I volunteer at our Welcome Home facility here in Kitchener/Waterloo and getting to know the refugees there has been very eye opening. The challenges involved with a 100km ride dwarfs in comparison of the challenges faced by a refugee. Imagine in a moments notice, force to leave everything you have and know to travel the refugee highway in hopes of a new future.

The event goal is $150,000 and I am looking to raise my share of that good goal. This year my personal goal is to raise $1000 and any amount you give will help reach or exceed it. Please help me reach my goal and help these people, in giving you too will ride with me that day.

Would you sponsor me?

There are over 35 million refugees in the world. Many are coming to Canada and they need support as they adjust to our Canadian way of life. Imagine snow for the first time. Imagine if the letters all ran backwards to what you were familiar with reading. Imagine being alienated from your friends and family. They need our support and International Teams (www.iteams.ca) has been serving refugees for over 25 years.

Don’t hesitate to sponsor me today!

You can go directly to my personal page to sponsor me by clicking on the link below;
https://secure.e2rm.com/registrant/personalPage.aspx?EventID=6694&LangPref=en-CA&RegistrationID=219228

You can also go online to www.rideforrefugees.ca and click on sponsor a rider. Once there you can donate with any credit card to my personal fundraising goal.

Thank you so much and God bless

TiVo, whose PVR boxes compete with those offered by rival carriers, such as Comcast’s cable business, will continue to offer the DirectTV TiVo service to existing DirectTV TiVo subscribers. The two companies also agreed not to file a patent suit against the other for the duration of the agreement.

“We are pleased to have reached an agreement with DIRECTV that will allow us to continue to provide our service to the more than 2 million DIRECTV TiVo households,” said TiVo chief executive Tom Rogers, in a statement. “As the pioneer in the DVR market, we have created a service that is highly valued by consumers because of our technology, the wide range of our unique features and the unparalleled ease of our user experience. This agreement reflects TiVo’s popularity among DIRECTV subscribers and importantly respects the value of our intellectual property as well.”

Terms of the deal were not disclosed, although the companies said that the “recurring monthly economics” would be about the same as the existing deal.

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1558,1948798,00.asp?kc=ETRSS02129TX1K0000532

Normally hidden away in a library at Sforzesco Castle and reserved for scholars’ eyes, the 55-page collection of sketches and writings is on public display for the first time in nearly a decade. It includes character studies, drawings of church domes and military machines, and even a self-improvement guide.

For all the larger-than-life ideas it contains, the Codex Trivulzianus is actually quite small. It measures 8 inches by 5.5 inches — about the size of an average paperback — and looks every bit its 519 years old.

The ongoing success of Dan Brown’s powerhouse potboiler The Da Vinci Code (a movie based on the novel is scheduled for release later this year) may have helped convince Milan to break out the slim volume.

Ever since the 2003 publication of Brown’s best seller, tourists have flocked to the city to gaze at Da Vinci’s painting of The Last Supper and see for themselves whether the figure depicted in the painting sitting just to the right of Jesus is Mary Magdalene or an effeminate apostle John.

Once a series of 62 unbound pages, the Codex Trivulzianus dates from Da Vinci’s first stay in Milan between 1487 and 1490. Some of the pages were lost for a time; once found, they were numbered and bound. What you’ll see at the exhibit depends on the curator’s choice of the week.

- Nicole Martinelli

http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,70537-0.html?tw=rss.index

Fujitsu has launched a 200GB Serial ATA 2.5in hard disk drive designed for notebook computers, the most capacious of its kind, the company claimed today. It said the drive’s size makes it ideal for vendors who want to equip their laptops with PVR functionality, or for anyone producing “digital home appliance” products.

The MHV2200BT spins at 4,200rpm and provides average read and write times of 12 and 14ms, respectively. It’s got 8MB of cache memory. The drive can withstand 300G of operating shock and 900G of non-operating shock, Fujitsu claimed.

The drive typically consumes 1.6W, the manufacturer said, falling to 0.5W or even 0.13W in its two ’slumber’ modes. Fujitsu said the drive complies with Reduction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) regulations.

The drive is due to ship around the world at the end of May.

http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2006/03/28/fujitsu_200gb_notebook_drive/

Here at Microsoft’s Mix 06 conference on March 20, Microsoft officials explained in a session on Windows Live how the company is thinking about making Windows Live appeal to third-party developers, not just to Microsoft’s own product teams.

Microsoft has been mulling how best to articulate its Windows Live developer story for several months, as noted on the LiveSide.Net Web site. To help simplify its message, Microsoft has consolidated its content and tools for Windows Live developers on a single Microsoft Developer Network site.

“We are opening the Windows Live platform to third parties to create a virtuous ecosystem” for users, developers, partners, advertisers and Microsoft, said Brian Arbogast, corporate vice president for the MSN Communications Platform with the MSN and Personal Services Division.

Arbogast outlined for session attendees the set of programming interfaces that Microsoft now considers the core of its Windows Live developer platform.

http://www.microsoft-watch.com/article2/0,1995,1940334,00.asp?kc=MWRSS02129TX1K0000535

This is from Alienware’s CEO Nelson Gonzalez about the acquisition:

Given all that, why then agree to an acquisition by Dell? Wouldn’t an acquisition by a larger, more established PC company like Dell violate the core brand tenets of Alienware, not to mention alienate (no pun intended) the core fanatical customer base we have built up such a huge following with?

The simple answer is no. We believe that this acquisition will offer our customers the best of both worlds — an Alienware that takes advantage of the world-class business practices and operational efficiencies that have made Dell one of the most respected companies in the world, while preserving the DNA of the Alienware brand and product strategy portfolio.

http://www.alienware.com/main.aspx

We’re not saying that Sirius is inferior to XM, mind you, just disappointed that consumers are losing the option to choose the satellite radio that get bundled into their new cars. They can always get go buy a XM receiver later on if they really want to, of course, but having a choice effectively made for you sucks nonetheless because the whole point of having satellite radio has always been one of choice—of choosing to not have to listen to annoying ads, stupid promos, and the same lame songs at the top of the charts on almost every single radio station because of music industry payola.

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Although the deal had been widely expected, the timing was a surprise to Wall Street, coming just three months after SBC Communications completed its purchase of AT&T Corp. to form the “new” AT&T Inc.

Together, AT&T and BellSouth would have a national long-distance telephone and data network, residential customers in 22 states and business customers comprising more than half of the Fortune 1000.

The deal also would bring Cingular Wireless, a joint venture of AT&T and BellSouth, under the control of one company and one brand. Cingular had acquired AT&T Wireless in 2004 to become the largest U.S. wireless company.

“The key risk is that there is simply too much to accomplish at the same time that competitive and technological pressures reach new levels,” said Morgan Stanley analyst Simon Flannery said.

AT&T expects to squeeze $18 billion in synergies out of the deal by eliminating 10,000 workers, integrating telephone networks and technology systems, reducing advertising expenses by having only one brand name, and gaining pricing leverage with vendors.

Some analysts fear that AT&T may be tackling too much, too fast.

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