Archive for January, 2012
Twitter to Censor Content in Some Countries
January 27th, 2012Via: Montreal Gazette: Twitter announced Thursday that it would begin restricting Tweets in specific countries, renewing questions about how the social media platform will handle issues of free speech as it rapidly expands its global user base. Until now, Twitter had to remove a tweet from its global network if it received a takedown request […]
Fast Food Companies Abandon Ammoniated ‘Pink Slime’ Beef
January 27th, 2012Via: Food Safety: Ammoniated beef has taken a real beating in the media over the past couple years, and now fast-food giants McDonald’s, Taco Bell and Burger King are no longer using it. As veteran journalist Philip Brasher reported over the holidays, the Iowa-based company that manufactures the beef product — at one time used […]
Britain: Wave Powered Pistons Will Pump Sea Water Into Reservoirs for On-Demand Electricity Generation
January 27th, 2012My guess is that pigs will fly before this is built out on any meaningful scale, but it looks like an interesting idea. Via: BBC: A Devon inventor’s electricity from seawater generator could be sited at 200 points around the UK coastline. Energy firm Ecotricity wants to develop a commercial Searaser for testing off Falmouth […]
Illinois Semi Automatic Firearm Owners: Be Aware of HB1294
January 27th, 2012If you bother to read the full text of the legislation, you’ll find that the definition of “assault weapons” is very broad and covers a lot of rifles, handguns and shotguns. Via: Illinois General Assembly: Synopsis As Introduced Amends the Criminal Code of 1961. Provides that 90 days after the effective date of this amendatory […]
North Mountain Pastures
January 27th, 2012Via: Kickstarter: If you love traditional European salume, charcuterie, cured meats, air-dried meats, or artisan meats by any other name, then you have come to the right place! North Mountain Pastures is me – Brooks, my wife Anna, and our two children, Kaj and Leila. We’ve been farming together on leased land for over 6 […]
UK Bioethicist: Pregnancy and Natural Birth Should Not Be Tolerated
January 27th, 2012Make ready the municipal hatcheries. Via: Bioedge: Pregnancy and childbirth are so painful, risky and socially restrictive for women that public funding should urgently be directed to the development of artificial wombs. This is the only way to achieve true equality between men and women for then neither women nor men would then be limited […]
LAPD and Special Forces Conduct Military Maneuvers in Skies Above Downtown LA
January 27th, 2012Via: CBS: The Los Angeles Police Department teamed with military special operation forces Wednesday evening to conduct multi-agency tactical exercises in the skies above downtown LA. Many questioned what was going on Wednesday night as a Black Hawk helicopter and four OH-6 choppers – or “Little Birds” – flew over the city, at one point […]
Land of the Free: U.S. Press Freedom Ranked 47th in the World
January 27th, 2012Via: Reporters without Borders: The United States (47th) also owed its fall of 27 places to the many arrests of journalist covering Occupy Wall Street protests.
The Death of Used Video Games
January 27th, 2012Via: Kotaku: Microsoft will upgrade its disc technology for its next Xbox from DVDs to Blu-Ray discs, catching up to rival Sony, games industry sources tell Kotaku. Sony’s PlayStation 3 currently supports Blu-Ray, which can contain 25 or 50GB of data compared to DVD’s 9GB. But that disc detail could be far less impactful to […]
MIT Student Develops $3 Cutting-Edge Healing Device, Field Tested in Haiti
January 26th, 2012This is a couple of years old, but it was news to me. Via: Fast Company: No one really knows why, but for an open wound, simply applying suction dramatically speeds healing times. (The theory is that the negative pressure draws bacteria out, and encourages circulation.) But for almost everyone, that treatment is out of […]
