Ottawa – Apple reports that iTunes Canada adds U.S. shows to its iTunes store in Canada to supplement the existing Canadian television fare.
American shows include NBC’s Heroes and 30 Rock, ABC’s Lost, and Fox’s 24, which are avaliable for $2.49, or $3.49 for high-definition, for a single episode. Full season shows cost $49.99, and $69.99 for high-definition. Cable networks like A&E, The History Channel and TLC are also adding shows for iTunes Canada users.
The video downloads will also ply on PCs and Mac computers; on iPod, iPhone and on televisions equipped with teh Apple set-top converter box.
Apple spokesperson Simon Atkins said that the Canadian iTunes store began adding television content in December 2007 but that sales lagged behind the U.S. iTunes store, which carried hit prime-time shows from the major U.S. broadcast networks. The Canadian networks included CBC, CTV, MTV, the Comedy Network, YTV, the Fashion Television Channel, Teletoon and Treehouse.
Cable and televisions networks are competing with Apple by offering on-demand video of their own. Rogers Communications, for example, announced earlier this year that it is opening up its own video portal.
Major American and Canadian networks like ABC and CTV are teaming up with online companies like Hulu and YouTube to stream full episodes of their series.
Apple also has a number of Canadian competitors in the video market. Bell Canada opened its own Bell Video store in May, and Microsoft in 2007 offered movie rentals on Xbox Live, the online hookup for its video game console.
Farrah Fawcett has entered the final treatment of her three year battle against cancer. In this latest stage Fawcett has become completely bedridden. This is a long way apart from the international sex symbol she used to be, although Fawcett is still showing the same personality that won her millions of fans the world around. While the golden locks that made her famous may have fallen out she still has her fiery personality to keep her going.
Fawcett’s battle against cancer has been one that she tried to keep secret in the beginning. Unfortunately her condition was leaked out to the media against her wishes. Now very much in the public light, Fawcett continues to try to have her privacy as much as possible.
Staying out of the spotlight was never something easy for the sex symbol. Known for her role in Charlie’s Angels and famous Sports Illustrated cover, Fawcett remains a sex symbol to this day. While her condition right now may look grim the road back can only go up from here. This final treatment has been the most severe and has tapped her energy, but this does not mean that all is lost. She may appear to be in a very bad state, but no one has yet to read her last rites. As long as she continues to keep her hopes up and th fight strong she may pull through.
NBC is going to be airing her story in which she will document her battle against her disease. Included in this is going to be home videos of her treatments and Doctors visits so people can see how horrible the disease truly is. This interview and video is meant to open peoples eyes to all the horrors of cancer.
Women have always been fickle about their weight gain during pregnancy, as it has been the butt of many jokes and comedic acts. However, a medical panel composed of physicians, nutritionists and public health doctors assembled by the institute and the National Research Council released new guidelines stating that the healthy amount of weight gain during pregnancy differs from weight group to weight group.
Putting on too much weight in pregnancy can result in health risks such as high blood pressure or diabetes, as well as increase the chances they will require a C-section. Also, babies born to obese mothers have a higher risk of premature birth or of later becoming obese themselves.
For obese women, the guidelines are stricter then many would think, the medical panel suggesting they only gain up to twenty pounds during pregnancy.
“More women are already obese when they become pregnant. Based on data from the Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System, one-fifth of American women are obese at the start of pregnancy, a figure that has risen 70 percent in the last decade,†the report reads. In fact, a study concludes 2/9 of all pregnant Americans are obese.
A guideline has also been set for women that are considered overweight but not obese at 25 pounds, due to the same health issues that come with pregnancy and being overweight.
Reports indicate that women being overweight when becoming pregnancy has risen staggering amounts in the last decade. A study concluded that 2/3 of people are overweight when becoming pregnant.
For women who are considered to be of a healthy body weight, the guideline is set around 30 pounds to provide a safe environment for their unborn babies to survive and thrive in.
The recent surge of women considered underweight due to various culture problems has deemed the board to set a standard for the group as well, 40 pounds being considered as a healthy weight gain.
Urging people to follow these guidelines, ”This is a pretty robust set of recommendations,” The panel’s chair, Kathleen M. Rasmussen, a nutritional scientist at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. said. “We have ample evidence that woman who gain within these guidelines do well.”
These guidelines are supported by a number of factors involving the health of the mother and embryo. Primarily the Institute’s recommendations is based on the body mass index (BMI) of the pregnant mother. This is based on a measurement of acceptable weight to height ratios. Women with a BMI of 30 or higher are thought to be obese, while a BMI of 25 to 29.9 is considered overweight. Normal weight women have BMIs between 18.5 and 24.9 and a BMI below 18.5 falls in the underweight range.
Surgery may not be an emergent need for patients with colorectal cancer, according to a new study.
A recent study has shown that patients with advanced colorectal cancer that has metastasized to other organs, doesn’t require surgery to remove the colon tumor.
Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center had researchers do a study and present their information at the American Society of Clinical Oncology Annual Meeting today.
The study consisted of 233 patients that have metastatic colorectal cancer and the cases were treated at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center between 2000 and 2006. The outcome of the analysis showed that 217 patients of the 233 treated, did not have any complications requiring them to have a removal of the primary tumor. Sixteen patients from the study were required to have surgery to remove their tumor for symptom management.
The previous routine in approaching the treating of the disease was for the patient to have colon surgery immediately and then chemotherapy treatments were taken about 3 weeks later. The reasoning of having the removal of the colon tumor was in hopes of preventing any further symptoms and complications.
With the new development of better treatments in chemotherapy, doctors are seeing a different aspect on the approach.
Each cancer patient has their own case of how to handle the disease, but this research may have found a better way of survival for colorectal cancer sufferers.
Farrah Fawcett Update
Farrah Fawcett’s three year battle with cancer is nearing a sad ending. After undergoing extensive treatments, both traditional and non traditional, there are signs that the cancer has gotten the upper hand.
Stricken with a rare form of the disease, anal cancer, it appeared that she had won the battle. For four months she was cancer free until it was discovered that the disease had spread to her liver. Hope was short lived. After a period of remissions, the cancer has stormed back stronger than ever and is on the verge of winning the battle.
Farrah has put up an incredible fight. Her plight was well documented in the T.V. movie, “Farrah’s Storyâ€. Millions of viewers were given access to the intimate details of her fight. Her courage, will to live, and determination were strongly portrayed.
Viewers were deeply saddened by her situation.
It appears that the fight is nearing an end. Farrah is now bedridden and has been reduced to taking an I.V. in order to receive nourishment. Doctors apparently feel that the cause is lost and have discontinued all medical treatments. They are doing everything possible to make her comfortable and the prognosis is that she has just a couple of months left to live.
Friends and family, as well as the attending physicians, have been standing by Farrah’s bedside. Her father has reportedly left Texas to be at his daughter’s side for the last days of her life.
What a sad ending to a beautiful lady’s life.
The news for Tori Stafford’s family is that police tell the family they may not find Tori’s remains, even while there’s a potential “deal with the devil” for the accused murderers. Tori, an eight year old girl missing since April 8, was seen last in a video from the surveillance camera with an unidentified woman at a nearby high school. Tori Stafford’s father is opposed to a deal, but he asserts that “any deal should only stand if it brings Victoria home.”
Both Terri-Lynne McClintic, 18, and Michael Thomas Rafferty, 28, are now charged with kidnapping and first-degree murder of Tori Stafford. They will now have separate trials, whereas previously, they were to be tried together and McClintic had the lesser charge of accessory to murder.
After the court’s separation of the trials, Rafferty’s defense lawyer stated that the prosecutor is likely to offer a deal to McClintic in exchange for testimony against his client. A law professor at University of Toronto states, however, that a deal could be made by the prosecution with either Rafferty or McClintic.
The potential deal has raised the issue of the prosecution’s “deal with the devil” in the 1993 murder of two teenage girls. In exchange for testimony against her husband Paul, Homolka Bernardo was given a plea bargain and a 12 year sentence for manslaughter. Later it was discovered that she was more involved in the killings than originally thought, which caused a public outcry.
Life presents enough challenges with worrying about the economy and our family life. So it was alarming this week to find out that the one place we shouldn’t have to worry about because we will get help there presents the biggest worry of all.
Quebec Health Minister Yves Bolduc sounded the alarm on cancer tests performed on women for breast cancer may not be accurate after the release of a damning report. At a time when breast cancer is one of the top cancers that kill women it’s very disturbing that this may have been going on for up to two years. With the deserved public uproar, the minister wants to quell the fears with saying this study has been well done and the breast cancer testing problems were just a result of what happens with different labs.
If you are sitting at home and you know you are one of those women who’ve been tested in the past couple of years in Quebec for breast cancer that explanation isn’t enough.
Now we learn that that up to 30 percent of the testing was flawed. That’s a huge number when you consider that at least 6,000 women are diagnosed annually with breast cancer and 1400 die of it.
Depending on the type of health coverage you have, when you are on a budget you need to know that you are getting the right medical diagnosis and your life isn’t being endangered with shoddy testing.
Stop the cover-ups and give the women of Quebec an apology and the proper health care that is deserved.
Friday, May 29, 2009 – The former Hollywood star, Farrah Fawcett is saying good-bye as her disease takes a turn for the worst.
As Fawcett has fought a good fight in battling with the rare form of anal cancer, she is saying her good-byes to her close friends and family. The doctors are unsure of how much longer she has to live, but are reportedly saying that she may have a month or so left.
The former Charlie’s Angels star is no longer receiving treatment, but is confined to her bed with IV’s for nourishment. The doctors are helping her to be comfortable at her California home.
Farrah was first diagnosed with anal cancer back in 2006. She refused to take a surgical procedure to remove it and go to Germany that has a natural treatment for cancer. She was stated to be cancer free for four months and then to receive word that the cancer had metastasized to her liver. Since then she has been fighting the battle with the disease.
Unfortunately as Fawcett lies in bed waiting for her death, her colleagues and friends are fighting over her wishes.
With the documentary of Fawcett in “Farrah’s Story†that was aired on NBC, Ryan O’Neal continues to film Farrah as she is still in the battle of her last days. No one is certain if this will be made into another film that will be shared with the world or not.
Many of Farrah’s friends and family are still praying for that miracle as they watch her by her bedside.
The wait is finally over. Microsoft introduced its new search engine to the world and the company claims it’s the first step in helping people search for information faster and be able to use it once they find it. This new Decision Search Engine is called Bing.com and will be in full operation in early June 2009. Microsoft has been studying the results of the current search engines and found that 30% of information searches are terminated without results. The company also discovered that two-thirds of the searches needed to be adjusted by refining the search or redirecting the search using different terminology.
Search engines are effective when it comes to navigating the web to find information, but then they drop the ball because the information may not be pertinent to the user’s needs. Microsoft is addressing that issue by calling Bing.com a Decision Engine, which will help people not only identify the information they need, they will be able to use it for their intended purpose.
Microsoft considers Bing.com an innovator rather than a duplicator in the search engine market. The company says that this site is the beginning of a long-term project to help people get the information they need and then apply that information to daily projects and tasks in a knowledgeable way.
Bing is able to improve live searches because it is able sift through the web in a more comprehensive fashion, so it can deliver more relevant information in a shorter period of time. Microsoft has designed Bing to organize search results in subdivisions or Search Categories. Bing is designed to understand the searcher’s intent rather than just matching keywords to web information and documents. Microsoft says Bing will get it right the first time, by supplying the answer to the searchers specific question.
Microsoft has about a 10% search market share at the moment. Google has 64% and Yahoo has a little over 16%. Bing has the power of Microsoft advertising dollars behind it and if it can perform like its test model Kumo, Bing might be giving Google a wake-up call to remember.
In the weeks since the airing of the documentary “Farrah’s Story,” actress Farrah Fawcett has mounted another surge in her struggle against anal cancer. The documentary, which aired on NBC, depicted the emotional two year battle the actress has fought, and along with nearly nine million viewers, Fawcett herself tuned in and found strength in the story.
Since then, though Fawcett’s cancer is still in stage four and considered to be very serious, her vitals have rallied some, as friends, family, and fans support the former “Charlie’s Angels” star. Despite reports a few weeks ago that Fawcett could be nearing the end of her struggle, news now suggest that the actress is doing better, that her spirits are good and her health has marginally improved.
With the instant popularity and the powerful impact of the documentary, no one was surprised when Fawcett’s longtime partner, Ryan O’Neal, confirmed that filming was continuing and that the rest of Fawcett’s story would be told. However, according to reports today, the plans for the sequel are not nearly so definite, as O’Neal is now reportedly saying that there are no set plans to release a follow up documentary.
It is uncertain what will become of the remaining footage that has been taken of the actress, or if the filming is still going on for other reasons. Official word even denies that a second documentary was ever in the works, suggesting that the final portion of Fawcett’s struggle may go untold for quite some time.