Sunday, June 23, 2013

EU blocks German plan for higher fixed phone rates

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Commission blocked plans by Germany on Friday to raise the fees alternative telecommunications operators charge each other to connect fixed-line phone calls.

The German telecoms regulator (BNetzA) proposed raising these call termination fees to three times the average rates in many parts of Europe to compensate for steadily declining revenues in the sector. There are over 50 alternative operators in Germany.

But the Commission, which opposed similar fee proposals for Deutsche Telekom early this year, is seeking to harmonize such rates across Europe.

"It is important for building up a real single market that both operators and consumers face termination rates in Germany that are in line with those in other EU Member States," the EU Commissioner for telecoms Neelie Kroes said on Friday.

The commission did not name any alternative operators in its decision but there are over 50 in the German market including EWE Tel GmbH and 1&1 Internet AG.

The German regulator had said it planned to raise rates to 0.0036 euros per minute at peak times and 0.0025 euros per minute at off-peak times.

These figures are the same as the rates BNetzA proposed for Deutsche Telekom. Operators following the Commission's stance charge on average 0.001 euros per minute.

The German regulator and the EU will now negotiate for a three-month period to seek a compromise, the Commission said. In the meantime implementation of the proposed rates is suspended.

(Reporting By Claire Davenport; Editing by Ruth Pitchford)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/eu-blocks-german-plan-higher-fixed-phone-rates-173207338.html

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Police again search home of Patriots' Hernandez

NORTH ATTLEBORO, Mass. (AP) ? State police officers and dogs searched the home of New England Patriots tight end Aaron Hernandez again Saturday as they continue to investigate the killing of a semi-pro football player whose body was found about a mile away.

The search of Hernandez's sprawling home and vehicle in North Attleboro began in the afternoon and lasted for more than three hours. Locksmiths and several officers were involved, including one with a crowbar.

Detectives and uniformed officers who searched the home, its backyard and playhouse did not comment to reporters on what they were looking for or what caused them to return to the house located not far from where the Patriots practice and about a mile from where a jogger found the body of Odin Lloyd on Monday.

Lloyd family members said Friday that he had been dating the sister of Hernandez's fiancee for about two years. They said the two men were friends who were together the night Lloyd died.

Authorities have ruled Lloyd's death a homicide.

A spokeswoman for the Bristol District Attorney's office declined to comment on the investigation Saturday. A state police spokesman referred questions to the district attorney's office.

An attorney for Hernandez has said he would not comment on the searches.

Three search warrants were issued in the investigation earlier last week but have not been returned, meaning they're not public. No arrest warrants were filed in state courts by the time court closed Friday, Attleboro District Court clerk magistrate Mark E. Sturdy said. Courts were closed Saturday.

Police previously searched in and around the home as they try to figure out who killed Lloyd.

Police in nearby Providence, R.I., said they had assisted Massachusetts state police and North Attleborough police with activity related to the Hernandez investigation at a strip club named Club Desire. It was unclear if they believed Lloyd and Hernandez might have been at the club in the days before Lloyd died.

Patriots spokesman Stacey James has said the team does not anticipate commenting publicly during the police investigation. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell was waiting for the legal process to take its course.

The Patriots drafted Hernandez out of Florida in 2010. Since then, he has combined with Rob Gronkowski to form one of the top tight end duos in the NFL. He missed 10 games last season with an ankle injury and had shoulder surgery in April but is expected to be ready for training camp. Last summer, the Patriots gave him a five-year contract worth $40 million.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/police-again-search-home-patriots-hernandez-205013835.html

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Saturday, June 22, 2013

Record US coal exports fuel climate change debate

With cleaner-burning natural gas cutting into the US electricity mix, American coal companies have found an eager customer in the East, fueling urbanizing economies in Asia with cheap steelmaking coal.?It's why coal export terminals are emerging as a flash point in the fight against climate change.

By David J. Unger,?Correspondent / June 20, 2013

A coal mine is shown near Gillette, Wyo. Proposed export terminals in Washington and Oregon would export millions of tons of coal each year to Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and elsewhere.

Nati Harnik/AP/File

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No country emits more carbon dioxide than China, but at least some of that heat-trapping gas gets its start in Appalachian mines.

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Why It Matters

Energy: Coal is a cheap, plentiful fossil fuel and the world's No. 1 source of electricity.

Environment: Despite technological advances, coal generally emits more pollutants than other energy sources.

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With cleaner-burning natural gas cutting into the their market in the United States, coal companies have found eager customers in the East, fueling urbanizing economies in Asia with cheap steelmaking coal. Coal's future in the US may have dimmed over recent years, but exports are hitting record highs.

It's why coal export terminals are emerging as a flash point in the fight against climate change. Don't be surprised if instead of reading about the Keystone XL pipeline, you are soon inundated with polarizing reports on Millennium Bulk Terminals-Longview,?the?Gateway Pacific Terminal, and the Morrow Pacific Project.

Those are three proposals for export terminals in Washington and Oregon that would export millions of tons of coal each year to Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and elsewhere.?

ViewSonic PJD6383s


The ViewSonic PJD6383s is very similar to its higher-resolution cousin, the Editors' Choice ViewSonic PJD6683ws ($750 street). As a short-throw projector for businesses or classrooms, it can be placed very near the screen, provides very good data image quality and a decent set of connectivity choices, and 3D capability for a modest price. It's a good choice if your presentations don't include much video.

The PJD6383s has a native XGA (1,024 by 768) resolution, at a 4:3 aspect ratio traditionally used for data presentations. It is suitably bright at a rated 3,000 lumens, and uses a DLP-based light engine.

This all-black projector measures 3.3 by 11.6 by 9.5 inches (HWD) and weighs a reasonably portable 6.6 pounds, though it lacks a carrying case. The lens has a prominent focus ring around its bulbous lens. The PJD6383s lacks a zoom, as is generally the case with short-throw projectors.

The PJD6383s has a solid set of ports for a data projector: HDMI; 2 VGA-in ports and 1 monitor-out; 2 audio-in and 1 audio-out; an RCA composite video jack; S-video; a mini-USB port for remote mouse control, and an Ethernet port. It comes with Crestron LAN control software, allowing multiple projectors to be remotely controlled and managed from a PC. It lacks wireless capability, as well as a USB type A port for running presentations computer free from a USB thumb drive.

Data Image Quality
I tested the PJD6383s at a little less than three feet away from the screen. Our test image, measuring about 60 inches diagonally, stood up well to the addition of ambient light.

In our data image testing using the DisplayMate suite, image quality was above par, suitable for most any business or classroom presentation. Though colors were otherwise reasonably bright, yellows and reds were slightly muted. There was virtually no tinting. It did well in our text testing; text was blurred but readable at the smallest white-on-black size, and black-on-white text was easily readable down to the smallest size.

I noticed the rainbow effect?in which little red-green-blue flashes appear, most often in images with bright areas against dark backgrounds?in some of the PJD6383s's data images. Every single-chip DLP projector is potentially affected with it, but even though it was more obvious than usual with this projector, it's unlikely to be much of a distraction in data images?even to people who are particularly sensitive to it.

Video and Audio
The rainbow effect is usually more problematic with video than with data images, and that's certainly true with the PJD6383s. With video, it even showed up in some scenes where I've seldom seen it before. It would likely be distracting to people even mildly sensitive to it, as is the case with me. Because of this, I'd limit this projector to very short clips as part of a presentation, or avoid it for video altogether. Even if you're not sensitive to the effect, your colleagues or students may well be.

Audio from the PJD6383s 's single 10-watt speaker was of decent volume and quality, and should fill a small to mid-sized conference room or classroom.

As a DLP projector, the PJD6383s provides 3D readiness using the DLP-Link system, although you need to get your own active-shutter glasses. At about $70 a pair, outfitting a classroom for 3D viewing could easily be more expensive than the cost of the projector itself.

The PJD6383s is similar in features and performance to the Editors' Choice ViewSonic PJD6683ws , though that model ups the native resolution to WXGA (1,280 by 800 pixels). They each are bright (3,000 lumens), light short-throw projectors, with very good data image quality, good audio systems, and rather poor video. Though both are fine data projectors, the price difference between is modest, so it's worth the extra dollars to get the higher resolution that the PJD6683ws offers, unless you can get the PJD6383s on sale.

The PJD6383s is similar to, though of lower resolution than, the Editors' Choice Optoma TW610ST, a WXGA short-throw projector, though it can't match the Optoma's data image quality.

The PDJ6383s has better data image quality than the Epson PowerLite 435W Multimedia Projector, a WXGA short-throw projector, but the Epson projector does better with video; for one thing, as it is LCD based, it's immune from rainbow artifacts.

The ViewSonic PJD6383s offers very good data image quality in a short-throw projector. You can get its higher-resolution cousin, the Editors' Choice ViewSonic PJD6683ws, for not much more money, but the PJD6383s offers excellent value at a modest price, as long as you don't need to run much video in your presentations.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ziffdavis/pcmag/~3/-xDDut-oSZY/0,2817,2420756,00.asp

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House rejects massive farm bill that would have cut food stamps (Star Tribune)

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Monday, April 29, 2013

How Long Should You Spend on Making Tasks More Efficient?

These days everyone wants you to hack your life in order to make your day-to-day existence more efficient. But there are times when the effort's not really worth it?and this chart should help you work out what to spend time on, and what to ignore.

Put together by XKCD's Randall Munroe, this chart tells you how much time you should spend on making a task more efficient based on how big a saving you can create and how often you have to perform the task over a five-year span. It makes complete sense, and is pretty revealing: if you can slice a minute off a 30 minute task you perform every day, then by all means spend an entire day trying to make that task more efficient.

A lot of the time, though, the savings just aren't worth the effort. Just make sure you don't spend too much time reading the chart?because that's hardly efficient, is it? [XKCD]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/5995497/how-long-should-you-spend-on-making-tasks-more-efficient

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Clarifying the effect of stem cell therapy on cancer

Apr. 28, 2013 ? Injection of human stem cells into mice with tumors slowed down tumor growth, finds research published in BioMed Central's open access journal Stem Cell Research & Therapy. Human mesenchymal stem cells (MSC), isolated from bone marrow, caused changes in blood vessels supplying the tumor, and it is this modification of blood supply which seems to impact tumor growth.

The use of stem cells in treating cancer has been controversial, with some studies finding that stem cells force tumors to enter programmed cell death. However other studies find that stem cells actually promote tumor growth by inducing infiltration of new blood vessels. In attempting to sort out this puzzle researchers from INSERM groups at Universit? Joseph Fourier in collaboration with CHU de Grenoble investigated the impact of MSC on already established subcutaneous or lung metastasis in mice.

For both the subcutaneous and lung tumors, injection of MSC reduced cell division, consequently slowing the rate of tumor growth. Part of the mode of action of stem cells therefore appears to be due to with angiogenesis, but the mechanism behind this is still unclear.

Claire Rome who led this study explained, "We found that MSC altered vasculature inside the tumor -- although new blood vessels were generated, overall they were longer and fewer than in untreated tumors. This could be restricting the oxygen and nutrients to the tumor, limiting cell division." She continued, "Our study confirms others which propose that stem cells, in particular MSC, might be one way forwards in treating cancer."

Commenting on this study Celia Gomes, from the University of Coimbra, said, "One of the interesting questions this study raises is when MSC promote tumor growth and when they restrict it. The answer seems to be timing -- this study looks at already established tumors, while others, which find that MSC increase growth, tend to be investigating new tumors. This is a first step in the path to identifying exactly which patients might benefit from stem cell therapy and who will not."

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by BioMed Central, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

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


Journal Reference:

  1. Michelle K?ramidas, Florence de Fraipont, Anastassia Karageorgis, Ana?ck Moisan, Virginie Persoons, Marie-Jeanne Richard, Jean-Luc Coll and Claire Rome. The dual effect of MSCs on tumour growth and tumour angiogenesis. Stem Cell Research & Therapy, 2013, 4:41 [link]

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/~3/SFxmSeqXAZ0/130428230425.htm

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