Hasta La Gadget!

Every time a major Website experiences downtime these days, fingers are pointed at 4Chan. MasterCard’s site was down much of the morning, and everyone’s looking at the site that pushed LOLcats onto an unassuming public.

The hacker message board is reportedly behind the DDOS attacks that took down the site, along with some help from the Operation Payback organization–the latter of which has taken responsibility.

The take down apparently comes in response to the credit card’s decision to end support for WikiLeaks donation. On Monday, a MasterCard spokesman told the press, “MasterCard is taking action to ensure that WikiLeaks can no longer accept MasterCard-branded products.”

Separate attacks have been waged against sites like PayPal and Switzerland’s PostFinance bank, both which have also refused support for the whistle blowing site.

Though Twitter has become a greater professional tool than we’d imagine anyone ever intended it’s still hard to take the service too seriously. We like silly twitterers, whether they be offering pretend writing advice, charting the reclusive tendencies of Hollywood’s leading men, or just threatening to force choke any troll who gets in their way. Wouldn’t it be fun if your pooch could get in on those antics? No, as it turns out, it isn’t all that fun at all.

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California-based Space Explorations Technology (SpaceX) launched a test run of its Dragon capsule this morning. The first-ever privately owned space craft lifted off from Cape Canaveral at 10:45 ET. The capsule will separate from the company’s Falcon 9 rocket. Once out of the atmosphere, it will orbit Earth and transmit signals.

The Dragon will only orbit for a few hours, after which it drop down into the Pacific. The next step in the plans–should today’s launch prove successful–involves a five day mission, with the Dragon capsule getting within six miles of the International Space Station.

In the future, the ship may be used to supply the International Space Station, once NASA retires its fleet.

The launch was initially scheduled for 9:00, but was pushed back for unknown reasons.

A few weeks back, Peel launched the Peel program guide app for the iPhone, a guide that tailors itself to your favorite programs. Now the company is announcing a hardware component that turns your phone into a remote control. The Peel universal control system bridges your iPhone and TV. The hardware includes two pieces: the Peel cable and the Peel fruit (yes, those are the real names). The Peel fruit sits within line-of-site of the user’s entertainment system. The Peel cable plugs into a power outlet and the Ethernet port of a wireless router.

Peel is looking to buyers to determine the price. A limited quantity of the first units are available directly from Peel for whatever the buyer is willing to pay. Buyers can make offers on the Peel website and the best offers will get units. After those are gone, look for the Peel universal control on store shelves in a few weeks.

All multi-cell organisms start their existence as microscopic blobs of goop. As you can imagine, these little snot balls of life are very difficult to discern one from another. As embryo-centric science marches forward, the need arises for a precise method to readily tell these little gloopies apart, thus mitigating the potential for (very damaging) human error.

That is why researchers at the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona have developed a technique to insert microscopic bar codes directly into developing embryos. In test trials, these tiny silicon bar codes have been safely injected into the outer layer of mouse embryos. Eventually, through the natural course of development, the outer layer of the embryo is “shed” with bar code in tow, leaving no lasting effect. The Health Department of Catalonia has given the all-clear to use the procedure to be used on human embryos in Spanish fertility clinics.

Humans and cans of soup: in the future, they won’t be so different after all.

via SingularityHub