In response to this article, why do investors pay fund of fund fees?  There are at least three primary reasons why investors invest in fund of fund companies.

1. Expertise in hedge fund strategies/styles

2. Manager selection/Diversification

3. Transparency

Most investors complain about the layering of fees but actually a fund of fund (FoF) group is paid for their expertise in understanding hedge fund strategies.  There are many different alternative asset classes that do well in certain market environments.  FoF groups are paid to understand these complex relationships.  Hedge Funds can have different styles andportfolios despite being in the same absolute return category.  Its up to the fund of funds to understand this and differentiate themselves from their competitors by capturing excess return which is also known as alpha.

Another benefit that investors have with a fund of funds is their ability to have access to a diversified portfolio of hedge funds.  An investor with only 10 million to invest can usually only invest in two big hedge funds.  This may not be enough diversification if he wishes to have a diversified portfolio of alternative asset managers.

Fund of fund investors also pay for the long standing relationships that Fund of Funds have with the hedge funds that they are invested in.  Through the relationships held, they provide greater access to transparency than a small investor has from just the monthly investor letter.  Another level of transparency that can be revealed by bigger competitors in the FoF industry is their ability to access HF portfolios that cannot be seen by small investors.

The ability of the fund of funds to capture alpha will get harder as more and more competitors come into the industry.  This is typical for all strategies as overcrowding in the industry will lead to diminishing returns.

As for advice on picking a fund of funds to invest in, it is usually a good idea to look for one that has been in business with a long and profitable track record.

Small investors could do it themselves however the ability to monitor investments, as well as the ability to have influence the hedge funds they are invested in, will be limited at best.

Efter 2-3 års hårdt arbejde har I formået at klare jer igennem møllen og kan langt om længe tage huen på med en stor ære, fornøjelse og stolthed!!

Herunder vil jeg især ønske hjertelig tillykke til min egen skattebasse, lillebror, som blev student i dag! Klarede sig igennem en dansk eksamen med et stort 7 tal!

Ligeledes ønsker jeg vores anden skat, SK, (min lillebrors udkårne) hjertelig tillykke med huen, og ønsker alt godt for hende inshaAllah.

Jeg laver dua for at alle, nybagte studenter, opnår det bedste resultat fremover, både i denne verden og i det hinsides, må Allah swt acceptere jeres dua og ønsker, som passerer forbi jeres rene og oprigtige hjerter inshaAllah, og må Allah swt hjælpe jer med at træffe de bedste valg i jeres liv. Må prøvelserne i det hinsides være ligeså lette som denne verdens, Amin ya Rabbil-Alemin..

INDEN i træder ind i den virkelige verden, efter sommerferien, så håber jeg at alle nybagte studenter får en rigtig god og solrig sommer, ooooooooog selvfølgelig en velfortjent sommerferie ;)

Nogle billeder af min lille skattebasse med huen og hans udkårne inshaAllah :D

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Global Macro: Global macro funds tend to trade across multi financial products, esp currency trading, options, equities, and futures. One very well known global macro fund was Julian Robertson's Tiger Management Corp. These fund managers many different macroeconomic principles to determine where the market should be. Another famous fund manager in this HF (hedge fund) space is George Soros. George Soros was known for breaking the Bank of England by betting heavily against the british pound because he theorized that the bank had to devalue the british currency.

Directional: includes Long/short, Emerging Markets, Sector Funds.

Directional funds place outright bets on certain themes such as emerging market growth in a particular country/region. It could even be macroeconomic themes such as Paulson and Phil Falcone seeing the housing crisis of 2007-2008 and subsequently betting on the rise in the cost of credit default swaps (which they bought cheaply in late 2006). Directional and Global Macro sometimes overlap in strategies.

Long/short strategies often consist of bets where portfolio managers will buy certain stocks that they feel will go up and short the ones that will go down. Long/short strategies are suppose to provide absolute returns that will not correlate to market movements in the short and long term. Long/short strategies can be done from a top down (macroeconomic viewpoint approach) or from a bottoms up (fundamental viewpoint approach).

Event Driven - is another big HF category. Risk Arbitrage also known as merger arbitrage is one subcategory within the Event Driven Category. Risk arbitrage involves placing bets on companies that have announced mergers/acquisition with another company. One recent example of a merger arbitrage trade that has gone right would be the JPM for BSC.

JP Morgan announced that they would take over Bear Stearns (BSC) for 10 dollars a share. When the announcement was given, BSC stock traded up to 9.53/share. This represented a risk arbitrage gain of 4.7% if the acquisition would go through. The risk arbitrageurs will generally buy the acquiree (BSC) and sell short JPM (acquirer). The JPM for BSC risk arb spreads have yielded 4.7% if the merger had gone through. (luckily with hindsight basis, we saw that the risk arb trade was profitable, however at the time it wasn't such a certainty).

Microsoft has been rumored to be interested in buying Yahoo for $34/share. This however was rebuffed by the execs at Yahoo and the risk arb spread has widened greatly. Yahoo stocks have been trading erractically from a high of 30 to a low of 23 in a 3 month period. As the deal uncertainty continues, the potential profitability of the trade will be more profitable or perhaps nonexistent if the deal falls through.

Merger arbitrage results for the past 5 years have been lackluster at best due to the availability of credit and the low interest rate environment. Due to the available and excessive capital, many m&a transactions have gone through due to the ease of credit.

Due to the credit crisis of 2007 and the eventual raising of the cost of capital (ie. fed funds rate will not remain at a 2% rate for the years to come), expect for risk arbitrage returns to be more volatile in the future on both the up and downside.

Another popular, or soon to be popular event driven HF strategy is/will be Distressed Debt Investing. Distressed Debt players tend to acquire bonds in bankruptcy for a few cents on the dollar only to resell the distressed assets later on for double, triple their original cost in the bonds. One interesting event driven strategy that has caught my attention was from Marc Lasry of Avenue Capital Group. Lasry runs one of the biggest distressed debt investment funds, he bought distressed foreign government debt for pennies on the dollar and then sued the government to reclaim most of the promised principal on the bonds. Distressed Debt Investment clearly favors people with a legal background. With the US economic outlook for the next 3-5 years looking a little stagnant, my bet would be that you will see a lot of future bankruptcies and opportunities in this distressed debt area.

Relative Value - Pairs Trading

The quantitative trading shops tend to view the stocks as relationships within one another and will often take stabs at trading the relationship when it is out of whack and/or mispriced. Lets take two companies that are in the same in industry, for example:

CVX and XOM: both are very large integrated oil companies that operate in many of the same regions and have comparable fundamentals.

One would expect that they would trade in a very correlated fashion. The statistical arbitrage funds (stat arb funds) would typically make trades in these pairs (CVX and XOM) when the relationship between the two get out of whack.

There are many more differentiated HF strategies out there, I tried my best to cover the largest HF strategies but this post was perhaps a task that should have been split up in many parts. Please let me know if you want me to go into further detail about any of these HF strategies.

This question is akin to asking me if people are rational by nature.  The general answer is yes, people are rational most of the time.  But sometimes they are irrational as well.

One example of this irrationality is waiting online for about an hour and thirty minutes for a burger, fries and shakes from http://www.shakeshacknyc.com/ .  That is irrational.  The payoff in that scenario is lose/lose. If you haven't tried shake shack yet, you should definitely try it.  But I am digressing....

Irrationality comes in the form of fear, europhia and other human emotions.  If there were efficient markets, there would not be bubbles, crashes and any extreme events.  Efficient markets would imply opportunities that cannot be gamed. 

This is not true.  Opportunities to "game" the markets exist all the time.  Again, this is not to say that this is a game that it is easy to make money from.  Just as in poker, the stock market requires much discipline, patience and enough conviction and an ability to stomach swings in both gains and losses in your portfolio/bankroll.  With that said, there are many different ways to play the markets as there are in poker.  I truly believe there is no one absolute method to making money in the markets just as there is no "best way" to play in poker.  A market speculator/poker player needs to adjust his strategies to how his market/table is acting/reacting.

There are many different strategies that hedge funds utilize in the stock market. 

Before we start, lets talk about what hedge funds are.

A hedge fund is basically an investment fund much like a mutual fund where the aims of this fund is to make their investors money.  A hedge fund differs from a mutual fund in that it is able to go long or short, and has a lot of leeway in determining how to allocate capital among investments.

More on hedge fund strategies in the next post...

Jeg hedder Anders Stubkjær og underviser i engelsk og samfundsfag på gymnasium og hf. Formålet med denne blog er at samle mine undervisningsforløb, links, boganmeldelser, kommentarer om undervisning på ét sted, så jeg selv kan holde styr på dem.

Jeg håber, at lærere såvel som elever får glæde af det jeg lægger ud, og at folk har lyst til at kommentere det, og gerne bidrage med yderligere ideer, materialer, links, etc.

Det bedste ville være at denne weblog bliver et sted som mange kan få glæde af.

Hilsener,
Anders

International Marconi Day Event Is April 26 (Apr 15, 2008) -- Special event stations will be on the air Saturday, April 26 (UTC), to mark International Marconi Day (IMD), a 24-hour Amateur Radio event commemorating the birth of wireless pioneer Guglielmo Marconi on April 25, 1874. Participants can qualify for awards by making contacts on 160 through 10 meters (CW, SSB and digital) with designated IMD stations operating on or near a site where Marconi carried out experiments or where Marconi equipment was used prior to his death in 1937. The sponsoring Cornish Radio Amateur Club (CRAC) will operate GB4IMD from Pendennis Castle, Falmouth, Cornwall, overlooking Falmouth Harbour where Marconi spent some 10 days aboard his yacht Elettra in April 1923. Additional IMD stations will be on the air from the UK, the US, Canada, South America, Australia and Europe. The IMD Web site has a list of IMD 2008 award stations. On the US side, the Marconi Cape Cod Radio Club, KM1CC, will operate participate at the Coast Guard Station on Coast Guard Beach in Eastham, Massachusetts, just south of Marconi's original 1903 station on Cape Cod. If you would like to operate an IMD 2008 award station, register your station prior to the event, providing full details.Link to this item

ARRLWeb: ARRL Home Page

Como sempre meu FDS semana foi um desastre, fiz um verdadeiro HF, pelo menos fiz uma caminhada um pouco maior no sábado e tb dancei mto sozinha (tenho vergonha de dançar na frente dos outros, imagina eles vendo um monte de banha balançando) no meu quarto escuro, parecia uma louca e acho que incomodei os vizinhos. Mas pelo menos foram umas poucas calorias gastas a mais.

Por causa desse excesso desanimei, mas quando voltei aqui e vi seus comments, já me animei de novo.

Bjos

PsicoAnna

the list for my dislike goes on and on, but I won't bore you with the details. When the CRZ was announced, I was so excited I peed myself. Twice. After cleaning up the mess, I saw it:

That's a whole lot of wasted steel right there. There's an old saying that goes something like this:

"Seek not to follow in the footsteps of the great men of old, but rather seek what they sought."

There are a lot of ways to interpret that, but for the purpose of this article, let's assume you can only interpret it as:

Honda has lost sight of what its goals were, and cannot be trusted to effectively innovate. They are re-hashing the same principles over and over and are making no gains.

I hate to admit it, but I've lost faith in Honda's vision. Thankfully, there are some companies coming to the forefront. You'll need to twist your mind around a little, and redefine what you think the CRX is. It's not a sporty econobox, the CRX is a smart car. Just bear with me for a moment, and I'll explain. Economy cars could be defined as high-mileage utilitarian cars that are at least somewhat nerdy-looking and do not have the ability to pick up chicks (or guys, but I'm playing to my primary audience here). The CRX was a bit different because it actually does have sex appeal and is fun to drive. It was built on econobox ideals, but had gone above and beyond while keeping the price tag low. A win-win in every direction.

The smart car is the perfect econobox. It's nerdy, lacks sex appeal, and is very utilitarian for everyday use. It's also uglier than sin:

There is just no way I could feel cool driving that thing around unless I'm pulling into a convention to discuss partition tables and stack overflow errors. There are cool aspects to it, though:

1. It gets good mileage
2. It comes with only two seats
3. It's cheap
4. It's MR
5. You can put a GSXR motor into it (more info)

Now, take all that, put a sexy body around it, and stuff a bi-turbo v6 into the back, and you have the Smart Roadster:

I consider this to be the most true reincarnation of the CRX. It's fun, efficient, sexy, and cheap. Not only could I drive it to the nerd-fests and feel like I belong, but I could also take it to the track and feel like I'm being competitive (the bi-turbo v6 puts out 215 hp and weighs in under 1900lbs). I'm not sure that I'm going to rally to get these imported to the US, but I'm going to keep my eyes open in the future. At least someone has the right idea.

John Kanzius, K3TUP, had an idea - killing cancer cells with radio waves.  This had been tried before with poor results.  John’s experience in ham radio had taught him that radio energy (RF) can heat objects.  But his idea went further. What if the cancer cells were tricked into taking a metal target inside just the tumor cells?   John was aware of "nanoparticles."  If the tumor cells, and ONLY the tumor cells,  could be made to take in these metallic bits, and if they could then be heated up with RF, would that kill off the tumor or the patient?   Recent university animal testing gave the answer - the tumor was destroyed.  Now researchers are following John’s lead in exploring a host of life-saving applications.

13.56 MHz as a Cancer Cure?  It just might be! 

From QST - a magazine of the ARRL, the national association for Amateur Radio in the US 

In the past months there has been a lot of publicity about John Kanzius and a possible method of destroying cancerous tumors in humans using RF energy and nanoparticles.  Animal tests look very good and human testing is on the fast track.  But who is this and how does radio fit in? 

John Kanzius is a ham, K3TUP, and a cancer survivor.  He loves to build what he calls "exotic antennas" at his station.  Stacked rotating beams or a rotating tower with multiple beams was a common K3TUP antenna farm.   According to John, many well known contesters won world wide contests from his Western Pennsylvania site as guest op's.

John also is a broadcast engineer who acquired ownership of several radio and TV stations, then sold them as a group and retired to a life of leisure on Sanibel Island - or so he thought.   That dream was destroyed in 2002 when he was diagnosed with leukemia.

In between trips to the doctors, he saw the devastation cancers have on human beings and the horrors of chemotherapy's side effects.  Despite the advances in pharmacology and surgery, "cancer" was still a terrifying word.  The slow downward spiral that engulfed many lives, let alone his own situation, was summarized by John as, "…hoping we kill the cancer before we kill the person."

In October 2003 John had an idea - kill cancer cells with radio waves.  As every ham knows, radio energy (RF) can heat objects.  This was not a new idea and had been tried before with poor results.  Previous attempts, called "ablation," used needles inserted into the patient as the targets for the RF energy.  The energy would heat up the needles and cook the tissue surrounding the needle.  The problem was that it (a) used needles and (b) cooked everything, both good and bad cells.  But John's idea went further - and this is where the inspiration came.  What if, instead of needles, the cancer cells were tricked into taking a metal target inside just the tumor cells?  

Like many of us who have great ideas in the middle of the night, it sounded good to him.  But unlike most of us, he did not wait until morning.  Rather than run the risk of losing the concept in his sleep, John immediately got up in the dark and began work on possible antenna designs by cutting up his wife's pie pans. Hearing the strange noises in the night his wife, Marianne, investigated.  "What the hell are you doing?"  

John’s first attempts used copper sulfate, and his first “patient” was a hot dog.  But it worked and gave him the confidence to start asking questions of doctors in the field.  The next steps were to interest scientific researchers in the concept, build a special transmitter that could safely focus the RF energy, test it out on real tumors, find ways to trick cancerous cells into absorbing the RF target and see if it really was "too good to be true."

A much better RF target was presented in 2005 when his own personal doctor brought him into contact with Dr. Steven Curley, M.D., a professor at the M.D. Anderson Department of Surgical Oncology at the University of Texas.  Dr. Curley found the process promising and brought a present – “nanoparticles.”

Nanoparticles are incredibly small objects, usually metallic, measured in billionths of an inch.  If the tumor cells could be made to take these particles internally, and if they could then be heated up with RF, would that kill off the tumor or the patient?

John built a special RF generator for the project.  As John says, "Trying to build an array that would heat particles one billionth of a meter in length was challenging.  But building equipment all of my life was inspired by my dad, W3NRE, who was licensed in 1934."

As for attracting serious researchers, John got the interest of Dr. David Geller, a co-director at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center in their liver cancer program. 

Dr. Curley knew they were on to a major event in medicine.  "We could target specific abnormal proteins, put a polar charge on the nanoparticles and use magnets to focus them on those areas of the tumor." 

 Dr. Richard Smalley (SK), a Nobel laureate and also a cancer victim, was Rice University's expert in nanoparticles and especially "fullerenes," which are made of carbon and include tube shaped particles called "nanotubes."  When Dr. Curley first reported to Dr. Smalley that he actually had seen carbon nanoparticles get very hot when in the beam of John's RF generator, Smalley is reported to have grasped the importance immediately and exclaimed, "Holy God!" 

John is more modest about it and simply writes, "The research scientists at Rice were stunned to see that my device could heat nanoparticles at the 13.56 MHz frequency."

Dr. Smalley spent the rest of his working days on the project because he believed that this is indeed the breakthrough that had been hoped for by so many millions.  Dr. Boris Yakobson, Ph.D., continues the work at Rice.   

The rabbit didn’t die

Initial animal testing done at Rice University used rabbits.  Being careful that all scientific methods were complete with several control groups, a solution containing carbon nanotubes was injected into cancerous tumors in rabbits.  The rabbits had either pancreatic cancer or liver cancers.  Four rabbits were the primary test animals for the experiment.  After the injection, they were put into the special RF field created by John's RF generator for two minutes.   48 hours later the results were checked.  The tumors in all four had been destroyed by heat, but there was very little damage to neighboring tissues as close as 2-5 mm away.

Science is an exacting discipline.  Every aspect of a clinical trial, let alone a revolutionary finding like this one, must withstand extensive peer review and be published for others to test and duplicate.  In September 2007 John learned that the paper he co-authored¹ had been accepted and would be printed in no less than Cancer, a major oncology medical journal published on behalf of the American Cancer Society in December. 

The Future

Unfortunately, even though in vivo animal tests and human cancer cells on Petri dishes have been destroyed by this method and the technology is on "fast track," actual experiments with living human cancer victims still may be three years away.  Meanwhile he has been bombarded with offers and people wanting to make a deal for his invention. 

Work continues to progress on the procedure at the world's largest cancer research center.  John wisely patented his RF generator and formed Therm Med, LLC.  He now has his RF generators being made in a factory, so his wife's pie pans are safe again.  John is obviously optimistic about it all and credits his Amateur Radio experiences as a fundamental part of the invention process.

"If it were not for my ham radio and all the days of experimentation to improve my station, this new procedure for treating cancer, which continues to show such promising results, would probably not be on the cutting edge at the largest cancer center in the world."

In the past months others have also become excited as positive results pile up.  

###

Carbon nanotube-enhanced thermal destruction of cancer cells in a noninvasive radiofrequency field

While the full scientific paper is quite complex, here’s a brief “translation.”

John Kanzius, K3TUP, invented the experimental radiofrequency generator and the concept of using it with nanoparticles serving as targets for RF to “cook” tumor cells internally.  John is a cancer survivor, active ham and former radio station owner whose knowledge of the potential effects of targeted radio waves triggered his search for alternatives to chemotherapy.

There have been past attempts to treat cancers and related tumors using RF energy.   Most of these past attempts involved inserting needles into the tumors and using RF to heat the needles which then killed any cells in proximity to the needle, both good and bad. 

The excitement in John Kanzius’ work is the demonstrated ability to target the RF energy to specific locations by use of Single-Walled Carbon Nanotubes that release heat energy in an RF field.  SWNT’s are incredibly small cylinders with walls one atom thick.  Using water-soluble SWNT’s and injecting them into the tumor, the nanotubes are taken up by the tumor cells.  Then, using a 13.56 MHz RF field and between 400 and 1000 watts, researchers were able to heat the nanotubes, killing the tumor cells while not harming normal cells. 

The RF generator is connected to a high Q coupling system with transmitter and receiver heads which can be swiveled as needed to orient the RF direction.  The distance between the Tx and Rx heads is adjustable which changes the field size, shape and density.  They usually use an RF field diameter of about 30 cm.

The animal studies that have been completed used carbon SWNT’s injected into rabbit tumors.  The results were that there was “total cell necrosis of the tumors” while the animals has no side effects.   Current research is looking into ways to use gold SWNT’s coupled to other chemical agents that will only be absorbed by cancerous cells, allowing many more delivery options.  There are several agents possible for this and hopes are high that it can be done.

Hams will note that the nanotubes are very small.  The carbon ones are about 20 nm (that’s 20 billionths of a meter) and the new gold ones are only 3-5 nm.  Meanwhile the wavelength of 13.56 MHz is even longer than our 20 meter band.  John reports that he has devices on multiple frequencies of 13.56 MHz. and chose that because it and it's harmonics are industrial assigned frequencies by the FCC. He was assured not to be interfering with other services and his preliminary tests showed the human body to be transparent to that frequency.

There are currently several theories for the resonance of the nanotubes despite the disparity between size and wavelength.  The most supported one is that in an RF field the nanotubes organize themselves in some way, much like iron filings in a magnetic field.  They form chains which hit upon a frequency multiple and achieve resonance and heat up - In short, a “self-assembling antenna!”

The next steps are human studies and using agents that will deliver the nanotubes to tumor cells but not healthy cells.   For this step they will shift to the use of gold nanotubes instead of carbon because gold nanotubes have already been approved by the FDA for human use.  All in all, if it proves out, this could be an easy golden pill to swallow and sure beats chemotherapy!  

###

1   The primary scientific paper, Carbon nanotube-enhanced thermal destruction of cancer cells in a noninvasive radiofrequency field, was published online on October 24, 2007 and copyrighted by The American Cancer Society.  It is to appear in the December issue of their Cancer magazine.  It was written by:

Christopher J. Gannon, M.D.  (University of Texas, M.D. Anderson Cancer Center)

Paul Cherukuri, Ph.D. (University of Texas, M.D. Anderson Cancer Center)

Boris Yakobson, Ph.D. (Rice University, Dept of Chemistry)

Laurent Cognet, Ph.D.  (Rice University, Center for Biological and Environmental Nanotechnology)

John S. Kanzius, K3TUP

Carter Kittrell, Ph.D. (Rice University, Carbon Nanotechnology Laboratory)

R. Bruce Weisman, Ph.D. (Rice University, Center for Biological and Environmental Nanotechnology)

Matteo Pasquali, Ph.D. (Rice University, Carbon Nanotechnology Laboratory)

Howard K. Schmidt, Ph.D. (Rice University, Center for Biological and Environmental Nanotechnology)

Richard E. Smalley, Ph.D. (Rice University, Carbon Nanotechnology Laboratory)

Amateur Radio on the International Space Station

Ham Radio on the ISS, NASA

When astronauts, cosmonauts and mission specialists from many nations fly on the international space station, they will have amateur, or ham, radio as a constant companion. Since its first flight in 1983, ham radio has flown on more than two-dozen space shuttle missions. Dozens of astronauts have used the Space Shuttle Amateur Radio Experiment, or SAREX, to talk to thousands of kids in school and to their families on Earth while they were in orbit. They have pioneered space radio experimentation, including television and text messaging as well as voice communication. The Russians have had a similar program for the cosmonauts aboard the Russian Space Station Mir. When U.S. astronauts were aboard Mir in preparation for the long duration missions of the international space station, they used amateur radio for communication, including emergency messaging while Mir was in distress. As human space flight moves into a new uncharted era, an organization called ARISS, which stands for Amateur Radio on international space station, has been formed to design, build and operate equipment. In 1996, delegates from major national radio organizations and from AMSAT, which stands for the Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation, in eight nations involved with the international space station signed a Memorandum of Understanding to form ARISS. NASA and the Russian space organization Energia have signed agreements that spell out the place of amateur radio on the station. A technical team, called ISS Ham, has been officially established to serve as the interface to support hardware development, crew training and on-orbit operations. In the United States, the American Radio Relay League, which is also known as ARRL, and AMSAT provide leadership and consultation. They also donate and build hardware as well as making sure safety and qualification tests are successfully completed so the equipment can fly. The Russians have provided ports so that antennas can be mounted on the station's Zvezda Service Module -- the space station unit that provides living quarters for the astronauts and cosmonauts. United States and Russian teams have trained the astronauts and cosmonauts to operate the equipment. The Italian team has designed and built antennas. The German team has built sophisticated repeater stations that will allow crews to make recorded reports on their daily activities and permit hams on Earth better contacts with men and women aboard the station. The first initial radio station was flown onboard the space shuttle Atlantis on STS-106. The crew transferred the ham radio gear into the space station for future use by the Expedition One crew. The astronauts and cosmonauts will work hard on these missions, but they plan to take some time off for educational outreach contacts with schools. NASA's Division of Education is a major supporter of the amateur radio activity. The sponsoring agencies have stated that they consider access to a ham radio system a requirement for psychological support of the crews, by providing family and general contacts for people who will be in space many weeks at a time. As the international space station takes its place in the heavens, the amateur radio community is prepared to do its part by helping to enrich the experience of those visiting and living on the station.

spacecontact.mp3

SuitSat was an Amateur Radio installed inside a surplus Russian space suit and tossed out into space.  It became an independently orbiting ham radio satellite deployed by the crew of the International Space Station.  It was so much fun, hams plan to do it again!  

Do you want to be part of the international network of ground stations that help support Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) operations? ARISS is looking to add numerous ground stations capable of relaying ISS amateur radio sessions with schools and also serve as back up communications relays should they be needed. If you are already a licensed Amateur Radio Operator and would like to be considered for selection as one of the new ARISS telebridge stations, then send an email with details about your station and contact information to ARISS-telebridge@amsat.org.  Frank Bauer, KA3HDO
ARISS International Chairman,  AMSAT V.P. for Human Spaceflight Programs 

IT DESERVES TEN STARS BECAUSE IT IS AWESOME.

NOW A FLURRY OF IMAGES AND TOTALLY COOL CAPTIONS, BECAUSE ITALICIZING=COOL.

ISNT IT VERY GREAAAAAAT

IT LOOKS SO FINE

UNLIKE THIS UGLY BEAST

_E%t43y0i43ykgbsdjgkbopdsakig-i3wt3- FILLER SPACE

YEAH!

NOW HERE ARE SOME TAGS. Call of Duty 4!

Olen aina liikkuessani kuunnellut musiikkia matkapuhelimellani ja sen mukana tulleilla korvanapeilla. Äänenlaatu on noissa Nokian korvanapeissa ollut (mallista riippuen) välilllä ala-arvoisen mutta välillä riittävän kuuloinen, mutta tosiasiahan on että aika surkeita ne oikeasti ovat.

No kävipä niin että töistä tullessa poikkesin erääseen kauppakeskukseen ja kävin vartavasten tutkimassa millaisen parannuksen sieltä löytäisi musiikinkuunteluani parantamaan. Tarjollahan olisi loputtomasti erillaisia MP3-soittimia mutta en ole sellaista koskaan ostanut koska se olisi jälleen yksi laite lisää mukana taskussa, ja koska huippulaatuinen äänentoisto ei ole minulle niin ehdoton asia niin päädyin vain etsimään paremmat korvanapit Nokia N73 puhelimeeni.

Ensiksi valitsin korvanapit ja sen jälkeen ostin mukaan AD-46 audio adapterin. Tavalliset 3,5mm kuulokkeet saa liitettyä tähän puhelimen pop-port liittimeen sopivaan pieneen palikkaan jossa on normaalit HF toiminnot kuten mikrofoni, äänenvoimakkuus ja vastauspainike.

Korvanappeja valitessa päätin kokeilla perinteisistä poikkeavia korvaan hieman syvemmälle tungettavia ja korvaan mukautuvia nappeja. Tutkittuani valikoimaa, hylkäsin kaikki Philipsit ja panasonicit sun muut ja päädyin KOSS merkkiin. Tarkemmin tutkittuani jouduin valitsemaan kahden tuotteen väliltä: KOSS Sparkplug ja KOSS Isolation Earbud.

KOSS Sparkplug

KOSS Isolation Earbud

Valitsin jälkimmäisen koska se on muuten lähes sama tuote kuin Sparkplug(hintakin sama) mutta näissä on jäätävänkokoisen mukautuvan "vaahtomuovi-tutin" sijaan pehmeä silikoni reunus jonka voi vaihtaa kolmeen mukana tulevaan eri kokoon. Katsoessani Sparkplugeja näytti korvaan työnnettävä osa sen mukautumisesta huolimatta jättimäiseltä kun taas valitsemassani Isolation Earbudissa kyseinen osa on paljon pienempi.

Musiikkia kuunnellessani Huomasin että valmiiksi asetetut keskikokoiset silikonireunukset ovat hieman liian isot korvaan joten vaihdoin pienimmän kokoiset tilalle ja se auttoi heti. Sopivasta tuntumasta huolimatta alkoi hetken kuuntelun jälkeen tuntua oikeassa korvassa kipua, tämä ei suinkaan johtunut liian suuresta äänenvoimakkuudesta vaan ilmeisesti korvakäytävä ei ollut vielä tarpeeksi tottunut että sinne tungetaan tälläisiä nappuloita.. Ongelma häviää luultavasti hetken totuttelun jälkeen.

Äänenlaatu kuulokkeissa on jotain aivan uskomatonta! Tai no olenhan aikaisemmin kuunnellut Nokian vakionapeilla joten on sanomattakin selvää että eroa on.
Äänet toistuu pakkauksen mukaan 15 hertzistä 20 kilohertziin. Lisäksi kuulokkeet estävät taustamelun kuulemisen melko totaalisesti, kuuntelin musiikkia melko hiljaisella meluisassa bussissa joka rymisteli mukulakivikatua pitkin mutta silti musiikista sai kaiken irti eikä taustaäänet päässeet häiritsemään.

KOSS Isolation Earbud napit maksoivat 28 euroa mutta halvemmallakin/kalliimmallakin löytyy varmasti.
AD-46 audio adapter maksoi 22 euroa, eli perus Nokia-kilkkeiden ryöstöhinta.

loppusanoiksi voisin todeta:
Näillä mennään!

- Rate (speed)

- Range (distance)

- Density

Packaging line:

Drug manufacturers need 'Rate'. The packaging line needs to read/write RFID labels at a high speed. This activity occurs when the labels are spooled and the distance between labels is negligible, or the bottles/boxes as they travel 100-200 per minute down a belt with only 3-4 inches between the items.

Generally HF has a challenge in high speed. There are various claims of performance, and each drug company should define their Service Level Agreement to achieve the desired 'Rate' with their RFID packaging vendor, but overall 'Rate' is generally lower with HF than UHF.

Supply Chain:

Once the bottles/boxes are packed in shipping cases, 'Rate' is much less important and 'Range' plus 'Density' becomes more critical. Once you have 24-48 bottles (boxes) in a shipping case, the RFID antenna for HF need to be fairly close to the RFID labels to read all the HF labels in the case. UHF is much more friendly for 'Range'.

For 'Range' HF is good up to about 4-6 inches with a mean of 5 inches from the antenna surface, but 'Density' performance suffers.

At the wholesaler, 'Range' and 'Density' is critical. This is why if you want to verify and validate all the case labels on a pallet, you need UHF on the cases, and this is where 'Range' and 'Density' become critical.

There is no way you can read 100% of the case labels on a pallet with HF. If you want to use RFID, there is no choice but to use UHF. On the other hand, if you don't care to read all case labels on a pallet than it's much less expensive to just use datamatrix or RSS barcode. Line -of-sight, is 'line-of-sight'.  If you need to read cases at a few inch distance, save the money and use barcode.

The wholesaler opens the cases and the product is picked in individual quantities,  'Rate' becomes a non-issue. Basically, items are read either in single quantities, or limited quantities.  Either HF or UHF will perform on the item level.  'Range' is a factor. If you want accuracy, the HF environment will prevent cross-reads from other product. the limitation of 'Range' precludes false reads. UHF, regardless of the individual tag producer, will have cross-reads and produce errors in Pedigrees.

The optimal data carrier for picking and Pedigree accuracy is the barcode. The barcode may not be as fast to read as RFID, but the question has to be, "What's more important at the item level picking operation for the production of a Pedigree ?  Speed or accuracy ?"

Drug Store:

At the drug store the same issues prevail as the item picking operation. Cross reads at the shelf and counter is critical. The technology with the least influence of cross reads is barcode. HF RFID produces a lower risk of cross reads on the shelf or counter. So once again the priority for Pedigree is, "What's more important at the item level picking operation for the production of a Pedigree ?  Speed or accuracy ?"

i took it upon myself to put these to the test and see if they were worth the 5-15$

and way, for a CRX you need to remover your third brake light cover and remove the (2) 10mm bolts holding your brake light in. clean the glass well with rubbing alcohol, if you have ever aplied window tint, this is no different.

if you have not, this is for you,

1.clean the glass throughly.

2. with a spray mist bottle, mist the area where the tint or in this case the decal will be.

3.remove the decal all the way from any tack paper and spray the sticky side with the misting bottle

4.gently lay the sticker on the window and move it until it is in the appropriate location.

5. using a small squeegee or a reasonable application( like a credit card or license) hold the stiker in place while you squeegee all the water from in between the sticker and contact point.

6. check for air bubbles and remove the same way as with the water.

7. within 24 hours the water should dry up and your decal will stick.

8. if your of age, sit back and enjoy a refreshing drink of chosen alcohol while admiring your handyman skills. if your not of age have a soda and do the same thing.

it should look like this for a final product.

and with no brakes

i would have done a full write up with pics but i didnt have a camera until i was done.

-Bam