53135167
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
Google's wireless charger is now available from Play. The charger uses a magnet to hold the device in place while charging, and comes with a 1.8A (9W) power supply, although it isn't clear what the charging rate of the device is.
51512583
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
The on-going leak of radioactive wastewater at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has been traced to an overflow tank that was built on a slope. Because one side of the tank is lower than the other water slops over the side when it is nearly full. TEPCO estimate that 430 litres of wastewater seeped outside the barrier around the tank and say some of this water may have flowed into the sea, about 200 meters away. They detected 200,000 becquerels per liter of beta ray-emitting radioactive substances in water pooled inside the barrier around the tank. The safety limit is 30 becquerels per liter.
Officials say that a miscommunication with contractors lead to the blunder.
51325589
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
A representative from GE Canada has posted a job offer to the Vintage Computer forum for a PDP-11 assembly language programmer. Apparently the original job posting failed to turn up any qualified candidates to support the nuclear industry's existing robotic control systems, which they say they are committed to running until 2050. If they are having trouble finding anyone now one wonders how hard it will be in 37 years time.
50232525
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
The Ministry of Sound, a UK dance music brand, is suing Spotify because it has not removed user's playlists that mirror their compilation albums. The case will hinge on whether compilation albums qualify for copyright protection due to the selection and arrangement involved in putting them together. Spotify has the rights to stream all the tracks on the playlists in question, but the issue here is whether the compilation structure — the order of the songs — can be copyrighted.
50003593
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
Japan's nuclear regulators have raised the level of severity of the radioactive water leak from a tank at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. It is now a level-3 serious incident. The revision from level 1 is based on estimates of the volume of radioactive substances leaked. The International Atomic Energy Agency supports the revision. They say the tank leak can be assessed separately from the Fukushima Daiichi crisis as a level 3 incident. Japanese experienced a level-3 nuclear event in 1997 with the fire and explosions at a fuel reprocessing plant in Tokai Village, Ibaraki Prefecture. 37 workers there were exposed to the leaked radioactive substances.
49754637
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
Medical examinations in Fukushima Prefecture following the nuclear crisis of 2011 have detected 18 children with thyroid cancer, with a further 25 suspected cases awaiting confirmation. The group checks 360,000 who were aged 18 or under at the time of the accident. The incidence rate of thyroid cancer in children is said to be one in hundreds of thousands. In Japan, 46 people under 20 were diagnosed with thyroid cancer in 2006.
49739455
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
Radioactive water has leaked from a storage tank into the ground at Japan's Fukushima plant, operator TEPCO says. Officials described the leak as a level-one incident — the lowest level — on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (Ines), which measures nuclear events. This is the first time that Japan has declared such an event since the 2011 earthquake and tsunami. A puddle of the contaminated water was emitting 100 millisieverts an hour of radiation, equivalent to five year's maximum exposure for a site worker. In addition up to 300 tonnes a day of contaminated water is leaking from reactors buildings into the sea.
49293301
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
This year's ACSI Benchmarks for Smartphone Brands measure consumer satisfaction with different smartphones and brands. ACSI surveyed 4,112 phone owners in the U.S. who judged their phones on overall experience (customer expectations, perception of overall quality, value for money, customer loyalty) and experience of quality (ease of making and receiving calls, ease of sending and receiving text messages, performance of phone in terms of battery life, etc.) Samsung took the top spot, followed by Apple and Motorola all within a few percentage points of each other. RIM's Blackberry brand didn't do so well.
49167935
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
The only two remaining nuclear reactors generating power in Japan will be shut down for maintenance next month, leaving the country without any nuclear power for the first time in 14 months. Reactor 3 will stop on 15/9, with reactor 4 to follow two weeks later. Four utilities have asked the Nuclear Regulation Authority to restart 12 reactors in 6 power plants. Their applications are currently being screened, but no clear prospects for restarting any of the reactors have emerged.
49085393
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
Technology giant Apple is facing fresh allegations of worker rights violations at Chinese factories of one of its suppliers, the Pegatron Group. China Labor Watch has alleged that three factories of Pegatron violate a "great number of international and Chinese laws and standards". These include underage labour, contract violations and excessive working hours. Li Qiang, executive director of China Labor Watch, claimed that "our investigations have shown that labour conditions at Pegatron factories are even worse than those at Foxconn factories". The campaign group said that it had found that average weekly working hours in the three factories investigated by it were approximately 66 hours, 67 hours, and 69 hours, respectively.
49079423
submission
48990809
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
It seems that the smartphone and display panel markets are booming for Samsung. Net profit was 7.8 trillion won ($7bn; £4.5bn) in the April to June quarter, a 50% jump from a year ago. Flagship products such as the Galaxy S4 are said to have contributed to the increase. Samsung's display panel unit alone, which has made Samsung the world's biggest TV manufacturer, also reported a 46% surge in the same period to 1.12 trillion won. Earnings were boosted by strong demand for high value-added panels for IT as well as TV panels sized 60-inch and over.
48990679
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
The BBC reports that Huawei, one of the world's largest manufacturers of telecoms equipment, is controlling popular ISP TalkTalk's web censorship system. The system, known as Homesafe, was praised by Prime Minister David Cameron. Customers who do not want filtering still have their traffic routed through the system, but matches to Huawei's database are dismissed rather than acted upon. In other words there is no opt-out. Mr Cameron has demanded similar measures be adopted by all internet service providers (ISPs) in the UK, to "protect our children and their innocence".
48933109
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
Experts from the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology studied the cost of decontamination for the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident, estimating it at $50 billion. They estimate that decontamination in no-entry zones will cost up to 20 billion dollars, and in other areas, 31 billion dollars. It includes the cost of removing, transporting and storing radioactive waste such as contaminated soil. The central government has so far allocated about 11 billion dollars and the project is already substantially behind schedule.
Meanwhile the effectiveness of the decontamination is being questioned. NHK compared data from before and after decontamination at 43 districts in 21 municipalities across Fukushima Prefecture. In 33 of the districts, or 77 percent of the total, radiation levels were still higher than the government-set standard of one millisievert per year. In areas near the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, where decontamination has been carried out on an experimental basis, radiation levels remain 10 to 60 times higher than the official limit.
48784627
submission
AmiMoJo writes:
A recent job posting by MI5 seeks to recruit "Data Exploitation Specialists". The core of the role is described as "provid[ing] tactical solutions and operational support to business users of information exploitation systems." In other words, industrial espionage. This open admission comes at a time when the UK and its partners are accusing China of the same thing. Pot, kettle, black?
