10 Dicas para seu iPad ou iPhone - Wall Street Journal

Own an iPhone or iPad? Chances are there are some functions you're still not aware of. WSJ's Katherine Boehret has drawn up a list of 10 to help you get the most out of your devices.

It's with you every moment of every day. It reminds you of little things that you sometimes forget, like calling friends on their birthdays and picking up the dry cleaning. It sleeps by your side, resting when you rest and working when you work. It even talks back once in a while. But how well do you really know your iPhone?

After months of watching friends and family use their iPhones and iPads, I realized most of them were missing out on a lot of features. I'll walk you through 10 things you might not know your iPhone and iPad can do. Aficionados may know most of these, but typical users likely won't.

1. Directly Access Apps

If you're like most people, you have your iPhone set to show some pop-up notifications. They might show up on the home screen when you get a Facebook notification, or a text message, for instance, and even when the phone is locked and the screen is asleep. To open these messages, you don't have to first swipe to unlock your phone and then open the app. As long as your device isn't protected by a four-digit security code, swipe from left to right on the notification to open the app in which the message appeared. If you do use a code, you'll be prompted to enter it after swiping the notification.

2. Tap to Scroll Up

Give your pointer finger a rest from scrolling up, up, up to get back to the top of a page. Tap once on the status bar—where the time and battery life are displayed—at the top edge of the iPhone or iPad screen and you'll jump up to the top. This works for websites, email, Contacts and many other apps.

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Gary Hovland

3. Keyboard Shortcuts

Tapping on a glass keyboard has its downsides, but a few shortcuts could ease the experience. Tap and hold the "Compose new message" button in Mail to automatically bring up all your saved email drafts. And rather than switching to the number keyboard and then switching back to the letter keyboard, tap and hold the "123" key, then drag it to a number to select it. When you lift your finger from the number, the letter keyboard will appear again.

When entering an email address, hold down the period key to see other address endings. Add emoticons to your keyboard by choosing: Settings, General, Keyboard, International Keyboards, Add New Keyboard, Emoji. When entering a Web address in the browser, hold down the .com key to see alternate URL endings, like .org and .edu.

You can split the iPad's on-screen keyboard in two so you can grasp the iPad with two hands and type with your thumbs. This is on by default, though you might not know it. (To check, go to Settings, General, Keyboard and Split Keyboard.) To see the split keyboard anytime you're using the regular keyboard, spread your two thumbs from the center of the keyboard out. Or just tap and hold the keyboard icon (bottom right corner) and select Split. An Undock option also appears and this lets you move the keyboard up or down.

4. Speed from App to App

The iPhone and iPad have many apps running in the background. There are shortcuts for jumping around apps without going to the home screen. Double tap the Home button (a physical button below the screen) to see a pop-up tray of apps and swipe to the left to scroll through them. Select one to jump to it. On the iPad, do this is by placing four fingers on the screen and swiping all of them up at once. This and other multitask gestures are on by default on the iPad 2 and newest iPad. But you have to turn them on with the first-generation iPad by going to Settings, General, Multitask Gestures.

5. Take Screenshots

Ever see something on your iPhone or iPad screen and wish you could save that image, but can't figure out how? Press the Home button and the On/Off button (top right edge) simultaneously to take a screenshot of whatever you see on the device. You'll hear the same sound as when you take a picture with the Camera app. You can find all of your screenshots stored in Camera Roll, along with your photos, and share them via email or social networks as you do regular photos.

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Apple

Splitting the iPad's on-screen keyboard in two lets you grasp the iPad with two hands and type with your thumbs. This is on by default—though you may not know it.

6. Swipe to Search

Another way to quickly find apps on an iPhone or iPad is to swipe left-to-right from the home screen. This reveals a search box in which you can type the name of any app to jump right to it. This search also finds contacts, emails, calendar items and texts, as well as other things.

7. Read Websites More Easily

Stop struggling to read overcrowded Web pages on the iPhone's small screen. Instead, tap the Reader button, found in the URL bar at the top of a Web page, and you'll see a much clearer, predominantly text version of the page. Even better: This view hides advertisements. It doesn't work with all websites. This also works on the iPad.

8. A Smarter Camera (iPhone)

If you've ever wished your iPhone camera had a physical shutter button, look no further. The phone's volume up (+) button doubles as a shutter button whenever the Camera app is opened. This hard button feels sturdier all around, plus it makes it a cinch to take self-portraits or to tell strangers how to take a photo of you and your friends.

And speaking of handing your phone to strangers, don't forget about the lock-screen shortcut for opening the Camera: Slide up the camera icon (found at the bottom right of the home screen) to open Camera without unlocking the phone. You can do this with anyone's phone, regardless of whether or not you know their password because it only opens the Camera app, locking you out of all other apps—and other photos and videos—on the phone. Just the photos or videos you take at that moment will be visible to you.

9. Digital Picture Frame (iPad)

Put your iPad to work as a digital picture frame for a photo slide show. Tap the Picture Frame icon, which appears to the right of the slide-to-unlock bar on the lock screen.

If you own an iPad case, flip it into its stand-up position, place the iPad on a table, press the Picture Frame icon and walk away. Guests in your home will have to unlock the iPad to access other apps.

Photos can be pulled from all photos or specific albums, events or images of certain faces. Make these and other slide-show adjustments in Settings, Picture Frame.

10. Mute or Screen Lock (iPad)

The same button on the right edge of your iPad that locks the screen in portrait or landscape mode can double as a mute button. This comes in handy if you find yourself frequently muting the iPad. Change this button's default lock function by going into Settings, General, Use side switch to: Lock Rotation or Mute. By default, this button is on Lock Rotation. Another quick way to mute is by pulling up the multitask bar by double tapping Home (or using a four-finger swipe up), then swiping left-to-right to see a mute, as well as sliders for volume and screen brightness.

You can find more tips at Apple.com/iphone/tips.

Write to Katherine Boehret at katie.boehret@wsj.com

A version of this article appeared August 22, 2012, on page D1 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: Ten Tips and Tricks Every iPhone and iPad User Should Know.

Intelectuais publicos: debate no Olimpo (Fareed Zakaria; Niall Ferguson)

Intellectual power and responsibility in an age of superstars

Daniel W. Drezner

Foreign Policy, August 23, 2012

In the last few weeks, Fareed Zakaria and Niall Ferguson have found themselves at the centers of controversy. As someone who has written a thing or two about public intellectuals, I confess to finding it all very fascinating. What's striking to me is the vehemence on all sides.  Brad DeLong is an excitable sort, but calling for Harvard to fire Niall Ferguson for tendentious matters unrelated to his scholarly work seems... a bit much. Last week the Washington Post ran a story falsely accusing Zakaria of another act of plagiarism... without independently checking to see if the charge had any validity. 

On the other hand, the defenses that have been mounted also seem a bit over the top. Tunku Varadarajan defended Zakaria in Newsweek with an essay that bordered on the sycophantic, all the while accusing Zakaria's accusers of simple envy:

What one has seen in the past few days can only be described as a hideous manifestation of envy—Fareed Envy. Henry Kissinger’s aphorism about academia (where the “politics are so vicious precisely because the stakes are so small”) applies with delicious tartness to journalism, where media reporters of the kind who hounded Zakaria occupy the lowest rung and exult at the prospect of pulling people down. Zakaria, by contrast, is insanely successful by the standards of his profession: he has a TV show to which few people of any prominence would refuse an invitation, plus columns at Time, CNN.com, and The Washington Post. He also writes academic-lite books that presidents clutch as they clamber aboard planes, and gives speeches at—it is said—$75,000 a pop. He is as much a brand as he is a journalist: he has “inc.” in his veins.

Zakaria himself responded to the Post's bogus second charge of plagiarism in a somewhat curious manner. Here's what he told them: 

Zakaria, in an interview Monday, defended the practice of not attributing quotes in a popular book. “As I write explicitly [in the book], this is not an academic work where everything has to be acknowledged and footnoted,” he said. The book contains “hundreds” of comments and quotes that aren’t attributed because doing so, in context, would “interrupt the flow for the reader,” he said.

He compared his technique to other popular non-fiction authors. “Please look at other books in this genre and you will notice that I'm following standard practice,” he said.

“I should not be judged by a standard that's not applied to everyone else,” he added. “People are piling on with every grudge or vendetta. The charge is totally bogus.”

Ferguson responded to his critics in a similar fashion: 

The other day, a British friend asked me if there was anything about the United States I disliked. I was happily on vacation and couldn’t think of anything. But now I remember. I really can’t stand America’s liberal bloggers....

My critics have three things in common. First, they wholly fail to respond to the central arguments of the piece. Second, they claim to be engaged in “fact checking,” whereas in nearly all cases they are merely offering alternative (often silly or skewed) interpretations of the facts. Third, they adopt a tone of outrage that would be appropriate only if I had argued that, say, women’s bodies can somehow prevent pregnancies in case of “legitimate rape.”

Their approach is highly effective, and I must remember it if I ever decide to organize an intellectual witch hunt. What makes it so irksome is that it simultaneously dodges the central thesis of my piece and at the same time seeks to brand me as a liar.

I'd feel more sympathy towards Ferguson if his term "liberal blogosphere" obfuscates the fact that a Nobel Prize-winning economist is rebutting Ferguson on his use of facts, and then Ferguson didn't compound his economic errors in a Bloomberg interview. 

So what the hell is going on? 

I think there are three interlocking things going on that explain why everyone feels so cranky.  The first, as I alluded to in my Zakaria post, is that the economics of superstars has now reached the world of public intellectuals.  There's been a lot of talk about "brands" recently, and it gets at how the rewards for intellectual output have expanded at the upper strata: 

Not that long ago, getting a column in Time would have been the pinnacle of a journalist’s career. But expectations and opportunities have grown in the last few years. Many writers now market themselves as separate brands, and their journalism works largely as a promotion for more lucrative endeavors like writing books and public speaking.

Replace "journalist" with "intellectual" and that paragraph still works.  Credentialed thinkers like Zakaria and Ferguson, once they've reached the top, become brands that can multiply their earning potential far more than was the case fifty years ago.  The ways in which the Internet concentrates attention on a Few Big Things means that if you are good and lucky enough to become one of those Big Things, money will rain down on your door.  Over at Esquire, Stephen Marche proffered this explanation for what he would call Ferguson's intellectual devolution:

The real issue isn't the substance of Ferguson's argument, though, which is shallow and basically exploded by this point in time. It isn't even the question of how such garbage managed to be written and published. It is, rather, why did Ferguson write it? The answer is simple but has profound implications for American intellectual life generally: public speaking.

Ferguson's critics have simply misunderstood for whom Ferguson was writing that piece. They imagine that he is working as a professor or as a journalist, and that his standards slipped below those of academia or the media. Neither is right. Look at his speaking agent's Web site. The fee: 50 to 75 grand per appearance. That number means that the entire economics of Ferguson's writing career, and many other writing careers, has been permanently altered. Nonfiction writers can and do make vastly more, and more easily, than they could ever make any other way, including by writing bestselling books or being a Harvard professor. Articles and ideas are only as good as the fees you can get for talking about them. They are merely billboards for the messengers.

That number means that Ferguson doesn't have to please his publishers; he doesn't have to please his editors; he sure as hell doesn't have to please scholars. He has to please corporations and high-net-worth individuals, the people who can pay 50 to 75K to hear him talk. That incredibly sloppy article was a way of communicating to them: I am one of you. I can give a great rousing talk about Obama's failures at any event you want to have me at.

Now, railing at the One Percent aside (*cough* Esquire's target demograpic *cough*) Marche is really onto something here. I've heard from a few sources that Ferguson resigned his professorship at Harvard Business School (but not Harvard University) because he calculated that if he gave four or five extra talks a year, he could earn his HBS salary without all the tedious teaching obligations. 

Zakaria and Ferguson got to where they are by dint of their own efforts, but the thing about the superstar phenomenon is that there's also an element of caprice involved. The gap between Zakaria and Ferguson, and their replacement-level deep thinkers is pretty narrow; the gap in the financial and intellectual rewards is pretty vast.

So I suspect that there is a bit of jealousy and resentment in some of the criticisms being leveled. These guys earn many multiples of the median intellectual income -- and I guarantee you that the median intellectual doesn't think that either Ferguson or Zakaria is many times smarter. 

The top tier of public intellectuals are doing well in this world, and the best are pretty savvy at marketing their ideas across multiple platforms in a Web 2.0 world. But the same dynamics that push these people to the top also increase their vulnerability to intellectual criticism. As I noted a few years ago:

The most useful function of bloggers is when they engage in the quality control of other public intellectuals. [Richard] Posner believed public intellectuals were in decline because there was no market discipline for poor quality. Even if public intellectuals royally screw up, he argued, the mass public is sufficiently disinterested and disengaged for it not to matter. Bloggers are changing this dynamic, however. If Michael Ignatieff, Paul Krugman or William Kristol pen substandard essays, blogs have and will provide a wide spectrum of critical feedback.

One can clearly add Niall Ferguson and Fareed Zakaria to this list. Furthermore, the very act of trying to market ideas across platforms -- and the constant drive to generate new content -- leaves these intellectuals vulnerable to criticism. They can get sloppy, like Zakaria, and commit a near-fatal error. They can be tendentious in their use of facts, like Ferguson, and suffer reputational damage. Or, they can simple debase themselves to the point where Evgeny Morozov goes medieval on them. 

For high-flying intellectuals, this kind of public criticism clearly wounds. What the superstar phenomenon gives, it can also threaten to take away (though, to be honest, scandals and bad writing don't seem to actually take away rewards all that often). But in the mind of top-tier public intellectuals, effort and intellect drive their accomplishments, not fortuna. They see online criticism and interpret it as jealousy, pettiness and ideological score-settling. A lot of the time that's exactly what it is -- but the online intellectual ecosystem is also pretty good at fact-checking and substantive criticism. Publc intellectuals don't see that these kinds of criticisms are the flip-side of the very phenomenon that is enriching them in the first place. They also don't realize that in a Web 2.0 world, mere bloggers can fact-check them and scorn them for a lack of citation. 

Which leads to the last thing that I think is going on: this superstar phenomenon is invading one of the last spheres of life where money is not necessarily the Most Important Thing. Getting a Ph.D. means being socialized into a world where an academic job is considered more respectable than becoming a consultant that earns gazillions more in money. The currency in the academic economy is intellectual respect. Even if public criticism doesn't affect their real-world income, it does affect their intellectual standing. Even if Zakaria has left the academy, and Ferguson can "transcend" it, they were socialized into this value system, and they clearly care what their peers think. 

Zakaria's argument that general nonfiction shouldn't be held to the standards of academic discourse rankles academics who know that he should know better -- the first instinct of any person with graduate training is to read the literature and cite, cite, cite. As my friend Delia Lloyd put it:  "I find him culpable because Zakaria comes from the world of academia.... Plagiarism may not be  a major moral failing... in the university setting in which Zakaria was trained and credentialed, it’s pretty much one of the worst crimes you can commit."

As for Ferguson, Timothy Burke blogs about what it is exactly about Ferguson's career arc that nettles him: 

Ferguson would feel more like he was still within the bounds if he either investigated his own distaste for Obama in more reflective, philosophical and recursive ways or if he was willing to lay out a generalized, prescriptive theory of political leadership that didn’t fitfully move the goalposts on intensely granular or particular issues every few seconds. Why? Because I think scholarship requires some measure of self-aware and reflective movement between what you know and what you believe, and the relationship between your own movements and those of your professional peers... A scholar has to believe on some level that things are known or understood only after being investigated, tested, read, interpreted, that there’s something unseemly about robbing the graves and morgues for cast-off “facts” in order to assemble them into a shambling, monstrous conclusion built from a hackish blueprint. Being an intellectual takes some form of thoughtfulness, some respect for evidence and truth, something that goes beyond hollow, sleazy rhetoric that plays dumb every time it gets caught out truncating quotes or doctoring charts. Being an expert means you guide an audience through what is known and said about a subject with some respect for the totality of that knowing and saying before favoring your own interpretation.

Public intellectuals who have PhDs do not want to lose their standing as scholars.  Sure, they can gin up psychological defenses against the hidebound ivory tower, but criticism like the one quoted above will leave a permanent mark. They'll have their riches, but they won't have what they were trained to crave more than anything -- respect. 

In the end, what I think is going on is that, contra Russell Jacoby, top-tier public intellectals have acquired greater power than they used to possess. What they resist on occasion is the responsibility that comes with that power. 

So that's what I think is going on. What do you think? 

Apple: muita gente vai perder dinheiro...

Durante toda a minha vida computacional -- que se estende desde a segunda metade dos anos 1980 -- nunca tive, e nunca comprei para mim nenhum outro computador que não fosse Apple; comprei todos os modelos, quase todos eles, ao longo desse período, mesmo pagando um pouco mais caro do que os modelos da linha MS-DOS e depois (R)Windows. Ou seja, eu sou um MacAddicted, e orgulhoso de sê-lo.
Mesmo assim, eu não compraria uma ação da companhia a 600 dólares. Acho que isso não vai se sustentar, e quem está comprando a esse preço, se não vender antes da debâcle, vai perder dinheiro...
Paulo Roberto de Almeida

Apple

A good Cook

Tim Cook’s first year as the technology giant’s boss has been a success. But the toughest test lies ahead

Aug 25th 2012 | SAN FRANCISCO | from the print edition

TALK about a hard act to follow. When Tim Cook replaced an ailing Steve Jobs as Apple’s chief executive on August 24th last year, he took over from the nearest thing the tech world had to a rock star. Some people wondered out loud how Jobs’s more humble second-in-command would fare in the absence of the firm’s brash and brilliant co-founder, who died in October. They need not have worried. As Mr Cook celebrates his first anniversary at Apple’s helm, the company continues to smash records.

On August 20th Apple’s market capitalisation reached over $623 billion, making it the most valuable listed company (if you ignore inflation) of all time. That title was previously held by Microsoft, another tech titan, whose market worth hit $615 billion in December 1999. Much of the credit for Apple’s phenomenal success goes to Jobs, the father of the iPhone and the iPad tablet computer. But Mr Cook also deserves praise for the way he has handled a tricky transition.

In this section

• The ineluctable middlemen
• Printers sink
• »A good Cook
• Delivering the goods
• Another click on the wall
• Upwardly mobile
• The mommy track

Reprints

The process has not been without hiccups. In July Apple’s share price fell sharply after the company’s quarterly earnings disappointed investors, even though its net profit rose by 21%, to $8.8 billion. And earlier in the year Apple was lambasted for its use of Foxconn, a supplier under fire from labour activists for failings such as excessive working hours at its Chinese facilities. Mr Cook promptly went on a highly publicised tour of a Foxconn factory in China. Apple and Foxconn subsequently pledged to improve workers’ conditions there. This week the Fair Labour Association, a non-profit group that audits workplaces, said progress had been made, but more still needed to be done to cut overtime hours without unduly harming workers’ incomes.

Veteran Apple-watchers say this and other episodes are a sign that Mr Cook is more likely to pay attention to opinions outside Apple than his predecessor. “I think he’s a little bit more sensitive to criticism than Steve Jobs was,” says Tim Bajarin of Creative Strategies, a consultancy. Apple’s boss has certainly listened to calls from Wall Street for the company to hand back some of its cash hoard, something Jobs was notoriously reluctant to do. Earlier this month, Apple paid its first dividend since 1995.

In addition to disarming critics and delighting investors, Apple has been dishing out lawsuits. As The Economist went to press, a testy court battle in America between the firm and Samsung over various patents connected with smartphones and tablet computers was drawing to a close. Like his mentor, Mr Cook is clearly not afraid of a fight. He also seems to be developing other Jobs-like traits, including a penchant for pithy put-downs. Asked on an analysts’ call whether personal computers and tablets could one day merge into a single device, Mr Cook shot back: “You can converge a toaster and a refrigerator, but those things are probably not going to be pleasing to the user.”

The big question is whether Apple’s boss has also learnt enough from his predecessor to keep the creative juices at the company flowing freely. In a blog post earlier this year George Colony, the boss of Forrester, a research firm, noted that the fortunes of companies such as Sony and Disney faded after their charismatic founders departed. He predicted that Apple would suffer a similar fate after coasting for a while on the back of existing products. But if Mr Cook can keep the firm’s talented senior executives on board and inspire them to conquer new markets like digital TV, where Apple has yet to make much of an impact, the firm could buck this trend. His big screen test awaits.

Economia ao contrario na Venezuela: escasez de gasolina

Venezuela enfrenta escasez de gasolina

Venezuela – El Nuevo Herald – 23/08/2012

Venezuela, país que presume de contar con las mayores reservas petroleras del mundo, enfrenta agudos problemas de escasez de gasolina provocados por un pronunciado deterioro en su sistema de refinación, así como por los gigantescos volúmenes del combustible que son contrabandeados fuera del país.

Expertos consultados indicaron que el país sudamericano ha pasado de exportador a importador de gasolina bajo el mandato del presidente Hugo Chávez, cuyo gobierno ahora se ve obligado a importar desde Estados Unidos el combustible, así como los componentes para elaborarlo, no sólo para el consumo interno, sino también para que la estatal Petróleos de Venezuela, S.A. (PDVSA), pueda cumplir con los compromisos contractuales adquiridos con sus clientes.

Los expertos temen que el gobierno optará por racionar el combustible ante su incapacidad de contener el contrabando y aumentar su capacidad de refinación.

De cierto modo, ya comenzó a hacerlo, declaró Juan Fernández, ex director ejecutivo de planificación de PDVSA, haciendo referencia a una disposición gubernamental que obliga a los automovilistas en los estados fronterizos a colocar un chip en sus vehículos que mide la cantidad de combustible que se les echa.

La medida, que generó grandes protestas en el estado Zulia, viene acompañada de una normativa que limita las compras del combustible a sólo 41 litros (10.83 galones) cada dos días, en un intento por controlar el masivo contrabando de gasolina hacia Colombia.

Aún cuando la medida por el momento no parece ser tan drástica, Fernández señaló que esto podría ser sólo el comienzo.

“Como todas estas economías donde todo se termina deteriorando, todo se arregla racionando a la gente, controlando a la gente, y eso es lo que estamos viendo con este supuesto chip, que es una medida de racionamiento introducida bajo la excusas de un contrabando que no se resuelve de esa manera”, comentó Fernández en una entrevista telefónica.

“Esto es una arruga que el gobierno va a comenzar a correr [extender], porque hoy empieza en los estados fronterizos, pero luego va ir un poco más allá, alcanzando los estados cercanos a los estados fronterizos, y como el sistema está en déficit, al final veremos como la arruga se va corriendo hasta que esté todo el mundo bajo un sistema de control de su consumo”, señaló.

El sistema está en déficit debido a una combinación de factores que van desde una abrupta caída en la capacidad de producción del país, un incremento en el parque automotor y la fuga de miles de barriles de la extremadamente barata gasolina venezolana a Colombia, Brasil y Guyana.

“Es una combinación perfecta”, afirmó Horacio Medina, ex gerente de PDVSA. “Mientras estén estos factores en juego va a ser muy difícil resolver este problema”.

El que Venezuela cuente con una insuficiente capacidad de refinación es paradójico para un país que alardea de disponer de la mayor reserva de crudo del planeta, calculada en unos 316,000 millones de barriles, y que hace 10 años exportaba gasolina a otros países, incluyendo a EEUU.

Hoy en día, es EEUU el país que vende crudo a Venezuela en grandes volúmenes.

Según el Departamento de Energía, el país sudamericano importó un millón de barriles de gasolina terminada durante tan sólo el mes de diciembre del 2011, volumen que aunado al total de compras de crudo y derivados petroleros de EEUU un total de 2.21 millones de barriles.

Los expertos señalaron que la capacidad de refinación en Venezuela ha sido desmantelada a lo largo de los últimos 10 años, primero por la decisión del gobierno de Chávez de vender las refinarías que PDVSA tenía en el exterior, y luego debido a una cadena de accidentes y problemas de mantenimiento en las principales refinerías del país.

Por otro lado, Venezuela no ha construido una sola refinería desde que Chávez se instauró en el poder, pese a que ha prometido construir decenas de ellas, dentro y fuera del país. Por ejemplo, el martes prometió dos nuevas instalaciones.

Sólo una de esas promesas parece estar concretándose por el momento, la que le hizo a los hermanos Castro de construir una refinería en Matanzas, Cuba.

Por otro lado, el suministro de combustible nacional también está siendo afectado por el masivo contrabando, que se ha convertido en una gigantesca fuente de corrupción.

Estas operaciones son muy lucrativas debido a los gigantescos subsidios que el gobierno brinda al consumo de gasolina de Venezuela, donde un galón puede ser adquirido por 12 centavos de dólar.

“Si en Venezuela el precio es de dos centavos de dólar por litro, y en Cúcuta, Colombia, al otro lado de la frontera es de un dólar treinta. Tienes sesenta veces la diferencia de precio y eso te da para todo”, comentó Fernández.

Pero los volúmenes involucrados demuestran que la fuga no ocurre principalmente a través de individuos que llenan el tanque y luego cruzan la frontera para venderla en el país vecino, aunque no hay duda de que una pequeña porción del contrabando se realiza de esa manera.

Medina explicó que son camiones tanqueros y gabarras de río transportando miles de galones de gasolina los que cruzan la frontera diariamente para venderlos en Colombia, operaciones que sin duda no pondrían ser realizadas sin algún tipo de complicidad por parte de las autoridades encargadas de cuidar la frontera.

“Estamos hablando de miles de millones de dólares que se están perdiendo de esta manera. Es mucho dinero, y es un dinero que no se lo llevan los taxistas en los tanques de gasolina de sus vehículos”, sostuvo.

Uruguai: um paraíso financeiro? - Bob Bauman (Sovereign Investor)

Os EUA estão "apertando" -- para usar um termo moderado -- a Suíça, em razão de suas regras laxistas em matéria fiscal e tributária e, sobretudo, por causa de seu regime bancário, baseado no segredo bancário e no anonimato das contas individuais dos estrangeiros. Ou seja, a Suíça já não é mais o que era...
Os investidores americanos se voltam, assim para o Uruguai, um recurso já conhecido de evasores argentinos, brasileiros e vários outros na região, com muitas facilidades financeiras e total segredo de valores e transações envolvidas.
A matéria abaixo, de um consultor que quer uma comissão sobre o seu dinheiro, pretende ensinar os americanos a recorrer aos bancos uruguaios, em lugar dos suíços. Sorte deles...
 Paulo Roberto de Almeida

As Swiss Banks Close Their Doors, Look to Uruguay
By Bob Bauman JD, Offshore and Asset Protection Editor

The “Switzerland of Latin America” – that’s the phrase I used six months ago when I wrote to you from Punta del Este, Uruguay. I was referring to the delightful South American country I was visiting for the first time.

But that catchy phrase was not mine: 61 years ago, in the shattered wake of World War II, Uruguay was described as the "Switzerland of the Americas" in a 1951 New York Times article.

Uruguay earned that unusual name because of its popularity as a safe haven for capital and precious metals fleeing Europe at the time, and for its adoption of careful, Swiss-inspired banking laws and customs.

When I wrote about Uruguay back in March, I got some serious grief from good friends in Switzerland, claiming I had abandoned their country, which I had always called the world’s leading offshore financial center. Well, my friends, I still say that … but Switzerland and the Swiss have got some major problems of their own making – and anyone planning personal financial activities has to keep them in mind.

Money Taking Flight

In the three years since the tawdry UBS-American tax evasion scandal was exposed, Swiss government politicians have tried to shield UBS and other threatened Swiss banks by capitulating to U.S. IRS pressures, too often at the expense of American clients. Thousands of U.S. names have been turned over to the IRS.

In effect, this has all but repealed the 1934 Bank Secrecy Law, ironically even as Swiss courts have upheld that law. As a self-serving byproduct of this, thousands of innocent Americans with Swiss bank accounts suddenly found themselves dumped in a wave of unjustified financial ethnic cleansing by nervous Swiss banks.

The truth is, there are still very solid Swiss banks that do welcome American clients. We know who they are, and we can arrange accounts with very little trouble for our Sovereign Society members.

But Swiss banking experts themselves openly now say that Swiss banks must lure affluent clients from emerging markets or face a slow death as the pursuit of tax dodgers by the U.S. IRS and European tax-collection hounds results in more fleeing assets.

Western Europeans may pull as much as US$139 billion, or 15% of their holdings, from Swiss banks, claims Herbert Hensle of Cap Gemini SA. Bank Sarasin & Cie AG reported last week that private clients withdrew US$308 billion from Swiss locations in the 12 months leading up to June 2012.

Switzerland built the world’s biggest offshore wealth center during an era of “black money” that ended when the U.S. sued UBS three years ago. Many of the highest fee-generating European and U.S. customers are withdrawing funds as the hunt for tax evaders widens.

As many as 100 Swiss banks will vanish, according to Vontobel Chief Executive Officer Zeno Staub. (Vontobel is one of the cooperative Swiss banks with which we work).

Solid and Confidential

By comparison, Uruguay’s banking system is solid, appealing to investors and depositors from around the world who seek a safe haven that also offers tax advantages. Since January 1, 2008, almost 400 banks have failed in the United States … meanwhile, Uruguay’s banks have operated without problems. While the U.S. GDP has shrunk, Uruguay’s continues to grow.

Unlike too many other offshore banks around the world, banks in Uruguay welcome American clients. Most banks offer e-banking, but a personal visit is required to open an account.

Uruguay’s financial reputation has made it an important regional financial center for all Latin America. There are 11 private banks, plus the government central bank, Banco de la República (BROU), that strictly supervises all banks in the country.

The private banks are totally or partially owned by leading American or European financial institutions. Banco Itaú and Lloyds TSB in Montevideo usually accept non-resident American clients in their retail banking branches. In addition, attesting to its regional banking role, there are over 30 representative offices of foreign banks.

Financial Privacy Guaranteed By Law

Unlike the United States, where the PATRIOT Act has destroyed financial privacy, Uruguay’s protection is based on a bank secrecy statute (Law #15,322, 1982) that forbids banks to share information with anyone – including the government of Uruguay and foreign governments.

The only exceptions allowed are in cases involving issues of alimony, child support, or alleged crimes such as foreign tax evasion and fraud. Even then, information can be shared only after obtaining a local court order.

The country does not automatically exchange tax or bank account information with the U.S., Canada or any other government. Uruguay does comply with Article 26 of the Organization for Economic and Community Development’s (OECD) model standards for tax information exchange requests. That is, banks may exchange information upon proof of foreign tax evasion or tax fraud.

In keeping with current international “political correctness,” Uruguay’s government does not want the country labeled as a “tax haven.” Nevertheless, Uruguay is, in fact, an offshore tax haven that imposes very few taxes on foreign residents living here.

A frase da semana: Adam Smith sobre as universidades

É sabido que Adam Smith, antes de se tornar o consagrado professor da Universidade de Glasgow, na Escócia, andou por Oxford, na Inglaterra, e de lá saiu com uma péssima impressão, achando-a medíocre, segundo seus padrões exigentes.
Eis o que ele escreveu depois sobre as universidades:

“The improvements which, in modern times have been made in several different branches of philosophy, have not, the greater part of them, been made in universities, though some, no doubt, have. The greater part of universities have not even been very forward to adopt those improvements after they were made; and several of those learned societies have chosen to remain, for a long time, the sanctuaries in which exploded systems and obsolete prejudices found shelter and protection, after they had been hunted out of every other corner of the world. In general, the richest and best endowed
universities have been slowest in adopting those improvements, and the most averse to permit any considerable change in the established plan of education. Those improvements were more easily introduced into some of the poorer universities, in which the teachers, depending upon their reputation for the greater part of their subsistence, were obliged to pay more attention to the current opinions of the world.”

Smith, Adam:
An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
(p. 456). University of Chicago Press. Kindle Edition.

Ainda retiro esta informação do verbete sobre Smith na Wikipedia:

In Book V, Chapter II of The Wealth of Nations, Smith wrote: "In the University of Oxford, the greater part of the public professors have, for these many years, given up altogether even the pretence of teaching." Smith is also reported to have complained to friends that Oxford officials once discovered him reading a copy of David Hume's Treatise on Human Nature, and they subsequently confiscated his book and punished him severely for reading it.

So' com Portunhol, fica dificil fazer um curso decente...

Sem inglês, estudantes buscam países ibéricos

Correio Braziliense, 21 de Agosto de 2012
Dados do programa Ciência Sem Fronteiras mostram que a procura por instituições de ensino na Espanha e em Portugal é maior do que em nações de língua inglesa. Principal motivo é a falta do idioma. Para amenizar a deficiência, pasta estuda a criação de projeto de capacitação.
O programa de bolsas de estudos Ciência Sem Fronteiras, parceria do Ministério da Educação (MEC) e da Ciência, Tecnologia e Inovação, tem como principal barreira a falta de fluência, conversação e entendimento da língua inglesa pelos alunos brasileiros. Lançada oficialmente em dezembro do ano passado, a iniciativa concedeu até o momento 14.944 bolsas. Do total, somente 1.435 foram para o Reino Unido, os Estados Unidos e a Austrália. Em contrapartida, mais do que o dobro das vagas foram oferecidas em universidades espanholas e portuguesas. Os editais para esses países não cobram exame de proficiência.
 
Pesquisa realizada pela escola de inglês on-line Global English mostra a deficiência em números. O Brasil ficou em penúltimo lugar no ranking mundial dos países com melhor proficiência em inglês, na frente somente da Colômbia. O resultado é de um teste feito em 76 países, com foco na análise no nível de conhecimento da língua de Shakespeare. No Brasil, 13 mil pessoas fizeram a prova. Enquanto a média mundial foi de 4,15 pontos, a brasileira ficou em 2,95.
 
Maior entusiasta do Ciência Sem Fronteiras desde a época em que era ministro de Ciência e Tecnologia, o titular da pasta de Educação, Aloizio Mercadante, reconhece que muitos estudantes brasileiros optam por universidades da Espanha e de Portugal porque não têm a proficiência em inglês. O MEC identificou a baixa demanda de alunos inscritos para países anglófonos e deficiências na aplicação das avaliações de certificação TOEFL e IELTS no Brasil. "A gente poderia aumentar as vagas de Portugal e Espanha ou enfrentar o problema da proficiência em inglês. Eu prefiro enfrentar", afirmou. Como solução, o MEC elabora o projeto Inglês Sem Fronteiras, para auxiliar na integração dos estudantes brasileiros aos pré-requisitos do Ciência Sem Fronteiras.
 
"Vamos contratar professores por meio das universidades federais para dar cursos a esses alunos. Nós sabemos qual é a demanda e vamos atrás dela. Vamos ofertar aulas para garantir a proficiência em inglês e aumentar a procura nos próximos editais", adiantou Mercadante. Uma comissão com representantes da Associação Nacional dos Dirigentes das Instituições Federais de Ensino Superior (Andifes) e das autarquias do MEC, da Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (Capes) e do Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) foi criada em maio deste ano para planejar, organizar e gerenciar as ações do Inglês Sem Fronteiras, ainda sem data para ser lançado.
 
Christina da Silva Freitas, 23 anos, está de malas prontas para estudar por mais de um ano na Universidade de Granada, na Espanha. Apesar de feliz com a oportunidade, ela admite que não tentou vaga em uma instituição norte-americana ou inglesa porque ficou com medo de não passar no exame de certificação do idioma. "Eu fiz um curso de inglês, mas era mais de gramática. Eu achei que não fosse passar na parte de conversação. Como o edital para universidade espanhola não cobra proficiência, eu preferi", justifica. A chamada pública do Ciência Sem Fronteiras para as instituições espanholas oferece um curso de três meses do idioma para os universitários admitidos.
 
A estudante do 5º semestre de licenciatura em matemática na Universidade do Estado do Amazonas (UEA) vai para Espanha fazer um aprofundamento em álgebra. Christina, porém, vai estudar espanhol pela primeira vez, por meio do curso oferecido pelo governo federal. Ainda assim, ela disse não estar preocupada. "A dificuldade maior será falar. Sei das dificuldades que terei de enfrentar e estou disposta a encarar", analisa. Ela acredita que a falta de obrigatoriedade de língua justifica a maior concorrência nos editais para Portugal e Espanha. Na UEA, 10% dos estudantes admitidos no programa vão para Espanha.
 
Acordos - Em março deste ano, o MEC lançou duas chamadas públicas para convocar alunos brasileiros interessados em estudar em instituições de Portugal e da Espanha. Os acordos de cooperação foram assinados com o Conselho de Reitores das Universidades Portuguesas (CRUP), que agrega 16 universidades de Portugal, e com o Ministério da Educação, Cultura e Esporte da Espanha e a Fundación Universidad.es, que contempla 34 instituições espanholas.
 
Apesar de a oferta de universidades espanholas e portuguesas reunir instituições de peso, como Universidade de Coimbra, do Porto, ou Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, as instituições mais conceituadas e mais bem colocadas em rankings mundiais, como o Times Higer Education (THE) ou Ranking Web of World Universities (Webometrics), são norte-americanas.
 
Ensino Médio - Após a divulgação do Índice de Desenvolvimento da Educação Básica (Ideb) 2011, na semana passada, apontar estagnação no ensino médio, o MEC se reúne hoje (21) com representantes do Conselho Nacional de Secretários de Educação (Consed) para discutir a reformulação do antigo segundo grau. Na avaliação do ministro Aloizio Mercadante, os dados mostram que é preciso mudar. Além da reestruturação na etapa escolar, a pasta discute com a Andifes a adequação das universidades ao novo sistema de cotas sociais e raciais, que aguarda sanção presidencial.
 
No encontro com os representantes do Consed, Mercadante apresentará a sugestão de concentrar as disciplinas em quatro áreas do conhecimento, conforme o Exame Nacional do Ensino Médio (Enem). De acordo com o ministro, o currículo atual é muito fragmentado, com variações de 13 a 20 matérias. "Não vamos acabar com a química, a física, a biologia, mas organizá-las no campo da ciência da natureza. Com isso, os professores permanecem mais tempo nas mesmas escolas, não se dispersam em várias instituições, e ainda melhoram a relação com o aluno", aposta. A alteração, segundo Mercadante, abre espaço para que o Ideb seja aos poucos substituído pelo Enem. "O exame está se tornando um censo do ensino médio e, agora, com as cotas sociais, o interesse por ele vai crescer ainda mais", acredita.
 
Diante do cenário de estagnação dos últimos anos da educação básica e da instalação do novo sistema de reserva de vagas direcionado aos estudantes de escolas públicas, à população negra, parda e indígena, Mercadante levará aos reitores proposta para adaptação desses alunos. Uma das opções, segundo ele, é implementar curso de nivelamento capaz de corrigir as falhas, aliado ao acompanhamento pedagógico. "É melhor resolver o problema pela raiz do que acumular dependências", justifica. Antes de apostar na ideia, no entanto, ele ainda aguarda um levantamento com a quantidade de alunos provenientes de escolas públicas nas universidades federais e estaduais.
 
Educação integral - No programa semanal de rádio Café com a Presidenta, Dilma Rousseff defendeu ontem (20) a implementação de escolas em tempo integral e a reformulação na grade curricular, como soluções para o baixo desempenho do ensino médio. Segundo ela, os números do Ideb 2011 mostraram que o aprendizado no País melhorou em escolas que seguem este modelo. O programa Mais Educação do MEC já existe em 32 mil escolas públicas, sendo que em quase 18 mil delas a maioria dos alunos é beneficiária do Bolsa Família. "Nosso objetivo é ampliar o tempo na escola e, ao mesmo tempo, estamos assegurando acesso à alimentação de qualidade e ao esporte", disse.