@egoldstein, I'm willing to go back to the basics to play along. What does clicking on Like do here at Amplify? I see that if the people I follow like a post, it shows up in RSS (I don't use Amplify RSS daily as it is always crowded) So what happens when I like someone's post? Thanks. http://amplify.com/u/bt2mf

Lavish Indian wedding celebrations continue - Filthy rich has a new meaning in India

Amplify’d from www.bbc.co.uk

A helicopter was among the gifts for the groom in what is being described as one of India's most expensive weddings.

The week-long nuptials of Lalit Tanwar to his bride Yogita Jaunapuria are lavish and attended by thousands.

Thursday's Indian newspapers say that the wedding was celebrated with 100 dishes and 12 giant TV screens to broadcast proceedings.

The Hindustan Times reported that 2,000 guests were invited to the pre-wedding ceremony last week and each was given a silver biscuit, a safari suit and $500 (£307) in cash, while at a different ritual the bride's family welcomed the groom with gifts worth $5m (£3m).

There was even a reported gift of $5,500 (£3,381) for the groom's barber.

See more at www.bbc.co.uk

 

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How the rich soaked the rest of us

The astonishing story of the last few decades is a massive redistribution of wealth, as the rich have shifted the tax burden

Amplify’d from www.guardian.co.uk

Over the last half century, the richest Americans have shifted the burden of the federal individual income tax off themselves and onto everybody else. The three convenient and accurate Wikipedia graphs below show the details. The first graph compares the official tax rates paid by the top and bottom income earners. Note especially that from the end of the second world war into the early 1960s, the highest income earners paid a tax rate over 90% for many years. Today, the top earners pay a rate of only 35%. Note also how the gap between the rates paid by the richest and the poorest has narrowed. If we take into account the many loopholes the rich can and do use far more than the poor, the gap narrows even more.

One conclusion is clear and obvious: the richest Americans have dramatically lowered their income tax burden since 1945, both absolutely and relative to the tax burdens of the middle income groups and the poor.

When the Cadillac Eldorado made its debut in the 1950s, wealthy Americans were paying a top rate of tax of 90%; today, the top rate of tax is 35%. Read more at www.guardian.co.uk

 

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TwitPic makes $1,600 every time Charlie Sheen tweets an image

Amplify’d from blogs.forbes.com

The company best poised to capitalize on Sheen’s move to social media would be TwitPic.com, a Twitter-based image sharing website founded in 2008 by Noah Everett. TwitPic.com – one of many photo sharing sites utilized by Twitter users – is clearly Sheen’s service of choice; it has been the medium for six of Sheen’s eleven tweets at press time. Sheen’s first photograph – which features the actor posing with chocolate milk, a Naked juice bottle, and a porn star – has racked up 1.2 million views in less than 24 hours. By contrast, one of TwitPic.com’s most recognizable photos, of US Airways Flight 1549 on the Hudson River, has received only 656,000+ views in its considerably longer lifespan. Read more at blogs.forbes.com

 

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Are "groups" & "chat" making a comeback?

Groups and Chat seem to have sneaked back in through the back door of mobile user adaptability.  Is this is a real deal or a fad? Well, get on the bandwagon while it is hot!



Here are four recent stories.



Blogging Startup Posterous Throws In The Towel, Reinvents Itself As Mobile App

Facebook set to unveil new group chat feature

Forget Facebook and use The Fridge to plan your spring break

New Chat Thing Convore Is Google Wave Minus the Suck

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Scientists examine the impact of the human genome map, 10 years later

Amplify’d from harvardmagazine.com

In the decade since the first mapping of a human genome in its entirety, the pace of discovery enabled by this new technology has, in different ways, both exceeded and fallen short of expectations, professor of systems biology Eric Lander said at a February 22 panel.

Subsequent discoveries have radically altered our understanding of how the genome operates: among the three billion base pairs, “there are a lot fewer genes than we thought, but a lot more regulatory controls,” Lander noted. (Read more about the surprising importance of what was once known as “junk DNA.”) Scientists today are aware of about 1,100 genes associated with common diseases, he said; 10 years ago, that number was 20. And, he said, “The cost of sequencing has fallen by 100,000-fold—soon to be a millionfold.”

Journalists and the public, on the other hand, were overly optimistic, hoping for disease cures within a few years, Lander said. “Real scientific revolutions are measured in a period of multiple decades,” he said, noting that 60 years passed between the discovery of the germ theory of disease and the successful use of antibiotics to treat illness. Read more at harvardmagazine.com

 

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How To Block Targeted Ads From Following You Around

Not sure how effective this is.

Amplify’d from www.businessinsider.com via Google Reader

Maybe you've seen this before: You're shopping around for a DVD, book, or gadget on Google and later that same item shows up in an ad on another website.

It's annoying. And it means companies are tracking your browsing history to show you targeted ads.

How can you stop it? Lifehacker has an extensive column on the subject, but we'll tell you one way to help get rid of it.

Several major online advertising companies have joined together to give users the option to avoid targeted ads while browsing.

If you want them to stop tracking your browsing history, head over to aboutads.info, a site that will let you opt out of ads from 60 different companies.

The site adds a cookie to your browser that will keep your history a secret. Just check the box next to each company you want to block and click "submit." Read more at www.businessinsider.com

 

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