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A manhunt is under way in western Germany for a convicted drug dealer who escaped by mailing himself out of jail.

The 42-year-old Turkish citizen – who was serving a seven-year sentence – had been making stationery with other prisoners destined for the shops.

At the end of his shift, the inmate climbed into a cardboard box and was taken out of prison by express courier.

He’s caught. Apparently german express couriers don’t do First Class Male Delivery.

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A financially ailing Ohio school district has joined the ranks of banks and automakers clamoring for a portion of the $700 billion economic bailout package.

Olmsted Falls Superintendent Todd Hoadley said Tuesday that if automakers and big U.S. cities can ask for federal bailout money, schools should be able to follow suit.

“I feel a moral obligation to our taxpayers to make this attempt,” said Hoadley, who requested $100 million from the Treasury Department last week. “This is a legitimate request. I’ll be frankly disappointed if something positive doesn’t come out of this.”

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President Kgalema Motlanthe’s cabinet will today unveil a plan for rescuing the country, which is buckling under the weight of a shattered economy, food shortages, a cholera outbreak and rioting soldiers.

South Africa believes that Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe has lost control.

A South African government official said: “That is why we are moving in. To help some government institutions to provide basic services. Mugabe has lost control. He has lost power. It’s just a matter of time before the country implodes. He cannot support his own people and that is a danger for the region.”

[Quote:]

Starting Nov. 27 and continuing until Monday, Army soldiers rampaged through the capital, Harare, after hearing that the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe would be unable to print enough currency to pay their daily wages. Hundreds of soldiers took their anger out on street vendors, looting the markets for food and other goods.

[Quote:]

He stepped outside and tapped numbers into his orange Nokia cellphone. After many tries, he reached a black-market money dealer, who relayed an up-to-the-hour exchange rate: 1.1 million Zimbabwe dollars to one U.S. dollar, up 10 percent since morning. Within minutes, the handwritten price tags on the store’s bags of cornmeal, the staple food here, had jumped from 17.6 million to 19.2 million Zimbabwe dollars.

[..]

In Zimbabwe, where historic hyperinflation is causing the value of local currency to evaporate in people’s wallets, it is increasingly the greenback that rules. Many vendors and businesses now demand American currency. Others peg their prices to the U.S. dollar and charge less if payment is made with it or the South African rand, widening a buying-power divide between those with access to foreign currency and those without — mostly people who have no relatives abroad and people in rural areas.

[..]

Inflation is officially at 231 million percent annually, but independent economists say it hovers around 1 quadrillion percent, driven by the insolvent government’s penchant for printing money to meet demand for scarce cash.

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The BlackBerry Storm, in my opinion, is a wonderful illustration of how Apple’s innovation and market appeal can force a smart company like RIM to invest millions of dollars in a product that’s way outside its core competency. You don’t see Apple trying to create a full-on enterprise/e-mail device, do you?

You don’t, and you won’t. Apple will just continue to gather mindshare as dozens of imitators try to absorb their share of the touchscreen multimedia pie.

So what exactly did RIM just do with the Storm?

Validated the hell out of Apple’s innovation, technology and — because RIM fell short with the Storm — position in the market. Like every other company that released its ‘iPhone killer’ only to see it heavily discounted after six months of slow sales.