Archive
10 Interesting Links From November 20th
- 9NEWS.com | Colorado’s Online News Leader | Huge ball of ice crashes through woman’s roof – Then she heard a huge explosion after something fell out of the sky right into her kitchen. Thankfully Hagan was not sitting in the room. The two of them had just left the kitchen and no one in the home was injured. "It was just bizarre," Hagan said, "I heard a huge explosion, couldn't figure out if something had crashed in or exploded out and [it was] just complete chaos after that." It turns out a piece of ice, a bowling-ball-size piece, fell from the sky.
- Quit smoking today—and start looking better tomorrow: Consumer Reports Health Blog – Fewer wrinkles. Better-smelling breath, hair, and clothing. Healthier teeth and gums. More money in your pocket. An improved sense of taste and smell. A reduced risk of heart disease, stroke, chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases, and cancer of the lungs, cervix, pancreas, throat, intestine, kidneys, and bladder. Most important, up to 10 years added to your life span. Despite these convincing reasons to quit smoking, Americans are not getting the message that smoking can not only shorten your life, but also increase the risk of death in those who come into contact with your secondhand smoke—including your children.
- Ten Awesome Feats Of Automotive Infrastructure – Infrastructure – Jalopnik – This is apparently how Japanese engineers settle civil arguments: Don't want to move your building? Eat me. I've got a road to build.
- J.C. Penney discontinuing "big book" – Dallas Business Journal: – As more consumers flock to the Web to make online retail purchases, North Texas-based J.C. Penney Co. is changing the face of its brand by discontinuing the publishing of its two “big book” catalogs in exchange for more online initiatives and smaller, more specialized catalogs.
- Daily Express | World News :: Million hit by ‘plague worse than swine flu’ – A cocktail of three flu viruses are reported to have mutated into a single pneumonic plague, which it is believed may be far more dangerous than swine flu. The death toll has reached 189 and more than 1 million people have been infected, most of them in the nine regions of Western Ukraine.
- Washington Redskins can keep team name; Supreme Court refuses native Americans’ suit | csmonitor.com – A group of native Americans have lost their bid to force the Washington Redskins pro football team to change its name because they consider it to be a racial slur. On Monday, the US Supreme Court, in a one-line ruling, refused to take up the case. The action lets stand a decision by a federal appeals court in Washington that the native Americans had waited too long to bring their challenge to the Redskins trademark, and thus forfeited any right to sue.
- Web site’s cash handout stunt horrifies French minister| Technology| Reuters – Marketing Web site Mailorama.fr was forced to call off its plan to throw envelopes of cash to passers-by from the top of a bus on Saturday after thousands of people turned up and began spilling over security barriers. The decision to call off the stunt, which had been heavily promoted beforehand, sparked violent scenes in which shop windows were smashed, at least one car was overturned by hooded youths and photographers and cameramen were attacked.
- Americans see country headed in wrong direction, poll says, but closer look shows strong partisan divide on nation’s direction | Postcards – Daron Shaw, a University of Texas government professor who helped helm the poll, reacted: “The Republicans are (basically) more pessimistic than the Democrats are optimistic.”
- Al Jazeera English – Europe – Sicilian Mafia fugitive arrested – He had been convicted of five murders, including the kidnapping and killing of a rival's son, whose body was thrown into a vat of acid. Raccuglia faces several life sentences.
- Foodborne illness: An acute and long-term health challenge for the 21st century | Science Blog – CFI's report, The Long-Term Health Outcomes of Selected Foodborne Pathogens, calls for a new approach to foodborne illness research and surveillance and provides expert reviews about some of the long-term health outcomes for five foodborne pathogens. The outcomes range from hypertension and diabetes to kidney failure and mental retardation.
10 Interesting Links From November 16th
- Foodborne illness: An acute and long-term health challenge for the 21st century | Science Blog – CFI's report, The Long-Term Health Outcomes of Selected Foodborne Pathogens, calls for a new approach to foodborne illness research and surveillance and provides expert reviews about some of the long-term health outcomes for five foodborne pathogens. The outcomes range from hypertension and diabetes to kidney failure and mental retardation.
- Arizona lands solar manufacturing facility – Phoenix Business Journal: – The company, which is based in Wuxi, China, and has its American offices in San Francisco, has not settled on a site as of yet. Company officials cited its work with the Greater Phoenix Economic Council as well as the state’s renewable energy standard and potential research relationships with Arizona State University as the reasons behind its decision. The plant will initially employ about 75 people with the potential to double that within the first year.
- Local News | ‘Missing’ SeaTac man found with new name, in new state | Seattle Times Newspaper – Earlier this year, Christine Francisco got a divorce and, in an interview with KIRO-TV, said she had subsequently learned her husband had been leading a double life, complete with hidden bank accounts.
- Mysterious Porpoise Deaths Blamed On Berserk Dolphins – News Story – KTVU San Francisco – Marine biologists have figured out why a growing number of dead harbor porpoises have been found on California beaches in recent years: dolphin attacks.
- High Fructose Corn Syrup: A Recipe For Hypertension, Study Finds – Over the last 200 years, the rate of fructose intake has directly paralleled the increasing rate of obesity, which has increased sharply in the last 20 years since the introduction of HFCS. Today, Americans consume 30% more fructose than 20 years ago and up to four times more than 100 years ago, when obesity rates were less than 5%. While this increase mirrors the dramatic rise in the prevalence of hypertension, studies have been inconsistent in linking excess fructose in the diet to hypertension.
- News : Desalinization plant presents sustainability, waste concerns – Rio Rancho Observer – Jensen is also concerned with what happens after 100 years. “The deepwater isn’t renewable, so when it’s gone, it’s gone,” he said. “So, if it’s being used to promote more growth and more development and more housing, when that water runs out, there’s going to be a huge question of where the water comes from to supply the new population. That is a serious issue.”
- Report: Motorola looking at selling unit – Motorola Inc. is seeking to sell its largest division, which includes Tempe operations, according to a report Wednesday. Motorola has a location in Tempe at 2900 S. Diablo Way. The Schaumburg, Ill., company is exploring a sale worth about $4.5 billion, according to The Wall Street Journal's Web site, which cited "people familiar with the matter."
- Al Jazeera English – Americas – Rio gangs down police helicopter – Suspected drug traffickers in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro have shot down a police helicopter monitoring a shootout between rival armed gangs.
- Florissant deer gores woman who tried to pet it – The Denver Post – A young buck mule deer gored a 63-year-old woman near Florissant on Monday after she apparently called to the animal in an attempt to pet him, officials from the state Division of Wildlife said today in a news release.
- Birth Control Pills Affect Women’s Taste in Men: Scientific American – Studies suggest that females prefer the scent of males whose MHC genes differ from their own, a preference that has probably evolved because it helps offspring survive: couples with different MHC genes are less likely to be related to each other than couples with similar genes are, and their children are born with more varied MHC profiles and thus more robust immune systems.
10 Interesting Links From September 16th
- Is war on drugs worth it? Maybe not, new FBI data suggest. | csmonitor.com – The new statistics point to a continued emphasis on drug interdiction – otherwise known as the "war on drugs" – that more and more law enforcement officers are now questioning. While many experts hold the anti-drug campaign to be the key reason for the decline in the crime rate in the US, especially violent crime, since the 1990s, these police officers, as well as current and retired judges and prosecutors see, instead, thousands of American lives ruined for small drug infractions in a costly and possibly unwinnable "war."
- Al Jazeera English – Europe – Italian mafia ’sunk toxic waste’ – Italian authorities have begun investigating a shipwreck allegedly containing toxic waste off the Calabrian coast, after claims it was deliberately sunk by the mafia. A former member of the criminal organisation says the vessel and its cargo were blown up in a lucrative radioactive disposal scheme and that the ship contained "nuclear" material
- The White House – Blog Post – Reality Check: The Truth About "Czars" – But of course, it’s really the hypocrisy here that is noteworthy. Just earlier today, Darrell Issa, a Republican from California and one of the leaders in calling for an investigation into the Obama Administration’s use of "czars", had to admit to Fox News that he had never raised any objections to the Bush Administration’s use of "czars". Many of these members who now decry the practice have called on Presidents in the past to appoint "czars" to coordinate activities within the government to address immediate challenges. What is clear is that all of this energy going into these attacks could be used to have a constructive conversation about bringing this country together to address our challenges moving forward – and it doesn’t take a "czar" to bring that about! Just some folks willing to act in good faith.
- Nazi flag flying high over East Mesa again – Las Cruces Sun-News – Triplett's flags – which he said signified protest against what he viewed as unjust government action and impending communism – were taken down Sept. 11 but went back up Monday, a Nazi flag still on top but the American flag right-side-up this time. A call to Triplett at his business, New Mexico Roof Coating Co., met with no reply and a hang-up. A subsequent message left there, seeking comment, was not immediately returned.
- Colo. budget plan: 6,400 prisoners face early release – The Denver Post – Colorado Department of Corrections officials underreported by thousands the number of prisoners — including thieves, drug dealers and killers — who are eligible for early release under a $19 million budget-cutting plan. A review of the list shows that among the hundreds of violent offenders to be considered are several convicted killers and a man who shot and wounded a police officer, even though DOC officials and Gov. Bill Ritter have promised that the prisoners are not the type who would be eligible for early release. The early-release plan, announced Aug. 18, is part of a plan to shore up a $318 million gap in this year's budget.
- Charles Darwin film ‘too controversial for religious America’ – Telegraph – Movieguide.org, an influential site which reviews films from a Christian perspective, described Darwin as the father of eugenics and denounced him as "a racist, a bigot and an 1800s naturalist whose legacy is mass murder". His "half-baked theory" directly influenced Adolf Hitler and led to "atrocities, crimes against humanity, cloning and genetic engineering", the site stated.
- AMREP Reports First Quarter Fiscal 2010 Results – PRINCETON, N.J., Sept. 9 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — AMREP Corporation (NYSE: AXR) today reported a net loss of $1,056,000, or $0.18 per share, for its fiscal 2010 first quarter ended July 31, 2009, compared to net income of $71,000, or $0.01 per share, for the first quarter of the prior fiscal year. Revenues were $32,457,000 in the first quarter of this fiscal year versus $35,570,000 in the first quarter of fiscal 2009. First quarter 2010 revenues from land sales at the Company's AMREP Southwest subsidiary were $1,485,000 compared to $1,263,000 for the same period of fiscal 2009, with the results of both periods reflecting a continuing softness in the real estate market in the greater Albuquerque-metro and Rio Rancho areas that is consistent with the well-publicized problems of the national home building industry and credit markets.
- Why I Love Al Jazeera – The Atlantic (October 2009) – Al Jazeera is also endearing because it exudes hustle. It constantly gets scoops. It has had gritty, hands-on coverage across the greater Middle East, from Gaza to Beirut to Iraq, that other channels haven’t matched. Its camera crew, for example, was the first to beam pictures from Mingora, the main town of Swat, enabling Al Jazeera to confirm that the Pakistani military had, in fact, prevailed there over the Taliban.
- When Bush spoke to students, Democrats investigated, held hearings | Washington Examiner – The controversy over President Obama's speech to the nation's schoolchildren will likely be over shortly after Obama speaks today at Wakefield High School in Arlington, Virginia. But when President George H.W. Bush delivered a similar speech on October 1, 1991, from Alice Deal Junior High School in Washington DC, the controversy was just beginning. Democrats, then the majority party in Congress, not only denounced Bush's speech — they also ordered the General Accounting Office to investigate its production and later summoned top Bush administration officials to Capitol Hill for an extensive hearing on the issue.
- BBC NEWS | UK | Northern Ireland | Huge ’sky explosion’ investigated – An Irish astronomy group is calling for help in tracing the origin of a huge explosion in the skies over the country on Thursday evening.
10 Interesting Links From September 7th
- Al Jazeera English – Asia-Pacific – Samoa set to switch road lanes – Drivers fear traffic chaos in Samoa as they prepare to switch from driving on the right-hand side of the road to the left. The small South Pacific nation of 180,000 people is set to change lanes on Monday, the first country to do so in nearly 40 years. The government has banned the sale of alcohol for three days and declared a two-day public holiday as a precaution, until people get used to the changes.
- Al Jazeera English – Europe – Three guilty of UK plane bomb plot – The bombers intended to simultaneously destroy at least seven planes carrying over 200 passengers each between London's Heathrow airport and the United States and Canada in August 2006, prosecutors said. The suspected al-Qaeda plot led to a tight of security restrictions worldwide on the amount of liquids passengers could take on board aircraft.
- Front Row Washington » Blog Archive » Obama to post White House visitor logs on the Internet | Blogs | – After early signs he might follow the lead of other presidents and keep his White House visitor logs secret, Barack Obama has decided instead he’s going to post it on the Internet.
- Brain scan: Paranoid survivor | The Economist – EARLIER this year Andrew Grove taught a class at Stanford Business School. As a living legend in Silicon Valley and a former boss of Intel, the world’s leading chipmaker, Dr Grove could have simply used the opportunity to blow his own trumpet. Instead he started by displaying a headline from the Wall Street Journal heralding the recent takeover of General Motors by the American government as the start of “a new era”. He gave a potted history of his own industry’s spectacular rise, pointing out that plenty of venerable firms—with names like Digital, Wang and IBM—were nearly or completely wiped out along the way.
- The elusive search for the sufficiently innocent criminal. – By Dahlia Lithwick – Slate Magazine – The state of Texas now has the opportunity to review Beyler's findings and conclude that it has carried out the "execution of a legally and factually innocent person."
- Intel spent $877K lobbying government in 2Q – Forbes.com – Intel Corp., the world's No. 1 computer microprocessor maker, spent $877,000 on lobbying in the second quarter, according to recent disclosure forms.
- Men lose their minds speaking to pretty women – Telegraph – The research shows men who spend even a few minutes in the company of an attractive woman perform less well in tests designed to measure brain function than those who chat to someone they do not find attractive.
- List of inventors killed by their own inventions – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia – This is a list of inventors whose deaths were in some manner caused by or related to a product, process, procedure, or other innovation that they invented or designed.
- Man sentenced for selling bald eagle feathers – Authorities say a Dilkon man has been sentenced in federal court for selling 11 bald eagle tail feathers. Prosecutors say Cedric E. Salabye pleaded guilty in April to one count of a federal indictment charging him with selling eagle feathers in violation of the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act. A U.S. District Court judge in Phoenix on Friday sentenced Salabye to five years of probation, six months of home confinement and 150 hours of community service.
- Al Jazeera English – Asia-Pacific – China launches organ donor scheme – China is reportedly launching a new national organ donor scheme, aimed at reducing the health system's current dependence on body parts taken from executed prisoners. According to the China Daily newspaper, currently more than 65 per cent of organ donations come from executed convicts – a system that has been criticised as unethical and profit driven.
10 Interesting Links From August 26th
- www.KOB.com – APD sees rise in new meth making method – Meth makers have found a new way to create the highly dangerous drug—they call it “shake and bake.” APD says most of the meth cases they work with now involve the shake and bake method.
- THE MOST NOTORIOUS COUNTERFEITER: DETAILS Article on men.style.com – Despite the best efforts of the Secret Service, the printer behind these notes evaded capture for more than three years. By then, Albert Edward Talton, of Lawndale, California, was responsible for putting more than $7 million in phony currency into circulation. And he'd made much of it using supplies purchased from his local Staples.
- Struggling homeowners left in limbo – Five months into the $75 billion federal program meant to toss a lifeline to homeowners facing foreclosure, most people in need of help are still floundering. Overall, about 15 percent of borrowers across the country who are eligible for the program have been offered help from their lender, according to a recent U.S. Treasury Department report. Of those homeowners, 9 percent have participated in a trial loan modification. President Barack Obama's administration is calling for lenders to ramp up their efforts and help 500,000 more homeowners by November.
- www.KOB.com – Man arrested for 22nd drunken driving offense – State police say a Mora County man has been arrested for his 22nd drunken driving offense – and his blood-alcohol content tested almost five times higher than New Mexico's legal limit.
- Colorado wildlife experts get aggressive going after smart bears – The Denver Post – Colorado wildlife overseers flummoxed by a rash of bear-human conflicts are searching for options, from "adverse conditioning" to haze nuisance bears that have been trapped to raising the number of hunting permits to thin the population. Wildlife officials say hundreds of clashes this summer in mountain towns — including a fatal attack, a mauling and myriad break-ins — require an aggressive response.
- Philltopia » 15 life lessons learned from SimCity – Ah, SimCity. While all the other video games out there were teaching us to become violent, antisocial little monsters, SimCity was quietly showing us the positive, constructive side of life. As a loyal player for many years, I thought I’d reflect on the countless insightful lessons this little game has taught me.
- iPhone Jailbreaking Could Crash Cellphone Towers, Apple Claims | Threat Level | Wired.com – The nation’s cellphone networks could suffer “potentially catastrophic” cyberattacks by iPhone-wielding hackers at home and abroad if iPhone owners are permitted to legally jailbreak their shiny wireless devices — that’s what Apple claims.
- Al Jazeera English – Asia-Pacific – China cracks down on rights lawyers – The authorities in China appear to have mounted a sweeping crackdown on human rights lawyers, revoking the licences of more than 50 lawyers in the past week.
- The Best Place To Hide Money: Conversation With A Burglar – Personal Finance Advice – I had quite the interesting conversation this weekend with a person who happened to be a former burglar. It was great timing because I was wondering if something like the skid mark underwear for hiding money would really work. I also figured that if you wanted to know the best place to hide your money from a burglar, a former burglar was the person to ask.
- SIA: Global chip sales on an upswing – New Mexico Business Weekly: – Worldwide sales of semiconductors for the second quarter of 2009 were $51.7 billion, a 17 percent increase from the first quarter when sales were $44.2 billion, the Semiconductor Industry Association reported Monday.
10 Interesting Links From July 28th
- Transparent aluminium is ‘new state of matter’ – Oxford scientists have created a transparent form of aluminium by bombarding the metal with the world’s most powerful soft X-ray laser. 'Transparent aluminium' previously only existed in science fiction, featuring in the movie Star Trek IV, but the real material is an exotic new state of matter with implications for planetary science and nuclear fusion.
- Blue M&Ms ‘mend spinal injuries’ – The compound Brilliant Blue G blocks a chemical that kills healthy spinal cord cells around the damaged area – an event that often causes more irreversible damage than the original injury. On the downside, the treatment causes the skin to temporarily turn bright blue and BBG needs to be injected soon after the trauma. The test injections were given within 15 minutes.
- iBank provides yet another reason to dump Quicken for Mac – IGG Software has announced a "Why wait another day?" rebate program to persuade frustrated Quicken Mac 2007 owners to switch to iBank 3.5 (US$59.99). If you're a Canadian or U.S. owner who purchased iBank after July 10th, 2009, and have proof of ownership (installation disc or receipt) for either the Mac or Windows versions of Quicken or Microsoft Money, sending in a mail-in rebate form will get you a $20 incentive to switch to iBank.
- S.C. case looks on child obesity as child abuse. But is it? – USATODAY.com – Jerri Gray was doing all she could to help her son lose weight, her attorney says. But something had gone terribly wrong for the boy to hit the 555-pound mark by age 14. Authorities in South Carolina say that what went wrong was Gray's care and feeding of her son, Alexander Draper. Gray, 49, of Travelers Rest, S.C., was arrested in June and charged with criminal neglect. Alexander is now in foster care.
- Consumerist – Watch Out For Panasonic’s Proprietary Battery Cameras – Panasonic – Many of Panasonic's cameras will only work with official Panasonic batteries—the newest models require "an embedded security ID chip," while older models have been issued a firmware upgrade that locks out third-party vendors. This is already pretty obnoxious, but what makes it even worse is Panasonic can't keep up with demand, so the batteries they insist you buy for your camera aren't available.
- Al Jazeera English – Americas – Man gets life for Bush murder plot – A man who received a 30-year jail sentence for joining al-Qaeda and conspiring to kill former US President George W. Bush has had his penalty increased to life imprisonment. Ahmed Omar Abu Ali, 28, was given the harsher sentence on Monday after a US appeals court ruled that his 2005 punishment was too lenient.
- AP Sources: U.S. Man Was ‘Gold Mine’ of Terror Intel – Local News | News Articles | National News | US News – FOXNews.com – Months before President Barack Obama took office with a pledge to change U.S. counterterrorism policies, the Bush administration gave Vinas all the rights of American criminal suspects. And he talked. "This was by the numbers. It was a law enforcement operation and it worked,"
- BBC NEWS | Americas | Whale wedged on cruise ship bow – A rare whale was discovered wedged on to the bow of a cruise ship when it docked in a Canadian port. The 70ft fin whale, a threatened species in Canada, was found when the Sapphire Princess docked at the Port of Vancouver, the cruise company said.
It said it had "strict whale avoidance" measures and it was unclear where, when or how the whale became stuck. - Revealed: the secret evidence of global warming Bush tried to hide | Environment | The Observer – Graphic images that reveal the devastating impact of global warming in the Arctic have been released by the US military. The photographs, taken by spy satellites over the past decade, confirm that in recent years vast areas in high latitudes have lost their ice cover in summer months. The pictures, kept secret by Washington during the presidency of George W Bush, were declassified by the White House last week. President Barack Obama is currently trying to galvanise Congress and the American public to take action to halt catastrophic climate change caused by rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
- Southwest Airlines breaks losing string, posts $54M profit | News for Dallas, Texas | Dallas Morning News | Latest News – Southwest Airlines Co. said Tuesday it earned $54 million in the second quarter, the Dallas carrier's first official profit after three quarters of losses. However, the carrier said it cannot guarantee that it'll make money in the third quarter, typically one of the strongest for Southwest and the airline industry.
10 Interesting Links From June 20th
- Police: Argument over better father ends in shooting – A man shot his former lover's new boyfriend in the leg early Saturday morning after the two men argued about who was a better father to the first man's son, police said.
- Home invasion suspects tied to border group – KVOA News 4, Tucson, Arizona - – The trio are alleged to have dressed as law enforcement officers and forced their way into a home about 10 miles north of the Mexican border in rural Arivaca on May 30, wounding a woman and fatally shooting her husband and their 9-year-old daughter.
Their motive was financial, Dupnik said.
"The husband who was murdered has a history of being involved in narcotics and there was an anticipation that there would be a considerable amount of cash at this location as well as the possibility of drugs," Dupnik said.
Forde is the leader of Minutemen American Defense, a small border watch group, and Bush goes by the nickname "Gunny" and is its operations director, according to the group's Web site.
- News : Intel fined for hazardous waste – The New Mexico Environment Department fined Intel for violating the state’s hazardous waste management regulations in March.
On March 25, NMED conducted a hazardous waste compliance evaluation inspection at Intel Corporation. Inspectors discovered that Intel failed to close several containers of universal waste lamps. Universal waste lamps are bulbs used for standard office lighting and can contain levels of mercury and lead that make them hazardous waste when disposed.
- Growing the Poison Pepper – Boing Boing – I ordered naga jolokia pepper seeds from the Chile Pepper Institute at New Mexico State University. The naga jolokia, sometimes called the bhut jolokia, the ghost pepper, or the poison pepper, is the world's hottest chile pepper. My brother, the expert gardener, is growing them right now. These are pretty difficult to grow in Minnesota; they take forever to germinate and the drop flowers at the slightest provocation.
- Bare-bones warning to Boulder cyclists – The Denver Post – Boulder Police Chief Mark Beckner warned Thursday that police will ticket bike riders if they expose their genitals during the World Naked Bike Ride, which is planned for Saturday as a protest against oil dependency.
- Not so windy: Research suggests winds dying down – The Denver Post – The wind, a favorite power source of the green energy movement, seems to be dying down across the United States. And the cause, ironically, may be global warming—the very problem wind power seeks to address.
The idea that winds may be slowing is still a speculative one, and scientists disagree whether that is happening. But a first-of-its-kind study suggests that average and peak wind speeds have been noticeably slowing since 1973, especially in the Midwest and the East. - Four Reasons Why iPhone Owners Hate AT&T – With the iPhone 3G S news now in the wild, the discussion digressed from the announcement of the 3G S itself to AT&T, the iPhone's exclusive carrier in the U.S. (at the moment). Without a doubt, this relationship is where Apple's weaknesses lie.
- Three Things the Palm Pre Does Better Than the iPhone 3GS | Popular Science – Arguably the Pre’s biggest draw is its super-elegant multitasking schema—apps fill up “cards” as they’re launched, which you can quickly scroll through horizontally by pressing the main button, which zooms out into a “card”view. Closing apps is done by flicking it off the top of the screen, which feels great. Aside from the five icons in a quick-launch bar and those within the three drawers of the app launcher, there is no icons-on-a-desktop conceit.
- Al Jazeera English – Europe – WHO declares H1N1 pandemic – The World Health Organisation has declared a H1N1 pandemic, the first such annoucement in more than 40 years, as infections continue to rise around the planet.
- Atomic Warfare – Intel last week bought for $884 million Wind River Systems, a venerable embedded operating system company — yet another of the chip giant’s recent forays into software. The reason for this purchase is both simple and grand — to help Intel vertically integrate and to further its Linux ambitions. Intel’s ultimate target with this purchase is Microsoft. It’s all about kicking Redmond out of the netbook business.
10 Interesting Links From April 10th
- Camping 101: What to Take & Where to Go – If you are a working stiff, a 3-day camping trip is the ideal way to recreate yourself. Sneak out of work for a day and a great big adventure lies before you. But so many of us have no gear or no experience here in the mountain west. And many would like to get started camping but really have no idea how to begin without going broke at REI. So here are some thoughts from a person who has camped out for over 50 years and just last summer camped his way across America hauling everything on a bicycle.
- An Evolutionary Explanation for Sexual Smell Differences | Wired Science from Wired.com – "Women have a larger interest in reproductive events because they have fewer opportunities for passing on their genes than men," said George Preti, a Monell Chemical Senses Center organic chemist.
In a study published Monday in Flavour and Fragrance, Preti and colleagues found that women were able to detect body odors masked by other fragrances. Male noses quickly lost the scent. - After earthquake, Italians ask questions about building codes | csmonitor.com – Four days after a devastating earthquake in central Italy left more than 280 people dead, attention is turning to whether a culture of impunity toward building codes contributed to the high number of casualties.
Many of the centuries-old buildings in L'Aquila, where the 6.3-magnitude quake struck overnight Sunday, sustained severe damage. But newer buildings were also affected. With Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi vowing to rebuild the stricken town, some experts say, more stringent building codes are needed – along with tougher enforcement to ensure compliance.
- Al Jazeera English – Middle East – Iraqi protesters call for US exit – Abdel Wahab Al-Qassab from the Strategic Studies Centre in Doha, Qatar, which researches political and military strategies, said that Iraqi public opinion is overwhelmingly in favour of US forces leaving the country.
- Scorpion biodiversity | Science Blog – Scorpions possess resistance to high temperatures and the ability to conserve water for long periods of time, and as a result thrive in hot and arid parts of the world. But is this global distribution also seen at a more local level? Reporting in the open-access, peer-reviewed journal PLoS ONE April 9, Doctoral student Shmuel Raz and colleagues at the University of Haifa, Israel now show that this is indeed the case, even when European-like and African-like habitats were separated by no more than 100 metres.
- Jennifer Huard – It’s All Happening…: Winslow Sandstorm – 10am – We had just pulled over because visibility was down to… well, you can see. As soon as we pulled over, the traffic in the lanes came to a halt. Truckers slowed everyone down and stopped traffic before the idiot drivers who didn't know any better started a chain reaction pile up. No accidents to report, everyone kept their cool and no one got hurt.
We sat there for over an hour as 40mph winds whipped the dirt up, gusting to 60pmph. Soon the traffic slowly started moving, so we joined the caravan and rolled on down the highway into the clear blue a couple miles up the road.
- Rio Rancho economic outlook upbeat – New Mexico Business Weekly: – Also, the state will receive $30 million in funds for weatherization and energy efficiency programs for housing, much more than it has received in the past, Denish said. This will help people stay in their homes, she said.
Sandoval County, which has the highest foreclosure rate in New Mexico, will get about $1.7 million in neighborhood stabilization funds from the Mortgage Finance Authority to help get abandoned homes back on the market by repairing them and helping first-time homebuyers acquire them.
During a question and answer session, Sue Cleveland, superintendent of the Rio Rancho Public Schools, said the ARRA funds do present a challenge because they don’t take into account state equalization formulas for school funding. As a result, Rio Rancho will get the least amount per pupil from the ARRA funds even though the system is already struggling with growth issues, she said.
- Electric Radiant Floor Heat | Efficiency – Typical DIY bathroom electric radiant heat installations will run $300-500 over their unheated counterparts. Add in up to $750 more for professional electrical and material installation. And after the installation, the floor requires power to keep your investment producing a warm, comfortable atmostphere. So the question is: how much power will your investment consume?
- Decoding Intel’s New Logo Stickers – Columns by PC Magazine – If you go shopping for a new Intel-powered desktop, laptop, nettop, or netbook in the coming weeks, you'll notice some changes. This month, Intel updated its logos to hopefully simplify the buying experience. Along with these new logos, there's a new standardized 5-star rating system to go along. So how do you tell the difference between a Core i7 and a Celeron (aside from the price)? Well, here's a decoder ring.
- Apple – iTunes – 1 Billion App Countdown – As of today, nearly one billion apps have been downloaded around the globe. So we just want to say thanks — a billion. Download an app and you’ll automatically get the chance to win a $10,000 iTunes Gift Card, an iPod touch, a Time Capsule, and a MacBook Pro. Just go to the iTunes Store, browse the App Store, and download your best app yet.
10 Interesting Links From March 21st
- Under 35? Hurray for the meltdown! – MSN Money – If you're 35 or older, the financial crisis may seem to have no upside. Your retirement funds, home equity, job prospects and credit lines have withered so much that it's hard to focus on anything but what you've lost.
If you're young, though, the biggest threat to your future financial security isn't the current crisis. Your greatest risk is that fear will cause you to miss some once-in-a-lifetime opportunities. - Al Jazeera English – Europe – Italians hold anti-mafia protest – Tens of thousands of people have marched through the streets of Naples to commemorate the victims of mafia violence and demand an end to organised crime in southern Italy.
Demonstrators, many clad in white, held banners and pictures of relatives killed by mafia gangs, as the names of some 900 mafia victims were read out through loudspeakers on Saturday.
- Tech Trader Daily – Barron’s Online : Dell: Dude, What Did You Do With Your Cell Phone? – Shaw Wu, an analyst at Kaufman Bros., asserts in a research note today that the company’s first attempt was basically rejected by the carriers as too, well, Dell-like.
He asserts that Dell showed a prototype to the carriers, but that they weren’t all that impressed. “From our conversation with supply chain and industry sources, it appears that it ultimately came down to lack of carrier interest and small subsidies, making it difficult for Dell to make a profit,” he write. “In our view, the last thing Dell needs is to enter another money losing business as it seeks to preserve its operating margins of 5%-6%.” (Which he notes compares to Hewlett-Packard at around 11%, and Apple and IBM at 15%.)
- Part of Biosphere 2 to get boost from sun to run things – Biosphere 2, the giant terrarium in Oracle, plans to use the sun's energy to operate a portion of the facility.
Solon Corp., a solar-panel manufacturer with a factory in Tucson, is donating more than $200,000 in solar panels to the research center.
- Report: BofA CEO wants to repay TARP money by 2010 – New Mexico Business Weekly: – Bank of America Chairman and CEO Ken Lewis said he’d like to repay the government’s $45 billion investment in his bank later this year or in early 2010.
“In terms of paying it totally back then you’re probably talking about sometime late this year or sometime early next year when we see the economy improving,” Lewis told the Charlotte [N.C.] Observer this week.
- New Mexico Independent » New Mexico’s brave new world of film and TV — courtesy of you! – Gov. Richardson liked the idea of luring movies and TV to New Mexico so much that he expanded the incentives package — increasing what had been a 15 percent film production tax rebate to 25 percent. The Democratic governor also led the charge to relax state sales taxes on the industry, and he added a program to subsidize the training of New Mexico residents in so-called “advanced below-the-line” crew positions — a subsidy that amounts to a reimbursement of half of the trainees’ wages.
- Goodbye Google | stopdesign – Yes, it’s true that a team at Google couldn’t decide between two blues, so they’re testing 41 shades between each blue to see which one performs better. I had a recent debate over whether a border should be 3, 4 or 5 pixels wide, and was asked to prove my case. I can’t operate in an environment like that. I’ve grown tired of debating such miniscule design decisions. There are more exciting design problems in this world to tackle.
- PETA: Ingrid Newkirk’s Unique Will – a. That the “meat” of my body, or a portion thereof, be used for a human barbecue, to remind the world that the meat of a corpse is all flesh, regardless of whether it comes from a human being or another animal, and that flesh foods are not needed;
- Was Eliot Spitzer Taken Out Because He Was Going to Bust AIG? | PEEK | AlterNet – Today in Slate Eliot Spitzer has a short op-ed that speaks volumes about what is going on, and indirectly, if you follow the money, what happened to him. Plainly stated, Spitzer brings the AIG Ponzi Scheme one step closer to the revered establishment when he explains how the bailout money was funneled straight into the top players, with Goldman Sachs being the name that comes up again and again. These top players already got bailout money, and Goldman is looking at zero losses at this point, while regular Americans are being asked to make concessions or just plain losing everything. here are the biggest financial entities in the world, making billions on what appears to have been nothing but air traded back and forth, and having gutted the American people they are walking away with 100% return to their stockholders.
- Despair over financial policy – Paul Krugman Blog – NYTimes.com – To this end the plan proposes to create funds in which private investors put in a small amount of their own money, and in return get large, non-recourse loans from the taxpayer, with which to buy bad — I mean misunderstood — assets. This is supposed to lead to fair prices because the funds will engage in competitive bidding.
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