Shopping is the purchase of goods and services from retailers.

Shopping is considered a recreational activity of psychological interest. Shopping involves selection and purchase.

"Window shopping" is an American/English phrase meaning to look into glass windows of a shop for entertainment and imagine purchasing items without actually purchasing, possibly just to pass the time between other activities, or planning a purchase.

Retail pricing
The pricing technique used by most retailers is cost-plus pricing. This involves adding a markup amount (or percentage) to the retailers cost. Another common technique is manufacturers suggested list pricing. This simply involves charging the amount suggested by the manufacturer and usually printed on the product by the manufacturer.

In Western countries, retail prices are often so-called psychological prices or odd prices: a little less than a round number, e.g. $ 6.95. In Chinese societies, prices are generally either a round number or sometimes some lucky number. This creates price points.

Often prices are fixed and displayed on signs or labels. Alternatively, there can be price discrimination for a variety of reasons. The retailer charges higher prices to some customers and lower prices to others. For example, a customer may have to pay more if the seller determines that he or she is willing to. The retailer may conclude this due to the customer's wealth, carelessness, lack of knowledge, or eagerness to buy. Price discrimination can lead to a bargaining situation often called haggling — a negotiation about the price. Economists see this as determining how the transaction's total surplus will be divided into consumer and producer surplus. Neither party has a clear advantage, because the threat of no sale exists, whence the surplus vanishes for both.

[edit]
Kinds of shops
Shops are divided into multiple categories of stores which sell a selected set of goods or services.

Many shops are part of a chain: a number of similar shops with the same name selling the same products in different locations. The shops may be owned by one company, or there may be a franchising company that has franchising agreements with the shop owners (see also restaurant chain).

Some shops sell second-hand goods. Often the public can also sell goods to such shops. In other cases, especially in the case of a nonprofit shop, the public donates goods to the shop to be sold (see also thrift store). In give-away shops goods can be taken for free.

For details on the various types of retail stores see:

Bookstore
Convenience store
Department store
Dollar store
Electronic commerce, B2C
General store
Hardware store
Hobby store
Hypermarket
Mail order
Pet store
Pharmacy
Sex shop
Sports Store
Supermarket
Superstore
Surplus store
Thrift store
Travel agency
[edit]
See also
List of department stores
List of supermarkets
List of leading shopping streets and districts by city
List of marketing topics
Distribution
Electricity retailing
Loyalty card
Marketing
Markup
MSRP
Retailers' cooperative
Shopping hours
Shopping cart
Shopping mall
Shrinkage
Sunday shopping
Vending machine
Online shop
[edit]
External links
National Consumer Council, July 2005, "Shopping Generation" (PDF)

Categories: Socioeconomics | Hobbies

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Real estate or immovable property is a legal term (in some jurisdictions) that encompasses land along with anything permanently affixed to the land, such as buildings. Real estate (immovable property) is often considered synonymous with real property (also sometimes called realty), in contrast with personal property (also sometimes called chattel or personalty). However, for technical purposes, some people prefer to distinguish real estate, referring to the land and fixtures themselves, from real property, referring to ownership rights over real estate. The terms real estate and real property are used primarily in common law, while civil law jurisdictions refer instead to immovable property.

In recent years, many economists have not recognized that the lack of effective real estate laws can be a significant barrier to investment in many developing countries. In most societies, rich or poor, a significant fraction of the total wealth is in the form of land and buildings. In most advanced economies, the main source of capital used by individuals and small companies to purchase and improve land and buildings is mortgages -- bank loans for which the real property itself constitutes collateral. Banks are willing to make such loans at favorable rates in large part because if the borrower does not make payments the lender can foreclose, that is, file a court action that lets them take the property and sell it to get their money back. But in many developing countries there is no effective means by which a lender could foreclose, so the mortgage loan industry as such either does not exist at all or is only available to members of privileged social classes.

In spite of the name, real estate has no connection with the concept of reality (in other words, the law does not consider real property more "real" than personal property). It derives instead from the feudal principle that in a monarchy, all land was considered the property of the king. Thus originally the term real estate was equivalent to "royal estate", real originating from the French royale, as it was the French-speaking Normans who introduced feudalism to England and thus to the English language; cognate to Spanish real.

With the development of private property ownership, real estate has become a major area of business. Purchasing real estate requires a significant investment, and each parcel of land has unique characteristics, so the real estate industry has evolved into several distinct fields. Cities such as Vancouver, British Columbia have experienced remarkable growth in real estate prices in the new millennium. Specialists are often called on to valuate real estate and facilitate transactions. Some kinds of real estate businesses include:

Appraisal - Professional valuation services
Brokerages - Assisting buyers and sellers in transactions
Development - Improving land for use by adding or replacing buildings
Property management - Managing a property for its owner(s)
Real Estate Marketing - Managing the sales side of the property business
Relocation services - Relocating people or business to different country
Within each field, a business may specialize in a particular type of real estate, such as residential, commercial, or industrial property. In addition, almost all construction business effectively has a connection to real estate.

"Internet Real Estate" is a term coined by the internet investment community relating to the parallel that exists between high quality internet domain names and real-world, prime real estate.

[edit]
Levels
According to The Economist, "developed economies'" assets at the end of 2002 was

Residential property: $48 trillion
Commercial property: $14 trillion
Equities: $20 trillion
Government bonds: $20 trillion
Corporate bonds: $13 trillion
Total: $115 trillion
That makes real estate assets 54% and financial assets 46% of total stocks, bonds, and real estate assets. Assets not counted here are bank deposits, insurance "reserve" assets, and human assets; also it is not clear if all debt and equity investments are counted in the categories equities and bonds. For US asset levels see FRB: Z.1 Release-- Flow of Funds Accounts of the United States.

[edit]
See also
Housing bubble
List of real estate topics
Real estate pricing
National Association of Realtors
Real estate appraisal
Real estate economics
Real property
[edit]
External links
For real estate websites, see

Real Estate at the Yahoo! Directory
MSN Real Estate

Category: Real estate

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An Arabic language mobile phoneA mobile phone or cell(ular) phone is an electronic telecommunications device. Most current mobile phones connect to the network using a wireless radio wave transmission technology (the exception are satellite phones). These mobile phones communicate via a cellular network of base stations (cell sites), which is in turn linked to the conventional telephone network and were first introduced in the early to mid 1980s (the 1G generation). Prior mobile phones operating without a cellular network (the so-called 0G generation), such as Mobile Telephone Service, date back to 1946. Until the mid to late 1980s, most mobile phones were sufficiently large that they often permanently installed in vehicles as car phones. With the advance of miniaturization, currently the vast majority of mobile phones are handheld.

In addition to the standard voice function of a telephone, a mobile phone can support many additional services such as SMS for text messaging, packet switching for access to the Internet, and MMS for sending and receiving photos and video.

Some of the world's largest mobile phone manufacturers include Alcatel, Audiovox, Fujitsu, Kyocera, LG, Motorola, NEC, Nokia, Panasonic (Matsushita Electric), Philips, Sagem, Samsung, Sanyo, Sharp, BenQ-Siemens, SK Teletech, Sony Ericsson, and Toshiba.

There are also specialist communication systems related to, but distinct from mobile phones, such as Professional Mobile Radio. Mobile phones are also distinct from cordless telephones, which generally operate only within a limited range of a specific base station. Technically, the term mobile phone includes such devices as satellite phones and pre-cellular mobile phones such as those operating via MTS which do not have a cellular network, whereas the related term cell(ular) phone does not. In practice, the two terms are used nearly interchangably, with the preferred term varying by location.


Worldwide deployment

Mock-up of the "portable phone of the future", from a mid-60s Bell System advertisement, shows a device not too different from today's mobile telephones.Radio phones have a long and varied history that stretches back to the 1950s, with hand-held cellular radio devices being available since 1983. Due to their low establishment costs and rapid deployment, mobile phone networks have since spread rapidly throughout the world, outstripping the growth of fixed telephony.

In most of Europe, wealthier parts of Asia, the Caribbean, Latin America, Australia, Canada and the United States, mobile phones are now widely used, with the majority of the adult, teenage, and even child population owning one. At present India and China have the largest growth rates of cellular subscribers in the world. The availability of Prepaid or pay as you go services, where the subscriber does not have to commit to a long term contract, has helped fuel this growth.

The mobile phone has become ubiquitous because of the interoperability of mobile phones across different networks and countries. This is due to the equipment manufacturers working to meet one of a few standards, particularly the GSM standard which was designed for Europe-wide interoperability. All European nations and some Asian nations adopted it as their sole standard. In other countries, such as the United States, Japan, and South Korea, legislation does not require any particular standard, and GSM coexists with other standards, such as CDMA and iDen

[edit]
Mobile phone culture

SMS message on a Sony Ericsson handsetIn less than twenty years, mobile phones have gone from being rare and expensive pieces of equipment used by businesses to a pervasive low-cost personal item. In many countries, mobile phones now outnumber land-line telephones, with most adults and many children now owning mobile phones. It is not uncommon for young adults to simply own a mobile phone instead of a land-line for their residence. In some developing countries, where there is little existing fixed-line infrastructure, the mobile phone has become widespread.

With high levels of mobile telephone penetration, a mobile culture has evolved, where the phone becomes a key social tool, and people rely on their mobile phone addressbook to keep in touch with their friends. Many people keep in touch using SMS, and a whole culture of "texting" has developed from this. The commercial market in SMS's is growing. Many phones even offer Instant Messenger services to increase the simplicity and ease of texting on phones. Cellular phones in Japan, offering Internet capabilities such as NTT DoCoMo's i-mode, offer text messaging via standard e-mail.

The mobile phone itself has also become a totemic and fashion object, with users decorating, customizing, and accessorizing their mobile phones to reflect their personality. This has emerged as its own industry. The sale of commercial ringtones exceeded $2.5 billion in 2004 [1].


The use of a mobile phone is prohibited in some rail carriagesMobile phone etiquette has become an important issue with mobiles ringing at funerals, weddings, movies, and plays. Users often speak at increased volume which has led to places like bookshops, libraries, movie theatres, doctor's offices, and houses of worship posting signs prohibiting the use of mobile phones, sometimes even installing illegal jamming equipment to prevent them. Many rail companies, particularly those providing long-distance services, offer a "quiet car" where phone use is prohibited, much like the designated non-smoking cars in the past. Mobile phone use on aircraft is also prohibited, but because of concerns of possible interference with aircraft radio communications [2].

Cameraphones and videophones that can capture video and take photographs are increasingly being used to cover breaking news. Stories like the London Bombings, the Indian Ocean Tsunami and Hurricane Katrina have been reported on by cameraphone users on news sites like NowPublic and photosharing sites like Flickr.

In Japan, cellular phone companies provide immediate notification of earthquakes and other natural disasters to their customers free of charge. In the event of an emergency, disaster response crews can locate trapped or injured people using the signals from their mobile phones; an interactive menu accessible through the phone's Internet browser notifies the company if the user is safe or in distress.

[edit]
Mobile phone features
Main article: Mobile phone features
Mobile phones often have features beyond sending text messages and make voice calls—including Internet browsing, music (MP3) playback, personal organizers, e-mail, built-in cameras and camcorders, ringtones, games, radio, Push-to-Talk (PTT), infrared and bluetooth connectivity, call registers, and ability to watch streaming video or download video for later viewing.

[edit]
Technology
Mobile phones and the network they operate under vary significantly from provider to provider, and even from nation to nation. However, all of them communicate through electromagnetic radio waves with a cell site/base station, the antennas of which are usually mounted on a tower, pole, or building.

The phones have a low-power transceiver that transmits voice and data to the nearest cell sites, usually .5 to 10 miles away. When the cellular phone or data device is turned on, it registers with the mobile telephone exchange, or switch, with its unique identifiers, and will then be alerted by the mobile switch when there is an incoming telephone call. The handset constantly listens for the strongest signal being received from the surrounding base stations. As the user moves around the network, the mobile device will "hand off" to new cell sites.

Cell sites have relatively low-power (often only one or two Watts) radio transmitters which broadcast their presence and relay communications between the mobile handsets and the switch. The switch in turn connects the call to another subscriber of the same wireless service provider or to the public telephone network, which includes the networks of other wireless carriers.

The dialogue between the handset and the cell site is a stream of digital data that includes digitized audio (except for the first generation analog networks). The technology that achieves this depends on the system which the mobile phone operator has adopted. Some technologies include AMPS for analog, and TDMA, CDMA, GSM, GPRS, EV-DO, and UMTS for digital communications. Each network operator has a unique radio frequency band.

[edit]
Controversy
[edit]
Health controversy
Main article: Mobile phone radiation and health
As with many new technologies, concerns have arisen about the effects on health from using a mobile telephone. There is a small amount of scientific evidence for an increase in certain types of rare tumors (cancer) in long-time, heavy users. More recently a pan-European study provided significant evidence of genetic damage under certain conditions. Some researchers also report the mobile phone industry has interfered with further research on health risks. So far, however, the World Health Organization Task Force on EMF effects on health has no definitive conclusion on the veracity of these allegations. (See also electromagnetic radiation hazard.) It is generally thought, however, that RF is incapable of producing any more than heating effects, as it is considered non-ionizing radiation; in other words, it lacks the energy to disrupt molecular bonds such as occurs in genetic mutations.

[citation needed]

[edit]
Driving controversy
Main article: Mobile phones and driving safety
Another controversial but more lethal health concern is the correlation with road traffic accidents. Several studies have shown that motorists have a much higher risk of collisions and losing control of the vehicle while talking on the mobile telephone simultaneously with driving, even when using "hands-free" systems. A study in The New England Journal of Medicine reports that drivers who used mobile phones while driving were four times more likely to crash than those who don't, a rate equal to that for drunken driving at the .01 blood alcohol concentration (BAC) level. An experiment conducted by the American television show MythBusters concluded that use of mobile phones while driving poses the same risk as someone operating a vehicle while under the influence of alcohol.

Accidents involving a driver being distracted by talking on a mobile phone have begun to be prosecuted as negligence similar to driving while intoxicated. At least 25 countries restrict or prohibit cell and other wireless technology: Israel, Japan, Portugal and Singapore all prohibit mobile phone use while driving. Australia, Brazil, Chile, Croatia, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iran, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, the Philippines, Romania, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the United Arab Emirates prohibit the use of hand-held cell phones while driving. Drivers in the Czech Republic and France may use cell phones but can be fined if they are involved in crashes while using such a device.

Restrictive legislation has been proposed in 40 states in the US, but only New York State, Connecticut, and New Jersey, and Washington, D.C. have passed laws regarding cell phone use and driving.

[edit]
Security concerns
Early mobile phones did not have much security designed in. Some problems with these models were "cloning", a variant of identity theft, and "scanning" whereby third parties in the local area could intercept and eavesdrop in on calls. Analogue phones could also be listened to on some radio scanners.

Although more recent digital systems (such as GSM) have attempted to address these fundamental issues, security problems continue to persist. Vulnerabilities (such as SMS spoofing) have been found in many current protocols that continue to allow the possibility of eavesdropping or cloning.

[edit]
Future prospects

Video phoneThere is a great deal of active research and development into mobile phone technology that is currently underway. Some of the improvements that are being worked on are:

Now that operators have upgraded their networks to 3G, many new entertainment and communications services are becoming available. With downlink speeds comparable to that of wireline DSL, mobile service can now offer capabilities such as streaming video sharing and music downloads. Services such as MobiTV or Juice Caster are just some examples of applications that leverage these new networks.
One difficulty in adapting mobile phones to new uses is form factor. For example, ebooks may well become a distinct device, because of conflicting form-factor requirements — ebooks require large screens, while phones need to be smaller. However, this may be solved using folding e-paper or built-in projectors.
One function that would be useful in phones is a translation function. Currently it is only available in stand-alone devices, such as Ectaco translators.
An important area of evolution relates to the Man Machine Interface. New solutions are being developed to create new MMI more easily and let manufacturers and operators experiment new concepts. Examples of companies that are currently developing this technology are Digital Airways with the Kaleido product, e-sim, mobile arsenal, and Qualcomm with UIOne for the BREW environment.
Mobile phones will include various speech technologies as they are being developed. Many phones already have rudimentary speech recognition in a form of voice dialing. However, to support more natural speech recognition and translation, a drastic improvement in the state of technology in these devices is required.
New technologies are being explored that will utilize the Extended Internet and enable mobile phones to treat a barcode as a URL tag. Phones equipped with barcode reader-enabled cameras will be able to snap photos of barcodes and direct the user to corresponding sites on the Internet. This technology can be extended to RFID tags, or even snapped pictures of company logos. Searches can also be personalized to local areas using a GPS system built in to cell phones. Examples of companies that are currently developing this technology are Neomedia (via Paperclick), Mobot and Scanbuy. Another approach (used by jumptag.com) is to map URLs to short text tags tailored for easy user entry on phone keypads.
Developments in miniaturised hard disks and flash drives to solve the storage space issue are already surfacing, therefore opening a window for phones to become portable music libraries and players similar to the iPod.
Developments in podcast software enables mobile phones to become podcast playback devices through existing channels like MMS Podcast, J2ME Podcast and AMR-NB Podcast.
The emergence of integration capabilities with other unlicensed access technologies such as a WiMAX and WLAN, as well as allowing handover between traditional operator networks supporting GSM, CDMA and UMTS to unlicensed mobile networks. The new standard (UMA) has been developed for this.
Further improvements in battery life will be required. Colour screens and additional functions put increasing demands on the device's power source, and battery developments may not proceed sufficiently fast to compensate. However, different display technologies, such as OLED displays, e-paper, or retinal displays, and smarter communication hardware (directional antennae, multi-mode, and peer-to-peer phones) may reduce power requirements, while new power technologies such as fuel cells may provide better energy capacity.
Speculative improvements in the future may be inspired by an English team led by James Auger and Jimmy Loizeau who in 2002 developed an implant designed to be inserted into a tooth during dental surgery. This device consists of a radio receiver and transducer, which transmits the sound via bone conduction through the jawbone into the ear. Sound is transmitted via radio waves from another device (presumably a mobile phone) and received by the implant. The implant is currently powered externally, given that no current power source is small enough to fit inside the tooth with it. In addition, the implant was only designed to receive signals, not transmit them. Directly tapping into the inner ear or the auditory nerve is already technologically feasible and will become practical as surgical methods advance.
New technology in Japan has combined the RFID chip principle into the handset and hooked it up to a network of readers and interfaces. The system, pioneered by NTT DoCoMo and SonyEricsson, is called Felica and there are around 10,000 convenience stores where one can now use a phone to pay for goods just by 'swiping' it over a flat reader. By charging up a phone with pre-paid cash credits, it can act as a sophisticated mobile-phone wallet. The technology is proving popular and there are now even vending machines that accept this form of payment.
The delivery of multimedia content including video to mobiles is beginning to become a reality with two main competing standards DMB - Digital Multimedia Broadcasting - and DVB-H - a handset version of the Digital Video Broadcasting standard. These methods avoid swamping the network by using traditional broadcasting.
Image scanning, as seen in existing research [3] [4]. With time, this may develop into full 3D texturing and modeling. It is unlikely that cell phones will have the processing power to construct models and textures. But it is likely that the bandwidth to communicate the video, and receive a processed model will exist.
There are several cell phones that can perform GPS positioning. In the future, GPS positioning may be coupled with accelerometer positioning, for covering underground or indoor positioning. This would likely lead to maps and help finding where you are going, and supports social efforts, such as locating friends or group members nearby, and identifying some strangers. The GPS technology already available in some phones, while coupled with the camera phone, may also allow users in the future to not only take a picture, but snap the exact location and angle at which the picture was taken.
[edit]
Terminology
[edit]
Mobile phone terms
Brick
A large, heavy, and usually obsolete wireless mobile phone, such as the Motorola International 3200. (also Cinderblock)
Cell phone, cellular phone, or cell
Term used currently in the United States and Canada (and in other countries as well during the 1980s) to refer to most mobile phones. It technically applies specifically to mobile phones which use a cellular network. In developing mobile phone technology, American electrical engineers saw the main technical problem as achieving a smooth handoff from one radio antenna to the next. After they gave the name "cell" to the zone covered by each antenna, it was a natural choice for them to apply the term "cellular" to both the technology and the phones that ran on it.
Handset
A term used by manufacturers to refer to a mobile phone. Also commonly used by industry insiders.
Hands-free car kit
Mobile phone accessory used to talk while keeping hands on the steering wheel.
Mobile phone
A term covering cellular phones, satellite phones, and any phones giving wide-ranging mobility, used in most English-speaking countries. In some English-speaking countries such as the UK and Australia, common usage refers specifically to cellular phones.
Ringtone
A song or tune that is played when a mobile phone is receiving a call.
Satellite phone
A mobile phone which communicates with a satellite rather than a land-based network.
3G phone
A mobile phone which uses a 3G network, with greater bandwidth allowing faster data downloads and face-to-face video calling.
Wireless phone
A term that generally refers to a Wi-Fi VoIP phone but is sometimes used by the mobile phone industry to describe mobile phones.
[edit]
Related systems which are not cell phones
Cordless phone (portable phone)
Cordless phones are standard telephones with radio handsets. Unlike mobile phones, cordless phones use private base stations that are not shared between subscribers. The base station is connected to a land-line.
Professional Mobile Radio
Professional mobile radio systems are very similar to cell phone systems and attempts have even been made to use TETRA, the international digital PMR standard, to implement public mobile networks, but normally PMR systems are sufficiently separate from the phone network to not really be considered phones but rather radios.
Radio phone
This is a term which covers radios which could connect into the telephone network. These phones may not be mobile; for example, they may require a mains power supply. Also, they may require the assistance of a human operator to set up a PSTN phone call.
[edit]
Terms in other countries
Further information: Mobile phone terms across the world, and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]]
[edit]
See also
Look up cell phone in Wiktionary, the free dictionaryWikimedia Commons has media related to:
Category:Mobile phones Mobile phone Portal
Cell phone generations: 0G, 1G, 2G, 2.5G, 2.75G, 3G and 4G.
Signal strength
History of mobile phones
Japanese cell phone culture
Camera phone
List of mobile network operators
Satellite: Iridium, Inmarsat
Location based service and GSM localization
GSM
GPRS (General Packet Radio Service)
CDMA2000
UMTS (Universal Mobile Telecommunications System)
A comparison of Mobile development platforms
Java ME
MIDlet
BREW (Binary Runtime Environment for Wireless)
Push to talk
iDEN (Integrated Digital Enhanced Network)
Over The Air Programmable
Mobile Payment Services Association
Fixed-line telephony
Telecommunication
Messages: SMS, MMS
Wire and Wireless Connectivity: Bluetooth, bluechat, bluedating, wifi, USB
Mobile power: battery, car lighter, solar energy
Marine and mobile radio telephony
Dropped call
Microbrowser
E-waste
Cellular repeater
moblog - mobile weblog
Wireless Village - cell phone instant messaging protocol
WAP (Wireless Application Protocol)
Smartphone
Music Porter X
Digital camera integration
GPS integration
[edit]
External link
How Cell Phones Work (HowStuffWorks)


Categories: Articles lacking sources Embedded systems Mobile phones Consumer electronics Mobile telephony

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A map is a simplified depiction of a space, a navigational aid which highlights relations between objects within that space. Most usually a map is a two-dimensional, geometrically accurate representation of a three-dimensional space. The science and art of map-making is cartography; see that page for further discussion of the history of maps and map-making.

Map-making dates back to the Stone Age and appears to predate written language by several millennia. One of the oldest surviving maps is painted on a wall of the Catal Huyuk settlement in south-central Anatolia (now Turkey); it dates from about 6200 BC. [Harvey 2000, p. 142].

While we tend to think of maps today as products of a rationalistic, scientific world-view, maps also have a mythic quality. Pre-modern maps, and mapping traditions outside the Western tradition, often merge geography with non-scientific cosmography, showing the relationship of the viewer to the universe. Medieval "T-O" maps, for example, show Jerusalem at the centre of the world, and in some cases related the "body" of the Earth to the body of Christ. By contrast, navigational (or "Portolan") charts of the Mediterranean from the same period are remarkably accurate. Even today, maps can be powerful rhetorical tools beyond their purely practical value, and this has been the source of much fruitful map criticism over the last twenty years, notably in the works of J.B. Harley, Mark Monmonier, and Denis Wood.

Because maps are abstract representations of the world, they are not neutral documents and must be carefully interpreted. It is, of course, this abstraction that makes them useful. Lewis Carroll made this point humorously in Sylvie and Bruno with his mention of a fictional map that had "the scale of a mile to the mile". A character notes some practical difficulties with this map and states that "we now use the country itself, as its own map, and I assure you it does nearly as well". This conceit is elaborated in a one-paragraph story by Jorge Luis Borges and Adolfo Bioy Casares, generally known in English as "On Exactitude in Science".

Road maps are perhaps the most widely used maps today, and form a subset of navigational maps, which also include aeronautical and nautical charts, railroad network maps, and hiking and bicycling maps. In terms of quantity, the largest number of drawn map sheets is probably made up by local surveys, carried out by municipalities, utilities, tax assessors, emergency services providers, and other local agencies. Many national surveying projects have been carried out by the military, such as the British Ordnance Survey (now a civilian government agency internationally renowned for its comprehensively detailed work).


Orientation of maps

The Hereford Mappa Mundi, about 1300, Hereford Cathedral, England. A classic "T-O" map with Jerusalem at centre, east toward the top, Europe the bottom left and Africa on the right.Conventionally, on most geometrically accurate maps text is upright when the map is oriented with the north up, hence north is identified with the top of a sheet.

Maps that don't put north at the top:

Polar maps
Dymaxion maps
Old maps of Edo show the Japanese imperial palace as the "top," but also at the centre, of the map. Labels on the map are oriented in such a way that you cannot read them properly unless you put the imperial palace above your head.
Medieval European T and O maps such as the Hereford Mappa Mundi were centred on Jerusalem, with East at the top.
Medieval Arab maps, such as the one by Muhammad al-Idrisi, which placed south at the top.
Some rectangular maps produced in Australia show the south pole at the top. To someone used to seeing the map the other way around, this map may appear to be "upside down". These are primarily intended as novelty and tourist maps.
Other modern maps put south on top, generally either out of a sense of playful confusion or to make a political statement about the North-South divide. See Reversed map.
If a person is located at an identifiable point within the area of such a map, then the map can be oriented in such a way that every point on the map lies in the same direction as the corresponding point in reality. The practice of navigating in this way is orienteering.

For a vertically positioned map representing a horizontal area true orientation is not possible, of course, but it is sometimes approximated by putting the forward direction up.

Occasionally a map is on a ceiling, correctly showing directions; in that case, looking up we have in clockwise direction backward, right, forward, and left. If the map is prepared on a table, to be attached to the ceiling, then on the table it is a mirror image of a normal map. If the map would be transparent, one could prepare a normal map, move it up without rotating it, and thus look at the "backside".

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Scale and accuracy
Many but not all maps are drawn to a scale, allowing the reader to infer the actual sizes of, and distances between, depicted objects. A larger scale shows more detail, thus requiring a larger map to show the same area. For example, maps designed for the hiker are often scaled at the ratio 1:24,000, meaning that 1 of any unit of measurement on the map corresponds to 24,000 of that same unit in reality; while maps designed for the motorist are often scaled at 1:250,000. Maps which use some quality other than physical area to determine relative size are called cartograms.

A famous example of a map without scale is the London Underground map, which best fulfils its purpose by being less physically accurate and more visually communicative to the hurried glance of the commuter. This is not a cartogram (since there is no consistent measure of distance) but a topological map that also depicts approximate bearings. The simple maps shown on some directional road signs are further examples of this kind.

In fact, most commercial navigational maps, such as road maps and town plans, sacrifice an amount of accuracy in scale to deliver a greater visual usefulness to its user, for example by exaggerating the width of roads. With the end-user similarly in mind, cartographers will censor the content of the space depicted by a map in order provide a useful tool to that user. For example, a road map may or may not show railroads, and if it does, it may show them less clearly than highways.

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World maps and projections
Main article: World map

Map of large underwater features. (1995, NOAA)Maps of the world or large areas are often either 'political' or 'physical'. The most important purpose of the political map is to show territorial borders; the purpose of the physical is to show features of geography such as mountains, soil type or land use. Geological maps show not only the physical surface, but characteristics of the underlying rock, fault lines, and subsurface structures.

Maps that depict the surface of the Earth also use a projection, a way of translating the three-dimensional real surface of the geoid to a two-dimensional picture. Perhaps the best-known world-map projection is the Mercator Projection, originally designed as a form of nautical chart.

Airplane pilots use aeronautical charts based on a Lambert conformal conic projection, in which a cone is laid over the section of the earth to be mapped. The cone intersects the sphere (the earth) at one or two parallels which are chosen as standard lines. This allows the pilots to plot a great-circle route approximation on a flat, two-dimensional chart.

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Electronic maps

A USGS digital raster graphic.From the last quarter of the 20th century, the indispensable tool of the cartographer has been the computer. Much of cartography, especially at the data-gathering survey level, has been subsumed by Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Even when GIS is not involved, most cartographers now use a variety of computer graphics programs to generate new maps. Interactive, computerised maps are commercially available, allowing users to zoom in or zoom out (respectively meaning to increase or decrease the scale), sometimes by replacing one map with another of different scale, centred where possible on the same point. In-car satellite navigation systems are computerised maps with route-planning and advice facilities which monitor by satellite the position of the user.

From the computer scientist's standpoint, zooming in entails one or a combination of:

replacing the map by a more detailed one
enlarging the same map without enlarging the pixels, hence show more detail
enlarging the same map with the pixels enlarged (replaced by rectangles of pixels); no additional detail is shown, but, depending on the quality of one's vision, possibly more detail can be seen; if a computer display does not show adjacent pixels really separate, but overlapping instead (this does not apply for an LCD, but may apply for a cathode ray tube), then replacing a pixel by a rectangle of pixels does show more detail. A variation of this method is that interpolation is performed.
For example:

Typically (2) applies to a Portable Document Format (PDF) file. The increase in detail is, of course, limited to the information contained in the file: enlargement of a curve may eventually result in a series of standard geometric figures such as straight lines or arcs of circles.
(2) may apply to text and (3) to the outline of a map feature such as a forest or building.
(1) may apply to the text (displaying labels for more features), while (2) applies to the rest of the image. Text is not necessarily enlarged when zooming in. Similarly, a road represented by a double line may or may not become wider when one zooms in.
The map may also have layers which are partly raster graphics and partly vector graphics. For a single raster graphics image (2) applies until the pixels in the image file correspond to the pixels of the display, thereafter (3) applies.
The word "map" has also been used to describe places within video games, such as SOCOM II: U.S. Navy SEALs and Counter-Strike, that players choose to compete on, as a synonym for level.

See also Webpage (Graphics), PDF (Layers), Mapquest, Google Maps, Google Earth or Yahoo! Maps.

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References
David Buisseret, ed., Monarchs, Ministers and Maps: The Emergence of Cartography as a Tool of Government in Early Modern Europe. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992, [ISBN 0226079872]
Miles Harvey, The Island of Lost Maps: A True Story of Cartographic Crime. New York : Random House, 2000. [ISBN 0767908260, cited above; also ISBN 0375501517]
Mark Monmonier, How to Lie with Maps, [ISBN 0226534219]
O'Connor, J.J. and E.F. Robertson, The History of Cartography. Scotland : St. Andrews University, 2002. http://www-gap.dcs.st-and.ac....~history/HistTopics/Carto graphy.html
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See also
General:

Cartography · Geography · Atlas

Map design and types:

Map design · World map · Topographic map · Geologic map · Dymaxion map · Roadmap · Navigation map · Cartogram · Plat · Floor plan · Planform

Modern maps:

Maps of the UK and Ireland · Maps of the United States · Google Maps · Japanese map symbols

Map history:

George Bradshaw, including maps of the British railway network, first published in 1839
Sanborn Maps - detailed American fire insurance maps
Ordnance Survey
Other:

Template_talk:Mapquest - Linking Mapquest maps to articles.
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External links
Wikimedia Commons has media related to:
maps[edit]
Map discussion and history
Geography and Maps, an Illustrated Guide, by the staff of the US Library of Congress.
Antique Maps by Carl Moreland and David Bannister - complete text of the book
Map Room, a weblog about maps, with a links Directory
The Upsidedown Map Page Pictures and info about maps which are oriented without North at the top
Example of map legends (Cito-Plan city maps)
Wikipedia:Maps, use of maps on Wikipedia
slashgeo.org - Community-driven and ad-free website for news and discussions about Maps and Geospatial technologies
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Map link sites
Perry-Castañeda Library, Maps on Other Web Sites
British Library links for historic maps and interactive mapping, both their own collections and other sites
Odden's Bookmarks, The fascinating world of maps and mapping, a huge database of maps and articles; searchable, or use the categories list. Modern and historical maps and information.
University of Iowa Links, many map-related links
Online Map Catalogs in North America and Europe
Geographical data resources online
Primary sources for the research scholar, links to websites for archives of research material.
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Modern maps and atlases online
World:

UNEP/GRID-Arendal Maps and Graphics Library, web-site from the UN Environment Programme with hundreds of examples of thematic maps
The World Factbook and Reference Maps (also see Wikipedia article The World Factbook).
The maps but with a faster, cleaner directory at the University of Texas; also has prior years' maps.
United Nations Cartographic Section, mostly in PDF
MapMachine (National Geographic/ESRI) maps; also the Maps page - more emphasis on the physical world
Google Earth, interactive map of the world
Holt, Rinehart and Winston, maps and basic statistics
Infoplease, maps, almanac and encyclopedia
Perry-Castañeda Library Map Collection at the University of Texas at Austin, a large collection of maps online, frequently updated
Some also at [1] and [2]; thumbnails.
National:

National Atlas of the United States
National Map, United States Geological Survey
TerraServer-USA and TopoZone host USGS topographic maps (and aerial photos on TerraServer-USA); Maptech hosts historical USGS topos in the northeast United States.
Atlas of Canada
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Antique and historical maps online
Historical map web sites list, Perry-Castañeda Library, University of Texas
Map history and collections introductory page and list of maps on the web organized by geographical region
David Rumsey map collection, 12,600 maps online
Online map collections at the Library of Congress
Historical Maps from the Hargrett Library Collection (University of Georgia) - browse over 1000 maps from as early as 1544. DjVu format; requires free plugin or JAVA
Historical Maps from the Portal to Texas History
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Online map creation tools
Online Map Creation: Webinterface to GMT mapping package; new version at Planiglobe Beta
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Online mapping engines and route planners
Google Maps: Google Maps US · Google Maps UK
Yahoo maps:
Yahoo Maps: on US, Canada, Germany, France, Spain, Italy
Yahoo UK
Yahoo Germany: on France, UK, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Austria, Switzerland, Benelux
MapQuest [3]: on US, Canada and Western Europe more detailed than the rest of the world - the list of scales to select from is not location-dependent: for parts of the world several zoom level links lead to an image with just the message "No Data Available".
Maps at MSN
World atlas (the whole world on the same scale: 4 km = 49 pixels, 82 m / pixel)
North America (Canada, US, Mexico), US to street level, Mexico only some parts to street level (for the other parts street level scale is available, but it shows blank maps with e.g. only one dot to represent a village)
Western Europe to street level, see map of area covered
India
[4] - Interactive map of India (find locations and get driving directions)
Australia
Brazil
Multimap world atlas: on UK, US, Canada, Australia and Western Europe more detailed than the rest of the world; the list of scales to select from is location-dependent - also provides geographic coordinates of a location selected from a map.
US Map: ABMap - Interactive World Map and detailed united states street map
Routenplaner24, street maps and route planner in Germany
Street Maps in Switzerland, Austria and Germany
FreeRoute (Germany)
Free Maps and Route Planner on Europe (Germany)
Free Maps and Route Planner for India
krak.dk, interactive map of Denmark
Hong Kong Maps CentaMap

Categories: Cartography | Maps | Hiking equipment

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In principle, a postal service can be private or official. Restrictions are generally placed on private systems by governments. Since the 19th century, national postal systems have generally been established as government monopolies with a fee on the article prepaid, often in the form of adhesive stamps. Government monopolies generally do not extend to delivery of parcels or to courier services, which provide express delivery.

Postal systems often have functions other than sending letters. In some countries, the postal system also has some authority over telephone and telegraph systems. In others, postal systems allow for savings accounts and handling applications for passports.


Early postal systems

Japanese PostCommunication via written documents which an intermediary carries from one person or place to another almost certainly dates back nearly to the invention of writing. The development of a formal postal system occurred much later, however. The first documented use of an organized courier service for the diffusion of written documents is in Egypt, where Pharaohs used couriers for the diffusion of their decrees in the territory of the State (2400 BC). This practice almost certainly has roots in the much older practice of oral messaging and may have been built on a pre-existing infrastructure.

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Persia
The first credible claim for the development of a real postal system comes from Persia, but the point of invention remains in question. The best documented claim (Xenophon) attributes the invention to the Persian King Cyrus the Great (550 BC), while other writers credit his successor Darius I of Persia (521 BC) Other sources claim much earlier dates for an Assyrian postal system, with credit given to Hammurabi (1700 BC) and Sargon II (722 BC). Mail may not have been the primary mission of this postal service, however. The role of the system as an intelligence gathering apparatus is well documented, and the service was (later) called angariae, a term that in time turned to indicate a tax system. The Old Testament (Esther, VIII) makes mention of this system: Ahasuerus, king of Medes, used couriers for communicating his decisions. The Persian system worked on stations, where the message carrier would ride till the next post, where upon he would swap his horse with a fresh one, for maximum performance and delivery speed.

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China
The next credible claimant to the title of first postal system is China. Claims concerning the origins of this mail system also conflict somewhat, but it is clear that an organized postal infrastructure is put in place during Qin Dynasty (221 BC–207 BC) and that was substantially expanded during the subsequent Han Dynasty. The origins of a Chinese mail system may go back to the Zhou Dynasty (1122 BC–256 BC), when Confucius (551 BC–479 BC) says "news of deeds travels faster than the mail." It may also build on a pre-existing messaging infrastructure started by the Shang Dynasty. Whatever its point of origin, the Chinese Postal Service has clear title to the world's oldest continuously operating mail system. Today's Chinese mail system is continuous with one that was probably formalized under the Qin Dynasty.

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Rome
The first well documented postal service is that of Rome. Organized at the time of Augustus Caesar (62 BC–AD 14), it may also be the first true mail service. The service was called cursus publicus, and was provided with light carriages called rhedæ with fast horses; additionally there was another, slower, service equipped with two-wheels carts (birolæ) pulled by oxen. This service was reserved to the government's correspondence; another service for citizens was later added.

By the name of the stations in which mail was distributed and messengers' routes crossed, derives the Latin name of mail, Posta (originally posata or pausata = place of rest) because in these stations messengers used to rest during their voyages. The English term "mail" is instead supposed coming from the Teutonic name for the bag used by messengers.

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Other systems
Another important postal service was created in the Islamic world by the caliph Mu'awiyya; the service was called barid, by the name of the towers that were built in order to protect the roads by which couriers travelled.

Well before the Middle Ages and during them, homing pigeons were used, taking advantage of a singular quality of this bird, which when taken far from its nest is able to find his way home due to a particularly developed sense of orientation. Messages were then tied around the legs of the pigeon, which was freed and could reach his original nest.

Mail has been transported by quite a few other methods throughout history, including dogsled, balloon, rocket, mule, pneumatic tubes and even submarine.

Charlemagne extended to the whole territory of his empire the system used by Franks in northern Gaul, and connected this service with the service of missi dominici.

Many religious orders had a private mail service, notably Cistercians' one connected more than 6,000 abbeys, monasteries and churches. The best organisation however was created by Teutonic Knights. The newly instituted universities too had their private services, starting from Bologna (1158).

Popular illiteracy was accommodated through the service of scribes. Illiterates who needed to communicate dictated their messages to a scribe, another profession now quite generally disappeared.

In 1505, Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I established a postal system in the Empire, appointing Franz von Thurn und Taxis to run it. Von Thurn und Taxis's family, then known as Tassis, had operated postal services between Italian city states from 1290 onwards. Following the abolition of the Empire in 1806 the Thurn und Taxis postal system continued as a private organisation, continuing to exist into the postage stamp era before finally being absorbed into the postal system of the new German Empire after 1871.

Study of the mails is also known as postal history.

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Modern mail
Modern mail is usually organised by national services (that in recent times are increasingly being replaced by privately owned companies), reciprocally interconnected by international regulations (some of which still in their original 18th century form, many others of which are set out by the Universal Postal Union), organisations and agreements.

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Organization

In the United States, private companies such as FedEx and UPS compete with the United States Postal Service, particularly in package delivery. Different mailboxes are also provided for local and express service.The world-wide postal system comprising the individual national postal systems of the world's self-governing states is co-ordinated by the Universal Postal Union, which among other things sets international postage rates, defines standards for postage stamps and operates the system of International Reply Coupons.

In many countries a system of codes has been created (they are called ZIP Codes in the United States and postal codes in most other countries), in order to facilitate the automation of operations. This also includes placing additional marks on the address portion of the letter or mailed object, called "bar coding." Bar coding of mail for delivery is usually expressed either by a series of vertical bars, usually called POSTNET coding, or a block of dots as a two-dimensional barcode. The "block of dots" method allows for the encoding of proof of payment of postage, exact routing for delivery, and other features.


A post box in India.The ordinary mail service was improved in the 20th century with the use of planes for a quicker delivery (air mail). The first scheduled airmail service took place between the London suburbs of Hendon and Windsor on 9 September 1911. Some methods of airmail proved ineffective, however, including the United States Postal Service's experiment with rocket mail.

Receipts services were made available in order to grant the sender a confirmation of effective delivery.

Mail going to naval vessels is known as the Fleet Post Office.

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Payment
Worldwide the most common method of prepaying postage is by buying an adhesive postage stamp to be stuck to the envelope before mailing; a much less common method is to use a postage-prepaid envelope. Franking is a method of creating postage-prepaid envelopes under licence using a special machine. They are used by companies with large mail programs such as banks and direct mail companies.

In 1998, the U.S. Postal Service authorised the first tests of a secure system of sending digital franks via the Internet to be printed out on a PC printer, obviating the necessity to license a dedicated franking machine and allowing companies with smaller mail programs to make use of the option. The service provided by the U.S. Postal Service in 2003 allows the franks to be printed out on special adhesive-backed labels. In 2004 the Royal Mail in the United Kingdom introduced its SmartStamp Internet-based system, allowing printing on ordinary adhesive labels or envelopes. Similar systems are being considered by postal administrations right around the world.


Canada Post truckWhen the pre-paid envelope or package is accepted into the mail by an agent of the postal service, the agent usually indicates by means of a cancellation that it is no longer valid for pre-payment of postage. The exceptions are when the agent forgets or neglects to cancel the mailpiece, or for stamps that are pre-cancelled and thus do not require cancellation.

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Rules and etiquette
Mail is quite generally protected by the secret of correspondence (secretus epistulae), meaning that no letter or other document can be read by anyone other than the receiver (under U.S. law, this only applies to First Class mail). This right is usually guaranteed by most national constitutions, such as the Mexican Constitution, and is alluded to in the European Convention of Human Rights.[1] Usually, special procedures are required in case correspondence has to be, openly or discreetly, controlled by police. The operations of control of private citizens' mail is called censorship and concerns social, political and legal aspects of civil rights. While in most cases this censorship is exceptional, military censorship of mail, particularly of soldiers at the front, is routine and almost universally applied. In the United Kingdom, once the sender places a letter in a post box or hands over a parcel to the Post Office to be delivered, they belong to, and are protected by The Crown, until handed over to the recipient.

The use of mail is subject to common rules and a particular etiquette. After the discovery of new communicating systems and vehicles, mail, though retaining a certain charm, lost favour to more quickly connecting systems such as the telephone, and remained as a vehicle for commercial or formal documents. It is however still widely in use in more cultivated classes for personal communication; in particular, wedding invitations are customarily sent by mail.

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Rise of electronic correspondence
Since the advent of e-mail, which is usually faster, the postal system has come to be referred to in Internet slang by the retronym "snail mail". Occasionally, the term "white mail" or "the PaperNet" has also been used as a neutral term for postal mail.

In modern times, mainly in the 20th century, mail has found an evolution in vehicles using newer technologies to deliver the documents, especially through the telephone network; these new vehicles include telegram, telex, facsimile (fax), e-mail, short message service (SMS). There have been methods which have combined mail and some of these newer methods, such as INTELPOST, which combined facsimile transmission with overnight delivery. These vehicles commonly use a mechanical or electro-mechanical standardised writing (typing), that on the one hand makes for more efficient communication, while on the other hand makes impossible characteristics and practices that traditionally were in conventional mail, such as calligraphy.

This epoch is undoubtedly mainly dominated by mechanical writing, with a general use of no more of half a dozen standard typographic fonts from standard keyboards. However, the increased use of typewritten or computer-printed letters for personal communication and the advent of e-mail, has sparked renewed interest in calligraphy, as a letter has become more of a "special event." Long before e-mail and computer-printed letters, however, decorated envelopes, rubber stamps and artistamps formed part of the medium of mail art.

In the 2000s with the advent of eBay and other online auction sites and online stores, postal services in industrialized nations have seen a major shift to item shipping. This has been seen as a relief to the system due to the lowered level of paper mail due to the accessibility of e-mail.

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Collecting
Postage stamps are also object of a particular form of collecting, and in some cases, when demand greatly exceeds supply, their commercial value on this specific market may become enormously greater than face value, even after use. For some postal services the sale of stamps to collectors who will never use them is a significant source of revenue for example postage stamps from Tokelau, South Georgia & South Sandwich Islands, Tristan da Cunha, Niuafo´ou and many others. Stamp collecting is commonly known as philately, although strictly the latter term refers to the study of stamps.

Another form of collecting regards postcards, a document written on a single robust sheet of paper, usually decorated with photographic pictures or artistic drawings on one of the sides, and short messages on a small part of the other side, that also contained the space for the address. In strict philatelic usage, the postcard is to be distinguished from the postal card, which has a pre-printed postage on the card. The fact that this communication is visible by other than the receiver often causes the messages to be written in jargon.

Letters are often studied as an example of literature, and also in biography in the case of a famous person. A portion of the New Testament of the Bible is composed of the Apostle Paul's epistles to Christian congregations in various parts of the Roman Empire. See below for a list of famous letters.

A style of writing, called epistolary, tells a fictional story in the form of the correspondence between two or more characters.

A make-shift mail method after stranding on a deserted island is a message in a bottle.

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Deregulation
see also: New Zealand Post
Several countries, including Sweden (in 1991), New Zealand (1998 and 2003) and Argentina have opened up the postal services market to new entrants. In the case of New Zealand Post Limited, this included (from 2003) its right to be the sole New Zealand postal administration member of the Universal Postal Union, thus the ending of its monopoly on stamps bearing the name New Zealand.

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Types of mail

Woman putting letter in a mailbox, United States, 1909[edit]
Letters
Letter-sized mail comprises the bulk of the contents sent through most postal services. These are usually documents printed on A4 (210×297 mm), Letter-sized (8.5×11 inches), or smaller paper and placed in envelopes.

While many things are sent through the mail, interpersonal letters are often thought of first in reference to postal systems. Handwritten correspondence, while once a major means of communications between distant people, is now used less frequently due to the advent of more immediate means of communication, such as the telephone or e-mail. Traditional letters, however, are often considered to harken back to a "simpler time" and are still used when someone wishes to be deliberate and thoughtful about his or her communication.

Bills and invoices are often sent through the mail, like regular billing correspondence from utility companies and other service providers. These letters often contain a self-addressed, envelope that allows the receiver to remit payment back to the company easily. While still very common, many people now opt to use online bill payment services, which eliminate the need to receive bills through the mail.

Bulk mail, often called junk mail, are commercial solicitations sent by advertisers. The senders of these messages sometimes purchase lists of addresses (which are sometimes targeted towards certain demographics) and then send letters advertising their product or service to all recipients. Other times, commercial solicitations are sent by local companies advertising local products, like a restaurant delivery service advertising to their delivery area or a retail store sending their weekly advertising circular to a general area. Bulk mail is also often sent to companies' existing subscriber bases, advertising new products or services.

Many other things are also sent as letters through postal services, like wedding invitations and bank statements.

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Repositionable Notes
The United States Postal Service has recently permitted "repositionable notes" to be attached to the outside of envelopes.[2]

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Postal cards and postcards
Postal cards and postcards are small message cards which are sent by mail unenveloped; the distinction often, though not invariably and reliably, drawn between them is that "postal cards" are issued by the postal authority or entity with the "postal indica" (or "stamp") preprinted on them, while postcards are privately issued and require affixing an adhesive stamp (though there have been some cases of a postal authority's issuing non-stamped postcards). Postcards are often printed today to promote tourism, with pictures of resorts, tourist attractions or humorous messages on the front and allowing for a short message from the sender to be written on the back. The postage required for postcards is generally less than postage required for standard letters, although the United States Postal Service has imposed a surcharge for the purchase of postal cards, over and above the required postage.

Postcards are also used by magazines for new subscriptions. Inside many magazines are postage-paid subscription cards that a reader can fill out and mail back to the publishing company to be billed for a subscription to the magazine. In this fashion, magazines also use postcards for other purposes, including reader surveys, contests or information requests.

Postcards are sometimes sent by charities to their members with a message to be signed and sent to a politician (e.g. to promote fair trade or third world debt cancellation).


This antique "letter-box" style U.S. mailbox is both on display and in use at the Smithsonian Institution Building.[edit]
Other
Larger envelopes are also sent through the mail. These are often made of sturdier material than standard envelopes and are often used by businesses to transport documents that are not to be folded or damaged, such as legal documents and contracts. Due to their size, larger envelopes are sometimes charged additional postage.

Packages are often sent through some postal services, usually requiring additional postage than an average letter or postcard. Many postal services have limits on what can and cannot be sent inside packages, usually placing limits or bans on perishable, hazardous or flammable materials. Additionally, because of terrorism concerns, the U.S. Postal Service subjects their packages to various security tests, often scanning or x-raying packages for materials that might be found in mail bombs.

Magazine subscriptions are also sent through postal services. Many magazines are simply placed in the mail normally (but in the U.S., they are printed with a special bar code that acts as pre-paid postage - see POSTNET) but many are now shipped in shrinkwrap to protect the loose contents of the magazine.

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See also
post office, postal code, ZIP Code
courier, mail carrier, express mail
electronic mail
fan mail, hate mail, love letter
irradiated mail
Railway post office (US), Travelling Post Office (UK): Two types of railway car used for sorting mail aboard a train en route
[edit]
Famous letters
Rainer Maria Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet
Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Letter from Birmingham Jail
The Pauline epistles
Samantha Smith's letter to Yuri Andropov
Virginia O'Hanlon's letter to the New York Sun, replied to in a famous editorial
[edit]
List of national postal services

A German old-style-replica Postbriefkasten in use in DresdenAn Post (Ireland)
Australia Post (Australia)
Canada Post (Canada)
China Post, 中国邮政 (People's Republic of China)
Chunghwa Post, 中�郵政 (Republic of China)
Correos (Spain)
Correios (Brazil)
CTT (Portugal)
Deutsche Post (Germany)
De Post, La Poste, Die Post or The Post (Belgium)
Hongkong Post (Hong Kong)
Indian Postal Service (India)
Indonesian Post - Pos Indonesia (Indonesia)
Israeli Postal Authority, רשות הדו�ר (Israel)
Japan Post (Japan)
Jersey Post, (Jersey)
La Poste (France)
Magyar Posta (Hungary)
New Zealand Post (New Zealand)
PhilPost-Philippine Postal Corporation (Philippines)
Post Danmark (Denmark)
Poste Italiane (Italy)
Posten (Sweden) (Sweden)
PoÅŸta Română (Romania)
Postverk Føroya (Faroe Islands)
Royal Mail (United Kingdom)
Sociedad Estatal Correos y Telégrafos (Spain)
Swiss Post (Switzerland)
TPG Post, formerly PTT (The Netherlands)
United States Postal Service (USA)
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External links
Potts, Albert, "US19578 (First U.S. street mailbox patent)". US patent office. 1858
GRC Database Information: links to worldwide postal services websites
International Pen Friends
Royal Engineers Museum - British Army Postal Services History

Category: Postal system

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For other meanings, see the disambiguation pages for U.S., USA, or United States.
The United States of America is a federal republic situated primarily in North America. It is bordered on the north by Canada and to the south by Mexico. It comprises 50 states and one federal district, and has several territories with differing degrees of affiliation. It is also referred to, with varying formality, as the United States, America[1], the U.S., the U.S.A., the U.S. of A., the States, or (poetically) Columbia.

Since the twentieth century, following World War I, the United States has emerged as the dominant global influence in economic, political, military, cultural and technological affairs. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, it is today's sole global superpower.

The country celebrates its founding date as July 4, 1776, when the Second Continental Congress—representi ng thirteen British colonies—adopted the Declaration of Independence that rejected British authority in favor of self-determination. The structure of the government was profoundly changed on March 4, 1789, when the states replaced the Articles of Confederation with the United States Constitution.

History
U.S. History
Timeline:
Colonial America
1776 to 1789
1789 to 1849
1849 to 1865
1865 to 1918
1918 to 1945
1945 to 1964
1964 to 1980
1980 to 1988
1988 to present
Topics:
Diplomatic history
Continental expansion
Overseas expansion
Military history
Industrial history
Economic history
Cultural history
History of the South

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Main article: History of the United States
[edit]
Prehistory
American history began with the migration of people from Asia across the Bering land bridge some time prior to 12,000 years ago, possibly following large animals that they hunted into the Americas. These Native Americans left evidence of their presence in petroglyphs, burial mounds, and other artifacts. It is estimated that 2–9 million people lived in the territory now occupied by the U.S. before that population was diminished by European contact and the foreign diseases it brought (although both the number of Native Americans originally on the continent and the number who did not survive European immigration are the subject of continued research and thus are open to debate). Some advanced societies were the Anasazi of the southwest, who inhabited Chaco Canyon (and built sandstone buildings with up to 5 floors), and the Woodland Indians, who built Cahokia, a city with a population of 40,000 at its peak in AD 1200, located near present-day St. Louis, Missouri.

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European settlement
External visitors including the Norse had arrived before, but it was not until after the voyages of Christopher Columbus in late 1400s and early 1500s that European nations began to explore the land in earnest and settle there permanently.

During the 1500s and 1600s, the Spanish settled parts of the present-day Southwest and Florida. The first successful English settlement was at Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607. Within the next two decades, several Dutch settlements, including New Amsterdam (the predecessor to New York City), were established in what are now the states of New York and New Jersey. In 1637, Sweden established a colony at Fort Christina (in what is now Delaware), but lost the settlement to the Dutch in 1655.

This was followed by extensive British settlement of the east coast. The British colonists remained relatively undisturbed by their home country until after the French and Indian War when the Kingdom of Great Britain and its North American Colonies fought against France and its North American Colonies. The war resulted in France ceding Canada and the Great Lakes region to Britain, and Spain gaining Louisiana in compensation for its loss of Florida to Britain.

Later that year, the British government under George III issued the Royal Proclamation of 1763 that placed a boundary upon the westward expansion of the British North American colonies. The Proclamation's goal was to force colonists to negotiate with the Native Americans for the lawful purchase of the land and, therefore, to reduce the costly frontier warfare that had erupted over land conflicts.

A tax was imposed on the colonists as it was becoming increasingly difficult for the crown to pay for its military excursions and the defense of the American colonies from native uprisings. The colonists widely resented the taxes as they were denied representation in the British Parliament. Tensions between Britain and the colonists increased, and the thirteen colonies eventually rebelled against British rule.

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Nationhood

First President of the United States under the Constitution, George Washington (1789-1797).In 1775, the American Revolutionary War against colonial rule by Britain began. In 1776, the 13 colonies declared their independence from Great Britain and formed the United States. Before the ratification of a national government, the United States existed as an informal alliance of independent individual colonies with their own laws and sovereignty, while the Second Continental Congress was given the nominal authority by the colonies to make decisions regarding the formation and founding of the Continental Army but not to levy taxes or make federal law.

The first united national political structure was a confederation proposed in 1777, and ratified in 1781 as the Articles of Confederation, making the United States the world's first constitutional federal republic. After long debate, this was supplanted in 1789 by the Constitution, which formed a more centralized federal government. For the original 13 states, the date when they accepted the Constitution is often considered as their date of admission to the union.

[edit]
Civil War

American westward expansion is idealized in Emanuel Leutze's famous song Westward the Course of Empire Takes its Way (1861). The title of the painting, from a 1726 poem by Bishop Berkeley, was a phrase often quoted in the era of Manifest Destiny, expressing a widely held belief that civilization had steadily moved westward throughout history. (more)Main article: American Civil War
By the mid-19th century, a major division over the issue of states' rights, role of the federal government, and the expansion of slavery came to a head.

The Northern states had become opposed to slavery, while the Southern states saw it as necessary for the continued success of agriculture, especially the cotton industry, and wanted it expanded to newer territories in the West. Several federal laws were passed in an attempt to settle the dispute, including the Missouri Compromise and the Compromise of 1850.

The dispute reached a crisis on December 20, 1860, when South Carolina became the first state to secede from the Union. Six other southern states followed (Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas)1, forming the Confederate States of America and leading to the Civil War. Soon after the war began, four more southern states seceded (Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina), and two states (Kentucky and Missouri) had both Union and Confederate governments at different points throughout the war. Though these states were never under consistent Confederate control, they were still counted as Confederate States (seen most prominently on the flag of Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia).

During the war (after the Battle of Antietam), President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, mandating the freedom of slaves located in the states in rebellion. There were some exceptions. Slaves owned by Northerners in the State of Louisiana were considered exempt. Full emancipation did not take place until after the end of the war in 1865, when the Thirteenth Amendment took effect. The Civil War effectively ended the question of a state's right to secede, and is widely accepted as a major turning point after which the federal government became more powerful than state governments.

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Expansion

National Atlas map (circa 2005) depicting territorial acquisitions and dates of statehood.During the 19th century, many new states were added to the union as the nation expanded across the continent. Manifest Destiny was a philosophy that encouraged westward expansion in the United States: as the population of the Eastern states grew and as a steady increase of immigrants entered the country, settlers moved steadily westward across North America.

In the process, the U.S. displaced most Native American nations. This displacement of Native Americans continues to be a matter of contention in the U.S., with many nations attempting to assert their original claims to various lands, citing the Indian relocation acts of 1830. In some areas, Native American populations had been reduced by foreign diseases contracted through contact with European settlers, and U.S. settlers acquired those emptied lands.

Further information: United States territorial acquisitions, and U.S. colonization outside North America, and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]]
During this period, the nation also became an industrial power and a center for innovation and technological development.

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Geography and climate
[edit]
Geography

A satellite composite image of the contiguous United States. Deciduous vegetation and grasslands prevail in the east, transitioning to prairies, boreal forests, and the Rockies in the west, and deserts in the southwest. In the northeast, the coasts of the Great Lakes and Atlantic seaboard host much of the country's population.
Mount McKinley, Alaska, the highest point in North America at 20,320 ft (6,194 m)
The Grand Canyon from Moran Point. The Grand Canyon is among the most famous locations in the country.Main article: Geography of the United States
The United States shares land borders with Canada (to the north) and Mexico (to the south), and territorial water boundaries with Canada, Russia, the Bahamas, and numerous smaller nations. It is otherwise bounded by the Pacific Ocean on the west, the Atlantic Ocean on the east, and the Gulf of Mexico to the southeast. Alaska borders the Pacific Ocean to the south, the Bering Strait to the west, and the Arctic Ocean to the north, while Hawaii lies far to the southwest of the mainland in the Pacific Ocean.

Forty-eight of the states are in the single region between Canada and Mexico; this group is referred to, with varying precision and formality, as the continental or contiguous United States, sometimes abbreviated CONUS, and as the Lower 48. Alaska, which is not included in the term contiguous United States, is at the northwestern end of North America, separated from the Lower 48 by Canada. The state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the Pacific Ocean. The capital city, Washington, District of Columbia, is a federal district located on land donated by the state of Maryland. (Virginia had also donated land, but it was returned in 1847.) The United States also has overseas territories with varying levels of independence and organization.

In total area (which includes inland water and land), only Russia and Canada are larger than the United States; if inland water is excluded, China ranks second, the U.S. ranks third, and Canada ranks fourth. The United States's total area is 3,718,711 square miles (9,631,418 km²), of which land makes up 3,537,438 square miles (9,161,923 km²) and water makes up 181,273 square miles (469,495 km²).

The United States's landscape is one of the most varied among those of the world's nations. The East consists largely of rolling hills and temperate forests. The Appalachian Mountains form a line of low mountains in the Eastern U.S. The five Great Lakes are located in the north-central portion of the country, four of them forming part of the border with Canada. The Southeast largely contains subtropical forests and mangrove, especially in Florida. West of the Appalachians, the Ohio and Tennessee Valleys and the Midwest consist largely of rolling hills and productive farmland, stretching south to the Gulf Coast.

Stretching west from the Midwest are the Great Plains. A large portion of the country's agricultural products are grown in this region. The region consists mostly of large, heavily cultivated and very flat grassland. The Great Plains come to an abrupt end at the Rocky Mountains. The Rocky Mountains form a large portion of the Western U.S., entering from Canada and stretching nearly to Mexico. The Rocky Mountains generally contain fairly mild slopes and low peaks compared to many of the other great mountain ranges, with a few exceptions (such as the Teton Mountains in Wyoming and the Sawatch Range in Colorado). In addition, instead of being one generally continuous and solid mountain range, it is broken up into a number of smaller, intermittent mountain ranges, forming a large series of basins and valleys.

West of the Rocky Mountains lies the Intermontane Plateaus (also known as the Intermountain West), a large, arid desert lying between the Rockies and the Cascades and Sierra Nevada ranges. The large southern portion, known as the Great Basin, consists of salt flats, drainage basins, and many small north-south mountain ranges. The Southwest is predominantly a low-lying desert region. A portion known as the Colorado Plateau, centered around the Four Corners region, is considered to have some of the most spectacular scenery in the world. It is accentuated in such national parks as Grand Canyon, Arches, and Bryce Canyon, among others.

The Intermontane Plateaus come to an end at the Cascade Range and the Sierra Nevada. The Cascades consist of largely intermittent, volcanic mountains rising prominently from the surrounding landscape. The Sierra Nevada, further south, is a high, rugged, and dense mountain range. It contains the highest point in the contiguous 48 states, Mount Whitney (14,505 ft; 4,421 m). These areas contain some spectacular scenery as well, as evidenced by such national parks as Yosemite and Mount Rainier. West of the Cascades and Sierra Nevada is a series of valleys, such as the Central Valley in California and the Willamette Valley in Oregon. Along the coast is a series of low mountain ranges known as the Pacific Coast Ranges. Much of the Pacific Northwest coast is inhabited by some of the densest vegetation outside of the Tropics, and also the tallest trees in the world (the Redwoods).

Alaska contains some of the most dramatic and untapped scenery in the country. Tall, prominent mountain ranges rise up sharply from broad, flat tundra plains. On the islands off the south and southwest coast are many volcanoes. Hawaii, far to the south of Alaska in the Pacific Ocean, is a chain of tropical, volcanic islands, popular as a tourist destination for many from East Asia and the mainland United States.

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Climate

Deep snow during the Blizzard of 2006 Nor'easter in Brooklyn, New York City.
The U.S. State of Hawaii has a year-round tropical climate, and is known for its many beaches, such as this one on O'ahu.Due to its large size and wide range of geographic features, the United States contains just about every climate. Its comparatively generous climate partially contributed to the country's rise as a world power, with infrequent severe drought in the major agricultural regions, a general lack of widespread flooding, and a mainly temperate climate that receives adequate precipitation.

The main influence on U.S. weather is the polar jet stream, which brings in large low pressure systems from the northern Pacific Ocean. The Cascade Range, Sierra Nevada, and Rocky Mountains pick up most of the moisture from these systems as they move eastward. Greatly diminished by the time they reach the High Plains, much of the moisture has been sapped from the orographic effect as it is forced over several mountain ranges. However, once it moves over the Great Plains, uninterrupted flat land allows it to reorganize and can lead to major clashes of air masses. In addition, moisture from the Gulf of Mexico is often drawn northward. When combined with a powerful jet stream, this can lead to violent thunderstorms, especially during spring and summer. Sometimes during late winter and spring these storms can combine with another low pressure system as they move up the East Coast and into the Atlantic Ocean, where they intensify rapidly. These storms are known as Nor'easters and often bring widespread, heavy snowfall to the Mid-Atlantic and New England. The uninterrupted flat grasslands of the Great Plains also leads to some of the most extreme climate swings in the world. Temperatures can rise or drop rapidly and winds can be extreme, and the flow of heat waves or arctic air masses often advance uninterrupted through the plains.

The Great Basin and Columbia Plateau (the Intermontane Plateaus) are arid or semiarid regions that lie in the rain shadow of the Cascades and Sierra Nevada. Precipitation averages less than 15 inches (38 cm). The Southwest is a hot desert, with temperatures exceeding 100°F (38°C) for several weeks at a time in summer. The Southwest and the Great Basin are also affected by the monsoon from the Gulf of California from July-September, which brings localized but often severe thunderstorms to the region. Much of California consists of a Mediterranean climate, with sometimes excessive rainfall from October-April and nearly no rain the rest of the year. In the Pacific Northwest rain falls year-round, but is much heavier during winter and spring. The mountains of the west receive abundant precipitation and very heavy snowfall. The Cascades are one of the snowiest places in the world, with some places averaging over 600 inches (1,520 cm) of snow annually, but the lower elevations closer to the coast receive very little snow. Another significant (but localized) weather effect is lake-effect snow that falls south and east of the Great Lakes, especially in the hilly portions of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and on the Tug Hill Plateau in New York. The Wasatch Front and Wasatch Range in Utah can also receive significant lake effect accumulations off of the Great Salt Lake.

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Natural disasters

Hurricanes are among the most devastating natural disasters that impact the United States. This picture shows the Coast Guard assisting in relief during Hurricane Katrina in 2005.The United States is affected by a large variety of natural disasters yearly. Although severe drought is rare, it has occasionally caused major problems, such as during the Dust Bowl from 1931-1942, which coincided with the Great Depression. Farmland failed throughout the Plains, entire regions were virtually depopulated, and dust storms ravaged the land. More recently, the western U.S. experienced widespread drought from 1999-2004, and signs of a major, long-term drought across the Great Plains have developed.[2]

The United States also experiences, by a large margin, the most frequent and powerful tornadoes in the world. The Great Plains, due to the contrasting air masses, sees frequent severe thunderstorms and tornado outbreaks during spring and summer. The strip of land from north Texas north to Kansas and east into Tennessee is known as Tornado Alley, where many houses have tornado shelters and many towns have tornado sirens. Another natural disaster that frequents the country are hurricanes, which can hit anywhere along the Gulf Coast or the Atlantic Coast, particularly the central and southern Texas coasts, the area from southeastern Louisiana east to the Florida Panhandle, the east coast of Florida, and the Outer Banks of North Carolina, although any portion of the coast is at risk. Hurricane season runs from June 1 to November 30, with a peak from mid-August through early October. Some of the more devastating hurricanes have included the Galveston Hurricane of 1900, Hurricane Andrew in 1992, and Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The remnants of tropical cyclones from the Eastern Pacific also occasionally impact the southwestern United States, bringing sometimes heavy rainfall.

Like drought, widespread severe flooding is rare. Some exceptions include the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927, the Great Flood of 1993, and widespread flooding and mudslides caused by the 1982-1983 El Niño event in the western United States. Localized flooding can, however, occur anywhere, and mudslides from heavy rain can cause problems in any mountainous area, particularly the Southwest. Large stretches of desert shrub in the west can fuel the spread of wildfires. The narrow canyons of many mountain areas in the west and severe thunderstorm activity during the monsoon season in summer leads to sometimes devastating flash floods as well, while Nor'easter snowstorms can bring activity to a halt throughout the Northeast (although heavy snowstorms can occur almost anywhere).

The West Coast of the continental United States makes up part of the Pacific Ring of Fire, an area of heavy tectonic and volcanic activity that is the source of 90% of the world's earthquakes. The American Northwest sees the highest concentration of active volcanoes in the United States, in Washington, Oregon and northern California along the Cascade Mountains. Other hotspots for volcanic activity include the islands south and southwest of Alaska and on the Alaska Peninsula. There are several active volcanoes located in the islands of Hawaii, including Kilauea in ongoing eruption since 1983, but they do not typically adversely affect the inhabitants of the islands. Volcanic eruptions can occasionally be devastating, such as in the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens in Washington.

The Ring of Fire makes California and southern Alaska particularly vulnerable to earthquakes. Earthquakes can cause devastating damage, such as the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake or the 1964 Good Friday Earthquake near Anchorage, Alaska. California is well known for seismic activity, and requires large structures to be earthquake proofed to minimize loss of life and property. Outside of devastating earthquakes, California experiences minor earthquakes on a regular basis.

[edit]
Government

The Constitution is the supreme law of the United States.Main article: Federal government of the United States
[edit]
Republic and suffrage
The United States is a constitutional republic, with a government composed of and operating through a set of limited powers imposed by its design and enumerated in the United States Constitution. Specifically, the nation operates as a presidential democracy. There are three levels of government: federal, state, and local. Each level enjoys certain exclusive powers and obligations, and the precise division of these powers has been a matter of considerable ongoing debate. Officials of each of these levels are either elected by eligible voters via secret ballot or appointed by other elected officials. Almost all electoral offices are decided in "first-past-the-post " elections, where a specific candidate who earns at least a plurality of the vote is elected to office, rather than a party being elected to a seat to which it may then appoint an official. Suffrage has changed significantly over time. In the early years of the United States, voting was considered a matter for state governments, and was commonly restricted to white men who owned land. Direct elections were held only for the Federal House of Representatives (the "lower house" of a bicameral parliament, or Congress) and state legislatures, although this varied from state to state. Under this original system, the Senate (the "upper house" of Congress) was chosen by a majority vote of their state's legislature. Now, since the 1913 ratification of the Seventeenth Amendment, members of both Houses of Congress are directly elected. Today, partially due to the Twenty-sixth Amendment, Americans enjoy almost universal suffrage from the age of 18 regardless of race, sex, or wealth, and both Houses of Congress are directly elected. There are some limits, however: felons are disenfranchised and in some states former felons are as well. Furthermore, the national representation of territories and the federal district of Washington, DC, in Congress is limited: residents of the District of Columbia are subject to federal laws and federal taxes but their only Congressional representative is a non-voting delegate.

[edit]
Federal government
The federal government is comprised of a Legislative Branch (led by Congress), an Executive Branch (led by the President), and a Judicial Branch (led by the Supreme Court). These three branches were designed to apply checks and balances on each other. The Constitution limits the powers of the federal government to defense, foreign affairs, the issuing and management of currency, the management of trade and relations between the states, as well as the protection of human rights. All other government powers theoretically repose in the individual states. However, in addition to these explicitly stated powers, the federal government—with the assistance of the Supreme Court—has gradually extended their power into such areas as welfare and education, on the basis of the "Necessary and Proper" and "Commerce" clauses of the Constitution.

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Legislative branch
The Congress of the United States is the legislative branch of the federal government of the United States. It is bicameral, being comprised of the House of Representatives and the Senate. The House of Representatives consists of 435 members, each of whom represents a congressional district and serves for a two-year term. House seats are apportioned among the states by population; in contrast, each state has two Senators, regardless of population. There are a total of 100 senators (as there are currently 50 states), who serve six-year terms (one third of the Senate stands for election every two years). Each House has particular exclusive powers—the Senate must give "advice and consent" to many important Presidential appointments, and the House must introduce any bills for the purpose of raising revenue. However, the consent of both Houses is required to make any law. The powers of Congress are limited to those enumerated in the Constitution; all other powers are reserved to the states and the people. The Constitution also includes the "necessary-and-prope r clause", which grants Congress the power to "make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers."

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Executive branch
All executive power in the federal government is vested in the President of the United States, although power is often delegated to his/her Cabinet members and other officials. The President and Vice President are elected as 'running mates' for four-year terms by the Electoral College, for which each state, as well as the District of Columbia, is allocated a number of seats based on its representation (or ostensible representation, in the case of D.C.) in both houses of Congress.

Further information: U.S. Electoral College, and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]]
The relationship between the President and the Congress reflects that between the English monarchy and parliament at the time of the framing of the United States Constitution. Congress can legislate to constrain the President's executive power, even with respect to his or her command of the armed forces; however, this power is used only very rarely—a notable example was the constraint placed on President Richard Nixon's strategy of bombing Cambodia during the Vietnam War. While the President can directly propose legislation (for instance, the Federal Budget), he must rely on supporters in Congress to promote and support his or her legislative agenda. After identical copies of a particular bill have been approved by a majority of both Houses of Congress, the President's signature is required to make these bills law; in this respect, the President has the power—only occasionally used—to veto congressional legislation. Congress can override a presidential veto with a two-thirds majority vote from both houses. The ultimate power of Congress over the President is that of impeachment or removal of the elected President through a House vote, a Senate trial, and a Senate vote (by two-thirds majority in favor). The threat of using this power has had major political ramifications in the cases of Presidents Andrew Johnson, Richard Nixon, and Bill Clinton.

The President makes around 2,000 executive appointments, including members of the Cabinet and ambassadors, which must be approved by the Senate; the President can also issue executive orders and pardons, and has other Constitutional duties, among them the requirement to give a State of the Union address to Congress from time to time (usually once a year). (The Constitution does not specify that the State of the Union address be delivered in person; it can be in the form of a letter, as was the practice during most of the 19th century.) Although the President's constitutional role may appear to be constrained, in practice, the office carries enormous prestige that typically eclipses the power of Congress: the Presidency has justifiably been referred to as 'the most powerful office in the world'. The Vice President is first in the line of succession, and is the President of the Senate ex officio, with the ability to cast a tie-breaking vote. The members of the President's Cabinet are responsible for administering the various departments of state, including the Department of Defense, the Justice Department, and the State Department. These departments and department heads have considerable regulatory and political power, and it is they who are responsible for executing federal laws and regulations. George W. Bush is the 43rd President, currently serving his second term.

[edit]
Judicial branch
The highest court is the Supreme Court, which currently consists of nine justices. The court deals with matters pertaining to the Federal Government, disputes between states, and interpretation of the United States Constitution, and can declare legislation or executive action made at any level of the government as unconstitutional, nullifying the law and creating precedent for future law and decisions. Below the Supreme Court are the courts of appeals, and below them in turn are the district courts, which are the general trial courts for federal law. Separate from, but not entirely independent of, this federal court system are the individual court systems of each state, each dealing with its own laws and having its own judicial rules and procedures. A case may be appealed from a state court to a federal court only if there is a federal question (an issue arising under the U.S. Constitution, or laws/treaties of the United States); the supreme court of each state is the final authority on the interpretation of that state's laws and constitution.

[edit]
State, tribal, and local governments

United States of America, showing states, divided into counties. Note that Alaska and Hawaii are shown at different scales, and that the Aleutian Islands and the uninhabited Northwestern Hawaiian Islands are omitted from this map.The state governments have the greatest influence over most Americans' daily lives. Each state has its own written constitution, government, and code of laws. There are sometimes great differences in law and procedure between individual states, concerning issues such as property, crime, health, and education. The highest elected official of each state is the Governor. Each state also has an elected legislature (bicameral in every state except Nebraska), whose members represent the voters of the state. Each state maintains its own judiciary, with the lowest level typically being county courts, the highest being the state supreme court, though sometimes named differently. In some states, supreme and lower court justices are elected by the people; in others, they are appointed, as they are in the federal system. See state court for more information.

As a result of the Supreme Court case Worcester v. Georgia, Indian tribes are considered "domestic dependent nations" that operate as sovereign governments subject to Federal authority but, generally, outside of the influence from state governments. Hundreds of laws, executive orders, and court cases have modified the governmental status of tribes vis-à-vis states, but have kept the two officially distinct. Tribal capacity to operate robust governments varies, from a simple council used to manage all aspects of tribal affairs, to large and complex bureaucracies with several branches of government. Tribes are empowered to form their own governments, with power resting in elected tribal councils, elected tribal chairpersons, or religiously appointed leaders (as is the case with pueblos). Tribal citizenship (and voting rights) is generally restricted to individuals of Native descent, but tribes are free to set whatever membership requirements they wish.

The institutions that are responsible for local government are typically town, city, or county boards, making laws that affect their particular area. These laws concern issues such as traffic, the sale of alcohol, and keeping animals. The highest elected official of a town or city is usually the mayor. In New England, towns operate in a direct democratic fashion, and in some states, such as Rhode Island and Connecticut, counties have little or no power, existing only as geographic distinctions. In other areas, county governments have more power, such as to collect taxes and maintain law enforcement agencies.

[edit]
Political divisions

Map of the United States with state namesMain article: Subdivisions of the United States
With the Declaration of Independence, the thirteen colonies proclaimed themselves to be polities modeled after the European states of the time. Although considered as sovereigns initially, under the Articles of Confederation of 1781 they entered into a "Perpetual Union" and created a fully sovereign federal state, delegating certain powers to the national Congress, including the right to engage in diplomatic relations and to levy war, while each retaining their individual sovereignty, freedom and independence. But the national government proved too ineffective, so the administrative structure of the government was vastly reorganized with the United States Constitution of 1789. Under this new union, the continued status of the individual states as sovereign nation states fell into dispute in 1861, as several states attempted to secede from the union; in response, then-President Abraham Lincoln claimed that such secession was illegal, and the result was the American Civil War. Since the Union victory in 1865, the independent status of the individual states has not been broached again by any state, and the status of each state within the union has been deemed by mainstream officials and academics to be settled as being subordinate to the union as a whole.

In subsequent years, the number of states grew steadily due to western expansion, the purchase of lands by the national government from other nation states, and the subdivision of existing states, resulting in the current total of 50. The states are generally divided into smaller administrative regions, including counties, cities and townships.

The United States–Canadian border is the longest undefended political boundary in the world. The 50 states are divided into distinct sections:

the "continental United States," also known as "the Lower 48" and more accurately termed the conterminous, coterminous, or contiguous United States
Alaska, an exclave, which is physically connected only to Canada
the archipelago of Hawaii, in the central Pacific Ocean.
The United States also holds several other territories, districts, and possessions, notably the federal district of the District of Columbia, which is the nation's capital, and several overseas insular areas, the most significant of which are American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the United States Virgin Islands. The Palmyra Atoll is the United States's only incorporated territory; it is unorganized and uninhabited. Islands gained by the United States in the war against Spain at the turn of the 20th century were no longer to be considered foreign territory; on the other hand, the United States Supreme Court declared that they were not automatically covered by the Constitution and that it was up to Congress to decide what portions of the Constitution, if any, applied to them. This had been the precisely the quarrel between American colonies and Great Britain that resulted in the founding of the United States. Seen like this, the Supreme Court in 1901 would have decided in favor of George III of the United Kingdom.

The United States Navy has held a base at a portion of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, since 1898. The United States government possesses a lease to this land, which only mutual agreement or United States abandonment of the area can terminate. The present Cuban government of Fidel Castro disputes this arrangement, claiming Cuba was not truly sovereign at the time of the signing. The United States argues this point moot because Cuba apparently ratified the lease post-revolution, and with full sovereignty, when it cashed one rent check in accordance with the disputed treaty.

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Foreign relations and military

The Statue of Liberty was a centennial gift to the United States from France. (See Franco-American relations.)Main article: Foreign relations of the United States
The immense military and economic strength of the United States has made its foreign relations an especially important topic in international politics. Reactions towards American foreign policy by other nationalities are often strong, ranging from admiration to fierce criticism. The same range of opinions is also found within the United States, with many Americans either supporting or strongly criticizing United States foreign policy.

Traditionally, the greatest military ally of the United States has been the United Kingdom, though the earliest alliance the nation formed was with France (see Franco-American relations).

The United States presently occupies 702 military bases worldwide in 132 different countries. The United States is currently involved in an occupation in Iraq, Afghanistan, and an intervention in Haiti. It has also embarked upon a global War on Terrorism.

The United States currently enjoys a particularly positive relationship with the United Kingdom, Australia, Japan, and Poland, among several others, in that these nations are participating as active military allies with, or logistical supporters of, the United States in all theaters. Currently, Canada, Germany, and other nations, are participating in the Afghanistan theater under the command of NATO, but not in Iraq.

Three of the nation's four military branches are administered by the Department of Defense: the Army, the Navy (including the Marine Corps), and the Air Force. The Coast Guard falls under the jurisdiction of the Department of Homeland Security in peacetime, but is placed under the Department of Defense in times of war.

The combined United States armed forces comprise 1.4 million active duty personnel, along with several hundred thousand each in the Reserves and the National Guard. Military conscription ended in 1973. The United States armed forces are considered to be the most powerful (of any sort) in the world and their force projection capabilities are unrivaled by any nation or collaboration of nations. They are dominant on land, water, air, and space.

The 2005 defense budget amounted to $401.7 billion, an increase of 4% over 2004 and 35% since 2001, with over 50% being spent in research & development. The 2006 defense budget will amount to nearly $440 billion, the highest ever. U.S. defense expenditure is estimated to be greater than the next twelve largest national military budgets combined, although citing this figure can be controversial since it does not take into effect local-currency purchasing power ratios.

It should be noted that the United States' focus on military expenditures has ranged very broadly, due to regularly changing ideologies inherent in its political system. The American military, in terms of physical resources, is actually smaller now than it was twenty years ago, despite being larger than it was five years ago, for example.

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Human rights
Main article: Human rights in the United States
Several American states maintained legal slavery until 1865 and did not abolish various forms of ethnic and other discrimination until the mid-to-late 20th century. The effects of this history are still apparent in the social structure, although all Americans now possess legal equality.

The United States is sometimes criticized for interventionist policies in Latin America, Middle-East, South-East Asia and elsewhere, and for aid (financial, military and otherwise) given to repressive governments and warlords. Its military tactics have sometimes been questioned, as in the Vietnam war in which U.S. explosives and chemical weapons left much of the region uninhabitable to the locals.

During the Cold War period, aid policies were considered a counterweight to the aid the Soviet Union was giving, but American foreign support has been criticized as profit-driven, such as support to Saddam Hussein, Suharto and Saudi Arabia. Traditionally, however, the U.S. has still been strongly committed to the Western ideology to pursue civil liberties.

In the early 21st century, most notably following the September 11, 2001 attacks and the ensuing War on Terror, invasions of privacy, intrusive inspections, detentions under the USA PATRIOT Act, secret prisons and restrictions on freedom of expression are currently debated questions. While opponents see them as dangerous decline in human rights and democracy, supporters see them as positive and necessary actions for security.

See also: List of United States foreign interventions since 1945
[edit]
Economy

The Midtown area of Manhattan, New York City, is one of the most important commercial and financial areas in the world.
Farming is a major contributor to the American economy. This style of farm near Klingerstown, Pennsylvania is similar in style to many older farms on the East Coast.
The state of Alaska is a major domestic source of oil, which is transported from the far north of the state to ports via the Trans-Alaska Pipeline.Main article: Economy of the United States
The United States has the largest and most diverse economy of any nation-state in the world. The United States has a per-capita annual gross domestic product of $43,555 (www.imf.org), ranking 3rd behind Luxembourg, and Norway. As in all market-oriented economies, private individuals and business firms in the U.S. make most of the decisions, and the federal and state governments buy needed goods and services predominantly in the private marketplace. This is financed via taxes and borrowings in the money and capital markets. Federal borrowings are subject to borrowing caps to theoretically prevent fiscal irresponsibility. The cap as of 2006 stands at 9 trillion. (Borrowings as of November 2005 are 8.1 trillion.)

The largest sector of the U.S. economy is now service, which employs roughly three quarters of the work force. The United States has many natural resources, including coal, oil and gas, metals, and such minerals as gold, soda ash, and zinc. In agriculture, it is a top producer of, among other crops, corn, soy beans, rice and wheat; the United States is a net exporter of food. The manufacturing sector produces goods such as cars, airplanes, steel, and electronics, among many others.

Economic activity varies greatly from one part of the country to another, with many industries being concentrated in certain cities or regions. For example, New York City is the center of the American financial, publishing, broadcasting, and advertising industries. Silicon Valley is the country's largest high technology hub, while Los Angeles is the most important center for film and television production. The Midwest is known for its reliance on manufacturing and heavy industry with Chicago as the "Capital of the Midwest," and with Detroit, Michigan, serving as the center of the American automotive industry. The Great Plains are known as the "breadbasket" of America for their tremendous agricultural output; the intermountain region serves as a mining hub and natural gas resource; the Pacific Northwest for fish and timber, while Texas is largely associated with the oil industry; and the Southeast is a major hub for both medical research and the textiles industry.

Several countries continue to link their currency to the dollar or even use it as a currency (such as Ecuador), although this practice has subsided since the collapse of the Bretton Woods system. Many markets are also quoted in dollars, such as those of oil and gold. The dollar is also the predominant reserve currency in the world, and more than half of global reserves are in dollars.

The largest trading partner of the United States is Canada (19%), followed by China (12%), Mexico (11%), and Japan (8%). About $1.1 billion dollars worth of goods cross the U.S.-Canada border each day, making the two the largest trading partners in the world.

In 2003, the United States was ranked as the third most visited tourist destination in the world; its 40,400,000 visitors ranked behind France's 75,000,000 and Spain's 52,500,000. The largest amount of tourist receipts come from Canadians.

Labor unions have existed since the 19th century, and grew large and powerful from the 1930s to the 1950s. See Labor history of the United States. Since 1970 they have shrunk in the private sector and now cover fewer than 8% of the workers. However union membership has grown rapidly in the public sector, especially among teachers, nurses, police, postal workers, and municipal clerks. There have been few strikes in recent years.

The United States's imports exceed exports by 80%, leading to a real annual trade deficit of $650.3 billion or 5.7% of real gross domestic product. It is the largest debtor nation in the world, with total gross foreign liabilities of over $12 trillion as of 2004, and it absorbs more than 50% of global savings annually.

Since the 1980s, the U.S. has increased the use of neoliberal economic policies that reduce government intervention and reduce the size of the welfare state, backing away from the more interventionist Keynesian economic policies that had been in favor since the Great Depression. As a result, the United States provides fewer government-delivered social welfare services than most industrialized nations, choosing instead to keep its tax burden lower and relying more heavily on the free market and private charities. The United States, today, is considered to have a mixed economy.

Eighteen states and the District of Columbia have minimum wages higher than the national level ($5.15 per hour), including the highest, the State of Washington's $7.35. Twenty-six states are the same as the federal level; two—Ohio and Kansas—are below; and six do not have state laws.

The United Nations Development Programme Report 2005 ranks income the United States as the 74th most equal out of 124 countries, as measured by the Gini coefficient. The richest 10% make 15.9 times as much as the poorest 10%, and the richest 20% make 8.4 times as much as the poorest 20%. (See List of countries by income equality.) However, the median income in America is greater than in most industrialized nations, placing higher by the Gini coefficient.

America's poverty line, defined for a family of four as an income of less than $19,157, is at 12.7% of the general population. Approximately one out of every five children in the United States grows up below the official poverty line. Among racial groups; Native Americans and Alaska Natives have the lowest median income while Asians have the highest. Regionally, the southern states have the lowest median incomes while the West Coast and New England have the highest.

See also: List of United States companies
[edit]
Demographics
[edit]
Population

2000 Population Density MapMain article: Demographics of the United States
The mean center of the U.S. population continues to drift farther west and south. The fastest growing region is the West, followed by the South. Growth in some parts of the nation have been particularly extreme such as the fastest growing metropolitan area, Las Vegas, Nevada, which went from 273,288 people in 1970 to about 1,650,671 in 2004. Between 1990 and 2000, 19 of the 20 fastest-growing states were in these two regions.[3]

Major demographic trends include the mass immigration of Hispanics from Latin America into the Southwest, which is home to 60% (21 of the 35 million) of the nation's Hispanics (their numbers increased 57.9% nationally in the 1990s). The West Coast has been the residence of choice for immigrating Asians, particularly from the Philippines and China. The West Coast is now home to approximately half of all American citizens of Asian ancestry (5 of the 10 million, increasing 52.4% in number during the 1990s).

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Ethnicity and race
Main article: Racial demographics of the United States
The United States is a very ethnically diverse country. According to the 2000 census, it has 31 ethnic groups with at least one million members each, and numerous others represented in smaller amounts.

The majority of Americans descend from white European immigrants who either arrived after the establishment of the first English colonies or after the period Reconstruction (1863-1877). This majority -- 75.1%[4] in 2000 -- decreases each year in percentage, and is expected to become a plurality by 2050. The most frequently stated European ancestries are German (15.2%), Irish (10.8%), English (8.7%), Italian (5.6%) and Scandinavian (3.7%). Many immigrants also hail from Slavic countries such as Poland and Russia. Other significant immigrant populations come from eastern and southern Europe and French Canada.

Hispanics from Mexico are second only to the German-American population in the single-race category. Hispanics comprise 13% of the population (2000 census) which include people from South and Central America. People of Mexican descent made up 7.3% of the population in the 2000 census and about 66% of the Hispanic-American community. This proportion is expected to increase significantly in the coming decades.

African Americans or Blacks comprise 13% (2000 census) of the American population. This percentage includes 0.6% of individuals that identified as black and one or more other race. The initial wave of people from Africa arrived enslaved, particularly throughout the colonial period and infancy of the new nation (1690-1808). Today, African Americans are spread throughout the country, but the population is largely concentrated in the Southern United States.

Asian Americans, including Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders, are a fourth significant minority (4% of the population in 2000). Most Asian Americans are concentrated on the West Coast and Hawaii with a growing concentration in the New York City Metropolitan Area and Northern Virginia. The largest groups are immigrants or descendants of emigrants from the Philippines, China, India, Vietnam, South Korea, and Japan.

Indigenous peoples in the United States, such as American Indians and Inuit, make up 1% of the population (2000 census). About 35% live on Indian reservations.

For the first time ever, American citizens were able to list all of the racial, ethnic, or ancestry groups which they felt was appropriate for them in the 2000 census. For example, a person could be counted in both the Italian and the Irish ancestry group if they described themselves as being of dual ancestry.

See also: Immigration to the United States
[edit]
Religion
Main article: Religion in the United States
The First Amendment to the Constitution forbids the establishment of an official religion or restrictions on free religious expression. Nonetheless, the United States is overwhelmingly Christian; about 80 percent of Americans are Christians of various denominations, the largest being Roman Catholicism (about 26 percent of all Americans) and Baptist (about 17 percent). The United States is also home to a large Jewish community, with (primarily Ashkenazic) Jews accounting for about 2 percent of the population. Of the remaining Americans, 15 percent claim no religion, and another 3 percent belong to other religions, such as Mormonism, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism.

The United States is noteworthy among developed nations for its relatively high level of religiosity. According to a 2004 Gallup poll, about 44% of Americans attend religious services at least once a week. However, this rate is not uniform across the country; regular attendance is more common in the Bible Belt—composed largely of Southern and Midwestern states—than in the Northeast and on the West Coast. In the Southern states, Baptists constitute the largest group, followed by Methodists. Roman Catholicism is predominant in the Northeast and in large parts of the Midwest due to these being settled by descendants of Catholic immigrants from Europe, such as Germany, Ireland, Italy, and Poland, or other parts of North America (mainly Quebec and Puerto Rico). The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, whose members are commonly known as Mormons, is the predominant religion in the state of Utah, with significant populations in neighboring states, as well. The rest of the country generally has a mixture of various Christian denominations.

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Language
Main article: Languages in the United States
The United States has no official language, but English is the most widely spoken language, spoken by nearly all of American citizens. 97% of Americans speak English well or very well. There have been moves in the past for English to be named as the official language of the United States, but this has been a major political issue for a good part of the country's existence. Some states, such as Alabama, California, Florida, New Hampshire and Oregon have made English the official language at the state level, but there still is strong resistance at the national level.

Spanish is the second most widely spoken language of the U.S., spoken mainly by immigrants or descendants of recent immigrants from Latin America and Spain, but also by generations-old descendants of the original settlers of the traditionally Spanish-held Southwestern United States. Hispanics now make up the largest ethnic minority in the country. There are also large populations of non-Hispanic Americans who speak fluent Spanish. Spanish is widely taught as a second language, especially in areas with large Hispanic populations such as Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, Florida and New York. Younger generations of non-Hispanics seem to be learning Spanish in larger numbers, thanks to the growing Hispanic population and increasing popularity of Latin American movies and music performed in the Spanish language. Over 30 million Americans, roughly 12% of the population, speak Spanish, making the U.S. the fifth largest Spanish speaking population in the world after Mexico, Colombia, Spain, and Argentina.

Chinese, mostly of the Cantonese dialect, is the third largest language spoken in the United States, almost completely spoken within Chinese-American populations, especially in California. Many young Americans not of Chinese descent have become interested in learning the language (mostly due to a perception of increased business opportunities available in China's growing economy), though it is the Mandarin dialect that is mostly taught. Over 2 million Americans speak Chinese dialects.

Other European languages are widely spoken as well. French, the fourth largest foreign language, is spoken mainly by the small native French, Haitian or French-Canadian populations. It is widely spoken in Maine and in Louisiana, a former colony of France, where it is still used with English as the state's de facto official language. German, although not widely spoken, was the second official language of Pennsylvania until 1950. Italian, Polish and Greek are still widely spoken among populations descending from immigrants from those countries in the early 20th century, but the use of these languages is dwindling as older generations die out. Starting in the 1970's and continuing until the mid 1990's, many people from the Soviet Union and later its constituent republics such as Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and Uzbekistan have immigrated to the United States, causing Russian to become widely spoken in the United States.

Tagalog and Vietnamese have over one million speakers in the United States, almost entirely within recent immigrant populations.

There are also a small population of Native Americans who still speak their native languages, but these populations are dropping and the languages are almost never widely used outside of reservations. Hawaiian, although having few native speakers, is still used at the state level in Hawaii along with English.

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Public health
Main article: Health care in the United States
The United States has an advanced health-care system which is ranked 37th by the World Health organization[5]. People from all over the world travel to the United States for medical care, and numerous medical discoveries and innovative treatments have been pioneered in the United States.

Despite this, the United States has several public health problems: widespread obesity, cigarette smoking among over a quarter of the population, and HIV-AIDS.

Unlike most Western governments, the U.S. government does not provide all-embracing socialized medicine. Several proposals (notably during the Clinton administration) have been made and failed to generate sufficient interest among voters. Even so, government spending on health care is the highest of any country in the world with major programs such as Medicare and Medicaid; there are also many other programs on the federal, state, and county level, as well as private charities. Since the 1980s, HMO coverage has increased as a means of controlling costs; critics charge that some HMOs make care decisions that are not in the patient's interest in order to save money; criticism has also been made of interference in the patient-doctor relationship. Health insurance in the United States is traditionally a benefit of employment, and in many cases this is mandated by law. Also by law, licensed emergency care facilities are required to provide emergency care regardless of the patient's ability to pay.

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People and culture

American cultural icons, such as apple pie, baseball, and the American flag.Main article: Culture of the United States
U.S. popular culture has a significant influence on the rest of the world, especially the Western world. U.S. music is heard all over the world, and it is the sire of such forms as blues, jazz, and house and had a primary hand in the shaping of modern rock and roll and popular music culture. Many famous Western classical musicians and ensembles find their home in the U.S. New York City is a hub for international operatic and instrumental music as well as the world-famed Broadway plays and musicals. Nashville is the center of the country music industry. Another export of the last 20 years is hip hop music, which began in New York and is growing in influence as it branches into the fashion, food and drink, and movie industries. New York, Seattle, and San Francisco are worldwide leaders in graphic design and New York and Los Angeles compete with major European cities in the fashion industry.

U.S. movies (primarily embodied in Hollywood) and television shows can be seen almost anywhere except the most totalitarian of places. This is in stark contrast to the early days of the republic, when the country was viewed by Europeans as an agricultural backwater with little to offer the culturally advanced world centers of Asia and Europe.

Nearing the mid-point of its third century of nationhood, the U.S. plays host to the gamut of human intellectual and artistic endeavor in nearly every major city, offering classical and popular music; historical, scientific and art research centers and museums; dance performances, musicals and plays; outdoor art projects and internationally significant architecture. This development is a result of both contributions by private philanthropists and government funding.

American holidays are variously national and local. Many holidays recognize events or people of importance to the nation's history; as such, they represent significant cultural observance.

See also: Arts and entertainment in the United States, Media of the United States, and Holidays of the United States
[edit]
Largest cities

New York City, New York

Los Angeles, California

Chicago, Illinois
The United States has dozens of major cities, including 11 of the 55 global cities of all types—with three "alpha" global cities: New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago. The figures expressed below are for populations within city limits. A different ranking is evident when considering U.S. metro area populations, although the top three would be unchanged. Note that some cities not listed (such as Atlanta, Boston, Cleveland, Las Vegas, Miami, New Orleans, Seattle, San Francisco, and Washington) are still considered important on the basis of other factors and issues, including culture, economics, heritage, and politics. The ten largest cities, based on the United States Census Bureau's 2004 estimates, are as follows:

Rank City Population
within
city limits Population
Density
per sq mi Metropolitan
Area Region
millions rank
1 New York City, New York 8,104,079 26,402.9 18.7 1 Northeast
2 Los Angeles, California 3,845,541 7,876.8 12.9 2 West
3 Chicago, Illinois 2,862,244 12,750.3 9.4 3 Midwest
4 Houston, Texas 2,012,626 3,371.7 5.2 7 South
5 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 1,470,151 11,233.6 5.8 4 Northeast
6 Phoenix, Arizona 1,418,041 2,782.0 3.7 14 West
7 San Diego, California 1,263,756 3,771.9 2.9 17 West
8 San Antonio, Texas 1,236,249 2,808.5 1.8 29 South
9 Dallas, Texas 1,210,393 3,469.9 5.7 5 South
10 San Jose, California 904,522 5,117.9 1.7 30 West




Further information: List of United States cities by population, and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]], and [[]]
See also: United States metropolitan area
[edit]
Education

America's 19 World Heritage Sites include Thomas Jefferson's home at Monticello and the University of Virginia (original library, designed by Jefferson, shown above), the only collegiate campus on the list. Both sites are located in Charlottesville, Virginia.Main article: Education in the United States
In the United States, education is a state, not federal, responsibility, and the laws and standards vary considerably. However, the fede

A career is traditionally seen as a course of successive situations that make up a person's worklife. One can have a sporting career or a musical career, but most frequently "career" in the 20th century referenced the series of jobs or positions by which one earned one's money. It tended to look only at the past.

As the idea of personal choice and self direction picks up in the 21st century, aided by the power of the Internet and the increased acceptance of people having multiple kinds of work, the idea of a career is shifting from a closed set of achievements, like a chronological résumé of past jobs, to a defined set of pursuits looking forward. In its broadest sense, career refers to an individual’s work and life roles over their lifespan.

In the relatively static societies before modernism, many workers would often inherit or take up a single lifelong position (a place or role) in the workforce, and the concept of an unfolding career had little or no meaning. With the spread during the Enlightenment of the idea of progress and of the habits of individualist self-betterment, careers became possible, if not expected.

Career counseling advisors assess people's interests, personality, values and skills, and also help them explore career options and research graduate and professional schools. Career counseling provides one-on-one or group professional assistance in exploration and decision making tasks related to choosing a major/occupation, transitioning into the world of work or further professional training. The field is vast and includes career placement, career planning, learning strategies and student development.

By the late 20th century a plethora of choices (especially in the range of potential professions) and more widespread education had allowed it to become fashionable to plan (or design) a career: in this respect the careers of the career counsellor and of the career advisor have grown up. It is also not uncommon for adults in the late 20th/early 21st centuries to have dual or Multiple Careers, either sequentially or concurrently. Thus, professional identities have become hyphenated or hybridized to reflect this shift in work ethic. Economist Richard Florida notes this trend generally and more specifically among the "Creative Class."


Labor and Employment Research
Cornell University, School of Industrial and Labor Relations

Institute for Women and Work at Cornell University

Labor and Worklife Program at Harvard Law School

For a pre-modernist notion of "career", compare cursus honorum.

[edit]
See also
Career development
Career management
Description of a Career
Edgar Schein
John L. Holland
Holland Codes
Peer pressure
Personality psychology
School counselor
Multiple Careers
[edit]
References
Bolles, Richard Nelson. What Color Is Your Parachute? ISBN 1580086152
Lore, Nicholas. The Pathfinder ISBN 0-684-82399-3
Jackson, Tom. http://www.careervictory.com/...
Manahan, Rowan. Where's My Oasis? ISBN 0091899982
Pan, Eric T-S.. Perpetual Business Machines: Principles of Success for Technical Professionals ISBN 0975448005 http://www.mdc-learning.com/
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External links
"Resources" - Articles, suggested reading, links on career development, job search and more.
WorklifeWizard
Occupational Outlook Handbook
Lunch-Money.com - Work Importance / Interest Profilers to Locate Careers of Interest
Kids Vocational Site
Career Information Portal
O*Net, more career stuff
United Nations (2002), Handbook on career counselling
Career guidance site - University of South Africa
Career guidance resources & Online workshops - Career Services, Brock University

Categories: Employment | Personal development

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Health is a term that refers to a combination of the absence of illness, the ability to cope with everyday activities, physical fitness, and high quality of life. In any organism, health can be said to be a "state of balance," or analogous to homeostasis, and it also implies good prospects for continued survival. Wellness is a term sometimes used to describe the psychological state of being healthy, but is most often used in the field of alternative medicine to describe one's state of being.

The most widely accepted definition is that of the World Health Organization (WHO). It states that "health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity" (WHO, 1946). In more recent years, this statement has been modified to include the ability to lead a "socially and economically productive life." The WHO definition is not without criticism, as some argue that health cannot be defined as a state at all, but must be seen as a process of continuous adjustment to the changing demands of living and of the changing meanings we give to life. The WHO definition is therefore considered by many as an idealistic goal rather than a realistic proposition.

Health is maintained through the science of medicine, but can also be improved by individual effort. Physical fitness, weight loss, healthy eating, stress management training and stopping smoking and other substance abuse are examples of steps to improve one's health. Workplace programs are recognized by an increasingly large number of companies for their value in improving health and well-being of their employees, and increasing morale, loyalty and productivity at work. A company may provide a gym with exercise equipment, start smoking cessation programs, provide nutrition, weight or stress management training. Other programs may include health risk assessments and health screenings.

Alternative medicine can sometimes be used to improve health. However, with the lack of scientific proof through double blind testing, the placebo effect should be assumed to provide the health improvement in the case of successful alternative treatments until such testing can provide proof of any effects besides placebo. This is because as someone who feels well from their (possibly subconcious) belief in the therapies may lower their stress levels, resulting in beneficial effects on numerous factors, including blood pressure, gastrointestinal functioning, and immune response. The field of psychoneuroimmunology explores these links.

An increasing measure of the health of populations is height, which is strongly regulated by nutrition and health care, among other standard of living and quality of life matters. The study of human growth, its regulators and its implications is known as auxology.




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See also
Disease
Environmental health
Health care
Health disparities
Health profession
Healthcare delivery
Longevity
Mental health
Population health
Public health
Sexuality
[edit]
Notes and references
World Health Organization, Constitution, World Health Organization, Geneva, 1946. Available online at http://w3.whosea.org/aboutsea... Accessed October 24, 2005.
WHO (1979) Health for All, Sr. Nos. 1, 2
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External links
World Health Organization
National Center for Health Statistics (USA)
'Your-Health-Articles' contains extensive authors though not necessarily accredited
National Institute of Health (USA)
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (USA)
Health news blog
(http://www.DetoxIY.com Health, beauty and Detox website)

Categories: Health | Personal life | School subjects

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Yahoo! GroupsYahoo! Groups is an electronic mailing list service provided by Yahoo!. Over the years, Yahoo! bought several other mailing list providers, including the popular eGroups, and combined them with Yahoo! Clubs into one system. Thus, Yahoo! Groups is now by far the most popular and well-known provider of electronic mailing list facilities.

The category tree of topics in which the groups are sorted is borrowed largely from Yahoo!'s own directory hierarchy, however some subcategories in Yahoo! Directory such as music are so popular in Yahoo! Groups that they have their own top-level category.

As well as providing e-mail relaying and archiving facilities for the many lists it hosts, the Yahoo! Groups service provides additional functions on the web site, such as voting and calendar systems, file uploading, easy management and more. This has helped persuade many large users to continue using the service, since these "value added" elements would be harder to provide on their own servers. However, while the basic mailing list functionality can be used with any e-mail address, the additional features require using a Yahoo! ID for logging on to the web site.

[edit]
Unique facts about Yahoo! Groups
Yahoo! Groups is unique as it combines elements of an electronic mailing list, and an internet forum. Many Yahoo! Groups exsist for the sake of carrying on discussions, which can be posted by e-mail, or from the group homepage, just like a forum. The group homepage often also contains extra features such as a photo gallery, a file hosting space, links, a calendar and often even a chat room. Thus, Yahoo! Groups has become very popular among independent webmasters because of its versitility. Some groups, however, are still just mailing lists that only the group moderators can post to. But slowly, Yahoo! Groups are being used more for Usenet style discussion groups rather than just mailing lists.

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See also
Google Groups
MSN Groups
[edit]
External links
Yahoo! Groups (US)
Yahoo! Groups (UK)
This website-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it..

Categories: Website stubs | Yahoo!

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Types of Internet hosting service
Full-featured hosting services
Virtual private server
Dedicated hosting
Colocation centre
Web hosting
Free hosting
Shared hosting
Clustered hosting
Reseller hosting
Application-specific
Blog hosting
Image hosting
File hosting
Remote backup service
Game server hosting
DNS hosting
E-mail hosting

A web hosting service is a type of Internet hosting service that provides individuals, organizations and users with online systems for storing information, images, video, or any content accessible via the Web. Web hosts are companies that provide space on a server they own for use by their clients as well as providing Internet connectivity, typically in a data center. Web hosts can also provide data center space and connectivity to the Internet for servers they do not own to be located in their data center.


Service scope
The scopes of hosting services vary widely. The most basic is web page and (small) file hosting, where files can be uploaded via FTP or a Web interface. The files are usually delivered to the Web "as is" or with little processing. Many ISPs offer this service for free to their subscribers. People can also obtain Web page hosting from services such as GeoCities. Web page hosting is typically free, advertisement sponsored, or cheap.

Web page hosting is generally sufficient only for personal home pages. A complex site calls for a more comprehensive package that provides database support and application development platforms (e.g. PHP, Java, and ASP.NET). These facilities allow the customers to write or install scripts for applications like forums and content management. For e-commerce, SSL is also required. The host may also provide a Web interface (e.g. cPanel) for managing the Web server and installing scripts as well as other services like e-mail.

Some hosts specialize in certain software or services (e.g. e-commerce). They are commonly used by larger companies to outsource network infrastructure to a hosting company.

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Types of hosting
Internet hosting services can run web servers; see Internet hosting services.

Hosting services limited to the web:

Free web hosting service: is free, (sometimes) advertisement-supported web hosting, and is extremely limited when compared to paid hosting.
Shared web hosting service: one's Web site is placed on the same server as several hundred other sites. These are somewhat restricted to what can be done.
Dedicated web hosting service: involves getting your own Web server either managed by the Web host or with full control over it (root access for Linux/administrator access for Windows).
Colocation web hosting service: provides physical space that your server takes up and the hosting company takes care about bandwidth/data center.
Reseller web hosting: allows clients to become web hosts themselves.
File hosting service: is a kind of web hosting service optimized for hosting large files.
Clustered hosting
Some specific web services:

Image hosting service
Blog hosting service
[edit]
Obtaining hosting
Web hosting is often provided as part of a general Internet access plan; there are many free and paid providers offering these services.

A customer needs to evaluate the requirements of the application to choose what kind of hosting to use. Such considerations include database server software, scripting software, and operating system. Most hosting providers provide Linux-based web hosting which offers a wide range of different software. A typical configuration for a Linux server is the LAMP platform: Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP/Perl/Python.

Web hosting packages often include a Web Content Management System, so the end-user doesn't have to worry about the more technical aspects.

[edit]
External links
Web hosting (Wikiclassifieds), list of providers
Open Directory List of Free Web Hosts
Open Directory List of (all) Web Hosts
Open Directory Hosting Reviews

Category: Internet hosting
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