Koch Brothers - Products To Avoid

Koch Brothers - Products To Avoid

Want to boycott the Koch Brothers' products and not have your money going to support the Tea Party, more dirty polluting political shenanigans, attacks on workers rights to organize? Here's a quick list of the companies you should be avoiding. 

Anything That Georgia-Pacific Produces

First are Georgia-Pacific consumer products: Angel Soft, Quilted Northern, and Soft n Gentle toilet paper; Brawny paper towels; any of the Dixie plates, bowls and napkins; Sparkle, Vanity Fair and Zee napkins; Georgia-Pacific's paper products.

Frankly, many dedicated TreeHugger readers caring about buying post-consumer recycled paper products or (better) using reusable alternatives are probably already avoiding these brands. But if you're not, start.

Second are Georgia-Pacific building products. The list is quite extensive so I'll just refer you to Shoq Value's rundown of them.

Invista's Fabrics, Fibers and Polymers

Third are a whole bunch of products under the Invista banner: Coolmax, Cordura, Solarmax, Supplex, and Thermolite fabrics, as well as those containing Lycra; Comforel fiberfill; Dacron fibers; Somerelle bedding products; Stainmaster carpets and Tactesse carpet fiber. There are also a number of resins on the list.

Oil Refining, Fertilizers, Chemical Production, Cattle Ranching

In addition to those three big areas, Koch Industries is involved in huge range of activities: Pollution control equipment, oil refining, fertilizers--as well as the Matador Cattle Company.

Now, in terms of impact it's important to remember that the Koch Industries is a humungous empire--one of the two largest privately held companies in the United States--so in practical terms a boycott would have to grow by leaps and bounds before having a big impact. But it does have to start somewhere, and even if it doesn't symbolic action is important.

If all of the background on this has passed you by, Think Progress is a good place to start to get back up to speed.?  

Free Office 2013 Alternatives 

Not keen on ponying up the cash for Microsoft's new Office 2013? Check out these free Microsoft Office 2013 has officially hit the streets, and it offers a significantly upgraded interface, more tools, and perhaps most importantly, a cloud-friendly system that lets you work from anywhere. In any case, if you are part of the camp that is unconvinced by Microsoft's new offerings, then know that there are some fantastic and completely free alternatives out there. Here are four that we like.

---

Google Docs
Many Office users have been migrating to Google's productivity tools since long before Office 2013 and its yearly subscription came to be. That's because Google offers fantastically intuitive applications for creating text documents, spreadsheets, presentations, forms, and drawings. You can import and export Microsoft Office file types, and it's all completely free (for individual users, not businesses). A Google account is required, though.

One downside to Docs, of course, is that its functionality requires a Web connection and browser. To be clear, you can work with Docs while offline, but only through the Chrome browser, and your edits will only sync once you are reconnected to the Web. Another possible issue with Docs is compatibility, as we have seen text formatting get wonky when importing from Word. Still, because of its ease of use, broad functionality, and collaboration capabilities, Google Docs deserves its spot on this list of viable Office alternatives.One of the biggest draws of Google's offering is the collaboration that it makes possible. Because all of your editing takes place in the cloud, you can actually share documents with other Google users and work on them together in real time. What's more, Docs integrates well with other Google offerings, making it a great choice for dedicated Google users.

---

Microsoft Office Web Apps
This one is a no-brainer. If you're not keen on paying for Microsoft's full-featured desktop Office suite, then why not try using its trimmed-down cloud-based option for free? The suite consists of Web versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote.

For anyone who uses Office, Microsoft Office Web Apps should be a cinch to pick up. All of the compatibility you need is there, and I would even go so far as to say that this cloud-based suite's interface is quite a bit more elegant than Google's. Microsoft's cloud-based Office Web Apps are integrated with SkyDrive and are free for individuals to use.

---

LibreOffice
LibreOffice is an open-source office suite that was developed in 2010 after forking from the also outstanding and popular OpenOffice.org program. It is completely free downloadable desktop software, and it comes loaded with tools for word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, drawings, databases, and math formulas. With its slick interface and powerful arsenal of tools, LibreOffice is certainly one of the best free Office alternatives available today.

LibreOffice's interface should look and feel familiar to any seasoned Microsoft Office user, which means you should be able to hit the ground running immediately after downloading. It is eminently compatible with Microsoft's native file formats, but we have seen reports of minor text-formatting issues when importing files from Word. Still, with its five-star rating on CNET's Download.com, the free LibreOffice is definitely a good choice. It works on Windows, Mac, and Linux systems.

---

Kingsoft Office Suite Free 2012
When it comes to compatibility, Kingsoft is king. It can open Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files, and from what we've seen, can preserve all of Microsoft's formatting when doing so. For anyone looking for an Office replacement, this sort of worry-free compatibility is a huge deal.

Kingsoft Office Suite Free 2012 is available on Windows and has a companion app for Android. There is also a paid Pro version of Kingsoft's suite that offers a few extra power features like VBA functionality in spreadsheets.

Creating DVDs From VOB Files

Creating DVDs From VOB Files

I lifted this discussion from Isobuster.com.  I copied it here in case it ever becomes unavailable.  I found it very useful.

We are going to use VOBedit and IFOedit freeware programs to recreate DVDs from VOB files.  To be able to use Vobedit properly we need to rename the extracted VOB files like this:VTS_01_001.VOB, etc. It's very important for this tool that the file ends with double zero and then a consecutive number starting with 1, so _001.VOB, _002.VOB, _003.VOB and so on.

Now start up VobEdit.

1. Click the Open button and open the first VOB file (VTS_01_001.VOB).
2. Next, click Edit and select Join Clips

1. Next choose or create a new folder and preferably name it VIDEO_TS.
2. Use the proposed name of VTS_01_1.VOB.

1. In the next dialog box, check that the number is 1 and next click OK., 

VobEdit will now convert the renamed (_001,...) VOB files to VTS_01_1.VOB etc. The resulting VOB file(s) may be combined in one file, the sizes can be altered or there can be more files, it all depends.

After this process you end up with one or more new VOB files in a VIDEO_TS folder, which are also already named correctly, so that they can be used later on to produce a new Movie DVD.     

Now it's time to start up IfoEdit.

1. Click the Create IFOs button.
2. Open the first VTS_01_1.VOB file which was produced by VobEdit.
3. Make sure that the Same as source checkbox is checked!
4. Click OK.

IfoEdit will now create the IFO and BUP files:   

After the process is done you will see two lines in the top pane of IfoEdit:
VIDEO_TS.IFO and VTS_01.0.IFO.

1. Click the first line. Content will be displayed in the second (bottom) pane.
2. In the bottom pane, click the line that says VTS_1 Audio..., this triggers a popup dialog.
3. In the dialog, change the Language to English.
4. .  Click the OK button on the dialog.
5. Save and confirm when asked to overwrite. 

Repeat the same process again, but this time for the second line:

1. Click the second line. Content will be displayed in the second (bottom) pane
2. In the bottom pane,double click the line that says Audio 1:... which triggers a dialog to popup.
3. In the dialog, change the Language to English.
4. Click the OK button on the dialog.
5. Save and confirm when asked to overwrite.

As a last step:

1. Click the button Get VTS sectors.
2. Select Yes to process all IFO files when prompted.e        

You can now close IfoEdit. The result is a full set of IFO, BUP and VOB files in a VIDEO_TS folder on your HD. This set of files is (or should be) suitable to be burned with a standard write application, such as Nero for instance.

    

The Double-Headed Eagle

The Double-Headed Eagle

I am trying to get through David Starkey's Churchills on Channel Four, and I noticed that the emblem of the family is a double- headed Eagle.  I have always loved that symbol.  I have always loved that symbol.  I am Greek Orthodox, and the emblem of the church has a double-headed eagle, which was borrowed from the Byzantine Empire.

The double-headed eagle is a common symbol in heraldry and vexillology. It is most commonly associated with the Byzantine Empire, the Holy Roman Empire, the Russian Empire and their successor states. In Byzantine heraldry, the heads represent the dual sovereignty of the Emperor (secular and religious) and/or dominance of the Byzantine Emperors over both East and West. In the Holy Roman Empire's heraldry, it represented the church and the state. Several Eastern European nations adopted it from the Byzantines and continue to use it as their national symbol to this day.

Frankly, I think the church's symbol isn't as pretty as some that I have seen.  Here is one that was used by Russia, which I find attractive:

The one you usually seen used by the church isn't muscular like Russia's, but looks like it could afford to lose a few pounds.