Word: givens
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...roll-up strategy, buying YoVille, licensing Texas HoldEm (which it renamed zyngapoker) and imitating rivals. Playfish's Restaurant City was around before Cafe World, and FishVille is reminiscent of Crowdstar's Happy Aquarium. Even FarmVille rips off Happy Farm, a hugely popular online game in China (richly ironic, given China's disregard for intellectual property). Once it had collected a vast user base, Zynga could lure customers to new games...
...There is also concern that growth will slip backward once China's recession-fighting stimulus is scaled back. One reason Xu's minivan sales have accelerated is government tax breaks and rebates offered on certain car purchases - incentives that won't last forever. State subsidies have also been given to rural residents to spur sales of refrigerators and washing machines. Though the government is implementing longer-lasting plans to convince citizens to spend more money (including a $125 billion program to improve national health care, especially in less developed regions), those efforts will take years to reach their full impact...
...entire nation that has given the automobile far too much right of way, the TFA report, titled "Dangerous by Design," makes it clear that Florida is a cautionary tale. It's especially relevant during the current recession, when the U.S. is also looking to alternative transportation projects like passenger rail to help jump-start the economy. "We're not saying paralyze traffic or penalize drivers," says TFA spokesman David Goldberg. "But we have to restore some balance in this country and fix this deadly situation, especially for the health and safety of our kids and senior citizens...
...Meanwhile, the West finds itself standing on the sidelines. Since 2002, U.S. officials have tried to secure the right to truck food and other supplies from Europe to its troops in Afghanistan via Russia and Turkmenistan, but have been consistently rebuffed. The U.S. has only been given permission to fly humanitarian supplies through Turkmen airspace - but no military hardware. Earlier this year, Gen. David Petreaus, chief of the U.S. Central Command, met with Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, who became Turkmenistan's new President when Niyazov died in 2006, but was unable to persuade him to open his country even a crack...
...given how much natural gas and oil Turkmenistan has under its desert sands, the U.S. and Europe look determined to keep trying to get a foot in the door. Just how they can achieve this in a crowded marketplace - and without a warmer welcome from the wary Turkmen - remains to be seen...