Mediaboss Marketing

By Will Hobson, Times Staff Writer Will HobsonTampa Bay Times In Print: Wednesday, March 28, 2012

LARGO Since Apple debuted the iPad in 2010, the sleek device has revolutionized and dominated the tablet computer market. Apple has sold more than 55 million. The company may soon get seven more customers: Largo's city commissioners.

The iPads will replace laptops as the devices commissioners use to check email and review city documents from home. The city staff is still working out the kinks of determining Largo's application needs, but information technology director Harold Schomaker thinks he'll be ordering several (depending on how many of the seven commissioners request one) in the next few weeks.

And although some residents may criticize commissioners for spending city money on iPads while trying to cut the budget, Schomaker counters that the iPads will actually save Largo tax dollars.

Commissioners now use Dell laptops, which cost between $1,200 and $1,400, Schomaker says, and are out of warranty and in need of replacing. With Apple's recent release of the latest model, older iPads are on sale for as little as $399.

"Why buy a big old laptop you have to lug around when you can get something smaller and cheaper that has the same functionality?" said Schomaker, who has been using an iPad 2 at work for the past two months to test different types of applications commissioners will need.

One of the applications Schomaker is testing, iAnnotate, may have won over Commissioner Harriet Crozier, who has declined to take a city laptop. The iAnnotate app allows users to jot notes onto electronic documents they can save for future reference.

Crozier is Largo's representative on a number of local boards, like the Metropolitan Planning Organization, and often finds herself juggling several bulky agenda packets, each with a different set of notes. With an iPad, she could save the agendas and her notes, all in one place.

"I think it's really going to help me, and it's a great price," said Crozier, who objected a few years ago when she says former City Manager Steve Stanton bought laptops for the commissioners without asking first. Crozier didn't like the idea of reading agenda documents off the screen of a laptop, but she's sold on the sleeker iPads.

So is Mayor Pat Gerard, who has left her city laptop at City Hall for the last year. She doesn't like lugging the laptop around, but Gerard thinks she'll get more use out of the iPad, which is less than 10 inches in height and weighs less than 2 pounds.

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Largo commissioners' digital efforts going smaller with iPads

A screen grab from the Nelson Mandela Digital Archive, which went live Tuesday. (Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory / March 27, 2012)

March 27, 2012, 5:30 p.m.

For a look at the future of digital museums, check out the Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory's new digital archive composed of thousands of scanned documents from the African leader's life.

With the help of a $1.25 million grant from Google, the center digitized thousands of documents and images that illustrate the life and times of South Africa's first black president. But instead of scanning them and dumping them online for scholars to peruse, the center, with Google's support, created a virtual museum experience -- highlighting certain pieces from the archives, putting them in the context of Mandela's life and then enabling a visitor to the site to go deeper if they'd like.

The exhibit is organized by different phases of Mandela's life, such as "Early Life," "Prison Years," "Presidential Years" and "Retirement." As you move through the different sections, you'll find the earliest known photograph of Mandela, scans of the desk calendars where he scribbled notes during his 27 years in prison, and handwritten notes he sent his daughters -- including one written shortly after the arrest of their mother.

Although Google provided money and technical support for the project through the Google Cultural Insitute, Verne Harris, head of memory programming at the Centre of Memory, made it clear that the center is still firmly in control of presentation choices and the material used.

"The Centre of Memory owns the content and individual contributors remain the owners of their copyright," he said in a statement. "Google does not own the material. The project is about public access and the preservation of heritage."

The statement also made it clear that the center is responsible for what information is put on the website, and how.

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Nelson Mandela's life in a digital museum, courtesy of Google

OAKLAND, CA--(Marketwire -03/27/12)- More than 50 winners of the 2011 Digital/Social Awards for Excellence in Online Communications were summarized today in the Bulldog Digital Social Awards Hall of Fame magazine.

Winners were chosen exclusively by working journalists from hundreds of entries representing the very best strategic and tactical prowess that PR/corporate communications has to offer. Campaigns were judged by a team of working journalists, who assessed them on the basis of their ability to achieve extraordinary visibility and influence opinion, as well as on their creativity, command of media and technology, and tenacity.

This year's Grand Prize Best Use of Digital/Social for a Digital/Social Communications Campaign of the Year was awarded to Denison University, which also won Gold Digital/Social awards for Best Online Newsroom of the Year, Best Use of Digital/Social for Higher Education and a Silver award for Best Microsite or Specialized Website.

Bulldog Reporter publishes the Daily 'Dog online trade journal, the PR/communication industry's largest circulation publication, and is the industry's premier provider of professional development events and materials.

Here is a complete list of the 2011 Bulldog Digital/Social PR Awards Winners:

Best Use of Digital/Social for a Digital/Social Communications Campaign of the YearGrand Prize Awarded to Denison University For TheDEN

Best Use of Digital/Social in an Arts/Culture/Entertainment Campaign GoldAwarded to Activate Sports & Entertainment and New Jersey Devils for 'Mission Control'

SilverAwarded to Euro RSCG Worldwide PR For KmartGamer

BronzeAwarded to Rogers & Cowan For Avon Voices

Best Use of Digital in a B2B Technology Campaign GoldAwarded to LEWIS PR For Digital Drives Thought Leadership

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The Hall of Fame Online Magazine Showcasing the Winners of the 2011 Bulldog Digital/Social Awards for Excellence in ...

The Irish Times - Wednesday, March 28, 2012

CARL O'BRIEN, Chief Reporter

THE REVENUE Commissioners raised serious concerns over the fairness of aspects of Government tax breaks aimed at luring multinational executives to Ireland before they were signed into law earlier this year.

The tax incentive contained in the recent budget provided an exemption from income tax on 30 per cent of a salary of between 75,000 and 500,000 for employees assigned to work here for up to five years.

In addition, expenses paid to employees for private school fees of up to 5,000, along with travel and trips home, are exempt from taxable income.

A Department of Finance briefing document prepared earlier this year noted concern from the Revenue, pointing out that it had been established policy not to provide tax breaks for private education.

The Revenue has raised serious concerns as to how such a provision would be perceived among the wider taxpaying population, particularly against the background of cutbacks in education spending, the document states.

Department of Finance officials however countered that the perks should be allowed as an additional incentive for employees to take up positions in the Irish-based operations of their employer.

Officials also decided the tax break should not be classified as a tax relief, as this would bring it under restrictions for high earners introduced in recent years. These restrictions ensure that people earning above 125,000 pay a minimum tax rate of 30 per cent.

The introduction of the tax break known as the Special Assignee Relief Programme followed lobbying from a number of companies such as Citibank, consultants KPMG, PwC and Deloitte, along with industry groups such as the American Chamber of Commerce, the IFSCs Tax Strategy Group and the Irish Funds Industry Association.

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Revenue concerns over fairness of foreign executives' tax break

With the U.S. Supreme Court debating Obamacare, talk of freedom has been ringing in the land.

In a related story, this freedom of ours sure is getting expensive.

Unnoticed as the debate rages over the mandate in the health-care reform, this state just passed a grim milestone. The amount of "charity care" delivered at state hospitals reached, for the first time, the $1 billion mark.

The state hospital association reported last month that for 2011, the total medical bills not collected because people were judged too poor to pay was $1.1 billion in Washington. Five years ago, the figure was only half that.

Another $895 million went uncollected in 2011 due to "bad debts" which is when patients don't pay their bills but are considered capable of doing so.

Combined, the two figures mean local hospitals now face $2 billion in unpaid bills every year. And rising fast.

The eye-watering price of free health care has exploded for predictable reasons. More people with no insurance plus cuts to government health programs equals more patients who can't pay showing up in emergency rooms.

Tuesday's Supreme Court argument was all about this problem.

At one point, the lawyers labeled the people coming to the emergency rooms as "free riders." They use health care when they get sick, but haven't insured themselves against that possibility. Either because they can't afford to, or choose not to.

I was briefly a free rider when I was young and stupid (I know, that's redundant). I didn't have much money and figured I wouldn't need to go to the doctor, so I took the risk. Nothing happened, so it all worked out in my case.

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Health-care freedom can be costly