Hasta La Gadget!

When it comes to Android One powered smartphones, those used to be launched in India across several smartphones, and it seems that the Android One bandwagon is about to cross over to Europe – in the U.K. in fact, with Indian handset manufacturer Karbonn having introduced the Karbonn Sparkle V in that part of the world.

The Karbonn Sparkle V happens to be one of the world’s first Android One smartphones, and it is now available as an unlocked device over on Amazon UK for £129.99, which would place it in good stead to go up against the likes of the Motorola Moto G and Nokia Lumia 635 that will cost somewhere in the same price region. This Black Friday, however, is the time for you to save more money since this spanking new smartphone will see further discounts added to it, so that its price will drop to £99.99.

What is one of the main advantages of the Karbonn Sparkle V? It is more or less certain of receiving newer versions of Android for a couple of years down the road, which is one of the characteristics of Android One smartphones, and right now, it runs on Android 4.4 KitKat with a very real proposition of picking up Android 5.0 Lollipop in due time.

Karbonn Sparkle V To Hit Europe , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.

It’s Saturday morning in Plympton, Mass., and the sun has yet to dry the dew from the windows at the Mayflower Cranberries farm, but owner Jeff LaFleur is already on a knee in his bog inspecting his crimson bounty in preparation for the fall harvest.

“It’s a pretty big berry, as you can see it here set on the vine,” LaFleur says, breaking off a couple berries that rival the size of California-grown grapes. “Try one. They’re a little bitter, but these are sweeter than a lot of the other varieties.”

Sweet indeed.

The fall harvest season at Mayflower Cranberries, home to the first commercial cranberry bog in Plympton, is a scene that truly captures the essence of the Thanksgiving holiday.

Cranberries have been cultivated in the bogs of Southeastern Massachusetts since 1816, according to Cohasset, Mass., author Susan Playfair’s new book, America’s Founding Fruit: the Cranberry in a New Environment.

At Mayflower Cranberries, LaFleur has vines in his Brown Swamp Bog that date to the late 1800s and are still producing fruit today.

“We grow four different varieties of cranberries,” said LaFleur, who manages 23.5 acres of active cranberry bogs. “Stevens, which is a hybrid variety used mainly for Craisins. Howes and Early Black, which are a primarily a juicer and a sauce berry, and Whiting-Randall.”

Part of the fabric of Southeast Massachusetts and Thanksgiving Day celebrations across the country, cranberries are one of three mature fruits that are native to North America (along with blueberries and Concord grapes). They are also extremely dependent on water as commercially-grown cranberries are irrigated regularly during warmer months, and for frost protection in the cold, and then are flooded for protection and harvest purposes in the winter and fall.

And while some cranberry farms in Massachusetts have roots that stretch back two centuries, progressive growers like LaFleur are modernizing operations by integrating renewable energy projects, smart technologies and precision irrigation practices into their bogs to ensure they remain productive for another 200 years.

“You have to,” said LaFleur, a former Executive Director for the Cape Cod Cranberry Growers’ Association who now grows for the Ocean Spray co-operative. “Water is critical for growing cranberries, and we have to ensure our water sources remain healthy.”

Along with laser leveling beds, implementing tailwater recovery systems and dikes to minimize water usage, Massachusetts’ innovative growers are using automated irrigation systems and soil-moisture monitoring stations to reduce water usage and environmental impact.

One U.S. Department of Agriculture study reported automated systems can help cut back run times by two hours, which amounts to almost 300,000 gallons per acre over the length of the growing season.

LaFleur uses Hortau’s “smart” irrigation management stations, which run on solar power in the bogs and report soil moisture data, plant stress levels and weather information to the web in real-time.

“Being able to rely on this new technology,” he said, “has been a real plus for our farm.”

LaFleur learned about the system while working with the University of Massachusetts Cranberry Station on various soil-moisture monitoring research projects.

Peter Jeranyama, an environmental physiologist and assistant professor at UMass, said he liked the accuracy of the Hortau system because it is based on soil tension, which measures plant stress and how difficult it is for the root to extract water from the soil particle.

“There is now a renewed interest in looking into tensiometers as tools in cranberry irrigation management,” Jeranyama said. “Hortau tensiometers along with other sensors will soon be recommended as tools in good soil moisture and environment stewardship in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and we are working with NRCS (Natural Resources Conservation Service) to make this happen — thus am impressed with the technology.”

The web-based system utilizes mobile networks to send in-field data to the cloud, which growers can access anywhere via a mobile device or computer, where they can set up frost text alerts and other automated notifications when extreme conditions hit.

The systems not only save growers time, no longer having to measure soil moisture by hand from bog to bog previously, but significantly reduce water usage and other inputs. Cutting back on water also helps reduce pumping costs, energy use and emissions, and being able to better monitor soil moisture and plant stress helps improve overall crop health.

“In many cases we believe that overwatering does impact the quality of the fruit,” he said. “We certainly saw that once we started reducing the amount of water that we applied during an irrigation. We only applied it when we needed it, and in the amounts we needed it, and we really saw that fruit quality started to improve.”

The results come to fruition during the fall harvest, when “you see the yields improve because you’re not over-irrigating,” LaFleur said.

“From our perspective, that’s one of the critical parts,” he added. “When you see fruit rot percentages drop dramatically, you really see the fruit quality that we need to provide to the co-op and Ocean Spray to make Craisins. It’s an important issue for us.”

It’s an important issue for all of us as our population continues to grow and farmers like LaFleur will have to come up with more innovative ways to produce more food with less inputs to help feed an estimated 9 billion people by 2050.

And that commitment to precision irrigation practices and growing more cranberries with less water and energy, is definitely a more sustainable growing model that’s worth being thankful for this holiday season.

Brian Milne is a freelance journalist and blogger who writes about green technology, precision agriculture and water issues.

Jennifer discovered from her husband Tom’s emails that he was meeting Brad for sex. She came to see me, heartbroken, sure that her marriage to her “gay” husband was doomed. But when I examined Tom, I discovered he wasn’t gay. He had been sexually abused by his coach when he was a boy, and his compulsion to have sex with men was a “trauma reenactment,” which could be eliminated through therapy. Of course, Tom and Jennifer still had to work through the betrayal of his sexual acting out, but his issues did not present a fundamental impediment to the marriage. Had he been gay, then Tom and Jennifer’s challenges would have been much greater.

Seeking sex with men does not make a man gay. Sexual orientation is a complex state of being. You aren’t gay because you “act gay.” You’re gay because you are gay. When I examine a man who’s questioning his sexual orientation, I ask him about childhood abuse and other traumas that can lead straight men to seek sex with men. I’ve also developed a checklist of characteristics of gay men to help me with diagnosis. These characteristics go beyond mere sexual acts. Here is a simplified list:

1. The beach test: Gay men see the men on a beach, not the women.
2. Youthful noticing: Before puberty, gay boys notice other boys with a kind of giggling delight, just as straight boys do girls.
3. Waking up: Straight guys, even those who have sex with men, don’t want to wake up next to one.
4. Falling in love: A gay man can fall in romantic love with a man; straight men don’t.
5. Romantic hopes and dreams with a male partner: After a period of promiscuous “gay adolescence,” a gay man will yearn to “settle down.”
6. Gay sex not degrading: Straight men sometimes interpret gay sex as humiliating. Gay men find it fundamentally joyful.
7. Homophobia: If a gay man is repressing his gay identity, he is often negative about gay people and the “gay lifestyle.”

Of course, sometimes a questioning man comes to me and it turns out he is gay or bi. In this case, marriage between the man and a woman is fundamentally complicated and often (but not always) leads to divorce. I’ve developed a set of guidelines for these couples. (See my post “Mixed Orientation Marriages” on my website, JoeKort.com, or Chapter 13 of my recent book, Is My Husband Gay, Straight, or Bi?: A Guide for Women Concerned About Their Men.)

Many couples come to see me because the husband’s unconventional sexual interests are interpreted as “gay.” I’m amazed that people continue to believe that an interest in anal sex makes a man gay. Sometimes “kinks” are acted out as compulsions and need to be addressed by therapy to give the man more control over his impulses, but they usually are not “proof” that the man is gay.

Joel came to see me, afraid his wife might discover his secret. He was meeting couples to engage in very specific sex “scenes.” He wanted to be “forced” by a woman to watch her make love to her husband — even to help her make love to her husband — but if the woman wasn’t there, he wasn’t interested. His compulsion for this kink (commonly called “cuckolding”) might seem gay (because of the man in the room), but in fact I’ve never heard of a gay man with this interest.

I did help Joel become less compulsive. In his therapy we uncovered a complex situation in his childhood in which his mother doted on him when his father was absent on business trips but ignored him completely when his father was home. His longing to be included as a child had been sexualized in his psyche as a cuckolding kink. I could not “cure” him of his fantasy; he’ll always be aroused by some version of it. What we achieved in therapy was freeing him from the compulsion to act on it. As a result, he didn’t need to continue to meet with couples for sex.

When a married man and woman come to me for clarity, they end up in one of three situations:

1. The man is acting out a homosexual behavioral imprinting from childhood, which often fades with therapy.
2. The man is gay or bi, and the couple must decide how to stay together or part because of it.
3. The man has a kink whose compulsivity may be controlling and ruining his life (and the marriage), but through therapy he can learn to manage and moderate it, even though it will never go away entirely.

But wait! You want to know if your husband is gay. Without the terror of homophobia clouding our vision with horrendous legal and social consequences, it is relatively easy to determine if a man is gay. He can determine it himself, using the simple tools I noted above: beach test, youthful noticing, and so on. Bisexuality is subtler. The best way to tell if a man is bisexual is to sit down with him and talk about it.

One final thought: No one — not even an “expert” — has the right to tell you to panic and divorce. You most likely understand what you’re dealing with better than anybody. You can choose for yourself. It’s your future. You have options.

Nevada Assemblyman Ira Hansen, recently elected speaker of the assembly’s Republican caucus, stepped down this week. His resignation comes after he made some truly remarkable public comments about race. He claimed that the “relationship of Negroes and Democrats is truly a master-slave relationship, with the benevolent master knowing what’s best for his simple-minded darkies.” Yes, he called black Americans “Negroes” and somehow thought sticking it to the Democrats would be accomplished by using the dated epithet “darkies.”

His plan backfired, because it brought into clear focus a point that Democrats often make about Republican leadership: They’re completely unaware of contemporary racial dynamics in the United States and don’t care to learn. This is largely because black Americans aren’t invited to the party. (Pardon the pun.)

First, let’s take a look at the Congressional Black Caucus, which represents black Americans in the United States Congress. There are currently 44 members. Every last one is a Democrat. Since the organization was founded in 1971, only six black Republicans have even been elected to Congress at all. Alignment with the Democratic Party is not the result of exploitation by white leadership. Rather, the Democratic Party welcomes black Americans as leaders to represent their own communities. The Republican Party does not extend the same welcome.

In fact, the Republican Party has been attempting to literally erase black Americans from the voting map. Republicans have been simultaneously pushing voter-ID laws, which disproportionately affect racial minorities, and gerrymandering the districts. If you’re wondering why Democrats are having such a hard time these days, it’s partially because Republicans have succeeded in drawing lines straight through their constituencies. Guess whom these lines disproportionately affect? You got it: racial minorities.

Republicans also almost universally oppose actions designed to combat inequality. The most notable example is their rejection of affirmative action, a measure initially instituted to combat racial discrimination in employment. One bizarre moment found likely presidential contender Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) suggesting that the section of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 banning discrimination in business was unconstitutional. He claimed “private ownership” should allow businesses to discriminate against black Americans.

While comments like Sen. Paul’s may reflect a cold version of legal analysis that doesn’t appropriately factor in race, the Republican response to race has been downright ugly in other instances. In 2009 Judge Keith Bardwell, a Republican justice in Louisiana, refused to officiate the marriage of an interracial couple. He reasoned that neither black nor white communities would “accept” their possible offspring. Did I mention this was 2009?

The racism present on the right extends beyond elected officials. The connection of news media to politics further highlights the divide. On the conservative, Republican-leaning Fox News, there is not one single-host show featuring a person with dark skin during the week. Only one black host appears at all during this time, a single member of the panel on The Five. Contrast that with the liberal, Democratic-leaning MSNBC. There is a single-host show featuring a black anchor during the morning, afternoon and primetime on every weekday. Two of these shows are hosted by black women. Michael Steele, the black ex-chairman of the Republican National Committee, is notably not with Fox News but serves as a paid contributor to MSNBC.

It’s a widely known fact that white Americans will cease to make up a majority of the population by 2043. And non-white Americans vote overwhelmingly for Democrats, which rightly frightens Republicans. But to claim that this dynamic exists because Democrats act as “master[s]” is clearly laughable.

Why would black Americans vote for a party that doesn’t invite them, doesn’t represent their needs and, in extreme cases, rejects their integration into basic contracts like civil marriage?

Rather than finding ways to open the door to racial minorities, the Republican Party is now lashing out at Democrats. In the process, they’re only further alienating the very people they need to remain a serious force in the American political system.

This Black Friday is set to be bigger than ever, with pre-sales already up 19 percent year over year, according to IBM. But there is huge overlap on product offerings for many big box stores and if social media is any indicator, the core opportunity (and challenge) is differentiation on anything other than price.

Messages highlighting heavily discounted products, coupons, hashtags and free gifts are everywhere, with one brand even offering to discount a pair of boots by $90 if their Instagram post receives 25,000 likes:

Like it to lower the price! If we hit 25k likes on this post, we’ll drop the price of these boots by $90 for #BlackFriday. #nordstrom (Discounted price online = $109.90!) ❤️

A photo posted by Nordstrom (@nordstrom) on Nov 11, 2014 at 8:15am PST

Retailers such as Target, Amazon, Walmart, Sears and many more have kicked off early Black Friday sales, in many cases posting their most aggressive discounts early to get a jump on share of the consumer’s wallet this holiday. Amazon is even releasing new deals every ten minutes, creating anticipation and an auction-like atmosphere that drives stickiness on site, time pressure and — hopefully for Amazon — a compulsive desire to keep coming back throughout the sale period.

But how can shoppers sustain meaningful excitement when EVERYONE is heavily discounting many of the same products, with no real demarcation between when the sales end and begin? Are we going to soon have Black November with the whole month on sale? It can get overwhelming just keeping on top of all the timing and lists, and Black Friday hasn’t even officially begun.

Which has left many wondering — will we have anything left in us for the actual Black Friday, let alone by the time Cyber Monday rolls around?

If social media is any indication, retailers have nothing to worry about. Since the start of the month, social shoppers have shared more than 120 million moments with retail brands such as Macy’s, Amazon, Nordstrom and more — sharing, commenting, tweeting and liking their way towards Black Friday sales, with no sign of slowing down. This also reflects a 109 percent growth over 2013, based on findings from social media measurement provider Shareablee.

Social clicking is also on the rise, with major retailers receiving 2.2 clicks for every other kind of engagement on social media, indicating that social audiences on platforms such as Facebook and Twitter do find it compelling to click back to a site to learn more about offers, products and other content. In fact, social clicking has risen 127 percent over 2013. This is a particularly strong sign given the opportunity in e-commerce for Cyber Monday, despite the prevalence of Instagram, a platform that has not yet enabled retailers or brands to place live links inside of posts to drove referral traffic.

For me, lining up for hours in order to stampede my way through packed physical spaces strewn with discounted goods has never sounded like an ideal cure for overindulgence on Thanksgiving. But like any shopper, the appeal of the timely discount is strong, and Cyber Monday is a compelling counter balance to the drama of Black Friday — particularly if I can partake in the shopping tradition in a few clicks, from the warmth and comfort of my home. This becomes truer as each year passes and the lead-up becomes more protracted — the simplicity of Cyber Monday, a one-day free-for-all in which shoppers get to bypass the in-person madness while deriving much of the benefit. It is a simple way to partake in an established tradition, with a hint of counter culture to it.

As time becomes more scarce, I like to think of this as “Effective/Efficient Shopping Management.”