July 2012
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Biofuel from Plastic for this Young Egyptian...
Azza Abdel Hamid Faiad was the winner of the 2011 European Union Contest for Young Scientists for finding a new way of turning plastic into biofuel.
A sixteen-year-old Egyptian student, Azza Abdel Hamid Faiad from the Zahran Language School in Alexandria has identified a new low-cost catalyst which can generate biofuel by breaking down plastic waste.
The idea of breaking down plastic polymers...
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Study: Solar energy production cost effective. By...
New study (by The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA)) shows investment in solar energy production as cost effective or more than production of fossil fuel-based energy
Solar energy production is one of the fastest growing industries in the world and a recent study has found that it is now also as cost effective – if not more – than fossil fuel-based energy production.
The renewable...
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Lebanon invaded by Israeli ...
Lebanon: Cosmetics sector boycott comes under the knife
Investigation by Campaign to Boycott Israel Supporters in Lebanon reveals that local beauty market has been ‘invaded’ by Israeli-made products
Therapeutic and cosmetic laser surgery is an integral part of a booming medical tourism industry in Lebanon. But unknown to most patients, the Lebanese market hosts a wide variety of...
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Minnesota Courts Cyclists With A New Mobile...
TUNE-UP SHELTERS, MOBILE APPS, AND A HEART-SHAPED LOGO: WELCOME TO THE BIKE-FRIENDLY STATE.
Cyclists in New York (and pretty much every other state) are used to struggling for the attention of lawmakers. Not so in Minnesota, a state that’s actively courting cyclists—most recently, through Pedal Minnesota, a new campaign aimed at making it easier for locals and tourists to get around by...
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How To Thrive In The Free-Product Economy. BY...
Someone will probably make a product just like yours, then give it away for free. Why not beat them to the punch?
Building technology has never been cheaper than it is today. Or faster.
In the past twelve months, Ruby on Rails programmers built more than a million apps on top of Heroku, a platform that allows coders to save drastic amounts of development time. Historically, the majority of...
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Fungus-powered superplants may beat the heat. By...
THE US is in the grip of the worst drought in over 50 years. Across the nation, crops that should be at their greenest in July are instead small and withered, and are expected to produce 35 per cent less food than normal. During such droughts, plants that have been genetically modified to need less water become more attractive. But the expense and time needed to get GM plants to market has...
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The true faces of emotion. By Courtney Humphries
Bushmen or businessman, everyone makes the same expressions to signal emotions – or so we thought. Now it looks like human nature isn’t so universal after all
Test yourself: ”What emotions are written all over their faces?”
IN 1868, while working on his latest book on evolution, Charles Darwin liked to show visitors to his house a series of ghoulish photographs of...
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Inequality: The more money, the merrier? By...
IF YOU are a top hedge-fund manager taking home $40 million this year, you can afford a lifestyle with more than a little luxury. So why strive to take home $50 million next year? The question goes to the heart of one of the most-researched paradoxes in social science: why do people dedicate so much energy to trying to make more money, when having more money does not seem to make them that...
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The End of Gun Control? [UPDATED]. By Mark Gibbs
Given the recent appalling events in Aurora, Colorado, there’s been a renewed call for greater gun control and a ban on assault weapons.
I’m in favor of tighter gun control and a ban on weapons that are unnecessarily powerful but I’m afraid that technology will soon make any legislation that limits the availability of any kinds of guns ineffective.
To understand why this might happen,...
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Humour: Andrew Lucas - Macro shooting principle.
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shesgothighmorale:
Okay. Maybe I need to say this one last time.
Arabs can’t be anti-Semitic. They are Semitic. Now everyone shut up.
Why the hell did the U.S. government think they could just pull the narrowest definition of the word out of their asses and use it in their campaigns. Fuck.
It’s not just the “narrowest definition of the word” it’s the dictionary...
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The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge. By Maria... →
“The real enemy is the man who tries to mold the human spirit so that it will not dare to spread its wings.”
In an age obsessed with practicality, productivity, and efficiency, I frequently worry that we are leaving little room for abstract knowledge and for the kind of curiosity that invites just enough serendipity to allow for the discovery of ideas we didn’t know we were interested in until we...
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“Due to the cool rainy weather in London, beach volleyball players will likey...”
– Brad Dickson
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“Even though the Olympics take place during Ramadan, some Muslim athletes said...”
– Conan O’Brien
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WatchIn anticipation of her 9th birthday, Rachel Beckwith informed her mom that she didn’t want presents; instead, she asked friends and family to donate $9 to charity: water, so that kids her age in Africa would have clean water to drink.
She fell shy of her goal of $300, which is enough to give 15 people clean drinking water. But she pledged to do better when her 10th birthday rolled around.
...
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London 2012 Schedule and Results →
Schedule & Results
All daysSingle day
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basic_olympic-calendar
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London time | My time All...
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Watch“Hello Dolly”
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ADS OF THE 2012 OLYMPICS
VISA
EDF
COCA-COLA
BRITISH AIRWAYS
NIKE
PROCTER & GAMBLE
CHANNEL 4 PARALYMPICS
ADIDAS
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Israeli art school redesigns hacked webpages for...
To Israelis who are under constant cyber-attack, the most offensive part is that the crackers have no sense of style. From Business Insider:
Students from HaBezefer, the Israeli school of advertising and art, and ad agency McCann Digital Israel, came up with an unconventional response to cyberattacks: Re-design hacked takeover pages so they look more aesthetically pleasing. McCann Digital art...
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Jerusalem: There is no such place! – tourist book...
The world is virtually shrinking. The relentless rise of both the internet and mobile telecommunications has seen people connected in every corner of the globe. It has created friendships and cross-cultural bonds, united people, and somehow brought the human race a little closer together. Having myself travelled extensively last year, I now boast Facebook friends in Sudan and Syria, Malawi...
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JewTube →
It’s not YouTube, it’s JewTube. The badly-punned site is the self-proclaimed “leading video sharing site for the Jewish community and premier destination to watch and share Jewish-themed videos.” Popular videos include an Occupy Wall Street Sukkot service, “Bible Raps,” and pro-Israel television commercials. Not too Kosher, however, are the commercials for Dubai escort agencies that...
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Ecured is a Cuban state-operated clone of... →
While Ecured runs on a crowdsourced model somewhat similar to its American cousin, government authorities keep close tabs on IP addresses that edit articles and strictly monitor content. Users who edit articles must be approved by government censors as well. Ecured, which launched in 2010, has over 17,000 articles including one on “Yankee imperialism.”
Unlike Wikipedia’s clamorous riot...
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5 Things That Keep App Developers Up At Night. By...
A hit mobile app can mean a big payday for a developer. But so much about what makes or breaks a product is completely outside of their control. And that means one thing: omnipresent anxiety.
Each of the world’s 410 million devices running iOS produces approximately $18.50 in App Store sales, according to Apple—of which $13 goes straight to developers. In other words: A hit...
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Watch
TALKS
Malte Spitz: Your phone company is watching
What kind of data is your cell phone company collecting? Malte Spitz wasn’t too worried when he asked his operator in Germany to share information stored about him. Multiple unanswered requests and a lawsuit later, Spitz received 35,830 lines of code — a detailed, nearly minute-by-minute account of half a year of his life.
Malte Spitz asked...
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Watch
TALKS
James Stavridis: How NATO’s Supreme Commander thinks about global security
Imagine a global security driven by collaboration — among agencies, government, the private sector and the public. That’s not just the distant hope of open-source fans, it’s the vision of James Stavridis, the Supreme Commander of NATO, who shares vivid moments from recent military history to...
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Watch
TALKS
Vinay Venkatraman: “Technology crafts” for the digitally underserved
Two-thirds of the world may not have access to the latest smartphone, but local electronic shops are adept at fixing older tech using low-cost parts. Vinay Venkatraman explains his work in “technology crafts,” through which a mobile phone, a lunchbox and a flashlight can become a digital projector for a village...
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Watch
TALKS | TEDX
John Graham-Cumming: The greatest machine that never was
Computer science began in the ’30s … the 1830s. John Graham-Cumming tells the story of Charles Babbage’s mechanical, steam-powered “analytical engine” and how Ada Lovelace, mathematician and daughter of Lord Byron, saw beyond its simple computational abilities to imagine the future of...
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Watch
TALKS
Neil Harbisson: I listen to color
Artist Neil Harbisson was born completely color blind, but these days a device attached to his head turns color into audible frequencies. Instead of seeing a world in grayscale, Harbisson can hear a symphony of color — and yes, even listen to faces and paintings.
Neil Harbisson’s “eyeborg” allows him to hear colors, even those...
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WatchMad World, Arab-Israel Conflict
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Heart muscle helps cyborg jellyfish come alive. By...
Video: Jellyfish engineered from rat cells
Even before a jolt of electricity was applied to animate its body, the cyborg twitched with signs of life. No, this isn’t a scene from Frankenstein but a lab at Harvard University, where the world’s first artificial jellyfish has been created. With a single pulse of electricity, the artificial jellyfish even swims like the real...
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Virtual germ created on computer for first time....
(Image: Thomas Deernick, NCMIR/Science Photo Library)
In a move that promises to bring the advantages of computer aided design (CAD) to genetic engineers, the first computer model of a complete bacterium has been produced in the US. It means researchers will soon be able to modify models of an organism’s genome on a computer screen - or create artificial lifeforms - without the...
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Are these the brain cells that give us...
The brainiest creatures share a secret – an odd kind of brain cell involved in emotions and empathy that may have accidentally made us conscious
THE origin of consciousness has to be one of the biggest mysteries of all time, occupying philosophers and scientists for generations. So it is strange to think that a little-known neuroscientist called Constantin von Economo might have unearthed an...
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We will never be silent. By Tobias Petersson
Swedish activist says anti-Israel propaganda in Europe can and must be confronted
Last Wednesday in Stockholm a swedish guy sat down in a square next to a Ship to Gaza demonstration. He was holding a sign saying: “Hundreds of rockets hitting Israel from Gaza whileI srael is delivering supplies to Gaza.The blockade is legal. Are ship to Gaza’s activities legal? Humanitarian?”
He...
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“Seeing how Iron Man and Batman are only really smart and super rich, I’m really...”
– @the_moonface
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Reuters: Israel plans to revive ailing Jordan...
Once vibrant biblical river is struggling with pollution stagnant but authorities aim to use desalination, wastewater recycling to revive it
The River Jordan is neither deep nor wide these days. The Biblical river, which has inspired countless spirituals and folk songs, is just a narrow stream in many parts – polluted and stagnant. But that is about to change.
Thanks...
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Humour: railroad lawyer
A big-city lawyer was representing the railroad in a lawsuit filed by an old rancher. The rancher’s prize bull was missing from the section through which the railroad passed. The rancher only wanted to be paid the fair value of the bull. The case was scheduled to be tried before the justice of the peace, in the back room of the general store. The attorney for the railroad immediately...
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Oldie: UN survey
A world-wide telephone survey was conducted by the UN. The only question asked was: “Could you please give your honest opinion about solutions to the food shortage in the rest of the world?” The survey was a massive failure because: 1. In Eastern Europe they didn’t know what “honest” meant. 2. In Western Europe they didn’t know what “shortage”...
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“We are Sabadell” Flashmob
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Disabled soldier fulfills dream of becoming IDF...
In spite of being born with cerebral palsy, 21-year-old soldier graduates from officers’ training course. ‘I felt obligated to Israel,’ he says
B. (21) was born with cerebral palsy and has partial paralysis in all four limbs. Just before he turned 18, B. got a letter from the IDF, stating that he was officially exempt from military service.
However, the physical hindrance did...
