A gene that makes bacteria invulnerable to many antibiotics, including drugs of last resort, has just got a lot scarier. It was thought to pose a threat mainly in hospitals, but it has now been found in sewers and drinking water in India's capital, New Delhi.
And it is likely to be much more widespread than that. The gene has already invaded germs that cause cholera, dysentery and other major infections, and can jump readily among bacteria in the conditions of India's monsoon season.

As the sun travels through the galaxy, the solar wind—actually charged particles streaming from the sun—collides with interstellar gases, forming a cocoon around the solar system called the heliosphere.

The edge of this cocoon, the heliopause, lies more than 9 billion miles (14.5 billion kilometers) from the sun.

"The Voyager spacecrafts were the first to reach these outer boundaries, and [they] gave us very localized information," said study leader Nathan Schwadron of the University of New Hampshire. (See "Solar System Is 'Bullet Shaped.'")

"But IBEX now allows us to pull back and finally show us its global properties. We are now overturning 40 years of theories about this gigantic bubble which surrounds and protects our solar system from harmful galactic cosmic rays," high-energy particles that zip through the universe.

Cosmic rays constantly bombard our solar system, but the heliosphere shields us from most of the radiation. Still, the small amounts that leak through and reach Earth can fry satellite electronics and pose a health hazard for astronauts.
[...]
Now Schwadron and his team have finally been able to digitally subtract the intense emissions given off by this mysterious ribbon, revealing the heliosphere's nose. This feature, like the bow of a ship, appears at the leading edge of the windsock-like heliosphere.

"It turns out that the ribbon happens to go right through this region of the heliosphere, so we just had to pull back that curtain to reveal its signal," Schwadron said.

This nose appears to point in the general direction of the zodiacal constellation Scorpius. From our perspective, Scorpius follows the ecliptic, or the path of Earth's orbit around the sun. Scorpius rises during the summer months in the Northern Hemisphere.

2011/03 Mike Monteiro | F*ck You. Pay Me. from SanFrancisco/CreativeMornings on Vimeo.

A 15 minute film showcasing BDH's visual effects from the Wonders Of The Universe series. Music score by Timo Baker

Tablet computing is the way of the future. But unfortunately for those cursed with normal sized fingers, these technological advancements can become burdensome lifestyle obstacles and usability nightmares. Like many, we have often wished for the convenience of a touch screen interface with the ease of a traditional typewriting keyboard.

After 16 months of intense product design and laborious research and development we are proud to say that our wishes (and hopefully yours) have finally come true! From texting to web browsing, the new Spinning Hat Typescreen™ gives you all modern functionality of an iPad with the sleek classic feel of retro typewriters that we all miss so dearly...

isoHunt is the most comprehensive BitTorrent search engine on the interwebs. It comes as no surprise that losers online share links of copyleft and copyright materials which isoHunt indexes, both in indiscriminate amounts. Each possible infringement from such links are worth tens of thousands of dollars in statutory damage. With 166.2 million files indexed within torrent links on isoHunt, the amount of potential claim is worth TRILLIONS of dollars.

However, the conundrum isoHunt faces is determining who owns copyright over what files are described within torrent files that isoHunt indexes, and what are the wishes of these copyright holders. Is a file's copyright owned by hippies such as Richard Stallman and similar Free Software gang with these ridiculous beards? Or socialist commies such as these filmmakers posting free films and shows at Vodo, (absurd, I know) and similarly free music at Jamendo, and any other sites hosting such so-called copyleft non-sense? Or such copyright holders, whoever they are, hang on to their copyright as they rightfully should and intend on suing any who infringes on their copyright? Afterall, victories in court or settlements are worth more than customers. These copyright holders are our friends and isoHunt seek your expertise in bringing copyright thieves to justice. And profit.

Candidates for a position as Senior Architect and Programmer for Anti-Piracy has the following requirements:

* Semantically determine from names of file listings within close to 7 million .torrents isoHunt indexes, the following: copyright holder of such files, and metadata on the copyright status of such files
* isoHunt do not host or have access to such files (isoHunt can't be a hypocrite and download these files like all the pirates do), so your job it is to determine the above by solely file names
* No master database referencing copyright ownership and status with files shared on P2P networks currently exist, so your job it is to build such a database
* Desired, but not required: to determine names and addresses of pirates participating in the piracy of copyrighted works, for law enforcement purposes (not those owned by copyleft hippies, after having determined copyright status of files). Note that IP addresses does not suffice, even a child can copy out IP addresses of fellow pirates in his BitTorrent client.
* 30+ years experience in C++, Java, Python, Perl, TCP/IP, BitTorrent protocols, and strong magic are required for this job.

Should you qualify, please reply ASAP. Trillions of dollars of profit await, and your compensation will be almost as impressive.

An advertising firm has apologised for placing a billboard for a TV show called The Walking Dead on the side of a funeral parlour.
The unintended, "unfortunate juxtaposition" caused raised eyebrows in Consett, County Durham.
The roadside advert for the Channel 5 post-apocalyptic drama has since been removed from the exterior wall of the Co-operative Funeralcare premises.
An alternative poster has been pasted in its place.
A spokeswoman for Clear Channel, the firm responsible for the billboard, apologised.
"Clear Channel apologises for any offence caused by the unfortunate juxtaposition of this advertisement, which was certainly not intended," she said.
"We arranged to have it moved right away and it has now come down."

To make themselves worthy of salvation, Applewhite insisted that the members of the cult give up drinking, drugs, and sex. Some of the male members, including Applewhite, had themselves castrated.

(...)

Applewhite became convinced that the appearance of the Hale-Bopp comet masked a spacecraft that would enable the members of Heaven’s Gate to ascend to heaven. He was able to convince the other members of the cult that this was the opportunity for them to shed their human bodies for the journey. At the time, Heaven’s Gate had thirty-nine members living at the mansion in Rancho Santa Fe. Beginning on March 22, 1997, members packed suitcases, put on new Nike clothes, and prepared for the trip. Over a period of several days, three shifts mixed phenobarbital sleeping pills, in applesauce or pudding, with a shot of vodka, lay down on their bunk beds, and placed plastic bags over their heads. Members of later shifts cleaned up the area around the bodies and placed shrouds over the bodies. Only the last two helpers were not shrouded and still had plastic bags around their heads. In the front of their tunics, each member had a birth certificate, passport, or driver’s license for identification; a $5 bill; and a handful of quarters. Applewhite left a videotaped message from the cult explaining that the suicides were timed to the appearance of the Hale-Bopp comet and the arrival of Easter.

What a wonderful world The Painting from Dan Berglund .

Scientists at the Johnson Space Center have shown that the effectiveness of drugs declines more rapidly in space.
Continuous doses of radiation onboard spacecraft may be to blame, according to the study published in the AAPS Journal.
The authors said longer missions have increased the need for drugs in space.

Doctor Who fans around the world are currently in shock by today's news of the sudden passing of Elisabeth Sladen.

Sladen was most known—and absolutely beloved—for her portrayal of journalist Sarah Jane Smith on Doctor Who, a role that she made popular in the 1970s and reprised once again in 2006 alongside the revival of the series. This eventually led to her starring in the character's own program, The Sarah Jane Adventures, which was due to begin filming its fourth season soon.

According to preliminary reports from Doctor Who Magazine, as well as from Who alumni Nicola Bryant and Paul Cornell, the 63-year-old Sladen died of complications involving cancer.

It's been eight years since the Supreme Court officially knocked down anti-sodomy laws as unconstitutional in Lawrence v. Texas, but Texas' state legislature has thus far refused to remove the law from the books—in large part because most Texas Republicans still support it. In 2010, the state GOP made defense of the anti-sodomy statute part of its platform, calling for the state to effectively ignore the the law of the land: "We demand that Congress exercise its authority granted by the U.S. Constitution to withhold jurisdiction from the federal courts from cases involving sodomy."

The house had a colorful history even before Lovecraft wrote about it, none of which is mentioned in the real estate listing however. Aside from a giant monster buried in the basement (which can, admittedly, be killed with acid), it has four bedrooms, a koi pond and a library.

The lawsuit, made public Tuesday in Los Angeles by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, accused Global Horizons Manpower Inc., based in Beverly Hills, California, and eight farms in Hawaii and Washington state of luring more than 200 men from Thailand to work at farms where they were subjected to abuse.
The government alleges that between 2003 and 2007, Global Horizons promised hundreds of workers lucrative jobs in the United States, and then charged the workers exorbitant recruitment fees that they were expected to work to pay off. In some cases, according the lawsuit, the workers owed tens of thousands of dollars.

The farms in Hawaii include: Captain Cook Coffee Co., Del Monte Fresh Produce, Kauai Coffee Co., Kelena Farms, MacFarms of Hawaii and Maui Pineapple Farms. The farms in Washington state were identified as Green Acre Farms and Valley Fruit Orchards.

DON-8r (pronounced “donator“) is a small, fund-raising robot that travels through public spaces relying upon coin donations from passers-by to keep it moving. Each donation not only helps to power DON-8r but also goes directly towards supporting a chosen charity.
Inspired by the increasingly negative attitude that many people have towards on-the-street charity workers, DON-8r raises money through encouraging playful and empathetic support from strangers and passers-by.
DON-8r has recently been wowing shoppers in Dundee, Scotland raising both money and awareness for Dundee Science Centre.
Designed to be re-branded to suit different charities, DON-8r provides a unique platform for charities to engage with members of the public in a fun and memorable manner.

Mickey Nilsson, a 62 year old resident of Bardstown Kentucky, has found a way to turn his junk, into a car that runs on Kentucky Bourbon Whiskey. Nilsson, a long time tinkerer, got his inspiration from a character in the film Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. The character in question, one Caractacus Potts was best known for re-purposing junk to create new and more useful machines, which is exactly what Mr. Nilsson has done.

A general cessation of hostilities between the government in Manila and the MILF was signed in July 1997 but this agreement was abolished in 2000 by the Philippine Army under the administration of Philippine President Joseph Estrada. In response, the MILF declared a jihad (strived and struggled) against the government, its citizens and supporters. Under President Gloria Arroyo, the government entered into a cease-fire agreement with the MILF and resumed peace talks.[10]

Despite peace negotiations and the cease-fire agreement, the MILF attacked government troops in Maguindanao resulting in at least twenty-three deaths in January 2005. The combined armies of the MILF and Abu Sayyaf were involved in days of fighting which necessitated government troops using heavy artillery to engage rebel forces.

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