UK: Apple must apologize again over copycat claims

LONDON (AP) — British judges say Apple needs to apologize once more for falsely claiming that South Korea’s Samsung copied its iPad, the latest embarrassing episode in the tech rivals’ world-spanning patent battle.

Apple Inc. was ordered to print an apology on its website after British judges repeatedly rejected its claim that Samsung Electronics Co. ripped off its designs when creating its own tablet computer, the Galaxy Tab.

Apple did post an apology, but judges at London’s High Court ruled Thursday that it didn’t go far enough and ordered a new one posted to its site within 48 hours.

Samsung and Apple are locked in a series of international lawsuits over alleged copyright violations, including a California case which saddled Samsung with a $ 1 billion fine for copying Apple’s design.

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Ralph Nader to Stephen Colbert: Give me your Super PAC cash!

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Stephen Colbert‘s super PAC is sitting on nearly $ 778,000 in cash, and five-time presidential candidate Ralph Nader knows exactly where to spend it.

On Ralph Nader.

If only Colbert would listen.

The longtime consumer advocate told TheWrap in an exclusive interview that he has been trying to get the “Colbert Report” host to donate the money remaining in Americans for a Better Tomorrow, Tomorrow’s coffers to the nonprofit American Museum of Tort Law he plans to build.

Dedicated to personal injury and other tort cases, the museum will go up in Nader’s hometown of Winsted, Conn. Nader announced the plans, and started fundraising, 14 years ago.

“Since he deals with wrongful injuries and reputations night after night, there must be a little humor here,” Nader told TheWrap. “Tell him we’ll name the courtroom after him.”

There’s just one problem: Nader can’t get to Colbert, even though Nader feels responsible for the Comedy Central host’s success.

In 2004, while Colbert was hosting “The Daily Show” during the birth of Jon Stewart’s first child, Nader was the interviewed guest. A year later, Colbert got his own show.

“He did so well that they gave him his own program,” Nader said. “So you’d think he’d be accessible to me, right?”

Apparently, wrong.

Even as Colbert trolled the Republican presidential campaigns as a possible third-party candidate during the primary earlier this year, Nader – the nation’s perennial third-party runner – couldn’t get in touch with him.

“Forget it, forget it,” he said. “It’s almost impossible to reach celebrity media these days.”

A spokesman for Colbert and Americans for a Better Tomorrow, Tomorrow did not respond to repeated emails and phone calls from TheWrap requesting comment.

Nader did tell TheWrap that he was happy to see Colbert satirize the growing role of money in electoral politics and draw attention to a candidate outside the two-party nexus.

“Since our elections are for sale at ever-higher auction prices, it’s good that he did this satirical effort to highlight the absurdity of it all,” Nader said.

Colbert first announced the formation of his own super PAC during a March 2011 segment of his show. He set up a company in the regulatory oasis of Delaware called Anonymous Shell Company and began raising funds for a farcical campaign.

After briefly declaring his candidacy for “President of the United States of South Carolina,” Colbert launched a series of ads urging voters to cast ballots for Rick Parry — a spinoff of then-candidate Texas Gov. Rick Perry. Later, he threw his support behind Herman Cain, the pizza mogul who was widely mocked for his candidacy and seemingly far-fetched tax plans.

While he scored around $ 1 million for his PAC, the $ 778,000, according to an SEC filing, is what’s left after advertising and expenses.

So far, Nader seems to be one of the few people gunning for the funds. But Colbert has floated at least one idea about how to spend it.

After real-estate-mogul-cum-reality-star-cum-political-blowhard Donald Trump offered President Obama $ 5 million to a charity of his choice to reveal his college and medical records, Colbert made Trump an offer.

The comedian said he’d donate $ 1 million to a charity of Trump’s choice – if he allows Colbert to dip his testicles in his mouth.

So far, at least, Trump has not accepted the offer.

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Hospitals sue government over private Medicare audits

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A coalition of hospitals sued the U.S. government on Thursday, claiming that private auditors hired to crack down on improper Medicare payments are denying hospitals hundreds of millions of dollars in legal payments for necessary care.

The lawsuit alleges auditors known as Recovery Audit Contractors (RAC) forced hospitals to repay Medicare for the cost of in-patient services by determining months and sometimes years after the fact that beneficiaries should have been treated as out-patients instead of being admitted.

The plaintiffs — the American Hospital Association and four institutions from Missouri, Michigan and Pennsylvania — say auditors in many cases do not deny the care is necessary but the government still refuses to reimburse hospitals under the Medicare program for out-patient service.

Filed in U.S. District Court in Washington, the suit charges the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services with violating the law that governs the popular Medicare program for the elderly and disabled as well as other statutes.

A spokesman for U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said it is administration policy not to comment on pending litigation.

The RAC audit program, established under the Bush administration to curtail improper Medicare payments, has collected $ 1.86 billion in overpayments from October 2009 to March 2012, according to the court filing.

(Reporting by David Morgan; editing by Andrew Hay)

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Asian factories perk up, U.S. shows improvement

NEW YORK/BEIJING (Reuters) – Asia‘s large economies started to pick up steam last month after a year of slower growth, surveys showed on Thursday, while U.S. manufacturing showed modest improvement.

The jury was out on whether the data signaled sustained improvement in the fragile global economy, although analysts said strength in the United States and China, the world’s two biggest economies, was essential to overall economic well-being.

That is particularly so at a time when a debt crisis in the 17-country euro zone has plunged several countries in the region into recession. Reports on major euro zone countries are due on Friday and expected to show continued economic contraction.

But the picture appeared to be brightening elsewhere.

The Institute for Supply Management said the pace of U.S. manufacturing growth picked up slightly in October, with its index rising to a five-month peak of 51.7. But hiring in the sector slowed.

A separate report from data firm Markit showed the slowest pace of growth in 37 months, the result of reduced demand for U.S. goods overseas.

“It looks like manufacturing has stopped deteriorating. It’s weak growth but it’s growth,” said Christopher Low, chief economist at FTN Financial.

More encouraging, payrolls processor ADP said U.S. companies added 158,000 jobs in October, far more than the 135,000 forecast in a Reuters poll. [ID:nEAPA10EH0] Another report showed consumer confidence at a four-year high. [ID:nL1E8LV9LZ]

The data was welcomed by the U.S. stock market, which rose on the second day since it reopened following a massive storm that battered the U.S. Northeast earlier this week.

The data “are encouraging,” said David Sloan, economist at 4Cast Ltd in New York. “There shouldn’t be any distortions from the hurricane yet. There is some evidence of labor market improvement. It is not totally convincing yet but overall the message is positive.”

A more comprehensive government jobs report due Friday, however, was expected to be a bigger test of U.S. labor market health and will be the last economic data before the November 6 presidential election. Economists surveyed by Reuters expected the economy added 125,000 jobs in October.

In Brazil, manufacturing expanded for the first time since March, according to the HSBC Purchasing Managers’ Index, boosting hopes for economic improvement in the fourth quarter.

ASIAN REBOUND

Data from Asia was encouraging as well. China’s economy, the motor of global growth in recent years, appears to have gathered pace in October after slowing to its weakest pace in more than three years in the third quarter.

Chinese manufacturing showed renewed vim, with the official manufacturing purchasing managers’ index rising to 50.2 from 49.8 in September. Economists said that could help lift fourth-quarter growth above the 7.4 percent rate recorded in the July-to-September period.

Also on Thursday, the final reading of the Chinese HSBC PMI rose to 49.5 in October from 47.9 in September. The reading was the highest since February.

The official PMI generally paints a rosier picture of the factory sector than the HSBC PMI as the official survey focuses on big, state-owned companies, while the HSBC survey targets smaller, private companies that have limited access to bank loans.

“Overall sentiment is brightening and Chinese orders are suggesting a moderate recovery,” said Hirokazu Yuihama, a senior strategist at Daiwa Securities in Tokyo.

Beijing has been following a program of pro-growth fine tuning of economic policies for a year and analysts broadly expect that to remain in place when a new leadership line-up at the top of the ruling Communist Party is unveiled this month.

“The return of the PMI above 50 suggests economic momentum has indeed picked up. It indicates the effect of policy easing may have been stronger than the consensus expected,” Zhiwei Zhang of Nomura said in a comment emailed to Reuters.

“We believe macro data will continue to surprise on the upside in coming months, as the government continues to ease policy through the period of leadership transition.”

South Korea, another of Asia’s manufacturing powerhouses, posted the first annual rise in exports in four months in October, adding to hopes for a turnaround after a year-long slump in global trade.

HEADING FOR THE CLIFF?

The biggest risk to more robust global growth, however, may be just around the corner. After the U.S. election, Congress will have less than two months to decide whether to let some $ 600 billion of automatic tax increases and spending cuts to take effect.

While fiscal tightening of that magnitude would help reduce a U.S. budget deficit of more than $ 1 trillion – something both Democrats and Republican say is essential – it would also be a big hit on U.S. output, which would threaten global growth.

That has raised concern among some central bankers and finance ministers due to attend a Group of 20 meeting in Mexico on Sunday and Monday.

It was also keeping market participants uneasy.

“The big thing weighing on business sentiment is the fiscal cliff. Things like investing and hiring are delayed but not cancelled outright,” said FTN Financial’s Low said.

“The divergence between business and consumer sentiment is unusual. Consumers seem oblivious about possible tax increases.”

(Additional reporting by Yati Himatsingka in Bangalore, Jonathan Standing in Taipei and Sven Egenter in London; Editing by Clive McKeef and Andre Grenon)

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Canada will push to keep bank capital rules on schedule

OTTAWA (Reuters) – Canada will urge all countries to stick to the agreed schedule for implementing tougher bank capital rules at a November 4-5 meeting of finance ministers and central bankers from the Group of 20 nations, a senior finance ministry official said on Thursday.

The so-called Basel III rules are the world’s regulatory response to the financial crisis, forcing banks to triple the amount of basic capital they hold in a bid to avoid future taxpayer bailouts.

They were to be phased in from January 2013 but areas such as the United States and the European Union are not yet ready and U.S. and British supervisors have criticized them as too complex to work.

The Canadian official, who briefed reports ahead of the meeting on condition that he not be named, said it was imperative that the rules, the timelines and the principles behind them be respected and said Finance Minister Jim Flaherty would make that view known to his G20 colleagues.

Canada sees the European debt crisis as the biggest near-term risk to the global economy, and it also expects the U.S. debt crisis to be top of mind at the talks, the official said.

But the meeting takes place just before the U.S. presidential election and U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner will be absent, so it remains unclear how much the G20 can pressure Washington on that front.

Some other countries have also scaled back their delegations, raising doubts about how meaningful the meeting will be.

The official dismissed that argument, saying high-level officials substituting for their ministers allowed for extremely important issues to be addressed anyway.

He said holding each country around the table accountable to its past commitments helped keep the momentum going toward resolving global economic problems.

(Reporting by Louise Egan; Writing by David Ljunggren; Editing by M.D. Golan)

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‘Wreck-It Ralph’ celebrates video-game nostalgia

LOS ANGELES (AP) — In Disney’s “Wreck-It Ralph” opening Friday, the title character is the bad guy from a fictional 1980s video game. Despite faithfully doing his job well for 30 years, he gets no respect at work, so he escapes through the wires of Litwak’s Family Fun Center searching for another game where he might prove his worth.

Along the way, Ralph takes viewers on a nostalgic trip through the history of video games, from the blocky, eight-bit look of the ’80s through the swirly, colorful, Nintendo 64-inspired games of the ’90s to the gritty, ultra-detailed first-person shooters of today.

For director Rich Moore and the 450 artists and animators behind the Walt Disney Animation Studios production, video games are as integral a part of childhood as the green army men and pull-string cowboys celebrated in Pixar’s “Toy Story” films.

“There’s a lot of history in video gaming — serious nostalgia,” Moore said. “The worlds of video games are so fertile. They cover everything, and so many different genres. You can kind of make up whatever you want and it can feel like a game.”

Besides the scores of fictional game characters featured in the film, there’s also familiar arcade favorites such as Q(asterisk)Bert, Clyde (the orange ghost from Pac-Man), Sonic the Hedgehog and Zangief from “Street Fighter.”

“It’s pretty awesome to animate game characters that you knew as a child,” said animation supervisor Renato dos Anjos. “It’s like living in a dream world. All your favorite heroes and villains are in your hands.”

“Wreck-It Ralph” centers on Ralph (John C. Reilly), the 9-foot, 643-pound bad guy from the ’80s video game “Fix-It Felix Jr.” Ralph’s job is to wreck the apartments of Niceland so Felix (Jack McBrayer) can fix them. But while Felix is lauded and loved for his efforts, Ralph is ostracized to a trash heap on the edge of town. Fed up and bummed out — especially when he realizes he wasn’t invited to a 30th anniversary party for “Fix-It Felix Jr.” — Ralph goes rogue, tripping through the wires of the arcade into games where he doesn’t belong.

He’s drawn to “Hero’s Duty,” a contemporary shooting game led by tough-as-battle-armor Sergeant Calhoun (Jane Lynch), in which soldiers who destroy the invading CyBugs win a glittery medal — tangible proof of their heroic efforts. With such a trophy, Ralph figures the Nicelanders would have to appreciate him. But he isn’t programmed to handle such ultra-violent play, and when things go awry, Ralph finds himself trapped in the pink-hued, candy-filled world of Sugar Rush. Here he meets another video-game misfit, Vanellope Von Schweetz (Sarah Silverman), whose pixelated programming glitch makes her an outcast.

Reilly, McBrayer and Silverman all grew up as gamers, and say bringing life to their animated characters called upon the same imagination and determination gaming did when they were kids.

“If you were born any time after 1965, when I was born, video games made a huge impression,” Reilly said, adding that when “Space Invaders” first came out, “it was like a spaceship landed in the bowling alley.”

“People can’t fully appreciate what an insane change that was,” he continued. “Because there were no computers; there were no cellphones. I didn’t even have a VCR at that point. There was no way to manipulate something on a screen. And all of a sudden, this thing lands in the arcade.”

McBrayer grew up with an Atari 2600 system, “but we kept that over at grandma’s house so we wouldn’t get too attached to it.”

He remembers taking his report card to Super Scooper, the ice-cream parlor/arcade near his Georgia home, where good grades were rewarded with video-game tokens. He preferred the “cutesy, non-threatening games” and the escape they provided.

“So many kids won’t even recognize half of these (game references in the film),” McBray said, “but I hope they have fun just realizing that there’s this whole world of video-game characters and environments that make up the history of the video games they’re playing now.”

Silverman, whose early arcade favorites included “Asteroids,” ”Missile Command” and “Space Invaders,” notes that video games have been around for 30 years, “but in technology years, that’s like 200 years old.”

The actors said they don’t play video games much these days, but the film’s director does, whipping out his iPhone during a recent interview to prove the point.

“I feel really, really fortunate to have been someone who got to grow up with them,” said Moore, whose previous directing credits include “The Simpsons” and “Futurama.” So it’s an honor and a privilege to be the guy that gets to pull from one end of the timeline to this end of the timeline … to put them in a movie and put them in a story that pays tribute to all of them.”

___

Follow AP Entertainment Writer Sandy Cohen on Twitter at www.twitter.com/APSandy .

___

Online:

http://disney.go.com/wreck-it-ralph/

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Kardashian boosts “X Factor” ratings, but wins few fans

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Khloe Kardashian‘s first outing as the new co-host of “The X Factor” helped boost the show’s audience by 30 percent, yet the reality star got mixed reviews for a nipple-baring debut that made headlines – but many TV critics found awkward.

Kardashian, 28, best known for starring with socialite sisters Kim and Kourtney in “Keeping Up with the Kardashians,” shocked some viewers by wearing a sheer purple blouse without a bra on Wednesday’s first live episode of the TV singing contest.

“I think the air conditioning is on high tonight. It’s very distracting,” judge and producer Simon Cowell quipped on the show, apparently referring to the glimpses of nipple.

But Kardashian was less impressive in her hosting duties.

The Washington Post said Kardashian “came across like the novice she is, shouting her lines despite the mic clutched in her hand and making awkward small talk with contestants and judge and executive producer Simon Cowell.”

Nevertheless, Kardashian brought more eyeballs to the show. Some 7.4 million viewers watched “The X Factor” on Fox television, according to early ratings data, up some 30 percent from last week’s 5.7 million and a 13 percent increase in the 18-49 age group most coveted by advertisers.

Kardashian was Cowell’s personal pick for the job as part of his efforts to revamp the singing contest after a disappointing first season. But the reality star’s lack of experience had already raised eyebrows, and “X Factor” has often drawn a smaller audience than last year.

Cowell told reporters earlier this week that Kardashian “wants to prove (to) anyone who doubted her that she’s capable of doing the job … she really has got a fun personality.”

The New York Daily News called Kardashian a “surprisingly good host,” while The Hollywood Reporter said “both Kardashian and (co-host Mario) Lopez seemed at ease in their new roles.”

The Hollywood Gossip website, however, said Kardashian was “every bit as boring and awkward as we imagined she would be.”

“The X Factor” is broadcast on Fox, a unit of News Corp.

(Reporting by Jill Serjeant; Editing by Jan Paschal)

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Mass. firm tied to closed pharmacy issues recall

BOSTON (AP) — A company with the same founders as the specialty pharmacy linked to deadly meningitis outbreak says it’s recalling all its products.

In a statement Wednesday, Ameridose said the voluntary recall comes after FDA officials told the company it must improve its sterility testing. The Westborough company says it has no reports of problems with its products, or any impurities, but issued the recall “out of an abundance of caution.”

The company did not say how many products it is recalling.

Ameridose agreed to shut down for inspection earlier this month after tainted steroids from the New England Compounding Center were linked to an outbreak that has killed 28.

Ameridose and NECC were both founded by brothers-in-law Barry Cadden and Greg Conigliaro. Ameridose says it is a separate entity with distinct management.

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Panasonic Feels Pain of Chinese Backlash

Those islands in the East China Sea at the center of the dispute between Japan and China are uninhabited, but we’re told they’re still worth fighting over because they might have valuable oil and gas nearby. Let’s hope so. That might at least provide some consolation to Japanese employees, executives, and shareholders of companies such as Panasonic (6752:JP), which have suffered badly as Chinese consumers shun Japanese goods in order to show their displeasure over the islands.

China problems are a major factor in what is shaping up to be a particularly lousy year for Panasonic. Japan’s second- biggest TV maker said on Wednesday that it expects to lose as much as ¥765 billion ($ 9.6 billion) in the year ending in March 2013. That loss, the second biggest in Panasonic’s history, is 30 times larger than analyst estimates had foreseen. Back in May, Panasonic was expecting profits for the year, projecting earnings of ¥50 billion.

That was before the latest dispute between China and Japan erupted, leading to an informal boycott of Japanese goods by many consumers in the world’s second-largest economy. Japan’s automakers, for instance, have experienced sharp declines in China sales. In September, Toyota (TM)’s China sales plummeted 49 percent, Honda’s (7267:JP) dropped 41 percent, and Nissan’s (7201:JP) fell 35 percent.

Now it’s Panasonic’s turn. With the Japanese economy stuck in a deflationary downturn, Panasonic can hardly afford a slowdown in China. The country accounted for 14 percent of Panasonic sales in the first quarter. That proportion is sure to shrink.

Even before the Wednesday announcement, it was clear the political tensions were hurting Panasonic. During anti-Japan protests last month, fire damaged a Panasonic factory in the northeastern Chinese city of Qingdao. Protests against Japan disrupted operations at two addditional Panasonic plants in China.

China and Japan aren’t close to resolving their dispute over the East China Sea Islands (called Diaoyu in China and Senkaku in Japan). Even if the situation doesn’t deteriorate further, Panasonic and other Japanese companies are likely to continue feeling the heat. Panasonic’s chief financial officer, Hideaki Kawai, estimates that the Japan backlash may lead to a ¥100 billion decline in sales and a ¥30 billion decline in operating profit for the current fiscal year.

Panasonic is the first of the big Japanese electronics companies to report some results of the Japan backlash in China. There is probably more bad news to come. Sony (SNE) and Sharp (6753:JP) are both scheduled to report earnings on Thursday. Those Japanese companies are unlikely to have fared any better than Panasonic with angry Chinese consumers.

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Clinton calls for overhaul of Syrian opposition

ZAGREB (Reuters) – The United States called on Wednesday for an overhaul of Syria‘s opposition leadership, saying it was time to move beyond the Syrian National Council and bring in those “in the front lines fighting and dying”.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, signaling a more active stance by Washington in attempts to form a credible political opposition to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, said a meeting next week in Qatar would be an opportunity to broaden the coalition against him.

“This cannot be an opposition represented by people who have many good attributes but who, in many instances, have not been inside Syria for 20, 30, 40 years,” she said during a visit to Croatia.

“There has to be a representation of those who are in the front lines fighting and dying today to obtain their freedom.”

Clinton’s comments represented a clear break with the Syrian National Council (SNC), a largely foreign-based group which has been among the most vocal proponents of international intervention in the Syrian conflict.

U.S. officials have privately expressed frustration with the SNC’s inability to come together with a coherent plan and with its lack of traction with the disparate internal groups which have waged the 19-month uprising against Assad’s government.

Senior members of the SNC, Free Syrian Army (FSA) and other rebel groups ended a meeting in Turkey on Wednesday and pledged to unite behind a transitional government in coming months.

“It’s been our divisions that have allowed the Assad forces to reach this point,” Ammar al-Wawi, a rebel commander, told Reuters after the talks outside Istanbul.

“We are united on toppling Assad. Everyone, including all the rebels, will gather under the transitional government.”

Mohammad Al-Haj Ali, a senior Syrian military defector, told a news conference after the meeting: “We are still facing some difficulties between the politicians and different opposition groups and the leaders of the Free Syrian Army on the ground.”

Clinton said it was important that the next rulers of Syria were both inclusive and committed to rejecting extremism.

“There needs to be an opposition that can speak to every segment and every geographic part of Syria. And we also need an opposition that will be on record strongly resisting the efforts by extremists to hijack the Syrian revolution,” she said.

Syria’s revolt has killed an estimated 32,000. A bomb near a Shi’ite shrine in a suburb of Damascus killed at least six more people on Wednesday, state media and opposition activists said.

NEW LEADERSHIP

The meeting next week in Qatar’s capital Doha represents a chance to forge a new leadership, Clinton said, adding the United States had helped to “smuggle out” representatives of internal Syrian opposition groups to a meeting in New York last month to argue their case for inclusion.

“We have recommended names and organizations that we believe should be included in any leadership structure,” she told a news conference.

“We’ve made it clear that the SNC can no longer be viewed as the visible leader of the opposition. They can be part of a larger opposition, but that opposition must include people from inside Syria and others who have a legitimate voice which must be heard.”

The United States and its allies have struggled for months to craft a credible opposition coalition.

U.S. President Barack Obama’s administration has said it is not providing arms to internal opponents of Assad and is limiting its aid to non-lethal humanitarian assistance.

It concedes, however, that some of its allies are providing lethal assistance – a fact that Assad’s chief backer Russia says shows western powers are intent on determining Syria’s future.

Russia and China have blocked three U.N. Security Council resolutions aimed at increasing pressure on the Assad government, leading the United States and its allies to say they could move beyond U.N. structures for their next steps.

Clinton said she regretted but was not surprised by the failure of the latest attempted ceasefire, called by international mediator Lakhdar Brahimi last Friday. Each side blamed the other for breaking the truce.

“The Assad regime did not suspend its use of advanced weaponry against the Syrian people for even one day,” she said.

“While we urge Special Envoy Brahimi to do whatever he can in Moscow and Beijing to convince them to change course and support a stronger U.N. action we cannot and will not wait for that.”

Clinton said the United States would continue to work with partners to increase sanctions on the Assad government and provide humanitarian assistance to those hit by the conflict.

(Additional reporting by Ayla Jean Yackley; editing by Andrew Roche)

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