Second honor in a week: Park City one of 'America's best ski towns ...

The back-to-back national tributes for Park City and Salt Lake City in recent weeks provide the folks who promote the state with some welcomed leverage.

Tourism ? Travel + Leisure names 11 as must-visit destinations.

For the second time in less than a week, Utah is receiving national raves as a ski destination.

Travel + Leisure magazine has included Park City among 11 spots in a piece it titled "America?s Best Ski Towns."

It said this: "Nearly a million annual visitors descend on Park City, whose Main Street still has the rugged good looks of a 19th century western mining town. It puts skiers in easy reach of mountain resorts, hosts the Sundance Film Festival, and has become a culinary hotbed.

"The ski-in High West Distillery & Saloon offers customized flights of craft creations paired with dishes like Kentucky whiskey beer cheese and bourbon three-onion soup. The seasonal tasting menu at Talisker on Main incorporates vegetables and herbs grown on its rooftop, while the Canyons? Bistro restaurant is the first and only certified kosher restaurant at a U.S. ski resort. With the restoration of the 1889 Washington School House into a 12-room hotel, you?ve got a new home base?plus complimentary transportation to your preferred slopes."

Others on the list included Telluride, Colo., and Taos, N.M.

Last week, the travel website TripAdvisor ranked Salt Lake City No. 4 in its top 10 "Best Value Ski Destinations"

It noted that Utah?s capital city boasts seven major ski resorts within 45 minutes of downtown.

The back-to-back tributes provide the folks who promote the state with some welcomed leverage.

"There?s nothing better than a third-party endorsement," said Nathan Rafferty, CEO of Ski Utah, marketing arm for the state?s 14 resorts. "It?s one thing when we say we have the best snow, it?s another when someone independently says good things.

"We?ll shine a light on these rankings because they get a ton of traction. They have credibility."

story continues below

Copyright 2012 The Salt Lake Tribune. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/money/55565323-79/ski-park-travel-leisure.html.csp

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Star Wars Creator George Lucas Engaged To Mellody Hobson!

Star Wars Creator George Lucas Engaged To Mellody Hobson!

George Lucas has finally popped the question to his girlfriend of seven years Mellody Hobson. Lucas’ 31-year-old daughter Amanda took to Twitter to share the happy news of the engagement! Amanda posted an article about the engagement and tweeted, “George Lucas, Mellody Hobson Engaged: ‘Star Wars’ Director, Businesswoman Set To Marry ….Congratulations Dad & Mellody!:) ...

Star Wars Creator George Lucas Engaged To Mellody Hobson! Stupid Celebrities Gossip Stupid Celebrities Gossip News

Source: http://stupidcelebrities.net/2013/01/star-wars-creator-george-lucas-engaged-to-mellody-hobson/

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S&P 500 finishes at 5-year high on economic data

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The benchmark Standard & Poor's 500 index ended at a five-year high on Friday, lifted by reports showing employers kept up a steady pace of hiring workers and the vast services sector expanded at a brisk rate.

The gains on the S&P 500 pushed the index to its highest close since December 2007 and its biggest weekly gain since December 2011.

Most of the gains came early in the holiday-shortened week, including the largest one-day rise for the index in more than a year on Wednesday after politicians struck a deal to avert the "fiscal cliff."

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> gained 43.85 points, or 0.33 percent, to 13,435.21. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> rose 7.10 points, or 0.49 percent, to 1,466.47. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> edged up 1.09 points, or 0.04 percent, to 3,101.66.

For the week, the S&P gained 4.6 percent, the Dow rose 3.8 percent and the Nasdaq jumped 4.8 percent to post their largest weekly percentage gains in more than a year.

The CBOE Volatility index <.vix>, a measure of investor anxiety, dropped for a fourth straight session, giving the index a weekly decline of nearly 40 percent, its biggest weekly fall ever. The close of 13.83 on the VIX marks its lowest level since August.

In Friday's economic reports, the Labor Department said non-farm payrolls grew by 155,000 jobs last month, slightly below November's level. Gains were distributed broadly throughout the economy, from manufacturing and construction to healthcare.

Also serving to boost equities was data from the Institute for Supply Management showing U.S. service sector activity expanding the most in 10 months.

With the S&P 500 index at a five-year closing high, analysts said any gains above the index's intraday high near 1,475 in September may be harder to come by.

"We are getting to a point where we need a strong catalyst, which could be earnings, it could be three months of good economic data, it could be a variety of things," said Adam Thurgood, managing director at HighTower Advisors in Las Vegas, Nevada.

"What is going on right now is this conflicting view of fundamentals look pretty good and improving, and then you've got these negative tail risks that could blow everything up," Thurgood said.

He referred to "a fiscal superstorm brewing" of issues still left unresolved in Washington, including tough federal budget cuts and the need to raise the government's debt ceiling all within a couple of months.

The rise in payrolls shown by the jobs data did not make a dent in the U.S. unemployment rate still at 7.8 percent.

A Reuters poll on Friday of economists at Wall Street's top financial institutions showed that most expect the Fed in 2013 to end the program with which it bought Treasury debt in an effort to stimulate the economy.

A drop in Apple Inc shares of 2.6 percent to $528.36 kept pressure on the Nasdaq.

Adding to concerns about Apple's ability to produce more innovative products, rival Samsung Electronics Co Ltd is expected to widen its lead over Apple in global smartphone sales this year with growth of 35 percent. Market researcher Strategy Analytics said Samsung had a broad product lineup.

Eli Lilly and Co was among the biggest boost's to the S&P, up 3.7 percent to $51.56 after the pharmaceuticals maker said it expects its 2013 earnings to increase to $3.75 to $3.90 per share, excluding items, from $3.30 to $3.40 per share in 2012.

Fellow drugmaker Johnson & Johnson rose 1.2 percent to $71.55 after Deutsche Bank upgraded the Dow component to a "Buy" from a "Hold" rating. The NYSEArca pharmaceutical index <.drg> climbed 0.6 percent.

Shares of Mosaic Co gained 3.3 percent to $58.62. Excluding items, the fertilizer producer's quarterly earnings beat analysts' expectations, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Volume was modest with about 6.07 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, NYSE MKT and Nasdaq, slightly below the 2012 daily average of 6.42 billion.

Advancing stocks outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by 2,287 to 701, while on the Nasdaq, advancers beat decliners 1,599 to 866.

(Reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Nick Zieminski and Kenneth Barry)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/fed-minutes-short-circuit-wall-street-rally-004318703--sector.html

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Homeland

Illustration by Nicole Georges

When Alex Haley chronicled his family?s lineage from the coast of Gambia to the chains of slavery in the United States in his sprawling 1976 epic Roots, America?particularly black America?took notice. With extensive research and interviews with family members, Haley was miraculously able to do what most black Americans could not and still cannot?trace back his heritage seven generations and a couple hundred years. Roots and the wildly popular miniseries of the same name influenced many people of all ethnicities to seek out their own familial backgrounds, in hopes of understanding where they came from, and where their true, spiritual home may lie.

Of course, as Haley?s friend Henry Louis Gates Jr. told the Boston Globe in 1998, ?Most of us feel it's highly unlikely that Alex actually found the village whence his ancestors sprang.? The elusive fantasy of many black Americans of finding ?home? speaks to how we all seek refuge in the images and ideas we hold of our ancestors.

In her memoir Searching for Zion, Emily Raboteau travels to several continents and countries?including Israel, Jamaica, and Ghana?seeking her own personal Promised Land. While Raboteau, whose mother is white and father is black, may not have been looking to trace her ancestors like Haley, the hope to find some connection to an unknown past rings with the same pang of truth.

Raboteau?s book is at once a memoir and an exercise in researching and reclaiming history. Throughout her travels, she writes candidly of her family?s past?particularly of the murder of her grandfather by a white man in Mississippi in the early 1940s?as well as her resentment over being perceived by others as ethnically ambiguous, leaving her with an intense feeling of displacement. The question Searching for Zion asks is bold and grand in scope: What and where is home, and how do people of color in particular?people who have often been displaced due to slavery, civil unrest, or willing expatriation?go about achieving inner peace?

Raboteau?s travels are sparked by a trip just prior to 9/11 to visit a Jewish childhood friend, Tamar, who moved to Jerusalem in adulthood. Despite the intense violence occurring in that part of Israel at the time and the emotional toll it took upon her friend, Raboteau felt envious?this was, after all, the holy place where Jesus was crucified and brought back to life. ?All I understood was that she?d taken the opportunity to make this place her own,? Raboteau writes. ?As complicated and confusing as that choice must have been, I felt enormously jealous of her ability to make it.??

Hers is an emotional struggle that most, if not all, black people face at one point or another. I confess to once feeling equally bothered that, unlike my Jewish friends who had the opportunity to go on Birthright and return to their ?homeland? once they turned 18, I had no direct or spiritual ties to the continent?much less the country?of my earliest ancestors. As far as birth records and oral history from relatives are concerned, my family?s origins exist nowhere beyond the United States. Raboteau?s father is correct when he describes the hurt of realizing that America is not his Promised Land as a ?black feeling.??

But being black does not mean that I couldn?t attempt to make Jerusalem or any other place my new ?paradise? if I wanted to. As Tamar informs Raboteau on this first visit, there are a handful of black Americans who have done so already, as well as blacks from other nations as well. On her return six years later, she encounters a Jamaican Rastafarian, who, like others of the faith, believes he is a descendant of Ethiopia and considers the one-time Ethiopian emperor Haile Selassie to be the Messiah. There are also the Beta Israel?Ethiopian Jews who have been recognized by the Israeli Rabbinate since the 1970s, allowing them to emigrate under the Law of Return?many of whom have not found Jerusalem to be the beacon of hope they may have imagined it to be. Forced to shed their religious and cultural identities in order to gain full Jewish status and Israeli citizenship, many Ethiopians, particularly of the younger generation, have become disenchanted with their expatriation. Teenagers embrace the Western ideologies of black pride through rap music and Bob Marley rather than Israeli or Ethiopian culture. ?The Jamaican searches for Ethiopia,? Raboteau writes. ?The Ethiopian searches for Israel, arrives, then searches for Jamaica. And I, the so-called African American, search for what, exactly???

Raboteau had to visit several continents over the course of a decade to fully accept the fact that she had to find this peace on her own. For blacks of my generation, such travels may not be necessary. By the 1980s, the names given to girls born in a black California neighborhood were 20 times more likely to be common among blacks as opposed to whites. (In the 1970s, they were only twice as likely.) I wasn?t born in California, but I was a product of the ?80s and had a father who gave me and my younger sister distinctly African first and middle names despite the fact that at the time he had no idea what country our ancestors were torn away from, much less what tribe or what language they spoke.

Though I love my name and would never think of changing it, meeting and making friends in college with first- and second-generation students who were from Ghana, Senegal, and Nigeria only magnified how disconnected I am with the diaspora. In my mind, they are true African-Americans; I now identify myself solely as a black American. As Mary Ellen, an American woman exiled to Ghana with African studies professor John Ray in 1976, tells Raboteau, ?I?m not African. Four hundred years away made me something else.??

Author Emily Raboteau

Courtesy of Author

For a time, like Raboteau, I was bothered by these feelings. But eventually, I learned to latch on to what I did know of my background, thanks to my father?s reconstruction of our family tree and the recollections of relatives from my mother?s side. It?s probably no coincidence that it is during Raboteau?s trip to the American South?the place of her grandfather?s horrific death?that she finally begins to come to terms with her feelings of incompleteness. It is a trip that includes stops at Selma, Ala.; Montgomery, Miss.; and finally Decatur, Ga.; where family on her father?s side now resides after being displaced from Mississippi following Hurricane Katrina. Raboteau?s cousin Tracy lived through a harrowing Katrina experience and now accepts the fact that the only place she?s known is no longer her home. The resiliency of Tracy, and her insistence that they are survivors, not victims, humbles the author and challenges her understandings of what ?home? can really mean.

Almost all of the cast of colorful characters Raboteau encounters on her travels are disillusioned with the place they chose to call home. Finding paradise isn?t as simple as it seems. A man Raboteau meets in Ethiopia comfortably describes himself as a hybrid of genealogical and geographic roots?including Barbadian, American, and Ethiopian. He insightfully advises her that Zion can only be found once you ?transcend false compartmentalization of humanity into black/white, Muslim/Jew.? Being free or at peace with one?s sense of self cannot be found via a geographic location or ethnic identity: Zion is a myth, a frame of mind, and a place you can?t get to on a plane.?

Searching for Zion by Emily Raboteau. Atlantic Monthly Press.

Source: http://feeds.slate.com/click.phdo?i=84e944885d27fe15d0bf2719d9a0f644

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We Are Now a Society of Multi-taskers and Multi-screeners | Social ...

We are a nation of multi-taskers. As you read this, you?re either doing something else, or this is the ?something else? you?re doing while your work on other projects or relax in front of another device. Not only are we multi-taskers, we?re also multi-screeners. Whether it?s a smartphone, tablet, PC/laptop, TV or something other device, we?re consuming, creating, and curating content across multiple devices, often at the same time. It seems that we?re rewiring our brains simply by how we interact with content and devices as part of our everyday lives.

As we become increasingly wired?or wireless, that leaves room for two types of people in this world, those who are always-on and those who are at least connected. I?ve long maintained that the net result of connectedness is a narrowing attention span. I don?t necessarily believe that attention is as much distracted as it is focused on what?s important in the moment. As such, businesses are simply trying to reach an audience or audience segments, but instead an audience with an audience of audiences that is interconnected by shared interests and experiences.

How you design, sell, market, and serve will require nothing short of complete transformation over the next 10 years. This is true in not only how you engage connected customers but employees as well. It?s a lifestyle and as businesses, we must become connected to earn relevance. If we don?t, then we earn just the opposite, irrelevance. I refer to this transitory economic state as Digital Darwinism, when technology and society evolve faster than the ability to adapt.

So what does this multi-tasking multi-screen audience with an audience of audiences look like you ask? Google recently released a telling report, ?The New Multiscreen World? that reveals the extent of cross platform consumer behavior.

The study offers an awakening glimpse into the impact of connected consumerism and how it forces a shift in the future of customer engagement. In short, your customer base is fragmented. Just showing up in new channels and creating website-like presences in social networks isn?t enough. Designing apps or creating digital assets for mobile devices is only part of the solution. Without a vision, without an articulation of the overall experience and how customer engagement takes shape in each channel and as a whole, any work you do may hurt more than it helps.

What does the multi-screen world look like today?

According to Google?s research, 90% of all media interactions are screen based, including smartphones, laptops, tablets, and TVs. On average, consumers spend 4.4 hours of leisure time in front of these screens every day. On the contrast, only 10% of all media interactions are non-screen based. The victims of this attention shift come as no surprise as radio, newspapers, and magazines were threatened long ago.

The four screens are becoming equal in how they lure our attention. In each sitting or interaction, time spent on each device isn?t that far apart.

TV ? 43 minutes
PC/Laptop ? 39
Tablet ? 30
Smartphone ? 17

Not only are consumers spending a significant amount of time on these devices outside of work, they?re doing so at the same time. And, as the once king of the living room, the idea of a TV, it too is evolving. Programs, how they?re watched and when, will undergo an significant transformation over the next several years. This will be primarily fueled by content consumption behavior and how Generation-C blurs the lines between the screens. As they become more capable, content will freely traverse devices creating an overlap in the roles they play.

Content Context is King

I?ve long maintained that while content is important, context is truly how we?re digitally seduced. That context may shift from device to device. Google found that as consumers move seamlessly between devices each day, they tend to focus usage of each device based on context as well as?

- The amount of time they have or need
- They goal they want to accomplish
- Their location
- Their attitude and state of mind

Each device serves a particular purpose.

Computers Keep Us Productive and Informed

24% of our daily media interactions occur on a PC

40% use PCs to find information

29% use them to keep up to date

69% of use is at home and 31% out of home

Usage is productive and task-oriented

It requires significant amount of time and focus

The mindset is serious with a research intensive attitude

Smart Phones Keep Us Connected

38% of our daily media interactions occur on a smartphone

60% of this usage is at home and 40% out of home

54% of attention is dedicated to communication and 33% is entertainment

People use smart phones to communicate and connect in short bursts of time. And, they need information quickly and efficiently.

Tablets Keep us Entertained

9% of daily media interactions occur on tablets

79% use tablets at home and 21% out of home

63% of usage is for entertainment purposes and 32% is for communication

Tablets are mostly used for entertainment and browsing

Consumers loose their sense of time as tablets inspire a relaxed and leisurely approach

Sequential vs. Simultaneous Usage

As a nation of multi-taskers and multi-screeners, Google observed two forms of distinct behavior.

Sequential usage follows consumers as they begin their journey on one screen and continue that journey across devices at different times to accomplish a specific task. Think about seeing an idea for a trip on your smart phone and then continuing your research to tablet for research and eventually your PC to book the trip.

90% of consumers use multiple screens sequentially to accomplish a task over time.

The top activities for sequential screening include:

Browsing the internet ? 81%
Social networking ? 72%
Online shopping ? 67%
Research/Search ? 63%
Managing Finances ? 46%
Planning a trip ? 43%

Google?s research found that smartphones are the most common starting places for online activities.

PCs are the source of more complex activity.

Tablets are typically the starting point for shopping and trip planning

Simultaneous usage occurs as the consumer is using more than one device at the same time for either a related or an unrelated activity. Social TV is one of the most common examples of simultaneous multi-screening. While watching TV, consumers will use either a tablet, PC, and/or a smart phone to have conversations on social networks about what?s on the TV or just in general, play games, or look up more information about the show that they?re watching.

On average, Google found that we use three different screen combinations every day.

81% ? Smartphone and Television

66% ? Smartphone and Laptop/PC

66% ? Laptop/PC and Television

How are people using these devices simultaneously and to what extent?

Smartphones: 57% of the time consumers us a smartphone, they?re also using another device. 28% of the time is with a PC/Laptop and 29% is with a TV.

Tablets: 75% of the time tablets are used, it?s done so with a smartphone (35%) and TVs (44%).

TVs: 77% of people who watch TV do so with another device. 49% use a smartphone and 34% watch TV with their laptop.

PCs/Laptops: 67% of those who use their laptop/PC are also using another device.

What are people doing during they?re multi-screening?

They?re doing the things that single screeners often do, but just at the same time?

Email = 60%

Internet browsing = 44%

Social networking = 42%

Playing games = 25%

Searching = 23%

In Summary

Consumers are incredibly connected and their attention can only be described as fragmented as best.. As they multi-task and multi-screen, new touchpoints emerge for engagement. Google refers to these new touch points as ?found time.? These micro-moments emerge as consumers see or think of something something and reach for the screen that?s closest to them to search. Google found that consumers use these micro-moments across multiple screens to search, shop, communicate and keep entertained?.spontaneously. This offers advertisers net additional opportunities to engage consumers throughout the day in ways that are contextually relevant to each screen.

Here?s what real people have to say about how their new found time helps them:

?I?m online more than before, for sure. I check a lot more stuff every day than I normally would have never done, because it?s so easy to check. I can go to 10 apps, when I have 15 free minutes, I can check my bank account or I can check the news or I can check some music websites that are very cool.? ? Leum

?I scan for deals on Groupon or Twitter when I?m waiting in line. It?s life time management. Whether it?s something urgent for business or something fun ? I get to choose what to look at.? ? Maria

That?s what this is about. Your business must now understand how consumer behavior is splintering away from the customer that you know and creating a new type of customer you need to know.

The future is indeed bright across the screens, but what?s happening now is happening by happenstance. Imagine what this will look like once you start to design experiences around found time and the multi-tasking, multi-screen consumer journey. Beyond understanding, for any this to be optimized and beneficial to your business, takes vision and architecture. You are the architect of new experiences for a new generation of connected consumers.

Connect with me:?Twitter?|?LinkedIn?|?Facebook?|?Google+

The?End of Business as Usual?is officially here?

?

Originally published on?AT&T?s Networking Exchange

Image credit: Shutterstock

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Source: http://socialmediatoday.com/briansolis/1099886/we-are-now-society-multi-taskers-and-multi-screeners

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War is over: imaginary ?Bicholim Conflict? page removed from Wikipedia after five years

While Wikipedia editors strive for perfection, some elaborate hoaxes have managed to slip through (BGR News)A 17^th Century international conflict has finally been laid to rest, nearly 400 years after it never happened. Wait a second. Are you feeling confused?

A fascinating new story in the Daily Dot chronicles how for more than five years, rogue editors on Wikipedia perpetuated a hoax about the ?Bicholim Conflict,? a purely fictional historical event.

Before its eventual deletion, the 4,500-page read in part:

?From 1640 to 1641 the might of colonial Portugal clashed with India's massive Maratha Empire in an undeclared war that would later be known as the Bicholim Conflict. Named after the northern Indian region where most of the fighting took place, the conflict ended with a peace treaty that would later help cement Goa as an independent Indian state.?

Amazingly, the article was even nominated for the site?s Featured Article of the Day, a Wikipedia stable that highlights some of the site?s best-researched and written articles.

The actual writer of the Wikipedia article is still unknown, but members of the Wikipedia community have narrowed down at least one suspect.

?Unfortunately, hoaxes on Wikipedia are nothing new, and the craftier they are, the more difficult it is to catch them,? William Beutler, president of Beutler Wiki Relations, a Wikipedia consulting firm, told Yahoo News. ?Anyone who's clever enough to make up convincing sources and motivated enough to spend the time and skilled enough to write a plausible article can deceive whole Internet?at least for awhile.?

A December 2012 poll by the Pew Internet and American Life Project found that Google and Wikipedia were the top two research tools used by U.S. middle and high school students.

To its credit, Wikipedia has its own page devoted to Wikipedia hoaxes. Some of the more noteworthy attempts include a page on a fictional conspirator in the assassination of Julius Caesar, a false claim of inspiration in the ?Lord of the Rings? novels and a former Harvard student who for eight years successfully operated a Wikipedia page claiming he was the mayor of a small Chinese town.

Beutler, a longtime Wikipedia community editor himself, says he once helped remove a hoax article after its author contacted him in an attempt to boast of their prank.

And as Beutler notes, in many ways, Wikipedia is no different than the professional journalism world from which it culls so much of its source material. No single source is infallible, even to the watchful and detail oriented community of Wikpedia editors.

?There are the outliers in each: Jayson Blair for the New York Times, the ?Bicholim conflict? author on Wikipedia,? Beutler said.??Stephen Glass would have been a terrific Wikipedia hoaxer.?

Even stranger, while the fake article itself has been deleted, the Bicholim Conflict continues to haunt the halls of the Internet at large.

As the Daily Dot notes, several references to the Bicholim Conflict continue to exist online, with other web sites having copied and pasted the text verbatim.

There?s even a book version of the fraudulent article available for sale on the Barnes and Noble website for $20 and credited to ?authors? Jesse Russell and Ronald Cohn. As the product?s one reviewer notes in their comment, ?A copy of a hoax Wikipedia article (which you could have read for free) in printed form.?

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/war-over-imaginary-bicholim-conflict-page-removed-wikipedia-234717353.html

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Zoo count begins: No creature too small to count

LONDON (AP) ? In a sea of flapping black and white flippers, Ricky is hard to miss: He's got spiky yellow feathers, a flamboyant character, and he's the only rockhopper among the dozens of penguins living in the London Zoo.

That's a big help for keepers who embarked Thursday on their annual stock-taking of all the zoo's residents. It's no easy task, when there are more than 17,500 creatures to count. All animals have to be accounted for, including the tarantulas, locusts and snails.

The same scene was being repeated at zoos throughout Britain Thursday ? the census is nationwide. No stone is left unturned, lest there be a beetle below.

At the London Zoo, keepers hope the new year will bring some company to Ricky, who has been the zoo's lone rockhopper since 2011.

"Ricky's quite a unique character ? he was rejected by his parents and was hand-reared. He's more interested in zoo keepers than in other penguins," said zoological director David Field. "It's time to get him some rockhopper partners."

In the meerkat enclosure, 11 of the small mammals were only too happy to be counted, climbing onto a keeper's clipboard seeking attention and food.

An all-female family of nine otters likewise rushed forward at the sight of their favored delicacies: Mice and crayfish. In the invertebrates section, a palm-sized red-kneed tarantula called Jill caused a stir among visitors when she was lifted out of her box for inspection.

"This is quite a docile one," said keeper Amy Callaghan, who held the spider out in her hand for photographers. "I was a little bit wary of them at first, but now I think they're brilliant."

The census is required as part of the license terms of British zoos, and the data is used for zoo management and international breeding programs for endangered animals. The final tally could take weeks.

Most animals in the zoo have microchips in their bodies, making counting a little less daunting. Fish and animals with camouflage properties ? such as leaf insects ? are trickier, and the tiniest ones such as ants are counted in colonies, not as individuals.

New additions to the zoo being counted for the first time included baby Ziggy, an endangered white-naped mangabey monkey, and Maxilla, a black-and-white colobus monkey.

The zoo also welcomed a pair of new Sumatran tigers ? male Jae Jae from a zoo in Ohio and female Melati, from Perth, Australia. The endangered tigers were matched by an international breeding program to ensure a genetically diverse population of animals.

"We breed them in the zoo because they are running out of time in the wild," said Field, who's hopeful the tigers will soon produce cubs.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/zoo-count-begins-no-creature-too-small-count-173906495.html

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