What's in the News

2012: the year the interweb ends

http://ipower.ning.com/netneutralityold

 

And to think of all the time the conspiracy theorists wasted on Roswell when it's really the Chinese reverse engineering the alien technology.   

****

 Chinese company develops 'UFO': report

Tue Jun 17, 6:04 AM ET

BEIJING (AFP) - A Chinese company has developed a prototype flying saucer that can hover in the air and be controlled remotely from afar, state press said Tuesday.

The aircraft is 1.2 metres (four feet) in diameter and is able to take off and land vertically and hover at an altitude of up to 1,000 metres (yards), Xinhua news agency said.

The unmanned disc is driven by a propeller and can be controlled remotely or sent on a preset flight path, it said.

Its top speed is 80 kilometres (50 miles) per hour, it added.

It took the Harbin Smart Special Aerocraft Co Ltd 12 years and 28 million yuan (4.1 million dollars) to develop the prototype craft, which is designed for aerial photography, geological surveys and emergency lighting, the report said.

What about all of the remotely controlled toy planes currently flitting about??

What's happening in Canada??

""Sixth human foot washes up to shore

June 19, 2008 - 7:19AM


Another human foot - the second this week and the sixth in a year - has washed ashore off the coast of British Columbia in Canada.

Sergeant Mike Tresoor said a citizen reported finding the foot, which appeared to be a right foot, on a beach on Tyee Spit on Canada's Pacific coast. No other remains were found.

It is the latest in a bizarre and deepening mystery, which began when the first foot was found nearly a year ago on Jedidiah Island in the Strait of Georgia.

Within days, another right foot was found inside a man's Reebok sneaker on nearby Gabriola Island and the third was found in the same area, on the east side of Valdez Island in early February.

The fourth foot was found May 22 on Kirkland Island in the Fraser River, only about a mile away from the site in Ladner, along the same river, where the fifth foot was found on Monday.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said the remains of the latest foot were found inside a size 10 black adidas running shoe.

Sergeant Tresoor said major crime investigators from the Campbell River detachment, with staff from the coroner's office, went to the scene to investigate.

"The object will ultimately be examined by a forensic pathologist in attempts to determine the source of the foot and if it is related to other feet recently found," he said in a statement.

On Tuesday, the chief coroner of British Columbia, Terry Smith, said DNA profiles have been obtained from the first three of the feet.

He said that so far the DNA samples taken from the feet have not been able to be matched with any known samples to determine identities.

He and others have already put forth the hypothesis that the feet have washed ashore because they were encased in buoyant running shoes.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police have said there's no evidence the feet were severed or removed from the victims' legs by force.

Curtis Ebbesmeyer, an oceanographer based in Seattle, said when a human body is submerged in the ocean, the main parts such as arms, legs, hands, feet and the head are usually what come off the body.

He said his theory is that the feet came along as a result of an accident that might have happened up along the Fraser River, that washed down and spread out along the Straight of Georgia.""

Killjoys!! Partypoopers! Puritans! They're taking all the fun out of things...

BEIJING, China (CNN) -- What's in a name?


Westerners are more accustomed to names that describe the ingredients and how they are cooked.

 Local dishes like "Husband and wife's lung slice" or "Chicken without sexual life" conjure lots of furrowed eyebrows on famished foreigners.

So, with the Olympics a few short weeks away, China is giving its cuisine a linguistic makeover.

It is proposing that restaurants change the names of exotic, but bizarrely named, delicacies to make them more delectable for the estimated 50,000 visitors arriving in August for the Summer Games.

The appetizer "Husband and wife's lung slice" is taking on the more appetizing "Beef and ox tripe in chili sauce."

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"Chicken without sexual life" has been transformed into "Steamed pullet."

The government has put down more than 2,000 proposed names in a 170-page book that it has offered to Beijing hotels, according to state media.

"Thanks to the pamphlet, we do not have to struggle to come up with the English translations of dishes any more, which is usually time consuming," a senior manager at the four-star Guangzhou Hotel in downtown Beijing told the Xinhua news agency.

The Chinese say the names of their dishes focus more on appearance than taste or smell. But Westerners are more accustomed to names that describe the ingredients and how they are cooked -- such as pot roast.

The government realizes local names are a matter of taste, but don't want them to get lost in translation.

Hence, the spicy Sichuanese dish "Bean curd made by a pock-marked woman" has been bestowed the more palatable "Mapo tofu."

Not everyone is pleased.

"The process of standardizing a menu translation is a double-edged sword," wrote columnist Raymond Zhou in the China Daily newspaper. It "removes the ambiguity and unintended humor" and "takes away the fun and the rich connotation.

"It turns a menu into the equivalent of plain rice, which has the necessary nutrients but is devoid of flavor."

.
The Chinese say the names of their dishes focus more on appearance than taste or smell.

Hence, the spicy Sichuanese dish "Bean curd made by a pock-marked woman"

The mind boggles!!!!!

They seem to have missed the point of bad translating. It's a literal thing, and no-one bothers searching for the most appropriate word. First one that comes up will do! For example, "Jack" is often translated into "Left Bower"......hence, on the drinks menu will be "Left Bower Danni"...........
I'm sure that "husband and wife" has only a miniscule connection to "beef and ox", and "lung" has naught to do with "tripe".
I bet the Chinese don't read it as "Chicken without sexual life".

No - my Chinese mates laugh at that translation as well.

http://apcmag.com/top_10_reasons_to_hate_the_iphone_3g.htm
Top 10 reasons to hate the iPhone 3G
   
Dan Warne25 June 2008, 10:38 AM (5 hours 13 minutes ago.)

Is the iPhone 3G really deserving of the nickname Jesusphone?

Sure, the iPhone 3G is a groundbreaking phone. There's a lot to love about it… the amazingly easy-to-use touchscreen interface, amazing video playback, a big, bright, high contrast, high-resolution display that's the best of any smartphone on the market, and a web browser that's as good as any you'd use on a desktop computer. Not to mention Apple's new MobileMe service which will provide over the air syncing of your email, contacts, calendar, tasks and photos with your home or office computer — no plugging in required.

But there are a lot of big disappointments with the iPhone 3G too. Some of them are stubborn commercial decisions Apple has made; others look like oversights, and others are fundamental flaws in the design of the phone itself.

Think I don't know jack? Before you post an angry comment, read through the 10 points and then tell me what you think.

#1 No upgrade to the camera

The camera in the first-gen iPhone was only two megapixels with no flash. "Fair enough," I thought… "it's a first-gen product. They have to leave themselves room to move for the upgrade they'll surely put into the next-generation iPhone." No such luck. The camera in the iPhone 3G is exactly the same as the first-gen one. Still stuck at two megapixels. Still unable to cope in low-light and still no flash. Oh, and there's no video recording capability either, even though this has been found on phones for the last five years or so.

Scorecard
iPhone 3G: 2 megapixel camera, no flash, no video, no optical zoom
Other phones: up to 5 megapixel cameras, optical zoom, lens-based autofocus, flash.
Verdict: Smackdown by other phones.

#2 No Adobe Flash support

Undeniably, the iPhone has the best web browser of any phone on the market. But when you hit a web page with Adobe Flash in it, you'll just get an empty space with a 'missing plugin' icon. Apple says Flash would run too slowly on the iPhone, but in reality, it's probably more to do with Apple wanting to promote its competing web app development technology, Sproutcore.

Apple realises the 'mobile web' is at a tipping point… if it can get enough momentum behind developers coding sites specifically for the iPhone, it will help sales of the iPhone along in the long term. (That said, unlike Flash, Sproutcore is an open standard that theoretically works in any web browser that supports Javascript, so it could be widely supported by all handset makers if their phone web browsers got better.)

For a laugh, check out Steve Jobs demonstrating the web browser on the iPhone. When he views The New York Times, up pops the 'missing flash' icon.

Scorecard:
iPhone: no Adobe Flash support
Other smartphones: Flash Lite support, or full Flash support on Windows Mobile.(Admittedly Flash support on other phones isn't great either, but then, they're not running a full computer operating system like the iPhone is, where it would be trivially easy to port Flash across to run on it.)
Verdict: Other phones win by a narrow margin.

#3 No instant messaging

Despite the fact that the iPhone comes with unlimited data plans (in the US at least; Australian plans haven't yet been revealed) Apple has hobbled the iPhone's ability to do instant messaging.

Rather than sending instant messages over the internet to friends, the iPhone sends them by SMS. Since Apple has great instant messaging software for Mac called iChat, this is undoubtedly a concession to phone companies. SMS is widely considered to be the most expensive data service in the world, with each message only 165 characters long but charged by phone companies at around 20c per message. Multiplied out, that equates to 1.3 million dollars per gigabyte of SMSes. (By comparison, Aussie mobile network Three offers 1GB of high speed internet usage for $15.)

Oh yeah, and forget about chatting to someone who's sitting at a computer using the iPhone. Heaven forbid you might want to chat to someone using MSN/Windows Live Chat, Google Talk, AIM, ICQ, Facebook or any of the other popular chat protocols.

Hopefully, this ludicrous situation will be plugged by third-party application developers who will develop internet-based chat clients for iPhone. However, Apple has said that it will not allow applications to run in the background on the iPhone; instead, the developers must run an internet-based service, send a message to Apple servers, which will then send a message to the iPhone to alert the user to open the app. Yes, it may save battery life on the iPhone, but no, it's not exactly convenient.

On a Blackberry, the Blackberry Messenger just sits quietly in the background. If your phone is on, so is Blackberry Messenger. It's 100% reliable. It doesn't send messages using a stupid method like SMS. It uses the Blackberry's unlimited internet access. And yes, Blackberries do have good battery life.

Scorecard:
iPhone 3G: SMS is the only way to instant message people.
Other smartphones: A large variety of instant messaging software that can send messages using the internet capability of the phone.
Verdict: iPhone is shamed by other phones.

#4 Totally impractical for international travel

The iPhone downloads full emails, attachments and all, when you view them on the iPhone. If someone sends you an email with several megabytes of photos attached, that's how much data has to be downloaded by the iPhone. That's fine if you're in your home country and have an unlimited data plan. But go to another country and see how much it costs you — you can expect to pay up to $20 per megabyte. Your roaming charges will soon be running into hundreds of dollars.

Not to harp on about the Blackberry, but when you roam with one of them, it's quite cheap, because the Blackberry servers downscale images to perfectly fit the size of the Blackberry screen before sending them — a huge saving in data transfer charges, and messages are heavily compressed before transmission, etc. In fact, even heavy Blackberry users may be surprised to learn that they use less than 5MB of data per month.

Scorecard:
iPhone 3G: It's the data equivalent of the gas guzzling SUVs that GM suspended production of this week.
Other smartphones: Well, there are certainly other data guzzling phones. But Blackberry is a perfect example of a smartphone that's made for roaming.
Verdict: Blackberry wins

#5 Not compatible with Bluetooth car kits or headphones

Apple has Bluetooth wireless in the iPhone, but it only works with a handful of wireless headsets. Forget talking handsfree on Bluetooth car kits or using the iPhone with stereo Bluetooth headphones. You could expect those sorts of features from the world's leading music player, but not the iP… oh, wait.

Considering Apple wants the world to take the iPhone seriously for its phone capabilities, it's truly incredible that it has hobbled the Bluetooth audio capability so much. Could it be because it wants to make money from car equipment manufacturers who build an iPod dock connector into their car stereos?

Caveat: this comment is based on what we know about pre-release versions of the iPhone 2.0 software. It's possible Apple will have fixed this in the release version of the iPhone 3G.

Scorecard:
iPhone 3G: only works with Apple's mono Bluetooth headset and a handful of other companies' similar units. No support for Bluetooth stereo or in-car Bluetooth handsfree.
Other smartphones: many support stereo Bluetooth for streaming to headphones or a stereo, and most models work with Bluetooth car handsfree units (though there are still compatibility glitches between brands, admittedly.)
Verdict: Other phones win

#6 No cut and paste

This one is truly hard to understand. Apple brings out one of the world's most advanced smartphones in terms of user interface, and somehow forgets to put in cut and paste... probably the only smartphone on the market that doesn't have it. The mind boggles. (Also something that Apple could conceivably fix by the time the iPhone 3G is released… here's hoping.)

Scorecard:
iPhone 3G: No cut and paste.
Other smartphones: Well, yeah, duh. They have cut and paste.
Verdict: Decisive victory for other phones.

#7 Non user-replaceable battery

It's a sad fact about rechargeable batteries: the first time you recharge them, their maximum capacity degrades. After a few hundred recharges, their capacity is down to something like half their original capacity. Normally, this is annoying, but manageable — you just swap the battery out for a new one, or get a second battery and swap between the two of them until the first battery is toast.

Not so with the iPhone. Its battery is sealed up tightly inside the nearly-impossible-to-pry-open casing (believe me, I've taken the back off an iPhone and that sucker is not meant to come apart… Apple must be replacing the casing of iPhones it services). Apple will then install the battery for you (in the US it costs $US85.95) and post it back to you. Oh, and you can pay them extra $US30 for the privilege of renting another phone from them to use in the meantime.

Not only is this massively inconvenient, it's a cunning attempt by Apple to get people to simply buy a new iPhone when the battery finally dies. People will be asking themselves… "do I pay $105.95 to get my old iPhone battery fixed, or do I pay $199.00 to buy the latest and greatest model of iPhone?" I know which one I'd pick, and I bet that's central to Apple's business plan.

Scorecard:
iPhone 3G: Battery sealed inside the case. Costs a hundred bucks and considerable inconvenience to get it replaced.
Other smartphones: Well, yeah, duh. You just unplug the battery and put a new one in.
Verdict: Crushing loss to Apple.

#8 No MMS

So you've snapped a nice photo on your iPhone and you want to send it to a friend? You'd better hope they have email on their phone, because that's the only way you're going to be able to send it to them with the iPhone. For some reason, despite its ridiculous decision to force all instant messaging through SMS, Apple has totally left out MMS (picture/video SMSes) from the iPhone.

Scorecard:
iPhone 3G: No MMS support. You will send your photos using the Apple-authorised method, by email.
Other smartphones: Well, yeah, duh. They have MMS.
Verdict: Own-goal by Apple.

#9 No turn-by-turn navigation

Despite building a GPS satellite navigation receiver into the iPhone, Apple has stopped short of offering voiced, turn-by-turn navigation into the device. Yes, you can plot directions from your current position to somewhere else, and you can watch yourself as a little dot on the map, but have you ever tried doing that in a car? I have … on my Blackberry. I nearly crashed.

If you're thinking I'm being a bit overly critical (isn't it a "nice to have" feature than a necessity?) compare Apple to Nokia, which has been offering voiced, 3D, turn-by-turn navigation on its phones for a couple of years now. Having a Nokia N78 saved my bacon recently when I realised I was totally lost and didn't have a street directory with me. I also had a Blackberry with me that has 2D map routing similar to what's on the Blackberry, and it sucked, because it was like reading a map constantly while driving.

Scorecard:
iPhone 3G: No voiced, 3D turn-by-turn navigation.
Other smartphones: OK, so it's not a standard feature on all phones. But Nokia, which has over 50% market share in Australia, has been shipping it with its phones for the last couple of years.
Verdict: Nokia wins.

#10 Stunning hypocrisy

At Apple's last presentation on the iPhone (March 6th 2008), Apple marketing chief Phil Schiller ridiculed market leader Blackberry for the complexity of its push email service, pointing out that your messages have to pass through a RIM messaging server and a network operations centre before they're sent out to your phone. Plus you have to pay extra for the service.

With the iPhone 3G, Apple introduces MobileMe, a service that … passes your email through an Apple messaging server before it is sent through to your phone. And it costs $AUD119 per year extra. Spot any similarity with the Blackberry business model?

It seems stunningly hypocritical for Apple's to criticise the technology of the market leader in the US smartphone space, then adopt the same technologies in its own product. On the other hand, I'm glad it has… but I'm flabbergasted at Apple's audacity in working on a service while at the very same moment criticising others for doing it.

Scorecard:
iPhone 3G: made by a company dominated by self-serving hypocrites.
Other smartphones: let's be honest... made by companies dominated by self-serving hypocrites.
Verdict: Apple is on even footing with other handset makers. Welcome to the industry!

Bush Government Sues To Make Testing Meat Illegal
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 05.12.08
Food & Health (food)

In most free countries, the Government and its agencies try to raise standards and make food healthier. Not in America. Creekstone Farms wanted to test every one of their cows for mad cow disease, to satisfy demand from overseas customers.

Except that they are not allowed to; the USDA guidelines only test 1% of cows. Creekstone went to court for the right to test all of their cows and won at a lower level, but the Bush Administration is appealing it, saying that "more widespread testing does not guarantee food safety and could result in a false positive that scares consumers."

What kind of government goes to court to stop testing done voluntarily by a company? Perhaps one that listens to large meatpackers who oppose wider testing because, according to AP, "consumer pressure would force them to begin testing all animals too. Increased testing would raise the price of meat by a few cents per pound."

Lawyers for Creekstone say "This is the government telling the consumers, `You're not entitled to this information.'" The Chief Judge on the Court of Appeal seems to agree: "All they want to do is create information," Chief Judge Sentelle said, noting that it's up to consumers to decide how to interpret the information.

No wonder people don't have faith in their food supply, when the government makes it illegal to even test it"

Steak and tomatoes are off the menu, Raoul!!

Yea, open accountable government!


Hu Jintao answers to people online for first time

Rowan Callick | June 21, 2008

A CHINESE leader yesterday communicated with some of the country's 221 million "netizens" directly for the first time.

President Hu Jintao, on a visit to the People's Daily, answered questions posed on the newspaper's Strong China Forum, which receives 23,000 postings and 1.4million web page hits daily.

Given brief notice that the President would be online, readers asked: "How are you fighting corruption?", "What do you think of democracy in Taiwan?" and "What is your answer to the oil crisis?".

He greeted them with: "Hello, my friends!" Mr Hu said that although he was too busy to surf the web every day, he liked to go online, especially to read news.

"Through the web, I also want to know what netizens are thinking about and hope to get some advice for the Government and the party," he said.

Mr Hu told Little Flaming Dragon: "The web is an important channel for us to understand the concerns of the public, and to assemble its wisdom."

But after explaining that time constraints prevented him responding to any questions except with generalisations about the web, he signed off.

Tell your students!


Call to let foreign postgrads stay

Guy Healy | June 25, 2008

FOREIGN higher degree research students should be given preferential residency treatment to counter the deepening researcher shortage, University of NSW deputy vice-chancellor Les Field has said.

The idea of adding foreign masters and PhD students studying in Australia to the federal Government's Migration Occupations in Demand List was contained in UNSW's submission to the Government's innovation review.

With leading submissions identifying a shortfall of 19,000 scientists and engineers during the medium term, Professor Field told the HES it had become necessary to tap highly skilled migration in defined areas of anticipated academic skills shortages.

"About 30 per cent of our higher degree research students are from overseas and are steadily increasingly, in contrast to domestic PhDs, who are slowly declining (in number) due to competition from employment," he said.

Professor Field described UNSW's research intensive environment for postgraduates as incredible. "But most overseas postgraduates are forcibly repatriated within weeks, often days of them ending their degrees, in contrast to countries such as New Zealand (that) capitalise on the high level training they have invested in," Professor Field said.

The tertiary qualifications of overseas higher degree research students should be given a weighting under the MODL to encourage such students, especially PhDs, to remain in Australia, he said.

The Australian Research Council's submission also highlighted how mobility enhanced skills development and the building of co-operative networks.

It welcomed the Government's recent opening of key fellowships and awards to foreigners.

"Also desirable is a visa system that, while ensuring that entry requirements are met, makes it easier for higher education institutions to welcome into this country staff and students from overseas," it said.

However, the ARC warned that success rates for some of its flagship schemes were at, or close to, historically low levels.

Spokesmen for the two federal departments that run the MODL -- immigration and education -- said university researchers couldn't be added to it at present because the occupation wasn't on the government's Skilled Occupations List.

However, the Government was reviewing the MODL's occupations and it had no firm view on the inclusion or exclusion of any occupations during the review consultation period, the spokesman for the Department of Immigration and Citizenship told the HES.

 

Oh dear.  Side effects.


Fuel costing brothels their regular trucker clients

Chris Ayres, Los Angeles | June 27, 2008

THE oldest profession is one of the few sectors that is generally immune to global economic problems. But high oil prices are another thing, especially when many of your regular clients are truckers.

According to the Nevada Brothel Owners Association, revenue for US houses of ill repute has dropped by 20-45per cent since the energy crunch began - the worst economic crisis in prostitution in almost half a century.

"Old George or Jimmy out there, he's got to take care of Momma and the groceries first, and he's got to take care of fuel costs, and he's got other expenses, and he may not have much left over for having a good time," association director George Flint said.

At the Stardust Ranch in eastern Nevada, so many girls have been made redundant that only two still work there, despite the management offering incentives such as free showers, overnight parking and coffee.

At other brothels in the Nevada desert - where licensed brothels have been legal since the silver mining boom of the 1800s - petrol discount schemes are being introduced.

Some have abandoned financial negotiations between customers and girls and are offering flat-rate, no-haggle services, advertised online. At the Shady Lady Ranch, a 40-minute session is being promoted for the discount price of $US175 ($183).

Next month, customers will receive a $US50 petrol voucher if they spend at least $US300, or a $US100 voucher if they spend $US500.

Truckers are the ideal customers for brothels. Bored, a long way from home and with nothing much to spend their money on while on the road, they are often tempted by the prospect of the intimate company of women.

But fuel bills for truckers have risen by two-thirds in the past year, and many brothels are several hours' drive outside metropolitan areas because of licensing restrictions.

Politicians have tried to help. A ban on advertising was lifted last July, allowing brothels to put up billboards in cities such as Las Vegas, where prostitution is illegal.

President George W.Bush's tax refund cheques have also been helpful. At the Moonlite Bunny Ranch, the first 100 customers who showed up with their tax refunds were offered special deals.

'You bring your $US600 cheque in, and we give you the $US1200 George Bush party: three girls and a bottle of champagne," owner Dennis Hof promised.

The Times

offering incentives such as free showers

  You mean they had to pay for the showers before??  I wonder how many truckers bothered??

OK.  So I have Google giving me updates and Alerts on stuff.  Today's crop yielded these interesting articles.

First, a report on Iraqi (paralympic) competitors to Beijing.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/29/world/middleeast/29paralympic.html?_r=1&ref=middleeast&oref=slogin


The second was on the economic fallout in India, from the earthquake in China.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Business/Indian_silk_industry_hit_by_China_quake/articleshow/3177116.cms



And apparently, the tourism industry in and around BJ is hurting! big time!  Hotels occupancy is down 15-50% over last year.  And not looking to improve as much as was promised for this Summer Event.

Hhhhmmmm....... Seems furriners don't like what they're seeing/hearing about snowstorms, protests, earthshakes nor new visa hassles.  Guess they're figuring that there are better places to go $pend their fund$.

I'm not sure how many people would be put off by acts of nature, that wouldn't be one of my considerations, given that every country has these little occurrences.  But - dumb visa rules?  Too right!

Someone needs to tell Hu Jin Tao.