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Japan’s Internet Cafe Homeless
Posted on 09.19.07 by John @ 7:50 pm

'Net cafe Tokyo Image by Kai Hendry
Nice to know that if I’m ever in Tokyo and need a place to sleep I can just hunker down in an Internet cafe for the night. Apparently there are a few thousand people that just can’t get enough work to afford an apartment in Tokyo. You have to remember that when you undertake the renting of an apartment you have to pony up about four months worth of rent as the down payment. Ouch! You also have to have a co signer in case you can’t make the rent, if you don’t have one of these your out of luck. It’s no wonder that these guys will spend 980 yen ($US) for a place to sleep. The deal breaker is the free coffee and soda that the cafes offer.

[via boingboing and futurismic]
The internet cafe refugees – no friends or prospects, and only a cubicle to call home

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Filed under: Japan and News
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Google Sponsors Lunar X PRIZE
Posted on 09.14.07 by John @ 6:43 pm

Google sponsors Lunar X Prize to create a space race for a new generation
Ripped from the headlines of today…

The X PRIZE Foundation and Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) today announced the Google Lunar X PRIZE, a robotic race to the Moon to win a remarkable $30 million prize purse. Private companies from around the world will compete to land a privately funded robotic rover on the Moon that is capable of completing several mission objectives, including roaming the lunar surface for at least 500 meters and sending video, images and data back to the Earth.

Well this is just cool, a $30 million dollar (US) prize may not sound like all that much when your talking about going to the moon but the money isn’t what is at stake here. Charles Lindbergh didn’t set out to win the Orteig prize (Started in 1919 by a wealthy hotel owner, it offered $25,000 for the first allied aviator(s) to fly non-stop from New York NY to Paris France vice-versa) just for the cash. I’m sure the money was part of the incentive, but the achievement of winning was it’s own reward. When Lindbergh finished his 30 plus hour flight his accomplishment ushered in a new age for aviation. I can see
No one has eve said that space travel is easy. It may possibly be the single hardest task to accomplish in the world. It’s full of risks, high costs, the potential for catastrophic disaster is high. But the long term rewards are fantastic. The knowledge gained by undertaking such a task could benefit mankind for years to come. If your one of those people that think that thing like the exploration of space and a contest to get robots to the moon is just a waste of time and money I’d like you to give a long hard look at what your reading this on. If it’s a computer, and I bet I’m right, then you yourself have already reaped the rewards of technology that was pioneered for space exploration. No matter how you slice it, setting a mark and offering people a chance to excel breeds innovation and advancements that the entire world benefits from.

[via CNN Money]

Google Sponsors Lunar X PRIZE to Create a Space Race for a New Generation

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Filed under: Historic and News and Science and Space and Technology
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Space Shuttle Mission STS-118 is Underway!
Posted on 08.08.07 by John @ 3:35 pm

Space Shuttle Endeavour during liftoff. Photo credit: NASAToday the latest space shuttle mission to the International Space Station launched without a hitch. One goal of this flight is to deliver a third starboard truss segment to the space station.

NASA - STS-118 Mission Page
NASA - Latest News
NASA Video

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Filed under: News and Science and Space
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Space Shuttle Lands
Posted on 06.23.07 by John @ 5:07 pm

Atlantis landsVery good to see the crew made it back safe and sound.

Space Shuttle Atlantis descended to a smooth landing at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., concluding a successful assembly mission to the International Space Station. With Commander Rick Sturckow and Pilot Lee Archambault at the controls, Atlantis landed at 3:49 p.m. EDT on Friday

NASA - Space Shuttle

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Filed under: News and Space
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Mr. Wizard, Dead at 89
Posted on 06.12.07 by John @ 10:42 pm

Don Herbert
I just read that Don Herbert, TV’s ‘Mr. Wizard’ passed away today at the age of 89. Mr. Wizard was and shall remain a remarkable man in that he introduced thousands of kids to the idea that science can be fun. His TV program started in 1951 and ran for 14 years and was revived in 1970 and then again from 1983-90. I remember watching the revival of his program on Nickelodeon in the mid 80’s and being amazed at how well he could explain the concepts of science to kid. His legacy lives on in the countless number of scientists and teachers that credit him for their early interest in science. I can only hope that there is someone out there that is inspiring the youth of today to be the scientists of tomorrow.

[via boingboing]
Don Herbert, 89; TV’s ‘Mr. Wizard’ taught science to young baby boomers - Los Angeles Times
The Official Website of Mr. Wizard Studios

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Filed under: News
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Space Shuttle Mission 117 (STS-117)
Posted on 06.08.07 by John @ 4:33 pm

STS-117

The countdown for the launch of Shuttle mission STS-117 has resumed at T-9 minutes after a scheduled hold. For more information quickly go over to the NASA Human Spaceflight web page and follow along.

NASA - Space Shuttle

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Filed under: Cool and News and Space and Technology
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US Version of British Hit ‘IT Crowd’ On NBC Mid Season
Posted on 05.16.07 by John @ 11:14 am

US version of British hit show IT CrowdI’ve said before that I’m a big fan of the British TV series ‘IT Crowd’, a show about two nerds surrounded by non tech supervisors in an equally tech illiterate company. Well in the grand tradition of British television programming migrating across the pond to the US shores, the IT Crowd has been picked up at a mid season series on NBC. Not h best of situations for a TV show but at least it will be in the air. The cast will include two US actors, Joel McHale ("The Soup") and Jessica St. Clair ("For Your Consideration") and an original member of the British series Richard Ayoade. I’m hoping that that spark of the original show will be carried over with Ayoade, if not this will crash and burn like the US adaptation of "Ad Fab" did.
 
[via lonelocust]
NBC’s New Shows for the 2007-08 Season

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Filed under: Cool and News
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Sorry for the Downtime
Posted on 05.13.07 by John @ 11:46 am

Arrgh!I’d like to apologize for the recent weird goings on with TeamDroid. I don’t know why (yet) but the MySQL database that is hosted on the iPowerseb server has been corrupted. After repeated reloads, repairs, resets, and just about anything else I can think of, it’s back to a somewhat normal mode. IPower provides the Vdeck management console for conducting maintenance and repair of all aspects of the site and it seems to have it’s limitations. So far it has removed entire tables from the database when a repair was done, failed to restore my most recent backups and reported false a status when a DB check was done. It’s been an annoying day to say the least. I’m hoping that my latest fixes will hold.

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Filed under: News
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New Cogs in the Machine
Posted on 04.24.07 by John @ 10:15 pm

Dancing Stars by decafinataI’d like to introduce the latest contributor to TeamDroid, Alexandria. She is just starting out in the blogging world so some of her posts might be a little rough around the edges but should improve with age. So be on the look out for new topics and views in the near future.
-John

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Arizona State Quarter
Posted on 04.21.07 by John @ 10:12 am

I’m sure that by now people living in the United States know about the US Mint 50 State Quarter program by now. For those who haven’t used cash in a while I’ll fill you in on the rough details. The US Mints decided to add a little much needed variety to our currency. So, after having a nice long think about just how well the Sacajawea dollar coin did (it didn’t, it’s been universally declared a flop) they decided that celebrating each of the 50 US states would be a good thing. So far it’s working out rather well. People love them and are even collecting them. The program started in 1999 and the quarters are issued in 10 week cycles in order that the state joined the country. There is a lengthy process to decide the actual design of the coin but towards the end the states can put the finalists to a vote. The Arizona quarter is slated to be minted in mid 2008 and the five finalists are up for the popular vote. I figure that as everyone in America will be using them I don’t see why non-Arizonians shouldn’t be able to have a voice in selection. So have at it and see if your choice ends up in your pocket.

Arizona State Quarter

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Apple TV - An Honest Review
Posted on 03.26.07 by John @ 9:19 pm

Apple TVI think I might have done the impossible, I found a review of the new Apple TV that was not written by a drooling Apple fanboy. Nice review, gives an honest opinion of the video quality of what was playing on the demo model. He does put forth an interesting idea on how one could go about turning the Apple TV into an automated bit torrent downloading monster capable of transcoding Xvid video to H264. Ooo.. I wants one…

Apple TV - gosh, I touched one.

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Filed under: Apple and Computers and News
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Grand Canyon Skywalk Stirs Up The Dust
Posted on 03.20.07 by John @ 10:53 am

Photo: AP/CNNI saw on CNN this morning that the Hualapai Indian tribe(wiki) is getting ready to open what they hope will be their ticket out of reservation poverty. The Skywalk is a massive steel and glass horizontal arch that lets people walk out over the edge of the Grand Canyon and look down some 4,000 feet to the canyon floor. The tribe has bet the proverbial farm on this in hopes that the tourist draw from near by Las Vegas will give them a much needed boost to their economy. The fees from the Skywalk(wiki) attraction ($25US) and a tribal heritage center ($50US) will give the 2,200 members of the tribe a better standard of living.
However, this have been met with criticism from some environmentalists stating that the increased traffic will put an undo burden on the local environment. Also some members of the tribe have voiced concerns that near by burial sites will be damaged.
One mans cultural awareness center is another mans tourist trap. It all depends on what side of the dollar you’re on. I wish them the best of luck with this endeavor and I hope that the entire tribe and the other people involved will not over develop the land around Skywalk and degrade the attraction to the point that no one wants to see it any more.

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Filed under: Dumb and News
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DCA (Sodium Dichloroacetate) Cancer Treatment for Pets
Posted on 03.15.07 by John @ 7:32 pm

Special agent Greg on detachment in the Interzone had this to say recently:

It has begun: this link is to a site that is ostensibly to sell Sodium Dichloroacetate for experimental use in pets with terminal cancer. This compound has received much press recently due to some encouraging preliminary lab test results. Obviously, desperate people are going to be purchasing and using this compound long before clinical trials even begin.
It may very well interfere with conventional treatments, be harmful in itself, or be ineffective. DCA is known to cause peripheral neuropathy (tingling and numbness of the extremities) with chronic use.
On the other hand, if it proves to be the miracle cure that some are hyping, we will begin hearing reports in the next couple months of people with untreatable conditions making miraculous recoveries.

I think he is absolutely right. Expect to see more and more people rolling their own treatments with DCA in the near future. For better or for worse.

Buy DCA - DCA Sodium Dichloroacetate Cancer Treatment for Pets

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Filed under: DIY and Historic and Mad Science and News and Science
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1×50 Atom Transistor
Posted on 03.10.07 by John @ 1:14 pm

Graphene Transistors DemonstratedQuite amazing, the transistor junctions made from this material (Graphene) are ten times smaller than their silicon counterparts. As long as the heat dissipation issues are not the same as with silicon these could be what runs the computers in 20 years.

Using the world’s thinnest material, Graphene, researchers at the University of Manchester have created the world’s smallest transistor. According to Professor Andre Geim and Dr. Kostya Novoselov from The School of Physics and Astronomy at The University of Manchester, the new transistors are only one atom thick and less than 50 atoms wide. The development opens the gate to superfast computer chips at sizes not possible before with standard Silicon transistors.


[via digg, DailyTech]
University of Manchester - New graphene transistor promises life after death of silicon chip

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Filed under: News and Technology
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US Postal Service Removes Clocks to Speed Up Time, WTF?
Posted on 03.09.07 by John @ 6:07 am

USPSNormally I’d make a long winded rant about the piss poor service I have been getting at my local post offices lately but I see little point in it. Lets just say that if the overlords at the USPS would wake up they would realize that customer service and proficiency of your tasks should be ‘job one’. Whey you employ chatter boxes and inept fools at the front lines (counter help) your making a big mistake. I don’t know what genius decided that taking the clocks out of the waiting room was a good idea but I bet i was the same ass that did away with the ‘take a number’ concept. Perhaps this is a ploy to get everyone to use FedEx and UPS so the postal employees can whine and cry about being put out of a job by those guys. Somehow the ‘forever stamp‘ works into that scenario I’m sure. Jerks. I blame the unions…

[via Consumerist]
Postal Service fixes long waits by removing clocks

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Filed under: Dumb and News and Rants
Comments: 1 Comment

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