New iPad is hot, but some report the device overheating -

New iPad is hot, but some report the device overheating - 
 



OWNERS of the new iPad complained yesterday that the device was overheating and becoming too hot to hold as Apple announced record sales since Friday's launch.


Apple is investigating the issue which drove owners to comment on online forums about the possible flaw.


One customer said: "Mine is overheating. The heat is reduced when the brightness is reduced but what's the point of that? It drains the battery fast too . . . I am going to wait one week to see if there are any solutions from Apple, if not, they can have it. I am very disappointed."


Another new iPad buyer said: "I'm loving the screen and speed but there's something weird about it. It gets rather warm/hot after 30 minutes of usage. It has never happened on my iPad 2."


Unless discovered to be widespread, the problem may not dent sales of the gadget, as it remains on course to be another bestseller for Apple. The company was unavailable for comment.


Yesterday as the company announced plans to pay a quarterly dividend from July and buy back $US10 billion worth of shares, Apple's chief executive officer Tim Cook, said. "We had a record weekend and we're thrilled with it."


He refused to reveal exact sales figures, but analysts already believe that the updated version of the device, known simply as "the new iPad", will prove to be a major hit.


Gene Munster, the respected technology analyst at Piper Jaffray, had predicted that Apple would sell around one million iPads over the weekend. His estimate was based on strong demand for the machine in the run-up to its launch.


Before the device went on sale within stores, Apple had sold out of units online, with waiting times for new buyers stretching beyond two weeks.


As with previous Apple's launches, fans of the company's products queued overnight outside its stores to be the first to own the new device, which features a vastly improved screen, processor and camera.


The critical reaction to the machine has been mixed, with some disappointed that it did not include a major new function and was slightly thicker and heavier than its predecessor, the iPad 2.


Apple has sold more than 55 million iPads since launching the first version of the gadget two years ago. In its most recent financial quarter, the Californian company said it had sold 15.43 million iPads.


Read more -
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/new-ipad-is-hot-but-some-report-the-device-overheating/story-fnb64oi6-1226304983738 

Viking invasions throughout the North Atlantic world 1,000 years ago brought mice everywhere, except for Canada -

Viking invasions throughout the North Atlantic world 1,000 years ago brought mice everywhere, except for Canada - 
 



An international team of scientists has determined that the Viking invasions throughout the North Atlantic world more than 1,000 years ago were accompanied in almost every case by the introduction of common house mice to the newly established Norse colonies - with the lone exception of Canada.


The new research is described as further proof of the inhospitable conditions encountered by Viking seafarers led by Leif Ericsson when they landed at L'Anse aux Meadows in northern Newfoundland. The harsh Canadian climate and the Vikings' violent clashes with the island's ``skraelings'' - members of an unidentified aboriginal nation - are believed to have forced the would-be conquerors of North America (and apparently their mouse companions, too) to abandon Newfoundland after a short time and to return to safer settlements in Greenland and Iceland.


The study, led by evolutionary biologist Eleanor Jones of Sweden's Uppsala University and Britain's University of York, traces the associated movements of Norse colonists and the European domestic mice that apparently stowed away in the travellers' sailing vessels en route to new lands to the west of ancient Scandinavia.


The research team, which also included experts from Iceland, Denmark and the U.S., examined evidence of ancient mice DNA from Viking archeological sites as well as the genetic features of mice living today in areas once inhabited by Norse settlement parties.


In findings published in the latest issue of the scholarly journal BMC Evolutionary Biology, the researchers explain how they discovered proof that bloodlines from the mouse species Mus musculus domesticus - already known to have been carried by Viking voyagers to medieval Scotland and Ireland - also found their way to Iceland and Greenland, presumably in mice hidden among the livestock carried to those colonies aboard ships from old Norway.


Read more -
http://www.canada.com/Viking+invasions+brought+mice+everywhere+except+Canada/6326666/story.html 

Panda droppings could make world’s most expensive cup of tea -

Panda droppings could make world’s most expensive cup of tea - 


 



China’s national treasure, the giant panda, will become even more precious if one businessman succeeds in using their dung to grow organic green tea he intends to sell for over $200 a cup.


An Yanshi, an entrepreneur in southwest China, grows the tea in mountainous Ya’an in Sichuan province using tonnes of excrement from panda bears living at nearby breeding centres.


The first batch of panda dung tea will be sold in lots of 50 grams that will cost some 22,000 yuan ($3,500) each, a price An said makes it the world’s most expensive tea. Most people use about 3 grams of tea per cup.


Read more -
http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/1148401--sweet-smell-of-success-panda-poo-could-make-world-s-most-expensive-cup-of-tea?bn=1 

Wendy's has dethroned Burger King as the country's second biggest hamburger chain -

Wendy's has dethroned Burger King as the country's second biggest hamburger chain - 


 



Wendy's edged out Burger King in U.S. sales volume for the first time last year since Wendy's was founded in 1969, according to a report by the food industry research firm Technomic Inc. that's set to be released next month.


Wendy's had sales of $8.5 billion in 2011, compared with $8.4 billion for Burger King. McDonald's remained far larger than both with $34.2 billion in sales.


The figures are based on Technomic's estimates of system-wide sales at franchise and company-owned restaurants, rather than corporate revenue, which includes fees from franchise operators. Worldwide, Burger King still has far more restaurants than Wendy's and remains the second biggest hamburger chain behind McDonald's.


Both Burger King and Wendy's have struggled in recent years to keep up with the growth of McDonald's, which has managed to keep prices low through the recession, while also introducing a new menu items and remodeling restaurants. Sales are up 26 percent in the past five years at McDonald's, up 9 percent at Wendy's and flat at Burger King, according to Technomic.


Read more -
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_FAST_FOOD_RANKINGS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT 

Prime Minister David Cameron's table tennis table gift to Barack Obama made in China -

Prime Minister David Cameron's table tennis table gift to Barack Obama made in China - 
 



It was a gift that David Cameron chose to represent the best of Britain on his recent visit to meet Barack Obama in Washington.
But far from showcasing the wealth of talent in UK manufacturing, the £600 Dunlop tennis table presented to the US President was reportedly made abroad.
Downing Street had insisted that the “truly British” product was a fitting gift in the run up to the London 2012 Olympics.
However, it has been found that although the ping pong table was “designed and branded” in the UK, it was actually manufactured in China.
In presenting the gift to the Obamas, a spokesman for Number 10 said: “Founded in 1886, Dunlop is a truly British company which operates in over 70 countries.


Read more -
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/david-cameron/9151444/David-Camerons-table-tennis-table-gift-to-Barack-Obama-made-in-China.html 

30 million Chinese live in caves... -

30 million Chinese live in caves... - 
 

Reporting from Yanan, China— Like many peasants from the outskirts of Yanan, China, Ren Shouhua was born in a cave and lived there until he got a job in the city and moved into a concrete-block house.


His progression made sense as he strove to improve his life. But there's a twist: The 46-year-old Ren plans to move back to a cave when he retires.


"It's cool in the summer and warm in the winter. It's quiet and safe," said Ren, a ruddy-faced man with salt-and-pepper hair who moved to the Shaanxi provincial capital, Xian, in his 20s. "When I get old, I'd like to go back to my roots."


More than 30 million Chinese people live in caves, many of them in Shaanxi province where the Loess plateau, with its distinctive cliffs of yellow, porous soil, makes digging easy and cave dwelling a reasonable option.


Each of the province's caves, yaodong, in Chinese, typically has a long vaulted room dug into the side of a mountain with a semicircular entrance covered with rice paper or colorful quilts. People hang decorations on the walls, often a portrait of Mao Tse-tung or a photograph of a movie star torn out of a glossy magazine.


The better caves protrude from the mountain and are reinforced with brick masonry. Some are connected laterally so a family can have several chambers. Electricity and even running water can be brought in.


"Most aren't so fancy, but I've seen some really beautiful caves: high ceilings and spacious with a nice yard out front where you can exercise and sit in the sun," said Ren, who works as a driver and is the son of a wheat and millet farmer.


The caves have an important role in modern Chinese history. The Long March, the famous retreat of the Communist Party in the 1930s, ended near Yanan, where Mao took refuge in caves. In "Red Star Over China," writer Edgar Snow described a Red Army university that "was probably the world's only seat of 'higher learning' whose classrooms were bombproof caves, with chairs and desks of stone and brick, and blackboards and walls of limestone and clay."


Read more - 
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-china-caves-20120318,0,2352472.story 

Toxic Treats from China Killing US Dogs, Say Pet Owners -

Toxic Treats from China Killing US Dogs, Say Pet Owners - 
 

When Kevin and Candace Thaxton's 10-year-old pug Chansey got sick late last year, the couple assumed at first it was simply old age. The small dog started showing symptoms of kidney failure -- drinking water excessively and urinating in the house. By the time the Thaxtons got her to a veterinarian, Chansey's kidneys had shut down and she was in extreme pain. She died two days later.


"It was so hard. It was just devastating," Kevin Thaxton told ABC News.


But the Thaxtons would go through the ordeal again just weeks later -- leading them to a new theory behind Chansey's death -- when their new Pekingese-mix puppy Penny exhibited the same symptoms, finally resulting in kidney failure. When Candace Thaxton stumbled on a Food and Drug Administration warning that there'd been an increase in complaints about chicken jerky dog treats made in China, she says she knew immediately what had happened to her beloved dogs.


"I grabbed the bag of treats and turned it over," Candace said. "At first I saw it said 'Manufactured in South Carolina' so I thought I was safe. Then I looked harder and it said 'Made in China' and I just said 'Oh no.' "


Read more -
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/toxic-treats-china-killing-us-dogs-pet-owners/story?id=15927579#.T2UVTBGPU7c 

Facebook spies on phone users' text messages - admitted it as part of a trial to launch its own messaging service -

Facebook spies on phone users' text messages - admitted it as part of a trial to launch its own messaging service - 


Internet giant Facebook is accessing smartphone users' personal text messages, an investigation revealed Sunday.
Facebook admitted reading text messages belonging to smartphone users who downloaded the social-networking app and said that it was accessing the data as part of a trial to launch its own messaging service, The (London) Sunday Times reported.
Other well-known companies accessing smartphone users' personal data -- such as text messages -- include photo-sharing site Flickr, dating site Badoo and Yahoo Messenger, the paper said.
It claimed that some apps even allow companies to intercept phone calls -- while others, such as YouTube, are capable of remotely accessing and operating users' smartphone cameras to take photographs or videos at any time.
Security app My Remote Lock and the app Tennis Juggling Game were among smaller companies' apps that may intercept users' calls, the paper said.
Emma Draper, of the Privacy International campaign group, said, "Your personal information is a precious commodity, and companies will go to great lengths to get their hands on as much of it as possible."




Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/02/26/facebook-spies-on-phone-users-text-messages-report-says/?test=latestnews

55 Interesting Facts About The U.S. Economy In 2012 -

55 Interesting Facts About The U.S. Economy In 2012 - 




How is the U.S. economy doing in 2012?  Unfortunately, it is not doing nearly as well as the mainstream media would have you believe.  Yes, things have stabilized for the moment but this bubble of false hope will not last for long.  The long-term trends that are ripping our economy and our financial system to shreds continue unabated.  When you step back and look at the broader picture, it is hard to deny that we are in really bad shape and that things are rapidly getting worse.  Later on in this article you will find a list of interesting facts that show the true state of the U.S. economy.  Hopefully many of you will find this list to be a useful tool that you can share with your family and friends.  Each day the foundations of our economy crumble a little bit more, and we need to wake up as many Americans as we can to what is really going on while there is still time.  We have accumulated way too much debt, we consume far more wealth than we produce, millions of our jobs are being shipped overseas, our big cities are decaying, family budgets are being squeezed more than ever, poverty is rampant and we have raised several generations of Americans that expect the government to fix all of their problems.  The U.S. economy is at a crossroads, and the decisions that the American people make in 2012 are going to be incredibly important.


The statistics listed below are presented without much commentary.  They pretty much speak for themselves.


After reading this list, it will be hard for anyone to argue that we are on the right track.


The following are 55 interesting facts about the U.S. economy in 2012….


#1 As you read this, there are more than 6 million mortgages in the United States that are overdue.


#2 In January, U.S. home prices were the lowest that they have been in more than a decade.


#3 In Florida right now, some drivers are paying nearly 6 dollars for a gallon of gas.
#4 On average, you could buy about 10 gallons of gas for an hour of work back in the mid-90s.  Today, the average hour of work will get you less than 6 gallons of gas.


#5 Sadly, 43 percent of all American families spend more than they earn each year.


#6 According to Gallup, the unemployment rate was at 8.3% in mid-January butrose to 9.0% in mid-February.


#7 The percentage of working age Americans that have jobs is not increasing.  The employment to population ratio has stayed very steady (hovering between 58% and 59%) since the beginning of 2010.


#8 If you gathered together all of the workers that are “officially” unemployed in the United States into one nation, they would constitute the 68th largest country in the entire world.


#9 When Barack Obama first took office, the number of “long-term unemployed workers” in the United States was approximately 2.6 million.  Today, that number is sitting at 5.6 million.


#10 The average duration of unemployment in the United States is hoveringclose to an all-time record high.


#11 According to Reuters, approximately 23.7 million American workers are either unemployed or underemployed right now.


#12 There are about 88 million working age Americans that are not employed and that are not looking for employment.  That is an all-time record high.


#13 According to CareerBuilder, only 23 percent of American companies plan to hire more employees in 2012.


#14 Back in the year 2000, about 20 percent of all jobs in America were manufacturing jobs.  Today, about 5 percent of all jobs in America are manufacturing jobs.


#15 The United States has lost an average of approximately 50,000 manufacturing jobs a month since China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001.


#16 Amazingly, more than 56,000 manufacturing facilities in the United States have been shut down since 2001.


#17 According to author Paul Osterman, about 20 percent of all U.S. adults are currently working jobs that pay poverty-level wages.


#18 During the Obama administration, worker health insurance costs have risenby 23 percent.


#19 An all-time record 49.9 million Americans do not have any health insurance at all at this point, and the percentage of Americans covered by employer-based health plans has fallen for 11 years in a row.


#20 According to the New York Times, approximately 100 million Americans are either living in poverty or in “the fretful zone just above it”.


#21 In the United States today, corporate profits are at an all-time high.  The percentage of Americans that are living in “extreme poverty” is also at an all-time high according to the U.S. Census Bureau.


#22 In the United States today, the wealthiest one percent of all Americans have a greater net worth than the bottom 90 percent combined.


#23 The poorest 50 percent of all Americans now collectively own just 2.5%of all the wealth in the United States.


#24 The number of children living in poverty in the state of California has increased by 30 percent since 2007.


#25 According to the National Center for Children in Poverty, 36.4% of all children that live in Philadelphia are living in poverty, 40.1% of all children that live in Atlanta are living in poverty, 52.6% of all children that live in Cleveland are living in poverty and 53.6% of all children that live in Detroit are living in poverty.


#26 Since Barack Obama entered the White House, the number of Americans on food stamps has increased from 32 million to 46 million.


#27 As the economy has slowed down, so has the number of marriages.  According to a Pew Research Center analysis, only 51 percent of all Americans that are at least 18 years old are currently married.  Back in 1960, 72 percentof all U.S. adults were married.


#28 In 1984, the median net worth of households led by someone 65 or older was 10 times larger than the median net worth of households led by someone 35 or younger.  Today, the median net worth of households led by someone 65 or older is 47 times larger than the median net worth of households led by someone 35 or younger.


#29 If you can believe it, 37 percent of all U.S. households that are led by someone under the age of 35 have a net worth of zero or less than zero.


#30 After adjusting for inflation, U.S. college students are borrowing about twice as much money as they did a decade ago.


#31 According to the Student Loan Debt Clock, total student loan debt in the United States will surpass the 1 trillion dollar mark at some point in 2012.  If you went out right now and starting spending one dollar every single second, it would take you more than 31,000 years to spend one trillion dollars.


#32 Today, 46% of all Americans carry a credit card balance from month to month.


#33 Incredibly, one out of every seven Americans has at least 10 credit cards.


#34 The average interest rate on a credit card that is carrying a balance is now up to 13.10 percent.


#35 Of the U.S. households that do have credit card debt, the average amount of credit card debt is an astounding $15,799.


#36 Overall, Americans are carrying a grand total of $798 billion in credit card debt.  If you were alive when Jesus was born and you spent a million dollars every single day since then, you still would not have spent $798 billion by now.


#37 It may be hard to believe, but the truth is that consumer debt in America has increased by a whopping 1700% since 1971.


#38 At this point, about 70 percent of all auto purchases in the United States involve an auto loan.


#39 In the United States today, 45 percent of all auto loans are made to subprime borrowers.


#40 Mortgage debt as a percentage of GDP has more than tripled since 1955.


#41 According to a recent study conducted by the BlackRock Investment Institute, the ratio of household debt to personal income in the United States is now 154 percent.


#42 To get the same purchasing power that you got out of $20.00 back in 1970 you would have to have more than $116 today.


#43 When Barack Obama first took office, an ounce of gold was going for about $850.  Today an ounce of gold costs more than $1700 an ounce.


#44 The number of Americans that are not paying federal incomes taxes is atan all-time high.


#45 A staggering 48.5% of all Americans live in a household that receives some form of government benefits.  Back in 1983, that number was below 30 percent.


#46 The amount of money that the federal government gives directly to Americans has increased by 32 percent since Barack Obama entered the White House.


#47 During 2012, the U.S. government must roll over nearly 3 trillion dollarsof old debt.


#48 The U.S. debt to GDP ratio has now reached 101 percent.


#49 At the moment, the U.S. national debt is sitting at a grand total of$15,419,800,222,325.15.


#50 The U.S. national debt is now more than 22 times larger than it was when Jimmy Carter became president.


#51 During the Obama administration, the U.S. government has accumulated more debt than it did from the time that George Washington took office to the time that Bill Clinton took office.


#52 If the federal government began right at this moment to repay the U.S. national debt at a rate of one dollar per second, it would take over 440,000 years to pay off the national debt.


#53 If Bill Gates gave every single penny of his fortune to the U.S. government, it would only cover the U.S. budget deficit for about 15 days.


#54 Right now, the U.S. national debt is increasing by about 150 million dollars every single hour.


#55 Spending by the federal government accounted for about 2 percent of GDP back in 1800.  It accounted for 23.8 percent in 2011, and according to former U.S. Comptroller General David M. Walker, it will account for 36.8 percent of GDP by 2040.


Bad news, eh?


Read more -
http://www.blacklistednews.com/55_Interesting_Facts_About_The_U.S._Economy_In_2012/18097/0/0/0/Y/M.html

Nearly Half of All Americans Don’t Pay Income Taxes - most of that population receives generous federal benefits -

Nearly Half of All Americans Don’t Pay Income Taxes - most of that population receives generous federal benefits - 


This year’s Index of Dependence on Government presented startling findings about the sharp increase of Americans who rely on the federal government for housing, food, income, student aid or other assistance. (See last week’s chart.)
Another eye-popping number was the percentage of Americans who don’t pay income taxes, which now accounts for nearly half of the U.S. population. Meanwhile, most of that population receives generous federal benefits.
“One of the most worrying trends in the Index is the coinciding growth in the non-taxpaying public,” wrote Heritage authors Bill Beach and Patrick Tyrrell. “The percentage of people who do not pay federal income taxes, and who are not claimed as dependents by someone who does pay them, jumped from 14.8 percent in 1984 to 49.5 percent in 2009.”
That means 151.7 million Americans paid nothing in 2009. By comparison, 34.8 million tax filers paid no taxes in 1984.
The rapid growth of Americans who don’t pay income taxes is particularly alarming for the fate of the American form of government, Beach and Tyrrell warned. Coupled with higher spending on government programs, it is already proving to be a major fiscal challenge.


Read more - 
http://blog.heritage.org/2012/02/19/chart-of-the-week-nearly-half-of-all-americans-dont-pay-income-taxes/