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Monday, April 29, 2013

Royal hoax caller to testify at inquest into UK nurse's death

By Shadia Nasralla

LONDON (Reuters) - An Australian radio presenter will give evidence at an inquest into the death of a nurse who hanged herself after putting through a hoax call seeking information on Prince William's pregnant wife Kate, the presenter's lawyers said on Monday.

Mel Greig asked to appear as an individual at the inquest into Jacintha Saldanha's death, which provoked worldwide anger at the radio DJ's actions.

"(Greig) is determined to address any questions surrounding her role in these tragic events as part of the inquest," her lawyers Slater & Gordon said in a statement.

"Ms Greig wants (Saldanha's) family to know she will answer any questions the coroner or the family's lawyers may have at the inquest."

The inquest, which had been due to start in London this Thursday, has been postponed until September 12-13 while more evidence is gathered, a spokesman for Westminster City Council confirmed.

It was not immediately clear whether Greig will give evidence in person or via videolink.

Saldanha, 46, was found hanged last December in her hospital lodgings in London, days after she answered the call from Greig and her colleague Michael Christian from Australian radio station 2Day FM.

As part of the ruse, Greig and Christian had pretended to be Queen Elizabeth and Prince Charles, William's father.

Saldanha put the call through to a colleague who, despite the DJs' unconvincing accents, disclosed details of the Duchess of Cambridge's condition during treatment for an extreme form of morning sickness in the early stages of pregnancy.

British newspapers reported that Saldanha, a mother of two, held the DJs responsible for her death in one of three suicide notes she left.

"Ms Saldanha's suicide was a devastating tragedy and Ms Greig's thoughts have been with the family ever since," her lawyers said in the statement.

2DayFM canceled the pair's show, which had been off the air since the incident, and Australia's media regulator has launched an investigation to see whether the station breached its license conditions and commercial radio codes of practice.

Southern Cross Austereo, parent company of the radio station, has also apologized and promised to donate advertising revenue to a fund for Saldanha's family with a minimum contribution of A$500,000 ($525,000).

(Reporting By Shadia Nasralla, Editing by Belinda Goldsmith)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/royal-hoax-caller-testify-inquest-uk-nurses-death-112520339.html

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Fashion-Focused Startups Stylit And Black Tag Offer Free, Personal Shoppers For Both Women & Men

E-commerce is booming, but shopping for clothing online can still be a challenge. Unlike many consumer products, clothing is personal and often needs to be tried on for fit. Plus, there are numerous options available via the web, so sometimes it’s tough to even know where to begin with an online shopping expedition. Two companies from TechCrunch Disrupt NY’s Startup Alley are addressing these problems by offering personal stylists and recommendations online. One, Stylit, is targeting women and another,?Black Tag, is focused on men. Stylists-as-a-service? Yep, it’s that kind of thing. Tel Aviv-based Stylit’s co-founder and chief stylist Maya Kramer has a decade’s worth of experience in the fashion industry: She’s worked as a stylist herself, as well as a personal shopper, photo shoot producer, boutique owner, fashion writer, styling instructor, model and even TV personality. Her clients have included Vogue, Sak?s Fifth Avenue, Microsoft, Glamour, Target, Victoria?s Secret and various celebrities, designers and artists. Others on the founding team include CEO Yaniv Nissim, CTO Michael Gutkin, and lead engineer Shilo Ayalon. “We feel that personal styling was not accessible to everyone,” explains Kramer. “Stylit solves this.” After signing up on the website, users are prompted to fill out a questionnaire, detailing their budget, body type, and personal tastes. Stylit’s personal shoppers will then curate a selection of outfits based on these answers. The outfits, sent out on a weekly basis, don’t just include the clothing, but also accessories like shoes, bags, hats, jewelry, etc. Users can choose to buy the outfit and/or the individual items, or just pass altogether. But to help the stylists better learn their own personal tastes, users are also asked to rank the outfits they’re sent, allowing the recommendations to improve over time. Unlike with many stylists in the offline world – and even some found online – there’s no charge to use Stylit’s personal shopping service. Instead, the company is monetized through affiliate sales for now, though Kramer explains that longer-term, the company could work with brands directly to help them connect with those who best fit their target demographic. In addition, the company wants to eventually build each of their users their own personalized stores that provide items that fit their body type and style preference, says Kramer, who calls this bigger vision a “Pandora for online shopping.” The stylists work for the site on a freelance basis. This differentiates the service from

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/APLdP4RUUxU/

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Google Drive

What started as a free online alternative to Microsoft Office has quickly become one of the most impressive services for creating, editing, saving, syncing, and collaborating on documents. Google Drive (freemium) has long impressed me in just how far it goes toward helping groups of people work together on files simultaneously. Some new features rolling out in a recent update add even more support for teamwork.

It hasn't been long since Google Docs rebranded itself as Google Drive, so allow me to briefly recap: Google Docs took on the new name after it added local file syncing to its service. In other words, Google Docs?ahem, Drive?now works more like Dropbox , SugarSync, or any other file-syncing service you care to name, while still retaining the core office productivity apps. In that sense, its closest competitor may well be Microsoft SkyDrive, which also has online document creation tools.

With Google Drive, you can upload files to your Google account, convert them to Google's file format to edit them online, create new docs in the Web interface, collaborate with other users in real time, and export the finished products to more standard file formats, such as .doc, .rtf, .pdf, and so on. The latest round of changes makes working with others in real time even more intuitive, because you can see their profile pictures on the screen, where formerly you only saw a line of text at the top and a color code indicating who else was looking at or editing the file.

Because of these wide-ranging capabilities and its dedication to collaborative document editing, Google Drive remains a PCMag Editors' Choice. We have no hesitation recommending Google Drive?although it is important to understand how one of the new features works. The feature in question could potentially reveal your identity to others, but managing it is simple when you know how it works. And as much as Google Drive is an excellent platform and service, that doesn't mean it's the only file-syncing service you should use either.

What's New in Drive?
The newest change in Google Drive, which will roll out to users slowly, is that Google+ profile pictures of collaborators now appear at the top of the file when they're viewing or editing a document. Formerly, when collaborators opened a document, you would see a line of text reading "2 other viewers" at the top right, which opened to reveal their names or email addresses and a color code for each person. For example, if I invited Maria to edit a spreadsheet with me, I would see her name appear next to a pink square at the top of the spreadsheet any time she opened it. As she moved through cells, they would appear highlighted in pink.

The new feature adds Maria's profile picture at the top of the document and would let me add her to my Google+ circles. There's also now an integrated group chat feature that lets multiple collaborators hold discussions via text while they're working.

Another fairly big addition is offline access to all your Drive materials if you're using Google Chrome OS. To enable this setting, go to your Google Drive page and look under the "More" button the left for the offline access setting. Turning on this feature lets you read and edit your files offline; changes will sync to the cloud the next time you connect.

Privacy
The toughest criticism Google Drive has faced amount to concerns over privacy and IP ownership. The new collaboration features could put your face in front of strangers if you're not careful, but it's very easy to manage this potential problem with an ounce of care.

Some Google Drive owners keep their documents open to the public, and if you're signed into your Google account when you view these files, other users will be able to see your picture and name. When looking at public files, it's a better idea to log out of Google, or use a different browser, and maybe also turn on incognito features if your browser has them to keep yourself anonymous. Anonymous users are assigned random profile pictures of animals instead, such as a dolphin, dinosaur, or beaver.

My feeling on the matter of privacy in Google Drive is this: If you are comfortable using Gmail, you should be comfortable with Drive. If you are skeptical of Google's user agreements, don't use Google products. For more in-depth analysis, see "Google Drive's Terms of Use: Lazy People Should Worry."

Main Features of Drive
The gist of Google Drive, and the main attraction to it, is it can store your files in the cloud where they are accessible to you and your collaborators, and become highly searchable.

One feature related to "search" stands out: Google's ability to scan a photo and "read" it using optical character recognition, or identify it using its own technology. The only other app of this kind that uses built-in OCR nearly as well is Evernote , although you have to have a paid Premium account to use it.

Google also claims Drive allows videos to be uploaded, but we encountered some issues with that part of the service.

Like many other general file-syncing services, Google Drive works better for document files than multimedia. It's not ideally meant to be a music and video streaming service?for that kind of product, you'll likely need a paid service and device, such as the Verbatim Mediashare Mini, although SugarSync does offer some neat capabilities and support for streaming iTunes music. Amazon Cloud also offers some special support for music and movies. However, within the Google universe you can use Google Play in tandem with Drive (more on that in a bit).

Carryover Features from Google Docs
The core services and functionality that were in Google Docs, namely, a free online office suite where files are also hosted, remain intact in Drive. Google Docs is one of the best known free alternative to Microsoft Office, although it's entirely Web-based?there's no software to install to use it (the only downloadable part is the app for local syncing with Drive).

As with Microsoft Office, Google Drive lets you create word processing documents, spreadsheets, presentation documents, forms, vector drawings, and now in beta, tables. Google hosts your files, too, so when you log in, all your files are there. You can sort them into customizable folders, which appear along a left pane, or just search for what you need, using a standard search bar in the Web app.

When you create a document in Google Drive, the file format used is Google's own. However, the system couldn't be more flexible. You can export Google documents to more standardized files formats, like .doc, .rtf, .ppt, .pdf, and more; and you can import practically any document with the option of keeping it in its native format (which may limit your ability to edit it) or translating it into a Google doc file, which makes it editable in the online service. I've certainly had my share of moments when I was stuck on a computer that didn't have Microsoft Office at the very moment someone emailed me an important file that required my feedback pronto. Google Drive saved the day. I could open the file in GoogleDrive, edit it, and export the revised file back out to its original form. Occasionally some formatting will go haywire during this process, but it gets the job done.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ziffdavis/pcmag/~3/hpQ0vAJfEIY/0,2817,2403546,00.asp

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Sunday, April 28, 2013

Why Caffeine In Coffee Is A Miracle Drug For The Tired : Bay Area ...

Many believe that humanity?s caffeine addiction has wrought a lot of good. Photo: istockphoto.com

Post by Eliza Barclay, The Salt at NPR Food (4/26/13)

NPR?s Coffee Week is winding down, but we?d be remiss if we didn?t give some space to caffeine, the most widely used stimulant drug in the world.

As much as we may enjoy the nutty dark roast aromas and the sensations of a warm beverage, coffee is often just a caffeine delivery system for a groggy brain. Approximately 80 percent of caffeine is consumed in the form of coffee, and in the U.S., we average about two cups of coffee per day. That 200 milligrams of caffeine affects our brains, our performance, and maybe even our health.

Many believe that humanity?s caffeine addiction has wrought a lot of benefits. Earlier in the week, historian Mark Pendergrast told us about how coffee (and caffeine) helped Western civilization ?sober up? enough to get down to business. And Jerry Seinfeld claimed coffee has made us a more productive society.

But is there any science behind the idea that caffeine, by way of coffee, makes us better workers? And what exactly is caffeine doing to our tired brains?

For some, coffee is simply a a caffeine delivery system for a groggy brain. Photo: Andrew Moor/Flickr

For these questions, we turned to Stephen Braun, a medical writer who sifted through the research on caffeine in his book Buzz: The Science and Lore of Alcohol and Caffeine. (It came out in 1997, but it?s still among the best resources on the topic.)

According to Braun, caffeine works by blocking receptors for adenosine, a compound in the brain that makes you feel sleepy. In other words, he writes in the book, consuming caffeine is like ?putting a block of wood under one of the brain?s primary brake pedals.?

Of course, there?s a huge amount of variation in how caffeine affects individuals, which depends on genetics, tolerance and other factors. But several small studies have shown that at low doses (between 100 and 250 mg), caffeine improves alertness and mental performance, especially in people who are already tired. Neuroscientists report that it makes us more supportive of each other in social situations. And one study even found that higher caffeine consumption helped reduce the risk of workplace accidents.

?Its indirect action on arousal, mood and concentration contributes in large part to its cognitive enhancing properties,? according to a review article in the Journal of Alzheimers Disease.

As Allison Aubrey reported last month, caffeine also seems to improve short-term memory ? if you?re exhausted. But researchers said it didn?t have any beneficial effects on memory among people who are well rested.

As with all drugs, there is such a thing as too much caffeine. According to a 2001 Institute of Medicine report, 600 mg of caffeine (or six cups of coffee) will bring on negative cognitive effects, otherwise known as the jitters, in most people ? including Kramer from Seinfeld. And some people are so sensitive to caffeine that one cup will bring on nervousness and irritability, rather than the alertness that most of us feel.

?We also know that caffeine is bad for people with anxiety ? for them, it?s likely to hurt productivity,? Braun tells The Salt. ?But for people on the more depressive end, caffeine would improve productivity. The effect of the drug really depends on the brain into which it?s being infused.?

Increasingly, medical researchers are worried about about how teens? overuse of caffeine is keeping them from getting the restorative sleep they need. That goes for some adults, too.

As psychologist Harris Lieberman of the Army Research Institute of Environmental Medicine told NPR back in 2011, modern life has made us more dependent on the drug. ?It?s a combination of driving ourselves and having high expectations of ourselves, but also of society making a lot of demands on us, so they kind of add up to give us insufficient time to sleep.?

Braun has a theory on how to get the most out of caffeine, and it involves taking regular ?caffeine holidays? five or six times a year.

?I find it to be most useful when I start at a virgin state, so I taper down slowly,? he says. ?I switch from coffee to black tea, and then peppermint tea. So when I get that first cup of java again, it?s such a great feeling.?

Tapering down also reminds him that he can function perfectly well ? and sleep better ? without caffeine.

Tags: Caffeine, coffee, coffee week, drug, jerry seinfeld, latte, seinfeld

Category: health and nutrition, NPR food, tea and coffee

Source: http://blogs.kqed.org/bayareabites/2013/04/27/why-caffeine-in-coffee-is-a-miracle-drug-for-the-tired/

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Saturday, April 27, 2013

Toshiba to release 4K-ready, 160MB/s CompactFlash memory cards

Toshiba will launch its Exceria Pro series of CompactFlash cards into the Japanese market tomorrow with 160MB/s read speeds and 150MB/s write speeds. The company claims the 32GB and 64GB models are the fastest CF cards you can get now, thanks to the UDMA7 protocol combined with its own NAND flash memory and custom firmware. As such, it's certified them to the "video performance guarantee profile 2" (VPG-65) standard, meaning they're guaranteed to sustain 65MB/s, which Toshiba says will support many CF-equipped 4K cameras on the market. Obviously, HD and RAW still shooters using pro DSLR models like Canon's 5D Mark III and the Nikon D800 won't have to sweat the frames-per-second, either. There's no word on US availability or pricing, but we should know more when they hit Japanese shops on April 27th.

Filed under: Cameras, Storage