Boeing Closer to Answer on 787s, but Not to Getting Them Back in Air

Issei Kato/ReutersSafety inspectors looked over a 787 on Friday in Japan. The plane made an emergency landing after receiving a smoke alarm. With 787 Dreamliners grounded around the world, Boeing is scrambling to devise a technical fix that would allow the planes to fly again soon, even as investigators in the United States and Japan are trying to figure out what caused the plane’s lithium-ion batteries...

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Social media dispute resolution stumps some companies

(Reuters) – If HBO cuts out on you in the middle of the latest “Girls” episode, and you have Charter Communications Inc as your cable provider, don’t try tweeting your dismay to their customer service department. Nobody will hear your lament.Charter, the fourth largest cable provider in the U.S. with 5.2 million customers across 25 states, closed up its social-media based customer service team in...

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Alicia Keys first Sundance as producer, composer

PARK CITY, Utah (AP) — It's a busy week for Alicia Keys.The singer-songwriter is set to perform at three events during Barack Obama's presidential inauguration on Monday. She'll sing the National Anthem at the Super Bowl on Feb. 3. And meanwhile, she popped over to Park City, Utah, to debut her first film as executive producer and composer.The 32-year-old entertainer is attending her first Sundance...

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Business Briefing | Medicine: F.D.A. Clears Botox to Help Bladder Control

Botox, the wrinkle treatment made by Allergan, has been approved to treat adults with overactive bladders who cannot tolerate or were not helped by other drugs, the Food and Drug Administration said on Friday. Botox injected into the bladder muscle causes the bladder to relax, increasing its storage capacity. “Clinical studies have demonstrated Botox’s ability to significantly reduce the frequency...

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Boeing Closer to Answer on 787s, but Not to Getting Them Back in Air

Issei Kato/ReutersSafety inspectors looked over a 787 on Friday in Japan. The plane made an emergency landing after receiving a smoke alarm. With 787 Dreamliners grounded around the world, Boeing is scrambling to devise a technical fix that would allow the planes to fly again soon, even as investigators in the United States and Japan are trying to figure out what caused the plane’s lithium-ion batteries...

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As Rescue Operation Continues in Algeria, Fate of Hostages Remains Unclear

British Petroleum, via European Pressphoto AgencyThe remote In Amenas natural gas field in Algeria, the site of a terrorist attack and the taking of hostages on Wednesday. BAMAKO, Mali — Dozens of hostages may still be held by militants at a remote gas field facility in the Algerian desert on Friday, according to Algeria’s state-run news agency, a day after the nation’s military launched an intense...

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Why Won’t the NRA Say Anything About Its (Possibly Fake) New Video Game?

If this app is, in fact, an unlicensed kind of hoax using the NRA acronym without permission, you’d think the NRA might want to squash the brand association quickly. Despite the gun lobby’s slow response to the Newtown massacre, the NRA isn’t afraid of issuing cease and desists or suing President Obama, the District of Columbia, or the Department of Justice.RELATED:...

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Playwright Anna Deavere Smith wins Gish Prize

NEW YORK (AP) — Anna Deavere Smith has won one of the largest and most prestigious awards in the arts.The committee that awards the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize announced Friday that the actress and playwright known for pioneering a form of theatrical journalism is this year's winner."Anna opens our eyes, ears and minds to some of the most challenging aspects of our lives, and in so doing helps...

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The Neediest Cases: Medical Bills Crush Brooklyn Man’s Hope of Retiring

Andrea Mohin/The New York TimesJohn Concepcion and his wife, Maria, in their home in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn. They are awaiting even more medical bills. Retirement was just about a year away, or so John Concepcion thought, when a sudden health crisis put his plans in doubt. For the past 100 years, The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund has provided direct assistance to children, families...

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Regulators Around the Globe Ground Boeing 787s

Kyodo News, via ReutersThe 787 that made an emergency landing in Japan on Wednesday. All 137 passengers and crew members were evacuated safely. Regulators around the globe on Thursday ordered the grounding of Boeing 787s until they could determine what caused a new type of battery to fail on two planes in recent days, resulting in an emergency landing Wednesday and a fire last week. The directives...

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PlayStation 4 and Xbox 720 could cost just $350, expected to launch this fall

Sony (SNE) and Microsoft (MSFT) are both expected to announce their next-generation gaming consoles at the Electronics Entertainment Expo in June, or even a little before then. While we have seen rumored specs for both the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox 720, one thing that has escaped us is a possible price tag. In a research note to investors on Monday, Colin Sebastian of Baird Equity Research suggested...

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Lance Armstrong left it 'all on table' with Oprah

All the speculation is about to end. In a matter of hours, viewers can judge for themselves whether Lance Armstrong told the truth this time.Armstrong's confession to Oprah Winfrey about using performance-enhancing drugs to win the Tour de France a record seven times in a row will be televised at 9 p.m. Thursday, the first segment of a two-part special on the Oprah Winfrey Network. Since word of his...

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The New Old Age Blog: Officials Say Checks Won't Be in the Mail

The jig is up.Two years ago, the Treasury Department initiated its Go Direct campaign to persuade people still receiving paper checks for their Social Security, Veterans Affairs, S.S.I. and other federal benefits to switch to direct deposit.“At that point, we were issuing approximately 11 million checks each month,” or about 15 percent of the total, Walt Henderson, director of the campaign, told me.After...

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DealBook: H.P. Said to Have Suitors for Two Units

Hewlett-Packard has received a number of inquiries from would-be buyers for its Autonomy and Electronic Data Systems units in recent weeks, though the technology company is not interested in selling at the moment, a person briefed on the matter said on Wednesday.The calls from potential suitors and bankers picked up after H.P. filed its annual report with regulators on Dec. 28, said the person, who...

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The Lede Blog: Updates on the Gun Violence Debate

The Lede is following the debate on gun violence in the wake of the shootings in Newtown, Conn., with reports from our correspondents and from around the Web. On Wednesday, President Obama is expected to announce a push for new laws to restrict the availability of guns and to embrace a series of executive actions that he can take without seeking congressional approval....

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Leaked BlackBerry 10 sales manual reveals new images and details

The buzz continues to mount leading up to the January 30th unveiling of Research In Motions’s (RIMM) next-generation BlackBerry 10 platform, but we’re not sure how much is left to learn. Many BlackBerry 10 features have already been announced, we’ve seen RIM’s first two next-generation handsets — the BlackBerry Z10 and the BlackBerry X10 — a number times, and now Rogers’ internal sales manual for...

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Director defends 'Zero Dark Thirty' torture scenes

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Director Kathryn Bigelow defends torture scenes in her Oscar-nominated film "Zero Dark Thirty," saying torture was an undeniable part of the hunt for Osama bin Laden after the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.The film opens by declaring it's based on firsthand accounts of actual events.But Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and other lawmakers criticized the film as misleading...

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Phys Ed: Exercise Can Boost Flu Shot's Potency

Phys EdGretchen Reynolds on the science of fitness.As this year’s influenza season continues to take its toll, those procrastinators now hurrying to get a flu shot might wish to know that exercise may amplify the flu vaccine’s effect. And for maximal potency, the exercise should be undertaken at the right time and involve the right dosage of sweat, according to several recent reports.Flu shots are...

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DealBook: Goldman Sachs Earnings Soar

9:46 a.m. | Updated Goldman Sachs on Wednesday reported a fourth-quarter profit of $2.89 billion, or $5.60 a share, a significant jump from the period a year earlier.The per-share figure is after the company paid preferred dividends, and comes in well ahead of analysts’ expectations of $3.78 a share, according to Thomson Reuters. Analysts had been anticipating a fairly decent quarter for Goldman,...

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The Caucus: In Debt Game, an Early Move From Obama

In a high-stakes negotiation, the most important moves often come not in the end game but at the very start, when one side or the other prevails in defining what is on the table. If you listened closely, you might have heard President Obama try to do just that in his news conference on Monday, when he suggested that Washington will have tamed the government’s debt problems if the two parties can agree...

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Tata Consultancy says demand in U.S. strong across segments

MUMBAI/BANGALORE (Reuters) – India’s top software services provider Tata Consultancy Services Ltd (TCS) said demand in the key U.S. market is strong across its business segments, with regional banks stepping up spending on technology.The Mumbai-based company said on Monday that profit jumped 23 percent in the quarter ended December, beating analysts‘ expectations. TCS also gave an upbeat growth outlook,...

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AP NewsBreak: Rewrite for National Book Awards

NEW YORK (AP) — The National Book Awards are getting a rewrite.New rules announced Tuesday include a "long list" of 10 nominees to be offered for each of the four competitive categories before being narrowed to the traditional five finalists. And the pool of judges will be expanded beyond writers to include critics, booksellers and librarians.The changes are the most extensive since the mid-1990s...

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Personal Best: Training Insights From Star Athletes

Of course elite athletes are naturally gifted. And of course they train hard and may have a phalanx of support staff — coaches, nutritionists, psychologists.But they often have something else that gives them an edge: an insight, or even an epiphany, that vaults them from the middle of the pack to the podium.I asked several star athletes about the single realization that made the difference for them....

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