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A Russian spacecraft containing 45 mice, 8 gerbils, and 15 newts returned to Earth on Sunday. The spacecraft, a modified Bion-M life sciences satellite, was launched in April 2013 and was intended to study the biological effects of long-term weightlessness. However, due to a combination of equipment failure and what scientists referred to as "the stresses of space," fewer than half the mice (and none of the gerbils) remained alive after their month in space. The newts were fine, though.
The low survival rate among rodents "was to be expected," according to Vladimir Sychov, deputy director of the Institute of Medical and Biological Problems, the agency conducting the experiment. The Bion-M satellite was equipped with internal cameras so that scientists could visually monitor the animals during flight, which orbited at an altitude of about 357 miles
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The Finnish mobile phone company Jolla unveiled on Monday its first smartphone running Sailfish OS, the spiritual successor to Nokia’s MeeGo. The phone, which is also named “Jolla,” will retail for €399 and features a user-replaceable battery and the ability to run Android apps.
A number of Nokia employees splintered off from the company last July with the intent of taking MeeGo to the heights they thought it was destined for. MeeGo had been jointly developed by Intel and Nokia as a combination of the two companies’ Moblin and Maemo projects.
Sailfish OS is based on Mer, an open-source OS that was part of MeeGo. The developers unveiled a concept device back in November, and the Jolla represents the actual product the company intends to ship.
After being publicly exposed in February as the source of a long list of cyberattacks on US companies and media organizations, the Chinese People's Liberation Army's (PLA) Unit 61396 largely pulled back from the networks the unit had infiltrated. But now, the New York Times reports , the hackers are back in action using new techniques to go after many of the same corporate and government targets they had infiltrated before.
The revived attacks come despite (or perhaps because of) the direct accusations leveled against China's military in a Pentagon report to Congress earlier this month. The White House approved "naming and shaming" the PLA unit in hopes that it would cause the Chinese government to take action. The move was part of an escalation of diplomatic pressure that began in March, when White House National Security Advisor Tom Donilon first publicly mentioned the Obama Administration's appeal to the Chinese
...UPDATE : We reported yesterday that Yahoo was on the verge of announcing an acquisition of Tumblr. Today, Yahoo confirmed its plan with a somewhat unusual press release titled " Yahoo! to Acquire Tumblr/Promises not to screw it up ." The announcement's text has a playful response to Tumblr users who complained about the acquisition.
"Per the agreement and our promise not to screw it up, Tumblr will be independently operated as a separate business," Yahoo said. "David Karp will remain CEO. The product, service and brand will continue to be defined and developed separately with the same Tumblr irreverence, wit, and commitment to empower creators." The acquisition is expected to close in the second half of the year, after the usual regulatory process.
Yahoo hopes to turn Tumblr into a profitable part of the company. "Tumblr can deploy Yahoo!'s personalization technology and search infrastructure to help its users discover creators,
...Looks like Samsung has one-upped Sharp. The latter...
