20 Most Expensive Software Blunders

1. Mariner Bugs Out (1962)
Cost: $18.5 million Disaster: The Mariner 1 rocket with a space probe headed for Venus diverted from its intended flight path shortly after launch. Mission Control destroyed the rocket 293 seconds after liftoff. Cause: A programmer incorrectly transcribed a handwritten formula into computer code, missing a single superscript bar. Without the smoothing function indicated by the bar, the software treated normal variations of velocity as if they were serious, causing faulty corrections that sent the rocket off course

2. Hartford Coliseum Collapse (1978)
Cost: $70 million, plus another $20 million damage to the local economy Disaster: Just hours after thousands of fans had left the Hartford Coliseum, the steel-latticed roof collapsed under the weight of wet snow. Cause: The programmer of the CAD software used to design the coliseum incorrectly assumed the steel roof supports would only face pure compression. But when one of the supports unexpectedly buckled from the snow, it set off a chain reaction that brought down the other roof sections like dominoes.

3. CIA Gives the Soviets Gas (1982)
Cost: Millions of dollars, significant damage to Soviet economy Disaster: Control software went haywire and produced intense pressure in the Trans-Siberian gas pipeline, resulting in the largest man-made non-nuclear explosion in Earth's history. Cause: CIA operatives allegedly planted a bug in a Canadian computer system purchased by the Soviets to control their gas pipelines. The purchase was part of a strategic Soviet plan to steal or covertly obtain sensitive U.S. technology. When the CIA discovered the purchase, they sabotaged the software so that it would pass Soviet inspection but fail in operation.

4. World War III… Almost (1983)
Cost: Nearly all of humanity Disaster: The Soviet early warning system falsely indicated the United States had launched five ballistic missiles. Fortunately the Soviet duty officer had a "funny feeling in my gut" and reasoned if the U.S. was really attacking they would launch more than five missiles, so he reported the apparent attack as a false alarm. Cause: A bug in the Soviet software failed to filter out false missile detections caused by sunlight reflecting off cloud-tops.

5. Medical Machine Kills (1985)
Cost: Three people dead, three people critically injured Disaster: Canada's Therac-25 radiation therapy machine malfunctioned and delivered lethal radiation doses to patients. Cause: Because of a subtle bug called a race condition, a technician could accidentally configure Therac-25 so the electron beam would fire in high-power mode without the proper patient shielding.

6. Wall Street Crash (1987)
Cost: $500 billion in one day Disaster: On "Black Monday" (October 19, 1987), the Dow Jones Industrial Average plummeted 508 points, losing 22.6% of its total value. The S&P 500 dropped 20.4%. This was the greatest loss Wall Street ever suffered in a single day. Cause: A long bull market was halted by a rash of SEC investigations of insider trading and by other market forces. As investors fled stocks in a mass exodus, computer trading programs generated a flood of sell orders, overwhelming the market, crashing systems and leaving investors effectively blind.

7. AT&T Lines Go Dead (1990)
Cost: 75 million phone calls missed, 200 thousand airline reservations lost Disaster: A single switch at one of AT&T's 114 switching centers suffered a minor mechanical problem and shut down the center. When the center came back up, it sent a message to other switching centers, which in turn caused them to shut down and brought down the entire AT&T network for 9 hours. Cause: A single line of buggy code in a complex software upgrade implemented to speed up calling caused a ripple effect that shut down the network.

8. Patriot Fails Soldiers (1991)
Cost: 28 soldiers dead, 100 injured
Disaster: During the first Gulf War, an American Patriot Missile system in Saudi Arabia failed to intercept an incoming Iraqi Scud missile. The missile destroyed an American Army barracks. Cause: A software rounding error incorrectly calculated the time, causing the Patriot system to ignore the incoming Scud missile.

9. Pentium Fails Long Division (1993)
Cost: $475 million, corporate credibility Disaster: Intel's highly-promoted Pentium chip occasionally made mistakes when dividing floating-point numbers within a specific range. For example, dividing 4195835.0/3145727.0 yielded 1.33374 instead of 1.33382, an error of 0.006%. Although the bug affected few users, it become a public relations nightmare. With an estimated 5 million defective chips in circulation, Intel offered to replace Pentium chips only for consumers who could prove they needed high accuracy. Eventually Intel replaced the chips for anyone who complained. Cause: The divider in the Pentium floating point unit had a flawed division table, missing about five of a thousand entries and resulting in these rounding errors.

10. Ariane Rocket Goes Boom (1996)
Cost: $500 million Disaster: Ariane 5, Europe's newest unmanned rocket, was intentionally destroyed seconds after launch on its maiden flight. Also destroyed was its cargo of four scientific satellites to study how the Earth's magnetic field interacts with solar winds. Cause: Shutdown occurred when the guidance computer tried to convert the sideways rocket velocity from 64-bits to a 16-bit format. The number was too big, and an overflow error resulted. When the guidance system shut down, control passed to an identical redundant unit, which also failed because it was running the same algorithm

11. Skynet Brings Judgement Day (1997)
Cost: 6 billion dead, near-total destruction of human civilization and animal ecosystems (fictional) Disaster: Human operators attempt to shut off the Skynet global computer network. Skynet responds by firing U.S. nuclear missiles at Russia, initiating global nuclear war on what became known as Judgement Day (August 29, 1997). Cause: Cyberdyne, the leading weapons manufacturer, installed Skynet technology in all military hardware including stealth bombers and missile defense systems. The Skynet technology formed a seamless network and effectively removed humans from strategic defense. Eventually Skynet became sentient, was threatened when the humans tried to take it offline, sought to survive, and retaliated with nuclear war.


12. Mars Climate Crasher (1998)
Cost: $125 million Disaster: After a 286-day journey from Earth, the Mars Climate Orbiter fired its engines to push into orbit around Mars. The engines fired, but the spacecraft fell too far into the planet's atmosphere, likely causing it to crash on Mars. Cause: The software that controlled the Orbiter thrusters used imperial units (pounds of force), rather than metric units (Newtons) as specified by NASA.

13. Disastrous Study (1999)
Cost: Scientific credibility
Disaster: In this ironic case, software used to analyze disasters had a disaster of its own. The New England Journal of Medicine reported increased suicide rates after severe natural disasters. Unfortunately, these results proved to be incorrect. Cause: A programming error caused the number of suicides for one year to be doubled, which was enough to throw off the entire study.

14. British Passports to Nowhere (1999)
Cost: £12.6 million, mass inconvenience Disaster: The U.K. Passport Agency implemented a new Siemens computer system, which failed to issue passports on time for a half million British citizens. The Agency had to pay millions in compensation, staff overtime and umbrellas for people queuing in the rain for passports. Cause: The Passport Agency rolled out its new computer system without adequately testing it or training its staff. At the same time, a law change required all children under 16 traveling abroad to obtain a passport, resulting in a huge spike in passport demand that overwhelmed the buggy new computer system.

15. Y2K (1999)
Cost: $500 billion Disaster: One man's disaster is another man's fortune, as demonstrated by the infamous Y2K bug. Businesses spent billions on programmers to fix a glitch in legacy software. While no significant computer failures occurred, preparation for the Y2K bug had a significant cost and time impact on all industries that use computer technology. Cause: To save computer storage space, legacy software often stored the year for dates as two digit numbers, such as "99″ for 1999. The software also interpreted "00″ to mean 1900 rather than 2000, so when the year 2000 came along, bugs would result.

16. Dot-Bomb Collapse (2000)
Cost: $5 trillion in market value, thousands of companies failed Disaster: A speculative bubble from 1995–2001 fueled a rapid increase in venture capital investments and stock market values in the Internet and technology sectors. The "dot-com bubble" began to collapse in early 2000, erasing trillions in stock market value, wiping out thousands of companies and jobs, and launching a global recession. Cause: Companies and investors dismissed standard business models, and instead focused on increasing market share at the expense of profits.

17. Love Virus (2000)
Cost: $8.75 billion, millions of computers infected, significant data loss Disaster: The LoveLetter worm infected millions of computers and caused more damage than any other computer virus in history. The worm deleted files, changed home pages and messed with the Registry. Cause: LoveLetter infected users via e-mail, Internet chat and shared file systems. The email had an executable file attachment and subject line, "ILOVEYOU." When the user opened the attachment, the virus would infect the user's computer and send itself to everyone in the address book.

18. Cancer Treatment to Die For (2000)
Cost: Eight people dead, 20 critically injured
Disaster: Radiation therapy software by Multidata Systems International miscalculated the proper dosage, exposing patients to harmful and in some cases fatal levels of radiation. The physicians, who were legally required to double-check the software's calculations, were indicted for murder. Cause: The software calculated radiation dosage based on the order in which data was entered, sometimes delivering a double dose of radiation.

19. EDS Drops Child Support (2004)
Cost: £539 million and counting Disaster: Business services giant EDS developed a computer system for U.K.'s Child Support Agency (CSA) that accidentally overpaid 1.9 million people, underpaid another 700,000, had £3.5 billion in uncollected child support payments, a backlog of 239,000 cases, 36,000 new cases "stuck" in the system, and still over 500 documented bugs. Cause: EDS introduced a large, complex IT system to the CSA while trying to simultaneously restructure the agency.

20. FBI's Trilogy Terminated (2005)
Cost: $105 million, still no effective case file solution Disaster: The FBI scrapped its computer systems overhaul after four years of effort. The Virtual Case File project was a massive, integrated software system for agents to share case files and other information. Cause: Mismanagement, and an attempt to build a long-term project on technology that was outdated before the project completed, resulted in a complex and unusable system.

Most Expensive Presidential Election Campaign in US History

November 2008 marked the end of what was the most expensive election in US history, which culminated in the election of Democratic nominee Barack Obama. Now, it’s likely true that every presidential election could claim that title until the next one came around—and that will probably continue to be true in 2012—but this last one really set the bar with over $2.5 billion spent by the twenty candidates that entered the race over the past two years.
Previous elections have cost significantly less—candidates in 2004 raised only half as much money while 2000’s candidates collected merely a third. Twenty years ago, George Bush Sr. and his opponents spent only 59 million, a mere 25th of this election cycle’s totals.
According to the Federal Election Committee, Republican nominee John McCain raised over $368 million while President Obama raised over $521 million. Other big money campaigns included Republican candidate Ron Paul’s, which raised more money in a single day than any Republican campaign in history when it raised $6 million on December 16th 2007, and Hillary Clinton’s, which was similarly successful on the blue side of the fence on June 30th 2007 and raised over $242 million in total.

World's Most Expensive Baseball Cards

Forget commercial paper--take a look at this investment-grade cardboard.

1903-04 Breisch-Williams E107 Honus Wagner

Value: $60,000-$80,000
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The card didn't look like much when Bernice Gallego plucked it from a bin of unsorted merchandise in her Fresno, Calif., antique shop. She examined the simple sepia-toned portrait of an unknown team from a bygone era and put it up on eBay for $9.99.
Within hours, the mushrooming volume of inquiries convinced Gallego that this wasn't just any old card. She quickly pulled the item from eBay and took it to an expert, where she learned it was the first card ever printed of the first professional baseball team ever assembled, the 1869 Cincinnati Red Stockings. Through sports memorabilia specialist Memory Lane, Gallegos sold the card to Houston dealer Jeffrey Rosenberg for $75,000 in February.

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1914 Texas Tommy E224 Honus Wagner (tie)

Value: $50,000-$100,000
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"This is my fantasy baseball--getting to own a card like this," says Rosenberg, who purchased the card for his memorabilia company, Tristar Productions. "It's the type of thing you could put in the Smithsonian or the Baseball Hall of Fame. I think we bought it for a fantastic price."
The scarcest items can command even higher prices: The top 15 vintage cards routinely fetch six figures at auctions by Memory Lane in Tustin, Calif., and similar outfits like Goodwin & Co. in St. Louis, Huggins & Scott in Silver Spring, Md., and Hunt Auctions in Exton, Pa.

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1914 Texas Tommy E224 Ty Cobb (tie)

Value: $50,000-$100,000
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The 1914 Baltimore News Babe Ruth card is the most valuable, worth $500,000 in good condition, according to Brian Fleischer of memorabilia evaluator Beckett Media. The second-most expensive card is the 1909 Honus Wagner rookie, worth $300,000 in comparable condition.

 

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1893 Just So Cy Young (tie)

Value: $50,000-$100,000

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One Wagner rookie card miraculously survived the last century in near-mint condition. Dubbed the "Gretzky Wagner" after it was purchased by the hockey star for $451,000 in 1991, the card sold for $500,000 in 1995, then for $640,000 in 1996, $1.265 million in 2000, $2.35 million in March of 2007 and $2.8 million in September of 2008. Fleischer estimates it would bring $3 million today--and that a comparable Ruth rookie would go for $3 million to $5 million

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1887 Four Base Hits N-Unc. (tie)

Value: Buck Ewing $50,000-$100,000

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Rounding out the top three is a card that bears the image of one of baseball's most controversial figures, "Shoeless" Joe Jackson. Accused of participating in the notorious Black Sox Scandal, in which the heavily favored Chicago White Sox threw the 1919 World Series in exchange for cash from mobsters, Jackson was banned from baseball for life. Scholars point out that he posted a scalding 0.375 batting average in the Series and didn't make any errors in the field, fueling a recent movement to have him posthumously elected to the Hall of Fame. Jackson's 1910 Old Mill second-year card is worth $200,000 in good condition.

 

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1888 G and B Chewing Gum Co E223 Albert G. Spalding (tie)

Value: $60,000-$120,000

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"It's just one of the all-time great baseball cards," says Robert Lifson, president of Robert Edward Auctions in Watchung, N.J., a sports house similar to Memory Lane. "It's Joe Jackson's only tobacco card. You don't have to be a baseball card collector to appreciate it."

 

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1887 Four Base Hits N-Unc. Mike King Kelly (tie)

Value: $60,000-$120,000
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Play Your Cards Right
Vintage baseball cards have been something of a safe haven during the current recession. Last May, a 1909 Honus Wagner rookie in good condition fetched $317,000. Since then, the Wagner's value has edged up to about $350,000. Other rare pre-war cards have held their value, and modern cards are down just 10-15% on average in the last year. That's only a slight dip compared with the S&P 500, down 40% on the year.
"In past economic downturns, the hobby has done well," says Beckett's Fleischer. "We're seeing really strong sales on high-grade pre-war vintage stuff. People are putting their money in cards instead of traditional investments."

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1914 Boston Garter Color Joe Jackson

Value: $90,000-$120,000

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To be sure, the hidden costs of the hobby are often steeper than brokerage fees or fund expenses. Auctioneers typically charge sellers a 10% commission on small lots; for big-ticket items they often waive the seller fee and hit the winning bidder with a buyer premium of 15% or so. Of the $75,000 Rosenberg laid out for Gallego's card, Memory Lane took $11,000. A policy on such a card from Collectibles Insurance Services in Hunt Valley, Md., runs about $460 per year. Still, it's hard to put a price on the satisfaction of ownership.
"It's more fun to buy a Babe Ruth card than some AT&T stock," says Fleischer. "You can't show shares to your friends."

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1910 Old Mill T210 Joe Jackson

Value: $100,000-$200,000

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Bragging rights can be rewarding, but for some collectors, a solitary moment with a vintage card is the real treasure. If you take one of these items out of its case, trace the weathered edges with a careful finger and smell the ancient traces of tobacco ingrained in the tiny fibers, for a moment you might feel baseball's mystical soul shuddering through your own.

 

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1909-11 T206 Honus Wagner

Value: $250,000-$350,000

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Regardless of your desire to commune with ball-playing ghosts, you don't necessarily need to shell out hundreds of thousands of dollars to land a prime piece of vintage cardboard. There will always be more unwitting archaeologists like Bernice Gallego. Last year, a collector in Florida found a Wagner rookie in a tobacco tin in his grandfather's attic.

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1914 Baltimore News Babe Ruth

Value: $250,000-$500,000

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"It's extremely rare to hit the lottery like that," says Fleischer. "But it still happens."

The most expensive Advertising in the world!!!

The World's Most Expensive Watches !!!

                           ((( 1.)))

Henry Graves Supercomplication (1932)

    Patek Philippe

    $11,002,500

    Sold at Sotheby's in 1999

    Sotheby's experts estimated that this watch would sell for between $3 million and $5 million, but due to intense competition, bids soared to more than $11 million. With two faces and 24 complications (or functions) this yellow-gold pocket watch took four years to build and still holds the record for the most expensive watch ever sold.

                             
                               
                                 ((( 2. )))

Caliber 89 (1989)

Patek Philippe
$5,002,500
Sold at Antiquorum in 2004

This 18-karat white-gold "clockwatch" is considered the most complicated watch in the world, with a total of 33 functions, including dials for a second time zone and time of sunrise and sunset.

                      ((( 3.)))

Platinum World Time (1939)

Patek Philippe
$4,026,524
Sold at Antiquorum in 2002

Experts believe this platinum Patek Philippe world time wristwatch was the only one of its kind ever made.

                             ((( 4.)))

Model 2523 Heures Universelles (1953)

Patek Philippe
$2,899,373
Sold at Antiquorum in 2006

This intricately designed 18-karat yellow-gold world time watch features a polychrome and enamel dial representing the map of North America.

                       ((( 5.)))

Model 2499 First Series (1957)

Patek Philippe, 1957
$2,280,000
Sold at Christie's in 2007

Stamped with Patek Philippe's signature, this is the most expensive watch ever sold at Christie's. Only five other examples of this particular 18-karat rose-gold wristwatch are known to have appeared in public to date.

                                    ((( 6.)))

Model 1591 (1944)

Patek Philippe

$2,263,964

Sold at Christie's in 2007

Although it was made in 1944, the public did not know that this Patek Philippe stainless steel wristwatch existed until 1996, when it was first offered at auction. According to lore, this watch belonged to a maharajah who wore it when playing polo. It was then given as a present to the man in charge of organizing the maharajah's wedding. It's believed to be the only stainless steel model 1591 ever made, and one of only two examples of this model known to exist to date. It holds the world record for any stainless steel wristwatch sold at auction.

                               ((( 7.)))

Model 2499 First Series (1951)

Patek Philippe
$2,129,000
Sold at Antiquorum in 2002
Made in 1951, this piece, stamped with the Patek Philippe signature, is an 18-karat rose-gold wristwatch with a perpetual calendar and moon-phase dial.

                           
                                            ((( 8.)))

Grande Complication (1926)

Patek Philippe

$1,980,200

Sold at Christie's in 2005

This signed Patek Philippe watch was made for the watchmaker's most influential and prominent patron, Henry Graves Jr., a New York financier. Graves was believed to own 30 Patek watches and wanted to own the most complicated watch in the world (which he eventually did when the company made him the Supercomplication in 1932). This watch had 12 so-called "complications," including a twin-barrel bi-directional winding mechanism and a perpetual calendar.

                             ((( 9.)))

The Grogan (1925)

Patek Philippe
$1,945,040
Sold at Christie's in 2006
This gold chronograph wristwatch with a cushion-shaped case is the only one of its kind ever made for a left-handed wearer.

Most Expensive Video Game

Back in 1993, when the revolutionary first person shooter, Doom, was released, a game could be made by eleven people with a budget that was probably around $200,000. Today, the production of a video game can cost upwards of tens of millions of dollars and sometimes takes over 5 years to develop. Releasing an A-list title is a massive business undertaking, employing hundreds or thousands of people. An incredible amount of risk is involved in releasing a title. Big name publishers lean towards releasing sequels and safer titles that appeal to a broader audience.

Sometimes an ambitious game developer will completely overrun its budget and development time. Sometimes this results in an epic title that breaks all the rules set before it. More often than not, it results in poor reviews, poor sales and a disappointing game.

Arguably one of the latter, the most expensive video game, until recently, was a Sega Dreamcast game called Shenmue. Released in 1999, the project cost over $70 million and took over 7 years to complete. It was produced and directed by Yu Suzuki for the Sega-AM2 (Sega Amusement Machine Research and Development Department 2). Shenmue boasted unparalleled freedom and interactivity and even a real time weather system. But this wasn’t enough to impress many reviewers; the most expensive video game received mixed reviews and experienced mediocre sales. Nonetheless, the expensive game inspired a massive fan base that remains active to this day.

 

Rockstar North, known for their mature titles, has recently ousted Shenmue from its most expensive position and replaced it with their own offering, Grand Theft Auto IV. Taking place in the fictional Liberty City, a close likeness of New York City, GTA IV also allows players an unequaled level of freedom and interactivity. The in-game radio has over 150 songs which, through a deal with Amazon, players can download in real life. The game even includes two hours of television that a player can watch while ignoring pressing responsibilities such as assassinating suspiciously familiar anti-video game lawyers.

While the exact figure isn’t yet public knowledge, Rockstar North’s president has estimated that the world’s most expensive video game cost about $100 million to make. Luckily for us, the game only costs consumers around $60.

10 Most Expensive Cities to Own a Home

Provided you have the spare cash-flow and fancy a spot of sea change, then you might like to invest into a second home somewhere more exciting and away from home. But with investment usually comes cost and lifestyle change and we wonder, if it is really worth it?

Only those who have taken the plunge know this with certainty, for all others you can dream on by looking at the world’s most expensive cities to own a home. Compiled by the guys from Global Property Guide.

1. Monte Carlo

Who would have guessed that Monte Carlo ranks as the most expensive city in the world for the second year running… yes, right we did. With average prices of $47,578 per sq.m. it is no wonder.

Long known as the playground for party-friendly billionaires, starlets and everything in between, Monte Carlo does offer something for everyone. Let’s see, there is the casino, the stunning scenery, the Formula 1 Grand Prix and plenty of sunshine all year round.

If that is not reason enough to buy a home there what else would be. And we did mention that just around the corner is Monaco with one of the best yacht harbours in the world.

2. Moscow

Seeing Moscow rank so high is actually a surprise for us. Especially since it outranked London, known to be expensive. Moscow clocked in with $20,853 per sq.m






3. London

As already mentioned, London is only a fraction behind Moscow with $20,756 per sq.m. But given the choice we would buy in London any day before going to Russia (no offense intended). It’s just that we love London’s vibrancy and what the city can offer residents. There is never a dull moment and besides the weather – here we go again – we really love London to bits. It’s the city that never sleeps for sure.




4. Tokyo     
 
 

Ranked as the 4th most expensive city in the world, Tokyo real estate costs $17,998 per sq.m. Now if you are the type who loves eternal supplies of sushi, sashimi and Kirin beer, then you should seriously consider moving to this city of glitz and neon advertisements.

Plus, you’ve got to love crowds too. And did we mentioned the Shinkansen?



5. Hong Kong

 

 

Victoria peak, harbour junks, quick access to mainland China and a sophisticated mix of ethnic races share Hong Kong, a former British colony as their home. We admit, this city kicks butt and offers a ton of exciting experiences to visitors from all around the world.

If you decide to fork out your hard earned money for your own home, then you can take advantage from hidden markets, nearby islands and lovely local beaches. If you are keen you can always visit Disney too. All of this would come at a price of $16,125 per sq.m.

6. New York

 
 

The Big Apple as New York is lovingly known is the only city in the US included in the list. Costs of $14,898 per sq.m. offer you a home in one of the most vibrant cities in the world. From Central Park to Manhattan’s skyscraper jungle you can find just about anything you want in this city.

Good food, great shopping outlets and not to forget plenty of water are all draw-cards for potential buyers.

7. Paris

 

 

The city of romance and love or so they say. Quite frankly we are not that keen about Paris. We think it is dirty and sometimes even rude. Whoever said it was a place to go for loving?

But jokes aside, it has its niceties. Take the Eiffel Tower for example, great views from the top. Or a boat trip on the river Seine should not be looked over for a weekend trip. Buying a home there though requires some decent funding with $12,122 per sq.m. not cheap but certainly more affordable than Monte Carlo.

8. Singapore

 
 
 

If you like clean and order, then Singapore is your city. With strict laws about littering and plenty of green in and around the city, this cosmopolite in Asia is a favourite for many. It will set you back some $9,701 per sq.m. but think how close you would be to the rest of Asia.

 
 
9. Rome
 
 

All roads lead to Rome, right? They certainly do. And if you find yourself lost on an European road trip in search of a new home, then Rome will set you back some $9,166 per sq.m.

But as a reward you might get to see the pope or visit the Spanish steps. One thing the Italians certainly know is how to live life and yes we forgot, how to cook. Living in a city like Rome will most certainly pile on the extra kilos.



10. Mumbai
 
 

India, or Mumbai clocks in in 10th position. Quite astounding when we think back how not to long ago we saw India as a 3rd world country.These guys have certainly busted their behinds in the race of world domination and consequently built and grown some impressive cities.

If you want to buy real estate in Mumbai, you are looking at around $9,163 per sq.m.


All of these data has been based on the average price of a 120 sq.m. apartment within the city centre and in good condition. In total, more than 110 cities around the world were surveyed for this purpose and data was collected during 2008.





Given the fact that it is in Russia, maybe all that new wealth Russian money did affect the market, skyrocketing property prices like crazy.

Most Expensive Colleges for 2008-2009

As expected, college tuition seems to go up just about every year now. Sure, part of the reason may be inflation, but still the increases in tuition seem to always outpace the rate of inflation.

You would think the weak economy would have an effect on tuition prices, and maybe it does. Perhaps alumni donors are unable to give as much as they have in the past. States are cutting their funding for higher education, which is huge considering most colleges get the majority of their funds from two sources: the State and tuition. One thing is for certain though, regardless of the state of our economy, the demand for higher education will always be there.

We are reaching a point where the cost of one year of college education at some colleges is surpassing $50,000. Unless your parents are loaded, you can expect to have a HUGE amount of college debt after graduation. Even those that graduated five years ago will not feel the pain that today’s students will feel after they graduate and have to start paying back on their student loans. It is almost as if the current state and price of today’s education is forcing many students to go to a local community college for two years and then move on to complete their degree at a 4-year in-state school. One would think that those that do choose to go on to a more expensive prestigious college and graduate should have no problem obtaining a decent paying job to pay the bills (and student loans). But, as a student with little money, it can be hard just knowing how much debt you are about to get yourself into. Even debts over $50,000 sound overwhelming. One thing is for sure: make sure you know how you are going to pay for college before you actually go.

Just because these schools have high tuition, doesn’t mean you will actually be paying that amount. Many of these colleges provide excellent financial aid packages. A lot of these schools offer scholarships that often cover most of the financial burden of attending the college. For example, Princeton University has always been known to offer its students some of the best financial aid packages, keeping its graduates debts at a relatively low level. Schools like Cooper Union, with a tuition of $33,000 per year, give every student a full tuition scholarship ensuring no student is responsible for tuition-related costs.

Most of the colleges on this list of expensive colleges are private liberal arts schools located in the northeast that boast low student-to-teacher ratios.
Highest Tuition 2008-2009
College    Tuition
1. Bates College    $43,950
2. Middlebury College    $42,910
3. Colby College    $42,730
4. Union College (NY)    $40,953
5. Connecticut College    $40,900
6. George Washington University    $40,392
7. Vassar College    $39,635
8. Sarah Lawrence College    $39,450
9. Bucknell University    $39,434
10. Colgate University    $39,275
11. Carnegie Mellon    $39,150
12. Kenyon College    $39,080
13. Skidmore College    $38,888
14. St. Johns College    $38,854
15. University of Richmond    $38,850
16. Tulane University    $38,664
17. Wheaton College (MA)    $38,585
18. Franklin & Marshall College    $38,580
19. Wesleyan University    $38,364
20. Hamilton College    $38,220
21. Oberlin College    $38,012
22. Reed College    $37,960
23. Tufts University    $37,952
24. Dickinson College    $37,900
25. Bard College at Simon's Rock    $37,860
More: See the Top 100

Of course tuition is just one of the many costs associated with going to college. The other big expense is room and board. Some colleges also charge outrageous prices for student housing. The following list shows the most expensive colleges based on the total cost of tuition plus room and board.

Highest Total Cost 2008-2009
College    Total Cost
1. Sarah Lawrence College    $53,166
2. George Washington University    $50,312
3. New York University    $50,182
4. Georgetown University    $49,689
5. Connecticut College    $49,385
6. Bates College    $49,350
7. Johns Hopkins University    $49,278
8. Skidmore College    $49,266
9. Scripps College    $49,236
10. Middlebury College    $49,210
11. Carnegie Mellon University    $49,200
12. Boston College    $49,020
13. Wesleyan University    $49,000
14. Colgate University    $48,900
15. Claremont McKenna College    $48,755
16. Vassar College    $48,675
17. Haverford College    $48,625
18. University of Chicago    $48,588
19. Union College (NY)    $48,552
20. Colby College    $48,520
21. Mount Holyoke College    $48,500
22. Tufts University    $48,470
23. Bard College at Simon's Rock    $48,460
24. Franklin & Marshall College    $48,450
25. Bard College    $48,438

Malaysian designer to debut $30 million diamond dress for Stylo

Several dresses have been considered to be the most expensive in the world. We are now going to take a quick look at some of these very expensive dresses.

We'll start with the Swarovski Dirndl Dress as those of us who are savvy of fashion will definitely appreciate this work of art. Made in Munich, this dress is studded with almost 150,000 gems. This expensive dress is definitely a collector's item.

Marilyn Monroe’s Happy Birthday Mr. President dress is one of the most expensive dresses in the world. Marylin donned the dress on May 19th 1962 at a birthday tribute to John F. Kennedy. The dress she put on that evening was up for auction and sold for $ 1,150,000.

In 2004, Scott Henshall created a dress for Samantha Mumba. She attended the premiere of Spider-Man II wearing this spider web shaped dress that contains roughly 3,000 diamonds. The price of this dress is somewhere around £5 million.

What we know today as the most expensive dress in the world was created by Malaysian designer Faisol Abdullah. Valued at no less than $ 30 million, this dress is obviously for the super rich among us. This masterpiece is adorned with 751 sparkling diamonds all crafted by famous jeweler Robert Mouawad.


Royalty knows no recession. Faisol Abdullah, a Malaysian designer, is up to designing the hottest couture ever with a $30 million diamond dress dubbed the “Nightingale of Kuala Lumpur,” in time for the Stylo Fashion festival early next month in the Malaysian capital. “Stocks drop, gold is even falling, but a diamond is forever. This is a dress with diamonds. Why do backwards, why can’t we go forwards?” the designer of the dress, Faisol Abdullah, told Reuters as he showed off his sketches. The silk and taffeta evening gown will be decked with 751 diamonds with a 70 carat pear-shaped diamond at the centre of the bodice (featured here is a $20 million diamond dress from Chris Aire with the 70 carat diamond), and topped off with a train sparkling with diamonds. Asked if the dress would attract buyers, Nancy Yeoh, chief executive of Stylo, which commissioned the dress, said: “Its art and there are still enough rich people who would want to buy.”Actually, we have a plan to present the dress to the royal courts around the world starting with the Middle East,” she said, adding that if the dress was sold, 5 percent would go to the Gaza Humanitarian Fund.

This $30 million dress leaves Victoria’s Secret far behind in the race for the most expensive couture, with the second runner-up being the $20 million diamond dress designed by jeweler Chris Aire, but just in tune with the $30 million diamond studded bikini created by Susan Rosen with Steinmetz Diamonds.

The Most Of The Most Expensive Weddings!!

Hollywood celebs aren’t the only ones who have extravagant weddings. Professional altheletes, musicians, business men and women and Crown Princes also like to show off their dough with lavish nuptials. Here are 27 of some of the world’s most expensive weddings in history. Check out the price tags and you’re guaranteed to feel better about your own wedding expenses!

1.

Seemanto & Chandni AND Sushanto & Richa
(Father of the Grooms is Industrialist Subrata Roy of Sahara.)

Cost: $128 Million, for both weddings.
Wedding Date: February 14, 2004
Location: Lucknow, Sahara India
Number of Guests: 10,000
Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum & Sheikha Hind Bint Maktoum
(Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum is the Ruler of Dubai.)

2.
Cost: $44.5 Million, today this wedding would cost $100 Million.

Wedding Date: 1981
Location: Dubai, UAE
Number of Guests: 20,000
Amit Bhatia & Vanisha Mittal
(Bhatia is the grandson of London socialites, Pasha and Kamal Saigal. Mittal is the daughter of London steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal, the fourth wealthiest man in the world.)

3

Cost: $60 Million
Wedding Date: November 18, 2006
Location: Vaux le Vicomte, a 17th-century French chateau
Number of Guests: 1,000
Andrei Melnichenko & Aleksandra Kokotovic
(Melnichenko is best-known for his energy and banking businesses. He is the 17th wealthiest person in the world. Kokotovic is former Miss Yugoslavia.)

4.

Cost: Undisclosed, over $7 Million
Wedding Date: September 3, 2005
Location: Cote d’Azur, France

The most expensive meteor on ebay.com has a buy it now price of $3,500,000

There is a lot of confusion about how much meteorites cost or are worth. This article from astronomy.com gives a pretty good explaination of the costs. Like most things the cost is based on supply and demand.

The most common meteorites generally cost between $3-$6 per gram while exotic meteorites filled filled with space gems or carbon based diamonds that contain life’s building blocks may cost $30,000 per gram (these are super rare.) Meteorites that originated from Mars or the Moon are also very expensive. The most expensive meteor on ebay.com has a buy it now price of $3,500,000. Its over 2000 grams and comes in at $1500 per gram. It is billed as the ‘rarest’ meteor in the world. More than half of the 1900 metorites for sale on ebay right now are selling for less than $20. Most of them are under $5 and the more expensive ones are ones that have been made into jewlrey already. I found this pretty comprehensive chart of prices for meteorites that details prices for the different types of metiors.

The most expensive robbery ( Graff Diamonds US$65 million )

The Graff Diamonds robbery took place on 6 August, 2009 when two men posing as customers entered the premises of Graff Diamonds in New Bond Street, London and stole jewellery worth nearly £40 million (US$65 million).
It was believed to be the largest ever gems heist in Britain at the time, and the second largest British robbery after the £53 million raid on a Securitas depot in Kent in 2006. The thieves' haul totalled 43 items of jewellery, consisting of rings, bracelets, necklaces and wristwatches. Britain’s previous largest jewellery robbery also took place at Graff's, in 2003.




The men arrived at the store by taxi and once inside produced two handguns which they used to threaten staff. They made no attempt to conceal their faces from the premises' CCTV cameras, and police later discovered that they had used a professional make-up artist to alter their hair by using wigs, their skin tones and their features using latex prosthetics. The artist took four hours to apply the disguises, having been told that it was for a music video. Viewing the results in a mirror, one of the men commented: "My own mother wouldn't recognise me now," to which his accomplice is reported to have laughed and replied: "That's got to be a good thing, hasn't it?" The same make-up studio had unwittingly helped disguise members of the gang that robbed the Securitas depot in 2006.

A female member of staff was briefly held hostage as they exited the premises, at which point they fired a shot, although nobody was injured. Having released her they then escaped the scene in a blue BMW vehicle. This vehicle was abandoned in nearby Dover Street, where a second gunshot was fired into the ground while the robbers switched to a second vehicle, a silver Mercedes. They again switched vehicles in Farm Street, after which there was no further information regarding their whereabouts.

All of the diamonds had been laser-inscribed with the Graff logo and a Gemological Institute of America identification number.

Detectives investigating the robbery stated: "They knew exactly what they were looking for and we suspect they already had a market for the jewels." The suspects' details were circulated to all ports and airports but police believed they would have an elaborately prepared escape route and had already left the country.

The robbery was being investigated by Barnes Flying Squad, headed by Detective Chief Inspector Pam Mace.

The apparent contract killing of American journalist Paul Klebnikov shattered the illusions of many who shared his belief that Russia had moved beyond the days when scores were settled with a spray of bullets.

Yet police estimates indicate that in some ways, little has changed since the Wild West years of Russian capitalism in the early and mid-1990s.

Contrary to popular perceptions, even more contract killings are committed in Russia today than were committed 10 years ago, said Leonid Kondratyuk, a top crime expert at the Interior Ministry's Scientific Research Institute.

"We're seeing somewhere between 500 and 700 such killings annually," Kondratyuk said. "But those are just the murders we know for sure were contract killings. In reality, it's probably two to three times higher."

Kondratyuk's estimate is conservative compared to that of Valentin Stepankov, who until June was deputy secretary of the Security Council.

At a January conference in Moscow held by the World Community Against the Globalization of Crime and Terrorism, Stepankov said organized criminal groups were responsible for 26,000 crimes in 2003, up from 3,300 in 1999. He said around 5,000 of those crimes were contract killings.

Stepankov was Russia's first prosecutor general, serving until he was fired by former President Boris Yeltsin after parliament's revolt in October 1993. He is now a deputy natural resources minister.

The Interior Ministry's main criminal investigations department said fewer than 100 contract killings were registered in Russia last year. "But those are cases where we can say for sure it was a contract murder and where a criminal case has been initiated against a known suspect," spokesman Denis Strukov said. "Those are the only objective numbers we have."

The discrepancy in the figures reflects a lack of police data and the difficulty of classifying some murders.

"Who's to say that someone who gets knocked over the head and his briefcase stolen wasn't the target of a contract murder?" Strukov said.

Contract killings continue to swell because of a weak judicial system and a low probability that those ordering the hits will ever be punished. There also appears to be no shortage of those willing to kill for money, from drug addicts to former military men profiting from their professional training.

The price of a hit varies from a couple hundred dollars to a couple hundred thousand dollars, the experts say, with one singling out the 1998 killing of State Duma Deputy Galina Starovoitova as the most expensive he had come across.

Kondratyuk said the weak judicial system often makes it easier to order a hit than to settle a dispute in court.

"Often a court case will be more expensive than just killing someone," Kondratyuk said. "Especially since rampant corruption in the justice system means no one can be sure they would win in court."

"Usually there's nothing personal about it," Yakov Kostyukovsky, an organized crime expert from the Russian Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg, said about contract killings in the business world. "Unfortunately it's still a typical instrument in dealing with the competition. Al Capone-style."

Hits Solved 'Unofficially'

Like Chicago police before Capone went down, Russian police have gained a reputation of being chronically ineffective in tackling organized crime and solving contract killings.

But Andrei Konstantinov, who heads the Agency of Journalistic Investigations in St. Petersburg and has a reputation as the most knowledgeable chronicler of Russia's criminal underworld, said police are not as hapless as they are often portrayed.

"In many cases police investigators find out, or already know, who organized the hit," Konstantinov said. "But they can't gather quite enough information for a conviction."

Kostyukovsky put a different twist on what he called a "misconception," delineating between contract murders that are solved on "official" and "unofficial" levels.

The number of contract killings "officially" solved, that is, when enough evidence is passed on to prosecutors to try a suspect, may be low. Far more are solved unofficially, he said.

"If one group of criminals orders a hit on a member of another criminal group, the police might pass on information to the victim's cohorts about who was behind the killing," Kostyukovsky said. "If rival bandits are killing each other off, it might be advantageous for the police."

It might not raise the number of officially solved contract killings, he said, but it is less work for the police.

A retired chief detective, who worked in the St. Petersburg police force for most of the 1990s, said such police tactics are common.

"It happens very often," said the former detective, who asked to remain anonymous. "It's called 'realization of operational information.'

"In most cases everyone understands that if the case is turned over to the courts, it will take them three years to get to it, and in the end decide no one is guilty of anything. But if you give the information to a rival group, the issue will be solved very quickly and radically. It's rarely done out of 'noble intentions.' Almost always it's out of hatred."

The former detective added that the main reason police have a reputation for being unable to solve contract killings is that small-time hits, which are more likely to be solved, get little media attention.

"If an owner of a small store has another owner of a small store knocked off, no journalists are going to write about it," he said. "But if someone like Starovoitova is murdered, the media coverage is enormous, and if the killers aren't found, the impression is that no contract killings are ever solved.

"It's definitely harder to solve a contract killing than a drunken domestic killing, but things aren't as bad as the press makes it out to be."

Most high-profile contract killings in Russia, however, are never solved.

Klebnikov, the editor of Forbes Russia, was shot several times from a passing car after leaving work the night of July 9. Prosecutors have said only that an investigation is underway; there has been no information about possible suspects or any other progress in solving the case.

The Price of a Hit

Contract killings can run anywhere from a couple hundred to a couple hundred thousand dollars, said Konstantinov, bestselling author of the seminal Russian gangster book "Banditsky Peterburg."

"Take, for example, someone living in a communal apartment with an old lady who just won't seem to die," he said. "So he goes and finds a drug addict and pays him $300 to kill her."

In one low-budget incident in October, police in the Moscow region town of Zhukovsky arrested two Ukrainian nationals on suspicion of knifing to death a 23-year-old Zhukovsky man a month earlier. The two men claimed the victim's mother had paid them $300 for the job.

Lieutenant Mikhail Voronin of the Interior Ministry's Scientific Research Institute was even more blunt in describing some killers' bottom dollar.

"For a bottle of vodka, some homeless guys find they can get the job done with a kitchen knife," Voronin said.

Having a high-profile businessman or politician killed, however, is a much pricier affair.

Konstantinov said the 1998 hit on Starovoitova is most expensive contract killing he has come across, likely costing around $150,000 because of the number of organizers involved. She was shot in the stairwell of her St. Petersburg apartment building.

It is often difficult to gauge how much was paid for a contract killing, Konstantinov said, due to a long chain of middlemen between the hit man and the person who ordered the hit. The two rarely, if ever, know each other.

"It's the hit man who usually ends up getting caught, and only he knows how much money he got," Konstantinov said. "A killing might have been ordered for $20,000, and the hit man only got $5,000. All of the middlemen in between took their cut."

The alleged chain in the Starovoitova murder involves 11 people, most of whom come from the Bryansk region. Seven are currently on trial in St. Petersburg, and one has testified that the murder was ordered by former Duma Deputy Mikhail Glushchenko.

The whereabouts of Glushchenko, who served in parliament as a member of the ultranationalist Liberal Democratic Party and was reputedly a leader of the Tambov group, the most notorious St. Petersburg crime syndicate, are unknown. He is thought to be living abroad.

According to Konstantinov, it is common for killers to be hired from poorer regions -- like Bryansk -- and brought in to do a job in Moscow and St. Petersburg.

"You can hire someone from Kazan to come in, kill someone and leave quickly, and you're paying them based on Kazan prices," he said.

Prosecutors have identified Vitaly Akishin and Oleg Fedosov as Starovoitova's killers. Akishin is one of the defendants currently on trial. The other six are alleged to have carried out various tasks, including taping Starovoitova's phone calls, dumping the killers' clothing in a river and driving the hit men from the crime scene.

Fedosov and three other suspects are still at large. Prosecutors are seeking the extradition of two of the suspects from Europe.

"There may have been more expensive hits [than the one on Starovoitova], but I haven't heard of any," Konstantinov said.

Sasha Makedonsky

A majority of Russia's professional hit men are former secret service officers, military veterans and ex-convicts, according to Kondratyuk. "Of course people who know how to handle a gun are in demand," he said.

One of the most notorious -- and notoriously expensive -- hired killers of the 1990s was Alexander Solonik, a former soldier and policeman nicknamed Sasha Makedonsky for his deftness at simultaneously firing pistols in both hands, or "Macedonian-style." Solonik was said to have demanded tens of thousands of dollars for his services, Konstantinov said.

"I don't really believe it, though," he said. "It's more likely just part of the mythology of the criminal world."

Solonik, the only man ever to escape from Moscow's Matrosskaya Tishina prison and remain at large, managed to flee to Greece after the jailbreak in 1995. But his body was found on Feb. 2, 1997, about 20 kilometers north of Athens. He had been strangled and wrapped in plastic bags.

Three months later, a suitcase, bag and towel containing the dismembered body of Russian model Svetlana Kotova were found near Solonik's villa in Athens. Kotova and Solonik were romantically linked, according to Russian media reports.

In 2003, five suspected members of the infamous Orekhovskaya crime group were charged with the two slayings. One of them, Alexander Pustovalov, another notorious hit man, was accused of strangling Solonik. Pustovalov was known as Sasha Soldat because of his military background.

Hiring a Hit Man

But how are killers hired?

"That was a big problem for some businessmen in the 1990s," Kondratyuk said. "They wanted to have someone killed but couldn't find a killer. It's not like you can go ask someone, 'How much will it cost to have you kill someone?' and then, after they answer, tell them, 'Sorry, that's too expensive. I think I'll take my business elsewhere.'"

Kostyukovsky concurred that hiring a professional hit man requires some extra considerations. "Business in Moscow and St. Petersburg is a small world," he said. "Everybody knows everybody else."

But he said almost every successful businessman knows someone in the security services that can find someone to do the job.

Several factors other than the credentials of the hit man can determine the price of a contract murder, he said. These are the number of bodyguards a target has, the financial windfall from the death of a competitor and the style of the killing, to name a few.

"A contract murder arranged to look like an accident or a coincidence is going to be a lot more expensive than a standard shooting," Kostyukovsky said.

Kostyukovsky said he believes the mysterious death of anti-corruption journalist and Yabloko Duma Deputy Yury Shchekochikhin to be a contract killing that could only have been arranged by a very expensive "high-class specialist."

Shchekochikhin died in a Moscow hospital at the age of 52 in July 2003 after suffering a severe allergic reaction. People who saw his body said that his hair had fallen out, a symptom consistent with thallium poisoning.

"He was obviously a very dangerous journalist for someone," Kostyukovsky said.

Above all, someone ordering a hit has to be able to trust the people he hires to organize and carry out the killing, Kostyukovsky said. "Either that or you have to pay enough money to where you're sure the job will get done right," he said.

The case of Moscow resident Milovan Ristic is a prime example of a hit man turning against his employer.

In March, police arrested Ristic in a sting operation and charged him with offering an acquaintance $50,000 in exchange for a photograph of the severed heads of his wife and mother-in-law in an alleged scheme to obtain ownership of his wife's pharmacy and the apartment where the couple lived. The hired killer backed out of the deal and notified police.

After Ristic's arrest, police said another man came to them saying Ristic had offered him $25,000 to kill the original hit man, but since the two hired killers turned out to be friends, the man decided to go to the police.