Court says: Bacardi’s Havana Club not misleading

Court says: Bacardi’s Havana Club not misleading
BY ELAINE WALKER

An appellate court ruled that Bacardi U.S.A.’s marketing of Havana Club rum is not misleading to consumers.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit unanimously ruled in Bacardi’s favor in the ongoing dispute with Pernod Ricard. The Appellate Court reaffirmed that Bacardi has accurately portrayed both the geographic origin and the Cuban heritage of the Havana Club.

Bacardi’s labeling of the product says that the product is made in Puerto Rico based on the original Cuban recipe from the creators of the brand, the family of Jose Arechabala.

Pernod Ricard had argued that using the Havana Club name for a rum not made in Cuba was misleading to consumers. Pernod has been trying to block Bacardi from selling Havana Club in the U.S.

The Appellate Court found that the packaging is “factually accurate” and “unambiguous” regarding the geographic origin of Havana Club rum. The Court added “no reasonable consumer could be misled by those statements and the rest of the label does not put those statements in doubt.” The ruling upheld the original ruling on April 6, 2010 by the Wilmington, Delaware, District Court.

Bacardi re-launched Havana Club rum in the U.S. in August 2006 based on the original recipe created in Cuba in the 1930’s.
This is just the latest ruling in a fight that has dragged on for more than a decade, through multiple courts and government agencies, over who has the rights to the Havana Club trademark. Pernod Ricard sells Havana Club internationally and in Cuba through a partnership with the Cuban government.

LeBron Defends Tebow After ESPN Analyst Criticizes QB

LeBron Defends Tebow After ESPN Analyst Criticizes QB

Tim Tebow defended himself and got a little backup from LeBron James after ESPN’s Merril Hoge was critical of the Broncos’ second-year quarterback. This all came about on Wednesday as the Broncos officially named Kyle Orton their starting quarterback.

Tebow posted on Twitter early Wednesday, saying, “Hey Merrill ….. ‘ppreciate that”.

Tim Tebow is trying to win the Broncos' starting quarterback job, and has one believer in LeBron James. (AP Photo)

Later, James, who dealt with his fair share of criticism in the past year said via Twitter, “Guys get on that TV and act like they was all WORLD when they played. How bout encouraging him and wishing him the best instead of hating!!”

Hoge played fullback for the Pittsburgh Steelers from 1987-1993 and ended his career in 1994 with the Chicago Bears. He ran for 3,139 yards and 21 scores as well as catching 254 passes for another 13 touchdowns. The Steelers did not reach a Super Bowl during Hoge’s tenure.

James continued, “Tim Tebow will succeed in the NFL. He's a hard worker, a student of the game, a natural born leader and most of all a WINNER! It takes time and he'll be nice."

The Twitter volleys were in response to Hoge posting a series of earlier tweets saying, "It's embarrassing to think the Broncos could win with Tebow!! ...That throwing motion he changed? You can't change who you are!... College credentials do not transfer to NFL, rah-rah speeches do not work! You must possess a skill set to play! Tebow struggles with accuracy!"

Hoge also said on ESPN’s SportsCenter that Tebow has poor fundamentals that prevent him from being an accurate passer, particularly when he must move outside the pocket.

The Broncos could have a quarterback controversy on their hands, with many fans clamoring for a glimpse of the quarterback who led the Florida Gators to two national championships. SN’s Clifton Brown reported Tuesday that if Orton isn’t traded, it sounds like many Broncos players would prefer that the veteran be the starting quarterback.

Miami condo rents rise in double digits

Fueled by strong demand, Miami condo rents rise in double digits
By Marilyn Bowden

Strong demand and rapidly diminishing inventory is significantly boosting rental rates in Brickell's condos, brokers say"Rents have gone up by 12%-15%," said Edgardo Defortuna, president of Fortune International Realty. "In our luxury buildings, we used to rent for $1.85-$1.90 a foot. Now it's $2.20-$2.35 a foot."

In some properties such as Icon Brickell, he said, there's a waiting list for rentals. At the same time, units that were initially rented by their owners are being marketed for sale when leases expire.

"There are several rental markets going on," said Melanie Hyer, leader of the Revest Group at Keller Williams Miami Beach. "There are investors who purchased in the past four years and got wonderful deals. They will hold the unit for five to 10 years, renting them while they wait for really good appreciation.

"Then there are developers who have rented out some units until they can sell. They will enter them into the market a few at a time. Icon is a good example of that."

For one-bedroom units, said Alicia Cervera Lamadrid, managing partner of Cervera Real Estate, the median rent over May, June and July of this year was $1,650 — an increase of $100-$150 a month over the same period the year before.

The median rent for two-bedroom units from May-July 2011 was $2,200, up from $1,950-$2,000 in 2010.
The median time a Brickell condo stays on the rental market, Cervera's researchers find, is 30 days. 

Cervera's survey covers the whole of the Brickell area, from the south bank of the Miami River to the Rickenbacker Causeway. 

Demand, Ms. Lamadrid said, continues to be extremely strong.

"Inventory is dropping dramatically, and rates are increasing," she said. "That's one of the first strong indicators that prices are going to move up, because there's a tipping point where renters become buyers. We are getting close to that point as it gets harder to find a nice rental unit."

Renters, she said, are typically young professionals who work in the downtown area, "and those tenants will grow up to be our buyers. Long term, they will give us a much more interesting city and a much more affordable base."
"We also have some foreigners who are looking into the area," Mr. Defortuna said, "and some people who were renting in Kendall, South Miami, West Dade and Broward and now find Brickell is much more convenient."

The trend for condo units to be occupied by renters, Mr. Defortuna said, is the opposite of the rage a few years ago to convert rental properties to condos.

Since cash is still king in the residential market, buyers tend to be Latin Americans looking for investments in a relatively stable economy.

"We see a big demand among international buyers," Ms. Hyer said, "some Europeans, but largely people from Brazil, Argentina, the Dominican Republic, Panama, Venezuela.

"Upper-class Latins love Brickell, and especially when they can buy foreclosed units as investments and then rent them out, it really makes sense. They can't buy this quality in their own countries at this price.
"These are people who still believe in the long-term future of Miami real estate."

About 75% of these buyers paid cash, Mr. Defortuna said, and are under no pressure to resell. "They're happy to keep them rented and generate cash flow," he said.

Ms. Hyer said the numbers of younger renters, many migrating from older and more expensive properties in South Beach, are not only eating up excess rental inventory but also changing Brickell's image.

"There are so many young professionals here now that it's become very cool," she said, "and more people want to live there. So while in 2008-'09, when a lot of new projects came on at the same time, there were so many beautiful units, all empty, and a lot of competition, now there's not so much rental inventory left."

Police: Man tries steal cop's car, blames 'Batman'

Police: Man tries steal cop's car, blames 'Batman'

Pittsburgh police say a man tried to carjack a plainclothes officer near filming for the latest Batman movie -- and allegedly told him it was part of the script.

Detective Robert DiGiacomo was in an unmarked vehicle around 7:15 p.m. Saturday, looking for a suspect in an assault. That's when police say a man opened the car door, sat down and told the officer to get out.

The officer drew his gun and ordered the suspect, 21-year-old Micah Calamosca, out of the car. He says the suspect told him he was part of filming for "The Dark Knight Rises" and that taking the vehicle was in the script.

Calamosco was taken into custody and faces a charge of robbery of a motor vehicle. It's unclear if he has an attorney.

Should Your Boss Be Able to Fire You Because of Facebook Posts or Photos?

Facebook Firings: Feds, Managers Navigate 'New Territory' In Employment

WASHINGTON -- The federal agency tasked with enforcing labor law has been fielding complaints from workers across the country who have been fired or disciplined for their work-related indiscretions on Facebook. Although the feds have taken up the cases of a number of jaded workers, others have essentially been told they have no one to blame for their workplace troubles but themselves.

That includes a Walmart worker who referred to his manager as a "puta" -- Spanish for "whore" -- on the social networking site after a spat over store displays, as well as a frustrated Illinois bartender who took to Facebook to air his desire to see the "redneck" patrons on the other side of the bar "choke on glass" as they drove home drunk.

The latter worker was canned and the former admonished for their respective online outbursts, andboth appealed to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in hopes that their employers' actions would be deemed unlawful. In both of those cases, the NLRB declined to issue complaints on the workers' behalf, essentially saying the punishments were legitimate.

Like others that have preceded them, the two cases give workers, managers and lawyers a better idea of where the labor board stands in what is still a largely unexplored area of employment law. Although the NLRB deals primarily with issues surrounding union elections, the board has stood out in recent months as an agency willing to grapple with the question of when firing someone over a Facebook missive is fair game.

"The NLRB is the one making big splashy decisions, and people are drawing conclusions from those," said Tina Hsu, a lawyer specializing in employment and social media at Shulman Rogers in Potomac, Md. "They seem to be trying to discern whether private or non-work postings are having an adverse effect on the workplace. That's a difficult or blurry line to draw."

"It's new territory," said Nancy Cleeland, spokeswoman for the NLRB.

Cleeland said the agency received "several dozen" pleas from fired or otherwise punished workers in the wake of a complaint the board issued last fall in a Facebook case. Because of the inundation, board officials have asked that the NLRB's regional offices steer any Facebook cases toward the agency's Washington headquarters, where the general counsel is currently drafting a report that will outline certain Facebook scenarios and how the board has acted upon them.

"It's to give more guidance and to help employers understand where we're coming from on these," Cleeland said.

In the case from last fall, an employee at a Connecticut ambulance company was fired for knocking her boss on Facebook. "Love how the company allows a 17 to become a supervisor," Dawnmarie Souza wrote, "17" being an insider's term for a psychiatric patient. The company, American Medical Response, had a policy that forbid employees from criticizing the company online. The NLRB took up Souza's complaint, arguing in part that such a policy was too broad.

In its complaint, the board's counsel said that Souza's online griping amounted to "protected concerted activity," for which, under American labor law, an employer cannot fire a worker. The agency basically argued that the Facebook chatter was no different from workers gathering around the water cooler to discuss working conditions. The case was settled in February, with American Medical Response agreeing to no longer punish employees for such online discussion.

The agency has applied that virtual water cooler argument to a handful of other Facebook cases, including that of a Chicago-area car dealership worker who was let go after criticizing his employer. The employee mocked management for serving hot dogs from Sam's Club at an event designed to promote a luxe new BMW model. The NLRB filed a complaint in May arguing that the firing violated labor law.

But according to the board's counsel, a worker's sniping doesn’t always amount to protected activity.

In the Walmart case, an employee at one of the retail giant's Oklahoma stores alighted on Facebook after an argument with an assistant manager, as reported on Labor Relations Today. "Wuck Falmart!" he wrote. "I swear if this tyranny doesn’t end in this store they are about to get a wake-up call because lots are about to quit!" His Facebook friends included several Walmart co-workers. One responded with "bahaha like! :)" and another with "Lol."

In response to his friends' comments, the employee called the manager a "super mega puta," going on to say that if the situation at the store didn't improve, then Walmart "could kiss my royal white ass!" A co-worker who saw the posting provided the boss with a printout of the exchange.

The manager prepared a written disciplinary report saying that the worker's behavior reflected poorly upon the company and that he would be fired if it continued. The worker appealed to the NLRB, but the board's counsel threw out the case last month, finding that the Facebook tirade was nothing more than "an expression of an individual gripe," rather than concerted activity with other co-workers. "Mere griping," the dismissal noted, "is not protected."

NLRB counsel dismissed the bartender's complaint for similar reasons. In that case, a bartender at JT's Porch Saloon & Eatery in Lombard, Ill., had a back-and-forth on Facebook with his stepsister, complaining that waitresses at the bar didn’t share their tips with bartenders and that he hadn't seen a raise in five years. He threw in the comments on the "redneck" drinkers for good measure. The night manager later informed the bartender that he would probably be terminated for the remarks.

In a cruel bit of irony, the owner of the establishment then fired the bartender via Facebook message.

As in the Walmart worker's case, NLRB counsel found that the bartender's complaint fell short of concerted activity since the posting didn’t involve an earnest discussion about working conditions with any of his co-workers.

According to Cleeland, the NLRB will probably release its report on Facebook cases sometime in the coming weeks. Careful not to call it a guide, Cleeland said it will merely detail particular complaints that have come before the agency and what the outcomes were.

Hsu said employers and workers alike could use a little guidance on social media, however small.

"You can't stick your head in the sand and tell your workers to abstain," she said. "They're not going to. A lot of people growing up, they don’t know anything but communicating through Facebook. You have to teach them how to navigate this new area."

Kobe says folks should ease up on LeBron

Kobe says folks should ease up on LeBron

Kobe Bryant wishes everyone would just leave LeBron James alone.

During a Sunday conversation “SportsCenter,” ESPN’s George Smith asked Bryant, “There was a lot of venom toward the Heat, and particularly toward LeBron James. What did you make of that?”

“I think people need to lay off that kid,” Bryant responded. “That’s what I think. I’ve gotten to know him pretty well, playing with the Olympic team. I think they need to back up off him and just let him play, and let him live his life, and let him make his decisions, and let him mature as a player.

“It’s tough to be under the microscope like that all of the time. I would like everybody to back off of him and let him play.”

Are Internet Explorer users dumb?

Are Internet Explorer users dumb?
By Doug Gross, CNN
Are users of other Web browsers smarter than the people who use Microsoft's Internet Explorer?

A new survey doesn't quite say so. But it sure as heck suggests it.

The survey by AptiQuant, a Vancouver-based Web consulting company, gave more than 100,000 participants an IQ test, while monitoring which browser they used to take the test.

The result? Internet Explorer users scored lower than average, while Chrome, Firefox and Safari users were slightly above average.

And users of the more obscure Camino and Opera browsers, as well as those using Explorer with Chrome Frame (a plug-in designed to let users view emerging HTML5 content), had what AptiQuaint called "exceptionally higher" IQ levels.


Those numbers, it should be noted, probably aren't very scientific. The field of test-takers was self-selecting -- people who chose, on their own, to take an IQ test instead of a scientifically selected study group. They found the test through Web searches or ads the company placed online.

The report suggests that people using Explorer, the built-in, default browser for Windows-based computers, may be more resistant to change. A similar study in 2006 showed users on the then-current IE browser scored above average.

Internet Explorer is the world's most popular browser, with about a 43% share, according to StatCounter. Firefox has just under 30%, and Google's Chrome has 19%, according to a report from May.

Users of Internet Explorer 6, released in 2001, scored the lowest on the tests, at just over 80. Users of Opera, the Norway-based browser, scored the highest at well over 120. (What AptiQuant called its complete results included a bar graph showing the scores, but didn't appear to have text giving the exact numbers.)

IQ scores have a "population mean" of 100.

If this all smacks of a little good, old-fashioned Microsoft hate, the language the company uses in its report doesn't do much to downplay that.

"It is common knowledge that Internet Explorer Versions 6.0 to 8.0 are highly incompatible with modern web standards. In order to make websites work properly on these browsers, web developers have to spend a lot of unnecessary effort ...," said the report from AptiQuant, which offers online tools for employers to measure employee, and potential employee, aptitude.

"Now that we have a statistical pattern on the continuous usage of incompatible browsers, better steps can be taken to eradicate this nuisance."

What do you think? Cheap shot or telling results? Let us know in the comments.