Free Kareem
ALERT!! A serious injustice was committed. Please take action now! Kareem Amer, an Egyptian blogger who was imprisoned for exercising his right to freedom of speech, is still in prison and needs YOUR help!
Find out more information by visiting FreeKareem.org or by networking with us.
Latest News from freekareem.org- Free Kareem campaign in Berlin, Germany – PICTURES February 27th, 2010
- Video: Free Kareem rally in Washington, DC
- Kareem forbidden visits by his lawyer
- Meklit Hadero sings a song for Kareem
- Kareem’s final appeal rejected
Kareem has been in prison for: 1226 days.
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Amazing But True
The word “queue” is the only word in the English language that is still pronounced the same way when the last four letters are removed.
Beetles taste like apples, wasps like pine nuts, and worms like fried bacon.
Of all the words in the English language, the word ’set’ has the most definitions.
What is called a “French kiss” in the English speaking world is known as an “English kiss” in France. Read more
Canada’s Gravity Hole
Massive Ice Sheet Partial Cause of Missing Canadian Gravity
A mysterious dip in gravity over northern Canada has long been a weighty topic for some scientists.
Satellite data indicates that that a massive ice sheet that once covered eastern North America is at least the partial cause of this gravitational anomaly.
Scientists have known that the area around Hudson Bay has lower gravity than the surrounding areas.
Two theories have emerged to explain the strange phenomenon, but conclusive evidence has been elusive. Read more
Kentucky Derby
Kentucky Derby
| Grade 1 Race | ||
|---|---|---|
| Kentucky Derby | ||
 “The Most Exciting Two Minutes in Sports” |
||
| Location | Churchill Downs Louisville, Kentucky, USA |
|
| Inaugurated: | 1875 | |
| Race type | Thoroughbred | |
| Website: | 2007 Kentucky Derby | |
| Race information | ||
| Distance | 1¼ miles | |
| Track | Dirt, Left-handed | |
| Qualification | 3-year-old | |
| Weight | Colt/Gelding: 126 lbs (57.2 kg) Filly: 121 lbs. (54.9 kg) |
|
| Purse | US$2 million | |
| Bonuses: | US$ 200 | |
The Kentucky Derby is a Grade I stakes race for three-year-old thoroughbred horses, staged annually in Louisville, Kentucky, on the first Saturday in May, capping the two-week-long Kentucky Derby Festival. The race is over one and a quarter miles (2 km) at Churchill Downs. Colts and geldings carry 126 pounds (57.2 kg) and fillies 121 pounds (54.9 kg).[1] The race is known in the United States as “The Most Exciting Two Minutes in Sports” for its approximate duration, and is also called “The Run for the Roses” for the blanket of roses draped over the winner. It is the first leg of the Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing in the US and typically draws around 155,000 fans. It is the single oldest annually held sporting event in the entire South. Read more
Muhammad
Muhammad
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
“Muhammad” in a new genre of Islamic calligraphy started in the 17th century by Hafiz Osman.[1]
Liviu Librescu
Liviu Librescu
Liviu Librescu (August 18, 1930 – April 16, 2007; Hebrew: ליביו ליברסקו) was a Romanian born and educated Israeli-American scientist and academic whose major research fields were aeroelasticity and aerodynamics. His most recent position was Professor of Engineering Science and Mechanics at Virginia Tech.[3] The 76-year-old Holocaust survivor was shot and killed in the Virginia Tech massacre while holding off the gunman at the entrance to his classroom so his students could escape through the windows.[4]
Read more
Joost
(pronounced ‘juiced’) is a system for distributing TV shows and other forms of video over the Web using peer-to-peer TV technology, created by Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis (founders of Skype and Kazaa).
Joost began development in 2006. Working under the code name “The Venice Project,” Zennström and Friis have assembled teams of some 150 software developers in about a half-dozen cities around the world, including New York, London, Leiden and Toulouse. Joost’s CTO is Dirk-Willem van Gulik.[1]
The teams are currently in negotiations with FOX networks. It has signed up with Warner Music, Indianapolis Motor Speedway Productions (Indianapolis 500, IndyCar Series) and production company Endemol for the beta.[2] In February 2007, Viacom entered into a deal with the company to distribute content from its media properties, including MTV Networks, BET and film studio Paramount Pictures.
Company representatives have gone on record as saying the name should be pronounced as “juiced”, unlike the Dutch first name Joost, which is pronounced ‘Yohst.’
Technology
P2PTV overlay network serving three video streams.
P2PTV overlay network serving three video streams.
The program is based on P2PTV technology and is expected to deliver (relaying) near-TV resolution images. It turns a PC into an instant on-demand TV without any need for additional set top box. News updates, discussion forums, show ratings, and multi-user chat sessions (often linked to the active stream/channel) are made possible through the use of semi-transparent widget overlays.
The current version of the software is based on XULRunner and the audio management re-uses the ZAP Media Kit. The peer to peer layer comes from the Joltid company, which also provided the peer to peer layer of Skype. The video playback utilizes the CoreCodec, CoreAVC H.264 video decoder.
[edit] Financing
[edit] Joost development
As co-owners of Skype, Friis and Zennström received part of a $2.6 billion cash payment when eBay acquired Skype in 2005, which easily covered the development and marketing cost of their Joost venture. Just a week after launching the service, the founders announces that they have raised additional $45 million. Sequoia Capital, which backed Yahoo, Google and YouTube; Index Ventures, an early investor in Skype; Li Ka-shing, the Hong Kong tycoon; and CBS, the US media group, have all taken “small minority†stakes in the start-up. Viacom is also understood to be among the partners, although the nature of its backing has not been disclosed.
[edit] Content distribution
As opposed to streaming technology in which all clients get the feed from the server, P2P TV technology differs in the sense that the servers serve only a handful of clients; each of the clients in turn propagate the stream to more downstream clients and so on. This moves the distribution costs from the channel owner to the user.
The Joost service will be ad-supported, with advertising analogous to that shown on traditional TV, according to CEO Fredrik de Wahl.[4]
[edit] Availability
Currently, the software is in an open beta stage; an invite is required to become a user. However, a new stage of the beta was announced on May 1st, and all users were given unlimited invitations.[5] Linux is not yet supported.
[edit] Programming Content
Viacom Inc. and Joost entered into a content provider agreement for the Joost platform on February 20, 2007. Under the agreement divisions of Viacom (including MTV Networks, BET Networks and Paramount Pictures) will license their “television and theatrical programing” to Joost.[6] This came shortly after Viacom requested 100,000 potentially infringing videos to be removed from YouTube.com, which showed a preference by Viacom for the Joost platform over YouTube.[7]
Joost also currently has licensing agreements in place with Ministry of Sound TV, Warner Music, the production company Endemol[8], Diversion Media[9], CBS[10] and CenterStaging’s rehearsals.com[11]. On May 1, 2007, Joost signed a deal to distribute NHL content, including full game replays of the Stanley Cup Finals, and vintage games.[12]
[edit] Channels
The Joost applications includes three special channels What’s Popular, Search, and Joost Suggests which offers services, like searching the channel list or gathering statistics about channels, that can be used to find a channel that can be viewed. Apart from that, it also lists a number of channels serving various genres of content.[13]
[edit] History
[edit] Timeline
* 2006, October: The Venice Project announced.
* 2006, December: Invitation-only beta testing began.
* 2007, January 16: Officially announce real name, “Joost”[14]
* 2007, February 17: Macintosh beta testing began
* 2007, February 20: Viacom announces that it will be a “key partner” in television programming for Joost.
* 2007, March 7: CHUM Television announces its partnership with Joost to provide content, the majority of which to come from MuchMusic.
* 2007, April 5: Joost opens the newest beta version 0.9.1 to many new users, however bugs prevail and problems with playback now exist.
* 2007, April 10: Joost releases beta 0.9.2 to remove a hard-coded security certificate. Previous versions no longer run.
* 2007, April 24: Joost releases beta 0.9.4
* 2007, May 1: Joost releases beta 0.10.1 , granting existing beta users the ability to invite up to 999 peers to try Joost.
* 2007, May 9: Joost releases beta 0.10.2
[edit] See also
* Internet television
* Democracy Player
* TVUPlayer
* Babelgum
* Zattoo
Amazon Kindle
Click for More Information, Specs, and Deals
Amazon Kindle is an ebook reader which uses an electronic paper display, reading Amazon’s proprietary Kindle format (AZW format), and connects by downloading content over Amazon Whispernet, which uses the Sprint EVDO network. The Kindle does not need access to a computer. Whispernet is accessible through Kindle free of charge. The day that the Kindle was released, the Kindle Store had over 88,000 digital titles available for download. The initial sale of the Kindle sold out in 5.5 hours.
Technical specifications
The Kindle features a 6″ diagonal, 4-level grayscale electrophoretic display (E Ink material) with a resolution of 600×800 pixels (167 ppi), although the largest graphic image that can be displayed without being resized is 450×550 pixels. It measures 5.3 inches × 7.5 inches × 0.7 inches (134.5 mm × 190 mm × 19 mm) and weighs 10.3 oz (295 g). The Kindle’s internal storage capacity is 256 MB, shipping with 180 MB free. A SD memory card expansion slot is present, officially supporting up to 4GB which implies support for SDHC. It has 64 MB of RAM. The battery lasts roughly two days with wireless on, and one week with wireless off. The battery charges in about two hours. A USB 2.0 port (mini-B connector) is available for connecting to a computer (where it acts as a USB flash drive). The Kindle features a headphone jack and one-year warranty. The device runs on a modified version of Linux based on the 2.6.10 kernel.
Content
The internal memory of the Amazon Kindle can hold approximately 200 non-illustrated titles. Users can download content from Amazon in the proprietary Kindle format (AZW), or load unprotected Mobipocket (PRC, MOBI) or plain text content. Amazon offers an email-based service that will convert HTML, DOC (Microsoft Word), JPEG, GIF, PNG, and BMP documents to AZW. It also supports audio in the form of MP3s and Audible 2, 3, and 4 audiobooks, which must be transferred to the Kindle over USB or on an SD card.
Users can download content through the Kindle Store. The Kindle Store is accessed through Whispernet, over Sprint’s EVDO network, which Amazon provides free of charge. New releases and New York Times bestsellers are offered for approximately $10. Classics like Bleak House sell for around $1.99, with free samples available of the first chapter of each book. Subscriptions to newspapers cost between $5.99 and $14.99 per month, magazines between $1.25 and $3.49 per month, and blogs for $0.99-$1.99 per month. Users can send documents to a conversion service which will send a Kindle-formatted file to the device directly for $0.10 or to a personal e-mail account for free. Users can transfer converted documents from a computer to the Kindle via a USB cable or an SD card for free. Access to Wikipedia is offered at no additional charge.
Digital Text Platform
Concurrently with the Kindle device, Amazon launched the Digital Text Platform, a system for authors to self-publish directly to the Kindle. Currently in open beta, the platform was promoted to established authors by e-mail. Authors can upload documents in several formats for delivery via Whispernet and charge between US$0.99 and $200 per download. The authors receive 35% of revenues based on their list price, regardless of discounts by Amazon.
Diet enacts law to reduce air pollution in big cities
TOKYO — The Diet enacted a revised law Friday aimed at reducing motor vehicle emissions by tightening regulations on the construction of department stores, offices and other facilities in Tokyo, Nagoya and Osaka. The revised law on vehicle-emitted nitrogen oxides and particle matters is designed to regulate those facilities, which may generate heavy vehicle traffic.
The revised law empowers prefectural governors to formulate and implement antipollution measures such as building flyover roadways at intersections or other designated areas polluted heavily with nitrogen oxides and particles from vehicle emissions that cause asthma. It requires reporting to governors projections of gas emissions and plans for reducing emissions before building facilities such as hotels and theaters that may draw vehicles.
In addition, trucking and transport companies in areas surrounding the designated ones are required to work out measures to cut vehicle emissions such as reducing the number of their entries into such areas.
Bullying Stories
“So, what is Bullying Long Term Effects and Bullying Stories Blog about. It’s actually been 28 years in the making for me. I am currently working on a documentary film about the long term effects of bullying. With this blog, I am hoping to collect your stories and start to share in what I believe to be the long term effects that being bullied or being a bully has on us as adults. This isn’t the kids perspective, but an adult perspective on how those informative years affect how we are as adults today: our fears, our attitude, and our memories of childhood.
Lauren Nelson helps nab child preditors and pedophiles
Lauren Nelson is a beauty queen from Lawton, Oklahoma who holds the Miss America 2007 title. Nelson is the second consecutive Miss America and sixth in the history of Miss America to hail from this state.
Nelson was Miss Teen Oklahoma 2004, and in this role, she performed at the 2005 Miss America Pageant.[2] En route to Miss America, she won the Miss Oklahoma State Fair local title and then competed in the Miss Oklahoma pageant for the first time on June 11, 2006, and was crowned Miss Oklahoma 2006, for which she received a $16,000 scholarship. At age nineteen, she was the youngest contestant to become Miss Oklahoma.
Nelson went on to represent Oklahoma in the Miss America 2007 pageant broadcast on CMT from the Aladdin Resort and Casino on January 29, 2007. She won a preliminary swimsuit award on Thursday night, becoming her state’s first Swimsuit preliminary award since 1955. At the conclusion of the live telecast, Nelson was crowned the 82nd Miss America. She succeeds Jennifer Berry, of Jenks, Oklahoma, in the first occurrence of consecutive winners from the same state since 1959-1960.
A graduate of MacArthur High School, Nelson is a student at the University of Central Oklahoma. She is also a member of Sigma Sigma Sigma sorority. She is a member of Centenary United Methodist Church in Lawton, Oklahoma. Her goal is to become a Broadway performer. Her Miss America talent was a vocal performance, and her platform issue is “Be NetSmart – Protecting Kids Online”. She receives a $50,000 scholarship award along with the title.
In a recent article she expressed support for Democratic Presidential Candidate Barack Obama.[3]
Nelson recently teamed up with host John Walsh on the FOX television show America’s Most Wanted to assist in the apprehension of potential child predators. Initial reports as of May 1, 2007, stated that she did not plan to return to testify against those predators that were apprehended, putting the prosecution’s case in jeopardy. [4] However, she appeared to change her mind later that day, and it is reported that she will testify against the perpetrators.
Source: Wikipedia
