PARIS (Reuters) - Austerity opponents from Athens to Paris say Italy's election stalemate is proof that Europe's voters have had enough of the painful spending cuts that Germany and its northern allies prescribe for their less fortunate neighbors.
While the outcome will not persuade Germany to abandon its demands for budgetary rigor altogether, it makes it more likely debt-laden euro zone states will receive some leniency from Berlin, paymaster of the European Union, as long as they show real efforts on reform.
Early beneficiaries of that indulgence will be France, which in coming weeks expects to win a year's grace from the European Union to achieve deficit targets, and Cyprus, which Berlin now acknowledges must be offered an aid package next month.
"THE SOUTH IS COMING," Panos Kammenos, head of the fiercely anti-austerity and anti-German Independent Greeks party tweeted in response to the Italian election, which he saw as a backlash against the rigor imposed on southern states such as Greece, Portugal and Spain.
While the poll deadlock in Rome owes much to Italy's chaotic politics, it showed a huge popular protest against austerity measures and underlined the north-south split dividing Europe into debt sinners and self-appointed fiscal disciplinarians.
Stirring up animosities dating back to World War Two, the debt crisis has turned Angela Merkel, the unassuming daughter of an East German pastor, into Europe's most divisive leader since Britain's Tony Blair split the continent in two by backing the 2003 U.S.-led Iraq war.
Lampooned in banners on Irish soccer terraces and in Spanish and Greek cartoons, Merkel has become the embodiment of austerity and is among the tiny band of European politicians who stir genuine passions across the continent.
"Mrs Merkel cannot lead Europe alone," France's left-wing Industry Minister Arnaud Montebourg said this week in a rare breach of French policy not to criticize the conservative German leader in public.
NO DIKTAT?
French Finance Minister Pierre Moscovici, more senior to Montebourg in the government, declined to join such attacks in an interview for the Reuters Euro Zone Summit this week.
But he stated: "The message from Italy is: 'Be careful, when you are in a situation in which you ask populations to make sacrifices for long periods ... There needs to be another perspective - which is 'growth again'."
While Paris accepts that the might of the German economy has thrust Berlin into a crisis leadership role, officials complain in private that Germany has yet to work out how it can perform that role without raising the hackles of others.
German opposition chancellor candidate Peer Steinbrueck found himself on the wrong side of that dilemma on Wednesday - and in the process talked himself out of dinner with Italy's president - by describing ex-premier Silvio Berlusconi and comic-turned-politician Beppe Grillo, who both scored well in the election thanks to protest voters, as "clowns".
German leaders bristle at the accusation they are trying to browbeat Europe into their mould, with President Joachim Gauck - the largely ceremonial head of state - insisting last week that Berlin did not want to rule the continent by "German diktat".
"We don't want to intimidate others, nor force our ideas upon them. But we do stand by our experiences and want to share them," Gauck said in a speech, noting Germany's economy had been written off as unreformable less than a decade ago.
The hands of Merkel and Steinbrueck are tied; neither can expect to win a September election if they relent too much on a path of budgetary rigor that is as popular with German voters as it is poisonous to electorates in southern Europe.
But Germany's austerity push is not as monolithic as many opponents would have it.
SOURCE OF PAIN
Berlin already agreed last year to give Spain and Greece more time to seek budget cuts and, in a move intended as an attempt to boost growth and help the competitive edge of other euro economies, has let its domestic wage levels tick higher.
Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble told the Reuters summit that stable finances remained a condition for growth, and warned against a repetition of the joint Franco-German push a decade ago to water down EU budget rules.
But he also showed a conciliatory line on France's admission last week that it will miss a 2013 deficit target of 3 percent of output.
"France is not saying it will flout the rules," he told the Stuttgarter Zeitung newspaper, adding it was time to look with the European Commission at what the admission meant for the EU stability pact governing deficit targets.
That gels with the Commission view that a postponement of deficit targets for countries on the brink of recession is possible if they are trying their hardest to secure reform.
Even the Netherlands, which for years played hardball on the need for southern countries to accept budget cuts, may now fall into that category after conceding on Thursday it will miss its own deficit target this year.
But European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso rejected the idea that the Italian vote would mean countries around the zone simply being let off the hook.
"We never said it would be easy ... But I insist for this kind of policy we need leadership, democratic leadership that has the courage to resist short-term considerations and the capability to explain to the public what is at stake," he told Reuters.
As always with politics, form is as important as substance.
Clemens Fuest, incoming president of Germany's ZEW centre for economic research, said that for Europe's leaders to keep selling austerity policies to their voters, they must also convince them they have a plan to kickstart the region's economies by highlighting efforts to prop up banks and private investors.
"They have to come up with a credible story that will tell voters there is some silver lining on the horizon," Fuest said. "There has to be some sort of growth story."
That is something on which, according to a conservative ally of Merkel, the German leader is already reflecting.
"If the economic situation in southern Europe gets worse, if unemployment continues to rise, that doesn't help her," said the ally, who requested anonymity.
"She wants to see growth. She has no interest in being seen as the source of the pain."
(Additional reporting by Reuters Euro Summit team; Nicholas Vinocur in Paris; Noah Barkin in Berlin; Deepa Babington in Athens; Fiona Ortiz and Manuel Maria Ruiz in Madrid; Padraic Halpin and Conor Humphries in Dublin; Gilbert Kreijger in Amsterdam; Editing by Will Waterman)
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/italy-vote-arms-critics-berlins-austerity-mantra-141717241--business.html
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SURPRISE! That is ultimate shock in what could be the most misunderstood big data stats ever released. As a social media management agency, even we must admit to having underestimated some of the risky business taking place behind the backs of CEO?s, investors and marketing pro?s alike. From thought leaders to industry experts, these big data stats are nothing short of shocking?and very instructive. Keep reading to discover what is lurking behind the big data facade and what it means for the future of social media marketing.
Russian phone maker Yota Devices will start making its first dual-screen e-ink YotaPhones in Singapore. The company has signed with Hi-P, a manufacturer in the country, to have it mass-produce the devices. Yota’s COO, Lau Geckler, told us that he is also in Singapore to help set up Yota’s Asian sales office and the company’s second R&D facility. Its original R&D center is in Finland, and it has development teams in Russia and the U.S., he said. The company is now hiring mainly sales and marketing staff for Asia and in the U.S. to add to the 55 people it has in its headquarters in Russia, which take care of software development and design. Geckler, who joined Yota last August, said the company has been on an aggressive hiring spree, and that the team has grown from 15 when he joined to its current size. When I met him, he showed me the YotaPhone. The charger was hastily bound to the phone by a rubber band, and he apologized, noting that it is still in prototype form, but the company expects to iron out all those kinks together with Hi-P here, as it takes it to mass production. He wouldn’t talk of how many phones they had committed to make here, but I get the feeling that once things ramp up, Yota could be free to move the process to a cheaper location in China, perhaps. Geckler said that the company intends to own as much of the manufacturing process’ IP as possible. Still, it won’t be for a while. He said that Yota isn’t looking to sign on more manufacturing partners for now, and it is keen to first start selling in Russia, before moving into Asian markets, particularly Singapore, Japan, Indonesia and Hong Kong, where interest has been high. Japanese users, in particular, tend to hold both e-ink e-reader devices and smartphones, so the product seems fit for them, he added. Yota was a spin-off of Russian operator, Yota, in December 2011. Yota recently merged with Megafon,?a fellow operator in the country. Back in Russia, Yota also sells LTE modems, routers and dongles. It’s sold 3 million of these devices so far, and last year sold a million.
Some apps are essential, and everyone who's anyone knows to have them on their computer. Some apps, however, are fantastic, yet fly under the radar. Today, we look at our top 10 underhyped apps on Windows. 
WizMouse is that app you never knew you wanted until you use it. It allows you to scroll in windows when you mouse over them, not just after you click on them?something OS X and Linux have built-in, but Windows is seemingly missing. It may seem trivial, but after using it for awhile, you'll wonder how you ever lived without it. It'll even enable the mouse wheel in applications that don't support it, or even reverse the direction for the "natural" scrolling some people prefer. Check out our original post on it for more.
Skitch isn't necessarily the best screenshot tool around, but it's long been our favorite screenshot annotation tool for the Mac, and now it's on Windows. It's amazing what a few well-placed arrows, text, and shapes can do when you're trying to explain something?and, while you could just do it in Microsoft Paint, Skitch makes it look good (and easy). If you use Evernote, the Evernote integration is pretty great too.
You've probably heard of PotPlayer before?after all, it's our App Directory pick for the best video player on Windows. Despite that, however, it seems to be a much lesser-known app that deserves more attention. It's fast, lightweight, and has more settings for tweaking your video than you can shake a stick at (plus it can play just about any video you throw at it). As such, it earns higher praise from us than more popular players like VLC, at least if you want those advanced settings. If you've been using another player and want more, PotPlayer is where you'll find it.
Windows' taskbar is still the best taskbar around, but that doesn't mean it's perfect. Bins is a simple $5 app that adds a few really handy features to the taskbar, most notably the ability to group multiple apps into one square. Click on that square and it'll launch the primary app, but hover over it, and you can choose which app to launch. It's perfect for those that have multiple music players, photo editors, or other things that you don't want taking up space on your taskbar. Check out our post on it to see even more stuff that it can do.
Chocolatey brings Linux's lightning-fast, super configurable package management to Windows. What does that mean? It means you can install a ton of apps at once (perfect for clean installs) with no effort. Or, you can try out that new app without having to find its site, download the file, and install it yourself. Everything happens with just a few keystrokes. Check out the video to the left to see it in action.
Dexpot is an awesome little utility that adds a ton of features to the windows on your desktop?and gives them all sorts of shortcuts. Its main purpose is to split your desktop up into four different workspaces, much like the Spaces feature on OS X or the Workspaces feature on Ubuntu. It can also make windows transparent, give you an Expos?-like view of all your open windows, and more. If your desktop is starting to feel a little cluttered with Windows, Dexpot is the perfect app to save your productivity.
Growl is an incredibly popular program on the Mac, but its Windows version doesn't get a lot of attention?despite the fact that its grown into quite the notification system. Growl essentially puts all the popups, balloons, and other notifications on your desktop into one unified system that you can control, customize, sent to other machines, or even forward to your phone. It supports a ton of popular apps, and it's very easy to set up. Check out our guide to Growl for Windows for more info.
At first glance, MusicBee seems like just another music player for Windows, but it's actually the perfect balance between the existing programs out there. It's fully-featured, like Winamp, but much lighter weight, and 100% free. It's not quite as customizable as foobar2000, but is much easier to use, and has more than enough customization features for the average user. It's even got a lot of tagging features for those that might be considering something like MediaMonkey. Plus, it syncs with Android phones superbly. Does it beat out any of these players at their specialty features? No, but it has a little bit of everything, is super lightweight, and is sure to fit into anyone's workflow. If you haven't found a music player you truly love, try it out. It was a contender in our Hive Five on desktop music players, but barely scraped together 6% of the final vote, so we're still considering it very underhyped.
Nircmd isn't an "app" in the traditional sense of the word, but it's something we think every life hacker should have on their Windows computer. Essentially, Nircmd is a command line tool that performs all sorts of system functions with really easy-to-understand commands. Sound boring? Combine it with AutoHotkey?one of Windows' most deservedly hyped apps?and you can perform nearly any system task with one keystroke. You can open or close your CD drive, start your screensaver, put your computer to sleep, change the volume, speak the text on the clipboard, kill instances of any program, or perform over 70 other tasks. Check out Nircmd's full list of features to see what it can do, and check out our guide to integrating it with AutoHotkey to really make it awesome. Photo by Neil T.
Microsoft's note-taking application OneNote is one of those apps no one really talks about much, but is absolutely loved by everyone who uses it. Heck, you guys even voted it your favorite outlining tool, personal project management tool, and minutes meeting service, not to mention third place for best note taking app. It's available for a ton of platforms, too (despite it being part of Microsoft Office), so if you're finding that Evernote just isn't quite powerful enough for your organizational needs, give OneNote a shot?you might be surprised at everything it can do given its lesser-known status.