Red Panda / Zoo Planckendael

For the first time in Zoo Planckendael‘s history, a baby Red Panda has been born. The timid little new born is difficult to spot, but if you’re lucky, you’ll catch him scampering from one nest box to another under the watchful eye of her mother, Lolita. The female cub, named Nangwa (Tibetan for appearance) by keepers, is an ambassador for her imperilled species. The Red Panda is listed on the IUCN Red List as Vulnerable because of habitat loss in their native Nepal. Timber from their natural environment is increasingly cut down for fuel and construction. Additionally, their reddish-brown fur is highly sought after — via ZooBorns

Curtain Door / Matharoo Associates

Designed by the architectural firm Matharoo Associates, the Curtain Door is most definitely a door like no other I’ve seen. The massive door is made of 40 sections of thick Burma teak and sits between the entrance’s concrete walls. Each section has been carved to incorporate 160 pulleys, 80 ball bearings, one wire rope, and a hidden counterweight — via Design Milk

Spam text senders face fines of up to £500,000

Two people responsible for sending out millions of spam texts offering accident compensation and payment protection insurance (PPI) mis-selling services face fines totalling about half a million pounds, following a crackdown by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO).

Another eight companies could face similar fines as the data enforcement office concentrates on unsolicited texts, which its research has shown is one of the most annoying examples of unwanted marketing people receive.

The case is the first of its kind in which the ICO has used its new powers to levy fines of up to £500,000 for misuse of personal data — via redwolf.newsvine.com

On the Effectiveness of Aluminium Foil Helmets: An Empirical Study

Among a fringe community of paranoids, aluminium helmets serve as the protective measure of choice against invasive radio signals. We investigate the efficacy of three aluminium helmet designs on a sample group of four individuals. Using a $250,000 network analyser, we find that although on average all helmets attenuate invasive radio frequencies in either directions (either emanating from an outside source, or emanating from the cranium of the subject), certain frequencies are in fact greatly amplified. These amplified frequencies coincide with radio bands reserved for government use according to the Federal Communication Commission (FCC). Statistical evidence suggests the use of helmets may in fact enhance the government’s invasive abilities. We speculate that the government may in fact have started the helmet craze for this reason — via redwolf.newsvine.com

California governor bans gay conversion therapy

Therapy aimed at turning gay kids straight will soon be illegal in California, with the state’s governor declaring he hopes a new law will relegate such efforts to the dustbin of quackery.

The legislation — which the state Senate passed in May, Governor Jerry Brown signed into law this weekend and will take effect 1 January — prohibits attempts to change the sexual orientation of patients under age 18.

This bill bans non-scientific therapies’ that have driven young people to depression and suicide, Brown tweeted. These practices have no basis in science or medicine — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Do Not Knock Signs Have Legal Effect

I loathe door-to-door salespeople, so this news makes me very happy: the Federal Court has slapped a $1 million fine on two electricity sellers for repeatedly ignoring consumer law. More importantly, the court finding also confirms the validity of do not knock signs.

Neighbourhood Energy and Australian Green Credits (who got taken to court by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission back in May) had the fines imposed in part because staff repeatedly ignored do not knock signs and refused to leave premises when they encountered such signs. As such, ACCC chairman Rod Sims sees it as a major victory:

The effect of the Court’s order is that every time a salesperson ignores a visible do not knock sign on a consumer’s door, the company they represent is exposed to a maximum penalty of $50,000.

— via redwolf.newsvine.com

Ruby Ring / Cafe Racer Dreams

Two months ago, CRD hit the ball out of the park with an elegant vintage BMW R75. They’ve now revisited the Teutonic theme, this time with a muscular and purposeful R 100RT.

Ruby Ring was commissioned by an Austrian fan of the Spanish custom builders. And she’s not just a pretty face: the extensive list of mods starts with the engine, which has been heavily upgraded with the help of BMW specialists MaxBOXER — via Bike EXIF

Stillness / Gilbert Booth

Stillness, is a five-bedroom art deco property in Bromley, Kent designed by Gilbert Booth in 1934. It is a stunning slice of period architecture and one that has been maintained well and modernised to a good standard. Yes, there’s a modern kitchen and bathroom in here, but the shell is still faithful to the original build.

On the downside, you’ll need to find a monthly rent of £3,300 — via WowHaus

Design

Victory / Bremont

More than just named after the famous warship, the Bremont Victory actually contains wood and metal from the ship itself, which, if you didn’t know, was Lord Nelson’s flagship. All in all, it’s a cool chronograph with serious historical nods. It’s also Bremont’s first truly complicated watch — via HODINKEE

Ducati GT-R / Spirit of The Seventies

A stern test for established custom builders is how they handle the budget job. Can they capture the flavor of the mega-buck builds at half the cost? The English workshop Spirit of The Seventieshas just taken this test, and passed with flying colours.

Tim Rogers and Kev Taggart call their latest machine the Ducati GT-R. But despite the name, performance modifications were not on the client’s wishlist. Our client didn’t even have a bike, which was great news. We knew exactly what to use as the donor — a Ducati GT1000 — via Bike EXIF

Former Copyright Boss: New Technology Should Be Presumed Illegal Until Congress Says Otherwise

One of the reasons why we live in such an innovative society is that we’ve (for the most part) enabled a permissionless innovation society — one in which innovators no longer have to go through gatekeepers in order to bring innovation to market. his is a hugely valuable thing, and it’s why we get concerned about laws that further extend permission culture. However, according to the former Register of Copyrights, Ralph Oman, under copyright law, any new technology should have to apply to Congress for approval and a review to make sure they don’t upset the apple cart of copyright, before they’re allowed to exist. I’m not joking. Mr Oman, who was the Register of Copyright from 1985 to 1993 and was heavily involved in a variety of copyright issues, has filed an amicus brief in the Aereo case (pdf).

As you hopefully recall, Aereo is the online TV service, backed by Barry Diller, that sets you up with your very own physical TV antenna on a rooftop in Brooklyn, connected to a device that will then stream to you online what that antenna picks up. This ridiculously convoluted setup is an attempt to route around the ridiculous setup of today’s copyright law — something that Oman was intimately involved in creating with the 1976 Copyright Act. The TV networks sued Aereo, but were unable to get an injunction blocking the service. Oman’s amicus brief seeks to have that ruling overturned, and argues that an injunction is proper.

But he goes much further than that in his argument, even to the point of claiming that with the 1976 Copyright Act, Congress specifically intended new technologies to first apply to Congress for permission, before releasing new products on the market that might upset existing business models — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Hotel Tholos / Santorini

Set on the bewitching Greek island of Santorini is a special resort. The luxury Hotel Tholos overlooks the Mediterranean Sea. The hotel is set among typical Greek white-washed villages nestled at the tops of the steep sides of the caldera of an extinct volcano — via Home Design Find

Kawasaki Z1 / Bull Dock + Nitron

Back in 1974, the Kawasaki Z1 was the most exotic thing on two wheels. And nearly four decades later, it’s lost none of its lustre. This high-performance custom is a collaboration between the Japanese workshop Bull Dock and the British suspension manufacturer Nitron — hence the paintjob in Nitron’s brand colors — via Bike EXIF

Malayan Tapir / Artis Zoo

On the morning of 24 August a baby Malayan Tapir named Betong was born at The Netherlands’ Artis Zoo. Within an hour of his arrival, Betong was successfully nursing and standing firm on his four feet. That following Tuesday, the spotted male Tapir baby was out on exhibit for the first time — via ZooBorns

Sky Team Ace 125

Well, here’s a surprise. A Chinese-built motorcycle with a dash of style, reportedly good build quality, and a nod to the Japanese racing heritage of the 1960s.

It’s the Sky Team Ace 125, a loose replica of the Honda CR110 racer. Honda itself created a replica in 2004, the lovely Dream 50R, but the Ace 125 is a mass-market bike available to all. It’s passed homologation and emissions tests and the US sticker price will be around $2,500 — via Bike EXIF

Purpose of RFID finally discovered: It’s for pairing up socks!

The dream of 21st-century man, socks that pair themselves, is almost upon us with special hosiery which can find its mate using only an iPhone, an embedded tag and an RFID reader.

The socks come from Blacksocks, and feature a heat-tolerant RFID tag identifying the pair to which the garment belongs. Sadly the iPhone has no RFID reader, so a separate reader is waved over the laundry pile to track down the errant match, the details being reported to the iPhone application as RFID Journal explains — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Some Advice On Securing Your WordPress Site

If you’re hosted on WordPress.com, there’s not a great deal you can do to harden your site. However, if you have your own server space somewhere and it uses WordPress as a content management system / blog software, there are a few simple steps you can take to make your particular part of the internet a little less inviting to hackers — via Lifehacker Australia

House 77 / dIONISO LAB

Póvoa de Varzim is a city profoundly related to the sea and fishing. Its great cultural richness became an interesting stimulus to the project. In fact, the house [dIONISO LAB] was an opportunity to revitalise some of the city’s memories and to participate in the panoply of colours and materials that characterise the street — via ArchDaily