Solar Plane Lands in Ariz., 1st Leg of Major Trip

A solar-powered airplane landed in Phoenix early Saturday morning after flight from California that included several hours in the air after sundown.
The Solar Impulse set down about 12:30 a.m. at Sky Harbor Airport after flying, completing the first leg of a planned cross-country trip that its co-pilot described as a "milestone" in aviation history.
The Solar Impulse — considered the world's most-advanced sun-powered plane — left Moffett Field in Mountain View near San Francisco just after dawn Friday.
Its creators said the trip is the first attempt by a solar airplane capable of flying day and night without fuel to fly across America.
Video posted on the expedition's website showed a smiling pilot Bertrand Piccard shortly after landing as he waved to wellwishers and held up a flag emblazoned with the Solar Impulse name.
"It's a little bit like being in a dream," Piccard said as he stepped on the tarmac.

From Phoenix, it plans to travel to Dallas-Fort Worth airport in Texas, Lambert-St. Louis airport, Dulles airport in the Washington area and New York's John F. Kennedy airport. Each flight leg will take about 19 to 25 hours, with 10-day stops in each city.
"All the big pioneers of the 20th century have tried to fly coast to coast across America," co-pilot and one of the plane's founders, Piccard, said before the flight. "So now today we're trying to do this, but on solar power with no fuel with the first airplane that is able to fly day and night just on solar power."
The plane is powered by about 12,000 photovoltaic cells that cover massive wings and charge its batteries.
The delicate, single-seat Solar Impulse flies around 40 mph and can't go through clouds. It weighs about as much as a car, making it vulnerable to bad weather.
Its creators said solar planes will never replace fuel-powered commercial flights. But the goal is to showcase the potential of solar power.
"What we look for is to have a new milestone in this very exciting history of aviation that can attract interest of the people, of the political world, of the media and show that with renewable energies and clean technology for energy efficiency, we can achieve impossible things," Piccard said.
The plane has previously impressed audiences in Europe.

SOURCE : http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/solar-plane-lands-ariz-1st-leg-major-trip-19107916#.UYTr0ko4rFw

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Google Glass 'will soon support iPhone texts and navigation'

Google Glass users will reportedly soon be able to connect to text and navigation services using their iPhone.

A source within Google told TechCrunch that the device could also work independent of a phone in the future.

© Google

Google Glass

At present, several features on Google Glass rely on the Android Glass Companion app, which allows connection to texts and navigation features from the Android device.

Glass is not able to connect to the internet independently, requiring a tethering plan on a phone or local WiFi to reach its full potential. This is already possible for iPhone users but it does not allow Glass to tap into the non-web related features.

The report also suggests that Glass could get its own GPS receiver once it moves out of beta and into the general public, enabling it to be fully independent and functional with any internet source.

See a selection of the first images captured on Google Glass in our gallery below:

Read more: http://www.digitalspy.com/tech/news/a478827/google-glass-will-soon-support-iphone-texts-and-navigation.html#ixzz2SJxKjZVp

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PepsiCo drops Lil Wayne from Mountain Dew deal

PepsiCo has ended a deal with Lil Wayne to promote soft drinks brand Mountain Dew.

The move follows controversy over rapper Wayne's lyrics referring to civil rights martyr Emmett Till, The AP reports.

© PA Images / Jordan Strauss / AP

Lil Wayne promotes his TRUKFIT clothing line

Till was attacked and killed in 1955. The 14-year-old Mississippi resident was targeted for reportedly flirting with a white woman.

The lyric in question appeared on Future's 'Karate Chop', on which guest Wayne raps: "Beat that p***y up like Emmett Till."

Till's family were among those to condemn the lyric and criticized PepsiCo's partnership with Wayne.

Reverend Wheeler Parker Junior, who is Till's cousin and witness to his abduction, said: "It's mindboggling to me that they partnered with him in the first place.

"Major corporations should scrutinize who they endorse, don't let greed or money determine who you sponsor."

In a statement, PepsiCo said that Wayne's "offensive reference to a revered civil rights icon" does not reflect the values of the brand. The company declined to comment further.

© PA Images / Gerald Herbert / AP

Lil Wayne at a skateboard park he helped to fund

© WENN / FayesVision/WENN.com

Wayne's publicist Sarah Cunningham said that the deal fell apart due to "creative differences", but added that it was "amicable".

This is the second race-related controversy the Mountain Dew brand has been involved in this week.

PepsiCo was forced to withdraw a Mountain Dew advert created by Tyler the Creator after outcry over its alleged racist and misogynistic overtones.

Read more: http://www.digitalspy.com/music/news/a478837/pepsico-drops-lil-wayne-from-mountain-dew-deal.html#ixzz2SJwkqhaC

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First woman put on FBI's 'Most Wanted Terrorist' list

 

There are rewards totalling $2m for the capture of Joanne Chesimard 

 

A fugitive convicted killer has become the first woman to be put on the FBI's list of "Most Wanted Terrorists".

Joanne Chesimard, a member of the Black Liberation Army also known as Assata Shakur, fled to Cuba in 1979 after escaping from a prison where she was serving a life sentence for murder.
She is listed as a domestic terrorist on the FBI website, although she is not considered to pose a new threat.
There are rewards totalling $2m (£1.3m) for information leading to her capture.
Chesimard is thought still to be living in Cuba, which does not have an extradition treaty with the US and is believed to be providing shelter to an estimated 70 people sought by the US authorities.
However, in April the Cuban authorities returned a Florida couple who were accused of kidnapping their two young sons after losing a custody battle with the boys' grandparents.
'Flaunts her freedom' Chesimard was a leader of the Black Liberation Army, which the FBI described as a revolutionary extremist organisation responsible for killing more than a dozen US police officers in the 1970s and 1980s.
In 1973, she and two accomplices were stopped on the New Jersey Turnpike by two troopers from the New Jersey State Police. They then opened fire on the troopers, wounding one and killing the other "execution-style" at point-blank range, according to the FBI. One of Chesimard's accomplices died in the shootout; the other remains in jail.
In 1977, Chesimard was sentenced to life in prison after being found guilty of first degree murder, assault and battery of a police officer, assault with a dangerous weapon, assault with intent to kill, illegal possession of a weapon, and armed robbery.
However, two years later she broke out of the Clinton Correctional Facility in New Jersey with the help of armed members of the Black Liberation Army, They drove a van into the prison and then took her out.
Chesimard spent the next few years living in safe houses in the US before surfacing in Cuba in 1984, New Jersey State Police said.
"Of those responsible, one is dead, one is in jail, and one was broken out of jail and remains free in Cuba," said NJSP Superintendent Col Rick Fuentes. "Joanne Chesimard... flaunts her freedom in the face of this horrific crime".
Chesimard had been granted political asylum in Cuba, and given "the pulpit to preach and profess, stirring supporters and groups to mobilise against the US by any means necessary", Col Fuentes added.
The FBI is offering a reward of up to $1m (640,000) for information leading to her capture, while the state of New Jersey is separately offering another $1m.
FBI agent Aaron Ford said that the agency would "pursue justice, no matter how long it takes".

SOURCE : http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-22397295
 

 

 

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Economy gains 165,000 jobs; jobless rate, 7.5%

Employers added a better-than-expected 165,000 jobs in April,, easing concerns that payroll growth may be slipping into a sustained mid-year slump.
The unemployment rate fell to 7.5% fromt 7.6%, the Labor Department said Friday.
Economists had forecast that the economy added 148,000 jobs last month.
Several economic reports this week appeared to solidify the view that the economy and job market are mired in a fourth straight spring slump. A survey by payroll processor ADP estimated businesses added just 119,000 jobs last month. Manufacturing activity in April barely grew, while construction spending fell.
Economists have largely blamed the weakening on across-the-board federal spending cuts, a recent payroll tax increase and small business hesitancy to hire because of coming health care insurance requirements.
Yet the number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits for the first time fell last week by 18,000 to 324,000, Labor said Thursday. That bolstered some economists' view that the recent downturn was due to a cold March and April and job growth could soon rebound.

SOURCE : http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2013/05/03/april-employment-report/2131167

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Anonymity ZUCKS: Facebook's Instagram to switch on face tagging

Oversharing narcissists will be able to reveal who is pictured in their cloud-stored Instagram photos - by tagging people in the colour-mangled snaps.
The Mark Zuckerberg-owned, retro photo-aging service released version 3.5 of its software today, which adds features making it even more like its parent-company Facebook.

Whenever anyone takes a picture, filters it and puts it out of focus, they can then tag whoever is in the image. Assuming the tagged person doesn't remove the tag or report it as offensive, it is then displayed on their user profile.

Privacy settings will allow bashful people to prevent anyone from tagging them.
The new feature is called "Pictures of You" and goes live on 16 May. Until then, users are free to "play around" with the feature without the pictures being made publicly available.
It was launched with a suitably sentimental video advert featuring all the familiar tropes of consumer tech advertising: babies, twee music and a multi-ethnic friendship group who demonstrate their solidarity by forming a circle, taking shots of their shoes and then tagging them.

The changes were also announced on the Instagram blog:

Photos are memories of the people, places and moments that mean the most to us. We have always sought to give you simple and expressive ways to bring the stories behind your photos to life. Your captions and hashtags capture the “what?” and your Photo Map answers the “where?” but until today we’ve never quite been able to answer the “who?”.
Today, we’re excited to introduce Photos of You and bring you a new way to share and discover stories on Instagram. When you upload a photo to Instagram, you’re now able to add people as easily as you add hashtags. Only you can add people to your photos, so you have control over the images you share. And it doesn’t stop at people — you can add any account on Instagram, whether it’s your best friend, favorite coffee shop or even that adorable dog you follow.

Instagram did not reveal further details of how a dog might take photographs and then edit them, which would be a truly revolutionary achievement for any software company. ®

SOURCE : http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/05/03/instagram_changes_tags/

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'Angry Birds Friends' Goes Mobile

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Rovio is rolling out Angry Birds Friends to iOS and Android, allowing players to compete against Facebook friends while on the go.
The apps are available for free, though the next weekly tournament doesn't begin until May 6. Once it kicks off, users can compete on mobile or Facebook, with progress synced across both platforms.
"Download it today to get some practice in before it all begins. And be sure to invite your Facebook friends to take part in all the fun," Rovio said in a blog post.
The Facebook version of Angry Birds Friends debuted last year and allowed players to participate in weekly tournaments, win power-ups, and gave them the ability to compete with friends.
Every Monday, a different tournament is unveiled with new challenges, and the levels aren't easy. To help navigate the game, players can use power-ups like King Sling, Super Seeds, and Birdquake, or they can call in Wingman to give them a boost on a level and earn a higher score. Users can also share their victories on Facebook and give out gifts to their fellow competitors.
Players with the best overall score among their friends earn a gold trophy, with silver and bronze for second and third place, along with power-up bundles. For competing in the tournament, users win a single power-up as a consolation prize.
If you're up to the challenge, the iOS and Android versions are available now, as is the Facebook app.
In other Angry Birds news, Rovio has launched an entirely new version of the game for Windows Phone that adds 100 levels. "The reason why we're re-releasing the game is that it will be technically easier for us to support in the future," Rovio said in a separate blog post. The game is free on the Microsoft's mobile OS until May 15 (for Windows Phone 8 and Windows Phone 7.5), and Redmond hinted that Angry Birds Rio would land on the platform "very soon."

SOURCE : http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2418465,00.asp

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