Microsoft Delays Its Windows 10 Mobile Upgrade to Early 2016

Microsoft had previously promised to deliver its Windows 10 Mobile update to existing Lumia devices this month, but the company is delaying its roll out. In a statement, Microsoft says the Windows 10 Mobile upgrade will now begin early next year to select devices running Windows Phone 8 and 8.1:

Teens Are Using Secret Hashtags to Share Dangerous Habits

Rule-breaking may be just as irresistible to teenagers today as it was in their parents’ day, but a new study of secret social media hashtags like #selfharmmm suggests that new technology is helping kids share dangerous behaviors more easily than ever before.


When it comes to what’s known as non-suicidal self-injury – cutting, burning and scratching done with damage rather than death in mind – teens can be quite crafty at deploying hashtags that mask their activities, evade content safeguards and advisory warnings, and make it much harder for parents to monitor their virtual lives.

Everything we know about the iPhone 7 so far

Everything we know about the iPhone 7 so far
Apple only launched the iPhone 6S two months ago, but there are already rumors swirling about its successor — some far more believable than others. At this point, Apple hasn't even announced the iPhone 7, so it's difficult to be sure of anything. But here's what people are saying, and what to expect.

Samsung will finally pay Apple more than half a billion dollars for copying the iPhone

Nearly five years after Samsung was found guilty in a California court of copying certain aspects of Apple’s iPhone and iPad without permission, the South Korean tech giant will finally pay up. While it’s not the $1 billion Apple was initially awarded in the years-long trial, court documents state that Samsung has agreed to pay Apple more than half a billion dollars to settle the case. Of course, the news sadly doesn’t mean that this saga has ended — there are a few caveats that leave the door open for the case to carry into its sixth year.




According to court filings discovered by FOSS Patents, Samsung has submitted documents stating that it has agreed to pay Apple $548 million to settle their patent dispute. Apple must submit an invoice for the sum to Samsung before the weekend arrives in South Korea, and Samsung will then remit payment within 10 days.

Of course, the payment doesn’t necessarily mean this tedious battle is over. As the report notes, Samsung says it reserves the right to ask for its half-billion back in the event that any future court findings that invalidate the judgement.

World War 3 Fears Grow As Russia Confronts Turkey

World War 3 could be closer than ever before even though most experts believe that Moscow would not escalate tensions with Ankara over the recent downing of its Su-24 fight jet by Turkish F-16 in Syria. Of course, Turkey had refused to participate in the Western sanctions against Russia last year. The two countries have close economic ties, and Turkey is the favorite destination for Russian tourists.

Egypt says 90 percent chance of hidden rooms in Tut tomb

Egypt says 90 percent chance of hidden chambers in King Tut's tomb amid new probe

FILE -- In this Thursday, Nov. 5, 2015 file photo, tourists look at the tomb of King Tut as it is displayed in a glass case at the Valley of the Kings in Luxor, Egypt. On Saturday, Nov. 28, 2015, Egyptian Antiquities Minister Mamdouh el-Damaty said there is a 90 percent chance that hidden chambers will be found within King Tutankhamun's tomb, based on the preliminary results of a new exploration of the 3,300-year-old mausoleum. (AP Photo/Amr Nabil, File)

Egypt on Saturday said there is a 90 percent chance that hidden chambers will be found within King Tutankhamun's tomb, based on the preliminary results of a new exploration of the 3,300-year-old mausoleum.

Samsung Galaxy Note 6 To Include Micro SD, 4K Resolution [RUMOR]

Reports are suggesting that the Galaxy S7 will include micro SD provision, and this is likely to be reflected in the Galaxy Note 6 as well. It would make particular sense for Samsung to include the technology that enables storage to be boosted in the Galaxy Note 6, as this handset could be the first from the Korean manufacturer to embrace 4K resolution.

4K Galaxy Note 6 mooted

Report: Apple will kill the 3.5mm headphone jack on the iPhone 7

Even though the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus mildly surprised the world by being ever-so-slightly thicker than the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, Apple’s apparent obsession with thinness is far from over. A Japanese blog cites a source who says Apple intends to do away with the traditional 3.5mm headphone jack for the iPhone 7 and require users to hook up their cans via a Lightning connector or Bluetooth.

The move would enable Apple to shave off “more than 1mm” from the thickness of the current iPhone 6S, according to 9to5Mac, citing the Japanese blog Macotakara. This could give Apple an opportunity to boast that the iPhone 7 is the thinnest iPhone ever.

The 3.5mm headphone jack is essentially the bottleneck to supreme thinness, since it “can hardly be thinner because it is the world standard,” according to Macotakara. Apple once considered replacing the 3.5mm port with a 2.5mm port, according to 9to5Mac. Last year, Apple introduced Lightning headphone specs, though Lightning headphones are still a rarity.

“The report claims that Apple will bundle Lightning connector-equipped EarPods with the next iPhone, incorporating a tiny DA (Digital to Analog) converter into the connector,” according to 9to5Mac.

If this report is accurate, Apple’s move would open the floodgates for manufacturers of 3.5mm-to-Lightning adapters. It also surfaces questions about charging the iPhone while a headphone is plugged in

Source: Digital Trend
By Jason Hahn


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America's F-23 Stealth Fighter vs. the Lethal F-22 Raptor: Who Wins?

In 1991, Lockheed won the Advanced Tactical Fighter (ATF) competition and went on to develop the stealthy world beating F-22 Raptor air superiority fighter.

While in many ways, Northrop’s losing YF-23 was a much better design, but the U.S. Air Force chose the Lockheed aircraft because it believed that company would better manage the development program—and because the service thought the Raptor would cost less.


At the time, Northrop was in the doghouse with the Pentagon and the U.S. Congress because of massive cost overruns on the B-2 Spirit stealth bomber and several other projects. Meanwhile, partner McDonnell Douglas wasn’t faring much better. “I don't know how the Air Force decided which contractors would build the ATF, but I can only assume that there was some long-overdue consideration of Northrop's dismal track record of test fraud, contract suspension and fines,” Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) told theLA Times years ago.

But what would an operational F-23 have looked like? And what if General Electric’s revolutionary variable-cycle YF120 had carried the day?

Even in 1991, in terms of raw performance, the General Electric-powered YF-23was acknowledged to have been the best performer even compared to its Pratt & Whitney YF119-powered twin. The YF-23 had much better supersonic cruise performance, stealth and was only slightly less maneuverable at extremely low airspeeds.

“Interestingly the YF-22 and YF-23 had exactly the same trimmed AoA of 60°. The YF-23 could do it without thrust vectoring. Those V-tails were very powerful especially when coupled to an unstable airframe,” said one source who is intimately familiar with both the YF-23 and the Raptor. “The YF-22 probably had an advantage at very, very low airspeeds but neither company had enough time to investigate dynamic low speed, high AOA maneuvering. This was a good example of how a competition needs to consider the PR value of flight test events. Lockheed understood this and did high AOA and shot missiles and pulled 9Gs. All single point, benign condition events but they left an impression.”

The source added that in some ways, it might have cost Northrop the Advanced Tactical Fighter competition—barring the other factors involved in the selection.



“ACC [Air Combat Command] pilots were enamored with dogfighting and Lockheed gave a good visual demonstration of high AOA—albeit a very limited and benign test,” the source said. “Northrop chose not to do high AOA during DemVal and that was a mistake. Both airplanes could do the same exact maneuver—trimmed, high AOA. As it was, the YF-22 ‘appeared better’ because they did something visually exciting and Northrop couldn't—or so it was inferred.”

But what would all of that have meant for an operational aircraft? In either case, the U.S. Air Force would have received an outstanding air superiority fighter that has no equal. But while the Lockheed Martin F-22 is bar none the best air superiority fighter the United States has ever produced, an operational F-23 might have offered an even greater performance margin over potential adversaries than the Raptor currently does.

The final operational version of the F-23 would have offered much better range than the Raptor—especially at supersonic speeds—especially if powered by the YF120. That would have come in handy over the Pacific. It would also have been stealthier and it would have been almost as maneuverable as the Raptor—or possibly more so at different speeds and altitudes.

Both the Raptor and a fully operational F-23 would have carried eight air-to-air missiles internally—that was the Air Force requirement. Moreover, the operational jets were essentially identically in terms of avionics—both competitors had proposed similar avionics suites. In fact, the Raptor ended up with the radar that was originally proposed for the YF-23.

Ultimately, the Air Force ended up with an excellent plane with the Raptor—but both the YF-22 and YF-23 were outstanding designs. Had Northrop won the competition, the F-23 might have been a better overall performer, but it would have likely been more expensive. With the F-23, the Air Force would have a greater margin of superiority over potential threats like the Chinese J-20 or the Russian PAK-FA. But would that have been worth the price differential? Hard to say—but one can only imagine.

Published On NationalInterest

By Dave Majumdar




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Google Is Relaunching the Struggling Google+ Social Network

After slowly dismantling its struggling social network, the company isrelaunching Google+ with a new look and an emphasis on ways to join interest groups, called “Communities,” and group posts by topics, called “Collections.“

Google says that the new site is much simpler and geared towards helping people connect with other like-minded users and discover content about their interests.

“Collections let you immerse yourself in content about topics like surfing (goo.gl/vvv5QD) or tiny tilt-shift photography scenes (goo.gl/nWyicL),” product manager Luke Wroblewski writes on Google Plus. “Communities enable groups of people with the same interests to join up and geek out on anything from Game of Thrones (goo.gl/aaqtgq) to Painting (goo.gl/kmlM7m).”


(Google)


This move comes not long after Google broke out the social network’s photo product and also decoupled it from YouTube.

Bradley Horowitz, the man leading the social network, told TechCrunch that Google+ relaunch is essentially the company ripping the social network down and then building it back up.

Here’s how Google+ prompts users to create Collections:




(Google)

For now, you have to opt-into the new version, but eventually it will be rolled out to all users.

Published On Business Insider
By Jillian D'Onfro


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Mark Zuckerberg is starting his parenting career on the right note

On Friday, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that he’ll be taking two months off from work after the birth of his daughter to focus on being a parent. I applaud his decision, which runs counter to so many of the prevailing (and deleterious) myths we have about what it takes to be the leader of a large company. All too often, workaholism is mistaken for dedication, and neglect of family is taken as some kind of marker for diligence. We need more people like Zuckerberg — those who have a choice of whether to take parental leave or not — to set the right expectations and an example for everyone around them to follow.

Satya Nadella put it very astutely when he said that, as Microsoft CEO, his job is to be the curator of corporate culture. He might not be the one making the final design or engineering decisions, but he determines the mindset and objectives that inform those choices. That’s just as true, perhaps even more so, when it comes to the more personal decisions that his employees make — such as whether to utilize the parental leave available to them or to forego it in an effort to be more competitive and avoid being stigmatized.

FAMILY LIFE HAS INTRINSIC, UNQUANTIFIABLE VALUE OF ITS OWN

One of Nadella’s charges, Joe Belfiore, has decided to take a year away from work to travel with his family. The immediate reaction from fans and many corners of the tech press was to question whether the news was a form of "soft firing": taking a long hiatus before returning in a diminished role. Belfiore’s efforts with Windows Phone have never delivered any great success, and it could still be the case that he’s taking an honorable demotion, but we have to question our own knee-jerk reaction. Why do we not credit the idea of spending a year wholly dedicated to one’s young family as having value in and of itself?

In a former life, I interned at an investment management firm. There, I would see some of the smartest people I’ve met using up all their time and energy behind Bloomberg terminals while their kids grew up in their absence. Those men were undoubtedly great providers of fungible goods for their families, but they were not, in my judgment, great parents. How can you be a good father if you’re never present to do fatherly things?

What Joe Belfiore and Mark Zuckerberg are doing are things we all should be able to do. The reality of life in the United States, however — where parental leave is a privilege and not a right — is that only very few even get the option. And among those who do, there’s a widespread culture of "electively" neglecting those benefits in order to keep up in the corporate rat race. Much of the furor surrounding Amazon’s work conditions centered on the extreme culture and expectations within the company. Contrast that with Microsoft, whose values, says Belfiore, "align with mine and whose management has been completely supportive of me and my family."

TECH COMPANIES ARE FAR FROM PERFECT, BUT THEY ARE MOVING IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION

The tech industry has taken a number of important steps toward promoting greater inclusiveness and equality among genders and races. It still has a long way to go, but having Indian-American leaders like Microsoft’s Nadella and Google’s Sundar Pichai, as well as the openly gay Tim Cook of Apple, offers great symbolic significance. It signals an industry that’s unafraid of being diverse, and big companies like Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, and Intel now prepare detailed reports that track their progress on that front.

The reason why paternity leave matters in the gender equality conversation is that it actually works in women’s favor. If men take as much time off as women after the birth of a child, then both genders would be hired on an equal footing, without the unspoken prejudice against women who’d be expected to be absent longer around a pregnancy.

As of this summer, Netflix offers unlimited paid parental leave for the first year after a child’s birth. It’s gender-neutral. Amazon followed that lead this month, partially, by announcing it will offer paid paternity leave for the first time in its history. It doesn’t match the company’s maternity leave allowance, but it’s another incremental step toward better and fairer working conditions.

WHERE ZUCK LEADS, OTHER CHIEF EXECUTIVES SHOULD FOLLOW

The more companies that follow Netflix’s lead, the better. But the formal availability of parental benefits isn’t enough. It has to be given meaning and endorsement by each company’s leadership — and it’s arguable that Mark Zuckerberg should have gone further and taken the full four months of available paid leave that Facebook offers. Because if Zuck can take that much time to be a good dad, then so can all the rest of us. That’s the sort of thinking that has to filter through companies like Facebook, Microsoft, the rest of the tech industry, and all other businesses in a modern society if we are to achieve the universal goal of creating better places and ways to work.

Family life has intrinsic, unquantifiable value in and of itself. The tech industry is gradually recognizing that, in a move toward greater equality that needs to be fueled by more examples of CEOs and other high-level executives paying due attention to their families. Why else do we work but to ensure a good life for ourselves and our loved ones? A good work ethic shouldn’t come at the cost of a good family life.

Published On TheVerge.com
By Vlad Savov


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Russia just dealt a huge blow to Turkey over its downing of a Russian warplane

(REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque) 

Russian President Vladimir Putin during the luncheon at the United Nations General Assembly in New York on September 28.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced on Friday that Russia would be suspending its visa-free travel agreement with Turkey, in light of Turkey's decision to shoot down a Russian warplane earlier this week.



The suspension, which will make it harder for Russians to travel to Turkey, is likely to have a significant negative impact on Turkey's economy.

Russians account for a huge portion of Turkey's tourism industry. About 3.3 million Russian tourists visited Turkey in 2014, the second-largest number of tourist arrivals after Germany and around 12% of total visitors, according to Reuters.

The move comes two days after Russia issued an official travel warning advising its citizens against visiting Turkey. Russian travel agencies have also announced that they will withdraw their business in Turkey until next year, according to a translation by Boris Zilberman, a Russia expert at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank.

The move marks perhaps the culmination of Moscow's attempts to retaliate against Ankara.

"Absent a clear Turkish apology, Putin had to show toughness and 'react,'" geopolitical expert Ian Bremmer, president of Eurasia Group, told BI on Friday.

"But this reaction is carefully measured and not meant to create a tit for tat that becomes dangerous. Russians aren't going to touch gas exports to Turkey. And I don't see military escalation on either side."


(BBC)
An image from a BBC video showing the crash.

On Tuesday, Turkey ordered the shooting down of a Russian Su-24 fighter that Turkey accused of violating its airspace for roughly 17 seconds.



Turkey has defended its decision to down the plane, contending that the plane was in Turkish airspace and had been warned repeatedly before it was shot down by Turkish F-16 jets. Turkey released audio of those warnings on Thursday. But Russian President Vladimir Putin said the plane was destroyed by a Turkish missile while flying in Syrian airspace, roughly a mile from the Turkish border.

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev called the act "criminal," announcing on Thursday that Russia would place wide-ranging sanctions on "foodstuffs, labor, and services from Turkish companies" in Russia.

The sanctions "could bite into more than $30 billion in trade ties between the two countries, as police here began seizing Turkish products and deporting Turkish businessmen," Andrew Roth, The Washington Post's Moscow correspondent, wrote on Thursday with Karla Adam.

(Kayhan Ozer/Pool/Reuters)

  Turkey's President Tayyip Erdogan (2nd R) walks with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin prior to their meeting at the Group of 20 (G20) leaders summit in the Mediterranean resort city of Antalya, Turkey, November 16, 2015. 

On Thursday, Putin threatened to pull out of the fight against ISIS, also known as the Islamic State, if Turkey downed another Russian jet.



"We are ready to cooperate with the coalition which is led by the United States," Putin said at a news conference on Thursday with French President Francois Hollande, according to The Guardian.

"But of course incidents like the destruction of our aircraft and the deaths of our servicemen ... are absolutely unacceptable."

On Friday, Erdogan reiterated during a speech in Bayburt, in northeast Turkey, that he didn't want Turkey's relations with Russia to suffer.

But, he added: "We very sincerely recommend to Russia not to play with fire."
'Geopolitical games'

Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, accused Turkey on Friday of "playing a game where terrorists are allocated the role of secret allies," adding that Russia was ready to block the Turkish-Syrian border to "eradicate terrorism on Syrian soil."

It is unclear how such a blockage would be enforced, or whether it would involve stationing Russian ground troops at the border.

(Osman Orsal/Reuters) 
Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, right, with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov of Russia, left, and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu of Turkey. 

Russia has accused Turkey of facilitating the Islamic State's rise by purchasing oil stolen and produced by the jihadist group in Syria.



"We established a long time ago that large quantities of oil and oil products from territory captured by the Islamic State have been arriving on Turkish territory," Putin said on Wednesday from theRussian Black Sea resort of Sochi, before a meeting with Jordan's King Abdullah.

Western officials have long harbored suspicions about Turkey's links to the Islamic State. One official told The Guardian's Martin Chulov in July that a US-led raid on the compound housing ISIS' "chief financial officer" produced "undeniable" evidence that Turkish officials directly dealt with ranking ISIS members, mainly by purchasing oil from them.

Still, those links have never been confirmed — a point Erdogan made as he shot back on Friday, challenging Russia to provide proof that Turkey had ever engaged in financial dealings with ISIS.

Erdogan further accused Russia of supporting what he called the "state terrorism" of the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad that has "killed 380,000 people," according to the Turkish state news agency Anadolu.

Russia, a staunch ally of Assad, began launching airstrikes in Syria in late September on behalf of the Syrian government. But the lifelines Russia has thrown to Assad have not been limited to military aid.





(Institute for the Study of War)




On Wednesday, the US Treasury sanctioned Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, a former president of the autonomous Russian Republic of Kalmykia, on suspicion of helping Syria's central bank avoid international sanctions.

The Treasury Department also sanctioned Russian-Syrian businessman George Haswani for using his firm, Hesco Engineering and Construction Co., to purchase oil from the Islamic State on behalf of the Assad regime.

In response to the sanctions, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabokov said Washington should stop playing "geopolitical games."


Russian officials complained on Thursday that they had not received a "clear apology" from Turkish officials over the downed plane, adding that they would not communicate with Turkey directly until Ankara apologized.

Though he acknowledged on Thursday that Turkey "may have warned the plane differently" had it known it was a Russian jet, Erdogan has refused to blink first.

"I think if there is a party that needs to apologize, it is not us," he told CNN in an interview from Ankara.

He added: "Those who violated our airspace are the ones who need to apologize. Our pilots and our armed forces, they simply fulfilled their duties, which consisted of responding to ... violations of the rules of engagement. I think this is the essence."

Published On
By Natasha Bertrand

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Why Google’s Virtual Assistant Won’t Tell You Jokes

Apple’s Siri and Google Now respond differently to a request for a joke. (Business Insider)

Google may have a wild sense of humor when it comes to the silly Easter Eggs it hides inside many of its products, but you won’t find its virtual assistant joking around.

Google Now, the company’s equivalent to Apple’s Siri or Microsoft’s Cortana, purposely avoids having any sort of personality, search executive Amit Singhal told Time’s Victor Luckerson.

Singhal says that incorporating humor into voice assistants hints at artificial intelligence capabilities that just don’t exist yet. He believes that it misleads users.

“I’m not saying personality shouldn’t come, but the science to get that right doesn’t fully exist,” he says.

He then dropped a bit of a burn on Apple’s Siri, which has a reputation for providing funny responses to questions like “Do you believe in God?” or “Do you have a boyfriend?”

“You’ve seen what happens in real life,” he says. “That is interesting for a day or two, but then it kind of…loses its charm, let’s say.”

Singhal says that improving natural language processing is one of the big challenges to improving Now and Now On Tap — Google’s companion service for Android phones which will scan users’ screens to provide even more useful info. The better the virtual assistant can understand themeaning of a complex string of words, the better it can provide helpful answers.

To keep its search relevant in a world where people are increasingly looking for new, non-desktop ways to get information, Google sees expanding Now into more products that you use every day, like TVs or your refrigerator.

Published On Business Insider
By Jillian D'Onfro



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Apple’s best invention is one that nobody talks about

One of my favorite Apple inventions is one that you might not even know about — or only think of when you’re travelling.

The Magsafe power adaptor that came with your MacBook, and the charger that came with older iPhones can quickly be swapped to suit any power outlet, provided you’ve got the right adaptors.

Adaptors for almost every plug type in the world are available as part ofApple’s World Travel Adaptor kit.

Now when I travel anywhere I just grab the relevant adaptor from the box and don’t bother taking those clunky, expensive adaptors made for tourists with me. Over the years, I’ve gathered a collection of these things — they’re like gold.

The best part is that the same bits work with all your devices, so it makes traveling (or moving country) a lot easier.

What’s sad, though, is that this awesome invention seems to be slowly going away as Apple creates new chargers for its devices. The latest iPhone comes with a moulded charging adaptor that can’t be swapped, as does the most recent batch of iPads.






The good news is that you can still buy these if you want to. A swappable version will run you $19, but considering how many years I’ve had mine, it’s worth the investment.

It does seem to be sticking around for computers, however, with the new MacBook featuring a swappable USB-C adaptor.

Sure, thinking a wall charger is cool is pretty mundane, but it’s one of my favorite travel hacks for not needing to take generic wall adaptors with me everywhere — just throw a few tiny swappable ones in your bag and you’re set!

Published On TheNextWeb.com
by OWEN WILLIAMS


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Microsoft releases Nokia 230, its most expensive feature phone with 2MP selfie camera

Microsoft's new feature phone, the Nokia 230, is just $15 cheaper than its cheapest Lumia, but arguably much better looking.

Microsoft's Nokia 230 features two cameras on the front and back, each supported by an LED flash. Image: Microsoft

Microsoft's latest internet-enabled feature phone, the Nokia 230, isn't its cheapest but comes with an all-new design and is the first with a decent selfie camera.

A few of Microsoft's recent Nokia-branded feature phones come with a two-megapixel main camera, but the headline feature of its new $55 Nokia 230 is that it has "not one but two" of them, on the front and back, each supported by an LED flash.

Microsoft has also gone back to the drawing board for the design of the new Nokia 230. Gone are the loud green, red and blue colour options of earlier feature phones, with the Nokia 230 available only in black or white. It's also introduced a consistent grey, sand-blasted aluminium back cover common to both colours.

The aluminium cover is wedged between two bars at the top and bottom that match the main colour option. The end result is a slicker finish than its predecessor feature phones and one that could even be more visually appealing than its flagship Lumia 950 and 950 XL.


Specs-wise, the latest Series 30+ devices don't come close to the new Lumia duo, featuring a 2.8-inch display -- the largest in the current Nokia line-up -- 16MB RAM, and a 1,200mAh battery that has a maximum standby time of 27 days.

Other entertainment features include the FM radio and MP3 player, which can make use of a memory slot supporting up to 32GB storage.

The Nokia 230 is also an internet phone and can run a number of apps such as WhatsApp and Facebook, and games from the Opera Store, or be used to search the web using the Opera Mini browser it comes with.

However, the Nokia 230 arrives as the prices of smartphones nudge up against the Nokia 230's $55 tag. That price isn't too far from its cheapest Windows handsets, such as the $70 Lumia 430, which can upgrade to Windows 10.

If Google is right, it should be about two years before the price of smartphones comes down to the $50 mark, the price point it believes will be a turning point for smartphone adoption in emerging markets, which no doubt Microsoft also wants to be a part of.

Presumably until that time comes, Microsoft will keep a hand in the feature-phone business.

The Nokia 230 and a dual SIM variant go on sale in December in India, Asia and the Middle East, with other markets to follow in 2016.

Published On ZdNet.com

By Liam Tung




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Miss Canada lashes out at Beijing after contest snub

.


Hong Kong (AFP) - A Canadian beauty queen lashed out at Beijing on Friday, saying she was barred from boarding a flight from Hong Kong to China to compete in a pageant because of her human rights activism.


Chinese-born Anastasia Lin, a 25-year-old actress crowned Miss World Canada in May, said that China was blocking her from travelling to the seaside resort city of Sanya for the Miss World contest.

Lin, who told AFP late Thursday that Chinese authorities were suppressing people who "dare to speak their minds", was speaking from Hong Kong's international airport where she was blocked from taking a flight bound for mainland China.

"I believe the Chinese government is angry at me because my work brings attention to these (human rights) issues," Lin said at a press conference on Friday morning.

"I knew there was a big risk I could be barred but I didn't want to give in, didn't want to give up, unless I had exhausted all my options," she said, adding that she officially remained a contestant in the pageant even if she could not travel to the venue.

The actress has appeared in films depicting sensitive issues in China ranging from corruption to suppression of religion.

Anastasia Lin has appeared in films depicting sensitive issues in China ranging from corruption to s …

She called on the media to question why China would be concerned about a beauty queen.

"Ask them whether they would also bar Olympic athletes from participating in the winter Olympic Games just because they have different views that the Communist Party doesn't agree with," she said.

Beijing in July won the right to host the 2022 Winter Olympics. It hosted the Summer Games in 2008 and will be the only city to have held both events.

The beauty queen has actively denounced human rights abuses in China, both on film and in public comments, notably its persecution of practitioners of Falun Gong, a spiritual group banned in mainland China.

The Buddhist-inspired group was outlawed in 1999 and branded an "evil cult" by Chinese authorities.
View gallery

Anastasia Lin has actively denounced human rights abuses in China, both on film and in public commen …

Herself a practitioner of Falun Gong -- which emerged in the 1990s combining Taoist philosophy, meditation and qigong exercises -- Lin testified in July at a US congressional hearing on religious persecution in China.

Lin told US lawmakers she "wanted to speak for those in China that are beaten, burned and electrocuted for holding to their beliefs -- people in prison who eat rotten food with blistered fingers because they dare have convictions."

Lin had previously claimed Chinese security agents coerced her father, who lives in China, into pressuring her to abandon her human rights advocacy.

"When I was crowned Miss World Canada, my father was so proud of me," she said then.

"He received hundreds of congratulatory messages. But within a couple days, my father's tone changed. He told me nervously that I must stop my advocacy for human rights in China, or else he would have no choice but to sever contact with me."

Source:




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Russia-Turkey Relations Heading Into 'Dead-End,' Putin Says as Turkey Refuses to Apologize for Downing Plane

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Russia-Turkey Relations Heading Into 'Dead-End,' Putin Says as Turkey Refuses to Apologize for Downing Plane 


Russia and Turkey’s relations continued to deteriorate Thursday as Russian president Vladimir Putin said Turkey’s government was driving relations with them "into a dead-end."


The remarks came as Moscow tightened control on the import of Turkish goods and threatened widespread economic retaliation in the wake of a Russian bomber being shot down by Turkish jets and Turkey refused to apologize for the incident.

Putin described Turkey’s government as "a sponsor of terrorism", saying it profited from the sale of oil by ISIS, and criticized Turkey for refusing to apologize for the shooting down.

"We have the impression that the Turkish government is deliberately driving relations with Russia into a dead-end," Putin told a televised gathering of new foreign ambassadors, freshly arrived in Moscow.

Turkey’s leader, president Tayyip Erdogan, struck back, telling local governors in his palace that it was Russia’s ally, Syrian president Bashar al-Assad who bought ISIS oil and that those making the claims were "slanderers."

He also told CNN that "if there is a party that needs to apologize, it is not us."

"Those who violated our airspace are the ones who need to apologize," he said.

Russia's Prime Minister, Dmitry Medvedev said Russia would be launching a range of "response measures" targeting Turkish economic interests in Russia. He said the measures could involve the suspension of major joint projects, as well as raising import tariffs. The measures will be determined in the next two days, he said.

Russia’s state consumer watchdogs said that they had discovered dangerous and poor quality goods among Turkish imports and announced they were imposing reinforced inspection measures on products from Turkey, in particular food products but also furniture and other consumer goods. One agency, Rospotrebnadzor said it already seized almost a ton of Turkish products.

The intensified checks resulted in a build-up of Turkish trucks at the border, local Russian media reported, with some Turkish vehicles being forced to turn-back.

A Kremlin spokesman denied that any sort of embargo was in place, but the consumer watchdog only announced it had found Turkish products to be dangerous two days after Turkey downed the Russian jet.

"There is no kind of embargo being imposed. It is just reinforced controls," the spokesman Dmitrii Peskov told the news agency Interfax.

But he added that "it’s absolutely natural given the unpredictable actions in the case of the Turkish Republic."

Another official, the deputy head of Russia’s agricultural standards agency, Nikolai Vlasov, was more direct, telling Interfax the measures were needed to prevent “enemy tricks” from the Turkish side.

Russian and Turkish relations have fallen off precipitously since Turkish fighter planes shot down a Russian Su-24 jet on the Syria-Turkey border on Tuesday morning, leading to the death of one pilot and a harrowing rescue operation to rescue the other. Turkey insists that the plane had violated Turkish airspace and had received multiple warnings to change course, a claim Russia disputes.

To back up its position Turkish military officials released audio recordings of what it said were 10 warnings issued in 5 minutes to the Russian jet. On the recordings, passed to ABC, a voice can be heard repeatedly warning a plane it is approaching Turkish airspace and to turn back.

Russia, however, rejected the claims and the jet’s surviving pilot, Captain Konstantin Murakhtin, said he had been given no kind of warning at anytime before his plane was hit. Speaking to Russian state television at an airbase in Syria after his rescue, Murakhtin also denied his aircraft had crossed into Turkish "even for a second".

Both sides have so far largely sought to avoid escalation, with Russia’s foreign minister saying Russia has no intention of fighting a war, but on Thursday the two countries’ leaders traded back-handed accusations.

Although most Russians do not want a military response to the shooting down of the plane, the incident has prompted low-boiling anger among many.

On Wednesday night, a Moscow radio station, Ekho Moskvi, reported dozens of people had marched on a brewery belonging to the Turkish beer brand, Efes, in the city of Ulyanovsk and demanded that those inside remove the Turkish flag.

Published On
By PATRICK REEVELL




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Russia says jet downing 'provocation' as pilot denies warning

© Reuters Smoke rises over a mountainous area in northern Syria after a war plane was shot down by Turkish fighter jets near the Turkish-Syrian border Russia on Wednesday accused Turkey of a "planned provocation" over the downing of a warplane on the Syrian border as a rescued pilot claimed that no warning had been given.


As the diplomatic fallout from Tuesday's incident raged on, Ankara sought to play down tensions and its allies in NATO issued urgent appeals for restraint.

Moscow said Russian and Syrian special forces had rescued one of the two pilots who ejected from the bomber as it plunged to the earth in a fireball but confirmed the second airman and a soldier sent to rescue him died.

In his first interview, rescued pilot Konstantin Murakhtin told Russian state media there had been no warning before his plane was shot down by Turkish fighter jets.

"There was no warning, not by radio exchange nor visually. There was no contact at all," Murakhtin said at Moscow's base in Syria, with his back to the cameras.

Turkey insists it gave 10 warnings in the space of five minutes, an account backed up by its NATO ally the United States which spearheads a coalition against Islamic State jihadists in Syria.




The downing has threatened ties between two major rival players in the Syrian war and raised fears it could escalate into a wider geopolitical conflict.


"We have serious doubts about this being an unpremeditated act, it really looks like a planned provocation," Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters after speaking to Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu by phone in the first contact between the two over the incident.

"We do not plan to go to war with Turkey, our attitude toward the Turkish people has not changed," he added, but warned Moscow would "seriously reevaluate" relations with Ankara.

President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday branded the incident a "stab in the back committed by accomplices of terrorists", and told Russians not to to visit Turkey, a key tourist destination.

Turkey, however, has sought to turn down the heat, with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan insisting Ankara was simply defending its border.


"We have no intention to escalate this incident. We are just defending our security and the rights of our brothers," Erdogan said in a speech in Istanbul.

Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu called Russia "our friend and our neighbour" and said Ankara did not want to further strain ties.

Turkey says the Su-24 bomber violated its airspace 10 times within a five-minute period, despite warnings each time.

Turkey's ambassador to the UN Halit Cevik said in a letter to the Security Council that two planes were involved.

He said both had flown 1.36 miles (2.19 kilometres) into Turkish airspace for 17 seconds in a final violation at 0724 GMT and that one was shot down while the other left Turkish airspace.

According to an audio recording aired in the Turkish media but not independently verified, the Turks said: "This is Turkish air force speaking - on guard. You're approaching Turkish airspace."

But Russia insists the plane never strayed from Syrian territory.

The shooting also risks derailing efforts to bring peace to Syria that were gaining tentative momentum following the November 13 Paris attacks claimed by Islamic State extremists who control swathes of northern Syria.

French President Francois Hollande flies to Moscow on Thursday to meet Putin, with both struggling to make good on demands for a broader coalition to fight IS.

Lavrov backed a call by Hollande to close the Turkey-Syria border to stem the flow of jihadist fighters.

Ankara and Moscow are already on starkly opposing sides in the four-year Syrian civil war, with Turkey wanting to see the ousting of President Bashar al-Assad while Russia is one of his last remaining allies.


Assad's other key ally Iran also slammed Ankara. Turkey's behaviour "sends the wrong message to the terrorists" in Syria, its Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told Lavrov.

In an apparent response to Turkey's action, Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said Moscow would send its most hi-tech S-400 air defence system to its airbase in Syria.

The Moskva guided missile cruiser will be stationed near the Syrian Mediterranean port of Latakia, the defence ministry said.

There has been fears of such a mid-air incident since Russia launched air strikes in Syria in September, to the consternation of nations already involved in the US-led coalition.

Turkey had protested that Russia's campaign was aimed at hitting Syrian rebels and buttressing the Assad regime rather than hurting IS jihadists.

Putin said Murakhtin would be given a medal, along with those involved in the rescue operation and the second pilot who was shot dead by rebels after parachuting out.

Russia said another soldier had been killed in a first failed bid to rescue the pair.

In Moscow several hundred activists hurled stones and eggs at Turkey's embassy and brandished anti-Turkish placards in a brief protest over the jet downing.

Europe's main stock markets rebounded from losses Tuesday over the downing, but the spiking geopolitical tensions continued to dominate investor sentiment.

Source: MSN




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Turkey, USA, Syria, Russia,UK, Germany, NATO hilaroius conversation

I found this picture on Twitter and I'd like to share it. lol

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Anonymous Makes Devastating First Move In Its War on ISIS

After declaring war on ISIS following the horrifying attacks that took place in Paris on November 13th, hacktivist group Anonymous have wasted no time in making their first move.
In their first effort to weaken the terrorist group, Anonymous hackers have disabled more than 3,800 Twitter accounts, a tool that has been beneficial to the terrorists in the past.



The hackers flagged the Twitter accounts for officials to investigate further. Social media has played a big role in the recruitment process for ISIS, using the online tool to extend their reach.






Anonymous has also set up their own official Twitter account to help with the ‘Paris Operation,’ saying that their goal is to unite humanity in the pursuit of the destruction of the militant group. They sent out a tweet saying that they will not stop their opposition to the terrorist group.



The event that spurred the hacktivist’s operation was the series of coordinated attacks that occurred on November 13th in Paris, France. At least 129 people were killed and hundred more were injured in the attacks that ISIS claimed responsibility for.







Anonymous has become known for electronically taking down their enemies. In early November, the group made headlines after they released the information of more than 1,000 people that were suspected to be members of, or to have some affiliation with, the Klu Klux Klan.
The flagging of the Twitter accounts has comes just days after Anonymous posted a video to YouTube declaring a cyber war on the terrorists, saying, ‘Expect massive cyber attacks. Anonymous from all over the world will hunt you down. You should know that we will find you and we will not let you go.’
Anonymous is a network of hackers that first gained recognition in 2008 after launching an attack on the Church of Scientology. Since then, they’ve become known for launching attacks on organizations they believe to have wronged others. In 2012, they were named one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People.

Source: glitta.tv
Written by the Glitta.tv editorial team

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Using new gene drive to create malaria-resistant mosquitoes

This photo provided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC ) shows a feeding female Anopheles stephensi mosquito crouching forward and downward on her forelegs on a human skin surface, in the process of obtaining its blood meal through its sharp, needle-like labrum, which it had inserted into its human host. California researchers hatch malaria-resistant mosquitoes and use a groundbreaking technology to ensure the insects pass on the protective gene as they reproduce. It has implications far beyond fighting malaria. (James Gathany/CDC via AP)



California researchers hatched some malaria-resistant mosquitoes and then gave evolution a shove — using a groundbreaking technology to ensure the insects pass on that protective gene as they reproduce, with implications far beyond the promise of fighting malaria.


The experiment reported Monday involves what's called a "gene drive," a technique that, if it pans out, promises to alter the genetics of populations of insects and certain plants and animals faster than Mother Nature could.

Normally, genes have a 50-50 chance of being inherited. University of California researchers created a strain of mosquitoes that could pass a specially engineered malaria-blocking gene to about 99 percent of their offspring.

The mutant mosquitoes, kept in a secured lab, highlight the promise of this technology along with questions about when and how it might be safe to try it in the wild.

"This is a major advance because it shows that gene drive interventions will likely be effective in mosquito vectors of disease," said biologist Kevin Esvelt of Harvard's Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering, a gene drive researcher who wasn't involved with the newest study.

But because no one knows how such rapid genetic change might impact habitats, Esvelt has urged the public to weigh in. The California study published online in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences adds some urgency.

"This work suggests that we're a hop, skip and jump away from actual gene drive candidates for eventual release" in nature, he said.

Malaria kills more than half a million people a year, mostly children in Africa, and sickens about 200 million more. Mosquitoes pick up the parasite by biting an infected person, and spread it when they bite someone else. Mosquito-killing insecticides and bed nets are the main protection.

At the University of California-Irvine, molecular biologist Anthony James is developing what he calls "sustainable technologies" — rather than killing mosquitoes, instead rendering them unable to infect people.

James engineered immune system genes that could spur a mosquito's body to develop antibodies to attack the parasite, so that it couldn't transmit the infection. The new genes worked as intended when injected into the eggs of a particular malaria-spreading mosquito species, Anopheles stephensi.

Altered mosquitoes would have to gradually spread their new genes by mating with wild mosquito populations — and the next challenge is how to speed that process quickly enough to make a dent in malaria in any given region.

Enter gene drives, a technique that proponents say one day might be used to wipe out invasive species like kudzu or cane toads, or reverse pesticide resistance in weeds, or suppress insect populations. The idea comes from a few examples in nature where certain genes spread disproportionately, and scientists have longed for a way to control that process. Recently they've had some success using a powerful new tool named CRISPR-Cas9 that allows precise editing of DNA in living cells, sort of like cut-and-paste software.

Earlier this year, University of California, San Diego, biologists Ethan Bier and Valentino Gantz announced a CRISPR-fueled gene drive that worked in fruit flies.

For Monday's study, the San Diego researchers teamed with James — packing the malaria-resistance genes with the CRISPR-based gene drive, boosting chances of inheriting the malaria protection by targeting the change to a specific spot in the mosquito's reproductive DNA. To measure, they tacked on a fluorescence gene that made mosquitoes' eyes look red if they harbored the new gene.

The malaria protection spread remarkably well, proving the concept even though far more work is needed before this kind of mosquito could be tested in the wild, James said. Among the findings to be addressed was that the transgenic male mosquitoes passed their new trait to the next generation more efficiently than transgenic females did.

Gene drive experiments are controversial. One worry is the possibility of altered organisms escaping the laboratory before scientists know how to use them. The California team took safeguards including special lab security and using a mosquito species that can't survive in California's climate.

Additional questions involve what's appropriate to try — wiping out a species or just altering it, for example — and how to approach such research in low-income countries.

The prestigious National Academy of Sciences is studying ethical issues surrounding gene drive research, and the California team says countries that struggle with mosquito-borne diseases in particular should be involved. "Somebody sitting in the U.S. making up a list of rules has to appreciate that these countries have their own concerns," James said.





Source: Yahoo
By LAURAN NEERGAARD


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Turkey and Russia Saga

2m ago17:07
Obama: 'attack on Paris, an attack on world itself'

President Obama has just started a joint press conference with his French counterpart Francois Hollande at the White House. Calling France America’s oldest ally, he pays tribute to its culture and its joie de vivre. He happy memories of being in Paris with Michelle, including them kissing in the Jardin de Luxembourg. “Nous sommes tous Francais.” He says the attacks in Paris as an assault on the world itself. He claims that 8,000 airstrikes have pushed back Isis.

10m ago16:53
Reuters is reporting that a Tunisian military bus carrying presidential guards has been hit by an explosion in central Tunis. Tunisia has suffered a couple of devastating attacks recently, including the massacre of tourists on a beach and the assault on the Bardo museum. Six people are reported dead.

Updated at 4.56pm GMT




18m ago16:45
White House: 'Russian incursion into Turkish airspace lasted seconds'


Russia’s operation in Syria will continue despite the downing of a Russian fighter jet by the Turkish air force, the Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said. Meanwhile, a US official has said that initial indications are that the Russian incursion into Turkish airspace lasted a matter of seconds.




26m ago16:38
Turkish official: 'Two Russian pilots still alive'


Despite earlier reports that the two pilots are dead, a Turkish official has told Reuters otherwise.


Turkey believes the two pilots from a Russian war plane it shot down close to the Syrian border on Tuesday are still alive and is working to secure their release from Syrian rebels, a Turkish government official told Reuters. “Our units, who received the information that the two pilots were alive, are working to get them from opposition rebels safely,” the official said.




31m ago16:32


While EU president Donald Tusk appeals for calm, Russia and Turkey might choose to up the ante. Analysts Ege Seckin and Firas Abi Ali from IHS Country Risk consider the options for both.



In the medium term, Russia and Turkey both have escalation options against one another. Russia can increase the price of Russian gas, while Turkey can provide support to insurgents within Russian Caucasian republics and in Crimea. Russia is also likely to retaliate indirectly by increasing support for the Syrian-Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its Turkey-based counterpart, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).




48m ago16:15
Russian plane 'acting against militants originating from Russia'


More from the Russian defence ministry, which follows Putin’s comments (see 13.02) that the Russian jet was taking action against militants originally from Russia.



“The Russian operations were against illegal terrorist formations mainly made up of fighters from Russia’s North Caucasus region… Attempts by Russian defence ministry specialists to make emergency contact with their Turkish counterparts were unsuccessful… The ministry is currently working out a range of measures to react to this kind of incident… Military operations against terrorists in Syria will continue.”

Updated at 4.20pm GMT




1h ago15:53
On the diplomatic front, French president Francois Hollande has begun talks with Barack Obama at the White House. Hollande is seeking support for increased military action against Islamic State after the atrocities in Paris that left 130 dead. He received David Cameron at the Elysee palace yesterday. Hollande, who is to go on to Russia, has pleaded for the US and Russia to set aside their policy differences over Syria and “fight this terrorist army in a broad, single coalition”.

Updated at 4.09pm GMT




1h ago15:42
Here is some historical background on past aerial clashes between the west and its allies and the Soviet Union.



No Nato country has shot down a Russian warplane since the end of the cold war, but there have been many incidents involving the west and the then Soviet Union. In the most high-profile case, Gary Powers’ U2 spy plane was shot down by Sam-2 anti-aircraft missiles in 1960. When the US refused to apologise, plans for a superpower summit in Paris collapsed. Powers was eventually swapped for a Soviet spy.

During the Korean war, there were several dogfights between Americans and Soviet pilots flying Migs in Chinese and North Korean markings. The last recorded downings of Soviet planes by US pilots came in November, 1952 when four Migs-15s were shot down during American air strikes against the North Korean port of Hoeryong, near the major Soviet base at Vladivostok.

Captain Royce Williams, a US Navy pilot, was credited with shooting down three of the Migs, possibly the fourth as well. During the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan, Pakistani pilots flying American-made F-16s shot down at least 10 Soviet aircraft in the late 1980s.




2h ago15:30
Russian state tourism agency recommends suspension of Turkish tours


Russia’s state tourism agency Rostourism is recommending suspending sales of tour packages to Turkey the Russian RIA news agency reports.




2h ago15:24
It’s a tough day for Moscow. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reports that Syrian fighters destroyed a Russian helicopter with a missile, shortly after they forced it to make an emergency landing in a nearby government-held area in Syria’s Latakia province.

A Syrian insurgent group, which receives US Tow missiles, said its fighters hit the helicopter with an anti-tank missile while it was in the air and put out a video showing the helicopter being blown up after one of its fighters struck it with another missile.


Rami Abdulrahman from the Observatory said at least 10 people were on the helicopter when it was hit but they were all evacuated when it landed and before the missile destroyed it.





2h ago15:19
Donald Tusk, EU president, has called for calm. The former Polish prime minister is due to host a EU summit with Turkey in Brussels on Sunday which was supposed to deal with the refugee crisis.




Source: The Guardian




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Quote of The Day: John Wooden

Talent is God given.

 Be humble.

 Fame is man-given.

 Be grateful. 

Conceit is self-given.

 Be careful.
John Wooden

Android apps’ covert communications may be killing your phone’s battery

You recently decided to buy a phone with a bigger battery — so why does it still seem to drain more quickly than you expected? One answer might be that the apps you’ve installed are covertly communicating with their own back-end and other third-party servers on a constant basis even though such communications aren’t helping deliver a better user experience.

has found that “63 percent of the external communication made by top popular free Android applications from Google Play has no effect on the user-observable application functionality.” This constant background chatter with servers also has negative implications for user privacy, not to mention that it sucks up both your phone’s battery life and your monthly data allotments.

Here’s the real kicker: The researchers found that when they disabled many of the channels that these apps used to communicate with remote servers, it had no effect on their usability. In fact, shutting off chatter between some apps and servers left their functionalities completely intact.

Given how Google has been working to give Android users the option to grant more granular permissions with Android 6.0 Marshmallow, it would make sense if it also looked into options for helping users limit the amount of background chatter that goes on, both for the sake of privacy and device performance.

Source: Bgr
By Brad Reed



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Scientists create microscopic submarines with light-powered molecular motors

Researchers at Rice University have revealed a breakthrough in nanotechnology that could someday quite literally change the world as we know it. Led by Rice lab chemist James Tour, the team has created what it is referring to as “nanosubmarines” that are microscopic in size, powered by ultraviolet light, and capable of traveling through solution at what the researchers say are breakneck speeds. The technology is still in early stages of development, but these nanosubs powered by “molecular motors” may ultimately be among the most important scientific breakthroughs we’ve seen in recent history.

Rice University’s nanoscale submarines each consist of just one molecule with 244 atoms. Their ultraviolet light-powered motors run at more than 1 million RPM, fueling a tail-like propeller that moves the subs forward at a rate of 18 nanometers per revolution. While that translates to a pace of just under 1 inch per second, it is indeed a breakneck speed considering the scale.

“These are the fastest-moving molecules ever seen in solution,” Tour told Rice University News.

According to the scientists, their research proves that these unique molecular motors are powerful enough to propel microscopic submarines through solutions consisting of molecules that are the same size. “This is akin to a person walking across a basketball court with 1,000 people throwing basketballs at him,” said Tour.

Rice University News explained how the molecular motors work:

The motors, which operate more like a bacteria’s flagellum than a propeller, complete each revolution in four steps. When excited by light, the double bond that holds the rotor to the body becomes a single bond, allowing it to rotate a quarter step. As the motor seeks to return to a lower energy state, it jumps adjacent atoms for another quarter turn. The process repeats as long as the light is on.

Why is this breakthrough so exciting? The team’s research represents a major step toward the creation of a mechanism that could deliver targeted medical therapies through human blood. Medicines could be hauled by these nanosubs and sent to attack specific cells in the blood or organs. Of course, there is still much work to be done before these subs are capable of such an impressive feat; perhaps the biggest barrier is the fact that Rice’s microscopic molecular submarines currently cannot be steered.

“There’s a path forward,” team member and lead author on the researchers’ paper Victor García-López said. “This is the first step, and we’ve proven the concept. Now we need to explore opportunities and potential applications.”

Source: Bgr
By Zach Epstein


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Meet the tiny robot that walks on water, cleans pollution, and never needs to be charged

Sometimes you just have to tip your hat to researchers who work tirelessly to further technology not simply for profit or fame, but to better the world around them. This is especially true when their inventions are as impressive as the Row-bot. The tiny robot pictured at the top of this page isn’t some cute little children’s toy parents will need to fight their way through crowds to purchase this coming holiday season. It’s a scientific breakthrough that could have a dramatic impact on the environment.




First presented last month at the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems in Hamburg, Germany, the Row-bot is a essentially a fuel cell powered by electricity that is generated solely by bacteria living inside the device. The beauty of this particular bacteria-powered fuel cell, however, is the means by which the tiny organisms living in its gut generate that electricity.



The Row-bot has four tiny buoyant stabilizers for feet and two paddles that extend from the middle of its body. While the feet keep Row-bot afloat, the paddles send it skimming across the surface of a body of water. The device takes water into a cavity in its housing as it moves, where electrogenic bacteria digest pollutants found within the water. The byproducts of that digestion are carbon dioxide and electricity, which in turn fuels the Row-bot and keeps it moving.

Row-bot is the brainchild of a team of researchers from the University of Bristol, Bristol BioEnergy Centre and Bristol Robotics Laboratory, all located in Bristol, England.

“We present a design for an energetically autonomous artificial organism, combining two subsystems; a bioinspired energy source and bio-inspired actuation,” the researchers wrote in a paper covering their work on Row-bot. “The work is the first demonstration of energetically autonomy in a microbial fuel cell (MFC)-powered, swimming robot taking energy from it’s surrounding, aqueous environment. In contrast to previous work using stacked MFC power sources, the Row-bot employs a single microbial fuel cell as an artificial stomach and uses commercially available voltage step-up hardware to produce usable voltages.”

The team continued, “The energy generated exceeds the energy requirement to complete the mechanical actuation needed to refuel. Energy production and actuation are demonstrated separately with the results showing that the combination of these subsystems will produce closed-loop energetic autonomy. The work shows a crucial step in the development of autonomous robots capable of long term self-power.”

Imagine that: A self-driving, self-powered robot fueled by waste that pollutes the Earth.

Source: Bgr
By Zach Epstein



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Apple, Google, Facebook and Microsoft warn weaker encryption makes the bad guys stronger

Image Source: www.huffingtonpost.com



In the wake of last week’s deadly terror attacks in Paris, prominent politicians and senior law-enforcement officials have said that western governments have to rethink their stance on encrypted Internet-connected products and services.

But government officials aren’t the only ones to voice concerns about encryption. Politicians might be pushing legislation to weaken encryption in the name of greater security but many big-name tech companies — including Apple, Google, Facebook and Microsoft — warn that weaker encryption will help the bad guys.

“Encryption is a security tool we rely on everyday to stop criminals from draining our bank accounts, to shield our cars and airplanes from being taken over by malicious hacks, and to otherwise preserve our security and safety,”reads a statement posted on the website of the Information Technology Industry Council (ITIC) on Thursday.

“We deeply appreciate law enforcement’s and the national security community’s work to protect us, but weakening encryption or creating backdoors to encrypted devices and data for use by the good guys would actually create vulnerabilities to be exploited by the bad guys, which would almost certainly cause serious physical and financial harm across our society and our economy. Weakening security with the aim of advancing security simply does not make sense.”

Apple, Google and Facebook aren’t the only members of ITIC. Plenty of other companies that provide Internet-related services and products, including Adobe, AMD, BlackBerry, Canon, Corning, Dell, Epson, Fujitsu, HP, HTC, IBM, Intel, Intuit, Kodak, Lenovo, Logitech, LinkedIn, Nokia, Oracle, Qualcomm, Samsung, Sony, Symantec, Toshiba, Twitter, Visa, and Yahoo, are also part of ITIC (see full list at this link).

Source: BGR

By Chris Smith




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Here’s How Fast Google Fiber Really Is

The United States may be a bedrock of technological innovation, but when it comes to something as basic as Internet browsing speed, there’s a whole lot of room for improvement. In fact, if you look at a ranking of average Internet connection speed across different countries, the United States doesn’t even manage crack the top 10.


Thankfully, though, the number of high-speed Internet options for consumers to choose from is growing slowly but surely with each passing year.






Not only does Comcast’s upper tier Internet service provide browsing speeds of 75 Mbps, but Google Fiber can support speeds of up to 1,000 Mbps, or 1 gigabit of data per second. By way of contrast, the average connection speed in the U.S. stands at just 11.5 Mbps. Though Google Fiber is only available in a few select cities currently, the speed it provides is an undeniable glimpse into the future of computing.


Nonetheless, it’s not always easy to truly appreciate how fast a service like Google Fiber really is. Truth be told, most people probably couldn’t tell you off-hand if there’s any appreciable difference between a 3 Mbps and 6 Mbps connection. For many, the mere mention of Mbps or gigabit is reason enough to start zoning out.


The following video cleverly demonstrates the difference between varying Internet speeds by using a bucket of dripping water to represent bandwidth. Things start off slowly, with just a drip, as the video illustrates what a 768 Kbps connection looks like. By the time the video gets to a 1 Gbps connection, which is what Google Fiber provides, well, let’s just say that the future of hyper-fast Internet speed for the masses can’t come soon enough.









This article was originally published on BGR.com

By Yoni Heisler




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Russia Claims to be Bombing ISIS Ruthlessly; Obama Says US Still Doesn’t Know if Russians Are Onboard

A Russian Tupolev Tu-160 “Blackjack"

The United States still doesn’t know whether Russia can “make the strategic adjustment” necessary for it to join the coalition against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS/ISIL), President Obama said on Sunday.

Speaking in Kuala Lumpur on the final day of a visit to South-East Asia, Obama said the focus of Russia’s air campaign in Syria has been “the moderate opposition” and its principal goal appears to have been “to fortify the position of the Assad regime.”

“It will be helpful if Russia directs its focus on ISIL, and I do think that as a consequence of ISIL claiming responsibility for bringing down their plane [over the Sinai on Oct. 31], there is an increasing awareness on the part of President Putin that ISIL poses a greater threat to them than anything else in the region,” Obama said.

“The question at this point is whether they can make the strategic adjustment that allows them to be effective partners with us and the other 65 countries who are already part of the counter-ISIL campaign,” he added. “And we don't know that yet.”

That assessment came despite Russian military reports that – over just four days last week – it fired more than 100 air- and sea-launched missiles and dropped more than 1,400 tons of bombs, on more than 820 targets which Moscow claims are predominantly ISIS facilities.

On Friday, military commanders reported to President Vladimir Putin on a four-day “retaliation” operation which he ordered after determining that the Sinai plane crash was caused by a terrorist bomb. ISIS claimed responsibility for the incident, which cost 224 lives.

The hundreds of strikes from Tuesday to Friday included cruise missiles launched from ships in the Caspian Sea, and air-launched missiles fired from aircraft that flew from an airbase in the Caucasus more than five hours’ flying time from the targets.

A Tu-160 and its escort during Friday’s long-range cruise missile strike mission. (Screengrab: Russian Defense Ministry video)

In the most ambitious mission yet in the seven-week campaign, supersonic Tu-160 bombers took off from an airbase north of the Arctic Circle, circumnavigated Europe before flying eastward over the Mediterranean and launching cruise missiles, then returning to base over Iran and the Caspian Sea. The unprecedented (for Russia) strike mission, which required mid-air refueling, was some 16,000 kilometers long and took more than 16 hours.

Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu told Putin the main goal of the escalated strikes had been to “destroy ISIS military and oil-and-gas infrastructure facilities,” adding that 23 training bases, 19 arms and explosives production plants, 47 ammunition and supply warehouses were among targets destroyed.

He claimed that cruise missile strikes against one facility in north-eastern Syria alone had “resulted in the elimination of over 600 militants.”

Despite the claims by Moscow, Obama continues to voice doubt that Russia is really focusing its attacks on ISIS.

“So far, over the last several weeks, when they started taking strikes in Syria, their principal targets have been the moderate opposition that they felt threatened Assad,” he said on Sunday.

“Their principal goal appeared to be – if you follow the strikes that they took – to fortify the position of the Assad regime.”

Obama said that, during a brief exchange with Putin at a G20 summit in Turkey last week he had stressed the need to “go after the people who killed Russian citizens” in the aircraft bombing.

“And those aren’t the groups that they were currently hitting with strikes,” Obama said. “ So they're going to have to make an adjustment in terms of what they're prioritizing.”

The U.S. and other members of the coalition maintain that Assad cannot be part of any political solution to the civil war. Russia, a longstanding Assad ally, says that’s for the Syrian people – not outsiders – to decide.

Obama said that, at multilateral talks in Vienna on a political solution to the conflict, Russia agreed to a political transition process taking place, but had yet to commit to Assad “moving out.”

“ I think we’ll find out over the next several weeks whether or not we can bring about that change of perspective with the Russians,” he said.

The French aircraft carrier, and flagship of the French Navy, Charles de Gaulle, arrived off the Syrian coast on Sunday. (AP Photo, File)

New cooperation with France

In contrast to Washington’s skepticism about Russia’s actions and motives, France has adjusted its approach in the aftermath of the terror attacks in Paris, claimed by ISIS.

French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian cited the Russian cruise missile assault on the ISIS stronghold of Raqqa and said Moscow has evidently “shifted” its position by bombing known ISIS targets.

French President Francois Hollande called last week for a “large and singular coalition” involving “all who can really help fight the terrorist army.” Hollande is due to hold talks with Putin in Moscow on Thursday, two days after meeting with Obama in Washington.

Sensing a softening on the part of France, Putin has ordered his Navy vessels in the Mediterranean to cooperate closely with the French aircraft carrier group which arrived off the Syrian coast on Sunday..

Russian President Vladimir Putin holds a teleconference briefing with his defense minister and military officials about the Syrian airstrike campaign, on Friday, November 20, 2015. (Photo: Russian presidency)

In his briefing on Friday, Shoigu also told Putin that, in line with his instructions, the Russian military has “begun organizing cooperation with France’s armed forces.”

The U.S. administration remains leery. Obama in Malaysia did not directly respond to part of a reporter’s question noting that Russia would be part of the grand coalition Hollande is proposing.

But, after addressing his concerns about Russia’s continuing support for Assad, and his view that Assad cannot stay in power Obama said, “there are a large number of members of this coalition, including President Hollande, who agree with me on that.”

At Friday’s daily press briefing, State Department spokesman John Kirby sounded dubious about the potential for Russia to be part of the coalition..

“If Russia is serious about this, about going after ISIL and changing the calculus of the military activities it’s conducting inside Syria, well, then that’s great, and we’d be willing to have a discussion with them about how they might be able to contribute to coalition operations,” he said. “We’re just not at that stage right now.”




Published On Cns News

By Patrick Goodenough




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