Science

San Francisco, August 27: Online collaborative encyclopedia Wikipedia announced a tightening of its editing rules Wednesday aimed at preventing vandalism, as it becomes an increasingly important source of information.

The new guidelines will require that all edits to articles about living people be approved by authorised editors. The rules represent the most far-reaching changes ever undertaken by the user-written encyclopedia, which had previously allowed anyone to contribute articles or revise information on existing articles.

Washington, August 26: Jabra has planned for a new Bluetooth headset Jabra Halo Bluetooth portable headset.

The Jabra name is well known in the market and previously jabra has also came up with many Bluetooth headsets and they would not face any problem in launching this new device.

The Jabra Halo Bluetooth headset offers many features like it allows the users to make connection between the two Bluetooth enabled gadgets which includes MP3 player, TV, Laptop. This new headset provides the full satisfaction to the user in terms of sound quality, portability.

New Delhi, August 26: Nokia 6600 was a good status phone of its time but while keeping this in mind Nokia has planned for its new version Nokia 6600i with the latest features and applications.

This Nokia 6600i slide is a 3G cellphone which is packed to provide the best performance to the users.

Nokia 6600i slide phone measures 93.0 x 45.0 x 14.2 mm and Weight about 110 g in size along with a 2.2 inch screen offering a resolution of 320 x 240 pixels (QVGA).

Hyderabad, August 26: In a move to bridge the digital divide the government was working to develop laptops costing as low as $ 10, Union Minister of State for Human Resource Development D Purandeswari said here today.

“To ensure that students have access to computers, the government is studying the feasibility of developing laptops which would cost not more than 10 dollars.

Washington, August 26: The United States ranks 28th in the world in average Internet connection speed and is not making significant progress in building a faster network, according to a report.

The report by the Communications Workers of America (CWA) said the average download speed in South Korea is 20.4megabits per second (mbps) — four times faster than the US average of 5.1 mbps.

Japan trails South Korea with an average of 15.8 mbps followed by Sweden at 12.8 mbps and the Netherlands at 11.0 mbps, the report released yesterday said.

Tokyo, August 26: The Japanese government plans to request Google to alert the residents about when and where it will take a close-up and 360-degree colour footage of the street’s under its ‘Street View service’ as to make sure people’s privacy is not intruded, officials said.

The Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry on Tuesday made this decision after an advisory panel asked it to demand from California-based Internet firm ‘Mountain View’ to inform both municipal governments and residents beforehand of the time and place when it plans to shoot street film.

Goheung, August 26: South Korea’s first rocket blasted off into space Tuesday following an aborted attempt last week and just months after its rival North Korea drew international ire for its own launch.

A problem quickly surfaced, however, when space officials said that an initial investigation showed that the satellite the rocket was carrying apparently failed to enter its intended orbit.

New Delhi, August 26: Noting that India’s space programme faces several challenges, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today said the Space Vision 2025 should reflect how the country could more effectively harness space technology for development.

Exploring new frontiers of space technology aimed at low-cost access to space, development of heavy lift boosters to launch heavier satellites, realising high power and high bandwidth communication satellites and remote sensing satellites with all- weather capacity are some of the challenges, he said.

Cape Canaveral, August 26: NASA delayed a Wednesday morning liftoff of the space shuttle Discovery because of an apparent problem with a valve in its fuel tank.

It was the second consecutive delay, after stormy weather postponed a launch attempt early on Tuesday. Discovery and its seven-member crew were preparing for a 13-day supply mission to the International Space Station.

The valve problem surfaced as technicians began fueling up the shuttle for a launch set for 1:10 a.m. EDT (0510 GMT) from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Cape Canaveral, August 26: A ruptured hydrogen valve found while fuelling the shuttle Discovery led NASA to postpone a launch planned for Wednesday – the second to be scrapped in 24 hours.

An agency spokesman said that fixing the broken valve, discovered while filling the shuttle’s external fuel tank, would push back the launch at least 48 hours.

“At this point we don’t know when the next attempt will be,” said NASA spokesman Allard Beutel.

Officials said a press conference to discuss the US space agency’s revised launch plans was likely later on Wednesday.

Washington, August 26: When asked to sum up the consistently seductive powers of the company that brought the world the iPod and the iPhone, a glassy-eyed devotee once said: “I’ll buy almost anything if it’s shiny and made by Apple.”

The unshakeable disciple of Apple Inc was in reality an actor appearing in a spoof video by the American satirical newspaper, The Onion, about an exciting new Mac computer which allowed users to bypass the traditional need for a raised keyboard to input information.

Florida, August 26: NASA called off the launch of space shuttle Discovery on Tuesday, the second day in a row the liftoff was scrubbed, this time because of a bad fuel valve.

Launch officials halted the countdown midway through the fueling process. The seven astronauts had not yet boarded the shuttle for the scheduled early Wednesday morning flight to the international space station.

London, August 26: You don’t have to be some high-paid auteur or even create a wildly popular character like “Fred” to cash in on YouTube.

Google announced Tuesday that its video site is opening the YouTube Partnership Program to the masses–provided they’re packing a hot video.
YouTube said in a note posted to Google’s blog that it will enable users who start accumulating lots of hits to generate revenue from their clips–provided they meet YouTube’s terms.

New Delhi, Auugst 26: One of the LG handset cut off the sale of one million within five month. The handset is an Arena series handset which is also recognized as LG KM900.

The LG KM900 was launched in Feb at the mobile world congress and striked the Indian market in the month of June.

Washington, August 25: Researchers have a new clue to the collapse of honey bee colonies across the US – damage to the bees’ internal “factories” that produce proteins.

Theories about the cause of bee colony collapse have included viruses, mites, pesticides and fungi.

The new study of sick bees disclosed fragments of ribosomal RNA in their gut, an indication of damage to the ribosomes, which make proteins necessary for life, according to a study in Tuesday’s issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

RNA, which is made from DNA, is central to protein production.

London, August 25: It may be a symbol of Middle Eastern culture and a trendy pastime for British youths, but the shisha water pipe that burns sweet scented tobacco is just as bad for your health as smoking cigarettes.

Research from Britain’s Department of Health and the Tobacco Control Collaborating Centre showed that people who regularly smoke shisha can suffer from dangerous levels of carbon monoxide – similar to sucking on a car exhaust or entering a room with a faulty boiler.

New Delhi, August 25: The modern society is surrounded by the magic of music lovers. Each next person seems to be very fond of music while seeing this Creative Gigaworks has tried to capture the music market with their new music gadgets.

Creative has planned his new gadget Creative Gigawork T3 which is a 2.1 music speaker especially designed for computers.

The creative has packed this device with Subwoofer, Volume manager, and a set of speakers.
When we talk about the size then the two speaker measures 5.9X3.0X3.7 inches, Subwoofer measures 8.4X9.3X11.3 inches.

New Delhi, August 25: World’s largest companies are 39 years behind in achieving the levels of green house gas reductions as recommended by Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC), according to a new study released on Monday.

The analysis showed that going by present rates of reduction targets in their emissions, the companies would reach the IPCC recommended levels of greenhouse gas cuts only by 2089, which is 39 years too late to avoid dangerous climate change on the planet, researchers said.

New Delhi, August 25: Almost a month after clearing the Solar Mission, the Prime Minister’s Council on Climate Change today gave nod to National Mission on Enhanced Energy Efficiency enabling about Rs 75,000 crore worth of energy transactions that are likely to cut down annual energy consumption.

“In doing so, it (the mission) will, by 2015, help (the country) save about five per cent of our annual energy consumption and nearly 100 million tonnes of carbon dio-oxide every year,” Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said while approving the mission.

Jungfraujoch, August 25: Agatha Christie fans may remember Hercule Poirot solving a murder at the highest station of a Swiss funicular railway as heavy snowfall isolated it from the rest of the world. Atop a funicular here, similarly isolated scientists are probing another mystery — why the earth’s climate is changing and they would welcome collaboration with India.

Cape Canaveral, August 25: NASA fuelled space shuttle Discovery for an early morning flight to the International Space Station on Tuesday as a TV comedian whose treadmill is on board gave a “go” for launch and urged, “Let’s light this candle!”

Thunderstorms remained over the launch site late Monday, however, and forecasters lowered the odds of acceptable conditions to a grim 40 percent.

Rome, August 25: Exactly 400 years ago today, on 25 August 1609, the Italian astronomer and philosopher Galilei Galileo showed Venetian merchants his new creation, a telescope – the instrument that was to bring him both scientific immortality and, more immediately, a whole lot of trouble.

Moscow, August 25: Russia has launched 20 carrier rockets since the beginning of the year, which beats last year’s average monthly rate, an analysis of which will be discussed at a meeting today to be chaired by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

The meeting will discuss restructuring of the rocket and space industry and focus on creation of an effective mechanism for improving the state of the industry, the government press service has said.

Cape Canaveral, August 25: The launch of the space shuttle
Discovery was delayed for one day Tuesday due to bad weather conditions in the area of the launch site at Cape Canaveral, NASA said.

Discovery had been scheduled to blast off at 1.36 a.m. (0536 GMT) from Kennedy Space Center in Florida to transport new equipment and experiments to the International Space Station.

The safety risk for Discovery’s seven astronauts and the shuttle was too high, NASA said.

The space shuttle is now scheduled to lift off Wednesday at 0510 GMT.

–IANS

Washington, August 25: Belkin has bought its rather weirdly named Google Skype phone to India, promising amazingly cheap ISD call rates.

The VoIP phone needs a WiFi connection to work and uses Skype to enable free calls to any Skype phone globally. If you have an existing Wi-Fi set up, this should easily amalgamate into your network. If not, you’d need need to buy one for around Rs 1500. The most amazing thing about the Skype phone is the ultra low call rates it offers for any ISD mobile number. How does Rs. 1 per minute sound?