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Thursday, January 19, 2012
Taco Bell's Stupidly Exploitative MLK Day Tweet [MLK Day]
Snowfall totals scaled back in Seattle, up for other areas (Reuters)
(Reuters) ? Seattle residents bracing for an epic storm on Wednesday may now only see up to 6 inches of snowfall while towns in the southwest interior of Washington were likely to be slammed with more than a foot of snow, forecasters said.
In the greater Seattle area about 1 to 2 inches of snow dusted the ground in the early morning hours with about 3 to 6 inches expected, down from forecasts of up to 10 inches, according to National Weather Service meteorologist Dustin Guy.
Seattle typically averages just six to seven inches of snow each year.
Toward the southwest interior of the state, however, residents were preparing for up to 20 inches of snow, he said, with reports of 12 to 15 inches already on the ground in an eight hour period just south of the capital city of Olympia.
"For western Washington, those are pretty extreme numbers," Guy said.
State agencies were prepared early to monitor the developing weather situation as dozens of school districts around Seattle closed for the day and transportation snarled.
Air travel was expected to be disrupted throughout the day, with Alaska Airlines already cancelling 38 west coast flights into and out of Seattle and Portland, Oregon. Southwest and JetBlue airlines also urged passengers to check with carriers before traveling to the region.
The brunt of the snowstorm was expected through the early afternoon, tapering off into the evening, NWS said. By Thursday forecasters expected to see a gradual warming trend followed by rain.
"That will help to melt the snow but it will also create a very messy situation," said NWS meteorologist Guy.
(Reporting By Lauren Keiper, additional reporting by Laura Myers in Washington. Editing by Paul Thomasch)
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Wednesday, January 18, 2012
How to Predict the Future of Technology
As a tech columnist, I?m often asked to speak about the future of technology. Well, sure. Who doesn?t want to know what the future holds? Yet I?d be in much better shape if I were asked to predict the future of politics or bass fishing. Because nothing changes faster, and more unpredictably, than consumer technology.
Everybody who takes a stab at these kinds of predictions inevitably winds up looking like an idiot. Surely you?ve seen these things go around by e-mail: ?I think there is a world market for maybe five computers,? said the chairman of IBM in 1943. ?This ?telephone? has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication,? went an 1876 Western Union internal memo. ?Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?? asked Harry M. Warner (one of the Warner Brothers) in 1927.
It?s not predictions in general that will get you into trouble, though. The danger lies in predicting that things can?t be done or will never work. Those are the forecasts that will make you look shortsighted.
In general, it?s much safer to predict things that will happen. If you?re right, you?ll look like a genius. Take Jules Verne, whose articles and stories described electric submarines, TV news, solar sails, ?phonotelephote? (video calling), ?atmospheric advertisements? (skywriting) and ?electronic control devices? (tasers).
Or Arthur C. Clarke?s ?newspad? (iPad), Ray Bradbury?s ?thimble radios? (earbuds), Isaac Asimov?s pocket calculators and George Orwell?s security cameras.
And if you?re wrong, well, who can blame you? After all, if you predict something that hasn?t come true, you can always cover yourself by adding ?yet.?
So the first rule of making tech predictions is this: make predictions about things that will come to pass, not about things that won?t.
Here?s the second rule: history is going to repeat itself. Experience has shown, over and over again, that certain trends are virtually inviolable.
For example, black-and-white formats always go to color: photographs, TV, movies. So back in 1970 you could have confidently predicted the proliferation of color newspapers.
In addition, analog formats always go digital. Audio, video, photos. So in 1990 you could have safely predicted the dawn of digital TV and e-book readers.
We know that Internet access is becoming more ubiquitous, and more gadgets are getting online. Thus, you?re safe describing a future where things that currently aren?t generally online will be, like cars, kitchen appliances and clothing.
If you insist on predicting the demise of things, stick to extrapolating from obvious trends. Look at the way recent college graduates live and assume that they are the future. They don?t subscribe to printed newspapers. They don?t sign up for home phone service. They film with phones or still cameras instead of camcorders. They download their movies.
They expect to get everything on demand?songs, books, magazines, newspapers, TV shows, movies?and you?d be foolish to bet against that trend.
But what about specific products? Is there any way to predict what we?ll be carrying in our pockets in 2020? Can anyone see the next iPhone, iPad or Wii?
Probably not. If they could, electronics companies wouldn?t release flopperoos like Microsoft Zune, the BlackBerry PlayBook and the Iridium satellite phone.
In the end, it?s a blessing we can?t predict the future of tech?because it means we?ll keep trying. If we don?t know if something will succeed or fail, we?ll keep innovating. We?ll heed the words of Alan Kay: ?The best way to predict the future is to invent it.?
Source: http://rss.sciam.com/click.phdo?i=be8330e081601a10f2354f8a16b278c1
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Saudi Arabia doubts Iran oil blockade claim (Reuters)
TEHRAN (Reuters) ? Saudi Arabia on Monday expressed doubts over Iran's claim it could block the main oil shipping route out of the Gulf and made clear it was ready to pump more oil after sanctions threatened to cut Iranian sales of crude.
Brent crude rose above $111 on concerns about global oil supplies if sanctions freeze OPEC's second biggest producer out of the market or push it towards military conflict, while Saudi Arabia said it would work to stabilize the price at $100.
Israel, which has often said it could strike Iran to stop it developing nuclear weapons, called for tough new sanctions against Tehran to stop its nuclear program.
But it said that for sanctions to work effectively, all countries must join in - a subtle swipe at Russia and China which oppose the latest Western moves.
"Iran must be stopped and the good news is that Iran can be stopped with economic and diplomatic means once the entire international community gathers together with effective sanctions," Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon told the BBC.
Tehran has been under a growing array of U.N. and unilateral sanctions for years, but a U.S. bill that President Barack Obama signed into law on New Year's Eve went far further than previously, aiming to stop countries paying for Iranian oil.
The European Union - Iran's second biggest oil customer after China, buying some 450,000 barrels per day of its 2.6 million bpd exports - is also expected to agree to embargo Iranian oil at a foreign ministers meeting on January 23.
The measures go far further than U.N. sanctions agreed by China and Russia and have helped cause a currency crisis in Iran where dollars are now a scarce commodity for Iranians seeking a safe haven for their vulnerable rial-denominated savings.
DANGEROUS
The new sanctions prompted Iran to threaten to close the Gulf to oil trade if it was prevented from selling its oil and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's senior military adviser reiterated Iran would act decisively to protect itself.
"Iran would use any tools to defend its national interests, if it was exposed to any dangers," Major-General Yahya Rahim-Safavi said, according to the semi-official Mehr news agency.
Israel - reputed to have the Middle East's only nuclear arsenal - said such talk was more evidence of the need to act quickly against Tehran.
"A nuclear Iran would mean a new world order where a very dangerous terroristic regime has impunity and also can control oil flow and oil prices," Ayalon said.
U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Martin Dempsey is to make his first visit to Israel on Thursday. Israeli media say he will try to persuade his hosts not to "surprise" Washington on Iran.
Saudi Arabia, Iran's main rival for influence in the Middle East which would play a key role in replacing Iranian oil in he event of an embargo, played down Tehran's talk of closing the Strait of Hormuz, the vital shipping lane for Gulf exports.
"I personally do not believe that the Strait, if it were shut, will be shut for any length of time. The world cannot stand for that," Saudi Arabia's Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi told CNN.
"I don't think all these pronouncements are helpful to the international oil market or to the price of oil. It's really disturbing."
Iran's warning to its Gulf Arab neighbors not to raise oil output to replace its crude appeared to have fallen on deaf ears. Naimi said Riyadh could increase production by about 2 million barrels per day (bpd) "almost immediately."
"Our wish and hope is we can stabilize this oil price and keep it at a level around $100," Naimi said.
The leader of China, Iran's biggest oil customer was in Abu Dhabi on Monday, on a six-day tour of the region where he hopes for greater access to its huge oil and gas reserves.
Although Beijing opposes further international sanctions on Iran, it has already cut its purchases of Iranian oil by more than half for the first two months of this year.
A senior Iranian oil official denied reports that Iran's exports to Asia were already suffering due to the intensified sanctions pressure, saying contracts were bring renewed on schedule.
In addition to the confrontation with the United States over sanctions, Iran has accused it of being behind the latest murder of a nuclear scientist, blown up by a bomb attached to his car last in Tehran week, a charge Washington denies.
Parliament speaker Ali Larijani said "some people have been arrested" in connection with the assassination, the fifth such killing in the last two years.
Larijani gave no further details but told state-run Arabic language al Alam TV Tehran was ready to deal with sanctions.
"We are prepared for oil sanctions and have different scenarios, but we would not announce them in order to avoid alerting our enemies," he said.
(Additional reporting by Peter Griffiths in London; Writing by Robin Pomeroy; Editing by Giles Elgood)
Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/iran/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120116/wl_nm/us_iran
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Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Evangelical leaders try to unite behind Rick Santorum
Evangelical leaders want to use whatever clout they have to help a strong conservative advance in South Carolina?s primary, upsetting frontrunner Mitt Romney, who is viewed as too moderate.
In a bid to sway the South Carolina vote, national evangelical leaders, meeting at a ranch west of Houston, on Saturday rallied behind former Sen. Rick Santorum for the GOP presidential nomination.
Skip to next paragraphMany came into the meeting committed to other candidates, especially former Speaker Newt Gingrich. All of the candidates, except former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman, sent surrogates to make a case for support.
But in the end, evangelical leaders want to use whatever clout they have to help a strong conservative advance in South Carolina?s Jan. 21 primary, upsetting frontrunner Mitt Romney, who is viewed as too moderate ? or too Mormon.
?There was a desire to see a true conservative emerge to secure the nomination, and the overwhelming belief was that a true conservative has the best chance of winning a direct election against Barack Obama,? said Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, in a conference call with reporters after the Saturday morning vote.
?What?s the point if we do not get a true conservative?? he added.
But with so much at stake in the 2012 vote, it's not clear that either the GOP candidates or the voters are likely to defer to an 85-to-25 vote in a back room in Houston.?
?What we are seeing today is nothing like the influence we saw in the 1980s and ?90s,? says Robert Jones, who heads the Public Religion Research Institute in Washington.??The days of kingmakers in a small room deciding the GOP nominee are over.?
?Focus on Family laid off hundreds of people, the Crystal Cathedral is for sale, and the Moral Majority and the Christian Coalition are no more," he adds.?
South Carolina looms large for Christian conservatives, who see their failure to unite around a single candidate in 2008 ? then, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee or?former Sen. Fred Thompson of Tennessee ? as swinging the GOP nomination to Sen. John McCain, a moderate on social issues.?Governor Romney is currently leading in South Carolina polls, followed by Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, Gingrich, and Santorum.?
?There is hope and expectation that, with the constituencies represented here, it will have an impact on South Carolina,? said Mr. Perkins. Christian conservatives account for 60 percent of the likely GOP primary vote in South Carolina. ?I was amazed at the unity that was here.?
At issue is how to winnow the GOP primary field, before it?s too late to stop frontrunner Romney, who is viewed as not consistent on issues such as abortion rights, which he formerly supported. There are too many social conservative candidates in the race, and they are dividing the social conservative vote, they say.
The aim of Saturday?s meeting is to find out whether there is a viable alternative to Romney, says Richard Land, president of the ethics and religious liberty committee of the Southern Baptist Convention, in an interview on C-Span?s Newsmakers on Friday, to be aired Jan. 15.
?Most social conservatives find Romney a more attractive candidate than they did John McCain,? he said. ?This isn?t anti-Romney, but wouldn?t it be nice to find out if a social conservative is viable both in the primary and the general election??
However, if polls show that Romney continues to be more viable in the general election campaign than a conservative alternative, than Romney will be the GOP nominee, he added. ?Do not underestimate Barack Obama?s unique ability to unite social conservatives and others around whomever he is running against in a general election.?
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Is Romney ?inevitable?? Here?s how he lines up against Obama
New polls show Mitt Romney consistently comes close to beating President Obama, running neck-and-neck with the President ? way better than most of the other GOP candidates.
If electability trumps ideology in the Republican nominating contest ? and in the end it almost always does (Barry Goldwater in 1964 was an exception) ? then the 2012 presidential race inevitably will boil down to Romney vs. Obama.
Skip to next paragraphThat?s the main message in a series of recent polls. Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney consistently comes close to beating Obama, running neck-and-neck with the President ? way better than most of the other GOP candidates, although Ron Paul comes close in some national surveys as well.
A CNN/ORC International Poll released Monday has Romney a whisker ahead of Obama (48-47 percent), well within the survey?s margin of error.
Another aspect of this poll shows a tightening of the race as measured by voter ?enthusiasm.?
Enthusiasm about voting now stands at 54 percent among registered Republicans, CNN reports, down ten points from last October. Meanwhile, enthusiasm among registered Democrats has risen six points, and now stands at 49 percent.
"In a race that tight, turnout is likely to determine the outcome, and the Democrats have begun to close the 'enthusiasm gap' that damaged their prospects so badly in the 2010 midterms," writes CNN Polling Director Keating Holland.
Each candidate has distinctive strengths, says Holland:
"On the economy ? issue number one to most Americans ? Romney has a clear advantage. Fifty-three percent say the former Massachusetts governor can get the economy moving; only 40 percent say that about President Barack Obama. But the numbers are reversed when voters are asked whether the candidates are in touch with ordinary Americans. Fifty-three percent say that Obama is in touch; only four in ten feel that way about Romney."
In another poll out Monday ? this one by Fox News ? Obama is ahead of Romney by a single percentage point (46-45), another statistical tie.
?Behind those numbers is a striking contrast,? writes Dana Blanton at foxnews.com. ?Seventy-four percent of Obama backers say they are voting ?for? him rather than ?against Romney? (21 percent). Yet for Romney, his support is mainly anti-Obama. Fifty-eight percent of Romney voters say they would be voting ?against Obama? rather than ?for Romney? (33 percent).?
But there?s a warning for the Obama campaign as well. Independents favor Romney 43-38 percent.
?The poll brings more mixed news for Obama,? reports Blanton. ?On the positive side, 34 percent of voters are satisfied with the way things are going in the country today. That?s up from 24 percent in October and 30 percent in April 2011. And more voters today think the economy has started to turn the corner than thought so two months ago. Forty percent now think the worst is over, up from 29 percent in mid-November. Less encouraging for the president is that a 56-percent majority is pessimistic on the economy, and 53 percent think life for the next generation of Americans will be worse than life today. Thirty-four percent think it will be better.?
Among the remaining five Republican candidates (Jon Huntsman dropped out Monday), only Romney is very close to Obama as measured by the Real Clear Politics average of recent polls ? just 0.8 percent behind the incumbent in a theoretical match-up.
Newt Gingrich is back 8.6 percentage points, Rick Santorum 8.0 percentage points, Ron Paul 4.4 points, and Rick Perry 12.0 points.
Volatility and the possibility of unknown factors are basic to presidential campaigns this early in a race that still has months to go ? perhaps more so than usual at a time when the incumbent (the first African American president who could be running against the first Mormon to head a national ticket) is disengaging from two wars and trying to pull the national economy back from recession.
?Americans' current evaluation of the president's job performance, their satisfaction with the direction of the country, and their ratings of the economy are all on the lower end of what Gallup has found at or near the start of previous years when an incumbent president sought re-election,? Gallup?s Lydia Saad writes in an analysis posted Monday. ?While these comparisons are not auspicious for Obama's re-election, a broader view of how these ratings have changed over the course of previous presidential election years suggests it is not too late for the numbers to shift in Obama's favor.?
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Sunday, January 1, 2012
Chinese bus driver infected with bird flu dies (AP)
BEIJING ? A Chinese bus driver who tested positive for the H5N1 bird flu virus died Saturday in a city bordering Hong Kong, health officials said, in the country's first reported case of the disease in humans in 18 months.
The man surnamed Chen died in the wealthy southern city of Shenzhen, provincial health officials said. Shenzhen is separated by a small river from Hong Kong, where thousands of birds have been slaughtered after two were confirmed to have the virus last week.
During the month prior to his fever, Chen, 39, apparently had no direct contact with poultry and did not travel out of Shenzhen, a metropolis of 10 million people.
H5N1 rarely infects humans and usually only those who come into close contact with diseased poultry. But among those infected, nearly 60 percent die, and scientists are closely watching the virus for any signs it is becoming more easily transmissible from human to human.
Chen developed a fever on Dec. 21 and was hospitalized on Dec. 25, city and provincial authorities said in a statement. Health Ministry experts confirmed on Saturday that he was infected with H5N1, the provincial health department said.
The Guangdong health department also said 120 people who had close contact with Chen have not developed any abnormal symptoms.
The Ministry of Health has informed the World Health Organization about the case, local authorities said.
WHO says globally there have been 336 human deaths from 573 confirmed bird flu cases since 2003. Of these, 40 cases were in China, 26 of which were fatal.
Chen's death comes a week after two dead birds tested positive for the virus in Hong Kong.
More than 19,000 birds at a Hong Kong market were slaughtered and imports and sales of live poultry were banned for three weeks after a chicken carcass tested positive for H5N1. Lab tests later confirmed that an Oriental magpie robin found dead on Dec. 17 was also infected.
China's last reported human case of H5N1 was in June 2010. A pregnant 22-year-old woman from central Hubei province died after being exposed to sick and dead poultry.
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