| Unemployment figures for Scotland fell last month, official statistics ...
I think we're going to have to start shouting about the truth ("Scotching The Myth" etc.) a LOT LOT louder. I give you exhibit one from our dear friend Mr Simon Heffer: http://www.telegraph .co.uk/opinion/main. jhtml?xml=/opinion/2 007/11/14/do1401.xml .
Around the world in ... Near Field Communications (NFC)
Meanwhile, Commonwealth Bank has introduced Mastercard's contactless payment tech PayPass into its credit cards, following a trial in NSW that lasted six months and involved 35,000 participants. Commonwealth has included the technology on most of the credit cards it has sent out recently -- a total of over 300,000 to date, with 60,000 new PayPass cards being issued every month. Both Commonwealth and the NAB/Visa/Telstra experiment allow users to make purchases of AU$35 and under without secondary verification; users making purchases over that amount will be asked to enter a PIN code to authenticate the payment. The ill-fated Tcard, initially conceived as a smartcard ticketing system for Sydney transport, is another well-known example of contactless tech.
Town's Mardi Gras fun is fit for king
Genevieve Herald managing editor Jean Feld Rissover. The town's colonial residents, joined by area farmers, trappers, Indians and slaves partied the last weekend before Lent with music, dancing and food. Ownership of the territory was alternately French, Spanish and American ''but the French traditions persisted no matter who was in charge,'' Rissover said. Originally, the King's Ball was traditionally held in the home of Ste. Genevieve's oldest female resident, according to ball organizer Mickey Koetting. Today, partiers fill the local VFW Hall, one of the few modern buildings in a place whose distinctive French colonial architecture harkens to an earlier era. Cousin Curtis and the Cash Rebates, a St. Louis string band, has had the King's Ball gig for 20 years.
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