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Submission + - top 10 google and yahoo searches over the past 10 (newscaplet.com)

Submitted by waldini
waldini writes: This brought back so many memories! More importantly, it shows us our obsessions in that point of time and what was most important to our society. For example, Britney Spears was the most googled term for 2 yrs and 4 years on Yahoo. In 2008, "Facebook Login" was the 3rd most googled term. It just shows us how thing change and we change. I can not think of a better indicator of us then this. Great to get your thoughts?
Science

Submission + - Sex-Crazed Astrologer Was a Stellar Records Keeper (sciencemag.org)

Submitted by sciencehabit
sciencehabit writes: If you lived in the time of Shakespeare and wanted to know whether your sick child was going to make it, you might well have paid a visit to the shady offices of physician-cum-astrologer Simon Forman, who, with his student Richard Napier, advised more than 30,000 patients and clients during their careers. Forman would listen to your description of the symptoms, note them meticulously as you spoke, consult the stars, and give you a prognosis or suggest a treatment. Although his fellow physicians considered him a quack, Forman's bad reputation might be about to get a boost; his casebooks between the years 1596 and 1634 have now turned out to be the most extensive and systematic set of known medical records from that period. Historians are putting these records online for all to peruse and study medical trends in Elizabethan England.
AI

Submission + - U.S. Homeland Security moves forward with 'pre-cri (cnet.com)

Submitted by suraj.sun
suraj.sun writes: An internal U.S. Department of Homeland Security document indicates that a controversial program designed to predict whether a person will commit a crime is already being tested on some members of the public, CNET has learned. If this sounds a bit like the Tom Cruise movie called "Minority Report," it is. But where "Minority Report" author Philip K. Dick enlisted psychics to predict crimes, DHS is betting on algorithms: it's building a "prototype screening facility" that it hopes will use factors such as ethnicity, gender, breathing, and heart rate to "detect cues indicative of mal-intent."

The latest developments, which reveal efforts to "collect, process, or retain information on" members of "the public," came to light through an internal DHS document obtained under open-government laws by the Electronic Privacy Information Center. DHS calls its "pre-crime" system Future Attribute Screening Technology, or FAST.

CNET News: http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-20117058-281/homeland-security-moves-forward-with-pre-crime-detection/
Japan

Submission + - Scosche Announces Radiation Detector for iPhone (gizmag.com)

Submitted by Zothecula
Zothecula writes: As a result of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster following the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, radiation detectors have been a popular item for Japanese consumers. Recognizing the market for such devices, last month Scosche — a company known for its car audio and iPod/iPhone accessories — released its RDTX-Pro radiation detector and app for iPhone and iPod touch in Japan. With that model apparently flying off the shelves — it is temporarily out of stock on Scosche's website — the company has decided to expand the product line with the announcement of two new radiation detectors.
Power

Submission + - Graphene creates electricity when struck by light (extremetech.com)

Submitted by
MrSeb
MrSeb writes: "Oh graphene! The cheap, easy-to-manufacture one-atom-thick sheet of carbon can add yet another weird, fantastical, and possibly life-changing ability to its list of characteristics: it has an incredibly sensitive thermoelectric response to light. In layman’s terms: graphene, when struck by light of almost any wavelength, can produce an electric current. Discovered by MIT and Japanese researchers, this effect (hot carrier response) works at room temperature, with a wide range of light spectra, and at low intensities, which means it could replace photovoltaic solar panels, photodetectors in astronomy and photography, and even some medical applications (searching for disease and toxin)."
Android

Submission + - Grumblings In Google's App Marketplace (ibtimes.com)

Submitted by RedEaredSlider
RedEaredSlider writes: Some app developers are expressing discontent with the way Google operates the Android Market for apps, and at least one has decided to call out Google in public.

Rich Jones formed the Android Developers Union, a loose group he claims has 200 members. The group started as a blog that Jones says he started to call attention to Google's policies on deleting apps.
Books

Submission + - Crime Writer Makes a Killing with 99 Cent eBooks

Submitted by
Hugh Pickens writes
Hugh Pickens writes writes: "Joe Konrath has an interesting interview with independent writer John Locke who currently holds the coveted #1 spot in the Amazon Top 100 and has sold just over 350,000 downloads on Kindle of his 99 cent books since January 1st of this year which with a royalty rate of 35%, is an annual income well over $500k. Locke says that 99 cents is the magic number and adds that when he lowered the price of his book "The List" from $2.99 to 99 cents, he started selling 20 times as many copies — about 800 a day, turning his loss lead into his biggest earner. "These days the buying public looks at a $9.95 eBook and pauses. It’s not an automatic sale," says Locke. "And the reason it’s not is because the buyer knows when an eBook is priced ten times higher than it has to be. And so the buyer pauses. And it is in this pause—this golden, sweet-scented pause—that we independent authors gain the advantage, because we offer incredible value." Kevin Kelly predicts that within 5 years all digital books will cost 99 cents. "I don't think publishers are ready for how low book prices will go," writes Kelly. "It seems insane, dangerous, life threatening, but inevitable.""

Submission + - Foxconn Lays Down Employee Commandments (itworld.com) 1

Submitted by itwbennett
itwbennett writes: Foxconn, the company that produces Apple's gadgets, has put in place 8 commandments that it believes will stop suicides. While most of the list has to do with avoiding illegal activities, a few exceptions stand out: #5 Do not engage in improper male-female relations, i.e. extramarital affairs; #7 Do not participate in activities that are bad for physical or mental health; and #8 Employees who are on duty during long public holidays, or take an overseas trip, must sign an 'employee safety agreement' and inform the company of their whereabouts. The company had previously taken measures to try and reduce the numbers of suicides by raising workers pay and improving their working conditions, and, according to a recent Slashdot post, was on the verge of pulling out of China altogether.
Security

Submission + - Bank software update hits mortgage repayments (computerworlduk.com)

Submitted by ChiefMonkeyGrinder
ChiefMonkeyGrinder writes: Clydesdale Bank and Yorkshire Bank have blamed a software glitch for under-calculating customer mortgage repayments. In a statement, the banks have admitted to miscalculating around 18,000 borrowers’ repayments, which has led to customers underpaying. Customers are now being told to fork out more money as the banks try to recoup the money customers should have been paying in line with their mortgage terms.
Government

Submission + - Why Taking Photos in Public Places Is Not A Crime (popularmechanics.com)

Submitted by longacre
longacre writes: Blogger, lawyer and Popular Mechanics contributor Glenn Reynolds calls out the legally dubious practice of restricting photography in public places in the name of national security. From the article, "Legally, it's pretty much always okay to take photos in a public place as long as you're not physically interfering with traffic or police operations. As Bert Krages, an attorney who specializes in photography-related legal problems and wrote Legal Handbook for Photographers, says, "The general rule is that if something is in a public place, you're entitled to photograph it." What's more, though national-security laws are often invoked when quashing photographers, Krages explains that "the Patriot Act does not restrict photography; neither does the Homeland Security Act." But this doesn't stop people from interfering with photographers, even in settings that don't seem much like national-security zones."
Music

Submission + - Space Music Vol. 12: Solar Music Explained (howstuffworks.com)

Submitted by OMGTSFS
OMGTSFS writes: Remember the "solar music" or "music of the sun" sound clips that made the rounds last month without much in the way of explanation of what we were hearing and why? Well here's an explanation from a solar astrophysicist about what it all means (if anything). No science babel! Just answers!
Iphone

Submission + - Apple "under-reported" scale of iPhone Antennagate (pcpro.co.uk) 1

Submitted by Barence
Barence writes: The number of customers affected by iPhone 4's antenna issues is likely to be far higher than Apple reported, industry insiders have told PC Pro. Apple CEO Steve Jobs stated that only 0.55% of iPhone 4 customers had contacted the company's support desk to complain about reception issue, in last week's press conference. However, that represents only a tiny fraction of the customers affected by the issue, according to WDS Global, a company that provides customer support desks for several leading phone networks and handset manufacturers. "If you look at the mobile industry as whole, only about 20-30% of consumers will ever actually phone their carrier or handset manufacturer to report a fault," WDS Global's Tim Deluca-Smith told PC Pro, with most people visiting online forums or asking friends and family to solve issues.
"Saying that everybody who had a problem would have phoned AppleCare is not a true representation of the issue."

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