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Microsoft to buy a BlackBerry to Apple?

2011-05-06T04:08:00.000-07:00

Speculation has been triggered by the presence of Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's RIM BlackBerry world, an annual Conference for developers and customers, partners, and Florida this week.

Although the MEASURING RIM unveiled a new slimmer BlackBerry Bold smart phones 9900 and 9930, multi-platform BlackBerry Enterprise solution, the new BlackBerry operating system, and to update its aging handset configuration is the annual gathering Gloom has lifted from Canada informed the wireless giant.

RIM stock plunging, which began last week after the company slashed its quarterly Outlook below sales, is to find some takers, prompting analysts to say that the company that invented the telephone in the smart tag is almost in terminal decline and ripe for a takeover.

They cite the presence of Microsoft, Managing Director of the World Conference as the Tip of the BlackBerry in the following months, the obvious place.

These analysts say that if the RIM-about USD 24 billion-to-market value at the current pace, by sliding the BlackBerry Maker is reduced to only 15 billion USD soon.

"Microsoft (currently) to 48 billion dollars in cash. If the value of RIM may result in a loss of USD 15 billion, it will be an attractive target for Microsoft. Perhaps Steve Ballmer was planting that seed during his Keynote appearance at world level ', ' Harry of Blackberry Wang, mobile research, Parks Associates, the Director told the premier "skor".

In addition, with its main competitor, Apple is now worth over US $ 320 billion, analysts say, will allow for economies of scale makes the BlackBerry Maker just distorted the world's largest technology company, against the r and d expenditure.

In addition, such as the processing of the data is transferred from the desktop to the laptop and now to the smart tag phones and tablets, Microsoft is understood, is to enter the mobile space, if it is to survive. This objective has launched Windows 7 phone and just become a strategic global handset market leader in the conversion of the Nokia, which accepts now Windows 7 phone Smartphone strategy with the key.

But if Microsoft never Apple and Google in the mobile space, the software giant have to apply to the hardware vendor for the giant such as RIM, which fits the Bill of materials (BOM), because the BlackBerry maker to display also the huge base of users to the Microsoft company.

Analysts, RIM has just informed its Bing Microsoft provides the default search engine blackberries is an obvious tip for the coming months, the future of the partnership say.

(Gurmukh Singh can be contacted at: gurmukh.s@ians.in)

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Drinking coffee, having sex, blow the nose increases the risks of Brain Aneurysm rupture

2011-05-06T04:05:00.000-07:00

Dutch scientists identify the triggers of the eight major Intracranial aneurysm, which seems to (IA) of the brain blood vessel, which often cause the bubble wall due to the risk.

If it ruptures, it can lead to a subarachnoid hemorrhage, which is caused by bleeding of the brain in the North of the drawing. An estimated 2% of the population are the international accounting standard (IAs), but only few of the rupture.

The population of the subarachnoid haemorrhages due to the risk, which can be allocated, in particular, the trigger factor to calculate the fraction of the eight authors and researchers to identify their risk.

It was found that coffee consumption of 10.6%, contributed to the strong year of 7,9%, nose auxiliary blowing agents 5.4% to 4,3%, sexual intercourse, i.e. 3.6%, 3,5% of the consumption of cola ulostaa devices that startled 2,7% and 1.3% of the angry.

Triggers all of a sudden and brief increase in causing the blood pressure, which affects the value of the aneurysmal possible easily wounded pride by H.m. Vlak, Monique. M.D., lead author of the study and the University Medical Center Utrecht neurologist, the Netherlands, said.

The risk was higher after the consumption of alcohol, but fell quickly, researchers said.

Subarachnoid haemorrhage from Intracranial aneurysm of the rupture is a devastating event that affects young adults often.

We found these trigger factors are on the top of the known risk factors, including women, gender, age, and pulmonary, Vlak said.

Although the potential of sport to start, the researchers don t advice because it s the abstinence is also an important factor in lowering the risk of cardiovascular diseases in the other.

Reducing Caffeine consumption or constipated patients with unruptured IAS substances with laxatives may reduce the risk of subarachnoid haemorrhage, Vlak said.

The definition of blood pressure medicines to patients in unruptured IAS: whether is useful, as well as prevent aneurysmal value still needs to be investigated, Vlak is still added.

The research is published in Stroke: Journal of the American Heart Association.

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Arnold Schwarzenegger is likely to welcome the Will, during the visit of the Kat California

2011-05-06T04:00:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is expected to welcome the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, during a visit to the State on their Canadian tour after July.The couple travel to the West Coast US State July 8-10, reports in the Telegraph.

It is the first time that William has visited the United States in the official capacity and for the first time Kate has ever been in the country.

The pair are expected to attend the Canada Day celebrations in Ottawa on 1 July. The stay also includes the journey to the Arctic, according to Canadian officials.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper called on the Canadian couple, when they announced their engagement last November. Canada is also the honorary award of their stamps.

-ANI

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China's richest village Scale new heights

2011-05-06T03:57:00.000-07:00

Beijing, may 6: China's Jiangsu Province, the village is unusual because all of its inhabitants live in plush Villas and at least two cars in the learning activities of the Central Bank of the USD accounts each and have free health care and education.Huaxi village, China is now all set to reach new heights-it is training 100 new pilots in the air transport services in the tourism project, the China daily cited the Yangtze Evening News as saying in the report.

Major tourist Draw for the time being a unique success story, the village has already become splurged USD 13.4 million for the purchase of two helicopters and is planning to acquire a fleet of 20 aircraft for the next five years, in addition to my airline!

The designers intend to fly in this village for tourists from all around the pilots training, the maximum number of visitors.

Ambitious plans asked avitation, Wu Xie'en, a village chief, said the village is about two million visitors annually, and this prompt in the tourism industry a huge eye Huaxi.

In the village during the flight, which will focus on the chopper takes approximately 15 minutes to fly around the height of two to four passengers, for a period of up to 300 metres. Each flight is a budget of US $ 4,460/hour.

Spead the radius of four kilometres to the population of the village during the 36,000, this is not one of the largest China hailed the success stories today.

In 1957, Huaxi was only around 1,800 inhabitants and 576 Yuan (US $ 240) for the resources in the sleepy village.

Five of the last decade, it is the capital of Angmar revenue 229.6 billion Yuan (44.89 billion USD).

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Bin Laden Abbottabad compound fast becoming a tourist destination

2011-05-06T03:54:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: If Osama Bin Laden holed in Pakistan itself has already become a secret compound in the tourist destination of tens of people flocking site only days after he was shot dead.Sightseers are thronging the place of expensive Abbottabad, Pakistan, where Al-Qaeda leader meets his end of the fringes.

The terror chief s-ports remain closed, the compound, visitors are given free access to the surrounding area after the Pakistani army investigators scouring pastes in the House.

Local resident Ali Abbas, 43, who has begun a campaign to turn the final page of the official home of the Lade s tourist site, welcomes the interest and claimed many more visitors could follow in Europe and the United States.

Westerners are crazy people. Although local to foreign or not, will be permanently, if it has been declared a tourist site, the Daily Mail quoted Abbas as saying.

IT is very good in the city. People go to and see where the world s largest terrorist lived, he said.

-ANI

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Bin Laden was the fear, confusion, the final moments of the

2011-05-06T03:50:00.000-07:00

Washington, may 6: Al Qaida leader Usama bin Laden was "scared" and "confused", in his final moments, sources from the last Sunday of Navy seals in operation are revealed.He was actually "shoving his wife," Navy Seal, who eventually shot him in the direction.

Information to clarify what happened exactly 40 minutes-Abbottabad raid contradictory information.

Fox News quoted the sources as saying that bin Laden was "raukkamaiset way" when confronted.

Bin Laden was unarmed, but was standing near the two weapons-AK-47 and a Makarov pistol, which are now within reach of the door to the US custody.

Pistol is a semi-automatic 9 mm pistol, the standard issue Russian Russian military until 1991.

US officials also told Fox News that only one of the five people killed in the RAID, was carrying a weapon and firing.

Overview of the scene was described as a Chaotic, balancing the forces of the United States, and the barricades in the women's compound screaming and attacking with men.

A second Us official said were "at least half-a dozen weapons" the quantities of fish at.

-ANI

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In India, the Special Envoy of the acts of the u.a.e., the passport shall be issued and renewed complaints

2011-05-06T03:47:00.000-07:00

Dubai, may 6: the Indian Embassy, Abu Dhabi will soon designate deal with the complaints, the passport shall be issued and shall be renewed, the consular official said the Ambassador MK Lokesh.The consular section will deal with the complaints already made by telephone, but can be processed by the designated official to agree to more effectively, Lokesh said.

He added the four problems that arose after the new agency-BLS international services took the Indian visa and Passport Services April 6 was separate.

Was widespread complaints about poor customer service and a proposal from the author (s) concerned, issued the visa and passport delays after the outsourced services had been taken of the new agency's Gulf News reported.

Lokesh said the delay in issuing visas and passports in the later issues had been resolved.

Now is not the passport applications are pending. Passports in the United Arab Emirates and the United Arab Emirates is hereby renewed for an additional period of five working days, outside and within 40 working days, he added.

Asked to renew the passport was issued in Southampton in time for the appeal, the Ambassador said, could be a few individual cases had to give the new users, but the grievance mechanism to solve such a column.

Lokesh, it was clear that the Embassy is dealing with the complaints lodged in Abu Dhabi only.

Dubai Consulate General Dubai and the Northern may own the United Arab Emirates applications related to the complaints, he said.

-ANI

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Osama was shot dead when he tried to grab the guns

2011-05-06T03:42:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: Al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden was shot dead in the city of Abbottabad in Pakistan, US commandos as he tried to grab the two guns, it was reported here.The Sun quoted us sources as saying that Osama was shot as he went in to Grab two of the guns, where he was hiding in his bedroom the sprawling Mansionin.

Daring raid was carried out by the US Navy Seals who was found in the arms-AK-47 Assault rifle and a Makarov pistol said.

US officials have said Osama was unarmed when he was shot dead at during the operation.

"He (Osama) had not been armed, the Administration has confirmed, but the room was the weapons," US Congressman Jim Langevin played by saying.

One of the Senate, said the weapons search, had hiked the commandos surrendered peacefully concern for Osama.

"The Us special forces are raiding the girl scout troop looking for overdue library books. They were to kill Osama bin Laden operation, "the official said the United States.

Deep within Pakistan killing Osama has strained relations between Washington and Islamabad.

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' Indian investors face discrimination, Ghana '

2011-05-06T03:37:00.000-07:00

, Francis Kokutse Accra, may 6: the Ghana Investment Promotion Centre (GIPC) has said its policy not to discriminate against foreign investor and the fears of some Indian investors rejected that Chinese companies were currently being favored against them.Senior investment officer, GIPC, Noah Gaikpah, said, "the complaints were not in order to be useful and that the investor, who had a genuine complaint, the aim should be the main centre."

"We have been established on the basis of regulations when it comes to investment in the country, and is firmly attached," Gaikpah told IANS.

Indians spoke to investors who refused to be named, afraid of reprisal IANS. However, the claim will come only weeks after the part of the Ghanaian industry claimed that the land in the open, non-discriminatory trade policy with China was to kill the domestic industries.

Several local companies last year appealed to the Ministry of trade and economic pressure was coming, and were at the level of their industry-reducing because they could compete with the Cheap Chinese imports.

The head of the trade, bilateral trade, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Cletus Ayaaba, the Government was aware of the threat, but China was the country because the country had different mulitilateral contracts will expire from imposing protectionist system that saves the country must be signed by members of the local industries.

(Francis Kokutse can be contacted at: fkokutse@hotmail.com)

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The United States Navy seals, as he shot up Osama lunged to grab the guns

2011-05-06T03:34:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: a US Navy Seal team starts, Osam al Qaeda Chief bin Laden after he went to his bedroom, according to American officials. Grab the two guns, AK-47 Assault rifle and a Makarovpistol--Us officials already have said that bin Laden was unarmed when he was shot dead Sunday s during the operation, but the arms now displays the new information on why the assault team decided to kill Bin Laden insteadthe attempt to capture him, to survive.

U.s. Congressman Jim Langevin said: They were not armed, the Administration has confirmed that the weapons were room but, as the case may be.

One of the Senate, who asked not to named, said the weapons Search, had increased the seal unit s fears that bin Laden's Return peacefully, the Sun reports.

Critics who questioned the slamming why bin Laden shot dead an unarmed, the US official said: "Our special forces raiding weren t girl scout troop looking for overdue library books. They were to kill Osama Bin Laden for the operation.

The condition of anonymity, Us officials said the talks, the details of what happened were clearer, now that the kokemasta attack group debriefing.

-ANI

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Bad Cholesterol is also vital for the health

2011-05-06T03:30:00.000-07:00

LDL is called "bad" cholesterol because it is the tendency to create the walls of the arteries, blood flow, which often leads to heart disease and heart attacks slowly.

HDL or high density Lipoprotein, cholesterol is often called the ' good ', often helps, delete the bad cholesterol in blood vessels.

Steve Riechman, Texas A & M University Professor-led study of LDL is made in the last few years, the Villain.

"Simply can remove all the" bad "cholesterol in the body, without any serious problems that occur," he said.

Riechman, and colleagues examined the 52 60-year-old-69, who were in healthy adults, but are not physically active, and none of them was involved in the training program in gerontology is reported by a journal.

The investigation showed that, after a fairly strong workouts, the participants, who had been the most muscle mass also had LDL (bad) cholesterol, very unexpected results in the best possible "and that has surprised us," said the statement from the University of California at Berkeley.

"It shows that you need to get some more muscle mass in LDL. There is no doubt, you need both LDL-and HDL-and the truth is, (cholesterol) are all good, "said Riechman.

Cholesterol is all the human and the body fat around the type. A person's level of total cholesterol and HDL LDL include the cholesterol.

"LDL serves a very useful purpose. It serves as a warning sign that something is wrong and it gives these warning signs of life. It makes it work, how it is intended.

"People often say, I want to get rid of all my bad (LDL) cholesterol, but it is, if you did you would die," added the Riechman.

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Pakistan defends ties with us, warns India

2011-05-06T03:27:00.000-07:00

Pakistan responded to the Indian defense officials claim that India is capable of carrying out activities such as the United States, saying that such a catastrophe and misadventure can bring Pakistan s defence property does not appear to underestimate the danger of the situation of Osama.

Osama bin Laden, the 54-year-old fight against international terrorism and the United States on 9/11 attack was killed in the firefight, the architect of Pakistan's border city of Abbotabad compound of his hideout in the US Navy seals and the CIA, in the form of a contribution at the sitting.

Reiterates that the activities of the United States was a covert operation and Pakistan have been consulted, Bashir said, in their relations with the United States is the nose-diving, his knowledge.

He said unilateral action is not the right way, but wavered by what to do if the US, Pakistan again holed in Pakistan in the second, the objectives of the fight against terrorism a clear answer.

IT must be assessed in the light of the historian. I am saying, if it is legal or illegal, said Bashir, is on us to do it again, if necessary, statements.

Bashir s expression clearly shows Pakistan s helplessness in Slamming, not even orally, without informing the Islamabad Osama operation USA.

He said cooperation with the United States is a two-way street and that international law, in cooperation with the US, and we are bigger domain looks forward to this cooperation.

The infringement of our sovereignty, according to the new xeno is amply clear from the opposition, he said.

It is important to continue the cooperative mode, and red lines not to cross, he said.

Bashir and the legal issues raised in the context of the moral and the Charter of the United Nations and the principles of the UN Security Council resolutions but stopped, and referred to in the us in a strong way, Slamming.

Referring to his recent us visit, he said: We have strategic partners, he said, the ties nosedived, according to our understanding.

The ratio is the lowest stage, that is not entirely true, he said.

We have an excellent exchange of views, he said, referring to his recent visit to Washington.

IT is in the right direction, he said.

He said Osama bin laden is history and the development of the 2 may should be reviewed in the context of the right. ?

He said, Slamming Media is unwarranted ISI. He said the Government, and the ISI gave any cover to Usama.

He thanked the fight terror against the ISI, and said, what had happened to General Intelligence error, but this is not a value judgement.

He said, there is no reason not to mistake that Pakistan, the Pakistan presidency of the people hold dear to them for their individual ambition.

The nation as a whole and the State institutions is determined to maintain the sovereignty, he said that Osama was the covert actions and Pakistan had heard.

Into India, he said: There should be a wrong impression of our defense capabilities. There should be a misunderstanding of this account.

The Indian defence chief s attention, that India is capable of naming India, for the purpose of carrying out the operation without such surgical, he warned, the terrible disaster that unilateral action or misadventure.

We See a lot of bravado in the area. ... Are the phrases that have become ... from the army. .. in the air force ... which indicates that this will be repeated. We think that would lead to a terrible misadventure in the sort of disaster, he said, referring to the Indian army officials "bragging".

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Women only fest in Peshawar

2011-05-06T03:22:00.000-07:00

Islamabad, may 6: three days of the date on which the social and cultural event for women began in Peshawar on Friday.The Festival, called the ' Huner-i-hawwa ', is the most delicious food, music, and innovative games.

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which organizes the event, Tourism Corporation said it wanted to bring women to all levels of Government and to offer them the opportunity to interact and get to your home.

Zehra Alam, principal, said that the owners are women.

Outdoor fashion show will present the future designers of talent.

The exhibition area of competitions for the painting, cooking, mehndi Bridal Suite, Souvenirs/Gift shop, and Makeup.

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Pretty girls motivated to join the acting school of Pattinson

2011-05-06T03:17:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: actor Robert Pattinson, who is the "Twilight Saga" dating actress-Kristen Stewart, the opportunity to meet quite says, of the girls was one of the factors encouraging him to join the work of the school."I suppose it was quite a number of things-girls? The angle of the theatre was in my house. I think that it was always something I wanted to do, but I thought that it was a rather pretentious-for children, the school does not have in mind, but I wanted to do it secretly outside the school, "quoted him as saying the contactmusic.com.

"I liked the environment Only. Worked for about three years, the backstagelta, and just watched all the, and then I made a couple of plays and I got one of the Ombudsman plays, completely at random, "he added

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End the FDI, says Bangladesh's apparel industry

2011-05-06T03:14:00.000-07:00

Bangladesh garments manufacturers and exporters Association (BGMEA), industry, the tip of the trade, for the purpose of the tax relief is also worshipped.

"Please, we do not want to remain in the area of FDI clothing. Local manufacturers are not able to compete with foreign manufacturers. Because, unlike the local manufacturers of aliens to receive the tax benefits of the holiday and all service fees, including power, gas and water, the export of industrial areas, such as "BGMEA President Shafiul Islam Mohiuddin said pre-budget meeting with the national Government and the revenue (NBR).

BGMEA leaders submitted proposals to the Chairman of the NBR Nasiruddin Ahmed of the next national budget in the new age newspaper reported.

The local clothing manufacturing units are involved in 92% of the clothing that the President of the country of export, the BGMEA said.

Garment exports, a profit margin is also reduced by 30-35% to 42% growth in exports, despite the current financial year, during the first eight months, because the banks are charging 15-17% of industry interest, he added.

Body demanded sales tax holiday and other facilities, to reduce the foreign and local entrepreneurs a huge disparity between.

In the last three decades, developed a number of premium content providers of apparel industry has attracted foreign investment in South Korea, Taiwan and Japan, among other things, that set up the units with advanced computer.

With the knitwear garments industry content providers, earned USD 12 billion last year.

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Pillay's concern about Bahrain crackdown

2011-05-06T03:09:00.000-07:00

The trial of the military courts of civilians is always cause for concern. Without proper procedure, and then in the secrecy of the trial is illegal and absolutely unacceptable to the application of the death penalty, respect for human rights Navi Pillay High Commissioner said in a news release.

The defendants are entitled to fair trials in civilian courts, in accordance with the requirements of international legal instruments, and the Bahrain international human rights obligations of s, where he will be added.

Bahrain has a number of Nations in the Middle East and North Africa, which has been rocked this year by protests calling for increased democracy, the rule of law refor, and Government s crackdown on Klimaflüchtlinge must be affixed to the criticism of UN officials, including the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, which is the largest safety device called for dialogue and called on the inclusion of all parties.

On Wednesday, the Ministry of Justice of the Bahrain s announced that 23 and 24 of the doctors and nurses from the Salmaniya medical complex are duly tried war legal fees unlicensed protests including participation in and instigation of hatred against the Government.

Last week four of the demonstrators were sentenced to death and three to life imprisonment, two of the policemen alleged the killing. This took when reportedly held without their families, arbitrary and limited access to lawyers.

In addition, hundreds of people reportedly detained in the Protest movement, including teachers, lawyers, journalists and bloggers, medical professionals, artists, activists and members of political bodies, the Office of the High Commissioner (OHCHR) s.

The Government has submitted a final rough estimate of the number of persons in detention, the 400, but OHCHR has received the information that the number may be greater than 1 000, of which more than 50, the place of residence is unknown.

Pillay, that he is at least four people in custody in particular concerned about the reported deaths. There has to be in these cases, the death in detention of independent investigation and torture allegations. Bahrain authorities must stop the intimidation and harassment of human rights defenders and political activists, by ensuring that their civil and political rights protected.

He called on the Government, as a matter of urgency, an independent, impartial investigation and to bring all those who were responsible for assaulting and killing demonstrators and legal protection, the Government repeated its request to allow OHCHR-assessment mission to the country.

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With allergic Cough's iconic hand than the reaction to the killing of Osama more outbreaks of foot facial image: Hillary Clinton

2011-05-06T03:04:00.000-07:00

Now he fears that his demeanor expressive photo, the White House situation room may have less to do with national security than one might think.

CBS News quoted him as saying in Rome, Italy: "I am a little concerned, on the other hand, sheepishly was my one of my early spring to prevent allergic cough."

He added: "so, it may not in any great significance."

Arresting photo took the White House photographer Pete Souza at the same time, Obama and his national security team monitor the tight military operation which led to bin Laden ' s death.

It describes the Clinton staring intently at the front, covering his mouth with his hand.

Set the top photo editors ' judgment on Clinton ' s expression, one of the most important and effective element of the photo.

Kira Pollack, time ' ' s Director of photography, said: "his hand over his face in the reaction. His eyes. Clearly, he '' s something he ' safety ' s watching. "

"To me, that the size of the image is about Hillary," Pollack added.

Scott Hall, photography, Newsweek, the Director of the expression in much of the picture '' s mystique Clinton ' s-expression.

He said: "what happens to the mystery '' s use of the camera captured Hillary '' s face." clause

Clinton, however, said: "the type of oil the deck were 38 minutes. I do not know what the US had, in particular, consideration will be given to the millisecond, "the picture was taken.

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Blackhawk pilot quick thinking helped the Navy seals, the full operation of Usama to kill

2011-05-06T03:00:00.000-07:00

Washington, may 6: the elite Army unit known as Task Force 160 is effectively out of the Navy seals and flying to the Group of 6, which was involved in Al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden following the killing.In particular, the CBS News one Blackhawk helicopter pilot may have been the difference between success and failure, reports.

The seals quickly about the rope in front of the courtyard of the farm ' bin Laden ' s in the House when the Blackhawk lost lift. Imagine what would have happened if it had crashed with all seals in the courtyard of the farm, still on the boat.

Ex-military Chris Marvin has said the pilot had the talent and skill to land the aircraft safely and without injury.

The pilot, nudged forward controlled Blackhawk crash, but it sheered off part of the tail.

The seals had the opportunity to continue their mission, and before they left, as much as possible, as the Blackhawk blew them to but was tail section intact.

-ANI

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Usama was the railway network in the United States attack

2011-05-06T02:55:00.000-07:00

In New York in May 6: Al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden appeared to directly draw from the terrorist attacks on the anniversary of his hideout Abbottabad, Pakistan, where the railway network in the United States attack since 9/11 is his primary target.After evaluating your computer files and documents, compound where bin Laden was killed in the American intelligence analysts seized was found in a manuscript notebook, February 2010, which deals with the päästöjenvalvontatietokoneeseen on the tracks derail train bridge, possibly jouluaUusi Year, the date of the Union address s or 11. disc 2001 attacks this tenth.

But they said there was no evidence of a plot, The New York Times reports.

Obama administration official said the documents about the attacking things were the first Arabic measurement currency and analyzed. Materials with other intelligence cache again by intelligence officials, much more complex picture of the Qaeda network management Elite member s as he tried to elude the General dragnet.

He wasn t only a figurehead. He continued to plot and the objectives of the plan and communicate these ideas to come up with ideas for other senior Qaeda leaders said one American official, speaking on condition of anonymity, had laid down penalties for the documents.

Abbottabad to American officials in the compound, according to the documents taken, indicate that Bin Laden's terror network, he was in regular contact with.

-ANI

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Lahore High Court allows you to enumerate the data of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Pak as the defendant petitions Hafiz Saeed

2011-05-06T02:50:00.000-07:00

Lahore, may 6: Lahore High Court has allowed for the Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, the Chief may enumerate the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Pakistan, as the defendant in his petition seeking government defends him to the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks in the context of the Court of the United States., instructionsSaeed, his operational commander Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, Phare Intelligence (ISI) Chief Lt Gen Ahmad Shuja Pasha, his predecessor Lt Gen (r)-Nadeem Taj, ISI officials, Major Sameer Ali and Major Iqbal among American, appearing before a court in the case of a citizen of the United States Office of injured persons in the custody of the Tribunal and the four other heirsthe 26-year-old, who died. November 2008 terror strike.

During the court proceedings, the Deputy Attorney General Nasim Kashmiri said that Saeed s case, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which had not been made party to the case of the domain.

He said a petition was put at the disposal of the Ministry of defence, where the wrong selections were made, and the PHARE fund Intelligence (ISI), the defendant in a memo, although they were concerned the importance of the Nation reports.

DAG said that target was not related to the Ministry of defence and the ISI, which may be the reason that the Agency had presented the response in this regard, for an indefinite period of time.

DAG said also that ISI is a fully independent national institution cannot be forced to provide information about the document such as Hafiz Saeed delicate.

The Court shall be adopted in accordance with the time to file a new finance charge memo, the defendant in that regard, the Office shall give a petition aimed at the LHC, in order to respond to the notification of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, immediately on learning of the Ministry of Justice of the petitioner (s) for the defendant, also on the finance charge memo.

-ANI

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There is no need for any of the people's defense of Pakistan feel the demoralised: Salman Bashir capacity more than

2011-05-06T02:47:00.000-07:00

Bin Laden, who was outstanding in the capture of the Decade, was killed Sunday night in a top secret operation involving a small group of US Special Forces in the city of Abbottabad, is located 50 kilometres northeast of Islamabad and 150 kilometres to the East of Peshawar.

Many Pakistanis shocked their intelligence community '' s failure to Locate Bin Laden, were also angered by the armed forces ' s failure to detect us military helicopters, 40-minute raid Paris, participates in the sprawling compound on the most wanted terrorist.

The addresses of the grooming news conference, Bashir said that the Pakistanis should feel proud of their countries and institutions.

Pakistan's military and political leadership of s is very well equipped and aware of the requirements of the country's defense policy. Pakistan not demoralised in this respect, it seems the News quoted the Secretary as saying.

He said that the US action, which led to the killing of Osama bin Laden, was a covert operation and that the armed forces have not been consulted before the raid carried out by Pakistan.

Pakistan has adequate capacity to maintain himself/herself and the CIA-led operation was to protect the conversion. The helicopters managed participatory our radars. We have received the first information was when the helicopter crashed. Then we immediately reacted, the Secretary said that Pakistan's intelligence agencies have been able to identify the US helicopters in Pakistan's air space in response to the allegations.

Bashir was also found that the Phare Intelligence (ISI) is a brilliant record in the fight against terrorism, and emphasized its success against al-Qaida. He also rejected speculation that the ISI was to provide protection for the term and concept of bin Laden's absolutely wrong.

He pointed out, the ISI had collected intelligence which led to the formal terrorists such as Khalid Shiekh Mohammad arrest Rawalpindi and al-Qaeda operational Chief Abu Faraj al Libbi from Mardan.

The Bali bombings, was also involved in the intelligence agency from Abbottabad, he added, and also the judgment of the notorious terrorist in Pakistan from its spy agencies apprehending.

Bashir also claimed that the CIA and the ISI shared intelligence which led to the bin Laden hideout Abbottabad, add s to that, he sent the information for the identification of the bin Laden s courier, who led the Union to focus on the CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY INTER-SERVICES INTELLIGENCE.

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The border shootings: concerns Indian claim to Bangladesh on a daily basis

2011-05-06T02:44:00.000-07:00

Dhaka, may 6: the Indian claim that 40% of the total killed in the border illegally with the nationals of Bangladesh are the Indian was the leading newspaper expressed doubts Friday that the accused New Delhi, "lack of stability" in seeking to resolve the issue.The Daily Star editorial wondered what India Secretary Nirupama Rao had 40% of the image is currently being killed Indians.

"We're not quite sure how this image is a candidate. Even so, it evokes the Indian border force (border security force), tend to be the trigger-happy, disrupting ghost ", the newspaper said.

The South Asian neighbours, between the sensitive topic of the debate was revived India's Vice President Hamid Ansari, during the two-day visit.

This is the biggest by Indian dignitary during the past two years, and is considered to be part of the preparations for the visit of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh here later this year.

"For us in Bangladesh, this joint efforts to contain the problem, to talk about is something we have heard previously. Has been the need for guarantees that the delays aplenty, "the newspaper said.

Dhaka contends that the BSF has killed more than a thousand people over the last one.

The BSF men says, "to defend itself," the fire-goods, cattle, arms and drugs smuggling-till as many armed border crossing.

The editorial said: "these attitudes are revealed only in the absence of the seriousness of the problem as part of the information concerned. In turn, has to deal with the problem was the lack of willingness.

"All said and done, though, it is expected by the Ms. Rao gentle means killing the problem to the edge of the fresh new approach to the beginning. Let Bangladesh and India to get down to serious discussions for Shooting people at the side of the dead, raises the question of human rights, "the newspaper reported.

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My song ' Judas ' is not a religious statement: Gaga

2011-05-06T02:40:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: Pop Star Lady Gaga is being criticised for his new single Mary "Judas" in his advertising, but he says the song has nothing to do with religion. ""The Video is not the view of the religious statement. I can view it in a social statement. Can I view the culture statement. Metaphor has. It should be a Bible lesson "contactmusic.com quoted him as saying.

DJ White shadow, which is produced by the singer of the hit "born this way", is blasted through the track, which critics argued it is a copy of the Madonna is the Italian "Express yourself".

"I think that it was the bulls ** t organized. I think that is the height of one hundred pieces, and could place the BPM (beats per minute), and the loop and make them sound like nothing. Actually five songs out of the same song on the radio are exactly the same time. Just now. Why does anyone still bring that? That is f *** ing drug crime.

"How many people have been copying Gaga because she came out? Oh, I have the answer: all. Have you seen the painted face or on the other hand, the eye in Flash photos during the cover-ups-bolts? "

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We have not forgotten: Obama is the 9/11 Memorial

2011-05-06T02:36:00.000-07:00

Before laying Wreath Red, blue and white flowers to the 9/11 memorial site here in the memory of the killed person 3000-the al-Qaeda attack, President Barack Obama met terror attack, a Manhattan firehouse, he remembered the tragedy of the engine of the company's home-the survivors in a 54-year-old, who lost 15 members of the twin towers Collapse.

This is Obama's first visit to ground zero point, and he bowed to remember the horrific attack of the dead, according to the aircraft. He set a wreath in the tree that was planted there after its recovery from the 2001 foot in an attack on the huge rocks.

The Alliance survivors and emotional tribute to attack that occurs later in the 10-year long manhunt Osama bin Laden, and finally ended with the killing of terrorism concern that traffickers may be diverting Pakistani Abbottabad Monday in the wee hours of the attack on the diseased.

Speaking at the "Pride of Midtown" Firehouse, engine 54, ladder 4, Battalion 9, Obama said: This is a symbolic site for an additional victim, who had done the same: the terrible, almost 10 years ago. Of course, we cannot bring back to your friends, which was lost, and I know that each and every one of them grieve not only, but also has to deal with over the last ten years the members of their families, their children, trying to give them comfort, tries to give them support.

Speaking of the first Precinct police station here, Obama said the operation to send a signal to Abottabad-around the world that we never forgot the extra male, which was carried out on September 11th.

We will never have forgotten tragedy. we never have forgotten lives. We will never forget the courage you, which was shown by the NYPD, the fireman, the first of the defendants, he said.

My understanding is, everything was the same. And I know that you'll never forget. I know that it s difficult to fill the hole, which occurred as a result, you can lose Seriously that you had worked for so long. But what, I hope this weekend will have it in their hearts, says we keep; We have not forgotten; What we did what we said-it is going to do, we had; and that the Americans, even in the midst of a tragedy, had encountered together with the whole year, politics, party, different administrations, make sure that justice is done, he said.

And, so that by the time of the year, I know, you're much more likely to be adopted shall be bcomforted loved except those that were lost. You have a lot of their child is probably the children without a parent undertaking grew. And a lot of you can continue the exceptional acts of extraordinarily courageous--without fanfare, he said in an emotional speech a lot.

We did on Sunday, was directly connected to it, what to do every day. And I know that I speak for teams of military intelligence teams, which helped to get bin Laden, saying that, we know that the male and the courage that you show as well and that you have a team that will help us achieve our goal, but we can also keep the public safe every day, he said.

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UK transport trade unions can be "bribed" to prevent the strikes during the Olympic Games

2011-05-06T02:33:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: British Ministers have secret plans to buy off the militant trade unions to block traffic in the ' battle of the picking list for the 2012 Olympic Games up ".Yesterday, the hardline Rhetoric of the strengthen the rail maritime and transport (RMT) Union, when it ordered six of the walkouts, which is specified in the pipeline will cripple the capital s network in the coming weeks, the Daily Mail to inform the Government.

London Mayor Boris Johnson is called RMT leader Bob Crow harder to call strikes for the introduction of new legislation.

Senior Whitehall source, said the Ministers, however, were already held informal consultations of the members of the RMT provides information about the "decent wage rises next year during the Olympic Games cannot be carried out by the attacks in exchange for the contract.

He also said the new laws the strike could be counterproductive and lead to a series of industrial actions.

The move is likely to agitate for Johnson, who had branded the Prime Minister David Cameron as the lily livered-it does not restrain the power of trade unions this week.

-ANI

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Hexaware announces interim dividend of 25 pc FY11

2011-05-06T02:29:00.000-07:00

New Delhi, may 6: Hexaware Technologies Ltd, the IT service provider today announced interim dividend of 25% in the year 2011.Hexaware is a cash balance that exceeds 100 million dollars.

Therefore, the Government has informed the Liberal dividend policy to reward its shareholders with more than 84,000.

In addition, the company's Board of Directors declared a dividend of Rs 0.50 tab/share (25%) of the shares of Rs 2 each, said in a statement.

The record date is fixed for 28. May 2011, this interim dividend for shareholders. This interim dividend shall be paid to eligible shareholders 3. June 2011.

Rs 1.40 a final amount of the dividend per share (70%) by the year 2010 had been approved, 27. April 2011 annual meeting of the general meeting and is now the complete right to shareholders.

Total dividends for the year 2010 was Rs 2.00/share (100 percent), with the exception of Rs 1.00 special dividend (50%), for a period of not more than Rs. 40/share (70%) in 2009, it said.

-UNI-

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Halle Berry fragrance filled

2011-05-06T02:25:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: actress Halle Berry, who has created three successful perfumes, are valid for the duration of the year FiFi Awards with the fragrance of a celebrity."for years I have created my own personal fragrances fragrances, mixing and stacking, to become one of the unique and try different. It is a great form of self-expression, and I am as good as it gets, that you share these fragrances, with consumers around the world ", femalefirst.co.uk gave Berry as saying.

His three perfumes is called Halle Halle Berry, pure Orchid and disclose.

The fragrance Foundation each year selects a US one of the celebrity, which shall in particular contribute to the industry to attract shoppers, including Paris Hilton, and Usher in the last few winners.

Black Eyed Peas star Fergie is presented with a new fragrance for the prize in a celebrity, the Outspoken, even legendary designer Jean Paul Gaultier will receive a Hall of Fame award.

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Radioactive materials leaked into the Pacific from Fukushima to reach US: the IAEA:

2011-05-06T02:22:00.000-07:00

In Vienna in May 6: the International Atomic Energy Agency has said that the plant leaked radioactive substances into the Pacific Ocean, Fukushima Daiichi nuclear crippled in Japan is expected to be achieved by the United States and Canada in one of the West Coast, or two years.The number of substances, however, is expected to be too small to affect human health, the Japanese news agency Kyodo quoted the IAEA's official, as saying.

Radioactive substances is also in the light of the nuclear plant that had crippled 11. March of the massive earthquake and tsunami, the leakage of the atmosphere and the whole was established in the northern hemisphere and southern hemisphere.

-ANI

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Mussolini fights Berlusconi n ' bums ' best women's "micro-penis" with the offensive

2011-05-06T02:17:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: Benito Mussolini granddaughter, Alessandra Mussolini threatens to fight the "sexism" by male members of the Parliament of the micro-penises.Benito Mussolini, 48, made the decision to initiate countermeasures in combating sexist male colleagues of Silvio Berlusconi s Party brutalize a cameraman after that they were preparing a list of the best bums parliament.

He had been from the PDL (Liberty of the people) MP Giancarlo Mazzuca, and asked how he felt about to put in the best (women 's) listed five behinds.

The list is the Panorama magazine, a weekly owned by the news of the rag, the aging of Italy s premier will appear.

I had no idea what he meant, the independent, La Repubblica quoted as reporting another MP, Benito Mussolini as tells, as the case may be.

The fifth-ranking person who had proposed the most legislation, perhaps? He replied: the Legislation? We are talking about I m the number of bums and you would be in the position of the five, he revealed.

Benito Mussolini, who was furious, two senior Berlusconi s yliluutnantin and learning that one seemed aware of the drop-down list, select the method of chilling threat issued rushed.

This article has been published in a single line, if you permit, I will write an article of their own classification, L Espresso, how long or short micro-penises are among our male members of Parliament, he said.

Shall be determined on the basis of Benito Mussolini said, he had already started to make jokes about the male parliamentarians, well within earshot PDL's own resources.

-ANI

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Bulgaria: the comprehensive nuclear-test-ban calls on youth to join in building a safer world in the UN

2011-05-06T02:13:00.000-07:00

Realizing these goals is not easy. It means the investment when the dividends may not immediately. The use of the actual wage may become the line down. But only if the bold measures are taken now, ban told a group of users, Sofia University, Bulgaria, where he had been invited to speak, his vision of the world for the next two decades.

He said the current generation is the first, the means and the know-how of the global poverty, such as leikkaisi, he stressed the importance of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which was laid out by the world's leaders 10 years ago hyvinvointijärjestelmä known as the roadmap.

He said progress had been made in the reduction of extreme poverty, development, the possibility to primary education, women, the improvement of the health of mothers and children, the killer diseases such as AIDS and malaria and to protect the environment.

Like never before, in the context of the fight against poverty and the promotion of growth in the developing countries to create jobs and growth back home. How to build the prosperity of the new generation that s

The prohibition on the use of the environment, told the students, faculty members and dignitaries gathered at a University, without the consequences of the consumption of days have passed.

Our test is green in our economies to reduce emissions, and clean energy growth, he said. Green economy goals requires connecting among climate change, water, energy, food security and other fundamental challenges for the 21st century, according to the points that one problem solutions, solutions for all.

The power of nuclear safety, the Secretary-General said, the public and the growing number of Governments are realizing that the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons to bring only the illusion of security.

As long the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons exist, we live in a danger: nuclear proliferation of the nuclear war of catastrophic accident or terrorism. The only way to remove these risks is to eliminate nuclear weapons.

He recalled his visit to Ukraine last month to mark the disaster there for 25 years, the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the site tells the audience that he called a top to bottom review of nuclear safety standards.

For the purposes of the comprehensive nuclear-test-ban recommended greater role for the UN International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on nuclear safety issues, and stressed the importance of natural disasters, and nuclear safety of the connection. He is also a new cost-benefit analysis called the nuclear energy and nuclear safety, nuclear safety and emphasized the connection between the two.

Remind you of your democratic transition from the Bulgarians in 1989, the author of Genesis, the prohibition of the development of the then current compared to the events of North Africa and the Middle East, where people require more civil and personal freedo

Visiting Tunisia and Egypt recently, I saw a fresh possibility that euphoria Bulgaria was two decades ago, he said in the same sense.

These are the most opportunities to represent the one of the rounds to promote human rights and democracy in a generation. Are properly handled, they may become a model for similar transformations throughout North Africa and the Middle East.

But he noted the success of these social transformations cannot be expected to require the entire international community and to consolidate a strong support.

Bulgaria has much to offer the democratic process. You know how difficult it is to build a democracy the transformation of the police State economies to extract and create the rule of law.

I hope, as this new generation of revolutionaries, to understand their drea to join the United Nations and other

Previously, on Thursday, Prime Minister of Bulgaria, of the prohibition also meets the Boyko Borisov, the Sofia Mayor Yordanka Fandakova and s Tsetska Tsacheva, Chairman of the National Assembly, the country s. His visit to the Eastern European nation on Friday

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77% of Americans say Obama was born in the US: Poll

2011-05-06T02:09:00.000-07:00

Washington, may 6: the Americans who believe that President Barack Obama was born in the United States, the percentage rate increased significantly, when he published the birth, the new Washington Post poll has revealed.CBS News quoted as saying that 77% of Americans believe Obama was born in the United States, now, 68 percent a year ago. Eighty-Six percent say it is at the very least, their best guess He was born in the United States.

Those who say Obama is likely to be born abroad has fallen to 20% of the annual report of the Post-ABC, then to the 10% of the new query, even if only one percent of the respondents say they have "solid evidence" to support that belief.

CBS News/New York Times survey will be carried out in mid-April, before the long form birth certificate, State-of-the-art it was found that one in four Americans, including nearly half of the Republicans, Obama was born in the United States is believed to be wrong outside of the publication.

-ANI

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The Indian move to Mumbai after the masterminds in Pakistan? WE will make sure that the

2011-05-06T02:04:00.000-07:00

"I do not want to speculate too highly the activities, which was clearly the unique history of the United States and world history," State Department spokesman Mark toner told reporters Thursday when asked if it encouraged India to adopt similar measures, 26/11 elements in Pakistan.

"We had a private individual, who was possibly the greatest man in the world and was the most serious crimes perpetrated against the citizens of the only American citizens, but around the world," he said

"I do not want to draw too broad a picture here," toner said. "What we've all along is that this was the single, when we had actionable under the intelligence, we are against him, because we have believed he had a direct and immediate threat to the United States."

Within certain individuals were from Pakistan attacked the Indian Parliament, and who were responsible for the hundreds of people in Mumbai, the color of the substance, said he was aware of these cases.

"For us cooperation in the fight against terrorism with India and Pakistan is in progress, and we believe that it is for exactly such elements," he said.

But the color of the substance to be made clear that the us again to perform a similar operation, despite warnings from Islamabad that Pakistan's sovereignty more violates the warrant review of military intelligence, where necessary, the cooperation with the United States.

"I can only say that our position is quite clear that we believe this individual was a direct threat to the United States and the United States, as well as the citizens of the world," he said. "And when we have the intelligence, actionable under the intelligence activities to such we going."

Dye said the Administration had, Obama reaching out to Congress to listen to their concerns and passes them to the members of the Government of Pakistan.

"These are the concerns that we share, honestly, these concern possible assistance-that he (Osama) have been", but Washington is believed to be that "it is our fundamental interests, to continue such cooperation" with Pakistan.

"I think we've committed to this relationship. We believe that our national interest. That said, we are quite clear in our concerns and we will Wait to hear the response. "

(Arun Kumar can be contacted at: arun.kumar@ians.in)

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Delhi wants Dhaka ties to achieve the highest possible Summit

2011-05-06T02:01:00.000-07:00

Visiting Vice President Hamid Ansari, expressed this Hope at the same time, the President Zillur Rahman.

"Bangladeshi relations more and more powers of decision shall be as set out in the coming days as we share many things in common, including the culture and history," Ansari said Thursday.

Ansari arrived here Thursday, a two-day visit to the birth of the 150th anniversary of the Nobel Prize in Physics for his discovery of the poet Rabindranath Tagore to the interface.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is scheduled to start with the celebrations of the common later Friday.

At this time, Rahman said, "excellent" in the light of the State of bilateral relations were between the two countries and Bangladesh attached great importance to the protection of the "it" in ties, India, Bangladesh Sangbad Sanstha (BSS), the official news agency reported.

This is the first high level visit to Bangladesh, the Indian delegation, led by the Awami League, when the Government took office in January 2009.

The visit is considered to be the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India, the preparation for the voyage later this year.

Rahman thanked Ansari of Bangladesh to join Tagore's birth anniversary celebrations coming soon.

He expressed the hope that the joint celebrations continue to deepen the friendship of the peoples of the two countries.

The Chairman is known as a reliable friend of Bangladesh, India, and remember, the Indian Government and the people of that country's crucial support for the war in 1971.

Ansari said, India had supported Bangladesh during its war in 1971 "as a moral responsibility," the Daily Star said.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina also met with the former diplomat, Ansari, who has worked in Bangladesh, although, the Indian Foreign Service.

The two leaders discussed a wide range of bilateral issues, trade and business expansion, as well as two further markkinalähtöisemmässä of the cultural heritage with neighbouring countries creates the Press Secretary Abul Kalam told newspersons.

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"Bad" cholesterol, is actually "good"

2011-05-06T01:56:00.000-07:00

Almost always known as the bad LDL-cholesterol because it is the tendency to create the walls of the arteries, causing the blood flow, which often leads to heart disease and heart attacks.

But the researcher Steve Riechman Texas A and M University said, serves a very useful purpose in the LDL. It serves as a warning sign that something is wrong and it gives these warning signs of life. It does its work in a way, it is supposed to.

Led by the University of Pittsburgh study Riechman, Kent State University, the Johns Hopkins weight Management Center and the Northern Ontario School of Medicine colleagues.

They will be examined in the light of the age of 52 adults-60 to 69, which were generally good, but the physically active, and none of them had been involved in the training program.

The investigation showed that, after a fairly strong workouts, the participants, who had been the most muscle mass also had a (bad) LOW-DENSITY LIPOPROTEIN-cholesterol, which, in order to make the best possible Riechman said, a very unexpected result and one that surprised us.

IT shows that you need to get some more muscle mass in LDL. There s no doubt you need both LDL and HDL-and the truth is, (cholesterol) are all good. You can simply can t remove all of the bad cholesterol in the body, without serious problems, he said.

People often say, I want to get rid of all my bad (LDL) cholesterol, but it is, if you did you would die.

Our tissues are cholesterol and LDL to HDL, the good cholesterol. immediately after the repair is done. And add your own blood LDL is better is to build the muscle during resistance training.

The line is that LDL man-of-war-a reminder, that is something is wrong and we must find out what it is, he added.

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The dead have not publish images of Usama conspiracy theorists: Rogers

2011-05-06T01:51:00.000-07:00

Washington, may 6: the United States has decided not to release the dead Osama bin Laden, the officials believe the United States because, inter alia, the most ardent work of even the disbelievers, not by forcing the evidence of his killing.Al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, who was outstanding in the Decade to capture the top-secret Sunday night died in the operation involving a small group of US Special Forces in the city of Abbottabad, is located 50 kilometres northeast of Islamabad and 150 kilometres to the East of Peshawar.

Conspiracy theorists from around the world is only a claim the photos are doctored, Dispinterface Gossip quoted Mike Rogers of the Senate, the US House of representatives Intelligence Committee, Republican Guard, the President, as saying.

Different but related problem faces Pakistan bin Laden responsible for the killing of the consequences of the report said, adding that no matter what it says there is a lot of people who buy it.

-ANI

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US Lawmakers raise questions about Pakistan, but defend the support

2011-05-06T01:47:00.000-07:00

"We have to be granted to Pakistan is not an easy partner. But the kuulostanut distance ourselves from the impartiality meant Pakistan would be a wise and very dangerous, "Dick Lugar, the top Republican member of the Foreign Relations Committee, said at the hearing of the Senate during the United States on Thursday to assess the extent to which the visa policy in Pakistan-bin Laden after the killing.

"It undermines the United States of America and the United States intelligence capabilities to restrict and prevent the conflict between India and Pakistan and further complicate your military action in Afghanistan, searching for the terrorists to stop cooperation and remove the safety of its engagement with Islamabad on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons," he said.

Defend, send money Islamabad after bin Laden hiding in Pakistan, were found in the Area admitted that it raised questions about the reliability of Pakistan as the ally, but cautioned that it is "a strategic country in which we operate."

Too democratic Committee Chairman John Kerry, said that even if he is, "unusual" about Pakistan's military or intelligence services were involved in protecting the parts bin Laden, the US should not rush the judgment that could ultimately hurt its national security.

"Does not matter, what about the events which would require killing Osama bin Laden, we are still essential national security interests in this region, and we have worked hard to build Pakistan, sensitive and difficult, and can be challenged, because sometimes the partnership," Said Kerry.

The u.s. Institute of Peace in South Asia Adviser Moeed Yusuf called for pragmatism and realism in US Pakistan's expectations. "Pakistani relations will never be a" good ". But they are still necessary, "Yusuf said.

"There are things that money can't buy. In the case of Pakistan, and their strategic thinking is, "he said. "India and Pakistan, normalization is critical of Pakistan, but it does not have our support, which is expected to do the trick," he said

The US military and aid in Pakistan has a total of approximately USD 20 billion over the past decade. After Monday's raid, many have questioned what the United States for the purpose of the payment.

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Better with age, says Cameron Diaz

2011-05-06T01:42:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: actress Cameron Diaz thinks that he is getting "better" with age, such as the problems of life is to improve on his person."I think you can get better as you age. You know what you want, and you, mentally and Syndicalism in physically. But there are also things have happened recently have pushed me to grow. My father died, and the commitment period that really made me think about my life and how you want to live, "Diaz told Cosmopolitan Magazine.

the 38-year-old also said that he does not care about how people perceive, in his reports, femalefirst.co.uk. "It's my life and I live it the way I want."

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When the iPhone, a game-changer PaperPhone is here!

2011-05-06T01:37:00.000-07:00

Dubbed the PaperPhone, this Smartphone 9,5 cm diagonal thin film flexible screen is the forerunner to a paper-thin handset and in the future, according to the researchers, the tablets.

This smart phone users Start Guide do the touch screen or buttons on the call, play music, Zoom the google maps or flip through e-books. Instead, the goal of bending angles of commands, or the right edge of the rolling it forward or backward. Bending in different ways in different commands to start the sensors.

The researchers say, it does all the smart tags, such as the phone enough store of books, music, or make phone calls.

Since the display is much more flexible form of the current mobile device for portable and your pocket with shape, because it senses its format.

"This is the future. All are intended to be displayed and the feel of this, within five years, in accordance with the lead researcher, ' ' Roel Vertegaal.

"You have to interact with the bending it in a mobile phone, the angle of the rotation of pages or write to the pen." In the printers and the users can store and work with documents on these mobile devices is greater than the version on the other hand, say the researchers, or the Smart Start Guide has offices in the future of phones require the invention of paper.

"The Paperless Office is here. All data can be stored digitally and to place these computers in much the same way as at the top of the stack of paper, or throw them around the desk, "says Vertegaal, which is the human Media Lab at the University of Queen's University at Kingston.

Researchers have also developed a wearable computer, which bends around the rannettasi. When you delete it, you can use it to Notepad, says Vertegaal.

"It knows what the format is. It knows it is no longer a connection to the ARM architecture. Now you're using it in Notepad, so change it to Notepad, ' ' the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation to purchase him as saying.

Calling the game changing technology, he says, it's five to ten years in the mass market.

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Few changes seen on food prices: UN Apr

2011-05-06T01:33:00.000-07:00

FAO: food price index average of 232 points in April, when it fell to Mar the eight months of consecutive increases, then the almost unchanged. It was, however, not yet 36% higher than it was in April 2010, the news release is told in the Rome-based agency.

Sugar prices and the decline in the index of the rice to stabilize, but helped almost all the other food commodities to international prices were considered closed.

(A) of the sliding dollar and oil prices are high, as the case may be, to contribute to the monitoring of foodstuffs intended for human consumption in the prices of raw materials, in particular in the grains, said David Hallam, Director, FAO s trade and market-sharing.

With continued strong demand, prospects for the return to more Normal prices hinges greatly depends on how much production is increasing in 2011, and how much of the grain reserves are consolidated with the new season, he added.

FAO: N cereal price index average of 265 points, 5.5% more than in Mar, and the last of more than 71% Apr of maize prices increased by 11. atmospheric distillation and wheat increased by 4% in the last month as a result of bad weather and planting delays.

Grain prices were more than offset Apr by Mel counts, milk products, sugar and rice, while the prices of oils and meat were mostly unchanged, according to FAO.

The Agency said, referring to the most recent entries in the recovery plan for the World cereals production in 2011, provided that the more normal weather. Wheat production is expected to rise to 3.5% and 3% of the rice.

Although the outlook at the beginning of 2011, cereals production is good, the weather is critical in the coming months, FAO said Abdolreza Abbassian grain analysts.

Production 2010 prospects were very favourable last year at this time, but bad weather between July and October, the outlook changed dramatically as he noted, adding, among grain maize is the most worrisome.

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The US military contingent in Moldova, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Government of the call:

2011-05-06T01:30:00.000-07:00

Washington, may 6: in the Centre of Pakistan's decision to reduce the American military footprint in the country, the United States has said that its contingent there to perform, train and equip its military operations. At the invitation ofPakistan Al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, who was outstanding in the Decade to capture the top-secret Sunday night died in the operation involving a small group of US Special Forces in the town, located 50 kilometres northeast of Islamabad and 150 kilometres to the East of Peshawar.

Hakaniemi square on America s unilateral military operation against bin Laden in Pakistan, Pakistan has decided to cut the number of US Army contingent on its soil.

The Conference was informed of the General Headquarters in Rawalpindi, who was the Chairman of the Pakistan Army Chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, the Corps commanders decision to reduce US military personnel in Pakistan for at least the essential strength, Inter Services PUBLIC RELATIONS (ISPR) said in a statement.

When asked during the press briefing book to comment on the Pakistan Army s statement, which threatens to reduce the US military presence in the country, the work of the Deputy State Department spokesman Mark c. toner pointed out that the United States army personnel in Pakistan, the Pakistan army was to support.

Look, the relatively small Us army contingent that s in there, that there is at the invitation of Pakistan and they re do train and their activities in Pakistan, the army, he said.

(I) to (d) to refer to more detailed information on what Pakistan they ve said that he added the information.

-ANI

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Mendes, Watts, a new brand ambassadors from Pantene

2011-05-06T01:25:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: actress Eva Mendes and Naomi Watts has been appointed as the new celebrity Ambassadors for the brand, Pantene haircare.Mendes will Pantene: n, even if the strength of the collection at Watts to be seen as a fixed drive. Both will appear over each July.

"I put my hair irons, blow dryers and curling irons to torture, as well as the number of leaves my hair very corrupt. I use all of Pantene these tools and still keep my hair healthy. Is the amazing brand such as Pantene, which is to be honest; working with the photo shoot set is not the tricks. Each item was a natural and never treated and my hair looked healthy and beautiful, for each shot, "saying the quoted Mendes femalefirst.co.uk.

Watts, said: "do not want to give women the fine hair knows that to achieve the beautiful hair, broad, it is possible without damaging the hair or by adding the snap-ins. I am really blown away from research and science, which must be done in the Pantene. Regardless of the type of hair you will find the Pantene product that gives you the result you are looking for. "

Both of the actresses is displayed on the TV and print ads for the store displays, iMedia and public relations campaigns.

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China can benefit from the United States, Pak post-Osama killing suspicion

2011-05-06T01:20:00.000-07:00

Washington, may 6: China analysts have proposed that the United States and Pakistan, between the Al Qaida suspicion leading to Osama bin Laden after killing can be useful in Beijing.China has described the death of bin Laden's landmark event and said that it is a step in the right direction for the efforts of the terrorism and praised its Islamabad counter terror efforts.

Some influential Chinese analysts suggest that the atmosphere of suspicion to Pakistan to give Beijing its dependence on the United States, wean.

So long as Pakistan appeals to the United States, support for terrorism, it continues to suffer more attacks, regardless of whether or not, at least, claims Yan Xuetong, head of the Institute for International Affairs at the University of Tsinghua in Beijing Studies.

Pakistan is important for the international campaign against terrorism, the Foreign Ministry spokesman Jiang Yu of China said on Tuesday.

He adds: The Chinese Government firmly supports Pakistan in formulating and implementing the counter-terrorism strategies with the domestic market conditions.

China and Pakistan are old and close friends. Pakistan was one of the first countries to recognize the people's Republic of China to the People of the country s and stuck the international isolation of the 1960 s and 1970 s during the year.

The two countries have diplomatic relations with the Amiata is celebrating the 60 year anniversary this year.

We have common strategic interests, so we are stable, said Professor Yan.

He added: Both pages must be considered to be the edge of the safe limits of terrorism and stability maintenance of territorial balance.

-ANI

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Murdered Indian-origin of the mother of the bride Anni n plight still in trial version

2011-05-06T01:15:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: Anni Dewani, who was murdered on his honeymoon in Cape Town last year, his mother collapsed after her daughter's killing kauhistuttavat data were presented in court.Fifty-nine-year-old was rushed to the hospital Nilam Hindocha, after he fell ill, suffering from shock and stress, the Daily Express reports.

Anni s father, Vinod Hindocha, told the Court yesterday, the whole process relating to the killing of his daughter was having a devastating effect on his family s health.

In addition, he urged his son-in-law to return voluntarily in the Dewani Shrien of South Africa to face trial and ends his family s sufferings.

I say, Give us the Shrien, we need answers. You said that you have included. The South African authorities, the questions and let the court decide Belmarsh Magistrates Hindocha, said of the Court of London.

That you will be asked, why his wife was not present in court, said: She began Hindocha vomiting. He was in hospital last night and is pretty bad.

Dewani s extradition hearing adjourned till July 18.

-ANI

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After the Pakistanis know the real Osama raid: opposition

2011-05-06T01:12:00.000-07:00

Islamabad, may 6: the Pakistanis were "known insecure" in their own country following the US commandos in a raid, which killed the leader of the Al Qaida's Osama bin Laden, said the Leader of the National Assembly, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan.Khan criticized the Government Thursday for killing Osama, Abbottabad at some plausible over there, becoming an official response.

The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), the Director said, the whole world had been unclear in its action for annulment claim Pakistan Osama n through death.

Khan asked the national research the event, and added that the Government's "the mysterious silence", the event was to be forbidden, in order not to compromise the security of the State.

After this development, "every one of us is feeling insecure in their own country," Dawn quoted him as saying.

If the US special forces, the four helicopters can override the four airbases Abbottabad on the way to the right of action, including, but not limited to 40 minutes to complete and return, without any commitment on this side, "the people have a right to ask so many questions, which the Government must respond," he added.

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Pakistan's Prime Minister, the aircraft continues to snag the mid air

2011-05-06T01:07:00.000-07:00

Islamabad, may 6: Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf breed Raza Gilani's particular aircraft was returned to Paris after it developed a snag mid-air, it was reported here.The aircraft had developed a problem with the automatic pilot system, taking 15 minutes to Press Islamabad, Pakistan, the newspaper reported.

Gilani had gone to Paris for a three-day official visit.

The Media report, said that the special requirements of the Airbus A-310-300 aircraft, the type of the currently running Test, which Pakistan's VVIP flights of the air force to hit air traffic after the turbulence of the minutes and the auto-pilot, take the system also carries out the failed.

The aircraft began to pressure from one page to another, when it was in 1996.

The pilots managed to manually control the aircraft and decided to return to. The extra fuel was burned before the hour, and the side of the aircraft landed at Orly airport.

The airport is closed to air traffic at 11 p.m., but special arrangements had been made in Pakistan, the aircraft's landing.

The delegation will return home on a regular basis now PIA flight from Paris Friday evening.

The official was quoted as saying the aircraft could have gone to Islamabad was able to fly more smoothly after the initial problems.

The nature and the VVIP flight duration of eight hours, the decision was made, however, to take back.

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US Lawmakers to reform the Afghan troops pullout plans

2011-05-06T01:04:00.000-07:00

Washington, may 6: the death of Osama bin Laden may have contributed to the Democrat and Republican legislators in the United States renewed the withdrawal of American forces in Afghanistan, and calls for rapid, but both, is not yet a party s management support.Also, there is no such thing as a product of the structure of the force, in order to interfere with the Congress to focus on Afghanistan, The Washington Post reports.

We Re inept. We are inept and insignificant, Representative Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) said about the Congress, adding that the death of bin Laden would be in force at the end of the war, s-a reassessment of the fishing effort.

Too many of our colleagues are afraid to quote unquote soft terror Chaffetz said.

House Speaker John a. Boehner (R-Ohio) said, bin Laden's killing is the proof that Obama should take General David h. Petraeus counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan, s.

The war on terrorism, this is a critical safety and security of the American people. We face increasingly complex and dangerous threat of terrorism. And it s important that we remain vigilant. Obama has said that the withdrawal of troops will begin in July, but he has said how many or how quickly. Petraeus has warned that the recent battlefield gains, which the u.s. troops in Afghanistan is fragile and reversible, he added.

Progressive medical authority, six members of the standby brigades wrote a letter to Obama on Wednesday, it is recommended to have a significant drawdown u.s. forces this summer.

Neither of the leaders of the party s medical authority, however, showed the interest of the rapid withdrawal of the Afghan leadership.

Representative Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill), which was en route to Afghanistan days before bin Laden was killed, said the death of Usama s bolsters the fast against the withdrawal.

This is the end of the war in Afghanistan, the randomness of t. This is the Taliban and al-Qaida uppercut. But he stressed that now, when we re offense and now, that really do we re now profits, do not have time to reverse these gains, Kinzinger is added.

-ANI

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Paris Hilton is the mean value: Lindsay Lohan

2011-05-06T01:01:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: the principles of the market is the actress Mischa Barton reportedly branded socialite Paris Hilton in "means" for the fun of his jewelry theft case.Lindsay, who is currently facing a disciplinary procedure against theft to steal $ 500 2 allegedly necklace jewelry store in Los Angeles, California, is shocked about the Hilton cracked his new reality series "the World According to the Paris" episode of the joke.

TMZ.com reports that Lindsay has reacted and has organized the friends: "Paris is the mean value. You do not have to make fun of people's lives in serious matters is funny. "

Convicted of stealing necklace, Lindsay is likely to be sent to jail. Last week, he was also found guilty of his probation in connection with the case and was sentenced to 120 days in prison, where he was one of the features from the, and the community service 480 hours.

Paris and Lindsay have had a turbulent relationship since 2006, when the accused was in Paris to get too close to the ex-boyfriend, Stavros Niarchos.

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CIA spied bin Laden from Abbottabad safe house

2011-05-06T00:57:00.000-07:00

Washington, may 6: the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) reportedly maintained its spies to engage a broad control of the compound where the Al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden was killed by a group of Navy seals, the last Sunday of the month period. "safe-house in AbbottabadThe Obama administration, the Washington Post quoted the officials as saying that the secret CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY, the port facility has been used as the basis for most of human intelligence, that Pakistan, one of the data sources and other sources to synthesise the pattern of the life portrait of the seats and the day-to-day operations for the collection of the converters rely on the properties of the compound.

Is the surface of the control of the country-of-the-business intelligence-gathering was part of the pusher is acquired from August last year after the discovery of suspicious complex.

It comes with almost all of the classes in the US arsenal, the satellite pictures within the intentions of the recording of the sounds of eavesdropping the quantities of fish in the field of action of the collection.

The effort was so large and expensive that the CIA: N went to Congress in December to secure her tens of millions of dollars to fund the Agency's budgets within the assortment it authority, Us officials said.

For the most part, that, according to the surveillance of budgetary positions and the surveillance capabilities of the Office of the United States Navy remained the seals raid after 1 a.m. Pakistan.

Agency s safe house did not affect the role of the deck, and since has been shut down.

-ANI

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Lewis Hamilton vows to hunt Sebastian title competition

2011-05-06T00:53:00.000-07:00

London, may 6: Formula 1, Lewis Hamilton has vowed to fight the item does not ever, as he offers to take a step closer to purchase matching his F1 hero Ayrton Senna. The ACEShanghai catapulted him won the Hamilton s second positions, still 21 points to the Red Bulls s Vettel Sunday behind going into the competition, s Turkey.

I am a Hunter-he is in the quarry. I'm not as Sebastian, who has been for some time now, the fastest car and may arrive here, knowing he has the fastest car. He can go to a lot of different approaches, the Sun quoted him as saying, with the weekend.

I have received from the hustle and try and exploit any slip up, or they make an error in the grind. And I have to try and extract even more in my car. Keeping the momentum for us at this time is instead to win each race, is consistently finishing vocals, Hamilton said.

Hamilton for his 75 rows in the Grand Prix having chalked up to 15 win since 2007 debut this weekend.

Two other than his hero Senna managed in the same stage of his career-even if the Brazilian went on to win 41 times and get the three drivers.

-ANI

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Whether your wife too tired of sex "? Circadian rhythms to blame his faster

2011-05-06T00:48:00.001-07:00

London, may 6: women may be too tired for sex in the evening, because of their circadian rhythms are faster than men ' s, and so they have to go to, to sleep in the past, the new research.The six women '' to carry out on-the-minute faster than the men s circadian rhythms: a '' s, a much more likely is the early birds, night owls instead.

Harvard researchers have stated that the report on women in the early morning insomnia for about 50 pc more often than men. When they wake up, they have difficulties to go back to sleep.

It helps to explain why women are often even with the lark, even though their partners as part of the morning for a long stay on the slumbering.

However, women may end up in the patient group sleep only because of the faster they will try to sleep cycles and in the evening in the hotel before being woken prematurely by too much light in the morning too.

We found was that women's biological clock length was shorter on average than men, it was the Daily Mail quoted the cycle What Jeanne Duffy, one of the authors ' investigation ' s than tells NPR.

The average difference was approximately six minutes, he added.

According to Charles Czeisler, Professor of sleep medicine and the doctor is in the millions of women from the Harvard Medical is fighting their circadian rhythms faster on a daily basis.

Harvard Brigham and Women s hon hospital has released the findings of the investigation.

-ANI

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Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival

2011-04-10T00:11:00.000-07:00

Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival

Ind vs Pak: India beat Pakistan to reach World Cup final

2011-03-30T10:32:00.000-07:00

Ind vs Pak: India beat Pakistan to reach World Cup final

India v Pakistan:Wahab Riaz and Saeed Ajmal help keep hosts in check in World Cup semi-final

2011-03-30T06:21:00.000-07:00

India v Pakistan:Wahab Riaz and Saeed Ajmal help keep hosts in check in World Cup semi-final

Bollwood celebrities tweets on Ind-Pak Cricket match in Mohali

2011-03-30T00:10:00.000-07:00

Bollwood celebrities tweets on Ind-Pak Cricket match in Mohali

iPhone 4 Pre-Orders Start Shipping

2010-06-21T01:27:00.001-07:00

iPhone 4 day is almost upon us, and with four more days to go, some buyers are reporting that they’ve received shipment notifications from Apple.

MacRumors reports that these notifications carry a “Delivers by” date of June 23, although it’s possible Apple will delay those shipments one more day to match the release date.

All is not well in the realm of iPhone 4 pre-orders, however: There are numerous reports of legitimate orders being cancelled by both Apple and AT&T, perhaps related to the pre-order disaster last week.

Have you received either a shipment notice or a cancellation note for the iPhone 4? Let us know in the comments.

[img credit: MacRumors]

Why Feedback and Filters are Necessary in Social Media

2010-06-21T01:15:00.000-07:00

Howard Greenstein is a Social Media Strategy and Marketing consultant, and President of the Harbrooke Group. He’s also a national board member of Social Media Club.

We’ve all experienced that person who’s talking on his cell phone in public, in a voice that’s way too loud — on the train, in a restaurant, or walking down the street, screaming into the mobile, oblivious to the effect he’s having on the crowd nearby.

We rarely experience this with a land line phone. That’s because when we talk on a land line phone, “There’s a small percentage of our voice that’s fed back to us. It’s called “sidetone,” according to former Bell Labs scientist Dr. Steve Crandall. About 18 decibels of sound (the loudness of a whisper) comes back to us to give us an indication that our voice is being heard on the other side of the connection. When we have that feedback, we are less apt to make a spectacle of ourselves.

On social networks like Facebook () and Twitter (), as on cell phones, people often have no measurable feedback on the amount of shouting, over-talking, and noise they’re creating on the web.

“Our brains don’t adapt as quickly as the technology works,” said Pamela B. Rutledge, Ph.D., MBA, and director of the Media Psychology Research Center. “Humans have limited capacity to process information at any given time.”

Thus, individuals and businesses can miss out on the real value of these networks because the bare bones web interfaces don’t allow them to effectively filter, categorize, or otherwise make sense of the information. Like cell phone loud-talkers, we make noise and don’t realize it –- and we end up consuming useless noise from others instead of tapping into the real potential.

Clients have consistently asked, “How would I use Twitter? It’s just a bunch of people talking about esoteric and self-centered things, with no order or reason.”

However, given the right tools to filter conversations, such as hashtag trackers or column interfaces, they can soon figure out who’s talking, what is relevant, and get feedback on how their communication affects others.

The Problem of Inadvertent Noise Sharing

Popular social Facebook games like FarmVille and Mafia Wars were examples of unintentional noise sharing before Facebook stepped in to quiet them down. The keys to their widespread adoption were the auto-generated status messages that announced the success of players to their friends.

At first, most people didn’t realize that their exploits were being shouted from the virtual rooftops, annoying their friends. Many articles have been written informing people how to shut off the gaming broadcasts.

These problems have been mitigated by a slew of Facebook interface changes over the years, including news feed control options, friend lists, and application blocking. Yet they did not solve the root of the problem through feedback — that is, notifying the people who are generating the noise in the first place.

Rutledge told me that “For the amount of information Facebook is trying to coral, they have a very ineffective interface. They should be careful about assuming people are going to continue to be loyal to them. … [P]eople are not in love with Facebook. They’re in love with the contacts they’re able to maintain with other people via Facebook.”

When social media noise interferes with those connections, it could mean trouble for both users and the network alike.

Volume and Relevance

Sharing every whim, utterance and update indiscriminately risks a “boy who cried wolf” scenario. If all of your previous messages have been irrelevant or useless, the one you really want people to see will be ignored.

It can be even worse when networks are linked. A person whose every “Lol, Thx” tweet is echoed on his or her Facebook profile can end up with angry friends.

Matt Wallert, lead scientist at Churnless, studies decision making and works to figure out how people relate to information. He created the interface for the much touted personal finance website Thrive.

“As people, we’re designed to make decisions a certain way. We bring in information, and we process it, and then we make a judgment that leads to behavior. We’re efficient at filtering out peripheral information that our brain decides doesn’t matter,” said Wallert — for instance, our ability to hear one person talking to us in a crowded room. “Often in social media, all the information we get is given the same weighting or value. For example, on Twitter, all followers are treated with the same weight. You could easily miss the ‘friend’s husband died’ message because the ‘I just brushed my teeth’ messages’ overwhelm the truly relevant ones.

While the major social networks themselves can’t do much to push the most relevant information forward, developers are hot on the trail.

Prioritizing Your Updates

Imagine a world where we can set up useful, personal filters that enable us to prioritize certain kinds of messages, especially if they come from specific people. Xobni () and Rapportive do some analysis based on people you e-mail frequently, and their connections to you in other networks. Gist tries to tie your social graph from LinkedIn (), Facebook, Twitter, and Gmail () together, and rank the people you communicate with the most.

T.A. McCann, founder and CEO of Gist, told us that “Most of us have an inbox or three that are overwhelming, and the amount of personal communication is difficult to deal with … Most of us, irrespective of what stream we’re looking at, tend to look at it in chronological order. That might not be most effective — we should be looking at who is most important, and center the content around them. Gist is trying to help people prioritize by centering the information you get around the people or businesses you care about.”

These third party tools are very useful, but they’re also limited by the amount of openness and connectivity provided by the networks to which they connect.

Disclosure: Gist is a Mashable () sponsor.

Conclusion

In the future we see the possibility of tools that enable us to see our “noise impact” on social media — similar in function to Klout, and others that show our online influence or sentiment. Social networks may also choose to give us feedback when people “mute” us or “dislike” what we’re posting, perhaps anonymously or in aggregate, similar to the way Facebook’s Insights for Pages show the number of people leaving every week. This feedback, just like the sidetone on the old phones, may be just what we need to bring the volume down and allow us to make more sense of the social web.

Facebook Video Ads Win Over Gamers with Virtual Currency

2010-06-20T06:56:00.000-07:00

With a population approaching half of a billion users, if Facebook was its own nation it would be the third largest in the world behind China and India. With that in mind, it's no surprise that secondary activities on Facebook - like viewing videos - can still produce high rankings for the site that compete with the likes of Hulu and YouTube. One of the ways users on Facebook view video is through advertisements, and a recent study by TubeMogul revealed some interesting stats on which ones worked, and why.

TubeMogul studied the various forms of video advertising displayed throughout Facebook, including in-banner video, interstitial and virtual currency ads. Virtual currency ads are served to gamers who receive points or virtual money within a game in return for completing them, and they turned out to be one of the best methods of attracting traffic.

You Scratch My Back, I'll Scratch Yours

According to the study, around 43% of virtual currency ad viewers completed the entire ad, and roughly 52% watched at least three quarters of the ad. These numbers just barely inch out those of in-banner and interstitial ads, but where the virtual currency ads excel is in click-through and share rate. By rewarding viewers for completing ads, advertisers see a click-through rate double that of in-banner ads and over 5 times that of interstitial ads. Users share these ads on Facebook and Twitter roughly 50% more than in-banner ads and around 6 times more than interstitial ads.

Additionally, virtual currency ads are watched 6 seconds longer than in-banner ads on average, and nearly 5 times longer than interstitial ads. The most intriguing statistic from the study, especially for advertisers, is the price of these ads compared to how long they are watched. The study found that virtual currency ads average $0.22 per minute viewed, nearly identical to the $0.23 cost for interstitial ads. In-banner ads, on the other hand, averaged $6.27 per minute viewed.

How Facebook Ads Stack Up Against Web Benchmarks

But how do these Facebook ads compare to ads placed outside of the site. TubeMogul used an off site benchmark to gauge the advantage or disadvantage of using Facebook for video ads. The study found that Facebook users are nearly twice as likely to finish watching ads than they would outside of the site, but click-throughs for the benchmark ads were higher than in-banner and interstitial Facebook ads. Virtual currency and in-banner ads are watched between 9 and 15 seconds longer than offsite ads, but the offsite ads tend to be better value to advertisers than many Facebook-based ads.

Targeting Ads at User Behaviors

User behavior seems to play a large role in determining which Facebook video ads work the best. By rewarding game players with virtual currency, advertisers see higher click-throughs, longer watch times and higher value from their ads. Interstitial ads, which pop up as users navigate through games and apps, garner just a fraction of the view time and click-through rate despite being cheaper to implement.

Interstitial ads seem obtrusive to users since they only appear at the exact moment a user has clicked to navigate from one screen to another, so it makes sense that users close them quickly in frustration. By offering Facebook users with rewards for watching videos at their own discretion, advertisers attain much higher view times and click-throughs.

Google Docs Simplifies Collaboration With Sharable Links

2010-06-20T06:54:00.000-07:00

As Microsoft moves into the cloud with Web-based versions of its Office suite of applications, Google has been beefing up Google Docs to stay one step ahead. The Big G has just made it much easier to share documents online through the service's online document editor, Google Docs. Previously, users who wished to share documents with others had to send a formal invitation through email, but now sharing can be as easy as sharing a link. These changes come on the heels of enhanced collaboration features which were recently added to Docs to give it more of a Google Wave feel.

Each document created Google Docs can now be given a privacy rating on a tiered system. Documents users want to keep to themselves should be kept "Private," while others they wish to share can either be set to "Anyone with the link" or "Public on the web."

Google describes the former of these as equivalent to having an unlisted number - where anyone with the correct URL to a document can view it, but it won't be searchable on Google. The latter option makes the document fully public, and puts the URL in the "phonebook," which means anyone could stumble onto the document through a Google search.

Visibility options are now clearly displayed next to each document on the Google Docs homepage, and users can make bulk changes to many documents at once in their settings. Additionally, users can create a customized URL for their docs to make sharing faster and easier to understand than a jumbled stream of letters and numbers.

These new sharing features, coupled with the addition of Wave-like real-time collaboration and chat continue to push Google Docs to the forefront of online document editing solutions. Microsoft may be slowly catching up by offering Web-based versions of Word, Excel and other Office products, but Google's simplicity, ease of use and Web-native functionality maintain its position as the better choice at the moment.

Google Chrome Gets Extension Sync

2010-06-20T06:53:00.000-07:00

The developer's version of the Google Chrome Web browser was updated this week to include the ability to sync your extensions. The new feature joins Chrome's other sync options, in place for some time (Bookmarks, Preferences and Themes), to more fully round out the browser's synchronization platform.

How to Enable Sync

To enable extension sync in Chrome, you'll first need to install the current developer's build. Once installed, you'll then need to edit the Chrome shortcut's properties.

In Windows, you right-click on the shortcut, choose "Properties," and in the "Target" box, add -enable-sync-extenstions at the end of the command, to the right of the quotes. (Update: see the comments section for a tip on implementing this feature without the reported bugs).

Mac OS X users will need to use Terminal or this handy script that does the work for you (Pointed out to us courtesy of LifeHacker.)

Sync: For a Browser that Knows You

The great thing about Chrome's synchronization options is how it allows you to create a standardized experience no matter what computer you're using. Whether on the netbook in the living room, the desktop in the den or your notebook at the office, you can install Chrome and immediately have it set up with your personal preferences.

For this former Firefox user, the addition of extension sync has been one of the more highly anticipated options, second only to bookmark sync. There was a time - not too long ago, mind you - when you had to make manual lists of your installed extensions or use some sort of third-party add-on to back them up every time Firefox released a new version. And believe me, that process was not as simple as it sounds.

With Chrome, though, the transition from version to version is seamless. There's no backup needed. Forget iterative Web apps, Chrome is the iterative Web browser.

Although the current version of extension sync is still in testing - and apparently a bit crash-prone reports CNET - it's only a matter of time before the feature is stabilized and ported to the beta channel, followed by the public release.

As for what's next for Chrome sync, could it be the ability to sync browser history, searches and cookies? Passwords? Auto-complete settings? We would imagine that it's all of the above...maybe not soon but definitely not never.

Facebook iPhone App Now Plays Videos And More!

2010-06-20T06:49:00.000-07:00

Facebook for iPhone 3.1.3 has just been released in the App Store, bringing a series of new features including the ability to play Facebook videos on your phone.

Other additions in this update include the ability to view and write on the walls of events, and a new width for the photos you upload: 720px. There’s also a series of bug fixes in the release. You can download the app on iTunes here.

While its iPhone app impresses, however, Facebook is still notably without an iPad app. Its Android app, meanwhile, is somewhat lackluster.

Thanks to RedmondPie for the heads up.

Facebook Posts to Appear in Real-Time Search Results

2010-06-18T19:54:00.000-07:00

As of today, real-time results from millions of users’ Facebook posts will now appear in search results on OneRiot, one of the world’s leading real-time search engines.

These Facebook posts will also be accessible through OneRiot’s API, which powers more than 100 real-time apps around the web and on mobile devices.

OneRiot already pulls data from blogs, Twitter, Digg and millions of other sources all over the social web. Having access to Facebook’s nearly 500 million members, however, takes these search results to a higher plane by pooling a much larger dataset when finding and ranking links for search results.

Facebook data that will appear in OneRiot search results include publicly shared links on user profiles and publicly “liked” stories from all over the web. For example, a search for “World Cup” on OneRiot will reveal the most popular links about the soccer tournament being shared by Facebook users right now.

Of course, the availability of real-time results from Facebook is great for app developers. In a release this morning, OneRiot President Tobias Peggs said, “The addition of Facebook shares is an important update for the OneRiot API. To offer developers the best real-time search experience, we have to have the best understanding of what the whole social web cares about, right now. Facebook shares and likes give us key insights into what those things are.”

This news comes just a few days after Bing announced it would be serving Facebook and Twitter posts in search results, too. Google also added Facebook Pages to its real-time search offering in February this year.

What do you think of this new development?

Google Releases Command-Line Tool for YouTube, Calendar, Docs, and More

2010-06-18T19:51:00.000-07:00

Google has launched a simple but very useful app for computer nerds everywhere: GoogleCL, a command-line tool that allows users to do everything from upload folders to Picasa to adding appointments to a Google Calendar.

Google CL is a Python application that makes Google Data API calls through the command line. A command-line interface (CLI) is an interface where the user can tell the computer to perform specific tasks by typing commands. You’ve probably seen them before, most likely via the MS-DOS command-line interface. The CLI is in contrast to the mouse-based interface that we all use today, known as the graphical user interface (GUI).

Googlers from the Street View team created the application for their own use, but have now turned GoogleCL over to the general public. It accepts commands to Google Calendar, Google Docs, Google Contacts, Picasa, YouTube, and Blogger. Here’s an example command:

$ google calendar add “Social Media Day SF Party at 7pm”

For us computer nerds, this tool is going to be a big productivity saver. There are many instances where we just want to skip using the web interface because the command line is often faster. I’ll admit, I downloaded GoogleCL the moment I saw it was available.

Google has provide a list of sample scripts to get started, but we bet that page will expand with more commands and more supported Google services over time. It’s a great combination of the command line and the cloud. If you want to get started, you can download GoogleCL and the necessary Python library client here and here.

Fashion Retailer Responds to Facebook Fans’ Call for “Real Women” in Photos

2010-06-18T19:50:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday, LOFT — a brand owned by Ann Taylor Inc. — posted pictures of a tall, blonde catalog model in the brand’s new silk cargo pants on its Facebook Page with a click-to-buy link in the captions.

Nothing about the post was uncommon — except, perhaps, Fans’ responses. While many Fans acknowledged that the pants looked good on the model, they complained that the pants were “not universally flattering” and would “look great [only] if you’re 5′10″ and a stick like the model in the photo.” The post led several women to request — politely, of course — that LOFT show the pants on “real women.”

The next day, the fashion retailer posted pictures of its own staff posing in the cargo pants. The women — drawn from different departments of LOFT’s design, styling and marketing staff — ranged from size 2 to 12, and from 5′3″ to 5′10″. Each styled the pants for a specific occasion, and explained why they liked the pants or why the pants worked well on their individual bodies.

As you can imagine, Fans were very pleased. “I sooooo appreciate you taking the time to ‘listen’ to our comments and show these pants on ‘real’ women,” one Fan wrote, while still acknowledging that the pants were ugly.

This is, in our opinion, a great example of a big company using social media to drive customer loyalty and satisfaction. And while many other large companies — like Comcast, Ford, Virgin Airlines, Starbucks and Best Buy — have also used social media to connect with their fans in smart, personable ways, we’ve rarely seen this level of engagement from a fashion company. It’s certainly a step in the right direction after the brand’s run-in with the FTC, social media-wise.

What do you think of LOFT’s response? Have you ever had a positive interaction with a big brand using social media? Share your thoughts and stories in the comments.

Pants Modeled by a Professional Model

Pants Modeled by LOFT Employees

iPad vs. iPhone: A User Experience Study

2010-06-18T00:12:00.000-07:00

Our 2-year-olds can use it. It's a brilliant entertainment device. But what sort of business potential does the iPad offer? Several companies have shown interest in mobile payment systems from startups like Square to mega-corporations like Visa. But what is the iPad's user experience in a real-world, business environment?

By now, one thing we know is that the iPad is not simply a larger iPhone, nor is it a smaller computer. Developers have been quick to port their apps from the iPhone to the iPad to ensure they don't miss out on this trend, but there are big differences in the underlying specs and form factor of the iPad that make this a fundamentally different user experience.

Lucky for us, Bolt | Peters likes researching UX, and we thought this topic deserved a little investigation. So we conducted an observation of 14 customers over three months at our neighborhood coffee shop, Sightglass, that just happened to be an early user of Square on both the iPhone and the iPad. We observed and recorded those customers' mobile payment interactions with the Square app, and interviewed select customers. Our first study was in December 2009 (with the iPhone) with a follow-up in April 2010 (with the iPad).

Two important business considerations came from our studies: (1) speed kills (in a good way), and (2) shared is the new private. If you're thinking that nothing statistically valid can come from observing such a small sample of interactions, the Internet is chock full of data supporting that behavior repeats over a very small sample, and that we can safely extract patterns to much larger audiences, as long as we're not talking about opinions. We were definitely not observing people's opinions about the iPad or iPhone; we are strictly interested in how they accomplish the simple task of paying for coffee.

Speed Kills

In our observations of mobile payment transactions at Sightglass, the time it took to complete a purchase using Square on the iPad was more than twice as fast as using Square on the iPhone. In one direct comparison, it took 20.5 seconds to complete a purchase with the iPad, but 44.1 seconds on an iPhone 3G.

As slaves to our digital devices, we find that the physical world is constantly competing for our attention. Seconds matter here. This hasn't been an issue with computing until very recently; usability scientists in the 90‘s claimed 8 to 15 seconds was the maximum time someone would wait for an interaction using a desktop computer (see Shackel's Acceptability Paradigm). But with any kind of portable device, seconds mean the difference between a seamless user experience and pocketing the device to pay with cash or talk to a stranger.

Watch video of our study:

A 100% increase in speed is a huge deal. It means the merchant was effortlessly ringing up customers one after another with fewer clicks and less down time on the iPad. There was more time to prepare other customers' drinks and less time spent hunched over a handheld device waiting for the transaction to complete. Keep in mind that for Sightglass, a boutique coffee kiosk, the iPhone as a point-of-sale system was still superior to accepting cash only; they had no other cash register.

We all have heard by now that the iPad's 1GHz processor is light years ahead of the current iPhone, although this has changed now that Apple has gotten back all its "stolen" 4G iPhones and released them to the public. And while it seems obvious, this speed in the iPad makes for more than just a casually better user experiences and positive outcomes for business prospects. It's the first time that seconds are a fundamental part of user experience in almost a decade of personal computing.

Shared is the New Private

The form factor and physical affordances of the iPad also change the nature of the game. The iPad is not pocket sized, it has a large screen (1024 x 768 at 132ppi), and it naturally lays flat on the table as opposed to resting upright or being tucked away in your hand. All of these factors place the iPad squarely in the realm of a shareable computing device.

Notice how easy it is to view content on iPad. The screen can easily be viewed by 3-4 users sitting around in a circle or gazing over the shoulder. An iPhone with its 480x320 screen would be squinted at by neighbors, or would simply be passed around and handled individually.

And as a shared device, the iPad invites social interaction.

This actually proves to be somewhat of a pain point in the user experience of Square on the iPad, as customers are drawn to interacting with (or at least observing) their payment transactions. Yet iPad users today are now largely removed from the transaction, apart from providing their credit card as a form of payment.

After that, the merchant drives the interaction. Since the iPad Square app doesn't require customer signatures anymore, we observed merchants skipping over the (optional) tipping screen time and again. When asked about this, merchants said it was too awkward to ask aloud, "And would you like to add a tip to that?" One time the transaction proceeded so quickly that a customer commented at the end, "This is great! But where do I tip?"

Part of the reason for this shift in experience is that Sightglass' iPad is more like a cash register than a hand-held mobile device. This is made possible, in part, by a custom wooden holder that was specially designed for Sightglass. The holder keeps the iPad upright and angled in such a way that it's readable and easy to interact with by people standing at the counter. Plus it swivels and hides all the ugly cords and stuff.

Take a look at the side-by-side comparison of a mobile payment transaction on the iPhone versus the iPad, paying attention to all the open space surrounding the iPad.

It's interesting that customers want to engage with merchants during payment, but don't quite know what their role is supposed to be. Around normal cash registers, customers would never step behind the table and complete their own transaction. With the iPhone Square app, customers were required to complete their own transaction. And now with the iPad, do the customers step up and add their own tip—entering the private space of the merchant and cash register—or stay clear of the transaction altogether?

We observed one telling interaction that illustrated how the affordances of the iPad-cum-cash-register can lead to some awkwardness. In this case, the merchant swiped the customer's card (per usual) but immediately stepped away from the iPad to prepare another customer's drink. This left the payment process in limbo, and made the paying customer wonder what would happens next.

After a moment or two, the customer glanced down at the iPad and noticed that the transaction had paused on the screen asking for a tip. He looked around, hesitated, and then gingerly reached over and pressed the $1 tip button. He did the same on the next screen, where he entered an email address for a receipt, only stepping closer to use the iPad keyboard. Throughout this episode, his body language spoke of his social curiosity for the iPad mixed with the social taboo of entering the domain of the merchant.

Now, this is just one example of how the physical affordances and social invitation of the iPad can lead to awkward user experiences, especially for customers involved in mobile payment transactions. At the same time, customers were not involved in most of the transactions at Sightglass, making the user experience for the merchant quick, painless, and efficient.

Thousands using 'illegal' Skype on mobile in UAE - paper

2010-06-18T00:10:00.000-07:00

SKYPE BAN: The UAE is one of only four countries that do not allow Skype software to be downloaded. (Getty Images)

Thousands of Apple iPhone users in the UAE are flouting the country’s law by using the popular free-calling software Skype, according to a report.

According to the Abu Dhabi-based The National daily, many iPhone users are breaking the law as the country’s telecoms regulator has banned Skype for Apple’s hand-held devices.

Though the Skype application is freely available on Apple’s iTunes store in the UAE and will work on iPhones connected to Etisalat or du services, the ban issued in 2006 by the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) still remains in place, The National said,

According to the daily, the TRA has said: “If a third party application, such as Skype, is available for download from iTunes or any other website, it does not mean that it’s legal to use. Furthermore, the licensees have the right to block the illegal traffic of the application.”

Rouzbeh Pasha, the head of Skype for the Middle East and Africa, told The National that the only way the iPhone application would not be available in the UAE was if the regulator said no one in the country could have access to the iTunes store.

“As long as the App Store is available, Skype and other applications will be there as well,” Mr Pasha said. “This is part of the [Skype’s] ecosystem. Soon you’ll have Panasonic and Sony television sets that will have Skype built in.”

The UAE is one of only four countries that do not allow Skype software to be downloaded and block access to the company’s website. North Korea, Oman and Kuwait are the others, according to The National.

Taliban 'seizes Pakistani troops'

2010-06-17T09:02:00.000-07:00

The Afghan Taliban says it has captured dozens of Pakistani soldiers following an attack on their checkpoint during a cross-border raid.

Athar Abbas, a major-general in Pakistan's army, confirmed on Wednesday that 40 Frontier Corps troops were missing after their post on the border between Pakistan's Mohmand and Bajaur districts was overrun by Afghan Taliban on Monday.

Abbas said the Taliban had handed over five of the soldiers to the Pakistani consulate in Jalalabad, in Afghanistan, but the whereabouts of the other 35 was unknown.

The Pakistani army also said it had killed 38 Afghan Taliban fighters in Bajaur on Wednesday, where commanders had previously said the Taliban were purged.

Officials said 10 soldiers were also killed in the fighting.

"At least 38 militants were killed and 10 soldiers were martyred," Zakir Hussain Afridi, the Bajaur administration chief, said as he showed 18 bodies of fighters in the presence of local forces commanders.

He said security forces destroyed two Taliban hideouts and arrested 23 fighters during the clashes.

Troops mounted another offensive in Bajaur earlier this year and declared the terrain to be free of Taliban in March.

Commanders claimed an earlier victory in February 2009, but violence returned when the military turned its attention to fighting the Taliban in South Waziristan and Swat, also in the northwest.

Pakistani troops have been fighting in Bajaur since August 2008, trying to wipe-out Taliban and al-Qaeda hideouts, but there are indications that the Taliban is trying to make another comeback.

Pakistan rejects report of ISI's links with Taliban

2010-06-14T03:17:00.000-07:00

Islamabad/London (IANS)- Pakistan has rejected a report claiming that its spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) not only funds and trains Taliban fighters in Afghanistan but is officially represented in the group's leadership council.

A Pakistan Army spokesperson termed the report unfounded and baseless, Online news agency said Monday citing a BBC report.

The spokesperson said the allegations were an attempt to defame security agencies and the army.

The report, published in The Sunday Times Sunday, said research strongly suggested that support for the Taliban was the "official policy" of the ISI.

The report also claimed that Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari was reported to have visited Taliban prisoners in Pakistan in April, where he is believed to have promised their release and help for militant operations.

"You are our people, we are friends, and after your release we will of course support you to do your operations," Zardari was quoted as saying by The Sunday Times citing a senior Taliban source.

UN bid to cut Taliban from blacklist

2010-06-14T03:16:00.000-07:00

THE United Nations is reviewing an international terrorist blacklist that could lead to the lifting of travel restrictions and asset freezes on some key Taliban and al-Qaeda figures.

Delegates to a national conference, or peace jirga, held in Kabul this month called on the government and its international partners to remove some of the 137 people from the list - a long-standing demand of the Taliban.

''Delisting was one of the clear messages coming from the peace jirga,'' said Staffan de Mistura, the UN representative in Afghanistan.

He said a 27-member delegation from the UN Security Council's al-Qaeda and Taliban sanctions committee was in Kabul on a three-day visit to study the composition of the terrorist blacklist and make recommendations to the Security Council about possible changes.

''Delisting was one of the clear messages coming from the peace jirga,'' Mr de Mistura said.

''The UN is listening to what the peace jirga is saying. Some of the people in the list may not be alive any more. The list may be completely outdated.''

The US, Britain and France, who maintain troops here, wield veto power on the Security Council and would have to agree to changes on the list.

''If we want the peace jirga to produce results, we need to keep momentum,'' Mr de Mistura said.

Since 1999, Security Council Resolution 1267 has blacklisted 142 Taliban figures as well as 360 others with ties to al-Qaeda, ordering their bank accounts seized and prohibiting them from crossing international borders.

The presence of Taliban leaders on the list has been a sticking point in efforts to start peace talks, but attempts to remove any have foundered because of opposition from Security Council members.

In January, five Taliban insurgents were delisted before the London conference on Afghanistan, leaving 137 still blacklisted.

US officials have argued for removal from the blacklist case by case. Russia and China have also objected to a broad delisting. Now, a UN official said, there was a real possibility of removing several names.

NEW YORK TIMES, AP

Taliban blows up girls’ school in FATA’s Mohmand Agency

2010-06-14T03:10:00.000-07:00

Islamabad, Jun.14 (ANI): The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) destroyed yet another girls’ school in Mohmand Agency of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) on Monday taking the total number of schools blown up by extremists in the restive region to 48.

This was the second such incident in less than a month when a girls’ school has been bombed in the Mohmand Agency.

Earlier this month, a girls’ school and a health centre was razed by the Taliban insurgents in the Khushal Kally area of the Agency.

The Talibani militants have destroyed hundreds of schools, mostly for girls, in the troubled tribal regions in Pakistan’s north-western region in the past few months.

Over 200 girls schools have been destroyed in the Swat valley in the last two years, since the Taliban’s uprising to enforce the Islamic ’sharia’ law in the region. (ANI)

Nokia announces the X5-01, proclaims it’s hip to be square

2010-06-14T03:08:00.000-07:00

SINGAPORE – The Nokia Connection event has just started over in Singapore with the launch of two new mobiles in the entertainment-oriented Xseries range of consumer smartphones. The phones in question are the new Nokia X5-01 model and the Nokia X6 8GB. Join us after the break for full details, pictures and a video of the Nokia X5 in action.

The Nokia X5 plugs part of the gap between the Nokia X3 and Nokia X6, but as you can see from the pictures, is a pretty unique device in its own right. You might be reminded of a MiniDisc player in its visual stylings and the musical connection is definitely correct when it comes to this device’s specialisms. The Nokia X5 features excellent sound quality, dedicated music keys and loud speakers, and will include access to Ovi Music, and to Comes with Music in some regions.

But this is also a social media maven’s mobile. There’s a full QWERTY keyboard under the dashboard, ready to deliver tweets, status updates and text messages at your convenience. The device supports all the major IM and webmail services out of the box and also offers easy access to major social networking sites (Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and Hi5). The camera offers 5 megapixels, 4X digital zoom and an LED flash. Onboard memory comes in at a modest 200MB, but there’s a 2GB Micro-SD card included, which can be upgraded up to 32GB. Like most recent mobiles from Nokia, the battery life also looks impressive, with up to 16-days standby time or 24 hours music playback from a full charge.

The device also features some inventive new input options. Budding DJs can spin the phone to switch to a new random track; while shaking it reveals the number of unread messages waiting from your friends. At present, the device is destined to launch in Indonesia during Q3, at an estimated retail price of EUR 165 before taxes and subsidies. Its availability in other markets is as yet unknown.

The event’s second launch – the Nokia X6 8GB – is rather more familiar, acting as a baby brother to the original Nokia X6 device – which came with 32GB – and the 16GB version that followed. It is expected to begin shipping during Q3 2010, and will sell at an estimated price of EUR 225 before taxes and subsidies.

India out of ‘peace pipeline’ as Iran-Pakistan seal gas deal (Lead)

2010-06-14T01:26:00.000-07:00

Tehran/New Delhi, June 14 (IANS) Iran has formally signed a $7.6-billion cross-border pipeline deal to supply 750 million cubic feet of natural gas daily to Pakistan from mid-2014, ignoring India that was part of the original plan conceived in the 1990s.
The pipeline will connect Iran’s giant South Pars gas fields with Pakistan’s restive Balochistan province in the southwest and Sindh in the south. Once the gas starts flowing in, it will account for 20 percent of Pakistan’s needs, IRNA reported.

“We explicitly announce that as a country having huge gas reserves, Iran will play a key role in guaranteeing global energy security in the future,” Oil Minister Masood Mir-Kazemi was quoted as saying by the official agency after the deal was inked in Tehran.

Iran has already laid around 900 km out of the 1,000 km of the pipeline envisaged on its territory. Now, Pakistan will have to construct about 700 km from the border to its gas transmission network at Nawabshah, near Karachi, at a cost of $1.65 billion, officials said.

There is also a provision to raise the level of import to as much as 1 billion cubic feet of gas per day during the 25-year validity of the pact, which can be extended by another five years.

“Now the project has entered into the implementation phase and there are no further formalities left in the way,” said Naeem Sharafat, managing director of Pakistan’s Inter-State Gas Co who was part of his country’s delegation.

The original plan, however, was different, with India keen to secure supplies from Iran, which boasts the second largest reserves of natural gas in the world after Russia.

In the mid-1990s, Tehran and New Delhi had inked preliminary pacts to transport gas to India through Pakistan. The proposal was then called “peace pipeline’ to showcase to the world good neighbourly relations between India and Pakistan.

But India remained concerned about three aspects, preventing meaningful progress of the deal.

The first was the price of gas, the second was Islamabad’s reluctance to guarantee the safety of the pipeline in its territory and the high transit fee Pakistan demanded.

India, so far, has not said formally that it had withdrawn from the project. Petroleum Minister Murli Deora had, in April, even proposed a trilateral meeting in the Iranian capital to take the talks further.

He also met Iran’s Deputy Minister for International Affairs Noghrehkar Shirazi on the sidelines of the 12th International Energy Forum at Cancun proposing such talks.

But Iran’s state-run agency has been reporting that New Delhi had, indeed, withdrawn from the project last year. The agency, however, said that Iran remained warm to welcoming India should it wish to join the project later.

10 militants killed, 6 injured in Orakzai air raids

2010-06-14T01:04:00.000-07:00

At least 10 militants were killed and another six wounded Monday in Orakzai tribal agency, as security forces jets pounded at militants' hideouts, destroying two in the restive northwest tribal areas of Pakistan, official sources said.
In an attempt to clean the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan of Taliban militants, Pakistani military had launched an operation in Orakzai and Kurram agencies in March this year using both ground and air firepower, killing over 1,000 militants. It has achieved significant progress in the area.
While in a recent visit to the restive region, General Ashfaq Pervaiz Kayani announced a victory against the militants, predicting a much awaited and long demanded military operation by the United States in the nearby North Waziristan area, which has said to be housing al-Qaeda operatives and fleeing militants from other tribal areas of Pakistan.
According to official sources 5,000 Internally Displaced Persons(IDPs) have returned to the lower Orakzai after the end of operation last month. However, local sources do not see the situation much changed in the central and upper Orakzai where militants resistance is still going on.

Asia looks to nuclear power for energy

2010-06-13T23:50:00.001-07:00

There was always a suspicion that the 2008 deal by which the George W. Bush administration bent and steamrollered the rules to bring India into the club of accepted nuclear nations would come back to haunt the Americans.

That moment appears to have arrived with the news that China intends to use the same slight-of-hand to build two new nuclear reactors in Pakistan -- which, like India, has not and will not willingly sign the required nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

And there may be many more difficulties waiting in the wings.

Asia has looked at its dependence on fossil fuels, the growing demands of its burgeoning cities and manufacturing industries, its worries about global warming, benighted fishermen and pelicans in the Gulf of Mexico, and the ineffectiveness of much-hyped "green alternative" energy, and is pursuing nuclear reactors as the most practical solution.

According to the London-based World Nuclear Association, there are 37 large nuclear reactors under construction in Asia, compared with 18 in the rest of the world.

For the administration of President Barack Obama, which has made strengthening the nuclear treaty's enforcement and even eradicating nuclear weapons a central policy issue, the Asian trends, but especially the immediate question of the China-Pakistan deal, have presented a conundrum.

There is no need for the Obama administration to be consistent with what the Bush government did.

But the Bush White House did not offer Pakistan the same deal as New Delhi because of worries about the security of Islamabad's nuclear arsenal and its past record of spreading nuclear know-how to rogue states -- the very sins said to be uppermost on the Obama list of concerns.

However, after first showing some signs that it might respond to some heavy lobbying within the U.S. and attempt to block the China-Pakistan deal at the critically important, 46-member Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), the Obama administration appears to have decided to roll with the punches.

It is as yet unclear what part the Pakistan nuclear reactor contract played during U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's visit to Beijing at the end of May.

There was speculation at the time that the U.S. might let Beijing know it would not block the deal with Pakistan at the NSG, just as China refrained from blocking America's deal with India, in return for assistance on other matters.

Those other matters, of course.

They include Chinese help with getting North Korea back to the table to discuss dismantling its nuclear weapons program, and Beijing's support for a fourth round of sanctions against Iran for ignoring United Nations' demands it stop enriching nuclear fuel.

Well, last week, China supported the Washington-sponsored UN Security Council resolution imposing a fourth round of sanctions on Iran.

This need not have been a payoff by Beijing, because China has -- in the last few years at least -- an honourable record of observing non-proliferation rules and the NSG's voluntary requirements.

Since it joined the suppliers group in 2004, China has been open about its existing agreement to supply civilian, electricity-generating nuclear reactors to Pakistan -- especially the Chashma-2 reactor now nearing completion.

But until now Beijing has deflected Pakistan's requests that China build two more reactors on the same site.

Now that Washington's help for New Delhi to legitimize its previously outlaw nuclear program has prompted Russian, French and Japanese companies to rush for a hand in expanding India's network, China sees no need to be coy about its Pakistan relationship any more.

Mark Hibbs, a senior nuclear policy analyst with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, wrote last week that as the price of the suppliers' group acceptance of Pakistan as a respectable nuclear state, pressure might be put on Islamabad to drop its current obstruction at the UN Conference on Disarmament of a treaty to halt worldwide production of highly enriched uranium and plutonium suitable for making nuclear weapons.

There is a view that China -- the only one of the five nuclear weapons states that have signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty not to have also declared a moratorium on producing fissile material -- is a silent backer of Pakistan's obstructionism.

Asia's growing passion for nuclear power is not, on the surface, weapons-based, though that can never be ignored.

In the capitals of Asia, however, there is now a fixed belief that nuclear power is the clean and relatively

cheap option to fill the gap between the domestic energy resources of individual countries and the uncertainties of the market place supply.

Although it must never be forgotten that it was an Asian country, Japan, that has been the only target of nuclear weapons used in anger, Asia as a whole has had a benign experience of using nuclear technology to generate electricity.

There are 112 nuclear-powered reactors in operation at the moment, 37 under construction and commitments to build another 84.

Newcomers considering the nuclear option include Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam and Thailand.

The Philippines, which built a reactor in the 1970s that never went into operation because of safety concerns, is having another look at the possibility.

But China, as in so many other spheres, is leading the way.

China has 11 nuclear reactors in operation, another 20 under construction and plans to increase sixfold the amount of electricity generated by this means by 2020.

jmanthorpe@vancouversun.com

This Apple iBook Has a Built-In iPad

2010-06-13T09:58:00.001-07:00

Remember in Dark Knight when the Batmobile got all busted up and Bruce Wayne jettisoned spectacularly out of its wreckage riding the Batpod? That's kinda what this gutted iBook iPad dock is like.

The antique iBook was hollowed out to accommodate the iPad and a new Apple keyboard, connected to the tablet via the camera connection kit. Just getting your hands on one of those things is hard enough; putting it right to use in a wacky novelty iPad dock—not to be mistaken with the serious-business ClamCase laptop dock—shows some serious dedication.

The builder says the iBook can't be properly closed without scratching the iPad's screen, but whatever, do you think Bruce Wayne was ever worried about the Batpod getting scratched up as it was birthed, fully formed, from the Batmobile? Of course not.

Do keep in mind, though, that the whole reason the Batpod was so awesome was because of its surprise emergence from its Batmobile husk. What I'm getting at here is that you're gonna have to make sure all your friends see you using your old-school iBook a few times before you can yank out its iPad screen in your moment of gadget-stacking-doll glory. But it'll be totally worth it. [Apple Noir via Dvice via Unplggd]

These iPhone Speakers Look Like They Come From Another Planet

2010-06-13T09:53:00.000-07:00

The floating half orbs, the exquisite teardrop, the glowing blue light, and well, everything about these Speakal speakers makes this a number one seller among aliens. Luckily, us humans can buy one too.

Considering their past efforts, Speakal really upped their design chops for the iCrystal. The Speakal iCrystal Docking Station works with all iPhones (yes, even the iPhone 4) and iPods through the dock connector and everything else with a 3.5mm headphone jack. The iCrystal has basic touch functions to go along with a terribly bland, just-from-earth remote. We'd tell you how they sound but frankly we don't care. When aliens come to Earth, we'll jam out together with these speakers no matter how bad they are. It'll set you back $79.99 and you have your choice of black, white, or red. [Speakal via DVICE]

Microsoft Security Essentials Finds New Malware But Avoids False Positives, Still the Best Free Option

2010-06-13T09:51:00.000-07:00

Microsoft's free Security Essentials package rates well at removing malware and running light, but what about dealing with brand-new, unidentified bad stuff? Turns out Security Essentials is still the best at figuring out what's bad—while also avoiding annoying false positives.

In a follow-up to their previous performance tests, long-running, independent testing site AV-Comparatives.org loaded up anti-virus and malware prevention suites with definition updates from February 2010, but slipped them malware and other bad stuff that had been detected and defined since then. This was to test the heuristic and analytic powers of these security suites—in other words, to see if the software could figure out up-to-the-minute malware, even if their providers haven't cataloged them yet in an update, or if the update hasn't hit your computer yet.

The straight-up performance of 20 security suites is shown in this graph, excerpted from AV-Comparatives' full report (click for a larger view—bigger equals better).

That chart only shows detection of the known bad stuff. For balance, AV-Comparatives also checked how often each software provided false positives—warning of potential viruses and the like on benign software. As a site with AutoHotkey-based apps that generates a lot of incorrect security warnings, we're sensitive to this measure of quality.

So while Microsoft Security Essentials wasn't the absolute winner in finding new malware without a definition available, it was the highest ranking free option, and it did perform best among those apps that had "Very few false alarms"—perfect for software that's free and light on resources.

On that level, pay apps F-Secure also detected smartly with few annoyances, as did BitDefender. You can read the full report at the direct PDF link below, or see AV-Comparatives's backlog of tests at their main test results list. Thanks to Charles for sending in the link!

Sony Outs Seven LED 3DTVs At Once

2010-06-13T08:56:00.000-07:00

The promise of Sony's entry into the 3DTV market has been swirling since last September. Today they're not just dipping their toes in the 3D waters; they're delivering a full-on cannonball, with the launch of seven 3D and "3D-ready" TVs.

Only two of the models—the 52-inch and 60-inch Bravia XBR-HX909 series—feature integrated 3D right out of the box. The other five range from 40 to 55-inches and cost between $2100 and $4000. That's before you throw in the Sony active shutter glasses for $150 a pop and $50 sync transmitter that make the sets 3D-capable.

It's great to see a new heavyweight entrant in an area that's so far been dominated by Samsung and Panasonic. And Sony's models are coming in at least cost-competitive, although it's a little disappointing that they're not undercutting the competition to the extent that we'd heard. At least they're throwing in a 3D Blu-ray Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs and Deep Sea consolation prize.

The sets are available for pre-sale now and will be in stores sometime next month.

SONY DELIVERS THE INDUSTRY'S LARGEST ARRAY

OF 3D CAPABLE HDTVs AND HOME AUDIO AND VIDEO PRODUCTS

Pre-sales Begin for BRAVIA 3D HDTVs; 3D Upgrade For Earlier 2010 Blu-ray Models

SAN DIEGO, June 9, 2010 – Sony today announced that its 3D capable BRAVIA® HDTVs are now available for pre-sale at Sony Style stores and that its new integrated Blu-ray 3D™ devices will hit retail shelves beginning this July. Additionally, the company released a free firmware update that activates Blu-ray 3D capability for previously announced Blu-ray Disc models including the BDP-S470 and BDP-S570 players and the BDV-E570 and BDV-E770W home theater systems.

Sony now offers consumers the most diverse line of 3D capable home entertainment products including 19 BRAVIA® HDTVs, Blu-ray Disc players and theater systems, and audio/video components that offer various levels of performance and features.

Sony will support the 3D launch with an integrated marketing campaign featuring NFL quarterback Peyton Manning of the Indianapolis Colts, and Grammy® and Emmy® award-winning Jive/Sony Music artist Justin Timberlake aiming to deliver consumer education and eliminate 3D confusion.

"3D is revolutionizing the entertainment industry and only Sony is involved in every stage of the ecosystem," said Chris Fawcett, vice president of Sony's television business. "Leveraging deep 3D expertise from the company's theatrical and professional groups, Sony products are optimized to offer the best possible 3D home entertainment experience."
BRAVIA 3D HDTVs

Focusing on that high quality experience, Sony's 3D capable BRAVIA HDTVs incorporate a frame sequential display with active-shutter glasses that work together with Sony's proprietary high frame rate technology reproducing smooth, full high-definition 3D images.

The line-up includes the 3D integrated BRAVIA XBR-LX900 HDTV, which features a built-in 3D sync transmitter and two pair of active shutter glasses and the 3D ready BRAVIA XBR-HX909 and KDL-HX800 series 3D ready models which offer the option of adding the 3D sync transmitter and glasses at an additional cost.

The line features screen sizes including 40, 46, 52, 55, and 60-inches and ranges in price from around $2,100 (KDL-40HX800) to about $5,000 (XBR-60LX900).

Consumers who purchase and register one of the new 3D BRAVIA models will receive a copy of Sony Pictures Home Entertainment's Blu-ray 3D™ title Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs as well as Blu-ray 3D title Deep Sea. The sets will also include a PlayStation® Network voucher enabling 3D BRAVIA purchasers to download stereoscopic 3D gaming experiences on the PlayStation3 (PS3™) System (sold separately). The titles include PAIN (partial game) and MotorStorm®: Pacific Rift (demo) and full game downloads of WipEout® HD and Super StarDust™ HD.

BRAVIA XBR-LX900 Series Integrated 3D HDTVs

The full HD 1080p (1920 x 1080) BRAVIA XBR-LX900 series features integrated 3D functionality and includes the 60-inch XBR-60LX900 for about $5,000 and the 52-inch XBR-52LX900 for about $4,000.

The Monolithic Design, Edge LED backlight models also feature integrated Wi-Fi® (802.11n) for an easy connection to broadband home networks to access Sony's BRAVIA Internet Video Platform and BRAVIA Internet Widgets, as well as Sony's new premium video service, Qriocity.

BRAVIA XBR-HX909 Series 3D Ready HDTVs

The XBR-HX909 series is 3D ready with the addition of Sony active shutter glasses (about $150 per pair) and sync transmitter (about $50), both sold separately. The models feature full HD (1920 x 1080p) and Sony's Intelligent Dynamic full array LED backlight. The Monolithic Design concept models include the 52-inch XBR-52HX909 for about $4,000 and the 46-inch XBR-46HX909 for about $3,500.

Sony's Intelligent Dynamic LED backlighting improves contrast and dynamic range by local dimming that controls the LED backlight level by area so that detail is maintained in the dark areas, while other areas are driven near peak brightness. The models also include an RS-232c I/0 terminal for custom installation applications.

BRAVIA KDL-HX800 Series 3D Ready HDTVs

Also 3D ready (with the addition of Sony active shutter glasses and sync transmitter, sold separately), the BRAVIA KDL-HX800 series features full HD 1080p (1920 x 1080) and utilizes a Dynamic edge LED backlight with local dimming for improved contrast and dynamic range. The series includes the 55-inch class (54.6-inches measured diagonally) KDL-55HX800 for about $3,400, the 46-inch KDL-46HX800 for about $2,700, and the 40-inch KDL-40HX800 for about $2,100.

Blu-ray 3D Players

Available in July for about $300, Sony's Blu-ray 3D BDP-S770 model offers built in Wi-Fi (802.11n) for easy access to Sony's BRAVIA Internet Video platform and Qriocity.

Additionally, Sony's BDP-S470 and BDP-S570 Blu-ray Disc players can be upgraded to play Blu-ray 3D with a free online firmware update that is now available. The update also adds Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA®) compatibility to the models.

Blu-ray 3D Home Theater Systems

Also available this July for about $800, Sony's new full HD 1080p 5.1 channel Blu-ray 3D capable home theater system (model BDV-HZ970W) features wireless capabilities via the included USB wireless LAN adapter (802.11n) allowing for easy access to the BRAVIA Internet Video platform and Qriocity.

The model also offers two HDMI inputs with 3D pass-through, HDMI repeater function, and a universal remote.

Sony's BDV-E570 and BDV-E770W Blu-ray theater systems can now also be upgraded to Blu-ray 3D with the free firmware update. The update also adds DLNA compatibility to the units.

Unique to all Sony Blu-ray Disc players, users with an iPhone® or iPod® touch device can control the players using a free app called "BD Remote" which can be downloaded from the Apple App store. The app, will also be available soon for Android™ devices, allows the device to function as a remote control that includes the ability to access a Blu-ray Disc's details such as jacket artwork, actor, and production information as well as search for additional video clips online.

3D Capable Home Audio Components

Sony also recently announced 3D capable home audio products including the STR-DN1010 audio/video receiver, the HT-CT350 and HT-CT150 3.1 channel sound bars, and the HT-SF470 5.1 channel home theater system. The models offer consumers flexible solutions to round out the Sony 3D experience and meet the demands of 3D home entertainment.

Additionally, Sony will add 3D capability to the previously announced STR-DH810 and STR-DH710 AV receivers through a firmware update later this month.

The Defense of Computers, the Internet and Our Brains

2010-06-13T08:50:00.000-07:00

Charles Baldwin for The New York Times Several studies show that video games and the Web stimulate areas of the brain associated with memory, hand and eye coordination and attention.

If you’re reading this blog post on a computer, mobile phone or e-reader, please stop what you’re doing immediately. You could be making yourself stupid. And whatever you do, don’t click on the links in this post. They could distract you from the flow of my beautiful prose and narrative.

This is the alarm currently being rung by some in the bell towers of technology.

There is a lively discussion and some concern that computers, the Internet and multitasking are extracting a mental price.

Nicholas Carr argues in his book “The Shallows,” that the Internet, computers, Google, Twitter and the like, are making us into shallow thinkers and the neurocircuitry of our brain that long form reading creates is critical for society to function. Mr. Carr thinks that the Web, with its colored hypertext and endless abyss of bite-sized morsels of information, is making us stupid.

And although there are plenty of others in this camp, there are some who argue that not only are our brains just fine on the Internet, but they are indeed better off for it.

Steven Pinker, a cognitive scientist and professor of psychology at Harvard, argues on the Op-Ed page in Friday’s New York Times that the current outcry is nothing new. The same was heard, he writes, after the invention of the printing press, newspapers, paperbacks and television. Now, the fear stems from PowerPoint, search engines and Twitter.

Professor Pinker points out that our brains are intended to be rewired and learn new things. It’s the way we are built:

Critics of new media sometimes use science itself to press their case, citing research that shows how “experience can change the brain.” But cognitive neuroscientists roll their eyes at such talk. Yes, every time we learn a fact or skill the wiring of the brain changes; it’s not as if the information is stored in the pancreas. But the existence of neural plasticity does not mean the brain is a blob of clay pounded into shape by experience.

Jonah Lehrer, author of “How We Decide,” also argues that our brains are likely just fine on the Internet. Mr. Lehrer, a former neuroscientist, writes on his blog, The Frontal Cortex, that “given this paucity of evidence, I think it’s far too soon to be drawing firm conclusions about the negative effects of the Web.”

In a recent blog post Mr. Lehrer notes that the evidence critics use to attack the Web could be used to argue that we shouldn’t even walk down a city street as the cognitive load is far too great for our brains to handle. He notes that a in 2008, a group of scientists from the University of Michigan engaged in a study that showed walking led the brain to see a “dramatic decreases in working memory, self-control, visual attention and positive affect.” Mr Lehrer writes:

When people walk down the street, they are forced to exert cognitive control and top-down attention, and all that mental effort takes a temporary toll on their brain.

Based on this data, it would be easy to conclude that we should avoid the metropolis, that the city street is a hazardous place.

Then there is the reality that our brains, the tool that you, the reader, are currently using to decode these symbols and understand what they mean, has still not evolved to naturally learn to read: reading is an unnatural task that we still need to train our brains to learn.

Maryanne Wolf, the director of the Center for Reading and Language Research at Tufts, and author of “Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain,” notes that our brains were never actually designed to read. In a blog post last year on The Times blog, Room for Debate, Ms. Wolf wrote:

After many years of research on how the human brain learns to read, I came to an unsettlingly simple conclusion: We humans were never born to read. We learn to do so by an extraordinarily ingenuous ability to rearrange our “original parts” — like language and vision, both of which have genetic programs that unfold in fairly orderly fashion within any nurturant environment. Reading isn’t like that.

Ms. Wolf, who is concerned about the effects of the Web on children, recently explained in a phone interview that although our brains are not designed to read, the act and process children go through when decoding letters and narrative is an imperative part of a child’s development and thinking.

Ms. Wolf points out different media have value. “I’m not saying other mediums and technologies are not good for the brain, research shows that they are,” she said, “but we must understand the use of visual auditory narratives so we don’t neglect the role of the reading circuit.”

Research shows that each medium offers its own positive attributes: Neuroscience has shown that playing video games stimulates areas of our brains that control working memory, hand and eye coordination and attention and can stimulate and vastly improve our cognitive skills. Reading on the other hand promotes deep thought and exercises areas of the brain responsible for reflection, reasoning and critical analysis. And auditory storytelling stimulates areas of the brain involved with creativity, contextual thinking and executive function.

It could be argued that the Web, which is the ultimate library of words, video, images, interactivity, sharing and conversation, is the quintessential place to learn.

Soluto Is an Awesome Tool to Speed Up Your System Boot, Fix System Slowdowns

2010-06-13T08:42:00.000-07:00

Windows only: Soluto bills itself as an "Anti-Frustration Software", and it's not hard to see why—it tracks all the applications in your system boot process, and tells you exactly which ones are slowing you down.

Once you've installed the software and rebooted your PC, Soluto springs into action, tracking every single process that runs during the boot process, and then allows you to easily drill down into the list of processes to see exact times for each one. To make it easier for the layman to understand what processes can be removed, the applications are grouped into "No-brainer" or "Potentially removable" groups.

Once you've identified an application that you'd like to deal with, you can drill down into the details and control it directly from this screen. You can "Pause" the application, which will effectively remove it from the boot process, or you can "Delay" it, which will change the service to run on a delay instead of directly during the boot process—which will get you to a working desktop a little quicker.

The graph next to the buttons shows you what other users did, so if you really have no idea what something is, you can use the wisdom of the crowd—though we'd like to point out if you really aren't sure, you might want to Google it first, or ask a more geeky friend.

Clicking the Read more link next to the application name will bring you to a screen that shows even more details about a process,including the process name, what percentage of Soluto users have it installed, and a lot more information.

Other than tracking your boot process, you can also enable tracking while you are running your PC, which will allow Soluto to try and identify more problems with system slowdowns, compatibility, and other issues. You can choose the "My PC Just Frustrated Me" option, which will pop up a screen with some suggestions on what applications might be cause, and send the report to Soluto—though you won't immediately see any results from doing so.

To better understand how Soluto works, check out this short video which does a great job of explaining the software, how to use it, and how it can help you troubleshoot the boot process:

According to our conversations with Roee Adler from Soluto, the software will always be free for end-users. Soluto's application does send some information about your PC back to Soluto's servers in order to analyze your system, but they assured us that it was limited strictly to data about the processes, drivers, and system components, and no personal information is transmitted or kept anywhere.

Soluto is a free download for Windows only, and definitely worth a look if you'd like to troubleshoot your system boot speed issues.

Windows 7 Running Hot On a JooJoo Tablet

2010-06-13T08:28:00.001-07:00

The JooJoo tablet, possibly big in Europe but not much else, now runs Windows 7 with touchscreen controls for some reason thanks to Joojoo Forums dweller darkdavy.

The tablet runs about four hours with Windows 7 shoehorned in there, during which time it doubles as a space heater thanks to the heat it puts off as it chugs along trying to keep up.

There's a video and instructions in the forums so you can play along at home. Also, soothing birds of paradise in the background:

Drawbacks? Well, aside from a warm lap, the accelerometer does not work with Win7, nor does 3G. [JooJoo Forums via Engadget]

Windows 7 Running Hot On a JooJoo Tablet

2010-06-13T08:28:00.000-07:00

The JooJoo tablet, possibly big in Europe but not much else, now runs Windows 7 with touchscreen controls for some reason thanks to Joojoo Forums dweller darkdavy.

The tablet runs about four hours with Windows 7 shoehorned in there, during which time it doubles as a space heater thanks to the heat it puts off as it chugs along trying to keep up.

There's a video and instructions in the forums so you can play along at home. Also, soothing birds of paradise in the background:

Drawbacks? Well, aside from a warm lap, the accelerometer does not work with Win7, nor does 3G. [JooJoo Forums via Engadget]

Facebook Fans Spend More Money [STUDY]

2010-06-12T21:11:00.000-07:00

A social media marketing company called Syncapse surveyed [PDF link] 4,000 people who have “Liked” the top 20 brands that have pages on Facebook and figured out exactly how valuable those “fans” are.

The study (“The Value of a Facebook Fan: An Empirical Review”) estimates that someone who has Liked a brand will spend an average of $71.84 more each year on that brand’s products or services than will someone who has not Liked it on Facebook, for a total average annualized value of $136.38.

This method is very different than the one employed by Vitrue in another fan value study a month ago. Vitrue’s method valued fans by figuring out how much it would cost to buy advertising on a website to reach the same people.

Product spending was only one of six fan benefits that Syncapse studied. The others were loyalty, propensity to recommend, brand affinity (“perception and recall”), media value (efficiency of Facebook vs. other ways to reach consumers) and acquisition cost.

In most cases, the average fan was more valuable to the brand than the average non-fan, though results varied widely on an individual basis. For example, some fans spent no money at all on a brand and never recommend it to friends.

Note that this was just demonstrated as a correlation, nothing more. Nabbing someone as a Facebook fan hasn’t been proven to increase spending in this study. The study just demonstrates that people who become fans of brands are more likely to spend and evangelize. If they liked the brand enough to “Like” it on Facebook, they might have done those things anyway.

Intel Ice mod

2010-06-12T19:30:00.000-07:00

Well after a long break I am back at doing some modding projects, I have 4 total that I wanted to have completed by the end of the year.

The first Mod is called Intel Ice, Featuring a Intel® Desktop Board D945GSEJT Atom CPU mini itx Board Sponsored by Intel, Looking to make it my Home Media Server. I t will set in a a Custom fake arclyic ice case. Let Begin

Parts List

Plexi Glass
Plastic Resin
Vandal Switch
DC power adapter ( on order)
Intel® Desktop Board D945GSEJT Mother Board Sponsored by Intel!!!!
PCi min express wireless Card ( on order)
Wireless Logitech Keyboard and mouse
Western Digital hard drive
Win 7
2 80 mm Blue led fans
mixing bowl /wood spoon
alumin foil
2 boxs one slightly bigger than the other!!!

The mold Not much Card Board and aluminum foil

Lets Begin

64 fl oz of Plastic resin 1/2 oz of catalyst hardner
Mixed it it for 60 sec

Poured the top of the case in the moldto about 1/2 inch deep. Then waited 30 min till it start to gel then I put a second box on top to make inside walls. pour the remaining resin in to make the walls.

I had to apply a little weight on top of the inside box to keep from floating up.

This will set overnite to cure and make sure you are in a well ventilated area.

Will Carriers Be Big Players in the Internet of Things?

2010-06-12T19:28:00.000-07:00

Qiq connected insole

The number of mobile devices using integrated wireless broadband is expected to top 2 billion by 2014, according to research firm In-Stat. That forecast represents an 11 percent cumulative annual growth rate in the number of devices that demand wireless services — yet the carrier networks are already struggling to keep up with demand from existing devices.

Perhaps the wireless infrastructure issue would be lessened if we only used smartphones, but increasingly, people are buying other types of devices with wireless capabilities; the average U.S. or Canadian consumer has 1.3 cellular connections, for example. Smartphones are the obvious leader of the pack in terms of sheer numbers — research firm Gartner predicts more handsets than computers will be sold by 2012 — but laptop data cards, portable hotspot devices and e-book readers are eating up the wireless pie, too. Even feature phones, which are still expected to outnumber smartphones in the U.S. until the end of 2011, are nibbling away at the broadband supply. For more examples of non-traditional connected devices, here are seven I never even imagined — among them smart insoles or ski-run trackers.

But the rise of connected devices fighting for wireless connectivity isn’t all doom and gloom. In-Stat highlights a key point in the transition and usage of new 4G technologies, and suggests that “smartphones and computing devices are the only devices expected to transition to 4G technologies over the next five years.”

If that holds true, it will help manage wireless supply with growing demand in several ways. As illustrated in our GigaOM Pro report on the topic (subscription required), 4G technologies such as WiMAX and LTE offer spectrum efficiencies not found in today’s 3G networks, which helps to reduce network congestion. And while such a transition will force service provides to run multiple networks for some time — they’ll still need 3G for e-book readers and those intelligent insoles — devices such as smartphones and laptops requiring faster pipes will use 4G and free up existing 3G resources for less data-intensive mobile gadgets.

Plus, in comparison to the totality of connected gadgets as estimated by Intel (5 billion today) or Ericsson (50 billion by 2020) 2 billion by 2014 on cellular networks isn’t too crazy. In fact, in that light, it looks like cellular operators should aim to take a bigger slice of the connected gadget pie.

Image of Qiq Insole courtesy of 24eight This article also appeared on BusinessWeek.com

Why LG Is Enlisting In the Android Army

2010-06-12T19:27:00.000-07:00

LG Electronics hopes to turn around profits in its mobile communications division by building 20 new Google Android devices by the end of this year. Although LG’s upcoming handset portfolio isn’t exclusive to Android, the move signals a reversal of sorts — last February, LG announced full support for Microsoft Windows Mobile with plans to create north of 50 handsets on Microsoft’s platform. What a difference a year makes.

LG knows that the smartphone landscape of today is quite different from that of February 2009. Back then, Google’s Android platform was just a toddler, as the initial T-Mobile G1 had arrived only five months prior. Based on worldwide AdMob data reported that same month, Apple accounted for 33 percent of web requests while Symbian tumbled to 43 percent from 64 percent as BlackBerry and Windows Mobile brought up the rear. LG obviously couldn’t build iPhone or BlackBerry handsets, which left it with either Windows Mobile or Symbian. And while it could have followed in Samsung’s footsteps to build a proprietary platform, such an effort runs the risk of a weak ecosystem if developers aren’t attracted to build software.

LG still can’t build iPhones or BlackBerrys, of course, but it can join the Android army, which sold more Google handsets in the first quarter than Apple sold iPhones. LG may have bet on the wrong horse early last year, as Windows Mobile sales have dropped by comparison. Add in the fact that Microsoft hasn’t moved the platform forward much during that period and it’s clear why LG isn’t officially re-upping for another major tour of duty with Redmond. The company hasn’t said it’s abandoning Windows Mobile, but at least it can build handsets for a hot platform as it waits for Windows Phone 7 to arrive later this year.

Is Google Trying to Make Its News More Human?

2010-06-12T19:25:00.000-07:00

Google is apparently experimenting with adding a human element to its Google News pages, according to a report by the Nieman Journalism Lab. Writer Megan Garber noticed that the regular Google News page had a small box entitled “Editor’s Picks,” with articles from a number of publications selected by an editor at that particular outlet. So is Google trying to curry favor with newspapers and other media outlets that have criticized the company for “stealing” their content? Or is it an admission that the company’s news-finding algorithms aren’t as perfect as they could be, and that humans still have a role to play?

According to a statement from Google about the new feature, it’s a limited test with a small group of users, and allows “a small set of publishers to promote their original news articles through the Editors’ Picks section.” The screenshot below, for example, has headlines from Slate magazine.

screenshot courtesy of Nieman Journalism Lab

It’s a small step, and it may not ever become a full-fledged feature for all Google News users. The search company routinely experiments with new additions to its services, some of which go on to become official releases and others that never again see the light of day. For example, Google launched a commenting feature for Google News in 2007, which saw it reach out to newsmakers involved in current stories and ask them to comment, then highlight their comments in Google News result pages. But the feature was later removed, although no reason was given as to why.

There’s no question that Google could stand to have a friendlier relationship with some major news outlets. Rupert Murdoch and other media moguls such as former Tribune owner Sam Zell routinely complain that the search company steals their content through Google News and that it should be paying them for it. Google CEO Eric Schmidt, meanwhile, has said that the company wants to help newspapers, and has been experimenting with features that it thinks could help bring in new readers, such as its FastFlip service, which is designed for mobile devices like the iPad.

But this new feature could also be a sign that Google is looking to inject a more human element into its news selection, instead of relying solely on computers. Techmeme, a popular technology news aggregator created by Gabe Rivera, was originally controlled by an algorithm with little or no human input on which headlines were featured, but Rivera started adding human editors in 2008, and admitted that the algorithm alone was not producing a complete enough picture of the top news. Perhaps Google has begun to recognize the benefits of human beings as well.

How Much Is a Facebook Fan Really Worth?

2010-06-12T19:15:00.000-07:00

Lots of companies — more every day, it seems — want to have Facebook “fan” pages, where customers or would-be customers can connect with them and become part of their online community. But what are those fans actually worth to a company? Everyone has their own views on that question, but now a social media measurement firm called Syncapse has come up with an actual dollar value in a report released today (PDF link). The answer? An average fan is apparently worth about $136.38, although for some very successful social marketers the value can be dramatically higher, while for some less successful companies it can be virtually zero.

Syncapse came up with the figure by asking 4,000 fans of 20 of the top brands on Facebook — including Nokia, BlackBerry, Victoria’s Secret, Adidas, Nike, Coca-Cola, Starbucks and McDonald’s — why they were fans of those companies or brands, and about their past and future purchasing behavior. Syncapse then tried to estimate what the value of each fan’s spending would be to a company, as well as the value of continuing to have that fan as a customer over time.

The key findings of the report are likely to come as music to the ears of advertisers that have been pursuing a Facebook-based social media strategy. According to the survey:

On average, fans spend an extra $71.84 they would not otherwise spend on products they describe themselves as fans of, compared to those who are not fans.
Fans are 28 percent more likely than non-fans to continue using a specific brand.
Fans are 41 percent more likely than non-fans to recommend a product they are a fan of to their friends.

That probably helps to explain why, according to recent statement by the company, the number of advertisers working with Facebook has doubled in the past year. But Syncapse also said that its results showed how the value of a fan can vary widely:

An average fan may participate with a brand ten times a year and will make one recommendation. But an active fan may participate thirty times and make ten recommendations. The impact this has on fan value is quite dramatic. In the case of Coca- Cola, the best case for fan value reaches $316.78 but is $137.84 for an average fan. In the worse case scenario, a fan is worth $0.

As the chart below shows, fans of McDonald’s spent, on average, more than $300 on the company’s products, while non-fans spent just half that amount. Fans of Starbucks also spent more than twice as much as non-fans.

Some might argue that these conclusions aren’t exactly rocket science — after all, one would assume that if someone goes to the trouble of becoming a fan of a product on Facebook, that person would be enough of a supporter of the brand that they would buy it more often, recommend it to their friends and so on. And Syncapse’s results may also not be 100 percent reliable if extended to the entire universe of 500 million Facebook users, since a few thousand users is a relatively small sample. But it’s still interesting to see someone try to put an actual dollar figure on the value of a Facebook friend.

Bing Adds Facebook Updates and Links to Search Results

2010-06-12T18:53:00.000-07:00

Facebook search will go live later today at bing.com/social and will include the full Facebook firehose complete with non-Pages content.

Microsoft’s search engine will combine both Facebook and Twitter results into one search experience. Results will include Facebook Page updates, as well as popular shared links from Facebook in aggregate form.

Bing promises that the Facebook links that surface in search results are based on Facebook updates that are shared with “everyone.” The company is even going so far as to share only the link content, so Facebook users’ names and photos won’t be revealed.

The blog post on the news explains how the search engine handles links with this example (as seen above): “Searching for ‘World Cup’ will show what links Facebook users are sharing on the topic – with a caption that is extracted from the original article shown below the link.”

Bing will also be updating the homepage to surface trending topics based on Twitter and Facebook data.

What do you think of the new search features?

Facebook Expands Its Reach with Address Book Import

2010-06-12T18:51:00.000-07:00

Facebook now allows users to bulk import their e-mail address books so that they can invite non-Facebook friends to join in Facebook games and apps, including people who may not even have a Facebook account.

Facebook’s growth over the past couple years has been phenomenal; perhaps this new move will help the company maintain that trajectory by increasing the number of invitations to the network.

According to Facebook, these changes to the multi-friend selector for app invitations “make it easier for users to invite friends who don’t have a Facebook account. The multi-friend selector already enables users to invite friends using their email address. This [feature] adds a page to the end of the flow and removes friction from the process by allowing users to invite contacts from their address book.”

Previously, users had the option to manually enter e-mail addresses for non-Facebook friends; however, this new feature eliminates the need to search through your e-mail client to find the address you need. The importer also recognizes which e-mail addresses belong to your current Facebook friends, so the imported contacts list won’t contain many redundancies.

You’ll be able to import contacts from a web mail client (such as Gmail () or Yahoo Mail), from a program such as Outlook, Outlook Express, Thunderbird or Apple Mail. You can import files (such as VCF or CSV files) for other types of contacts, too.

We tested out this feature for an event invite, and here’s the flow we saw:

After that process, we were able to select non-Facebook friends and invite them from a list with check boxes.

Will this personally make it easier for you to manage your events, play your games and stay connected? Will it also help Facebook extend its reach into the inboxes of non-users and keep up it breakneck pace of growth?

Microsoft Office Challenges Google Docs with New Web Apps

2010-06-12T18:47:00.000-07:00

In a move that seems like a challenge to Google’s suite of web-based office tools, Microsoft is opening some of its Office programs — including PowerPoint, Word and Excel — to the web.

Office Web Apps will allow for online document creation, editing, collaboration and storage using Windows Live. Documents created in Office 2010 can be stored directly to the cloud, as well.

Users will have to download the desktop version of Office 2010 in order to try Office Web Apps. We’re unsure whether Office Web Apps will allow users to import their Google Docs (); if not, that might be a stumbling block for otherwise eager adopters.

Here’s a preview of what the new apps will look like:

Office Web Apps will also be available as a SaaS solution for businesses. Companies running Office 2010 through a volume licensing program will be able to use Office Web Apps on a server running Microsoft SharePoint 2010.

Clearly, all of these features and benefits parallel the Google Docs suite of applications. Google () has the advantages of longevity and agnosticism — you don’t have to run any desktop software and Google Docs is plug-and-play — and Google Docs is already integrated into many of our online lives via a Google account.

It will be interesting to see how this battle plays out in the enterprise, where legacy and relationships are all-important. Will larger organizations, from corporations to municipalities to educational institutions, be willing to part ways with their current Google Apps installations? Will they be more likely to head for the cloud — some for the first time — with a MS Office-branded product?

If not, Microsoft’s bid for businesses’ cloud-based office software needs may be too little, too late. What’s your opinion?

Google Merges Street View with User Photos

2010-06-12T18:44:00.000-07:00

Google is now allowing you to overlay photos from other users into Street View, giving you a new way to experience places near and far.

With this new feature, you can view any available user-contributed photographs within the panorama of a Street View location. User photos first came to Street View more than a year ago, but this is the first time we’re seeing image and object recognition used to place this trove of content placed in a real-world context.

To try out the overlay, click “Photos” in the top right corner of a Street View screen. Street View will then show thumbnails of related photos placed over Google’s Street View imagery. When you mouse over the thumbnail, you’ll see a preview of the corresponding photograph without navigating away from Street View. When you click on the photo, you’ll be directed to Google’s photo browser, where you can explore other user-generated images from that location.

This is a stunning, inspiring way to see different people, perspectives, seasons, events and even times of day at a given spot.

Check out this feature when used to view the Eiffel Tower (below), and then try it at a popular tourist attraction or someplace you’ve always wanted to visit. Let us know what you think in the comments.

Keep Your Business Files Synced Between the Desktop and the Cloud [APPS]

2010-06-12T10:16:00.000-07:00

Cloud-based storage and collaboration platform Box.net is launching Box Sync for Business, a new tool that will make it easy for businesses and organizations to keep their files on the desktop always in line with files on the cloud. Think of it as Dropbox for the Enterprise.

Using the new Box Sync client (available for Windows () now and Mac by the end of the summer), users can selectively sync files and folders to make collaboration easier between colleagues. Like Dropbox, folders you choose to sync with Box Sync will be accessible both on the cloud and on your desktop, and changes made in one folder will automatically be updated in the other.

This is a big step for Box, who over the last 18 months has really transitioned from a consumer-facing online storage company into a SMB-centric competitor to higher-level file server and storage systems, like Microsoft’s SharePoint. The desktop sync client completes that circuit, so to speak, by making the physical location of files less of a consideration.

Box Sync will be free for business and enterprise customers, and will be rolled out to users over the next few weeks. Later this year, individual and “Lite” users will get the feature too.

For an overview of how Box Sync works, check out this video:

If you’ve used Dropbox () before, the idea should be pretty familiar. Existing Box.net share rules will be carried over to the sync client so that you can selectively control who can see what files. Someone who has read-only access might be able to view a file in the cloud, but he won’t have a copy in his “My Documents” folder.

All of Box Sync’s files are held in a Box Sync folder within My Documents. This is to make it clear which files are shared or synced with the cloud and which aren’t. A blue sync icon is appended next to files and folders within Windows Explorer to indicate that a file is shared on Box Sync. Likewise, files on Box.net have the same icon to show they are being synced with the desktop.

A big issue with any file syncing tool — especially in a collaborative environment — is conflict management. If two people are editing the same file at the same time, a system needs to stay in place to merge those changes without overwriting the other file. Box knows this and put great effort into making a sophisticated conflict management system that was designed primarily with business and collaborative users in mind. Box.net already has a versioning system wherein you can view the history of a file or document, and in Box Sync you can view previous revisions and download a copy to your desktop.

For business users, especially new businesses that might just be starting out, there are many advantages of using a cloud-based file system. First, it can allow companies to eschew the cost of buying and maintaining a central file server. Second, the advantage of the cloud is that you have access to your files no matter where you are: the web, your phone, your iPad, etc.

However, one problem with cloud-based systems is that unless they have a sync client, you have to manually upload your files and documents and create all new files within the cloud. That can work for a lot of workflows, but sometimes it’s just easier to keep your local files local and know that you can keep them automatically in sync with the cloud.

We think that Box Sync is a really important step for cloud-based file systems because it streamlines a lot of workflow issues, while also retaining existing share rules and keeping other devices in the loop.

How do you keep your local files synced with the cloud?

Google to Integrate Google Voice with Gmail [RUMOR]

2010-06-12T10:13:00.000-07:00

Google is testing a new feature in Gmail, in which a phone icon opens a special Gmail chat window consisting of a dialpad, contact search, credit balance and a call button. The feature is not yet publicly available.

A couple of weeks ago we asked whether GoogleGoogle was building a Skype competitor after Google acquired VoIP company Global IP Solutions (GIPS). Google also acquired another VoIP-related company, Gizmo5, in late 2009 and integrated its team with Google’s own Google Voice team.

Now, it’s all coming together in GmailGmail, which already offers voice chat to users. Google VoiceGoogle Voice lets you do VoIP over the phone, but integrating that with Gmail’s voice chat feature means that you could call anyone directly from Gmail, finally solidifying Google’s VoIP offering as a true SkypeSkype competitor.

[img credit: Google Operating System]

Adobe Flash 10.1 Now Available for Download

2010-06-12T10:09:00.000-07:00

The Adobe Flash platform saw significant improvements today with the launch of Adobe Flash Player 10.1 and Adobe AIR 2.

According to a blog post from Adobe’s Flash team, the new Flash Player 10.1 features improved performance, power management and video features. The player has also been given new multi-touch and private browsing functionality. The overall viewing experience for Mac users has been fine-tuned as well.

The new Flash player should deliver an altogether smoother, higher-quality experience for web video, with better buffering, peer-to-peer video and online streaming video.

Adobe also says more details on Flash 10.1 for mobile devices will be announced later this month, but we’re not holding our breath for fantastic iPhone news.

As for AIR, this product was released two years ago and hasn’t seen a major update until now. AIR 2 improves overall performance and HTML support while reducing memory usage. AIR 2 also includes some new APIs for developers.

WordPress.com Goes Down, Takes Millions of Blogs With It [UPDATED]

2010-06-12T10:05:00.000-07:00

WordPress.com and the millions of blogs hosted by it have gone down for currently unknown reasons. Not only are blogs hosted on WordPress.com down, but WordPress VIP blogs are out of commission as well.

All it currently says on WordPress-hosted blogs is the following:

“WordPress.com will be back in a minute!”

Millions of blogs, including ones like GigaOm, are down for the count. WordPress.com also experienced extended downtime back in February.

UPDATE: WordPress has responded to our inquiry, saying that all hands are on deck to restore service and suggesting that we check out its Twitter account (@Wordpressdotcom) for updates.

Here is what Wordpress tweeted moments ago:

“We are working on restoring WordPress.com as quickly as possible.”

UPDATE 2: From @Wordpressdotcom: “We’ve isolated the issue on WordPress.com, and we are working on a fix.”

UPDATE 3: WordPress.com blogs are back up. Founder/CEO Matt Mullenweg tweeted this: “The vast majority of blogs are back up, bringing up the rest over the next few minutes after we verify them.”

In all, the downtime was around an hour.

UPDATE 4: WordPress.com and most of its blogs have gone back down, less than an hour after they were brought back online.

Motorola Droid 2 Pics and Video Leak Online

2010-06-12T08:14:00.000-07:00

The hotter-than-Hades-in-July Motorola Droid — which we just reported is selling so fast that manufacturers can’t keep up with the demand — is getting some sweet upgrades with its newest iteration, the Droid 2.

Photos of the new handset were leaked today by Droid Life, and they’ve got us positively twitching for a release date.

Most significantly, the phone will retain the physical keyboard to which Droid lovers are so addicted. The keyboard has been overhauled, too, and now features keys that are slightly more raised and no gold D-pad, which was a barely useful mystery, at best.

The lower edge of the phone’s keyboard layer is now completely covered by the screen, so you’ll have a smooth-surfaced device without the awkward “lip” seen on the first Droid. The rest of the hardware is pretty much identical to the original Droid.

The device will allow for Wi-Fi tethering, and it features a 750MHz OMAP processor and an updated version of Motoblur, Motorola’s push-based social networking service.

Now for the bad news: It looks like the device won’t be getting a front-facing camera, so no video conferencing just yet for Droid owners. And the phone won’t come with Froyo (Android OS 2.2) installed, in all likelihood. You won’t get an EVO-class 8MP camera; 5MP will have to do.

Still, do you think the Droid 2’s other features will make it worth buying? Do you think this new iteration will be as popular as the original? Check out this video of the phone’s boot sequence while you ponder those questions, then let us know your opinion in the comments.

Google Celebrates Cousteau’s Birthday in the U.S., World Cup Everywhere Else

2010-06-12T08:13:00.000-07:00

They say that soccer/football is gaining popularity in the U.S., but Google seems to think otherwise. In most countries, Google’s logo today is an image related to the World Cup, which starts today. In the U.S., however, it’s an image of a diver, celebrating the birthday of the great Jacques-Yves Cousteau.

With its sporty doodle, and the recently altered search results logo, Google () is now all dressed up for the World Cup in many countries. The tribute is fitting, seeing as how the event will occupy the minds of many, many men and women during the next month.

Meanwhile, over in the states, many are paying homage to legendary French explorer and filmmaker Jacques-Yves Cousteau, who was born on June 11, 1910, and died on 25 June 1997; He practically invented modern underwater diving in the 1940s, and later created a bevy of films and books, mostly related to marine life and diving.

According to Google’s official Twitter account, we can expect the U.S. doodle to change to a football/soccer theme later in the day.

Hackers Break Into Reddit’s Gmail and Twitter Accounts

2010-06-12T08:12:00.000-07:00

According to Reddit’s blog, the site’s official Gmail account — reddit@gmail.com — has been broken into. Luckily, it’s just an account for feedback e-mail, so no user data or confidential information has been compromised. Following the security breach, Reddit has changed the feedback e-mail to reddit@reddit.com.

From the blog: “We’re in contact with both google’s and twitter’s security team, and the site has not been broken into. All he’s done at this point is ruined everyone’s night. We don’t recycle passwords, and we don’t store passwords in the reddit email. No one’s account has been compromised. We don’t store any confidential information in that account; it is just for feedback email.”

Notice the part where it says that Reddit contacted Twitter’s security team? Yup, Reddit’s Twitter account was linked to the GmailGmail account, and it also got compromised, but Reddit has recovered it and deleted the tweets posted by the hacker(s).

Of course, the story about the breach reached the top of Reddit, as well, and one commenter asks an interesting question: “Why does Reddit use a Gmail account for this purpose, anyway?” One of the site’s moderators answers: “When we were much, much smaller (no mail server, etc) it was the easiest way for several people to get to the feedback account at the same time, and it stuck.”

So there you have it: as the company grows, it should continually update its security practices, otherwise it might find that certain solutions, that were good enough a couple of years ago, simply don’t cut it anymore.

Image courtesy of iStockphotoiStockphoto, bunhill

Google News and Why Human Editors Still Matter

2010-06-12T08:09:00.001-07:00

After years of having its news generated by algorithms, Google News is testing a new “Editor’s Pick” section with publishers, enabling them to select and promote specific content to users.

The new feature — a module of content that is hand-picked by editors at partnering news organizations — with a “small percentage” of users, according to report by Megan Garber of Nieman Lab. Partners include less than a dozen publishers, such as Reuters, Slate and The Washington Post.

Although social media and other web tools have enabled users to personalize their news streams, the ubiquity of content has created an echo chamber that some readers are trying to parse through to find not only what they want to know, but the news they “need” to know as well. This is where human “editors” and curators play a crucial role in helping readers filter through the noise.

And although it is only a small test, it marks a significant shift for Google NewsGoogle News, which includes the footer tagline: “The selection and placement of stories on this page were determined automatically by a computer program.” See the screenshot of stories picked by Slate’s editors below:

The Value of Curation in the Age of Personalized News

It may be a step in the right direction for GoogleGoogle — who began experimenting with new content formats to present content using the likes of FastFlip and contextualized content with Living Stories — to help news organizations and showcase the curation expertise of editors. It can also give publishers the opportunity to put forward and promote content that may not be performing well in terms of traffic or meme value, but are important to share in the interest of public awareness (i.e. government scandals to hold officials accountable, human rights injustices in countries afar, etc.).

There is no doubt that news has become increasingly social; readers are often pointed to content that is recommended by friends on FacebookFacebook, TwitterTwitter and DiggDigg. That’s because there is a lot of value in receiving news from friends, whom often have similar interests.

News That Content Farms Can’t Point You To

Limor Elkayam, the founder of iSpotAStory.com, which curates content from the Web using editors, told MashableMashable that she thinks that Google is realizing the value and benefit of having human editors filtering content.

“Computer algorithms are great for many things, but when it comes to news, people still want that human element, telling them what they should read or pay attention to; it’s why people love Twitter for getting news…there’s a human behind it.”

Whatever Google decides to do with the feature, it has the potential to add a lot of value to readers in getting pointed to content by professional journalists. What do you think? Is this a feature you find worthwhile?

Image courtesy of iStockphotoiStockphoto

[screenshot credit: Nieman Journalism Lab]

More Facebook Design Changes Being Tested [PIC]

2010-06-12T08:07:00.000-07:00

Images of more Facebook design tweaks landed in our inbox (actually, in my Twitter stream) this afternoon, involving some changes to the publisher you get atop your News Feed.

The biggest changes, it would appear, are making the option to share photos more prevalent (currently, you only get the photo option after clicking on the status box), some aesthetic changes to status updates,as well as bumping up the prominence of the pull-down that lets you select the privacy level of your post.

Facebook confirmed they are testing this new look in an email to us this afternoon, writing, “we’re currently testing different variations and designs of our Publisher. As with many of our features and products, we’re constantly making tweaks to test performance and usability.”

It’s hard to say what the goals of these changes are without the full context of what Facebook’s testing, but the simple conclusion is that they’re looking to promote even more photo sharing and get users to pay more attention to privacy settings (which, makes sense in light of recent news).

In any event, if you’re seeing new looks at Facebook, let us know in the comments.

[h/t @deucehartley]