London to Brighton

I am going to do a practice run in July, start about 3 am and my mate who I am racing and has just done Lands end to John a Groats is starting at 7am. Last one to arrive buys lunch/dinner etc Perhaps we could get some of the flab fighting TRC ers to team up for the next official one ? (I am using a 24 speed hard tail mountain bike with road tyres, I don't see the point in making it too easy on the legs and hard on the arse)

Source: http://www.therevcounter.co.uk/general-mayhem/89392-london-brighton.html

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Australian PM Gillard calls for vote on leadership

By James Grubel

CANBERRA (Reuters) - Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard has called a snap party vote on her leadership for later on Wednesday, in a bid to squash a campaign to replace her with former leader Kevin Rudd less than three months before national elections.

Polls show Rudd is more popular with voters and could help Labor hold on to more seats at the election. Gillard now rules with a one-seat parliamentary majority, with support from the Greens and key independents.

Gillard said she would quit politics at a scheduled September 14 election if she loses the leadership to Rudd, whom she toppled in a leadership coup in June 2010.

"I do think it's in the best interests of the nation and in the best interests of the Labor Party for this matter to be resolved," Gillard said, in calling the leadership vote for 7 p.m. (5 a.m. EDT).

"This is it. There are no more opportunities, tonight is the night and this is it. All of these issues need to be resolved tonight. We cannot have the government or the Labor Party go to the next election with a person leading the Labor Party and a person floating around as the potential alternate."

The moves to oust Gillard and return to Rudd follow a series of opinion polls showing her minority government could lose up to 35 seats at the elections, giving the conservative opposition a massive majority in the 150-member parliament.

But any return of Rudd as prime minister could force Australia's governor-general, as head of state, to intervene and initiate an immediate election, as Rudd does not have agreed support from independent lawmakers who wield the balance of power in parliament.

The Greens and key independents have said Rudd, if elected, would need to test his support in parliament.

With parliament due to adjourn ahead of the election on Thursday, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott suspended question time to urge Gillard to end the uncertainty over her future and call elections for August 3.

"We see the tremors of leadership change shaking the foundations of this parliament," Abbott told lawmakers.

"The poison inside the Australian Labor Party is paralyzing government in this country. And every hour, every day, that this is not resolved, the paralysis inside the government just gets worse and worse.

"Why should we limp on for another 80 days of confusion and paralysis under the current regime? Let's have an election."

(Reporting by James Grubel; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/australian-pm-gillard-calls-vote-leadership-062922948.html

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Angry Birds Trilogy slingshots to Nintendo's Wii U and Wii consoles on August 13th

As if its flock of angry fowl weren't already near-ubiquitous, Rovio's today announced an August 13th release date for the Wii and Wii U versions of Angry Birds Trilogy. The Finnish company had previously committed to the two Nintendo ports earlier this year, prompted by the success of the title on the 3DS, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. Rovio's not just pushing out a repackaged redo, either -- this collection bundles the original Angry Birds game with Seasons and Rio, while also adding some new levels. And given the finger-flicking origins of the franchise, gamers will be able to make use of the Wii U's GamePad for that famed asymmetric play (read: GamePad-only) and touch controls. If you haven't already exhausted your lust for flipping Rovio's birds, then the dog days of summer should see you and that Wii U making nice. Of course, by then you could also be flinging zombie-like Pikmin with reckless abandon. What's a Wii U owner to do?

Filed under: Gaming, Nintendo

Comments

Source: Polygon

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/06/27/angry-birds-trilogy-nintendo-wii-u-wii/?utm_medium=feed&utm_source=Feed_Classic&utm_campaign=Engadget

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Miley Cyrus to Haters: I Win!

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2013/06/miley-cyrus-to-haters-i-win/

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Nokia to stream its New York Lumia event, teases 41 million reasons to tune in

For anyone that won't be attending Nokia's incoming New York event, you won't have to sit in silence until the news breaks, because the entire event will be streamed from Nokia's own Conversations site. There's nothing going on at the link yet, but you can at least bookmark it for now and we'll be there in person to report on all the important announcements, presumably including a photo-loving, zoom-reinventing new Windows Phone.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Nokia

Comments

Source: Nokia Conversations

Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/rPUWK8faX-w/

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NSA leaker Snowden expected to fly to Cuba

WASHINGTON (AP) ? The bizarre journey of Edward Snowden is far from over. After spending a night in Moscow's airport, the former National Security Agency contractor ? and admitted leaker of state secrets ? was expected to fly to Cuba and Venezuela en route to possible asylum in Ecuador.

Snowden, also a former CIA technician, fled Hong Kong on Sunday to dodge U.S. efforts to extradite him on espionage charges. Ecuador's Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino said his government had received an asylum request, adding Monday that the decision "has to do with freedom of expression and with the security of citizens around the world." The anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks also said it would help Snowden.

Ecuador has rejected the United States' previous efforts at cooperation, and has been helping WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, avoid prosecution by allowing him to stay at its embassy in London.

Snowden gave documents to The Guardian and The Washington Post newspapers disclosing U.S. surveillance programs that collect vast amounts of phone records and online data in the name of foreign intelligence, often sweeping up information on American citizens. Officials have the ability to collect phone and Internet information broadly but need a warrant to examine specific cases where they believe terrorism is involved.

Snowden had been in hiding for several weeks in Hong Kong, a former British colony with a high degree of autonomy from mainland China. The United States formally sought Snowden's extradition from Hong Kong to face espionage charges but was rebuffed; Hong Kong officials said the U.S. request did not fully comply with their laws.

The Justice Department rejected that claim, saying its request met all of the requirements of the extradition treaty between the U.S. and Hong Kong. During conversations last week, including a phone call Wednesday between Attorney General Eric Holder and Hong Kong Secretary for Justice Rimsky Yuen, Hong Kong officials never raised any issues regarding sufficiency of the U.S. request, a Justice representative said.

The United States was in touch through diplomatic and law enforcement channels with countries that Snowden could travel through or to, reminding them that Snowden is wanted on criminal charges and reiterating Washington's position that Snowden should only be permitted to travel back to the U.S., a State Department official said. Snowden's U.S. passport has been revoked.

U.S. officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the case.

An unidentified Aeroflot airline official was cited by Russia's state ITAR-Tass news agency and Interfax as saying Snowden was on the plane that landed Sunday afternoon in Moscow. The Russian report said Snowden intended to fly to Cuba on Monday and then on to Caracas, Venezuela.

The White House was hoping to stop Snowden before he left Moscow.

Caitlin Hayden, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council, said, "Given our intensified cooperation after the Boston marathon bombings and our history of working with Russia on law enforcement matters ? including returning numerous high-level criminals back to Russia at the request of the Russian government ? we expect the Russian government to look at all options available to expel Mr. Snowden back to the U.S. to face justice for the crimes with which he is charged."

Still, the United States is likely to have problems interrupting Snowden's passage. The United States does not have an extradition treaty with Russia, but does with Cuba, Venezuela and Ecuador. Even with an extradition agreement though, any country could give Snowden a political exemption.

The likelihood that any of these countries would stop Snowden from traveling on to Ecuador seemed remote. While diplomatic tensions have thawed in recent years, Cuba and the United States are hardly allies after a half-century of distrust. Another country that could see Snowden pass through, Venezuela, could prove difficult, as well. Former President Hugo Chavez was a sworn enemy of the United States and his successor, Nicolas Maduro, earlier this year called President Barack Obama "grand chief of devils." The two countries do not exchange ambassadors.

Snowden's options aren't numerous, said Assange's lawyer, Michael Ratner.

"You have to have a country that's going to stand up to the United States," Ratner said. "You're not talking about a huge range of countries here."

It also wasn't clear Snowden was finished disclosing highly classified information.

Snowden has perhaps more than 200 sensitive documents, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said on CBS' "Face the Nation."

___

Associated Press White House Correspondent Julie Pace and Associated Press writers Matthew Lee and Frederic J. Frommer in Washington, Lynn Berry in Moscow, Kevin Chan in Hong Kong and Sylvia Hui in London contributed to this report.

___

Follow Philip Elliott on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/philip_elliott

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/nsa-leaker-snowden-expected-fly-cuba-050842508.html

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Nashville Symphony settles with creditors on hall debt

By Tim Ghianni

NASHVILLE, Tenn (Reuters) - Just days before a foreclosure auction of its performance hall, the Nashville Symphony has struck a deal with creditors to settle an $82.3 million debt from the construction of the seven-year-old structure.

It was not immediately clear what was behind the eleventh-hour rescue of the orchestra, whose financial troubles echo those of other classical music ensembles nationwide, as the economy has cut into ticket sales and outside funding.

Under the terms of the agreement, "all of the symphony's obligations to its commercial lenders have been resolved, and the banks' recent foreclosure notice has been withdrawn," a statement from the symphony said on Monday. The auction for the hall had been scheduled for June 28.

The debt was the balance of a $102 million bond issue for the construction of the Schermerhorn Symphony Center in 2006. The Center was severely damaged by a flood in 2010 but has since been repaired. Some of the loss was recovered through federal funds.

The Nashville Symphony has told subscribers that it has been operating at a loss and needs to take aggressive actions to improve its finances.

Nashville billionaire businesswoman and philanthropist Martha Ingram, who helped lead the campaign to build the hall, said she had played a role in averting the foreclosure but would not disclose details.

While she celebrated the resolution, she added, "It is clear now that the symphony organization has work to do to improve its operating results and develop increased annual support."

Though Nashville is known for its country music, the symphony has won several Grammy awards and sells out many performances.

"It is because we recognize the orchestra's importance to this community that we were able to come together and work so hard to make this happen," Bank of America spokeswoman Shirley Norton said in a statement from corporate headquarters in Charlotte, North Carolina. The bank is the symphony's lead creditor.

Meanwhile, there has been no resolution reported in contract talks between the orchestra and its 85 musicians. Both the musicians' union and the Nashville Symphony Association have agreed to a media blackout of negotiations.

Several symphonies have been troubled by labor disputes with musicians in the past year, including the Minnesota Orchestra; the San Francisco Symphony, whose musicians struck for more than two weeks in March; and the Chicago Symphony, whose musicians walked out for 48 hours last fall before an agreement was reached.

(Editing by Mary Wisniewski and Steve Orlofsky)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/nashville-symphony-settles-creditors-hall-debt-233857690.html

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Billion-pixel view of Mars comes from Curiosity rover

June 24, 2013 ? A billion-pixel view from the surface of Mars, from NASA's Mars rover Curiosity, offers armchair explorers a way to examine one part of the Red Planet in great detail.

The first NASA-produced view from the surface of Mars larger than one billion pixels stitches together nearly 900 exposures taken by cameras onboard Curiosity and shows details of the landscape along the rover's route.

The 1.3-billion-pixel image is available for perusal with pan and zoom tools at: http://mars.nasa.gov/bp1/ and a scaled down version (~159MB) is available for direct download here: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA16919 .

The full-circle scene surrounds the site where Curiosity collected its first scoops of dusty sand at a windblown patch called "Rocknest," and extends to Mount Sharp on the horizon.

"It gives a sense of place and really shows off the cameras' capabilities," said Bob Deen of the Multi-Mission Image Processing Laboratory at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "You can see the context and also zoom in to see very fine details."

Deen assembled the product using 850 frames from the telephoto camera of Curiosity's Mast Camera instrument, supplemented with 21 frames from the Mastcam's wider-angle camera and 25 black-and-white frames -- mostly of the rover itself -- from the Navigation Camera. The images were taken on several different Mars days between Oct. 5 and Nov. 16, 2012. Raw single-frame images received from Curiosity are promptly posted on a public website at: http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw/ . Mars fans worldwide have used those images to assemble mosaic views, including at least one gigapixel scene.

The new mosaic from NASA shows illumination effects from variations in the time of day for pieces of the mosaic. It also shows variations in the clarity of the atmosphere due to variable dustiness during the month while the images were acquired.

NASA's Mars Science Laboratory project is using Curiosity and the rover's 10 science instruments to investigate the environmental history within Gale Crater, a location where the project has found that conditions were long ago favorable for microbial life.

Malin Space Science Systems, San Diego, built and operates Curiosity's Mastcam. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington and built the Navigation Camera and the rover.

More information about the mission is online at: http://www.nasa.gov/msl and http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/ .

You can follow the mission on Facebook and Twitter at: http://www.facebook.com/marscuriosity and http://www.twitter.com/marscuriosity .

For more information about the Multi-Mission Image Processing Laboratory, see: http://www-mipl.jpl.nasa.gov/mipex.html .

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/space_time/astronomy/~3/OHTcgAapQbM/130624135250.htm

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Skywire Pictures Nik Wallenda Crosses Grand Canyon - Business ...

UPDATE: He made it! After nearly 23 minutes, Nik Wallenda is the first human to ever cross the Little Colorado River Gorge on a wire.

Daredevil Nik Wallenda has a wife, three children, and he's been training for one moment his entire life:

To tightrope walk across the Grand Canyon without any safety net or harness. Making it across means life, falling means death.

The National Park Service would never allow a stunt like this over the Grand Canyon ? so Wallenda had to settle for the "little Grand Canyon" over the gorge of the Colorado River near Cameron, Arizona, on tribal lands of the Navajo Nation.

Wallenda's grandfather died before viewers' eyes on live television trying to do a similar, harness-free walk.

"Thank you Jesus," Wallenda kept repeating with each step. "You're my king, you're my protector, you're my shield, you're my strength, you're my lord." He battled high winds and balanced with a 45 pound bar on the 2-inch wire. He reached the half-way point on the wire at the 11:30 minute mark.

The quarter-mile walk at 1,500 feet in the air took more than 20 minutes ? in winds ranging from a safe 18 mph to a more treacherous 30 mph. Wallenda knelt twice to wait out the stronger wind.

Here's his bio on Discovery's website:

Nik Wallenda is known as 'The King of the High Wire.' He is the seventh generation of the legendary Great Wallendas and began walking the wire at age 4. He and his family have performed some of the most famous stunts in the world, but no one else has ever dared to take on the Grand Canyon.

His incredible walk was aired on the Discovery Channel Sunday evening on a live feed.

This isn't the first feat on the tightrope for Wallenda. Last year, he successfully?walked across Niagara Falls, according to NPR.

Here are some shots of him crossing the Grand Canyon.

Discovery Channel

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/a-man-is-about-to-tight-rope-walk-across-the-grand-canyon-without-any-wires-2013-6

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Unexpected discovery of the ways cells move could boost understanding of complex diseases

June 23, 2013 ? A new discovery about how cells move inside the body may provide scientists with crucial information about disease mechanisms such as the spread of cancer or the constriction of airways caused by asthma. Led by researchers at Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC), investigators found that epithelial cells -- the type that form a barrier between the inside and the outside of the body, such as skin cells -- move in a group, propelled by forces both from within and from nearby cells -- to fill any unfilled spaces they encounter.

The study appears June 23, 2013 in an advance online edition of Nature Materials.

"We were trying to understand the basic relationship between collective cellular motions and collective cellular forces, as might occur during cancer cell invasion, for example. But in doing so we stumbled onto a phenomenon that was totally unexpected," said senior author Jeffrey Fredberg, professor of bioengineering and physiology in the HSPH Department of Environmental Health and co-senior investigator of HSPH's Molecular and Integrative Cellular Dynamics lab.

Biologists, engineers, and physicists from HSPH and IBEC worked together to shed light on collective cellular motion because it plays a key role in functions such as wound healing, organ development, and tumor growth. Using a technique called monolayer stress microscopy -- which they invented themselves -- they measured the forces affecting a single layer of moving epithelial cells. They examined the cells' velocity and direction as well as traction -- how some cells either pull or push themselves and thus force collective movement.

As they expected, the researchers found that when an obstacle was placed in the path of an advancing cell layer -- in this case, a gel that provided no traction -- the cells moved around it, tightly hugging the sides of the gel as they passed. However, the researchers also found something surprising -- that the cells, in addition to moving forward, continued to pull themselves collectively back toward the gel, as if yearning to fill the unfilled space. The researchers dubbed this movement "kenotaxis," from the Greek words "keno" (vacuum) and "taxis" (arrangement), because it seemed the cells were attempting to fill a vacuum.

This new finding could help researchers better understand cell behavior -- and evaluate potential drugs to influence that behavior -- in a variety of complex diseases, such as cancer, asthma, cardiovascular disease, developmental abnormalities, and glaucoma. The finding could also help with tissue engineering and regenerative medicine, both of which rely on cell migration.

In carcinomas, for instance -- which represent 90% of all cancers and involve epithelial cells -- the new information on cell movement could improve understanding of how cancer cells migrate through the body. Asthma research could also get a boost, because scientists think migration of damaged epithelial cells in the lungs are involved in the airway narrowing caused by the disease.

"Kenotaxis is a property of the cellular collective, not the individual cell," said Jae Hun Kim, the study's first author. "It was amazing to us that the cellular collective can organize to pull itself systematically in one direction while moving systematically in an altogether different direction."

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/z8YbWatzDnE/130623145100.htm

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Pelosi's defense of NSA surveillance draws boos (The Arizona Republic)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories News, RSS and RSS Feed via Feedzilla.

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Iraq attacks kill more than 30

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A suicide bomber blew himself up inside a Shi'ite mosque in northern Baghdad killing at least 12 people during evening prayers, police and medics said, in the deadliest of a series of attacks that claimed more than 30 lives across Iraq on Saturday.

Sectarian tensions in Iraq and the wider region have been inflamed by the civil war in Syria, where mainly Sunni Muslim rebels are fighting to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad, whose Alawite sect derives from Shi'ite Islam.

Insurgents including al Qaeda's Iraqi affiliate have been regaining ground and recruits from the country's Sunni minority, which feels sidelined since the U.S.-led invasion toppled former dictator Saddam Hussein and empowered majority Shi'ites.

"A suicide bomber blew himself up among the worshippers in the middle of evening prayer. There were bodies drenched in blood and others shouting for help while smoke filled the mosque," said a policeman at the scene.

A further 25 people were wounded in the attack, which took place in the Sab al-Bor district near Taji, 20 km (12 miles) north of Baghdad.

Scattered attacks across the country throughout the day killed at least 22 others, around half of them in or near the northern city of Mosul, where a suicide bomber killed four people at a police checkpoint.

In the western province of Anbar, which shares a border with Syria, militants detonated two car bombs near a checkpoint and attacked it with rocket-propelled grenades, killing five policemen.

Two people were killed when gunmen hurled a hand grenade at a gathering of laborers in Tikrit, 150 km (95 miles) north of Baghdad, and a roadside bomb near some restaurants in the center of the capital killed two more.

More than 1,000 people were killed in Iraq in May alone, making it the deadliest month since the sectarian bloodletting of 2006-07.

(Reporting by Kareem Raheem, Kamal Naama and Ziad al-Sanjary; Writing by Isabel Coles; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/suicide-bomber-kills-12-shiite-mosque-baghdad-police-181517624.html

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When in doubt, NSA searches information on Americans

According to newly revealed secret documents, the NSA retains wide discretion over targeting individuals for surveillance?? including, potentially, Americans. Civil libertarians say 'it confirms our worst fears.'

By Mark Clayton,?Staff writer / June 22, 2013

This 2007 photo shows the National Security Agency building at Fort Meade, Md.

Charles Dharapak/AP

Enlarge

Ever since a former National Security Agency contractor blew the cover off two massive, top secret intelligence collection programs that targeted phone records and Internet data, President Obama and senior NSA officials have insisted that the programs target only foreign terror suspects.

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In any case, Mr. Obama and the NSA have argued, a warrant is required to target Americans? communications.

But according to newly revealed secret documents, the NSA retains wide discretion over targeting individuals for surveillance based on whether they are ?reasonably believed? to be outside the US ? as well as over what to do with communications data on Americans that are ?inadvertently acquired.?

The documents, which were published by The Washington Post and Guardian newspapers late Thursday, are purported to be from the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Court in Washington and focus on intelligence programs operated under section 702 of the Patriot Act ? which targets foreigners. The court, which was established by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), rules on overseas requests for surveillance warrants against suspected foreign agents or terror suspects.

The NSA surveillance programs were publicly revealed a week ago in top secret documents leaked to the Guardian and the Post. Edward Snowden, the former NSA contractor, said he leaked the documents to expose an overreaching spy program. The NSA is charged with spying overseas ? but by law may not spy on Americans at home or abroad ? without a warrant.

On Friday, US officials said federal prosecutors have filed a sealed criminal complaint against Mr. Snowden, charging him with espionage and theft. The United States has also asked Hong Kong, where he is believed to be hiding, to detain him on a provisional arrest warrant.

Before the latest documents became public, the NSA sought to reassure the American public that its surveillance programs were beneficial.

In hearings Tuesday before the House Select Committee on Intelligence, Gen. Keith B. Alexander, the head of the NSA, told the committee that the surveillance had helped prevent ?potential terrorist events over 50 times since 9/11? and that 10 of the plots involved terror suspects or targets in the United States.

?In the 12 years since the attacks on Sept. 11, we have lived in relative safety and security as a nation,? General Alexander said. ?That security is a direct result of the intelligence community?s quiet efforts to better connect the dots and learn from the mistakes that permitted those attacks to occur on 9/11.?

But even as the drama of the pursuit and possible prosecution of Snowden unfolds, the new details that came to light late Thursday, which spell out procedures for those programs, seem likely to spur further foment in Congress and the American public.

Determining whether a target is inside the US or not, is a key uncertainty addressed by one legal FISA court document on ?targeting non-United States persons.?

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/pLqd47jrBDw/When-in-doubt-NSA-searches-information-on-Americans

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Friends of Syria agree to give urgent rebel aid

DOHA (Reuters) - Western and Arab countries opposed to President Bashar al-Assad agreed at talks in Qatar on Saturday to give urgent military support to Syrian rebels fighting for his overthrow, and to channel it through a Western-backed rebel military command.

Ministers from the 11 main countries which form the Friends of Syria group agreed "to provide urgently all the necessary materiel and equipment to the opposition on the ground, each country in its own way in order to enable them to counter brutal attacks by the regime and its allies".

They also condemned "the intervention of Hezbollah militias and fighters from Iran and Iraq", demanding that they withdraw immediately.

Guerrillas from Lebanon's Shi'ite pro-Iranian Hezbollah organization spearheaded the recapture of the strategic border town of Qusair from mainly Sunni Muslim rebels two weeks ago.

Hezbollah and Shi'ite Iraqi gunmen have also been fighting around the Shi'ite shrine of Sayyid Zainab south of Damascus, while Iranian military commanders are believed to be advising Assad's officers on their counter-offensives against the rebels.

The ministers said the growing sectarian nature of the conflict and the foreign interventions "threaten the unity of Syria (and) broaden the conflict" across the region. They also expressed strong concern at the increasing presence of "terrorist elements" and growing radicalization in Syria.

(Editing by Alison Williams)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/friends-syria-state-agree-urgent-rebel-aid-143858650.html

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Making Ice Brewed Coffee - A Craftsy Food & Cooking Tutorial

We?ve already talked about the intricacies of the right procedure for crafting the perfect cup of pour over coffee. We spoke of freshly roasted beans, the perfect grind and water temperature. Perhaps I even scared some of you away with all the scales, talk of grams and timers. For those of you who are still with me, I?m back with more coffee talk. This time we?re brewing the perfect cup of iced coffee.

Origins

From what I found, New Orleans was the initiator of iced coffee. Although I imagine some Italian might want to argue against that. In their version they?d let coffee grounds along with ground chicory steep in water for at least 12 hours at room temperature before they strained it, and served a tall glass over ice with a healthy amount of milk or cream. Many people continue to drink it in this way and lucky for us, iced Toddy (as this method is referred to) or cold-brew coffee has made its way all over country. Some say this method eliminates some of the unwanted acidic or bright taste in coffee and gives a smooth, rich and full flavor.

Others scoff at this method urging that the iced method (I?ll explain in a second) is the only way to go. I?d take either but today we?re talking about brewing over ice.

The Iced Method

This method was originally created in Japan, and is favored by many as it allows the natural brightness and subtleties of the coffee to come through. Since we?ve already discussed the intricacies of the pour-over method, making iced coffee will be very easy. The basic idea is that you prepare the grounds in the same way as you would a pour over but you use half the amount of water as you would preparing a cup of hot coffee. The other half of the water is in the cup below in the form of ice. So when you are finished you have a perfectly chilled and balanced cup of iced coffee with all the same nuances and flavors that you would have gotten out of a hot cup of coffee.

The Recipe

The basic iced coffee recipe is as follows:

• 1 ounce of freshly ground medium-fine coffee
• 7 ounces ice
• 8 ounces of nearly boiling water

Place the ice in the bottom of your Chemex or cup ? depending on which method you are using. Then proceed as you would the pour over method. The resulting cup of coffee is perfectly chilled, bright, clean and completely refreshing. I like a splash of cream in mine and perhaps some agave or simple syrup but if you?re a purist forget I said that.

If you?re like me and you like the idea of crafting a simple syrup to sweeten your coffee, check out this post for a recipe and variations on that recipe.

Source: http://www.craftsy.com/blog/2013/06/how-to-make-ice-brewed-coffee/

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Walmart permanently drops iPhone 4S price to $39, iPhone 5 to $129

While brief sales on iPhones are relatively common, it's rare to see permanent price drops outside of a hardware refresh cycle. Walmart is willing to give those cuts a shot, however. Visit the company's stores from this point onward and you can pick up the 16GB iPhone 4S in its AT&T, Sprint or Verizon forms at $39 on contract, instead of $90. The 16GB iPhone 5 for those same networks is dropping to $129 from its usual $190; sorry, T-Mobile fans, you're out of the loop for now. It's not hard to understand Walmart's sudden generosity -- when the iPhone range is nearing its annual upgrade, the lower prices should keep current units moving.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Apple, Verizon, Sprint, AT&T

Comments

Via: Mashable

Source: Walmart (1), (2)

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/06/23/walmart-permanently-drops-iphone-4s-and-iphone-5-prices/?utm_medium=feed&utm_source=Feed_Classic&utm_campaign=Engadget

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Acer Aspire R7-571-6858

The Acer Aspire R7-571-6858 might be the first desktop replacement laptop for the all-in-one desktop generation. Featuring an adjustable easel-style stand/hinge combination, it's the first laptop I've seen with a fully adjustable monitor, and more closely resembles a desktop than a laptop, with a flipping, folding, floating display design that is certainly unique. While this new design will turn heads and may hint at the shape of things to come, the overall design is dragged down by the decision to swap the touchpad and keyboard, resulting in a design that is awkward at best.

Design
With so many ultrabooks on the market, it's refreshing to see a full-bodied desktop replacement in the labs. The Aspire R7 is by no means svelte, measuring 1.1 by 14.8 by 10.0 inches (HWD) and weighing 5.22 pounds. The construction blends lightweight plastic on the lid and chassis with a metal hinge.

The most prominent feature on the Aspire R7 is the unique combination hinge and display stand, which Acer calls the "Ezel" hinge. Much like the multi-mode Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 13, the Aspire R7 uses the Ezel hinge to offer four different usage modes: Notebook Mode, Ezel Mode, Pad Mode, and Display Mode. In each mode, the 15.6-inch display flips and folds to present the 1,920-by-1,080 touch display at the most comfortable angle. As desk-bound systems go, it's one of the most comfortable implementations of touch that we've used.

Notebook mode is the closest of the four to a regular clamshell laptop, with the display lining up with the back edge of the laptop chassis. In this mode, it functions much like any other touchscreen-equipped laptop, aside from the unusual keyboard layout (more on that in a moment).

In Ezel mode, the display stand allows for a monitor-like setup much more like a desktop display. In addition to looking cool, this mode has the benefit of best utilizing the touch display, letting you bring the screen closer and put it at an angle more comfortable than a regular touch-enabled laptop screen. The Ezel hinge features two adjustable hinges, and both hold firmly enough that when touching and tapping the screen, there's no noticeable screen wobble. The unfortunate side-effect of the sturdy hinges, of course, is that they are just as stiff when adjusting the angle of the display and opening the closed laptop.

Folding the Ezel hinge flat with the screen out puts the laptop into Pad Mode, which converts the Aspire R7 into something like a tablet. It's too large to simply pick up and use on the go, though it can certainly be moved from one room to the next with relative ease. Though not exactly mobile, Pad mode does make for a more comfortable table-top touch experience, and the bulk of the hinge sets the display at an angle, more like a small All-in-One system laying nearly flat. Getting the Aspire R7 out of Pad mode is sometimes difficult, with the sturdy hinges requiring some force to pry the display up and manhandle it back into position.

Finally, the display can be tipped back and flipped over, to show the screen to someone on the opposite side. We've seen similar screen-sharing concepts on the Lenovo Yoga and the Asus Taichi 21, but the Aspire R7 doesn't do much to make this dubious concept seem more reasonable?showing someone else the display requires giving up your own, and it still seems like more trouble than looking at the same screen while standing side-by-side. As with the Asus Taichi, the display sharing feature feels more like an afterthought based on the fact that the stand allows flipping the screen, added to pad out the feature list.

The layout?keyboard on bottom, touchpad on top?is almost as weird as the bizarre easel/stand and display/monitor. While the reasoning is at least logical?with a floating touchscreen you don't necessarily need a touchpad, and the angle of the floating display would block part of the keyboard in normal use?there's no ignoring the fact that the switch is otherwise difficult to justify. The traditional keyboard and touchpad arrangement wasn't arbitrary; properly placed palm rests make typing more ergonomic and on-the-go laptop use easier, and a touchpad located below the spacebar lets you navigate without having to hover over the keyboard or worry about unintentional keystrokes. This new design eliminates those important touches, and just feels like change for the sake of change.

The Aspire R7 boasts four speakers for fuller sound, with Dolby Home Theater v4 adding to the overall quality. The sound quality was actually quite good, and the volume was impressive?loud enough to disturb the neighbors, and clear enough that you might want to. Flip the display from Ezel mode to Display also switches the right and left stereo channels, to match the right and left of the person viewing the screen.

Features
The Aspire R7 places all of its ports and connectors in the bottom half of the system. While this isn't uncommon for a laptop, the desktop-like design makes it feel more like an all-in-one placing all of the ports in the monitor stand, as is seen on the Vizio All-in-One systems.

On the right is a power button and volume controls, one USB 2.0 port with power for charging devices, an SD card slot (SD, SDHC, SDXC), and a Kensington lock slot for physically securing the device. On the left is a mini DisplayPort and full-size HDMI output for connecting an external monitor or TV, and two faster USB 3.0 ports. Despite the Aspire R7's undeniably desktop-like nature, you'll have to use the built-in 802.11n Wi-Fi for networking because there's no Ethernet port to plug into. Also, the Aspire R7 has built-in Bluetooth 4.0, with support for stereo sound, as well as an integrated 720p webcam above the screen.

Though the Aspire R7 is pretty big, the storage is a bit on the small side, with a 500GB spinning hard drive paired with a 24GB solid-state drive (SSD) for snappy performance.

Acer loads up the Aspire R7 with a lot of media and social apps, like Zinio and Next Issue magazine readers, Ebay and Amazon for shopping, and an array of others, like iCookbook, Spotify, ChaCha, Netflix, HuluPlus, and Amazon Kindle all crowding the start screen. Dig in a bit more and you'll find some truely useful extras, like Skype, Acer Clear.fi (for networked media sharing), and Dragon Assistant (a voice recognition and dictation app). While the appeal of individual apps will vary by personal preference and usage patterns, it's clear that Acer has made an effort to be sure that there is plenty to do with the Aspire R7 right out of the box. Acer also covers the Aspire R7 with a one-year warranty.

Performance
The Acer Aspire R7 is equipped with a 1.8GHz Intel Core i5-3337U processor paired with 6GB of RAM. It's the same processor seen in the Sony VAIO T15 Touch (SVT15112CXS), and actually did better in Cinebench, scoring 2.43 points to the Sony T15 Touch's 2.28, but the overall performance scores were very different. In PCMark 7 the Aspire R7 scored 2,702 points, falling behind every other 15-inch laptop with touch?the Sony T15 Touch scored 4,112 points in the same test, and the Editors' Choice Asus VivoBook S400CA-UH51 scored 3,013.

The Aspire R7 planted itself firmly in the middle of the pack during multimedia tests, finishing in Handbrake in 1 minute 33 seconds and Photoshop in 5:43. By comparison, the Dell Inspiron 15z (I15Z-4801SLV) (1:33 Handbrake, 4:51 Photoshop) and the Sony VAIO T15 Touch (1:25 Handbrake, 5:21 Photoshop) both offer better performance with similar hardware. Though the use of Intel's integrated graphics solution isn't sufficient for high end gaming, a 3DMark score of 1,203 points (at Entry settings) indicate that it will do just fine handling Web browsing and video. Given the unusual design and layout of the Aspire R7, media consumption may be one of its best uses.

And while raw performance may not put the Acer Aspire R7 at the top of anyone's must-have list, it did eke out a bit more battery life than competitors, lasting 5 hours 41 minutes in our battery rundown test, outlasting the competition by nearly an hour or more.

Conclusion
In the end, however, the Acer Aspire R7 is a high-flying concept brought low by reality. While the design is daring and innovative, even among the many experimental designs being tried with convertible and touch-centric laptops, the end user experience shows it to be deeply flawed. With a swapped keyboard and trackpad layout that proves cumbersome, a floating touch screen display that adds little, and a bulky design that reduces portability, the Aspire R7 is more of a weird-looking proof of concept than a marketable product, and the middling to mediocre performance just cements it further as a product that may look cool on the shelf, but isn't the one shoppers should spend their money on.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ziffdavis/pcmag/~3/v19S-vp7Ags/0,2817,2420714,00.asp

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