What does Carnival owe for 'nightmare' cruise? Not much

Herb Weisbaum , NBC News contributor ? ? ? 5 hrs.

What does a cruise line owe you when your dream vacation turns into a nightmare? As passengers who were trapped aboard the ill-fated Carnival Triumph for five days earlier this month are going to learn ? it?s not very much.

The cruise line has very limited liability even when things go terribly wrong. This is all spelled out in the ticket contract.

?The Carnival passenger contract is standard,? said Steve Danishek, a travel industry analyst based in Seattle. ?They protect the cruise lines from all sorts of liability and make it incredibly difficult for a passenger to take any legal action against them.?

Carnival?s ticket contract specifically bans class action lawsuits.

?All disputes other than personal injury, illness or death must go through arbitration and they get to choose the arbitration company,? said Professor Martin Davies, director of the Tulane Maritime Law Center. ?That means if your claim is simply, ?you ruined my vacation,? then this has to go to arbitration.?

And that arbitration hearing will be in Miami, where Carnival is headquartered. This may discourage people from going this route, but experts tell NBC News it?s perfectly legal.

A Miami law firm that specializes in maritime cases has filed a class action lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Florida against Carnival Corp. on behalf of all of the passengers on board the Carnival Triumph during its fateful cruise earlier this month.

The suit alleges Carnival was negligent because it allowed hazardous conditions ?to exist on its vessel which it knew or should have known was likely to cause injury, harm and damages to its passengers.?

The class action complaint claims passengers were given ?spoiled or rotting food that was unfit for reasonable safe human consumption, and were generally forced to live in squalid conditions that created a severe risk of injury, illness and/or disease.? The lawsuit alleged that the ?unbearable? conditions ?caused numerous passengers to vomit and/or become nauseous.?

The suit specifically asks the court to rule Carnival?s ban on class action claims to be null and void in this case because of the cruise line?s alleged negligence.

Carnival?s public relations manager, Aly Bello-Cabreriza, said the company cannot comment on pending litigation.

University of Washington Law Professor Anita Ramasastry said it will be an uphill battle for the passengers who file lawsuits.

?There is a chance a court would say that the arbitration clause and the class action waiver are unconscionable, especially for people who got sick because of the conditions on the ship,? she said. ?But that?s unlikely when you look at what?s been done in other cases.?

Compensation for a lousy cruise
Carnival says it will give all of the 3,000 Triumph passengers a refund for their trip and transportation expenses. Everyone will also get $500 and a future cruise credit equal to what they paid to be on the ship.

In a statement on its website, the company also promised to reimburse everyone for all shipboard purchases made during the voyage, except gift shop and casino charges or art purchases.

This may not be enough to appease the angry passengers, but it is significantly more than the company was required to do for them based on the contract. According to clause 7(c):

?Carnival has the right without previous notice to cancel this contract at the port of embarkation or any time during the voyage and shall thereupon return to the Guest, if the Contract is completely canceled, his passage money, or, if the Contract is partially canceled, a proportionate part thereof. Under such circumstances, Carnival shall have no further liability for damages or compensation of any kind.

?Carnival could have pulled the ship to the nearest port, gotten everybody off and that would have been it,? Danishek explained. ?They would have owed nothing but a partial refund because they would have performed to the terms of the contract.?

Very few people read the contract they get when buy a ticket on a boat, plane or train or rent a car. These companies all have tightly written contracts that are designed to protect them from you.

Related:

Herb Weisbaum is The ConsumerMan. Follow him on Facebook and Twitter or visit The ConsumerMan website.

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/travel/carnival-has-limited-liability-nightmare-cruise-1C8499971

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Bp. Sheridan: the Fishwrap is ?an embarrassment to the Catholic Church?

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Source: http://wdtprs.com/blog/2013/02/bp-sheridan-the-fishwrap-is-an-embarrassment-to-the-catholic-church/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=bp-sheridan-the-fishwrap-is-an-embarrassment-to-the-catholic-church

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Oxford in uproar over union motion to boycott Israel

Brasenose College student Eylon Aslan-Levy was told by George Galloway: 'I don't debate with Israelis.' Photograph: Mark Hemsworth/Caters News Agency

Students at Oxford University will this week vote on a controversial motion to boycott Israel, after a tumultuous week that has seen hate mail, accusations of racism and a furious exit from a debate by MP George Galloway .

The Oxford University Students' Union (OUSU) meets on Wednesday to decide finally on a motion backing the boycott of Israel, its companies and institutions. The motion, which would be tabled at the National Union of Students conference in Sheffield in April, calls on the student body to join the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement, in protest at Israel's treatment of Palestinians and its hindrance of attempts to create a Palestinian state.

Both the proposer and the seconder of the motion have received threatening emails: the seconder has withdrawn his support and the proposer has requested that her name not be publicised.

Last Wednesday, Galloway, MP for Bradford West, walked out of a debate at Christ Church College. Galloway arrived 90 minutes late, delivered a speech condemning Israel and then interrupted a reply being made by Eylon Aslan-Levy, a student at Brasenose College.

"You said 'we'. Are you an Israeli?" Galloway asked. When Aslan-Levy said he was, Galloway walked out. "I don't recognise Israel and I don't debate with Israelis," he said, to gasps of surprise and mutters of "racism".

Mahmood Naji of Christ Church College, who had invited the MP, said: "He agreed to a debate and I though he would welcome open dialogue. I was amazed. He left because he wanted to make a statement. His main interest was demonstrating that he supported the boycott movement."

The BDS movement urges a boycott of Israeli exports, including vegetables, fruit and Dead Sea beauty products, and of firms that do business in Israel, such as Caterpillar, security firm G4S and waste management company Veolia. Some BDS supporters have also disrupted cultural events involving Israeli performers.

Last week, OUSU gave the colleges a further two weeks to debate the issue after most failed to come to a decision.

Henry Watson of Magdalen College said the atmosphere at the university was fraught: "People thought it was a question of supporting Israel or Palestine or supporting peace. The boycott goes against everything the university stands for. The idea that we are not going to read your books or articles or hear your arguments on the basis of your nationality is ridiculous."

Magdalen College voted 39-3 against the motion, Watson said.

Aslan-Levy, who was born and brought up in Britain, said he is keen for the Palestinian conflict to be settled diplomatically and disagrees with the settler movement and its representatives, such as Dani Dayan, who spoke at the union last Friday. "In a lot of colleges, students are concerned about OUSU making foreign policy," he said. "In my college, the only argument was whether the motion was rejected or the college abstained. The college voted 20-15 to reject the motion."

Dani Dayan, chairman of the Israeli settlers' council, Yesha, was at the union to debate the question, "Settlers: War Criminals or Patriots?" for a debate to be broadcast on al-Jazeera in April. Al-Jazeera had hired security guards, but Dayan was booed once and given polite applause.

Not all students have immersed themselves in this debate. The Oxford Student newspaper reported that a member of the Bullingdon Club was fined for setting off a firework at a nightclub earlier this month. According to the paper, the student was accepted into the club after an initiation ceremony which included burning a ?50 note in front of a tramp.

Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2013/feb/23/oxford-union-boycott-israel

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Zambia: Chinese Experts to Monitor Internet?

The Zambian government has reportedly engaged Chinese experts to install a secret internet monitoring facility in the country. In tandem with this move, President Michael Sata has given authorization to the Special Division of the Office of the President (also known as the Zambian Security Intelligence Service) to monitor the telephone and online communications of anyone living in Zambia if ordered to do so by the Attorney General.

President Michael Sata surfing the internet.

Authorities plan to start monitoring social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter, blogs, email services, and ?unfriendly? websites. The government has allegedly spent close to K10 billion (about US$1.8m) on the partnership with Chinese technologists.

Independent news site the Zambian Watchdog reports that ZICTA (Zambia Information and Communication Technology Authority) officials asked telephone and internet service providers to allow information technology specialists from both the Office of the President and China to visit their facilities and study their network architecture, in order to identify places in the network where authorities could develop interception capabilities, or a ?backdoor? for monitoring. ComputerWorld reports that both Zambian and Chinese authorities have declined to comment on reports about their cooperation.

An anonymous source told the Zambian Watchdog:

They have already started their work [?] They have been visiting service providers so as to understand the topology of network. For those who may not know, it (topology) is appreciating the network architecture, things like where the servers are so that they know [where] to install their interception devices.

Service providers said that government intrusion on people?s private conversations had the potential to affect investor confidence as people would be reluctant to subscribe to their networks or speak for long periods on their phones, a change that could affect companies? revenue.

You know what, when people speak for a long time on the phone, mobile phone company providers make more money. But you will now have a situation where people will merely call each other for setting-up interpersonal meetings to discuss confidential information, unlike in the past when others would even have mobile conference meetings.

The shift will likely bring about reductions in email subscriptions on platforms such as Coppernet, Zamnet, Iconnect, all of which are provided by Zambian ISPs and therefore will soon become vulnerable to enhanced government monitoring tactics. The change will likely encourage Zambians to set up free private email addresses provided by Gmail, Yahoo and others.

Unfortunately, these are not the only restrictive measures that Michael Sata has imposed during his presidency. Soon after taking office in 2011, he ordered his newly appointed Attorney General to exert control over online news publications.

The government also initiated a SIM card registration policy requiring citizens to register their cell phone SIM cards with the ZICTA. The negative effects of this policy were felt during by-elections in some parts of the country recently when citizens began receiving unsolicited messages encouraging them to vote for particular government candidates.

Global Voices Advocacy will continue to cover these policy developments as they unfold in Zambia.

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Source: http://advocacy.globalvoicesonline.org/2013/02/23/zambia-chinese-experts-to-monitor-internet/

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New flu drug stops virus in its tracks

Friday, February 22, 2013

A new class of influenza drug has been shown effective against drug-resistant strains of the flu virus, according to a study led by University of British Columbia researchers.

Published online today in the journal Science Express, the study details the development of a new drug candidate that prevents the flu virus from spreading from one cell to the next. The drug is shown to successfully treat mice with lethal strains of the flu virus.

In order to spread in the body, the flu virus first uses a protein, called hemagglutinin, to bind to the healthy cell's receptors. Once it has inserted its RNA and replicated, the virus uses an enzyme, called neuraminidase, to sever the connection and move on to the next healthy cell.

"Our drug agent uses the same approach as current flu treatments ? by preventing neuraminidase from cutting its ties with the infected cell," says UBC Chemistry Prof. Steve Withers, the study's senior author. "But our agent latches onto this enzyme like a broken key, stuck in a lock, rendering it useless."

The World Health Organization estimates that influenza affects three to five million people globally each year, causing 250,000 to 500,000 deaths. In some pandemic years, the figure rose to millions.

"One of the major challenges of the current flu treatments is that new strains of the flu virus are becoming resistant, leaving us vulnerable to the next pandemic," says Withers, whose team includes researchers from Canada, the UK, and Australia.

"By taking advantage of the virus's own 'molecular machinery' to attach itself," Withers adds. "The new drug could remain effective longer, since resistant virus strains cannot arise without destroying their own mechanism for infection."

###

University of British Columbia: http://www.ubc.ca

Thanks to University of British Columbia for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/126979/New_flu_drug_stops_virus_in_its_tracks

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Mobile World Congress: Will the Windows ecosystem be relevant in Barcelona?

It?s still an iPhone and Android world, but at Mobile World Congress?in Barcelona next Monday, expect Microsoft?s Windows and Windows Phone platforms to show some intriguing signs of life.

There won?t be a lot of huge phone and tablet announcements at the show, and Microsoft?s own presence will be dialed back compared to previous years. Nonetheless, we might see some interesting new developments?especially if key rumors pan out.

Here?s a breakdown of all the speculation and concrete details concerning Windows 8/RT and Windows Phone hardware heading into next week?s event.

What little we know for sure

Expect AMD to show off its new Turbo Dock technology.

Of course, most hardware manufacturers won?t talk about their plans for MWC ahead of time. Trust us?we asked. Huawei, HTC, and Asus declined to comment, while Nokia replied with a schedule of its speaking arrangements.?Samsung didn?t even respond to our queries.

The big official news ahead of the show is that AMD will demonstrate a new Turbo Dock?technology for future Windows 8 hybrids. Unlike existing keyboard and trackpad docks?which merely add battery life to whatever devices they're connected to?Turbo Dock can crank up CPU and GPU performance by up to 40 percent, and it also provides an option for extra storage. It?s unclear, however, if PC makers will announce any actual products with this technology at MWC.

We also know that LG will show off a Windows 8 hybrid called the Tab-Book, which includes a keyboard that slides out from behind its multitouch screen. Still, LG has held off on most of the details, saying only that the hardware boasts an Intel Core i5 processor and an IPS display. The Tab Book launches this week in Korea, but there?s no word on additional availability.

LG should be revealing its new Tab-Book, another entry in the Windows 8 hybrid dogfight.

Rumors and speculation abound

The rumor mill is where things get interesting. In the run-up to MWC, we?ve seen reports of a Nokia Windows Phone with true PureView camera technology and a Nokia tablet running Windows RT. There?s also been talk of a 7.7 mm-thin Windows Phone from Huawei called the Ascend W2. It's rumored to pack a 4.5-inch display and a sizeable 2,800 mAh battery, and we could see a 6.1-inch Huawei Windows Phone phablet as well.

Just don?t expect all those rumors to pan out. Strategy Analytics performed ?extensive channel checks? this week, and believes that Nokia will hold off on announcing a Windows RT tablet. Neil Mawston, Strategy Analytics' executive director of global wireless practice, thinks the company is better off solidifying its position in smartphones first.

?It?s a question of timing, I think,? Mawston said in an interview. ?Nokia doesn?t want to move into tablets too soon, especially if you look back at the Nokia netbook that it launched three years ago. That sank without a trace and sold very small volumes, so any move into the computing market for Nokia will not be taken lightly.?

The Lumia 920 hasn't set the world on fire, so maybe Nokia should keep its focus on smartphones before getting distracted by tablets.

With that in mind, a new PureView Windows Phone smartphone seems like a possibility. Rumors have claimed that the phone would have a huge megapixel count,?allowing users to zoom and crop photos without sacrificing image quality?much like the PureView Symbian handset that debuted at last year?s MWC. Analysts say the new tech could make a big splash at the show.

?If that does come to pass, that could be exciting, especially because there doesn?t seem to be all that much news coming out of the show, at least in terms of what I know in advance,? said Avi Greengart, a research director with Current Analysis.

Greengart notes that smartphone makers such as HTC, Samsung, and Blackberry have followed Apple?s footsteps in holding their own press events for new smartphones, eschewing announcements at trade shows. This leaves room for a company like Nokia to fill the void.

Aside from a small number of potentially juicy announcements, the analysts I spoke with expect a focus on low-cost handsets, especially for emerging markets. This makes sense, considering that there?s no new version of Windows Phone to leverage, and therefore no built-in support for 1080p screens, which are popping up in most high-end Android handsets now.

Microsoft?s presence fades

Microsoft used to make its presence felt at MWC. Two years ago, CEO Steve Ballmer gave a keynote speech that included details on Windows Phone 7.5. Last year, the company held a press event to announce the Windows 8 Consumer Preview.

This time around, Microsoft is scaling back. The company won?t have an official booth like the one pictured below. It's also forgoing a keynote, and merely plans to meet with industry partners and update the press on recent announcements.

In 2012, Microsoft had a full-on booth presence at Mobile World Congress to show off the then still strange and unknown Windows 8.

Some second-guessing of this strategy is inevitable. ?Microsoft could have easily used this as an opportunity, not to announce, but more to set out what their vision is for Windows, and to keep hammering that same message again and again,? said Chetan Sharma, a technology and strategy consultant. He thinks a keynote would have been helpful to drive home its multiscreen vision of computing. ?To that extent, I think they?ve missed an opportunity," he said.

Avi Greengart with Current Analysis also thinks Microsoft could use a show like MWC to showcase Windows Phone and Windows apps, addressing the common complaint that Microsoft?s ecosystems are lacking in software. ?If they have partners who are creating Windows 8 apps that are unique, this would be a great place to highlight them,? Greengart said.

Keep in mind, though, that the industry?s major players are moving away from trade shows as a way to drum up people?s attention. Google also plans to tone down its own presence at MWC, as it looks to build up the Nexus brand through separate events. And let's not forget that Google just announced its Chromebook Pixel on Thursday in an intimate event in San Francisco.

Microsoft recently gave up its booth and stopped giving a keynote at CES in January. Though it would be exciting to see Windows and Windows Phone come out swinging with a slew of new devices, running unique software, Microsoft clearly wants to save that for a time when it can hog the spotlight.

In other words, don?t look to MWC as a sign of what?s to come for Windows 8, Windows RT, and Windows Phone, but more of a pulse of where things are right now.

Source: http://www.pcworld.com/article/2028987/mobile-world-congress-will-the-windows-ecosystem-be-relevant-in-barcelona-.html

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Iran: UN report proof of peaceful nuclear program

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) ? Iran cited the latest report by U.N.'s nuclear watchdog as evidence that its atomic program is being used for peaceful purposes, state TV reported on Friday ahead of a new round of nuclear talks with the West.

The report on Thursday by the International Atomic Energy Agency also said, however, that without Iranian "engagement," the IAEA will be unable to resolve concerns "which need to be clarified to exclude the existence of possible military dimensions to Iran's nuclear program."

State TV quoted Ali Asghar Soltanieh, Iran's envoy to the IAEA, as saying that the report from the Vienna-based watchdog shows Iran's nuclear activities are peaceful. Soltanieh said Iran has been committed to continuing talks with the IAEA and stressed that the talks require a "calm, propaganda-free atmosphere."

"The most important point of the report is that after a decade of continuous inspections by the agency, there is no evidence on divergence toward military purposes in Iran's nuclear material and activities," Soltanieh was quoted as saying.

The IAEA's report also said Tehran had recently installed advanced machines at its main uranium enrichment site in Natanz ? a significant upgrade of a program that the West fears could be used to make atomic weapons. The report, circulated to the 35-nation agency board, was the first independent and on-record confirmation that the work had begun and was advancing.

It is the combination of Iranian activities that has raised suspicions in the West, plus continuously shrugging off demands from U.N. Security Council to stop enrichment ? something the U.S. and its allies fear could lead to atomic weapons.

Iran and the members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany are scheduled to have another round of talks next week in Kazakhstan to discuss Tehran's nuclear ambitions.

The talks last year hit an impasse over Iran's highest-level enrichment, at 20 percent, which can be rapidly converted to weapons-grade material. Iran says it needs the 20 percent uranium for its medical research reactor. It also produces lower-enriched uranium at 3.5 percent for its Russian-built reactor to generate electricity.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/iran-un-report-proof-peaceful-nuclear-program-095148499.html

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