Online freedom declines, amid NSA effect

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Online freedom declines, amid NSA effect

Washington (AFP) - Internet freedom suffered this year as a growing number of countries stepped up efforts to spy on users and censor online postings, a global survey showed Thursday.

The report by the non-government watchdog group Freedom House said online freedom declined in 36 of 65 countries surveyed.

In some cases, governments use revelations about surveillance by the US National Security Agency to justify efforts to boost their own monitoring of Internet users and to crack down on dissent.

"Countries are adopting laws that legitimize existing repression and effectively criminalize online dissent," the report said.

"More people are being arrested for their Internet activity than ever before, online media outlets are increasingly pressured to censor themselves or face legal penalties, and private companies are facing new demands to comply with government requests for data or deletions."

The lowest score for Internet freedom was in Iran, followed closely by Syria, China, Cuba, Ethiopia and Uzbekistan.

Nineteen countries were rated "free," with the highest scores for Iceland and Estonia. Thirty-one countries were rated partly free and 19 "not free."

But a majority of countries saw declines in freedom.

Forty-one passed or proposed laws to criminalize or limit online speech or to expand surveillance between May 2013 and May 2014, the report said.

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District divided over freedom camping

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DEREK FLYNN

Top 10 Holiday Park owner Roger Kett is upset restrictions on freedom camping at Koromiko will shift more campers into Picton car parks.

Marlburians will be able to provide feedback on the Marlborough District Council's proposed freedom camping trial from April.

Mayor Alistair Sowman said opening up more freedom spots would make Marlborough more welcoming to visitors.

Regulations encouraging campers to stay at designated areas instead of parking on the roadside would protect the environment.

"It is important that we give a signal that Marlborough welcomes visitors," Sowman said.

"We also know that there are some travellers who, for one reason or another, do not want to stop at camping grounds or holiday parks.

"What we're trying to do is find a workable way of discouraging these visitors from creating problems for the region."

There has been public support for opening up Blenheim Railway Station car park and A&P Park to self-contained campervans.

But in Picton and Seddon, camping ground owners say freedom spots will put them out of business.

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District divided over freedom camping

Some sterilization victims seek compensation after denied state money

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CHARLOTTE, NC (WBTV) -

For decades, the state of North Carolina singled out people it deemed unfit to have children. Those people were forced to have surgery to become sterile. The North Carolina Eugenics Board existed from 1929 to 1974.

Victims came forward and state lawmakers set aside $10 million for compensation. But some who were sterilized may never see that money.

Deborah Blackmon from Charlotte was sterilized when she was 14-years-old. Her sister remembers when it happened, and her niece found the paperwork that shows it happened.

They submitted an application to the Office of Justice for Sterilization Victims and found out in July they were ineligible for the money. Their lawyer, Bob Bollinger, explained that while there is a lot of paperwork showing what happened and that the state paid for it, they lack a crucial piece of paper from Raleigh that says the sterilization was authorized by the Eugenics Board.

That's not what the legislature intended, I don't think, because they had the best of intentions with this. They're trying to right a wrong. I'm sure the legislature did not intend for people who were unlawfully sterilized to not be compensated, because all these sterilizations were done by the state, Bollinger said.

This has been a difficult process for sterilization victims. Deborah Blackmon's sister said Blackmon thinks about being sterilized but would rather not talk about it.

In 1972, Blackmon wrote DEBRA on her sterilization permit. Her sister, Margaret Rankin, remembers that day.

I remember when she came home my mom, my dad and myself went out to the car. My dad wanted everybody to grab a hold of her so she wouldn't fall or anything, Rankin said.

Rankin said she didn't fully understand what happened until her daughter, LaToya Adams, dug up the paperwork.

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Some sterilization victims seek compensation after denied state money

MHPS Receives Order for Hybrid Power Generation System Integrating Solid Oxide Fuel Cells and Micro Gas Turbine

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SOFCs are ceramic fuel cells that operate at a high temperature of 900 degrees Celsius (1,650 degrees Fahrenheit). In a pressurized hybrid system, power is generated directly by chemical reaction between oxygen in the air and hydrogen and carbon monoxide extracted from reformed city gas; residual fuel is then used to drive an MGT. This two-stage system achieves significantly higher power generation efficiency and, as a result, saves substantial energy. Air pressurized in the MGT's compressor is supplied to the SOFCs for use as an oxidizing agent, and then high-temperature exhaust is fed to the MGT and the heat and pressure, together with the residual fuel, are used to generate power. The pressurized SOFCs, having significantly increased voltage as a result of pressurization, lead to enhanced power generation efficiency.

The pressurized SOFC-MGT hybrid power generation system has been undergoing verification testing at the Senju Techno Station of Tokyo Gas Co., Ltd. since 2013. The verification system to be delivered to Kyushu University, the second system of the kind, features a thin, elongated cylindrical cell stack which, together with higher packing density, enables a greater than 40 percent reduction in requisite installation space compared to earlier systems. The system incorporates results achieved in joint research undertaken together with the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO).

The hybrid system will be installed at the Ito Campus of Kyushu University in Nishi-ku, Fukuoka City. It will be used for carrying out basic research toward enhancing the performance, longevity and reliability of SOFCs conducted in the Green Asia International Strategic Comprehensive Special Zone ("Verification of a Smart Fuel Cell Society") at the Next-Generation Fuel Cell Research Center (NEXT-FC). NEXT-FC was established with the aim of promoting collaboration between the academic community and industry toward achieving widespread use of SOFCs.

The hybrid system is being jointly developed with Toyota Motor Corporation. Toyota has a group company, Toyota Turbine and Systems Inc., that markets MGTs.

Leveraging the latest order, MHPS intends to further the discussion with NGK SPARK PLUG CO., LTD. (NTK), with which MHPS concluded a basic agreement on a business tie-up targeting mass production of cylindrical cell stacks in this June, and step up its development of the markets for hybrid systems for both business and industrial uses.

About Mitsubishi Heavy Industries

Since its foundation in 1884, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) has sought pioneering new monodzukuri (manufacturing) techniques, building the foundations for the development of the entire industry. Today, with environmental and energy issues to the fore, MHI provides people around the world with eco-friendly products, and contributes to society through its involvement in global infrastructure projects and other business activities. For more information, please visit the MHI website at http://www.mhi.co.jp.

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Dec 5, 2014 Source: Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (TSE: 7011) (U.S: MHVYF) From the Japan Corporate News Network http://www.japancorp.net Topic: Press release summary View more news from these Sectors: Energy General, Engineering

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MHPS Receives Order for Hybrid Power Generation System Integrating Solid Oxide Fuel Cells and Micro Gas Turbine

Ukrainian Volunteers Make ‘Cyborg’ Soldier Calendar: ‘Cyborgs’ defending Donetsk Airport for months – Video

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Ukrainian Volunteers Make #39;Cyborg #39; Soldier Calendar: #39;Cyborgs #39; defending Donetsk Airport for months
A group of Ukrainian volunteers have made a calendar using photos of the legendary so-called #39;cyborg #39; soldiers who are defending the Donetsk airport in easte...

By: UKRAINE TODAY

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Ukrainian Volunteers Make 'Cyborg' Soldier Calendar: 'Cyborgs' defending Donetsk Airport for months - Video

Disappearing beaches

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Beaches and coasts are amazing wonders of nature. Indias coastline stretches for around 7,500 kilometres. Quite apart from the beautiful beaches, they also support an incredible diversity of wildlife like flamingos, shore birds, Olive Ridley turtles and red crabs.

Indias beaches are visited by millions of people every year too. But have we thought how our beaches are formed? They are formed because of the rivers. Thats why majority of our coastline have sandy beaches.

The rivers draining into the sea transport the large amount of sand that is gradually accumulated along their course. The sea currents moving from south to north direction in the Bay of Bengal and the vice versa in the Arabian Sea deposits the flowing sand along the coast.

The sea waves act as the engines of sand transportation. They drive the movement of sand to form beaches. The amount of sand and sediments deposited in our beaches is a whooping 1.2 billion tonnes every year! Isnt this an amazing natural phenomenon?

These beaches act as a defence mechanism for coastal villages from large waves and natural calamities. But they are destroyed permanently every year at an alarming rate because of construction activities right on the beach.

The classic example for this is the Puducherry harbour. After it was built in the mid 1980s, the authorities realised that the harbour was too shallow for the ships to enter. So they abandoned it. Only smaller fishing boats use it today.

But just the two breakwaters that were built to form the harbour were enough to spark beach erosion. These breakwaters are long strips of construction with boulders. They jut out into the sea for many meters. One of the reasons these are built is to reduce the wave action so that the ships are anchored safely. The unintended consequence of constructions like these is erosion of beaches.

Because the sea currents move from south to north in the Bay of Bengal during the major part of a year, the incoming sand from the rivers is accumulated on the southern side of the breakwater while the northern part of gets eroded, in a matter of months.

This is the reason for erosion of the pristine beaches in Puducherry. With the protective barrier of beaches vanishing, the sea has engulfed fishing settlements, putting livelihoods at stake.

Even the temporary solution of depositing rocks along the beaches seals the opportunity for beach formation. This method not only destroys the hills and forests but also adds to further beach erosion.

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Disappearing beaches

Strange Galaxy Perplexes Astronomers, Citizen Scientists Lend A Hand

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Image Caption: Radio-optical overlay image of galaxy J1649+2635. Yellow is visible-light image; Blue is the radio image, indicating the presence of jets. Credit: Mao et al., NRAO/AUI/NSF, Sloan Digital Sky Survey

Provided by Dave Finley, National Radio Astronomy Observatory

With the help of citizen scientists, a team of astronomers has found an important new example of a very rare type of galaxy that may yield valuable insight on how galaxies developed in the early Universe. The new discovery technique promises to give astronomers many more examples of this important and mysterious type of galaxy.

The galaxy they studied, named J1649+2635, nearly 800 million light-years from Earth, is a spiral galaxy, like our own Milky Way, but with prominent jets of subatomic particles propelled outward from its core at nearly the speed of light. The problem is that spiral galaxies are not supposed to have such large jets.

The conventional wisdom is that such jets come only from elliptical galaxies that formed through the merger of spirals. We dont know how spirals can have these large jets, said Minnie Mao, of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO).

J1649+2635 is only the fourth jet-emitting spiral galaxy discovered so far. The first was found in 2003, when astronomers combined a radio-telescope image from the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA) and a visible-light image of the same object from the Hubble Space Telescope. The second was revealed in 2011 by images from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and the VLA, and the third, found earlier this year, also was discovered by combining radio and visible-light images.

In order to figure out how these jets can be produced by the wrong kind of galaxy, we realized we needed to find more of them, Mao said.

To do that, the astronomers looked for help. That help came in the form of large collections of images from both radio and optical telescopes, and the hands-on assistance of volunteer citizen scientists. The volunteers are participants in an online project called the Galaxy Zoo, in which they look at images from the visible-light Sloan Digital Sky Survey and classify the galaxies as spiral, elliptical, or other types. Each galaxy image is inspected by multiple volunteers to ensure accuracy in the classification.

So far, more than 150,000 Galaxy Zoo participants have classified some 700,000 galaxies. Mao and her collaborators used a superclean subset of more than 65,000 galaxies, for which 95 percent of those viewing each galaxys image agreed on the classification. About 35,000 of those are spiral galaxies. J1649+2635 had been classified by 31 Galaxy Zoo volunteers, 30 of whom agreed that it is a spiral.

Next, the astronomers decided to cross-match the visible-light spirals with galaxies in a catalog that combines data from the NRAO VLA Sky Survey and the Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty Centimeters survey, both done using the VLA. This job was done by Ryan Duffin, a University of Virginia undergraduate working as an NRAO summer student. Duffins cross-matching showed that J1649+2635 is both a spiral galaxy and has powerful twin radio jets.

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Strange Galaxy Perplexes Astronomers, Citizen Scientists Lend A Hand

Pupils reach for the stars with astronomy workshop at Barnard Castle School

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MORE than 150 primary school pupils searched for the stars at Barnard Castle School today (November 3).

Thats after physics teacher, Steve Wrathmall, gave the Year 5 and 6 pupils from Staindrop, St Marys, Stratford and Hepworth Primary Schools a master class workshop in Astronomy.

Dr Wrathmall held the interactive workshop, which is the third one the school has held, in an attempt to inspire the children about physics.

And it wasnt just comets and the stars up for discussion as he also showed them some Christmas Dinner table tricks such as how to levitate tinsel and create a flying teabag.

Both the pupils and staff were so impressed that they have already enquired about further workshops.

Dr Wrathmall said: Physics is a special subject. It affects our lives in so many ways every day.

But it also allows us to explore the universe within the classroom, to ask many fundamental questions about the world around us, and tries to answers some of the most important, often basic, questions we can ask.

It is an evolving, continuously changing subject which makes it ever more exciting.

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Pupils reach for the stars with astronomy workshop at Barnard Castle School

This Drone Took Amazing Astronomical Observatory Video In Wisconsin

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by Elizabeth Howell on December 5, 2014

Its hard to do many types of astronomy in the daylight, so that can be a good time to do a different kind of observing enjoying the architecture of the telescope! This new video shot by a drone shows off Yerkes Observatory in snowy Williams Bay, Wisconsin. The video was uploaded by Adam Novak.

Yerkes, which is operated by the University of Chicago, calls itself the birthplace of modern astrophysics because it combined astronomical observations with experimentation in physics and chemistry. Thats something thats normal in astronomy today, but certainly not in 1897.

Observations began with a 40-inch refractor (billed as the biggest such telescope ever finished) that weighs about 20 tons. While the telescope itself is from the turn of the century, the means of moving it is much more modern from about 50 years ago, according to a National Park Service book on the observatory:

The telescope was modernized in 1969 permitting more accurate and rapid setting of the position of the telescope. The efficiency of the telescope was further increased by the addition of an automatically guiding camera. The driving clock, by which the telescope is made to follow the stars, consists of a synchronous motor controlled by an electronic oscillator, the frequency of which can he set so as to make the telescope follow the sun, the moon, or stars.

You can learn more about Yerkes on the official website.

A drone shot of Yerkes Observatory in Wisconsin. Credit: Adam Novak / Vimeo (screenshot)

Elizabeth Howell is the senior writer at Universe Today. She also works for Space.com, Space Exploration Network, the NASA Lunar Science Institute, NASA Astrobiology Magazine and LiveScience, among others. Career highlights include watching three shuttle launches, and going on a two-week simulated Mars expedition in rural Utah. You can follow her on Twitter @howellspace or contact her at her website.

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This Drone Took Amazing Astronomical Observatory Video In Wisconsin

Stephen Hawking Says Artificial Intelligence Is A Threat To Human Existence – Video

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Stephen Hawking Says Artificial Intelligence Is A Threat To Human Existence
Stephen Hawking is happy with the artificial intelligence system that helps him speak, but remains leery of making technology in general too smart. When we t...

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Stephen Hawking Says Artificial Intelligence Is A Threat To Human Existence - Video