Re-Blog From - AVC -Venture capital firms invested only $3 billion in 549 young companies in the first quarter,the lowest investment level since 1997

I found this Article today:

Claire Cain Miller wrote a story in Friday's New York Times about the "Money Tree Report" that is published every quarter by the National Venture Capital Association and Pricewaterhouse Coopers. The picture in the first quarter is not pretty. As Claire explains:

Venture capital firms invested only $3 billion in 549 young companies in the first quarter, the lowest investment level since 1997, according to the analysis, done by the National Venture Capital Association and PricewaterhouseCoopers.

The amount invested was down 47 percent from the fourth quarter of 2008 and 61 percent from the first quarter last year. 

But the numbers don't jive with my own experience and so I took a deep dive into them this morning. There are detailed reports available on the NVCA website that provide a lot of underlying detail.

I decided to look at the numbers by region and focused on the three regions I know best, Silicon Valley, New England, and the NY Metro area. I went back to 2004, when we started Union Square Ventures, and charted total amount raised in each region and total number of deals in each region.

What you see when you do that is that the decline is largely happening in Silicon Valley and it not nearly as pronounced in other regions.

A VC, Apr 2009

You should read the whole article.

The New Sheek is Gangsta Geek

(Twitter-Mania)(CLick Here)

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50 cent is dressing up and taunting rivals on YouTube. Diddy is one of the top Twitter celebrities with over 270,000 followers as of today. Has the Hip Hop elite gone, well, geek? Is being tech savvy the new trend in music?

Actually, hip hop artists have had a close connection to technology since its inception. Hip Hop music was born from a fusion of elements that were captured, mixed, and produced. The "remix" as it is associated in Hip Hop is a modern day mash-up of music derived from old samples. Sound boards and mixing programs are like hip hop playgrounds for artists in the studio. So it shouldn't be a surprise that so many artists have gone tech.

If you look at it from a outside perspective you might not see all the reasons I mentioned that keep hip hoppers close to technology. You might just say, what's that "Gangsta Rapper" doing on Twitter and YouTube ? But rappers have a long history of being great promoters and technology these days allows them to extend their promotional reach. The whole concept of rapping evolved from people trying to outdo each other and prove who could rap the best. Rapping, is one of the purest forms of self promotion. Rappers say, "Give me the mic', and I will make you like me more than you like them". 50 cent and Diddy are both great self promoters and they have made their fortunes by promoting their talents.

Sean "Diddy" Combs is a self made mogul who lives far from a gangster-esque lifestyle anymore. Same is true with 50 cent, who is now worth over 100 million dollars and owns one of the largest homes in Connecticut (formerly owned by Mike Tyson), and he is a part owner of Vitamin Water.

Rappers have always been known to tote the newest cellphones and electronics. Hip hop culture is very comfortable with technology, sound mixing software and hardware makes it real easy for artists to become comfortable with high technology early. Hip hop artists have carried and promoted technology accessories for quite some time starting with Skypagers and Startac cell phones to all sorts of hi speed devices nowadays.

Diddy and 50 have been dabbling in online video for some time now. Diddy has PtwittyTv and 50 has been recently found taunting other rappers on YouTube.

Technology will always play a large role in hip hop business and current uses of technology are pretty imaginative. Hip hop is a culture that has drawn from numerous influences, and itself continues to influence the music industry to try new things while leading in new directions.

The GEM Peapod Mobility, Chrysler And NEV Concept

The GEM Peapod Mobility, Chrysler’s NEV Concept

Posted using ShareThis

This little car has been buzzing around the ‘Net for a few days now, after it’s debut in the U.S. at the New York Auto Show earlier in April. It’s made by GEM, who is owned by Chrysler, and is, in function, about what you expect from a neighborhood electric.

What it’s got that others don’t is styling..(read full article by Zoomi Life here)

Construction Loans, how difficult are they to obtain….

by Tom Matteson, Paramount Mortgage Funding

tmatteson77@pmfmortgages.com

 

With raw land prices dropping everywhere and the cost to build down, now more than ever might be a good time to think about building your own home.  It may not be as easy as it used to be, but it is still attainable with the help of FHA.  Three to fours years ago during the home building boom getting a construction loan for a spec house, or a primary residence was very easy.  With all the stated products such as no income verification loans and Alt-a  mortgages being pushed through, getting a construction loan was fairly easy and  many times required no money down.  Those days are long gone and for good reasons.  This sector of the business was responsible for the huge increase in home prices between 2003-2006 and is one of the main reasons we are in this mess.  These Alt-A lenders were handing out construction loans to investors like they were handing out Halloween candy.  With that said, much tighter regulation was needed in this sector and the investor needed to be eliminated from this sales cycle.  Once again it’s FHA to the rescue.

 

Their program is really straight forward if you have 10% down, a decent credit score (above 620), and you plan to live in the house as your primary residency.  These factors should get you approved, baring any unforeseen credit, or lender issues.  You can buy the land first or do it all at once, the choice is yours.  If you obtain the land first with a mortgage, that mortgage will be rolled into the new construction loan, once the project has been completed. 

FHA usually disburses the money to the construction company in two draws.  Once every item has been completed on the first punch list the contractor is then allowed to proceed with the second phase of the project, at which time the last set of funds are disbursed to him.  However, you will be making full payments on the mortgage even while the project is being completed, so finding a competent and professional contractor who you trust is imperative.  Most people don’t like making mortgage payments on homes they can’t live in, so try  to make sure it takes no more than three months to complete the house.  The only other option you have is to build the house yourself.

 

FHA will allow for an owner builder situation.  However, you have to prove competence in the industry, with a letter, a portfolio of completed work, and customer referrals.  You can also use a family member who has competence in the field under this provision to do the work.  They will have to prove the same level of competence in the field.  With that said, they will be much harder on an owner builder when it comes to the inspection and approving the work, so be careful. You can’t be an owner builder and expect to cut corners and not do things up to code, because if you do they will shut you down and delay the whole project.

 

Building your own home has been the American dream for 230 years and it is a viable option for home seekers, even in this terrible housing market. It will take patience and cooperation to complete the project. The first step is securing the financing because there is a lot of work involved in these kinds of loans and the financing is the most important piece.  So before you look at plans, look at lots, call a mortgage professional to get pre-qualified.

Thomas Matteson

Mortgage Consultant/Licensed FSP

Paramount Mortgage Funding, Inc.

Phone: 813-469-9762

Fax: 1-866-475-7508

Email: tmatteson77@pmfmortgages.com

 

Twitter Mania

(Color E-Readers)click here
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Twitter mania is happening across the world, right now thousands maybe even millions are tweeting as you read this. Somewhere right now Diddy is promoting his Twitter page, meanwhile across the city, Jimmy Fallon is tweeting with viewers on camera during his Late Night Show on NBC.

Do you Tweet ? Every major news outlet is, Barack Obama and the Small Business Administration are. Should you be? Here are some information to help you make your decision.

Twitter is a tool that is offering new means for communication, distribution, and consumption of information. Think of Twitter messages as short format communications which are distributed instantly. Nicolas Carr calls Twitter the Internet telegraph. Twitter messages are less than 140 characters in length and are distributed instantly to anyone who chooses to follow your Twitter feed. Twitter users follow each other in order to receive updates as they are sent out. You can choose how you wish to receive the updates, by email, by phone, or embedded into a website, blog, or social site like Facebook.

CNN has over 650,000 followers, Jimmy Fallon has 450,000, and Diddy has over 275,000. The popularity of Twitter is growing by leaps and bounds. Jason Calcanis, CEO of Mahalo, has offered $250,000 for placement on the "suggested users" page of people to follow. He thinks a 2 year agreement right now is worth 125,000 annually and he is publicly stating that he is interested in securing a contract now as he thinks it will be worth more in the future. This offer shows the potential of different types of advertising placement which may come its way.

Socially speaking, Twitter is a great communication tool. For personal use it can be used as a way to update a group of followers on what you may be doing at any given point in the day. It is also used to arrange meet-ups in social locations by Tweeting your location upon arrival, and/or leaving comments about the event you are at. Motivational and news related tweets seem to be the most popular form of tweet.

So now businesses are getting in on the act. NBC, CNN, and many other news outlets are using Twitter as a distribution source for information they want to release. The thinking behind integrating news content is very straight forward, it offers a direct means of distribution instantly. Twitter offers a personal press wire for any company who wants to reach their target base directly. The best part about is, followers are opt-in. On Twitter you choose to follow someone, so if you choose to follow CNN then you are choosing to receive all the information they send out, same is true if you follow your friend, your pastor, your realtor, or your local sports team.

Twittering Real Estate has become very popular. Using Twitter to send-out real estate tweets offers a free direct messaging system for agents and offices. It allows them to reach interested parties when listings or updates become available instantly. Once again it is opt-in, so it is non-intrusive and it allows users to receive tweets according to their own defined preferences. ChicagoRealty is a great example of how to integrate your listings. They send out tweets with the address and direct links of listing pages as soon as they receive them.

Churches have also begun to Twitter. Pastors are sending out messages of motivation & inspiration as well as updates on church happenings. Some churches have gone interactive and are asking members to respond to questions asked during the sermon. Some even show the the Twitter responses in real time on projection screens like survey results.

So how does Twitter make money you are wondering, huh ? Well, the answer is as of now they don't, but that won't be for long. The growth of rate of Twitter is incredible at over 1000% annually. That poses a lot of options for monteizing the large user base. Recently Twitter started experimeting with text based ads which are promoting their own tools below the "follower" numbers on users profiles. They have also stated they believe real-time search within Twitter will be a good avenue for monetization, along with coporate clients looking to reach certain audience demographics in large numbers. While there has been many skeptics to date, this is one venture which will not have to worry about monetization opportunities in the near future.

If you haven't yet started, it may be time to get Tweetin..

Color E-Readers Coming Soon : Flepia by Fujitsu Takes On Amazon's Kindle 2

Amazon has released the much hyped Kindle 2. Jeff Bezos, a great corporate icon, has been making the rounds promoting his new device. It is sleek, it has wifi, and it is connected to Amazon's library of over 200,000 titles. This device is all it is cracked up to be, but our question is, where's the color? Amazon made a smart move by deciding to make their titles available on the iPhone and iTouch. But what if the kindle had a color screen ? I imagine the images in books, magazines, and newspapers would look superb and offer greater appeal.

A recent leak out of the Fujitsu company has caused blog sites and major news sources to chatter about the possibility of color e-readers not far from the market. Fujitsu has hyped the technology for 2 years now. Color seems to be the next large barrier to consumer friendliness, after price, and practical utility. On March 18, 2009 Fujitsu announced the start of consumer sales in Japan of the world’s first color e-paper mobile terminal, FLEPia, available through Fujitsu Frontech’s online store. The FLEPia is advertised as lightweight and thin.The color e-paper mobile terminal features an easy-to-view 8-inch display screen capable of showing up to 260,000 colors in high-definition, in addition to being equipped with Blue-tooth and high-speed wireless and a touch screen.

The price tag on the FLEPia is about 2-3 times that of the Kindle so that will certainly deter buyers. However if color e-readers become prominent in Japan, we may see the Kindle 2 turn quickly into Kindle 3.

Strive For Greatness

Strive For Greatness

Every day when I wake up I think to myself "What can I do today that will set myself apart from yesterday, what can I do to excel today?"

I reflect on and draw from positive moments that have influenced my life, and I look to greet every day with a "I can't wait to do...” attitude. I begin my day reading quotes and listening to audio of great spoken moments in order to arouse an inner sense of “greatness”. This morning refresher evokes internal motivators to help me push forward with confidence. It is really amazing the way the human mind works when the right stimulus is applied. The message that I try to draw from most mornings is simple , “Get up, get out, and do something great!”

For me, it's like drinking an energy shot of “life’s vitality” every morning for a quick charge to approach the day.I offer up this little piece of my life in order to make a correlation between thinking about doing something great, and accomplishing greatness. The next time you have a thought and say to yourself, “hey, this would be something that would really be great”, grab that idea and run with it immediately. Set up stimuli in your life that pushes you to go above and beyond your normal thought process to accomplish what you dream of. What comes with the ability to dream, is the ability to make them a reality. Striving for greatness in all that you do will help you realize your dreams and accomplish your goals.

App Nation: Web Applications, Mobile Applications, and iTV Applications

(Micro-Projectors)
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We are an app nation. Apps are on our phones, on the Internet, and on their way Internet Television. Web applications are accessed via a web browser over a network such as the Internet or an intranet and they are software applications coded in browser-supported languages. Mobile applications are developed based on the 6 M's, Movement (location), Moment (time), Me (personalization), Multi-user (community), Money (payments) and Machines (automation). Internet TV applications are developed for set-top boxes, broadband TV's, and remote devices.

The iPhone is what has really made apps a relevant topic amongst the mainstream public and they are in high demand. There are iPhone apps for everything you can imagine. Apple says, "they leverage the groundbreaking technology in iPhone — like the Multi-Touch interface, the accelerometer, GPS, real-time 3D graphics, and 3D positional audio." They also have designed a great App Store where you can choose from thousands of applications ready to download now. If you have an iPhone you are probably already familiar with apps.

Google now has its own mobile app store for the Android platform and their G1 phone. Android is a software platform and operating system for mobile devices, based on the Linux kernel, developed by Google and later the Open Handset Alliance. It allows developers to write managed code in the Java language, controlling the device via Google-developed Java libraries. Here are some pics and information from Google.

A new service called Boxee is helping spur the Internet TV app market with its latest announcement of an app box. Boxee is a social media center. With Boxee you can play videos, music and pictures from your PC or from the Internet. You can also share with your friends what albums you're listening to, what movies and TV shows you're watching, send recommendations and more. The App box makes it much easier for everyone else to release new apps and add more content to Boxee. Blip.tv, a video site dedicated to helping great shows find an audience, has already built a Boxee app to share their shows with 350,000 Boxee users. Boxee has also designed an iPhone app that lets you control your AppleTV and Boxee system with the iPhone or iTouch.

Apps are influencing all aspects of our media lives and they play an integral part in processing information effectively. We will see apps spread to a wider range of devices in our homes over the next few years.

Micro-Projectors : A New Development In Miniaturized Electronics

(Social Multimedia: Virtual Worlds)
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Micro-projectors look like something straight out of a spy movie or James Bond flick. In some cases they are as small as a deck of cards and they project up to 52" with very good quality . Micro-projectors are the newest practical development in miniaturized electronics. They bring new value to the business community by providing a very portable and useful technology tool.

Presentations are given daily around the world as an integral part of sales & research, marketing, and a wide range of operational activities. Most presentations require a projector to display information. Projectors have always been very bulky and until the past decade were not very portable. Now, they are ultra-portable.

Here are a few micro-projectors worth looking into:

The 3mPro110 fits in the palm of your hand and is less 6 ounces in total weight. It offers up to a 50" viewing screen, 1 hour battery life, and it connects with just about any device. It costs around $350.00. The Samsung MBP200 is a portable media player with a pico projector inside and is less than 6 inches in total length. The MBP200 also runs about $300.00. WowWee has three micro projectors named the Cinemin Swivel, Cinemin Stick and Cinemin Station. They range from $200 to $400.

Multimedia - Social Sites: Virtual Worlds - examples: Second Life, World Of Warcraft

(Video: Livecasting)
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Virtual Worlds

Virtual Worlds are computer-based simulated environment intended for its users to inhabit and interact via avatars. These avatars are usually depicted as textual, two-dimensional, or three-dimensional graphical representations, although other forms are possible (auditory and touch sensations for example). The computer accesses a computer-simulated world and presents perceptual stimuli to the user, who in turn can manipulate elements of the modeled world and thus experiences telepresence to a certain degree. Massively multiplayer online games commonly depict a world very similar to the real world, with real world rules and real-time actions, and communication. Communication is usually textual, with real-time voice communication using VOIP also possible. Here are some of the most popular virtual worlds and online games.


Second Life (SL) is a virtual world developed by Linden Lab that launched on June 23, 2003 and is accessible via the Internet. A free client program called the Second Life Viewer enables its users, called Residents, to interact with each other through avatars. Residents can explore, meet other residents, socialize, participate in individual and group activities, and create and trade virtual property and services with one another, or travel throughout the world, which residents refer to as the grid.

World of Warcraft, often referred to as WoW, is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) by Blizzard Entertainment. It is the fourth released game set in the fantasy Warcraft universe, which was first introduced by Warcraft: Orcs & Humans in 1994. With more than 11.5 million monthly subscribers, World of Warcraft is currently the world's largest MMORPG in those terms, and holds the Guinness World Record for the most popular MMORPG. In April 2008, World of Warcraft was estimated to hold 62% of the massively multiplayer online game

Multimedia - Social Sites: Livecasting

(Video Sharing)
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Livecasting allows anyone to instantly stream live video over the internet or mobile devices. Here are some of the most popular livecasting sites.

Ustream.tv, established March 2007, is a website which consists of network of diverse channels providing a platform for lifecasting and live video streaming of events online. During the 2008 United States presidential election, the website was used by nearly all the main candidates to help their campaign, by allowing a larger amount of voters to ask political questions.

Justin.tv, founded in San Francisco by Justin Kan, is a network of diverse channels providing a platform for lifecasting and live video streaming of events online.

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(Virtual Worlds)


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Multimedia - Social Sites: Video Sharing

Photo Sharing
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Video Sharing



Video Sharing has taken over the web. There are billions of videos shown every month. Here are some of the most popular video sharing sites.

YouTube is by far the most popular video site on the web. Users can upload, view and share video clips. Three former PayPal employees created YouTube in February 2005. In November 2006, YouTube, LLC was bought by Google Inc. for US$1.65 billion, and is now operated as a subsidiary of Google

Vimeo is a video-centric social network site (owned by IAC/InterActiveCorp) which launched in November 2004. The site supports embedding, sharing, video storage, and allows user-commenting on each video page

MeFeedia.com is a media search website founded in 2004 that features videos, TV shows, movies, and music among other material

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Livecasting

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Multimedia - Social Sites : Photo Sharing

(Social News)

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Photo Sharing

Photo Sharing has become extremely popular on the web and just about every site has photo integration systems these days. Here are some of the most popular photo sharing sites.

Flickr is an image and video hosting website, web services suite, and online community platform. In addition to being a popular Web site for users to share personal photographs, the service is widely used by bloggers as a photo repository. As of November 2008, it claims to host more than 3 billion images

Photobucket is an image hosting, video hosting, slideshow creation and photo sharing website. It was acquired by Fox Interactive Media in 2007.

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Video Sharing

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Social News - examples: Digg, Reddit, Mixx

(Social Bookmarking: Delicious, Stumbleupon)
<---Previously

Social News

Social news refers to websites where users submit and vote on news stories or other links, thus determining which links are presented.
It became more popular with the advent of Digg, which combined Delicious and Slashdot's features.


Digg is a social news website made for people to discover and share content from anywhere on the Internet, by submitting links and stories, and voting and commenting on submitted links and stories. Voting stories up and down is the site's cornerstone function, respectively called digging and burying. Many stories get submitted every day, but only the most Dugg stories appear on the front page. Digg's popularity has prompted the creation of other social networking sites with story submission and voting systems

Reddit is a social news website on which users can post links to content on the web. Other users may then vote the posted links down or up, causing them to appear more or less prominently on the Reddit home page.

Mixx is a user-driven social media web site that serves to help users submit or find content by peers based on interest and location. It combines social networking and bookmarking with web syndication, blogging and personalization tools

Social Bookmarking - Examples: Delicious, StumbleUpon

(Wiki's - Click here)
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Social Bookmarking

Social Bookmarking is a method for Internet users to store, organize, search, and manage bookmarks of web pages on the Internet with the help of metadata, typically in the form of tags that collectively and/or collaboratively become a folksonomy. Folksonomy is also called social tagging, "the process by which many users add metadata in the form of keywords to shared content.

Here are some well known social bookmarking sites.


Delicious (formerly del.icio.us) is a social bookmarking web service for storing, sharing, and discovering web bookmarks. The site was founded by Joshua Schachter in 2003 and acquired by Yahoo! in 2005. It has more than five million users and 150 million bookmarked URLs.

StumbleUpon is an Internet community that allows its users to discover and rate Web pages, photos, and videos. It is a personalized recommendation engine which uses peer and social-networking principles. Web pages are presented when the user clicks the "Stumble!" button on the browser's toolbar. StumbleUpon chooses which Web page to display based on the user's ratings of previous pages, ratings by his/her friends, and by the ratings of users with similar interests.

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(Social News )

Social Media Field Guide: Part 3 - Social Networking, Aggregation, Wiki's

(Part 1 Available Here)

(Part 2 Available Here)

Social Networking

Social Networking focuses on building online communities of people who share interests and/or activities, or who are interested in exploring the interests and activities of others. Most social network services are web based and provide a variety of ways for users to interact, such as e-mail and instant messaging services.

Here are some well know social networking services:

Facebook is a social utility that connects people with friends and others who work, study and live around them and elsewhere

MySpace lets you find friends & classmates, meet new people, listen to free music & build playlists, share photos, watch videos, start a blog, read celebrity news

Linked-in strengthens and extends your existing network of trusted contacts. LinkedIn is a networking tool that helps you discover inside connections to recommended job candidates, industry experts and business partners.

Meetup.com is an online social networking portal that facilitates offline group meetings in various localities around the world. Meetup allows members to find and join groups unified by a common interest, such as politics, books, games, movies, health, pets, careers or hobbies. Users enter their ZIP code (or their city outside the United States) and the topic they want to meet about, and the website helps them arrange a place and time to meet.

Next....
Social Network Aggregation (Click Here)

Social Network Aggregation - Example: Friendfeed

(Previous Post: Social Networking (Click Here)

Social Network Aggregation

Social network aggregation is the process of collecting content from multiple social network services, such as MySpace, Facebook and even Twitter. The task is often performed by a social network aggregator, which pulls together information into a single location, or helps a user consolidate multiple social networking profiles into one profile. Various aggregation services provide tools or widgets to allow users to consolidate messages, track friends, combine bookmarks, search across multiple social networking sites, read rss feeds for multiple social networks, see when their name is mentioned on various sites, access their profiles from a single interface, provide "lifestreams", etc. Here is a social network aggregator.

Friendfeed is a feed aggregator that consolidates the updates from social media and social networking websites, social bookmarking websites, blogs and micro-blogging updates, as well as any other types of RSS/Atom feeds. Friendfeed makes content on the Web more relevant and useful for you by using your existing social network as a tool for discovering interesting information

Next

Wiki's (Click Here)

Wiki's - Example: Wikipedia, WetPaint

(Social Network Aggregation - click here)
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Wiki's

A Wiki is a page or collection of Web pages designed to enable anyone who accesses it to contribute or modify contentWikipedia is a free encyclopedia with millions of articles contributed collaboratively using Wiki software, in dozens of languages.Wetpaint is a company that provides social network service and wiki hosting service (or wiki farm). Wetpaint was founded in October 2005. Site URLs are often a subdomain of "wetpaint.com", but custom URLs are also available. Wetpaint targets non-technical internet users who want to collaborate online, and therefore attempts to include easy to use features, such as a three step wiki creation wizard.


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(Social Bookmarking: Delicious, Stumbleupon)


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