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Comment Eye witnesses (Score 2) 368

by tomhath (#48667351) Attached to: Study: Police Body-Cams Reduce Unacceptable Use of Force

How many of the "eye witnesses" in the Brown case weren't even at the scene until after it happened? No surprise that 87% of claims against police go away when there's a recording of what actually happened.

And who down-modded the parent post? It was at 2, now back to 1. People who do that should be banned from moderating

Submission + - No more foamy beer, thanks to magnets (sciencemag.org)

Submitted by sciencehabit
sciencehabit writes: Few sights at a bar are more deflating than a bottle of beer overflowing with foam. This overfoaming, called gushing, arises when fungi infect the barley grains in beer’s malt base. The microorganisms latch onto barley with surface proteins called hydrophobins. During the brewing process, these hydrophobins can attract carbon dioxide molecules produced by the mashed barley as it ferments, making the beer far too bubbly. Brewers try to tamp down the gushing by adding hops extract, an antifoaming agent that binds to the proteins first. Now, food scientists in Belgium have hit upon a technological solution: magnets. When the team applied a magnetic field to a malt infused with hops extract, the magnets dispersed the antifoaming agent into tinier particles. Those smaller particles were much more effective at binding to more hydrophobins, blocking carbon dioxide and decreasing gushing. During tests in a real brewery, the magnets decreased excess foaming so effectively that brewers needed much lower amounts of hops extract—a potential cost-saving measure. Future studies could explore whether magnetic fields alone could reduce foaming on an industrial scale, the team says.

Submission + - Why the Taj Mahal is turning brown (sciencemag.org)

Submitted by sciencehabit
sciencehabit writes: Air pollution has turned the Taj Mahal's snowy marble dome brown. Scientists didn't know what exact process caused the discoloration: Perhaps it was fog droplets oxidizing the surface or maybe sulfurous gas in the air. Now, computer modeling has shown that these particles absorb ultraviolet light, thus giving the dome a yellow-brown shade. Researchers blame vehicle emissions and burning of biomasses such as dung and trash for causing the pollution.

Comment Re:Knowledge is the solution (Score 1) 1051

by tomhath (#48582837) Attached to: Time To Remove 'Philosophical' Exemption From Vaccine Requirements?

I know someone has all these numbers and could easily put them in an easy to read chart?

Lawsuits.

A reasonable person understands that the vaccine isn't 100% effective or even 100% safe, just effective enough and safe enough to justify its use. But people like the anti-vaxxers aren't reasonable.

Submission + - Why women's bodies abort males during tough times (sciencemag.org)

Submitted by sciencehabit
sciencehabit writes: In times of trouble, multiple studies have shown, more girls are born than boys. No one knows why, but men need not worry about being overrun by women. An analysis of old church records in Finland has revealed that the boys that are born in stressful times survive better than those born during less challenging periods. The work helps explain why women may have evolved a tendency to abort certain males and could lead to a better understanding of miscarriages.

Submission + - A/B Tests Reveal Blondes Can't Sell Lingerie

Submitted by HughPickens.com
HughPickens.com writes: A/B testing, or two sample hyposthesis testing, happens all the time on the Internet. Netflix A/B tested its queue design to maximize binging; Google A/B tested the color of its ad links to maximize clicks; the Obama campaign A/B tested its website to maximize campaign donations. Now Rebecca Greenfield writes in Fast Company that the lingerie company Adore Me goes many steps further in A/B testing shooting multiple versions of images to run on its website. The distinctions between the pictures might include different models wearing the same set in the exact same position, or the same model in the same set in a different position, for example. For every thousand people that come on the site, 500 will see picture A, another 500 will see picture B and over time, one will sell better than the other. Some of AdmoreMe's discoveries: Sex doesn't sell, so forget the boudoir shot. Props distract. Couches are fine. Playing with hair is ideal. Interestingly enough while natural blondes make up about 16% of the US population, and science says that men prefer blondes, nobody wants to buy lingerie from them. So far, no one with golden locks has sold well.

Scrolling through the site, the models could all be related—long legs, olive skin, dark hair, insanely hot. "Picture has a huge impact on sale when it comes to fashion," says CEO Morgan Hermand-Waiche who studied math and computer science at Ecole de Mines, which he describes as the MIT of Paris. "You buy the product not only for what it looks like, but for the emotions that the product conveys to you and that you want to convey through the product."

Comment Re:Google needs to share (Score 1) 183

by tomhath (#48572487) Attached to: Google News To Shut Down In Spain On December 16th

Because site advertising wasn't covering their running costs. The newspapers need a business model that delivers profits

That's a different issue. The publishers are trying to become profitable by selling their content rather than through advertising. They could have used Google to send them visitors who are willing to pay, but instead they tried to sell directly to Google. Google declined to make the purchase. Sounds like a poor decision by the publishers.

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