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Submission + - Identical Twins Battle Over Paternety Test

Submitted by ziggamon2.0
ziggamon2.0 writes: Twin brothers Raymon and Richard Miller are the father and uncle to a 3-year-old little girl. The problem is, they don't know which is which. Or who is who. Since they are identical twins, and have the exact same DNA they are inseparable in paternety tests. How is one to know? And if their DNA is really the same, in a biological perspective, does it really matter?
It's funny. Laugh.

Submission + - UPS' Unlabeled Liability Forms: 'Just sign it!'

Submitted by
Rich
Rich writes: "A popular blogger on LiveJournal recently posted a hilarious but scary story about UPS' very real practices of sending uninformed drivers to people's doors with unmarked damage liability forms after packages are damaged or lost in transit. You sign this form, and you've just accepted responsibility for the loss. I work at a Geek Squad, and they've tried to do this to me at least twice. Another friend of mine was almost put out of business after he absentmindedly signed one of these and ended up having to pay for two of the same $10K item. This is ridiculous, considering that UPS' insurance deductible is tiny, and they're worth more than $45B. Anyway, here it is: UPS' Form of Mystery"
Power

Submission + - A Truly Inconvenient Truth

Submitted by
mattatwork
mattatwork writes: "I received an interesting email from my mother-in-law, and then had it forwarded again by my wife. According to WorldNetDaily, Compact Flourescent lamps (or CFL's) contain a significant amount of Mercury. While you're saving the world from global warming, you're also putting yourself and other carbon based life forms at risk to mercury poisoning. One of the victims of a CFL's mercury found out the hard and high priced way that removing the mercury couldn't be done with a simple vacuum, but by a specialized enviremental cleanup firm for around $2000. You would think someone like Al Gore, father of the Internet, would think twice before pushing a technology like CFL, still in its infancy, on consumers who don't or didn't know the risks. I know that when I get home tonight, I'm taking out my CFL's and replacing them with good ol' incandescents."
Microsoft

Submission + - Vista, Office Revenues Inflated By Accountants

Submitted by Overly Critical Guy
Overly Critical Guy writes: It turns out Microsoft's previously reported quarter numbers are inflated due to deterred revenues from last quarter. Without the deferred revenue, Microsoft's revenue growth would have been 17%, in line with past growth. Though revenue from last quarter was held back "for accounting reasons," one effect is to make Vista and Office revenues look more impressive.
Education

Submission + - Your Brain Can Grow Larger with Exercise

Submitted by
drmirkin
drmirkin writes: "Regular exercise makes your brain larger, according to a study from the University of Illinois (Journal fo Gerontology, November 2006). With aging, your brain becomes smaller. This study showed that 60 to 79-year-old men who exercised regularly actually had their brains grow larger. Study participants who did only a stretching and toning program had their brains shrink.

If you feel you are losing your ability to reason or think clearly, or if you suffer mood disorders such as depression, ask your doctor to do blood tests for homocysteine, folic acid, pyridoxine and vitamin B12. If these tests are normal, you should get tests for thyroid function, cholesterol and other causes of arterial damage.

You can suffer from B12 deficiency even if your blood levels are normal. When you body lacks B12, your red blood cells do not mature properly and are much larger than normal, and homocysteine accumulates in your bloodstream, damaging your arteries and brain cells. Having low levels of B12 can damage every nerve in your body including your brain, to make you forgetful and impair your ability to reason and solve problems. If you are low on B12, taking folic acid supplements or eating food heavily fortified with folic acid may cost you IQ points. A study from Tufts University showed that people who have low blood levels of B12 can suffer nerve damage, and those who also had high blood levels of folic acid had far more nerve damage than those with normal levels (American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, January 2007).

Your doctor should also check for diabetes, which can damage blood vessels that supply the brain, heart and other organs. Diabetics may suffer loss of memory long before they are diagnosed as having diabetes. While we await further studies, protect your memory with a lifestyle that will help you avoid diabetes, heart attacks and strokes. Control your weight, eat a wide variety of plants, limit refined carbohydrates and get plenty of exercise. See http://www.drmirkin.com/morehealth/G101.htm"
Security

Submission + - Ohio audit reveals more Diebold problems

Submitted by armb
armb writes: From http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2007/04/diebold_v ote_da.html "Problems found in an audit of Diebold tabulation records from an Ohio November 2006 election raise questions about whether the database got corrupted during the tabulation of election results" They were using the Microsoft Jet engine, which Microsoft do not recommend for serious use with concurrent updates. Perhaps most surprising of all, Diebold initially claimed that the raw election results were a protected trade secret.
United States

Journal Journal: A Modest Proposal: Prevent Copycats 12

Journal by pudge

Everyone from Hugh Hewitt to Sarah Brady have said that the news should not have published the pictures and audio and video from Cho, the VT shooter, because it might encourage "copycats."

I think this principle should be generalized. All news about crazy people harming others should be suppressed, that others do not follow in their footsteps.

Hence, from this day forth, I propose that the news media do not report on anything government is doing.
Power

Nanotubes May Improve Solar Energy Harvesting 93

Posted by Zonk from the just-put-in-a-direct-nuclear-tap dept.
eldavojohn writes "Scientists are hoping that the 'coaxial cable' style nanotube they developed will resolve energy issues that come with converting sunlight to energy. The plants currently have us beat in this department but research is discovering new ways to eliminate inefficiencies in transferring photons to energy. Traditional methods involve exciting electrons to the point of jumping to a higher state which leaves 'holes.' Unfortunately, these electrons and holes remain in the same regions and therefore tend to recombine. The new nanotubes hope to route these excited electrons off in the same way a coaxial cable allows a return route for electrons. End result is fewer electrons settling back into their holes once they are elevated out of them yielding a higher return in energy."
Security

Submission + - Food Ingredients Rarely Checked

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: "The same food safety net that couldn't catch poisoned pet food ingredients from China has a much bigger hole. Billions of dollars' worth of foreign ingredients that Americans eat in everything from salad dressing to ice cream get a pass from overwhelmed inspectors, despite a rising tide of imports from countries with spotty records, according to an Associated Press analysis of federal trade and food data." http://www.theindychannel.com/health/12915716/deta il.html
Sci-Fi

Submission + - 'Kryptonite' discovered in mine

Submitted by keeboo
keeboo writes: According to the this article:
A new mineral matching its unique chemistry — as described in the film Superman Returns — has been identified in a mine in Serbia.
Researchers from mining group Rio Tinto discovered the unusual mineral and enlisted the help of Dr Stanley when they could not match it with anything known previously to science.
Once the London expert had unravelled the mineral's chemical make-up, he was shocked to discover this formula was already referenced in literature — albeit fictional literature.
The Internet

Submission + - Sabotage at Calif. Power Grid's Data Center

Submitted by
miller60
miller60 writes: "A disgruntled system administrator intentionally pressed the Emergency Power Off (EPO) button in the data center that manages the electric grid for most of California, crashing the facility for hours, according to law enforcement accounts. The grid was unaffected, primarily because the event took place late on a Sunday night, rather than on a high-load weekday, according to power industry officials. The sysadmin worked for a third-party contractor which had warned its client, the California Independent System Operator (Cal-ISO), that the employee should be denied access to the facility. Inquiries are focused on why he was still able to get into the data center, which had several levels of access security."
Software

Submission + - Software Developer Rights

Submitted by
led_belly
led_belly writes: "I work as a contract Web Developer which often takes me into creating entire applications for clients. Usually in my prospectus I make a note that I retain the rights to all the code written for the client during the project. Is this enough? What laws are in place (in the U.S. & Canada) outlining the right and obligations in this kind of relationship? I have been told that the developer retains the rights to his/her work unless they sign these rights away to some other party, usually in the form of a financial transaction, but I wanted to hear what the slashdot crowd had to say about this."

Feed Drug Company Sales Visits Influenced Doctors, Study Finds (sciencedaily.com)

From feed by sdfeed
Almost half of sales visits by pharmaceutical company representatives advocating the use of the drug gabapentin led to doctors stating that they intended to increase their prescription of the drug or recommend it to colleagues, according to an analysis of a survey completed by the doctors shortly after the visits.

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