NFL exec: HGH testing resolution needed

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) ? NFL senior vice president Adolpho Birch says the league and players association need to reach agreement soon on HGH testing.

The NFL and the union agreed in principle to HGH testing when a new 10-year labor agreement was reached in August 2011. But protocols must be approved by both sides and the players have questioned the science in the testing procedures, stalling implementation.

Speaking at the scouting combine Thursday, Birch says the NFL has full confidence in the test and "should have been a year into this by now." He calls the delays "a disservice to all of us."

On Tuesday, the union said in a conference call it favors HGH testing, but only with a strong appeal process. Otherwise, NFLPA spokesman George Atallah said, "it's just a nonstarter."

Associated Press

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Why promising minority students aren't signing up for AP exams

Minority students sign up for AP exams at a lower rate than white peers, even if they are likely to pass. Cultivating early interest in math and science is key to fulfilling potential.

By Ryan Lenora Brown,?Contributor / February 20, 2013

Maia Luick marks an answer during a 30-minute science test at the GCI Alaska Academic Decathlon in Anchorage, Alaska, this month. Overall, more high school students are passing Advanced Placement exams, but minority students, even those likely to pass, aren't signing up for tests.

Erik Hill/The Anchorage Daily/AP

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The number of high school students passing at least one Advanced Placement (AP) exam is up overall this year, but students from minority groups still lag behind their white peers, particularly in math and science.

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Among members of the class of 2012, more than 32.4 percent (950,000 students) took at least one AP exam, up from 30.2 percent in 2011. A decade ago, the number was 18 percent, according to an annual report released Wednesday by the College Board, which administers the tests.

But the College Board also finds that many minority and low-income students, even those with a high likelihood of succeeding on AP exams, aren?t taking them. For students?deemed likely to pass an AP mathematics exam, only 30 percent of African-American and Hispanic students and 20 percent of American-Indian students signed up for the test, compared with 40 percent of white students and 60 percent Asian and Pacific Islander students.

?It?s really unconscionable that we?re not better as a nation at helping students from underserved backgrounds prepare for and enroll in AP courses,? says Trevor Packer, College Board senior vice president for AP.

Since its inception in the 1950s, the AP program has grown into a staple of the college preparatory curriculum in American high schools. The AP curriculum teaches college-level material to high school students in 31 subjects across a wide range of disciplines, including both traditional courses like physics and US history and atypical specialties like human geography and Japanese language and culture.

Passing an AP exam in high school is correlated to a higher college grade point average and an increased likelihood of graduating from a four-year college, the College Board reports. It can also bring down tuition costs for students who enter college with credits earned through AP scores. Exams are scored on a five-point scale ? three points or higher counts as passing and can be used for college credit or placement at many universities.

Enrollment in AP courses has recently become more diverse. In 2002, less than 18 percent of AP exam takers were so-called ?underserved minorities.? Now the figure is 26 percent. And the number of low-income students in the AP program has grown from 11 percent to nearly 27 percent in the same time period. This is due in part to widespread subsidies to help offset the test's nearly $100 price tag. ?

Mr. Packer says that low-enrollment in AP courses and exams among minority students is often a function of availability.?But other education experts argue that the problem is more systemic. ?

When it comes to math and science, minority students are ?often not recognized as the smart kids in the class,? says Mary Walker, an education professor at the University of Texas in Austin who focuses on math and science education.

If you don?t cultivate students? interest and aptitude for a subject early in their educational careers, she says, increasing their access to AP exams may simply be too little too late.

?If you don?t get them interested at middle school level they won?t be on track to take advanced courses in high school because they won?t have taken the necessary prerequisites,? she says.

The ?high likelihood? that a student will pass an AP exam is determined by looking at a student?s score on the Preliminary Scholastic Assessment Test (PSAT) ? an SAT-style test the College Board offers to high school sophomores and juniors. Students with certain qualifying scores on one or more sections of that exam have at least a 60 percent chance of passing an AP exam, the College Board reports.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/bOzRVc9IEk8/Why-promising-minority-students-aren-t-signing-up-for-AP-exams

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Critics Question 2 U.S.-Funded Cancer Studies In India

USA Today:

For more than 12 years, as part of two massive U.S-funded studies in India, researchers tracked a large group of women for cervical cancer but didn't screen them, instead monitoring them as their cancers progressed. At least 79 of the women died.

Read the whole story at USA Today

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/20/india-cancer-studies-us-funded-critics_n_2726227.html?utm_hp_ref=healthy-living

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Sorry, Yale: Harvard mints the most billionaires

Paul O'Donnell , CNBC.com ? ? ? 6 hrs.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology has its hedge-fund quants, the University of Southern California has its movie moguls. But if you really want your child to be a billionaire, you might want to send them to Harvard.

Harvard has graduated some 52 billionaires, with a collective fortune of $205 billion, to lead Wealth-X's global list of universities ranked by alumni worth $1 billion or more. That's nearly twice as many as the No. 2 school, the University of Pennsylvania, which has 28 billionaire alumni worth a collective $112 billion.

And these numbers don't include either Microsoft's Bill Gates or Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg both of whom attended Harvard but didn't stay to get their degree. Together they are worth some $45 billion.

Read More: Cities That Mint Millionaires the Fastest

Before dismissing Harvard as a domain of rich kids who mostly inherit their wealth, consider that the school also claimed the highest percentage of self-made billionaires in the study. Seventy-four percent of the school's billionaire alumni "built that," Wealth-X found.

"It shows the power of networks," said David Friedman, president of Wealth-X. "Harvard has this entrenched, powerful network that extends across so many sectors and is incredibly pro-active about connecting its alumni. You get a great education, but you also get access."

Harvard's success, said Friedman, "validates what we all whisper and now we know: It's not just what you know, it's who you know."

Other schools can boast about their networks, too, particularly those with lines into technology and other leading fields for growing wealth.

Stanford University, in the heart of Silicon Valley, has 27 billionaires to its credit, ranking No. 3. M.I.T., whose alumni beat Harvard's for highest average net worth, at $257 million, has sprinkled its number-crunching analysts throughout Wall Street and hedge funds. The University of Cambridge, the only school outside the United States to make the top 10, is a high-tech leader in the U.K.

Top 5 universities ranked by billionaire alumni

1. Harvard, 52 billionaire alums with a total wealth of $205 billion
   
2. University of Pennsylvania, 28 billionaire alums with total wealth of $112 billion
3. Stanford, 27 billionaire alums, total wealth of $76 billion
4. New York University, 17 billionaire alums, total wealth of $68 billion

Source: Wealth-X

And in the broader category of ultra-high-net-worth individuals, which Wealth-X defines as those worth $30 million or more, "there are smaller clusters of successful graduates who have drawn in other alumni," Friedman noted. The University of Virginia, for instance, has many fewer billionaires, but outdid Harvard for the highest percentage of self-made wealthy, at 79 percent.

Monash University, in Melbourne, Australia, is a launching pad for women. Seventeen percent of their ultra-high-net-worth graduates are women. Among top American universities, Northwestern and Brown are conducive to female wealth with 15 percent and 14 percent.

But Harvard led in every other category in the Wealth-X rankings. Its ultra-high-net-worth graduates' sheer numbers ? totaling close to 3,000 ? and their outsized total net worth of $622 billion is enough to make parents whose children won't be going feel left out.

Some quick math, Friedman pointed out, provides a little balm for those suffering from elite education envy. In all, the universities mentioned in Wealth-X's report have helped create 14,355 ultra-high-net-worth individuals out of a total global population of more than 186,000, or about 7 percent. "That leaves 93 percent of the world's super-rich," Friedman said, "who did just fine without attending a top ranked school."

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/business/sorry-yale-harvard-mints-most-mega-rich-alums-1C8452389

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Obama admin. tackles colonoscopy confusion

WASHINGTON (AP) ? The new health law requires that most insurance plans cover all costs for preventive care, including colon cancer screening.

But it didn't turn out to be that simple.

Many patients ended up with a bill when the doctor performing the colonoscopy removed precancerous growths known as polyps. Why the bill? Because a preventive screening had turned into a procedure.

Now the Obama administration is trying to straighten out the confusion: Polyp removal is part of preventive care, and therefore free of charge to the patient.

Health plans also must cover an expensive genetic test for breast cancer if a woman's doctor orders it. And the lowly aspirin for heart trouble is covered too, if prescribed.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/obama-admin-tackles-colonoscopy-confusion-190515059.html

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Any mock that has us taking anyone other than Geno Smith at #1, and subsequently has someone else taking him in the top 10 is worthless. Nobody needs a qb more than KC and Arizona. Two QB's will be gone in the top 15, count on it.

Source: http://www.chiefsplanet.com/BB/showthread.php?t=270220&goto=newpost

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Powerful people are looking out for their future selves

Feb. 19, 2013 ? Would you prefer $120 today or $154 in one year? Your answer may depend on how powerful you feel, according to new research in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.

Many people tend to forego the larger reward and opt for the $120 now, a phenomenon known as temporal discounting. But research conducted by Priyanka Joshi and Nathanael Fast of the University of Southern California Marshall School of Business suggests that people who feel powerful are more likely to wait for the bigger reward, in part because they feel a stronger connection with their future selves.

In the first of four experiments, the researchers randomly assigned participants to be a team manager (high-power role) or a team worker (low-power role) in a group activity. Afterwards, the participants were asked to make a series of choices between receiving $120 now or increasing amounts of money ($137, $154, $171, $189, $206, $223, and $240) in one year.

On average, low-power team workers were only willing to take the future reward if it was at least $88 more than the immediate one. High-power team managers, on the other hand, were willing to wait for future rewards that were only $52 more than the immediate one.

Joshi and Fast speculated that power holders may be willing to wait for the larger rewards because they feel more connected with their future selves, a consequence of experiencing less uncertainty about their futures along with an increased tendency to see the big picture.

In line with their hypothesis, the second experiment showed that the relationship between power and reduced temporal discounting could be explained, at least in part, by participants' connectedness to their future selves.

A third study showed that powerful people also show this pattern with non-monetary rewards.

In the final study, Joshi and Fast took their research outside the laboratory, asking dozens of people about how powerful they feel in their everyday jobs and how much money they have socked away. After accounting for various factors including total income and socioeconomic status, the researchers found that people who felt more powerful at work and who felt more connected with their future selves had amassed greater lifetime savings.

While powerful people may feel more connected with their future selves and are therefore more likely to save money, they also tend to be overconfident decision-makers.

"It is important to foster awareness of all of power's effects," the researchers conclude, "otherwise, the power holder may make overly risky -- albeit well-intentioned -- decisions on behalf of their future self."

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Association for Psychological Science.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

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Journal Reference:

1. P. D. Joshi, N. J. Fast. Power and Reduced Temporal Discounting. Psychological Science, 2013; DOI: 10.1177/0956797612457950

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_health/~3/J2ygcXZqG68/130219161254.htm

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Potential epigenetic mechanisms for improved cancer therapy

Feb. 19, 2013 ? A review article by researchers at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) proposes a new epigenetic hypothesis linked to tumor production and novel ideas about what causes progenitor cells to develop into cancer cells. Published in the February 2013 issue of Epigenomics, the article provides examples of how epigenetic drug treatments could be beneficial in treating cancers while also decreasing the likelihood of cancer relapse.

The article was written by researchers at the Boston University Cancer Center. Sibaji Sarkar, PhD, adjunct instructor of medicine at BUSM, is the article's corresponding author.

Cancer is a complex disease characterized by uncontrolled cell growth, division and invasion into other tissues. A 2004 review article published in Nature Medicine suggests that epigenetics, which is the phenomena whereby genetically identical cells express their genes differently resulting in different phenotypes and other factors play an important role in the formation of cancer originating from cancer stem cells.

Sarkar and colleagues propose that epigenetic processes, specifically DNA methylation, may trigger cancer progenitor cell formation from somatic cells in coordination with other cellular and environmental events. DNA methylation is a process that changes the DNA and causes genes to be silenced. In the absence of definitive proof of the existence of cancer stem cells, this hypothesis discusses a possible explanation for the formation and existence of cells that may develop into cancer. The researchers also explore why only some individuals develop cancer, despite identical genetic predispositions.

In cancer cells, the enzyme that maintains high levels of methylation in tumor suppressor genes is highly expressed, allowing uncontrolled growth. At the same time, many oncogenes, or genes with the potential to cause cancer, are activated and have lower levels of methylation. The apparent anomaly of the existence of both low and high rates of methylation could be explained with either the compartmentalization of these two processes and/or by the existence of both a methylation and demethylation system operating simultaneously at specific locations with the help of various accessory proteins.

The authors hypothesize the existence of both DNA methylating and demethylating enzymes in cells that regulate the methylation and demethylation process. Accessory proteins and/or small RNA factors could lead these enzymes to their sites of actions, resulting in some genes remaining methylated and others not methylated simultaneously within the same cellular environment. DNA sequences around the regions that are methylated and demethylated may also play role in these events. During drug treatments, the demethylating system dominates while the methylating enzyme is down-regulated, resulting in re-expression of silenced genes.

Recent studies have shown that epigenetic drug treatments prior to and with standard chemotherapy reduce the chance of cancer relapse.

"Progenitors are known to cause cancer relapse, and because epigenetic drugs can help destroy progenitor cells, these drugs could help reduce the chance of cancer relapse and improve the long-term outcomes of people with cancer," said Sarkar. "While our hypotheses are based on current knowledge, we are proposing important and exciting areas to be explored in the future."

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Boston University Medical Center, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

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Journal Reference:

1. Sibaji Sarkar, Sarah Goldgar, Shannon Byler, Shoshana Rosenthal, Sarah Heerboth. Demethylation and re-expression of epigenetically silenced tumor suppressor genes: sensitization of cancer cells by combination therapy. Epigenomics, 2013; 5 (1): 87 DOI: 10.2217/epi.12.68

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/health_medicine/genes/~3/C1hmNpux0kk/130219140720.htm

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Why Jessie J Hates Twitter $amp; 128GB iPad Overlord | DAILY REHASH | Ora TV

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Excerpt from: Why Jessie J Hates Twitter $amp; 128GB iPad Overlord | DAILY REHASH | Ora TV

In today's show, what does Jessi J have against Twitter? And your lives in 5 words. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]] ...

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As asteroid zips past Earth, exploding meteor hints at what could have been (+video)

The meteor that exploded over Russia was much smaller than the asteroid that will buzz Earth Friday. But it shows how destructive Earth impacts can be ? and how unexpected.

By Pete Spotts,?Staff writer / February 15, 2013

A simulation of asteroid 2012 DA14 approaching from the south as it passes through the Earth-moon system on Friday. The 150-foot object will pass within 17,000 miles of the Earth.

JPL-Caltech/NASA/AP

Enlarge

As scientists prepared to watch a massive asteroid zip past Earth Friday, a?10-ton meteor lit up the sky over the Russian region of Chelyabinsk before exploding into fragments high above the ground. And just like that, a day of one flying space rock became a day of two.?

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Asteroid 2012 DA14 will buzz within 17,200 miles of Earth ? a record for a known object of that size

"This is a big deal," says Kaliat Ramesh, a professor of mechanical engineering at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. "You really should view this meteoroid we saw in Russia as a wake-up call" regarding the hazards even small objects can present, he adds.

Indeed, it's a day of multiple wake-up calls.

At 2:24 p.m. EST today, asteroid 2012 DA14 passed within a scant 17,200 miles of?Earth ? a whisker in cosmic terms.

The asteroid is about 150 feet across and poses no threat to Earth, astronomers say, although an object of that size could take out a major metropolitan area if it collided with the planet. But the asteroid's close approach provides a unique opportunity for researchers to track and study it in ways that could improve their ability to distinguish truly hazardous asteroids in near-Earth orbits from the more benign objects.

Russia's meteor, however, has been anything but benign.

The first reports of the meteor came in a 7:55 a.m. local time, with many people capturing the event using video cameras installed in their cars.

The meteor, perhaps the size of a small cargo truck, was traveling at about 33,000 miles per hour. It exploded into fragments somewhere between 18 and 30 miles above the Earth. The shock wave from the blast ? heard in the central Russian cities of Chelyabinsk, Yekaterinburg, and Tyumen ? blew out windows at locations closest to the meteor's path. At least 950 people were injured, mostly from flying glass, according to the Moscow Times.

In addition, a zinc factory was damaged, and cell-phone service was knocked out in some areas.

Although the event occurred as asteroid 2012 DA14 was on its final approach to its close encounter with Earth, the different paths the two objects traveled make it unlikely the meteor was a 2012 DA14 cast-off.?

Astronomers will have a better sense of the meteor's final orbit once they study the video that's available from the event, says Gareth Williams, an astronomer and associate director of the International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center in Cambridge, Mass..

He explains that the video will allow researchers to reconstruct the meteor's path through the atmosphere in three dimensions. They can use this information to calculate the meteor's most probable orbit before its demise.

This was one of countless objects in near-Earth orbits that had eluded detection, despite efforts over the past 15 years to take a detailed census of these objects.?

The meteor "was not seen before it entered the atmosphere," Mr. Williams says. Had it been detected and reported to the center, it would have received a designator, similar to 2012 DA14, and we all could be describing this event as a collision with a small asteroid, he suggests.

Researchers say that objects the size of the Chelyabinsk meteor?enter the atmosphere once every few years but tend to go unheralded outside the asteroid-hazard community because they enter over oceans or vast stretches of uninhabited land.?

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/science/~3/mQAy9B00N28/As-asteroid-zips-past-Earth-exploding-meteor-hints-at-what-could-have-been-video

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Got questions about OPALCO broadband? I do | As I See It - Journal ...

By Dan Drath

Here in the islands, we have a wonderful electric utility co-operative that has served our needs for a long time. At the moment the co-operative members are being asked to expand our co-operative into the area of telecommunications.

Through several means and over time, we have been told of the progress OPALCO is making toward achieving their broadband proposal. According to a recent article in the San Juan Journal ("OPALCO awaits consumer buyin", Jan. 30 pg. 1), OPALCO members will soon be asked to vote the proposal, up or down.

Absent from the news and reports are many details.?In the interest of gaining a fuller understanding, I ask the following questions:

?In what other communities, similar to ours, have power utilities made the transition to providing broadband communication? What was their experience? Was it successful?

?What are the development risks in the OPALCO broadband proposal? What are the financial risks?

?If the OPALCO broadband proposal is implemented, how many new OPALCO jobs will be created? How many new hires will there be? How many current jobs in the county will be eliminated?

?If 1,000 OPALCO customers paying Rock Island Technologies $35 a month leave Rock Island, that would represent a loss of income to Rock Island of $420,000 dollars a year. Does that put a local business out of business? If on-island internet service providers lose a significant part of their business, how would their service and fees to non OPALCO broadband subscribers be affected?

?How many islanders are currently served by a 10 megabit-per-second internet connection? What is the estimate for the number that will want that speed in three years?

?In addition to the OPALCO initial broadband fees, to what other initial costs are members exposed for computer hardware and software?

?Will current CenturyLink subscribers stop receiving a CenturyLink bill when they sign up for OPALCO broadband?

?If one becomes an OPALCO broadband subscriber and does not like the service, what will be the cost to leave and reconnect to the previous telephone/ISP arrangement?

?For current CenturyLink subscribers, the maintenance responsibility interface is the CenturyLink junction box mounted to the outside of their home. What and where will be the maintenance interface under the OPALCO broadband plan?

?What are the software and hardware maintenance responsibilities of an OPALCO subscriber? If I sign up for OPALCO broadband, who do I call if I have no dial tone?

?Where will the ISP Servers be located and who will maintain them?

?If I subscribe to OPALCO broadband, must my computer be on 24/7 in order to receive calls? Who do I call if I have an internet connection issue?

?If I subscribe to OPALCO broadband, will my present home answering machine still be part of my home phone operation? Will my caller ID still function? Will I be able to block certain telephone numbers?

?In what telephone directory will subscribers to OPALCO broadband appear?

?Why does not OPALCO partner with an experienced telecommunication company to reduce development risk and cost?

?OPALCO says they will go ahead ?if about half of our members show their support.? Does OPALCO mean members or members who vote? How many is ?about half??

I hope answers will come soon.

?

Source: http://www.sanjuanjournal.com/opinion/191723181.html

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U.S. ready to counter China cyberattacks

WASHINGTON (AP) ? As public evidence mounts that the Chinese military is responsible for stealing massive amounts of U.S. government data and corporate trade secrets, the Obama administration is eyeing fines and other trade actions it may take against Beijing or any other country guilty of cyberespionage.

According to officials familiar with the plans, the White House will lay out a new report Wednesday that suggests initial, more-aggressive steps the U.S. would take in response to what top authorities say has been an unrelenting campaign of cyberstealing linked to the Chinese government. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the threatened action.

The White House plans come after a Virginia-based cybersecurity firm released a torrent of details Monday that tied a secret Chinese military unit in Shanghai to years of cyberattacks against U.S. companies. After analyzing breaches that compromised more than 140 companies, Mandiant has concluded that they can be linked People's Liberation Army's Unit 61398.

Military experts believe the unit is part of the People's Liberation Army's cyber-command, which is under the direct authority of the General Staff Department, China's version of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. As such, its activities would be likely to be authorized at the highest levels of China's military.

The release of Mandiant's report, complete with details on three of the alleged hackers and photographs of one of the military unit's buildings in Shanghai, makes public what U.S. authorities have said less publicly for years. But it also increases the pressure on the U.S. to take more forceful action against the Chinese for what experts say has been years of systematic espionage.

"If the Chinese government flew planes into our airspace, our planes would escort them away. If it happened two, three or four times, the president would be on the phone and there would be threats of retaliation," said former FBI executive assistant director Shawn Henry. "This is happening thousands of times a day. There needs to be some definition of where the red line is and what the repercussions would be."

Henry, now president of the security firm CrowdStrike, said that rather than tell companies to increase their cybersecurity the government needs to focus more on how to deter the hackers and the nations that are backing them.

James Lewis, a cybersecurity expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said that in the past year the White House has been taking a serious look at responding to China, adding that "this will be the year they will put more pressure on, even while realizing it will be hard for the Chinese to change. There's not an on-off switch."

The Chinese government, meanwhile, has denied involvement in the cyber-attacks tracked by Mandiant. Instead, the Foreign Ministry said that China, too, is a victim of hacking, some of it traced to the U.S. Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei cited a report by an agency under the Ministry of Information Technology and Industry that said in 2012 alone that foreign hackers used viruses and other malicious software to seize control of 1,400 computers in China and 38,000 websites.

"Among the above attacks, those from the U.S. numbered the most," Hong said at a daily media briefing, lodging the most specific allegations the Chinese government has made about foreign hacking.

Cybersecurity experts say U.S. authorities do not conduct similar attacks or steal data from Chinese companies, but acknowledge that intelligence agencies routinely spy on other countries.

China is clearly a target of interest, said Lewis, noting that the U.S. would be interested in Beijing's military policies, such as any plans for action against Taiwan or Japan.

In its report, Mandiant said it traced the hacking back to a neighborhood in the outskirts of Shanghai that includes a white 12-story office building run by the PLA's Unit 61398.

Mandiant said there are only two viable conclusions about the involvement of the Chinese military in the cyberattacks: Either Unit 61398 is responsible for the persistent attacks or they are being done by a secret organization of Chinese speakers with direct access to the Shanghai telecommunications infrastructure who are engaged in a multi-year espionage campaign being run right outside the military unit's gates.

"In a state that rigorously monitors Internet use, it is highly unlikely that the Chinese government is unaware of an attack group that operates from the Pudong New Area of Shanghai," the Mandiant report said, concluding that the only way the group could function is with the "full knowledge and cooperation" of the Beijing government.

The unit "has systematically stolen hundreds of terabytes of data from at least 141 organizations," Mandiant wrote. A terabyte is 1,000 gigabytes. The most popular version of the new iPhone 5, for example, has 16 gigabytes of space, while the more expensive iPads have as much as 64 gigabytes of space. The U.S. Library of Congress' 2006-2010 Twitter archive of about 170 billion tweets totals 133.2 terabytes.

"At some point we do have to call the Chinese out on this," said Michael Chertoff, Homeland Security secretary under President George W. Bush and now chairman of the Chertoff Group, a global security firm. "Simply rolling over and averting our eyes, I don't think is a long-term strategy."

Richard Bejtlich, the chief security officer at Mandiant, said the company decided to make its report public in part to help send a message to both the Chinese and U.S. governments.

"At the government level, I see this as a tool that they can use to have discussions with the Chinese, with allies, with others who are concerned about this problem and have an open dialogue without having to worry about sensitivities around disclosing classified information," Bejtlich said. "This problem is overclassified."

He said the release of an unclassified report that provides detailed evidence will allow authorities to have an open discussion about what to do.

Mandiant's report is filled with high-tech details and juicy nuggets that led to its conclusion, including the code names of some of the hackers, like Ugly Gorilla, Dota and SuperHard, and that Dota appears to be a fan of Harry Potter because references to the book and movie character appear as answers to his computer security questions.

The White House would not comment on the report expected Wednesday.

"We have repeatedly raised our concerns at the highest levels about cybertheft with senior Chinese officials, including in the military, and we will continue to do so," said Caitlin Hayden, spokeswoman for the National Security Council. "The United States and China are among the world's largest cyber actors, and it is vital that we continue a sustained, meaningful dialogue and work together to develop an understanding of acceptable behavior in cyberspace."

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said the report reinforces the need for international agreements that prohibit cybercrimes and have a workable enforcement mechanism.

___

Associated Press writers Christopher Bodeen, Gillian Wong, Charles Hutzler and Joe McDonald contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/us-ready-strike-back-against-china-cyberattacks-225730552--finance.html

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Jerry Buss, Lakers' flamboyant owner, dies at 80

LOS ANGELES (AP) ? Jerry Buss, the Los Angeles Lakers' playboy owner who shepherded the NBA team to 10 championships from the Showtime dynasty of the 1980s to the Kobe Bryant era, died Monday. He was 80.

He died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, said Bob Steiner, his assistant.

Buss had been hospitalized for most of the past 18 months while undergoing cancer treatment, but the immediate cause of death was kidney failure, Steiner said. With his condition apparently worsening in recent weeks, several prominent former Lakers visited Buss to say goodbye.

"The NBA has lost a visionary owner whose influence on our league is incalculable and will be felt for decades to come," NBA Commissioner David Stern said. "More importantly, we have lost a dear and valued friend."

Under Buss' leadership since 1979, the Lakers became Southern California's most beloved sports franchise and a worldwide extension of Hollywood glamour. Buss acquired, nurtured and befriended a staggering array of talented players and basketball minds during his Hall of Fame tenure, from Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to Bryant, Shaquille O'Neal and Dwight Howard.

"Condolences to the Buss family," tweeted James Worthy, the Lakers' Hall of Fame forward. "Dr Buss was not only the greatest sports owner, but a true friend & just a really cool guy. Loved him dearly."

Few owners in sports history can approach Buss' accomplishments with the Lakers, who made the NBA finals 16 times through 2011 during his nearly 34 years in charge, winning 10 titles between 1980 and 2010. The Lakers easily are the NBA's winningest franchise since he bought the club, which is now run largely by Jim Buss and Jeanie Buss, two of his six children.

"We not only have lost our cherished father, but a beloved man of our community and a person respected by the world basketball community," the Buss family said in a statement issued by the Lakers.

"It was our father's often-stated desire and expectation that the Lakers remain in the Buss family. The Lakers have been our lives as well, and we will honor his wish and do everything in our power to continue his unparalleled legacy."

Buss always referred to the Lakers as his extended family, and his players rewarded his fanlike excitement with devotion, friendship and two hands full of championship rings. Working with front-office executives Jerry West, Bill Sharman and Mitch Kupchak, Buss spent lavishly to win his titles despite lacking a huge personal fortune, often running the NBA's highest payroll while also paying high-profile coaches Pat Riley and Phil Jackson.

Always an innovative businessman, Buss paid for the Lakers through both their wild success and his own groundbreaking moves to raise revenue. He co-founded a basic-cable sports television network and sold the naming rights to the Forum at times when both now-standard strategies were unusual, further justifying his induction to the Pro Basketball Hall of Fame in 2010.

"Dr. Jerry Buss was a cornerstone of the Los Angeles sports community and his name will always be synonymous with his beloved Lakers," Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said. "It was through his stewardship that the Lakers brought 'Showtime' basketball and numerous championship rings to this great city. Today we mourn the loss and celebrate the life of a man who helped shape the modern landscape of sports in L.A."

Johnson and fellow Hall of Famers Abdul-Jabbar and Worthy formed lifelong bonds with Buss during the Lakers' run to five titles in nine years in the 1980s, when the Lakers earned a reputation as basketball's most exciting team with their flamboyant Showtime style. The buzz extended throughout the Forum, where Buss used the Laker Girls, a brass band and promotions to keep Los Angeles fans interested in all four quarters of their games.

Jackson then led O'Neal and Bryant to a three-peat from 2000-02, rekindling the Lakers' mystique, before Bryant and Pau Gasol won two more titles under Jackson in 2009 and 2010.

Although Buss gained fame and fortune with the Lakers, he also was a scholar, Renaissance man and bon vivant who epitomized California cool ? and a certain Los Angeles lifestyle ? for his entire public life.

Buss rarely appeared in public without at least one attractive, much younger woman on his arm at USC football games, boxing matches at the Forum, poker tournaments ? and, of course, Lakers games from his private box at Staples Center, which was built under his watch. In failing health recently, Buss hadn't attended a Lakers game this season.

Buss earned a Ph.D. in chemistry at age 24 and had careers in aerospace and real estate development before getting into sports. With money from his real-estate ventures and a good bit of creative accounting, Buss bought the then-struggling Lakers, the NHL's Los Angeles Kings and both clubs' arena ? the Forum ? from Jack Kent Cooke in a $67.5 million deal that was the largest sports transaction in history at the time.

Last month, Forbes estimated the Lakers were worth $1 billion, second most in the NBA.

Buss also helped change televised sports by co-founding the Prime Ticket network in 1985, receiving a star on Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2006 for his work in television. Breaking the contemporary model of subscription services for televised sports, Buss' Prime Ticket put beloved broadcaster Chick Hearn and the Lakers' home games on basic cable.

Buss also sold the naming rights to the Forum in 1988 to Great Western Savings & Loan ? another deal that was ahead of its time.

Born in Salt Lake City, Gerald Hatten Buss was raised in poverty in Wyoming before improving his life through education. He attended USC for graduate school, eventually becoming a chemistry professor and working as a chemist for the Bureau of Mines before his life took a turn into wealth and sports.

The former mathematician claimed his fortune grew out of a $1,000 real-estate investment in a West Los Angeles apartment building with partner Frank Mariani, an aerospace engineer and co-worker.

Buss purchased Cooke's entire Los Angeles sports empire in 1979, including a 13,000-acre ranch in Kern County. Buss' love of basketball was the motivation for his purchase, and he immediately worked to transform the Lakers ? who had won just one NBA title since moving west from Minneapolis in 1960 ? into a star-powered endeavor befitting Hollywood.

"One of the first things I tried to do when I bought the team was to make it an identification for this city, like Motown in Detroit," he told the Los Angeles Times in 2008. "I try to keep that identification alive. I'm a real Angeleno. I want us to be part of the community."

Buss' plans immediately worked: Johnson, Abdul-Jabbar and coach Paul Westhead led the Lakers to the 1980 title. Johnson's ball-handling wizardry and Abdul-Jabbar's smooth inside game made for an attractive style of play evoking Hollywood flair and West Coast sophistication.

Riley, the former broadcaster who fit the L.A. image perfectly with his slick-backed hair and good looks, was surprisingly promoted by Buss early in the 1981-82 season after West declined to co-coach the team. Riley became one of the best coaches in NBA history, leading the Lakers to four straight NBA finals and four titles, with Worthy, Michael Cooper, Byron Scott and A.C. Green playing major roles.

Overall, the Lakers made the finals nine times in Buss' first 12 seasons while rekindling the NBA's best rivalry with the Boston Celtics, and Buss basked in the worldwide celebrity he received from his team's achievements. His womanizing and partying became Hollywood legend, with even his players struggling to keep up with Buss' lifestyle.

Johnson's HIV diagnosis and retirement in 1991 staggered Buss and the Lakers, the owner recalled in 2011. The Lakers struggled through much of the 1990s, going through seven coaches and making just one conference finals appearance in an eight-year stretch despite the 1996 arrivals of O'Neal, who signed with Los Angeles as a free agent, and Bryant, the 17-year-old high schooler acquired in a draft-week trade.

Shaq and Kobe didn't reach their potential until Buss persuaded Jackson, the Chicago Bulls' six-time NBA champion coach, to take over the Lakers in 1999. Los Angeles immediately won the next three NBA titles in brand-new Staples Center, AEG's state-of-the-art downtown arena built with the Lakers as the primary tenant.

After the Lakers traded O'Neal in 2004, they hovered in mediocrity again until acquiring Gasol in a heist of a trade with Memphis in early 2008. Los Angeles made the next three NBA finals, winning two more titles.

Through the Lakers' frequent successes and occasional struggles, Buss never stopped living his Hollywood dream. He was an avid poker player, frequently participating in high-stakes tournaments, and a fixture on the Los Angeles club scene well into his 70s, when a late-night drunk-driving arrest in 2007 ? with a 23-year-old woman in the passenger seat of his Mercedes-Benz ? prompted him to cut down on his partying.

Buss owned the NHL's Kings from 1979-87, and the WNBA's Los Angeles Sparks also won two league titles under Buss' ownership. He also owned Los Angeles franchises in World Team Tennis and the Major Indoor Soccer League.

Buss' six children all have worked for the Lakers organization in various capacities for several years. Jim Buss, the Lakers' executive vice president of player personnel and the second-oldest child, has taken over much of the club's primary decision-making responsibilities in the last few years, while daughter Jeanie runs the franchise's business side.

Jerry Buss still served two terms as president of the NBA's Board of Governors and was actively involved in the 2011 lockout negotiations, developing blood clots in his legs attributed to his extensive travel during that time.

___

Associated Press writer Andrew Dalton contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/jerry-buss-lakers-flamboyant-owner-dies-80-185037942--spt.html

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Review Designer NFL Oakland Raiders folio hard case for ipad 2/ipad 3 /ipad 4 with water-resistant cover

Product features:

Use our iPad 2 and iPad 3 Folio Case to be as unique as you are and protect your iPad 2,3.
Water-resistant fabric wrapped hardcover exterior with elastic strap closure.
Suede interior with document pocket and elastic device corners straps.
Rubberized edges create folded viewing stand.
Size 9.87? x 8?.

Seller warranty description:
Shipping takes 9-12 days. Please consider it before purchasing.Most unopened items in new condition returned within 30 days will receive a refund or exchange. Items that are opened or damaged or do not have a packing slip or receipt may be denied a refund or exchange.

Related posts:

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/IpadAppsAndNews/~3/s2RTuTp45H4/review-designer-nfl-oakland-raiders-folio-hard-case-for-ipad-2ipad-3-ipad-4-with-water-resistant-cover.html

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???? Google Glass ? ?????? ????? ?????????????, ???? ...

?????????? ???????, 05:42

???-?? ???????, ?????? ?????????? ??? ? ?? ???????. ????? ??? ???? ?? ??????? ??? ?? ????? ??? ???? ?????? ???????? ? ? ???? ?? ?????.

? ????? ? ??? ???? ????. ?? ??????? ????????. ????? ???? ??? ?? ??????? ???, ???????. ??? ???????? ?? ????? ??????????? ?????? ? ???? ?????????? ????. ??????????, ???????. ??????????! ??????? ??????????

Source: http://forums.ferra.ru/index.php?showtopic=54551

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Downton Abbey, Season 3

Lord Grantham and Matthew Crawley.

Photograph courtesy of ? Giles Keyte/Carnival Film & Television Limited 2012 for MASTERPIECE

So, farewell then, Matthew Crawley. You were a curious British analog to America?s Magical Negro: the Magical Middle-Class Chap.

In Season 1, you saved Downton Abbey for the Crawley family by having the good sense to steer clear of the Titanic. When you emerged from your humble Mancunian roots, you found love?and a future earlship?on the other side of the Pennines.

In Season 2, you saved Europe from the Hun by fighting in some pathetically unconvincing trenches. Then you saved Lady Mary?s honor by exercising more forgiveness for her dalliance with the Turkish gentleman than any true toff could?ve managed.

In the just-completed season, you saved Downton from Lord Grantham?s bone-headed investment schemes by having the dumb luck to inherit yet another random fortune. (Even you couldn?t save the Swireses.) You saved it again by applying your bourgeois practicality to reform the aristocratic mismanagement of the Downton estate. And then you saved it one last time by fathering a son and heir who will remove the specter of that damned entail once and for all.

No wonder you were too spent to save yourself from that oncoming vehicle!

Indeed, you were such a reliable savior, it?s hard to imagine how Downton Abbey can survive without you. A family that was already reeling from the loss of its kind-hearted rebel is now also robbed of its conscience. And we viewers are left without the character who was most like us: an outsider overwhelmed by Downton?s sweeping scale, reluctantly charmed by its residents, but ultimately pessimistic that this strange anachronism can go on forever.

Julian Fellowes has said that Season 4 will begin six months after your death and will be about ?the rebuilding of Mary.? It will surely be a gloomy world of grief and mourning clothes. Downton Abbey has always been low on men, especially upstairs, and with you gone, the show?s Yorkshire village might as well twin with Northampton, Mass.

Matthew Crawley, Esq., you didn?t live long enough to become the 8^th Earl of Grantham, but you?ll always be the middle-class earl of our hearts. You spent too much time astride your high horse this season, preaching about the rights and wrongs of accepting inheritances and running estates, but as Seth Stevenson put it, ?no scene was entirely hopeless? when you were in it. As I face the long wait for Season 4, I?ll miss the show and this TV Club, but I?ll especially miss you, dear magical Matthew.

Source: http://feeds.slate.com/click.phdo?i=ab55face993e53d6c933bab409911ce7

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Western Washington man orders $47 Starbucks drink

by KING 5 News

KREM.com

Posted on February 18, 2013 at 6:48 PM

Updated today at 7:01 PM

An Enumclaw man took his caffeine craving to a record breaking level.

Beau Chevassus ordered what well could be the most expensive Starbucks drink ever for his 27th birthday.

He said it contained 48 shots of espresso, soy, several bananas, mango and protein powder among other things.

Since Chevassus planned this in advance he also brought his own 52 ounce coffee cup.

The drink rang up at $47.30.

Chevassus didn't actually pay for it, Starbucks gave it to him for free since it was his birthday.

?

Source: http://www.krem.com/news/northwest-news/191756441.html

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EU privacy regulators take aim at Google privacy policy

Claire Davenport , Reuters ? ? ? 13 hrs.

European data watchdogs said on Monday they plan to take action against Google by this summer for its privacy policy, which allows the search engine to pool user data from across all its services ranging from YouTube to Gmail.

The move is the latest in a skirmish between the Web giant and Europe's data protection regulators who view the privacy rules put in place in March by Google as "high risk," although have stopped short of declaring them illegal.

Regulators view the bundling of data on users as potentially constituting a high risk to individuals' privacy.

Google last year consolidated 60 privacy policies into one, combining data collected on individual users across its services, including YouTube, Gmail and social network Google+. Users cannot opt out.

In October, Europe's 27 data regulators gave Google four months to change its approach, listing 12 "practical recommendations" for it to bring its privacy policy into line.

On Monday the French privacy regulator, which last year led an initial inquiry into the tech giant's new policy, said it would set up a further inquiry because Google had not yet addressed their concerns.

"Google did not provide any precise and effective answers," the French regulator CNIL said.

"In this context, the EU data protection authorities are committed to act and continue their investigations. Therefore, they propose to set up a working group, led by the CNIL, in order to coordinate their reaction, which should take place before summer."

Google said it did respond to CNIL on Jan. 8 by listing steps already taken to address their concerns.

"We have engaged fully with CNIL throughout the process and will continue to do so," Al Verney, a spokesperson said.

He added that the privacy policy did respect European law.

The pooling of anonymous user data across Google services, is a big advantage when selling online ads.

Google and other large internet groups such as Facebook provide free services to consumers and earn money from selling ads that they say are more closely targeted than traditional TV or radio campaigns.

(Reporting by Claire Davenport; editing by Leila Abboud and Keiron Henderson)

Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters.

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/technolog/eu-privacy-regulators-take-aim-google-privacy-policy-1C8415363

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From the Editor's Desk: Ready for a wild couple weeks

Flights are booked, bags are packed and passports are in hand. February inevitably becomes one wild tech ride, and 2013's not disappointing. Consider:

• Feb. 19: HTC events in New York and London, and something in Sydney as well. The consensus is that we'll see the fabled "M7," possibly called the "HTC One."
• Feb. 20: Not strictly Android-related, but Sony's got something going on -- most likely the next-generation PlayStation. Kind of a big deal.
• Feb. 23-27: Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain. The show doesn't actually open until Feb. 25. But as is the trend these days, we've got meetings and events as early as two days before doors open. We'll have a full MWC preview later this week, but expect news from Sony, ASUS, Huawei, ZTE, Mozilla, Ubuntu and LG, among others.

And that's just the stuff we can tell you about. Things are happening off the books and behind the scenes, as they always do. So you'll forgive me if I keep this kind of short this week. Gotta run, but not before a few other thoughts ...

read more

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/WVrm-Rlh-ss/story01.htm

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Quickly Search Any Web Site's Archive with Drafts for iOS

Drafts is one of our favorite note taking apps, and a simple URL action will allow it to instantly search the archive of any website.

As you probably already know, prepending a Google search with "site:(URL)" will limit the search to the specified web site's content. For example, searching for site:lifehacker.com note taking will return a list of Lifehacker posts about taking notes. It's this Google-fu that lets us automate one-click site searches within Drafts, using the new URL actions feature introduced in the latest version. All you need to do is create a new URL action from the app's settings menu, and type in the following, replacing lifehacker.com with the site of your choice:

https://www.google.com/search?q=site:lifehacker.com+[[draft]]"

If you're reading this on an iOS device, you can download that Lifehacker search action to Drafts by clicking here. Then, you'll be able to easily duplicate and edit it to create other site searches.

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/m3kOaZc_82Y/search-any-websites-archive-quickly-with-drafts

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DigniCap, an experimental cold cap, may help cancer patients undergoing chemo keep hair

DigniCap, an experimental cold cap, may help cancer patients undergoing chemo keep hair A mechanical strap-on cap worn during chemotherapy may one day keep cancer patients from losing their hair.
Four patients here in the U.S. are trying out the "DigniCap" - a hat that contains a cooling gel and fits tightly on the head - reports Msnbc.com. During treatment, the gel chills the hair follicles, thus restricting the amount of chemotherapy that reaches them.
San Francisco breast cancer... read more

?

Source: http://www.newsrt.us/news/dignicap-an-experimental-cold-cap-may-help-cancer-patients-undergoing-chemo-keep-hair-912585.html

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Estimates raised for Russian meteor blast

Yekaterina Pustynnikova / Chelyabinsk.ru via AP

Click through scenes from Russia's Chelyabinsk region, where a huge meteor fireball set off alarms, injured hundreds of people and caused a factory roof to collapse.

By Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News

Scientists have raised their estimates of the size and power of what turns out to be the most widely witnessed asteroid strike in modern history. The size estimate puts the object that caused Friday's meteor blast over Russia in a troublesome category of asteroids: big enough to cause damage, but small enough to evade detection.

The new estimates, based on additional readings from a sensor network built to detect nuclear blasts, suggest the meteor released the energy equivalent of nearly 500 kilotons of TNT. That's about 30 times the power of the Hiroshima atomic bomb.

---

Experts have been assessing the level of the meteor explosion using a network of infrasound sensors that were set up under the terms of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty to check for changes in atmospheric pressure caused by nuclear blasts.

"These new estimates were generated using new data that had been collected by five additional infrasound stations located around the world ? the first recording of the event being in Alaska, over 6,500 kilometers away from Chelyabinsk," NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory said in a statement.

NASA now says the Chelyabinsk object must have been about 55 feet wide (17 meters wide) with a mass of 10,000 tons before it entered Earth?s atmosphere.

"We would expect an event of this magnitude to occur once every 100 years on average," Paul Chodas of NASA's Near-Earth Object Program Office said in the statement. "When you have a fireball of this size, we would expect a large number of meteorites to reach the surface, and in this case there were probably some large ones."

Searchers have been focusing on a frozen lake about 50 miles (80 kilometers) west of Chelyabinsk, where they suspect meteorite fragments made a 20-foot-wide (6-meter-wide) hole in the ice. Searchers have found fragments up to a half-inch wide (1 centimeter wide) that might have come from the meteor, but nothing bigger yet, according to reports from Russia.

Experts emphasized once again that the meteor's trajectory was significantly different from the path of asteroid 2012 DA14, a 150-foot-wide (45-meter-wide) space rock that passed harmlessly within 17,200 miles (27,600 kilometers) of Earth later Friday. Thus, 2012 DA14 was "a completely unrelated object," NASA said.

The space agency said Friday's Russian meteor was the largest reported since 1908, when an asteroid roughly the size of 2012 DA14 exploded over a remote wooded area in Siberia's Tunguska region. That blast flattened millions of trees over a 820-square-mile area, but was not widely seen. Friday's event, in contrast, took place over a city of 1.1 million inhabitants, and hundreds of millions more watched the videos that were distributed over the Internet.

As powerful as the meteor blast was, it's on the low end of the asteroid impact scale. Astronomers estimate that there are about a million potentially hazardous near-Earth objects smaller than 100 meters (330 feet) in width, and only about 1 percent of those have been cataloged. For the time being, NASA is focusing on detecting and tracking near-Earth asteroids wider than 100 meters.

But what about the smaller ones?

"Defending the Earth against tiny asteroids such as the one that passed over Siberia and impacted there is a challenging issue. That is something that is not currently our goal," Chodas told reporters on Friday.

The asteroid behind Friday's meteor blast would have been particularly hard to spot during its final approach, because it was coming from Earth's daylit side. The asteroid would have been lost in the sun's glare and undetectable by ground-based telescopes, said Bill Cooke, the head of the Meteoroid Environment Center at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center.

Several programs on the horizon hold the promise of finding the smaller asteroids that could threaten Earth:

• NASA has just started funding the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System, or ATLAS, which aims to establish two telescopes in Hawaii dedicated to scanning the skies for potential threats.
• The non-profit B612 Foundation has been raising money to launch its Sentinel Space Telescope as early as 2018. Sentinel would scan Earth's surroundings from an outward-looking position in a Venus-like orbit, interior to Earth's orbit. Such a project could provide advance warning for asteroids like the one that blew up on Friday. Former Apollo astronaut Rusty Schweickart, one of the foundation's founders, said he was "overwhelmed" by requests for information after Friday's blast. "It's pretty bonkers at the moment," he told NBC News.
• Planetary Resources, a commercial venture, is developing a fleet of Arkyd-100 space telescopes to identify near-Earth asteroids, in hopes of sending mining operations to them in the decades to come. "As the company ultimately develops the capability and infrastructure for intercepting and mining asteroids, Planetary Resources expects to be able to help in the (slight) redirection of these rocks to keep the Earth safe," Peter Diamandis, the company's co-founder and co-chairman, said in a blog posting.
• Another commercial space-mining venture, Deep Space Industries, is proposing its own set of asteroid-hunting space telescopes. "Placing 10 of our small FireFly spacecraft into position to intercept close encounters would take four years and less than $100 million," David Gump, the company's CEO, said in a statement. "This will help the world develop the understanding needed to block later threats."

More about asteroids and meteors:

---

Alan Boyle is NBCNews.com's science editor. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's?Facebook page, following?@b0yle on Twitter?and adding the?Cosmic Log page?to your Google+ presence. To keep up with Cosmic Log as well as NBCNews.com's other stories about science and space, sign up for the Tech & Science newsletter, delivered to your email in-box every weekday. You can also check out?"The Case for Pluto,"?my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.

Source: http://cosmiclog.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/02/16/16985690-estimates-raised-for-nuclear-sized-asteroid-blast-that-hit-russia?lite

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ABC: Are Some Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Pictures Racist?

Talk about your phony controversies.

On ABC's Good Morning America Sunday, they actually did a segment addressing whether or not some of the pictures taken during the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue photo shoots were - wait for it! - racist (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Co-host Dan Harris teased at the program?s opening:

DAN HARRIS, CO-HOST: Racy or racist? The new controversy about the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue. Do the shots of models in exotic locales turn local people into props? We'll show you the pictures. You decide.

About 30 minutes later:

BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CO-HOST: But first, controversy over the latest Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue. The issue is known for its pictures with scantily clad women in international locations, but there's something else in this year's photos that's raising eyebrows. ABC's Tanya Rivero is here with the story. Hey Tanya.

TANYA RIVERO: Hey guys. That?s right, certain pictures on the Sports Illustrated website, especially some from a shoot the swimsuit issue did in Namibia, have upset many people. They?re speaking out. Take a look at the pictures and you be the judge.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RIVERO: With a white hot cover shot of Kate Upton, this year's Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue made a big splash with buzz about photo shoots on all seven continents. But this year beautiful models in barely there bikinis are sharing air time with controversy brewing over some photos and video SI posted online that did not make it into the magazine, particularly these taken in Africa and this shot from China. Some are calling them at best culturally insensitive.

MARC LAMONT HILL: For me the African picture was probably the most offensive because it played on some of the most old and stereotypical images. It showed the African as primitive, almost uncivilized.

RIVERO: On the website Jezebel, deputy editor Dodai Stewart is also critical of the photos writing, ?Using people of color as background or extras is a popular fashion trope?But although it's prevalent, it's very distasteful?People are not props."

One of the models, Emily DiDonato, talks about her shoot on SI?s site.

EMILY DIDONATO: It was such a cool experience to shoot with someone like that, something completely different than anything I?ve ever seen or someone I?ve met in my life.

RIVERO: Some people we spoke with didn't see a problem with the photos.

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: As a traveler myself, I think I love seeing these places and seeing other cultures. So I think it?s great that they?re showing this in magazines.

RIVERO: Proving once again that controversy just like beauty is often in the eye of the beholder.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RIVERO: And Sports Illustrated gave ABC News this statement saying: ?This year's edition went to all seven continents, something no other publication has done, to present the natural beauty of each setting and its people. We apologize to anyone who has taken exception to the way their culture was represented." So they did issue an apology.

HARRIS: And oftentimes controversy does not hurt in a situation like this.

RIVERO: I?m sure they will still sell many magazines.

GOLODRYGA: I?m sure they will.

Story Continues Below Ad ?

Now one can understand the deputy editor of Jezebel getting tweaked out about this, although readers should be cautioned: some of Stewart's complaints are just absurd.

But did ABC News really have to give this matter attention?

Or was it just another opportunity to show pictures of scantily clad women in order to titillate viewers?

If the answer is the latter, did they have to do it on a Sunday?

After all, the Jezebel piece was published five days ago.

Maybe most importantly, what happened to the post-racial America we were promised if Barack Obama was elected president?

Now even Sports Illustrated swimsuit pictures are racist.

What's next?

(HT Dan Gainor)

Source: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2013/02/17/abc-are-some-sports-illustrated-swimsuit-pictures-racist

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Deer Antler, iPhone case for men, Valentine day SALE, iPhone 4 case for men, rubber, dark brown, natural by Raceytay

Was 35$. Now on sale

Deer antlers against a deep dark brown background - on your iPhone 4! A unique and different look that is sure to make you stand out from the crowd.

I'm thrilled to be able to offer you a selection of iPhone 4 and 4S cases featuring some of my favorite photographs. This case features my photo "14", a set of deer antlers with 14 points against a rich brown background.

This is rubber/silicone iPhone 4 case that is designed to fit all iPhone 4 and 4s models. It snaps in place over your phone and allows access to all buttons and openings.

All iPhone cases in my shop are in stock and ship out the next time I am at the post office - within 24 hours typically.

iPhone cases ship small package air and take between 8 and 12 business days.

See more photos, wearable art and iPhone cases in my shop:
raceytay.etsy.com

*** please note that colours will vary based on your monitor calibration

Have any questions? Contact the shop owner.

Source: http://www.etsy.com/listing/101846228/deer-antler-iphone-case-for-men

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