3 Florida Keys hotels make top 25 list

Three lodgings in the Florida Keys have been named among the nation’s top 25 small hotels for 2013 by TripAdvisor, the user-review website.

Marquesa Hotel in Key West came in No. 4. Island Bay Resort in Tavernier came in at No. 7, and Orchid Key Inn in Key West ranked No. 9.

Selections were based on millions of reviews and opinions covering more than 650,000 hotels and collected in a single year from travelers around the world, according to a TripAdvisor news release.

The top 10 in the best small hotels list were, in order:

1) Inn of the Five Graces, Santa Fe, New Mexico

2) Wentworth Mansion, Charleston, S.C.

3) Inn at the Black Olive, Baltimore, Md.

4) Marquesa Hote;, Key West

5) Old Ranch Inn, Palm Springs

6) Best Western Plus Post House Inn, Napa, Calif.

7) Island Bay Resort, Tavernier, Key Largo

8) City Loft Hotel, Beaufort, S.C.

9) Orchid Key Inn, Key West

10) Coast Cabins, Manzanita, Ore.

Jane Wooldridge

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Driver in Rickenbacker Causeway cyclist death to be sentenced

A motorist who killed cyclist Aaron Cohen in a hit-and-run crash on the Rickenbacker Causeway will learn his fate Wednesday.

A Miami-Dade judge on Wednesday afternoon will sentence Michele Traverso, 26, who earlier pleaded guilty for the crash that killed Cohen last February.

The fatality, and a similar hit-and-run wreck in 2010, has renewed calls for increased safety for cyclists and joggers on the popular causeway. Fellow cyclists staged a memorial ride and erected a billboard overlooking Interstate 95 in Cohen’s honor.

Members of Miami’s avid cycling community are expected to be on hand for the 1 p.m. sentencing.

Traverso, driving on a suspended license, struck Cohen and cycling partner Enda Walsh as the two rode in the northbound lanes near the crest of the bridge. Traverso surrendered to police 18 hours after the crash.

Though there were reports of Traverso drinking in Coconut Grove that night, investigators could not prove that his blood alcohol content level was above the legal limit because of the delay in turning himself in.

Traverso pleaded guilty to leaving the scene of an accident involving a death, leaving the scene of an accident with great bodily harm, and driving with a suspended license. He also pleaded guilty to earlier cocaine possession charge.

Miami-Dade Circuit Judge William Thomas could sentence him to as little as 22.8 months in prison, and as much as 35 years behind bars.

In May, Thomas told Cohen’s widow, Patricia Cohen, that he would be unlikely to deliver the maximum sentence, although he could consider “20 or 25 years” after hearing from her and Traverso’s own family at a possible sentencing.

The Cohen family is suing Traverso and his father, who owned the car.

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“GameStick” and NVIDIA “Project SHIELD” Consoles-in-a-Controller on Their Way

Both GameStick and NVIDIA’s Project Shield are upcoming game consoles the size of a game controller, which can hook up to a larger display. Both are powered by Android, Google‘s open-source operating system that’s normally used on smartphones and tablets. And both have working hardware prototypes already. But one is a $ 99 Kickstarter project by an indie group, while the other has the backing of two major companies in the PC gaming world — and will probably be a lot more expensive when it comes out.

Here’s a look at two upcoming TV game consoles that you’ll be able to fit in your pocket or handbag.

GameStick: Exactly what it sounds like

Imagine a tiny, rectangular game controller, sort of like a Wii Remote with more buttons and twin analog sticks. On one side is a plastic bump, that when you pull it off it becomes this gadget the size of a USB memory stick that plugs into a TV’s HDMI port. That’s GameStick, and with 19 days left to go in its Kickstarter fund-raiser it’s managed to raise more than three times the $ 100,000 its creators asked for.

GameStick will have 8 GB of flash memory, and a processor capable of handling modern AAA Android games like Shadowgun, plus 1080p video. If you don’t like the controller it comes with, you’ll be able to connect up to four of your own via Bluetooth, or even use your Android or iOS smartphone or tablet as a controller.

Project SHIELD: A controller that can stop bullets

Maybe it can’t literally serve as a shield. But at about the size of the original Xbox’s controller, the “portable” console NVIDIA showed off at this year’s CES sure looks like it can. It’s powered by a next-generation Tegra 4 processor, and features its own built-in 5-inch multitouch screen for gaming on the go. But it can also connect to a TV, and can even stream PC games via Steam’s Big Picture mode, which was designed for controller games.

A not-so-silver lining?

GameStick’s biggest weakness may be its developer support. Its Kickstarter page mentions the hundreds of thousands of Android games out there, but most of those are only on Google Play, which (unlike most of the rest of Android) is proprietary to Google. Time will tell whether its creators can get enough developers to write games for the platform by the time of its planned April launch, or enough gamers to buy games they might already have on their tablets.

In contrast, between full support for the Google Play store and PC game streaming from Steam, Project SHIELD will have thousands and thousands of games, and there will be no need to repurchase titles you’ve already bought from either store. There’s no word from NVIDIA yet, though, on how much its game console will cost or even when it will launch.

Jared Spurbeck is an open-source software enthusiast, who uses an Android phone and an Ubuntu laptop PC. He has been writing about technology and electronics since 2008.

Linux/Open Source News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Anderson Cooper Calls Lance Armstrong 'A Complete Jerk'

Reaction has been swift and harsh since news leaked that disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong confessed in a new interview with Oprah Winfrey that he used performance-enhancing drugs, despite vehement denials throughout his career. Anderson Cooper is the latest to offer an opinion, saying Armstrong's admission proves he behaved "as a complete jerk" for years.

Speaking Wednesday on his talk show Anderson Live, Cooper pointed out that Armstrong was long consistent in his denials despite the large amount of evidence that anti-doping officials had assembled over the years. "I've got to say he was a complete jerk about this for years and years and years," he said.

RELATED: Oprah Calls Lance Armstrong Confession 'Riveting'

"He wouldn't just deny this. He would go after and try to destroy the people who were telling the truth and people who were telling the truth would get anonymous death threats. Even the guy from the anti-doping agency got anonymous email death threats, it's not known who it's from," Cooper said.

He added that early reports about Oprah's interview seemed to indicate that Armstrong was just one of several people doping, while the investigation seems to contradict this. "This is the guy who was the star of the team. And if you read all the reports he pressured and bullied other team members into doping and to go along with him, and if they didn't go along with it they wouldn't be able to stay on the team."

RELATED: Lance Armstrong Agrees to Oprah Interview 

Oprah confirmed Tuesday that Armstrong reversed years of denials to reveal in a new interview to air on her OWN network over two nights beginning Thursday that he used performance-enhancing drugs.

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Mobster nabbed in massive bust was given big break when facing prison in 2012

One of the dozens of people rounded up today in a mob-related waste carting industry shakedown scheme is a mobster who last year was given a big break as he faced prison for threatening to maim a debtor.

Scott Fappiano, 51, a mob associate who has been linked to both the Gambino and Colombo crime families, allegedly broke his promise to go straight and went right back to his Mafia extortion tactics only days after a federal judge placed him on probation. He will be charged in Manhattan federal court later today for allegedly extorting "protection" payments from a trash hauler, an indictment says.

Gregory P. Mango

Scott Fappiano.

Before he was placed on probation in January 2012, Fappiano apologized to the victim of the earlier loansharking extortion and said he was sorry for his bad decisions.

His contrition and tragic personal saga played a major role in the judge's decision last year to place Fappiano on three years probation, ordering him to pay a $40,000 fine, and hand over $2,000 in forfeiture to the government.

At the time, Brooklyn federal Judge Kiyo Matsumoto said that Fappiano's previous experience -- as an innocent man wrongly convicted who had endured the horrors of prison -- played a "very significant" role in her decision to not send Fappiano back to prison.

Fappiano was just 23 years old when he was wrongly convicted of raping an NYPD officer’s wife and imprisoned after a trial in Brooklyn Supreme Court back in 1985. He spent two decades behind bars before he was exonerated through DNA evidence that cleared him of the sexual assault.

Last year at his sentencing on the mob loansharking extortion. Fappiano recounted some of the chilling ordeals he underwent during his years in jail.

While serving time in New York's state prison system, his face was crushed with a pipe, his was cut with a razor blade, and he was stabbed in the back with an icepick.

Once Fappiano saw a man burn to death in prison after being doused with gasoline and set afire.

To escape such dangers, Fappiano says he voluntarily spent eight years in solitary confinement.

Since being exonerated six years ago, Fappiano has grappled with problems of substance abuse directly linked to his wrongful conviction, his attorney said last year.

“In the years following his release, Mr. Fappiano struggled with alcohol and drugs in a misguided attempt at self-medicating for the severe anxiety and post-traumatic stress from which he was suffering,” his lawyer, Harlan J. Protass, wrote to the judge last year.

Following a DUI arrest in New Jersey in 2010, Fappiano has tried to confront these substance abuse problems and is wrestling to conquer them, his attorney insisted.

In 2011, the wiseguy checked himself into a long-term residential drug and alcohol treatment facility in Queens and spent six months as an in-patient there.

Since leaving re-hab, Fappiano has started a new regimen -- participating in weekly counseling sessions and attending Alcoholics Anonymous/Narcotics Anonymous meetings, his attorney said.

But last year federal prosecutors say that since his release from prison six years ago after being cleared of the sexual assault, Fappiano was quick to resume his association with mobsters.

"He schemed with members and associates of the Colombo family to assault the ex-husband of his current wife, to commit a violent armed robbery, and to distribute marijuana," Brooklyn Assistant US Attorney Liz Geddes wrote in 2012.

Last year, Fappiano pleaded guilty to participating in the earlier mob loansharking extortion plot after the FBI captured the wiseguy discussing his debt collection methods with the help of a government informant wearing a hidden "wire" tape recorder.

"I want to be diplomatic," Fappiano said about pressuring the debtor to repay a loan.

If "it gets to the point where he may have to get his f--ing leg broken... I’ll make sure I’m in court somewhere or doing a deposition," Fappiano said, according to a transcript filed with court documents.

As he awaited sentencing last year, the feds voiced their skepticism about his vow to keep clean and said they were not convinced that the wiseguy will permanently leave his mob activities and forego a life of crime.

After Fappiano's arrest today - if the new waste hauling shakedown charges leveled against him are to be believed - it would seem to suggest that following his vow last year to go straight he waited only days before breaking his promise and resuming his alleged extortion activities, a mob expert told The Post.

mmaddux@nypost.com

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Miami Dolphins bill would bring state money to aging stadiums

A bill drafted by the Miami Dolphins would give Florida sports teams $3 million a year in state money to improve older stadiums, provided the owner pays for at least half the cost of a major renovation.

Under the law, the stadium would need to be 20 years old and the team willing to put in at least $125 million for a $250 million renovation. That’s less than the $400 million redo of Sun Life Stadium that Dolphins owner Stephen Ross proposed this week, which he hopes will win state approval thanks to his offer to fund at least $200 million of the effort to modernize the 1987 facility.

Miami-Dade and Florida would fund the rest through a mix of county hotel taxes and state general funds set aside for stadiums. Sun Life currently receives $2 million a year through the program, and the Dolphins want to create a new category that would give them an additional $3 million.

While the Miami Marlins and Miami Heat both play in stadiums subsidized by county hotel taxes, the Dolphins receive no local dollars. The bill would change that by allowing Miami-Dade to increase the tax charged at mainland hotels to 7 percent from 6 percent, and eliminate the current rule that limits the money to publicly owned stadiums. Sun Life Stadium, in Miami Gardens, is privately owned but sits on county land.

The bill pits enthusiasm for one of Florida’s most popular sports teams against a lean budget climate and lingering backlash against the 2009 deal that had Miami and Miami-Dade borrow about $485 million to build a new ballpark for the Marlins. Ross also must navigate a Republican-led Legislature that has twice rebuffed his requests for public dollars.

“I would be surprised if that bill even got a hearing in committee,” said Mike Fasano, a Republican representative from the Tampa area and a critic of tax-funded sports deals. “I’m a big Dolphin fan, and have been for years. But with all due respect, we’ve got people who are struggling throughout this state right now . .. The last thing we should be doing is giving a professional sports team or facility additional tax dollars.”

While the bill would open up the $3 million subsidy to other the teams, the Dolphins see it as unlikely that another owner would be willing to put up as much money for renovations as Ross, a billionaire real estate developer.

If the bill were enacted today, any stadium opened before 1993 would be eligible for the money, provided it could show the proposed renovation would generate an additional $3 million in sales taxes.

Ross and his backers are pitching the renovation as a boon to tourism, with Sun Life a magnet for the Super Bowl, national college football games and other major events. The National Football League is considering South Florida and San Francisco for the 2016 Super Bowl, and the Dolphins say approval of renovation funding is crucial to winning the bid.

Sen. Oscar Braynon, D-Miami Gardens, who sponsored the Senate bill, said the funding makes sense because when Sun Life hosts a Super Bowl, the entire state benefits from both tourism dollars and publicity.

“It’s a small price to pay for economic development, and for all the shine we get from major sporting events,” said Braynon, whose district includes Sun Life. Rep. Eduardo “Eddy” Gonzalez, R-Hialeah, is the sponsor on the House side.

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Wedgie-spree at Florida theater lands prankster in jail

Authorities say that Charles Ross is known to go around Manatee County and create situations in order to harass and annoy people while filming their reaction for You Tube.

Last weekend, Ross, 18, of Bradenton, ended up in jail after police say he went on a wedgie spree at a theater.

Deputies say Ross was at Royal Palm Theater Sunday night with a friend and began grabbing people by their pants and pulling them up hard, causing discomfort.

A victim told deputies that Ross pulled up his pants, wedgie-style, and then asked the victim if he wanted to hit him, all while his friend was filming, according to the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office.

One victim decided to press charges but others were too embarrassed, deputies said.

The deputy took the camera as evidence and both Ross and his friend were removed from the theater and told they would be arrested if they come back, according to the report.

Ross was booked into the Manatee County Jail on battery charges and was released Monday on a $750 bond.

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Megan Fox Esquire

Still Foxy

She had a baby in September?! After giving birth less than four months ago, Megan Fox is already landing sexy covers, including her latest lingerie-clad photo shoot with Esquire magazine. In a cover story titled "Megan Fox Saves Herself," the This Is 40 star
offers comparisons between Lindsay Lohan and Marilyn Monroe, as well as
reveals her new favorite, yet possibly fictional, celebrities. Click the pics for a series of sexy shots and bizarre quotes, courtesy of Mrs. Brian Austin Green.

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Newtown shooting survivors record song for charity

Charles Sykes/Invision/AP

Ingrid Michaelson accompanied by children from Newtown, Conn. and Sandy Hook Elementary school perform "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" on ABC's "Good Morning America" today.

Children who survived last month's shooting rampage at Connecticut's Sandy Hook Elementary School have recorded a version of "Over the Rainbow" to raise money for charity.

Twenty-one children from Newtown, Conn., performed the song Tuesday with singer-songwriter Ingrid Michaelson on ABC's "Good Morning America." Most of them are current and former students of the school, where 20 first-graders and six staff members were killed.

David McGlynn

Musician Ingrid Michaelson talking to children from Sandy Hook Elementary today.

They recorded "Over the Rainbow" on Monday at the Fairfield, Conn., home of Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth, two former members of the Talking Heads and Tom Tom Club rock bands. Copies went on sale Tuesday on Amazon and iTunes, with proceeds benefiting the United Way of Western Connecticut and the Newtown Youth Academy.

Kayla Verga, 10, said she was singing for a friend, 6-year-old Jessica Rekos, who was killed in the massacre.

"Singing the song makes me feel like she's with me and she's beside me, singing along with me," Kayla told "GMA."

Another girl, 10-year-old Sandy Hook student Jane Shearin, added, "I really want to be kind to the people who have lost their loved ones and help them to recover from their sorrow."

Gunman Adam Lanza went on a shooting spree with a semiautomatic rifle in the school on Dec. 14 after having killed his mother at their home in Newtown. He fatally shot himself as police arrived at the school. It's still unclear what motivated the attack.

The Sandy Hook children have returned to classes in a neighboring town at a building renamed for their old school. Newtown officials and residents have begun discussing what to do with the school where the shootings occurred.

Some parents of children killed in the massacre spoke out on Monday, calling for a national dialogue to help prevent similar tragedies.

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Global entrepreneurship nonprofit Endeavor coming to Miami

Flawless execution helped propel Argentine Marcos Galperin’s e-auction site, Mercado Libre, above the competition to become a $3.8 billion company. Some 50,000 small businesses now use it to market their wares.

Leila Velez and Heloísa Helena Assis, cousins who grew up in the slums of Rio, started with one product and one salon. Today their company, Beleza Natural, operates 24 salons that bring in $75 million in revenues, employs 1,500 people and has an eye on U.S expansion.

Both were powered, in part, by Endeavor, a global nonprofit that selects, mentors, supports and accelerates high-impact entrepreneurs in metropolitan areas of 16 countries — and, soon, in Miami.

Endeavor and its local supporter, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, announced Tuesday that Knight is providing Endeavor with $2 million in grant funding over five years for Endeavor’s first U.S. expansion. Endeavor’s Miami office could ultimately service dozens of local entrepreneurs, but first a local board needs to be assembled, a managing director hired and offices set up.

Beginning late this year, South Florida’s innovators will be able to apply to become Endeavor Entrepreneurs, connecting them to a global network of mentors and advisors who can help grow their ventures. “We think this is a cornerstone of making Miami more of a place where ideas are built,” said Matt Haggman, Miami program director for the Knight Foundation, which has made entrepreneurship a key focus of its Miami program.

The announcement is an important milestone in Miami’s efforts to accelerate an entrepreneurial ecosystem, which has been gaining momentum, said Haggman, who led the effort for Knight, its largest investment in entrepreneurship to date. Accelerators, incubators and co-working spaces have been opening up, including Launch Pad Tech, which is receiving $1.5 million in public funding and opens for its first class next week. Last month, the first ever Innovate MIA week attracted hundreds of entrepreneurs, investors and other supporters to a packed schedule of daily events, which included the Americas Venture Capital Conference and Endeavor’s International Selection Panel.

“Miami is almost the perfect seeding ground for Endeavor,” said Peter Kellner, co-founder of Endeavor and now an Endeavor board member, an investor and South Florida resident who began discussing the project with Haggman in the spring. “There are commitments from large institutions like Knight, FIU, UM, there is capital, there are people that are interested in making things happen, there are already clusters of activity like accelerators and incubators. That’s where Endeavor thrives.”

Endeavor selects and works primarily with companies from a wide range of industries that are already earning $500,000 to $15 million in annual revenue and ready for the next stage: explosive growth.

“While the vast majority of small businesses employ two or three people, Endeavor businesses employ an average of 237,” said Endeavor co-founder and CEO Linda Rottenberg.

Launched in 1998 and headquartered in New York City, Endeavor now operates throughout Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, Europe and Southeast Asia and supports more than 750 entrepreneurs who are chosen in a rigorous selection process.

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