March 4th, 2009
Analyst Opinion – On the surface, the cooperation between Intel and TSMC seems like a routine cooperative partnership announcement. Yet with this one action, if managed effectively, Intel has almost assured Atom’s success as a major player in the growing world of consumer electronics.
Intel and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), one of the world’s largest chip foundries, just announced a marketing collaboration involving Intel’s Atom processor. Atom is Intel’s effort to downsize its processor chips to fit into the realm of emerging smart devices below the Personal Computer space. TSMC will work closely with Intel to port some of the Atom processors to its own process and design flows. TSMC will also have the ability to do engineering on the chip to build customized versions for the large number of existing TSMC customers. However, Intel will have ownership of the final device and the customer, as Intel will be selling the custom designed chips that TSMC designs and builds in its foundry.
As PC sales wane, and their chip revenues along with them, Intel looks to additional sources for revenues. Consumer products represent a massive potential market, though at clearly lower margins and price points. But, Intel’s cost of operations makes it a supplier at too high a price to go after the cut-throat and highly price sensitive consumer market. And Intel is not set up for customized, System On Chip (SOC) solutions the market demands. Enter a partner that can bring all of this capability to Intel – TSMC.
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March 4th, 2009
The brain may play a key role in some 40 percent of women who experience sexual dysfunction with lack of sexual interest, researchers said.
Such women, ages 18-59, experience sexual dysfunction with lack of sexual interest called hypoactive sexual desire disorder, known as HSDD.
Bruce Arnow and Dr. Leah Millheiser of Stanford Hospital & Clinics said the trial involved 16 women diagnosed with HSDD, along with 20 normal control subjects, who took part in the study involving brain scans. All subjects identified themselves as heterosexual.
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March 4th, 2009
Fredrik Neij, one of the PirateBay admins currently on trial in Stockholm, admitted that he was hupping his servers from the courtroom while the lawyers were making closing arguments:
- A server was down and I restarted it, Neij tells expressen.se. He is one of the four founders of The Pirate Bay that stand accused of “complicity to making copyrighted material accessible” (yes, that’s the charge). That didn’t stop him from taking care of a server mishap in the middle of the trial’s closing argument.
Thepiratebay.org was down during the best part of Monday, which had a good deal of file-sharing folks worried that the website might be down for good this time. Thankfully for them, he had his trusty laptop at hand and could restart the server remotely, so that eager fileswappers could get back inside.
-We have Internet access [in the court room] so it was no problem, Neij told Expressen today (Tuesday);
-Besides, I’m keeping up with the coverage of the trial.
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March 4th, 2009
In a move that will subject a number of government projects to enhanced environmental and scientific scrutiny, President Obama is restoring a requirement that U.S. agencies consult with independent federal experts to determine whether their actions might harm threatened and endangered species.
The presidential memorandum issued yesterday, which marks yet another reversal of former president George W. Bush’s environmental legacy, will revive a decades-old practice under the Endangered Species Act that calls for agencies to consult with either the Fish and Wildlife Service or the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on whether their projects could affect imperiled species. On Dec. 16, the Bush administration allowed agencies to waive such reviews if they decided, on their own, that the actions would not harm vulnerable plants and animals.
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March 2nd, 2009
At the fire station the city of Yokohama in Japan will soon be adopted by the work of robotic crawler transporter, which will safely remove people from the earthquake zone. In the event of an earthquake, emergency services workers will be able to immerse the victim in this transporter, and it automatically transfer him from disaster areas thereby helping to facilitate the operation. This conveyor is equipped with a 4 crawler belts and can easily move around rocks and other obstacles. Built engine has enough power to move 110-kilo man. In addition, the robotic system continuously measures the vital indicators of man. The carrier is equipped with infrared cameras, which allows you to manage them remotely at night or in bad weather conditions.
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March 2nd, 2009
A Holland American cruise ship was on its way back to the Mexican Riviera Sunday after docking in San Diego to drop off scores of sick passengers and disinfect the ship.
The cruise ship that sailed out of San Diego was on high alert after 106 passengers came down with the norovirus. More than 1,800 guests were on board the Oosterdam for a seven day cruise to Mexico.
“Guests who demonstrated symptoms were asked to remain in their cabins until symptoms disappeared,” Holland American Spokesperson Erik Elvejord said.
The Holland America Oosterdam ship departed San Diego a week ago for a cruise to Baja California and returned to San Diego Saturday morning.
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March 2nd, 2009
The Lamborghini Countach is fast, but everyone knows Bulls can’t swim, so is it fast enough to walk on water, Jesus-style?
We think not, which is why we wonder what the heck this thing is doing almost fully submerged. Anyone have any ideas? We did some searching online and couldn’t find anything.
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March 1st, 2009
Author Michael Books has investigated some of the most puzzling anomalies of modern science, those intractrable problems that refuse to conform to the theories. Here he counts down the 13 strangest.
1. MOST OF THE UNIVERSE IS MISSING
We can only account for 4 per cent of the cosmos
If you’re wondering what the LHC might do for you, how’s this: it might just find a whole quarter of the universe. The collider is hoping to create some particles of what physicists call “dark matter”, an enigma that is thought to make up roughly 25 per cent of the universe. Then there is the “dark energy”, a mysterious force that seems to be ripping space and time apart. In total, a whopping 96 per cent of the universe has gone AWOL. Unless, that is, we’ve got our maths all wrong. Watch this space.
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March 1st, 2009
Nina Meyer, a young, strong-willed exotic dancer at the Klassy Dolls Gentleman’s Club, informed patrons Monday that she only plans to perform nude for as long as it takes to get through the remainder of her existence on earth.
“Look, I’m not gonna be a stripper forever,” Meyer said while administering one more in an endless series of lapdances. “You better believe I’ll be out of here the minute I either die or become so old that no man will pay to see me naked.”
“I’ve got dreams a lot bigger than this dump,” Meyer continued. “I’m only doing this because there’s no way I’ll ever come close to achieving those dreams.”
Meyer, 24, accepted her current position three months ago to “pick up a little extra cash” for food, clothing, and shelter. She told reporters that stripping allows her the freedom to barely chip away at her enormous debt while still being able to save absolutely nothing for the future.
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March 1st, 2009
It’s been a rough week for the RIAA as massive layoffs are about to cost many employees their job. On top of that, the anti-piracy outfit is being sued for abusing the legal system for its war on piracy, civil conspiracy, deceptive trade practices, trespassing and computer fraud.
riaaCovering the progress in the various RIAA cases has never been one of our top priorities here at TorrentFreak. The legalese and numerous cases seem to drag on forever, or end up in a settlement where the alleged ‘pirate’ pays the record labels a few thousand dollars.
Today’s coverage at both P2Pnet and Ray Beckerman’s blog, however, caught our eye. In what seems to be a classic David versus Goliath story, Shahanda Moursy from North Carolina has demanded a trial against three major record labels and the RIAA.
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February 28th, 2009
Hard to believe that everything that happens in the 21 st century… Looks like the slavery. People working hard from dawn till dusk in awful conditions… No more words, just look…
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February 28th, 2009
If you are going to visit India, even don’t think about drinking local alcohol. You ask why? It is bacause it is made of… well… see for yourself 
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February 28th, 2009
The horrific visions that open the final chapter of Alan Moore’s Watchmen haunt you long afterwards. But Zack Snyder’s movie tones down that imagery, and screenwriter David Hayter says it’s because of 9/11. Spoilers below.
As you probably already know, there’s no giant squid at the end of Snyder’s movie adaptation. But that’s not the only thing that’s missing. The film leaves out the gut-wrenching images that fill nine pages of the graphic novel, at the start of Chapter 12
In the book, a doomsday clock dripping with the blood of massacred New Yorkers is followed by in-your-face carnage. There are no words, just page after page of silent faces frozen in despair. Bodies are piled on top of bodies, hunched over street corners and splayed outside of windows. If you’re familiar with the book, you know that the world, for New Yorkers, has just ended. The visually arresting images push forward the final issue that the entire novel hinges upon: Is it okay to kill millions to save billions? It’s violent and necessary… but it’s not in the movie.
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February 27th, 2009
Eminem’s lawsuit against his label finally went to trial this week after two years, in a case worth hundreds of millions of pounds to artists worldwide.
Eminem’s publishing company, FBT Productions, is suing Universal Music Group for $1.6m (£800,000) in alleged unpaid royalties. But what’s at stake is not just an unpaid bill – it’s the definition of digital royalties.
When a song or ringtone is bought online, at the iTunes Music Store or anywhere else, the artist receives a royalty. The amount of this royalty is governed by a contract between labels and artists. For many artists, however, that digital royalty is not explicitly stated – millions of contracts, after all, predate iTunes and did not anticipate the boom in digital music sales.
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February 27th, 2009
Doh! Big-screen success hasn’t jaded Homer, Bart, Marge, Maggie and Lisa. They’re going to stay on TV for a long time, Fox announced today.
The network renewed “The Simpsons” for two more seasons. That means 44 additional episodes after this season, bringing the show through its 22nd season and 493rd episode. “The Simpsons,” created by cartoonist Matt Groening, debuted as a regular series on Jan. 14, 1990 after a Christmas special on Dec. 17, 1989. It first appeared in 1987 as a series of 30-second shorts for “The Tracey Ullman Show.”
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