RIM changes name, unveils BlackBerry 10 in comeback bid

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Research In Motion Ltd unveiled on Wednesday the long-delayed line of smartphones it hopes will put the company on the comeback trail in a market it once dominated, but said sales of the BlackBerry 10 in the United States will not start until March.

Signaling his hopes for a fresh start for the company that pioneered on-your-hip email, Chief Executive Thorsten Heins also said RIM was abandoning the name it has used since its inception in 1985 to take on the name of its signature product.

"From this point forward, RIM becomes BlackBerry." Heins said at the New York launch. "It is one brand; it is one promise."

RIM launched its first BlackBerry back in 1999 as a way for busy executives to stay in touch with their clients and their offices, and the Canadian company quickly cornered the market for secure corporate and government email.

But its star faded as competition rose. The BlackBerry is now a far-behind also-ran in the race for market share, with a 3.4 percent global showing in the fourth quarter, down from 20 percent three years before. Its North American market share is even worse: a mere 2 percent in the fourth quarter.

RIM said the first of the new BlackBerrys will be available on Thursday in Britain, with other countries following as carriers complete their testing.

In the U.S. market, which sets trends that other countries follow, the BlackBerry Z10 touchscreen device will go on sale in March. U.S. carrier Verizon Wireless said the phone would cost $199 for a two-year contract, while Canada's Rogers Communications is quoting C$149 ($150) for certain three-year plans.

SHARES SLUMP

RIM shares initially rallied on Wednesday, but soon fell as much as 8 percent below Tuesday's close. The stock is down 90 percent from its 2008 peak as the BlackBerry has lost ground to rival devices. But in the last four months its volatile shares have more than doubled as buzz grew about the new devices.

"It was such a well-advertised launch date that people moved the stock up and then they took profits ahead of when it was going to be revealed," said Ian Nakamoto, director of research at Macdougall, Macdougall and Mactier in Toronto.

"For RIM, it's a normal stock market day. It would have been an abnormal stock market day if it had got cut in half or something."

The legal name change to BlackBerry from Research In Motion takes affect after shareholders approve the decision, but the company already plans to do business under the BlackBerry name.

"We want our employees to say, 'I work for BlackBerry.' Our customers to say, 'I own a BlackBerry.' Our shareholders to say, 'I own BlackBerry stock,'" said chief marketing officer Frank Boulben. "We want to become what I'd call a branded house versus a house of brands."

The new BlackBerry 10 phones will compete with Apple's iPhone and devices using Google's Android technology, both of which have soared above the BlackBerry in a competitive market.

The BlackBerry 10 devices boast fast browsers, new features, smart cameras and, unlike previous BlackBerry models, enter the market primed with a large application library, including services such as Skype and the popular game Angry Birds.

The new devices are sleek black numbers, one with the small "qwerty" keyboard that RIM made into its trademark, and one a pure touchscreen device that looks much like those its competitors already produce.

"QWERTY" DEVICE IN APRIL

The Q10 "qwerty" device will launch later than the Z10 touchscreen. Heins said it would hit global markets in April.

RIM picked a range of venues for its global launch parties, including Dubai's $650-a-night Armani Hotel, which occupies six floors of the Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest tower.

The New York event took place in a sprawling basketball facility on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, just north of the Manhattan Bridge. The Blackberry has been "Re-designed. Re-engineered. Re-invented," RIM said.

RIM, which is splurging on a Superbowl ad to promote its new phones, also introduced Grammy-winning singer/songwriter Alicia Keys as its global creative director.

"I was in a long-term relationship with BlackBerry, and then I started to notice some new, kind of hotter, attractive, sexier phones at the gym, and I kind of broke up with you for something that had a little more bling," Keys said at the New York launch.

"But I always missed the way you organized my life, and the way you were there for me at my job, and so I started to have two phones - I was kind of playing the field. But then ... you added a lot more features ... and now, we're exclusively dating again, and I'm very happy."

(Writing by Janet Guttsman; Editing by Frank McGurty, Lisa Von Ahn and Peter Galloway)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/rim-starts-glitzy-blackberry-10-launch-parties-151850139--finance.html

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Food & Drink Innovation Network ? NEW LOVEPICKLE BRAND ...

January 29th, 2013

Lovepickle is a new Indian chilli tomato pickle hitting store shelves this month.

This new spicy chilli tomato pickle is made from ripe tomatoes, fresh chillies, garlic, ginger, mustard oil and seeds plus a selection of herbs and spices.

Realising the UK market was lacking a premium pickle, Michael Sohel, former Investment Bank Business Manager decided to create the range to bring an Indian-style pickle to the UK market.

Lovepickle is available in four strengths

Lovepickle is available in four strengths ? Mild, Medium, Hot and Extra Hot. Mild is designed to be served as a dip for those who prefer a gentle spice, while Medium offers a stronger, spiced flavour.

Lovepickle Hot is tangy and designed for adding an extra fiery flavour to meals and Extra Hot is for those who enjoy a full-on spicy kick.

Positioned as a premium product, Lovepickle can be eaten with Indian foods such as poppadoms and naan bread or as an accompaniment to main courses.

It can also be eaten with a wide range of meals and dishes as a condiment and as an alternative to chutneys, relishes and ketchups.

Following a soft launch in summer 2012, Michael is now launching the product nationally and welcomes enquiries from retailers looking to stock this exciting new pickle brand.

Michael Sohel, founder of Lovepickle, said:

?The British palate is accustomed to spicy foods and many consumers enjoy spicing up their meals and snacks.

?The great thing about Lovepickle is that it?s so versatile ? it can be used as a dip or be served as a condiment alongside Indian dishes, with cheese and crackers, in sandwiches, and with main courses such as meat and fish.

?Encouragement from family and friends has led me to embark on this venture and to share a pickle that I have enjoyed for many years.

?Over the last year, I have developed the family recipe and brand following extensive research in the marketplace and consumer trials.

?I am passionate and excited about Lovepickle and truly believe that the result is a quality product that delivers on taste, texture and appearance that Indian and spicy food fans will enjoy as an accompaniment to a variety of foods.

?I am delighted to be introducing the Lovepickle range and I?ve had some great feedback from customers already. It?s a huge landmark as I venture into the retail product sector and will be extending the range during 2013.?

Lovepickle Mild, Medium, Hot and Extra Hot is available in cases of 24 x 180g jars with an RRP of ?2.95 to ?3.25 per jar.

It is an ambient product and has a shelf life of 12 months.

The product does not contain any added colours, flavours or preservatives.

The full range is available to multiple and independent retailers, specialty food stores, delis as well as fine food shops and markets.

Click here for more information.

Source: http://www.fdin.org.uk/2013/01/new-lovepickle-brand-adds-to-uk-condiment-sector/

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USF iPad Quintet lets their tablets do the rocking

By CHRISTOPHER SPATA | TBO.com
Published: January 30, 2013 Updated: January 30, 2013 - 10:09 AM

Roadies, it could be time to start looking for a new line of work.

A high-tech band of local musicians is proving that the days of lugging around heavy guitars and drum kits from gig to gig may soon be as outdated as sending out demos on cassette tapes.

Touch, the University of South Florida's iPad Quintet, takes the stage Friday at the School of Music Concert Hall for a performance played entirely on their Apple tablets.

The band, made up of music professors David Williams and Clint Randles, and graduate students Chris Morris, Victor Ezquerra and Nick Stefanic, will switch between dozens of musical apps as their fingers coax a mix of rock and hip hop covers, classical pieces and original tunes from their touch screens.

Williams, the School of Music's associate director, said the band's use of iPads is part of the natural evolution that's always happening in music. Instruments come and go as technology and listener's ears change.

"There was a time when the lute was the most popular instrument in all of Europe. People probably thought that lutes would never go away," Williams said. "In the '60s every pop song had a guitar. Check the iTunes top songs on any given day now. I'd be surprised if half of them had a guitar, and I dare you to find a clarinet or a violin."

"Instruments don't completely die, but they certainly disappear from popular music as others take their place."

And according to Williams, that's exactly what iPads are, just another instrument that takes time, skill and hours of practice to play well.

"The main thing to remember is that it's humans who create music," he said. "A trumpet isn't going to make music until a human being goes and picks it up, and neither is an iPad."

In many ways, Touch's show will look a lot like a traditional rock concert. There will be lights and fog machines and video screens, along with people standing up on their seats and singing along to songs by Coldplay and Blake Shelton, Williams said.

But technology is allowing the band to interact with the crowd in new ways. The audience is encouraged to bring their own tablets or phones loaded with drum apps to play along with the African-inspired finale. The audience's live tweets will guide the action on stage during an improvisational "Wizard of Oz" piece featuring actors from the USF theater department.

"These devices are portable, so it makes sense for the audience to have them too," Williams said. "In the theater world they talk about the fourth wall, the invisible barrier between the audience and the stage. In the classic music world that wall is always there too. One of our main goals with this show is to break it down."

The concert also features USF dance students, poets from the school's English program and a live painting by an artist whose brush strokes will direct the quintet's music.

As far as the future of iPad musicians, Williams said he's excited about the new ways technology will let humans be musical. When asked if he thought that teenagers with dreams of rock stardom would soon begin to pick up tablets in lieu of guitars, his answer was confident.

"We don't need a crystal ball," he said. "I think we're already there."

Source: http://www2.tbo.com/entertainment/music/2013/jan/30/usf-ipad-quintet-lets-their-tablets-do-the-rocking-ar-620297/

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RIM unveiling new BlackBerrys with modern software

FILE - In this Sept. 9, 2008, file photo, the logo on a BlackBerry smartphone is shows in Bochum, Germany. The maker of the BlackBerry smartphone is promising a speedy browser, a superb typing experience and the ability to keep work and personal identities separate on the same phone, the fruit of a crucial, long-overdue makeover for the Canadian company. (AP Photo/dapd, Volker Hartmann)

FILE - In this Sept. 9, 2008, file photo, the logo on a BlackBerry smartphone is shows in Bochum, Germany. The maker of the BlackBerry smartphone is promising a speedy browser, a superb typing experience and the ability to keep work and personal identities separate on the same phone, the fruit of a crucial, long-overdue makeover for the Canadian company. (AP Photo/dapd, Volker Hartmann)

NEW YORK (AP) ? After lengthy delays, Research In Motion Ltd. is unveiling its first phones with the new BlackBerry 10 system. RIM redesigned the system to embrace the multimedia, apps and touch-screen experience prevalent today. The question is whether there's time for the once-pioneering BlackBerry to catch up to Apple's trend-setting iPhone and devices running Google's Android system.

RIM CEO Thorsten Heins is hosting the main event in New York. Video of his appearance is being shown at other RIM events in Toronto, London, Paris, Dubai, Johannesburg, New Delhi and Jakarta, Indonesia.

RIM initially said BlackBerry 10 would come by early 2012, but then the company changed that to late 2012. A few months later, that date was pushed further, to early 2013, missing the lucrative holiday season. The holdup helped wipe out more than $70 billion in shareholder wealth and 5,000 jobs.

RIM had shown off prototypes and previews before. Wednesday's event is the first time RIM is showing a complete product, with details on prices and availability.

Most analysts consider a BlackBerry 10 success to be crucial for the company's long-term viability.

RIM is promising a speedier device, a superb typing experience and the ability to keep work and personal identities separate on the same phone. Previews of the BlackBerry 10 software have gotten favorable reviews on blogs. Financial analysts are starting to see some slight room for a comeback. With smartphone sales growing, the BlackBerry 10 can succeed without iPhone and Android users switching.

Regardless of BlackBerry 10's advances, though, the new system will face a key shortcoming: It won't have as many apps written by outside companies and individuals as the iPhone and Android.

Here's a running account of the BlackBerry 10 event, presented in reverse chronological order. All times are EST. Besides Heins, presenters include Alec Saunders, vice president of developer relations.

___

10:15 a.m.

Heins appears on stage.

___

10:10 a.m.

Saunders touts the amount of work done by RIM's outside developers. He says BlackBerry 10 is launching with the largest-ever catalog of apps for a new phone operating system.

RIM has said it plans to launch BlackBerry 10 with more than 70,000 apps, including those developed for RIM's PlayBook tablet, first released in 2011. Even so, that's just a tenth of what the iPhone and Android offer. Popular service such as Instagram and Netflix won't have apps on BlackBerry 10.

___

10:05 a.m.

The event in New York begins with a look at BlackBerry 10 events elsewhere through videoconferencing. Customer testimonials follow.

___

10 a.m.

Several hundred people await the start of the event, which is being held in a large warehouse-like entertainment venue on the shore of New York's East River.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/495d344a0d10421e9baa8ee77029cfbd/Article_2013-01-30-RIM-BlackBerry-Running/id-6c967920d9894e26a5e8ad3eafe9afd1

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Missile launcher shows up at Seattle gun buyback

SEATTLE (AP) ? Seattle police worked with Army officials Monday to track down the history of a nonfunctional missile launcher that showed up at a weapons buyback program and determine whether it was legal or possibly stolen from the military.

A man standing outside the event Saturday bought the military weapon for $100 from another person there, according to Detective Mark Jamieson.

The single-use device is a launch tube assembly for a Stinger portable surface-to-air missile and already had been used. As a controlled military item, it is not available to civilians through any surplus or disposal program offered by the government, according to Jamieson.

Seattle police have contacted Army officials at Joint Base Lewis-McChord near Tacoma deputy chief Nick Metz said Monday.

"Once it's brought on base and investigators have a chance to look at it, they'll see what they can determine," Army spokesman Joe Kubistek said Monday. "It's too early to give any information on it until we have hands-on access to see it and take a look at it."

Police witnessed the private exchange of the military launch tube near the gun buyback event, where gun buyers tempted those standing in long lines to turn in their weapons with cash.

"It was absolutely crazy what we saw out there," Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn said at a news conference Monday where officials announced they had collected a total of 716 weapons, including four confirmed as stolen.

Officers saw guns changing private hands without knowing whether the person buying the gun had the legal right to buy it, and those transactions are occurring all the time, McGinn said.

He added that the private sales of the missile launch tube and other weapons illustrate the need for comprehensive background checks as proposed by President Barack Obama, as well as other regulations at the state level.

While there were private gun buyers at the periphery of Saturday's event, Metz said a large majority of people chose to wait in line and get less money because they wanted to make sure they got the weapons off the streets.

"These are very dangerous weapons," Metz said. "They may not have looked very pretty, but (they're) definitely operable."

The firearms collected included 348 pistols, 364 rifles and three so-called street sweepers, or shotguns that include a high capacity magazine capable of holding twelve 12-gauge shotgun shells.

The program allowed people to anonymously turn in their weapons for a shopping gift card worth up to $200 -- $100 for each handgun, rifle or shotgun turned in, and $200 for each gun classified as an assault weapon under state law. Officials distributed about $70,000 in gift cards at Saturday's event.

Police took possession of the launch tube Saturday. Police said the man who had purchased it agreed to accept a gift card as compensation if the launch tube is not returned to him, though the man indicated he wanted to keep it if he was legally able to do so.

McGinn said he wanted to plan another buyback event soon and urged more donations to the program.

Meanwhile, police said people who wanted to turn in guns could do so at any time outside a buyback program, though they wouldn't be compensated for it.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/missile-launcher-shows-seattle-gun-buyback-174331546.html

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Dow edges closer to 14,000; S&P still above 1,500

54 min.

From wire services , NBC News

Drugmaker Pfizer gave the Dow a lift after posting a strong earnings report. That helped push the index closer to 14,000.?

The Dow Jones industrial average closed at 13,954. The index has advanced seven of the past eight days. The Standard and Poor's 500 gained 7 points to 1,507. The Nasdaq composite fell less than a point to 3,153.?

Stocks are approaching record levels after a January rally that has pushed the Dow 6.5 percent higher this month and the S&P 500 up 5.7 percent, to its highest level since December 2007. Demand was bolstered after lawmakers reached a deal to avoid the "fiscal cliff" at the start of the year.?

Advancing stocks outpaced declining ones on the New York Stock Exchange. Volume was above average at 3.9 billion shares.??

The S&P 500 is on track to post its best monthly performance since October 2011 and its best January since 1997 as investors poured $55 billion in new cash into stock mutual funds and exchange-traded funds in January, the biggest monthly inflow on record.?

Among rising defensive shares, which are companies relatively immune to economic swings, were Pfizer?and AT&T .?

"After the kind of rally that we had since the beginning of the year, many investors are becoming more cautious but there is fundamental reasons to be moving in the direction that we are moving in," said Joseph Tanious, global market strategist at J.P. Morgan Funds.?

"The 1,500 on the S&P is the psychological barrier but there are still more tailwinds than headwinds in the market."?

"Cyclical were moving very nicely, now you see balance with some of the defensive. Many managers use that as an internal hedge in equity portfolios," said Quincy Krosby, market strategist at Prudential Financial in Newark, New Jersey.?

She said the market is cautious ahead of Wednesday's statement following the Federal Reserve's two-day meeting. In addition, defensive stocks would hold up better if Friday's payrolls report surprises on the downside.?

The S&P hovered near 1,500, and market technicians say the benchmark is at an inflection point which will determine the overall direction in the near term.?

"The public is pouring in now," said Carter Worth, chief market technician at Oppenheimer & Co in New York. "It reflects complacency and that typically leads to hubris, and hubris leads to trouble. Everyone's buying."?

The energy sector also advanced, on the back of strong earnings from Valero Energy Corp and a hedge fund move to break up Hess Corp to boost investor returns.?

Valero shares jumped 10.8 percent to $42.99 and Hess gained 8.1 percent to $67.56.?

The equity gains have largely come on a strong start to earnings season, though results were mixed on Tuesday with Pfizer rising but Ford Motor Co down after its report.?

Both companies reported profits that topped expectations, but Ford also forecast a wider loss in its European segment. Ford dropped 5.6 percent to $13.01 as one of the biggest percentage losers on the S&P 500.?

Thomson Reuters data showed that of the 174 companies in the S&P 500 that have reported earnings this season, 68.4 percent have been above analyst expectations, which is a higher proportion than over the past four quarters and above the average since 1994.?

Disappointing outlooks from Seagate Technology and BMC Software pressured their shares. Seagate lost 9.6 percent to $33.82 and BMC fell 8.5 percent to $40.70.?

Software maker VMware Inc lost 21 percent to $77.71 also after a cautious 2013 outlook.?

Amazon was the biggest drag on the Nasdaq with a 3.2 percent drop to $267.17 before its results, expected after the closing bell.?

U.S. home prices rose in November to rack up their best yearly gain since the housing crisis began, a further sign that the sector is on the mend, but consumer confidence fell to its lowest level in more than a year in the wake of higher taxes for many Americans.?

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.?

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/business/dow-edges-closer-14-000-sp-still-above-1-500-1B8165123

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Staggering Stats: Cats Kill Billions of Animals a Year

Cats kill billions of birds every year and even more tiny rodents and other mammals in the United States, a new study finds.

According to the research, published today (Jan. 29) in the journal Nature Communications, cats kill between 1.4 billion and 3.7 billion birds and between 6.9 billion and 20.7 billion small mammals, such as meadow voles and chipmunks.

Though it's hard to know exactly how many birds live in the United States, the staggering number of bird deaths may account for as much as 15 percent of the total bird population, said study co-author Pete Marra, an animal ecologist with the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute.

Staggering toll

Marra and his colleagues are looking at human-related causes for bird and wildlife deaths in the country, from windmills and glass windows to pesticides.

But first, Marra and his team looked at the impact of the feline population, one of the biggest putative causes of bird demise in the country. ? ? ??

While past studies had used critter cams or owner reports to estimate the number of birds killed by cats, those studies were usually small and not applicable to the entire country, Marra told LiveScience.

For this broader analysis, the team first looked at all prior studies on bird deaths and estimated that around 84 million owned-cats live in the country, many of which are allowed outdoors. [In Photos: America's Favorite Pets]

"A lot of these cats may go outside and go to 10 different houses, but they go back to their house and cuddle up on Mr. Smith's lap at night," Marra said.

Based on an analysis of past studies, the researchers estimated that each of those felines killed between four and 18 birds a year, and between eight and 21 small mammals per year.

But the major scourges for wildlife were not those free-ranging, owned-cats, but instead feral and un-owned cats that survive on the streets. Each of those kitties ? and the team estimates between 30 million and 80 million of them live in the United States ? kills between 23 and 46 birds a year, and between 129 and 338 small mammals, Marra said.

And, it seems, the small rodents taken by felines aren't Norway rats or apartment vermin, but native rodent species such as meadow voles and chipmunks, he added.

No easy answers

One obvious step to reduce the mass wildlife death is to keep kitties indoors, Marra said.

Perhaps seeing their furry friends bring in a meadow vole or a cardinal will spur cat owners to say, "Listen, Tabby, we're going to have a heart-to-heart talk about how much time you spend outside," he said.

Wild cats pose tougher questions, because capture and sterilization approaches have varying levels of success depending on the community, said Bruce Kornreich, a veterinarian at Cornell University's Feline Health Center, who was not involved in the study.

While keeping owned-cats indoors is the best way to benefit both kitties and wildlife, a complete cat ban, like the one recently proposed in New Zealand, is probably not the answer, he said.

For one, it's not clear how completely removing cats from outdoors would affect the ecosystem.

"It may be in some cases that cats may also be keeping other species that may negatively impact bird and other small mammal populations in check," Kornreich told LiveScience.

Follow LiveScience on Twitter @livescience. We're also on Facebook?& Google+.?

Copyright 2013 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/staggering-stats-cats-kill-billions-animals-162839117.html

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Yahoo's 4Q report shows more signs of progress

FILE - In this Friday, Jan. 25, 2013, file photo, Marissa Mayer, CEO of Yahoo!, listens during the 43rd Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum, in Davos, Switzerland. Yahoo showed more signs of progress during the fourth quarter of 2012m, as the Internet company took advantage of higher ad prices and rising earnings from its international investments to deliver numbers that exceeded analyst forecasts. The results announced Monday, Jan 28, 2013, covered Yahoo's first full quarter under Mayer. (AP Photo/Keystone, Laurent Gillieron)

FILE - In this Friday, Jan. 25, 2013, file photo, Marissa Mayer, CEO of Yahoo!, listens during the 43rd Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum, in Davos, Switzerland. Yahoo showed more signs of progress during the fourth quarter of 2012m, as the Internet company took advantage of higher ad prices and rising earnings from its international investments to deliver numbers that exceeded analyst forecasts. The results announced Monday, Jan 28, 2013, covered Yahoo's first full quarter under Mayer. (AP Photo/Keystone, Laurent Gillieron)

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) ? Yahoo showed more signs of progress during the fourth quarter as the Internet company took advantage of higher ad prices and rising earnings from its international investments to deliver numbers that exceeded analyst forecasts.

The results announced Monday covered Yahoo's first full quarter under CEO Marissa Mayer. Yahoo Inc. lured Mayer away from Google Inc. in mid-July in its latest attempt to snap out of a funk that had depressed its revenue and stock price.

The company fared well enough in the final three months of last year to produce its first full-year gain in revenue since 2008.

Yahoo is now being run by its fifth permanent or interim CEO since then. Mayer, 37, has been focusing on improving employee morale and building better mobile and social networking services so Yahoo can make more money from two of technology's hottest trends.

Her efforts so far haven't made a huge difference in Yahoo's ad sales ? the company's main way of making money. For instance, during the final three months of last year, Yahoo's revenue from search and display advertising totaled $1.07 billion, roughly the same as a year earlier.

But Yahoo's average price for display ad on its website rose 7 percent from the previous year. Meanwhile, the average price for Yahoo's search ads increased by 1 percent from the previous year. The upturn indicates advertisers believe Mayer's changes are paying off.

Investors are clearly impressed with what Mayer has been doing. Yahoo's stock gained 92 cents, or 4.5 percent, to $21.23 in extended trading. The shares are now up by 35 percent since Mayer joined the Sunnyvale, Calif., company.

Yahoo has been benefiting from its significant stakes in Yahoo Japan and China's Alibaba Group, two Internet companies that have been thriving. Yahoo's fourth-quarter income from its investments increased 17 percent from the previous year to nearly $149 million.

Overall, Yahoo's fourth-quarter earnings dipped 8 percent from the previous year to $272 million, or 23 cents per share, from $296 million, or 24 cents per share. The earnings would have been higher than the previous year, if not for a charge to close its South Korea operations and other one-time accounting items.

If not for those charges, Yahoo said it would have earned 32 cents per share. On that basis, Yahoo topped the average estimate of 27 cents per share among analysts surveyed by FactSet.

Yahoo's fourth-quarter revenue increased 2 percent from the previous year to $1.35 billion.

After subtracting advertising commissions, Yahoo's fourth-quarter revenue stood at $1.22 billion ? about $10 million above analyst forecasts.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/495d344a0d10421e9baa8ee77029cfbd/Article_2013-01-28-US-Earns-Yahoo/id-251dc97cf80d4c9f999d4967dc284ba1

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Engineers use evolution to improve solar cell design

15 hrs.

TechNewsDaily

Scientists are using principles of natural selection to evolve a more efficient solar cell.

Engineers at Northwestern University wrote a computer program that "mates" design elements and assesses the fitness of their "offspring" to come up with the most efficient possible organic solar cell. Organic solar cells are made with the so-called organic elements ? carbon, oxygen and nitrogen ? and are cheaper to make, lighter and more flexible than the traditional silicon cells available in solar panels today.

Organic cells aren't as efficient at turning the sun's energy into electricity as silicon cells, however. Many research groups are working to improve organic solar cells' efficiency. If they work well, such cells could go into? electricity-producing windows ?or clothes.

In their work, the Northwestern researchers focused on the top layer of an organic solar cell, called the scattering layer, which traps photons from sunlight. They wanted a scattering layer that would hold photos for a greater amount of time.

"We wanted to determine the geometry for the scattering layer that would give us optimal performance," Cheng Sun, a mechanical engineer and one of the creators of the new organic solar cell,? said in a statement. "But with so many possibilities, it's difficult to know where to start, so we looked to laws of natural selection to guide us."

Sun and his colleagues' program simulated more than 20 generations of matings to come up with their final design. The program also mimicked the biological processes of mutation and an exchange of traits called crossing over.

The resulting design traps photons for three times as long as the Yablonovitch Limit, which describes how long a photon is likely to stay in a semiconducting material. Researchers have only been able to reach and break the Yablonovitch Limit in the last few years.?

The engineers? published their work ?Jan. 3 in the journal Scientific Reports.

Follow TechNewsDaily on Twitter @TechNewsDaily, or on Facebook.

Copyright 2013 TechNewsDaily, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/futureoftech/engineersscientists-evolve-super-efficient-solar-cell-1C8124835

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Has Google Finance's news feed got it in for Apple? - Apple 2.0 ...

Source: Google Finance

FORTUNE -- Hey, Apple's (AAPL) down, let's pile on!

That seems to be the attitude -- if a computer can have an attitude -- of the program that filters headlines on Google's (GOOG) financial news feed.

The list at right (expanded below) was generated by doing a Google Finance ?search for "Apple" at 8 a.m. Monday morning. You have to scroll down 24 headlines to get to a positive one ("Apple Inc. sales of $54 billion and profit of $13 billion both break records") which turns out to be Apple's own press release.

Given that many high-frequency trading algorithms are programmed to react to such headlines -- generated by the likes of Insider Monkey and ValueWalk, but not, curiously, Fortune.com -- these things matter.

Expanded list below.

Source: http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2013/01/28/apple-google-finance-news-feed/

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Hubble finds appearances can be deceptive: Looking at the stars in NGC 411

Jan. 26, 2013 ? Globular clusters are roughly spherical collections of extremely old stars, and around 150 of them are scattered around our galaxy. Hubble is one of the best telescopes for studying these, as its extremely high resolution lets astronomers see individual stars, even in the crowded core. The clusters all look very similar, and in Hubble's images it can be quite hard to tell them apart -- and they all look much like NGC 411, pictured in a new image.

And yet appearances can be deceptive: NGC 411 is in fact not a globular cluster, and its stars are not old. It isn't even in the Milky Way. NGC 411 is classified as an open cluster located in the Small Magellanic Cloud, a small sister galaxy near our own. Less tightly bound than a globular cluster, the stars in open clusters tend to drift apart over time as they age, whereas globulars have survived for well over 10 billion years of galactic history. NGC 411 is a relative youngster -- not much more than a tenth of this age. Far from being a relic of the early years of the universe, the stars in NGC 411 are in fact a fraction of the age of the sun.

The stars in NGC 411 are all roughly the same age, having formed at one time from one cloud of gas. But they are not all the same size. Hubble's image shows a wide range of colors and brightness in the cluster's stars; these tell astronomers many facts about the stars, including their mass, temperature and evolutionary phase. Blue stars, for instance, have higher surface temperatures than red ones.

The image is a composite produced from ultraviolet, visible and infrared observations made by Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3. This filter set lets the telescope "see" colors slightly further beyond red and the violet ends of the spectrum.

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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/space_time/nasa/~3/nCwqd3lMSz0/130126092923.htm

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Lawyer: Qatar poet appeals life sentence

DOHA, Qatar (AP) ? A defense attorney says a Qatar court will decide next month on the appeal of a poet given a life sentence for a verse that allegedly opposed the Gulf emirate's ruling system.

Muhammad ibn al-Dheeb al-Ajami's case is seen as a test of how far Gulf Arab states will push a crackdown on Internet posts they consider politically threatening. They face mounting international criticism.

Najeeb al-Nauimi argues his client had no intention of challenging Qatar's emir. During a hearing Sunday, al-Ajami met directly with the presiding magistrate. A verdict is expected Feb. 25.

Al-Ajami has been jailed since November 2011, months after an Internet video was posted of him reciting "Tunisian Jasmine," lauding the 2010 popular uprising there that touched off the Arab Spring. He was sentenced last November.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2013-01-27-ML-Qatar-Jailed-Poet/id-d71a6ac21fa147a6b7e905a440181b8e

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Cow smuggling ... it's how Bangladesh gets its beef

Beef is a delicacy in Bangladesh, but Hindu-majority India refuses to sell their sacred cows. The demand is so high, however, that a dangerous $920 million cow smuggling trade has popped up. ?

By Shaikh Azizur Rahman,?Contributor / January 26, 2013

An Indian Hindu man stands with a holy cow as he waits for alms at Sangam, the confluence of the holy rivers Ganges and Yamuna and mythical Saraswati at the Maha Kumbh Mela in Allahabad, India, last week. Cows are everywhere in India, but the cow is considered holy in the Hindu-majority country.

Kevin Frayer/AP

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In Muslim?majority Bangladesh beef is in high demand.?

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More than 90 percent of the 160 million people who live there are Muslims and for them beef is a delicacy.?

The country's meat producers estimate that slaughterhouses need up to 3 million cows every year to feed Bangladeshi appetites, and to help meet demand, Bangladesh is eyeing neighboring India. Cows are everywhere in India, but the cow is considered holy in the Hindu-majority country. In fact, slaughtering cows is banned in many Indian states, and New Delhi refuses to export?them.

That refusal hasn't done much to deter the demand for beef in Bangladesh, however.? In fact, say officials in Dhaka, beef has become so valuable it's spurred a dangerous cow smuggling trade across the India-Bangladesh border.?

More than 2 million cows are smuggled from India to Bangladesh every year and most of the illegal trade takes place through the Indian border state of West Bengal, says Bimal Pramanik, an independent researcher in Calcutta, India.

?Bangladeshi slaughterhouses cannot source even 1 million cows from within the country. If Indian cows do not reach the Bangladeshi slaughterhouses, there will be a big crisis there,? says Mr. Pramanik, adding that 3 out of every 4 cows slaughtered in the country are from India.?

?In this thriving trade, [herds of] cows worth 50 billion rupees [$920 million] are sent across to Bangladesh every year. It?s the sheer economics of the trade that drives the smuggling,??says Pramanik.

Cattle smugglers say they routinely bribe the police, customs, Border Security Force guards, and even some politicians in India to look the other way.

However, locals call this part of the border the ?Wall of Death,? for the smuggling-related tensions that?sometimes?turn into violence. In 2012, security forces killed 48 Bangladeshis along the border, according to the Bangladeshi human rights group Ain o Salish Kendra.?

But Bangladeshis say there is a simple way to end violence along the border.

"If India begins exporting cows to Bangladesh, such untoward incidents will stop," said the Bangladeshi Commerce Minister Golam Mohammad Quader.? "We are really keen to import cows from India, and want all illegal activities involving cow trade across the border to end," he said.

The former head of India's Border Security Forces Utthan Kumar Bansal recently agreed:?

?The menace of smuggling might be best controlled if the trade across the border is made legal. The legalization of export of cows could also help curb tension on the volatile border,? Mr. Bansal said.

Although Bansal?s comment did not trigger any government reaction in India, some right wing Hindu groups said they would never let India export cows to any country.?

Radhakanta Saha, who is a World Hindu Organization leader and heads a volunteer group that aims to prevent cow smuggling in West Bengal, said: ?The cow is our mother. We shall begin country-wide agitation if India decides to export cows to a country where they are likely to be slaughtered for ... meat.?

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/csmonitor/globalnews/~3/dWCK27Q-FSQ/Cow-smuggling-it-s-how-Bangladesh-gets-its-beef

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Plastic Surgeons' Concerns About Surgery

Posted by Abigail Aaronson on 1/25/13 ? Categorized as Health and Fitness

Plastic surgeons are medical professionals who are duly licensed and recognized as those who can perform surgeries and procedures as described in their profession and their specialties. Not all of these doctors have the same specializations that is why it is important to approach the right one as befitting one?s condition and needs. There are many different specializations for these professionals but almost all of these are focused on aesthetics or the improvement of the patient?s appearance in one way or another. Some of these doctors focus on breast augmentation, facelifts, rhinoplasty, liposuction and many others. In spite of the variety of operations that fall under their field, these doctors do have a lot of things in common when it comes to their stringent conditions before performing an operation.

Health and Safety

The health and safety of the patient is always a priority for all plastic surgeons. These professionals ask their prospective patients to take tests and have screenings done in order to check their health and overall well-being. Blood testing can verify a variety of conditions and diseases which may hamper the operation or motivate the doctor to take extra precautions regarding performing a major operation on a specific individual. Some conditions can be dangerous to have when going under anesthesia while some diseases can actually present the performance of the surgery due to the danger that they represent. It is not just the physical safety and health of the patient that the doctors are after but they also wish for the patient to have the best state of mind conducive to the performance and result of the operation. Some patients may not be as open as they appear when it comes to their acceptance of the fact that their current appearance is not perfect and that it will be change after the surgery. It is important for the plastic surgeons to make sure that the patients will be able to accept the results of the operation and live well with it.

It is not just acceptance of the results that worries some of these doctors. Many of their patients might become addicted to the fact that it is so easy to change one?s appearance for the better that they cannot seem to stop asking for different kinds of operations to alter how they look. Plastic surgeons should be vigilant when it comes to this kind of sickness because it can initially be subtle but become full blown after the patient has undergone a few operations. It is the responsibility of the doctor to advise the patient regarding the dangers of being addicted to cosmetic surgery.
Another concern for these medical professionals is how their patient may pay for the entire cost of the operation. Some of them offer easy payment plans for their patients in order to accommodate their salaries and their incomes. Hospitals may also offer schemes to help individuals achieve their cosmetic surgery dreams through credit card payments and other means. Plastic surgeons can make recommendations regarding which patient needs to be helped in this regard.

Get a heads up about conditions of Atlanta plastic surgeons before a surgery. http://www.swancenteratlanta.com.

Source: http://www.articlesrx.com/plastic-surgeons-concerns-about-surgery/10981

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Cycling agrees to amnesty for doping confessions

FILE - This is a Monday, Oct. 22, 2012 file photo of Pat McQuaid, President of the Union Cycliste Internationale, UCI, as he informs about the position of the UCI regarding the decision from USADA in the case of Lance Armstrong, during a press conference in Geneva, Switzerland. The head of cycling's governing body has been replaced on a key International Olympic Committee panel as he deals with the fallout from the Lance Armstrong doping scandal. International Cycling Union President Pat McQuaid said Wednesday he was too busy to attend all the meetings of the Olympic commission evaluating bids for the 2020 Summer lympics.(AP Photo/Keystone, Salvatore Di Nolfi, File)

FILE - This is a Monday, Oct. 22, 2012 file photo of Pat McQuaid, President of the Union Cycliste Internationale, UCI, as he informs about the position of the UCI regarding the decision from USADA in the case of Lance Armstrong, during a press conference in Geneva, Switzerland. The head of cycling's governing body has been replaced on a key International Olympic Committee panel as he deals with the fallout from the Lance Armstrong doping scandal. International Cycling Union President Pat McQuaid said Wednesday he was too busy to attend all the meetings of the Olympic commission evaluating bids for the 2020 Summer lympics.(AP Photo/Keystone, Salvatore Di Nolfi, File)

Foto de archivo del 20 de mayo de 2010 en la que el ciclista Lance Armstrong es ayudado tras sufrir una ca?da en el Tour de California. (AP Foto/Marcio Jose Sanchez)

LONDON (AP) ? Cyclists will be offered a chance to confess to past doping offenses without fear of retribution in an attempt to uncover the full scale of the Lance Armstrong scandal and drug use in the sport.

The UCI agreed Friday to introduce a "truth and reconciliation" commission with the World Anti-Doping Agency, cutting out the independent panel established to investigate the governing body's links to Armstrong.

UCI President Pat McQuaid said he wants to ensure cycling has "drawn a line in the sand finally ? and for the last time" on doping scandals that have tarnished the credibility of the sport.

Armstrong was stripped of his seven Tour de France titles and banned for life from Olympic sports following a report by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency that portrayed him as a longtime user of performance-enhancing drugs.

After years of denials, Armstrong admitted to doping in an interview last week with Oprah Winfrey.

"The truth and reconciliation process is the best way that we can examine the culture of doping in cycling in the past, and can clear the air so that cycling can move forward," McQuaid said after a stormy hearing by the panel investigating his body.

The UCI's reputation has been badly damaged by accusations its leaders covered up suspicious doping tests given by Armstrong during his 1999-2005 run of Tour de France victories and improperly accepted donations from him totaling $125,000.

The independent commission formed to establish the veracity of those claims clashed at Friday's hearing with the UCI's lawyer over two key demands it has made ? broaden the investigation into Armstrong's role as the ringleader of an elaborate doping scheme on the U.S. Postal Service team and begin an amnesty program of its own to ensure witnesses come forward.

The UCI rebuffed their proposals by insisting it would be too costly to fund wide-scale investigations, and the three-person panel will meet again on Thursday to discuss whether to proceed.

And McQuaid said since the independent commission was established, "several of our stakeholders have said they won't take part in it. Not just USADA and WADA but others, national federations."

The UCI said it would update the independent panel on the talks planned this weekend with WADA President John Fahey about the amnesty commission.

McQuaid first revealed he was considering such an amnesty program to The Associated Press in September, but said Friday the plans were only finalized in recent days.

"WADA have indicated that they would share costs with the UCI," McQuaid said. "The WADA code is being reviewed and an amnesty is under discussion within that review. But we're just bringing that aspect forward."

But British judge Philip Otton, who heads the independent panel, accused the UCI of trying to use the delay in the truth and reconciliation process as "an excuse to kick the USADA allegations into the long grass."

Now the UCI is effectively asking the panel it established to suspend itself. It had been scheduled to hold full hearings in April and report by June.

UCI lawyer Ian Mill said the "entire process has been derailed" because the panel is demanding a "truth and reconciliation" process of its own and a widening of its role into the wider doping scandal.

"Getting to the bottom and determining how the USPS team operated without detection or sanction in a reasonable timescale ... causes us considerable anxiety," Mill said.

"We can do something which we understand you don't want to do ... a limited inquiry taking place in April," he added.

In a heated exchange at the Law Society in London, Mill told the panel: "We're not trying to kill this inquiry. We set you up."

"Please do not raise your voice," Otton interjected.

"We are not the bad guys here," Mill said. "We have a finite amount of money available to us ... we are not like a football body."

McQuaid later said delaying the hearing was not designed to help his own re-election prospects in September, insisting: "I have nothing to worry about."

The panel fears that the process is stalled and complained about a lack of full disclosure by the UCI.

"It just amazes me that we have had absolutely no documents whatsoever," former British Paralympian Tanni Grey-Thompson said to the UCI's lawyer. "When are we going to get the ... files?"

___

Rob Harris can be reached at http://twitter.com/RobHarris

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2013-01-25-CYC-UCI-Armstrong-Panel/id-21e402c5372f4637bfcb3f8eabe20e20

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Iraq troops kill four in clashes with Sunni protesters

FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - Iraqi troops shot dead at least four people during clashes with Sunni Muslim protesters in Falluja on Friday in escalating unrest against Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.

A Reuters witness said troops initially fired in the air to disperse crowds, but then he saw some soldiers fire towards protesters who had approached their military vehicles and set one of them on fire.

Thousands of Sunnis have taken to the streets to protest against mistreatment of their minority sect since late December, increasing worries that Iraq could slide back into widespread sectarian confrontation.

Friday's violence complicates Maliki's attempts to end the protests, where demands range from amendment of terrorism laws that many Sunnis feel single them out to more radical calls for the Shi'ite leader to step down.

After thousands gathered for Friday prayers in Falluja, a mostly Sunni city 50 km (30 miles) north of the capital, clashes broke out when troops arrested three protesters and others tried to block a major highway, officials said.

"A final count shows we have six people killed and 52 wounded," a hospital source told Reuters. He said at least four had died from gunshot wounds, but it was not clear how the other two people had died.

A local television channel showed demonstrators approaching the army vehicles and throwing stones and water bottles while troops tried to keep them away by firing in the air. But images also showed one soldier aiming his rifle at demonstrators.

"I was trying to see the burned vehicle when the army started to drive the demonstrators away. When that did not work the soldiers opened fire at the people," said Aziz Nazal, a cameraman, who was wounded in his hand.

A year after the last American troops left Iraq, sectarian tensions are still raw in Iraq, where many lived through Shi'ite-against-Sunni bloodletting that killed tens of thousands a few years after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

Since the fall of the Sunni dictator Saddam Hussein a decade ago, many Iraqi Sunnis feel they have been sidelined by the Shi'ite leadership and believe Maliki is amassing power at their community's expense.

SUNNI FRUSTRATIONS

The protests erupted in late December when authorities arrested the bodyguards of the Sunni finance minister on terrorism charges, a move that many Sunnis saw as politically motivated. Officials say it is simply a judicial case.

Unrest has centered on the Sunni heartland of Anbar, a vast desert province that makes up a third of Iraq's territory and is populated mainly by Sunnis in towns along the Euphrates River.

Falluja, once the heart of al Qaeda's battle against American troops, suffered some of the worst urban fighting in the U.S.-led war and many there still harbor bitter memories.

Among the thousands of protesters in Falluja on Friday, some raised the old three-star Iraqi flag from the Saddam era and the black flag of al Qaeda's local wing, Islamic State of Iraq.

Sunni unrest has been accompanied by an uptick in violence from Sunni Islamist insurgents. Four suicide bombers have struck over the last week, including one in Falluja who targeted a Sunni lawmaker well known for his bitter opposition to al Qaeda.

The protests are evolving into a major political challenge for Maliki, whose fragile government, comprising Shi'ites, Sunnis and ethnic Kurds, has been deadlocked over how to share power almost since it was formed two years ago.

Authorities have released nearly 1,000 detainees in an effort to defuse the protests.

Moderate Sunni leaders are calling for modification of the anti-terrorism law, more control over a campaign against former members of Saddam's outlawed Baath party and the release of more detained prisoners under an amnesty law.

But more radical Islamist leaders and clerics call for Maliki's resignation and even for an autonomous Sunni Muslim region to be set up in Anbar.

The tensions are adding to Iraqi government worries that the war in neighboring Syria will upset Iraq's own delicate sectarian and ethnic balance.

Mainly Sunni rebels are fighting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, whose ruling clan belongs to a minority offshoot of Shi'ite Islam. Hardline Iraqi Sunnis think the potential rise of a Sunni regime in Damascus after Assad will strengthen their own position in Baghdad.

(Reporting by Kamal Naama in Falluja and Suadad al-Salhy in Baghdad; Writing by Patrick Markey; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/nine-wounded-iraq-troops-clash-sunni-protesters-091946441.html

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Ancient farmers may have nibbled chocolate

Ancient corn farmers living in pit houses among arid canyons of what is now Utah may have sweetened their lives with a chocolate derivative imported from the tropics of Central America, recent archeological findings suggest.

An archeologist and team of chemists analyzing the remains of an eighth century village near present-day Moab found theobromine and caffeine, compounds found in a cacao tree native to Central America and from which chocolate is derived.

"We associate cacao use with the migration of corn farmers from Mexico into the Southwest," University of Pennsylvania archeologist Dorothy Washburn said on Friday.

But the new findings suggest that cacao, a bean that was ground up and used to flavor food and make drinks, may have arrived in the region hundreds of years earlier than previously thought, and from farther afield, she said.

The team analyzed roughly a half dozen polished and "very beautifully designed" ceramic bowls "with non-local designs" that belonged to farmers whose ancestors migrated north over centuries from parts of Central America, Washburn said.

The findings strongly suggest the bowls contained cacao, and predate earlier traces of cacao studied in jars and bowls found in masonry pueblos from the 11th and 12th centuries at Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, Washburn said.

The Utah study, to be published in April in the Journal of Archaeological Science, is not definitive because water swished around the bowls and then analyzed did not contain a third compound that could prove the existence of cacao, Washburn said.

"We looked for it but didn't detect it," said Washburn, who conducted the study in 2012 with husband William Washburn and his colleague, Petia Shipkova, both chemists at drug maker Bristol-Myers Squibb.

Michael Blake, an anthropology professor at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, said cacao was an elite food in ancient times - the Aztec used cacao beans as currency - and the bowls analyzed in the study were likely from ordinary farmers.

"It is quite possible that it made its way up there as a precious trade item, part of a trade system of a wide range of precious commodities," Blake said.

The earliest evidence of cacao consumption dates back more than 3,000 years to southern regions of Mexico and Central America, Blake said. It cannot grow naturally in the Southwest United States.

Washburn said her team had also discovered cacao in ancient vessels analyzed near Collinsville, Illinois, which were used at the same time as those found in Chaco Canyon in New Mexico.

Washburn said the combination of theobromine and caffeine in the bowls from Utah suggested the existence of cacao, but the traces could also be from types of holly that grow along the Southeast United States Gulf coast and elsewhere.

(Reporting By Eric M. Johnson; Editing by Cynthia Johnston and Andrew Hay)

(c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2013. Check for restrictions at: http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/50593481/ns/technology_and_science-science/

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Pebble smart watch app for Android now available

For those of you who have one on the way, Kickstarter-funded smart watch maker Pebble has released its Android app onto Google Play today. The app allows the Pebble smart watch to connect to your Android phone over Bluetooth, showing information like weather, email alerts, incoming calls and messages. In addition, it acts as a "dashboard" for the watch, notifying you of software updates, allowing you to install new watchfaces and assisting with troubleshooting.

The watch itself is now shipping to Kickstarter backers on a first come, first served basis. If you've got one coming, be sure to shout out in the comments.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/z3q-TR7OHZA/story01.htm

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Geo Vision's New Performance Enhancement Products for Men and ...

BERRYVILLE, Va., Jan. 25, 2013 /PRNewswire/ ? Eagle Financial Services, Inc. (OTC BULLETIN BOARD: EFSI), the holding company for Bank of Clarke County, whose divisions include Eagle Investment Group, announces its 2012 fourth quarter and?record annual profits.? The Company?s common stock is listed for trading on the Over-the-Counter (OTC) Bulletin Board under the ticker symbol EFSI.

Fourth Quarter and Annual 2012 Highlights:

John R. Milleson, President and CEO, stated, ?We are pleased to report two exciting accomplishments during 2012: the Company produced record profits for the year and continued its streak of consecutive dividend increases, a streak unmatched by most financial institutions.? The 2012 dividend of $0.73 per share was the 26^th consecutive year of a dividend increase for the Company.? The year?s record earnings were primarily a result of a very steady and strong net interest margin of 4.47% and lower loan loss provisions.? That level of core earnings afforded the Company the ability to aggressively manage its non-performing assets as well as begin an expansion east into Loudoun County.? The Bank?s twelfth retail branch is currently under construction at 203 Hirst Road in Purcellville, Virginia and will open in April 2013. To branch at a time when many banks are contracting is a strategic initiative of which we want to take full advantage.?

Income Statement Review

Net income for the quarter ended December 31, 2012 was $1.6 million reflecting an increase of 128.1% from the quarter ended December 31, 2011.? Net income was $6.5 million for the year ended December 31, 2012 which represented an increase of 51.5% when compared to net income for the same period in 2011. These increases resulted mostly from reduced interest costs and loan loss provisions.

Net interest income for the quarter ended December 31, 2012 was $5.7 million, which represented a decrease of 3.3% when compared to $5.9 million for the same period in 2011.? Net interest income for the year ended December 31, 2012 was $23.2 million which represented an increase of 1.8% when compared to $22.8 million in 2011.? This increase in net interest income for the year resulted mostly from the decline in the Company?s funding costs.??

Total loan interest income was $5.5 million for the quarter ended December 31, 2012, reflecting a decrease of $305,000 from the quarter ended December 31, 2011.? Total loan interest income was $22.6 million for the year ended December 31, 2012, reflecting a decrease of $440,000 from the year ended December 31, 2011.? Average loans for the quarter ended December 31, 2012 were $420.2 million compared to $409.1 million for the same period in 2011.? Average loans for the year ended December 31, 2012 were $420.8 million compared to $405.8 million for 2011.? The tax equivalent yield on average loans for the quarter ended December 31, 2012 was 5.26%, down 43 basis points from the same time period in 2011.? The tax equivalent yield on average loans for the year ended December 31, 2012 was 5.39%, down 31 basis points from 2011.? Interest income from the investment portfolio was $933,000 thousand for the quarter ended December 31, 2012, reflecting a decrease of 15.6% when compared to $1.1 million for the same period in 2011. Interest income from the investment portfolio was $4.0 million for the year ended December 31, 2012 and $4.5 million for? 2011.?

Total interest expense was $814,000 for the three months ended December 31, 2012 and $1.1 million for three months ended December 31, 2011. Total interest expense for the year ended December 31, 2012 was $3.4 million, representing a decrease of $1.4 million or 29.6% from the year ended December 31, 2011. The average cost of interest bearing liabilities decreased 23 basis points when comparing the quarter ended December 31, 2012 to the same time period in 2011.? The average cost of interest bearing liabilities decreased 31 basis points when comparing the year ended December 31, 2012 to the same time period in 2011.? The average balance of interest bearing liabilities decreased $17.4 million from the quarter ended December 31, 2011 to the same period in 2012.? The average balance of interest bearing liabilities decreased $19.9 million from the year ended December 31, 2011 to the same period in 2012. The decline in interest bearing liabilities for both periods resulted from maturities of wholesale borrowings and time deposits.

The net interest margin was 4.31% for the quarter ended December 31, 2012.? When compared to the quarter ended December 31, 2011, the net interest margin decreased 16 basis points. The net interest margin was 4.47% for the year ended December 31, 2012.? When compared to the year ended December 31, 2011, the net interest margin increased seven basis points. This increase was attributable to the decreased cost of interest bearing liabilities.

The Company?s net interest margin is not a measurement under accounting principles generally accepted in the United States, but it is a common measure used by the financial services industry to determine how profitably earning assets are funded. The Company?s net interest margin is calculated by dividing tax equivalent net interest income by total average earning assets. Tax equivalent net interest income is calculated by grossing up interest income for the amounts that are non-taxable (i.e., municipal income) then subtracting interest expense. The tax rate utilized is 34%.

Noninterest income was $1.5 million for the quarter ended December 31, 2012 and $1.3 million for the same period in 2011.? Noninterest income was $6.1 million for the year ended December 31, 2012 and $5.9 million for the same period in 2011. Increases in service release premiums received from secondary market mortgage activity were the largest contributor to the year?s increase in noninterest income. Noninterest expense was $5.0 million for the quarter ended December 31, 2012 and $5.5 million for the quarter ended December 31, 2011. Noninterest expense was $18.5 million and $19.3 million for the years ended December 31, 2012 and 2011, respectively.??The majority of the decrease in noninterest expense resulted from a one-time adjustment to FDIC assessment expense.? The Company determined that the balance of the Company?s prepaid FDIC insurance was too low and as a result made a $199,000 adjustment to increase the prepaid balance and decrease the corresponding expense in the quarter ended June 30, 2012. ?Decreases in other operating expenses relate to the Company?s efforts to improve efficiency by diligently managing and monitoring its operating expenses.

Asset Quality and Provision for Loan Losses

Provisions for loan losses were $10,000 for the three months ended December 31, 2012, compared to $900,000 for the quarter ended December 31, 2011. Provisions for loan losses were $1.7 million for the year ended December 31, 2012, compared to $3.8 million for the year ended December 31, 2011. The ratio of allowance for loan losses to total loans was 1.57% at December 31, 2012 and 2.13% at December 31, 2011.? The ratio of allowance for loan losses to total nonaccrual loans was 272.5% at December 31, 2012 and 357.0% at December 31, 2011.? The amount of provision for loan losses reflects the results of the Bank?s analysis used to determine the adequacy of the allowance for loan losses.? The decreased provision for the quarter and the year mostly resulted from the decrease in the amount of specific allocations required for impaired loans. During the year, several impaired loan balances were partially charged off while others had been completely charged off and moved to other real estate owned.? At December 31, 2012, impaired loans totaled $15.3 million and had related specific allocations of $2.4 million.? At December 31, 2011, impaired loans totaled $19.9 million and had related specific allocations of $4.2 million.

Nonperforming assets increased slightly from $5.0 million or 0.87% of total assets at December 31, 2011 to $5.6 million or 0.94% of total assets at December 31, 2011. This increase resulted mostly from the increase in other real estate owned. Several loans had been charged off and moved to other real estate owned during the year, including two large commercial real estate loans whose collateral was valued at $853,000 at December 31, 2012.

Total nonaccrual loans totaled $2.4 million at December 31, 2012 and 2011.? During the fourth quarter of 2012, the Bank placed one loan totaling $230,000 on nonaccrual status. Although this loan is unsecured, the majority of the Bank?s other nonaccrual loans are secured by real estate.? Management evaluates the financial condition of these borrowers and the value of any collateral on these loans.? The results of these evaluations are used to estimate the amount of losses which may be realized on the disposition of these nonaccrual loans.? Loans greater than 90 days past due and still accruing increased from $94,000 at December 31, 2011 to $208,000 at December 31, 2012.

The Company realized $1.4 million in net charge-offs for the quarter ended December 31, 2012 versus $48,000 for the same period in 2011. The Company realized $3.8 million in net charge-offs for the year ended December 31, 2012 versus $2.1 for 2011. The 2012 loan charge offs were concentrated in larger balance commercial real estate loans while the 2011 loan charge offs were concentrated in residential real estate. ?The Company continues to operate a troubled credit group to monitor past due loans, identify potential problem credits, and develop action plans to work through its troubled loans as promptly as possible. ?Asset quality remains a primary concern of the Company. Necessary resources continue to be devoted to the ongoing review of the loan portfolio and the workouts of problem assets to minimize any losses to the Company. Management will continue to monitor delinquencies, risk rating changes, charge-offs, market trends and other indicators of risk in the Company?s portfolio, particularly those tied to residential and commercial real estate, and adjust the allowance for loan losses accordingly.

Total Consolidated Assets

Total consolidated assets of the Company at December 31, 2012 were $593.3 million, which represented an increase of $25.3 million or 4.5% from total assets of $568.0 million at December 31, 2011.? Total loans increased $7.7 million from $410.4 million at December 31, 2011 to $418.1 million at December 31, 2012.? Considering the continued low interest rate and competitive market environment, the Company has been conscientious about maintaining both its underwriting standards and its net interest margin and thereby cautious about the growth it has accepted in the loan portfolio.

Deposits and Other Borrowings

Total deposits, which include brokered deposits, increased $28.6 million to $477.1 million at December 31, 2012 from $448.5 million at December 31, 2011. The Company held $9.9 million in brokered deposits at December 31, 2012 and 2011.?

Securities sold under agreement to repurchase were $10.0 million at December 31, 2012 and 2011. Borrowings with the Federal Home Loan Bank of Atlanta were $32.3 million at December 31, 2012 and $42.3 million at December 31, 2011.

Equity

Shareholders? equity was $63.7 million at December 31, 2012 and $58.1 million at December 31, 2011. The book value of the Company at December 31, 2012 was $19.11 per common share. Total common shares outstanding were 3,352,523 at December 31, 2012.? On January 16, 2013, the board of directors declared a $0.19 per common share cash dividend for shareholders of record as of January 28, 2013 and payable on February 15, 2013.

Certain information contained in this discussion may include ?forward-looking statements? within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. These forward-looking statements relate to the Company?s future operations and are generally identified by phrases such as ?the Company expects,? ?the Company believes? or words of similar import. Although the Company believes that its expectations with respect to the forward-looking statements are based upon reliable assumptions within the bounds of its knowledge of its business and operations, there can be no assurance that actual results, performance or achievements of the Company will not differ materially from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. For details on factors that could affect expectations, see the risk factors and other cautionary language included in the Company?s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2011, and other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

EAGLE FINANCIAL SERVICES, INC.
KEY STATISTICS		For the Three Months Ended
		4Q12		3Q12		2Q12		1Q12		4Q11
Net Income (dollars in thousands)		$ ? ? ? ? ?1,581		$ ? ? ? ? ?1,253		$ ? ? ? ? ?2,002		$ ? ? ? ? ?1,714		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? 693
Earnings per share, basic		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.47		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.38		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.60		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.52		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.21
Earnings per share, diluted		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.47		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.37		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.60		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.25		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.21
Return on average total assets		1.08%		0.88%		1.43%		1.23%		0.48%
Return on average total equity		9.95%		8.01%		13.29%		11.74%		4.76%
Dividend payout ratio		40.43%		47.37%		30.00%		34.62%		85.71%
Fee revenue as a percent of total revenue		20.32%		20.40%		20.26%		19.18%		18.53%
Net interest margin(1)		4.31%		4.40%		4.60%		4.56%		4.47%
Yield on average earning assets		4.91%		5.01%		5.23%		5.25%		5.28%
Yield on average interest-bearing liabilities		0.83%		0.85%		0.87%		0.94%		1.07%
Net interest spread		4.08%		4.16%		4.36%		4.31%		4.21%
Tax equivalent adjustment to net interest income (dollars in thousands)		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? 198		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? 200		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? 207		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? 212		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? 214
Non-interest income to average assets		1.05%		1.09%		1.12%		1.06%		0.88%
Non-interest expense to average assets		3.41%		3.20%		3.12%		3.31%		3.73%
Efficiency ratio(2)		60.91%		61.36%		56.96%		61.43%		72.60%
(1)??The net interest margin is calculated by dividing tax equivalent net interest income by total average earning assets. Tax equivalent interest income is calculated by grossing up interest income for the amounts that are non taxable (i.e., municipal income) then subtracting interest expense. The rate utilized is 34%. See the table below for the quarterly tax equivalent net interest income and the reconciliation of net interest income to tax equivalent net interest income. The Company?s net interest margin is a common measure used by the financial service industry to determine how profitable earning assets are funded. Because the Company earns a fair amount of non taxable interest income due to the mix of securities in its investment security portfolio, net interest income for the ratio is calculated on a tax equivalent basis as described above.
(2)? The efficiency ratio is not a measurement under accounting principles generally accepted in the United States. It is calculated by dividing non-interest expense by the sum of tax equivalent net interest income and non-interest income excluding gains and losses on the investment portfolio and sales of repossessed assets. The tax rate utilized is 34%. See the table below for the quarterly tax equivalent net interest income and a reconciliation of net interest income to tax equivalent net interest income. The Company calculates this ratio in order to evaluate its overhead structure or how effectively it is operating. An increase in the ratio from period to period indicates the Company is losing a larger percentage of its income to expenses. The Company believes that the efficiency ratio is a reasonable measure of profitability.

????????

EAGLE FINANCIAL SERVICES, INC.
SELECTED FINANCIAL DATA BY QUARTER
		4Q12		3Q12		2Q12		1Q12		4Q11
BALANCE SHEET RATIOS
	Loans to deposits	87.63%		93.51%		94.36%		92.92%		91.52%
	Average interest-earning assets to
	??? average-interest bearing liabilities	139.30%		139.84%		138.63%		136.42%		132.72%
PER SHARE DATA
	Dividends	$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.19		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.18		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.18		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?0.18		$ ? ? ? ? ? 0.18
	Book value	$ ? ? ? ? ?19.11		$ ? ? ? ? ?18.78		$ ? ? ? ? ?18.47		$ ? ? ? ? ?18.05		$ ? ? ? ? 17.67
	Tangible book value	$ ? ? ? ? ?19.11		$ ? ? ? ? ?18.78		$ ? ? ? ? ?18.47		$ ? ? ? ? ?18.05		$ ? ? ? ? 17.67
SHARE PRICE DATA
	Closing price	$ ? ? ? ? ?22.00		$ ? ? ? ? ?21.50		$ ? ? ? ? ?20.10		$ ? ? ? ? ?20.75		$ ? ? ? ? 16.81
	Diluted earnings multiple(1)	11.70		14.53		8.38		9.98		20.01
	Book value multiple(2)	1.15		1.15		1.09		1.15		0.95
COMMON STOCK DATA
	Outstanding shares at end of period	3,352,523		3,344,737		3,337,251		3,320,600		3,300,692
	Weighted average shares outstanding	3,348,630		3,341,050		3,326,999		3,316,005		3,305,189
	Weighted average shares outstanding, diluted	3,359,611		3,352,337		3,337,114		3,321,687		3,312,290
CAPITAL RATIOS
	Total equity to total assets	10.74%		10.94%		10.83%		10.64%		10.23%
CREDIT QUALITY
	Net charge-offs to average loans	0.33%		0.40%		0.13%		0.04%		0.01%
	Total non-performing loans to total loans	0.63%		1.19%		0.43%		0.59%		0.62%
	Total non-performing assets to total assets	0.94%		1.30%		0.71%		0.94%		0.87%
	Non-accrual loans to:
	????? total loans	0.58%		1.19%		0.39%		0.48%		0.60%
	????? total assets	0.41%		0.89%		0.30%		0.36%		0.43%
	Allowance for loan losses to:
	????? total loans	1.57%		1.86%		2.01%		2.13%		2.13%
	???? non-performing assets	118.38%		16.64%		213.78%		168.99%		176.06%
	???? non-accrual loans	272.45%		156.37%		509.93%		445.46%		357.00%
NON-PERFORMING ASSETS:
(dollars in thousands)
	??? Loans delinquent over 90 days	$ ? ? ? ? ? ? 208		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? ? 10		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? 163		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? 449		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? ?94
	??? Non-accrual loans???	2,414		5,091		1,692		1,995		2,449
	??? Other real estate owned and repossessed assets	2,934		2,364		2,181		2,815		2,423
NET LOAN CHARGE-OFFS (RECOVERIES):
(dollars in thousands)
	??? Loans charged off	$ ? ? ? ? ?1,516		$ ? ? ? ? ?1,801		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? 609		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? 237		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?327
	??? (Recoveries)	(122)		(84)		(50)		(81)		(279)
	Net charge-offs (recoveries)	1,394		1,717		559		156		48
PROVISION FOR LOAN LOSSES (dollars in thousands)		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? ? 10		$ ? ? ? ? ?1,050		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? 300		$ ? ? ? ? ? ? 300		$ ? ? ? ? ? ?900
ALLOWANCE FOR LOAN LOSS SUMMARY
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