Month: December 2007

Bill Gates buys stake in Mexican brewer Femsa
 — Reuters

Billionaire Bill Gates has taken a stake worth $392 million in Mexican brewer Femsa, according to a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing on Thursday.

[snip]

Femsa has three divisions: its soft drinks unit, Coca-Cola Femsa, (KOF.N: Quote, Profile, Research) (KOFL.MX: Quote, Profile, Research), its beer subsidiary, and also a retail operation, which runs Latin America’s largest corner store chain, known as Oxxo.

[snip]

Via Gizmodo.

From the Library Journal:

The Winnipeg Public Library, MB, now offers wi-fi to laptop users—for a price. According to Sam Katz, mayor of Manitoba’s capital, the city must charge $3 CDN an hour to laptop users to recoup the $23,000 it spent to install wireless Internet in all 20 library branches (and in the Pan Am Pool). “Winnipeg needs to be, you know, in the modern age,” Katz said at a September 10 news conference, as was reported by CBC News. “We need to be hip, and this is what it’s all about. It’s happening in other cities, and I certainly don’t want us to be the last ones.”

[snip]

Via Library Technology in Texas.

Car commercials, court TV bringing good jobs to the Bayou City
— Houston Business Journal

[snip]

The film industry, especially commercials and court TV, are bringing
good-paying jobs to the Bayou City, says Rick Ferguson, director of the
Houston Film Commission, a division of the Greater Houston Convention
and Visitors Bureau. And, he notes, it’s an industry with a minuscule
environmental footprint.

[snip]

In case of an emergency, ‘ICE’ can be a lifeline
Cell phone entry may help a hospital locate victim’s loved one
— Houston Chronicle²

[snip]

Allen is among a growing number of people who are putting ICE, or “in case of emergency,” telephone numbers in cell phones that could assist emergency personnel in case of an accident or illness.

“It’s nice to know that they (emergency personnel) know exactly what to look for,” she said. “They know to look for ‘ICE’ rather than husband, son or daughter-in-law.”

The practice requires a person to program ICE before a relative’s or friend’s number in the phone. If a patient is unconscious or nonresponsive, a paramedic or emergency room worker will look in the phone’s address book for an ICE number.

ICE is known worldwide. In Houston, however, it is only slowly catching on.

“I think the ICE thing is very, very important,” Allen said, “and I think it needs to be publicized more.”

Emergency personnel in Houston are aware of ICE. But Houston paramedics don’t use it as much as hospital emergency room workers.

[snip]

Footnotes
2 = article may expire in a few weeks

I logged into my MySpace account this morning and was greeted with a notice of an Amber Alert in my area. I didin’t know that this was a feature MySpace offered. I’m impressed, despite my regular cynicism about online services.