Category: News

Our platform focus continues this fine Sunday with the e-Book Echo, our take on the week in the digital publishing world. Publishers are learning the hard way that consumers are willing to pay for what they want, and more importantly they don’t like for companies to push them around. That’s what consumers felt was happening when a number of publishers recently stated they would delay the release of e-book versions of best sellers in an attempt to get consumers to buy the expensive hardcover books instead. This is nothing new, having purchased e-books for a decade I can remember when e-book versions of top sellers followed the paper versions by months. What is new is how consumers are fighting back. A few publishers, HarperCollins among them, have seen a number of their books get stuck with one-star reviews on Amazon to mark displeasure at the delay of the Kindle version.

The folks that gave us the netbook are preparing to enter what is becoming a crowded field of e-book readers. The ASUS DR-570 will have a 6-inch screen and the company is claiming it will provide 122 hours of reading on a battery charge. While Eee-Reader sounds better than DR-570, ASUS is raising the bar by including a color OLED screen, and the integrated 3G and Wi-Fi will come in handy to get Flash content that can be played.  There is no word on what this jewel might cost.

Is it a stretch of logic, or purely logical? You be the one to judge. New York Magazine is reporting from what seems to be pretty solid word that the New York Times will start charging online readers for its content. That’s all well and interesting for a media hound, but there’s additional word that the announcement of this in “a matter of weeks” might coincide with the rumored January 27th Apple launch. You know, the tablet thing. We already know (or are pretty sure) that Apple has shopped around a theoretical device to content providers, including almost assuredly the New York Times, so it makes “sense.” Still, we aren’t putting solid money down on a single thing until Steve Jobs pulls this device out of a largish pocket of his and shows it to our face.

New York Times to begin charging for access… something something, Apple Tablet originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 17 Jan 2010 16:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink CNET  |  New York Magazine  | Email this | Comments

Buy This Item: [Click here to buy this item]

Article

“Excuse me, sir, but do you have the time?” “Why yes, yes I do.” “Well, what is it then?” “Menacing.”

Anyway, that’s how I see that conversation going down if, by some slim chance in the near future, I’m wearing this $400,000 watch and some curious chap asks me for the time. I’d be wearing an eye patch while drunk, if that helps you visualize the encounter any better.

Designed by Fabrice Gonet, the Black Pearl is a limited run timepiece that includes a number of subtle pirate-themed additions, including the prerequisite skull and bones (etched in glass on the back), a tiny cannon, and some nautical navigation touches. Then there’s the fact that it costs as much as some pirate’s treasure…

There were only eleven made, each with the aforementioned $400,000 asking price. [FLYLYF via technabob]

Read the original article from Tribune News Services.

About 200 people were evacuated from a Wal-Mart store in far north suburban Antioch today after someone called in a bomb threat to the store, police said.

Antioch police and fire department officials determined that the call was unfounded after a search of the Wal-Mart, 475 E Ill. Hwy.

Should new vitamin D recommendations be made? According to a new study carried out at the University of California at Davis, the recommended dose of vitamin D that most experts recommend taking is too low during the winter months when there’s less direct sunlight. This conclusion was reached after a Chinese study showed that a whopping 94% of people between the ages of fifty and seventy were deficient in this vitamin. The health benefits
of vitamin D are growing in number and more experts are recommending that new vitamin D recommendations be made in order to reduce the widespread deficiency that exists in this country.

Should There Be New Vitamin D Recommendations?

According to this research which was published in the Journal of Nutrition
, University of California researchers believe that the recommended dose of vitamin D during the winter months should be between 2100 and 3100 International Units per day. The current recommendation is 200 International Units per day for those fifty and under, 400 International Units for men and women between fifty-one and seventy, and 600 International Units per day for those over the age of seventy.

Why is Sun Exposure so Important?

Vitamin D deficiencies become more common in the winter months due to the lack of sun exposure. This is a problem for people who live in Northern parts of the country where the winters are long and there’s less sun exposure. Exposure to sunlight is the best source of vitamin D since good natural food sources of this vitamin are limited. Sunlight exposure causes a chemical reaction to occur on the surface of the skin that’s used by the body to manufacture vitamin D. When there’s little direct sunlight and the body is completely covered, this reaction can’t take place and vitamin D deficiency can occur. READ MORE…

When the Internet exploded after Infinity Ward announced the PC version of Modern Warfare 2 wouldn’t support dedicated servers, DICE saw an opportunity to win some populace points by announcing Battlefield: Bad Company 2 absolutely would. A small catch: The only way to host a private dedicated server is to rent one from one of DICE’s “authorized hosts,” a policy that DICE explained in a little more detail to Eurogamer.

“This does not earn DICE a profit,” said producer Gordon Van Dyke. “But we will see where the game goes and support it post launch.”

That’s an ominous wording, and Van Dyke didn’t explain exactly where the rental fees — if not in DICE’s coffers — are going toward. But he insisted this was the only way to “protect the game’s integrity on PC,” rather than making public the files the community would need to host private dedicated servers.

Buy This Item: [Click here to buy this item]

Read Original Article

There’s been tons of great tech-related charitable news this week, and here’s a little more: As of last Thursday, T-Mobile USA has waived all international calls to and from Haiti. The program will last until January 31. Every little bit helps, and if you haven’t donated yet, it’s as easy as texting HAITI to 90999. [Ubergizmo]

The report last year that xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus (XMRV) was found in a high proportion of patients with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) caused quite a stir — which is totally understandable given how frustrated the people with CFS are with the lack of adequate explanations for their suffering.

The investigators of the original report even began referring patients to a commercial lab (question #5) to get tested for the virus.

Now some British researchers weigh in.  Their findings:

Patients in our CFS cohort had undergone medical screening to exclude detectable organic illness and met the CDC criteria for CFS. DNA extracted from blood samples of 186 CFS patients were screened for XMRV provirus and for the closely related murine leukaemia virus by nested PCR using specific oligonucleotide primers.
(snip)
XMRV or MLV sequences were not amplified from DNA originating from CFS patients in the UK.

Oh darn.

One possible explanation for the negative finding is the differing epidemiology of XMRV in North America and Europe, something also noted in studies of XMRV and prostate cancer.

But the results certainly reinforce what I have suspected for some time, which is that CFS most likely has multiple causes — some infectious, some allergic, some environmental, some emotional, but all yielding a similar clinical phenotype due to underlying genetics and how an individual responds to illness.  Yes, XMRV might cause CFS in some people — but seems highly unlikely it does so in all.

I wish it were simpler than that, but alas don’t think it will be.

(Nice summary of the controversy here in ScienceNOW.)

Filed under: Budget, Truck, Scion

We know that Scion will launch a new tC coupe and a tiny little iQ minicar before the end of the year, but what comes after that? Yoshi Inaba, president of Toyota Motor North America, admits that the Japanese automaker hasn’t yet decided what future products make the most sense for the youth-oriented Scion brand, but Scion General Manager Jack Hollis tells Wards Auto that a truck is a possibility.

Take a look at the current pickup truck market and you’ll see that the only currently available machine that even remotely fits into the compact role is the Ford Ranger, which hasn’t been updated in eons and sees its sales dwindle every single year (55,600 in 2009). This being the case, there may be room for a small urban pickup from Scion, though the automaker indicates it would need to be careful not to infringe on the class-leading Toyota Tacoma.

If Scion did indeed build a true compact pickup with an eye toward reasonable fuel efficiency, what would it look like? Perhaps an xB with a small bed? Or might it look something like the Hako concept from the 2008 New York Auto Show (perhaps in modified form)? Refresh your memory of that odd-looking show car by perusing our high-res image gallery below.

[Source: Wards Auto]

Will Scion inject freshness into America’s stale compact pickup scene? originally appeared on Autoblog on Sun, 17 Jan 2010 15:19:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

Buy This Item: [Click here to buy this item]

Read Original Article