December 2007
Leading surveillance societies in the EU and the... →
The 2007 International Privacy Ranking
Web icon set to be discontinued →
The browser that helped kick-start the commercial web is to cease development because of lack of users. Netscape Navigator, now owned by AOL, will no longer be supported after 1 February 2008, the company has said. In the mid-1990s the browser was used by more than 90% of the web population, but numbers have slipped to just 0.6%.
Bhutto assassination plunges Pakistan into turmoil →
Pakistan opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was assassinated by a suicide bomber on Thursday, plunging the nuclear-armed country into one of the worst crises in its 60-year history. Her killing after an election rally in the city of Rawalpindi triggered a wave of violence, especially in her native Sindh province, and could lead to the postponement of January 8 polls meant to return Pakistan to...
Australia's controversial national ID program hits... →
Opponents of Australia’s controversial Access Card received an early Christmas present earlier this month when the incoming Rudd Labor Government finally axed the controversial ID program. Had it been implemented, the Access Card program would have required Australians to present the smart card anytime they dealt with certain federal departments, including Medicare, Centrelink, the Child...
Andy Warhol Exhibition in Brisbane, Australia →
Exclusive to Brisbane, Australia’s first major Andy Warhol retrospective brings together more than 300 works spanning all areas of his practice from the 1950s until his death in 1987 — paintings, drawings, prints, sculptures, photographs, films, videos and installations. One of the most influential and important artists of the late twentieth century and the figurehead of Pop art, Andy Warhol...
Merry Xmas Readers
If you are like you are probably glad xmas is over for another year and have started making new year resolutions that you won’t keep. Anyways a special thank you to all my readers in 2007 and I hope I can keep your interest in 2008. Cheers - your pal, mars-Z
Drugs to build up that mental muscle →
Forget sports doping. The next frontier is brain doping. Despite the potential side effects, academics, classical musicians, corporate executives, students and even professional poker players have embraced the drugs to clarify their minds, improve their concentration or control their emotions. “There isn’t any question about it — they made me a much better player,” said...
To catch a thief →
On three consecutive days last month, about $150 went missing from schoolbags, which students must store in the hat room during recess. Harry was a victim - he lost $18 - and other students had cash and bus passes nicked. Harry, 11, sprang into action. “The teachers said ‘wait, wait, wait’ and they weren’t taking any action,” he said. “I decided to act because I...
Elemance - Day B4 XMAS Eve 2007 →
Download Just Added @ Crystal Clouds: Elemance - Day B4 XMAS Eve 2007 Feedback Thread | DJ Homepage Tracklist 1. Robert Owens - Survive 2. Daniel Portman - White Russian (Original Mix) 3. Christian Smith & John Selway - Hidden Cities 4. dPen - Airborne (3 Colours Lift Off Mix) 5. King Unique - Yohkoh (James Talk Remix) 6. Lopazz - 2 Fast 4 U (G & the CDS Remix) 7. Motorcitysoul -...
Sunni, Shia March Together in Baghdad for Peace →
Approximately 1,000 Iraqi citizens, of both Shia and Sunni religions, joined together on the sectarian fault line in Rawaniyah, the Karkh District of Baghdad, to march with one another in what they called a “Peace March”, Dec. 19.
Debunking Medical Myths →
Physicians understand that practicing good medicine requiresthe constant acquisition of new knowledge, though they oftenassume their existing medical beliefs do not need re-examination.These medical myths are a light hearted reminder that we canbe wrong and need to question what other falsehoods we unwittinglypropagate as we practice medicine. We generated a list of commonmedical or medicine...
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Intelligence Redefined: Are You A Gifted Person? →
For a long time the meaning of giftedness has been restricted to the rigid confines of achievement and accomplishment. Academic toppers are, and should be entitled to their share of glory, but in the process of lauding top scorers and scholarship winners we may be crowding out those who actually have advanced and complex patterns of development but just don’t fit the system’s definition of ‘top...
Borat and Ali G retire from showbiz →
Sacha Baron Cohen has told Britain’s The Daily Telegraph that he is retiring the clueless Kazakh journalist, as well as his alter ego, aspiring rapper Ali G. “When I was being Ali G and Borat I was in character sometimes 14 hours a day and I came to love them, so admitting I am never going to play them again is quite a sad thing,” the 36-year-old actor-comedian says in the...
Can a Virgin Give Birth? Yes—but it's very, very,... →
During the holidays, Christians celebrate the birth of a human baby to his virginal mother. We know that female wasps, fish, birds, and lizards can produce healthy offspring without having sex, but what about people? Are natural human virgin births possible? Yes, in theory. However, a number of rare events would have to occur in close succession, and the chances of these all happening in real life...
Linux Is Not Y2K(38) Compliant!? →
All 32 bit Unix and Linux systems will come to a halt on January 19, 2038 at 3:14:07. This is due to the fact that *nix systems keep track of time in a four byte integer corresponding to the number of seconds after January 1, 1970 12:00:00. The maximum value of a four byte integer is 2,146,483,547 which is equivalent of January 19, 2038 at 3:14:07
Japan to drop humpback whale hunt →
Japan has suspended its first humpback whale hunt in seas off Antarctica since the 1960s, the government said Friday, backing down in an escalating international battle over the expansion of its hunt. Japan dropped the planned taking of 50 humpbacks — which have been off-limits to commercial hunting since 1966 — at the behest of the United States, the chair of the International Whaling Commission,...
11 "Don't-Tell-the-Wife" Secrets All Men Keep →
In the interest of uniting the sexes, we’ve scoured the country for guys willing to share the private truths they wouldn’t normally confess. Some are a bit crass. Some you’ve always suspected. Some are surprisingly sweet. But read on, and you may discover that the truth about men isn’t all that ugly.
Moon is younger and more Earth-like than thought →
New research suggests the moon is actually 30 million years younger than anyone had thought, and that it is merely a ‘chip off the old block’ of Earth rather than being made up of the remnants of a Mars-sized body that slammed into Earth billions of years ago. That violent impact was thought to have taken place 30 million years after the solar system began to condense from a disc of...
Vladimir Putin named Time's person of the year →
“At significant cost to the principles and ideas that free nations prize, he has performed an extraordinary feat of leadership in imposing stability on a nation that has rarely known it and brought Russia back to the table of world power,” Stengel wrote. “For that reason, Vladimir Putin is Time’s 2007 Person of the Year.” “Putin is not a boy scout. He is not a...
UFOs exist, says Japan official →
Japan’s chief government spokesman has announced that unidentified flying objects (UFOs) exist. Earlier, in response to a question from an opposition lawmaker, the Japanese government issued a statement saying it could not confirm any cases of UFOs. But Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura later told reporters he believed they were “definitely” real. It is the sort of...
“I have been primarily interested in how and why ordinary people do unusual...”
– PsyBlog: Why We do Dumb or Irrational Things: 10 Brilliant Social Psychology Studies
Study Reveals Why Monkeys Shout During Sex →
Female monkeys may shout during sex to help their male partners climax, research now reveals. Without these yells, male Barbary macaques (Macaca sylvanus) almost never ejaculated, scientists found. Female monkeys often utter loud, distinctive calls before, during or after sex. Their exact function, if any, has remained heavily debated.
Some Useful Condescending Phrases
# Thank you. We’re all refreshed and challenged by your unique point of view. # The fact that no one understands you doesn’t mean you’re an artist. # I don’t know what your problem is, but I’ll bet it’s hard to pronounce. # Any connection between your reality and mine is purely coincidental. # I have plenty of talent and vision. I just don’t care. # I like...
Booze, Bud & Blow- A History of Presidential... →
Bush, Clinton, Nixon, Kennedy—even our founding fathers. A historical look at presidential drug use and abuse.
An Invitation To The Electric Seance →
At precisely 20:02 on the 20th February, 2002 (20/02, 2002 in the UK date system), nine people gathered at the banks of the River Thames where it passes the Greenwich Observatory at 00 longitude, the world’s Prime Meridian. They were there to perform “a mass for palindromic time,” “to celebrate and to devastate, to perform an act of chronological terrorism, strike a blow to...
Ron Paul Supporters Make History with $6 Million... →
Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul made history Sunday by raising $6 million in online contributions in 24 hours, breaking the record for the most money raised by a national candidate in a single day, and potentially putting Paul on track to surpass the fourth quarter fund raising of all of his competitors in both parties. “I just think it’s extraordinary,” says Anthony...