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Yes folks, it’s coming! Sony Computer Entertainment Europe president Andrew House has confirmed their plans to introduce the often-rumored PSN pay-to-play service in a recent fan in question & answer post.
 

Pois é, pelo visto a nova moda de 2010 são os recalls e nem a L200 da Mitsubishi escapou dessa.

O modelo foi chamado para o recall devido a um problema em um parafuso frouxo na sua suspensão dianteira.

Segundo a marca, com o parafuso frouxo ouvisse ruídos e em casos mais graves o parafuso perde o toque de fixação podendo atrapalhar na condução da picape levando a um acidente.

A Mitsubishi não deu muitos detalhes sobre o recall, mas para quem quer mais informações, pode encontrar no telefone: 0800 702 0404 ou Mitsubishi.

Fonte: Carplace

Currently, the developing world (what used to be called “The Third World”) is experiencing the effects of higher commodity prices and declining agricultural production. Chronic undernourishment now affects an estimated one billion people, most of whom reside in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.

At current population trends, another 2.3 billion will be added to the world’s population by 2050. According to the findings of the World Summit on Food Security (Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN), in order to feed this additional 2+ billion people, developing countries will need to increase their cereal crop output by 70%, nearly doubling current output.

One of the UN’s Millennium Development Goals–to dramatically reduce world hunger by 2015–will most likely not be met, given these current trends.

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They employ about 3.5 million workers and produced about $3.5 trillion in revenue last year, they include 21 Fortune 100 companies, and all 6,000 of them support energy and climate legislation.  We’re talking about the number of U.S. businesses that have joined coalitions and initiatives in support of federal legislation to improve energy efficiency and cut greenhouse gas emissions.

The estimate of 6,000 was put together by a group called American Businesses for Clean Energy, which culled membership lists from seven organizations including We Can Lead, which kicked off a major initiative this spring to lobby Congress for more green jobs.  John Deere, Target, Boeing, Gap, General Electric, and IBM are just a few of the economic powerhouses supporting federal action, and they’ve got plenty of company overseas, too.

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The Dow Jones reached today the incredible low, just under 10000, the Dow Jones average wasn’t this low since four months. The main cause of this ever so low value is the drop of euro.

Dow Jones opened in the morning with a high value of 135 points but dropped down about 69 points in the closing, this is the 8 drop since 10 days for Dow.

It appears that investors are frightened by the heavy debt loads in the Europeans segments, probably fearing that this debt loads will spread to other countries too in the region. This fear could explain the heavy sell-off which occurred today on Dow.

The situation was getting even worst at the end of the trading day, since China started to review its government holdings in the European region because of this financial crisis in the euro zone.

The loose of confidence in the euro shows the loose of confidence in the European countries to be able to deal properly with their debt problems.

Related posts:

1. Markets Drop and Dow Plummets 997 Points
2. U.S. Stock Futures Back Up After Trouble on Thursday
3. Euro Rises

If you’re into R/C vehicles, there’s just the slightest chance that you might be interested in a power train that runs three to four times longer than regular battery-only systems, and that requires nothing but sunlight and water to recharge. It also educates people on what will likely be the power system of choice for future real-size automobiles… and oh yes, it looks dead sexy, in a Doc-Brown’s-Delorean-flux-capacitor kinda way. Without any further ado, please open your wallets for H-Cell 2.0, the latest miniature hydrogen fuel cell hybrid drive train from Horizon Fuel Cell Technologies…
Continue Reading H-Cell 2.0: Hobby market hydrogen fuel cell gets an upgrade

Tags: Fuel Cell,
Hydrogen,
Hydrogen-powered,
Miniature,
radio control

Related Articles:

• Fuel cell kit for Hobby R/C Cars
• Home Energy Station to expand fuel cell applications
• The world’s best selling fuel cell product – FUN!
• World’s most cost-efficient hydrogen fuel cell car on sale today
• The educational Hydrocar – US$79 reversible Polymer Electrolyte Membrane (PEM) fuel cell toy car
• The world’s smallest hydrogen car hits the showroom floor

Review: 2010 Volkswagen GTI – It’s got its mojo workin’ again

Like anyone in their 30s, the new GTI is a bit larger and a lot heavier, but does it still have a swing in its step?

Report: Toyota FT-86 delayed until 2013, hybrid under consideration

The FT-86 was due to arrive next year, but Toyota is reportedly modifying the body and considering a hybrid powertrain to better compete with the Honda CR-Z.

Droolworthy: BMW releases M3 GTS specifications

BMW finally releases all the details on the M3 GTS, and if you can manage the $170k entry-fee then your track-day dreams are sure to come true.

Also of interest:

• Spy Shots: 2011 Mercedes-Benz CLS shows off even more skin
• Hulme CanAm now available for order – Hurry, just 20 available
• Rumormill: Beachcomber-based Mini Moke may get the greenlight [w/video]
• Video: What could be better than donuts on a beach?
• Report: Tokyo Motor Show downsizes again, moving back into city

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Daily U-Turn: What you missed on 5.26.10 originally appeared on Autoblog on Wed, 26 May 2010 19:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Artist Neil Richards has created a set of 10 posters, one for each Dharma station on and off (and really off) the Island. They’re an awkward dimension for your desktop, but work GREAT as a smartphone wallpaper. [Flickr via Bestbookmarks] More »










Lost – Wallpaper – Desktop Customization – Arts – Holidays

Family Guy’s taking on Precious – Sorta….

The envelope-pushing comedy is campaigning for a Primetime Emmy, in typical Family Guy fashion, series writers have selected a tongue-in-cheek image for their 2010 Emmy mailer. This year, Peter Griffin’s does his best Gabby Sidibe by parodying the promo poster from the 2009 Oscar-nominated flick, Precious.

Also included in the mailer are these taglines:

“Family Guy – written by 8 WASPS, 6 Jews, 2 Asian and 1 Gay.

Family Guy with Tina Fey… Not really, we just want an Emmy”

Should companies have privacy rights? With recent legal rulings suggesting that companies have similar legal rights to individuals, does that include privacy rights? A bunch of groups, including Public Citizen and the EFF, have filed an amicus brief in a case that looks into that question. The lawsuit is between the FCC and AT&T. It seems that the FCC had done an investigation where it determined that AT&T — the same company that has “helped out” the government by explaining how the feds could get around pesky oversight rules by using post-it notes — has been over-billing the government.

That seems like pretty interesting information, and some others thought so — which is why a Freedom of Information Act request was made to the FCC, and the FCC agreed to hand over the documents concerning the investigation. AT&T, in response, sued the FCC, saying that releasing this info would violate the company’s “personal privacy.” Huh? It’s hard to see how a company has “personal privacy.” You can understand not releasing confidential information that involves a trade secret, or other such information. But claiming that details of an investigation of how you may have bilked the government is “private” info seems a bit absurd. If that was the case, then any company could demand that any embarrassing information never be released.

Unfortunately, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with AT&T, suggesting that the exemption in the Freedom of Information Act for “personal privacy” does, in fact, apply to AT&T as well. The new brief urges the Supreme Court review the case:

Unless the Supreme Court takes the case and reverses the Third Circuit decision, records about safety violations at a coal mine, environmental problems at an offshore oil rig, filthy conditions at a food manufacturing plant, financial shenanigans at an investment bank and many other records like these may be the subject of so-called corporate privacy claims that could result in agencies withholding those records from the public under FOIA.

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Michael Ventrella came as the Biggest Loser contestant in history and left as the winner of the show. To weigh half his body and win $250,000 was not that easy. Despite Michael having 526 pounds as his starting weight, his willpower and competitive nature made him stay up to the finale and won after he lost a the highest percentage of bodyweight (50.19 percent) between his competitors Ashley Johnston and Daris George. He said “As an Italian family, we use our food and eating as a social way of staying close. And being able to go there and change my habits and changing my mother’s habits ripples into our family and friends because that’s our way of celebrating.”

The 31-year-old is now down to 262 pounds and states that the biggest lesson he learned was that in order to help other people, he needed to help himself. He said, “I was always putting other people before me, [but] I couldn’t really help anybody if I was sick or I was dead. I learned how to focus on me, what my body needed and what I needed to sustain life and live happily. Look what happened from me focusing on myself and setting an example. … I can’t articulate how amazing it feels to be able to get that return. On top of everything that I’ve done for myself, I’ve been able to help other people.”

Related posts:

1. Biggest Loser Season Finale Results
2. Who Won Biggest Loser 2010?
3. The Biggest Loser Make Over Week

The hot, sweltering Tennessee sun baked us under a big white-top tent this morning as Nissan dedicated the future site of their $1.7 billion dollar, state-of-the art Nissan LEAF battery plant in Smyrna. Encompassing 1.3 million square feet (22 American football fields), when the plant comes online in late 2012 it will be one of the largest battery facilities in North America.

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Today has emerged a very strong rumor from several British media which claim that Natal will cost $ 149. According to the online edition of the British magazine Edge, a reliable source (which appears to be the same as that uncovered the first details and release date of Gears Of War 3 before the official announcement) reveals that Microsoft announced during E3, price, release date and final name of Project Natal.

According to the source Natal will be included in the Xbox 360 Arcade model for $ 299/243 €, prices outside the United States shall be determined by a number of factors including the actual change of currency so that the peripheral acquisition would be around  € 121/ $ 149 (at current exchange rates). The global launch is estimated for October 26 but this could vary by two weeks and come with a big advertising campaign.

It was not immediately known whether these reports are true, and Microsoft has not commented on this, although the rumors about the final name of the new device has already begun.

Related posts:

1. Microsoft will Launch Project Natal on Xbox 360
2. Apple iPad Costs 25% More In ‘Rip-Off’ Britain
3. Microsoft reorganizes its Entertainment and Devices Division

There’s a lot of complex math equations that describe the interaction between fluids and masses of lipids wrapped in keratinocytes, melanocytes, Langerhans cells and Merkels cells in the presence of gravity. This video doesn’t solve any of them. [Gawker TV] More »










Fluid dynamics – Physics – Fluid Mechanics and Dynamics – Companies – University of Massachusetts Lowell

Yesterday an employee at a corporate Verizon gym found an unreleased Motorola Droid Shadow. The device’s owner eventually returned to pick it up, but a photo and specs were still emailed to us. Hours later the gym employee was fired. More »










Verizon Communications – Droid – Smartphone – Handhelds – Motorola Droid Shadow

With the recent release of a new review in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, it now seems pretty well established that organic foods aren’t any nutritionally better than regular, conventional foods. But one of the comebacks we often hear from skeptical consumers (mostly parents of small children) goes something like this: “Well, maybe that’s true, but going organic helps American farmers abandon the use of harmful pesticides.” Really? Let’s take a closer look and see if organic myths match up with reality.

First, can Certified Organic farmers use pesticides on their Certified Organic crops? Absolutely. Organic production doesn’t allow synthetic pesticides, but they can use “natural” pesticides. What’s a natural pesticide? Common examples include pyrethrins (an extract from the chrysanthemum flower), rotenone (found in roots and stems of several plants), and Bacillus thuringiensis (a nasty bacterium found in soil). Guatemalan farmers have even used fermented urine. So if you think that organic apple doesn't need to be washed, think again.

And are organic pesticides safer and better for us than synthetic pesticides? Not really: Pyrethrins have been linked to tumors in rats. Rotenone has as well (although evidence is somewhat limited),and it’s also been found to cause damage to cells and DNA.

It’s also worth noting that organic pesticides aren’t as efficient as their more modern counterparts. National Review writer John Miller noted back in 2004:

Organic food products also suffer from more than eight times as many recalls as conventional ones. Some of this problem would go away if organic farmers used synthetic sprays — but this, too, is off limits. Conventional wisdom says that we should avoid food that's been drenched in herbicides, pesticides, and fungicides. Half a century ago, there was some truth in this: Sprays were primitive and left behind chemical deposits that often survived all the way to the dinner table. Today's sprays, however, are largely biodegradable. They do their job in the field and quickly break down into harmless molecules.

What’s the end result of using less-efficient “natural”pesticides? There are still going to be pests, so organic farmers have to apply more of these chemicals. “[T]he typical organic farmer has to douse his crops with it as many as seven times to have the same effect as one or two applications of a synthetic compound based on the same ingredients,” wrote Miller.

Should we be worried about exposure to these or other organic pesticides? Or synthetic pesticides, for that matter? Let’s add a little context.

Dr. Bruce Ames, who invented a test bearing his name that screens for potential carcinogens, threw cold water on chemical/cancer scaremongering back in 2000. In a paper co-authored with the director of the Carcinogenic Potency Project at UC-Berkeley, Ames wrote that we take in plenty of chemicals that we don’t realize are even there:

About 99.9 percent of the chemicals humans ingest are natural. The amounts of synthetic pesticide residues in plant food are insignificant compared to the amount of natural pesticides produced by plants themselves. Of all dietary pesticides that humans eat, 99.99 percent are natural: they are chemicals produced by plants to defend themselves against fungi, insects, and other animal predators….

Americans eat about 1,500 mg of natural pesticides per person per day, which is about 10,000 times more than the 0.09 mg they consume of synthetic pesticide residues.

So repeat this three times: “It’s the dose that makes the poison.” Many of these pesticides (both synthetic and organic) are pumped into rats in abnormally large doses to determine their lethality and toxicity—in other words, at levels far, far higher than how consumers usually encounter them.

There’s certainly nothing wrong with buying organic. But since the supposed health benefits don’t measure up, it’s hard to say whether consumers should believe that a warm, fuzzy feeling is worth the extra cost in a $5 tomato.

Filed under: Hybrid, Technology, Hatchback, Chevrolet, Electric

Back in 2006 when the Chevrolet Volt was first conceived, its extended-range electric (ER-EV) powertrain was originally dubbed E-Flex as its configuration was designed to be flexible. The only part of the system that was constant was the electric drive and the presence of a battery. The architecture was designed so any type of powerplant could be used as a range extender, and over the last three years concepts have been shown with flex-fuel three-cylinder turbos, inline-four diesels and hydrogen fuel cells.

Ultimately, powertrain chief engineer Larry Nitz and his team opted for a normally aspirated 1.4-liter inline-four for the first generation Volt because it offered the best combination of cost and efficiency. However, while working on the first generation Volt, work on the second-gen. model has been happening in parallel. Way back in May 2007 we talked to then-VP for R&D Larry Burns about using an HCCI engine for the Volt since it could be optimized to operate at steady state speeds and he agreed that was certainly one possible direction.

Right now the top priority for the second-generation Volt is driving down the cost of the powertrain, including the battery. Although automakers are always reluctant to talk about parts pricing, GM’s project management VP, Jon Laukner, has hinted on more than one occasion that the Volt pack costs somewhere in the $600 per kilowatt-hour range or under $10,000 for the 16 kWh unit. The goal is to get that cost down below $400 per kWh in the next few years and a combination of increased volumes and LG Chem launching cell production in western Michigan will certainly help to achieve that.

Reducing the cost of the range extender will also play a part. GM’s VP of global vehicle engineering, Karl Stracke told Inside Line that smaller range extenders in the 15-18 kilowatt range are part of the strategy and either a two-cylinder piston engine or a single rotor Wankel are possibilities to replace the current inline-four. Volt communications manager Rob Peterson confirmed to Autoblog that a number of different variants are being evaluated, but he wouldn’t say if any particular direction has been selected yet.

Powertrain engineering consultant FEV has recently been showing off an ER-EV Fiat 500 with a Wankel range extender. While Wankels are not known for fuel efficiency (quite the opposite actually), a modern direct injected unit for this type of application could be highly optimized to provide acceptable performance and consumption. A Wankel also has the advantage of being both very compact for its output and vibration-free, making it well suited for this type of application. With the first generation Volt only expected to have about a three-year life-span, a final decision will likely be made very soon.

Photos Copyright (C)2009 Sam Abuelsamid / Weblogs, Inc.

[Source: Inside Line, General Motors]

Next-gen Volt could use diesel, two-cylinder or rotary range extender originally appeared on Autoblog on Wed, 26 May 2010 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The National Republican Senatorial Committee has released an advertisement on the Web regarding Attorney General Richard Blumenthal’s statements about the Vietnam War.

The ad includes clips from Chris Matthews of MSNBC, who has become one of Blumenthal’s biggest critics.

A spokeswoman for Blumenthal, Maura Downes, could not immediately be reached for comment on Wednesday night.

WNPR’s John Dankosky says that the smiling photograph of Blumenthal that is used in the ad actually came from WNPR, which does not endorse any candidates. He is asking for it to be taken down.

http://whereweblog.wordpress.com/2010/05/26/national-republican-senatorial-committee-swipes-wnpr-photo-for-attack-ad/