Sania marches into Forest Hills finals
August 27, 2005 10:40 IST
India's Sania Mirza crushed the challenge of Alexa Glatch of the United States in the semi-final of the Forest Hills Women's Tennis Classic in New York to advance into her second WTA final on Friday.
The 18-year-old, seeded third, beat Glatch 6-4, 6-4 to enter the final of Tier IV event without dropping a set.
Glatch, who had shocked top-seed and Sania's nemesis Akiko Morigami in the first round, gave the Indian a tough fight as she made her toil for points.
But Sania remained unfazed by the heroics of the American teenager as she proved her supremacy by wrapping the first set 6-4.
The script did not see any change in the next set as Sania put an end to Glatch's dream run with a clinical 6-4 win to pocket the match and fix up a date with Safarova in the finals.
Sania, the highest remaining seed, will meet Lucie Safarova of theCzech Republic in the final on Saturday.
Unseeded Safarova, ranked 65th, beat compatriot Iveta Benesova 2-6, 6-1, 6-4.
The champion will pocket US $ 22,000.
Sania won her first title at the Hyderabad Open earlier this year, when she beat Ukraine's Alyona Bondarenko.
Read the full article at : Sania marches into Forest Hills finals
Saturday, August 27, 2005
BBC NEWS | South Asia | India rebels 'making porn films'
India rebels 'making porn films'
By Subir Bhaumik, BBC News, Calcutta
Rebels in India's north-eastern state of Tripura are making pornographic films to raise money for their separatist campaign, officials say.
The information has come from surrendered guerrillas of the National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT), according to police.
They say the rebels are forcing captured tribal women, and some men, to take part in the films.
The films are then dubbed to be sold in India and neighbouring countries.
Read the full article here : BBC NEWS | South Asia | India rebels 'making porn films'
By Subir Bhaumik, BBC News, Calcutta
Rebels in India's north-eastern state of Tripura are making pornographic films to raise money for their separatist campaign, officials say.
The information has come from surrendered guerrillas of the National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT), according to police.
They say the rebels are forcing captured tribal women, and some men, to take part in the films.
The films are then dubbed to be sold in India and neighbouring countries.
Read the full article here : BBC NEWS | South Asia | India rebels 'making porn films'
Friday, August 26, 2005
Adult-site publisher takes action against Google | CNET News.com
Adult-site publisher takes action against Google
Published: August 25, 2005, 9:11 AM PDT
By Dawn Kawamoto ,Staff Writer, CNET News.com
Adult magazine publisher Perfect 10 is seeking a preliminary injunction against Google to stop the search giant from allegedly displaying copyright images of its models.
Perfect 10, in a filing Wednesday with the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, asked the court to immediately halt Google from allegedly copying, displaying and distributing more than 3,000 Perfect 10 photos.
"Google is directly infringing on our copyrights. They are copying and showing our work on their Web site," said Norm Zada, Perfect 10 founder. "They are also placing ads on these Web sites that are infringing on our work."
Perfect 10 first became aware of Google serving up text links to other Web sites that allegedly carried copyright images of Perfect 10 models back in 2001, Zada said in an interview Thursday. The company then sent notices to Google, under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, asking the search giant to discontinue linking to the other sites.
Last year, Zada said, he learned Google was allegedly displaying photos of its copyright work on its Web site through its images feature that links to other Web sites. Perfect 10's request for an injunction is part of a copyright infringement lawsuit that it filed in November against Google.
Google did not immediately return phone calls seeking comment.
Perfect 10's lawsuit against Google is similar to one it filed against Amazon.com in July. In that suit, Perfect 10 makes similar allegations against Amazon's A9 search engine.
In June, the U.S. Supreme Court weighed in on the issue of copyright infringement. The court ruled that companies that are created with the intent of encouraging copyright infringement should be held liable for their customers' illegal actions.
Within days of the court's ruling, Google found that people had uploaded and watched copyright content such as the movie "Matrix" via its new video search tool. The search company quickly removed much of the full-length studio and television content.
Read the full article here : Adult-site publisher takes action against Google | CNET News.com
Published: August 25, 2005, 9:11 AM PDT
By Dawn Kawamoto ,Staff Writer, CNET News.com
Adult magazine publisher Perfect 10 is seeking a preliminary injunction against Google to stop the search giant from allegedly displaying copyright images of its models.
Perfect 10, in a filing Wednesday with the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, asked the court to immediately halt Google from allegedly copying, displaying and distributing more than 3,000 Perfect 10 photos.
"Google is directly infringing on our copyrights. They are copying and showing our work on their Web site," said Norm Zada, Perfect 10 founder. "They are also placing ads on these Web sites that are infringing on our work."
Perfect 10 first became aware of Google serving up text links to other Web sites that allegedly carried copyright images of Perfect 10 models back in 2001, Zada said in an interview Thursday. The company then sent notices to Google, under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, asking the search giant to discontinue linking to the other sites.
Last year, Zada said, he learned Google was allegedly displaying photos of its copyright work on its Web site through its images feature that links to other Web sites. Perfect 10's request for an injunction is part of a copyright infringement lawsuit that it filed in November against Google.
Google did not immediately return phone calls seeking comment.
Perfect 10's lawsuit against Google is similar to one it filed against Amazon.com in July. In that suit, Perfect 10 makes similar allegations against Amazon's A9 search engine.
In June, the U.S. Supreme Court weighed in on the issue of copyright infringement. The court ruled that companies that are created with the intent of encouraging copyright infringement should be held liable for their customers' illegal actions.
Within days of the court's ruling, Google found that people had uploaded and watched copyright content such as the movie "Matrix" via its new video search tool. The search company quickly removed much of the full-length studio and television content.
Read the full article here : Adult-site publisher takes action against Google | CNET News.com
PayPal co-founder readies photo-sharing service | CNET News.com
PayPal co-founder readies photo-sharing service
Published: August 26, 2005, 1:25 PM PDT
By Alorie Gilbert, Staff Writer, CNET News.com
It's been awhile since Max Levchin's job forced him to pull an all-nighter.
But the co-founder and former chief technology officer of PayPal has found himself working around the clock lately to launch his new Internet company, Slide. The San Francisco company, which he started last year, is Levchin's first big plunge into an Internet start-up since cashing in on eBay's $1.5 billion purchase of PayPal in 2002.
The free service, which the 12-person company plans to open to the Web-surfing public on Monday, CNET News.com has learned, combines aspects of social networking, photo sharing, Web syndication and e-commerce. At the heart of Slide is a downloadable desktop program that indexes all the photos on the user's hard drive and creates a slideshow at the edge of the screen.
From there, members can invite family, friends and other Slide members to view and save their photos and join Slide as a "friend" in their network. Members can also add each other's images to their own slideshows and alert each other to new albums. A set of access tools allows users to publish their photos to as few or as many people as they wish, and subscribe to others.
Slide builds on several trends du jour, including digital photography, personal publishing and Web syndication. But the company has a lot of company in this intersecting market. Yahoo, News Corp.'s MySpace and a number of others are developing services that tie blogging, social networking and photo sharing together. Flikr lets users subscribe to photo feeds using the Really Simple Syndication, or RSS, protocol made popular by blogs. Imeem, a start-up that launched last week, is adding instant messaging to the mix.
"Consumers are learning to do more with digital content than just print out pictures and paste them into an album," said Michael Gartenberg, an analyst at JupiterResearch. "Tools that let them edit, crop and share information and online content are coming into play, making it easier to get their stuff out."
Yet Levchin, who just turned 30 and has invested $1 million of his personal funds in the company, may have hit on the right way to make Slide stand out. He claims Slide's publish and subscribe tools are easier to use than other services, which require some technical know-how and a familiarity with RSS. The general public, including people like his mom, need simpler tools, he said. Jupiter's Gartenberg agrees.
"The key to taking it to the next step is getting to the point where you don't have to know what RSS or other technical concepts are," Gartenberg said. "You want to get to the point where you can just invite your grandpa to subscribe to your photos and all he has to do is click a few buttons."
Slide's "playback," or slideshow, feature is unique too, Levchin said. The desktop toolbar looks like a strip of film with different photos in each frame, which continually scrolls through a trove of stored images that people would probably rarely view otherwise. When consumers scroll over a particular shot, the slideshow pauses and enlarges the image. The program gives people the option of e-mailing the photo from there.
The company plans to let members incorporate video, text and news headlines with photos too, creating multimedia "channels."
"I want it to be the preferred way people share digital media with each other," Levchin said, describing his vision of the company.
For now, Slide works only on Windows computers, but the company is working on versions for the Macintosh.
Slide's business model is another distinguishing feature. While advertising is the main source of revenue for most competitors, Slide plans to sustain itself on commissions from facilitating online shopping. It has already inked agreements with online shoe store Zappos.com and designer clothing outlet Bluefly. The Web stores have agreed to maintain a Slide photo gallery of their products with links back to their stores. Slide members can subscribe to the photos and whenever they purchase something, Slide gets a cut of the transaction.
The fact that Zappos is one of Slide's first partners is no coincidence. Levchin came up with the idea for Slide while watching his girlfriend browse for shoes online. She spent so much time scrolling through pages of shoes at Zappos that he offered to write her a program that would do it for her.
"The idea was to encourage her to spend more time with me and less time browsing for shoes," he said.
Read the full article here : PayPal co-founder readies photo-sharing service | CNET News.com
Published: August 26, 2005, 1:25 PM PDT
By Alorie Gilbert, Staff Writer, CNET News.com
It's been awhile since Max Levchin's job forced him to pull an all-nighter.
But the co-founder and former chief technology officer of PayPal has found himself working around the clock lately to launch his new Internet company, Slide. The San Francisco company, which he started last year, is Levchin's first big plunge into an Internet start-up since cashing in on eBay's $1.5 billion purchase of PayPal in 2002.
The free service, which the 12-person company plans to open to the Web-surfing public on Monday, CNET News.com has learned, combines aspects of social networking, photo sharing, Web syndication and e-commerce. At the heart of Slide is a downloadable desktop program that indexes all the photos on the user's hard drive and creates a slideshow at the edge of the screen.
From there, members can invite family, friends and other Slide members to view and save their photos and join Slide as a "friend" in their network. Members can also add each other's images to their own slideshows and alert each other to new albums. A set of access tools allows users to publish their photos to as few or as many people as they wish, and subscribe to others.
Slide builds on several trends du jour, including digital photography, personal publishing and Web syndication. But the company has a lot of company in this intersecting market. Yahoo, News Corp.'s MySpace and a number of others are developing services that tie blogging, social networking and photo sharing together. Flikr lets users subscribe to photo feeds using the Really Simple Syndication, or RSS, protocol made popular by blogs. Imeem, a start-up that launched last week, is adding instant messaging to the mix.
"Consumers are learning to do more with digital content than just print out pictures and paste them into an album," said Michael Gartenberg, an analyst at JupiterResearch. "Tools that let them edit, crop and share information and online content are coming into play, making it easier to get their stuff out."
Yet Levchin, who just turned 30 and has invested $1 million of his personal funds in the company, may have hit on the right way to make Slide stand out. He claims Slide's publish and subscribe tools are easier to use than other services, which require some technical know-how and a familiarity with RSS. The general public, including people like his mom, need simpler tools, he said. Jupiter's Gartenberg agrees.
"The key to taking it to the next step is getting to the point where you don't have to know what RSS or other technical concepts are," Gartenberg said. "You want to get to the point where you can just invite your grandpa to subscribe to your photos and all he has to do is click a few buttons."
Slide's "playback," or slideshow, feature is unique too, Levchin said. The desktop toolbar looks like a strip of film with different photos in each frame, which continually scrolls through a trove of stored images that people would probably rarely view otherwise. When consumers scroll over a particular shot, the slideshow pauses and enlarges the image. The program gives people the option of e-mailing the photo from there.
The company plans to let members incorporate video, text and news headlines with photos too, creating multimedia "channels."
"I want it to be the preferred way people share digital media with each other," Levchin said, describing his vision of the company.
For now, Slide works only on Windows computers, but the company is working on versions for the Macintosh.
Slide's business model is another distinguishing feature. While advertising is the main source of revenue for most competitors, Slide plans to sustain itself on commissions from facilitating online shopping. It has already inked agreements with online shoe store Zappos.com and designer clothing outlet Bluefly. The Web stores have agreed to maintain a Slide photo gallery of their products with links back to their stores. Slide members can subscribe to the photos and whenever they purchase something, Slide gets a cut of the transaction.
The fact that Zappos is one of Slide's first partners is no coincidence. Levchin came up with the idea for Slide while watching his girlfriend browse for shoes online. She spent so much time scrolling through pages of shoes at Zappos that he offered to write her a program that would do it for her.
"The idea was to encourage her to spend more time with me and less time browsing for shoes," he said.
Read the full article here : PayPal co-founder readies photo-sharing service | CNET News.com
New Web copyright tool to exclude non-IE users | CNET News.com
New Web copyright tool to exclude non-IE users
Published: August 26, 2005, 12:13 PM PDT
By Anne Broache, Staff Writer, CNET News.com
Only users of Internet Explorer and a version of Netscape will be able to access a copyright preregistration system slated for launch in late October.
"Other browsers may work well with the version we are using now, but they have not been tested," Julia Huff, the U.S. Copyright Office's chief operating officer, said in an e-mail to CNET News.com. "Because of our tight schedule and resources, we cannot do that testing now."
Huff said Friday that the office must go ahead with the new electronic system by Oct. 24 because of a mandate in the Family Entertainment and Copyright Act, which Congress passed in April. The office just weeks ago suggested the possibility of browser limitations and began collecting public comments.
The idea behind the preregistration system is to let people stake claims on their as-yet unpublished creative works. For example, a moviemaker who preregistered a film would be able to go after those who prematurely release scenes or copies of the work.
Though the law set a deadline for the office to come up with regulations for the preregistration system, it did not explicitly call for an electronic approach. Huff said the office decided to pursue the electronic route because of its "short implementation time."
Copyright officials learned in the past few months that the planned online system, developed by Siebel Systems, had been tested only with Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator, Huff said. The office doesn't plan to support Firefox until it rolls out a new version of the software in late 2006. It has made no mention of plans to support Opera or Apple Computer's Safari.
According to statistics compiled by W3Schools, the two latest versions of Internet Explorer combined enjoyed more than two-thirds of the market share in August. Firefox garnered about 19 percent of users, and Netscape recorded less than 1 percent.
"There was, and is, no intent to endorse a particular vendor," Huff said.
But even if that wasn't the intent, industry groups argued, the office should rethink the move, which could effectively hamper consumer choice.
"By designing a system to open standards rather than the specifications of individual applications, the office will further its function and improve users' experiences, while promoting the vitality of the software market by not 'picking winners,'" representatives from the nonprofit Open Source and Industry Alliance, part of the Computer & Communications Industry Association, wrote in comments filed with the Copyright Office.
The organizations also urged the Copyright Office to be prepared to accept paper applications until it can make the system work for a broader swath of browsers. Huff said the office will evaluate the comments received before deciding whether to employ the paper option.
The World Wide Web Consortium, a global organization that encourages development of Web standards, said in its comments that going ahead with the limited version is contrary to the federal "e-government" strategy.
"The recommended strategy is to employ 'smart' buying practices to reduce acquisition and support costs, including software asset management, and increase the use of standards-compliant software,'" wrote W3C director Tim Berners-Lee, quoting from 2003 government recommendations.
And what about the moviemaker who wants to register his work from the set, using a Web-enabled cell phone? Not all such devices carry the Microsoft browser, Berners-Lee argued: "Restricting access to Internet Explorer only would then unfairly exclude those creators from the benefits of preregistration."
Read the full article here : New Web copyright tool to exclude non-IE users | CNET News.com
Published: August 26, 2005, 12:13 PM PDT
By Anne Broache, Staff Writer, CNET News.com
Only users of Internet Explorer and a version of Netscape will be able to access a copyright preregistration system slated for launch in late October.
"Other browsers may work well with the version we are using now, but they have not been tested," Julia Huff, the U.S. Copyright Office's chief operating officer, said in an e-mail to CNET News.com. "Because of our tight schedule and resources, we cannot do that testing now."
Huff said Friday that the office must go ahead with the new electronic system by Oct. 24 because of a mandate in the Family Entertainment and Copyright Act, which Congress passed in April. The office just weeks ago suggested the possibility of browser limitations and began collecting public comments.
The idea behind the preregistration system is to let people stake claims on their as-yet unpublished creative works. For example, a moviemaker who preregistered a film would be able to go after those who prematurely release scenes or copies of the work.
Though the law set a deadline for the office to come up with regulations for the preregistration system, it did not explicitly call for an electronic approach. Huff said the office decided to pursue the electronic route because of its "short implementation time."
Copyright officials learned in the past few months that the planned online system, developed by Siebel Systems, had been tested only with Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator, Huff said. The office doesn't plan to support Firefox until it rolls out a new version of the software in late 2006. It has made no mention of plans to support Opera or Apple Computer's Safari.
According to statistics compiled by W3Schools, the two latest versions of Internet Explorer combined enjoyed more than two-thirds of the market share in August. Firefox garnered about 19 percent of users, and Netscape recorded less than 1 percent.
"There was, and is, no intent to endorse a particular vendor," Huff said.
But even if that wasn't the intent, industry groups argued, the office should rethink the move, which could effectively hamper consumer choice.
"By designing a system to open standards rather than the specifications of individual applications, the office will further its function and improve users' experiences, while promoting the vitality of the software market by not 'picking winners,'" representatives from the nonprofit Open Source and Industry Alliance, part of the Computer & Communications Industry Association, wrote in comments filed with the Copyright Office.
The organizations also urged the Copyright Office to be prepared to accept paper applications until it can make the system work for a broader swath of browsers. Huff said the office will evaluate the comments received before deciding whether to employ the paper option.
The World Wide Web Consortium, a global organization that encourages development of Web standards, said in its comments that going ahead with the limited version is contrary to the federal "e-government" strategy.
"The recommended strategy is to employ 'smart' buying practices to reduce acquisition and support costs, including software asset management, and increase the use of standards-compliant software,'" wrote W3C director Tim Berners-Lee, quoting from 2003 government recommendations.
And what about the moviemaker who wants to register his work from the set, using a Web-enabled cell phone? Not all such devices carry the Microsoft browser, Berners-Lee argued: "Restricting access to Internet Explorer only would then unfairly exclude those creators from the benefits of preregistration."
Read the full article here : New Web copyright tool to exclude non-IE users | CNET News.com
Monday, August 22, 2005
CNN.com - Serial bomber apologizes for Olympics park bombing - Aug 22, 2005
Serial bomber apologizes for Olympics park bombing
Rudolph gets three more life sentences
Monday, August 22, 2005; Posted: 1:43 p.m. EDT (17:43 GMT)
ATLANTA, Georgia (AP) -- Victims of Eric Rudolph's bombs confronted him in court Monday, describing him as a small man who cowardly fled amid his carnage, before a judge sentenced him to life in prison.
Just before his sentence was handed down, Rudolph apologized to the victims of the 1996 Olympics blast in Atlanta, saying "I would do anything to take that night back."
He said he had wanted to anger and embarrass the federal government because it does not prohibit abortions, and that he wanted to harm only government workers.
"I can't begin to truly understand the pain that I have inflicted on these innocent people," Rudolph said, reading a statement. "To those victims, I apologize."
Read the full article here : CNN.com - Serial bomber apologizes for Olympics park bombing - Aug 22, 2005
Rudolph gets three more life sentences
Monday, August 22, 2005; Posted: 1:43 p.m. EDT (17:43 GMT)
ATLANTA, Georgia (AP) -- Victims of Eric Rudolph's bombs confronted him in court Monday, describing him as a small man who cowardly fled amid his carnage, before a judge sentenced him to life in prison.
Just before his sentence was handed down, Rudolph apologized to the victims of the 1996 Olympics blast in Atlanta, saying "I would do anything to take that night back."
He said he had wanted to anger and embarrass the federal government because it does not prohibit abortions, and that he wanted to harm only government workers.
"I can't begin to truly understand the pain that I have inflicted on these innocent people," Rudolph said, reading a statement. "To those victims, I apologize."
Read the full article here : CNN.com - Serial bomber apologizes for Olympics park bombing - Aug 22, 2005
Techtree.com India > News > Gadgets > Sony Launches The Bean
Sony Launches The Bean
Techtree News Staff
Sony has launched the Walkman Bean, a flash memory based MP3 player combining an innovative ergonomic design with ultimate ease of use.
'Bean', so-named because of its unique shape, features a direct 'pop-up' USB jack, which can be inserted in to a PC to transfer music with complete convenience.
Walkman Bean features a bright 1-line OLED display making navigation through track listings simple, up to 50-hour playback from a Lithium-ion Rechargeable Battery and a super high-speed charge facility, which provides the user with 3 hours play from just a 3-minute charge.
Gregory Kukolj, general manager, personal audio, Sony, said, "Walkman Bean is sure to be the most instantly appealing digital music player on the market. It combines striking design with optimum functionality and is fun, engaging and simple to use. All that, combined with an attractive price point, will make Walkman Bean irresistible to the consumer".
Walkman Bean is available in the following great colourways: Tropical Ice (Blue), Cotton Candy (Pink), Licorice (Black) and Coconut (White). All colours take their inspiration from various flavours of jellybean, owing to the shape of the device.
Walkman Bean will be available in both 512MB and 1 GB capacity. There will also be a 512 MB model with a built in FM tuner.
Walkman Bean features ATRAC3plus and MP3 Playback and ships with SonicStage 3.2 file management software.
Read the full article here : Techtree.com India > News > Gadgets > Sony Launches The Bean
Techtree News Staff
Sony has launched the Walkman Bean, a flash memory based MP3 player combining an innovative ergonomic design with ultimate ease of use.
'Bean', so-named because of its unique shape, features a direct 'pop-up' USB jack, which can be inserted in to a PC to transfer music with complete convenience.
Walkman Bean features a bright 1-line OLED display making navigation through track listings simple, up to 50-hour playback from a Lithium-ion Rechargeable Battery and a super high-speed charge facility, which provides the user with 3 hours play from just a 3-minute charge.
Gregory Kukolj, general manager, personal audio, Sony, said, "Walkman Bean is sure to be the most instantly appealing digital music player on the market. It combines striking design with optimum functionality and is fun, engaging and simple to use. All that, combined with an attractive price point, will make Walkman Bean irresistible to the consumer".
Walkman Bean is available in the following great colourways: Tropical Ice (Blue), Cotton Candy (Pink), Licorice (Black) and Coconut (White). All colours take their inspiration from various flavours of jellybean, owing to the shape of the device.
Walkman Bean will be available in both 512MB and 1 GB capacity. There will also be a 512 MB model with a built in FM tuner.
Walkman Bean features ATRAC3plus and MP3 Playback and ships with SonicStage 3.2 file management software.
Read the full article here : Techtree.com India > News > Gadgets > Sony Launches The Bean
BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Women 'take back seat' in science
Women 'take back seat' in science
The path for women in science remains a "difficult trek", according to a group of US researchers writing in the latest edition of Science magazine.
They say that although there have been major advances, academic institutions are still not making full use of the pool of women scientists available.
Female scientists sometimes find the campus environment "chilly" and may encounter "unconscious discrimination".
They also face the extra challenge of balancing home and family life.
"The good news is we have made progress," said lead author Jo Handelsman, of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, US. "The bad news is we still have a long way to go to achieve equity."
'Challenges'
Professor Handelsman and her colleagues believe there are a range of challenges that can derail women and prevent them from fulfilling their full academic potential.
"There is still a lot of covert and overt hostility on American campuses," she said. "Some of it is outright illegal behaviour, but most of it is subtle. It makes women feel undervalued and not respected."
Professor Handelsman and her colleagues say that, broadly speaking, there are four areas within which woman encounter hurdles.
# The pipeline: In some fields, notably engineering and the physical sciences, fewer women are trained to the PhD level and encouraged to pursue academic careers.
# Climate: Many women scientists who left the profession said they did so because of hostility from colleagues. According to the researchers, this atmosphere is invisible to many men, who tend "to perceive a better climate for women".
# Unconscious bias: According to the report, some people within science are unconsciously biased against women. The researchers cite a study which revealed that people evaluating work were likely to give it lower scores if they knew it was by a woman.
# Balancing family and work: Professor Handelsman claims that family responsibilities are mostly taken on by women, making it harder for them to progress in academic careers.
"The responsibilities for family caretaking continue to fall disproportionately on women," she said. "Universities aren't set up to deal with family issues."
Child care
There are a few things that could be changed, Professor Handelsman suggests, which would help women balance family and work, such as on-campus breast-feeding rooms and child care facilities.
Alice Hogan, director of the National Science Foundation's Advance Programme, an initiative developed to analyse the impact of efforts to advance women in science, believes it is highly worth while investing in female talent.
"While we have made progress in attracting women into most science and engineering fields, we still see fewer women with doctorates," she said.
"After investing in creating this pool of highly trained talent, we should see a high rate of return - productive, creative and respected teachers and researchers attracting more students into fields that might [previously] have seemed closed to them."
Read the full article here : BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Women 'take back seat' in science
The path for women in science remains a "difficult trek", according to a group of US researchers writing in the latest edition of Science magazine.
They say that although there have been major advances, academic institutions are still not making full use of the pool of women scientists available.
Female scientists sometimes find the campus environment "chilly" and may encounter "unconscious discrimination".
They also face the extra challenge of balancing home and family life.
"The good news is we have made progress," said lead author Jo Handelsman, of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, US. "The bad news is we still have a long way to go to achieve equity."
'Challenges'
Professor Handelsman and her colleagues believe there are a range of challenges that can derail women and prevent them from fulfilling their full academic potential.
"There is still a lot of covert and overt hostility on American campuses," she said. "Some of it is outright illegal behaviour, but most of it is subtle. It makes women feel undervalued and not respected."
Professor Handelsman and her colleagues say that, broadly speaking, there are four areas within which woman encounter hurdles.
# The pipeline: In some fields, notably engineering and the physical sciences, fewer women are trained to the PhD level and encouraged to pursue academic careers.
# Climate: Many women scientists who left the profession said they did so because of hostility from colleagues. According to the researchers, this atmosphere is invisible to many men, who tend "to perceive a better climate for women".
# Unconscious bias: According to the report, some people within science are unconsciously biased against women. The researchers cite a study which revealed that people evaluating work were likely to give it lower scores if they knew it was by a woman.
# Balancing family and work: Professor Handelsman claims that family responsibilities are mostly taken on by women, making it harder for them to progress in academic careers.
"The responsibilities for family caretaking continue to fall disproportionately on women," she said. "Universities aren't set up to deal with family issues."
Child care
There are a few things that could be changed, Professor Handelsman suggests, which would help women balance family and work, such as on-campus breast-feeding rooms and child care facilities.
Alice Hogan, director of the National Science Foundation's Advance Programme, an initiative developed to analyse the impact of efforts to advance women in science, believes it is highly worth while investing in female talent.
"While we have made progress in attracting women into most science and engineering fields, we still see fewer women with doctorates," she said.
"After investing in creating this pool of highly trained talent, we should see a high rate of return - productive, creative and respected teachers and researchers attracting more students into fields that might [previously] have seemed closed to them."
Read the full article here : BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Women 'take back seat' in science
USATODAY.com - Google updates search software with Desktop 2
Google updates search software with Desktop 2
By Matthew Fordahl, The Associated Press
SAN JOSE, Calif. — Google Inc. updated its software for searching PC hard drives and the Internet, giving the free program a new look and adding tools that deliver personalized information based on a user's Web surfing habits.
Google Desktop 2, available Monday as a public beta test, is the company's latest volley against Microsoft Corp. and Yahoo Inc. as all three race to expand their presence on PC desktops.
The latest Google offering includes several twists. Beyond providing search results, it monitors the user's behavior and presents relevant information in a resizable and moveable vertical window called the Sidebar.
One module aggregates e-mail messages from a variety of accounts, including Google's Gmail service or the user's Internet provider. Others display stock prices, personalized news headlines, weather reports and what's popular on the Web.
Another module pulls Really Simple Syndication feeds from Web sites that have been visited and offer that service. Unlike other feed aggregators, the user need not take any action for a feed to be added.
"For the novice, it's very easy. They don't even have to know what RSS feeds are," said Nikhil Bhatla, Google Desktop's product manager. "They'll just start seeing them in the Sidebar. Advanced users can go in and customize to their hearts' delight."
A photo module displays pictures from the local PC. It also pulls pictures from Web-based galleries that have been visited.
Some features, including personalized news, involve sending details of its users surfing habits back to Google. Bhatla said no personally identifying data is transmitted, and users can opt out.
The program has several tools for finding information buried on local and network drives as well as the Internet. The Sidebar has its own search box and it adds a new toolbar to Microsoft's Outlook e-mail program for quick access to mail messages.
After the initial indexing of all content on a drive — a process that takes place when the PC is not being used, subsequent indexing takes place in real time. That means a file can be found as soon as it's been saved to the disk.
The Sidebar's search box also finds applications, which can be launched directly from the results list that appears as words are typed in. It's similar to the Spotlight feature of Apple Computer Inc.'s Mac OS X and the built-in search of Microsoft Windows Vista, which is expected to be released next year.
Google, which has come under fire for making private information a bit too easy to find, said it has now disabled the caching of secure Web sites — an option that can be enabled if the user desires.
It also recommends against using the desktop program tool on computers in Internet cafes or in cases where many people share the same operating system account.
Google Desktop 2 also offers the ability to encrypt — or scramble — the index to protect it from being read by unauthorized parties.
The software works on computers running Windows 2000 or Windows XP. Mac OS X is not supported.
Read the full article here : USATODAY.com - Google updates search software with Desktop 2
By Matthew Fordahl, The Associated Press
SAN JOSE, Calif. — Google Inc. updated its software for searching PC hard drives and the Internet, giving the free program a new look and adding tools that deliver personalized information based on a user's Web surfing habits.
Google Desktop 2, available Monday as a public beta test, is the company's latest volley against Microsoft Corp. and Yahoo Inc. as all three race to expand their presence on PC desktops.
The latest Google offering includes several twists. Beyond providing search results, it monitors the user's behavior and presents relevant information in a resizable and moveable vertical window called the Sidebar.
One module aggregates e-mail messages from a variety of accounts, including Google's Gmail service or the user's Internet provider. Others display stock prices, personalized news headlines, weather reports and what's popular on the Web.
Another module pulls Really Simple Syndication feeds from Web sites that have been visited and offer that service. Unlike other feed aggregators, the user need not take any action for a feed to be added.
"For the novice, it's very easy. They don't even have to know what RSS feeds are," said Nikhil Bhatla, Google Desktop's product manager. "They'll just start seeing them in the Sidebar. Advanced users can go in and customize to their hearts' delight."
A photo module displays pictures from the local PC. It also pulls pictures from Web-based galleries that have been visited.
Some features, including personalized news, involve sending details of its users surfing habits back to Google. Bhatla said no personally identifying data is transmitted, and users can opt out.
The program has several tools for finding information buried on local and network drives as well as the Internet. The Sidebar has its own search box and it adds a new toolbar to Microsoft's Outlook e-mail program for quick access to mail messages.
After the initial indexing of all content on a drive — a process that takes place when the PC is not being used, subsequent indexing takes place in real time. That means a file can be found as soon as it's been saved to the disk.
The Sidebar's search box also finds applications, which can be launched directly from the results list that appears as words are typed in. It's similar to the Spotlight feature of Apple Computer Inc.'s Mac OS X and the built-in search of Microsoft Windows Vista, which is expected to be released next year.
Google, which has come under fire for making private information a bit too easy to find, said it has now disabled the caching of secure Web sites — an option that can be enabled if the user desires.
It also recommends against using the desktop program tool on computers in Internet cafes or in cases where many people share the same operating system account.
Google Desktop 2 also offers the ability to encrypt — or scramble — the index to protect it from being read by unauthorized parties.
The software works on computers running Windows 2000 or Windows XP. Mac OS X is not supported.
Read the full article here : USATODAY.com - Google updates search software with Desktop 2
Discovery follows 5.8 million-mile journey back home
Discovery follows 5.8 million-mile journey back home
08/22/2005 - 09:28
Discovery arrived back at its home port Sunday atop a jumbo jet following a 5.8 million-mile (9.3 million-kilometre) journey through space - the first by a shuttle in 2 years - and then a jog across the United States.
The shuttle, bolted to the top of the modified Boeing 747, flew from its last pit stop in Louisiana to the Kennedy Space Centre and, at midmorning, touched down on the runway where it should have landed almost two weeks earlier.
One of the seven astronauts who had ridden Discovery into orbit, Stephen Robinson, was among the crowd that gathered at the landing strip to welcome the shuttle home.
"As much as a person can love a machine, I really love that bird and look at this magnificent sight of it," Robinson said, gazing at the shuttle behind him, "out here on the runway and back where it belongs at home with the people who take care of her."
Launch director Mike Leinbach was thrilled to get Discovery back from California, where it landed Aug. 9, but couldn't help but think of Columbia's catastrophic return that Saturday morning in February 2003. "I feel like a family member has come home in one piece and safe, and it's just so damn good to see an orbiter whole again on the back of a 747," Leinbach said. "It's just an emotional time. It's a beautiful sight."
Bad weather in Florida prevented Discovery from returning here after two weeks in space. Instead, the first shuttle mission since the Columbia tragedy ended some 2,200 miles (3,500 kilometres) away in Southern California, costing NASA an extra $1 million (Euro820, 000) for the cross-country trek.
Discovery and the jetliner left California's Edwards Air Force Base on Friday and had to spend an extra night at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana because of poor weather.
The shuttle still is loaded with the gear and trash it picked up at the international space station.
All that will have to be removed, and the shuttle thoroughly inspected, before NASA can start readying it for the next flight.
Late last week, Discovery was moved to the start of the launch line-up after NASA decided to delay the next mission until at least March.
Atlantis had been scheduled to fly in September, but the loss of an alarming amount of foam insulation from Discovery's fuel tank resulted in a grounding of the shuttle fleet.
Vehicle manager Stephanie Stilson, who accompanied Discovery back from California, said the spacecraft shows remarkably little damage, although its nose cap - a particularly vulnerable area - has a ding.
Stilson said the chip in the nose cap's thermal shielding is smaller than the tip of a pinkie finger - "very, very minor damage" - and workers should be able to easily repair it.
Engineers do not know whether launch debris caused the ding, Stilson said. A preliminary look at Discovery's wings - the place where Columbia was struck by foam - has uncovered no damage.
Altogether, just over one pound (a half kilogram) of foam came off Discovery's tank during lift-off on July 26, most of that in a single 3-foot (1-meter) section.
Read the full article here : Discovery follows 5.8 million-mile journey back home
08/22/2005 - 09:28
Discovery arrived back at its home port Sunday atop a jumbo jet following a 5.8 million-mile (9.3 million-kilometre) journey through space - the first by a shuttle in 2 years - and then a jog across the United States.
The shuttle, bolted to the top of the modified Boeing 747, flew from its last pit stop in Louisiana to the Kennedy Space Centre and, at midmorning, touched down on the runway where it should have landed almost two weeks earlier.
One of the seven astronauts who had ridden Discovery into orbit, Stephen Robinson, was among the crowd that gathered at the landing strip to welcome the shuttle home.
"As much as a person can love a machine, I really love that bird and look at this magnificent sight of it," Robinson said, gazing at the shuttle behind him, "out here on the runway and back where it belongs at home with the people who take care of her."
Launch director Mike Leinbach was thrilled to get Discovery back from California, where it landed Aug. 9, but couldn't help but think of Columbia's catastrophic return that Saturday morning in February 2003. "I feel like a family member has come home in one piece and safe, and it's just so damn good to see an orbiter whole again on the back of a 747," Leinbach said. "It's just an emotional time. It's a beautiful sight."
Bad weather in Florida prevented Discovery from returning here after two weeks in space. Instead, the first shuttle mission since the Columbia tragedy ended some 2,200 miles (3,500 kilometres) away in Southern California, costing NASA an extra $1 million (Euro820, 000) for the cross-country trek.
Discovery and the jetliner left California's Edwards Air Force Base on Friday and had to spend an extra night at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana because of poor weather.
The shuttle still is loaded with the gear and trash it picked up at the international space station.
All that will have to be removed, and the shuttle thoroughly inspected, before NASA can start readying it for the next flight.
Late last week, Discovery was moved to the start of the launch line-up after NASA decided to delay the next mission until at least March.
Atlantis had been scheduled to fly in September, but the loss of an alarming amount of foam insulation from Discovery's fuel tank resulted in a grounding of the shuttle fleet.
Vehicle manager Stephanie Stilson, who accompanied Discovery back from California, said the spacecraft shows remarkably little damage, although its nose cap - a particularly vulnerable area - has a ding.
Stilson said the chip in the nose cap's thermal shielding is smaller than the tip of a pinkie finger - "very, very minor damage" - and workers should be able to easily repair it.
Engineers do not know whether launch debris caused the ding, Stilson said. A preliminary look at Discovery's wings - the place where Columbia was struck by foam - has uncovered no damage.
Altogether, just over one pound (a half kilogram) of foam came off Discovery's tank during lift-off on July 26, most of that in a single 3-foot (1-meter) section.
Read the full article here : Discovery follows 5.8 million-mile journey back home
'I'm Samaira's guardian'- The Times of India
'I'm Samaira's guardian'
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ SATURDAY, AUGUST 20, 2005 10:36:55 PM ]
NEW DELHI: Karisma Kapoor told the court that a father’s right over a minor child is neither absolute nor a right.
She claimed that as per Section 4 of the Hindu Minority and Guardianship Act, 1956, she is the guardian of her daughter. Karisma said she had the right to apply for her daughter’s passport since she has her physical custody and care.
Karisma said she was not obliged to take Sunjay’s consent consequent to his "constructive desertion".
The petition is an attempt to harass the minor child rather than to protect her, she claimed. She added that her application seeking a passport for Samaira was legally justified.
Karisma said she wanted to travel to New York as she was invited to attend the silver jubilee celebration of the India Day Parade.
The actress has challenged the jurisdiction of a Delhi court to hear the petition. The husband is supposed to file his rejoinder to the affidavits filed by Karisma and the Centre by August 24. The court will hear the matter on August 26.
Read the article here : 'I'm Samaira's guardian'- The Times of India
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ SATURDAY, AUGUST 20, 2005 10:36:55 PM ]
NEW DELHI: Karisma Kapoor told the court that a father’s right over a minor child is neither absolute nor a right.
She claimed that as per Section 4 of the Hindu Minority and Guardianship Act, 1956, she is the guardian of her daughter. Karisma said she had the right to apply for her daughter’s passport since she has her physical custody and care.
Karisma said she was not obliged to take Sunjay’s consent consequent to his "constructive desertion".
The petition is an attempt to harass the minor child rather than to protect her, she claimed. She added that her application seeking a passport for Samaira was legally justified.
Karisma said she wanted to travel to New York as she was invited to attend the silver jubilee celebration of the India Day Parade.
The actress has challenged the jurisdiction of a Delhi court to hear the petition. The husband is supposed to file his rejoinder to the affidavits filed by Karisma and the Centre by August 24. The court will hear the matter on August 26.
Read the article here : 'I'm Samaira's guardian'- The Times of India
Sunday, August 21, 2005
This Kid Nailed It
A little boy wanted $100.00 very badly and prayed for weeks, but nothing happened.
Then he decided to write God a letter requesting the $100.00.
When the postal authorities received the letter to God, USA, they decided to send it to the President.
The president was so amused that he instructed his secretary to send the little boy a $5.00 bill. The president thought this would appear to be a lot of money to a little boy.
The little boy was delighted with the $5.00 bill and sat down to write a thank-you note to God, which read:
Dear God:
Thank you very much for sending the money. However, I noticed that for some reason you sent it through Washington, DC., and those assholes deducted $95.00 in taxes.
Then he decided to write God a letter requesting the $100.00.
When the postal authorities received the letter to God, USA, they decided to send it to the President.
The president was so amused that he instructed his secretary to send the little boy a $5.00 bill. The president thought this would appear to be a lot of money to a little boy.
The little boy was delighted with the $5.00 bill and sat down to write a thank-you note to God, which read:
Dear God:
Thank you very much for sending the money. However, I noticed that for some reason you sent it through Washington, DC., and those assholes deducted $95.00 in taxes.
This Kid Nailed It
A little boy wanted $100.00 very badly and prayed for weeks, but nothing happened.
Then he decided to write God a letter requesting the $100.00.
When the postal authorities received the letter to God, USA, they decided to send it to the President.
The president was so amused that he instructed his secretary to send the little boy a $5.00 bill. The president thought this would appear to be a lot of money to a little boy.
The little boy was delighted with the $5.00 bill and sat down to write a thank-you note to God, which read:
Dear God:
Thank you very much for sending the money. However, I noticed that for some reason you sent it through Washington, DC., and those assholes deducted $95.00 in taxes.
Then he decided to write God a letter requesting the $100.00.
When the postal authorities received the letter to God, USA, they decided to send it to the President.
The president was so amused that he instructed his secretary to send the little boy a $5.00 bill. The president thought this would appear to be a lot of money to a little boy.
The little boy was delighted with the $5.00 bill and sat down to write a thank-you note to God, which read:
Dear God:
Thank you very much for sending the money. However, I noticed that for some reason you sent it through Washington, DC., and those assholes deducted $95.00 in taxes.
Friday, August 19, 2005
Quick tip for driving traffic to your blog | InfoWorld | TechWatch Blog | August 18, 2005 01:55 PM | By Cathleen Moore
Quick tip for driving traffic to your blog
August 18, 2005
I'm here Thursday and Friday at the Blog Business Summit in San Francisco, absorbing all that I can about, you guessed it, blogs.
Topics being explored here range from blog design, blog monitoring tools, to building blog traffic. One mantra that's been repeated in a number of different ways this morning is: in order to build a successful blog it is not enough just to post. It is about smart posting.
Venerable bloggers Robert Scoble and Dave Taylor just shared the stage here in a session about how to drive traffic to your blog.
One gem of wisdom (among many) shared is that bloggers should be active blog discussion participants. Driving traffic to your blog often occurs as a result of contributing to someone else's blog.
The process of finding what to write about can lead you to other blog sites that you can contribute to, and that is the one of the biggest drivers of traffic to your own blog, said Taylor.
"Being involved in other people's blogs is the best way to drive traffic to your own blog. Spend time on someone else's blog; add comments," he said.
According to Scoble, it's all about getting on the radar screen of other influential bloggers.
Read the full article here : Quick tip for driving traffic to your blog | InfoWorld | TechWatch Blog | August 18, 2005 01:55 PM | By Cathleen Moore
August 18, 2005
I'm here Thursday and Friday at the Blog Business Summit in San Francisco, absorbing all that I can about, you guessed it, blogs.
Topics being explored here range from blog design, blog monitoring tools, to building blog traffic. One mantra that's been repeated in a number of different ways this morning is: in order to build a successful blog it is not enough just to post. It is about smart posting.
Venerable bloggers Robert Scoble and Dave Taylor just shared the stage here in a session about how to drive traffic to your blog.
One gem of wisdom (among many) shared is that bloggers should be active blog discussion participants. Driving traffic to your blog often occurs as a result of contributing to someone else's blog.
The process of finding what to write about can lead you to other blog sites that you can contribute to, and that is the one of the biggest drivers of traffic to your own blog, said Taylor.
"Being involved in other people's blogs is the best way to drive traffic to your own blog. Spend time on someone else's blog; add comments," he said.
According to Scoble, it's all about getting on the radar screen of other influential bloggers.
Read the full article here : Quick tip for driving traffic to your blog | InfoWorld | TechWatch Blog | August 18, 2005 01:55 PM | By Cathleen Moore
MercuryNews.com | 08/19/2005 | Bucks for blogs
Bucks for blogs
BUSINESSES, BLOGGERS LOOK TO SCORE DEALS, FORGE LINKS AT S.F. SUMMIT
By Matt Marshall, Mercury News
When it comes to blogging, big corporations are turning to twentysomething mavericks for advice. If they can't lick them, they may have to join them.
So it was Thursday, as 21-year-old blogger Matt Mullenweg navigated the hallways of San Francisco's Palace Hotel, giving select corporate and other confidants a sneak peak at his latest offering: a special blogging software tool for companies.
Mullenweg is just one of the stars of the Blog Business Summit being held in San Francisco through today. Public relations representatives of companies from Hewlett-Packard to Wells Fargo are here to meet Mullenweg and other blogging bigwigs to get tips on how to communicate with bloggers, and how best to get the word out about their products -- on their own blogs.
Take the woes Dell Computer has faced. In recent months, big-name blogger Jeff Jarvis, on his Buzzmachine.com blog, has hammered on Dell for its poor customer relations. That, in turn, unleashed a deluge of similar comments from his readers, and spurred other bloggers to whine about Dell, too. On Wednesday, the University of Michigan released a survey confirming a drop in Dell's customer satisfaction ratings, something that may or may not have been related.
Bloggers have a swagger to their stride these days. Just a few years ago, Mullenweg, of Texas, thought he was going to be a musician, but a fascination with computers sidetracked him. He soon found himself the lead developer of a fast-growing blogging software, called WordPress. He has since moved to San Francisco.
Today is his big day. He's showing off the corporate version of his software, called WordPress.com, for the first time. It will allow companies to host the software on their own or WordPress servers -- giving employees the freedom to blog.
There are at least 70 million blogs, and counting. And at least a half-dozen blogging software companies are competing for those users.
In an industry where there is notoriously little money being made, there's hope corporations may pay big bucks for help in understanding blogs and in producing their own.
Just how should companies respond to snarky bloggers? Clam up, or let their employees start their own blogs to respond? Mullenweg and scores of his cohorts here believe companies will see the light and launch their own blogs. The trend is still in its early days: ``Right now, they're paralyzed by fear,'' says Mullenweg.
As he offers his sneak preview, another blogger celeb walks into the lobby and greets him. It's Robert Scoble, who writes the ``Scobleizer'' blog.
Scoble works for Microsoft, which many Silicon Valley veterans like to view as the evil empire. His blog is often critical of Microsoft's offerings, but the company hasn't snuffed him. This has boosted both Scoble's credibility and Microsoft's. ``It's hard to underestimate what he's done for Microsoft,'' remarks Mullenweg, ``and it's hard to hate Microsoft anymore.''
Soon Mullenweg is off to work the crowd. He's got his work cut out for him. His main competitor, a company called Six Apart, has a corporate blog tool called Typepad, and is also a sponsor of the event. Typepad is considered the industry leader, but one Mullenweg thinks he can catch by offering better spam protection.
Scoble, meanwhile, is mob- bed by other visitors.
One person headed to snag Scoble is Vassil Mladjov, owner of a new company called Blogtronix, which is using Microsoft's .Net platform to let companies blog there. He's betting corporations will trust Microsoft's platform more than they would an open-source company like Mullenweg's WordPress.
Mladjov has a coterie of programmers in Bulgaria, and he's poised to exploit what he says is a coming wave of corporate blogs: ``PR is dead,'' he said, citing the words of Dave Taylor, a blogger and entrepreneur who used the line Wednesday to shake up the room of public relations professionals attending the conference. Taylor argued that blogs have stymied traditional forms of public relations.
Others had their own agendas. Elizabeth Gebhardt, who runs a marketing company, hoped to find new blogging tools, such as podcasting, to help better engage people.
Bob Wyman, leader of a company called PubSub, prowled the halls talking about his software, which monitors 14 million blogs and can notify companies within 10 seconds after a blog has mentioned them or their product.
Seth Mazow, 24, of Mountain View, scoured the hallways for sponsors for his Web site, Interplast, which helps doctors in developing countries learn about reconstructive surgery for people born with things like cleft lips or palates.
``I'm reaching out to the blogeoisie,'' he said, using bloggers slang for more established bloggers who might have money to give.
Contact Matt Marshall via his blog at www.siliconbeat.com
Read the article here : MercuryNews.com | 08/19/2005 | Bucks for blogs
BUSINESSES, BLOGGERS LOOK TO SCORE DEALS, FORGE LINKS AT S.F. SUMMIT
By Matt Marshall, Mercury News
When it comes to blogging, big corporations are turning to twentysomething mavericks for advice. If they can't lick them, they may have to join them.
So it was Thursday, as 21-year-old blogger Matt Mullenweg navigated the hallways of San Francisco's Palace Hotel, giving select corporate and other confidants a sneak peak at his latest offering: a special blogging software tool for companies.
Mullenweg is just one of the stars of the Blog Business Summit being held in San Francisco through today. Public relations representatives of companies from Hewlett-Packard to Wells Fargo are here to meet Mullenweg and other blogging bigwigs to get tips on how to communicate with bloggers, and how best to get the word out about their products -- on their own blogs.
Take the woes Dell Computer has faced. In recent months, big-name blogger Jeff Jarvis, on his Buzzmachine.com blog, has hammered on Dell for its poor customer relations. That, in turn, unleashed a deluge of similar comments from his readers, and spurred other bloggers to whine about Dell, too. On Wednesday, the University of Michigan released a survey confirming a drop in Dell's customer satisfaction ratings, something that may or may not have been related.
Bloggers have a swagger to their stride these days. Just a few years ago, Mullenweg, of Texas, thought he was going to be a musician, but a fascination with computers sidetracked him. He soon found himself the lead developer of a fast-growing blogging software, called WordPress. He has since moved to San Francisco.
Today is his big day. He's showing off the corporate version of his software, called WordPress.com, for the first time. It will allow companies to host the software on their own or WordPress servers -- giving employees the freedom to blog.
There are at least 70 million blogs, and counting. And at least a half-dozen blogging software companies are competing for those users.
In an industry where there is notoriously little money being made, there's hope corporations may pay big bucks for help in understanding blogs and in producing their own.
Just how should companies respond to snarky bloggers? Clam up, or let their employees start their own blogs to respond? Mullenweg and scores of his cohorts here believe companies will see the light and launch their own blogs. The trend is still in its early days: ``Right now, they're paralyzed by fear,'' says Mullenweg.
As he offers his sneak preview, another blogger celeb walks into the lobby and greets him. It's Robert Scoble, who writes the ``Scobleizer'' blog.
Scoble works for Microsoft, which many Silicon Valley veterans like to view as the evil empire. His blog is often critical of Microsoft's offerings, but the company hasn't snuffed him. This has boosted both Scoble's credibility and Microsoft's. ``It's hard to underestimate what he's done for Microsoft,'' remarks Mullenweg, ``and it's hard to hate Microsoft anymore.''
Soon Mullenweg is off to work the crowd. He's got his work cut out for him. His main competitor, a company called Six Apart, has a corporate blog tool called Typepad, and is also a sponsor of the event. Typepad is considered the industry leader, but one Mullenweg thinks he can catch by offering better spam protection.
Scoble, meanwhile, is mob- bed by other visitors.
One person headed to snag Scoble is Vassil Mladjov, owner of a new company called Blogtronix, which is using Microsoft's .Net platform to let companies blog there. He's betting corporations will trust Microsoft's platform more than they would an open-source company like Mullenweg's WordPress.
Mladjov has a coterie of programmers in Bulgaria, and he's poised to exploit what he says is a coming wave of corporate blogs: ``PR is dead,'' he said, citing the words of Dave Taylor, a blogger and entrepreneur who used the line Wednesday to shake up the room of public relations professionals attending the conference. Taylor argued that blogs have stymied traditional forms of public relations.
Others had their own agendas. Elizabeth Gebhardt, who runs a marketing company, hoped to find new blogging tools, such as podcasting, to help better engage people.
Bob Wyman, leader of a company called PubSub, prowled the halls talking about his software, which monitors 14 million blogs and can notify companies within 10 seconds after a blog has mentioned them or their product.
Seth Mazow, 24, of Mountain View, scoured the hallways for sponsors for his Web site, Interplast, which helps doctors in developing countries learn about reconstructive surgery for people born with things like cleft lips or palates.
``I'm reaching out to the blogeoisie,'' he said, using bloggers slang for more established bloggers who might have money to give.
Contact Matt Marshall via his blog at www.siliconbeat.com
Read the article here : MercuryNews.com | 08/19/2005 | Bucks for blogs
BBC NEWS | Technology | Whose net is it anyway?
Whose net is it anyway?
Is it time to take control over the net away from the US government, asks technology analyst Bill Thompson?
When it comes to politics and policy making, those of us who take an interest in the way the internet is governed are usually treated with mild disdain by our activist friends.
Somehow the details of IP (internet protocol) address allocation, domain name resolution and the creation of new top-level domains (TLDs) by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann) fail to ignite the passions of even the most committed policy wonk.
Few people, for example, could tell you any of the tortuous history of the .xxx domain, which is intended for adult-only content, primarily pornography.
Originally proposed in 2000 and initially rejected, the board of Icann was about to give the final go-ahead to this new home for the world's pornographers when the US government said it was unhappy with the proposal.
Because of this approval has been put on hold for a month and may now not happen, despite the fact that there have been years of discussion and consultation and millions of dollars have been spent by those who want to run the registry which will provide .xxx websites.
Read the full article here : BBC NEWS | Technology | Whose net is it anyway?
Is it time to take control over the net away from the US government, asks technology analyst Bill Thompson?
When it comes to politics and policy making, those of us who take an interest in the way the internet is governed are usually treated with mild disdain by our activist friends.
Somehow the details of IP (internet protocol) address allocation, domain name resolution and the creation of new top-level domains (TLDs) by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann) fail to ignite the passions of even the most committed policy wonk.
Few people, for example, could tell you any of the tortuous history of the .xxx domain, which is intended for adult-only content, primarily pornography.
Originally proposed in 2000 and initially rejected, the board of Icann was about to give the final go-ahead to this new home for the world's pornographers when the US government said it was unhappy with the proposal.
Because of this approval has been put on hold for a month and may now not happen, despite the fact that there have been years of discussion and consultation and millions of dollars have been spent by those who want to run the registry which will provide .xxx websites.
Read the full article here : BBC NEWS | Technology | Whose net is it anyway?
Nanotubes show their strength in numbers - Science Mysteries - MSNBC.com
Nanotubes show their strength in numbers
Super-strong sheets could be used in future screens and surfacesBy Kathleen Wren
Science
Updated: 4:07 p.m. ET Aug. 18, 2005
WASHINGTON - Carbon nanotubes, the wunderkind molecules of the nanoworld, are finally showing strength in numbers. Researchers have now made large nanotube sheets that have many of the same star qualities as the prima donna-like single molecules, bringing the promises of nanotechnology a step closer to reality.
The flexible, transparent sheets can conduct electricity and emit light or heat when a voltage is applied, leading their creators to propose that our car windows and the canopies of military aircraft could contain nearly invisible antennae, electrical heaters for defrost, or informative optical displays.
Read the full article here : Nanotubes show their strength in numbers - Science Mysteries - MSNBC.com
Super-strong sheets could be used in future screens and surfacesBy Kathleen Wren
Science
Updated: 4:07 p.m. ET Aug. 18, 2005
WASHINGTON - Carbon nanotubes, the wunderkind molecules of the nanoworld, are finally showing strength in numbers. Researchers have now made large nanotube sheets that have many of the same star qualities as the prima donna-like single molecules, bringing the promises of nanotechnology a step closer to reality.
The flexible, transparent sheets can conduct electricity and emit light or heat when a voltage is applied, leading their creators to propose that our car windows and the canopies of military aircraft could contain nearly invisible antennae, electrical heaters for defrost, or informative optical displays.
 |
Two carbon nanotube sheets support droplets of orange juice, water and grape juice. The mass of each droplet is up to 50,000 times that of the contacting sheets. |
Read the full article here : Nanotubes show their strength in numbers - Science Mysteries - MSNBC.com
FT.com / Companies / By region - The week in technology: Worm farm
The week in technology: Worm farm
By Kate Mackenzie
Published: August 19 2005 13:58 | Last updated: August 19 2005 13:58
computer virus generic imageA spate of worms, known by many names including Zotob, took advantage of a newly-discovered hole in Microsoft Windows to wreak havoc in several large organisations. At least a dozen worms were released between August 14 and August 19, all based on code by an underground programmer believed to be living in Russia. The code was released on August 10, just a day after Microsoft publicised the flaw and made a patch available, and prompted a war between competing hackers, who made alterations to cause the worms to delete earlier versions.
Read the full article here : FT.com / Companies / By region - The week in technology: Worm farm
By Kate Mackenzie
Published: August 19 2005 13:58 | Last updated: August 19 2005 13:58
computer virus generic imageA spate of worms, known by many names including Zotob, took advantage of a newly-discovered hole in Microsoft Windows to wreak havoc in several large organisations. At least a dozen worms were released between August 14 and August 19, all based on code by an underground programmer believed to be living in Russia. The code was released on August 10, just a day after Microsoft publicised the flaw and made a patch available, and prompted a war between competing hackers, who made alterations to cause the worms to delete earlier versions.
Read the full article here : FT.com / Companies / By region - The week in technology: Worm farm
News from PC Magazine: Sony Announces Walkman Bean
Sony Announces Walkman Bean
08.19.05
Sony has announced a new flash-based MP3 player called the Walkman Bean. The 1.6-ounce player comes in two memory capacities, 512MB and 1GB, and four colors: Licorice Black, Cotton Candy Pink, Coconut White, and Tropical Ice Blue. It includes an FM tuner, but no recording capabilities, and has a one-line display.
We're intrigued by the Bean's claimed battery life—Sony says users will get 50 hours of playback from the rechargeable non-user-replaceable battery, and three hours of playback from a quick three-minute charge. We also like the USB connector, which is hidden in the player and pops out when the door is opened. Though the odd shape of the Bean will make it difficult for users to plug it directly into some computers, Sony thoughtfully includes a USB extension cable.
Read the full article here : News from PC Magazine: Sony Announces Walkman Bean
08.19.05
Sony has announced a new flash-based MP3 player called the Walkman Bean. The 1.6-ounce player comes in two memory capacities, 512MB and 1GB, and four colors: Licorice Black, Cotton Candy Pink, Coconut White, and Tropical Ice Blue. It includes an FM tuner, but no recording capabilities, and has a one-line display.
We're intrigued by the Bean's claimed battery life—Sony says users will get 50 hours of playback from the rechargeable non-user-replaceable battery, and three hours of playback from a quick three-minute charge. We also like the USB connector, which is hidden in the player and pops out when the door is opened. Though the odd shape of the Bean will make it difficult for users to plug it directly into some computers, Sony thoughtfully includes a USB extension cable.
Read the full article here : News from PC Magazine: Sony Announces Walkman Bean
Rail employee dies as commuters disrupt services
Commuters disrupt rail services; rail employee dies
August 19, 2005 01:04 IST
One railway employee died and some others were hospitalised after commuters pelted stones and manhandled them, disrupting train services on the Central Railway in Thane district on Thursday. The agitators were demanding more trains for Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST), Mumbai, railway sources said.
Rail services -- both long distance and suburban -- on the CR were disrupted for almost seven hours as more than 1,000 angry commuters pelted stones at Dombivali station, demanding fast surburban locals for CST.
Commuters disrupted train services at Titwala station also from 7.50 am to 9.50 am. They damaged the station and manhandled railway officials who sustained injuries and were hospitalised, a CR release said.
"One employee suffered cardiac arrest and died due to crowd behaviour and the stressful situation," railway sources said.
Read the full article here : Rail employee dies as commuters disrupt services
August 19, 2005 01:04 IST
One railway employee died and some others were hospitalised after commuters pelted stones and manhandled them, disrupting train services on the Central Railway in Thane district on Thursday. The agitators were demanding more trains for Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST), Mumbai, railway sources said.
Rail services -- both long distance and suburban -- on the CR were disrupted for almost seven hours as more than 1,000 angry commuters pelted stones at Dombivali station, demanding fast surburban locals for CST.
Commuters disrupted train services at Titwala station also from 7.50 am to 9.50 am. They damaged the station and manhandled railway officials who sustained injuries and were hospitalised, a CR release said.
"One employee suffered cardiac arrest and died due to crowd behaviour and the stressful situation," railway sources said.
Read the full article here : Rail employee dies as commuters disrupt services
Aid for family of Manipuri girl
Aid for family of Manipuri girl
August 19, 2005
The Maharashtra government will give Rs 1 lakh to the family of Leisha Choan, the Manipuri girl who was killed at the Gateway of India in Mumbai on August 13.
The amount will be sent to the Manipur government to be paid to Leisha’s family, Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh told a delegation, led by Manipur Education Minister Francis Gajopa, who met him yesterday.
Deshmukh said that the state government will also bear the medical expenses of Ngakuimi Relang, who was injured in the attack. He also expressed his wish to meet her soon. Relang may be discharged on Saturday from Bombay Hospital.
Describing the incident as unfortunate, the chief minister appealed to Manipuri students residing in Mumbai not to panic on account of the incident. ‘‘I assure Manipuri students of all necessary assistance whenever they need it,’’ he said, and that they could contact him for their problems.
Deshmukh also said that he had talked to the chief minister of Manipur about the matter.
Read the article here : Aid for family of Manipuri girl
August 19, 2005
The Maharashtra government will give Rs 1 lakh to the family of Leisha Choan, the Manipuri girl who was killed at the Gateway of India in Mumbai on August 13.
The amount will be sent to the Manipur government to be paid to Leisha’s family, Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh told a delegation, led by Manipur Education Minister Francis Gajopa, who met him yesterday.
Deshmukh said that the state government will also bear the medical expenses of Ngakuimi Relang, who was injured in the attack. He also expressed his wish to meet her soon. Relang may be discharged on Saturday from Bombay Hospital.
Describing the incident as unfortunate, the chief minister appealed to Manipuri students residing in Mumbai not to panic on account of the incident. ‘‘I assure Manipuri students of all necessary assistance whenever they need it,’’ he said, and that they could contact him for their problems.
Deshmukh also said that he had talked to the chief minister of Manipur about the matter.
Read the article here : Aid for family of Manipuri girl
Parties chew over Employment Bill in LS
Parties chew over Employment Bill in LS
PTI, August 18, 2005
New Delhi: A "historic" bill seeking to guarantee 100 days of employment to every rural household in a year was taken up for consideration in the Lok Sabha today with Congress president Sonia Gandhi asserting that the measure would fulfil one of the biggest promises made by her party in its election manifesto last year.
Members, cutting across party lines, welcomed by thumping of desks the National Rural Employment Guarantee Bill, 2004, as it was moved by Rural Development Minister Raghuvansh Prasad Singh for consideration, after the government incorporated a number of amendments to the original legislation introduced in the House last year.
Declaring the UPA government's resolve to improve the lives of rural people, Gandhi said through the "historic measure we are starting to give them their right so that they have a better future".
However, BJP leader Kalyan Singh, who headed the standing committee that examined the bill, picked holes in the legislation, taking a dig at the Congress party saying after 50 years in power it had realised the need for such a law.
Read the full article here : Parties chew over Employment Bill in LS
PTI, August 18, 2005
New Delhi: A "historic" bill seeking to guarantee 100 days of employment to every rural household in a year was taken up for consideration in the Lok Sabha today with Congress president Sonia Gandhi asserting that the measure would fulfil one of the biggest promises made by her party in its election manifesto last year.
Members, cutting across party lines, welcomed by thumping of desks the National Rural Employment Guarantee Bill, 2004, as it was moved by Rural Development Minister Raghuvansh Prasad Singh for consideration, after the government incorporated a number of amendments to the original legislation introduced in the House last year.
Declaring the UPA government's resolve to improve the lives of rural people, Gandhi said through the "historic measure we are starting to give them their right so that they have a better future".
However, BJP leader Kalyan Singh, who headed the standing committee that examined the bill, picked holes in the legislation, taking a dig at the Congress party saying after 50 years in power it had realised the need for such a law.
Read the full article here : Parties chew over Employment Bill in LS
ABC Plans a 'Dance-Off' to Answer Charges of a Rip-Off
ABC Plans a 'Dance-Off' to Answer Charges of a Rip-Off
By Lisa de Moraes, Friday, August 19, 2005
ABC programming chief Steve McPherson is so talented he can come up with a great stunt-programming idea while simultaneously fending off a couple hundred rabid TV critics.
The network announced yesterday that John O'Hurley and Kelly Monaco will go mano a mano on a 90-minute dance competition special, "Dancing With the Stars: Dance-Off" on Sept. 20 -- the first Tuesday of the new TV season.
John O'Hurley with Charlotte Jorgensen.
John O'Hurley with Charlotte Jorgensen. (Adam Larkey -- ABC)
O'Hurley, you'll recall, outdanced other C-list celebrities such as former model Rachel Hunter and ex-boy-bander Joey McIntyre in the summer series "Dancing With the Stars," but he was robbed of its Really Ugly Trophy in the final episode by ABC daytime hussy Monaco.
Read the full article here : ABC Plans a 'Dance-Off' to Answer Charges of a Rip-Off
By Lisa de Moraes, Friday, August 19, 2005
ABC programming chief Steve McPherson is so talented he can come up with a great stunt-programming idea while simultaneously fending off a couple hundred rabid TV critics.
The network announced yesterday that John O'Hurley and Kelly Monaco will go mano a mano on a 90-minute dance competition special, "Dancing With the Stars: Dance-Off" on Sept. 20 -- the first Tuesday of the new TV season.
John O'Hurley with Charlotte Jorgensen.
John O'Hurley with Charlotte Jorgensen. (Adam Larkey -- ABC)
O'Hurley, you'll recall, outdanced other C-list celebrities such as former model Rachel Hunter and ex-boy-bander Joey McIntyre in the summer series "Dancing With the Stars," but he was robbed of its Really Ugly Trophy in the final episode by ABC daytime hussy Monaco.
Read the full article here : ABC Plans a 'Dance-Off' to Answer Charges of a Rip-Off
The Telegraph - Calcutta : Metro
‘For a dad, son comes first’
Returning to celluloid after more than a decade, producer ROMESH SHARMA turns director with his son Karan’s launch film Dil Jo Bhi Kahey. He speaks to Pratim D. Gupta about the Bachchan-Revathy-starrer and what makes it special
Romesh Sharma
It’s been more than 15 years since you produced Hum. Where were you all this time?
After Hum, I made the Bengali film Bondhu starring Danny Denzongpa and Tapas Pal. Then I made the same film in Hindi with a different actor in place of Tapas. But at that time, I didn’t get distributors to release the Hindi film. Now, necessity being the mother of invention, I ventured into television and turned that film into a TV series called Ajnabee for DD Metro. From there on, I got sucked into the world of television and made three or four major soaps like Usool and Tulsi. I myself never realised how all these years went by.
So what brought you back to celluloid?
I knew I had to get back to films at some point of time. I made this 42-episode French television series Cest La Vie (This Is Life), which is the original of Dil Jo Bhi Kahey. That enjoyed 87.6 per cent viewership and was a big success there. So it was already tested for a small market. My son Karan, who plays the lead in Dil Jo…, also played the lead there. Hence, we decided to make the Hindi film which will see me debut as a director and Karan as the hero.
Wasn’t it boring, scripting the same story again?
When I was writing the Hindi script, I had to block out the French tele-series from my mind. It was left in the sub-conscious level only. I just disconnected from what had happened. So writing the film was a major exercise and it took a lot of time. At every stage I was ensuring that it was different from the television series despite the story being the same.
Read the full article here : The Telegraph - Calcutta : Metro
Returning to celluloid after more than a decade, producer ROMESH SHARMA turns director with his son Karan’s launch film Dil Jo Bhi Kahey. He speaks to Pratim D. Gupta about the Bachchan-Revathy-starrer and what makes it special
Romesh Sharma
It’s been more than 15 years since you produced Hum. Where were you all this time?
After Hum, I made the Bengali film Bondhu starring Danny Denzongpa and Tapas Pal. Then I made the same film in Hindi with a different actor in place of Tapas. But at that time, I didn’t get distributors to release the Hindi film. Now, necessity being the mother of invention, I ventured into television and turned that film into a TV series called Ajnabee for DD Metro. From there on, I got sucked into the world of television and made three or four major soaps like Usool and Tulsi. I myself never realised how all these years went by.
So what brought you back to celluloid?
I knew I had to get back to films at some point of time. I made this 42-episode French television series Cest La Vie (This Is Life), which is the original of Dil Jo Bhi Kahey. That enjoyed 87.6 per cent viewership and was a big success there. So it was already tested for a small market. My son Karan, who plays the lead in Dil Jo…, also played the lead there. Hence, we decided to make the Hindi film which will see me debut as a director and Karan as the hero.
Wasn’t it boring, scripting the same story again?
When I was writing the Hindi script, I had to block out the French tele-series from my mind. It was left in the sub-conscious level only. I just disconnected from what had happened. So writing the film was a major exercise and it took a lot of time. At every stage I was ensuring that it was different from the television series despite the story being the same.
Read the full article here : The Telegraph - Calcutta : Metro
Asylum sex scenes made Natasha cry
Asylum sex scenes made Natasha cry
Arthur J Pais | August 18, 2005 17:08 IST
AsylumThe sex scenes in the harrowing, riveting movie Asylum were so strong, confesses actress Natasha Richardson, that she cried a couple of times in her trailer to let off the tension.
"They were raw, and I knew they had to be there in the film for a purpose," the 42-year-old actress, also one of the film's executive producers, says. "And yet, I found the intensity of it all was too much. Those scenes messed with your head."
She knew it, she admits, that doing the scenes "behind the bed sheets would not do it. You know you are pretending, and yet you cannot but help feel overwhelmed by them."
David Mackenzie, who directed the film, created quite a furor with the nude scenes in his previous film, Young Adam, which also received very good reviews.
"David is a very rigorous director," Richardson says. "He picked up on everything; he pushed me very hard."
Read the full article here : Asylum sex scenes made Natasha cry
Arthur J Pais | August 18, 2005 17:08 IST
AsylumThe sex scenes in the harrowing, riveting movie Asylum were so strong, confesses actress Natasha Richardson, that she cried a couple of times in her trailer to let off the tension.
"They were raw, and I knew they had to be there in the film for a purpose," the 42-year-old actress, also one of the film's executive producers, says. "And yet, I found the intensity of it all was too much. Those scenes messed with your head."
She knew it, she admits, that doing the scenes "behind the bed sheets would not do it. You know you are pretending, and yet you cannot but help feel overwhelmed by them."
David Mackenzie, who directed the film, created quite a furor with the nude scenes in his previous film, Young Adam, which also received very good reviews.
"David is a very rigorous director," Richardson says. "He picked up on everything; he pushed me very hard."
Read the full article here : Asylum sex scenes made Natasha cry
New York Daily News - Entertainment - Jami Bernard: Red Eye
A top-flight airline thriller,
'Red Eye' delivers the goods
Red Eye. With Rachel McAdams, Cillian Murphy, Jayma Mays. Directr: Wes Craven (1:26). PG-13: Violence, language.
There's danger in the skies, and it's not from foreign terrorists. In Wes Craven's tight, tense thriller "Red Eye," a pretty hotel manager (Rachel McAdams) finds herself seated in coach next to a creepy guy - and her flight only gets bumpier when she finds out what he's after.
Lisa Reisert (McAdams) is a scrappy workaholic taking a red-eye flight home to Miami after her grandmother's funeral in Texas. Carl Ellsworth's crisp screenplay hands Lisa a bouquet of interesting traits even before she's buckled into her seat - she's mentally agile and has nerves of steel, all good for handling whiny customers and VIPs at the luxury hotel where she works. She's also sensitive to other people, particularly those in service industries, which is why she speaks up when irate travelers take out their frustrations on an overwhelmed airline worker.
But she's also unusually guarded, afraid to trust or to take a breather from herType A lifestyle. You can see her wrestle with herself when another passenger on her delayed flight asks her to have a drink with him while they wait in the terminal. She's so unused to social interaction, she's not sure she's reading the warning signs correctly.
Read the full article here : New York Daily News - Entertainment - Jami Bernard: Red Eye
'Red Eye' delivers the goods
Red Eye. With Rachel McAdams, Cillian Murphy, Jayma Mays. Directr: Wes Craven (1:26). PG-13: Violence, language.
There's danger in the skies, and it's not from foreign terrorists. In Wes Craven's tight, tense thriller "Red Eye," a pretty hotel manager (Rachel McAdams) finds herself seated in coach next to a creepy guy - and her flight only gets bumpier when she finds out what he's after.
Lisa Reisert (McAdams) is a scrappy workaholic taking a red-eye flight home to Miami after her grandmother's funeral in Texas. Carl Ellsworth's crisp screenplay hands Lisa a bouquet of interesting traits even before she's buckled into her seat - she's mentally agile and has nerves of steel, all good for handling whiny customers and VIPs at the luxury hotel where she works. She's also sensitive to other people, particularly those in service industries, which is why she speaks up when irate travelers take out their frustrations on an overwhelmed airline worker.
But she's also unusually guarded, afraid to trust or to take a breather from herType A lifestyle. You can see her wrestle with herself when another passenger on her delayed flight asks her to have a drink with him while they wait in the terminal. She's so unused to social interaction, she's not sure she's reading the warning signs correctly.
Read the full article here : New York Daily News - Entertainment - Jami Bernard: Red Eye
Google to sell $4 billion in stock - 08/19/05
Google to sell $4 billion in stock
Internet search leader may use the proceeds for possible acquisitions; says nothing is in the works right now.
By Matthew Fordahl / Associated Press
SAN JOSE, Calif. -- A year after its blockbuster debut as a public company, Google Inc. said Thursday it plans to offer another 14.2 million shares, worth about $4 billion, as competition heats up with rivals Yahoo Inc. and Microsoft Corp.
The Internet search leader said it will use the proceeds for "general corporate purposes," including possible acquisitions. Google said that it currently has no agreements or commitments to make a material purchase.
Google's stock price has more than tripled since the August 2004 initial public offering at $85.
Its stock fell $5.30, or 1.9 percent, to $279.80 in Thursday trading on the Nasdaq.
The secondary offering would raise nearly 2.5 times the $1.67 billion generated by the first IPO.
"The stock is at a nice price and they should be taking some money as a result," said Mark Stahlman, an analyst at the investment bank Caris & Co.
Google spokesman David Krane declined to comment further on the company's filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
"Literally, the document speaks for itself," he said in an e-mail.
Read the full article here : Google to sell $4 billion in stock - 08/19/05
Internet search leader may use the proceeds for possible acquisitions; says nothing is in the works right now.
By Matthew Fordahl / Associated Press
SAN JOSE, Calif. -- A year after its blockbuster debut as a public company, Google Inc. said Thursday it plans to offer another 14.2 million shares, worth about $4 billion, as competition heats up with rivals Yahoo Inc. and Microsoft Corp.
The Internet search leader said it will use the proceeds for "general corporate purposes," including possible acquisitions. Google said that it currently has no agreements or commitments to make a material purchase.
Google's stock price has more than tripled since the August 2004 initial public offering at $85.
Its stock fell $5.30, or 1.9 percent, to $279.80 in Thursday trading on the Nasdaq.
The secondary offering would raise nearly 2.5 times the $1.67 billion generated by the first IPO.
"The stock is at a nice price and they should be taking some money as a result," said Mark Stahlman, an analyst at the investment bank Caris & Co.
Google spokesman David Krane declined to comment further on the company's filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
"Literally, the document speaks for itself," he said in an e-mail.
Read the full article here : Google to sell $4 billion in stock - 08/19/05
MercuryNews.com | 08/19/2005 | Intel helps cities set up WiFi nets
Intel helps cities set up WiFi nets
`ON THE CUSP OF A REVOLUTION,' ANALYST SAYS
By Jessie Seyfer
Mercury News
Intel has been lending a hand to communities across the globe to help them develop citywide wireless Internet systems, the company said Thursday.
The first such projects to come to fruition have followed a more modest model than some, focused on streamlining government functions rather than citywide universal access for residents.
The Santa Clara chip maker highlighted three cities Thursday in particular -- Taipei, Taiwan; Corpus Christi, Texas; and Cleveland -- where wireless Internet systems, or WiFi, have become a community reality in a tangible way.
In Taipei, wireless technology has helped the city's 400-some agencies communicate paperlessly, and to provide real-time information about parking and traffic. In Corpus Christi, wireless Internet devices are helping building inspectors search structures' histories in the field and are tracking city vehicle fleets. In Cleveland, emergency responders can send live video of an incident to colleagues, so everyone can respond to it in a more informed way.
Bay Area companies, including Accela Communications of Dublin and Pronto Networks of Pleasanton, worked with Intel on the projects, which Intel has dubbed its Digital Communities Initiative.
Intel is helping 13 cities across the world develop community WiFi projects, and the company intends to lend its system design and technology expertise to many more. Company representatives said municipal WiFi projects will be a boon for Intel, which supplies processors for 80 percent of the world's computers, and for the entire field of technology. Intel processors are used in myriad wireless products.
Read the full article here : MercuryNews.com | 08/19/2005 | Intel helps cities set up WiFi nets
`ON THE CUSP OF A REVOLUTION,' ANALYST SAYS
By Jessie Seyfer
Mercury News
Intel has been lending a hand to communities across the globe to help them develop citywide wireless Internet systems, the company said Thursday.
The first such projects to come to fruition have followed a more modest model than some, focused on streamlining government functions rather than citywide universal access for residents.
The Santa Clara chip maker highlighted three cities Thursday in particular -- Taipei, Taiwan; Corpus Christi, Texas; and Cleveland -- where wireless Internet systems, or WiFi, have become a community reality in a tangible way.
In Taipei, wireless technology has helped the city's 400-some agencies communicate paperlessly, and to provide real-time information about parking and traffic. In Corpus Christi, wireless Internet devices are helping building inspectors search structures' histories in the field and are tracking city vehicle fleets. In Cleveland, emergency responders can send live video of an incident to colleagues, so everyone can respond to it in a more informed way.
Bay Area companies, including Accela Communications of Dublin and Pronto Networks of Pleasanton, worked with Intel on the projects, which Intel has dubbed its Digital Communities Initiative.
Intel is helping 13 cities across the world develop community WiFi projects, and the company intends to lend its system design and technology expertise to many more. Company representatives said municipal WiFi projects will be a boon for Intel, which supplies processors for 80 percent of the world's computers, and for the entire field of technology. Intel processors are used in myriad wireless products.
Read the full article here : MercuryNews.com | 08/19/2005 | Intel helps cities set up WiFi nets
NASA delays next shuttle launch until March
NASA delays next shuttle launch until March
Keay Davidson, Chronicle Science Writer,
Friday, August 19, 2005
NASA is delaying the next shuttle launch until some time in March, six months later than originally hoped.
The agency needs more time to figure out how to prevent a repeat of potentially dangerous technical problems that plagued the recent Discovery flight, NASA chief Michael Griffin explained at a press conference Thursday in Washington. Those problems included potentially hazardous foam that fell off the shuttle's external tank during launch.
Previously, NASA officials had hoped to launch another shuttle, Atlantis, in September. Thursday's announcement scotches that plan.
If the next shuttle does go up in March, NASA will have launched only a single shuttle during a three-year period -- the shuttle Discovery that flew from July 26 to Aug. 9 of this year.
Read the full article here : NASA delays next shuttle launch until March
Keay Davidson, Chronicle Science Writer,
Friday, August 19, 2005
NASA is delaying the next shuttle launch until some time in March, six months later than originally hoped.
The agency needs more time to figure out how to prevent a repeat of potentially dangerous technical problems that plagued the recent Discovery flight, NASA chief Michael Griffin explained at a press conference Thursday in Washington. Those problems included potentially hazardous foam that fell off the shuttle's external tank during launch.
Previously, NASA officials had hoped to launch another shuttle, Atlantis, in September. Thursday's announcement scotches that plan.
If the next shuttle does go up in March, NASA will have launched only a single shuttle during a three-year period -- the shuttle Discovery that flew from July 26 to Aug. 9 of this year.
Read the full article here : NASA delays next shuttle launch until March
Thursday, August 18, 2005
Hottest Clubwear: Glam, glitter and crystals! - Indiatimes People
Hottest Clubwear: Glam, glitter and crystals!
Jasmeen Dugal
Walk into any club and you’ll spot pretty young things in cleavage-contouring bustiers, short shorts, or clinging ‘red-carpet ready’ gowns. Wrap tops slink across tanned skin in a rustle of silk and satin. Racer backs and corsets are worn with élan. Check out some of the snazziest clubwear that have the power to raise temperatures, and the chic set who flaunt em ..!
Read the full article here : Indiatimes People
Jasmeen Dugal
Walk into any club and you’ll spot pretty young things in cleavage-contouring bustiers, short shorts, or clinging ‘red-carpet ready’ gowns. Wrap tops slink across tanned skin in a rustle of silk and satin. Racer backs and corsets are worn with élan. Check out some of the snazziest clubwear that have the power to raise temperatures, and the chic set who flaunt em ..!
Read the full article here : Indiatimes People
Busts that went bust - Indiatimes Women
Busts that went bust
Bollywood babes and cleavage have a long association. In the black and white era, it was all about tight blouses and see through saris. With Madhuri Dixit, thrusting what one had became a rage, thanks to the cult Dhak Dhak Karne Laga. Today, like all other things, there is an explosion in bosom exposure as well. More the merrier and it’s no longer about just the cleavage. Mallika Sherawat will tell you why and how. Here, some bust stories that are difficult to forget.
Read the full article here : Indiatimes Women
Bollywood babes and cleavage have a long association. In the black and white era, it was all about tight blouses and see through saris. With Madhuri Dixit, thrusting what one had became a rage, thanks to the cult Dhak Dhak Karne Laga. Today, like all other things, there is an explosion in bosom exposure as well. More the merrier and it’s no longer about just the cleavage. Mallika Sherawat will tell you why and how. Here, some bust stories that are difficult to forget.
Read the full article here : Indiatimes Women
A porsche in lieu of a tip!- The Times of India
A porsche in lieu of a tip!
AFP[ THURSDAY, AUGUST 18, 2005 03:07:37 PM ]
STOCKHOLM: A waitress in Sweden thought her elderly customer was joking when he offered her his Porsche as a tip, but he kept his word and gave her the keys to the car, daily Aftonblade t reported on Thursday. "I thought at first he was joking with me," 19-year-old Josefin Justin told the paper.
Justin was waiting tables at the Njuraanger Cafe in Sundsvall in central Sweden when the man, who had recently retired and was dining with a group of gentlemen, asked her age. When she told him, "he said I would get his Porsche as a tip." "At first I was a little suspicious but I didn't get the feeling he was hitting on me or anything, he just seemed really nice," she said.
Read the full article here : A porsche in lieu of a tip!- The Times of India
AFP[ THURSDAY, AUGUST 18, 2005 03:07:37 PM ]
STOCKHOLM: A waitress in Sweden thought her elderly customer was joking when he offered her his Porsche as a tip, but he kept his word and gave her the keys to the car, daily Aftonblade t reported on Thursday. "I thought at first he was joking with me," 19-year-old Josefin Justin told the paper.
Justin was waiting tables at the Njuraanger Cafe in Sundsvall in central Sweden when the man, who had recently retired and was dining with a group of gentlemen, asked her age. When she told him, "he said I would get his Porsche as a tip." "At first I was a little suspicious but I didn't get the feeling he was hitting on me or anything, he just seemed really nice," she said.
Read the full article here : A porsche in lieu of a tip!- The Times of India
Tests at Pune confirm 72 lepto cases
Tests at Pune confirm 72 lepto cases
PTI, August 18, 2005
Pune: One person has died due to suspected Leptospirosis while eight others have been tested positive for the dreaded water-borne disease in the city even as the Leptospirosis Referral Centre here has confirmed 72 cases as positive (for the disease), including 59 in Mumbai region, out of the over 160 samples it received since the heavy rains and floods on July 26.
Suffering from high fever and respiratory problems, Tushar Mahamuni (25) died yesterday in a private hospital, Chief Medical Officer of Pune Municipal Corporation Dr Pramod Dhaygude said adding, it was death due to suspected Leptospirosis.
Though Mahamuni's urine sample had tested positive for lepto, the same test could not be performed on the victim's blood sample, which was never sent to it for testing by the local authorities, officials at the Maharashtra-level Leptospirosis Referral Centre at B J Medical College said.
Read the full article here : Tests at Pune confirm 72 lepto cases
PTI, August 18, 2005
Pune: One person has died due to suspected Leptospirosis while eight others have been tested positive for the dreaded water-borne disease in the city even as the Leptospirosis Referral Centre here has confirmed 72 cases as positive (for the disease), including 59 in Mumbai region, out of the over 160 samples it received since the heavy rains and floods on July 26.
Suffering from high fever and respiratory problems, Tushar Mahamuni (25) died yesterday in a private hospital, Chief Medical Officer of Pune Municipal Corporation Dr Pramod Dhaygude said adding, it was death due to suspected Leptospirosis.
Though Mahamuni's urine sample had tested positive for lepto, the same test could not be performed on the victim's blood sample, which was never sent to it for testing by the local authorities, officials at the Maharashtra-level Leptospirosis Referral Centre at B J Medical College said.
Read the full article here : Tests at Pune confirm 72 lepto cases
Brits Rising against Mangal
Brits Rising against Mangal
By: Khalid A-H Ansari, August 18, 2005
London: The Rising — Ballad of Mangal Pandey, now showing in cinema chains in Britain, has come in for trenchant criticism here for purportedly distorting historical facts concerning British rule in India.
The film, starring Aamir Khan and billed as an “epic tale of friendship, betrayal, love and sacrifice”, is directed by Ketan Mehta, and is said to have been partly made from money from the British lottery.
A London newspaper has alleged that the UK Film Council gave £150,000 towards financing the £6.6 million blockbuster, ostensibly the most expensive film made in India.
The UK film council aims to “stimulate a competitive and successful British film industry”.
Read the full article here : Brits Rising against Mangal
By: Khalid A-H Ansari, August 18, 2005
London: The Rising — Ballad of Mangal Pandey, now showing in cinema chains in Britain, has come in for trenchant criticism here for purportedly distorting historical facts concerning British rule in India.
The film, starring Aamir Khan and billed as an “epic tale of friendship, betrayal, love and sacrifice”, is directed by Ketan Mehta, and is said to have been partly made from money from the British lottery.
A London newspaper has alleged that the UK Film Council gave £150,000 towards financing the £6.6 million blockbuster, ostensibly the most expensive film made in India.
The UK film council aims to “stimulate a competitive and successful British film industry”.
Read the full article here : Brits Rising against Mangal
PC Pro: News: Microsoft prices Xbox 360
Microsoft prices Xbox 360
Thursday 18th August 2005 12:53PM
No dates, but prices have been revealed for Microsoft's next-generation Xbox games console, the 360.
Prices for the 'Core' system start at £209.99 for the UK, €299.99 for Europe and $299.99 for the USA. For those of you concerned about cross Atlantic pricing schemes, this translates - on a dollar basis - into a cost of $377 for the UK and $368 for Europe. It appears the UK gamer is once again paying a price premium compared to our continental cousins.
The core system includes a wired Controller (on a nine-foot cable), the standard 'chill' white faceplate that can be swapped for customisation, and a standard AV Cable. With a built-in Ethernet port and a 'Silver level of service' out of the box, Xbox 360 will also connect players to the existing Xbox Live online gaming network.
Prices will increase depending on accessories bundled. The Xbox 360 list comprises: a 64MB Memory Unit (£22.99), a Wireless Controller (£32.99), a Play & Charge Kit (£14.99), a Rechargeable battery pack (£9.99), a Wireless Networking Adapter (£59.99), a Headset (£14.99), a Universal Media Remote (£19.99), a S-Video AV Cable (£17.99), and a VGA HD AV Cable (£19.99).
A Premium edition of the console, costing £279.99, includes a 20GB detachable hard disk.
Read the full article here : PC Pro: News: Microsoft prices Xbox 360
Thursday 18th August 2005 12:53PM
No dates, but prices have been revealed for Microsoft's next-generation Xbox games console, the 360.
Prices for the 'Core' system start at £209.99 for the UK, €299.99 for Europe and $299.99 for the USA. For those of you concerned about cross Atlantic pricing schemes, this translates - on a dollar basis - into a cost of $377 for the UK and $368 for Europe. It appears the UK gamer is once again paying a price premium compared to our continental cousins.
The core system includes a wired Controller (on a nine-foot cable), the standard 'chill' white faceplate that can be swapped for customisation, and a standard AV Cable. With a built-in Ethernet port and a 'Silver level of service' out of the box, Xbox 360 will also connect players to the existing Xbox Live online gaming network.
Prices will increase depending on accessories bundled. The Xbox 360 list comprises: a 64MB Memory Unit (£22.99), a Wireless Controller (£32.99), a Play & Charge Kit (£14.99), a Rechargeable battery pack (£9.99), a Wireless Networking Adapter (£59.99), a Headset (£14.99), a Universal Media Remote (£19.99), a S-Video AV Cable (£17.99), and a VGA HD AV Cable (£19.99).
A Premium edition of the console, costing £279.99, includes a 20GB detachable hard disk.
Read the full article here : PC Pro: News: Microsoft prices Xbox 360
Varma’s Magnum Opus Sholay is the talk of the town - Newindpress.com
Varma’s Magnum Opus Sholay is the talk of the town
Thursday August 18 2005 12:22 IST
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Of late, most of his characters in the tinsel world were almost superhuman. Yet, he is thrilled to don the role of a former super cop who got his hands amputated by a criminal and is now at the fag end of his life.
No wonder, superstar Mohan Lal has grabbed the offer as the role in the offing is nothing less than the reincarnation of Thakur Baldev Singh, played by Sanjeev Kumar in the legendary film Sholay, and the director who invited Lal is none other than Ram Gopal Varma.
Incidentally, Mohan Lal had made his debut in Hindi film world in Varma’s film Company in which he played the role of a super cop. The character of Thakur Baldev Singh has contributed much to the huge success of Sippy’s Sholay , which was screened continuously for five years at the Minerva Theatre in Mumbai.
Sholay, a Ramesh Sippy film released in 1975, became a trend-setter in Hindi filmdom. The BBC recently described Sholay as the best Bollywood film ever made.
Read the full article here : Varma’s Magnum Opus Sholay is the talk of the town - Newindpress.com
Thursday August 18 2005 12:22 IST
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Of late, most of his characters in the tinsel world were almost superhuman. Yet, he is thrilled to don the role of a former super cop who got his hands amputated by a criminal and is now at the fag end of his life.
No wonder, superstar Mohan Lal has grabbed the offer as the role in the offing is nothing less than the reincarnation of Thakur Baldev Singh, played by Sanjeev Kumar in the legendary film Sholay, and the director who invited Lal is none other than Ram Gopal Varma.
Incidentally, Mohan Lal had made his debut in Hindi film world in Varma’s film Company in which he played the role of a super cop. The character of Thakur Baldev Singh has contributed much to the huge success of Sippy’s Sholay , which was screened continuously for five years at the Minerva Theatre in Mumbai.
Sholay, a Ramesh Sippy film released in 1975, became a trend-setter in Hindi filmdom. The BBC recently described Sholay as the best Bollywood film ever made.
Read the full article here : Varma’s Magnum Opus Sholay is the talk of the town - Newindpress.com
Brosnan contemplates life after Bond
Brosnan contemplates life after Bond
05:39 AEST Thu Aug 18 2005, AAP
AP - A single, surprising phone call ended it all. That's how Pierce Brosnan says he learned his services as James Bond would no longer be required.
"One phone call, that's all it took," the 52-year-old Irish actor says of the decision last year by producers of the Bond films to drop him as the suave British superspy.
Brosnan starred in four Bond films. He says that before they stopped negotiations, the producers had invited him back for a fifth time.
"You know, the movie career for me really started with Bond," Brosnan tells Entertainment Weekly magazine, acknowledging that by the time GoldenEye premiered in 1995, he was already 42.
He then starred as 007 in Tomorrow Never Dies (1997), The World Is Not Enough (1999) and Die Another Day (2002).
His departure from the role was a "titanic jolt to the system," says Brosnan, followed by "a great sense of calm".
Read the full article here : Brosnan contemplates life after Bond
05:39 AEST Thu Aug 18 2005, AAP
AP - A single, surprising phone call ended it all. That's how Pierce Brosnan says he learned his services as James Bond would no longer be required.
"One phone call, that's all it took," the 52-year-old Irish actor says of the decision last year by producers of the Bond films to drop him as the suave British superspy.
Brosnan starred in four Bond films. He says that before they stopped negotiations, the producers had invited him back for a fifth time.
"You know, the movie career for me really started with Bond," Brosnan tells Entertainment Weekly magazine, acknowledging that by the time GoldenEye premiered in 1995, he was already 42.
He then starred as 007 in Tomorrow Never Dies (1997), The World Is Not Enough (1999) and Die Another Day (2002).
His departure from the role was a "titanic jolt to the system," says Brosnan, followed by "a great sense of calm".
Read the full article here : Brosnan contemplates life after Bond
Big B 'sweeps' away Preity on KBC - Newindpress.com
Big B 'sweeps' away Preity on KBC
Tuesday August 16 2005 09:26 IST, IANS
MUMBAI: "Kaun Banega Crorepati" has taken the kind of TRP-sweeping opening that TV channels only dream about. And guess who had the chance to sit on the hot seat in front of host Amitabh Bachchan - Preity Zinta and Saif Ali Khan.
"It's, in one word, awesome!" says Preity, who'll appear on a special edition of "KBC" along with Saif.
They are the first two celebrities on the hot seats for this season's "KBC". The stars of Yashraj Films' "Salaam Namaste" will be seen together in the middle of August.
Says Preity excitedly: "He looks so cool, and just sweeps you away. Just Bachchan being on the show makes it worth it. Of course I was nervous.
"But having worked with and been on 'KBC' earlier, I guess I had an edge over Saif. What I also liked about the 'KBC' experience this time was my partner. Saif is such a fun person. Just doing a fun thing with him is so much more fun."
Read the full article here : Big B 'sweeps' away Preity on KBC - Newindpress.com
Tuesday August 16 2005 09:26 IST, IANS
MUMBAI: "Kaun Banega Crorepati" has taken the kind of TRP-sweeping opening that TV channels only dream about. And guess who had the chance to sit on the hot seat in front of host Amitabh Bachchan - Preity Zinta and Saif Ali Khan.
"It's, in one word, awesome!" says Preity, who'll appear on a special edition of "KBC" along with Saif.
They are the first two celebrities on the hot seats for this season's "KBC". The stars of Yashraj Films' "Salaam Namaste" will be seen together in the middle of August.
Says Preity excitedly: "He looks so cool, and just sweeps you away. Just Bachchan being on the show makes it worth it. Of course I was nervous.
"But having worked with and been on 'KBC' earlier, I guess I had an edge over Saif. What I also liked about the 'KBC' experience this time was my partner. Saif is such a fun person. Just doing a fun thing with him is so much more fun."
Read the full article here : Big B 'sweeps' away Preity on KBC - Newindpress.com
Ramu’s Gambit: Anil Kapoor turns murderer - Sify.com
Ramu’s Gambit: Anil Kapoor turns murderer
Subhash K Jha, Thursday, 18 August , 2005, 10:30
“Every husband feels like killing his wife at some time or the other…”
This was the shocking quote that underlined the original intention behind Ram Gopal Varma’s new thriller on spousal violence.
The murdered wife…the husband on the run… sounds like Rajesh Khanna in Yash Chopra’s Ittefaq, Vinod Khanna in Achanak and Gulzar’s Nagarajuna in Mahesh Bhatt’s Criminal.
In his latest production My Wife’s Murder Ram Gopal Varma has cast Anil Kapoor as a man who accidently murders his wife.
Read the full article here : Ramu’s Gambit: Anil Kapoor turns murderer - Sify.com
Subhash K Jha, Thursday, 18 August , 2005, 10:30
“Every husband feels like killing his wife at some time or the other…”
This was the shocking quote that underlined the original intention behind Ram Gopal Varma’s new thriller on spousal violence.
The murdered wife…the husband on the run… sounds like Rajesh Khanna in Yash Chopra’s Ittefaq, Vinod Khanna in Achanak and Gulzar’s Nagarajuna in Mahesh Bhatt’s Criminal.
In his latest production My Wife’s Murder Ram Gopal Varma has cast Anil Kapoor as a man who accidently murders his wife.
Read the full article here : Ramu’s Gambit: Anil Kapoor turns murderer - Sify.com
JE epidemic looms large- The Times of India
JE epidemic looms large
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ THURSDAY, AUGUST 18, 2005 02:29:43 AM ]
LUCKNOW: As the official death toll following spread of Japanese Encephalitis (JE) in Gorakhpur district shot up to 79, fresh cases being reported from the terai region have pressed panic buttons. The viral disease now threatens to assume the proportion of an epidemic in the region. The toll has crossed the 100-mark, according to unofficial sources.
While the senior authorities of the state health department remained engaged in closed-door meetings throughout the day in Gorakhpur as well as in the state capital, finalising a blueprint to tackle the menace, governor TV Rajeswar postponed his visit to meet the victims of JE in Gorakhpur on Wednesday. He will now tour the district on Thursday.
Meanwhile, two special teams of doctors were dispatched from Lucknow to assist senior health officials of Gorakhpur in their endeavour to save the people from the deadly disease. Director general (DG), medical health, Dr OP Singh, and director, communicable diseases, Dr Bharti were set to leave for Gorakhpur by late on Wednesday night.
Read the full article here : JE epidemic looms large- The Times of India
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ THURSDAY, AUGUST 18, 2005 02:29:43 AM ]
LUCKNOW: As the official death toll following spread of Japanese Encephalitis (JE) in Gorakhpur district shot up to 79, fresh cases being reported from the terai region have pressed panic buttons. The viral disease now threatens to assume the proportion of an epidemic in the region. The toll has crossed the 100-mark, according to unofficial sources.
While the senior authorities of the state health department remained engaged in closed-door meetings throughout the day in Gorakhpur as well as in the state capital, finalising a blueprint to tackle the menace, governor TV Rajeswar postponed his visit to meet the victims of JE in Gorakhpur on Wednesday. He will now tour the district on Thursday.
Meanwhile, two special teams of doctors were dispatched from Lucknow to assist senior health officials of Gorakhpur in their endeavour to save the people from the deadly disease. Director general (DG), medical health, Dr OP Singh, and director, communicable diseases, Dr Bharti were set to leave for Gorakhpur by late on Wednesday night.
Read the full article here : JE epidemic looms large- The Times of India
Emergency landing for Jet Airways plane at IGI
Emergency landing for Jet Airways plane at IGI
Press Trust of India
New Delhi, August 18: A Jet Airways aircraft with 101 passengers on board today made an emergency but safe landing at Delhi's Indira Gandhi International airport soon after its take-off for Bangalore.
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The flight 9W-815 took off from Delhi airport around 10:15 am and soon after the pilot detected some technical fault and sought an emergency landing, police sources said.
Full emergency was declared at the airport with fire tenders and ambulances being kept ready.
The plane landed safely at around 10:30 am, they said.
Read the full article here : Emergency landing for Jet Airways plane at IGI
Press Trust of India
New Delhi, August 18: A Jet Airways aircraft with 101 passengers on board today made an emergency but safe landing at Delhi's Indira Gandhi International airport soon after its take-off for Bangalore.
Advertisement
The flight 9W-815 took off from Delhi airport around 10:15 am and soon after the pilot detected some technical fault and sought an emergency landing, police sources said.
Full emergency was declared at the airport with fire tenders and ambulances being kept ready.
The plane landed safely at around 10:30 am, they said.
Read the full article here : Emergency landing for Jet Airways plane at IGI
"Mangal Pandey, huge disapppointment at Locarno" - Sify.com
"Mangal Pandey, huge disapppointment at Locarno"
By Subhash K Jha, Thursday, 18 August , 2005, 11:17
Of late there has been an alarming trend in Bollywood of any and every filmmaker claiming that his film has been entered for an international film festival. Earlier we had a series of nondescript films claiming to be nominated for Cannes. Now we have the people behind Mangal Pandey claiming that their film got rave reviews at the ongoing Locarno film festival.
Did The Rising, a.k.a Mangal Pandey get a standing ovation at Locarno when it was screened last week? That's what the people behind the film claim.
According to director Ketan Mehta, "We saw the response of 8000 people.They gave the film a standing ovation. The critics also wrote favourably…."
Read the full article here : "Mangal Pandey, huge disapppointment at Locarno" - Sify.com
By Subhash K Jha, Thursday, 18 August , 2005, 11:17
Of late there has been an alarming trend in Bollywood of any and every filmmaker claiming that his film has been entered for an international film festival. Earlier we had a series of nondescript films claiming to be nominated for Cannes. Now we have the people behind Mangal Pandey claiming that their film got rave reviews at the ongoing Locarno film festival.
Did The Rising, a.k.a Mangal Pandey get a standing ovation at Locarno when it was screened last week? That's what the people behind the film claim.
According to director Ketan Mehta, "We saw the response of 8000 people.They gave the film a standing ovation. The critics also wrote favourably…."
Read the full article here : "Mangal Pandey, huge disapppointment at Locarno" - Sify.com
Sunday, August 14, 2005
She came from Manipur to see Mumbai
She came from Manipur to see Mumbai
Read the full article here : Maniac stabs girl to death at Gateway
'He caught her by the hair and cut her neck'
'He caught her by the hair and cut her neck'
Read the full article here : Maniac stabs girl to death at Gateway
Gore at Gateway - 'Mad' man goes on rampage
Gore at Gateway - 'Mad' man goes on rampage
Read the full article here : Maniac stabs girl to death at Gateway
Girl stabbed to death at Mumbai's Gateway of India
Girl stabbed to death at Mumbai's Gateway of India
A Correspondent | August 14, 2005 09:16 IST
A 22 year old Manipuri tourist was stabbed to death and her friend left in a critical incident, after a seemingly mentally deranged man attacked them with a knife at Mumbai's throbbing Gateway of India on Saturday evening.
Leisha Choan and Ngakuim Raony, both from Manipur, were spending time at the Gateway feeding pigeons at around 6 pm when the youth, identified as Uzer Patel, pounced on them from behind and slit Leisha's throat with a knife. As a horrified Ngakuim tried to intervene, he slashed her on the forehead and walked away, holding the bloody weapon in his hand. As the incident happened in a jiffy, the crowd stayed behind, watching the horror unfold before them. Policemen on bandobast duty near the Taj Mahal Hotel then disarmed Patel and arrested him.
Read the full article here : Girl stabbed to death at Mumbai's Gateway of India
A Correspondent | August 14, 2005 09:16 IST
A 22 year old Manipuri tourist was stabbed to death and her friend left in a critical incident, after a seemingly mentally deranged man attacked them with a knife at Mumbai's throbbing Gateway of India on Saturday evening.
Leisha Choan and Ngakuim Raony, both from Manipur, were spending time at the Gateway feeding pigeons at around 6 pm when the youth, identified as Uzer Patel, pounced on them from behind and slit Leisha's throat with a knife. As a horrified Ngakuim tried to intervene, he slashed her on the forehead and walked away, holding the bloody weapon in his hand. As the incident happened in a jiffy, the crowd stayed behind, watching the horror unfold before them. Policemen on bandobast duty near the Taj Mahal Hotel then disarmed Patel and arrested him.
Read the full article here : Girl stabbed to death at Mumbai's Gateway of India
Friday, August 12, 2005
Herald.com | 08/12/2005 | If you pay for it, you get Rob'd
DEUCE BIGALOW: EUROPEAN GIGOLO (R)
If you pay for it, you get Rob'd
BY PETER DEBRUGE, Special to The Herald
I can think of 100 reasons a desperate man might resort to a life of prostitution, but offering himself up as live bait for a serial killer definitely ain't one of 'em. So why would Deuce Bigalow go all the way to Amsterdam to reenlist as a male escort, especially when it means becoming a target in the Scooby-Doo-like mystery of the ''man-whore killer''? (Could it be the same reason a studio might greenlight a sequel to a tasteless red-light comedy like Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo -- because there's easy cash to be made in the process, even at the expense of good taste and propriety?)
But Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo isn't the slightest bit interested in what motivates a hustler to choose his line of work. Instead, it's preoccupied with what kind of hideous disfigurement would drive a woman to seek the services of a ''prostidude'' (the implication being that only the most desperate of women would ever have to pay for sex). Where narcoleptics, Tourette Syndrome sufferers and lonely prosthetic-limbed women dominated the original, the sequel graduates to such clients as a woman with a hole in her throat and another with a penis for a nose (one wonders what use such a person would have for a gigolo).
Read the full article here : Herald.com | 08/12/2005 | If you pay for it, you get Rob'd
If you pay for it, you get Rob'd
BY PETER DEBRUGE, Special to The Herald
I can think of 100 reasons a desperate man might resort to a life of prostitution, but offering himself up as live bait for a serial killer definitely ain't one of 'em. So why would Deuce Bigalow go all the way to Amsterdam to reenlist as a male escort, especially when it means becoming a target in the Scooby-Doo-like mystery of the ''man-whore killer''? (Could it be the same reason a studio might greenlight a sequel to a tasteless red-light comedy like Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo -- because there's easy cash to be made in the process, even at the expense of good taste and propriety?)
But Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo isn't the slightest bit interested in what motivates a hustler to choose his line of work. Instead, it's preoccupied with what kind of hideous disfigurement would drive a woman to seek the services of a ''prostidude'' (the implication being that only the most desperate of women would ever have to pay for sex). Where narcoleptics, Tourette Syndrome sufferers and lonely prosthetic-limbed women dominated the original, the sequel graduates to such clients as a woman with a hole in her throat and another with a penis for a nose (one wonders what use such a person would have for a gigolo).
Read the full article here : Herald.com | 08/12/2005 | If you pay for it, you get Rob'd
Thursday, August 11, 2005
Ottawa Citizen - canada.com network
The Rising, touted as the most expensive Indian film ever made, is released
Cara Anna, Canadian Press, August 11, 2005
Hundreds of Indians stand stiffly in rows, sweat dripping into thick uniforms and heavy boots. A wrong movement, and a shout from the white man with the microphone. Other white men stand on a platform in front of them, looking stern."Silence!"
The rest of us foreigners wait nearby for our scene. On a dusty parade ground a few hours from Mumbai, the "most expensive Indian film ever made" is paused before us. New to India, dressed as British officers, we watch the Indian men blankly, sipping cold water in the shade.
We wonder when this film will be released.
We wonder if we'll be able to see ourselves in it.
It's long past noon. No lunch until this scene is finished. The heat rises. A few men on the field start to swoon and are carried away.
This film is called The Rising, about a rebellion against colonial British rulers. For a sixth of the world's population, it's the biggest release of the year. It was meant to be from the very first take, when Prince Charles himself gave the clap and stepped back to watch a bloody story unroll.
Read the full story here : Ottawa Citizen - canada.com network
Cara Anna, Canadian Press, August 11, 2005
Hundreds of Indians stand stiffly in rows, sweat dripping into thick uniforms and heavy boots. A wrong movement, and a shout from the white man with the microphone. Other white men stand on a platform in front of them, looking stern."Silence!"
The rest of us foreigners wait nearby for our scene. On a dusty parade ground a few hours from Mumbai, the "most expensive Indian film ever made" is paused before us. New to India, dressed as British officers, we watch the Indian men blankly, sipping cold water in the shade.
We wonder when this film will be released.
We wonder if we'll be able to see ourselves in it.
It's long past noon. No lunch until this scene is finished. The heat rises. A few men on the field start to swoon and are carried away.
This film is called The Rising, about a rebellion against colonial British rulers. For a sixth of the world's population, it's the biggest release of the year. It was meant to be from the very first take, when Prince Charles himself gave the clap and stepped back to watch a bloody story unroll.
Read the full story here : Ottawa Citizen - canada.com network
Health News Article | Reuters.com
Could be that dad is not real father, report shows
Thu Aug 11, 2005 8:47 AM ET - NEW YORK (Reuters Health)
Perhaps one out of every 25 dads could unknowingly be raising another man's child, a finding that has huge health and social implications, according to report released Wednesday.
Exposing so-called paternal discrepancy -- when a child is identified as being biologically fathered by someone other than the man who believes he is the father -- could lead to family violence and the breakup of many families. On the other hand, leaving paternal discrepancy hidden means having the wrong genetic information, which could have health consequences.
A UK-based research team reviewed scientific research dealing with paternity published between 1950 and 2004 and reports that rates of paternal discrepancy range from less than 1 percent to as much as 30 percent.
The investigation also showed that becoming pregnant at a younger age, low socioeconomic status, and being in a long-term relationship rather than being married seem to be linked to greater likelihood of paternal discrepancy.
Read the full story here : Health News Article | Reuters.com
Thu Aug 11, 2005 8:47 AM ET - NEW YORK (Reuters Health)
Perhaps one out of every 25 dads could unknowingly be raising another man's child, a finding that has huge health and social implications, according to report released Wednesday.
Exposing so-called paternal discrepancy -- when a child is identified as being biologically fathered by someone other than the man who believes he is the father -- could lead to family violence and the breakup of many families. On the other hand, leaving paternal discrepancy hidden means having the wrong genetic information, which could have health consequences.
A UK-based research team reviewed scientific research dealing with paternity published between 1950 and 2004 and reports that rates of paternal discrepancy range from less than 1 percent to as much as 30 percent.
The investigation also showed that becoming pregnant at a younger age, low socioeconomic status, and being in a long-term relationship rather than being married seem to be linked to greater likelihood of paternal discrepancy.
Read the full story here : Health News Article | Reuters.com
Abhishek is Umrao ki jaan- The Times of India
Abhishek is Umrao ki jaan
SUBHASH K JHA
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 10, 2005 09:49:58 PM ]
To star as Ash's romantic interest in JP Dutta's Umrao Jaan
Movie moghul JP Dutta's courtesan tale Umrao Jaan is courting a captivating cast while recreating an alluring past. After finalising on Aishwarya Rai for the title role and Shabana Azmi (for the role played by her mother Shaukat Azmi in the original), the visionary in JP has zeroed-in on his favourite blue-eyed boy – Abhishek Bachchan – for the main romantic lead. "Abhishek Bachchan is my hero in Umrao Jaan," JP announces proudly, amidst hectic pre-production work and music recordings with lyricist Javed Akhtar and composer Anu Malik. "If you remember, I was supposed to launch Abhishek in a period film based on the life of Bahadur Shah Zafar and his son. It was also supposed to feature Dilip Kumar. That project unfortunately got shelved. Instead, Refugee happened. But my dream of casting Abhishek in the classic mould did not die."
Pausing and pondering, JP proceeds, "After Ash was cast as Umrao, I needed a man who could look like a poet and a dreamer, and at the same time match her as an ideal partner. When I closed my eyes, I could only see Abhishek."
Read the full article here : Abhishek is Umrao ki jaan- The Times of India
SUBHASH K JHA
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 10, 2005 09:49:58 PM ]
To star as Ash's romantic interest in JP Dutta's Umrao Jaan
Movie moghul JP Dutta's courtesan tale Umrao Jaan is courting a captivating cast while recreating an alluring past. After finalising on Aishwarya Rai for the title role and Shabana Azmi (for the role played by her mother Shaukat Azmi in the original), the visionary in JP has zeroed-in on his favourite blue-eyed boy – Abhishek Bachchan – for the main romantic lead. "Abhishek Bachchan is my hero in Umrao Jaan," JP announces proudly, amidst hectic pre-production work and music recordings with lyricist Javed Akhtar and composer Anu Malik. "If you remember, I was supposed to launch Abhishek in a period film based on the life of Bahadur Shah Zafar and his son. It was also supposed to feature Dilip Kumar. That project unfortunately got shelved. Instead, Refugee happened. But my dream of casting Abhishek in the classic mould did not die."
Pausing and pondering, JP proceeds, "After Ash was cast as Umrao, I needed a man who could look like a poet and a dreamer, and at the same time match her as an ideal partner. When I closed my eyes, I could only see Abhishek."
Read the full article here : Abhishek is Umrao ki jaan- The Times of India
Shabana to play Ash's mom in 'Umrao Jaan' - Newindpress.com
Shabana to play Ash's mom in 'Umrao Jaan'
Wednesday August 10 2005 15:01 IST
IANS
MUMBAI: If Aishwarya Rai as "Umrao Jaan" strikes you as the ultimate casting coup, then wait till you hear what movie moghul J.P. Dutta has lined up next.
It's the mother of all castings: the formidable Shabana Azmi has agreed to play Umrao Jaan's mother in J.P's version of the legendary love story.
It must be remembered that Shabana's mother, the indomitable Shaukat Azmi, had played "Umrao" Rekha's mother in the 1981 version of the film by Muzaffar Ali.
"My 'Umrao Jaan' is a totally different film based on a totally different screenplay," clarified J.P., who returned from London a day before the July 7 blasts. His wife Bindiya and two daughters are still there, though very much safe and sound.
"My father (O.P. Dutta) wrote his script nearly 20 years ago. He originally wanted to cast Nimmi as Umrao. But I guess I was destined to do the needful, with Ash."
Read the full article here : Shabana to play Ash's mom in 'Umrao Jaan' - Newindpress.com
Wednesday August 10 2005 15:01 IST
IANS
MUMBAI: If Aishwarya Rai as "Umrao Jaan" strikes you as the ultimate casting coup, then wait till you hear what movie moghul J.P. Dutta has lined up next.
It's the mother of all castings: the formidable Shabana Azmi has agreed to play Umrao Jaan's mother in J.P's version of the legendary love story.
It must be remembered that Shabana's mother, the indomitable Shaukat Azmi, had played "Umrao" Rekha's mother in the 1981 version of the film by Muzaffar Ali.
"My 'Umrao Jaan' is a totally different film based on a totally different screenplay," clarified J.P., who returned from London a day before the July 7 blasts. His wife Bindiya and two daughters are still there, though very much safe and sound.
"My father (O.P. Dutta) wrote his script nearly 20 years ago. He originally wanted to cast Nimmi as Umrao. But I guess I was destined to do the needful, with Ash."
Read the full article here : Shabana to play Ash's mom in 'Umrao Jaan' - Newindpress.com
Aamir Khan was not the first Mangal Pandey! - Sify.com
Aamir Khan was not the first Mangal Pandey!
By IndiaFM Thursday, 11 August , 2005, 13:05
Now this is something that we are sure will catch you unaware. Aamir Khan was not the first Mangal Pandey! Are you surprised? But yes, that is a fact. So who was the earlier Mangal Pandey? No it wasn’t any of the other Khans or anybody from the current brawny Bollywood brigade either. Any more guesses?
Read the full story here : Aamir Khan was not the first Mangal Pandey! - Sify.com
By IndiaFM Thursday, 11 August , 2005, 13:05
Now this is something that we are sure will catch you unaware. Aamir Khan was not the first Mangal Pandey! Are you surprised? But yes, that is a fact. So who was the earlier Mangal Pandey? No it wasn’t any of the other Khans or anybody from the current brawny Bollywood brigade either. Any more guesses?
Read the full story here : Aamir Khan was not the first Mangal Pandey! - Sify.com
Indo-Asian News Service -> India-Disaster/Health-Lead Mumbai -> Rise in death toll stokes fear of post-floods epidemic (LEADS)
Rise in death toll stokes fear of post-floods epidemic (LEADS)
Indo-Asian News Service
Mumbai, Aug 11 (IANS) The outbreak of waterborne diseases following floods in India's financial hub showed no signs of abating Thursday with the number of deaths crossing 55 even as the government played down fears of an epidemic.
Civic authorities said they had launched major initiatives to tackle the threat of an epidemic and to provide immediate medical care to those who had been affected by waterborne diseases.
Most of the 55 dead were from the densely populated city suburbs that were worst affected by last month's floods.
Maharashtra Health Minister Vimal Mundada said over 1,000 patients had been admitted to various Mumbai hospitals with complications arising from leptospirosis, dengue, typhoid and hepatitis.
Mundada told reporters that all government hospitals in this city of over 15 million people had been put on alert to give priority to cases of fever. The hospitals will provide medicines free of cost to all patients.
Despite the rising death toll, the state government played down fears of an epidemic and said the situation was completely under control.
"We are worried about the rising toll and efforts are being made to identify the cases in the affected areas at the earliest," said V.L. Patankar, the city's additional municipal commissioner.
"Most of the cases are suspected to be due to leptospirosis, dengue or malaria. We have sent medical teams and medicines to all areas that are badly affected by the diseases," Patankar told IANS.
"Since the incubation period of 10 days for all kinds of infectious diseases has just ended, people are reporting symptoms like high fever, vomiting and respiratory problems.
"But things haven't reached epidemic proportions yet and all efforts are being made to bring the situation back to normal very soon."
Read the full article here : Indo-Asian News Service -> India-Disaster/Health-Lead Mumbai -> Rise in death toll stokes fear of post-floods epidemic (LEADS)
Indo-Asian News Service
Mumbai, Aug 11 (IANS) The outbreak of waterborne diseases following floods in India's financial hub showed no signs of abating Thursday with the number of deaths crossing 55 even as the government played down fears of an epidemic.
Civic authorities said they had launched major initiatives to tackle the threat of an epidemic and to provide immediate medical care to those who had been affected by waterborne diseases.
Most of the 55 dead were from the densely populated city suburbs that were worst affected by last month's floods.
Maharashtra Health Minister Vimal Mundada said over 1,000 patients had been admitted to various Mumbai hospitals with complications arising from leptospirosis, dengue, typhoid and hepatitis.
Mundada told reporters that all government hospitals in this city of over 15 million people had been put on alert to give priority to cases of fever. The hospitals will provide medicines free of cost to all patients.
Despite the rising death toll, the state government played down fears of an epidemic and said the situation was completely under control.
"We are worried about the rising toll and efforts are being made to identify the cases in the affected areas at the earliest," said V.L. Patankar, the city's additional municipal commissioner.
"Most of the cases are suspected to be due to leptospirosis, dengue or malaria. We have sent medical teams and medicines to all areas that are badly affected by the diseases," Patankar told IANS.
"Since the incubation period of 10 days for all kinds of infectious diseases has just ended, people are reporting symptoms like high fever, vomiting and respiratory problems.
"But things haven't reached epidemic proportions yet and all efforts are being made to bring the situation back to normal very soon."
Read the full article here : Indo-Asian News Service -> India-Disaster/Health-Lead Mumbai -> Rise in death toll stokes fear of post-floods epidemic (LEADS)
Leptospirosis breaks out in Mumbai, Thane
Leptospirosis breaks out in Mumbai, Thane
By: UNI August 11, 2005
A fortnight after floods left over 700 people dead in Mumbai and adjoining Thane district, an outbreak of leptospirosis in the city and its suburbs, as also in the Kalyan-Dombivli belt, has claimed the lives of another 66 people.
This was confirmed by state health director Subash Salunkhe at a press conference in the presence of Health Minister Dr Vimal Mundada and Medical Education Minister Dilip Walse-Patil in Mumbai this evening.
As many as 37 people have died in the city and its suburbs and the remaining 29 in the adjoining Thane district, Dr Salunkhe added.
But Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh only alerted the people about the ''threat of epidemic'' and urged them to take necessary precautions against the spread of water-borne diseases in the aftermath of floods.
At the same time, the chief minister has asked the municipal, government and private hospitals to reserve 10 per cent beds for the leptospirosis cases and provide free treatment to the patients.
Deshmukh issued the direction after presiding over a high-level meeting attended by the health minister, chief secretary Premkumar, BMC commissioner Johny Joseph, health secretary G S Gill, and the health director. The chief minister also visited Nair Hospital for a personal interface with the patients and doctors.
Read the full article here : Leptospirosis breaks out in Mumbai, Thane
By: UNI August 11, 2005
A fortnight after floods left over 700 people dead in Mumbai and adjoining Thane district, an outbreak of leptospirosis in the city and its suburbs, as also in the Kalyan-Dombivli belt, has claimed the lives of another 66 people.
This was confirmed by state health director Subash Salunkhe at a press conference in the presence of Health Minister Dr Vimal Mundada and Medical Education Minister Dilip Walse-Patil in Mumbai this evening.
As many as 37 people have died in the city and its suburbs and the remaining 29 in the adjoining Thane district, Dr Salunkhe added.
But Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh only alerted the people about the ''threat of epidemic'' and urged them to take necessary precautions against the spread of water-borne diseases in the aftermath of floods.
At the same time, the chief minister has asked the municipal, government and private hospitals to reserve 10 per cent beds for the leptospirosis cases and provide free treatment to the patients.
Deshmukh issued the direction after presiding over a high-level meeting attended by the health minister, chief secretary Premkumar, BMC commissioner Johny Joseph, health secretary G S Gill, and the health director. The chief minister also visited Nair Hospital for a personal interface with the patients and doctors.
Read the full article here : Leptospirosis breaks out in Mumbai, Thane
Wednesday, August 10, 2005
USATODAY.com - Prison love affair has inmate, wife on run after guard killed
Prison love affair has inmate, wife on run after guard killed
KINGSTON, Tenn. (AP) — Prison nurse Jennifer Forsythe got fired last year for sneaking food to an inmate. A few months later, she got permission from the warden to marry that inmate, George Hyatte, a man with a long and violent criminal record.
Now the 31-year-old woman from Utah who had never been in trouble with the law is charged with gunning down a correctional officer Tuesday in a brazen attempt to help her new husband escape.
Both are now being sought in a nationwide manhunt for their role in what one law enforcement official called a "Bonnie and Clyde-style shootout."
Read the full article here : USATODAY.com - Prison love affair has inmate, wife on run after guard killed
KINGSTON, Tenn. (AP) — Prison nurse Jennifer Forsythe got fired last year for sneaking food to an inmate. A few months later, she got permission from the warden to marry that inmate, George Hyatte, a man with a long and violent criminal record.
Now the 31-year-old woman from Utah who had never been in trouble with the law is charged with gunning down a correctional officer Tuesday in a brazen attempt to help her new husband escape.
Both are now being sought in a nationwide manhunt for their role in what one law enforcement official called a "Bonnie and Clyde-style shootout."
Read the full article here : USATODAY.com - Prison love affair has inmate, wife on run after guard killed
LiveScience.com - Smart Nanotube
Smart Nanotubes
By combining a natural component of a cell and a synthetic version of another component, scientists have created a tiny structure that one day might be used for super-precise drug delivery.
The structure has been dubbed the “smart nano-tube” by its creators at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Researchers can open and close either end of the tube by changing the tube’s electrical charge.
Read the full article here : LiveScience.com - Smart Nanotubes
By combining a natural component of a cell and a synthetic version of another component, scientists have created a tiny structure that one day might be used for super-precise drug delivery.
The structure has been dubbed the “smart nano-tube” by its creators at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Researchers can open and close either end of the tube by changing the tube’s electrical charge.
Read the full article here : LiveScience.com - Smart Nanotubes
BBC NEWS | Business | Microsoft in $7m spam settlement
Microsoft in $7m spam settlement
US software giant Microsoft has won a $7m (£3.9m) court settlement from a businessman considered to be one of the world's biggest senders of spam e-mail.
Scott Richter agreed to pay the sum after Microsoft filed a lawsuit against his internet firm Opt In Real Big.
Microsoft alleged Opt In Real Big had sent millions of unsolicited commercial e-mails, using forged sender names and false subject lines.
Read the full article here : BBC NEWS | Business | Microsoft in $7m spam settlement
US software giant Microsoft has won a $7m (£3.9m) court settlement from a businessman considered to be one of the world's biggest senders of spam e-mail.
Scott Richter agreed to pay the sum after Microsoft filed a lawsuit against his internet firm Opt In Real Big.
Microsoft alleged Opt In Real Big had sent millions of unsolicited commercial e-mails, using forged sender names and false subject lines.
Read the full article here : BBC NEWS | Business | Microsoft in $7m spam settlement
Tuesday, August 09, 2005
Shuttle Lands, Safely Ending First Mission Since Columbia - New York Times
Shuttle Lands, Safely Ending First Mission Since Columbia
By JOHN SCHWARTZ
and WARREN E. LEARY
Published: August 9, 2005
EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif., Aug. 9 - The space shuttle Discovery glided back to Earth to a pre-dawn landing here in the Mojave desert today, nearly 14 days after its 5.8-million-mile journey began.
It was the first shuttle mission since the loss of the Columbia and its crew of seven astronauts in February 2003, which plunged the space agency into what Michael Griffin, NASA's administrator, has called the "depths of despair."
Discovery's mission, on paper, was straightforward: it involved resupplying the International Space Station and testing new technologies and techniques for detecting, measuring and repairing damage from launch debris.
But at the core, the mission of Discovery was to get the United States back in the business of launching humans into space.
Read the full article here : Shuttle Lands, Safely Ending First Mission Since Columbia - New York Times
By JOHN SCHWARTZ
and WARREN E. LEARY
Published: August 9, 2005
EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif., Aug. 9 - The space shuttle Discovery glided back to Earth to a pre-dawn landing here in the Mojave desert today, nearly 14 days after its 5.8-million-mile journey began.
It was the first shuttle mission since the loss of the Columbia and its crew of seven astronauts in February 2003, which plunged the space agency into what Michael Griffin, NASA's administrator, has called the "depths of despair."
Discovery's mission, on paper, was straightforward: it involved resupplying the International Space Station and testing new technologies and techniques for detecting, measuring and repairing damage from launch debris.
But at the core, the mission of Discovery was to get the United States back in the business of launching humans into space.
Read the full article here : Shuttle Lands, Safely Ending First Mission Since Columbia - New York Times
Monday, August 08, 2005
Unconfirmed Sources
Star Wars Missle Test Fails: Hymen Hurt
by Chuck Terzella
The first test by the Pentagon in nearly two years of the controversial 'Stars Wars' Missile Defense System failed when the interceptor missile shut itself down without ever leaving the silo. The failed test capped off a week of delays caused by everything from bad weather to a dead battery which left technicians scrambling to find jumper cables as a test attack missile was racing towards Billings, Montana.
Read the full article here : Unconfirmed Sources
by Chuck Terzella
The first test by the Pentagon in nearly two years of the controversial 'Stars Wars' Missile Defense System failed when the interceptor missile shut itself down without ever leaving the silo. The failed test capped off a week of delays caused by everything from bad weather to a dead battery which left technicians scrambling to find jumper cables as a test attack missile was racing towards Billings, Montana.
Read the full article here : Unconfirmed Sources
BB gun shooting at Britney Spears sighting gets on "front burner"
BB gun shooting at Britney Spears sighting gets on "front burner"
Monday, August 8, 2005
(08-08) 02:30 PDT Malibu, Calif. (AP) --
A sheriff's detective will be assigned to investigate the BB gun shooting of a photographer who was staking out Britney Spears over the weekend.
Such incidents usually draw little attention from the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, but authorities say they were swamped with phone calls.
"Because of the media attention, we'll probably put this on the front burner to settle the whole thing," said sheriff's Sgt. Robert Knudson.
Read the full article here :BB gun shooting at Britney Spears sighting gets on "front burner"
Monday, August 8, 2005
(08-08) 02:30 PDT Malibu, Calif. (AP) --
A sheriff's detective will be assigned to investigate the BB gun shooting of a photographer who was staking out Britney Spears over the weekend.
Such incidents usually draw little attention from the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, but authorities say they were swamped with phone calls.
"Because of the media attention, we'll probably put this on the front burner to settle the whole thing," said sheriff's Sgt. Robert Knudson.
Read the full article here :BB gun shooting at Britney Spears sighting gets on "front burner"
Herald Sun: Kylie's cancer crusade [08aug05]
Kylie's cancer crusade
Kate Jones, medical reporter
08aug05
KYLIE Minogue's breast cancer may have saved dozens of Australian women from dying of the same disease.
Minogue's diagnosis and its media coverage resulted in an unprecedented surge in the number of Australian women screened for the disease.
Read the full article here : Herald Sun: Kylie's cancer crusade [08aug05]
Kate Jones, medical reporter
08aug05
KYLIE Minogue's breast cancer may have saved dozens of Australian women from dying of the same disease.
Minogue's diagnosis and its media coverage resulted in an unprecedented surge in the number of Australian women screened for the disease.
Read the full article here : Herald Sun: Kylie's cancer crusade [08aug05]
Kylie Minogue's plight boosts cancer screenings. 07/08/2005. ABC News Online
A medical study has found that the Australian media's coverage of Kylie Minogue's breast cancer diagnosis and surgery prompted an unprecedented rise in bookings for mammography.
Today's Medical Journal of Australia has published a study revealing that bookings for mammograms rose by 40 per cent during the two weeks of coverage about Ms Minogue's diagnosis and surgery for breast cancer.
Read the full article here : Kylie Minogue's plight boosts cancer screenings. 07/08/2005. ABC News Online
Today's Medical Journal of Australia has published a study revealing that bookings for mammograms rose by 40 per cent during the two weeks of coverage about Ms Minogue's diagnosis and surgery for breast cancer.
Read the full article here : Kylie Minogue's plight boosts cancer screenings. 07/08/2005. ABC News Online
Saas-bahu come to city in new avtaar
udhiana, August 6: Indian television’s most popular saas-bahu duo, Savita and Tulsi Virani (played by Apara Mehta and Smriti Malhotra-Irani) today performed at a play organised at Guru Nanak Bhawan.
Read the full article here : Saas-bahu come to city in new avtaar
Read the full article here : Saas-bahu come to city in new avtaar
Tulsi is not dying: Smriti Irani - Newindpress.com
MUMBAI: It's got to be the biggest TRP-boosting gimmick in recent times in India. And it seems to be working better than the people behind it had bargained for.
Last week, television viewers were shocked out of their couched stupor when their favourite matriarch 'Tulsi', played by the fiery and no-nonsense Smiriti-Malhotra Irani, was declared diagnosed with lung cancer.
To make matters worse, Smriti Malhotra-Irani was quoted as saying that she was indeed dying in "Kyunkii Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi".
Read th full article here : Tulsi is not dying: Smriti Irani - Newindpress.com
Last week, television viewers were shocked out of their couched stupor when their favourite matriarch 'Tulsi', played by the fiery and no-nonsense Smiriti-Malhotra Irani, was declared diagnosed with lung cancer.
To make matters worse, Smriti Malhotra-Irani was quoted as saying that she was indeed dying in "Kyunkii Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi".
Read th full article here : Tulsi is not dying: Smriti Irani - Newindpress.com
Simply Another Blog
Welcome to my new blog. This is as the title says, Simply Another Blog. Here I would post stuff that I can't categorize for my other blogs. So browse along and maybe you will find something useful or funny...
My other blogs :
Santosh Mishra Blog
SM Knowledgebase
Beautiful Women From Around The World
Make Some Money
URL to this site : http://smcool.blogspot.com
XML Feed : http://smcool.blogspot.com/atom.xml
My other blogs :
Santosh Mishra Blog
SM Knowledgebase
Beautiful Women From Around The World
Make Some Money
URL to this site : http://smcool.blogspot.com
XML Feed : http://smcool.blogspot.com/atom.xml
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