pFiled under: a href="http://www.joystiq.com/category/pc/" rel="tag"PC/a, a href="http://www.joystiq.com/category/ps3/" rel="tag"Sony PlayStation 3/a, a href="http://www.joystiq.com/category/xbox360/" rel="tag"Microsoft Xbox 360/a, a href="http://www.joystiq.com/category/action/" rel="tag"Action/a/pdiv style="text-align: center;"a href="http://www.gametrailers.com/player/42987.html?type=mov"img hspace="0" border="1" vspace="4" src="http://www.blogcdn.com/www.joystiq.com/media/2008/11/gam_wantedbulletcurve_490.jpg" alt="" //abr //div Those among you who saw emWanted/em in theaters probably spent most of the 110-minute bullet-fest wondering how well the game would hold up when it made its seemingly inevitable journey to the Land of Licensed Video Games. Your inquisitive mind may have been eased by reading a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/07/16/wanted-heading-for-next-gen-bullet-curving/"our glowing write-up of our time with the game at E3/a earlier this year -- then again, you've never been much of a reader, have you? You're probably not even reading this right now, meaning we can call you a stupid jerk without fear of repercussion. Here goes -- emyou're a stupid jerk/em.br /br /If you emare/em still with us, we apologize for needlessly insulting you, and offer you a href="http://www.gametrailers.com/player/42987.html?type=mov"the debut trailer for emWanted: Weapons of Fate/em/a (posted after the jump) as a humble peace offering. It is emproudly /emNSFW, and chock-full of awesome -- though it is sorely lacking in Morgan Freeman appearances. Looks like we'll have to wait for Bungie's upcoming adaptation of emThe Bucket List/em to fulfill that particular fancy.pa href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/11/22/debut-wanted-trailer-curves-its-way-into-our-hearts/" rel="bookmark"Continue reading emDebut Wanted trailer curves its way into our hearts/em/a/pp style="padding:5px;background:#ddd;border:1px solid #ccc;clear:both;"a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/11/22/debut-wanted-trailer-curves-its-way-into-our-hearts/"Debut Wanted trailer curves its way into our hearts/a originally appeared on a href="http://www.joystiq.com"Joystiq/a on Sat, 22 Nov 2008 12:15:00 EST. Please see our a href="http://www.weblogsinc.com/feed-terms/"terms for use of feeds/a./pp style="clear: both; padding: 8px 0 0 0; height: 2px; font-size: 1px; border: 0; margin: 0; padding: 0;"nbsp;/ppa href=http://www.gametrailers.com/player/42987.html?type=movRead/anbsp;|nbsp;a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/11/22/debut-wanted-trailer-curves-its-way-into-our-hearts/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent link to this entry"Permalink/anbsp;|nbsp;a href="http://www.joystiq.com/forward/1380228/" title="Send this entry to a friend via email"Email this/anbsp;|nbsp;a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/11/22/debut-wanted-trailer-curves-its-way-into-our-hearts/#comments" title="View reader comments on this entry"Comments/a/p pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/03i7oaDAO8G7F8WPGhK5kIzQBg8/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/03i7oaDAO8G7F8WPGhK5kIzQBg8/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/joystiq?a=2A9mPGXd"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/joystiq?i=2A9mPGXd" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/joystiq?a=o8bU8eep"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/joystiq?i=o8bU8eep" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/weblogsinc/joystiq/~4/4-ahnH94Ap4" height="1" width="1"/

Quantel announced that its Stereo3D technology has received the Innovation of the Year' Award from Producción Profesional, one of Spain's - and Europe's - leading industry publications. The Award was collected by Rafael Zapardiel, Quantel Spain Senior Sales Manager.

2008 is the sixth year of the Producción Profesional Awards, which recognise the most important products and innovations in the Iberian market. The jury that judges the submissions comprises the ultimate in independent industry specialists because it comprises all the readers of the magazine. From a final shortlist of three products chosen by the readers, a panel of experts drawn from the industry then votes on the eventual winner.

"Quantel 3D Stereoscopic technology was on everybody's mind, the night the jury got together to vote," said João Martins - International Editor of Producción Profesional (Spain, Portugal, Brasil and Latin America). "After IBC 2008, it was clear that this is an industry-changing development, highly motivating for all creative minds. In our IBC 2008 report, we wrote ‘Quantel's demonstration with 3ality Digital was a decisive moment for anyone who thought 3D production was not practical. Suddenly, a post-production solution becomes part of the all production workflow'."

This prestigious Award brings the total number of Awards made to Quantel over the last three months for its Stereo3D technology to an incredible total of eight - including two IBC Innovation Awards, the HPA Engineering Excellence Award, the IABM Award for Design and Innovation Excellence, TV Technology STAR Award, Broadcast Engineering IBC Pick Hit and TVB Europe's Best of IBC 2008 Award.

Quantel's Stereo3D post production technology has made interactive post production of stereoscopic 3D a practical proposition for the first time. In doing so, it is helping to drive a major new creative and business opportunity for broadcasters and post houses, and giving producers a potent new weapon to attract audiences and increase revenues.

"We are proud and honoured to have won such recognition from Producción Profesional," said Rafael Zapardiel. "It also confirms the market's confidence and expectations for the development of Stereo3D, and we will continue our efforts to drive this new business forward. We would also like to congratulate the organisers of the Awards, Producción Profesional magazine on the launch of its 100th issue - a superb achievement."

Activision are pulling Lego Batman, Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga, and Lego Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures in Japan, according to Famitsu.

All three games will shortly be removed from store shelves or simply not shipped. Batman and Indy were set for release in the territory on December 18th.

No reason has been offered for the move - perhaps Lego just isn't held in the same esteem by the Japanese, or perhaps there is some confusing licensing issue. It could be anything - maybe Lego is suspected of corrupting Japanese youth with bricks that can be made into makeshift (if brittle and ineffective) street weapons. Who knows. Wild theories in the comments please.

http://kotaku.com/5096482/hey-japan-...-games-for-you

Following yesterday's news in USA Today, Rockstar has officially announced the first of two DLC episodes for the Xbox 360 version of Grand Theft Auto IV, titled "The Lost and Damned." The first high-res screens of the episode are out, along with a bare minimum of new details.

In addition to what yesterday's report contained – that players will control a new lead character, Johnny Klebitz, a biker with Liberty City motorcycle club The Lost – today's announcement confirms that the episode will contain "new missions that offer an entirely fresh way to explore Liberty City," along with new vehicles, weapons, multiplayer modes, and music.

The episode arrives via Xbox Live Marketplace on Feb. 17, and (obviously) requires the original GTA IV to play. We've been wondering if a Gold account will be required as well, but Rockstar's announcement merely mentions an Xbox Live account as a prerequisite for download. So ... let's hear your theories on the plot.

http://www.joystiq.com/2008/11/21/fi...nd-damned-dlc/

This guest post is written by Matt Rutherford, Web Strategist and technology producer for Charlie Rose. Matt focuses on the macro themes affecting the internet and the wider world.

In an intimate interview with Charlie Rose on PBS tonight, and available here, Stanford professor Larry Lessig reveals some profound views on copyright, remix culture, and the new hybrid economy that is emerging.

In particular, Lessig speaks out against the abolitionist movement growing against copyright:

My real fear is that the last 10 years have unleashed a kind of revolutionary attitude among the generation that will take over in 10 years. And it will be hard for them to distinguish between sensible copyright legislation and the kind that we’ve got right now. So my real fear is we’re going to lose control of this animal... I just want to reform [copyright] to make it make sense.

A reform of copyright is clearly overdue. We require a new form of regulation that takes into account the ease and speed of digital distribution and appropriation. Every week, books cross my desk clamoring for this change - some of which are certainly worth reading. And as Lessig explains on the show, it’s counterproductive to continue to criminalize kids for file-sharing, remixing and recreating with content. Copyright was established to encourage creativity, not stifle it.

Cultural Roots

Lessig thinks on a macro time scale. For him, the emerging “read-write creativity” seen on YouTube and elsewhere is actually a return to our natural cultural roots. Historically, man has always absorbed and re-created culture – the symbolic retelling of stories and re-interpreting of songs on the front porch. It is only the emergence of mass media in the last century that caused us to accept a passive relationship with culture.

What’s so extraordinary about the last four years is that they’ve demonstrated that the technology of the internet is giving us a chance to go back to the way culture has been from the beginning…Only the 20th century was a deviation from this. But from the beginning of culture, it was a normal thing for people to be able to create and recreate the most important parts of culture that were around them.

As evidence of this, Lessig cites the numerous Charlie Rose remix videos that are floating around the web.

I’ve seen some of these Rose remixes, and they are enormous. They’re fantastic. But I would hope, you know, eventually you could be in a position to say I want to encourage this, please. Please do it.

A lot of these remixes also come across my desk. In the spirit of research, here are a few of the best so far: Beckett, Kung Fu, nuclear weapons. They’re all superb. And yes, we do encourage this. As Lessig says, Please do it.

Hybrid Economy

There remains the fundamental question of how a ‘new’ copyright can maintain revenue. After all, despite the ease of pointing out the flaws in the current system, it’s quite another matter to propose a viable alternative. Lessig sees the solution, in part, coming from a new hybrid economy, one that combines the traditional commercial economy with sharing economies seen in Wikipedia, YouTube and elsewhere:

Businesses have begun to realize that the world is in part divided between commercial economies like buying and selling books, and sharing economies like Wikipedia where enormous value is produced for nothing, people are doing it all for free. The most interesting thing I think we’ve seen though in the last five years is the development of a hybrid economy where commercial entities are trying to leverage value out of these sharing economies or vice versa, sharing economies trying to leverage value out of commercial entities. And this hybrid depends upon the commercial entity showing the proper respect for the creation in the sharing economy, and giving space to it, encouraging it so that the sharing economy can produce enormous value that is beneficial to the people inside, and also to the commercial business.

Lessig’s Big Idea

Lessig concludes the interview with his ‘big idea’. It is an inspiring, and elegant reminder that we are in the midst of an unprecedented social change. Just as the Gutenberg press facilitated the spread of the Protestant Reformation, fundamentally altering the course of Western civilization, so too is the internet beginning to spark tectonic changes, the breadth of which we don’t yet have the historical perspective to grasp. As Lessig explains:

I think the big idea, as every big idea is, is just one amazing step beyond where we are right now. And I think you think about the Obama campaign, something like Wikipedia, something like the stuff that’s going on on the Internet, the kind that I think of as read write culture. What it really is doing is reviving the sense that people can do something. Not the passive couch potato politics or couch potato culture, but that they can do something. We’re close to making it really effective. I think the next cycle, what you’re going to see in the way politics functions, will be unrecognizable, even from today. But when we’re there, it will be a revival of ideals, aspirations about democracy that will surprise us. The cynicism that we had in the 20th century will look very 20th century.

Larry Lessig’s interview on Charlie Rose was first broadcast on Friday 11/21/08 on PBS, and is available in full or in clips: Larry Lessig (full segment), Larry Lessig (clips). Matt Rutherford can be reached at matt@charlierose.com.

Crunch Network: CrunchBase the free database of technology companies, people, and investors

The future of war is filled with poison gas, germ warfare and nuclear weapons. Each technological change shapes the risk calculations of our primate brains.br style="clear: both;"/ a style='font-size: 10px; color: maroon;' href='http://www.pheedo.com/hostedMorselClick.php?hfmm=v3:413c653f2e9c72db9c390910a09c96cc:vhkhAUTIx%2FlHPdA21xoN5XcygLmviGVVKKMFMV73n3I2S8iwiRStGRoUN03NuoWXEPD%2FyzqA%2BgaMJA%3D%3D'img border='0' title='Add to Facebook' alt='Add to Facebook' src='http://www.pheedo.com/images/mm/facebook.gif'//a a style='font-size: 10px; color: maroon;' href='http://www.pheedo.com/hostedMorselClick.php?hfmm=v3:ef48133350f33435e1727adf872f1849:PXWTX6YM5sMreM%2FOdxnHYAy1q4XnFbHYWQPYl50IOago3gsYQmLMduPdjjGqcRcPdmNeo8zc3s79'img border='0' title='Add to Reddit' alt='Add to Reddit' src='http://www.pheedo.com/images/mm/reddit.png'//a a style='font-size: 10px; color: maroon;' href='http://www.pheedo.com/hostedMorselClick.php?hfmm=v3:e9bf2cbf05b47e18040e671f1b8364f7:KmXEbD7jwHtrJnwW9Cu7mivCX50Ujvjsy5TGh7pxEGvLSMefi521It%2FsYR3RwnCNSYYnrAN0ZAvH'img border='0' title='Add to digg' alt='Add to digg' src='http://www.pheedo.com/images/mm/digg.gif'//a a style='font-size: 10px; color: maroon;' href='http://www.pheedo.com/hostedMorselClick.php?hfmm=v3:09de013c80af233ab8ce29a7060f4bea:rEpnOBOIWjOpNjXRedao8cH9DPfTFZ1f0BjoszO6CRN6jIqE6YkCeVWYmjxzbLIcc%2FTHuzZusUDR'img border='0' title='Add to Google' alt='Add to Google' src='http://www.pheedo.com/images/mm/google.png'//a br style="clear: both;"/ a href="http://www.pheedo.com/click.phdo?s=d875a793513f4170725170591dff10cep=1"img alt="" style="border: 0;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?s=d875a793513f4170725170591dff10cep=1"//a img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=d875a793513f4170725170591dff10ce" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/ pa href="http://feeds.wired.com/~a/wired/index?a=FqfREA"img src="http://feeds.wired.com/~a/wired/index?i=FqfREA" border="0"/img/a/pimg src="http://feeds.wired.com/~r/wired/index/~4/461518052" height="1" width="1"/

pFiled under: a href="http://www.joystiq.com/category/xbox360/" rel="tag"Microsoft Xbox 360/a, a href="http://www.joystiq.com/category/action/" rel="tag"Action/a/pdiv align="center"a href="http://www.rockstargames.com/thelostanddamned/"img vspace="4" hspace="0" border="1" src="http://www.blogcdn.com/www.joystiq.com/media/2008/11/gta4.thelostanddamned.logo.490.jpg" alt="" //abr / div align="left"Following a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/11/20/usa-today-gta-iv-dlc-named-detailed-dated/"yesterday's news/a in USA Today, Rockstar has officially announced the first of two DLC episodes for the Xbox 360 version of a href="http://www.joystiq.com/tag/gta-iv"emGrand Theft Auto IV/em/a, titled "The Lost and Damned." The first high-res screens of the episode are out, along with a bare minimum of new details.br /br /In addition to what yesterday's report contained - that players will control a new lead character, Johnny Klebitz, a biker with Liberty City motorcycle club The Lost - today's announcement confirms that the episode will contain "new missions that offer an entirely fresh way to explore Liberty City," along with new vehicles, weapons, multiplayer modes, and music. br /br /The episode arrives via Xbox Live Marketplace on Feb. 17, and (obviously) requires the original emGTA IV/em to play. We've been wondering if a Gold account will be required as well, but Rockstar's announcement merely mentions an Xbox Live account as a prerequisite for download. So ... let's hear your theories on the plot.br //div /div div class="postgallery"pstrongGallery: a href="/photos/grand-theft-auto-iv-the-lost-and-damned-dlc/"Grand Theft Auto IV: The Lost and Damned DLC/a/strong/pa href="/photos/grand-theft-auto-iv-the-lost-and-damned-dlc/1179133/" class="gallerythumbnail"img src="http://www.blogcdn.comwww.joystiq.com/media/2008/11/the-lost-4_thumbnail.jpg" alt="" title="" //aa href="/photos/grand-theft-auto-iv-the-lost-and-damned-dlc/1179132/" class="gallerythumbnail"img src="http://www.blogcdn.comwww.joystiq.com/media/2008/11/the-lost-3_thumbnail.jpg" alt="" title="" //aa href="/photos/grand-theft-auto-iv-the-lost-and-damned-dlc/1179131/" class="gallerythumbnail"img src="http://www.blogcdn.comwww.joystiq.com/media/2008/11/the-lost-2_thumbnail.jpg" alt="" title="" //aa href="/photos/grand-theft-auto-iv-the-lost-and-damned-dlc/1179130/" class="gallerythumbnail"img src="http://www.blogcdn.comwww.joystiq.com/media/2008/11/the-lost-1_thumbnail.jpg" alt="" title="" //a/divp style="padding:5px;background:#ddd;border:1px solid #ccc;clear:both;"a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/11/21/first-screens-of-gta-iv-the-lost-and-damned-dlc/"First screens of GTA IV: The Lost and Damned DLC/a originally appeared on a href="http://www.joystiq.com"Joystiq/a on Fri, 21 Nov 2008 22:00:00 EST. Please see our a href="http://www.weblogsinc.com/feed-terms/"terms for use of feeds/a./pp style="clear: both; padding: 8px 0 0 0; height: 2px; font-size: 1px; border: 0; margin: 0; padding: 0;"nbsp;/ppa href=http://www.rockstargames.com/thelostanddamned/Read/anbsp;|nbsp;a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/11/21/first-screens-of-gta-iv-the-lost-and-damned-dlc/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent link to this entry"Permalink/anbsp;|nbsp;a href="http://www.joystiq.com/forward/1380032/" title="Send this entry to a friend via email"Email this/anbsp;|nbsp;a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/11/21/first-screens-of-gta-iv-the-lost-and-damned-dlc/#comments" title="View reader comments on this entry"Comments/a/p pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/CWIga8QqX_LPckHqeWHKaczlJgA/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/CWIga8QqX_LPckHqeWHKaczlJgA/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/joystiq?a=T4CXAQji"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/joystiq?i=T4CXAQji" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/joystiq?a=HH2Rjotz"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/joystiq?i=HH2Rjotz" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/weblogsinc/joystiq/~4/tcjMjbJWTOU" height="1" width="1"/

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/28506?ns=guardianpageName=World+news%3A+Acid+attacks+and+rape%3A+growing+threat+to+women+who+oppose+traditional+orderch=World+newsc3=The+Guardianc4=Afghanistan+%28News%29%2CGender+%28News%29%2CWomen+and+women%27s+interests%2CWorld+newsc5=Not+commercially+useful%2CWomenc6=Clancy+Chassayc7=2008_11_22c8=1122121c9=articlec10=GUc11=World+newsc12=Afghanistanc13=c14=h2=GU%2FWorld+news%2FAfghanistan" width="1" height="1" //divp They were walking to school in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, a group of teenage girls discussing a test they had coming up, when two men on a motorcycle sprayed them with a strange liquid. Within seconds a painful tingling began, and there was an unusual smell as the skin of 16-year-old Atifa Biba began to burn. /ppHer friend rushed over to help her, struggling to wipe the liquid away, when she too was showered with acid. She covered her face, crying out for help as they sprayed her again, trying to aim the acid into her face. The weapon was a water bottle containing battery acid; the result was at least one girl blinded and two others permanently disfigured. Their only crime was attending school. /ppIt was not an isolated incident. For women and girls across Afghanistan, conditions are worsening - and those women who dare to publicly oppose the traditional order now live in fear for their lives./ppThe Afghan MP Shukria Barakzai receives regular death threats for speaking out on women's issues. Talking at her home in central Kabul, she closed the living room door as her three young daughters played in the hall. "You can't imagine what it feels like as a mother to leave the house each day and not know if you will come back again," she said, her eyes welling up as she spoke./pp"But there is no choice. I would rather die for the dignity of women than die for nothing. Should I stop my work because there is a chance I might be killed? I must go on, and if it happens it happens."/ppBarakzai receives frequent but cryptic warnings about planned suicide attacks on her car, but no help from the government. Officials advise her to stay at home and not go to work, but offer nothing in the way of security assistance, despite her requests. She said warlords in parliament who received similar threats were immediately provided with armoured vehicles, armed guards and a safe house by the government./ppAfghan women are feeling increasingly vulnerable as the security situation worsens and a growing number of western and Afghan officials call for the Taliban to join the government./pp"We are very worried that, now the government is talking with the Taliban, our rights will be compromised," said Shinkai Karokhail, an outspoken MP for Kabul. "We must not be the sacrifice by which peace with the Taliban is made."/ppUnder Taliban rule, up until 2001, women were not allowed to work and were forbidden from venturing outside the home without a male escort. /ppAfghan women who defy traditional gender roles and speak out against the oppression of women are routinely subject to threats, intimidation and assassination. An increasingly powerful Taliban regularly attacks projects, schools and businesses run by women. /ppSix weeks ago, Lieutenant-Colonel Malalai Kakar was assassinated in her car on her way to work in Kandahar. She was Afghanistan's highest-ranking female police officer and a fierce defender of women's rights. Only five feet tall, she was known to have beaten men she found to be abusing their wives. Another senior female police officer was killed in the province of Herat in June./ppstrongSafe house/strong/ppTalking to the Guardian at a safe house on the outskirts of Kabul, Mullah Zubiallah Akhond, a Taliban commander from the southern province of Uruzgan, said the group's attacks on women were always political and not based on any desire to target or punish women specifically. /ppHe condemned the acid attack on the group of schoolgirls in Kandahar, and insisted the Taliban were not involved. "We support the education of girls, but separate from boys. We would not attack schoolgirls. We only target those working with the government."/ppThe Taliban's regional commands have varying attitudes toward women, but all those fighting under the Taliban banner are committed to enforcing their interpretation of sharia law, which forbids women from working or leaving the house without a male escort./ppThe Islamist group is just one of the many threats facing Afghanistan's few outspoken female MPs. "Our parliament is a collection of lords," said Barakzai. "Warlords, drug lords, crime lords."/ppIn parliament, she says, she is often greeted with screams of "kill her" when she stands up to speak, and she has had no shortage of personal threats from fellow MPs. /ppThey visit her privately to tell her she will be killed if she continues to speak out on such issues as the right of a woman to have a personal passport (separate from the standard "family passport") or against compulsory virginity tests for young women, and the right of a man to have custody of a child at two years old. It is not only men who oppose women in parliament - both Barakzai and Karokhail have faced obstruction from other female MPs on key women's issues./ppKarokhail said that, of the 68 women in the 249-strong parliament, only five were vocal on women's issues. The majority of women in parliament vote in favour of more traditional legislation that often rules against women's rights./ppSome women now fear the parliament is becoming more conservative towards women. "Talibani ideas are natural among our people, particularly their vision about women," said Barakzai. /ppAccording to Afghan commentators, President Hamid Karzai, desperate to win next year's elections, has been bringing former mujahideen commanders into parliament in the hope they will support him at election time. /ppMost of these former jihadi commanders share the Taliban's ideas about women and are expected to support legislation that will once again limit women's freedom. In addition, according to the Taliban commander, the group has a growing number of MPs in parliament lobbying for their policies./ppIn much of the country, especially rural areas, women remain subservient to the men in their family and rarely venture out of their homes. Even in the relatively liberal capital, Kabul, it is common to see women robed in blue burkas trailing five paces behind their husbands./ppIt is difficult to gauge how the worsening situation in the country is affecting women, but according to a recent study by the UN, some 87% of them suffer abuse in the home. Afghan human rights groups are documenting cases of "honour" killings, forced abortions and rape, and a database is now being constructed by the UN./ppNajla Zewari, who works for the UN's gender and justice unit, believes violence against women is increasing, fuelled by growing frustrations caused by the economic crisis and lack of security. She said there had also been a sharp increase in rapes by men who claimed they could not afford to pay the dowry needed to marry. After the public shame of an attack, the victim is usually outcast and the rapist is then the only man who will have the woman as his wife./ppIt is crimes like this that make many Afghans nostalgic for the harsh justice of Taliban rule. Barakzai countered: "Women were safe, in one sense, under the Taliban - but they were kept as slaves, they were not allowed to do what they wanted even in their own home."/ppAs the Taliban strengthen, the future for women in Afghanistan looks bleaker. Barakzai said women's rights, once heralded as the great success of post-invasion Afghanistan, had been sidelined and might suffer more in the struggle to find a solution to the fighting./ppLast week, a council of 400 women politicians met in Kabul to discuss this possibility and prepare ways to counter it. Karokhail said: "Our biggest fear at the moment is that the return of Talibani ideas to government will wind back the gains we have made in these last years."/pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/afghanistan"Afghanistan/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/gender"Gender/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/women"Women/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Newscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227317660269112201400459684"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Newscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227317660269112201400459684" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/92014?ns=guardianpageName=World+news%3A+%27We+consider+ourselves+heroes%27+-+a+Somali+pirate+speaksch=World+newsc3=The+Guardianc4=Piracy+at+sea+%28News%29%2CSomalia+%28News%29%2CWorld+news%2CBusinessc5=Unclassified%2CBusiness+Markets%2CNot+commercially+usefulc6=Xan+Ricec7=2008_11_22c8=1122217c9=articlec10=GUc11=World+newsc12=Piracy+at+seac13=c14=h2=GU%2FWorld+news%2FPiracy+at+sea" width="1" height="1" //divpI am 42 years old and have nine children. I am a boss with boats operating in the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean./ppI finished high school and wanted to go to university but there was no money. So I became a fisherman in Eyl in Puntland like my father, even though I still dreamed of working for a company. That never happened as the Somali government was destroyed [in 1991] and the country became unstable./ppAt sea foreign fishing vessels often confronted us. Some had no licence, others had permission from the Puntland authorities but did not want us there to compete. They would destroy our boats and force us to flee for our lives./ppI started to hijack these fishing boats in 1998. I did not have any special training but was not afraid. For our first captured ship we got $300,000. With the money we bought AK-47s and small speedboats. I don't know exactly how many ships I have captured since then but I think it is about 60. Sometimes when we are going to hijack a ship we face rough winds, and some of us get sick and some die. /ppWe give priority to ships from Europe because we get bigger ransoms. To get their attention we shoot near the ship. If it does not stop we use a rope ladder to get on board. We count the crew and find out their nationalities. After checking the cargo we ask the captain to phone the owner and say that have seized the ship and will keep it until the ransom is paid. /ppWe make friends with the hostages, telling them that we only want money, not to kill them. Sometimes we even eat rice, fish, pasta with them. When the money is delivered to our ship we count the dollars and let the hostages go. /ppThen our friends come to welcome us back in Eyl and we go to Garowe in Land Cruisers. We split the money. For example, if we get $1.8m, we would send $380,000 to the investment man who gives us cash to fund the missions, and then divide the rest between us./ppOur community thinks we are pirates getting illegal money. But we consider ourselves heroes running away from poverty. We don't see the hijacking as a criminal act but as a road tax because we have no central government to control our sea. With foreign warships now on patrol we have difficulties. /ppBut we are getting new boats and weapons. We will not stop until we have a central government that can control our sea./pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/piracy"Piracy at sea/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/somalia"Somalia/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Newscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227347437607112209560537123"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Newscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227347437607112209560537123" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a

Celebrities are the new weapon in Indonesian politics

I dont think a firmware upgrade can make the iPhone beat the RAZR at this:rolleyes:





RAZR stops a bullet, its owner reports "feeling lucky, punk."


Source: Engadget

Quote: New Orleans resident Ronald Richard was mowing the lawn when he felt a hard object hit him in the chest -- precisely where he'd been keeping his pink Swarovski-encrusted (just kidding) RAZR. It was only after Richard took off his sweater that he discovered the .45-caliber slug and realized that the phone had literally taken a bullet for him. According to paramedics, the angle of the bullet and the modest stopping power of the cellphone were all that stood between the man and serious injury or even death. Instead, this lucky gent got away with little more than a fairly significant bruise and an excuse to pick up that Aura he's been coveting.
_____________________________________________

Full Story



Source: The St. Tammany News

Quote: By all accounts, Ronald Richard, 68, of Covington, should be dead.

Driving his John Deere tractor Saturday, Richard was suddenly thumped with a pain ”like a hard punch jumped up” and bit him in the heart.

He bent over and grasped his sweater. Then he took it off to get a closer look. A .45-caliber bullet casing tumbled out, clattered onto the tractor and fell on the ground.

Ronald Richard shows a hole in his shirt caused by a stray bullet. (Staff Photo by Matthew Penix)

He’d just been shot.

It was a stray bullet, and it tore through his sweater, leaving a 1/2-inch hole, where it entered into the top center pocket of his coveralls and hit his cell phone.

The bullet, coming in at a 45-degree angle, busted the phone in two, but the impact halted its trajectory just enough to save Richard’s life

”It’s a miracle,” he said Tuesday. ”Normally I put the phone in my inside pocket, but for some reason that day was different. Now I know why.”

Richard, a computer systems analyst who was alone at home at the time, didn’t hear a gunshot over the tractor’s roar and at first didn’t know what hit him. Part of him thought the tractor spewed some gravel. But being in the driver’s seat, he thought it impossible, he said.

”I was shocked,” he said. ”I just thought, ‘How did this not kill me?’”

After calling 911 and assuring a dispatcher several times that ”although I was shot in the chest I was fine,” Sheriff’s Office deputies arrived to investigate.

”He’s extremely fortunate,” said Capt. George Bonnett, Sheriff’s Office spokesman. ”And with Thanksgiving around the corner he definitely has something to be thankful for. I’ve never heard of anything like this before.”

Neither had Mindy, Richard’s wife.

Mindy, who was out running errands, returned to their house Saturday afternoon to find three Sheriff’s Office deputies parked in her driveway.

She wondered if Richard had a heart attack or flipped the tractor and was injured. She was confused.

Then Richard told her, ”I was shot.”

”You can’t tease me like this,” she said. ”But then I noticed he looked stricken. I burst into tears.”

The pair immediately remembered a spate of gunshots, some single, others rapid fire automatics, in the nearby woods that surround their Lee Road north of Covingtonhome and many others less than a quarter mile in all directions. They’ve always thought it was hunters or gun enthusiasts taking target practice, a noise they’ve heard intermittently for eight years, ever since they moved from Metairie to the Northshore in 2000.

Not against guns or hunters, the couple never reported the shots and just thought it was part of the territory ”because we live in the country.” They routinely see hunters park their cars at the intersection of Lee Road and North Fitzmorris Road and walk down a power line corridor through the woods and behind their home. In the past couple months, Sheriff’s Office deputies have fielded ”two or three” complaints of nearby gunshots, Bonnett said. But in recent days, the shots grew louder, closer, likely the result of deer season opening.

”I always thought one day a bullet would hit the house, whiz by us, but never did I think one would hit me,” Richard said.

The couple decided to tell their story Tuesday in an effort to teach hunters and gun enthusiasts how dangerous shooting near homes can be.

”We’re not against guns. My family used to hunt. We just want to tell as many people as possible to be careful,” Mindy said. ”And for them to be aware that people live here. We could be planning a funeral, but for the grace of God, he’s alive.”

The couple this week also sent a letter to St. Tammany Parish District 2 Councilman Chris Cooper urging for a harsher gun ordinance. They hope to increase jail time and fines for anyone firing a weapon in directions of nearby homes.

Cooper said he planned to meet with an attorney to discuss solutions.

”I’m going to do anything I can to solve this,” he said. ”There are a lot of homes in that area, and if it wouldn’t have been Richard it would be someone else. Somehow we’ve got to control this or get it stopped.”

For now, the couple is just happy to be alive. They just returned to live in their Hurricane Katrina-ravaged home and are still unpacking mounds of boxes and knickknacks. They just finished remodeling their kitchen. And now, ever since the accident, Richard’s son is calling home more often.

”We’re going to have a happy Thanksgiving this year,” Mindy said. ”We’ve got a lot to be thankful for.”

pFiled under: a href="http://www.joystiq.com/category/culture/" rel="tag"Culture/a, a href="http://www.joystiq.com/category/pc/" rel="tag"PC/a, a href="http://www.joystiq.com/category/firstpersonshooters/" rel="tag"First Person Shooters/a/pdiv align="center"a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/10/10/cern-only-one-crowbar-received-gordon-freeman-impossible-to-f/"img vspace="4" hspace="4" border="1" alt="" src="http://www.blogcdn.com/www.joystiq.com/media/2008/11/gordon-freeman-hunts-hadron-headcrab.jpg" //abr //div a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/10/10/cern-only-one-crowbar-received-gordon-freeman-impossible-to-f/"They found him/a! The Large Hadron Collider is now under the vigilant protection of the world's least communicative hero, Gordon Freeman. You have the folks at a href="http://blog.reddit.com/2008/11/crowbar-arrived-at-cern-freeman-was.html"Reddit/a to thank for equipping him with an iconic weapon, originally intended as an ominous gift before the a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/09/09/terrible-news-gordon-freeman-spotted-near-large-hadron-collider/"potentially apocalyptic/a Collider was fired up for the first time. We wish Gordon the best of luck as he trains in the fine art of bludgeoning parasitic creatures to a pulp.br /br /He has until Spring 2009 (view his progress in a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/reddit/GordonFreemanCERNAndAWreckingBar?authkey=bqut7SFV-Cc#"this photo gallery/a) -- that's when the Collider is expected to stop being broken.p style="padding:5px;background:#ddd;border:1px solid #ccc;clear:both;"a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/11/21/gordon-freeman-receives-crowbar-will-defend-raging-hadron/"Gordon Freeman receives crowbar, will defend raging Hadron/a originally appeared on a href="http://www.joystiq.com"Joystiq/a on Fri, 21 Nov 2008 17:09:00 EST. Please see our a href="http://www.weblogsinc.com/feed-terms/"terms for use of feeds/a./pp style="clear: both; padding: 8px 0 0 0; height: 2px; font-size: 1px; border: 0; margin: 0; padding: 0;"nbsp;/ppa href=http://blog.reddit.com/2008/11/crowbar-arrived-at-cern-freeman-was.htmlRead/anbsp;|nbsp;a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/11/21/gordon-freeman-receives-crowbar-will-defend-raging-hadron/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent link to this entry"Permalink/anbsp;|nbsp;a href="http://www.joystiq.com/forward/1379898/" title="Send this entry to a friend via email"Email this/anbsp;|nbsp;a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/11/21/gordon-freeman-receives-crowbar-will-defend-raging-hadron/#comments" title="View reader comments on this entry"Comments/a/p pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/IJ54AGwHPTdc-kKWX798FPt-2xM/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/IJ54AGwHPTdc-kKWX798FPt-2xM/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/joystiq?a=L2SGi2Lv"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/joystiq?i=L2SGi2Lv" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/joystiq?a=hevKs4pj"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/joystiq?i=hevKs4pj" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/weblogsinc/joystiq/~4/spP3CE0up68" height="1" width="1"/

Auteur : WMD-InsideStory
Tags : WMD Iraq weapons mass destruction MI6 conspiracy
Envoyé : 21 novembre 2008
Note :0.0
Votes :0

If only we could be a fly on the wall when our enemies are plotting to attack us. Better yet, what if that fly could record voices, transmit video and even fire tiny weapons?div class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/ibtimes/tech?a=PIEuN"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/ibtimes/tech?i=PIEuN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/ibtimes/tech?a=DmkGn"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/ibtimes/tech?i=DmkGn" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/ibtimes/tech?a=EqcLn"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/ibtimes/tech?i=EqcLn" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/ibtimes/tech/~4/461190230" height="1" width="1"/

pimg src="http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/gizmodo/2008/11/romp.jpg" width="600" height="400" style="display:block;" /ROMP—or Remotely Operated Mobile Platform—is a poor man's version of an iRobot battlefield bot. Instead of fancy tracks and miniaturized sensors, these ROMPs seem more like sophisticated all-terrain RC cars rigged with consumer cameras. Until you meet the older brother, of course, the weaponized WROMP with its big gun on top. In the words of its creator, Chris Rogers:/p blockquote p[The WROMP] is a weaponized version of the Remotely Operated Mobile Platform. The operator can "drive" the vehicle and fire the weapon although it is out of visual range. WROMP can also be used for reconnaissance and bomb investigation and remote detonation/p /blockquote pscript type="text/javascript" charset="utf-8" galleryPost('romp', 3, ''); /script/p pAs you can see, the weapon in this case is just a paintball machine gun. Enough for me, although Chris says the platform has been designed for any use, "including remote surveillance, security patrolling and bomb investigation." The system uses an audio/video system linked to an VR headset for control, aiming, and firing. [a href="http://www.coroflot.com/public/individual_file.asp?portfolio_id=1665489individual_id=46030sort_by=1"Coroflot/a via a href="http://dvice.com/archives/2008/11/romp_a_remote-c.php?p=1cat=undefined#more"Dvice/a]/p br style="clear: both;"/ a href="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/ht.php?t=camp;i=c9cdb830e50fca7d81f9fd2e05403522amp;p=1"img style="border:0;" src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/ht.php?t=vamp;i=c9cdb830e50fca7d81f9fd2e05403522amp;p=1" border="0" //adiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?a=1EeB8M05"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/gizmodo/full?d=120" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?a=eRwp5X7e"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/gizmodo/full?d=41" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?a=XQr4zDjb"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/gizmodo/full?i=XQr4zDjb" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?a=ssSRdkpB"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/gizmodo/full?i=ssSRdkpB" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~4/UgQGk7_S03o" height="1" width="1"/

The Fortune's Pack DLC will bring new vehicles and new weapons to both the singleplayer game and the multiplayer game. New screenshots inside.

What is Serene OverloaD?
Serene OverloaD is a new and exiting RPG based upon the stories being written by Brendan. If you would like to

read the stories go here: http://sereneadventure.net/area51/fo...rum=4&thread=5.

Why Help This Project?
We are no normal project, we want to emphisize creativity and create a fun envirment for the players. Its all

about creating something NEW!! Best of all theres no template, so you cant screw up (too bad at least).

What if I help?
Currently we have a tight budget (Enought to pay for hosting) so we cannot pay anyone but we will make sure that

you are given credit for any work you do! If we do start to make some money off this project we will pay people and

give some money to those who helped previously (Note: We plan to have a payed member status with special

unlockables)

2D or 3D?
The project currently only supports 2D modeling but when we move to other platforms we will move to 3D.

Style: Future

Colors: Any

Sizes
Characters: Berween 200x200 and 400x400 (px)
Weapons & Items: Not sure. For now smaller than 400x400

About the Characters
The character system includes leveling, status upgraing, equipment and will include class leveling.

About the Equipment
The equipment will feature mods (Simalar to Ratchet And Clank) that will create unlimitied possibilities.

Postions
Graphic Designer, Coding (PHP,Javascript and HTML), Moderators, Advertising Manager, Testers

Managers(Real Name/RPG Name [Position])
Tony Figueroa/Coldfirezz [General Mangaer/Boss]

Some Features
Custom Built Forum, Battle System, Store, Items (Healing Items), Equipment (Weapons & Armor), Custom Profiles and

More.....

Avalible Platforms: Web

Platform Plans: iPod Touch/iPhone, PC, Mobile Web, Xbox 360, PS3

Thank you - Coldfirezz