Archive for February, 2013
Why a One-Room West Virginia Library Runs a $20,000 Cisco Router
February 26th, 2013Via: Ars Technica: Marmet, West Virginia is a town of 1,500 people living in a thin ribbon along the banks of the Kanawha River just below Charleston. The town’s public library is only open Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays. It’s housed in a small building the size of a trailer, which the state of West Virginia […]
Foxconn Reshuffle: Some Manufacturing Going to Taiwan, Brazil, Indonesia and USA
February 25th, 2013Via: Forbes: Last Monday, Gou announced that Foxconn’s next major expansion push would be focused on Taiwan, where he wanted to put plants in New Taipei City, Taichung, and Kaohsiung. This comes at a time when the company is putting off the expansion of one of its China facilities, in Zhengzhou. Gou founded Foxconn in […]
Farm Theme Boosts Enrollment in Rural Kansas School
February 25th, 2013What? No In-School-Suspension program? Via: Reuters: The first clue is a sign “Fresh Eggs for Sale” in front of the school. There is a sheep pen on the baseball field and the sounds of farm animals greet pupils every morning. This is not your ordinary elementary school. It is the Walton Rural Life Center, a […]
NZ: Disgruntled Snitch Sues Police
February 25th, 2013Via: Stuff: A former police spy has lifted the lid on his decade of deception under the codename Muldoon. The details of Rob Gilchrist’s double life infiltrating protest groups and leading trade unions are contained in a draft claim for more than $500,000 from police for lost income, for humiliation, distress, and loss of reputation. […]
Widespread Seafood Fraud
February 25th, 2013Via: Oceana: From 2010 to 2012, Oceana conducted one of the largest seafood fraud investigations in the world to date, collecting more than 1,200 seafood samples from 674 retail outlets in 21 states to determine if they were honestly labeled. DNA testing found that one-third (33 percent) of the 1,215 samples analyzed nationwide were mislabeled, […]
China Acknowledges ‘Cancer Villages’
February 24th, 2013Via: BBC: China’s environment ministry appears to have acknowledged the existence of so-called “cancer villages” after years of public speculation about the impact of pollution in certain areas. For years campaigners have said cancer rates in some villages near factories and polluted waterways have shot up. But the term “cancer village” has no technical definition […]
PBS NOVA Rise of the Drones
February 24th, 2013Via: PBS: Related: Drone ‘Nightmare Scenario’ Now Has A Name: ARGUS
6 Tanks at Hanford Nuclear Site Leaking Radioactive Waste
February 23rd, 2013Via: Reuters: Six underground storage tanks at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation along the Columbia River in Washington state were recently found to be leaking radioactive waste, but there is no immediate risk to human health, state and federal officials said on Friday. The seeping waste adds to decades of soil contamination caused by leaking storage […]
Moody’s Downgrades Britain’s Credit Rating
February 23rd, 2013Via: Reuters: Britain suffered its first ever sovereign ratings downgrade from a major agency on Friday when Moody’s stripped the country of its coveted top-notch triple-A rating, dealing a major blow to finance minister George Osborne. Moody’s said weak prospects for British economic growth, which have thrown the government’s deficit reduction strategy off course, lay […]
Bank ‘Profits’
February 22nd, 2013Via: Bloomberg: So what if we told you that, by our calculations, the largest U.S. banks aren’t really profitable at all? What if the billions of dollars they allegedly earn for their shareholders were almost entirely a gift from U.S. taxpayers? Granted, it’s a hard concept to swallow. It’s also crucial to understanding why the […]
