LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Winter is coming – and so is a new line of beers based on HBO‘s fantasy drama “Game of Thrones.” Presumably, all will boast a full, robust head, perhaps resting on top of a spike.
HBO is teaming with Cooperstown, N.Y. brewery Ommegang for a line of brews centered around the series, the New York Times reports. The first beer, Iron Throne Blonde Ale, is slated to go on sale in March, in time for the March 31 premiere of the show’s third season.
It sounds like the perfect libation for watching the premiere from the comfort of your $ 30,000 Iron Throne replica.
A second “GoT”-themed beer will go on sale in fall 2013, with two more varieties expected to go on sale in conjunction with new seasons of the series.
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LONDON (Reuters) – Shire‘s hyperactivity treatment Vyvanse will be available in Europe within months after Britain’s drugs regulator backed the amphetamine-based stimulant used to treat millions of U.S. students.
The drug, lisdexamfetamine dimesylate, has a slow-release action that activates the amphetamine ingredient over the course of a day, helping levels of alertness and concentration in children with ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder).
It was assessed under the European Union‘s decentralized approvals procedure, led by Britain’s medicines watchdog. The application was supported by two European studies and clinical data from the United States.
Seven other EU countries – Denmark, Finland, Germany, Ireland, Norway, Spain and Sweden – participated, and they have agreed product labels. They will now issue their own national approvals, a process that takes up to three months, Shire said.
Chief executive Angus Russell said: “As all ADHD patients are different and will vary in their responses to the available treatments, we believe introducing Elvanse will provide physicians with a broader range of options to help patients with ADHD manage their individual needs effectively”.
Shire has established a leading position in treating hyperactivity in the United States with its stimulants Adderall XR and Vyvanse. The latter saw sales rise 24 percent to $ 247 million in the three months to September.
Shore Capital analyst Brian White said while he had modest sales expectations in the short term for the drug in Europe, where it will be the first amphetamine to be approved for ADHD, the decision was significant because the condition was becoming better known in Europe.
“Shire has been very successful in the U.S. with its ADHD franchise and one would expect them to use that experience to do a similar job in Europe, although that will take a lot longer just given the much lower awareness,” he said.
“They have another product coming along later (Intuniv) which is a non-stimulant, and that could be more appropriate for the European market than a stimulant.”
Vyvanse, which Shire said was the top-selling branded prescribed ADHD medicine in the United States, has been indicated in Europe for ADHD in children aged six years and over when treatment with methylphenidate, better known as Ritalin, was not successful.
(Editing by Dan Lalor)
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UK consumer prices inflation remained unchanged at 2.7% in November, according to official data.
The fastest price rises were seen in the cost of fruit, bread and cereals, as well as in energy bills, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said.
Car fuel and plane ticket prices fell in November from the month before, as did the cost of carpets and beer.
Retail prices index (RPI) inflation, which includes housing costs, fell to 3% last month, from 3.2% in October.
The consumer prices index (CPI) rate, which is targeted by the Bank of England, had jumped from a three-year low of 2.2% to 2.7% in October, a much bigger rise than had been expected and which came as a nasty shock in the City.
Separate data released by the ONS also showed that the annual rate of increase in producer prices – charged by manufacturers for their products – also held steady in November, at 1.4%, excluding the more volatile prices of food and fuel.
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The kind of stability delivered by inflation targeting today may be the stability of the grave yard”
End Quote
Energy bills
CPI inflation is now expected by many investors and economists to creep up further next year as further increases in electricity and gas prices take effect.
“UK inflation paused for breath in November before it resumes its assault on the 3% mark over the next few months,” said Rob Wood, economist at Berenberg Bank.
“The figures included the first of this winter’s gas and electricity price rises, from Scottish and Southern Energy,” he added, saying that the other companies’ bill rises would push the inflation rate higher.
A further rise in supermarket food prices is also widely anticipated, after droughts in the US and Russia, and light monsoons in India, pushed up worldwide prices for grain and other foodstuffs.
CPI inflation has been above the Bank’s 2% target for more than three years and until May this year had exceeded 3% for 29 consecutive months, prompting the governor Sir Mervyn King to write regular letters to the government explaining the Bank’s failure.
The Bank has tolerated the elevated inflation rate because of the depressed state of the economy, which has led the Bank to consistently overestimate how quickly CPI would fall back to its target.
The Bank now expects inflation to fall back to its target only in the autumn of 2014.
New target?
Mark Carney, the Canadian central bank head who is due to take over from Sir Mervyn as governor from June, has hinted at the possibility of scrapping inflation targeting.
That has led to speculation that the Bank may switch to an alternative target – with nominal gross domestic product (NGDP) seen as the most likely candidate.
NGDP measures the economy’s total economic output, but without adjusting for rising prices.
Targeting NGDP instead of CPI inflation would enable the Bank to tolerate higher inflation during the current period of depressed economic growth, and would also oblige the Bank to seek an even faster rise in prices if it had fallen short of its target in previous months.
Economist Chris Williamson: “The Bank of England will tolerate inflation to get the economy growing”
Some economists think that the resulting bias towards higher inflation – at least while the economy remains depressed – would help to make debts more manageable by eroding their value, and would encourage people to spend more for fear that their savings would also be eroded by rising prices.
Opinion is divided among analysts as to whether the Bank of England is likely to push ahead in its next monetary policy meeting with more monetary stimulus – likely to come in the form of further purchases of government debt with newly created money, or Quantitative Easing.
“Higher inflation makes it harder for them to restart QE,” said Alan Clarke, economist at Scotiabank. “I don’t think it makes any difference to the Bank of England. They know these things are outside of their control. Gas bills, droughts, they can’t control that.”
Some Monetary Policy Committee members have resisted increasing QE in recent meetings, according to minutes released by the Bank, with one member, Paul Fisher, publicly saying that he would wait for inflation to start falling before he would personally endorse more money creation.
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TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iranian media say the son of influential former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani has been released on bail.
Several papers, including the pro-reform Etemad daily, say Mahdi Hashemi was released late Sunday and immediately went to his father’s home.
Authorities arrested the younger Hashemi in late September, a day after he returned to Iran from Britain.
He is held on charges of fomenting unrest in the aftermath of Iran’s disputed 2009 presidential election that brought President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad a second term in office. Hashemi also faced corruption charges.
His arrest came days after his sister, Faezeh, was taken into custody to serve a six-month sentence on charges of making propaganda against Iran’s ruling system.
Since Rafsanjani backed Ahmadinejad’s reformist challenger in 2009, his family has come under pressure from hardliners.
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TORONTO (Reuters) – Research In Motion Ltd said on Monday that it had begun a “beta testing” program that allows 120 companies and government departments to try out its new BlackBerry 10 smartphones before their global launch on January 30.
The Canadian company, which is trying to reverse a sharp decline in market share for the BlackBerry, said the program would enable so-called enterprise customers in business and government to size up the BB10.
Features of the BB10 include the ability to separate personal and business information so that the user can store both without compromising security.
RIM has struggled in recent years to hold on to its base of enterprise customers, which typically pay a higher subscription fee than consumers, as their employees push to use devices such as Apple Inc’s iPhone for business as well as personal communications.
“This is a crucial step for us in getting our large enterprise customers ready to support BlackBerry 10 at the point of launch date, as opposed to post-launch date,” Bryan Lee, senior director for enterprise accounts, said in a phone interview.
RIM is providing the software and handsets at no charge, and the companies do not have to buy anything once the trial is finished.
The company plans to release its quarterly results on Thursday, and analysts expect it to report its third straight loss as it struggles to sell its older devices.
RIM made its name selling mobile email devices to bankers, lawyers and other professionals before expanding to sell phones to consumers.
The company said the BB10 testers were from financial, insurance, healthcare, manufacturing, media, and distribution industries and include 64 Fortune 500 companies, as well as government departments.
Lee would not identify any of the entities, beyond Integris Health and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, which have both said they are testing the new devices.
The customers have installed test versions of RIM’s new server software, which manages iPhones and devices using Google Inc’s Android software as well as BlackBerrys, and will each receive two preproduction BlackBerry 10 handsets later this week.
RIM shares were down 2.1 percent at C$ 13.59 in morning Toronto Stock Exchange trading.
The stock has rallied from September’s multiyear lows around C$ 6.50 on a wave of optimism over the new devices, but the share price is still far below mid-2008 highs of around C$ 150.
(Reporting by Alastair Sharp; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn)
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NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Beck Hansen wants you to think about the way music has changed over the last century and what that means about how human beings engage each other these days.
Laboring over the intricate and ornate details of his new “Song Reader” sheet music project, he was struck by how social music used to be — something we’ve lost in the age of ear buds.
“You watch an old film and see how people would dance together in the ’20s, ’30s and ’40s. You’d go out and people would switch partners and it was a way of social interaction,” Hansen said. “It’s something that was part of what brought people together. Playing music in the home is another aspect of that that’s been lost. Again, I’m not on a campaign to get people to take up songs and play music in their home or anything. But it is interesting to me, the loss of that, what it means.”
Beck hopes the “Song Reader” inspires some of us to pick up instruments and limber our vocal cords. It includes 20 songs annotated on sheet music that’s been decorated in the style popular in the early 20th century when the songwriting industry was a thriving enterprise with billions of songs sold.
The 42-year-old singer notes in the book’s preface that Bing Crosby’s “Sweet Leilani” sold an estimated 54 million copies in 1937, meaning about 40 percent or more of the U.S. population was engaged in learning how to play that song. They were touching it directly, speeding it up, slowing it down, changing the lyrics and creating something new.
“There’s popular bands now that people know the words to their songs and can sing along, but there’s something about playing a song for yourself or for your friends and family that allows you to inhabit the song and by some sort of osmosis it becomes part of who you are in a way,” he said. “So when I think of my great-grandparents’ generations, music defined their lives in a different way than it does now.”
Beck proposed the idea to McSweeney’s Dave Eggers in 2004 and it soon blossomed into something more ambitious as the artist wrapped his mind around the challenge of not just writing a song, but presenting it in a classic way that also engages fans who might not be able to read music or play their own instruments.
They quickly agreed it would make no money, but it seemed like an idea worth exploring.
“And it seemed like only Beck would have thought of it,” Eggers said in an email to the Associated Press. “It’s a very generous project, in that he wrote a bunch of songs and just gives them to the world to interpret. That’s a very expansive kind of generosity and inclusiveness that we’re happy to be part of. On a formal level, we love projects like this, that are unprecedented, and that result in a beautiful object full of great art and great writing. And it all started with Beck. It’s a testament to his groundbreaking approach to everything he does.”
Beck hopes fans will record their own versions and upload them to the Internet so those songs grow into something more universal.
As for his own recorded music, that’s a little more complicated.
Beck’s not sure where he’s headed at the moment. He recorded an album in 2008, but set it aside to work with Charlotte Gainsbourg on “IRM,” which he wrote and produced. He’s also been writing songs for soundtracks and special projects and producing artists like Thurston Moore, Stephen Malkmus and Dwight Yoakam. All that has left him feeling creatively satisfied, but he does acknowledge it’s been a while since he released 2008′s Danger Mouse-produced “Modern Guilt.”
He says in many ways he’s reached a crossroads he’s not yet sure how to navigate.
“This last year I’ve been thinking about whether I’d finish those songs (from 2008), whether they’re relevant or worthy of releasing. I know that doesn’t sound very definitive,” he said, laughing, “but that’s the kind of place I’m in — in this kind of limbo — and, um, yeah.”
The “Song Reader” spurred Beck to think about his own work in a new light as well. Spending six months finishing off the project after working on it sporadically over the years, he was struck by how much craft went into the creation of each song and how quickly music can come into existence today.
“There is so much music out there, to me,” he said. “I don’t know if it’s just where I am in my own music making or if it’s a product of the amount of music out there, but I feel like a piece of music does have to have a certain validity to be put out there and to ask people to listen. … I feel like it’s impossible for everyone to keep up, you know, so I guess I’ve been feeling like maybe there’s something to picking what you’re going to put out, about being more particular about what you put out.”
___
Online:
http://beck.com
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Follow AP Music Writer Chris Talbott: http://twitter.com/Chris_Talbott.
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(Reuters Health) – A mercury-containing preservative rarely used in the United States should not be banned as an ingredient in vaccines, U.S. pediatricians said Monday, in a move that may be controversial.
In its statement, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) endorsed calls from a World Health Organization (WHO) committee that the preservative, thimerosal, should not be considered a hazardous source of mercury that could be banned by the United Nations.
The AAP in 1999 asked for its removal from vaccines in the United States because of a concern that youngsters receiving multiple shots containing thimerosal might get too much mercury – and develop autism or other neurodevelopmental problems, despite the lack of hard evidence at the time.
“It was absolutely a matter of precaution because of the absence of more information,” said Dr. Louis Cooper, from Columbia University in New York, who was on the organization’s board of directors at the time.
“Subsequently an awful lot of effort has been put into trying to sort out whether thimerosal causes any harm to kids, and the bottom line is basically, it doesn’t look as if it does,” he said.
In a 2004 safety review, for example, the independent U.S. Institute of Medicine concluded there was no evidence thimerosal-containing vaccines could cause autism. A study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention came to the same conclusion in 2010.
With the exception of some types of flu shots, the compound is not used in vaccines in the United States, which are distributed in single-dose vials.
And nobody is arguing that should change, according to Dr. Walter Orenstein, a member of the AAP Committee on Infectious Diseases and a researcher at the Emory Vaccine Center in Atlanta.
But in countries with fewer resources – where many children still die of vaccine-preventable diseases – it is cheaper and easier to use multi-dose vials of vaccines against diphtheria and tetanus, for example.
Thimerosal prevents the rest of a multi-dose vial from getting contaminated with bacteria or fungi each time a dose is used.
Researchers estimated it could cost anywhere from two to five times as much to manufacture vaccines for developing countries without thimerosal, and both transporting vaccines and keeping them refrigerated would also be much harder.
“We’re having a hard time completing the task of getting every kid immunized now. That would add a tremendous burden,” Cooper said, adding that more children would probably die as a result.
Children who can now be protected from these life-threatening diseases could become vulnerable, Orenstein told Reuters Health.
The new statement is published in the AAP’s journal Pediatrics.
Thimerosal contains a type of mercury called ethyl mercury. Toxic effects have been tied to its cousin, methyl mercury, which stays in the body for much longer.
Earlier this year, the WHO said replacing thimerosal with an alternative preservative could affect vaccine safety and might cause some vaccines to become unavailable.
Mercury, however, is still on the list of global health hazards to be banned in a draft treaty from the United Nations Environment Program – which would mean a ban on thimerosal.
Reducing mercury exposure “is a wonderful thing,” Orenstein said.
However, “We need this exception because thimerosal is so vital for protecting children.”
For the Pediatrics document, please see: bit.ly/cxXOG
(Editing by Christine Soares, Nick Zieminski)
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The energy regulator will permit firms running the UK’s electricity and gas grids to add an average £12 to annual energy bills for the next eight years to pay for upgrades and maintenance.
Ofgem said it had cut £7bn from the total cost of work on UK transmission networks planned by energy firms.
The biggest of these firms by far – National Grid – said it was reviewing the “lengthy and wide ranging” plans.
Meanwhile a lobby group warned 300,000 more homes faced imminent fuel poverty.
Energy prices have risen 7% on average this year, according to the Fuel Poverty Advisory Group, and are set to leave more households paying more than 10% of their income on home heating unless the government takes action.
Tax change
Ofgem’s announcement will enable £24bn in total investment in the energy networks up until 2021.
However, an Ofgem spokesperson told the BBC that over half of the £12 bill increase was not due to physical investment in the network, but was instead because of a change in accounting rules which would mean that energy firms could no longer claim back tax on the cost of replacing parts of the network.
The regulator’s announcement represents a slight increase on the £22bn investment allowance that Ofgem initially proposed in July – adding an average £11 to bills – which was attacked by National Grid for being insufficient.
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A household is considered to be in fuel poverty if more than 10% of its income is spent on home heating.
“In analysing the proposals, we find numerous errors and questionable judgements which we cover in detail in our response,” the company had said of the initial plans in an open letter to Ofgem.
Under Ofgem’s revised proposal, the average increase in annual bills between 2013 and 2021 will equal £12, starting close to £8 at the beginning of the period, and rising to £15.10 by the end.
If National Grid chooses to challenge Ofgem’s new decision, it has until March to refer the matter to the Competition Commission.
National Grid and the distribution firms do not charge households directly for the cost of maintaining the grid, but the cost is instead passed through by electricity and gas suppliers.
The total cost of transmission and distribution comprises about 21% of gas bills and 10% of electricity bills.
Underground cables
Ofgem said that the increase in allowances compared with their July proposal was because the regulator had agreed to let gas network firms charge more for the cost of replacing gas mains.
Energy Secretary Ed Davey: “The big drivers on energy bills are wholesale and network costs”
National Grid operates the UK’s national electricity and gas grids, as well as four of the country’s eight regional gas distribution networks.
The electricity network in Scotland is owned by two other firms – Scottish and Southern and SP Energy Networks.
Ofgem had already reached an agreement with the Scottish firms in March over their investment plans, the cost of which will contribute £3.70 of the £12 average bill increase, to be borne equally across all UK households.
The planned investment spending across the UK is split between £15.5bn on electricity transmission and distribution, and £8.7bn on gas.
The investments will, among other things, hook up new wind farms and nuclear power stations to the electricity grid to replace traditional coal-fired power stations, and enable more liquefied natural gas imported from Qatar and elsewhere to be added to the gas network as North Sea gas supplies dwindle.
Other improvements will include the running of new and some existing high voltage cables underground, particularly where they affect areas of outstanding natural beauty, and the construction of a new undersea link connecting Scotland with England and Wales.
The spending on the gas network will also finance spending by the energy firms on raising public awareness about the risk of carbon monoxide poisoning.
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LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) — A navy helicopter crashed Saturday in the country’s oil-rich southern delta, killing a state governor and five other people, in the latest air disaster to hit Africa’s most populous nation, officials said.
Nigeria‘s ruling party said in a statement that the governor of the central Nigerian state of Kaduna, Patrick Yakowa, died in the helicopter crash in Bayelsa state in the Niger Delta. The People’s Democratic Party’s statement described Yakowa’s death as a “colossal loss.”
The statement said the former national security adviser, General Andrew Azazi, also died in the crash. Azazi was fired in June amid growing sectarian violence in Nigeria, but maintained close ties with the government.
Yushau Shuaib, a spokesman for Nigeria’s National Emergency Management Agency, said four other bodies had been found, but he could not immediately give their identities.
The crash occurred at about 3:30 p.m. after the navy helicopter took off from the village of Okoroba in Bayelsa state where officials had gathered to attend the burial of the father of a presidential aide, said Commodore Kabir Aliyu. He said that the helicopter was headed for Nigeria’s oil capital of Port Harcourt when it crashed in the Nembe area of Bayelsa state.
Aviation disasters remain common in Nigeria, despite efforts in recent years to improve air safety.
In October, a plane made a crash landing in central Nigeria. A state governor and five others sustained injuries but survived.
In June, a Dana Air MD-83 passenger plane crashed into a neighborhood in the commercial capital of Lagos, killing 153 people onboard and at least 10 people on the ground. It was Nigeria’s worst air crash in nearly two decades.
In March, a police helicopter carrying a high-ranking police official crashed in the central Nigerian city of Jos, killing four people.
LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Gravitas Ventures and Variance Films have acquired all North American rights to writer-director Mark Webber‘s drama “The End of Love,” the companies announced on Thursday.
The father-son drama, which debuted at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, stars Webber alongside Shannyn Sossamon (pictured), and Webber’s real-life son Isaac Love, and features appearances by Michael Cera, Jason Ritter, and Amanda Seyfried.
The film tells the story of struggling actor Mark (Webber), who is forced to grapple with his inability to grow up when the mother of his two-year-old son Isaac suddenly dies. As he kindles a relationship with a young single mother, Mark begins to realize that he can no longer remain in denial about the real-life consequences his choices have on Isaac.
Gravitas Ventures will debut the film across all major video on demand (VOD) platforms on January 21, 2013 with a theatrical release from Variance Films beginning March 1 2013 in select markets.
“Propelled by the authenticity and intimacy of the performances, our acquisition team was unanimous that ‘The End of Love’ was one of the strongest films not only of Sundance, but of all of the films we saw last year,” said Nolan Gallagher, founder and CEO of Gravitas Ventures.
“I’m thrilled that ‘The End of Love’ has found a home with Gravitas and Variance,” said Webber. “In the rapidly changing landscape of how films are seen, these two companies are at the forefront of embracing that change.”
