Dagmar wrote:
] w00t! Sounds like a great start to the weekend to me!

From the LA Times article:
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-lawmakers-arrested,1,970868.story?coll=sns-ap-nation-headlines&ctrack=1&cset=true

In a sting operation dubbed "Tennessee Waltz," the FBI set up a bogus company called E-Cycle Management Inc., then doled out payoffs to lawmakers to sponsor a bill that would allow the business to buy and sell used electronic equipment from the state. The bill was withdrawn Wednesday.
One of the lawmakers charged, state Sen. John Ford, allegedly received payments totaling $55,000, beginning last year. "You are talking to the guy that makes the deals," Ford boasted to the undercover agents, according to the indictment.

Ford was also charged with attempting to threaten or intimidate potential witnesses by telling an undercover agent that "if he caught someone trying to set him up he would shoot that person," prosecutors said.

I love the name they chose for the sting. Seems like I've memed the fine gentleman from Memphis at least half a dozen times before. This is great, long overdue but F* Great!!

RE: Tennessee Senators arrested by the FBI!

Update:
DOH! This turns out to be just another urban legend / internet hoax... I was wondering why the URL for a BBC page was on someone else's domain.

http://www.snopes.com/humor/iftrue/lionmidget.asp

I am starting to believe in karma here...

Spectators cheered as entire Cambodian Midget Fighting League squared off against African Lion

Tickets had been sold-out three weeks before the much anticipated fight, which took place in the city of Kâmpóng Chhnãng.

The fight was slated when an angry fan contested Yang Sihamoni, President of the CMFL, claiming that one lion could defeat his entire league of 42 fighters.

Sihamoni takes great pride in the league he helped create, as was conveyed in his recent advertising campaign for the CMFL that stated his midgets will "... take on anything; man, beast, or machine."

This campaign is believed to be what sparked the undisclosed fan to challenge the entire league to fight a lion; a challenge that Sihamoni readily accepted.
...
The fight was called in only 12 minutes, after which 28 fighters were declared dead, while the other 14 suffered severe injuries including broken bones and lost limbs, rendering them unable to fight back

Lion Mutilates 42 Midgets in Cambodian Ring-Fight

Ok, being proactive is normally a good thing but does the FAA have any jurisdiction here and was this really a necessary rulemaking at this point in time (& space)?

The United States government does not want billboards in space.

The Federal Aviation Administration proposed Thursday to amend its regulations to ensure that it can enforce a law that prohibits "obtrusive" advertising in zero gravity.

"Objects placed in orbit, if large enough, could be seen by people around the world for long periods of time," the FAA said in a regulatory filing.

Currently, the FAA lacks the authority to enforce the existing law.

FAA: Space billboards don't fly

Looks like good ole social engineering was behind the oh sooo publicized T-mobile sidekick hack of Ms. Hilton.

Computer security flaws played a role in the attack, which exploited a programming glitch in the Web site of Hilton's cell phone provider, Bellevue, Wash.-based T-Mobile International. But one young hacker who claimed to have been involved in the data theft said the crime only succeeded after one member of a small group of hackers tricked a T-Mobile employee into divulging information that only employees are supposed to know.

The young hacker described the exploit during online text conversations with a washingtonpost.com reporter and provided other evidence supporting his account, including screen shots of what he said were internal T-Mobile computer network pages. Washingtonpost.com is not revealing the hacker's identity because he is a juvenile crime suspect and because he communicated with the reporter on the condition that he not be identified either directly or through his online alias.
...
In the months leading up to the Hilton incident, the hacker group freely exploited a security glitch in the Web site of wireless phone giant T-Mobile, according to the hacker, who described himself as the youngest member of the group. The group had found that a tool on the T-Mobile site that allowed users to reset their account passwords contained a key programming flaw.

By exploiting the flaw, the group's members were able to gain access to the account of any T-Mobile subscriber who used a "Sidekick," a pricey phone-organizer-camera combination device that stores videos, photos and other data on T-Mobile's central computer servers.

Paris Hilton Hack Started With Old-Fashioned Con

Just wait until the p0rn industry gets a hold (no pun intended) of this technology.

Researchers have developed a cybernetic system to allow physical interaction over the internet. The system allows touching and feeling of animals or other humans in real time, but it's first being tried out on -- chickens.

Built by a wacky group of researchers at the Mixed Reality Lab at the National University of Singapore, the Touchy Internet works as follows:
You walk into your office, where a hollow, chicken-shaped doll sits on a mechanical positioning table close to your computer.

The doll whirs to life as soon as you switch on the system, duplicating the motion of a real chicken in the backyard whose movements are being captured by a webcam.

Fondling the doll translates into touching the real fowl.

Touch sensors attached to the doll convey tactile information to a nearby PC through radio signals. The data is sent over the internet to a remote computer near the chicken; the remote computer triggers tiny vibration motors in a lightweight haptic jacket worn by the fowl.

Eggheads Invent Tele-Petting

I thought that reporting a story without substantiation was the sole domain of the blogger, you know... those "journalists without rules..."

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Newsweek magazine on Monday retracted a report that U.S. interrogators at Guantanamo Bay had desecrated the Koran after the story triggered protests in Afghanistan that killed 16 people and the White House criticized it.

"Based on what we know now, we are retracting our original story that an internal military investigation had uncovered Koran abuse at Guantanamo Bay," Newsweek Editor Mark Whitaker said in a statement, a day after apologizing for the report.

Internet Rule #1: Just because you see it in print doesn't necessarily make it true... Unfortunately, newsweek up until now has had unquestioned credibility.

Newsweek retracts story on Koran under pressure

Isn't the road to hell paved with good intentions?

Parents may have to get involved in their children's schools — or else.

A proposal making its way through the General Assembly would require parents with children in kindergarten through grade 4 to ''volunteer'' at least 12 hours a year. And they couldn't just show up — they'd be expected to get involved in the teaching process by tutoring, chaperoning lesson-related field trips or helping students play educational games.

If the bill proposed by Sen. John Ford, D-Memphis, and Rep. Lois DeBerry, D-Memphis, is approved, though, it could become a rule without teeth. It's unclear what, if anything, would happen to parents or schools who fail to comply.
...
It's also unclear if parents who work long hours or have violent or criminal backgrounds would be expected to participate.

''I don't know that I'd want everybody up here working with my child,'' Lewis said.

Bill would make parents 'volunteer' in schools (Tenn)

OK, I must be ancient, I remember Gumby and Pokey clay character animations on weekend TV as a kid. Anyone remember Eddie Murphy's recreation of Gumby? I'm Gumby dammit!

"Gumby is an icon," said Diane Gibson-Gray, 49, executive director of the Arts and Cultural Foundation of Antioch, which is sponsoring the monthlong exhibit. "He's a cultural icon that many of us grew up with. And there's another wave coming. There's a whole new generation that's going to embrace and love Gumby as much as I did."

Gumby Making Comeback on 50th Anniversary

Cool Physics Experiment!

The tests were conducted in part to develop the ability to rapidly deploy large liquid drops by rupturing an enclosing membrane. As can be seen from the experiment footage, the initial rupture process is nearly ideal, but the finite size of the balloon material eventually ejects a spray from the drop surface. Then, when the balloon material leaves the drop entirely, it causes a large deformation of the drop (blob) which oscillates throughout the remainder of the test. Calculations suggest that such oscillations will continue for hours before the drop eventually becomes spherical.

NASA:water balloons in space?

We are the space robots, we are here to protect you. We are here to protect you from the terrible secret of space

10:36 AM May. 13, 2005 PT
Microsoft is rolling out a test version of an all-in-one subscription service that aims to protect computer users from viruses and spyware and give them tools to make machines speedier.

Microsoft is distributing Windows OneCare to its 60,000 employees this week. It plans to run a larger, invitation-only test this summer, then launch a full-scale trial by year's end.

Among its features, Windows OneCare would offer two-way firewall protection and perform maintenance work like cleaning up disks, repairing files and defragmenting hard drives so that bits of data aren't inefficiently spread out.

Microsoft risks alienating security vendors in releasing its own, competing products, but if it doesn't do more to stem internet attacks, it also risks further alienating customers unhappy with the multitude of threats already facing its ubiquitous software.

Microsoft: You're Safe With Us