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By Scott M. Fulton, III, Betanews

Yesterday, the Chairman of the European multi-national group of ministers overseeing online privacy policy enforcement, Jacob Kohnstamm of the Article 29 Working Party (WP29), sent letters to the CEOs of Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo, urging them to alter their personal data retention policies in keeping with new EU standards. Kohnstamm wants their search engines to destroy personal data after six months’ retention rather than nine, as is Google’s current policy; and he simultaneously urged European Commission Vice President Viviane Reding for help getting that message across.

In less than a day, Kohnstamm got his wish: This morning in Brussels, Comm. Reding placed a public call on the United States to forge an agreement that would enable the EC to sue the search engine leaders in US courts for failure to follow EU guidelines for data protection.

“The EU and US are both committed to the protection of personal data and privacy. However, they still have different approaches in protecting data, leading to some controversy in the past when negotiating information exchange agreements (such as the Terrorist Finance Tracking Programme, so-called SWIFT agreement, or Passenger Name Records),” reads this morning’s statement from Brussels. “The purpose of the agreement proposed by the Commission today is to address and overcome these differences. Today’s proposal would give the Commission a mandate to negotiate a new data protection agreement for personal data transferred to and processed by enforcement authorities in the EU and the US. It would also commit the Commission to keeping the European Parliament fully informed at all stages of the negotiations.”

In a taped address this morning, Comm. Reding characterized the agreement not only as essential for protecting citizens’ rights, but also as a necessary tool for both the US and EU in the war on terrorism.

“We all want to have control over our personal information. This is why the EU has rules on the protection of personal data,” Reding said. “Our rights are clear and must be respected. Whenever your personal information is collected, whenever it is processed, and whenever it is used, these are the high standards we must live up to…We are facing common security challenges from international crime and terrorism. We have been confronted with devastating attacks in Europe and in the United States. We are working hard with the US to confront these challenges.”

Yesterday, the European Commission published the draft of a letter to the CEO of Google (PDF available here). It’s easy to determine it was a draft since Chairman Kohnstamm left blanks where he intended to look up and confirm the name “Eric Schmidt” (unless Schmidt actually did receive a letter where his own name was omitted in the salutation “Dear,”).

What Kohnstamm did not leave blank was his view of the pointlessness of Google’s so-called anonymization policy, which for Google is not actually a destruction of personally identifiable data but a partial erasure of it. The specific part being erased is the last octet of the IP address for the computer being tracked. Although in practice, IP addresses are not necessarily personally identifiable, EU policy treats IP addresses as personal since, in theory, they can be used in determining the identity of users. Kohnstamm told the unnamed Mr. Schmidt that it’s an academic matter for a database manager to align a partial IP address older than nine months with personal cookie data, which Google retains for 18 months.

“In its opinion, WP29 stressed the sensitivity of personal data related to search queries. I know that Google also shares this concern,” Kohnstamm wrote. “In response to the opinion, your company publicly announced you will ‘anonymize’ IP addresses in your server logs after 9 months. In practice, you have indicated that you will delete the last octet of the IP addresses held in the search query log files after a period of 9 months… deleting the last octet of the IP-addresses is insufficient to guarantee adequate anonymisation. Such a partial deletion does not prevent identifiability of data subjects. In addition to this, you state you retain cookies for a period of 18 months. This would allow for the correlation of individual search queries for a considerable length of time. It also appears to allow for easy retrieval of IP addresses, every time a user makes a new query within those 18 months. Therefore, WP29 cannot conclude your company complies with the European data protection directive.”

Kohnstamm wrote a similar letter to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, whose name was also left blank from the draft published by the EC. In it, he commends Microsoft for promising to anonymize Bing’s personal data after six months, as the EC requested. However, he doesn’t believe that promise is being kept, since it was apparently contingent upon Google’s and Yahoo’s willingness to follow suit. He also pointed out that last-octet deletion is pointless as an anonymization tool, a message he also sent to (unnamed) Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz. Yahoo has pledged to anonymize personal data after three months.

In a separate letter to US Federal Trade Commission Chairman Jon Leibowitz yesterday (insert name, please), Kohnstamm called upon the FTC to investigate whether the three search engines’ failure to comply with EC directives constitutes “unfair or deceptive acts or practices in the marketplace” under Section 5 of the FTC Act. If it did — or if there was a reasonable theory that it did — such a finding could be the legal basis for charging Yahoo, Microsoft, and Google with fraud in US courts.

And if the agreement were written as Comm. Reding would prefer, according to the statement from Brussels this morning, it wouldn’t have to be the European Commission initiating the action. A European citizen could sue these parties in US courts for fraud and deception, if he believed his privacy was violated: “There would be an individual right of administrative and judicial redress regardless of nationality or place of residence.”

The US State Dept. has yet to issue a statement on the matter. Sec. of State Hillary Clinton is currently in Seoul, South Korea, in meetings with its president and foreign minister over the alleged sinking of a South Korean naval vessel by North Korea.

Copyright Betanews, Inc. 2010
















Google – Microsoft – Yahoo – United States – European Commission

Asi es, hace dos días fué el Ford Ka y hoy le ha tocado al lujoso y mítico Lamborghini Murciélago. Por lo visto, tampoco los superdeportivos se libran de tener que pasar por el taller debido a algún defecto en su construcción aunque nos cueste creerlo ya que recordemos, este vehículo cuesta alrededor de 200.000€. 

Según afirma la NHTSA, se ha tomado la decisión de llamar a revisión este modelo, porque ha habido varias quejas de distintos clientes sobre la seguridad del Murciélago. Se ha llamado a a revisión a un total de 458 unidades, tanto Coupé como Cabrio.

El problema podría estar causado por unas soldaduras de un soporte que sujeta la bomba de combustible que, de no solucionarse, podrían producir fugas de gasolina que podrían terminar por incendiar el coche. Como siempre, tanto la revisión como la reparación en caso de ser necesario, serán totalmente gratuitas.

Related posts:

1. Vídeo del Lamborghini Murciélago LP 670-4 SV
2. El sucesor del Lamborghini Murciélago verá la luz en 2012
3. Lamborghini Murciélago LP 670-4 SuperVeloce Chinese Edition

If you happen to find yourself in The Old World this autumn, then you may want to attend one or both of these conferences…

1) TAM London 2010 will be October 16 – 17 in (duh) London. The speakers list is every bit as impressive as last year’s! The highlight, no doubt, will be the premier of Tim Minchin’s animated short film “Storm”, which is destined to become a skeptical classic — watch the trailer here.

Before you ask, I won’t be at TAM London this year; the point is to make it Eurocentric, so American speakers are kept to a minimum. But of course, TAM 8 will be in Las Vegas this year from July 8 – 11. I’ll very much be there!

2) The 14th annual European Skeptics Conference will be from September 17 – 19 in Budapest, Hungary. That’s run by the European Council of Skeptical Organisations. I’ve heard Budapest is lovely, and someday I hope to get there.

If you’ve never been to a critical thinking conference, then you really should attend. And if you want to go to TAM, you’d better be ready to buy tickets when they become available; last year they sold out in less than an hour. There was a reason for that: it was awesome.

A bit of advice to school teachers out there. If your husband likes schoolgirl-themed pornography, keep it away from the class’ video yearbook. Unfortunately, the internet was not able to administer this advice before one Florida teacher swapped a porn DVD for the yearbook and gave it to a second grader. The mother is understandably upset.

From WTSP:

Deputies filed a report, but didn’t press charges because – according to [the mother] – there’s just no proof the swap was intentional.

But [she] remains angry the school hasn’t disciplined the teacher yet, and is even more upset the teacher hasn’t called to apologize yet.

She says she’s also concerned about the schoolgirl-themed movies belonging to the teacher’s husband. [The mother] says he also never misses a school function.

Well, that’s creepy.

Pornography handed out to second-grader [WTSP via FARK]

Fring is only too excited to share the news today that they are the first company in the world to offer video calling over IP for Android phones. They believe this could change the way people call each other, shop, and kiss their loved ones goodnight. With the HTC EVO 4G and dell streak both featuring front-facing cameras we’re inclined to agree.

Fring is a free download in the Android Market for handsets running 1.5 or higher. Of course, you’ll need a phone capable of video calling if you want to use the new feature.

Might We Suggest…

• Skype Intends to “Set the Bar on Mobile Video Calling”
  

  As we gear up for the release of the HTC EVO 4G, software developers, and fans, are turning their focus to the front-facing camera and the possibilities that rest within.  Just this week we’ve see…

Content: Deniable Ops: Insurgency
Price: 800 Microsoft Points
Availability: All Xbox LIVE regions except those in Asia
Dash Text: The critically acclaimed multiplayer mode is back and takes aim at Xbox LIVE with 4 new Deniable Ops maps. There are no refunds for this item. For more information, see www.xbox.com/live/accounts.

Add the Deniable Ops: Insurgency to your Xbox 360 download queue

Note: You’ll need a full copy of Splinter Cell Conviction to access this content

Brian Lockhart of Hearst Newspapers catches up with Richard Blumenthal’s good friend, Chris Shays, who says he never told the New York Times that he heard Blumenthal specifically say he served in Vietnam.

Courant colleague Rick Green also weighs in on the Shays-Blumenthal brouhaha.

And speaking of interesting reading, check out Colin McEnroe on the wide gulf between what the D.C. chattering class is saying and what Connecticut voters think.

Oh hey! After weeks of halfbaked attempts and botched efforts, yesterday’s top kill procedure has stopped the flow of oil into the Gulf, according to the Coast Guard. Soon engineers will start cementing and then sealing the well. More »










Coast Guard – Gulf of Mexico – United States – BP – Business

BMW acaba de dar a conocer nueva información técnica sobre su nuevo superdeportivo, el BMW M3 GTS. Según nos informa la marca, en un principio sólo estará disponible con un motor V8 de 4.4 litros.

Por otra parte, detalles como el precio o la potencia del motor son desconocidos por el momento. Eso si, ya podeis acercaros a vuestro concesionario de BMW más cercano para reservar una unidad. A continuación os dejo con la información publicada:

• Peso (tara/DIN): 1.530/1.605 kg
• Resistencia aerodinámica (cd x A): 0,34 x 2,17
• Cilindrada: 4.361 cc, V8
• Potencia máxima (kW/CV): 331/450 a 8.300 rpm
• Par motor (Nm) 440 Nm a 3.750 rpm
• Frenos delanteros: seis pistones, discos ventilados y perforados de 378 x 32 mm
• Frenos traseros: cuatro pistones, discos ventilados y perforados de 380 x 28 mm
• Neumáticos delanteros y traseros: 255/35 ZR19 – 285/30 ZR19
• Aceleración 0–100 km/h: 4,4 segundos
• 0–1.000 m: 22,5 segundos
• Velocidad máxima: 305 km/h
• Consumo en ciudad: 18,4 L/ 100 km
• Consumo en carretera: 9,3 L/100 km
• Consumo en ciclo combinado: 12,7 L/100 km
• Emisiones de CO2: 295 g/km

Related posts:

1. Porsche 911 GT2 RS, nueva información disponible
2. Volkswagen Golf BlueMotion, nueva información
3. Mitsubishi ASX, nueva información disponible

Better Memory = More Money = Wad of Cash = Adoring Female

Advertising is pretty much Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon except instead of Kevin Bacon the end is getting laid.

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Plus dozens of other benefits DR. BRUNO FURST proves that any average person can achieve tremendous memory improvement.

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Seek Wealth In These Needed Inventions

IT IS gratifying to the Editor of this Department to note the rapidly increasing interest in inventions on the part of the readers of Modern Mechanix and Inventions. The mail recently received proves that many fellows have come to realize that the same effort that they put in on the construction of various gadgets “just for the fun of it” can be used to create some truly novel article. In short, they see where the inventive talent that they use every day can be turned into real money-making channels.

Great Demand for Little Inventions.

There is still a tremendous need for little inventions that can be made quickly and sold easily. Take the matter of the savings bank as an example. Who can make a simple bank that will sell for a half dollar and that will register the amount of money it contains? If a quarter is dropped in, the bank automatically adds that amount to the figure posted. The whole idea could be built upon the fact that each piece of change in the American currency is slightly different in diameter. Here would be a big seller and a big money-maker.

What automobile driver of any experience has not had the job of righting a car with a wheel missing after it had fallen off the jack? The question is “Why do cars fall off jacks?” and the inventor answers logically enough, “Because the base of the jack is not large enough.” However, if the bases of jacks were made larger, they would be too cumbersome and would not fit so conveniently in the tool kit. Why not, then, design some sort of jack with a collapsible base that would provide twice the area now used? The idea probably would be a winner.

Carpenters and other mechanics are constantly having the edges of their chisels nicked by permitting them to jangle with other tools in the kit. Why not some sort of a little pressed metal gadget that could be slipped over the edge of a tool when it was not in use to preserve the edge? These articles should be so simple that they could be sold for a nickel apiece.

Among the toys of older boys there should be such a thing as a tri-ice-cycle—new word for the dictionary and a new thrill for children. This article would look very much like an ordinary tricycle save that it would have runners in place of wheels and some sort of a device would have to be developed that would propel the vehicle as the youngster peddled. The propelling device would have to take the form perhaps of a belt with spikes in it to engage the ice and snow.

Those who have tried to bevel edges uniformly with a plane would appreciate a little attachment for such tools that would prevent a workman from taking too large a cut and that would not only bevel the edge at the proper angle but also remove only a predetermined amount of wood.

There is needed an attachment for a three-jawed lathe chuck to make the chuck accommodate square rod. The attachment should be cheap; say two or three dollars. The object of the invention would be to make the cost of a fou»r-jawed chuck unnecessary for the small workshop.

The man who can invent a method or a device that will prevent sole rubbers from slipping off the feet will find himself in possession of a fortune in no time. Hundreds of thousands of people would wear rubbers of this type if they could be sure that they would stay in place.

The erasers on the end of lead pencils do not last as long as the pencil itself on the average. One large fortune was made in placing the rubber on the end of the pencil and now another fortune awaits the man who can equip the lead pencil with a longer rubber with a method of feeding it as it wears away.

There is a need for a fountain pen that will register the amount of ink it contains without the pen being transparent.

Golf is Now Played Like Roulette

A SCRAMBLING of the ancient Scotch game of golf and the somewhat less Scotch game of roulette has resulted in the creation which beats all for novelty—golf played on a roulette wheel. In the center of a circular pit a gaming wheel, marked like the table variety, spins merrily, while the golfer attempts to knock a golf ball into the winning compartments.

Introduced recently in Los Angeles, the new game is winning increasing favor among West Coast golf fans seeking the thrills of both roulette and golf. The putting tee is located in a recess in the side of the pit, and the ball, shot from there, flutters around the wheel and finally settles into some compartment. Located out of doors to give full health benefits, the wheel is cleverly decorated with flashing lights and illuminated numbers for night playing.

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How I Broke the World’s Altitude Record

On June 4, 1930, Lieut. Soucek flew a Navy plane to a height of more than eight miles to establish a new altitude record. Here he tells his story of his thrilling ascent to the roof of the world.

by Lieut. Apollo Soucek U. S. N.

MORE than 8 miles above the earth’s surface, in a region of terrific cold, where life itself depends on “canned air,” airtight clothing and electrically heated goggles, I fought, on the afternoon of June 4, 1930, a successful battle of two hours and five minutes against nature to gain for the Navy and the United States a new world’s altitude record.

For purely sentimental reasons, my latest climb of 43,166 feet, which broke the world’s record for all kinds of planes, previously held by Willi Neuenhofen, of Germany, who flew 41,794 feet on May 25, 1929, was made on the exact anniversary of my flight of June 4, 1929, when I was fortunate enough to establish a new world’s record for seaplanes of 38,560 feet.

My seaplane record was made in a single sealer Wright Apache plane, the very same ship that I used in my new world’s record flight, except that in the former case it was equipped with pontoons instead of wheels. Moreover, I also used this plane on May* 8, 1929 when I established a world’s record for all types of planes by reaching an official altitude of 39,140 feet, the mark which Neuenhofen broke only 17 days later.

Certainly the afternoon of June 4 seemed almost ideal for my climb. True, the temperature near the ground was well over 90 degrees, and the air a few hundred feet off the ground appeared somewhat hazy, but these factors were not important enough, as I found later, to interfere with flying conditions at great altitudes.

Just a few words about the equipment I used and we’re off! I wore, as usual, a fur-lined leather suit, but nary a stitch of underclothes, the fur being next to my skin. Commander Frederick Ceres, flight surgeon at the Naval Air Station at Anacostia, D. C, figured this one out from the clothes of the Eskimos.

Of course, I also wore a heavy helmet, a pair of heavy, wool-lined boots, and a pair of electrically heated goggles especially devised by my brother, Zeus, recently resigned from the Navy. But probably the most interesting contraption of all was the so-called “artificial lung” which I developed, with the aid of some loyal coworkers, to aid me in getting the right amount of oxygen at high altitudes. By long experience I had learned that at 40,000 feet or higher the pressure of the air is much less than the pressure in the pilot’s lungs, with the result that when the oxygen from the ordinary type of oxygen feeding device flows into his mouth, his lung pressure tends to force it right out again. So not long ago I extended the breath outlet tube a couple of feet and then sewed the bottom onto my control stick. The point is to build up’ a pressure in this tube equal to the pressure in my lungs, so that the incoming oxygen, instead of being forced out of my mouth again, will enter my lungs properly.

However, this tube has to be opened quite often, so as to let the poison air out. Some weeks ago, while making a test altitude flight of around 35,000 feet, I forgot to release my grip on the tube with the result that almost immediately it became very difficult for me to breathe. In fact, the pressure on this tube became so pronounced that it actually blew the breath out of the corners of my mouth so that I could see it freeze!

Of course, I released the tube, but it did not open. The inner sides had frozen together where it pressed flat. However, I somehow managed to jiggle it around and break it loose until it worked.

Now, for the actual flight! The time was exactly 2:18 when everything was in readiness and I finally did take off, sweating under the tremendous burden of my heavy equipment. On this particular June afternoon the wind out of the west was not so very different from the speed of the plane, so that I simply pulled back the control stick and then went straight up in the air until I reached the “ceiling,” or maximum height of the plane.

Just a few words, however, about my immediate problems while so doing. All I had to do was to continually hold the throttle and supercharger levers open with one hand, and work the stick, oxygen valve, oxygen “lung” outlet and a couple of other gadgets with the other.

Meantime, of course, I had to use my feet on the rudder, too, and keep a watchful eye on the flight instruments. Easily the worst thing of all is to hold all the levers open at the proper ‘ times. However, they are equipped with a strong spring so that should I pass out from lack of oxygen, then the throttle would automatically close and the supercharger be cut off.

In such case the plane probably would go into a dive, but I would likely revive soon, and no harm would be done. However, if the motor happened to be left running wide open during the dive, then it would soon tear everything to pieces.

Holding these levers open is something like holding down for a long time on the clutch of an auto. For over an hour I had to push with my left arm without letting up, and my arm got mighty tired.

After nearly an hour of climbing straight up from the Anacostia Naval Air Station I leached, according to my altimeter, an indicated height of 41,500 feet, a point where the ship no longer seemed to be climbing a trifle. Instead it appeared to be hanging motionless on its roaring propeller while powerful superchargers shrieked as they sucked and pumped the thin air into a density sufficient to keep the straining engine working.

For about 20 minutes thereafter I kept the plane’s nose pointed straight up, and the engine wide open in an effort to gain a few more precious feet. During this time the needle fluctuated and at times swung past the 42,000 mark, but I couldn’t get it to stay there.

Maybe I could have achieved more altitude, but I realized, glancing at my gasoline gauge, that the effort would be futile, for I actually had barely two gallons of gas left in my tank when I finally did land around 4:30 o’clock.

Fortunately I did not suffer greatly from the effects of the extreme altitude and bitter cold (about 76 degrees F). However, at one time the oxygen tube through which I breathed filled with ice and I was forced to beat the tube against the fuselage and to shake the accumulation out in order to continue breathing.

As a wise man once said, “don’t believe everything that you breathe, you get a parking violation and a maggot on your sleeve.” I’m not sure exactly what that last part means, but in any case it’s a friendly reminder that much of what we hear comes in the form of rumors. By definition, a rumor might not be true. Thankfully, that’s the case with our lead item in last week’s News From The Wire. The BlackBerry Pearl 9100 appears to be safely and soundly headed to the U.S.

(more…)

Muitas vezes nós vemos alguns desafios entre supercarros que chega a ser interessante. Esse vídeo também é interessante, mas eu diria que é uma luta um tanto quanto desleal. Um site russo chamado Dragtimes costuma fazer comparações de carros velozes nas estradas da Rússia e publicam na internet.

No vídeo acima, podemos ver então a performance de um Nissan GT-R totalmente equipado, contra o carro de rua mais rápido do mundo, o Veyron. Acha que com um GT-R envenenado o Veyron sofre alguma ameaça?

Vejam o vídeo para conferir o que parece óbvio, mas dando créditos ao Nissan GT-R, ele é potente o bastante para acompanhar por um certo tempo o poderoso Veyron. Outra coisa interessante é que as estradas russas sáo perfeitas para esse tipo de corrida, sendo extensas e desertas.

Via | Top Speed

Let’s skip straight to the chorus of the deficit reduction song: our debt crisis is our entitlement crisis is our debt crisis. Catchy! But not easily solved. The real long term threat is Medicare spending. The ghost in that machine is rising medical costs, which will take some Herculean efforts to curb. So for now, let’s talk about the other entitlement: Social Security.

Social Security isn’t in terrible shape. It just needs a fix up. Yes, it’s running a deficit this year, but it should be in the black for most of the decade and we’ve got a $2 trillion fund to wind down before the program goes officially bankrupt. Economic Policy Institute economist Monique Morrissey talked to the House committee yesterday about its sustainability:

Because of population growth, rising life expectancy does not create a Malthusian dilemma. In fact, the ratio of beneficiaries to covered workers is projected to level off after the Baby Boomer retirement.
 
Similarly, Social Security outlays are projected to level off–not spiral upward like health care costs.
 
This isn’t to say that Social Security costs won’t increase, but this increase is manageable–on the order of 1.5% of GDP. And because Social Security is currently running a surplus, the 75-year shortfall is much smaller–around 0.7% of GDP according to the Social Security actuaries, and even less according to the Congressional Budget Office.

It’s worth pointing out that a shortfall around 0.7% of GDP is manageable, but far from a cinch. Morrissey says that raising the earnings cap to 90% of income (currently the Social Security payroll tax does not touch income above $107,000) and eliminating it altogether on the employer side would account for 70% of the shortfall.

That’s good money if you can get it, but it’s not easy to tell families making $251,000, “Yes, your Bush tax cuts are disappearing, and your dividend rates are going up, and yeah, you’ll see Medicare tax rates creeping higher under health care reform, oh, and also, we’re slapping a 6.2% tax to the last $100,000 of your income”? Social Security is sustainable, but it’s sustainable provided we make some changes that will be politically difficult in an environment of rising tax burdens.

It doesn’t take rocket science to solve the SS shortfall. You can raise the tax rate, raise the payroll ceiling, delay retirement, restructure benefit outlays, or means-test the pay outs. In short, you can increase the revenues, or cut the spending, or do a little of both. But the longer those trying to protect Social Security delay reform by claiming there’s nothing to see here, the harder it will be to solve the problem later.

Social Security – Congressional Budget Office – Health care – Baby Boomer – Payroll tax

A study from Taiwan published in April indicates that people who eat breakfast are more likely to be at a healthy weight. This reinforces most of the previous findings on the subject.

One theory as to why is that skipping breakfast leads to eating more calories later in the day, but that doesn’t seem to be the case as breakfast skippers have been shown in previous research to eat the same or less calories. It seems likely to me that skipping breakfast slows down your metabolism.

It also could be that skipping breakfast doesn’t cause the weight gain, but is merely associated with something else that causes it. To adjust for this possibility, the researchers controlled for age, gender, marital status, educational level, income, smoking status, alcohol consumption, and exercise, and so differences in these variables between breakfast skippers and eaters should not account for the differences in body weight.

Thanks, Tom!

Reference

Huang CJ, Hu HT, Fan YC, Liao YM, Tsai PS. Associations of breakfast skipping with obesity and health-related quality of life: evidence from a national survey in Taiwan. Int J Obes (Lond). 2010 Apr;34(4):720-5.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sm8kICCxp1I

Full two-way video calling on mobile phones used to be pondered as a technology of the future. Well… ladies and gents, that future is now! fring, the mobile over Internet communication service, launched the world’s first mobile video calls over Internet on Android devices.

fring is an application for Android, iPhone/iPod touch and Nokia (Symbian S60) that allows user to make free mobile and now video calls plus chat over the Internet using services like Skype, MSN Messenger, GoogleTalk, AIM, ICQ, Facebook &  Twitter.

fring Video Calling with HTC Evo 4G

With the much anticipated HTC EVO 4G debuting June 4th, using fring to take advantage of it’s front facing 1.3 megapixel camera plus kick stand adds convenience to seeing your video caller and yourself simultaneously.

Check out fring or scan QR Codes provided above as we are and will have a full Android App Review soon!

Looking to make brownies that can be stored in a hot warehouse, dropped out of an airplane, dragged through the mud, left out with bugs and vermin and still be eaten 3 years later? Then you should check out this 26-page PDF from the Pentagon.

The instructions are intense. For example, consider the description of which shortening to use:

Shortening shall be a refined, hydrogenated vegetable oil or combination of refined vegetable oils which are in common use by the baking industry. Coconut and palm kernel oils may be used only in the coating. The shortening shall have a stability of not less than 100 hours as determined by the Active Oxygen Method (AOM) in Method Cd 12-57 of the Commercial Fats and Oils chapter in the Official and Tentative Methods of the American Oil Chemists Society. The shortening may contain alpha monoglycerides and an antioxidant or combination of antioxidants, as permitted by the Federal Grain Inspection Service (FGIS), and the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act and regulations promulgated thereunder.

NPR had someone whip up a batch — and apparently they aren’t that good.

We asked Penny Karas, the founder of Hello Cupcake bakery in Washington, D.C., to whip up us a batch. And to be honest, they weren’t too good: dry, crumbly and dense. But they did taste as if they might last quite a while if boxed up and shipped to a war zone.

They also noted that the Pentagon recently updated the brownie specifications to cover things like poppy seed cake. The document is now 31 pages.

MILITARY SPECIFICATION COOKIES, OATMEAL; AND BROWNIES; COCOLATE COVERED (PDF)
A 26-Page Brownie Recipe? Only At The Pentagon [NPR]