Bitcoin Car tour makes Santa Cruz visit

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The promotional Bitcoin Car stops in Santa Cruz on Friday. (Thomas Mendoza -- Santa Cruz Sentinel)

By Jennifer Pittman

SANTA CRUZ >> The Bitcoin Car, a Canadian-based, four-wheeled promotional tour for the nascent digital currency, drove into downtown Santa Cruz on Friday afternoon and parked in front of Lulu's at the Octagon caf, the latest local merchant to invite bitcoin transactions.

"Just four years ago, it was considered magic money and people were scoffing at it, but now you can find people in just about every community who are using bitcoin," said tour driver Robalo Davidson, the founding CEO of Kryptoz, a Canadian marketing company behind the tour.

Bitcoin is a software-based online payment system first introduced in 2009, according to Wikipedia.

Davidson together with his father, Bryan, has traveled about 20,000 miles on a zigzagging tour of North America. They are two-thirds of the way through a planned six-month tour that began in Edmondton, Alberta, Canada.

The tour will end with a raffle winner who can choose between the car, a 2014 Kia Soul decked out with Bitcoin decals, or bitcoin currency valued at CA$10,000 Canadian dollars. People can sign up for the raffle at the https://www.facebook.com/KryptozCom.

Advocates of the new currency are still grappling with significant issues related to the security, technology and volatility of the currency, he said, but "it's gaining traction," Davidson said.

That the relatively small community of Santa Cruz County would have picked up more than a handful of Bitcoin merchants this early in the evolution of the new kind of money is impressive, he said. Only a couple of communities have fledgling Bitcoin communities such as Cleveland and New York.

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Bitcoin Car tour makes Santa Cruz visit

Scientists determine a comet's smell: awful

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By Jenn Gidman

Newser

In this picture taken on Aug. 3, 2014, by Rosettas OSIRIS narrow-angle camera, Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko is pictured.(AP Photo/ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team)

Comets stink, and not just because they have the potential to cause cataclysmic devastation if they ever came hurtling through our atmosphere and made impact with Earth.

These "cosmic snowballs of frozen gases, rock, and dust roughly the size of a small town" (as described by NASA) literally stink to high heaven, according to scientists at Switzerland's University of Bern.

One comet does, anyway: Researchers analyzed the "perfume" of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko and said that its BO is apparently a combo of "rotten eggs, horse urine, formaldehyde, bitter almonds, alcohol, vinegar, and a hint of sweet ether," the AP reports.

"If you could smell the comet, you would probably wish that you hadn't," reads a blog post on the European Space Agency site. The scientists were able to surmise what the comet would smell like by examining the gas emitted by the "coma," the comet's head, Phys.org reports.

Luckily, instead of a squeamish human, a mass spectrometer aboard the space probe Rosetta was assigned the task of parsing out the perfumed molecules of 67P, including ammonia, methane, hydrogen sulfide, hydrogen cyanide, and "the pungent, suffocating (odor) of formaldehyde," notes the ESA post.

The probe caught up to the comet in August after chasing it nearly 4 billion miles; it will be sending its Philae robot lander onto the comet proper on Nov. 12, NASA reports.

And it appears the comet's odoriferous odyssey is just beginning: The lead scientist on the project says that as 67P gets closer to the sun, it will start stinking up the cosmos even more.

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Scientists determine a comet's smell: awful

ACT Comets duo score centuries to help Eastlake take victory in clash against Tuggeranong

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Sam Thornton of Tuggeranong drives powerfully against Eastlakes.

ACT Comets duo Vele Dukoski and Michael Spaseski have hit form at the right time, each smashing centuries in club cricket two days before the start of the Futures League.

Dukoski hammered 118 and his Eastlake captain Spaseski scored 103 in their side's comfortable 100-run win against Tuggeranong at Kingston Oval on Saturday.

Batsmen reigned supreme across the capital in the Gallop Cup.

North Canberra Gungahlin entered the record books with the largest one-day score in the competition's history, posting an imposing total of 353 in its match with ANU.

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Scotland international George Munsey was the star with 130 from just 88 balls, while opening partner Brock Winkler was three short of a well-deserved ton, falling for 97 from 82 deliveries.

Meanwhile, Blake Dean scored 135 and older brother Jono Dean chipped in with 68 in Weston Creek Molonglo's total of 8-286 against Wests/UC at Stirling.

Dukoski and Spaseski will both back-up for the Comets in their opening four-day game of the summer when they host the Queensland second XI at Manuka Oval, starting Monday.

Eastlake lost two wickets to be 2-35 before Dukoski and Spaseski teamed up to take the game away from Tuggeranong.

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ACT Comets duo score centuries to help Eastlake take victory in clash against Tuggeranong

Pewdiepie – Alien Isolation – Part 10 – Gameplay/Walkthrough – (CHIT CHAT WITH A SUPER COMPUTER) – Video

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Pewdiepie - Alien Isolation - Part 10 - Gameplay/Walkthrough - (CHIT CHAT WITH A SUPER COMPUTER)
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Pewdiepie - Alien Isolation - Part 10 - Gameplay/Walkthrough - (CHIT CHAT WITH A SUPER COMPUTER) - Video

[ISS] SpaceX’s Dragon CRS-4 Departs ISS for Re-Entry back to Earth – Video

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[ISS] SpaceX #39;s Dragon CRS-4 Departs ISS for Re-Entry back to Earth
SpaceX #39;s CRS-4 Dragon Spacecraft which has spent just over a month at the International Space Station was removed in what is called #39;unberthing #39; from it #39;s docking port by the Robotic Arm stationed...

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[ISS] SpaceX's Dragon CRS-4 Departs ISS for Re-Entry back to Earth - Video

SpaceX Dragon Departs Space Station after Delivering Slew of Science and Returns with Ocean Splashdown

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A space-weathered @SpaceX #Dragon looking great moments before release today Oct. 25, 2014 . Credit: NASA/Reid Wiseman

Concluding a busy five week mission, the SpaceX Dragon CRS-4 commercial cargo ship departed the International Space Station (ISS) this morning, Oct. 25, after delivering a slew of some 2.5 tons of ground breaking science experiments and critical supplies that also inaugurated a new era in Earth science at the massive orbiting outpost following installation of the ISS-RapidScat payload.

Dragon was released from the snares of the stations robotic arm at 9: 57 a.m. EDT while soaring some 250 mi (400 km) over the northwest coast of Australia.

It returned safely to Earth with a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean some six hours later, capping the fourth of SpaceXs twelve contracted station resupply missions for NASA through 2016.

The Dragon is free! exclaimed NASA commentator Rob Navias during a live broadcast on NASA TV following the ungrappling this morning. The release was very clean.

Dragon released from snares of ISS robotic arm on Oct. 25, 2014, for return to Earth. Credit: NASA

The private resupply ship was loaded for return to Earth with more than 3,276 pounds of NASA cargo and science samples from the station crews investigations on human research, biology and biotechnology studies, physical science investigations, and education activities sponsored by NASA and the Center for the Advancement of Science in Space, the nonprofit organization responsible for managing research aboard the U.S. national laboratory portion of the space station, said NASA.

The release set up a quick series of three burns by the ships Draco thrusters designed to carry Dragon safely away from the station.

NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman and Butch Wilmore quickly retracted the arm working from their robotics workstation in the domed Cupola module.

Thanks for the help down there, the astronauts radioed. It was a great day.

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SpaceX Dragon Departs Space Station after Delivering Slew of Science and Returns with Ocean Splashdown