Following pressure from a major investor, U.S. private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management is selling gunmaker Freedom Group, whose BushAR 15 rifle was used in the Connecticut school massacre last week. The California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) said it was reviewing its investment with Cerberus after Friday’s mass shooting, in which a gunman killed 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School and then took his own life. Some gun retailers also took steps, Dick’s Sporting Goods pulled all guns from its store closest to the site of the massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, and suspended the sale of certain kinds of semi-automatic rifles from its chains nationwide and Wal-Mart Stores took down an informational website about semi-automatic Bushmaster rifles. CalSTRS, the second-largest pension fund in the United States, had invested $751.4 million with Cerberus by the end of March 2012, and will now hire a financial adviser to sell its interests in Freedom Group and return the proceeds to investors.
Looks like Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is trying to follow the foot steps of Pope Benedict in terms of social media! Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has just joined Facebook! Launched a few days ago, the Facebook page “Khamenei.ir” displays photographs of the 73-year-old cleric alongside speeches and pronouncements by the man who wields ultimate power in the Islamic Republic. While there are several other Facebook pages already devoted to Khamenei, the new one – whose number of “likes” quadrupled on Monday to over 1,000 – appeared to be officially authorized, rather than merely the work of admirers. The page has been publicized by a Twitter account of the same name that Iran experts believe is run by Khamenei’s office. Both U.S-based social media sites are blocked in Iran by a wide-reaching government censor but they are still commonly used by millions of Iranians who use special software to get around the ban. In 2009, social media were a vital tool for those Iranians who believed the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was rigged. Facebook was used to help organize street protests of a scale not seen since the Islamic Revolution of 1979.)
Facebook’s photo-sharing site Instagram has developed some suicidal tendencies and has decided to update its privacy policy, giving it the right to sell users’ photos to advertisers without notification and without compensation to the given users! Unless users delete their Instagram accounts by a deadline of 16 January, they cannot opt out! The changes also mean Instagram can share information about its users with Facebook, its parent company, as well as other affiliates and advertisers. As you can imagine, social media users are very upset, but as Facebook’s vice-president of global marketing solutions said earlier this month: “Eventually we’ll figure out a way to monetise Instagram.” And lose our users in the process, he should have added. Luckily I personally never jumped on the Instagram bandwagon and am using Camera+ instead. I suggest you check it out guys. It’s a much better photo editing tool anyways!
Following pressure from a major investor, U.S. private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management is selling gunmaker Freedom Group, whose BushAR 15 rifle was used in the Connecticut school massacre last week. The California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) said it was reviewing its investment with Cerberus after Friday’s mass shooting, in which a gunman killed 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School and then took his own life. Some gun retailers also took steps, Dick’s Sporting Goods pulled all guns from its store closest to the site of the massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, and suspended the sale of certain kinds of semi-automatic rifles from its chains nationwide and Wal-Mart Stores took down an informational website about semi-automatic Bushmaster rifles. CalSTRS, the second-largest pension fund in the United States, had invested $751.4 million with Cerberus by the end of March 2012, and will now hire a financial adviser to sell its interests in Freedom Group and return the proceeds to investors.
Looks like Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is trying to follow the foot steps of Pope Benedict in terms of social media! Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has just joined Facebook! Launched a few days ago, the Facebook page “Khamenei.ir” displays photographs of the 73-year-old cleric alongside speeches and pronouncements by the man who wields ultimate power in the Islamic Republic. While there are several other Facebook pages already devoted to Khamenei, the new one – whose number of “likes” quadrupled on Monday to over 1,000 – appeared to be officially authorized, rather than merely the work of admirers. The page has been publicized by a Twitter account of the same name that Iran experts believe is run by Khamenei’s office. Both U.S-based social media sites are blocked in Iran by a wide-reaching government censor but they are still commonly used by millions of Iranians who use special software to get around the ban. In 2009, social media were a vital tool for those Iranians who believed the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was rigged. Facebook was used to help organize street protests of a scale not seen since the Islamic Revolution of 1979.)
Facebook’s photo-sharing site Instagram has developed some suicidal tendencies and has decided to update its privacy policy, giving it the right to sell users’ photos to advertisers without notification and without compensation to the given users! Unless users delete their Instagram accounts by a deadline of 16 January, they cannot opt out! The changes also mean Instagram can share information about its users with Facebook, its parent company, as well as other affiliates and advertisers. As you can imagine, social media users are very upset, but as Facebook’s vice-president of global marketing solutions said earlier this month: “Eventually we’ll figure out a way to monetise Instagram.” And lose our users in the process, he should have added. Luckily I personally never jumped on the Instagram bandwagon and am using Camera+ instead. I suggest you check it out guys. It’s a much better photo editing tool anyways!