutz
BOSTON (Reuters) - A tiny fraction of those who use the fast-growing social network phenomenon Twitter generate nearly all the content, a Harvard study shows.
That makes it hard for companies to use the micro-blogging site as an accurate gauge of public opinion, the Harvard Business School study showed.
Twitter Inc is a social networking website in which users post messages of 140 characters or less -- known as "tweets" -- that can be viewed by other users who elect to follow them.
The Harvard study examined public entries of a randomly selected group of 300,000 Twitter users. The researchers studied in May the content created in the lifetime of the users' Twitter accounts.
It found that 10 percent of Twitter users generated more than 90 percent of the content, said Mikolaj Jan Piskorski, who led the research. More than half of all Twitter users post messages on the site less than once every 74 days.
The median number of lifetime "tweets" per user is just one, according the research.
Companies are increasingly turning to Twitter to improve their understanding of how consumers view them, he said.
But some users are far more active and vocal than others, limiting information gleaned from messages on the site, said Piskorski, an assistant professor of strategy at Harvard Business School.
"If you're trying to get what a representative cross-section of the public is thinking, you're probably better off staying away from Twitter," he said in an interview.
Piskorski said Twitter could still be useful in responding to specific customer concerns. It can also be effective marketing, as companies with Twitter accounts can advertise sales and deals to users who follow them on the site.
JetBlue Airways Corp, Comcast Corp and Dell Inc are among companies with Twitter accounts.
JetBlue provides information on Twitter such as announcements of terminal changes at airports and tips on how to pack and directly answers customers' questions. Dell uses Twitter to point customers to discounts. Comcast's account largely responds to customer gripes.
"Enough of our customers are talking about their interactions with us that we get a decent sample of what's going on a daily basis that we wouldn't necessarily get from other long-term studies," JetBlue spokesman Morgan Johnston said in a telephone interview.
Unlike other social networking sites like Facebook.com, men are almost twice as likely to follow other men on Twitter than they were to follow women, according to the study.
Women were also more likely to follow men than they were to follow other female users. Continued...
Source: Reuters

Darfuris name babies after ICC prosecutor: Farrow

By Edith Honan
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Some refugees in Sudan's war-torn Darfur region have named their children "Okambo" as a tribute to the International Criminal Court's chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo, actress Mia Farrow said on Friday.
"I've met at least 100 babies named Ocampo," Farrow, a U.N. goodwill ambassador, told reporters following a U.N. Security Council meeting on Darfur. "They spell it Okambo. ... So the name has been Africanized."
The International Criminal Court (ICC) issued a warrant for the arrest of Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir in March, charging him with masterminding mass killings and deportations in Darfur in western Sudan.
The Sudanese government has rejected Moreno-Ocampo's charges and is refusing to cooperate with the court.
Moreno-Ocampo was at the United Nations to update the Security Council on activities related to the Bashir case and five others he has submitted to the court on possible war crimes in Darfur.
Breaking with standard U.N. practice, Moreno-Ocampo stood beside Sudanese U.N. Ambassador Abdalmahmoud Abdalhaleem, one of his most vocal critics, as the envoy addressed reporters at a press stakeout after the meeting.
Officials waiting their turn to speak typically stand to the side, out of view of TV cameras.
"Mr. Ocampo, you are not welcome in this place. You abuse the image of the United Nations," Abdalhaleem said, adding that Moreno-Ocampo was a "mercenary."
"Your dreams of publicity and media should come to an end also," he said.
Moreno-Ocampo said he had come to U.N. headquarters to talk about "crimes committed in Darfur."
Farrow went on a 12-day hunger strike in April and May to show solidarity with the people of Darfur. U.N. officials say as many as 300,000 people have been killed and more than 2.7 million driven from their homes in Darfur in almost six years of ethnic and political violence.
Khartoum says 10,000 people have died.
(Editing by Louis Charbonneau and Will Dunham)

Source: Reuters

Henry VIII's armor shows he dressed to impress

By Josie Cox
LONDON (Reuters Life!) - The armor made for England's King Henry VIII to inspire fear, awe and make room for his expanding girth has been gathered for a show at the Tower of London marking the 500th anniversary of his coronation.
The "Dressed to Kill" exhibition displays the largest collection of Henry's surviving armors just a stone's throw away from where he had his second wife Anne Boleyn beheaded.
"Henry is one of the most famous Kings in British history," curator Bridget Clifford told Reuters. "His image has been burned into so many people's psyches. That's why this exhibition is exceptional."
As well as a ruthless ruler famed for executing two of his six wives, the second monarch of the Tudor dynasty was also an avid sportsman, warrior and a political operator who knew the importance of dressing to impress.
The exhibition was stuffed with knives, swords, guns, shields, lances, riding gear and hunting equipment, in display cabinets affixed to the Tower's ancient stone walls and cradled by some of the free-standing suits of armor.
"Henry liked experimenting with firearms and was rather innovative," said Clifford, adding that the weapons and technology he used during his reign from 1509 until his death in 1547 were considered "cutting edge at the time."
Designed by some of the finest craftsmen in Europe, Henry's personal armor was made to protect him in war -- he led three campaigns against France -- and for sports such as jousting and foot combat.
One "tonlet" or suit of foot combat armor on display, was worn by Henry at one of the greatest tournaments of his reign, "The Field of the Cloth of Gold."
The armor on show also illustrates Henry's physical progression from suits for a svelte young prince to more portly pieces designed to fit the much larger king, whose search for a wife who could produce a male heir came to define his rule for many students of history.
Visitors to the exhibit will find free-standing suits, some on white mannequin horses, some decorated with Tudor symbols such as the rose and portcullis as well as one fearsome helmet with enormous ram-like horns and brass-colored spectacles.
"The exhibition aims to convey Henry's power, majesty and psychology," Clifford said, "and give him a human face."
Museums from around the world, such as New York's Metropolitan Museum, have loaned items to the show, which runs until January 10 next year.
A video gives a succinct overview of how the monarch has recently been portrayed on stage and screen -- in renditions of Shakespeare's "Henry VIII" and in Hollywood films -- with his power and influence, even over life and death, being an underlying theme.
"The story of Henry -- the Merry Monarch -- is romantic, dramatic, mysterious and powerful. And that's why an exhibition like this appeals to so many people" Clifford said.
(Editing by Paul Casciato)

Source: Reuters

Fish, environment boom at Italy's Portofino park

By Marie-Louise Gumuchian
PORTOFINO, Italy (Reuters Life!) - The chic Italian seaside resort of Portofino may be known for its postcard-perfect views and celebrities, but deep underwater, the rich sea life is also claiming a name of its own.
The sea off the Ligurian coast hosts an underwater treasure trove of moray eels, grouper fish, bream, mullet, red starfish, hundreds of yellow cluster sea "daisies" and red coral adding bursts of color against dark green algae-covered rocks.
In the last 10 years, since the Protected Marine Area of Portofino was founded, fish populations have grown as some activities became regulated or even banned, local officials, environmentalists, fishermen and divers said.
Although they said it was difficult to quantify, all noted a difference.
"Some fish that were not there before have now reappeared," said Giorgio Fanciulli, director of the marine protected area.
"For those that were caught through fishing when diving, something that's now banned, it means they have come back in significant numbers."
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The 374-hectare (924.2 acres) protected area runs from the town of Camogli around the promontory of Portofino, where colorful houses huddle around its little harbor.
The area is divided into zone A, which no one can enter, and zones B and C, each with their own rules. Boats need to anchor in specific areas, scuba divers are limited in numbers in the 20 diving spots and sport fishermen need special permits.
"There was a lot of opposition at first, because it was feared that everything would be forbidden. Now things have changed," Fanciulli said.
Simone Gambazza, a fisherman from the town of Camogli, said he had been wary of the protected area at first but has welcomed some of the rules. Gambazza and his colleagues practice fishing net techniques that go back centuries.
"As fishermen, we are happier that we don't have boats crossing us at nights. Sometimes, they wouldn't have any lights on, or it would be people coming back drunk," he said.
"Also the fish are less disturbed now."
The Portofino promontory has been known as diving spot for years. It even has a statue of Christ, 18 meters underwater.
"The quality of the dives has improved 100 percent," said Roberto Bacigalupi, who opened his B&B diving center some 20 years ago. "Before you wouldn't see the grouper you see today." Continued...
Source: Reuters