Predicting the future is a rough gig. In fact, it’s pretty much impossible. Psychics, Tarot Card readers, Sylvia Browne and your local weatherman have been more or less swindling people into believing that tomorrow can be forecasted beyond a shadow of a doubt.

1) Realistic Icons - 3 Icons in PNG + ICO format.

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2) Onibari light - Formats are Png’s,Ico’s and Icns’s…

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3) Leopar’d IconPackager - An IconPackage for Apple’s new Leopard theme.

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4) Adobe CS 2.0 Grande Icon Set- This is the large set of Adobe Creative Suite Icons.

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5) Glossy Member Icons - Glossy Member Icons…4 PNG Files…Easy to change colors…

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6) Oxygen- Are as light and airy as their name suggests. Beautiful transparency effects make these icons stylish, graceful, and especially gorgeous set against a dark background.

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7) iPhone Pack- iPhone icon pack (
Phone, Text, Chat, iPod, Notes, System)

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8 ) isabi - Includes icons for most Adobe applications, Microsoft Office 2008 as well as a few extras in 16, 32, 48, 128, 256 and 512 pixel sizes.

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9) Helix icons

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10) Prostor_icons

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11) Shopping Basket Icons 3D

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12) TextEdit - A replacement icon for TextEdit, Notepad.

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13) Paper Clip - icon size 512×512px in png

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14) Icon for Transformers

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15) Aeon

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16) ALL ICONS pack “limewire…”- 500*500 PIXELS - LEOPARD AND VISTA

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17) Adobe CS3 full pack- 256×256 png. & ico.

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18) AccBox

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19) Apple Mail Icons

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20) Windows Icons V1 - Custom Windows XP / Vista Icon pack.

TAKEN FROM www.noupe.com

Picture by: destinetics
Here’s a collection of 115 social bookmark and news sites ranked by PageRank, number of links and value of each site.

We used dnScoop to gather the data for all these sites. This is what the dnScoop data is based on:

Page Rank- Google PageRank

Inbound Links- The total number of pages that contain links to www.sitename.com

Site Value Report - This value is calculated based on several factors shown above, including: Links, Traffic (Alexa), age of the domain, site category, domain keyword popularity, and overall occurrences of the domain name on the web.

The list was based on this social bookmarking list . We added a few more sites, such as, Shoutwire.com, Plime.com and PixelGroovy.com.

The dollar value of the sites are a bit misleading (is Simpy.com really worth $302,332,960 more than Digg?), but this list should hopefully provide you with some data on social news and bookmark that you haven’t seen before. If anybody knows of any better online tools to roughly estimate the value a site then leave a link in the comments section and we’ll update this list over the next few weeks and compare the data.

Site	PR	Inbound Links	$ Value
www.slashdot.org	9	28,018,962	$25,787,200
del.icio.us	8	370,943,962	$521,172,000
www.technorati.com	8	148,233,993	$276,243,000
www.digg.com	8	137,000,000	$215,992,000
www.reddit.com	8	132,924,191	$178,934,400
www.stumbleupon.com	8	59,888,074	$39,723,400
www.connotea.org	8	3,272,642	$11,241,440
www.furl.net	7	99,028,154	$188,853,100
www.newsvine.com	7	49,881,588	$35,890,400
www.blinklist.com	7	47,039,214	N/A
www.folkd.com	7	13,766,114	N/A
www.squidoo.com	7	7,171,958	$13,336,150
www.citeulike.org	7	3,694,298	$11,226,880
www.kinja.com	7	2,593,905	$9,965,880
www.propeller.com	7	2,503,342	$13,613,600
www.spurl.net	6	34,419,253	$32,200,000
www.simpy.com	6	23,405,771	$518,324,960
www.mister-wong.com	6	9,672,510	$10,667,840
www.rawsugar.com	6	7,481,362	$14,925,880
www.diigo.com	6	6,095,828	$11,243,680
www.linkagogo.com	6	3,987,085	N/A
www.corank.com	6	1,536,589	$4,281,340
www.care2.com/news	6	808,351	$2,237,900
www.backflip.com	6	733,144	$2,463,550
www.spotback.com	6	315,219	$459,980
www.kaboodle.com	6	309,115	$3,691,950
www.shoutwire.com	6	284,654	$216,910
www.sphinn.com	6	270,738	$100,000
www.searchles.com	6	261,216	$197,160
www.bibsonomy.org	6	141,521	$2,305,350
www.clipclip.org	6	59,146	$75,210
www.sitebar.org	6	15,661	$245,204
www.taggly.com	5	998,006	N/A
www.buddymarks.com	5	890,014	$3,090,150
www.mylinkvault.com	5	559,084	N/A
www.stylehive.com	5	547,675	$1,377,760
www.hyperlinkomatic.com	5	505,338	$1,457,890
www.plime.com	5	448,091	$474,360,000
www.lilisto.com	5	363,661	$529,000
www.sk-rt.com	5	322,076	$442,900
www.markaboo.com	5	238,271	$227,900
www.xilinus.com	5	57,701	$38,160
www.startaid.com	5	49,341	N/A
www.uvouch.com	5	34,057	$424,020,140
www.thoof.com	5	30,719	$20,600
www.myhq.com	5	27,015	$29,536
www.mybookmarks.com	5	25,443	$29,468
www.hanzoweb.com	5	12,618	$17,222
www.favoor.com	5	11,756	$6,322
www.socialdanger.com	5	7,095	$1,600
www.murl.com	5	6,017	$8,236
www.mobleo.net	5	739	$1,039
www.plugim.com	4	588,860	$1,313,340
www.zurpy.com	4	192,408	$111,180
www.tagfacts.com	4	169,135	$120,772
www.oyax.com	4	112,111	$115,000
www.lifelogger.com	4	99,808	$107,744
www.complore.com	4	93,751	$74,200
www.connectedy.com	4	59,588	N/A
www.sitejot.com	4	55,414	N/A
www.pixelgroovy.com	4	41,778	$19,080
www.cloudytags.com	4	41,654	$29,664
www.blurpalicious.com	4	27,567	$12,900
www.dropjack.com	4	27,251	$13,100
www.bookmark-manager.com	4	18,872	$7,434
www.myvmarks.com	4	17,084	$6,650
www.contentpop.com	4	13,188	$16,274
www.bmaccess.net	4	11,959	$5,600
www.memfrag.com	4	10,564	$5,668
www.bookmarktracker.com	4	10,518	$8,618
www.mysitevote.com	4	9,218	$6,500
www.freelink.org	4	8,427	N/A
www.urlex.info	4	3,962	$2,507
www.rambhai.com	4	2,926	N/A
www.easybm.com	4	2,236	N/A
www.zlitt.com	4	2,236	$3,193
www.chipmark.com	4	2,196	$1,792
www.thinkpocket.com	4	1,914	$848
www.mywebdesktop.net	4	1,329	$368
www.philoi.com	4	1,097	$1,397
www.bookkit.com	4	1,049	N/A
www.bookmax.net	4	874	N/A
www.votelists.com	4	399	$339
www.whitelinks.com	4	269	N/A
www.tedigo.net	4	135	$458
www.mixx.com	3	559,683	$1,854,160
www.marktd.com	3	43,855	$56,180
www.tagza.com	3	35,627	$7,500
www.wirefan.com	3	17,204	$27,772
www.blogbookmark.com	3	11,934	$11,124
www.bukmark.net	3	8,545	$1,620
www.getboo.com	3	7,742	$42,728
www.fungow.com	3	4,553	N/A
www.syncone.net	3	4,026	$25,070
www.linksnarf.com	3	3,893	$1,120
www.ez4u.net	3	1,030	N/A
www.listerlister.com	3	633	$5,702
www.xlmark.com	2	15,012	$5,974
www.totalpad.com	2	4,693	$510
www.barksbookmarks.com	2	2,786	$11,766
www.memotoo.com	2	2,382	N/A
www.blipoo.com	2	598	$100
www.bookmarkall.com	2	371	$694
www.yattle.com	2	127	$1,081
www.wetogether.info	1	911	$515
www.vuju.com	1	284	$145
www.newsweight.com	1	67	$42
www.voteboat.com	1	41	$10
www.freezilla.co.uk	1	38	$21
www.faves.com	0	50,781	$38,720
www.socialogs.com	0	50,090	$18,500
www.i89.us	0	28,192	$11,872
www.crowdfound.com	0	1,516	$3,050
www.quickieclick.com	0	9	$650
ma.gnolia.com	N/A	N/A	N/A

If you have to stare at something for 8 or more hours a day, why not make it something interesting? Sure there are tons of places to find wallpaper on the web … but a lot of them are hard to navigate and highly disorganized. Divided into five helpful categories, with introductory descriptions and sample screenshots, here are over twenty of the best collections, communities and other resources on the web for finding excellent desktop wallpaper.

User-Submitted Wallpaper Communities:

InterFaceLift has a really useful system for cross-tagging wallpapers by size, category and type. You can browse their selection by most viewed, highest rated, date posted as well as by monitor size and aspect ratio as well as double and even triple-monitor. All in all this is one of the best and most user-friendly wallpaper databases out there.

SocWall is another community dedicated specifically to “social wallpapering” - users sharing wallpaper by category and voting on one another’s submissions. Because it is a free-for-all submission-wise there is a wide (and somewhat weird) variety of content. However, it is highly searchable and organized relatively well by fairly detailed categories.

Flickr has almost 25,000 wallpaper uploads by Flickr users. Of course any collection like this is bound to be hard to sort through and filled with good and bad but it’s still worth bookmarking. You can also search Flick using this handy wallpaper search engine.

Wikipedia is a place we all know to look for various kinds of information … but wallpaper? Indeed, there is an ever-changing collection of featured desktop wallpapers contributed to the Wikipedia Commons.

DeviantArt isn’t dedicated to wallpaper per say but many of the works of art featured on the site would make (and have made) amazing wallpaper depending upon the restrictions set upon a particular piece within the community.

WebShots is yet another user-submitted image site stocked mainly with photographs but also the occasional Photoshopped or otherwise digitally created image.

Photographic and Conventionally Pleasing Wallpapers:

SocksOff’s collection of wallpapers is primarily photographic or at least pseudo-photorealistic, full of rich colors that are in many cases absolutely stunning. Looking at these one could imagine finding a wallpaper for virtually any kind or color of computer that would blend perfectly with other elements on your screen as well.

Mike Swanson has collected a lot of his close-up-photograph wallpapers into one convenient location on his blog. The typical subject matter is floral or otherwise natural with a smattering of found objects thrown into the mix, usual shot from a few feet away.

Gran-Angular has some nice but somewhat generic photographic wallpapers. These are certainly nicer than standard stock images and higher resolution though overall they aren’t too far off the beaten path. Worth taking a look at for less-adventurous wallpaper-seekers out for something simple and nice.

Wallpaper Stock has some fairly atypical categories including “sexy” and “Christian” though is overall fairly tame and largely limited to photographic wallpaper of a relatively normal variety. Still, it is an interestingly eclectic mix with unusual organization.

Fantastic and Creatively Abstract Wallpapers:

Fantasy Art Design has a collection of wallpaper that would make Salvador Dali proud. The subjects range considerably but are typically surrealistic landscapes that place with light, color and physics with crisp and compelling details all around.

Vlad Studios deals mainly in simple but abstract wallpapers with a clear and focused theme or set of cartoonish and playful elements. These range from hearts and rainbows to somewhat more serious subjects but are largely light-hearted in nature.

Veer puts a decidedly retro twist on the art of desktop wallpaper. A lot of them are abstract and/or text-based and more hip and crisp than other wallpapers. The designs are conveniently available in various sizes, including ones suitable to the iPhone.

Pixel Girl Presents has wallpaper of virtually all kinds, submitted by users then approved by administrators, but the overall tone of the content is whimsical, fantastic and alternative rather than photorealistic, hence its inclusion in this category.

Mixed Wallpaper Collections and Designs:

Riccardo Iaconelli’s blog features last year’s fifteen winners of the Oxygen wallpaper design contest. Because the designers are all different the results are, of course, quite varied. Some are abstract while others are nature-themed and all are quite nice.

E-Wallpapers hasn’t been updated for some time but was once an active blog dedicated to interesting wallpaper. Still, even their older archives contain some wallpapers you may discover is still a beautiful and artistic today as when they were created.

Crestock has not one but two collections of nifty wallpapers, the first with 13 and the second with 17. These are a mixed back of photography and abstractia.

Specialty and Specific Niche Wallpapers:

Dual Screen Wallpapers features, as the name suggests, wallpaper specifically designed to be suited to wider and split screens. In some cases this means there is a natural break in the pattern somewhere toward the middle. These wallpapers are divided up into various categories including space, vehicles and abstract - something for everyone.

Zuneo has a great series of FireFox wallpapers. The theme is pretty limiting but if you love FireFox they are well worth checking out and range from simple to quite elegant and intricate. Want even more? DesktopNexus has another set.

Other Awesome Wallpaper Collections:

Smashing Magazine also composed a collection of wallpaper resources a while back and divided into five categories: typography, art, technology, photography and abstract themes. “Among other things we review calendar wallpapers, minimalistic wallpapers, wallpapers-illustrations and themes for Apple, Microsoft, Twitter and Google-fans.” But wait there’s more: here is another list from SmashingMagazine. Also, here’s an alphabetized list from Wallpaper Review to even more sites and many other artists whose works, with permission, make great desktop wallpaper!

Author: Regina.

Much has been said about Paris Hilton. Her life, love, and fame have been the subject of media scrutiny for the past years. Voted as the second “Worst Celebrity Role Model of 2006″ (behind Britney Spears), she also appeared in the 2007 Guinness Book of World Records as the world’s “Most Overrated Celebrity”. Indeed, people can’t seem to get enough of the hot and sexy controversial star.

It seems like controversies are inevitable part of this celebrity’s life. First, a four-year-old homemade sex video of her and then-boyfriend Rick Salomon was leaked on the Internet in 2003. And despite attempted legal action, it was later released as the DVD One Night in Paris. Then there were several driving violations, which resulted in Paris serving a widely publicized sentence in an L.A. County jail facility in 2007. Even her latest film, The Hottie and the Nottie, was critically panned by critics and was ranked as the number one worst film in IMDb.

Born in New York City from a wealthy family that owns Hilton Hotels Corporation, Paris is best known through the Fox reality series The Simple Life. Besides being a television and film actress, she is also a model, a writer, a singer, and a businesswoman. According to Forbes Magazine, she earned approximately $2 million in 2003–2004, $6.5 million in 2004–2005, and $7 million in 2005–2006.

Hot and sexy Paris began modeling as a child and signed with Donald Trump’s modeling agency when she was 19. In late 2003, she starred in The Simple Life, with best friend Nicole Richie. It was then followed with guest appearances in various tv shows, music videos, and films. She even landed minor and supporting roles in the feature films Nine Lives (2002), Raising Helen (2004), The Hillz (2004), and the horror remake of House of Wax (2005), in which she won the Teen Choice Award for “Best Scream”. Her first lead roles were in 2006 with the straight-to-DVD releases of National Lampoon’s Pledge This! and Bottom’s Up.

In 2004, the hot and sexy celebrity released an autobiographical book, Confessions of an Heiress: A Tongue-in-Chic Peek Behind the Pose, which includes full color photographs of her and her advice on life as an heiress. The book became a New York Times bestseller and was followed with a designer diary, called Your Heiress Diary: Confess It All to Me. In 2006, Paris released her self-titled debut album, Paris, under Heiress Records, a sub-label of Warner Bros. Records which she founded. Currently, she announced her support of vegetarianism and her opposition to wearing fur, after watching a graphic video about animals raised for their fur.

(More celebrities at Sexy Female Celebrity Features and Celebrities in DVD TV Shows)

About the Author:
A journalism graduate who loves to write about anything.

Author: Patrick Carpen.

The word ‘technique’ refers to the intricacies of playing the guitar strings in order to make it sound melodious. Finger movements play the most important role when strumming the strings. The use of chords spices up the music, but, then again, it involves complicated techniques, which can only be mastered after repeated practice.

Tools and techniques are the same and should be kept in mind when playing the guitar. One of the most important aspects is the synchronization between the right and the left hand. This, combined with repeated practice, can help in the mastery of the technique of playing. The art of learning to play smoothly lies in the movement of fingers, and in the comfort of the muscles of each hand. For someone who is not well-aware of the proper techniques of playing the guitar, the following important tips can help.

1. First and foremost, is learning how to bend a note. Bending a note allows for a change in the pitch of the note. Remember that the easiness with which the notes can be bent will depend upon the strings, and the type of the guitar being used. The trick of achieving the right bending of note is possible by pushing the string across the neck of the guitar. One of the best techniques of playing the guitar by bending the note while picking the string.

Another guitar technique is bending the note without picking it. This is done by bending the note, then picking the note, and finally releasing the bend. In such case, the pitch of the note can be heard falling after it has started.

2. The next guitar technique is the ‘hammer ons’. This technique allows one to play two or three notes for every picking note that is struck. The basic principle of the hammer on effect is that one should have good coordination between the left and the right hand to achieve the magical hammer-ons effect. For example, start by fretting a note on the fifth fret with the finger on the E. Prick the string with the fretting hand, and at the same time the fifth fret should be able to be moved simultaneously. This will bring out the magic of the hammering action. So, pluck both the strings and hear the fifth and the seventh strings together.

3. ‘Vibrato’ means varying the pitch of the note when it falls up and down in a cycle. If playing notes, which are sustained, then one can use vibrato to add that extra expression. Suppose a not is played on the fifth fret of the top E string? Now what is to be done next? Pluck the string and release it until it comes back to its normal position. Then repeat this over again. Now, continue the bend, release actions repeatedly, and this will bring the effect of continuous varying pitch.

4. The pull-offs also sounds very thrilling. Place the first finger on the fifth fret of the top-most string, and place the fifth finger on the same string but on the seventh fret. First, remove the finger from the seventh fret, and then slowly from the fifth fret, and this will sound truly amazing.

About the Author:
Patrick Carpen is the designer, writer and owner of the website http://guitaring.infobay.ws/
Infobay.ws is a content based, consumer oriented website that provides professionally researched, and up to the minute content on selected subjects.

Author: Al Terry.

The Beginning

After the departure of Dallas Chaparrals of the American Basketball Association to San Antonio in 1973, there was no professional Dallas team. In 1979, businessman Don Carter and Partner Norm Sonju requested the rights to bring an NBA franchise to Dallas, Texas. The league owners of the NBA All-Star game voted to admit the new team in 1980. The team name was chosen after the 1957-62 TV western Maverick. James Garner who played the character, was one of the owners. The team’s first head coach was Dick Motta, a man well-known for his disciplinary sternness.
Maverick tickets for the season shows you a team in action that had a roller-coaster ride; complete with thrills and spills. The Dallas Mavericks quickly rose to become a competitive franchise, when they joined the NBA in 1980-81. The decade saw a steady improvement in the team due to its premium draft selection. Mavericks looked like the most promising team for future. In the early 1990’s Mavericks experienced the steepest spiraling decline in NBA history. The team’s downward show was so bad that it threatened to record the worst single-season ever recorded, two times. Maverick tickets were not looked upon as a cherished possession. But true to its worth, with a solid foundation of strong, young and talented players, the Mavericks started their climb up the NBA ladder.

The Stars

In the 1994-95 season the catalyst for the turnaround was rookie point guard Jason Kidd. He led the NBA in triple-doubles with 4 and averaged 5.4 rebounds, 11.7 points and 7.7 assists for the year. Along with Detroit Pistons’ Grant Hill, Kidd was named co-rookie of the year. He finished 10th in the league in assists and 7th in steals. On 11th April Kid registered a triple-double (with 38 points) and also hit a trio of three pointers in the final nail-biting 55 seconds of the first overtime. This feat took the team for a win of 156-147 double-overtime against Houston Rockets. There were other two young and talented Mavericks worth mentioning, Jim Jackson and Jamal Mashburn. They combined as the league’s highest scoring pair. Mashburn averaged of 24.1 points per game and finished fifth in the NBA. Jackson averaged 25.7 points, due to a sprained ankle in February he could not continue for the rest of the campaign. In the second year forward Popeye Jones also displayed his prowess. He averaged 10.6 rebounds per game and registered 10th in the NBA. Jones had 329 offensive rebounds, more than any other NBA player. With such treats to be watched Maverick tickets sold like hot cakes.

The Mavericks performed very well in the 2006-07 season, winning the Southwest Division. Now the head coach Avery Johnson has set his goal on bagging the championship for 2007-08.The addition of Eddie Jones to the roster looks exciting, and the new assistant coach Paul Westphal, will also provide a much needed shot in the arm to the Maverick’s defense. Get your season’s Mavericks tickets to watch the magic unfold. Yet another basketball season is about to commence. Get your Maverick tickets for a season full of fun and excitement. Tickets can be bought online through a broker and also on the phone. No basketball fan would want to miss this year’s thrilling game.

About the Author:
For more great sports information and Maverick Tickets resources visit the author’s website which is loaded with team and venue history , as well as more Maverick tickets articles.