Palangkaraya Post News

U.S. video game retail sales soared 53 percent in June, fueled by Nintendo Co.’s Wii and handheld DS gaming systems, as well as Konami Corp.’s blockbuster “Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots” — by far the month’s best-selling title.

Total sales of video game hardware, software and accessories hit $1.69 billion during the month, up from $1.1 billion in the same period a year earlier, according to data from market researcher NPD Group.

“The video games industry continues to perform in the face of an ever-increasingly difficult economic environment as many turn to more in-home entertainment,” said NPD analyst Anita Frazier in an e-mail. “Even if growth slows over the back half of 2008, the industry is poised to achieve record-breaking revenues of over $22 billion for the year.”

Hardware sales grew 54 percent to $615.1 million from $399.2 million a year ago. Software sales jumped 61 percent to $872.6 million from $542.2 million. Read more…

North Korea’s phantom hotel is stirring back to life. Once dubbed by Esquire magazine as “the worst building in the history of mankind,” the 105-storey Ryugyong Hotel is back under construction after a 16-year lull in the capital of one of the world’s most reclusive and destitute countries.

According to foreign residents in Pyongyang, Egypt’s Orascom group has recently begun refurbishing the top floors of the three-sided pyramid-shaped hotel whose 330-metre (1,083 ft) frame dominates the Pyongyang skyline.

The firm has put glass panels into the concrete shell, installed telecommunications antennas — even though the North forbids its citizens to own mobile phones — and put up an artist’s impression of what it will look like.

An official with the group said its Orascom Telecom subsidiary was involved in the project but gave no details. Read more…

Apple Inc.’s new iPhone went on sale Friday to eager buyers worldwide, but there were problems getting the phones to work.

Kenny Pichardo, 24, was the first to buy an iPhone 3G at an AT&T store in the New York borough of Queens, but he said it took the store half an hour to get the phone activated.

That boded badly for the approximately 70 people after him in line. Pichardo had camped out overnight to be first.

A spokesman for AT&T Inc., the exclusive carrier for the iPhone in the U.S., said there was a global problem with Apple Inc.’s iTunes servers that prevented the phones from being fully activated in-store, as had been planned.
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Stocks tumbled Friday as investors focused on troubles at mortgage companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and watched oil prices climb further into record territory. The Dow Jones industrials fell more than 200 points and slid below the 11,000 mark for the first time in two years.

Investors seemed unimpressed by a statement from Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, who said the government’s focus is ensuring that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac remain as presently constituted to carry out their mission.

The government-chartered companies at times each lost more than 40 percent on growing speculation that a government bailout is needed. A collapse of the two financiers would cause further shock to the financial system, and trigger more losses to banks and brokerages with significant holdings of mortgage-backed securities.
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Lebanon - Lebanon’s prime minister has formed a national unity Cabinet in which Hezbollah and its allies have veto power over government decisions.

Prime Minister Fuad Saniora had been struggling to form a government since former army chief Gen. Michel Suleiman was elected president in May.

Saniora announced the Cabinet formation Friday in Beirut.

Hezbollah’s veto power was part of an Arab League-brokered deal to achieve compromise between the U.S. and Western-backed parliamentary majority and Hezbollah-led opposition.

Health officials at the Porter County Health Department updated their TDAP vaccinations Wednesday morning, guarding themselves against tetanus, diphtheria and pertussis, or whooping cough.

Pam Westfall, a registered nurse with the Health Department, said she got her shots this morning since she needed to renew them and she works a lot with children.

“We at the county Health Department all work a lot with kids, and we recognize the importance of health professionals, especially those who work with kids, of updating vaccinations,” Westfall said.

Westfall said whooping cough is extremely important to guard against because it is transmitted through airborne germs.
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Sidney Health Center celebrated the completion of the first phase of its $20 million building project with an open house of the new surgery area Sunday.

The improvements include a surgery waiting area with nearly 20 comfortable chairs so families can wait privately for their loved ones.

The outpatient recovery area includes 10 private rooms for patients.

“It’s where we get patients ready and we take care of them until they can go home,” Donna Anvik, registered nurse, said.

The recovery area for general surgery features three stations for adults and one private room for children.
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