Cloud computing and the hobbit, Bilbo Baggins?

What Bilbo Baggins Teaches Us About Cloud Computing

Cloud computing and the hobbit, Bilbo Baggins? What might they have in common? On the surface, you'd have to say nothing. But I've been thinking about The Hobbit lately, with the much-anticipated Peter Jackson epic set to debut in theaters soon. Although I'm sure J. R. R. Tolkien had no notion of cloud computing, or computers for that matter, Bilbo's story can still be read as an allegory for the journey that many IT pros take when they move to the cloud -- with many of the same lessons to be learned.

At the start, Bilbo is quite content in his little hobbit hole, Bag End, in the Shire. Think of that as IT pros in the traditional mode of on-premises deployments. Had he been left to himself, that's exactly where Bilbo would have stayed. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on your point of view), Gandalf chose Bilbo to accompany the dwarves on their quest across the wilds to the Lonely Mountain. We can say Gandalf is like a CIO or CEO or some conglomeration of super powerful execs. And the dwarves? We'll call them end users that Bilbo has to successfully move along to the cloud.

As long as Gandalf travels with the party, Bilbo does little of note. It's when Bilbo finds himself alone that his abilities begin to shine through and he proves Gandalf's choice of him -- first when separated from his companions in the goblin caves when he encounters Gollum, and more importantly when he has to rescue the trapped dwarves from the spiders in Mirkwood. When he doesn't have the wizard to fall back on, Bilbo proves quite resourceful and courageous.

So what do we learn about cloud computing from this story? A number of lessons can be read that apply both to the IT pro and to the business as a whole:

Give the hobbit his head -- It might be the CEO's decision that the business needs to move to the cloud, but determining what systems or applications can benefit from cloud computing should be a shared decision with your IT pros. Don't hamstring your IT department by dictating how and where that happens. Let them show their ingenuity and initiative -- you know, all that valuable knowledge that you've hired them for.
Make the goal tangible and valuable -- It's all well and good to talk about "cost savings" and "shared resources," but those terms are mostly meaningless to your common end user. However, if you can explain the change to cloud computing in terms of what those end users gain -- the treasure at the end of the quest -- and do so in concrete, meaningful terms, you can make those users willing partners, even leaders, in the journey to the cloud.
It's a long journey; plan carefully -- Don't expect to move to the cloud over night or over a weekend. It might not be an epic quest, but it does require careful planning to choose the right route for your business. You might find unexpected allies or partners along the road: Bilbo and the dwarves were aided by the eagles and Beorn; for your business, maybe it's Microsoft, VMware, or Rackspace. But there are likely to be unexpected pitfalls as well -- beware the trolls, goblins, and spiders, which you can do with careful research and scouting ahead.
If you reach your goal, there might still be battles to fight -- The dwarves were so intent on reaching the Lonely Mountain that they never thought how they would dispatch the dragon when they got there, which if you think about it, is a pretty big hole in their plan. Make sure you know how you'll manage your cloud environment, what security measures you need and how they'll be met, and what consequences might arise from your move. Keep your end users' experience in mind, as they're the ones who will be fighting the battle on the front lines if there's trouble down the line.
Remember: It's there and back again -- This is the part that Bilbo forgot: How was he going to get his share of the treasure all the way back to Bag End? When your business decides to move to cloud computing, you should still plan for what happens if it doesn't work out. Can you move back on premises? Can you move to a different hosting model? How long can you live with problems in the cloud before you need to take action? How do you move your data and what will the migration cost? Plan your exit strategy, even though you hope never to use it.
Yes, that Bilbo turned out to be quite the clever fellow. I don't know if this advice will help anyone slay their own cloud computing dragons, but at least it might give you a few things to think about.

Cloud computing gaining a strong foothold in IT Hub of Salt Lake Economic Times SALT LAKE: Cloud computing technology has a fast growing market worldwide. In India, players believe that the technology is expected to grow at 54.5 per cent in the next three years. Naturally the IT hub of the state, Salt Lake has also taken to the trend. See all stories on this topic » Economic Times

Games developers look to the cloud The Age While many businesses are still weighing up the benefits and risks of cloud computing, the cloud saved the skin of Australian games developer Halfbrick when dealing with the explosive popularity of its Fruit Ninja games. Halfbrick's executive producer ... See all stories on this topic » The Age

What Bilbo Baggins Teaches Us About Cloud Computing Windows IT Pro (blog) Cloud computing and the hobbit, Bilbo Baggins? What might they have in common? On the surface, you'd have to say nothing. But I've been thinking about The Hobbit lately, with the much-anticipated Peter Jackson epic set to debut in theaters soon ... See all stories on this topic » Windows IT Pro (blog)

iSoftStone Teams with IBM to Co-build A Cloud Computing Center of Excellence ... Sacramento Bee iSoftStone, as a leading IT services provider and a long-term strategic partner of IBM, has been building its unique and comprehensive capabilities in areas of cloud computing, smart cities, social networks, and big data, through partnerships with IBM ... See all stories on this topic »

Successful cloud adoption: It's the fit, stupid InfoWorld (blog) InfoWorld's IT advice columnist Bob Lewis reached out to me last week after my blog post "How AWS can conquer enterprise IT's resistance to public clouds" with a few ideas. He suggested we should take a page out of the early PC and Web playbooks to ... See all stories on this topic »

Telstra builds AU$100M cloud centre in Victoria ZDNet It is part of the telco's AU$800 million cloud-computing strategy announced last year, and will cater to business, enterprise, and government customers that prefer using local cloud services. "With many organisations moving into the cloud, the feedback ... See all stories on this topic »

What Happens When Cloud Computing Embraces Evolving Antivirus Brands As ... CloudTweaks News Three areas of cloud computing are the crisis points of security breaches. Were it not for Software as a Service (SaaS) programs, there would be no malware. Similarly, but for the openings in the server connections in a network or Infrastructure as a ... See all stories on this topic »

Tech Stocks Forecast 2013 - Ride the Mobile Wave, Bet on Cloud Computing The Market Oracle Most analysts divide big data and cloud computing into two separate categories. But I see these as two sides of the same computer coin. Here's the thing. The minute a firm decides to move data to the cloud it realizes it is sitting on a gold mine. So ... See all stories on this topic »

Piston Cloud Gets New Leadership Datamation Piston Cloud Computing is one of the leading companies in the Open Source OpenStack effort. Piston is now getting some new leadership of its own, appointing industry veteran Jim Morrisroe as CEO. Piston Cloud was founded by Joshua McKenty, one of the ... See all stories on this topic »

CA Technologies Powers CBN Cloud Services in Indonesia MENAFN.COM With CBN Cloud, the company envisioned providing cloud computing services for corporate and retail customers as a new business model. The CA AppLogic solution will enable CBN Cloud to stay ahead of the technology curve by providing a comprehensive ... See all stories on this topic »

Kingfisher Airlines Ltd’ lenders to meet on December 8

The 17-bank consortium that funded Kingfisher Airlines will meet on Saturday to decide its future course of action against the beleaguered private carrier.

The meeting has been convened at Mumbai by State Bank of India, which heads the consortium, sources in the banking industry said.

There is still no clarity as to whether Kingfisher Airlines’ promoter will come up with a credible proposition for equity infusion at the upcoming meeting on Saturday.

If nothing concrete comes through on Saturday, then bankers would have to think of initiating recovery proceedings, said a banker who did not wish to be identified.

So far, the public sector lenders have not initiated any action to recover their dues. For most banks in the consortium, Kingfisher Airlines is a non performing account.

An earlier attempt to restructure Kingfisher Airlines through corporate debt restructuring (CDR) mechanism had failed.

The attempt failed as the promoter could not bring in the desired equity funds for the package to sail through.

Banks will now be required to mount another restructuring exercise through CDR cell if the promoter’s new proposition, if any, is acceptable to them, sources said.

With Kingfisher Airlines grounded, the brand value of the airline has also taken a hit.

It is unlikely that any sizeable amount would get salvaged if bankers were to initiate recovery action today, sources said.

Kingfisher Airlines’ brand was the main collateral that was used for obtaining working capital funding for the private carrier.

The 17-bank consortium had last met in Bangalore in end September.

At that meeting, the bankers had rejected Kingfisher Airlines’ promoter Vijay Mallya’s request to provide a “lifeline” of Rs 200 crore to get all the “grounded aircraft” back into operation.

Kingfisher Airlines' lenders to meet on December 8 Hindu Business Line The 17-bank consortium that funded Kingfisher Airlines will meet on Saturday to decide its future course of action against the beleaguered private carrier. The meeting has been convened at Mumbai by State Bank of India, which heads the consortium ... See all stories on this topic »

Director Deals - Kingfisher PLC (KGF) Stock Market Wire Director Deals - Kingfisher PLC (KGF). 4 December 2012 | 17:10pm. StockMarketWire.com - Euan Sutherland, Executive Director, exercised 5,263 shares in the company on the 3rd December 2012 at a price of 172.40p. The Director now holds 5,263 shares ... See all stories on this topic »

'Kingfisher should satisfy with their operational, financial plan' Parda Phash New Delhi: Saying that the government will not interfere while the airline firms decide the air fares, the Aviation Minister Ajit Singh, on Tuesday, asked firms to keep transparency in the mechanism on which the fares are set. Minister said that let ... See all stories on this topic »

Cessna 172 crashes at just Northwest of the Rochester International Airport, Captain Scott Lebovitz of Owatonna and other passengers managed to escape.

A small plane crash last night leaves the plane a total loss, but all of the passengers, including a 9-year-old, making it out alive.

 Authorities say the four passengers are very lucky. The plane crashed into a field just Northwest of the Rochester International Airport; bouncing and flipping end to end before landing on its top. The plane was Cessna 172 of the Southeastern Minnesota Flying Club.

 Authorities say a call came in around 6:35 last night from the pilot of the plane.

 "I need to get ahold of the rescue group, at the approach end of the runway. The police department is on the line saying that they do have contact with those in the aircraft,” said air traffic control audio.

 "The pilot made a 911 call from the crashed airplane, uh I believe from his cell phone, so they were able to track the coordinates of the cell phone to get the location of the airplane,” said Detective Joe Rossman.

 But the conditions were less than ideal.  

“The fog was very dense at that time. We could not see, visibility was limited to 50 to 100 feet at times on the roadway,” said Steven Belau, Deputy Chief of the Rochester Fire Department.

 Because of that, sound was needed to locate the passengers. Keeping the pilot on the phone, emergency crews used their sirens and eventually their voices to pinpoint the exact location of the plane. When they arrived, all of the passengers managed to escape on their own.

 That included the pilot of the plane, 23-year-old Scott Lebovitz of Owatonna, Daniel Cronk and his 9-year-old son from Byron and Alan De Keyrel, also of Byron. De Keyrel is the owner of CWS in Rochester and former President of the Board for the Rochester Chamber of Commerce.  Two involved in the crash were transported by Gold Cross to St. Mary’s, all are now out of the hospital.

 The group used the Cessna 172 to fly to the Packers/Vikings game in Green Bay. The pilot listed on the on the plane was De Keyrel and although he had been taking flying lessons, he was not the pilot of the plane at the time of the crash.

 "We have fatal aircraft crashes in conditions like this. They were very fortunate, uh in that it was a relatively, they were coming for a landing so everything was kind of in their favor. Uh, fortunately the soil had been worked up, so that was soft, just everything was in their favor. If this was going to happen. They were very fortunate that all the circumstances were as they were,” said Belau.

 A statement sent to KAAL from De Keyrel reads: “We are very thankful that Alan and his friends all walked away from the crash with only minor scrapes and bruises. We are all very luck y and blessed and are enjoying this time as a family. Thank you for respecting our privacy.

 The FAA is investigating the crash. By using witness interviews, looking at the pilots training and checking if the plane was built properly, they hope to determine what caused it. They say it could be quite a while before we know.

MiamiHerald.com (registration) GREENSBURG, Ind. -- Two southeastern Indiana couples were killed when their plane crashedwhile approaching their small hometown airport in foggy, misty conditions, authorities said Monday. The crash Sunday night near Greensburg Municipal Airport ... See all stories on this topic »

A Fake TV Show Plane Crash Fooled the News Into Thinking It Was Real Gizmodo A girl who saw the plane crash from the ground said she thought the terrorist had came back for us! And it was a jarring sight, seeing a plane get split at the wing and land on a sleepy neighborhood street. The WGN-TV news broadcast's reaction is the ... See all stories on this topic »

Veteran pilot, 80, killed in small plane crash Sun-Sentinel Almost 60 years ago, David Flatter volunteered for Air Force flight school after learning how much better paid officers were than enlisted men. From that beginning, the Lighthouse Point resident went on to fly everything from fighter planes, bombers ... See all stories on this topic » Sun-Sentinel

Rochester: Small plane crashes; 3 suffer minor injuries Pioneer Press Investigators with the Federal Aviation Administration look through the wreckage of a single-engineplane crash Monday morning, Dec. 3, 2012, near the Rochester, Minn. airport. (Associated Press/Post-Bulletin: Ken Klotzbach). ROCHESTER, Minn. See all stories on this topic »

Pilot killed in small plane crash in Pahokee identified WPBF West Palm Beach Flatter is from Lighthouse Point, according to the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office. It's not clear what caused the plane to crash. According to the flight plan, it was headed to Pompano Beach. The plane has been moved to an impound lot for the ... See all stories on this topic » WPBF West Palm Beach

4 Killed When Small Plane Crashes in SE Indiana ABC News Authorities say four people died when a small plane crashed as it was approaching a southeastern Indiana airport. The Federal Aviation Administration says the crash happened Sunday evening about a mile south of the Greensburg Municipal Airport and that ... See all stories on this topic »

Two passengers killed in Iowa plane crash KCCI Des Moines ... small plane that crashed in northwest Iowa over the weekend remains in critical condition. Two passengers Gaylen Knaack was flying from Grand Island, Neb., died when the plane crashed short of a grass runway in foggy conditions south of ... See all stories on this topic » KCCI Des Moines

Juventus fined $13000 after fans unveil banner offending 1949 Torino plane ... Fox News MILAN – Juventus has been fined $13,000 after its fans unveiled an offensive banner during a 3-0 victory over Torino that referred to the 1949 plane crash that wiped out nearly the entire squad from the famed "Grande Torino" team. The huge banner read ... See all stories on this topic »

Positive Effects of Positive Thinking

Positive thinking not only changes your mind, it affects your body. So says Daisaku Ikeda, president of the world's largest Buddhist community, Soka Gakkai International. According to Ikeda, as soon as you decide to achieve a certain goal, every part of you, including your nerve fibers, gear up to help you achieve it. Conversely, says Ikeda on the Soka Gakkai website IkedaQuotes.org, as soon as you think you can't possibly succeed, "every cell in your being will be deflated and give up the fight [and] everything really will move in the direction of failure." Research supports Ikeda's claim.

More Resiliency

When life knocks down some people, says resiliency coach Angie LeVan of the University of Pennsylvania Abramson Cancer Center, they go down swinging and jump back on their feet to keep fighting---often with more power in their punches than they had at first. LeVan calls such people "people in high efficacy." She says they "learn from failure and channel it into success." In life, setbacks resulting from illness, death and countless other realities are bound to happen. But instead of being defeated by them, people in high efficacy use these obstacles to grow stronger.

Less Depression

According to the National Alliance of Mental Illness, untreated clinical or major depression can lead to suicide. Environmental factors, an imbalance of chemicals in the brain, and dysfunctional thinking are potential causes of major depression. Hara Estroff Marano, editor-at-large of Psychology Today, suggests that we train ourselves in cognitive-thinking---thinking about what we're thinking. By doing this we can combat negative self-talk with positive messages and stop a minor case of the blues from becoming a major depression. "The quickest way to change how you feel is to change how you think," says Marano.

More Immunity

Researcher Sheldon Cohen, Ph.D. asked a volunteer group of 334 18- to 34-year olds how often they experienced happy or unhappy emotions. The volunteers then received nasal drops containing a common cold virus. People who reported feeling happier were less likely to catch a cold. The March 2010 issue of Psychological Science, features Dr. Suzanne Segerstrom's study of 124 first-year law students. They completed questionnaires to determine how optimistic they felt. Each student received an injection that made skin bumps appear and become larger or smaller depending on her level of germ immunity. Highly optimistic students experienced higher immunity levels.

Less Cardiovascular Disease

Men who believed their risk of suffering from cardiovascular disease was lower than average were three times less likely to die from heart attacks and strokes than men who believed otherwise found a 15-year study conducted by University of Rochester Medical Center researcher Robert Gramling. In Dr. Karina Davidson's 10-year study of 877 healthy women and 862 healthy men, published in the February 2010 issue of European Heart Journal, participates who reported feeling happier had less heart attacks than those who felt less happy.

2 Pilots Capt Don Horan, wife, Barbara, 44; Captain Stephen Butz, wife, Denise, Greensburg with wife killed at Greensburg Municipal Airport were killed when their plane crashed

Two southeastern Indiana couples were killed when their plane crashed while
approaching their small hometown airport in foggy, misty conditions,
authorities said Monday.

The crash Sunday night near Greensburg Municipal Airport killed pilot Don
Horan, 46; his wife, Barbara, 44; Stephen Butz, 45; and his wife, Denise, 42,
Greensburg Police Capt. Bill Meyerrose said. All four were from Greensburg
and were heading back after a weekend outing in Florida with six others. They
had taken off from Destin, Fla., and crashed just a mile from the Greensburg
Airport.

The six others who were part of the excursion flew in another plane that
landed safely at a larger airport in nearby Columbus instead, Meyerrose said.
The Horans have four daughters, and the Butzes have two sons.

Victims IDed from small plane crash in SE Indiana Seattle Post Intelligencer GREENSBURG, Ind. (AP) — Authorities say two Greensburg-area couples are the victims of a smallplane crash near that southeastern Indiana city. The Decatur County Emergency Management Department identifies the victims as 46-year-old Donald P. See all stories on this topic »

32 People Were Killed When A Plane Crashed Into A Bar In The Congo Business Insider Red Cross workers search the wreckage of a cargo plane that crashed late on November 30 at Brazzaville airport as it was trying to land in a storm. A Congolese city morgue official on Sunday updated the death toll to 32, as the search continued for ... See all stories on this topic » Business Insider

Chicago Fire's Fake Plane Crash Fools Reporters Seattle Post Intelligencer Chicago Fire recently filmed a fake plane crash that was so convincing, one local Chicago news station reported the accident as breaking news! News anchors Larry Potash and Robin Baumgarten of Chicago's WGN-Channel 9 showed images of the accident ... See all stories on this topic »

Airplane crash in northwest Iowa kills two men, injures pilot DesMoinesRegister.com Friends and family members offered cherished memories Sunday of Schroeder and Smith, who were both killed in a northwest Iowa plane crash Saturday night. “In small towns like this, everyone knows each other,” said Mike Berning, former Anthon fire chief. See all stories on this topic »

Juventus fined $13000 after fans unveil banner offending 1949 Torino plane ... Washington Post MILAN — Juventus has been fined $13,000 after its fans unveiled an offensive banner during a 3-0 victory over Torino that referred to the 1949 plane crash that wiped out nearly the entire squad from the famed “Grande Torino” team. The huge banner read ... See all stories on this topic »

Small Plane Crashes Near Rochester Airport KAALtv.com (ABC 6 NEWS) - We're learning more about the four passenger of the small plane crash Sunday night. According to family members of one of the people on board the plane, the pilot and three passengers are okay. The pilot of the plane was 23-year-old... See all stories on this topic » KAALtv.com

Bodies recovered from Central Utah plane crash site ABC 4 CHALK CREEK, Utah (ABC 4 News) - The Sevier County Sheriff's Office says the bodies of three people were recovered from a small plane crash site in central Utah on Monday. Investigators say the plane took off from Fillmore and disappeared on November ... See all stories on this topic »

Indiana plane crash kills four WDRB (WDRB) -- The Federal Aviation Administration is investigating why a plane crash killed all four people on board near Greensburg, Indiana. Police say the plane went down about a mile from the Greensburg Municipal Airport. The plane had crashed through ... See all stories on this topic »

Shaver Lake Plane Crash: NTSB Releases More Info. KMPH Fox 26 Family members of the father and son killed in a plane crash near Shaver Lake over the weekend are speaking out. The plane went down in the snow Saturday night.More >>. FRESNO, Calif. (KMPH) -. The following information was provided by the National ... See all stories on this topic »

2 Indiana couples killed in small plane crash Seattle Post Intelligencer GREENSBURG, Ind. (AP) — Two southeastern Indiana couples were killed when their plane crashed while approaching their small hometown airport in foggy, misty conditions, authorities said Monday. The crash Sunday night near Greensburg Municipal ... See all stories on this topic »

Happy Fifth Anniversary, Great Recession!

On the surface, December is a great month. It's filled with holidays: Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Boxing Day, and a host of other special occasions. The 22nd is the winter solstice, the day when the Earth's natural calendar turns and days start getting longer, and the 31st is the night when the old year ends and a new one begins.

But for all its holidays and festivals, turning points and celebrations, December also has its fair share of grim anniversaries. The 7th, after all, remains a "day that shall live in infamy," and the 2nd is the day that Enron filed for bankruptcy. On the 11th, Bernie Madoff was arrested, and on the 14th, President George W. Bush was hit by a tossed shoe in Iraq.

Five years ago, December added another infamous event to its collection: According to the National Bureau of Economic Records, December 2007 is the when the U.S. economy peaked and the Great Recession began. That month, unemployment crept up to 4.9%, beginning a slow climb that would gather speed in 2008 before reaching its height in late 2009.

Three months after December 2007, the famed Bear Stearns bailout hinted at the Wall Street mayhem that was in the works. Of course, by then, the rise in unemployment was hard to miss: In February, employers cut 63,000 jobs, a five-year high. Over the ensuing months, those numbers would continue to rise as the jobless rate eventually topped 10%.

Five years later, the economy still hasn't recovered. Unemployment hovers just below 8% -- an improvement over worst days of the recession, but far from its pre-2007 levels. The number of underemployed workers is still high. And while the recession has officially ended, the effects it had on the middle class remain, in particular what many analysts have characterized as an unprecedented loss of wealth.

At the same time, the Great Recession also led to an explosion in the deficit, as the federal government tried to keep the financial collapses of Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers from rippling across the economy. Today, with the deficit at its highest level in history and a fight over austerity measures, taxes, and the debt ceiling brewing, the nation's modest recovery is at risk.

Among the possible results of the political grudge match now under way in Washington is that the next five years could look like a rerun of the last five. Perhaps next December, we'll be able to look back on this fifth anniversary of the Great Recession as having preceded a year in which the economy finally improved enough to revive America's optimism ... or perhaps we'll be remembering it as brief respite before the economy once again tumbled over a cliff.

Slovenia Ex-Premier Wins Presidency as Recession Deepens Businessweek Borut Pahor, Slovenia's former prime minister, won the presidential election in the euro-region nation that is fighting its second recession in three years. Pahor got 67 percent of the vote in the second round of elections while the incumbent Danilo ... See all stories on this topic »

Recession doesn't stop do-good consumption The News Journal In the recession and its aftermath, Merrick's company has grown. That first year, it sold its line of coffee, gum and mints in about 160 stores nationwide. By the end of this year, Merrick expects to be in 20,000, including mega-marketers Target and ... See all stories on this topic »

US economy may face recession next year due to political issues Economic Times The odds are now about 36% that the US will be in a recession next year. The reason is political: partisan polarisation has reached levels never before seen, threatening to send the US economy over the 'fiscal cliff ' — the automatic tax increases and ... See all stories on this topic » Economic Times

Happy Fifth Anniversary, Great Recession! DailyFinance Happy Fifth Anniversary, Great Recession! On the surface, December is a great month. It's filled with holidays: Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Boxing Day, and a host of other special occasions. The 22nd is the winter solstice, the day when the Earth's ... See all stories on this topic »

US birth rate falls to lowest since 1920 World Socialist Web Site The US birthrate plummeted last year to a record low, with the decline being led by immigrant women hit hard by the recession, according to a study released Thursday by the Pew Research Center. The study concludes that economic factors are having a ... See all stories on this topic »

Avoiding a new American recession BusinessDay The United States may be headed for a recession in 2013. Even if the country avoids going over the “fiscal cliff,” a poorly designed political compromise that cuts the deficit too quickly could push an already weak economy into recession. But a gradual ... See all stories on this topic »

Kids now have to pay for letters to Santa in recession move IrishCentral In previous years , Irish tots sending missives to the North Pole were told there was "no need for a stamp," but due to the recession, things have changed. An Post, the Irish postal service, is "encouraging" children to use stamps to teach them "the ... See all stories on this topic » IrishCentral

Euro-Area Manufacturing Contracts for 16th Straight Month Businessweek Euro-area manufacturing output contracted for a 16th month in November, adding to signs arecession in the currency bloc may extend into next year as leaders struggle to tackle the sovereign-debt crisis. A gauge of manufacturing in the 17-nation euro ... See all stories on this topic »

Recession in Europe starts to affect R.I. exporters The Providence Journal Rising exports have been one of the bright spots in Rhode Island's sluggish economy this year with sales overseas up 4.5 percent through the first nine months of 2012 compared with the first three quarters of 2011, according to statistics compiled by ... See all stories on this topic »