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Submission + - Woman of 24 found to have no cerebellum in her brain (gizmocrazed.com)

Diggester writes: DON'T mind the gap. A woman has reached the age of 24 without anyone realising she was missing a large part of her brain. The case highlights just how adaptable the organ is.

The discovery was made when the woman was admitted to the Chinese PLA General Hospital of Jinan Military Area Command in Shandong Province complaining of dizziness and nausea. She told doctors she'd had problems walking steadily for most of her life, and her mother reported that she hadn't walked until she was 7 and that her speech only became intelligible at the age of 6.

Feed Google News Sci Tech: Tesla's $1.3 billion incentive deal with Nevada includes direct sales - Automoti (google.com)


Salon

Tesla's $1.3 billion incentive deal with Nevada includes direct sales
Automotive News
(Bloomberg) -- Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval signed tax breaks worth as much as $1.3 billion and a measure allowing Tesla Motors Inc. to sell directly to state residents, the final steps to bring the world's largest lithium-ion battery factory to Reno. Sandoval...
Nevada Governor Approves $1.3B Tax Incentives Package For Tesla MotorsInternational Business Times
Nevada governor enacts Tesla tax break packageWSAV-TV
Tesla Receives Nevada Tax BreaksWall Street Journal

all 284 news articles

Feed Google News Sci Tech: Destiny Clocks $500-Million Debut; the Biggest Launch of a New Franchise - NDTV (google.com)


NDTV

Destiny Clocks $500-Million Debut; the Biggest Launch of a New Franchise
NDTV
Bungie studio's new science fiction action video game "Destiny" landed in the record books on Wednesday, boasting the biggest ever launch of a new franchise. Activision Publishing announced that more than $500 million worth of copies of "Destiny" had...

and more

Google

German Court: Google Must Stop Ignoring Customer E-mails 290

jfruh writes If you send an email to support-de@google.com, Google's German support address, you'll receive an automatic reply informing you that Google will not respond to or even read your message, due to the large number of emails received at that address. Now a German court has ruled (PDF) that this is an unacceptable response, based on a German law saying that companies must provide a means for customers to communicate with them. Update: 09/12 15:47 GMT by S : Updated to fix the links.
United Kingdom

UK Ham Radio Reg Plans To Drop 15 min Callsign Interval and Allow Encryption 104

First time accepted submitter product_bucket writes A consultation published by the UK Radio Regulator Ofcom seeks views on its plan to remove the mandatory 15 minute callsign identifier interval for amateur radio licensees. The regulator also intends to permit the use of encryption by a single volunteer emergency communications organization. The consultation is open until 20th October, and views are sought by interested parties.
Power

If Tesla Can Run Its Gigafactory On 100% Renewables, Why Can't Others? 444

Lucas123 writes Tesla CEO Elon Musk has said his company's Gigafactory battery plant, the world's largest, will be "self contained" and run on solar, wind and geothermal energy. The obvious problem with renewable sources is that they're intermittent at any given location, but on a larger scale they're quite predictable and reliable, according to Tom Lombardo, a professor of engineering and technology. Lombardo points out that Tesla isn't necessarily going off-grid, but using a strategy of "net metering" where the factory will produce more renewable energy than it needs, and receive credits in return from its utility when renewables aren't available. So why can't other manufacturing facilities do the same? Is what Tesla is doing not necessarily transferable to other industries? Sam Jaffe, principal research analyst with Navigant Research, believes Tesla's choice of locations — Reno — and its product is optimal for using renewable and not something that can be reproduced by every industry.
Science

Scientists Capture the Sound Made By a Single Atom 100

Jason Koebler writes Researchers at Columbia University and Sweden's Chalmers University of Technology say that they have, for the first time, "captured" the sound a single atom makes when it is excited—a single "phonon," as it were. So, why do this? For one, the team wanted to simply see if it could capture the softest sound ever made, which is certainly a noble goal. But, secondly, the researchers wanted to explore the quantum nature of sound. Photons have always been used in quantum experiments, but they're pretty hard to manipulate because they're so fast. Phonons move 10^5 slower and thus could make quantum communication easier.

Submission + - Hewlett-Packard pleads guilty to Bribery (usatoday.com)

Charliemopps writes: Hewlett-Packard and three subsidiaries pleaded guilty Thursday to paying bribes to foreign officials in Russia, Mexico and Poland and agreed to pay $108 million in criminal and regulatory penalties. For over 10 years Hewlett-Packard kept 2 sets of books to track slush-funds they used to bribe government officials for favorable contracts.

Submission + - SanDisk Releases 512GB SD Card (computerworld.com)

Lucas123 writes: SanDisk today announced the world's highest capacity SD card, a 512GB model that represents a 1,000-fold increase over the company's first 512MB card that it shipped a decade ago. The SanDisk Extreme PRO SDXC UHS-I memory card has a max read/write rate of 95MB/s and 90MB/s, respectively. The card is rated to function in temperatures from -13 to 185 degrees Fahrenheit. The 512GB model retails for $800. The card also comes in 128GB and 256GB capacities.
United States

U.S. Threatened Massive Fine To Force Yahoo To Release Data 223

Advocatus Diaboli writes The U.S. government threatened to fine Yahoo $250,000 a day in 2008 if it failed to comply with a broad demand to hand over user data that the company believed was unconstitutional, according to court documents unsealed Thursday that illuminate how federal officials forced American tech companies to participate in the NSA's controversial PRISM program. The documents, roughly 1,500 pages worth, outline a secret and ultimately unsuccessful legal battle by Yahoo to resist the government's demands. The company's loss required Yahoo to become one of the first to begin providing information to PRISM, a program that gave the National Security Agency extensive access to records of online communications by users of Yahoo and other U.S.-based technology firms.

Submission + - Chrome OS Can Now Run Android Apps with No Porting Required

An anonymous reader writes: On Thursday, Google launched "App Runtime for Chrome (Beta)" which allows Android apps to run on Chrome OS without the need for porting. At the moment, only Duolingo, Evernote, Sight Words, and Vine are available on the platform with the rest of the Play Store's offerings to come later. Google "built an entire Android stack into Chrome OS using Native Client" in order to achieve this.
Books

Publishers Gave Away 123 Million Books During World War Two 121

An anonymous reader writes Information wants to be free? During the Second World War, it actually was. Publishers took advantage of new printing technologies to sell crates of cheap, paperback books to the military for just six cents a copy, at a time when almost all the other books they printed cost more than two dollars. The army and the navy shipped them to soldiers and sailors around the world, giving away nearly 123 million books for free. Many publishers feared the program would destroy their industry, by flooding the market with free books and destroying the willingness of consumers to pay for content. Instead, it fueled a postwar publishing boom, as millions of GIs got hooked on good books, and proved willing to pay for more. It's a freemium model, more than 70 years ago.

Submission + - U.S. threatened massive fine to force Yahoo to release data (washingtonpost.com) 1

Advocatus Diaboli writes: The U.S. government threatened to fine Yahoo $250,000 a day in 2008 if it failed to comply with a broad demand to hand over user data that the company believed was unconstitutional, according to court documents unsealed Thursday that illuminate how federal officials forced American tech companies to participate in the NSA’s controversial PRISM program. The documents, roughly 1,500 pages worth, outline a secret and ultimately unsuccessful legal battle by Yahoo to resist the government’s demands. The company’s loss required Yahoo to become one of the first to begin providing information to PRISM, a program that gave the National Security Agency extensive access to records of online communications by users of Yahoo and other U.S.-based technology firms.

Submission + - Overstock.com Becomes First Retailer to Accept Bitcoin Worldwide

An anonymous reader writes: In January, Ovestock.com started accepting bitcoins as a method of payment in the U.S. On Thursday, it started accepting bitcoins from consumers all over the world. "You can order in North Korea if you want," stated Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne, "as long as you're having things delivered to, say, Singapore." The company will reportedly save significantly in foreign credit card transaction fees, but the fact that some governments are mobilizing to regulate the new currency could, at the very least, continue to stunt its widespread adoption.

Submission + - Stephen Hawking tries Linux powered Wheelchair made by Intel (themukt.com)

sfcrazy writes: While media was crazy about a smart watch, Intel created a smart chair for disabled people. Stephen Hawking, one of the smartest brains on the planet, gave Intel’s Linux powered wheelchair a try and talked about it. The company showcased their ‘Connected Wheelchair’ at the ongoing Intel Developer Conference (IDF).

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