Feb 09
The Nest Thermostat can be a hot (or cool) new member of your family as it adapts to your schedule, saves you money, and looks good doing it.
Feb 09
Egyptian court suspends YouTube for a month over controversial film (Update: Google statement)
Posted in: Today's Chili 
Users of YouTube in Egypt could face a month-long blackout of the service after an administrative court ruling ordered the website’s suspension. The ministries of communication and investment have been ordered to block the popular video sharing site, reports news agency MENA, for hosting the movie short Innocence of Muslims. The American-made film has caused strong reactions since its release in September, at which point the initial complaint about YouTube’s showing of it is said to have been made. Today’s decision is a result of that ruling, and while the service should still currently remain online, Egypt’s National Telecommunication Regulatory Authority has claimed it will uphold the suspension once it receives confirmation of the verdict. This isn’t the first time access to YouTube has been restricted by a government, and the very same film caused the Pakistani prime minister to call for a similar ban at the time of the movie’s release. The 13-minute video is still available on YouTube, implying that the site deems that it doesn’t breach its own guidelines, but it does come with a warning for user discretion due to possible offence. We’ve reached out to Google for comment.
Update: Google has responded with the following statement:
“We have received nothing from the judge or government related to this matter.”
Update #2: Our friends in Egypt tell us YouTube is working fine for now — at least as of 13.30pm today.
Source: Reuters
Feb 09
After missing initial shipping plans with some undisclosed delays, and despite seeing its welcome party in NYC abolished by a storm dubbed Nemo, Microsoft’s finally started the process to make that long-awaited Surface Pro available to the masses. Starting with US and Canada residents, those seeking Redmond’s in-house hardware and a full serving of Windows 8 can now snag a Surface Pro starting at $899 for the 64GB model, while the more spacious 128GB unit is slightly costlier at $999. And while these prices do include Microsoft’s pressure-sensitive pen, they don’t account for any other fancy accessories, which means potential buyers will have to shell out a little extra cash if a Touch or Type Cover are of interest — more specifically, $120 and $130, respectively. We’ll see how Ballmer and Co. cope with demand this time around, but as history would kindly note, it’s probably best to be one of the first in line just to be extra, extra safe.
Filed under: Desktops, Laptops, Tablets, Microsoft
Source: Microsoft, Microsoft Store
Feb 09
Take multi-tasking to the next level with the Potty Putter. Now you can poop, putt, shoot hoops, throw pitches, and anything else you can think of to do in the bathroom. Ok, you can poop and putt with it. Forget the other stuff.
Feb 09
NASA and Lockheed Martin finish MAVEN probe, hope to study Mars’ upper skies
Posted in: Today's Chili 
Us humans are surprisingly familiar with Mars’ surface, yet we haven’t studied its higher altitudes — an odd discrepancy when the sky plays as much of a role as the soil in determining the planet’s climate. We’ll get a better balance in our research now that NASA and Lockheed Martin have finished constructing the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution probe, or MAVEN. The robot craft will learn how quickly the Martian atmosphere is escaping into space and give us a better idea of how the planet’s arid landscape came to be. Lockheed Martin still needs to conduct space simulation tests and ship MAVEN to the Kennedy Space Center, but the ship should launch in November and deliver results roughly a year later; that’s a quick turnaround for a probe that could answer riddles spanning millions of years.
Source: NASA
Feb 09
Verizon has once again earned top-slot for customer care and service, according to JD Power and Associates. This marks the carrier’s fourth year straight as #1, something it isn’t showing any signs of letting go of in the near future. The status is based on ample amounts of feedback and surveys, with online, telephone, and in-person customers all being considered.
JD Power and Associates determines its results based on feedback from a variety of customers, as well as information provided on surveys. Using both, a score is given for each carrier, with 1000 being the maximum. Verizon clocked in at 766, narrowly beating AT&T, which had 759. Verizon received the Power Circle Rating of 5, while AT&T received 3.
Sprint came in next at 746 with a Power Circle Rating of 3, likewise placing it just a bit under its nearest competitor. Then, with a relatively large drop, there’s T-Mobile, which scored 715, and received a Power Circle Rating of 2. All of these fall under the full service list, which includes a non-contract section for prepaid carriers.
In the non-contract section, MetroPCS came out on top at 733 with a Power Rating of 5, while Virgin Mobile came in just under that at 729 with a Power Circle Rating of 5 as well. Third place is the popular prepaid service Tracfone at a solid 700/3, followed closely by Boost Mobile and Straight Talk. At the bottom of the list lies Cricket, with a score of 671/2, and Net10, with a score of 633/2.
[via Android Community]
Verizon awarded #1 in customer care by JD Power is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Feb 09
Excerpted from the book THE NORMAL BAR. Copyright © 2013 by Chrisanna Northrup, Pepper Schwartz, and James Witte. Published by Harmony, an Imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc. The Normal Bar is the world’s most extensive survey on romantic relationships, polling over 100,000 people and collecting over 1 million data points. The survey was conducted in 2011 using a powerful interactive survey tool called OnQ with the help of media partners The Huffington Post, Reader’s Digest, AARP, iVillage, & AOL.
The Normal Bar data show us that even in good relationships, trust is shaky. Having complete and total confidence in a partner seems to be a struggle for most of us.
Do you trust your partner?
Feb 09
Julian Assange Bill Maher Interview: WikiLeaks Founder Slams Drones, Targeted Killings
Posted in: Today's ChiliWikiLeaks founder Julian Assange weighed in on the brewing controversy surrounding the Obama administration’s targeted killing program Friday night during an appearance on “Real Time With Bill Maher.”
Assange railed against the revelation, made by NBC News earlier this week, that the U.S. government reserves the right to extrajudicially kill U.S. citizens, as long as they are perceived to be “imminent” terror threats — with “imminence” being given an especially broad definition.
Said Assange:
Read More…
More on Julian Assange
Feb 09
Bing Pulse launching with help from Fox News, aims to make State of the Union speech more interactive
Posted in: Today's Chili 
Just in time for next week’s State of the Union address, Bing announced it’s teamed up with Fox News to launch Bing Pulse, a one-stop hub where folks can easily interact and share their thoughts with one another while President Barack Obama’s speech is taking place. The Microsoft-owned search engine says that Pulse will allow participants to vote on reactions to the event every five seconds, with the impending results being shown on the Bing Politics site. What’s more, Bing believes “this will be the largest live online poll in history,” which will be enhanced by the outfit’s new Beat “social sentiment tracker” — a service that’s set to collect and analyze data from Twitter in order to figure out what are the trendiest political topics during the speech. Folks interested in joining the Bing Pulse conversation should hit that more coverage link to get acquainted — and, of course, don’t forget to bookmark it so you’re all set come February 12th.
Filed under: Internet, Microsoft
Source: Bing
Feb 09
The Mars Curiosity Rover has been busy snapping photos (selfies too) of Mars and found something… strange. A small, shiny, metal-looking “protuberance” sticking out from the red planet. Is it some secret lever to open up a world where Martians exist? Or some random space junk? We don’t know. More »
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