Acquaintances describe Lanza as remote

The family of Nancy Lanza, the mother of elementary school shooter Adam Lanza, issued a statement of grief and condolence about Friday's massacre through local law enforcement in Kingston, N.H. (Dec. 15

NEWTOWN, Conn.—

The gunman behind the Connecticut elementary school massacre stormed into the building and shot 20 children at least twice with a high-powered rifle, executing some at close range and killing adults who tried to stop the carnage, authorities said Saturday.

He forced his way into the school by breaking a window, officials said. Asked whether the children suffered, Chief Medical Examiner Dr. H. Wayne Carver paused. "If so," he said, "not for very long."

The terrible details about the last moments of young innocents emerged as authorities released their names and ages — the youngest 6 and 7, the oldest 56. They included Ana Marquez-Greene, a little girl who had just moved to Newtown from Canada; Victoria Soto, a 27-year-old teacher who apparently died while trying to hide her pupils; and principal Dawn Hochsprung, who authorities said lunged at the gunman in an attempt to overtake him and paid with her life.

The tragedy has plunged Newtown into mourning and added the picturesque New England community of handsome Colonial homes, red-brick sidewalks and 27,000 people to the grim map of towns where mass shootings in recent years have periodically reignited the national debate over gun control but led to little change.

Faced with the unimaginable, townspeople sadly took down some of their Christmas decorations and struggled Saturday with how to go on. Signs around town read, "Hug a teacher today," ''Please pray for Newtown" and "Love will get us through."

"People in my neighborhood are feeling guilty about it being Christmas. They are taking down decorations," said Jeannie Pasacreta, a psychologist who was advising parents struggling with how to talk to their children.

School board chairwoman Debbie Leidlein spent Friday night meeting with parents who lost children and shivered as she recalled those conversations. "They were asking why. They can't wrap their minds around it. Why? What's going on?" she said. "And we just don't have any answers for them."

The tragedy brought forth soul-searching and grief around the globe. President Barack Obama planned to visit Newtown on Sunday. Families as far away as Puerto Rico planned funerals for victims who still had their baby teeth, world leaders extended condolences, and vigils were held around the U.S.

"Next week is going to be horrible," said the town's legislative council chairman, Jeff Capeci, thinking about the string of funerals the town will face. "Horrible, and the week leading into Christmas."

Police shed no light on what triggered Adam Lanza, 20, to carry out the second-deadliest school shooting in U.S. history, though state police Lt. Paul Vance said investigators had found "very good evidence ... that our investigators will be able to use in painting the complete picture, the how and, more importantly, the why." He would not elaborate.

However, another law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said investigators have found no note or manifesto from Lanza of the sort they have come to expect after murderous rampages such as the Virginia Tech bloodbath in 2007 that left 33 people dead.

Lanza shot to death his mother, Nancy Lanza, at the home they shared, then drove to the school in her car with at least three of her guns, forced his way in and opened fire, authorities said. Within minutes, he killed 20 children, six adults and himself.

Education officials said they had found no link between Lanza's mother and the school, contrary to news reports that said she was a teacher there. Investigators said they believe Adam Lanza attended Sandy Hook Elementary many years ago, but they had no explanation for why he went there Friday.

Authorities said Adam Lanza had no criminal history, and it was not clear whether he had a job. Lanza was believed to have suffered from a personality disorder, said a law enforcement official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Another law enforcement official, also speaking on condition of anonymity, said Lanza had been diagnosed with Asperger's, a mild form of autism often characterized by social awkwardness. People with the disorder are often highly intelligent. While they can become frustrated more easily, there is no evidence of a link between Asperger's and violent behavior, experts say.

The law enforcement officials insisted on anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the unfolding investigation.

Richard Novia, the school district's head of security until 2008, who also served as adviser for the school technology club, of which Lanza was a member, said he clearly "had some disabilities."

"If that boy would've burned himself, he would not have known it or felt it physically," Novia said in a phone interview. "It was my job to pay close attention to that."

Amid the confusion and sorrow, stories of heroism emerged, including an account of Hochsprung, 47, and the school psychologist, Mary Sherlach, 56, rushing toward Lanza in an attempt to stop him. Both died.

There was also 27-year-old teacher Victoria Soto, whose name has been invoked as a portrait of selflessness and humanity among unfathomable evil. Investigators told relatives she was killed while shielding her first-graders from danger. She reportedly hid some students in a bathroom or closet, ensuring they were safe, a cousin, Jim Wiltsie, told ABC News.

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Pop star Kelly Clarkson announces engagement

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Kelly Clarkson, who became the first contestant to win “American Idol” a decade ago and went on to several chart-topping successes, has gotten engaged to her boyfriend, the singer said in a Twitter message on Saturday.

Clarkson, 30, previously revealed she had been dating talent manager Brandon Blackstock since early this year. Blackstock is the stepson of country singer Reba McEntire.

“I’M ENGAGED!” Clarkson said on Twitter. “I wanted y’all to know!! Happiest night of my life last night!”

She then followed that by posting a link to a photo of her canary yellow diamond engagement ring on a website. She wrote that her boyfriend helped design it and that she “can’t wait to make Brandon’s ring.”

Clarkson’s album “Stronger” hit No. 2 last year on the Billboard 200 sales chart, and she in previous years topped pop charts with her songs “My Life Would Suck Without You” and “A Moment Like This.”

The Texas-born singer won the Fox television singing contest “American Idol” in the show’s debut year in 2002, and has had more success than many of the show’s stars from following years.

Clarkson has burnished an image as an artist willing to speak her mind, even confessing to feelings of loneliness.

Last month, in an appearance on the “Ellen DeGeneres Show,” Clarkson said she had been dating Blackstock since earlier this year and was thankful to have him.

“I am not alone for the first time for Thanksgiving and Christmas and I’m very happy,” she said on the show.

In the same November appearance, Clarkson said she expected to get engaged to Blackstock. “We will totally, probably elope,” she told DeGeneres.

(Reporting By Alex Dobuzinskis; Editing by David Bailey)

Music News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Dr. William F. House, Inventor of Cochlear Implant, Dies

Dr. William F. House, a medical researcher who braved skepticism to invent the cochlear implant, an electronic device considered to be the first to restore a human sense, died on Dec. 7 at his home in Aurora, Ore. He was 89.

The cause was metastatic melanoma, his daughter, Karen House, said.

Dr. House pushed against conventional thinking throughout his career. Over the objections of some, he introduced the surgical microscope to ear surgery. Tackling a form of vertigo that doctors had believed was psychosomatic, he developed a surgical procedure that enabled the first American in space to travel to the moon. Peering at the bones of the inner ear, he found enrapturing beauty.

Even after his ear-implant device had largely been supplanted by more sophisticated, and more expensive, devices, Dr. House remained convinced of his own version’s utility and advocated that it be used to help the world’s poor.

Today, more than 200,000 people in the world have inner-ear implants, a third of them in the United States. A majority of young deaf children receive them, and most people with the implants learn to understand speech with no visual help.

Hearing aids amplify sound to help the hearing-impaired. But many deaf people cannot hear at all because sound cannot be transmitted to their brains, however much it is amplified. This is because the delicate hair cells that line the cochlea, the liquid-filled spiral cavity of the inner ear, are damaged. When healthy, these hairs — more than 15,000 altogether — translate mechanical vibrations produced by sound into electrical signals and deliver them to the auditory nerve.

Dr. House’s cochlear implant electronically translated sound into mechanical vibrations. His initial device, implanted in 1961, was eventually rejected by the body. But after refining its materials, he created a long-lasting version and implanted it in 1969.

More than a decade would pass before the Food and Drug Administration approved the cochlear implant, but when it did, in 1984, Mark Novitch, the agency’s deputy commissioner, said, “For the first time a device can, to a degree, replace an organ of the human senses.”

One of Dr. House’s early implant patients, from an experimental trial, wrote to him in 1981 saying, “I no longer live in a world of soundless movement and voiceless faces.”

But for 27 years, Dr. House had faced stern opposition while he was developing the device. Doctors and scientists said it would not work, or not work very well, calling it a cruel hoax on people desperate to hear. Some said he was motivated by the prospect of financial gain. Some criticized him for experimenting on human subjects. Some advocates for the deaf said the device deprived its users of the dignity of their deafness without fully integrating them into the hearing world.

Even when the American Academy of Ophthalmology and Otolaryngology endorsed implants in 1977, it specifically denounced Dr. House’s version. It recommended more complicated versions, which were then under development and later became the standard.

But his work is broadly viewed as having sped the development of implants and enlarged understanding of the inner ear. Jack Urban, an aerospace engineer, helped develop the surgical microscope as well as mechanical and electronic aspects of the House implant.

Karl White, founding director of the National Center for Hearing Assessment and Management, said in an interview that it would have taken a decade longer to invent the cochlear implant without Dr. House’s contributions. He called him “a giant in the field.”

After embracing the use of the microscope in ear surgery, Dr. House developed procedures — radical for their time — for removing tumors from the back portion of the brain without causing facial paralysis; they cut the death rate from the surgery to less than 1 percent from 40 percent.

He also developed the first surgical treatment for Meniere’s disease, which involves debilitating vertigo and had been viewed as a psychosomatic condition. His procedure cured the astronaut Alan B. Shepard Jr. of the disease, clearing him to command the Apollo 14 mission to the moon in 1971. In 1961, Shepard had become the first American launched into space.

In presenting Dr. House with an award in 1995, the American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery Foundation said, “He has developed more new concepts in otology than almost any other single person in history.”

William Fouts House was born in Kansas City, Mo., on Dec. 1, 1923. When he was 3 his family moved to Whittier, Calif., where he grew up on a ranch. He did pre-dental studies at Whittier College and the University of Southern California, and earned a doctorate in dentistry at the University of California, Berkeley. After serving his required two years in the Navy — and filling the requisite 300 cavities a month — he went back to U.S.C. to pursue an interest in oral surgery. He earned his medical degree in 1953. After a residency at Los Angeles County Hospital, he joined the Los Angeles Foundation of Otology, a nonprofit research institution founded by his brother, Howard. Today it is called the House Research Institute.

Many at the time thought ear surgery was a declining field because of the effectiveness of antibiotics in dealing with ear maladies. But Dr. House saw antibiotics as enabling more sophisticated surgery by diminishing the threat of infection.

When his brother returned from West Germany with a surgical microscope, Dr. House saw its potential and adopted it for ear surgery; he is credited with introducing the device to the field. But again there was resistance. As Dr. House wrote in his memoir, “The Struggles of a Medical Innovator: Cochlear Implants and Other Ear Surgeries” (2011), some eye doctors initially criticized his use of a microscope in surgery as reckless and unnecessary for a surgeon with good eyesight.

Dr. House also used the microscope as a research tool. One night a week he would take one to a morgue for use in dissecting ears to gain insights that might lead to new surgical procedures. His initial reaction, he said, was how beautiful the bones seemed; he compared the experience to one’s first view of the Grand Canyon. His wife, the former June Stendhal, a nurse, often helped.

She died in 2008 after 64 years of marriage. In addition to his daughter, Dr. House is survived by a son, David; three grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.

The implant Dr. House invented used a single channel to deliver information to the hearing system, as opposed to the multiple channels of competing models. The 3M Company, the original licensee of the House implant, sold its rights to another company, the Cochlear Corporation, in 1989. Cochlear later abandoned his design in favor of the multichannel version.

But Dr. House continued to fight for his single-electrode approach, saying it was far cheaper, and offered voluminous material as evidence of its efficacy. He had hoped to resume production of it and make it available to the poor around the world.

Neither the institute nor Dr. House made any money on the implant. He never sought a patent on any of his inventions, he said, because he did not want to restrict other researchers. A nephew, Dr. John House, the current president of the House institute, said his uncle had made the deal to license it to the 3M Company not for profit but simply to get it built by a reputable manufacturer.

Reflecting on his business decisions in his memoir, Dr. House acknowledged, “I might be a little richer today.”

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Greener planet is goal for 3 startups

If the glut of companies billing themselves as "solutions" providers is any indication, the world has no shortage of problems.

Green tech companies take on some of the most complicated, difficult problems to solve. They tend to be problems created by our mere existence, chief among them our massive demand for energy. The more we rely on energy to power our electronics, our vehicles and our lives, the more pollution we churn into our land, water and air.

The Tribune checked in with three local green tech startups at various stages of development. They haven't changed the world yet, but they're working on it.

COMPANY: LanzaTech

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: Global warming, a huge challenge as energy demand is expected to double within 40 years.

FUNDS RAISED: $100 million

It may sound like sci-fi, but LanzaTech produces gas-eating "bugs" that don't require oxygen to survive.

In April, the company's microscopic bacteria began ingesting carbon monoxide from a steel mill in China. Carbon monoxide goes in one end of the bacteria and ethanol comes out the other.

With a few genetic tweaks, the bug can produce a wide range of fuels and chemicals from gases that companies spend money to get rid of. The idea, says Jennifer Holmgren, the company's chief executive, is to trap nasty gases that float from steel mills, power plants and chemical factories, turning them into products that are useful and profitable.

The company recently inked a deal with Petronas, the national oil company of Malaysia, to develop a modified version of the bug that takes in carbon dioxide and produces acetic acid, a chemical companies need to produce polymers used in plastics.

"Rather than trying to sequester carbon deep into the earth, we will 'bury' it in a chemical," Holmgren said. "In this way, companies can not only comply with emissions reduction requirements, but also generate revenue along the way."

When Holmgren talks about the technology's potential, she pulls up a map of the world, showing partnerships and agreements the company has with companies from Boeing Co. in Chicago and Kansas-based Invista, the world's largest nylon producer, to Indian Oil Co. in New Delhi and Mitsui & Co. Ltd. in Japan.

Out of the company's various projects, the carbon monoxide-eating bacteria are the furthest along in the path toward commercialization. This month, LanzaTech finished a demonstration project for China's largest steel manufacturer, Baosteel, at a plant near Shanghai.

LanzaTech successfully produced the equivalent of more than 100,000 gallons of ethanol per year from just a fraction of the carbon monoxide the company creates in the steel-making process.

"You're literally driving for miles watching this steel mill," Holmgren said, explaining its vast size — and its potential to produce hundreds of millions of gallons of ethanol per year.

The technology creates a financial incentive to trap the gas rather than flare it, a common practice that produces carbon dioxide, which contributes to global warming. Through a series of pipes, the gas enters a vessel filled with the organism, which is floating in water. Fuel comes out the back end and is pumped through a distiller to create pure ethanol.

Because of the success of that demonstration, the steel company has ordered the first of what will eventually be three or four units, each about $80 million, that are each expected to produce 30 million to 50 million gallons of ethanol per year. Each unit pays itself back in under five years, Holmgren said.

"We don't want it to be green for green's sake. If it is, no one is going to use it," she said.

With 140 employees worldwide, LanzaTech doesn't have any revenues to report yet. Holmgren said LanzaTech expects to grow to profitability between 2013 and 2015.

COMPANY: Hybrid Electric Vehicle Technologies LLC

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Witness inside school: 'I've got bodies here'

A man killed his mother at their home and then opened fire Friday inside an elementary school, massacring 26 people, including 20 children, as youngsters cowered in fear to the sound of gunshots reverberating through the building and screams echoing over the intercom.

The 20-year-old killer, carrying at least two handguns, committed suicide at the school, bringing the death toll to 28, authorities said.

The rampage, coming less than two weeks before Christmas, was the nation's second-deadliest school shooting, exceeded only by the Virginia Tech massacre that claimed 33 lives in 2007.

"Our hearts are broken today," a tearful President Barack Obama, struggling to maintain his composure, said at the White House. He called for "meaningful action" to prevent such shootings, saying, "As a country, we have been through this too many times."

Police shed no light on the motive for the attack. The gunman, Adam Lanza, was believed to suffer from a personality disorder and lived with his mother, said a law enforcement official who was briefed on the investigation but was not authorized to discuss it.

Panicked parents looking for their children raced to Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, a prosperous New England community of about 27,000 people 60 miles northeast of New York City. Police told youngsters at the kindergarten-through-fourth-grade school to close their eyes as they were led from the building so that they wouldn't see the blood and broken glass.

Schoolchildren -- some crying, others looking frightened -- were escorted through a parking lot in a line, hands on each other's shoulders.

Law enforcement officials speaking on condition of anonymity said Lanza shot his mother, Nancy Lanza, then drove to the school in her car with at least three guns, including a high-powered rifle that he apparently left in the back of the vehicle, and shot up two classrooms around 9:30 a.m.

A custodian ran through the halls, warning of a gunman on the loose, and someone switched on the intercom, alerting people in the building to the attack -- and perhaps saving many lives -- by letting them hear the hysteria going on in the school office, a teacher said. Teachers locked their doors and ordered children to huddle in a corner or hide in closets as shots echoed through the building.

Authorities gave no details on exactly how the attack unfolded, but police radio traffic indicated the shooting lasted only a few minutes. State police Lt. Paul Vance said officers arrived instantaneously, immediately entered the school, searched it completely and found Lanza dead.

In addition to the 20 children, six adults were killed at the school; the principal was believed to be among the dead. A woman who worked at Sandy Hook Elementary was wounded.

A law enforcement official speaking on condition of anonymity said investigators believe Lanza attended the school several years ago but appeared to have no recent connection to the place.

At least one parent said Lanza's mother was a substitute teacher there. But her name did not appear on a staff list. And the law enforcement official said investigators were unable to establish any connection so far between her and the school.

Lanza's older brother, 24-year-old Ryan, of Hoboken, N.J., was being questioned, but a law enforcement official said he was not believed to have had a role in the rampage. Investigators were searching his computers and phone records, but he told law enforcement he had not been in touch with his brother since about 2010.

The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the unfolding investigation.

At one point, a law enforcement official mistakenly identified the gunman as Ryan Lanza. Brett Wilshe, a friend of Ryan Lanza's, said Lanza told him the gunman may have had his identification. Ryan Lanza apparently posted Facebook page updates Friday afternoon that read, "It wasn't me" and "I was at work."

Robert Licata said his 6-year-old son was in class when the gunman burst in and shot the teacher. "That's when my son grabbed a bunch of his friends and ran out the door," he said. "He was very brave. He waited for his friends."

He said the shooter didn't utter a word.

Stephen Delgiadice said his 8-year-old daughter heard two big bangs. Teachers told her to get in a corner, he said. "It's alarming, especially in Newtown, Connecticut, which we always thought was the safest place in America," he said. His daughter was uninjured.

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One Direction, Rihanna, Adele lead Billboard 2012 charts

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Newcomer British boy band One Direction joined R&B diva Rihanna and British singer Adele to top Billboard‘s year-end music charts, released on Friday.

One Direction, who topped the Billboard 200 album chart twice this year with their debut, “Up All Night” in March and their sophomore album “Take Me Home” in November, were named Billboard‘s top new artist/group, rounding off a stellar year of U.S. success for the band.

Adele, 24, who became the first woman top score No. 1 single, album and artist on Billboard’s 2011 year-end charts, continued her reign in 2012, when her Grammy-winning record “21″ was the top-selling album in the U.S. and she was once again named artist of the year.

“21″ has sold more than 10 million copies in the U.S. since its release in February 2011, becoming a fixture on the Billboard 200, especially after Adele’s six wins at the Grammy Awards earlier this year.

She is the only act to be named both top artist and have the top album in Billboard’s charts for two years in a row.

Adele was also named the No. 1 female artist while R&B rapper-singer Drake was named No. 1 male artist and pop-rock band Maroon 5 were named No. 1 group.

Rihanna, also 24, was named the top Hot 100 artist after a year of chart-topping hit singles such as “We Found Love” and “Diamonds” on the Hot 100 chart, which measures top-selling singles each week.

But Australia’s Gotye picked up the Hot 100 single of the year, with his heartbreak hit “Somebody That I Used To Know.”

Billboard compile their end-of-year lists based on chart performances between December 3 2011 and November 24 2012, tallying data including album sales and streaming figures.

For more on Billboard’s year-end charts, visit http://www.billboard.com/news/the-best-of-2012-the-year-in-music-1008045682.story#

(Reporting By Piya Sinha-Roy, editing by Jill Serjeant and Andrew Hay)

Music News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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3 innovations from Chicago science scene

Julian Gordon and Prasanthi Gandhi pose for a photograph amid various air-purifying devices in their lab at Inspirotec, 2201 W. Campbell Park Dr., Wednesday, Dec. 12, 2012, in Chicago. The duo created the company that plans to develop and market an all-in-one air collector-detector, which will allow consumers to find out what allergens and pathogens might be in the air around them. (John J. Kim / December 14, 2012)

By Melissa Harris

11:15 p.m. CST, December 14, 2012

Internet-centered technology has advanced to the point that smartphone apps and e-commerce sites seemingly sprout overnight. Indeed, many can be built inexpensively from off-the-shelf software in weeks. Scientific breakthroughs, however, often require decades of research and millions of dollars. At the end of every year, I feature three teams of Chicago innovators whose ideas won’t hit the big-time soon but have the potential to improve, even save, our lives a decade from now.

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Alvarez fires back at '60 Minutes'

After days of scathing reviews of her "60 Minutes" interview on false confessions, Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez fired off a letter to the venerable news program calling its Sunday report "one-sided and extremely misleading" and vowing to set the record straight.

The segment titled "Chicago: The False Confession Capital" featured two infamous Chicago-area cases in which teenage boys allegedly confessed to brutal murders but were later exonerated when DNA excluded them as the killers.

In her letter, addressed to CBS News Chairman Jeff Fager, Alvarez called the story "an offensive display" and accused reporter Byron Pitts of using only snippets of a 6-month-old interview to distort her record and make it appear she was still trying to prosecute the cases.

"Had I known that this story would completely distort my position and intentionally omit critical facts, I would never have agreed to your interview," Alvarez wrote.

One particularly damaging portion of the interview involved the Dixmoor Five case in which five men were convicted as teens of the 1991 rape and murder of a 14-year-old girl whose body was found on a path. DNA linked a serial rapist to the crime and undermined confessions from the teens. They were cleared in 2011 after spending years in prison.

Alvarez explained in the interview that one possible explanation for the DNA was necrophilia — that the rapist had sex with the girl after she'd already been killed.

That answer — which was roundly mocked in blogs and news critiques — was misconstrued, Alvarez said in the letter. She wrote that the necrophilia theory was used at trial years before she had any involvement in the case.

"I have never advanced that theory or argument, but simply responded, when asked by Mr. Pitts, that we can't say with certainty what had occurred," Alvarez wrote. "This story was not designed to inform, it was designed to undermine me and mislead the public."

Sally Daly, a spokeswoman for Alvarez, said the reaction to the piece has been vitriolic. "She's gotten hate mail, things you couldn't even publish," Daly said.

CBS News representatives did not return phone calls seeking comment.

jmeisner@tribune.com

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Microsoft plots living room domination with 43 new entertainment apps for Xbox 360

Game consoles are no longer simply for video games, as evidenced by last week’s announcement that the PlayStation 3 is the top Netflix (NFLX) streaming device of the year. Yusuf Mehdi, Microsoft’s (MSFT) chief marketing officer for its Interactive Entertainment Division, said this past March that Xbox 360 owners were spending more hours watching online entertainment than playing online games. And now, in a bid to bolster its efforts to conquer the living room, Microsoft Director of Programming for Xbox Live Larry “Major Nelson” Hyrb announced in a blog post that 43 new entertainment apps (mostly video) will launch between now and spring of 2013 in various regions. Ten new apps including ARTE, CinemaNow, CNET, Karaoke, Maxim, Napster, SkyDrive, SPORT1, VEVO and Zattoo will arrive this week. Microsoft’s full list of upcoming apps follows below.

1. All3M (United Kingdom, United States)
2. Ameba TV (Canada, United States)
3. ARTE (Germany, France)
4. Azteca (Mexico)
5. Canalplay Infinity (France)
6. CBC’s Hockey Night (Canada)
7. CrunchyRoll (Majority of LIVE Regions)
8. Deezer (Majority of LIVE Regions)
9. Eredivisie Live (Netherlands)
10. Fightbox (Austria, Germany, Spain, France, Ireland, Italy, Sweden, United Kingdom)
11. Flixster (United States)
12. GameTrailers (Australia, Canada, Germany, Spain, France, Italy, Japan, Mexico, United Kingdom, United States)
13. Globosat Muu (Brazil)
14. Gulli Replay (France)
15. HBO Nordics (Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden)
16. IndieFlix (Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, United Kingdom, United States)
17. Livesport.tv (Austria, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Spain, Finland, France, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, New Zealand, Sweden, United Kingdom)
18. Machinima (Majority of LIVE Regions)
19. Maxim (United States)
20. MTV (United States)
21. MyTF1 (France)
22. MyTF1VOD (France)
23. Napster (Germany, United Kingdom)
24. Pathe Thuis (Netherlands)
25. PBS (United States)
26. PopcornFlix (United States)
27. Rai TV (Italy)
28. Sainsbury (United Kingdom)
29. Saraiva (Brazil)
30. SBS (Netherlands)
31. SF Anytime (Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden)
32. Slacker Radio (Canada, United States)
33. SPORT1 (Austria, Germany)
34. The CW Network (United States)
35. Televisa (Mexico)
36. TV3 (Spain)
37. Viaplay (Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden)
38. Vidéo à la Demande d’Orange (France)
39. Vimeo (United States)
40. VIVO Play (Brazil)
41. Watchever (Austria, Germany)
42. Zattoo (Germany)
43. Ziggo (Netherlands)

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Politico financier Joe L. Allbritton dies at 87

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Joe L. Allbritton, the millionaire founder of Politico‘s parent company, died Wednesday of heart ailments in a Houston hospital. He was 87.

The founder of Allbritton Communications, which launched Politico and owns several television stations, built the Washington, D.C.-based media empire after controversy-fraught years as the chief of Riggs National Bank.

Born in Mississippi and raised in Texas, Allbritton was a self-made businessman, who dabbled in real estate, mortuaries and banking before entering the news business in 1974, when he purchased the struggling Washington Star newspaper.

He revived the paper. Six years later, federal regulations regarding cross ownership of newspaper and television stations forced him to sell his $ 35 million investment. Time Inc. bought it for $ 217 million.

Allbritton held on to his more lucrative media properties, including WJLA, an ABC affiliate in Washington, D.C. that took his initials, and helped launch NewsChannel 8, also in Washington, one of the country’s first 24-hour news channels.

The company he founded, which is now run by his son, Robert, has made inroads into the internet world – founding Politico in 2007 and TBD, a short-lived internet news site that the company shuttered in 2012. Though Politico is his son’s creation, the elder Allbritton bankrolled the publication and has been accused of excessively involving himself in its editorial affairs.

But, for all of Allbritton’s successes and wealth, his career was marred by a nationwide recession in the early 1990s that Forbes magazine said brought the bank to the brink of insolvency.

The economic slump left Riggs with bad loans on drastically devalued real estate, but Allbritton was also blamed by analysts for ignoring the growing suburban banking market which took business away from Riggs.

Despite these woes, he refused to give up his private jet at Riggs, even as shareholders urged him to sell the Gulfstream.

He was also criticized for his eagerness to do business with some shady customers

He personally courted Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, whom human rights groups accused of killing more than 3,000 of his own citizens during his 17-year reign.

And – in a 2001 letter to Teodoro Obiang Nguema, the dictator of oil-rich Equatorial Guinea – Allbritton praised the west African strongman’s “reputation for prudent leadership.” Obiang deposited hundreds of millions of dollars in banks controlled by Allbritton.

But little of this criticism appeared in Politico’s glowing, three-page obituary on its financier.

The piece, bylined by editor-in-chief John F. Harris and reporter James Hohmann, makes a brief, passing mention of a federal inquiry into Allbritton’s dealings with Pinochet. There is no mention of Obiang.

The man, whom the Washington Post noted – in the headline of its obituary – led once-venerable Riggs to “disrepute” is praised by Politico with a laundry list of accomplishments.

“He would wear Politico baseball caps and T-shirts while playing with his grandchildren. Sometimes, he would quiz executives at the company on business and editorial matters, sometimes pretending caustically to second-guess their decisions,” Harris and Hohmann wrote of the former boss.

“It took the publisher, adept at reading his father’s sense of humor, to assure people that he was just kidding; his main involvement in the new publication was as cheerleader.”

It wasn’t the only time Allbritton was accused of involving himself in Politico’s coverage.

In 2007, five months after the news agency’s christening, Glenn Greenwald, then a columnist at Salon, accused Politico of having a conservative bias, pointing to Allbritton’s appointment of Frederick J. Ryan Jr., a one-time assistant to President Ronald Reagan, as president and CEO of Politico.

“There is nothing wrong per se with hard-core political operatives running a news organization. Long-time Republican strategist Roger Ailes oversees Fox News, of course,” Greenwald wrote. “But it seems rather self-evident that a news organization run by someone with such clear-cut political biases ought to have a hard time holding itself out as some sort of politically unbiased source of news.”

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