How To Celebrate Being Debt Free

Why I will vote for the Democratic Party

I have an apology to my readers. In recent weeks, the time usually devoted to the blog I have instead engaged in campaign.

Why? Am I a political activist? No, they are not, or at least not in the sense traditional.

Indeed, as a journalist I always thought it was my duty not to be joined parties in order to preserve that freedom of opinion which is necessary for those who want to serve only the public and its demand for independent information that it expresses.

A brief personal history to mo 'premise of

However, there is passion in me civil . There has always been, since the years when I did, in ways independent from political party organizations, the representative of the students in my high school and the school district of the city where I grew up. After years

training and working abroad, I returned to Italy - Rome - in early 1994 , just in time to attend the launch of Forza Italy Fair of Rome towards the end of that January, and then the campaign that led to the first triumph of Silvio Berlusconi .

Since then, for seven years, followed by the U.S. publishing group worked for the Italian economic and political events.

I left Italy in the mid-80s convinced that my country was destined to a sad decline : too much corruption, a rotten economic-political establishment, a finance used for public purposes and patronage in worrying instability, lack of plans and vision for the future.

to convince me to move to Rome in 1994, my editor had to suffer. The prospect of a return to Italy I lured all.

In the end, to decide the match, was the charm of professional challenge: I have opened a new office correspondence, and it was increasingly clear that Italy, with the unusual political season that opened in that ' year, would have been for a while 'the international spotlight. Besides, working for a large American group, operating in all continents, she would also open new horizons that were far beyond the borders of my country.

From there began a melee between me and Italy that still lasts. I am Italian, but do not recognize myself in today.

If the rush and freedom of youth, in the '80s, I was induced to leave, my personal life and my civic passion led me, from that 1994, to deepen ties with my country, rather than to revolve back shoulders.

But it is a daily effort, full of thoughts. One way to give vent to my voltages without failing in the ethical principles that I was given as a journalist, since 1996, to participate - In very personal ways, and again, seconded by party organizations - to election campaigns.

The idea, as often happens, came from a very real and personal stress: the job, in my heart of Rome, a colleague and friend, Tana de Zulueta , until recently, very good first correspondent in Italy for the weekly magazine The Economist (whom I regard with particular admiration for having close knowledge of the extraordinary quality when, in 1991, I had the opportunity to spend in preparing a period of central London internship during my master in journalism).
A
Tana did not want to say no: he was too good, and the reasons they were too similar to mine. So, early in the morning, before going to work, in the spring of 1996, I went to the local markets of Prati - stronghold of the right - to speak of the personal qualities and projects Tana, a candidate for the center-left.

The experience was beautiful. Maybe because of my unusual approach, people will be happy to stop talking. It sprang hours of sincere dialogue, fans and civic way of life policy to me tagging along.

Since then, rules are always different but similar in substance, I continued to carve out a fair share of time to devote to debate politics with other citizens-voters, unknown to me before every election. So I did the last two weeks.

This premise, a bit 'because a long personal story not told in a sentence, unless it becomes an epitaph, I hope it served to frame the meaning of my political engagement.

I am a fiercely independent , but is careful to communities in which they live. I have no second reason: the only passion for the civil progress , and his desire to leave, for what little I can, a better country a legacy to my children .

For those who will vote and why

For those who will vote on Sunday? For the Democratic Party of Walter Veltroni. For those who urge you to not vote ? To the People of Freedom of Silvio Berlusconi.

Here is why.

reducing them to the bone, I think the reasons are three:

a) the PD is a democratic party while PDL, in my opinion, not is.

b) the PD expressed a renewal of realistic, common principles in the name of the liberal European civilization , the PDL is configured, in its essence, as a project of preservation of power in the hands of a caste.

c) the expressed a PD and a culture that can unify the country and thus make it possible to overcome a painful transition hitherto landlocked, the country that imprisons its past now decades, the PDL recurrence is tired of the divisions and the anomalies of the past and therefore condemns the country to repeat as and continue along the same path of decline .

These are my views, and now I will try to give an accelerated hearing.

a) On the first point I would like to cite three examples: the birth certificates of both parties, the replacement of the ruling classes, the electoral law. The

PD is marked by a founding act that has seen millions of citizen-voters to speak with the massive turnout at primary .

It marked a discontinuity characterized by a large of renewal applications and ruling class, a process typical of a healthy democracy.

Si è opposto a una legge elettorale che è una vera truffa per gli elettori, dal momento che li priva di ogni potere di scelta all’interno di liste preconfezionate dai vertici dei partiti.

Per il PdL vale il discorso opposto.

E’ nato da un colpo di mano di Silvio Berlusconi , confermando una genesi del tutto analoga a quella di Forza Italia , un partito-azienda privo di vita democratica e per questo senza eguali nel mondo occidentale (anche una leadership estremamente forte come quella di Margaret Thatcher sul partito conservatore britannico dovette affrontare crisi interne e formidabili Opposition movements, which eventually prevailed as is typical of the dynamics of true democracy).

E 'remained enmeshed in conflicts of interest of its leader, only to submit, for this reason, a number of applications under suspicion given the number of offenders, convicted plurinquisiti, often with heads imputation of considerable gravity.

The replacement is therefore blocked by the interests of its leader-owner, doubly linked to a group of power taken away from any possibility of verification of the consent , both inside the party in the electoral process.

This observation, of course, calls into question the electoral law , commissioned by Berlusconi and he strenuously defended even at the moment of this election, this confirms a worrying ability to compress the space of free democratic debate .

b) The PD in its positioning, its culture and its programs, is finally a port to normal in that it presents itself as a reformist party European, steeped in social values \u200b\u200band liberal .

overcoming the division between secular and Catholic abandonment of the ballast consisting of sections of the left radical and antagonistic constitute genuine prospects for the PD steady as the party of reform possible: those in Italy are evident to many, simply because they aim at a convergence towards the European political civilization, but which, nevertheless, were often impractical. The

PDL, FI-AN simple restatement of the covenant of past legislatures, it inherits the poverty of projects for the country and the vocation to act as a party aimed at the protection of special interests - sometimes even corporate but simply personal - as sadly demonstrated in navigating the Berlusconi government in the period 2001-2006.

The priority, in those years, has been continuously ad personam "laws that have made so much mulch every principle of democratic legal culture.

false accounting, international letters rogatory, the European arrest warrant, law Cirami, Maccanico award, former Cirielli, tax amnesties, tax amnesty, abolition of tax on capital gains from investments, TV rights of football, the Gasparri Law (now in the crosshairs of the Commission European Union), Decree-saving Rete 4, state aid to the decoder ... we could go.

c) The PD, as part of the reform, the party presents itself as that can help overcome the divisive tendencies underway in the country, which are large and worrying because you are now extended to areas as diverse as the institutional framework, the territorial (north-south), that of ' equality of rights (I think the job market), the socio-economic (I think the growing polarization in income distribution, making Italy one of the most unequal countries in Europe). The PDL

returns in this election, in fact, inconsistent with the same juxtaposition of alliances in 1994: then there were forces Italy over the League and National Alliance in the north to south, and today there are Forza Italy and AN, assembled in the PDL, in alliance with the Northern League and the Movement for Autonomy in the South

14 years have passed, but the paralysis is evident.

L ' opportunistic assembly of interest groups can also lead to power (as it is able to Berlusconi in 1994 and again in 2001), but does not evolve into a government project for the country.

Without this, the power Berlusconi's end in itself. Berlusconi enjoys the group of power around him, but does not translate into growth and progress for the country.

It is no coincidence that, in the fourteen years since the advent dell''era Berlusconi ', the national decline has been gradual but ended up touching its most acute in the years of right-wing government (the period 2001-2006 has coincided with the period of economic downturn more severe in recent Italian history, compounded by a deterioration of public finances after the consolidation of the second half of the 90s).

I mentioned at the beginning of this post on The Economist newspaper . Let me conclude by referring to the reading of a its editorial, published last week.

Veltroni called on to vote and let it go Berlusconi, confirming an opinion already expressed several years ago, the Knight is unfit to govern - and that is "unfit to govern" a Western democracy. It 'also my thought.

Duas To Write In Marriage Card

LA STORIA DELLE RIVISTE DI VIDEOGIOCHI /3

LA STORIA DELLE RIVISTE DI VIDEOGIOCHI - PARTE III
di Andrea Pachetti

Testata: K
Publisher: Glénat Italy / RCS

In previous articles we talked about the Studio Vit on several occasions. With K we face the third incarnation of the idea of \u200b\u200bpublishing the second video game Albini, Rossetti and Associates: always starting with a format of the existing Anglo-Saxon, so as to have a base of information for reviews and previews, it adapts to the needs and the demands of the Italian public, enriching the whole with original content.

In this case the primary source was the British magazine giant's English ACE and Future, as is normal, the gap between written and translated articles Italians went thinning over the years to make a magazine of 99% K "made in Italy".
Again, the structural model and the sections follow the de facto standard for this kind of publications, with the alternation of previews and reviews (this time defined "screen tests") without giving up the inevitable fixed appointments, such as section devoted to tips and solutions for mail and address book, the K-Box.

The difference from past experience, which is known since the early numbers, but that becomes apparent with each passing month, a trend is not only addressed the critical depth review of each game, but the analysis of themes and genres understood in a global sense, recognizing for the first time this media qualcosa di più interessante e profondo del semplice intrattenimento. In questo senso è possibile affermare che K fu la prima rivista del settore ad affrontare in modo adulto gli stessi temi dei concorrenti, nella sostanza ma anche nella forma, rinunciando spesso ai colori sgargianti e ai fondini psichedelici in voga in quel periodo in favore di un'impaginazione sobria su fondo bianco.
E' bene ricordare che gli anni d'oro di K (1989-1994) furono un periodo di grandi rivoluzioni per quanto riguarda l'hardware: alla fine degli anni '80 terminava lo strapotere degli 8-bit e del Commodore 64 in particolare, in favore dei più potenti Amiga e Atari ST. La scesa in campo di Sega e Nintendo con le loro corazzate Megadrive e Super NES fece da contraltare al definivo affermarsi del Personal Computer come seria alternativa di gioco, grazie alla scoperta di una vocazione multimediale che aveva tra i principali attori l'introduzione delle prime schede VGA e il sonoro delle Adlib e delle Soundblaster, che diventarono i sogni proibiti di molti.

In tutto questo vortice di nuove macchine e interrogativi, K si mosse dilatando spazi e tempi delle recensioni e rendendo il K-Box quasi una palestra di discussioni filosofiche sull'argomento, grazie soprattutto alle gestioni MBF e Toniutti di questo angolo.
Ben presto l'argomento console venne bandito dalla rivista tastando dapprima il mercato con due speciali a tema, che preparavano il terreno all'uscita del nuovo mensile complementare Game Power, opposto non only by subject but also the attitude, the calm and "clean" to K, as gleefully demented and insane to GP It was going so well that first posting to delineate between two audiences, the "hardcore" and the "casual", long before classes were to be explicitly defined.

The only limit that you can find in all this is precisely the lack of immediacy of certain texts and the feeling of wanting to take too seriously, feeling that may sound strange when you consider that the main topic of discussion, however, must remain the 'entertainment. This type of analysis can be also verified by comparing K with other publications of the period, For example, the crazy C + VG maintained by Fabio Rossi to whom we shall speak below, or the TGM at the time, especially on the lever that was light-hearted spirit of drafting. In its 67 numbers

K has also been a training ground for many new writers, including you immediately notice the group of people (Minini Saldini, Paglianti, Beretta and others) who will then give you life in recent years to leap GMC , even make a journal reference of the PC world.
A journey that started back in 1988 with the number 1 in December and I tend to consider that ended with the end of 1994, when a grinning and disturbing of Kyrandia Malcolm 3 shows the latest editorial Albini with the announcement of the passage of the management of EDI. Progress Zinsenheim. While the study

Vit rushed into the new adventure ZETA editorial, the magazine K went on for many years, until the last incarnation of "K PC GAMES 'with a game CD that came attached to the goal of the XXI century: But I prefer to remember the golden era, that of the votes cast at thousandths heinous and disturbing Curve Expected interest (CIP & CIOP), the Yellow Pages and cartoons of APEC.

Fluid On The Lungs More Condition_treatment

LA STORIA DELLE RIVISTE DI VIDEOGIOCHI /2

THE HISTORY OF THE REVIEW OF VIDEO GAMES - PART II
Andrea Packages

Magazine: Zzap!
Publisher: Edizioni Hobby / Xenia

Quattro lettere onomatopeiche (e un punto esclamativo) unite in un lampo che squarcia il buio, per incarnare il desiderio diffuso in gran parte dei giovani legati all'epoca degli otto bit. Un mantra mistico da pronunciare ad libitum al povero edicolante di turno, "Quando esce Zzap? Quando esce?" fino al punto da farlo impazzire.

Se Video Giochi rappresenta senz'altro la fase dell'infanzia della critica videoludica, con le sue rappresentazioni minimali e i mille disegni colorati che la accompagnavano, Zzap! è di sicuro il momento adolescenziale, con la sua ribellione, la vis comica, il linguaggio moderno, la vena sarcastica.
Il primo numero nasce nel maggio 1986 ad opera dello Studio Vit, borrowing the basic concept and much of the content from the homonymous Zzap! 64 Newsfield published in England by the publisher. Even starting simply as "the Italian edition of the British magazine's best-selling" its autonomy from the outset Mature themes, aiming to show a complete picture of the games released for all existing home computer, rather than simply the Commodore 64.

In England Newsfield had several single-issue journals, devoted to Crash Spectrum, Zzap! 64 dedicated precisely to the C64, Amtix all'Amstrad CPC, while the Zzap! Italian now embraces a calling platform that will be its main strength. On its pages will also be presented the first games for new monsters to sixteen bits, at least until they will get a magazine entirely dedicated to them, The Games Machine, this choice inextricably bind the fate of Zzap! that of C64 and associates, following the parable of glory and then the inevitable crisis.

probably the golden era can be traced back to 1987-89, when production was at the highest levels of games and gold medals abounded: the time of such masterpieces as McKraken Zak, Mission Impossible 2, and a thousand Armalyte others took turns pages, where in the meantime the firm had given way to Vit Bonaventura Di Bello and the team that had started to assemble from number 23. Through countless changes in layout and editorial changes problems begin to arrive in the early '90s, when it becomes increasingly difficult to find quality content for review by machines now "dying": you try to make room for consoles like the NES and Game Boy or collateral activities such as Japanese anime, but everything seems to end with the number 73 of December 1992.

Starting next month, although Zzap! ceases to exist as an autonomous entity, somehow continues to exit swallowed up by the now famous sister TGM: you attach a 16-page stapled insert (then only 8) until December of that year, with the number 84 that definitively closes this historical period Game Over with a terse written on with a black cover.
The basic structure of Zzap! takes many features of previous experience, but it certainly did the school both in terms of how to review games for the general attitude of those who wrote. Until then, the editor was a simple descriptor of hardware features and game modes, while the main merit of the original members and Julian Rignalla was precisely to create the editors "superstar", instantly recognizable thanks to the portraits that stood out in each review: T-shirts with their dark and white magic initials engraved on fire, became veritable icons showing from time to time joyful or disgusted expressions. Next to the description

principale di ogni gioco, ognuno poteva fornire la sua impressione personale in appositi box di commento, per poi concludere con una pagella descrittiva. Caratteristiche come Presentazione, Grafica, Sonoro, Appetibilità e Longevità sono entrate dunque nella storia, per arrivare poi al fantomatico Globale, che aveva l'ingrato compito di riassumere il giudizio complessivo e dava spesso adito a grandi discussioni nelle pagine della posta.

In un periodo in cui internet, l'email e i forum erano solo illusioni, la posta scritta dai lettori aveva una grandissima importanza e quella di Zzap! non fece eccezione, andando a creare quasi una rivista dentro la rivista, con i suoi protagonisti, le sue vicende, le sue polemiche. Personaggi come Spadini FFS and remain in the hearts of many, not to mention the philosopher MBF then managed to make the big jump, from a simple player editor itself.
There were not even the age-old discussion on piracy, and in this sense Zzap! was a brave experiment with your campaigns in favor of the original software: it is well to remember that in the mid 80s, the gaming market in Italy was dominated by magazines from newsstands literally "with a box attached. Accomplice to the lack of legislation about it, then it was legal to sell copied games editing a bit 'graphics and titles, reaching a curious perversions that now make you smile when you find yourself on a tape instead of Bolle Bolle un Bobble Bobble.

Accanto a questo, diverse pagine ogni mese erano dedicate alle soluzioni e ai trucchi per ottenere le agognate vite infinite, con vagonate di istruzioni poke da digitare e che presto vanificarono la rubrica del "signore dei punteggi" dedicata ai record, dato che non si poteva più stabilire se uno avesse imbrogliato o no ad un certo gioco.
Come dimenticarsi poi dei meravigliosi diari dei programmatori, in cui eroi solitari come Jeff Minter o Martin Walker ti ipnotizzavano parlavando di multiplexing e trucchi hardware? Delle meravigliose copertine di Oliver Frey che da sole invogliavano ad un acquisto compulsivo?

Zzap! è stata un avventura meravigliosa sia per i redattori che per i lettori, e chi non l'ha lived has lost a unique piece of history now: it was not just a magazine, but a way of being and to identify with a common passion, the place around which gather with friends at recess for the comments of the day, catalog of wonders, a dream that still lives on in memory.

I can only conclude this article by thanking publicly Bonaventure Bello (Executive Director) and Fabio Rossi (managing editor) for their presence on these pages.

Bonaventure BEAUTIFUL
is not easy for me to say a few lines in what was Zzap! because I've lived through a period of my life that was now far from carefree adolescence, I had plenty of the past twenty years and was married for a few years, plus I had moved to Milan from a small town in Campania.
I can say that has been largely positive experiences only: the professional development in the role of Executive Director (and one man band "in the early months, or before I began to recruit reporters), and the esteem and support of two wonderful people like Fernando Ferri and Roberto Monti, who ran the publishing house and that gave me more of an opportunity both before and after the enthusiasm and desire to learn, discover and grow in the (then) as a young Fabio Rossi , Marco Auletta, Stefano Giorgi and all gli altri che comunque non ho dimenticato e mi piacerebbe incontrare di nuovo, prima o poi, per scoprire com'è andata la loro vita e dirgli che li porto ancora nel cuore; l'essermi ritrovato nel pieno del fenomeno videoludico fino al passaggio dagli otto ai sedici bit, potendone cogliere tanto l'aspetto giocoso quanto quello di trend mediatico e commerciale; l'incontro con l'editoria 'vera' e con i suoi strumenti, dal Macintosh al laboratorio del fotolitista, un bagaglio di esperienza che negli anni mi ha offerto sempre nuove opportunità professionali.
Un periodo della mia vita intenso, quindi, sotto ogni punto di vista, al quale non posso che guardare sorridendo e asciugandomi l'inevitabile lacrima di nostalgia e affetto per tutto quanto and all those who have enriched immeasurably.

FABIO ROSSI
Zzap! was in all respects a great adventure. Not only we were in the forefront of cutting-edge video game phenomenon, which is now part of everyday life for anyone but it was still an oddity for impallinati; Not only we were in a period and in a situation that allowed it to make a magazine " punk, "where we were sailing in sight ignoring all convention and creating new ones ... but he was also my baptism as a journalist "true", from which depended a good part of my life.
What we lacked in graphics and sound (my god, we believe that we worked con i cut-up di Battiato in sottofondo?) lo compensavamo in pieno con Longevità (piaccia o no, tante riviste di videogiochi seguono ancora lo stile che inventammo all'epoca) e Giocabilità - anche se il lavoro era massacrante, passare giorni e notti in redazione era un divertimento impareggiabile.
Ormai a 38 anni sono tecnicamente un vecchio bacucco incarognito e nostalgico, però quegli anni per me restano senza pari proprio per la vitalità che avevamo non solo noi, ma l'intera pionieristica industria dei videogame. I giochi uscivano senza preavviso, con concetti imprevedibili (chi si ricorda Space Seed? E le assurdità di Jeff Minter?) in cui oggi non si avventurano neanche più i casual game, lanciando tecnologie innovative we now take for granted and real characters from movies like the spirited Fasoulas, Garriott in perpetual crisis mystic, philosopher or Crawford - tell me anything - like a volcano BDB, capable of brilliant insights.
I fear that since the twenty-first century Zzap! not make the same impression, a bit 'like Elvis Presley today is just smile. But we did rock 'n' roll, guys - and do not know what we are sorry to see your minimalism.

NOTE: This article was originally published on No. 3 of Gamers, Hobbymedia editions. The rights belong solely to the undersigned on the text and not the publisher for any use which is licensed under the Creative Commons located at the bottom of this blog.

scans of the article (as published in the paper on Gamers) are on the blog WOPR Box at the following address .

Tightness In Throat More Condition_symptoms

LA STORIA DELLE RIVISTE DI VIDEOGIOCHI /1

THE HISTORY OF THE REVIEW OF VIDEO GAMES - PART I
Andrea Packages

Magazine: Video Games
Publisher: Gruppo Editoriale Jackson

must now make a big effort to remember a time when the Internet did not exist as we know it now, and even e-mail was used almost exclusively in communications between scientists "in white coats." Thinking of the 80s, for news on video games magazines paper were the only source of updated information: this and the articles that follow are intended as a small tribute to that moment in videogame history in Italy, of course without any claim to completeness.

Like all the stories that respect, this is effectively told to be started from the beginning, from the first Italian magazine to have video games as a central subject, is at Gruppo Editoriale Jackson, star of those years in the publishing market computer science, which is responsible for the emergence of "Video Games" (or rather, Video Games, referring to the original logo).

The preparation was formed by the historic core of the Firm Vit led by Riccardo Albini, who will leave over the years an indelible mark in this market, creating some of the most important journals from the historical point of view, that is, Zzap!, K and Zeta. Obviously it was not a random experiment created out of nothing: the main inspiration was certainly the container-American magazines like the historical "Electronic Games", but this event is still a breath of fresh air on the newsstands. For the first time in our country, created a spontaneous movement of the fan club, mostly at an early age, literally submerged the preparation of colored letters, drawings and comics. "The place of mail" that was the appropriate category, it was always a riot of curious questions today would smile ("What should I buy from Atari and Intellivision?", "How many colors has the Coleco?"), but it certainly showed the desire to learn about a new and fascinating world.

The typical summary of a number of Video Games has a structure that will become a classic valid to this day, with the division between news and social news (the "Ready") and the reviews themselves, which were divided between those console ("What game?") and those for the home computer ("In front of the computer made"). Maurizio "IUR" Miccoli, expert gamer and record-holder was responsible for highly detailed descriptions of the coin-op ("The Bar") and were also devoted space to the game and gaming and portable LCD, thus completing the overview of what the market could offer at that time.

was a particular period and furious, with new consoles and software company that went out almost every month, many of which were of real meteors. In such a situation, a guide for the purchases was very important and Video Games also fulfills this task in an exemplary manner, with detailed lists of each imported brand in Italy.
Readers were also directly involved in the production of records, to be immortalized for posterity by means of photography: a fairly large space was given to video games, both on home consoles and arcades in the challenges. All were tempted to get the best score in the standings, thanks to the incentive of a free subscription if the record is quite resistant. This movement culminated in the creation of the historic AIVA, the Italian Association Video Athlete, which purported to be real professional players, able to rival the US-axis joystick.

The success of this magazine was soon to create the desire to separate the content, and thus was born a spin-off called "Home Computer" (HC), lasting fifteen numbers, dealing with information technology as "serious ", leaving the mother to the magazine reviews purely recreational.
In 1984-85 the reflections of the crash U.S. industry were felt even in Italy, and the three best-selling console of the period, Atari VCS, Intellivision and Colecovision were unfortunately forgotten almost immediately by fans, attracted by the increased expansion of small-sized computer and the lower prices of their media (tapes and floppy). The group

Jackson then tried to reinforce its leading journal in it through the transfer of the subject computer: HC closed and called the new incarnation of "Computer & Video Games, from number 29. Unfortunately, the downward trend was inevitable and the adventure ended 37 September 1986. Subsequent versions of "Video Games", among which is is worth mentioning the curious edition "poster" A3, had a relatively short life editorial and were unable to penetrate the market. Studio Vit meanwhile had already moved his interests on a successful British magazine, called Zzap! 64 ...

NOTE: This article was originally published on No. 2 Gamers, Hobbymedia editions. The rights belong solely to the undersigned on the text and not the publisher for any use which is licensed under the Creative Commons located at the bottom of this blog.