Light a Candle Campaign
If you haven’t made a difference in our world during this holy month, then please take a moment to join in the “Light a Million Candles” campaign. It will cost you nothing except a few minutes of your time.
“Light a Million Candles” is a campaign to raise awareness of the depravity of online child pornography. The goal of the campaign is to gather as many signatures as possible in a virtual petition to challenge financial institutions, governments, payment organizations, Internet service providers, technology companies and law enforcement agencies to work together to eradicate the scourge of child pornography from our world. Child pornography has become a multibillion-dollar commercial enterprise and is among the fastest growing businesses on the Internet. The Internet has enabled instant access to child pornography by hundreds of thousands and possibly millions of individuals around the world. The ability to use credit cards and other payment methods has made purchasing child pornography easy. The victims of child pornography are becoming younger and younger and the images more graphic and violent. Sickening as it is to imagine, infants and toddlers under the age of three years are being exploited by child pornographers online.
A group of volunteers in Singapore led by Standard Chartered Bank, in support of the work of the Financial Coalition Against Child Pornography have created the “Light a Million Candles” awareness campaign. FCACP includes banks, credit card companies, third party payment companies and Internet services companies. Through FCACP, 23 of the world’s most prominent financial institutions and Internet industry leaders have joined with the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) and its sister organization, the International Center for Missing & Exploited Children (ICMEC) in the fight against Internet child pornography.
The campaign was launched with the objective of lighting the first million candles in less than four months. Thanks to worldwide support, this was achieved in less than 60 days. The campaign continues to gain momentum, and awareness is building fast. This is an opportunity to tell the shocking facts about online child pornography and to get people to take action. The more candles lit, the more powerful the initiative becomes. To join with the more than two million people (and counting) to lend your voice to the fight against online child pornography click to www.lightamillioncandles.com — and ask your friends, relatives and colleagues to light a candle too.
Flat Panels Take Over
Flat panel TV sales are soaring, sending rear projection televisions (RPTV) in the opposite direction — downhill. For an industry where width and picture quality matters, RPTVs lose out for their unappealing girth, poor viewing angles, grayish black levels, and expensive bulbs that have short life spans. Despite RPTV vendors’ current efforts to improve upon form factor (slim depth) and video performance (LED and laser backlights), IDC believes the global RPTV industry is in a state of irreversible decline making way for all things flat panel.
In 2006, IDC found that worldwide RPTV shipments totaled a little more than 2.5 million units. By 2011, however, IDC forecasts that total worldwide RPTV shipments are expected to have all but eroded away, to just under 30,000 units, with revenues at the $10 million mark by then. IDC expects the US to account for the entire RPTV market in 2011, with the other markets having dropped out by the end of 2010. While the RPTV category still offers buyers a compelling value combination of very large, 60 inch plus TV sizes, with 1080p resolution at low price points, the total universe of buyers for this size is very small.
Next Harry Potter in December
The rebellion begins in Harry Potter’s fifth year at Hogwarts and no Muggle will want to miss the excitement when “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” arrives for the home video market this Dec. 11 from Warner Home Video. On the same date a Harry Potter Limited Edition DVD Gift Set becomes available. The 12-disc Limited Edition Gift Set comes in a collectible “suitcase,” and includes two-disc editions of all five Harry Potter films.
The Limited Edition Gift Set contains the following additions:
• A Hogwarts Challenge — A bonus disc containing a unique interactive DVD gaming experience with 14 adventure games based on the first three Harry Potter films and containing clips from the fourth and fifth films.
• Bonus materials — A bonus disc containing more than three hours of all-new content from the past Harry Potter films.
• The Harry Potter Bookmark Collection — Five unique souvenir metal bookmarks made especially for this gift set.
• Harry Potter Trading Cards — These include four packages containing cards from the first four films.
SAP Group Gulps Business Objects
SAP will make a cash tender offer agreement of 42 euros per ordinary share for Business Objects S.A. The transaction volume including transaction costs will be slightly above 4.8 billion euros. Founded in 1990, Business Objects, based in Paris, France, and San Jose, California, has roughly 5,450 employees, supporting more than 44,000 customers. Business Objects is a pioneer in the business intelligence software category.
Business Objects will operate as a stand-alone business as part of the SAP Group. When the transaction is complete, expected in the first quarter of 2008, John Schwarz will continue as the CEO of the Business Objects and is expected to become a member of the SAP Executive Board. Subject to the closing, SAP’s Supervisory Board intends to elect Business Object founder and Chairman Bernard Liautaud to the SAP Supervisory board at the next shareholders meeting.
