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InfoComm MEA Opens Today as Region’s Leading A/V Event, Showcasing Holograms, Videoboards, and Audio and Lighting Systems DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – 6 December 2016  Holograms, massive videoboards, and state-of-the-art audio and lighting displays will be among the audiovisual innovations set to make Expo 2020 in Dubai the world’s most technologically advanced event. The UAE is one of the fastest-growing professional audiovisual markets in one of […]

In interviews with The New York Times, a former Taliban finance minister described how he traveled to Saudi Arabia for years raising money while ostensibly on pilgrimage. The Taliban have also been allowed to raise additional millions by extorting “taxes” by pressing hundreds of thousands of Pashtun guest workers in the kingdom and menacing their families back home, according to Vali Nasr, a former State Department adviser. […]

It’s been a bad year for newspapers. Money from print advertising is tanking. Layoffs have affected newsrooms large and small. And The President-elect isn’t shy about abusing journalists on Twitter. But today, just a few weeks before Christmas, the clouds parted a bit as New York Times CEO Mark Thompson spoke at the UBS Global Media & Communications Conference in Manhattan. He dispensed a couple of encouraging […]

HONG KONGThe corruption crackdown ordered by Chinese President Xi Jinping is reliant on a secret system of detentions and torture beyond the reach of the formal Chinese criminal justice system, a U.S.-based human rights group said in a report on Tuesday. Human Rights Watch, which released its study in Hong Kong, called for the abolition of the system known as shuanggui, through which it alleges that confessions […]

BANGKOK Floods in Thailand have killed 14 people and badly affected southern holiday islands as the country heads into the December-January high season for tourism, authorities said on Tuesday. A low pressure system has brought heavy rain to parts of the south including the islands of Samui and Pha Ngan in the Gulf of Thailand, and floods have also severed the rail link to the south and […]

The inaugural event will serve as a platform for industry wide knowledge exchange and discussions around legacy creation 06 December 2016 Dubai, United Arab Emirates: Dubai Business Events in collaboration with the BestCities Global Alliance and the Professional Convention Management Association (PCMA), inaugurated the first ever BestCities Global Forum yesterday. Dubai is proud to host the first event of its kind organised by the global alliance, set […]

Flat6Labs Abu Dhabi, a digital media accelerator supported by twofour54 Abu Dhabi, showcased eight new start-up companies during its third Demo Day. The Demo Day, held under the patronage of HE Noura Al Kaabi, Minister of State for Federal National Council Affairs of the UAE and Chairwoman of the Media Zone Authority-Abu Dhabi, and twofour54, took place during the UAE Innovation week. In addition to the diverse […]

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Holiday shoppers eyeing tech devices from Microsoft will be pleased to learn that the company’s annual 12 Days of Deals promotion is back to lure consumers. So, if one missed out on the Cyber Monday and Black Friday specials on the Xbox One or Surface Pro 4, this is a great period to snag some discounts. “Whether you prefer to skip the madness of Black Friday and Cyber Monday […]

Islamic finance experts have developed new rules for gold transactions, they said on Monday, potentially opening the way for Islamic institutions to trade gold and silver much more actively. Gold transactions must be fully backed by physical metal and settled on the same day, the developers of the new guidance said, to observe Islam’s distinction between real economic activity and speculation. Traditionally, gold has played a very […]

Good morning. Here’s our daily summary of all the media news you need to know. Want to get this briefing in your inbox every morning? Subscribe here. Fake news is not the sole province of slimeball digital practitioners in faraway lands enabled by the righteous souls at Facebook and Google. There’s also — as has ever been so — the government. “Police investigating a notorious gang in […]

ABU DHABI // Pupils at Indian curriculum schools in the UAE outperform those in Kerala but are less able to handle stress, and less socially active and independent, a new study suggests. Psychologists Dr Sreethi Nair and Dr Smitha Dev interviewed and observed more than 400 pupils in their final years of high school in Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah, Umm Al Quwain and Ajman, and youngsters from […]

Jayaram Jayalalithaa, the chief minister of the southern state of Tamil Nadu and one of India’s most powerful politicians, was in “very critical” condition Monday, a day after she suffered a cardiac arrest, according to authorities at the hospital where she is being treated. Ms. Jayalalithaa, who has a cult-like following, was on life support systems, Apollo Hospitals said in statement Monday afternoon. Four doctors from New […]

The company responsible for rolling out the National Broadband Network across Australia was directly warned that a draft opinion piece by its chairman, Ziggy Switkowski, could potentially be seen as favouring one side during an election campaign. (Screenshot: Chris Duckett/ZDNet) In a letter submitted in response to Senate Questions on Notice late Friday afternoon, Deputy Secretary of the Department of Communications and the Arts Ian Robinson told […]

Following a successful listing on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) on November 17 with a market capitalisation of AU$23 million, conversational commerce company Flamingo is now looking at Australia as a key market, with online lending marketplace DirectMoney being announced as its first local client. Born in Australia and based in the US, Flamingo is a software-as-a-service (SaaS) company that provides an “intelligent guided selling platform” to […]

Small wind farm with several turbines. Credit: sprisi /www.pixelio.de Wind energy has been remarkably successful in providing an increasing share of cheap renewable energy. But can this trend continue to supply more and more renewable energy for decades to come? A new study published by scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry in Jena, Germany, lowers the expectations of wind energy when used at large scales. […]

New energy vehicles (NEVs) at Beijing Institute of Technology’s campus. Credit: Yu Hao Many Chinese cities are suffering from deteriorating environmental quality—particularly due to air pollution that contributes to fog and haze. Air pollutant levels now far exceed “safe” limits established by the European Union, and one of the main culprits behind it is the rapid increase in automobile ownership and usage. These rising environmental concerns are […]

ATHENS Political uncertainty in Europe has created fresh momentum for a “comprehensive and permanent” solution to the Greek debt crisis before the year ends, a government spokesman said on Sunday. Euro zone finance ministers will meet in Brussels on Monday to discuss short-term debt relief for Greece, and Germany’s Wolfgang Schaeuble said it must implement reforms instead of hoping for further debt forgiveness. Greece remained optimistic for […]

Bizarrely enough, it’s difficult to determine what constitutes a “small business” in the United States. The US Small Business Administration has a table of standards [PDF] that ranges from about 250 to over a thousand employees. On the other hand, the Affordable Care Act kicks in certain requirements for businesses with over 50 employees. So, what exactly is small? When I researched my book, How To Save […]

A gym membership can cost about Dh800 per month but the price of motivation to work out can cost triple that for some fitness fanatics, who feel that if they do not look the part – in the trendiest, branded activewear – they aren’t training right. What was once a niche market, targeted at serious athletes and serviced by big sports brands such as Nike and Reebok, […]

· Family businesses are threatened by rapidly changing internal and external environments · Study by Strategy& (formerly Booz & Company) stresses the need for family businesses to identify priority areas for action to institutionalize and adapt · Strategy& suggests three focus areas for institutionalization: governance, strategy and corporate enablers · Although each family business has unique features, Strategy& has identified four archetypes of family […]

The UK’s Information Commissioner, Elizabeth Denham, has been in post just under four months, but already the differences between her approach and those of her two most recent predecessors (Richard Thomas and Christopher Graham) are starting to become clear. This may be due partly to the fact that she comes to the role with six years’ experience as the Information and Privacy Commissioner for British Columbia, whereas […]

Beijing’s infamous smog spiked on Sunday despite draconian measures in surrounding cities to reduce persistent pollution during the winter in northern China. The thick layer of haze has become a political liability for the ruling Communist party and has driven China’s participation in the Paris climate accord to limit emissions of carbon and other greenhouse gases.  An air monitor index released by the US embassy in Beijing breached 600 […]

Systems out of thermodynamic equilibrium are very common in nature. In recent years they have attracted constantly growing attention because of their relevance for fundamental physics as well as for modern nanotechnology. In a collaborative effort, researchers now report on detailed new physical insights of non-equilibrium atom-surface quantum friction. (via WSJ)

By Francois Murphy | VIENNA VIENNA Austria will provide a new gauge of the populist wave sweeping Western democracies on Sunday, as the divided country holds a vote that could deliver the first freely-elected far-right head of state in Europe since World War Two. The knife-edge presidential run-off is all the more dramatic for being a re-run of an election held six months ago – before Britain […]

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RYO YAMADA
HITORI GOTOH
IKUYO KITA