Sony hackers reveal Seth Rogen and James Franco's pay for 'The Interview'

The cyber-attack targeting Sony Pictures uncovered a few more confidential details on Wednesday in what has turned into a publicity nightmare for the entertainment company.

Seth Rogen was reportedly paid $8.4 million for "The Interview," according to new data obtained by Bloomberg, while his co-star James Franco earned $6.5 million for the comedy.

The film, which allegedly cost $44 million, also paid Britney Spears' ex-husband Kevin Federline $5,000 for a cameo.

"The Interview," about two journalists tasked with assassinating North Korea dictator Kim Jong-un, is at the center of a recent hack attack at Sony, which this past week saw several new films leak online in addition to personal data and salary information about the company's top executives.

The FBI is investigating the corporate hacking, one of the worst in recent memory.

The hackers, identifying themselves as "The Guardians of Peace," have claimed that more information will be released about the movie distributor in the coming days.

North Korea, meanwhile, hasn't denied its involvement in the computer breach, simply telling the media to "wait and see" if the country is retaliating for Rogen and Franco's new comedy, which opens Christmas Day.

© 2014 Variety Media, LLC, a subsidiary of Penske Business Media; Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC

20.25 | 0 komentar | Read More

Carbonite shares soar on buy offer

Shares of Boston tech company Carbonite skyrocketed yesterday after the firm said it had received, and was considering, an acquisition offer from a California-based cloud services and digital media company.

Carbonite, a cloud storage and data backup company, disclosed in an SEC filing yesterday that j2 Global, which is headquartered in Los Angeles, had submitted an unsolicited offer to buy the company.

"J2 is ready, willing and able to acquire all outstanding shares of Carbonite stock that j2 does not now already own at a price of $15 per share payable in cash, representing a 28 percent premium" on Tuesday's closing price, according to a letter from j2 chairman Richard Ressler to Carbonite executives.

Ressler said Carbonite CEO David Friend told him the company was open to a sale "at the 'right price.'"

J2 tried to buy Carbonite more than two years ago, offering $10.50 per share.

Shares of Carbonite shot up 22.79 percent yesterday, closing at $14.44. The offer values Carbonite at just over $400 million.

Carbonite is not immediately rejecting the offer, said spokeswoman Megan Wittenberger.

"Our board — for the stockholders' sake — reviews any material offers," Wittenberger said. "We've received unsolicited offers in the past."

20.25 | 0 komentar | Read More

U.S. patients get Genzyme drug for MS

An injectable multiple sclerosis drug developed by Cambridge biotech giant Genzyme was made available to patients in the U.S. for the first time yesterday, less than a month after federal regulators reversed course and approved the medication.

"Lemtrada has changed my life," said Harold Johnson, 44, of Swansea, Ill., who was among the 1,500 MS patients who participated in the drug's clinical development program. "I'm working full time now, I'm married, I can ride my bike on the weekends, I can work out, I can finally be happy."

Johnson, who was diagnosed with MS in 2005, said he "felt almost reborn" just two weeks after receiving his first clinical dose of Lemtrada in March 2009.

"I felt like a new man," Johnson said. "I had a lot more energy, my depression immediately went away and it was replaced with the happiness that continues to this day."

Lemtrada, which is already sold in Europe, Canada and Australia, was initially rejected by the FDA last December after medical experts raised concerns about its safety and the quality of clinical studies. Two new studies comparing Lemtrada to EMD Serono's drug Rebif led to the medication's approval Nov. 14 for the treatment of American patients with relapsing remitting forms of the debilitating disease.

"My experience with Lemtrada as an MS center director has been quite positive," said Johnson's neurologist, Dr. Barry Singer of Missouri Baptist Medical Center in St. Louis, Mo. "We have really seen the impact where people's lives are more under control — that their lives are regained."

Multiple sclerosis is a chronic, autoimmune condition that affects more than 2 million people worldwide and up to 400,000 in the United States.

Bill Sibold, head of Genzyme's Multiple Sclerosis business, said: "Since approval, we have been singularly focused on providing access as quickly as possible for those patients awaiting Lemtrada by ensuring drug availability, completing required REMS training and certifications, and establishing appropriate patient support."

20.25 | 0 komentar | Read More

The Ticker

Walsh names entirely new licensing board

Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh yesterday replaced all three members of the city's Licensing Board, which regulates liquor licenses, restaurants, bars and hotels.

The three-member board now comprises Hyde Park attorney Christine A. Pulgini, a partner with the Law Offices of Joseph J. Pulgini P.C; Lisa Maki, a city of Boston lawyer since 2010; and Keeana Serene Saxon, deputy general counsel to the state's Executive Office of Housing & Economic Development since 2012. They started their six-year terms Monday.

State legislation passed this year moved responsibility for Licensing Board appointments from the governor to the mayor for the first time since 1906.

State's export growth seen lagging

Economists say Massachusetts has been lagging behind the nation as a whole in one key area of international trade.

MassBenchmarks, a journal of the state's economy, said in a report that Massachusetts ranked 49th out of the 50 states in export growth between 2009 and 2013. While U.S. exports have increased 50 percent since the Great Recession, exports from the Bay State have been, in the words of the economists, "fairly anemic," rising by just 14 percent.

Lower income tax for Mass. taxpayers

Massachusetts taxpayers will start paying a lower state income tax rate beginning in January.

Revenue Commissioner Amy Pitter confirmed that all the requirements needed to automatically lower the personal income tax rate from 5.2 percent to 5.15 percent beginning Jan. 1 have been met.

As a result, revenue collections for the remainder of the fiscal year, which ends June 30, will drop by about $70 million, contributing to an estimated $329 million budget gap.

Today

 Labor Department releases weekly jobless claims

 Selected chain retailers release November sales comparisons.

 European Central Bank's governing council meets to set monetary policy for the eurozone.

TOMORROW

 Labor Department releases employment data for November.

 Commerce Department releases international trade data and factory orders for October.

THE SHUFFLE

Codeship, a continuous delivery platform for software developers, announced the appointment of Jim Schley to vice president of engineering. Schley brings more than 15 years of successful product delivery experience to lead Codeship's expanding engineering team, with eight engineers across its Cambridge and Vienna offices.

20.25 | 0 komentar | Read More

Ringo Starr re-lists Shoot N' Starr ranch near Aspen

SELLER: Ringo Starr
LOCATION: Woody Creek, CO
PRICE: $3,850,000
SIZE: 3,192 square feet, 3 bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms

YOUR MAMA'S NOTES: Two weeks ago Your Mama dissed and discussed the pretty well palatial, 200-acre-plus English country estate that Beatles drummer Ringo Starr has up for sale at an undisclosed price that circumstantial digital evidence suggests is right around £15,000,000. (That's $23,541,600 as per our handy-dandy currency conversion contraption.) Earlier this week, as we first heard from the eagle-eyed kids at Curbed, the vaunted veteran rock star and his long-time wife, former Bond girl Barbara Bach, hoisted their 15-ish-acre spread along the Roaring Fork river in Woody Creek, CO, back on the open market with an asking price of $3.85 million.

Our research shows the Starrs picked up their rustic-luxe Colorado mini-ranch, which they dubbed the Shoot N' Starr ranch according to the wooden sign that hangs on the fence out front, way back in 1991 for $1.164 million. This is not, some of the children may already know, the first time the Starrs have tried to unload their Rocky Mountain retreat; They unsuccessfully had the place on the open market in 2010 for $4.5 million and then again in late 2013 and early 2014 for the (familiar) asking price of $3.85 million.

The equine accommodating property includes a 3,192-square foot main residence decked out in all manner of Americana regalia that Curbed accurately if cattily called "kitchy." There are three bedrooms and 2.5 bathrooms, as per listing details, plus a separate, studio-style caretaker unit. A Mexican paver tiled entry leads to a combination living and dining room with oatmeal-colored wall-to-wall carpeting, a stone-lined arched fireplace and high vaulted ceilings criss-crossed with a version of the rugged wood beams that are almost ubiquitous in a high percentage of the multi-million dollar homes in and around Aspen. The flooring switches to wood in the adjoining, window-lined family room that looks out over the yard and towards the river.

A row of muscular, tree-trunk beams make a bold and rustic statement in the spacious and well-maintained if outdated kitchen where the blue and white ceramic tile countertops are most certainly custom and have a sort of native American pattern thing happening that -- no offense to anyone -- this sometimes sassy property gossip is not so keen about as a countertop design. And, children, let's not even address the wacky wagon wheel "chandelier" over the center island that's laced with chili lights because just the very idea of it makes Your Mama need a nerve pill in the worst way imaginable.

One guest/family bedroom has multi-colored credenza painted in a rather cliché southwestern style and bevy of black and white photographs of what appear to be Native Americans while the other has a clunky television atop a dresser and a bed set -- we're afraid -- at a cattywompus angle. In general, Your Mama does not care for furnishings set at funny angles to a room's geometry but we find the practice particularly objectionable in bedrooms. Just imagine, children, how many times in the middle of the night a person has to reach down and retrieve a pillow that's fallen in to that sad little triangle between the head of the bed and the corner of the room? Anyhoodles, poodles, clunky boob-toobs and angled bed orientations are really neither here nor there when it comes to the real estate matter at hand so let's move on and wrap it up, shall we?

A dining and lounging deck off the back of the house looks out over a vast, tree-dotted lawn that slopes gently down to the rocky river's edge and a charming and perfectly appropriate split rail fence separates the landscaped areas around the house from a multi-acre horse pasture.

We can't confirm it directly but, so the story goes, Mister and Missus Starrs plan to spend more time in Los Angeles where our research shows they own a gated mini-estate near the eastern border of Beverly Hills that they scooped up in May 1991 for $3.2 million.

© 2014 Variety Media, LLC, a subsidiary of Penske Business Media; Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC

20.25 | 0 komentar | Read More

Steve Grossman blasts $65G raise for state pension chief

The salary of the state pension fund's executive director could catapult past $500,000 after its board yesterday gave him a $65,000 raise, prompting a warning from outgoing board chairman Treasurer Steve Grossman about the pay hike's optics amid financial unrest on Beacon Hill.

"We are ultimately spending taxpayer dollars and (it comes) at a time when cuts are taking place and budgetary belt-tightening is going on," said Grossman, who voted against boosting director Michael Trotsky's salary to $360,000, which, when combined with a bonus of up to 40 percent, could send his pay past a half-million dollars.

The state, Grossman noted, is trying to fill a $329 million budget gap, and the treasurer said he wanted to see a phased-in raise for Trotsky, who he still lauded for "outstanding" work.

Trotsky, who also serves as the $60.2 billion fund's chief investment officer, told the board that the fund's balance was up 9.4 percent in the year ending Oct. 31, but also warned of waves of market volatility amid the recent gains.

"We think this signals the late stage of the boom that we've been in for the past five years and we have prepared for," Trotsky said, according to the State House News Service.

A representative of Glen Shor, Gov. Deval Patrick's administration and finance secretary, was the only other board member to vote against Trotsky's raise.

Treasurer-elect Deb Goldberg said in a statement while a "significant raise" is well-deserved, the spike was "uncomfortable and not necessarily appropriate at this time."

Trotsky said in a statement he's "extremely proud" of the gains the fund has made.

20.25 | 0 komentar | Read More

Medical mistake numbers alarm experts

One of four Bay Staters say they or their loved ones have fallen victim to alarming medical mistakes like misdiagnoses and faulty treatments, according to a bombshell report that has local experts calling for more action to prevent such errors among state hospitals and agencies.

"This is a problem of just incredible magnitude," said Barbara Fain, director of the Betsy Lehman Center for Patient Safety and Medical Error, which funded the survey. "From our perspective there needs to be a greater urgency around making greater progress."

Misdiagnoses were the largest problem among those surveyed, comprising 51 percent of people who had encountered errors. Thirty-eight percent say they were given the wrong surgery or test, and 34 percent say they were given bad instructions.

The survey, conducted by the Harvard School of Public Health, asked 1,224 Massachusetts residents if they or someone close to them had experienced a medical misstep within the last five years.

The survey is one of several new reports funded by the Lehman Center, named after a Boston Globe health reporter who died in 1994 after an overdose of chemotherapy treatments.

Robert Blendon, a Harvard professor of health policy and political analysis who led the survey, said the results speak volumes about how little progress has been made since Lehman's death.

"Twenty years ago there was an event that spurred national and statewide movement with an awful death of a reporter," Blendon said. "What do you have 20 years later? You have an issue that's still a problem in people's lives. This is not a problem that went away decades later."

Patricia Folcarelli, senior director of patient safety for Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, said better systems need to be put into place to prevent human error. "The major take-away is that we still have a lot of work to do," said Folcarelli.

She said the sheer number of health care workers involved in the treatment of each patient — and breakdowns in communication among them — is the major problem behind these errors. "There's multiple people delivering care, and there are a lot of opportunities for information to get lost in the hand-off," she said. "The devil happens in the transitions."

20.25 | 0 komentar | Read More

Roslindale group battles Petco store in Village

A Roslindale Village group is trying to stop a pet store chain from opening amid its small, locally owned stores, and is seeking city regulations to cap the number of big-box stores and national restaurants in its neighborhood business district.

"We believe that national chains like Unleashed by Petco degrade the community character and make it difficult for local mom-and- pop businesses to thrive," said Christina DiLisio, executive director of Roslindale Village Main Street.

Unleashed, Petco's neighborhood version, is eyeing a new location at 745 South St., the former JB Edwards uniform store near Adams Park, but has faced stiff opposition from residents.

"People understand Roslindale Village to be something special," DiLisio said. "Chains are soulless."

The Roslindale Village Main Street is the oldest neighborhood business district in the city, established in 1985 thanks in part to then-city councilor Thomas M. Menino. There are now 20 Main Streets districts in Boston, whose aim is to revitalize and promote the city's neighborhood commercial centers.

While DiLisio and Roslindale Village Main Street battle Petco, they are also calling on the city to pass an ordinance to cap the number of so-called formula businesses — chain stores and restaurants — that could open in the future.

"Chains are never going to be able to have the face of a person and a real, live business owner putting their heart, sweat and tears to keep that business alive," DiLisio said.

City Councilor Tim McCarthy, who represents Roslindale, doesn't dismiss outright the idea of limits on chain stores in Roslindale Village, but said it would be complicated.

"We've kicked this around," McCarthy said. "If we're going to venture into this, we've got to do it right."

He said any ordinance would have to be specifically tailored.

"We may want to tweak it to make it Main Street specific," he said. "It can't be a general, sweeping regulation or ordinance."

Each Main Street program is an independent nonprofit overseen by the city's Department of Neighborhood Development.

"While we encourage innovative thinking about these issues, a formula business ordinance would have citywide implications, and will require thoughtful analysis," Neighborhood Development spokeswoman Lisa Pollack said.

Petco representatives did not respond to requests for comment.

20.25 | 0 komentar | Read More

Reebok to outfit all UFC fighters

Reebok is expanding its fitness focus by stepping into the Octagon under a six-year deal as the new exclusive outfitter of the Ultimate Fighting Championship mixed martial arts organization.

The Canton athletic brand also will be the official clothing provider for fans of the 21-year-old UFC and will develop a new line of training gear for the 35 million people worldwide who use MMA, boxing and kickboxing in their exercise regimes.

"It's a very significant commitment, and we think it will generate significant commercial opportunity," said Reebok president Matt O'Toole, who declined to put a dollar figure on the deal. "It's one of the few sports that's popular in every continent, and its viewership numbers keep climbing — similar to ... the NBA or other sports leagues."

The alliance is the biggest non-broadcast deal signed by the Las Vegas-based UFC and will further professionalize the sport, chairman and CEO Lorenzo Fertitta said. "Working with another global brand with such a strong history in training and fitness will deliver long-term value for UFC athletes and their brands by elevating and further professionalizing the events and the sport," he said in a statement.

UFC athletes will be required to wear Reebok gear at all official UFC events starting in July and will no longer be permitted to exhibit other sponsors' logos during them. In turn, the UFC will compensate them based on their rankings during event weigh-ins.

Reebok currently sponsors UFC welterweight champion Johny Hendricks and lightweight champion Anthony Pettis and expects to add more UFC fighters to its roster.

20.25 | 0 komentar | Read More

Obama to discuss economic ideas with CEOs

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama is meeting with leading CEOs to discuss ways to promote the economy and create jobs during his last two years in office.

Obama on Wednesday will attend the quarterly meeting of the Business Roundtable, an association of CEOs. Obama plans to give a speech and take questions.

The White House says Obama will use the meeting to promote bipartisan opportunities to grow the economy and the middle class, such as tax reform, infrastructure spending and trade agreements.

In the weeks since the midterm elections, Obama has cited those three issues as examples of where Democrats and Republicans might be able to compromise. Heavy Democratic losses in the elections diminished Obama's prospects for passing most of his other legislative priorities before leaving office.

20.25 | 0 komentar | Read More