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Wealth Gap Causes Class Resentment

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Hating the Game & The Players Involved

– via AOL Money & Finance –
According to a recent poll published by the Pew Research Center, nearly two-thirds of Americans believe that the wealth gap is the greatest cause of tension in America.
According to the poll, which was released Wednesday, 66% of Americans believe that there is a “strong” or “very strong” conflict between the rich and the poor. These numbers are particularly noteworthy when one considers that in July 2009 — less than three years ago — only 47% of respondents expressed those opinions. What’s more, the number of respondents who stated that there was a “very strong” conflict has more than doubled, and is currently at the highest level since Pew began asking the question in 1987.
CLASS AWARENESS
According to Wednesday’s poll, the biggest jump in class awareness has occurred among white respondents: While 74% of black and 61% of Hispanic respondents said they believed that there is a serious class conflict in America, the increase in people holding that opinion since 2009 among both those groups was less than 13%. By comparison, the number of white respondents who believe that there is a strong or very strong conflict between the rich and the poor has shot up from 43% to 65% — an increase of more than 50%
PERCEPTION
According to the survey, Democrats are most likely to perceive class tension in America, but respondents across the political spectrum overwhelmingly agreed that there is conflict between the rich and the poor. In 2009, only 38% of Republicans said they thought there was a strong conflict between classes. Today, 55% do. Among independent voters, the numbers were even more stark: in the last three years, the percent of people who perceive a serious class conflict has jumped from 45% to 68%.
There is evidence to suggest that Democrats aren’t the only people who are concerned about wealth distribution in America. In addition to the growing number of worried Republicans that the Pew poll identified, an earlier poll by Bloomberg and The Washington Post found that 53% of Republicans believe that taxes should be increased on households making more than $250,000 per year.

$500 BlackBerry App Purchase

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Purchasing the $500 Clock App

– Courtesy CrackBerry Kevin –
Cesar HQ Limited Edition Desktop Clock App by St. Berlin. I’ll save the back story of how I decided I needed to buy the app for our next CrackBerry Podcast (for now let’s just say I was triple dog dared into it), but buy it I did. And you know what they say, What happens in Vegas ends up on Youtube, so check out the video above to see this Limited Edition desktop clock app get purchased and installed onto my BlackBerry Bold 9900. While at the time of purchase I thought this was the most expensive app in App World, turns out there are quite a few overpriced clock apps in there. And while I’m pretty sure I’m the only person in the world to have bought the Cesar HQ app, looking at the other clock apps I discovered one review by another person on another $500 clock app, so it looks like there is at least one other sucker out there.

So check out the video above and feel free to make fun of my stupidity in the comments. I fully deserve it. In the meantime, I’m going to brush up on my BlackBerry development skills. If there’s going to be a bunch of overpriced clock apps in BlackBerry App World, we might as well get some in there made by me 🙂

*Give Kevin a Hug for being crazy enough to install that app… If I spend $500, that clock better be something that I can touch!

Tom Tom App: Now Facebook Connected. Tweets/Posts Arrival Times at Events

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Tom Tom Taps Into Social Media Integration


– via CNet –
The new update to the TomTom App, version 1.10, gains integration with Facebook and Twitter, allowing users to share destinations and arrival times via the social networks, SMS text messages, and e-mail. Users can also access their Facebook places, events, and friends as potential destinations for turn-by-turn navigation–even the 1535M PND can’t pull off that last trick.

Like previous versions of the TomTom App, version 1.10 features locally stored maps, TomTom’s IQ Routes turn-by-turn routing engine, Google search integration, access to TomTom’s HD Traffic service, and in-app access to iPod audio, contacts, e-mail, calendar, and photos. Look for the update to the TomTom App to hit the iTunes App Store in the first quarter of this year.

*this could be good & bad… For one I can’t tell people I’m 5 minutes away anymore… they’ll already know!

Ainovo Presents the $79 Ice Cream Sandwhich Tablet

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$79 Android 4.0 Tablet

– via Engadget –
The folks from MIPS popped by the Engadget stage to talk about the budget device. The Ainovo Novo7 Paladin is available now in China, so if you actually want to get your hands on the thing here in the US, it will likely cost you a bit more when you actually factor in, you know, air fare and such, but the company assures us that something along the same lines ought to be coming to the States in the near future, with a similar price point.

As expected, this isn’t the sexiest tablet we’ve seen on the show floor — you’re not getting a Galaxy Tab here — but the build quality is quite solid. The seven-inch screen is 800 x 480 — again, not high-end specs we’re dealing with, but it does the trick for casual gaming and YouTube videos, and the MIPS folks mention to us plans to bump up the res for a US release. Along the top of the device, you’ll find three buttons: power, back and menu — the placement on the latter two are a bit counterintuitive when first picking up the tablet, but you’ll get used to it pretty quickly. Along the right side, you’ll find a headphone jack, miniUSB port (yes, mini), volume buttons and a microSD slot for expanding the already decent 8GB of storage.

Inside you’ll find that MIPS-based 1GHz single core processor and 512MB of RAM — again, not the greatest, but it should get the job done for most the paces you’d expect to put a $79 tablet through. There’s no cameras or GPS on the thing, though we didn’t really miss either one. If you’re looking for something that can do video and stills, however, $20 more will get you the $99 Novo7 basic.

*More on: Android 4.0 – codenamed Ice Cream Sandwich
Enhanced speed and performance
Virtual buttons in the UI, in place of capacitive or physical buttons
Separation of widgets in a new tab, listed in a similar manner to apps
Easier-to-create folders, with a drag-and-drop style
A customizable launcher
Improved visual voicemail with the ability to speed up or slow down voicemail messages
Pinch-to-zoom functionality in the calendar
Offline search, a two-line preview, and new action bar at the bottom of the Gmail app
Ability to swipe left or right to switch between Gmail conversations
Integrated screenshot capture (accomplished by holding down the Power and Volume-Down buttons)
Improved error correction on the keyboard
Ability to access apps directly from lock screen (similar to HTC Sense 3.x)
Improved copy and paste functionality
Better voice integration and continuous, real-time speech to text dictation
Face Unlock, a feature that allows users to unlock handsets using facial recognition software
New tabbed web browser, allowing up to 16 tabs
Automatic syncing of browser with users’ Chrome bookmarks
Modern Roboto font
Data Usage section in settings that lets users set warnings when they approach a certain usage limit, and disable data use when the limit is exceeded
Ability to shut down apps that are using data in the background
Improved camera app with zero shutter lag, time lapse settings, panorama mode, and the ability to zoom while recording
Built-in photo editor
New gallery layout, organized by location and person
Refreshed “People” app with social network integration, status updates and hi-res images
Android Beam, a near-field communication feature allowing the rapid short-range exchange of web bookmarks, contact info, directions, YouTube videos and other data
Hardware acceleration of the UI[62]
Resizeable widgets – already part of Android 3.1 for tablets, but new for cellphones[63]
Wi-Fi Direct[64]

Some Wives Say: I Love My Husband, But I Don’t Like Him

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A Common Complaint Wives Have About Their Husbands


– via Laurie Puhn (Harvard lawyer, couples mediator and bestselling author of Fight Less, Love More) –
“I love my husband, but I don’t like him.” That’s a comment I hear quite often in my couples mediation practice. Over the years, I discovered something: Many people are nicer to strangers than they are to their spouses.

The “liking” feeling tends to disappear as everyday job stress, parenting decisions, financial woes, and child-induced sleep deprivation start to bring out the worst in us.

When overwhelmed by life, small things may seem like “the last straw,” and you might even wonder if you are married to the right person.

As a lawyer, couples mediator and author of Fight Less, Love More, people turn to me for my expert relationship advice. Many assume that because I have the answers, I must have a perfect marriage. The truth is, I have a happy marriage and I love my husband, but still, we have the good and bad days that strain the liking feeling and require me to put my own communication advice into practice. Conflict is normal, especially for parents, but how we choose to respond to it will either strengthen or weaken the relationship.

One day, my husband told me he’d be home from work earlier than usual. He even told me which train he would to take.

I put his early arrival time into my afternoon schedule so my (then) two-year-old son and I would be home to greet him, and enjoy some playful “Daddy time.” When my husband’s designated arrival time passed, each additional minute pushed me into a worsening mood. At 50 minutes past his planned homecoming, I was furious. Why wasn’t he here? Why wasn’t he answering his cell phone? Enraged at this point, the only excuse that could save him was a train delay.

My husband showed up more than an hour after I expected him displaying a freshly trimmed head of hair, acting like nothing had happened.

“So you got a haircut?” I asked.

“Yes, I had time today, so I figured, why not?”

That was it. I ripped into his thoughtless selfish behavior and the fight began.

But minutes later, reality hit. In our pre-child days, I would have been more understanding and explained how I felt about his late arrival. Now, with my energy drained from attending to a very busy two-year old, I acted as if his haircut was akin to finding out he cheated on me with his hairdresser.

Our best selves

Frequently, I witness this over-reactive response from my clients. We are our best selves early in our relationship. We show each other empathy, respect and patience. As time passes, we come to expect those things from our partner, but we tend to deliver them less and less. Use of the words “thank you” and “please” become sparse, replaced by comments like “You have to…” and “Why didn’t you…” which are set-up comments for a fight. So what can a person say to prevent such unnecessary battles?

The answer is to stop and ask yourself one wise question when you feel your blood beginning to boil: Ask, “What do I want my spouse to do differently next time?” In my situation, I wanted him to call me in advance to tell me that his plans changed and that he would be home later than expected. If I had shared this future-oriented solution instead of yelling at him for what had already happened we would have skipped an unhappy battle.

As soon as I realized my short-tempered mistake, I apologized and asked for what I wanted. Interestingly, during that brief conversation my husband was flattered to learn that I was looking forward to his coming home early and was disappointed by his lateness. I also shared that I had rescheduled a play date for our son so we would be home to greet him. Our five minute talk ended with the agreement that if his plans changed, he would immediately call me. To this day that agreement has had a positive influence on our relationship.

So my advice for couples who want to love, and like, their mate for a lifetime is: Don’t focus on the problem. Do focus on the solution. A little wisdom makes a big difference.

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