Take from yahoo.com

MENTOR, Ohio – Sladjana Vidovic's body lay in an open casket, dressed in the sparkly pink dress she had planned to wear to the prom. Days earlier, she had tied one end of a rope around her neck and the other around a bed post before jumping out her bedroom window.

The 16-year-old's last words, scribbled in English and her native Croatian, told of her daily torment at Mentor High School, where students mocked her accent, taunted her with insults like "Slutty Jana" and threw food at her.

It was the fourth time in little more than two years that a bullied high school student in this small Cleveland suburb on Lake Erie died by his or her own hand — three suicides, one overdose of antidepressants. One was bullied for being gay, another for having a learning disability, another for being a boy who happened to like wearing pink.

Now two families -- including the Vidovics -- are suing the school district, claiming their children were bullied to death and the school did nothing to stop it. The lawsuits come after a national spate of high-profile suicides by gay teens and others, and during a time of national soul-searching about what can be done to stop it.

[Related: School-yard bullying: A survivor's tale]

If there has been soul-searching among the bullies in Mentor — a pleasant beachfront community that was voted one of the "100 Best Places to Live" by CNN and Money magazine this year — Sladjana's family saw too little of it at her wake in October 2008.

Suzana Vidovic found her sister's body hanging over the front lawn. The family watched, she said, as the girls who had tormented Sladjana for months walked up to the casket -- and laughed.

"They were laughing at the way she looked," Suzana says, crying. "Even though she died."

___

Sladjana Vidovic, whose family had moved to northeast Ohio from Bosnia when she was a little girl, was pretty, vivacious and charming. She loved to dance. She would turn on the stereo and drag her father out of his chair, dance him in circles around the living room.

"Nonstop smile. Nonstop music," says her father, Dragan, who speaks only a little English.

At school, life was very different. She was ridiculed for her thick accent. Classmates tossed insults like "Slutty Jana" or "Slut-Jana-Vagina." A boy pushed her down the stairs. A girl smacked her in the face with a water bottle.

Phone callers in the dead of night would tell her to go back to Croatia, that she'd be dead in the morning, that they'd find her after school, says Suzana Vidovic.

"Sladjana did stand up for herself, but toward the end she just kind of stopped," says her best friend, Jelena Jandric. "Because she couldn't handle it. She didn't have enough strength."

[Related: Cyber-bullying: When enough is enough]

Vidovic's parents say they begged the school to intervene many times. They say the school promised to take care of her.

She had already withdrawn from Mentor and enrolled in an online school about a week before she killed herself.

When the family tried to retrieve records about their reports of bullying, school officials told them the records were destroyed during a switch to computers. The family sued in August.

Two years after her death, Dragan Vidovic waves his hand over the family living room, where a vase of pink flowers stands next to a photograph of Sladjana.

"Today, no music," he says sadly. "No smile."

___

Eric Mohat was flamboyant and loud and preferred to wear pink most of the time. When he didn't get the lead soprano part in the choir his freshman year, he was indignant, his mother says.

He wore a stuffed animal strapped to his arm, a lemur named Georges that was given its own seat in class.

"It was a gag," says Mohat's father, Bill. "And all the girls would come up to pet his monkey. And in his Spanish class they would write stories about Georges."

Mohat's family and friends say he wasn't gay, but people thought he was.

"They called him fag, homo, queer," says his mother, Jan. "He told us that."

Bullies once knocked a pile of books out of his hands on the stairs, saying, "'Pick up your books, faggot,'" says Dan Hughes, a friend of Eric's.

Kids would flick him in the head or call him names, says 20-year-old Drew Juratovac, a former student. One time, a boy called Mohat a "homo," and Juratovac told him to leave Mohat alone.

"I got up and said, 'Listen, you better leave this kid alone. Just walk away,'" he says. "And I just hit him in the face. And I got suspended for it."

Eric Mohat shot himself on March 29, 2007, two weeks before a choir trip to Hawaii.

His parents asked the coroner to call it "bullicide." At Eric's funeral and after his death, other kids told the Mohats that they had seen the teen relentlessly bullied in math class. The Mohats demanded that police investigate, but no criminal activity was found.

[Related: 6 signs of cyber-bullying and what you can do about it]

Two years later, in April 2009, the Mohats sued the school district, the principal, the superintendent and Eric's math teacher. The federal lawsuit is on hold while the Ohio Supreme Court considers a question of state law regarding the case.

"Did we raise him to be too polite?" Bill Mohat wonders. "Did we leave him defenseless in this school?"

___

Meredith Rezak, 16, shot herself in the head three weeks after the death of Mohat, a good friend of hers. Her cell phone, found next to her body, contained a photograph of Mohat with the caption "R.I.P. Eric a.k.a. Twiggy."

Rezak was bright, outgoing and a well-liked player on the volleyball team. Shortly before her suicide, she had joined the school's Gay-Straight Alliance and told friends and family she thought she might be gay.

Juratovac says Rezak endured her own share of bullying — "name-calling, just stupid trivial stuff" — but nobody ever knew it was getting to her.

"Meredith ended up coming out that she was a lesbian," he says. "I think much of that sparked a lot of the bullying from a lot of the other girls in school, 'cause she didn't fit in."

Her best friend, Kevin Simon, doesn't believe that bullying played a role in Rezak's death. She had serious issues at home that were unrelated to school, he says.

After Mohat's death, people saw Rezak crying at school, and friends heard her talk of suicide herself.

A year after Rezak's death, the older of her two brothers, 22-year-old Justin, also shot and killed himself. His death certificate mentioned "chronic depressive reaction."

This March, her only other sibling, Matthew, died of a drug overdose at age 21.

Their mother, Nancy Merritt, lives in Colorado now. She doesn't think Meredith was bullied to death but doesn't really know what happened. On the phone, her voice drifts off, sounding disconnected, confused.

"So all three of mine are gone," she says. "I have to keep breathing."

___

Most mornings before school, Jennifer Eyring would take Pepto-Bismol to calm her stomach and plead with her mother to let her stay home.

"She used to sob to me in the morning that she did not want to go," says her mother, Janet. "And this is going to bring tears to my eyes. Because I made her go to school."

Eyring, 16, was an accomplished equestrian who had a learning disability. She was developmentally delayed and had a hearing problem, so she received tutoring during the school day. For that, her mother says, she was bullied constantly.

By the end of her sophomore year in 2006, Eyring's mother had decided to pull her out of Mentor High School and enroll her in an online school the following autumn. But one night that summer, Jennifer walked into her parents' bedroom and told them she had taken some of her mother's antidepressant pills to make herself feel better. Hours later, she died of an overdose.

[Related: Stop bullying by complaining – in writing]

The Eyrings do not hold Mentor High accountable, but they believe she would be alive today had she not been bullied. Her parents are speaking out in hopes of preventing more tragedies.

"It's too late for my daughter," Janet Eyring says, "but it may not be too late for someone else."

___

No official from Mentor public schools would comment for this story. The school also refused to provide details on its anti-bullying program.

Some students say the problem is the culture of conformity in this city of about 50,000 people: If you're not an athlete or cheerleader, you're not cool. And if you're not cool, you're a prime target for the bullies.

But that's not so different from most high schools. Senior Matt Super, who's 17, says the suicides unfairly paint his school in a bad light.

"Not everybody's a good person," he says. "And in a group of 3,000 people, there are going to be bad people."

StopCyberbulling.org founder Parry Aftab says this is the first time she's heard of two sets of parents suing a school at the same time for two independent cases of bullying or cyberbullying. No one has been accused of bullying more than one of the teens who died.

Barbara Coloroso, a national anti-bullying expert, says the school is allowing a "culture of mean" to thrive, and school officials should be held responsible for the suicides — along with the bullies.

"Bullying doesn't start as criminal. They need to be held accountable the very first time they call somebody a gross term," Coloroso says. "That is the beginning of dehumanization."

Forbes' power lists are synonymous with moguls and movie stars, heads of state and captains of business. One look at the 2010 World's 100 Most Powerful Women list and it is clear that we've come up with a new ranking of the female power elite that reflects the New Order of now.

When we set out to identify this year's list, we decided it was time to look up and out into the broader culture. Our assessment is based less on traditional titles and roles and more on creative influence and entrepreneurship. These power women have built distinctive companies and brands and championed weighty causes, sometimes through unconventional means; in other cases they have broken through gender barriers.

visit to forbes.com/woman

1. Michelle Obama, First Lady, U.S.
2. Irene Rosenfeld, Chief Executive, Kraft Foods
3. Oprah Winfrey, Talk show host and media mogul
4. Angela Merkel, Chancellor, Germany
5. Hillary Rodham Clinton, Secretary of State, U.S.
6. Indra Nooya, Chief Executive, Pepsico
7. Lady Gaga, Singer and performance artist
8. Gail Kelly, Chief Executive, Westpac
9. Beyoncé Knowles, Singer and fashion designer
10. Ellen DeGeneres, Talk show host
11. Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House, U.S.
12. Angela Braly, Chief Executive, Wellpoint
13. Janet Napolitano, Secretary, Homeland Security, U.S.
14. Cynthia Carroll, Chief Executive, Anglo American
15. Sheila Bair, Chair, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
16. Sarah Palin, Political maverick and commentator
17. Mary Schapiro, Chair, Securities and Exchange Commission
18. Ellen Kullman, Chief Executive, DuPont
19. Sonia Sotomayor, Supreme Court Justice, U.S.
20. Ursula Burns, Chief Executive, Xerox
21. Angelina Jolie, Actor and UN Goodwill Ambassador
22. Katie Couric, News anchor
23. Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary, Health & Human Services
24. Anne Lauvergeon, Chief Executive, Areva
25. Elena Kagan, Supreme Court Justice, U.S.

BAGHDAD – A Muslim cleric who once used a militia to resist the American positioned himself as a big winner in Iraq's monthslong political deadlock Friday when his party threw its support behind the beleaguered prime minister.The hard-line Shiite group led by Muqtadaal-Sadr called it the start of its ascent to nationwide power — a specter sure to spook the United States.Washington considers the cleric a threat to Iraq's shaky security and has long refused to consider his movement a legitimate political entity. But Prime Nouri al-Maliki may be unable to govern without him.March elections failed to produce a clear winner and left the nation in turmoil — a power vacuum that U.S. military officials say has encouraged a spike in attacks by Sunni insurgents.Final agreement on how to form the new government could still be weeks if not months away, but "the Sadrist acceptance of al-Maliki as prime minister could begin to break the logjam," said Iraq expert Daniel Serwer of the U.S. Institute of Peace in Washington.

A two-year-old Rottweiler has been recognised for his bravery after he saved a woman from a sex attacker.

The dog, named Jake, chased off the man as he molested a woman on Hearsall Common, Coventry, in July 2009.

Jake, who stood guard over the victim until police arrived, received his honour at an RSPCA event in Shrewsbury.

The attacker was convicted of serious sexual assault and jailed for four years.

Jake, who was honoured at the Prostar Stadium at an RSPCA conference on Saturday, was nominated by police for the bravery award and medallion after the incident.

Det Con Clive Leftwich, from Coventry police station, said: "From our point of view Jake the Rottweiler stopped a serious sexual assault from becoming even worse."

Liz Maxted-Bluck, who rescued Jake from an RSPCA home in December 2008, said: "He is such a lovely natured dog and is very nosey so I think that was why he went to investigate that day when he heard the screams.

"After I called the police, he stayed alert and close to us like he was guarding us.

"It is brilliant that he is receiving this award from the RSPCA, I am really proud."

Glenn Mayoll, manager of RSPCA Coventry Animal Centre, said it was "immensely proud" of Jake.

He added: "This story just goes to show that a rescue dog can be a great addition to any family."

As he was boasting that Apple is activating 230,000 iOS devices a day at Apple’s San Francisco event yesterday, Steve Jobs took the opportunity to accuse competitors of boosting their numbers when it comes to device activations.

“We think some of our friends are counting upgrades in their numbers,” said Jobs, most probably referring to the recent figures from Google, whose Eric Schmidt claimed 200,000 activations daily in August 2010.

Google has quickly responded to Jobs’ allegations. In a response to an inquiry from Fortune, a Google spokesperson said: “The Android activation numbers do not include upgrades and are, in fact, only a portion of the Android devices in the market since we only include devices that have Google services.”

So there you have it: according to Google, it might even have more than 200,000 Android device activations every day. Who do you trust: Apple or Google?

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama on Friday forcefully endorsed allowing a mosque near ground zero, saying the country's founding principles demanded no less.

"As a citizen, and as president, I believe that Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country," Obama said, weighing in for the first time on a controversy that has riven New York City and the nation.

"That includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances," he said. "This is America, and our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakable."

Obama made the comments at an annual dinner in the White House State Dining Room celebrating the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.

The White House had not previously taken a stand on the mosque, which would be part of a $100 million Islamic center two blocks from where nearly 3,000 people perished when hijacked jetliners slammed into the World Trade Center towers on Sept. 11, 2001. Press secretary Robert Gibbs had insisted it was a local matter.

It was already much more than that, sparking debate around the country as top Republicans including Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich announced their opposition. So did the Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish civil rights group.

Obama elevated it to a presidential issue Friday without equivocation.

While insisting that the place where the twin towers once stood was indeed "hallowed ground," Obama said that the proper way to honor it was to apply American values.

"Our capacity to show not merely tolerance, but respect towards those who are different from us — and that way of life, that quintessentially American creed, stands in stark contrast to the nihilism of those who attacked us on that September morning, and who continue to plot against us today," he said.

Obama harkened back to earlier times when the building of synagogues or Catholic churches also met with opposition. "But time and again, the American people have demonstrated that we can work through these issues, and stay true to our core values and emerge stronger for it," he said. "So it must be and will be today."

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, an independent who has been a strong supporter of the mosque, welcomed Obama's words as a "clarion defense of the freedom of religion."

But some Republicans were quick to pounce.

"President Obama is wrong," said Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y. "It is insensitive and uncaring for the Muslim community to build a mosque in the shadow of ground zero. While the Muslim community has the right to build the mosque they are abusing that right by needlessly offending so many people who have suffered so much."

Entering the highly charged election-year debate, Obama surely knew that his words would not only make headlines but be heard by Muslims worldwide. The president has made it a point to reach out to the global Muslim community, and the over 100 guests at Friday's dinner included ambassadors and officials from numerous Muslim nations, including Saudi Arabia and Indonesia. Seated around candlelit tables, they listened closely as Obama spoke, then stood and applauded when the president finished his remarks.

While his pronouncement concerning the mosque might find favor in the Muslim world, Obama's stance runs counter to the opinions of the majority of Americans, according to polls. A CNN/Opinion Research poll released this week found that nearly 70 percent of Americans opposed the mosque plan while just 29 percent approved. A number of Democratic politicians have shied away from the controversy.

The group behind the $100 million project, the Cordoba Initiative, describes it as a Muslim-themed community center. Early plans call not only for prayer space but for a swimming pool, culinary school, art studios and other features. Developers envision it as a hub for interfaith interaction, as well as a place for Muslims to bridge some of their faith's own schisms.

Opponents, including some Sept. 11 victims' relatives, see the prospect of a mosque so near the destroyed trade center as an insult to the memory of those killed by Islamic terrorists in the 2001 attacks. Some of the Sept. 11 victims' relatives, however, are in favor.

The mosque has won approval from local planning boards but faces legal challenges, and New York's Conservative Party is planning a television ad campaign to pressure a New York City utility to use its power to block the project.

jAKARTA, — Microsoft telah menetapkan jadwal pengenalan perdana browser terbaru yang sedang dikembangkannya ke publik. Versi beta Internet Explorer 9 itu akan tersedia pada 15 September 2010.

"Anda dapat mengunduh kode beta IE9 pada 15 September," demikian pernyataan Microsoft, Kamis (12/8/2010), seperti dilansir situs The Register. Microsoft direncanakan memulai debut IE9 itu dalam sebuah gelaran akbar di San Francisco bertajuk "Beauty of the Web".

IE9 bakal menjadi browser pertama Microsoft yang paling mendukung standar mana pun. Browser ini sudah mendukung penuh standar HTML5, grafis 2D dengan elemen Canvas, serta font bawaan menggunakan Web Open Font Format (WOFF). Selain itu, IE9 juga bisa mengeksekusi standar video codec terbuka WebM dari Google serta standar video H.264 yang bersifat propietary.

Sebelumnya, IE9 diperkenalkan pertam kali dalam acara Mix pada Maret 2009 lalu. Microsoft mengklaim, sampai saat ini kode preview browser tersebut sudah diunduh 2,5 juta kali. Kehadiran IE9 merupakan upaya Microsoft kembali mendominasi pasar browser yang kini tersisa sekitar 60 persen.

KOMPAS.com

Orange is launching a new project using the power of mobile technology to transform volunteering in the UK.The network will ‘make minutes matter’ by introducing convenient snack-sized volunteering, allowing people to volunteer anywhere at anytime whenever they have spare time – using mobile technology. The overall aim is to ‘turn down time into good time, generating hundreds of thousands of extra hours of volunteering in the UK each year.In the first phase, Orange is launching an online community to attract new ideas and concepts for mobile volunteering. People who have been invited include social entrepreneurs, charities and developers.

WASHINGTON – Appointed Sen. Michael Bennet won the Democratic nomination to a full term in Colorado Tuesday night, overcoming a fierce primary challenge at home and an outbreak of anti-establishment fever nationwide. In Connecticut, Linda McMahon easily captured the Republican Senate primary to join the slate of outsider-candidates who will carry the GOP banner this fall.

Bennet will face prosecutor Ken Buck, the winner of a tight GOP primary, in a race that Republicans need to win this fall if they are to challenge Democrats for control of the Senate.

McMahon, former CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment, will begin the general election campaign as an underdog in her race with Democratic attorney general Richard Blumenthal.

In Colorado, Bennet was gaining 54 percent of the vote compared with 46 percent for Andrew Romanoff, the former speaker of the state House, as he defied a trend that has dealt defeat to a half-dozen U.S. Senate and House incumbents in other states. In a year in which voters are reluctant to reward experience, he was quick to say he had little. "This election is the first time my name has ever been on a ballot," he told supporters.

Bennet was appointed to his seat nearly two years ago when Ken Salazar resigned to become Interior secretary in the Obama administration. Romanoff had hoped for the appointment, and he spurned entreaties from senior party officials to skip the race with Bennet, but he swiftly endorsed the winner after the outcome was clear.