Kemp returns, saves Dodgers in 6-5 win over Giants

LOS ANGELES (AP) ? Matt Kemp was insistent about getting back into the Los Angeles Dodgers' lineup Tuesday night after three frustrating weeks on the disabled list, and the last thing on his mind was whether his troublesome right hamstring would hold up.

So when it came time to test his leg, it passed with flying colors.

Kemp ran a long way and made a marvelous catch for the final out of a 6-5 victory over the slumping San Francisco Giants, extending Los Angeles' winning streak to a season-best four games.

"You can't really think like that," Kemp said when asked if he was relieved he didn't hurt his hamstring again. "I mean, I've thought like that after I came back from it last year, and it happened again. So I can't play timid. I have to let it go. And if it goes, it goes. Hamstrings are tricky, and you never know when they're good. But right now it feels good and I'm glad we got the win."

With runners at first and second, Marco Scutaro hit a long drive to center. Kemp, playing shallow with the potential tying run at second base, raced back and reached over his shoulder to make a sliding catch on the warning track. He popped up and smacked the wall hard, then shouted in excitement.

"Scutaro doesn't really drive the ball to center field like that, so he surprised me a little bit," the two-time Gold Glove winner said. "He's a good contact hitter that likes to drive the ball the other way in the hole and back up the middle, so I was just anticipating him trying to hit a ground ball up the middle, and he hit it pretty good. So I had to drop my head and run back."

Scutaro is homerless in 142 career at-bats against the Dodgers.

"I thought it had a good shot to go out," Giants shortstop Brandon Crawford said. "It looked like he hit it well, but I knew Kemp was out there and he's a good center fielder. So he was going to do all he could to not let it drop. It was bad luck for us. That's kind of what's been happening a lot to us lately."

Kemp returned to the lineup after missing 24 games with a right hamstring strain. He was injured May 29 while running down a double in right-center by Mike Trout at Angel Stadium. It was the fourth time in his career that Kemp landed on the DL, including two stints last season because of a left hamstring strain that cost him a combined 51 games.

"I had to beg him to let me play today," Kemp said, referring to manager Don Mattingly. "I was telling him I was just sick of watching my team play without me. It kind of feels like you're not part of the team when you're on the DL, so I just wanted to get back out there with the guys."

Mark Ellis and Hanley Ramirez each hit a two-run homer for the Dodgers, and rookie Stephen Fife pitched effectively into the seventh inning. Los Angeles handed the defending World Series champions their third loss in a row and eighth in 11 games, dropping them under .500 for the first time since losing to the Dodgers on opening day.

It's the latest the Giants have been below the break-even mark in any season since 2008, when they finished 72-90 in Bruce Bochy's second year as manager.

"Honestly, I didn't even know we were under .500. I just knew we haven't been playing well. That's a wake-up call in itself," Crawford said.

Fife (2-2) allowed three runs and four hits, including solo homers by Brandon Belt and NL MVP Buster Posey, in 6 2-3 innings. The 26-year-old right-hander struck out three and walked two in his 11th major league start, only the second in which he gave up more than two runs.

With closer Kenley Jansen unavailable after pitching three consecutive days, demoted closer Brandon League came on in the ninth to protect a 6-3 lead and did not retire any of the three batters he faced.

Belt hit an RBI double and Andres Torres added an RBI single off League before Paco Gonzalez got three outs for his first major league save ? barely.

Mike Kickham (0-2) was charged with six runs, five earned, and eight hits over 5 1-3 innings in his second big league start.

The Dodgers broke a 2-all tie with four runs in the sixth. Adrian Gonzalez doubled and Ramirez followed with a drive off the left-field foul pole for his fifth homer. Kickham gave up singles to his next two batters before rookie Jake Dunning came in and gave up an RBI single by Tim Federowicz.

Nick Punto kept the inning alive when he beat the relay throw to first base with a headfirst slide on a potential double-play grounder. Andre Ethier then scored on Dunning's wild pitch to Fife.

Belt, who was 3 for 4 after coming in 4 for 43 lifetime at Dodger Stadium, got one of the runs back for the Giants in the seventh with his eighth homer.

Fife retired his first 11 batters before Posey drove an 0-1 pitch barely over the left-field fence for his ninth homer. The Giants tied it in the fifth on a run-scoring groundout by Torres.

Ellis opened the scoring with his fourth homer, a two-run shot with two outs in the third after Federowicz led off with a double.

NOTES: Punto, starting at 3B while Juan Uribe got the night off, jumped to pull down Pablo Sandoval's line drive in the second inning. Hunter Pence, the next batter, lifted a popup toward the stands and Punto stretched over the barrier before landing in the first row with the ball in his glove. ... Kemp was 1 for 4 with a single. He is homerless in 106 at-bats at Dodger Stadium since his two-run shot off Colorado's Jorge De La Rosa last Sept. 20. ... The Giants have been outhomered 19-5 over their last 15 games. ... The Dodgers, who were 11-13 in Kemp's absence, opened a roster spot for him by optioning INF-OF Elian Herrera to Triple-A Albuquerque. ... Giants CF Angel Pagan had surgery in Los Angeles to repair a tendon in his left hamstring, an injury that has sidelined him since May 26.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/kemp-returns-saves-dodgers-6-5-win-over-053736803.html

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LGBT Community Untapped Market Consumer Brands - Business ...

Flickr/Brendon Thorne

Rick and Liam wanted recognition of their commitment to each other, so they did what many gay couples are doing these days.

They boarded a plane to New York where marriage between same-sex partners is legal. After hearing about the couple?s plans, the JetBlue crew on their flight showered them with special attention including free drinks and best wishes.

When Rick and Liam realized they lacked a witness for the wedding, one of the flight attendants accompanied the men to city hall to serve in that role, showing up at the nuptials only after stopping to get a special dessert for the occasion. The newly married men penned a heartfelt ?thank you? letter to JetBlue. The airline proudly posted the story on their blog and distributed it to the press.

JetBlue is not alone in its desire to shine a light on its support of its gay consumers. Many brands are waking up to the opportunity that the LGBT market today represents for their business.

Brands from Apple to Budweiser to JCPenney are becoming more interested in gay consumers, with many brands making concerted efforts to target the LGBT market. ?

Why? What is really at stake? Here are just a few numbers surrounding LGBT consumers and the differences in spending power of gay households vs. the American general market:

• 23% higher median household income¹

• 24% more equity in their homes¹

• 26% of gay men say they will pay more for top quality brands²

• 30% have taken a major vacation in the past year²

• 40% bought a new smart phone in the past year²

Estimates put the buying power of the LGBT community at over $800 billion annually. Some marketers are realizing that they may need to adjust their plans to accommodate this segment, or at least make sure that their marketing spending is inclusive of this valuable target. But many brands have been slow to pick up on the impact of the gay and lesbian consumer on their sales. Some are content to let their general market messages do the job of reaching everyone, and see no reason to pay special attention to LGBT consumers.

Are gay consumers? spending habits and brand loyalties really all that different? In some categories, maybe not. But in others, the impact of gay consumer spending is more profound. Here are a few differences between the purchasing habits of gay consumers and everyone else.

Gay Shopping Habits Pay Off For Brands ? Same-sex households spend at rates fairly similar to other households, when it comes to shopping for consumer packaged goods. However, gay and lesbian households make 16% more shopping trips than the average U.S. household ? 173 vs. 149 per year.3 The impact on total spending equates to about 25% more for same-sex households. Male same-sex households are especially likely to spend more frequently, shopping nearly 30% more often than the average household. On average, that?s $2,045 more per year spent on packaged goods in male same-sex households.3 This means that brands have more opportunities to reach LGBT consumers at retail to influence their purchase behaviors and brand preferences.

Gay Consumer Brand Loyalties ? Are the factors that influence the brand selection of gay consumers really that different? They are more likely to pay for quality brands and to influence others as well. When asked if it is worth paying extra for top-of-line or cutting edge products, 26% of gay men agreed, considerably higher than the average American?s answer to that question. And LGBT consumers are a source of word-of-mouth marketing for brands. Gay men (64%) and women (65%) agreed that when they find a brand they like, they are likely to make a point of telling their friends about it. That?s well above the average of all U.S. consumers.²

Gay Consumers and Finances ? Although there is some disagreement about income of gay consumers compared to the average American, most sources indicate LGBT consumers have more disposable income. According to a survey done by Prudential in 2012, gay consumers reported annual household incomes around $61,500, significantly higher than the national median of just over $50,000.1 Gays were more likely to have higher educations, to carry less debt, to have more savings and were less likely to be jobless with an unemployment rate of almost a point below the national percentage. Additionally, LGBT homeowners in the survey had significantly more equity in their homes and were better financially set for retirement.¹

But are gay consumers open to brand marketing messages tailored to them? With a constant media-driven debate reminding gay Americans of inequities including workplace discrimination, marriage inequality, and cultural clashes, on an almost daily basis, gays and lesbians are paying attention to brands that appear to be allies.

And even for brands that do not have any plan to market directly to LGBT consumers, the shift in America?s attitudes about the issue is requiring a new sensitivity. Brands from beer to candy bars have found themselves the subjects of consumer or industry criticism when they used ??harmless? jokes in ads that inadvertently seemed to show same-sex relationships in a bad light. And the concerns are not always coming from gay groups. More and more progressive general market consumers are expressing their support of gay issues and holding brands accountable as well.

With billions in spending at stake, it?s more important than ever that brands, even those who have no interest in marketing to gay Americans, become sensitive to these issues. This loyal group of consumers is ready to reward brands that really speak their language.

¹Prudential 2012 Survey of more than 1,000 LGBT respondents

²Community Marketing, Inc., July 2012 survey of 13,000 Gay & Lesbian Americans

³Nielsen, January 2013

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/lgbt-community-untapped-market-consumer-brands-2013-6

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Acer Aspire P3 review: a nice enough tablet, but wait for the refresh

Back when Windows 8 first launched, the Acer Iconia W700 quickly became one of our favorite laptop / tablet hybrids. There were two reasons for that, really: the price was right, and the battery lasted longer than pretty much any other Win 8 device we'd tested. The thing is, it was more of a business device than something we'd recommend to the average consumer. After all, it came with a heavy, desk-bound docking station, with the carrying case and included keyboard as standalone pieces. That's quite a lot to carry if you ever feel like taking it on the road.

That's where the Acer Aspire P3 comes in. Don't worry, the W700 is still alive and kicking, but for people who've been looking for something more portable, this could be the one you want. Like the W700, the P3 starts at a reasonable price ($800) and has the guts of an Ivy Bridge laptop, including a Core i5 processor, Intel HD 4000 graphics, 4GB of RAM and a 120GB SSD. The difference is that rather than a clunky cradle, it comes with a carrying case that doubles as a keyboard; just prop the tablet up into a ready-made slot when you feel like watching movies or answering email. Yep, kind of like the Surface Pro, except there's no built-in kickstand and the keyboard is actually included. So is it a good deal at that price? Let's find out.

Gallery: Acer Aspire P3 review

Filed under: Tablets, Acer

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Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/ny-H1camXs8/

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Panasonic VT60 Television: $3000 of Video Perfection

When it comes to high-end HD sets, you get what you pay for. And in the case of Panasonic's new top-of-the-line plasma set, it's worth every penny.

What Is It?

A THX-certified flat-screen television, and arguably the single best-looking plasma set on the market right now.

Who's It For?

People whose home theaters are actually theaters?not just two rows of couches and some blackout curtains?and want their display to reflect the investment. Simply put, rich folk.

Design

The VT60 may be beautiful to look at but that's only when it's on. The 60-inch single-sheet screen is surrounded by a roughly 2-inch black bezel and rested atop a flat, silvery-grey stand?just like most every other one we've seen. Nothing about the set itself really stands out save for the integrated pop-up camera.

Using It

Setup was simple and straightforward but exhaustive. Setting up the 97 pound TV and stand requires at least two people and performing the initial software registrations?setting up Wi-Fi, setting up the voice-control, setting up the motion-tracking remote, setting the home screen options, registering streaming accounts, etc?took the better part of an hour, and that's not including calibrating the picture.

The VT60 offers a slew of calibration setting options. In addition to the standard sharpness, brightness, hue, and saturation tweaks, you can apply filtering like the Brilliance Enhancer, Motion Smoother, and others. It's also got a full complement of ISFccc options for professional installers.

While the video camera's facial recognition feature (which loads a personalized home screen depending on who turned it on) is more gimmick than feature, the voice command functionality is freakin' awesome. Panasonic built a mic into the Viera touch remote so that it now not only acts as a mouse for web browsing and data input, it also understands your speech. This allows you to effortlessly input user information, dictate web addresses, and even control video playback. And it actually, you know, works.

The Best Part

Once you get through the setup and actually sit down with this set, it's just incredible. The black levels and shadow details are unreal, the color accuracy is nearly perfect and the colors themselves are syrupy-saturated without making skin tones overtly Boehner-orange. This is one great, great looking screen. What's more, it's expansive enough to hold a video feed and a web browser window simultaneously without looking squeezed and crowded.

Tragic Flaw

The bright room performance is nothing to write home about, with noticeable glare even when watching on overcast days. Also having an integrated camera constantly staring at you would make watching porn on this thing rather uncomfortable.

This Is Weird...

Calibrations are tailored per input?that is, the Custom calibration setting you set on HDMI 1 can be different from the same setting on HDMI 2 and 3?which is helpful if you use the one channel for normal TV watching in a well-lit room but turn the lights down to watch DVDs on HDMI 2. Handy, but can also be a pain if you want the same calibration across all channels.

Test Notes

• The VT60 loves to auto-switch between input channels on its own accord when you turn a device on or off.
• The Viera's voice recognition isn't Google-good but it's definitely better than typing.
• For this test, I used the Mastered in 4K version of Ghostbusters, Blu-ray discs that will also be able to play on the 4K TV you get after this one.

Should I Buy It?

Whether or not you want to shell out three large for the best-performing plasma we've seen in the past year is entirely up to you.

Panasonic TC-P60VT60 Specs

• Class: 60"
• Display: Plasma 1080p
• Weight: 97 pounds
• Media player: SD/USB & DLNA
• 3D: Active (two pairs of glasses included)
• I/O: 3 HDMI, 3 USB, SD, Composite, RJ-45, DAO, Voice command
• THX: THX 3D Certified
• Connectivity: Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Ethernet
• Sound: 2, 5W fronts - 1, 10W sub
• Notable Features: Smart TV (built-in web browsing and content streaming), My Home Screen (personalized content presentation), Swipe & Share 2.0 (content sharing from mobile devices), Voice Commands
• Price: $3000 at Amazon

Source: http://gizmodo.com/panasonic-vt60-television-3000-of-video-perfection-511518667

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Rating Action on Selective Insurance - June 14, 2013 - Zacks.com

Recently, A.M. Best Co. affirmed the issuer credit rating (ICR) of Selective Insurance Group Inc. (SIGI - Snapshot Report) at ?bbb+? along with all the debt ratings of the company. The rating agency also affirmed the financial strength rating (FSR) and ICR of Selective Insurance?s subsidiary ? Selective Insurance Company of America ? and its 9 pooled affiliates at ?A? and ?a+?, respectively.

All ratings of Selective Insurance, its subsidiary and the affiliates carry a stable outlook.

The rating affirmation of Selective Insurance?s subsidiary and its affiliates were based on their sustained operating profitability, which resulted in a strong risk-adjusted capitalization even after dividend payments. Additionally, these companies? strong market position in the property and casualty insurance market, a proficient management team and the financial support provided by Selective Insurance also supported the ratings.

These positive factors were partly offset by significant variance in Selective Insurance Company of America and its affiliates? underwriting results, which sometimes led to below-average operating results, along with lower-than-composite average returns and investment yield and high underwriting leverage.

Ratings for Selective Insurance Company of America and its affiliates might be revised upward by A. M. Best if they generate above-average operating results over the long term. On the other hand, a significant downturn in operating profits or risk-adjusted capitalization may lead to a rating downgrade.

Rating affirmations or upgrades from credit rating agencies play an important part in retaining investor confidence in the stock as well as maintaining credit worthiness in the market. We believe the strong ratings scores will help Selective Insurance to retain investor confidence and help it write more businesses going forward, thereby boosting its results.

Selective Insurance currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). Some other companies worth considering in the property and casualty insurance business are Montpelier Re Holdings Ltd. (MRH - Analyst Report), XL Group plc (XL - Analyst Report) and White Mountains Insurance Group, Ltd. (WTM - Snapshot Report). All these companies carry a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy).

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Source: http://www.zacks.com/stock/news/101595/rating-action-on-selective-insurance

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Boxing tragedy inspires Blanchard's first opera

NEW YORK (AP) ? Jazz composer Terence Blanchard couldn't have imagined how timely his opera about a gay boxer would become when he accepted a commission three years ago.

Blanchard's "Champion" ? with a libretto by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Michael Cristofer ? is based on the life of former world welterweight and middleweight champion Emile Griffith. Its world premiere at the Opera Theatre of St. Louis on Saturday comes just weeks after NBA center Jason Collins became the first active male pro athlete from one of the four major North American team sports to come out as gay.

Griffith's greatest triumph came in a nationally televised welterweight title bout in 1962 when he knocked out Benny "The Kid" Paret by battering him with 17 punches in seven seconds, sending his rival into a coma. Paret died 10 days later.

At the weigh-in, the Cuban-born Paret had angered Griffith by using an anti-gay Spanish slur. Thirty years later, Griffith was beaten and nearly killed after leaving a gay bar near Times Square.

In a 2008 biography, Griffith came out and discussed being a bisexual athlete in an era when gays were not readily accepted. Griffith originally wanted to design women's hats, but was encouraged by his employer at a Garment District factory to take up boxing to support his family in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Blanchard boxes recreationally and first heard about Griffith from his friend and trainer, former heavyweight champion Michael Bentt. He was inspired to write the opera by a quote from Griffith in the biography: "I kill a man and most people understand and forgive me. However, I love a man, and to so many people this is an unforgivable sin; this makes me an evil person."

An abbreviated version of the quote is used in the opera's climactic closing scene where an aging Griffith meets Paret's son to seek forgiveness.

"I was just compelled by the whole notion of a person who could be that accomplished and not really share the moment of winning the championship with somebody that he loved," Blanchard said in a telephone interview from his New Orleans home. "I immediately thought of the first time I won a Grammy. My wife was with me and I turned around and kissed her without thinking about it.

"It speaks volumes of where we are as a society and how we need to really check ourselves, especially those of us who call ourselves compassionate human beings."

Benny Paret Jr. and Griffith's adopted son, Luis Rodrigo, are expected to attend the premiere. The 75-year-old Griffith, who lives in a nursing home in Hempstead, N.Y., suffers from dementia pugilistica after more than 100 professional bouts and requires full-time care.

"So often we think of opera as being kind of irrelevant in many ways, but I do believe opera-going audiences these days ... want something more modern that reflects contemporary society," said OTSL Artistic Director James Robinson, who is directing the production.

When Robinson took over as artistic director in 2008, he was interested in commissioning new works by American composers and the idea of a jazz opera came up. Gene Dobbs Bradford, who runs Jazz St. Louis, recommended Blanchard because of his extensive orchestral experience that includes writing scores for more than 50 films, including most of Spike Lee's.

The 51-year-old Blanchard agreed to undertake the biggest musical project of his career in part to honor his father who could not realize his dream of being an opera singer in an era when companies didn't hire male black singers. His father performed with amateur opera groups, and Blanchard grew up listening to opera recordings at his New Orleans home.

Blanchard knows his father would have been "overjoyed" to see that his son had written an opera performed by a largely African-American cast, including Denyce Graves as Griffith's mother, Arthur Woodley as old Emile and Aubrey Allicock as young Emile. An 11-year-old from St. Louis, Jordan Jones, plays Emile as a boy.

Cristofer's first opera libretto tells Griffith's story in 10 rounds.

"I saw in Emile's life the story of a man who was fighting to reconcile who he was inside with who he was in the outside world," said Cristofer. "He was a young man who wanted to make hats and sing and play baseball and instead became a famous and successful prize fighter. He was confused about his sexual identity and that confusion led to violence. That violence led to the death of another man."

Blanchard describes his work as an "opera in jazz." His score for symphony orchestra and jazz trio uses the language of jazz ? its rhythms and harmonies ? but leaves little space for improvisation. He says his biggest challenge was learning how to write for the individual singers because each human voice has its own characteristics.

While writing "Champion," Blanchard also took a new direction with his jazz quintet. The trumpeter's album "Magnetic," released in late May, features 10 original compositions by Blanchard and his bandmates that cover a wide range of styles from the driving bop of "Don't Run," featuring special guests bassist Ron Carter and saxophonist Ravi Coltrane, to the spacey electronic haze of "Hallucinations," with West African guitarist Lionel Loueke.

Blanchard hopes "Champion" builds bridges between the jazz and opera audiences.

"It's also a compelling story and hopefully we'll start to engage in a more in-depth conversation about being universally tolerant in this country," he said.

____

Online:

http://www.ExperienceOpera.org

http://www.terenceblanchard.com

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/boxing-tragedy-inspires-blanchards-first-opera-161007457.html

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EE now offering flat-rate unlimited broadband and call packages

EE's 4G may grab the headlines, but the company's also offering land line phone and internet services with a (Kevin) Bacony-twist. Now, the network is coaxing existing customers away from rival ISPs like Virgin and BT with six new unlimited broadband and call packages. The £5-per-month basic tier will give you unlimited ADSL and weekend calls, while bluer bloods can fork out £29 a month to get unlimited fiber (up to speeds of 76 Mbps), unlimited calls to landlines and 1,000 free mobile minutes each week. We've added a chart for comparison after the break, assuming you don't reach for your wallet every time you see a product pitched by the guy from Footloose.

Filed under: Wireless, Mobile

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