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Google

Google Draws Fire From Congress 212

bonch writes "Democrat Herb Kohl, the Senate's leading antitrust legislator, has vowed an antitrust probe into Google as one of his top priorities. Others in Congress are criticizing the search giant over several flubs, including scanning personal data over neighborhood WiFi, collecting Social Security information from children in a doodling contest, and sidestepping net neutrality rules through a deal with Verizon. They're also concerned over ties with the administration — Eric Schmidt is a technology adviser to President Obama, Andrew McLaughlin serves as Obama's deputy chief technology officer, and Sonal Shah leads the White House Office of Social Innovation. Google spent $5.2 million last year on federal lobbying, but critics say their increased Washington presence has made more enemies than friends." Reader walterbyrd contributes an article that suggests this is all just a fund-raising ploy.
Earth

Submission + - Japan:Caesium measured, melt down may have started (nhk.or.jp) 5

Anonymous Coward writes: "A japanese media broadcaster (NHK) as well es German tagesschau.de and Reuters report a possible start of a melt down in Fukushima 1/1 as caesium, a by product of melt downs was measured near the reactor: 'The government's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency says nuclear material cesium has been detected near the Number One reactor at the Fukushima Number One nuclear power plant. The agency says the detection indicates that some of the nuclear fuel at the reactor may have started melting, because cesium is produced during a nuclear chain reaction' (NHK, Japan Broadcasting Corporation)."
Handhelds

Smartphone Device Detects Cancer In an Hour 69

kkleiner writes "Scientists at the Center for Systems Biology at Massachusetts General Hospital have integrated a microNMR device that accurately detects cancer cells and integrates with a smartphone (abstract). Though just a prototype, this device enables a clinician to extract small amounts of cells from a mass inside of a patient, analyze the sample on the spot, acquire the results in an hour, and pass the results to other clinicians and into medical records rapidly. How much does the device cost to make? $200. Seriously, smartphones just got their own Samuel L. Jackson-esque wallet." Reader Stoobalou points out other cancer-related news that Norwegian researchers have found a group of genes that increase a person's risk to develop lung cancer.
Google

Google Introduces Domain Blocking To Search 323

An anonymous reader writes "We recently discussed a new Chrome extension that was introduced to block specified websites from appearing in search results. Now, Google has introduced a new feature that hide results from unwanted domains right from the search page. This is yet another way to find more of what you want on Google by blocking the sites you don't want to see at all in search result. The so-called 'experts exchange' or 'online eHow to guide' would be first on my blocked list." Another neat recent addition was the introduction of Recipe View, which adds depth to food preparation searches.
Communications

King Wants To Sell Out Ham Radio 309

An anonymous reader writes "Rep. Peter King (R-NY), Chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, has introduced HR 607, the 'Broadband for First Responders Act of 2011,' which has been referred to the House Energy and Commerce Committee (which handles telecommunications legislation). The bill would create a nationwide Public Safety broadband network using the so-called 'D-Block' of spectrum in the 700 MHz range for Public Safety use. But to pay for it, he wants to sell off 420-440 MHz, currently heavily used by the military, satellites and Amateur Radio operators."
Politics

US House Subcommittee Votes To Kill Net Neutrality 607

angry tapir writes "A US House of Representatives subcommittee has voted in favor of a resolution to throw out the US Federal Communications Commission's recently adopted net neutrality rules. The communications subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee voted 15-8 along party lines for a resolution of disapproval that would overturn the FCC's rules."
The Internet

Submission + - Trumpet Winsock creator made little money (ycombinator.com) 1

omast writes: It appears that Peter Tattam, creator of Trumpet Winsock, got very little for this piece of software. For those of you who do not remember — or did not need it because were already outside the MS Windows world — Trumpet Winsock was a shareware program that provided TCP/IP functionality to Windows machines back in 1994-1995. It allowed millions to connect to the Internet back then; I was one of them.
According to the article, Tattam made very little money from the program as it was widely distributed but rarely paid for.

Wikipedia

Submission + - Wikipedians are More Liberal Than US Population (jonathanwstokes.com)

An anonymous reader writes: This blogger scraped 137,000 Wikipedia user pages to graph Wikipedians by political party. The results show 57% of Wikipedians identify as liberal, 10% identify as Libertarian, and 26% as Conservative.
Android

Submission + - Android Devices Are Hives of License Violations (linuxplanet.com)

inkscapee writes: Android developers are paying little attention to Free/Open Source software licenses and have a 71% violation rate. Come on folks, FOSS licenses are easy to comply with, certainly easier than proprietary software licenses, and less punitive. But it seems even the tiny hoops that FOSS requires are too much for devs eager to cash in.
Programming

Adobe Releases Flash To HTML 5 Converter 168

An anonymous reader writes "Adobe has released its Flash to HTML 5 conversion tool, codenamed 'Wallaby.' Wallaby is an application to convert Adobe Flash Professional CS5 files (.FLA) to HTML5 and its primary design goals were to get the best quality and performance on browsers within iOS devices like iPhone and iPad."

Submission + - Estonian IT company blames PostGre for failure. 1

taara writes: When the votes of the elections of the parliament of Estonia were counted yesterday, there was a two hour blackout in the real-time publishing of the results. The election commission resolved the problem by using alternative channels, like Facebook, etc... The IT company, responsible for the service of online publishing, announced that the failure occurred because Estonian government opted for free software — PostGre — to save circa 170,000 USD and the problem is not their fault. http://www.e24.ee/?id=398586 ( In Estonian, use Google Translate). Might this claim have any legitimacy?
Intel

Intel's New Core I7-990X Extreme Edition Tested 149

MojoKid writes "Intel recently launched a speed bump of their flagship Extreme Edition Core i7 processor, known as the Core i7-990X. Its multiplier is unlocked and it's clocked at 3.45GHz stock speed with a Turbo Boost top-end speed of 3.73GHz. Intel claims its the fastest desktop chip on the planet; like geek tiger blood for your PC. The new Core i7-990X is also based on the 32nm Gulftown core and the performance metrics show it's easily the fastest 6-core chip for the desktop currently but of course it'll cost you as well."
Education

Submission + - Can For-Profit Tech Colleges Be Trusted? (infoworld.com)

snydeq writes: "InfoWorld's Robert Scheier takes a closer look at for-profit IT-oriented colleges, questioning whether IT pros and employers can trust the quality of education on offer at institutions such as University of Phoenix, DeVry, ITT Tech, and Kaplan in the wake of increasing scrutiny for alleged deceptive practices that leave in high debt for jobs that pay little. 'For-profit schools carry a stigma in some eyes because of their reputation for hard sales pitches, aggressive marketing tactics, and saddling students with big loans for dubious degrees or certificates,' Scheier writes. 'Should IT pros looking to increase their skills, or people seeking to enter the IT profession, consider such for-profit schools? And should employers trust their graduates' skills?'"
Open Source

Submission + - LSE: What really went wrong with trading (computerworlduk.com) 1

DMandPenfold writes: The London Stock Exchange has made a U-turn on the system requirements placed on data vendors such as Thomson Reuters, Interactive Data and Bloomberg, after three weeks of problems since the launch of its new trading platform.

The decision, to fundamentally change the timing and systems around closing share price data recording, was made following a heated meeting with the providers that addressed significant disparities in quoted share prices.

The move has been widely welcomed by vendors, which provide share price data from the LSE to traders, and compete on speed and quality. A number of them had expressed real opposition ...

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