eBay’s plan to allow pets to be sold on its auction site has been howled down by thousands of users, forcing the company to quickly abandon the idea. People feared changing eBay policy to allow sales of creatures other than fish and snails would invite abusive animal breeders such as puppy farms
. eBay then proposed limiting online pet postings to animal shelters, but users argued that it would be too difficult to cull the illegal breeders from legitimate shelters
Local importers have begun filing damages claims worth tens of millions of dollars against the Australian Customs Service after computer glitches left shipping containers filled with Christmas stock stranded on wharves
The House baulked at a Senate plan to extend the USA Patriot Act by six months to give Congress and the retarded monkey boy more time to work out their differences, instead forcing the Senate and the administration to accept a one-month extension
In a delightful example of common sense, Judge John Jones of the United States District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania ruled that intelligent design — which bills itself as a scientific theory and states that life shows signs of being the work of an intelligent designer — is in fact reworked creationism and the loony fundies trying to inflict their insanity on students are blatant liars — via The Pagan Prattle
Google and Time Warner have announced that Google will invest US$1 billion for a 5% stake in the media company’s AOL unit as part of a partnership that expands their existing search engine deal to include collaboration on advertising, instant messaging and video
A group of 40 drunken people dressed in Santa Claus outfits went on a rampage through Auckland, robbing stores, assaulting security guards and urinating from highway overpasses. The rampage, dubbed Santarchy
by newspapers, began when the men, wearing ill-fitting Santa costumes, threw beer bottles and urinated on cars from an overpass. The men then rushed through a central city park, overturning garbage bins, throwing bottles at passing cars and spraying graffiti on office buildings. The Santas entered a convenience store and carried off beer and soft drinks — via The Register
A while ago, Microsoft stopped updating IE for Mac, freezing it at version 5. But according to Microsoft, all support will cease 31 December 2005, and any official distribution with cease 31 January 2006. They also suggest that Macintosh users migrate to more recent web browsing technologies such as Apple’s Safari
The US National Security Agency has been caught spying on American citizens. According to numerous un-named sources, the retarded monkey boy signed a secret order authorising him to intercept phone calls and e-mails from US persons in communication with persons outside the US, and all without the slightest bit of judicial oversight. It’s not like this is anything new, it’s just that the targets have changed from those who can help line the pockets of the usual parade of rich, white morons, to those who show an interest in stopping that sort of corruption
Andreas Pavel invented the device known today as the Walkman. But it took more than 25 years of battling Sony and others in courts and patent offices around the world before he finally won the right to say it: Andreas Pavel invented the portable personal stereo player
Polar bears appear to be drowning when they attempt long sea crossings as a result of receding summer ice. New evidence from field researchers working for the World Wildlife Fund in Yakutia, on the northeast coast of Russia, has also shown the region’s first evidence of cannibalism among bears competing for food supplies. As the ice pack retreats north in the summer between June and October, the bears must travel between ice floes to continue hunting in areas such as the shallow water of the continental shelf off the Alaskan coast — one of the most food-rich areas in the Arctic. However, last summer the ice cap receded about 320km further north than the average of two decades ago, forcing the bears to undertake far longer voyages between floes
After starting a small row in cyberspace by trying to come up with its own name for RSS feeds, Microsoft has let it be known that it now accepts that RSS is here to stay, and one division within the company has even accomplished that most unusual of feats: an accommodation with an open source group
A remarkable humanitarian programme is under way in Havana, which aims to restore the sight of six million people through free eye surgery. Launched in July by the 79-year-old Cuban President, Fidel Castro, and Venezuela’s Socialist leader, President Hugo Chavez, Operation Miracle has brought daily planeloads of the poor from across Latin America and the Caribbean to Havana for surgery. Cuba provides the medical skills, Venezuela the petro-dollars
In a world first, German scientists, from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, say they have reconstructed a key sequence in the genome of the woolly mammoth that shows the extinct beast’s closest modern relative is the Asian elephant
Companies and law enforcement agencies are becoming increasing frustrated and concerned at the high amount of fraud at eBay. There are reports that it can take two months for eBay to pass details to fraud investigators, and that even for companies with a special relationship
with eBay it can take five days for fraudulent auctions to be shut down. With all the amount of profits that eBay makes, then there is ample scope for additional staff. Frankly, it is totally unsatisfactory
A sub-orbital mission to determine whether spider-like robots could construct complex structures in space is set to launch in January
Google has launched a new service intended to give searchers fast links to song lyrics, musical artists and CD titles on the main search results page. Google Music will allow a person to type in the name of a band, artist, album or song in the main Google search bar, and results will appear at the top, accompanied by icons of music notes — via Darren Barefoot
Ancient tools found in Britain show that humans lived in northern Europe 200,000 years earlier than was previously known, at a time when England’s climate was warm enough to be the home of lions, elephants and saber-tooth tigers
When I first saw the photos of the new Nintendo controller (for the upcoming Revolution console), I was both impressed and bewildered. Impressed, because clearly it was going to be something a bit out of the ordinary (Nintendo’s strong suit), and bewildered as to how the thing was supposed to work in the real world. CNN had a play with the Rev controller prototype and all is revealed: as well as having the usual rumble feature (and wirelessness), the controller is also modular and gyroscopic.
The basic unit looks like a TV remote, and has a d-pad, a trigger, and a large main button. Two smaller buttons are lower on the face, as well as the usual start button. The select button is also back, and an indicator has been added to show you which control port the device is wireless mapped to. The basic idea is that you tilt the controller, and the analogue gyroscope works like a control stick. You can also move the whole controller through the air, swinging it like a sword, yanking it like a fishing rod, or moving it like a free-floating joystick. For games that require two axes of movement, like first-person shooters, a traditional control stick can be added (see picture).
There are more Rev controller photos at Nintendo.com.
The European Space Agency is developing a new thruster based on the same physics that power the northern and southern auroras. This new plasma thruster could eventually deliver more power than the efficient ion engines which have been installed on several spacecraft — via digg
Spray Grancrete over a frame of Styrofoam, metal, wood‚Äîeven woven sugarcane stalks‚Äîand in 20 minutes you have a waterproof, fire-resistant structure that has more than twice the strength of traditional concrete and can withstand extreme temperatures without cracking — via digg
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