Cancer screening rates still too low, says CDC

Cancer screening for three major cancer types in the US remain below goals for 2020, according to the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS), a report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the National Cancer Institute (NCI).

Rates for Asian and Hispanic Americans are lower than other groups.

According to the report, in 2010:
-- The screening rate for breast cancer was 72.4%,; the 2020 national target is 81%
-- The screening rate for cervical cancer was 83%; the 2020 target is 93%
-- The screening rate for colorectal was 58.6%; the 2020 target is 70.5%.

The US Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) makes the recommendations for cancer screening, and the US Department of Health and Human Services has set 10-year national targets for screening as an aspect of its Healthy People 2020 program.

Source: Medical News Today

Source: http://www.cancertreatment.net/news/breast-cancer/cancer-screening-rates-still-too-low-says-cdc

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Davis, Dujardin win lead honors at SAG awards (AP)

LOS ANGELES ? Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer were the maids of honor at Sunday's Screen Actors Guild Awards, where their Deep South drama "The Help" won them acting prizes and earned the trophy for overall cast performance.

Davis won as best actress and Spencer as supporting actress for "The Help," while Jean Dujardin was named best actor for the silent film "The Artist" and Christopher Plummer took the supporting-actor award for the father-son tale "Beginners."

The wins boost the actors' prospects for the same honors at the Feb. 26 Academy Awards.

In "The Help," Davis and Spencer play black maids going public with uneasy truths about their white employers in 1960s Mississippi.

"I just have to say that the stain of racism and sexism is not just for people of color or women. It's all of our burden, all of us," Davis said, accepting the ensemble prize on behalf of her "The Help" co-stars.

Accepting her best-actress award, Davis singled out two performers in the audience who inspired her early in her career: "The Help" co-star Cicely Tyson and Meryl Streep, Davis' co-star in the 2008 drama "Doubt" and one of the nominees she beat out for the SAG prize. Streep had been nominated as Margaret Thatcher in "The Iron Lady," a role that won her the dramatic actress award at the Golden Globes over Davis.

A French film star who is a newcomer to Hollywood's awards scene with "The Artist," Dujardin played a silent-era screen idol fallen on hard times as talking pictures take over in the late 1920s.

"I was a very bad student. I didn't listen in class. I was always dreaming," Dujardin said. "My teachers called me `Jean of the Moon,' and I realize now that I never stopped dreaming. Thank you very much. Thank you for this dream."

Plummer would become the oldest actor ever to win an Oscar at age 82, two years older than Jessica Tandy when she won best actress for "Driving Miss Daisy."

Backstage, Plummer joked when asked if he would like to win an Oscar, an honor so elusive during his esteemed 60-year career that he did not even receive his first Academy Award nomination until two years ago, for "The Last Station."

"No, I think it's frightfully boring," Plummer said. "That's an awful question. Listen, we don't go into this business preoccupied by awards. If we did, we wouldn't last five minutes."

Spencer, a veteran actress who had toiled in small TV and movie parts previously, had a breakout role in "The Help" as a brassy maid whose mouth continually gets her in trouble.

"I'm going to dedicate this to the downtrodden, the under-served, the underprivileged, overtaxed ? whether emotionally, physically or financially," Spencer said.

On the television side, comedy series awards went to "Modern Family" for best ensemble; Alec Baldwin as best actor for "30 Rock"; and Betty White as best actress for "Hot in Cleveland."

"You can't name me, without naming those other wonderful women on `Hot in Cleveland,'" the 90-year-old White said. "This nomination belongs to four of us. Please, please know that I'm dealing them right in with this. I'm not going to let them keep this, but I'll let them see it."

The TV drama show winners were: Jessica Lange as best actress for "American Horror Story"; and Steve Buscemi as best actor for "Boardwalk Empire," which also won the ensemble prize.

For TV movie or miniseries, Kate Winslet won as best actress for "Mildred Pierce," while Paul Giamatti was named best actor for "Too Big to Fail."

Before the official ceremony, the Screen Actors Guild presented its honor for best film stunt ensemble to "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2." The TV stunt award went to "Game of Thrones."

The winners at the SAG ceremony often go on to earn Oscars. All four acting recipients at SAG last year later took home Oscars ? Colin Firth for "The King's Speech," Natalie Portman for "Black Swan" and Christian Bale and Melissa Leo for "The Fighter."

The same generally holds true for the weekend's other big Hollywood honors, the Directors Guild of America Awards, where Michel Hazanavicius won the feature-film prize Saturday for "The Artist." The Directors Guild winner has gone on to earn the best-director Oscar 57 times in the 63-year history of the union's awards show.

The guild's ensemble prize, considered the ceremony's equivalent of a best-picture honor, has a spotty record at predicting what will win the top award at the Oscars.

While "The King's Speech" won both honors a year ago, the SAG ensemble recipient has gone on to claim the top Oscar only eight times in the 16 years since the guild added the category.

Though "The Help" won the ensemble prize this time, "The Artist" and George Clooney's family drama "The Descendants" are considered stronger contenders for the best-picture Oscar.

Both "The Artist" and "The Descendants" also were nominated for writing and directing Oscars, categories where serious best-picture candidates generally need to be in the running. "The Help" missed out on nominations in both of those Oscar categories.

Mary Tyler Moore received the guild's lifetime-achievement award, an honor presented to her by Dick Van Dyke, her co-star on the 1960s sit-com "The Dick Van Dyke Show."

SAG President Ken Howard put in a plug during the show for the guild's planned merger with another Hollywood union, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. The boards of both groups have approved the merger, and ballots will be sent to members of each union.

"As one union, SAG-AFTRA will support a future of great entertainment for all of us," Howard said.

___

Associated Press Entertainment Writer Anthony McCartney contributed to this report.

___

Online:

http://www.sagawards.com

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/celebrity/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120130/ap_en_mo/us_sag_awards

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Picture of the Day (talking-points-memo)

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In Egypt, 1 Year After: One Revolution, Two Perspectives (Time.com)

Twelve months after a popular uprising erupted in Egypt, captivating the world and dislodging its authoritarian President, many in the country question whether the country is on the right path and whether the revolution has delivered on its promise. The unity of last year's revolution has given way to new realities and widening differences among Egyptians.

On the one-year anniversary marking the start of the revolution, I spent the day in Tahrir Square, the symbolic heart of Egypt's struggle for change, asking people what Jan. 25 means to them. Their answers can be categorized into two groups: the anniversary was either about celebrating the revolution or trying to reinvigorate it. (See photos of police and protesters clashing in Cairo.)

The invigorators argue the revolution has not lived up to its potential. They say this Jan. 25 was all about renewing calls for sustained protests against the military to hand over power to a civilian government immediately. Last year, the people had coalesced around this once central demand: the fall of the regime embodied by the departure of the President Hosni Mubarak. The word regime was commonly used but perhaps less understood than it is now. A year later, those critics contend the regime is still very much in place and that the biggest mistake was entrusting the military with the keys to the revolution after it assumed power.

History has yet to write its final chapter on what role the military played in easing Mubarak's departure. But anecdotal evidence, key decisions throughout the year and recent statements by the military, as embodied in the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), suggest it has embraced its newfound role as the country's paramount power over the past year. In a posting on its Facebook page on the eve of the Jan. 25 anniversary, the ruling military council wrote that the "military protected the revolution, stood with its objectives, embraced its demands and promises to fulfill it." The military is operating from a position of strength, observers say.

Political analysts say the military has managed to outmaneuver other forces in the country (Islamists, revolutionary youth, liberals, business elite and even foreign governments) by creating conditions on the ground whereby everybody discreetly feels the military should play a role in safeguarding the political process despite calls for its complete marginalization from political life. (Watch TIME's video "Why They Protest: Egypt, Libya and Syria.")

Antimilitary activists say more than 12,000 civilians have been detained by military tribunals in the past year -- more than the Mubarak era that lasted over 30 years. One year after the President's fall, not a single senior officer in any Egyptian security force has been convicted in the killing of protesters in the 18-day uprising. The trial of the former President was slow to start after the revolution. Since he left office, Mubarak has not spent time in prison, instead remaining under 24-hour medical watch at advanced medical facilities. Lawyers from his defense have been allowed to call hundreds of witnesses, a process that could delay his trial indefinitely. And while Mubarak is granted all of the protections of due process, civilians facing much lesser charges are being tried rapidly in military tribunals. Lawyers, victims and revolutionary groups have questioned the intent of the SCAF or government prosecutors to deliver true justice. Fueling their suspicion is the fact that the entire ruling military council and the country's general prosecutor are among the handful of officials appointed by Mubarak who have remained in power.

But there are signs of hope that the country is changing for the better. Many Islamist politicians and sizable part of the middle class in Egypt say while the pace of reform has been slow, certain gains have been made that are irreversible. Change is tangible. Those celebrating the revolution look at the gains achieved in the past year with optimism that the country is moving in the right direction.

A new parliament is being established. And people are enjoying newfound freedoms of speech, of the media and of the right to protest. There has been an explosion of political parties across the entire political spectrum, from socialists to ultraconservative Islamists. But above all, the relationship between the state and the citizens has changed. "A psychological barrier of fear has been broken," says Wael Ghonim, the young Google executive who rose from obscure activist to the global face of the Egyptian revolution after he and friends started a Facebook page that helped mobilize street protests. There is no going back to the ways of past oppression, he and others say. (See why Egyptians marked their revolution's anniversary with mixed feelings.)

But among the democratic realities that have emerged in post-revolutionary Egypt is the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood and the ultraconservative Salafist movement in mainstream politics. These two parties overwhelmingly won the majority of seats in parliament. Will their mandate from the people be seen as a direct order to challenge the military? Some argue the Islamists are content with the democratic process undertaken by the military because it has paved their way to power. Some Egyptians fear the Brotherhood and the military have cut backroom deals. One popular theory is that the military will move the democratic process at a pace and under conditions favorable to Islamist parties at the expense of the lesser and weaker secular and liberal forces and that, in return, the Islamists will not mobilize their massive street support against the military or hold it accountable for past misdoings.

So whether Egyptians are celebrating or hoping to reinvigorate the revolution, one thing is certain: a year later, the success of that revolution still remains very much in question.

Mohyeldin is a foreign correspondent for NBC News based in Cairo.

Read "How the Islamist Group Became a Force in Egypt's Power Equation."

See the top 10 pictures of 2011.

View this article on Time.com

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UN weighs action on Syria

The Security Council began closed-door negotiations Friday on a new Arab-European draft resolution aimed at resolving the crisis in Syria, but Russia's envoy said he could not back the current language as it stands.

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Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told reporters afterward that the text introduced by new Arab Security Council member Morocco has "red lines" for Moscow, but he's willing to "engage" with the resolution's sponsors.

Churkin said those lines include any indication of sanctions, including an arms embargo. "We need to concentrate on establishing political dialogue," he said.

British Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant later insisted that the text based on the Arab League's recent recommendations for Syria contains no mention of an arms embargo or any other sanctions, and that it received broad support from other council members. "A lot of straw men are being put up," he said.

"We want, as do the Arabs, an unanimous resolution," Lyall Grant said. "Frankly, the time has come where we should be supporting the Arab League efforts."

Video: Syrians say: ?We need intervention!? (on this page)

The U.N. says at least 5,400 people have been killed in a monthslong Syrian government crackdown on civilian protests.

At least 384 children have been killed and virtually the same number have been jailed, the United Nations Children's Fund said. UNICEF spokeswoman Marixie Mercado told Reuters the figures were based on reports by human rights organizations which it judged to be credible.

European diplomats have been meeting this week with diplomats from Arab countries, including Morocco and Qatar, on a resolution that would strongly back an Arab League bid to end the crisis.

French Ambassador Gerard Araud told reporters he expected that a "very determined negotiation process" on the text would start at the ambassador level on Wednesday, one day after the Arab League secretary-general and Qatar's prime minister brief the council on the situation in Syria.

"There is now a chance that the Security Council will finally take a clear stand on Syria. That is long overdue," German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said Friday at the General Affairs Council in Brussels. The comments were provided by the German mission to journalists at the U.N.

"We hope now that council members will seize this new window of opportunity and find common ground," German Ambassador Peter Wittig said before the council met behind closed doors.

Story: Outside Syria's capital, suburbs look like war zone

But, as Churkin indicated, eventual approval is far from guaranteed.

Permanent council members Russia and China used their veto powers last fall to block an earlier European resolution on Syria. On Friday, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov was quoted by the ITAR-Tass news agency as saying Moscow will oppose the new draft U.N. resolution on Syria because it fails to take Kremlin's concerns into account.

South African Ambassador Baso Sangqu said it was important that supporters of the resolution assure other countries, including his, that the draft was not a plan for regime change.

Russia and some other countries believe NATO misused last year's Security Council's resolutions on Libya as a pretext for regime change in that nation.

Syria's U.N. Ambassador Bashar Ja'afari expressed his country's opposition to the new draft resolution saying that "Syria will not be Libya."

Interactive: Young and restless: Demographics fuel Mideast protests (on this page)

Russia has been a strong ally of Syria since Soviet times, when the country was led by the president's father Hafez Assad, and has long supplied Syria with aircraft, missiles, tanks and other modern weapons.

The new Arab-European draft resolution on Syria, obtained by The Associated Press, expresses support of the Arab League's Jan. 22 decision "to facilitate a political transition leading to a democratic, plural political system."

The draft does not explicitly mention sanctions, but calls for the adoption of unspecified "further measures, in consultation with the League of Arab States," if Syria does not comply within 15 days.

The draft also condemns the "continued widespread and gross violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms by the Syrian authorities" and demands that the Syrian government immediately stop all human rights violations.

The Arab League earlier this month sent observers to Syria, but the mission was widely criticized for failing to stop the violence. Gulf states led by Saudi Arabia pulled out of the mission Tuesday, asking the Security Council to intervene because the Syrian government has not halted its crackdown.

The head of Arab League observers in Syria said in a statement that violence in the country has spiked over the past few days. Sudanese Gen. Mohammed Ahmed al-Dabi said the cities of Homs, Hama and Idlib have all witnessed a "very high escalation" in violence since Tuesday.

Meanwhile, militiamen loyal to Assad killed at least 10 people on Friday in Syria's main commercial and industrial hub of Aleppo after pro-democracy demonstrations erupted in the city and broke months of quiet, activists said.

The killings, the deadliest in the city during the 10-month uprising against 41 years of Assad family rule, occurred in the tribal Marjeh neighborhood after security forces fired at a rally demanding Assad's removal, they said.

Some activists said the 10 killed were all demonstrators while others said most were killed in clashes that followed the shooting on the protest.

There was no comment from the Syrian authorities, which restricts media access in the country.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46160189/ns/world_news-mideast_n_africa/

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Fujifilm X10

The Fujifilm X10 ($599.95 direct) may look like an older camera on the outside, but it's a purely digital point-and-shoot with some nice features that photographers should appreciate. Along with the X100 and recently announced X-Pro1, the camera is part of Fuji's X series?a group of unique cameras that are aimed at enthusiasts. The X10 is set apart from other point-and-shoots by its larger image sensor, bright optical viewfinder, abundant physical controls, and Raw shooting capability. It doesn't manage to oust the Canon PowerShot S100 ($429.99, 4.5 stars) as our Editor's Choice for high-end compacts, but if you're looking for a zooming compact with a good optical viewfinder, the camera is worth consideration.

Design and Features
From a distance, the X10 could easily be mistaken for a 1970s-era 35mm camera. Its all-black finish and optical viewfinder fit the bill, but the camera's disguise is betrayed by the modern rear LCD and an abundance of button and dials. It's a bit larger than most compact cameras, measuring 2.7 by 4.6 by 2.2 inches (HWD) and weighing in at 12.3 ounces. The Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX5 ($499.99, 3.5 stars), which delivers a similar zoom range but lacks an optical finder, is only 2.6 by 4.3 by 1.7 inches and a bit lighter at 9.5 ounces.

Unlike most modern cameras, the X10 lacks a power switch. To turn the camera on, you must remove the lens cap and twist the lens away from its Off position. You also twist the lens to change its focal length?there are no power zoom controls like on other compact cameras. This gives you more control over the zoom action, but also makes the camera a bit awkward to use?especially if you're shooting via the optical viewfinder. Other cameras in this class have optical finders, including the Canon PowerShot G12 ($499.99, 2.5 stars), but they are generally much smaller and don't lend themselves to regular use.

The viewfinder is bright and clear enough for regular use, but it is not without its foibles. It doesn't cover the entirety of the frame, only about 80 percent, so for tightly-composed photos you'll probably want to use the rear LCD. It is also without any sort of information display. There is no focus confirmation, so you'll have to place your trust in the camera's autofocus system. By default, the camera uses a center focusing point, although you can change that manually. If you use something other than center as the point, it's up to you to remember where in the frame the camera is focusing and translate that to a position in the finder.

Placing trust in the autofocus is not something to be worried about?I was able to raise the camera to my eye for quick street shots and the X10 nailed the focus quickly and consistently. There is an option to have the camera make an audible beep when focus is locked, but street shooters are likely to disable this. There is no way to separate the focus confirm beep and the shutter sound clip, which is unfortunate as the desire to have an audible confirmation of focus lock does not go hand-in-hand with that to have the camera play a fake shutter noise when a photo is snapped.

I also found that using the zoom lens and the optical finder together could be a bit awkward. My hand would generally get in the way of the finder when adjusting the focal length, which makes grabbing quick shots difficult. I also inadvertently added fingerprints to the front of the finder when operating the zoom on several occasions, which very noticeably affected its clarity.

The 4x zoom lens is the equivalent of a 28-112mm f/2-2.8 in 35mm photography. It's a very sensible zoom range?although it lacks the telephoto reach needed for sports, birding, and similar applications. Other top-end compacts feature similar zoom ranges and fast lenses, although the Nikon Coolpix P7100 ($499.95, 4 stars) leads the pack with a 7.1x (28-200mm f/2.8-5.6) lens. The camera has a very nice macro mode to allow you to focus on objects that are very close to the lens. Enabling it also enables the rear LCD, as you cannot get accurate framing with the optical finder when shooting on a close object due to parallax. This is true for any camera that has a viewing lens that is offset from its taking lens.

The X10's rear LCD isn't the best in its class. It is 2.8 inches in size, a bit smaller than the 3-inch displays?that are par for the course in this class of camera, but does offer the same 460k dot resolution that is common to the Canon PowerShot S100, Panasonic LX5, and Canon G12. Both the Nikon P7100 and the Samsung TL500 ($449, 3 stars) offer 921k dot screens. The X10's LCD is bright, so you won't have any trouble using it on a sunny day?and the optical finder is there if you're in a situation where glare cannot be avoided?but it's easier to confirm critical focus on a higher-resolution display.

You'll find a number of physical controls on the X10. The top-mounted Mode Dial allows you to toggle between shooting modes, and another dial makes it easy to dial in EV compensation from -2 EV to +2 EV in third-stop increments. The shutter button features a standard thread, which makes it possible to add a soft release button or to use a manually shutter release cable to grab a photo. Rear controls include a 4-Way Command Dial, AE-L/AF-L, and a button to switch from JPG to Raw shooting for a single shot. There is also a standard rear command dial which will adjust aperture in A mode, shutter speed in S mode, and can be used to navigate through menus.

The menu system isn't the most intuitive; in my testing, some of the settings were a bit hard to find. The Raw shooting mode is actually located in the Settings area rather than the Shooting Menu where I'm used to seeing it. Once the initial setup is complete you won't have to spend a lot of time diving into menus?there are enough physical controls so you can avoid that. The X10 also supports a few film emulation modes, including Provia, Velvia, and Astia film stocks as well as a few different black and white shooting modes.

Even though the 2/3-inch image sensor in the X10 is larger than those found in most point-and-shoots, it is smaller than that found in interchangeable lens cameras like the Nikon J1 ($649.95, 3.5 stars), Olympus E-PM1 ($499.99, 4 stars), and our Editors' Choice, the Sony Alpha NEX-C3 ($649.99, 4.5 stars)?all of which are similarly priced to the X10. The main reason to opt for a compact over one of these mirrorless shooters is portability. Larger lenses are required to capture enough light to cover larger image sensors, where a compact camera like the X10 is able to get the job done with a much smaller lens. Canon's recently announced G1 X ($799.99) is set to change this a bit, as its sensor is larger than that of a Micro Four Thirds camera, but the camera itself is only slightly larger than the X10.

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ScienceOnline2012 Sci-Art Show: The Winners

Already announced by Karyn Traphagen on the ScienceOnline2012 blog, I?m taking another look at the winners of the first ScienceOnline Science-Art Show.

Artwork at a science communication conference in many ways should be a no-brainer: visuals are often left as frills and afterthoughts in blog posts, books and articles. But a strong image can viscerally commubicate, educate and inspire. I?ll write more about the impact all these artists and an art show had on ScienceOnline in coming days. ?For now, ?I?ve included some commentary that represents my own thinking about each piece, and what made these stand out.

With $100 prizes generously donated by Rob Dunn and the Your Wild Life Lab, the winners are:?

Most Innovative

? Kalliopi Monoyios

Kalliopi Monoyios for Science Cover

Here we have the visualization process that takes place in science all shown in one image. ?Kalliopi simultaneously shows the nuts and bolts of creating an image from evidence, through the sketch to the refined head of Tiktaalik, and wove the mystery-animal-coming-into-focus story into the composition itself.

?

? Alicia Hunsicker

Alicia Hunsicker for Transfusion

Hunsicker gives is the branches of thought, the branching arteries and systems of the body and the botanical branches of the environment all together: Is the figure transfused with a sense of nature? Is a dead body transfusing nutrients to the forest? ?Mysterious and haunting ? or joyful?- this painting asks us to ask questions.

?

Best able to convey complex ideas

? Lynn Fellman

Lynn Fellman for Crossing Beringia

The story of humans crossing the land-bridges from Asia to North American is one we can discover anew, through genetic comparison. Lynn Fellman combines maps, DNA sequences, a sense of prehistory?s flow in the colours, and above all, a human face. These were people who made the journey, and Fellman prompts us to remember that while teasing out genetic clues to one of the greatest journeys of our species.?

? Perrin Ireland

Perrin Ireland for Brain Atlas 4

Research notes that would?ve made da Vinci proud.? Perrin Ireland?s sketchnotes were a massively popular activity at the conference, and this example from her Brain Atlas project makes it easy to see why: science is communicated in accessible, energizing illustration and living text that compels you to read it. Reeeead it.

Best science art having to do with daily life

? Nathaniel Gold

Nathaniel Gold for Anarchy

Nathaniel Gold, who regularly illustrates Eric Johnson?s The Primate Diaries here on the Scientific American Blog Network, ?creates the ultimate in teenaged apathy and anger in this piece, Anarchy. The figure is in a casual posture, belying the shirt and title, and like a chimpanzee or an real teen, that mood can shift in an instant: the anarchy of being on the cusp of maturity.

? Emily Damstra

Emily Damstra for Earthworm Dissection

Raise your hand if you?ve actually done one of these before. ?Emily Damstra makes the messy neat and the icky clinical in this sharp, realistic unlabelled scientific illustration. It?s the complexity inside every worm seen on the way to work in the spring, every one on a hook. And Damstra made it beautiful.
* *

?

After viewing and judging the astounding array of artistic astonishments, we decided to to create the Judges Special Awards, for works that really stood out but did not fit into the categories above. These winners will be receiving artwork from me, that I donated to the conference.

Judges Special Awards

? Diana Marques

Diana Marques for Chameleon

The detail is amazing, the chameleon is charming. ?Marques, along with Monoyios and Damstra above, are some of the heavy-hitting professional scientific illustrators who submitted to the contest, and this chameleon astounded me. I even kinda like the watermarks in the background, and I?m no fan of big watermarks.

? Susan Ashley

Susan Ashley for Eclipse

Susan Ashley?s submissions caught me off-guard. One of many people chosen for the gallery who was completely not on my radar before ?I saw her submissions, this one was created in part by using LED lights, which is something you don?t see in a typical folksy assemblage.

?

? Kaitlin Beckett

Kaitlin Beckett for Pilotfish

I?m tempted just to say Kaitlin Beckett is one of my favourite living artists in any genre or capacity and leave it at that. But what makes Pilotfish stand out is the?sinister?charm of these coldly unethical bioengineers clearly bent to a purpose ? a purpose that leads them to leave the water and take to the grim skies. I for one, bow to out Pilotfish overlords.

You can see the whole show here.

Will we do it again next year? ?Change a few things? ?I think the show overall came out well, and Karyn and I have already exchanged a flurry of emailed suggestions to make next years even more vital and exciting.
What do you think of the show, in person, online?
Did it suit the conference?
Are these your picks?
What?s your favourite and why?

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Poll ruling sparks street clashes in Senegal (Reuters)

DAKAR (Reuters) ? Protesters hurled rocks at police who retaliated with tear gas in Senegal's capital Dakar on Friday after a top legal body said President Abdoulaye Wade had the right to run for a third term in elections next month.

Reuters reporters saw youths set fire to tires in the street and overturn cars after a late-night ruling of the West African country's Constitutional Council.

Rivals to 85-year-old Wade say the constitution sets an upper limit of two terms on the president. Wade, who came to power in 2000 and was re-elected in 2007, has argued his first term pre-dated the 2001 amendment establishing the limit.

"Stop these displays of petulance which will lead to nothing," Wade, 85, told state television in an appeal for calm.

"The electoral campaign will be open. There will be no restrictions on freedom," said Wade, who faces 13 rivals in the February 26 election.

The Council validated 13 other candidates but rejected the presidential bid of world music star Youssou N'Dour, determining he had not gathered the necessary 10,000 valid signatures backing his candidacy.

It said authorities had been unable to identify around 4,000 of some 12,000 signatures gathered by N'Dour.

"The decision of the Constitutional Council has nothing to do with the law," said N'Dour campaign manager Alioune N'Diaye.

"It is purely political. Youssou N'Dour was a problem and they wanted to be shot of him," he told Reuters, adding that N'Dour planned an appeal.

All of the five judges on the Council are by law appointed by the president.

THREAT TO PEACE

The centrist Wade will face rivals including Socialist Party leader Ousmane Tanor Dieng and three ex-prime ministers - Idrissa Seck, Macky Sall and Moustapha Niasse.

Senegal is the only country in mainland West Africa to have not had a coup since the end of the colonial era. February's poll, and a possible run-off a few weeks later, are seen as major test of social peace in the predominantly Muslim country.

"We are here to protest against Wade," Yero Toure, a 26-year-old student at an opposition rally of a couple of thousand people in central Dakar. "If they don't reject him the people will rise up against him."

Critics say that Wade, who spent 26 years in opposition to Socialist rule, has done nothing during his 12 years in power to alleviate poverty in a country where formal employment is scarce, while dragging his heels on tackling official graft.

Wade points to increased spending on education and infrastructure projects such as roadbuilding as proof of his aim of turning Senegal into an emerging market country and a regional trade hub.

His candidacy has been controversial from the start, with rivals suspecting him of seeking to secure a new seven-year mandate only to hand over mid-term to his financier son Karim - who already has a "superministry" in the government. Both father and son have denied such a plan.

Wade backed down last June on planned changes to election rules after clashes between security forces and protesters who alleged the reforms were an attempt to ensure his victory.

His candidacy has raised eyebrows abroad. The senior U.S. State Department official for Africa, William Fitzgerald, told French RFI radio this month Washington viewed it as "a bit regrettable".

"From our point of view it was the right moment to go into retirement, to protect and support a good transition - democratically, peacefully, safely," Fitzgerald said.

(Writing and additional reporting by Mark John Editing by Maria Golovnina and Angus MacSwan)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/energy/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120128/wl_nm/us_senegal_election

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In original Internet shows, hints of coming change (AP)

NEW YORK ? After years of experimenting, the top video destinations on the Web are suddenly flush with original programming: documentaries, reality shows and scripted series.

Over the next few months, YouTube, Netflix and Hulu will roll out their most ambitious original programming yet ? a digital push into a traditional television business that has money, a bevy of stars and a bold attitude of reinvention.

The long-predicted collision between Internet video and broadcast television is finally under way.

No one is suggesting that the quality on the Internet is close to that of broadcast TV, but it's becoming easy to imagine a day when it will be.

And even though critics question whether new media can rival a business that's been around for about 70 years, the video sites have sought partnerships with seasoned professionals. And they benefit from the different economics of global Web-based entertainment.

Either way, what's happening now is just the first wave.

"This convergence is now," says documentary filmmaker Morgan Spurlock, who created "The Failure Club," a series about people trying to do the things they've always feared, for Yahoo, and "A Day in the Life," a series documenting 24 hours of someone's life, for Hulu.

He says the quality still varies, but viewers will soon see talent and production values begin to change.

On Feb. 6, Netflix will premiere its first scripted show, "Lilyhammer," in which Steve Van Zandt ("The Sopranos") plays a New York mobster in witness protection in Norway. Later this year, it will release "House of Cards," a highly anticipated adaptation of the British miniseries produced by David Fincher and starring Kevin Spacey. Next year, it will debut new episodes of the cultish comedy "Arrested Development," which originally aired on Fox.

Hulu plans a Feb. 14 premiere for "Battleground," a mock political documentary. The site will later release "Up to Speed," a six-part documentary by Richard Linklater about "monumentally ignored monuments of American cities."

Hulu, which has some 30 million monthly users and 1.5 million for its monthly subscription service Hulu Plus, is co-owned by the parent companies of NBC, Fox and ABC.

Yahoo has sought to capitalize on its enormous search audience of nearly 180 million unique monthly visitors by drawing viewers to its original programming, including a slate of women-focused shows launched last fall and comedy programming planned for February. Its first scripted entry will be "Electric City," a futuristic animated series produced by Tom Hanks, who will also voice a character.

YouTube recently launched an entire catalog of original programming, spending $100 million on the gradual rollout of more than 100 niche-oriented channels.

The channels don't have the pressures of a 24-hour schedule and instead focus on short-form, on-demand programming. Partners vary from the Wall Street Journal to World Wrestling Entertainment to Madonna.

At the recent consumer electronics trade show CES, YouTube's global head of content predicted that by 2020 about 75 percent of channels will be transmitted by the Internet. And video will soon be 90 percent of all traffic.

"Over time, you will see more and more television properties, television channels distributed over the Internet," Robert Kyncl said. "Everything in its due time."

Internet delivery allows programming that is "much harder to fulfill through traditional distribution means...because we have a global scale," Kyncl added.

And online systems can serve niche audiences that would be difficult to sustain any other way, and do so at lower cost.

YouTube plans to expand to hundreds of Internet channels, just as television went from a few networks to dozens of cable channels. In the next few years, "most of your interests will have channels on YouTube," Kyncl predicts.

Netflix, which streamed 2 billion hours of video in the fourth quarter of 2011, is already operating under the assumption that video networks ? whether streaming or televised ? are converging. Just as Web video is undertaking original programming, TV networks are experimenting with systems such as TV Everywhere, which allows viewers to watch channels on the Web and on mobile devices.

"You can think of us as a cable-TV network, but we like to think we are at the center," says Reed Hastings, CEO of Netflix. "We are an Internet TV network, and then they are going to become like us. But it's the same thing, really."

Hastings offers a comparison between Netflix and HBO: "We are becoming more like them in doing some originals, starting that journey, and they are becoming more like us in creating an on-demand interface like HBO Go," which allows viewers to watch channels on the Web and on mobile and tabulate devices.

HBO declined to comment.

Production schedules will vary widely at the sites, but Netflix plans one notable difference: All its episodes will be released at once.

James McQuivey, an analyst at Forrester Research, says the fact that Hanks is making a series for the Internet shows how the traditional TV system is "ready to unravel.

McQuivey says the disruption in video will "unfold in front of us like a slow-mo replay of an accident."

"The new content won't be as good as what you watch Thursday nights from 9 to 10 p.m., but it's going to get closer to that quality," he adds. "And it's certainly as good as what you watch on Thursday from 3 to 4 in the afternoon or Saturday morning from 10 to 11."

Hulu and Netflix both want to use original content to entice viewers to their much larger libraries of older content. For Netflix, that's movies and old TV; for Hulu, that's last night's TV and older series. Hulu executives say any new original series has to be match up to traditional content.

"If you're ever going to do anything original, it's got to stand up to that," says Andy Forssell, senior vice president of content at Hulu. "That can't be `Web video,' it's got to be TV quality."

Original content remains a small percentage of the budget for Hulu, which plans to spend $500 million on content in 2012.

Erin McPherson, head of original programming at Yahoo, likes to call Yahoo "the fifth network." Its Yahoo Studios production house in Los Angeles produces as many as 30 originals a month, often partnering with production companies such as Reveille (NBC's "The Office"). Its original programming attracted more than 26 million unique visitors in November, according to comScore.

"The time is right," says McPherson. "We're finally here."

___

AP Technology Writer Michael Liedtke in San Francisco contributed to this report

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/tv/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120126/ap_en_tv/us_original_online_programming

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Minnesota laying groundwork for gray wolf hunt (Reuters)

MINNEAPOLIS (Reuters) ? Minnesota officials on Thursday outlined plans to permit a hunting season for the gray wolf this year following its removal from federal endangered species protections, prompting opponents of the plan to consider a court challenge.

Minnesota is home to the largest population of gray wolves in the lower 48 states, about 2,900, and could become the first upper Midwest state to set a hunting season for the animals as they are stripped of federal protections.

Federal officials have withdrawn safeguards under the Endangered Species Act effective Friday, allowing states to decide whether or not to allow the gray wolf to be hunted.

There are about 4,000 gray wolves in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Michigan and adjacent states losing protections. Hunting seasons have not yet been proposed in Wisconsin or Michigan.

Federal court challenges brought by the Humane Society and other groups overturned de-listing bids by the fish and wildlife service in 2007 and 2009.

The Humane Society opposed the latest de-listing, opposes the hunting season and is considering another court challenge, Howard Goldman, the Minnesota state director of the Humane Society, said Thursday in a telephone interview.

"We are looking at the legal side and the biology," Goldman said. "We don't believe the wolf has recovered nationally. It only occupies 5 percent of its historic range."

Wolves were hunted to the edge of extinction nationwide, but populations have recovered to the point of conflict between ranchers, farmers and hunters who see them as a threat to livestock and big-game animals such as deer.

A separate population of about 1,200 wolves in Montana and Idaho were removed from the endangered species list last year under an unprecedented act of Congress.

There were fewer than 750 gray wolves in Minnesota in the 1950s. The population had grown to about 2,900 by the late 1990s, a level that has not changed significantly since, according to state natural resources department estimates.

Minnesota state officials plan to allow 400 gray wolves to be killed in a hunting season in late November and believe the population could sustain a higher quota. They discussed the plans with state lawmakers in committee hearings on Thursday.

(Reporting By David Bailey)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/pets/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120127/us_nm/us_minnesota_wolves_hunting

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Spacetime Studios bringing Dark Legends to Android

Spacetime Studios, creators of Pocket Legends and Star Legends, are returning to Android with their latest creation; Dark Legends. Release for this taste of the undead is currently slated for Q1 2012. 

The gameplay of Dark Legends is said to draw the player deeper into the experience. Boasting a combat system that features new mechanics such as charge attacks and the ability to drain enemies.

The game will also be more focused on the narrative aspect, and will offer the ability to complete quick action missions with a single tap. Such missions feature cut-scenes that become linked together to create a storybook where the player experiences the life of a vampire up close and personal.

The game is said to open with your character recently 'raised' and being watched over by the vampire that created them. The existance of vampires has been exposed and the humans are uniting to exterminate them all. You must work with your clan to survive. 

The previous games from Spacetime have been downloaded over 7 million times and offer players such a high level of gaming quality. There's no reason to suspect Dark Legends will be any different. It is due to be shown off for the first time at GDC 2012. 

via Marketwatch; More: Spacetime Studios

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/XxhGfhVruwQ/story01.htm

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Well: In Rating Pain, Women Are the More Sensitive Sex

Do women feel more pain than men?

It has long been known that certain pain-related conditions, like fibromyalgia, migraine and irritable bowel syndrome, are more common in women than in men. And chronic pain after childbirth is surprisingly common; the Institute of Medicine recently found that 18 percent of women who have Caesarean deliveries and 10 percent who have vaginal deliveries report still being in pain a year later.

But new research from Stanford University suggests that even when men and women have the same condition ? whether it?s a back problem, arthritis or a sinus infection ? women appear to suffer more from the pain.

There is an epidemic of chronic pain: Last year, the Institute of Medicine estimated that it afflicts 116 million Americans, far more than previously believed. But these latest findings, believed to be the largest study ever to compare pain levels in men and women, raise new questions about whether women are shouldering a disproportionate burden of chronic pain and suggest a need for more gender-specific pain research.

The study, published Monday in The Journal of Pain, analyzes data from the electronic medical records of 11,000 patients whose pain scores were recorded as a routine part of their care. (To obtain pain scores, doctors ask patients to describe their pain on a scale from 0, for no pain, to 10, ?worst pain imaginable.?)

For 21 of 22 ailments with sample sizes large enough to make a meaningful comparison, the researchers found that women reported higher levels of pain than men. For back pain, women reported a score of 6.03, men 5.53. For joint and inflammatory pain, it was women 6.00, men 4.93. Women reported significantly higher pain levels with diabetes, hypertension, ankle injuries and even sinus infections.

For several diagnoses, women?s average pain score was at least one point higher than men?s, which is considered a clinically meaningful difference. Over all, their pain levels were about 20 percent higher than men?s.

Unfortunately, the data don?t offer any clues as to why women report higher pain levels. One possibility is that men have been socialized to be more stoic, so they underreport pain. But the study?s senior author, Dr. Atul Butte, an associate professor at Stanford?s medical school, said that explanation probably did not account for the gender gap.

?While you can imagine such a bias,? he said, ?across studies, across thousands of patients, it?s hard to believe men are like this. You have to think about biological causes for the difference.?

An extensive 2007 report by the International Association for the Study of Pain cited studies showing that sex hormones may play a role in pain response. In fact, some of the gender differences, particularly regarding headache and abdominal pain, begin to diminish after women reach menopause.

Research also suggests that men and women have different responses to anesthesia and pain drugs, reporting different levels of efficacy and side effects. That bolsters the idea that men and women experience pain differently.

One reason for the lack of information about sex differences is that many pain studies, in both animals and humans, are done only in males. One analysis found that 79 percent of the animal studies published in a pain journal over a decade included only male subjects, compared with 8 percent that used only female animals.

In addition, experiments testing pain in men and women have shown that they typically have different thresholds for various types of pain. In general, women report higher levels of pain from pressure and electrical stimulation, and less pain when the source is from heat.

Melanie Thernstrom, a patient representative on the Institute of Medicine pain committee from Vancouver, Wash., said the newest research ?really highlights the need for more treatment and better treatment that is gender-specific, and the need for far more research to really understand why women?s brains process pain differently than men.?

Some researchers believe the pain experience for women may be even more complicated. Women who have given birth, for instance, may have a different threshold for ?worst pain ever,? causing them to underreport certain types of pain. The bottom line, Dr. Butte said, is that far too little is known about how men and women experience pain and that more study is needed so that, ultimately, pain treatment can be customized to each patient?s needs.

?If doctors have a threshold for when they give a dose or start a medication,? he said, ?you could imagine that the number they are using is too high or too low because a person may be in more pain than they are saying.

?In the end, it comes down to what the brain perceives as pain.?

Source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=9930b456c1e56b4cc784dcd3f04497f5

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Tax dodgers on the federal payroll: By the numbers (The Week)

New York ? Nearly 100,000 government workers owe a collective $1 billion in unpaid 2010 taxes ? including employees at the Treasury Department and Government Ethics Office

As Congress and the White House cast about for ways to shrink the yawning U.S. budget deficit, they could do worse than starting with a few stern words for their own staffs. According to IRS data crunched by The Washington Post, almost 100,000 employees of Congress, the West Wing, and several other federal agencies were collectively about $1 billion short in paying their 2010 taxes. That's "totally unacceptable and disrespectful," says Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), who's pushing a bill to make tax delinquency a firable offense for federal workers. "If you're on the federal payroll, the very least you can do is pay your taxes." Here, a by-the-numbers look at the federal bureaucracy's tax problem:

$114.2 billion
Unpaid 2010 taxes, interest, and penalties for all Americans

SEE MORE: Why the GOP caved in the payroll tax fight: 4 theories

?

$1.03 billion
Amount that 98,291 federal, postal, and congressional employees owe in unpaid 2010 taxes

$32 million
Increase from 2009 to 2010 in delinquent federal employee taxes owed

SEE MORE: The payroll tax shell game

?

745
Decrease from 2009 to 2010 in number of federal employees with unpaid taxes

$10.6 million
Unpaid 2010 taxes for 684 congressional staffers

SEE MORE: Will the payroll tax fight shut down the government?

?

$833,970
Unpaid 2010 taxes for 36 White House employees

$111 million
Unpaid 2010 taxes for 29,482 active duty military personnel

SEE MORE: Americans don't really want spending cuts

?

$265.1 million
Unpaid 2010 taxes for all civilian Army, Navy, Air Force, and Pentagon workers

0.96
Tax delinquency rate, in percent, at the Treasury Department, which houses the IRS. That's the lowest rate of any agency studied.

SEE MORE: Will the House GOP kill the payroll tax break?

?

$9.3 million
Unpaid 2010 taxes for 1,181 delinquent Treasury employees

9.43
Tax delinquency rate, in percent, at the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation ? the highest rate of any agency studied

SEE MORE: Congress' 'wild final month': 5 predictions for December

?

$18,218
Unpaid taxes for five delinquent Council on Historic Preservation employees

2.25
Delinquency rate, in percent, at U.S. Tax Court. Five employees owe a total of $62,508.

SEE MORE: The payroll tax cut deal: 3 reasons the GOP caved

?

6.49
Delinquency rate, in percent, at the U.S. Office of Government Ethics. Five employees owe a combined $22,160.

Sources: Federal Times, NPR, Washington Post (2)

SEE MORE: The deal averting a government shutdown: Who achieved what?

?

View this article on TheWeek.com
Get The budget: Is the GOP's plan to cut $32 billion enough?

Opinion Brief: Is Obama's 2012 budget 'irrelevant?'

Opinion Brief: Is Obama too 'weak' to tackle the deficit?

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Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/oped/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/theweek/20120124/cm_theweek/223605

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Publicize your every want with Shopography iPhone app (Appolicious)

Should your Amazon Universal Wishlist not be enough to hammer home what you desire for an upcoming present-receiving occasion, there?s now Shopography, an app for iPhone and iPod Touch that lets you add items to a wish list with your device?s camera. Although I don?t dislike Shopography?s concept, I hate just about everything else about the app.

To use Shopography, you?ll need an account, creatable in-app. It requires your full first and last name. Against my better judgment, I provided this to Shopography. Indeed, your full name will appear on your profile, viewable to all other app users. Dislike. Shopography has users scan an item?s barcode and then state whether they ?want? or ?got? the item. Scanning a UPC or piggybacking on items already added to the service are the only ways to add an item to your feed. The scanner works well, mostly ? the app did glitch out after my phone had gone to sleep for a while ? and might be the only thing I like from Shopography, only because it recognized all of my scanned items.

Because I created an account, I was able to see what specific users had posted. There is no way to delete something you?ve scanned, as I found out when I flooded Shopography?s feed with two items multiple times ? an accident, I swear. When you add an item, you?re also asked to rate where the item falls in terms of being cool or lame or cheap or pricey. I thought I was editing this rating, but instead I was publishing an item over and over. You can opt to share your item to Facebook or Twitter so your friends are privy to your every desire, and you can also add a comment about what the item is, or why you want it.

Of course, there is a social aspect to Shopography where you can follow and be followed by other users. Based on the user photos, this network populous is on the young side, too (another reason why full names is a bad idea), so I?m not sure how well matched users will be. From the speed of the recent feed?s updates, there aren?t many active users anyway.

So. Mediocre scanning, no privacy, no editing and no option to delete add up to a bad bet for buyers. Stick with the usual suspects for sharing your wants and needs.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/applecomputer/*http%3A//us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/external/appolicious_rss/rss_appolicious_tc/http___www_appolicious_com_articles10851_publicize_your_every_want_with_shopography_iphone_app/44288395/SIG=136losqaj/*http%3A//www.appolicious.com/tech/articles/10851-publicize-your-every-want-with-shopography-iphone-app

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Office Supply Monolith Is Perfect Desk Minimalism [Design]

If you can ever have one thing where you used to have many things, you've accomplished good design. The Lexon Mini Totem does just that, curbing desktop sprawl with stackable items you can arrange how you want. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/ijCdwwwiMoc/office-supply-monolith-is-perfect-desk-minimalism

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Romney looks to hit back at Gingrich in Florida

Republican presidential candidate, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich speaks at The River Church, Monday, Jan. 23, 2012, in Tampa, Fla. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Republican presidential candidate, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich speaks at The River Church, Monday, Jan. 23, 2012, in Tampa, Fla. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, holds a discussion on housing and foreclosure, Monday,Jan. 23, 2012, in Tampa, Fla. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

Republican presidential candidate, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, arrives at PGT Industries in North Venice, Fla., Monday, Jan. 23, 2012. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) ? Unwilling to wait for an evening debate, Republican presidential rivals Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich got a head start on the squabbling on Monday in a campaign turning more caustic by the day.

Romney, trounced by Gingrich in last weekend's weekend South Carolina primary, began airing a harshly critical new campaign ad and said the former House speaker had engaged in "potentially wrongful activity" with the consulting work he did after leaving Congress in the late 1990s.

Gingrich retorted that Romney was a candidate who was campaigning on openness yet "has released none of his business records."

He followed up two hours before the debate by arranging the release of a contract his former consulting firm had with the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. for a retainer of $25,000 per month in 2006, or a total for the year of $300,000. The agreement called for "consulting and related services."

Despite Romney's attempts to call Gingrich a lobbyist, the contract makes no mention of lobbying.

Aside from Romney and Gingrich, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum and Texas Rep. Ron Paul had spots on the debate stage for the first of two encounters scheduled before the Jan. 31 Florida primary.

Increasingly, though, the race for the nomination appeared to be a two-way competition between the former Massachusetts governor and the one-time speaker of the House.

After relying on allies to make most of the attacks on his rivals earlier in the campaign, Romney unleashed a commercial that went straight at Gingrich.

"While Florida families lost everything in the housing crisis, Newt Gingrich cashed in," the TV ad says, noting that the former speaker made more than $1.6 million working for Freddie Mac. "Gingrich resigned from Congress in disgrace and then cashed in as a D.C. insider."

Gingrich never registered as a lobbyist, but said he was a consultant for Freddie Mac, the federally backed mortgage company that played a significant role in the housing crisis.

It remains to be seen if Romney can effectively use his newly aggressive stance on the debate stage, a forum in which Gingrich has excelled so far. Underfunded and overmatched by Romney's massive ground game across the country, Gingrich has relied upon strong debate performances to build support.

It appears Romney has brought in outside help to improve his debate technique.

Veteran debate coach Brett O'Donnell was spotted at a Romney campaign stop on Monday. He previously advised President George W. Bush and GOP nominee John McCain and was a senior adviser and speech writer for Michele Bachmann's abbreviated campaign.

Gingrich showed no signs of backing down.

During an appearance on ABC's "Good Morning America," he referred to Romney as "somebody who has released none of his business records, who has decided to make a stand on transparency without being transparent." After initially balking, Romney is set to release personal tax records on Tuesday.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2012-01-23-Republicans-Debate/id-ae332c6ba8234cebbdb3b555763a8a28

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Poland reviews stance on treaty after web attacks (AP)

WARSAW, Poland ? Poland's government went into defense mode on Monday after a network of online activists paralyzed government websites in opposition to Warsaw's plans to sign an international copyright treaty.

Poland had originally planned to sign the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, or ACTA, in Tokyo on Thursday. ACTA is a far-reaching international agreement that would fight copyright infringement and online piracy. Critics fear it could lead to censorship on the Internet.

A Twitter account using the name "AnonymousWiki" announced plans to attack government websites to protest the government's support for ACTA.

Within hours on Sunday, the websites of the prime minister, parliament and other government offices were unreachable or sluggish, the hallmarks of a denial of service attack. The technique works by directing streams of bogus traffic at a website, jamming it in the same way that a telephone line can be overwhelmed by hundreds of prank calls.

In an initial response, government spokesman Pawel Gras on Sunday suggested there hadn't been an attack at all on the sites. "This isn't an attack by hackers, but just the result of huge interest in the sites of the prime minister and parliament," he said, a comment that quickly became a source of ridicule on Facebook and other Internet sites.

By Monday, with the sites still paralyzed, the prime minister and other leaders were holding a meeting to reconsider their stance on the treaty.

"It was a velvet attack by hackers, but still it was an attack. Pawel Gras was wrong," said Slawomir Neumann, a lawmaker with the government Civic Platform party. Neumann said the situation showed that the Polish government is poorly prepared to handle such attacks.

And Michal Boni, the minister for administration and digitization, acknowledged in a radio interview Monday that the government had failed to hold enough consultations with the public on the matter.

An opposition party, the Democratic Left Alliance, also called on the government to not sign in it in a gesture of solidarity with those who warn it could hurt Internet freedom.

Anonymous, the group suspected of involvement in the attacks, made a number of threats before and during the Internet disruptions.

"Dear Polish government, we will continue to disrupt and interfere with your government official websites until the 26th. Do not pass ACTA," one tweet by AnonymousWiki said.

It also threatened more trouble should Poland sign ACTA.

"We have dox files and leaked documentations on many Poland officials, if ACTA is passed, we will release these documents," AnonymousWiki said in a separate tweet.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/tech/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120123/ap_on_hi_te/eu_poland_websites_attacked

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Prison Planet.com ? Cancer Drugs Make Tumors More Aggressive ...

Prisonplanet.com
January 22, 2012

Guest Mike Adams of NaturalNews.com discusses breakthrough research that suggests chemotherapy can be more dangerous than helpful, as findings show it can multiply the chances of tumors and the presence of cancer in patients.

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Source: http://www.prisonplanet.com/cancer-drugs-make-tumors-more-aggressive-infowars-nightly-news.html

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In SC, Romney says he'll win some, lose some (AP)

GREENVILLE, S.C. ? Mitt Romney is heading into primary day conceding that he'll win some and lose some.

Romney on Friday acknowledged the contest here is "neck-and-neck" and said he expects to lose "some primaries" to rival Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker.

As voters head to the polls Saturday, Romney and Gingrich both planned to appear at the same breakfast restaurant in the morning. Both campaigns refused to change their schedules Friday night, potentially setting up a face-off between the two men ahead of the polls closing.

The past week has been an abrupt reversal of fortune for the former Massachusetts governor, who landed here last Wednesday after a big victory in New Hampshire and what was then a narrow win in Iowa.

But this week the Iowa GOP reversed his win there after problems with the vote count, and he's been dogged by questions about releasing his tax returns. And instead of emerging from South Carolina with three wins and a seeming lock on the GOP nomination, Romney and his team are now acknowledging they could lose here. That would leave the putative front-runner with just one early state win heading into Florida's Jan. 31 primary.

Romney's campaign planned at least two campaign stops Saturday ahead of polls closing. He planned to visit his campaign headquarters and Tommy's Country Ham House, where Gingrich also planned to stop. Romney was to end the day in Columbia, the state capital.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/politics/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120121/ap_on_el_pr/us_romney

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