FBI Teaches Agents: Mainstream Muslims Are Violent, Radical

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15 September 2011
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In Rights, World
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The FBI is teaching its counter-terrorism agents that main stream [sic] American Muslims are likely to be terrorist sympathisers; that the Prophet Mohammed was a cult leader; and that the Islamic practice of giving charity is no more than a funding mechanism for combat.

At the Bureau’s training ground in Quantico, Virginia, agents are shown a chart contending that the more devout a Muslim, the more likely he is to be violent. Those destructive tendencies cannot be reversed, an FBI instructional presentation adds: Any war against non-believers is justified under Muslim law; a moderating process cannot happen if the Koran continues to be regarded as the unalterable word of Allah.

These are excerpts from dozens of pages of recent FBI training material on Islam that Danger Room has acquired. In them, the Constitutionally protected religious faith of millions of Americans is portrayed as an indicator of terrorist activity — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Passport changes for the gender diverse

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15 September 2011
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In Politics, Rights
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Transsexual Australians will be able to get a passport in their preferred gender without undergoing a sex-change operation.

Under new guidelines released by the federal government today, gender reassignment surgery will no longer be a pre-requisite for sex and gender diverse people to get a passport identifying them the way they wish — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Outrage over egg industry’s definition of free-range

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15 September 2011
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In Rights, Wildlife
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For the first time, the country’s egg industry has defined the term free-range and wants it to be legally enforceable. But free-range farmers and animal welfare groups are outraged and say the standard is not ethical.

The Australian Egg Corporation, which represents most egg farmers, this week sent new draft standards to producers, which would allow a free-range egg farm to run as many as 20,000 chickens per hectare. The industry’s current model code, which is not legally enforceable, allows 1500 chickens per hectare.

The managing director of the corporation, James Kellaway, said he wanted an agreed definition of free-range that was enshrined in legislation and enforceable to replace the loose standards that currently existed — via redwolf.newsvine.com

TARDIS Cat Fort / Astromark

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15 September 2011
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In Craft, Entertainment, Wildlife
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Astromark created this beautiful half-scale Tardis for his very lucky kitty, Kaylee. I’m very impressed by how precise the copy is, and how hard he worked to ensure that all of the details were just right, from the sign on the door to the the lantern on top. Head over to Tardis Builder to see more photos of the building process! I think the Doctor would be proud — via CRAFT

Tomboy: Simple note taking

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14 September 2011
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In Technology
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If you’re looking for a utility that’s more powerful than a text editor but lighter on the system than one of the more robust web-enabled utilities, consider Tomboy, a free, open-source note taking utility that supports Windows, Mac OS, and Linux. Tomboy supports linked notes, easy editing and quick search, and even syncing notes to Ubuntu One so they’re accessible on other systems

House Holman / Durbach Block Jaggers

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14 September 2011
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In Design
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Sited on the edge of a 70-metre high cliff, the plan of Holman House [Durbach Block Jaggers] refers to Picasso’s painting The Bather. It contains a complex series of fluid living spaces set within a meandering perimeter that arcs, folds and stretches in response to sun, landscape and views. Living and dining areas cantilever out over the ocean, allowing dramatic views up and down the coast. The lower floor forms a base that is built from rough stone walls like an extension of the cliff below. These walls continue along the cliff edge to form a series of eccentric terraced gardens and a vase-shaped rock pool — via Romain Jerome TimeouT

Smithsonian conservators develop new technique to determine age of silk artifacts

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14 September 2011
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In History, Science
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Conservation scientists have developed a new technique to authenticate and determine the age of silk artefacts held in museums and collections, the Smithsonian Institution announced Monday.

Carbon dating is too destructive for most silk items, scientists said. The new method uses the natural deterioration of silk’s amino acids to determine its age by calculating that change over time — a process known as racemisation. Archaeologists and forensic anthropologists have used this process for years to date bones, shells and teeth — via redwolf.newsvine.com

theSkyNet launched, set to spread online

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14 September 2011
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Western Australian researchers today switched on a citizen science project dubbed theSkyNet, hoping that it will spread to computers throughout Australia.

Despite the similarity in name between the artificial intelligence software from the Terminator series, theSkyNet has no possibility of becoming self-aware and destroying humanity. Rather, its purpose is to use the combined computing power of personal computers to help analyse and interpret radio signals received from space.

Science and Innovation Minister John Day, who was one of the first to log on to theSkyNet, said that, by connecting hundreds and thousands of computers together through the internet, it will be possible to simulate a single machine capable of processing signals from space, so they can be used by scientists to support their work — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Internet troll jailed after mocking deaths of teenagers

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14 September 2011
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An internet troll who posted videos and messages mocking the deaths of teenagers, including a girl hit by a train, has been jailed.

Sean Duffy, 25, targeted Facebook tribute pages and posted videos on YouTube taunting the dead and their families.

Among his victims was Natasha MacBryde, 15, who died instantly when hit by a passenger train near her home in Bromsgrove, Worcestershire.

The day after Natasha’s death in February, Duffy posted comments including I fell asleep on the track lolz on the Facebook tribute page created by her brother James, 17.

Four days later he created a YouTube video called Tasha the Tank Engine featuring her face superimposed on to the front of the fictional engine — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Filesharing service sues Warner Bros for copyright fraud

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14 September 2011
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In Business, Entertainment, Rights, Technology
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The battle over software and video piracy took a turn yesterday when a Florida file hosting service sued Warner Brothers for allegedly engaging in copyright fraud and abuse of anti-piracy laws. Hotfile accuses the Warner Bros of using the hosting company’s anti-piracy tools to remove titles the studio doesn’t own, including open source software. Hotfile is asking a court to make it whole for the losses they claim Warner Bros caused.

The suit is in response to a ruling in a related case. This spring, Warner joined with four other studios and the Motion Picture Association of America to sue Hotfile for facilitating illegal file transfers. Two weeks ago, a judge ruled that Hotfile must release detailed information about its users and affiliates. Hotfile’s countersued yesterday, alleging copyright fraud — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Will copyright extensions ever end?

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14 September 2011
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It’s now more than a decade since the internet began killing the music industry. The situation is so much worse than the last thing to kill music — home taping — that the industry is enjoying considerable success in getting its business model protected by law.

Just last year the Government passed the Digital Economy Act, which the industry argued was needed to tackle piracy, and yesterday the European Commission extended the copyright term on sound recordings from 50 to 70 years.

And the European copyright extension is great news for artists. At least according to the IFPI, the organisation that represents the international recording industry — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Church of Scientology facing back-pay claims

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14 September 2011
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The Church of Scientology is facing the prospect of back-pay claims that on some estimates could run into millions of dollars.

In March last year the ABC’s Four Corners broadcast a program containing allegations of mistreatment and exploitation of some of the church’s most loyal members.

The next day, the Fair Work ombudsman started an investigation into the church.

ABC’s Lateline has obtained a draft copy of that investigation’s report, which contains allegations of false imprisonment and forced labour — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Xenophon names priest accused of sex abuse

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14 September 2011
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Independent Senator Nick Xenophon says he has named a priest at the centre of an alleged seminary rape scandal because the Catholic church failed to stand the man down while investigating the allegations.

Speaking under parliamentary privilege last night, Senator Xenophon named the priest as Monsignor Ian Dempsey, a parish priest in the Adelaide suburb of Brighton.

Senator Xenophon said there were allegations that Monsignor Dempsey raped the Archbishop of the Traditional Anglican Communion, John Hepworth, more than 40 years ago — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Nurse Files $45M ‘Virgin’ Lawsuit Against NYU Hospital

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14 September 2011
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Accusing the hospital of failing to protect her medical records, former employee and pediatric nurse Kristen Haight has filed a $45 million virgin lawsuit against NYU Langone Medical Centre.

The lawsuit claims that, after being diagnosed with and receiving treatment for endometriosis, doctors, nurses and administrative staff accessed Haight’s medical files, harassing her about her sex life and calling her a 41-year-old virgin in honor of the film.

The media has yet to confirm the appropriateness of the nickname.

Regardless, her colleagues’ alleged behaviour was anything but appropriate — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Fifty new exoplanets discovered

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14 September 2011
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Astronomers using a telescope in Chile have discovered 50 previously unknown exoplanets.

The bumper haul of new worlds includes 16 super-Earths — planets with a greater mass than our own, but below those of gas giants such as Jupiter.

One of these super-Earths orbits inside the habitable zone — the region around a star where conditions could be hospitable to life.

The planets were identified using the Harps instrument in La Silla in Chile

Star blasts planet with X-rays

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14 September 2011
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A nearby star is pummelling a companion planet with a barrage of X-rays a hundred thousand times more intense than the Earth receives from the Sun.

New data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope suggest that high-energy radiation is evaporating about 5 million tons of matter from the planet every second. This result gives insight into the difficult survival path for some planets.

The planet, known as CoRoT-2b, has a mass about 3 times that of Jupiter (1000 times that of Earth) and orbits its parent star, CoRoT-2a at a distance roughly ten times the distance between Earth and the Moon — via redwolf.newsvine.com

Arcosanti / Paolo Soleri

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13 September 2011
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In Design
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70 miles north of Phoenix, in central Arizona lies an experimental town created by Paolo Soleri, intended to house 5,000 people. Arcosanti is the study of the concept of arcology, which combines architecture and ecology. The intentions of this community is to form a gestalt that houses the relations and interactions that living organisms have with respect to each other and their natural environment.

One of the most imaginative thinkers of our time, Paolo Soleri has dedicated his life to addressing the ecological and social concerns raised by modern urban existence. Soleri’s career contains significant accomplishments in the fields of architecture and urban planning, and his groundbreaking philosophical writings on arcology, the co-presence of architecture with ecology, continues to garner interest globally — via ArchDaily

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