Shih-In Ma is a social justice advocate who works to promote diversity and inclusion in Centre County. The State College native and Penn State alum, left a corporate career at IBM to begin a journey of spirituality, self-reflection and meditation. Her journey has taken her around the world and included spending four years in India with Amma, who's known as the hugging saint. Shih-In Ma teaches meditation and shares opportunities for others to gain better insight and understanding of those around them. TRANSCRIPT: Cheraine Stanford Welcome to Take Note on WPSU, I'm Cheraine Stanford. Shih-In Ma is a social justice advocate who works to promote diversity and inclusion in Centre County. The State College native and Penn State alum, left a corporate career at IBM to begin a journey of spirituality, self-reflection and meditation. Her journey has taken her around the world and included spending four years in India with Amma, who's known as the hugging saint. Shih-In Ma teaches meditation

Robert Crumb is best known as an underground cartoonist, whose work, including Fritz the Cat and Mr. Natural, remains controversial. But Crumb is also a collector and celebrator of old blues records. Jerry Zolten is a professor of communication arts and sciences and integrative arts at Penn State Altoona. His work includes the book “Great God A’Mighty! The Dixie Hummingbirds: Celebrating the Rise of Soul Gospel Music.” WPSU's Anne Danahy spoke with Crumb and Zolten about their love of old blues music and records.

Brian Wray is an award-winning children’s book author for his book “Unraveling Rose” about a toy bunny rabbit with OCD. His latest book, “Max’s Box,” talks about what happens when negative emotions are suppressed. Both of his picture books focus on children’s mental and emotional health. TRANSCRIPT: Kirsten Tekavec: Welcome to Take Note on WPSU, I'm Kirsten Tekavec. Brian Wray is a children's book author and the 2017 Gold Winner of the Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Award for his book "Unraveling Rose." His latest book, Max's Box," talks about what happens when negative emotions are suppressed. Both of his picture books focus on children's mental and emotional health. He is a Penn State graduate and currently lives in Brooklyn. Brian Wray, thank you for joining us. Brian Wray: Thank you for having me. Tekavec: Before we begin discussing your work, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got into writing children's books? Wray: I have been writing stories for as long

A recent study published in the journal Science found the number of birds in North America is plummeting. The bird population dropped by more than a quarter over the past 50 years. Grassland birds, shore birds and songbirds are all affected. WPSU's Anne Danahy spoke with Greg Grove, editor of Pennsylvania Birds, and Doug Wentzel, president of the State College Bird Club, about bird watching and those trends

WPSU is traveling to towns across central and northern Pennsylvania to collect oral history recordings. In Lock Haven we paired with a college journalism class and had students find someone interesting to interview. Lock Haven University student Julia Snyder talked with her grandmother Mary E. George about George’s fond memories of her grandparents who immigrated from the Czech Republic.

Through a program called “Feed the Soul,” hospital workers across North Carolina are receiving deliveries of nutritious meals as they respond to growing needs to treat COVID-19 patients. The program also supports local restaurants seeing a slowdown in business. The meal deliveries are made possible by contributions made to an emergency response fund created by the North Carolina Healthcare Foundation ( NCHF ), a nonprofit charitable organization. To date, the program has delivered more than 10,000 meals to staff at 13 hospitals in Asheville, Charlotte, Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill. The program is now expanding to Greenville and Wilmington in eastern North Carolina. North Carolina has more than 200,000 hospital workers, many of whom are appreciating the delicious and nutritious meals prepared by local restaurants. “While most of us are staying home to eat meals due to social distancing, hospital employees are working around-the-clock to care for growing numbers of coronavirus

FEMA recently approved disaster assistance funding for public utilities affected by Hurricane Dorian. More than $940,000 will go to Carteret-Craven Electric Cooperative for the replacement of damaged poles and transformers. The City of Kinston will receive more than $143,000 to replace damaged poles and transformers. And Brunswick County will receive nearly $45,000 for wastewater treatment repairs. FEMA has provided more than $16.1 million for Hurricane Dorian-related expenses in North Carolina through the Public Assistance program.

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, there is one unexpected silver lining that I just have to share. Teachers are finally getting some of the love and respect that they so sincerely deserve from parents who now have that role – at least temporarily. Praise for educators is all over social media right now, and even celebrities and sports stars are acknowledging how challenging it is to teach and how appreciative they are for their children’s teachers. Teachers of all levels – from preschool through college – have shifted their instruction online while also demonstrating their compassion and concern for their students. Teacher car parades are driving through neighborhoods with signs to remind children and families that their teachers care about and miss them. Teachers are calling students to show they care, and online class sessions are routinely beginning with “check-ins” to make sure everyone is OK. Has the shift to at-home learning been perfect? Absolutely not, but educators across

FM Nirmala Sitharaman had announced about a 10% cut in corporate income tax in September 2019 to boost the economy.

Green Visor Capital backed-Simpl, that allows users to buy now and checkout with pay-later function, said the surge in the number of transactions done for daily essentials increased despite supply and workforce issues by merchant partners.

"Similar to others in the marketplace, approximately half of Nike-owned stores have been temporarily closed," while it is "experiencing lower than planned retail traffic in stores that do remain open."

Russia has imported leather and footwear worth USD 3.9 billion in 2018, and India's exports to that country stood at only USD 52.6 million, said Panaruna Aqeel Ahmed, chairman of Council for Leather Exports (CLE).

The pandemic is also likely to catalyse the shift to e-commerce.

The production of high-tech running shoes at its so-called speedfactories in Germany's Ansbach and in the US city of Atlanta "will be discontinued by April 2020 at the latest", Adidas said in a statement.

Sportswear makers say sales in tier II and III towns have grown exponentially in the last few years and contribute a sizable percentage of their revenue now.

Puma operates 365 owned stores in India, and over the past three years, has signed up cricketer Virat Kohli, boxer Mary Kom, footballer Sunil Chhetri and actress Sarah Ali Khan to endorse its products.

According to the company, Puma's collaboration with the Indian cricket captain saw a massive rise in sales in FY2019 with sales through One8 accounting for almost 10 per cent of its overall sales, and cementing the leadership position by a wider margin.

In a letter to the brand’s business partners, Bjorn Gulden, global CEO of Puma SE, announced Ganguly’s elevation in the company adding that that he will continue to work out of Puma’s India head office in Bengaluru.

​​​​Voganow Fashion owned Brune & Bareskin sells leather jackets, footwear, bags and accessories for men on online platforms such as Myntra, Jabong and Snapdeal.

“We have bagged a multi-million dollar order from the Ministry of Defence to make rucksacks for the Indian army. It is an unchartered territory but creating an ideal rucksack for an Indian jawaan who spends maximum time outdoors in challenging terrain will be good learning. The order will be executed next year,” said Siddharth Sood, cofounder of Wildcraft India.

While early movers like Rolex, Omega and Tag Heuer entered India in early noughties, a clutch of global luxury watches like Panerai are now placing bets on the Indian market, keeping in mind a longer investment horizon. In a bid to create a deeper connect with the Indian consumers, Panerai launched two MS Dhoni special edition watches on Wednesday.

Retail in India has not developed at the same pace as the products. Getting good quality retail is a challenge. The country has limited number of malls. There is no high street.

​Chumbak founder Vivek Prabhakar will continue as head of marketing and digital, and co-founder Shubhra Chaddha will continue to head product and design.

Italian artist and teacher Giacomo Verde passed away today. Video artist and activist he has explored the use of electronic and digital video image in theatre and performances. Among the highlights in his career he collaborated with Van Gogh TV →

“There are supply issues for several brands. There is no clarity when the situation will normalise,” said Nilesh Gupta, director at Vijay Sales, a leading electronics retailer in Mumbai and New Delhi. “If it doesn’t get corrected fast, we may move into a stock-out situation from next month.”

In an interview with Fox Business, Cook said: "I see India as a huge opportunity for us. For years, we could not enter there unless we entered there with a partner into retail and we did not want to do that. We wanted to maintain control of our brand and so forth".

US phone-maker said to have leased 25k sq ft space at Maker Maxity mall in the Mumbai hub.

The decision was taken in the 39th GST Council meeting chaired by finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman. The move was made to correct the inverted duty structure. ​

Industry bodies Manufacturers’ Association of Information Technology (MAIT) and India Cellular & Electronics Association (ICEA) have written to the government seeking concessions in the delivery of smartphones among other electronics devices and removal of restrictions on the movement of components for inland and export purposes.

Handset makers and offline traders have urged the commerce and home ministries to allow the sale and service of mobile devices and its accessories through offline stores in the country.

All India Mobile Retailer Association (AIMRA), which represents 1.5 lakh such retailers across the country, wrote to commerce minister Piyush Goyal to not consider mobile handsets as essential items.

Xbox will be available for Rs39,990, while the model with Kinect, an interface that allows the use of gestures to play games, will cost Rs45,990.

“For incubators, we want to look at India as the first starting point,” said Manish Agarwal, CEO of Reliance Entertainment.

Rovio’s India head also said that the company wants to have its own retail store where it can sell Angry Birds merchandise such as shirts and stuffed toys.

Many people assume that the videogame seller will go the route of book, music, and video stores, reports Joshua Brustein at Bloomberg Businessweek.

The mobile app development companies as well as independent developers are leveraging this to pitch their apps into the market.

Reliance Entertainment, an arm of the Anil Ambani-headed Reliance Group, on Thursday named Amit Khanduja as the new CEO of Reliance Games, effective June 1.

With 35% users each in the US and Asia Pacific region and the remaining in Europe, 99Games is one of the first Indian gaming studios to hit this success.

Samsung will compete with the likes of Benq and Asus, who also have a strong line-up of gaming monitors.

There are nearly 100 such gaming cafes currently and less than 1000 non-exclusive cafes, said Vamsi Krishna, Head of Consumer Marketing, South Asia, NVIDIA.

Free download of Really Wanna See You from Lydia Loveless ' new CD "Somewhere Else", currently featured on The Sound. Find out more about the artist here .

Free download of Outskirts of Love from the CD of the same name by Shemekia Copeland , currently featured on The Sound. Find out more about the artist here.

The total outstanding amount, according to the agency, is approximately Rs 3695 crores. The agency had sealed the office and house of Vikram Kothari’s residence, in New Delhi.

Complicated manufacturing and investment needs may have a role in keeping new players out of the business.

Readers have placed online orders and bookstores are keeping a track of each order and are hoping to cater to every such customer once the situation gets better.

Kohler would enhance its sales network in the domestic markets by having presence in 200 towns in next three years and become a 1,000 store company in next five years.

We will be investing approximately Rs 2-3 crore each in setting up 10 Lacasa stores covering around 40,000-50,000 sq. ft. area till 2020.

The Group has launched a marketing campaign including digital, outdoor, television and cinema to promote the brand, the company said in a statement.

Sebi shall also appoint an independent audit firm for conducting a detailed forensic audit of the books of accounts of Ricoh for the financial year 2012-13 onwards till date, the cost of which shall be borne by Ricoh.

"Some part of Kurl-on's business did get cannibalized with the opening of IKEA's first store in Hyderabad, but it is not a cause of worry," Sudhakar Pai, Chairman and MD, Kurl-on says.