December 22, 2015

Top News Stories –

Actor Nicolas Cage returns stolen dinosaur skull he bought –
Hollywood actor Nicolas Cage has agreed to turn over a rare stolen dinosaur skull he bought for $276,000 to U.S. authorities so it can be returned to the Mongolian government. The office of Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney in Manhattan, filed a civil forfeiture complaint last week to take possession of the Tyrannosaurus bataar skull, which will be repatriated to Mongolia. The lawsuit did not specifically name Cage as the owner, but Cage’s publicist confirmed that the actor bought the skull in March 2007 from a Beverly Hills gallery, I.M. Chait. The “National Treasure” actor is not accused of wrongdoing, and authorities said he voluntarily agreed to turn over the skull after learning of the circumstances. Cage outbid fellow movie star Leonardo DiCaprio for the skull, according to prior news reports. [Reuters]
Nicolas_CageNicolas_Cage

SpaceX succeeds in historic rocket launch and landing –
SpaceX successfully landed its powerful Falcon 9 rocket late on Monday night for the first time, a major milestone in the drive to cut costs and waste by making rockets as reusable as planes. Its engines burning bright orange against the dark night sky, the Falcon 9 made a graceful arc back to Earth and touched down upright at Cape Canaveral, Florida, minutes after launching a payload of satellites to orbit, video images showed. “I still can’t quite believe it,” Musk said in a teleconference after the landing. “I think this is a revolutionary moment. No one has ever brought an orbital class booster back intact.” Previous attempts to land the Falcon 9’s first stage on a floating ocean platform have failed – with the rocket either colliding with the autonomous drone ship or tipping over. [Daily Telegraph] In June 2015 a SpaceX rocket carrying cargo to the International Space Station exploded minutes after take-off. See Video of the Day
Elon Musk - The Summit 2013Elon Musk

Video of the Day –

Historic Landing of Falcon 9 First Stage at Landing Zone 1

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February 9, 2016

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‘Airbnb for sex’ – Entrepreneurs set up KinkBNB for lovers to book guiltless sexcapades –
People who own a Fifty Shades-esque red dungeon of pain, and want to find a use for it when they are on holiday, or who own a honeymoon-worthy castle could now find themselves a lucrative new source of income. KinkBNB is marketing itself as the sex-positive Airbnb – and tenants and renters alike know what they are getting into when they sign up for the site. The Airbnb-style homesharing website now lets lovers book sex-focused getaways without stressing about waking up the next door neighbours or being landed with a hefty damages charge. Its layout is similar to the traditional homesharing site – listing amenities such as washing machines, gardens and swimming pools.
Kink BnB logo

Google boss becomes highest-paid in US –
The chief executive of Google, Sundar Pichai, has been awarded $199m (£138m) in shares, a regulatory filing has revealed. It makes him the highest-paid chief executive in the US.
Mr Pichai became chief executive of the search engine giant following the creation of its parent, Alphabet. The founders of Google, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, have amassed fortunes of $34.6bn and $33.9bn, according to Forbes. Mr Pichai, 43, was awarded 273,328 Alphabet shares on 3 February, worth a total of $199m, according to a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. The new award of shares takes Mr Pichai’s total stock value to approximately $650m. [BBC]
Sundar_PichaiSundar Pichai

Video of the Day –

Tongue in a Mouse Trap – The Slow Mo Guys –

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May 5, 2016

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Tunisian mobile gamers win a cow –
A couple in Tunisia have walked away with an unusual prize – a cow – after they recorded the top score in a locally developed mobile phone game, it’s reported.
Pamela the cow spent two weeks at the game developer’s headquarters in Tunis before being awarded to the unnamed couple at the beginning of May, the Tuniscope news website says.
The pair triumphed in a strategy game called Bagra – literally “cow” – which consists of keeping a herd of cows and preventing other players from stealing them, while trying to pinch as many as possible from other herds. [BBC]

Canadian wildfire edges south, leaves thousands stranded –
The 88,000 residents who fled a wildfire that has ravaged the Canadian oil town of Fort McMurray in Alberta will not be able to return home anytime soon, officials warned on Thursday, even as the inferno edged slowly south. The out-of-control blaze has consumed entire neighborhoods of Fort McMurray in Canada’s energy heartland and officials warn its spread now threatens two oil sands sites south of the city. The wildfire has already forced precautionary production cuts or shutdowns at about a dozen major facilities, eating into a global crude surplus and supporting oil prices this week. [Reuters] See Video of the Day

Facebook Live tab is now on the Android app –
It’s taken a month, but the Live tab on Facebook has now started appearing for Android app users. Back in April, the social network announced that video was going to be even more of priority for the company, with users being offered a dedicated page to find live streams. Android users are starting to see the Live tab in the centre of the screen, pushing out Messenger from its spot. Clicking on the Live option brings up a scrolling stream of video.Anyone watching the feed can then react and comment in real time. [BBC Newsbeat]

Video of the Day –

Fire ‘rains’ down in Fort McMurray neighbourhood during escape

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May 6, 2016

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Labour’s Sadiq Khan elected London mayor –
Sadiq Khan has been elected the new Mayor of London – boosting Labour after it slumped in Scotland’s elections. Mr Khan is the city’s first Muslim mayor, after beating Tory Zac Goldsmith by 1,310,143 votes to 994,614. The result bolsters leader Jeremy Corbyn after Labour was beaten into third in Scotland by the Tories and lost some English councillors.
In Scotland, the SNP said it would form a minority government after winning its third election in a row. First Minister Nicola Sturgeon is celebrating what she said was an “emphatic” victory, her first as party leader, after the SNP emerged as the largest party at Holyrood with 63 seats, ahead of the Conservatives on 31 and Labour on 24. But she played down talk of another independence referendum after falling short by two seats of an overall majority. In Wales, Labour remains as the largest party, with 29 out of 60 seats, but was denied a majority as Plaid Cymru and UKIP both made notable gains. [BBC]
Sadiq_Khan Sadiq_Khan

China bans ‘erotic’ banana-eating live streams –
Chinese live-streaming services have banned people filming themselves eating bananas in a “seductive” fashion. New regulations mean that live-streaming sites must monitor all their output round-the-clock to ensure nothing untoward is going on, keeping an eye out for any “erotic” banana-eating, according to New Express Daily. It’s not just fruit that’s on their radar though – the paper adds that wearing stockings and suspenders while hosting a live stream is now also forbidden. The move is the authorities’ latest attempt to clamp down on “inappropriate and erotic” online content, state-controlled CCTV reports. In April, the Ministry of Culture announced it was investigating a number of popular live-streaming platforms for allegedly hosting pornographic or violent content that “harms social morality”. Despite the government’s concerns, such sites are attracting more and more users in China. Particularly popular are webcam sessions where young women – and sometimes girls under 18 – entertain a predominantly male audience, often singing Chinese songs or chatting to their viewers. [BBC]

Video of the Day –

Inside a 6ft Air Balloon – 4K – The Slow Mo Guys

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  • A man is killed, and two others are injured (a man in critical condition and a woman with non-life-threatening injuries), in the parking lot of Westfield Montgomery Mall in Potomac in Montgomery County, Maryland, near Washington, D.C. Soon after, a woman is killed at a grocery store some miles away. Police suspect that the same shooter may be behind both crime scene incidents. Police in both Montgomery County and neighboring Prince George’s County are also examining whether this person is the same as the male involved in the fatal shooting the previous day of a woman, Gladys Tordil, who was allegedly shot (a bystander who tried to help was also wounded) by her estranged abusive husband, tentatively identified as Eulalio Tordil, 62, a former Federal Protective Service officer. (MSN) (CNN)
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