An In-Class Speaking Tip!

While discussing media like articles during class, try hard to incorporate the vocabulary used in the article into your dialogues, some of these words may be pivotal in your future conversations.

Grammar tip, Have, Have got

I have a new mobile phone.
I have got a new mobile phone.

In these sentences, have and have got tell us that something is mine.  It belongs to me.
(When we are talking informally, we often use have got.)



Present Simple Tense
I have/have got a new phone.
You have/have got a new phone.
He has/has got a new phone.
We have/have got new phones.
They have/have got new phones.



Questions and NegativesDo you have any stamps?
Have you got any stamps?I haven't got any stamps.
I don't have any stamps.

Do you have any stamps? Yes, I have. / No, I haven't.

Have you got any stamps? Yes, I have. / No, I haven't.

Examples of have / have got
We use have and have got when we talk about sickness.

I have / I've got the flu.
I have / I've got a cold.

We use have and have got when we talk about our relationships with other people.

We have / We've got four children.

We also use have and have got when we talk about what we look like.

I have / I've got brown eyes.
My grandmother has got brown eyes and gray hair.

Look at other examples for have and have got.

I have / I've got a great job. I love it.I have / I've got lots of homework.

Actions
We also use have to talk about things we do or consume.
I have breakfast. = I eat breakfast.
I have a cup of coffee at seven o'clock. = I drink my coffee.
I have a shower. = I wash in the shower.
We do not use have got to talk about things we do.

I have got a bath. = I have a bathtub.

My little brother has a bath every night. Not My little brother has got a bath every night.

Article for November 9th

Words which may be new:

to come under fire for something

mandate (n,v)

to hit the industry hard

breach (n,v)

grant (n,v)

absorbed

deprive

bogged down

cookies (computer not confectionary)

to enforce

to break into something

merely

flexibility 

WSJ: EU Proposes New Plan For Online Privacy Rights

By John W. Miller, Of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

The European Union on Thursday proposed new privacy rights for citizens sharing personal data with such websites as Facebook and Google, threatening to heighten tensions with U.S. tech companies and a fast-growing online advertising industry.

Both Google Inc. and Facebook Inc. have come under fire in the EU this year for collecting personal data without authorization.

The proposed EU rules suggest the creation of an online "right to be forgotten." That would impart to users the power to tell websites to permanently delete personal data. The rules also mandate that users give explicit consent before companies can use or process their personal data in any way. The 20-page document also criticizes the companies' current privacy policies as opaque.

The document, a proposed rewriting of a 1995 data-protection law, suggests that a "shift of focus" is necessary to deal with a new generation of websites that come with "significant challenges" to protecting users' privacy. "Ways of collecting personal data have become increasingly elaborated and less easily detectable," the document says.

"The protection of personal data is a fundamental right," said EU commissioner for justice Viviane Reding, who is overseeing the proposed regulation. "To guarantee this right, we need clear and consistent data-protection rules. We also need to bring our laws up to date with the challenges raised by new technologies and globalization."

The proposal recommends giving consumers the right to sue companies for privacy breaches and even suggests criminal penalties.

Europe's online advertising industry has argued that putting the onus on Internet users to explicitly grant consent for websites to use personal data, as opposed to allowing them to opt out of having such data shared, would hit the industry hard. It would reduce the numbers of Internet users receiving targeted advertising and thereby, they argue, deprive them of free services.

Free content and services, such as email funded by Internet advertising, is valued at EUR69 billion ($97 billion) annually to Europeans, according to a recent report from consultants McKinsey & Co.

John Vassallo, Microsoft Corp.'s Brussels-based counsel, said it is too early to say what effect the new rules might have. "If the balance of privacy is right, the business costs will be absorbed," he said. "The industry will make its voice heard."

Mr. Vassallo, also chairman of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in Brussels, said he didn't think it would fuel trans-Atlantic tensions. "European companies are also affected," he said. In the end, he added, industry would like to see a global treaty on data protection.

The EU, whose 27 member nations tend to have stricter privacy cultures than the U.S., sees itself as a leader in the fight for online privacy. It will be a challenge, however, to put these laws into full force.

The European Commission, the EU's executive branch, will submit the new proposal as legislation next year. It will then be debated and amended by EU members and the European Parliament before becoming law. EU countries must then write the rules into their national legislations. Justice commission officials said Thursday they will be aggressive about taking EU members to court if they don't enforce the new rules.

A similar effort to mandate user consent for placing cookies, or small code files, on personal computers is currently bogged down by lack of clarity over the mechanics of gaining user consent. EU members must write the 2009 e-Privacy directive into national law by May 2011, but it remains unclear what the practical consequences will be for browser and online ad firms.

Privacy advocates praised the commission's new approach. "The consumer's right to privacy should not be undermined merely because it has become easier and more profitable to break it in the virtual world," said Monique Goyens, director of the European Consumers Organization.

Google and Facebook declined to offer immediate comment.

What tech companies want is a single set of rules for the entire EU, said Jonathan Zuck, president of the Association for Competitive Technology, a Brussels lobby group. "Today's communication is an opportunity to start building a unified data-protection system which will bring more flexibility and legal certainty" to tech companies, he said.

Article For the 9th of November

New words you may see in this article:

abdominal

(ab)normal

anxiety

bliss

boon

buffer

cardiovascular

chronic

cluster

deem(ed)

depression

diabetes

(dis)harmony

(dis)order

(dis)satisfied

elevate(d)

hormone(s)

metabolic

(pre)doctoral

psychological

spouse

 to spur

stroke

syndrome

theorize(d)

widow(ed)

Happy marriage may do a woman's heart good

New York - Wedded bliss may provide women some protection against heart disease and stroke, new study findings suggest.

The study, which followed 413 middle-aged women over a dozen years, found that those who were happy in their marriages were less likely than their dissatisfied peers to develop metabolic syndrome.

Metabolic syndrome is a cluster of disorders -- high blood pressure, excess abdominal fat, abnormal cholesterol levels and elevated blood sugar -- that raises the risk of diabetes, heart disease and stroke.

Some research has suggested that psychological stress can contribute to metabolic syndrome, and the authors of the new study theorized that a happy marriage -- perhaps by acting as a "buffer" against stress -- might be related to a reduced risk.

In support of their theory, women who were deemed "maritally dissatisfied" based on a standard questionnaire were three times more likely to develop metabolic syndrome during the study period than women who were content in their marriages. The risk was also higher among women who were divorced or widowed.

Single women, on the other hand, showed no significant difference from happily married women.

The elevated risks remained when the researchers controlled for other factors, such as age, race, education, smoking and exercise. And no psychological factor -- namely, depression, anxiety or a woman's feelings of support from family and friends -- explained the connection between marriage quality and metabolic syndrome.

The findings appear in the current issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine.

A number of studies have found that married men are at lower risk of cardiovascular disease than bachelors, but the evidence for such benefits in women has been less consistent. In addition, simply being married is not necessarily a health boon, as research has linked spousal discord to poorer health.

The new findings suggest that marital harmony and disharmony may indeed matter in a woman's cardiovascular health.

It's not fully clear why marital satisfaction would play a role in metabolic syndrome.

Wendy M. Troxel, a predoctoral fellow in psychology at the University of Pittsburgh, told Reuters Health that it's possible that chronic stress caused by an unhappy marriage could spur elevations in blood pressure, as well as changes in stress hormones that could affect cholesterol and blood sugar levels. -- Reuters

http://www.brudirect.com/DailyInfo/News/Archive/May05/210505/wn03.htm

Article For the 9th of November

New words you may see in this article:

advertise(ment)
amend
astronomer(s)
authority
aviation
billboard(s)
deploy(ed)
enforce
ensure
hinder
obstrusive
outsized
prohibit
propose(d)
regulation(s)
regulator(s)
telescope

Interesting Expressions
zero gravity

US moves to ban billboards in space

The US Government does not want billboards in space.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has proposed to amend its regulations to ensure that it can enforce a law that prohibits "obtrusive" advertising in zero gravity.

"Objects placed in orbit, if large enough, could be seen by people around the world for long periods of time," the FAA said in a regulatory filing.

Currently, the FAA lacks the authority to enforce the existing law.

For instance, outsized billboards deployed by a space company into low Earth orbit could appear as large as the moon and be seen without a telescope.

Big and bright advertisements might hinder astronomers.

"Large advertisements could destroy the darkness of the night sky," regulators said.

- Reuters

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200505/s1372853.htm