Tech & Science

In an interview on NBC's Today show with Matt Lauer, Tom Cruise aggressively defended his opposition to psychiatry and anti-depressive drugs. This occurred after being asked questions about his criticism of Brooke Shields, who has been taking drugs, including Paxil, for postpartum depression. Cruise is usually known for keeping his cool in interviews, but recently he has been slightly more unbound. Cruise's statements, including "Psychiatry is a pseudoscience", and "There is no such thing as a chemical imbalance in a body", reflect the belie

The Los Angeles Times has launched a web site where readers can collaboratively edit and respond to certain editorials from the paper. The site, called Wikitorial, uses a type of software known as a wiki. Registered users over 13 years of age may edit and contribute to designated "Wikitorials". On Friday, the Times posted the site's first editorial on latimes.com, entitled "War and Consequences". The corresponding Wikitorial is named "Dreams About War and Retribution". In its introduction to Wikitorial, a Los Angeles Times editor invited reade

A sizable earthquake shook Southern California for the third time this week. The quake occurred at 1:53 p.m. Pacific Time on Thursday and reached most parts of Southern California by 1:54 p.m. The 4.9-scale tremor, appearing to have originated 79 miles east of Los Angeles, comes on the tail of two other quakes, including a 7.2 magnitude quake off the coast of Northern California which briefly triggered tsunami warnings Tuesday night. Geologists at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) affirmed that the quake was too weak to cause s

A House subcommittee voted Thursday to sharply reduce the federal government's financial spending for Fiscal Year '06, including eliminating taxpayer funds that help produce such shows as Sesame Street and Arthur. The spending cutbacks far exceeded even those requested by the White House. Among initiatives slated for reduction are $39 million for conversion to digital programming and $50 million for upgrading PBS's aging satellite technology. The subcommittee also acted to eliminate federal money for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting,

The Swedish organization Antipiratbyrån (The Swedish Anti-Piracy Bureau) suffered a massive blow today when the Swedish government's Data Inspection Board stated that the Bureau's storage of Internet user's IP addresses is illegal. Antipiratbyrån is an organization representing the movie and software industry in Sweden, working to protect the intellectual property of its beneficiaries. This spring they started collecting IP-addresses of suspected copyright infringers. They used the collected information to press charges and to contact the susp

NASA has completed a major test of a 20-meter square solar sail, marking a "crucial milestone" in space propulsion technology. It is not the first to test solar sails, as the Japanese have deployed two solar sails in space. The Planetary Society is planning on launching a solar sail possibly by June 21. Shot into orbit by a converted intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), the Cosmos 1 would be launched from a submerged Russian submarine from within the Barents Sea. The spacecraft, powered by the sail, will have no destination. The purpos

The 23-year-old Canadian delegate Natalie Glevoba was elected on Tuesday morning as the new Miss Universe, in a ceremony held at Bangkok's Impact Arena. Glevoba is a professional model, height 1.79 m (5'11"), who received her Bachelor of Commerce in Information Technology Management and Marketing at Ryerson University. Born in Russia, she emigrated to Toronto at the age of 11. She beat four Latin American delegates in semifinals: Cynthia Olavarria (Puerto Rico), Renata Soñe (Dominican Republic), Laura Elizondo (Mexico) and Mónica Spear (Venezu

Tomasz Pacyński - Polish fantasy and science fiction author - was found dead in his garden by his family on May 30, 2005. The cause of death is presumed to be either heart inflammation or myocardial infarction. Pacyński, born on February 4, 1958, was one of the founders and the main editor of Fahrenheit, the first Polish Internet science fiction fanzine. He published short stories in such magazines as Science Fiction, SFera, and Fantasy, and in Internet fanzines such as Fahrenheit, Esensja, Fantazin and Srebrny Glob. He also wrote articles pub

Past Pandemics have claimed many lives. Disease Year Death toll Spanish Flu 1918/1919 50 million Asian Flu 1957 1 million Hong Kong Flu 1968 1 million The science journal Nature devoted a special section to the Asian H5N1 virus, or "Avian Flu", highlighting the danger it poses to world populations, and cautioning that unless steps are taken soon, it could lead to the deaths of many millions and lead to a major economic crisis. Their analysis shows a danger of it mutating into a strain with a lethality similar to the 1918 Spanish flu pand

NASA diagram of Voyager 1 entering the heliosheath region The Voyager 1 spacecraft, launched in 1977 to explore the planets, is now agreed by scientists to have entered the heliosheath at the edge of the solar system 8.7 billion miles (14 billion kilometers) from the Sun. In a few years, Voyager 1 is expected to become the first man-made object to cross into interstellar space. "Voyager has entered the final lap on its race to the edge of interstellar space, as it begins exploring the solar system's final frontier," said Dr. Edward Stone, Vo

The Brazilian government news agency Agencia Brasil, or Radiobras, says that it is transmitting audio and video through the internet using free software. Proprietary software like Windows Media Player is not necessary to watch or hear the radio and TV transmissions. According to Diogos Gonzaga, from Agencia Brasil technology division, the agency is using the following software: Icecast for the Ogg Vorbis codec radio transmissions and the Ogg Theora codec for the video ones. The user who wants to hear Brazilian radio transmissions can sele

Venture capital investment in Ireland has leaped by 35% in the first quarter of 2005, according to a new report by Ernst & Young. The report found that Europe-wide venture capital investment increased by a healthy 19% on the same period in 2004. Total investment in Ireland was €42.11m (US$52.8m, £28.9m) for the first 3 months compared to €31.23m (US$39.1m, £21.4m) in the first quarter of last year. The report found that 85% of the capital was invested in the information technology sector; largely helped by a successful €15m fundraising by Corv