Top Ten Cities of the world

The world's 10 best cities to live in, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit global liveability study, which looks at how tolerable it is to live in a particular place given its crime levels, threat of conflict, quality of medical care, levels of censorship, temperature, schools and transport links.

1.Melbourne, Australia scores an overall rating of 97.5 out of 100 

2.Vienna scores an overall rating of 97.3 out of 100

3.Vancouver, Canada 97.3

4.Toranto, Canada 97.2

5.Adelaide, Australia 96.6

6.Calgary, Canada (96.6)

7. Sydney, Australia 

8. Auckland, New Zealand.

9. Helsinki, Finland (96.0)

10. Perth, Australia (95.9)

10 Google Services You Probably Don’t Know

Google Inc. is a leading internet company that offers Internet-related products and services which include search engine, cloud computing, software and advertising technologies. Google offers more than 150 products or services to its users.

Google, since incorporation, has triggered a chain of products, acquisitions, and partnerships beyond the company’s core web search engine. The company offers online productivity software including email, an office suite, and social networking. Google’s products extend to the desktop as well, with applications for web browsing, organizing and editing photos, and instant messaging. Google leads the development of the Android mobile operating system, as well as the Google Chrome OS browser-only operating system.

10. Google Play

09. Google Web Fonts

08. Google Alerts

07. Google Offers

06. Google Page Creator

05. iGoogle

04. Google Apps for Bussiness

03. Google URL Shortener

02. Google Mars

01. Google Trends

Top 10 Most Spoken Languages In The World

Although there are over 6,000 languages in existence today, the vast majority of the world speaks less than 150. Of those 150, the usual suspects are all there, however there are a few that may surprise you; English drops to third place and Portuguese overtakes Bengali. Enough teasing, let’s get started.

01. Chinese (Mandarin) – 935 Million Native Speakers

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Of the more than 6.6 billion people in the world, 14.1% of them speak Mandarin Chinese. China has many dialects, but Mandarin Chinese is the most common and widely accepted of them all. It is the native language of roughly 935 million Chinese.

02. Spanish – 387 Million Native Speakers 

Photo Link — Enokson

Saying “Hola” at spot number two is Spanish with 387 million speakers. This accounts for about 5.85% of the world getting the big bien venido upon entering this world. Also a common second language, for Americans and others, Spanish is quickly gaining ground as a world language partly due to it being widely thought of as the easiest language to learn.[livingbilingual.com/2013/06/11/learning-a-language-the-easiest-language-to-learn] While it has quite a ways to go before it overtakes Chinese, it’s already overtaken number #3… English.

03. English – 365 Million Native Speakers 

 
Photo Link — DonkeyHotey

If you’re reading this, you speak English to some degree (or you are really confused.) While behind Spanish, English is still the lingua franca of the world. It dominates business, trade, and America’s currency, the dollar, is still used on a global scale. Hollywood helps spread our lovely language throughout the world and helps it maintain it as a status language.

04. Hindi – 295 Million Native Speakers

Photo Credit: Wikipedia

Hindi is the big-hitter in India. India has over 122 languages with 22 of them recognized by the constitution of India as official languages. Of them, Hindi has emerged as the big dog; the one everyone wants to play with. It is essentially a lingua franca in parts of, if not all of, India. Most Indians can speak or understand it to some degree. India has a lot of people, therefore a lot of people speak Hindi. Logical.

05. Arabic – 280 Million Native Speakers 

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Obviously, as astute as you all are, you know this statistic is a bit skewed. Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) is the common language used for news broadcasts and official stuff, however most Arabic-speaking folk speak a dialect of Arabic; Egyptian Arabic, Moroccan Arabic, Algerian Arabic, etc. If these were fragmented off, none of them would easily make the top 10, however, luckily for Arabic, they are all lumped together for official purposes. You got lucky this time, Arabic. Arabic is also one of the hardest languages to learn for English speakers.

06. Portuguese – 204 Million Native Speakers 

 
Photo Credit: Wikipedia

From Brazil to Portugal, the Portuguese know how to party. They also know how to multiply. From a relatively smaller number of countries, this rabbit-like mammals get it done when it comes to producing little Portuguese speakers.

07. Bengali – 202 Million Native Speakers 

Photo Credit: Wikipedia

I bet you didn’t see Bengali coming… in fact, I bet you don’t know what Bengali is. Let me educate you. Bengali is the language native to the southeastern region of Asia known as Bengal. Think Bangladesh. While numbers vary for the ‘native speakers’ of this language, it’s still in a solid place among the top 10 most spoken languages in the world.

08. Russian – 160 Million Native Speakers 

Photo Credit: Wikipedia

Russian, or Russki as I like to call it (I don’t know why) is a Slavic language that gives me fits when I try to learn it. Written in the Cyrillic alphabet, it looks and sounds foreign to most English speakers. The Russians know how to be cold and decline words. And be tough. And intimidating.

09. Japanese – 127 Million Native Speakers 

Photo Credit: Wikipedia

Perhaps the most polite language on the top 10, Japanese is famous for it’s difficulty in addressing various levels of people with regards to their status and respect level. Seemingly two different languages are used for addressing elders and people of authority vs. that annoying kid down the street. With it’s unique writing system, it appears to be really foreign to a large portion of the world. However, to 127 million people, it’s pure comfort.

10. Punjabi – 96-130 Million Native Speakers 

 

Photo Credit: Wikipedia

Ahh Punjabi, what would a top 10 list be without you? Punjabi “…is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by 130 million (2013 estimate) native speakers worldwide making it the 10th most widely spoken language in the world.”

It’s clear to see that the vast majority of languages are comprised of only the top fraction of a percent. Of the 6,000+ languages spoken today, this list of 10 makes up for roughly 45% or so of the total population of the earth. As the world becomes smaller, we lose a lot of the underrepresented languages out there. Whether you consider this a natural part of civilization, or a tragedy, it is happening. There are large efforts out there to support and help preserve near-extinct languages, but it will remain an uphill battle as more and more people jump on the bandwagon to speak one of the more ‘common’ languages.

Author Jeffrey Nelson of LivingBilingual.com

Top 10 Biggest Shopping Malls in the World

This is a list of the world's largest shopping malls based on their gross leasable area.

10. SM Megamall — 4,220,000 square feet

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SM Megamall is a huge shopping mall located in the Ortigas business district of Metro Manila, Philippines. It is one of the largest SM Supermall developed and operated by SM Prime Holdings, the largest mall operator in the Philippines owned by Henry Sy Sr. The mall has two buildings interconnected with a bridge and occupies a land area of approximately 21 hectares and has a total floor area of an estimated 392,000 m2 (4,220,000 sq ft), making it the second largest shopping mall in the country. The mall has a maximum capacity of 4 million people. It is as large as the Changi Airport Terminal 2 in Singapore. 10 more images after the break...

09. Sunway Pyramid — 4,276,945 square feet

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Sunway Pyramid is located in the heart of Bandar Sunway, Subang Jaya. It was opened in July 1997. One of the mall's most easily recognised designs is the Egyptian-inspired Pyramid with a lion "standing guard" at the entrance. The rest of the building is embellished in the monumental style, complete with pseudo-hieroglyphics decorating facades, along with numerous Pharonic statuaries. A monorail station connected to the Kuala Lumpur Monorail was originally planned to be built there. Construction began in early 2006, but was stopped and as of 2007 demolition is being considered.Its gross floor area of are totals 4,276,945 square feet (396,000 m²).

08 (a). Cevahir Shopping and Entertainment Center — 4,521,000 square feet

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Istanbul Cevahir Shopping and Entertainment Center, also known as Sisli Kültür ve Ticaret Merkezi (Sisli Culture and Trade Centre) is a modern shopping mall located in the Sisli district of Istanbul, Turkey. Opened on 15 October 2005, Istanbul Cevahir was the largest shopping mall in Europe in terms of gross leasable area between 2005 and 2011, and is one of the largest in the world.

Istanbul Cevahir was built on a 62,475 m2 (672,000 sq ft) land plot at a cost of US$250 million. It has a total floor area of 420,000 m2 (4,521,000 sq ft) and a gross leasable area of 110,000 m2 (1,184,000 sq ft) for shops and restaurants. The six retail floors of the shopping centre house 343 shops (some of which are the first in Turkey to sell certain international brands); 34 fast food restaurants and 14 exclusive restaurants. Other facilities include a large stage for shows and other events; 12 cinemas including a private theatre and a cinema for children; a bowling hall; a small roller coaster; and several other entertainment facilities. The building's 2,500 m2 (26,910 sq ft) glass roof carries the second biggest clock in the world, with three-metre (10 ft) high digits. The car park has an area of 71,000 m2 (764,000 sq ft) and a capacity of 2,500 cars, spread on four floors.

08 (b). Mid Valley Megamall — 4,521,000 square feet

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Mid Valley Megamall is a complex comprising a shopping mall, an office tower block, 30 offices, and 2 hotels located in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. It was opened in November 1999. The mall has 4.5 million square feet (420,000 m²) of total floor area, out of which 1.7 million square feet (158,000 m²) is leasable space.

It houses a 48,300 square foot (4,500 m²) convention centre and it is situated adjacent to a 646 room business hotel named Cititel Midvalley and 30 units of exclusive 11 storey signature offices. A second hotel, Boulevard, opened in mid-2005

07. Central World Mall — 4,600,000 square feet

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Central World is a shopping plaza and complex in Bangkok, Thailand. It is the sixth largest shopping complex in the world. The complex, which includes a hotel and office tower, is owned by Central Pattana. In 2006, after three years of design and renovation, CentralWorld was expanded to 550,000 square metres of shopping mall and 1,024,000 square metres of complex, topping nearby rival Siam Paragon in terms of size.

On 19 May 2010, CentralWorld was one of the many properties set on fire when the Red Shirts anti-government protesters were forcibly removed after months of demonstrations which included complete blockage of the Rachaprasong shopping district. The parts of the complex most affected were the Zen department store and its adjacent annex. A portion of the shopping complex reopened on 28 September 2010 after months of repair work.

06. Persian Gulf Complex — 4,800,000 square feet

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Persian Gulf Complex also known as Fars Shopping Complex is a large shopping mall located in Shiraz, Iran. It is the biggest mall in terms of the number of shops. The facility has space for 2,500 stores covering 420,000 square metres (4,500,000 sq ft).

Construction of the mall started in 2006 and was completed in 2011. The project was developed by Royal Star International, a Dubai-based construction group operating in the Middle East and Eurasia regions. Prior to its completion of the Fars Shopping Complex, Royal Star had completed 6 shopping malls, spread out across the region. These malls include Yazd Star, Qishm Star, South Star, City Center 1, City Center 2 and Shahr Star.

The complex includes the Burj Fars International, a 262-room hotel, an indoor and outdoor swimming pool, tennis court, convention centre and a helipad. In addition, there are two amusement parks at the mall, an outdoor amusement park called Iran Land, covering 37,000 square metres (400,000 sq ft), and an indoor amusement park covering 28,000 square metres (300,000 sq ft)with videogames, a bowling alley and a 3-story billiard hall. The mall also has six 240-seat cinema theaters. A 14,000-square-metre (150,000 sq ft) Carrefour Hypermarket is also located within the mall. The complex has four floors of parking space that can accommodate a total of 5,5000 vehicles.

05. 1 Utama Shopping Centre — 5,000,000 square feet

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1 Utama Shopping Centre is situated in Bandar Utama Damansara, a township in the north of Petaling Jaya, Selangor and is also adjacent to the Taman Tun Dr Ismail township in Kuala Lumpur, the capital city of Malaysia. Its gross built-up area totals 5,000,000 square feet (465,000 m²). It is the largest shopping mall in Malaysia and the fourth largest in the world.

04. Isfahan City Center in Isfahan, Iran. 6,500,000 square feet

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It is the largest shopping mall in Iran and is being built in four phases. It has a coverage of approximately 6,500,000 square feet, and includes a 5 star hotel (with 7 star standards), a shopping mall (including 7 cinema halls and more than 750 retail units), an international financial center (IFC), a world trade center (WTC), and an entertainment center with a cinema and a fair complex. The commercial center includes a hypermarket, a mall, shops, stalls, restaurants, and airline offices. The project is being developed by PRESTIGE LAND IRAN CO.

03. SM City North EDSA — 5,200,000 square feet

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SM City North EDSA is a shopping mall located at the intersection of North Avenue and Epifanio de los Santos Avenue (EDSA) in Quezon City, Philippines. It is the largest shopping mall in Southeast Asia and third largest in the world in terms of leasable area (496,878 square meters). The mall is operated by SM Prime Holdings, a local company in the Philippines, and the biggest retail and mall operator in Southeast Asia. SM City North EDSA opened on November 25, 1985 with an original concept offered a variety of tenants and flagship stores. The mall's redevelopment began with the opening of The Block in July 2006, went into high gear with the launching of newly modernized Annex in December 2008, and the opening of the Sky garden in May 2009. The Car Park Plaza transformed into a lifestyle center on 2009. SM City North EDSA, a work in progress with the renovation of the City Center, and the development of the North Link. SM City North EDSA constructed at a challenging period in the Philippines' political history with a gross floor area of 120,000 square meters in 1985.

02.Golden Resources Mall — 6,000,000 square feet

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Golden Resources Shopping Mall, or Jin Yuan is a shopping mall located near the Fourth Ring Road in Beijing, People's Republic of China. The nearest bus station is which in English is Yuanda Road East. In English, the mall has earned the nickname Great Mall of China, owing to its total area of 6 million square feet (557,419 square metres) over six floors. At 1.5 times the size of the Mall of America, Golden Resources Mall was the world's largest shopping mall from 2004 to 2005.The mall was completed on 20 October 2004 after 20 months of construction and opened four days later. 

01. New South China Mall — 7,100,000 square feet

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New South China Mall in Dongguan, China is the largest mall in the world based on gross leasable area, and ranked second in total area to the Dubai Mall. However, it is largely vacant. Unlike other "dead malls", which have been characterized by the departure of tenants, the New South China Mall has been 99% vacant since its 2005 opening as very few merchants have ever signed up.

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Top 10 Celebrities Earning Under the age of 30

10. Taylor Lautner

$22 million

With Twilight at an end, Lautner has to build a career outside of the supernatural franchise. His non-Twilight debut, Abduction, was a bust. He’ has a small role in the Adam Sandler film Grown Ups 2.

09. Kristen Stewart

$22 million

The Twilight money still rolling in (for now). Her earnings look set for a tumble: While she helped make Snow White and the Huntsman a hit, a sequel is still a ways off and the actress doesn't seem terribly interested in doing more big-budget movies.

08. Jennifer Lawrence

$26 million

Hollywood's new It girl walked away from 2012 with an Oscar for Best Actress for Silver Linings Playbook and one of the top-grossing movies of the year with The Hunger Games. Lawrence was paid under $1 million for the first Hunger Games movie but Lionsgate was happy to pay more to secure her for the second installment: Catching Fire. As Katniss, Lawrence has shown that action heroes don't always have to be played by men for a film to turn a profit.

07. Adele

$30 million

The singer still sells plenty of music but without a big global tour, it was hard for her to make the Celebrity 100 this year. The new mom got plenty of attention this year for “Skyfall,” her theme for the latest Bond movie. It won an Oscar for Best Original Song.

06. Katy Perry

$39 million

It's been a relatively quiet year for Perry as she prepares for a follow-up to Teenage Dream, which made her the only act besides Michael Jackson to have five No. 1 singles from the same album. She still earns plenty for private gigs, a fragrance with Coty and a deal with Popchips, the snackmaker in which she also holds an equity stake. Her 2012 biopic Part of Me added a seven-figure sum to her bottom line.

05. Rihanna

$43 million

The Barbados-born singer continues to rake in the dough, playing over 40 shows during our scoring period and releasing new album Unapologetic, her seventh in seven years. Even if you're not one of her 30 million-plus Twitter followers, it's hard not miss her recent singles "Diamonds" and "Stay" and her ubiquitous Vita Coco ads. And that's a formula that should keep the cash coming for years.

04. Calvin Harris

$46 million

Calvin Harris makes his debut on FORBES' Celebrity 100 after a stellar year. Discovered on Myspace eight year ago as a singer-songwriter, Harris has morphed into a world-renowned DJ and producer. In February, he signed on to play more than 70 shows over a two-year period in Las Vegas. While the majority of his money comes from performing, he also earns from writing and producing songs like Rihanna's Grammy-winning "We Found Love." Harris played more than 150 shows in the 12 months since June 1, 2012.

03. Taylor Swift

$55 million

Who says the music industry is dead? Swift released her fourth studio album, Red, in October 2012 and sold 1.2 million copies in week one. The album's first single, "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together," became her first to top Billboard's Hot 100 chart. She parlayed that success into endorsement deals with Diet Coke, Sony and Covergirl, not to mention big bucks on the road. She should earn even more next year as she transitions from arena shows to stadium sellouts.

02. Justin Bieber

$58 million

Since appearing on the cover of FORBES last year, the Canadian crooner has toured the world, picked up another 20 million Twitter followers and earned another $58 million (that sum would have been even higher if we hadn't credited him with a double-digit million-dollar merchandise advance last year). With stakes in startups including Enflick, Tinychat and Spotify, he shows no signs of slowing down.

01. Lady Gaga

$80 million

The Queen Monster would have earned even more had it not been for a hip injury that curtailed her Born This Way Ball Tour. The tour grossed $168 million through January; had Gaga been able to finish it, she would have likely topped $200 million. With a new album in the works, look for her to stay around the top of this list.

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