$1.5 Million Fine for Downloading 24 Songs

What's the value of a song? Jammie Thomas-Rasset has spent the last few years in court debating that question. The Minnesota mother of four is being penalized for illegally downloading and sharing 24 songs on the peer-to-peer file-sharing read more

Tropical Storm Agatha floods kill 150 in guatemala

Flooding and landslides from tropical storm Agatha have killed more than 150 people throughout Central America in the past few days, and apparently caused a giant Guatemala City sinkhole.

A sinkhole caused caused by tropical storm Agatha in Guatemala City on Sunday. Torrential rains brought by the first tropical storm of the 2010 season pounded Central America and southern Mexico, triggering deadly landslides.


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Maguindanao massacre- 45 persons were confirmed killed including politicians and journalist

MANILA, Philippines - Forty-three persons – including a politician about to file her and her brother’s certificates of candidacy (COCs), as well as journalists covering the event – were confirmed killed when heavily armed men waylaid the group on its way to the local Commission on Elections (Comelec) office in Maguindanao.

Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) Public Information Office chief Lt. Col. Romero Brawner confirmed that as of yesterday afternoon, ground troops had recovered 21 bodies – 13 women and eight men – from the massacre site in Barangay Saniag, Ampatuan town.

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RP placed under state of calamity

MANILA, Philippines - President Arroyo yesterday placed the entire nation in a state of calamity to allow the authorities as well as the public to prepare for super typhoon “Pepeng” and keep prices of basic commodities under control and maintain peace and order in the wake of the devastating floods earlier brought by tropical storm “Ondoy.”

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six year old boy from phillipines ,wins in Vegas chess tilt

A six year old, Stephen Rome Pangilinan of Milo Checkmate Philippines, won as over all champion under his division in Las Vegas International Chess Festival.

The chess player was between the 36 other players world wide who participated in the June 4 to 7 competition held at the South Point Hotel, Casino and Spa.

The boy was being ask why he became undefeated he said : “Kasi po ginamit ko yung pamatay kong opening.”

Additionally the boy stated that he dreams of playing against “People’s Champ” Manny Pacquiao when he gets back to the country.

Ohio grandma gives birth to daughter's triplets

CLEVELAND (AP) — A 56-year-old woman who gave birth to her triplet granddaughters a month ago is recovering from a Caesarean section and hopeful that one of the girls will be home from the hospital by Saturday.

Jaci Dalenberg, 56, of Wooster in northeast Ohio, offered herself as a surrogate when her daughter, Kim Coseno, and her husband, Joe, were waiting to adopt. Coseno had two children from a previous marriage but was unable to have another baby because of a hysterectomy.

Her ovaries could produce eggs, so she and Joe Coseno, her husband of three years, tried in vitro fertilization. The embryos were implanted in Dalenberg's uterus.

Dalenberg said she was not frightened to be pregnant at her age.

"I've always been really healthy. I did get medical clearance, including psychological testing," Dalenberg told The Associated Press on Tuesday. read more of the story

Source:http://usatoday.com

Google adds video and audio chat to gmail

Google announced Tuesday it is adding video and audio chat to its free e-mail service, joining Microsoft and Yahoo in a race to make communication on the Web a more social experience.

Both Microsoft and Yahoo offer video with their instant messaging services, but have not integrated it into e-mail.

"I think it's a nice addition and some people will use it, but I don't think it will drive huge adoption of gmail, " said Greg Sterling, of Sterling Market Intelligence, referring to Google's free e-mail service.

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source:

http://www.mercurynews.com

Cyber attacks on McCain and Obama teams 'came from China'

US government cyber experts suspect that an attack on the Obama and McCain campaign computer networks this summer originated from China, according to a US official.

Earlier this summer, the Secret Service and Federal Bureau of Investigation warned Barack Obama's and John McCain's campaign teams that their computer networks had been compromised by foreign hackers.

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Source: (http://www.ft.com)

Nepal appoints 3-year-old as new living goddess

KATMANDU, Nepal - Hindu and Buddhist priests chanted sacred hymns and cascaded flowers and grains of rice over a 3-year-old girl who was appointed a living goddess in on Tuesday. Wrapped in red silk and adorned with red flowers in her hair, Matani Shakya received approval from the priests and President Ram Baran Yadav in a centuries-old tradition with deep ties to Nepal's monarchy, which was abolished in May.
The new "kumari" or living goddess, was carried from her parents' home to an ancient palatial temple in the heart of the Nepali capital, Katmandu, where she will live until she reaches puberty and loses her divine status.

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HP, Intel and Yahoo study ways to make Web a utility

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Three tech giants -- Hewlett-Packard, Intel and Yahoo -- said on Tuesday they are teaming up on a research project to help turn Web services into reliable, everyday utilities.

The companies are joining forces with academic researchers in Asia, Europe and the United States to create an experimental network that lets researchers test "cloud-computing" projects -- Web-wide services that can reach billions of users at once.

continues......

Baby in India born with 4 arms, 4 legs

BANGALORE, India (AP) - Doctors began operating Tuesday on a 2-year-old girl born with four arms and four legs in an extensive surgery that they hope will leave the girl with a normal body, a hospital official said.

The girl named Lakshmi is joined to a "parasitic twin" that stopped developing in the mother's womb. The surviving fetus absorbed the limbs, kidneys and other body parts of the undeveloped fetus.

A team of 30 doctors was removing the extra limbs and organs. They have separated the fused spines and the next step will be to separate the extra limbs and then the rest of the "parasite," said Dr. Sharan Patil, the orthopedic surgeon leading the operation.

"As of now, the child has been responding very well," Patil said several hours into the operation.

Lakshmi is named after the four-armed Hindu goddess of wealth, and some in her village in the northern state of Bihar revere her.

"Everybody considers her a goddess at our village," said her father, Shambhu, who goes by one name. "All this expenditure has happened to make her normal. So far, everything is fine."

Others sought to make money from Lakshmi. Her parents kept her in hiding after a circus apparently tried to buy the girl, they said.

The complications for Lakshmi's surgery are myriad: The two spines are merged, she has four kidneys, entangled nerves, two stomach cavities and two chest cavities. She cannot stand up or walk.

"It's a big team effort of a lot of skilled surgeons who will be putting their heart and soul into solving the problem of Lakshmi," Patil said earlier in the day. "It's going to take many, many hours on a continuous basis to operate on the baby. So, these issues definitely make it complex."

Patil put the risk of losing Lakshmi between 20 and 25 percent.

Doctors at Sparsh Hospital in Bangalore, where the girl is undergoing surgery, said she is popular among the staff and patients.

"She's a very cute girl," Dr. Patil Mamatha said. "She's very playful and gets along well with others."

The hospital's foundation is paying for the operation because the girl's family could not afford the medical bills, Mamatha said.

13abc.com

California wildfire damage

Fires raging across California have caused more than $1-billion in property damage and left three people dead, officials said on Wednesday, as a lull in winds allowed firefighters to make their first significant progress in combating the flames.

Around 1700 buildings have been destroyed in the 18 fires that have erupted since Sunday, forcing an estimated 500 000 people to flee their homes and scorching 172 000 hectares of tinder-dry countryside stretching from celebrity-studded Malibu to beyond the Mexican border.

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said three people had died and 40 people had been injured in the fires, the worst to hit California since devastating 2003 blazes which claimed 22 lives.

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related stories
Victims in Wildfire’s Path Say, ‘Why Me?’

california wildfire pictures

Quake triggers tsunami in Indonesia

JAKARTA, Indonesia - A massive earthquake struck Indonesia on Wednesday, triggering a tsunami in the town of Padang and warnings for much of the Indian Ocean region, authorities said. The quake caused tall buildings to sway in at least four countries.

A wave of up to 9 feet was reported to have hit Padang about 20 minutes after the quake, said Suhardjono, an official with Indonesia's meteorological agency, who goes by only one name.

A local official told Indonesian radio that at least one person was killed and dozens were injured in the earthquake.

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center also reported that a small tsunami hit Padang.

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Erap guilty of plunder; acquitted of perjury

The Sandiganbayan Special Division on Wednesday found former president Joseph Estrada guilty beyond reasonable doubt for the crime of plunder but acquitted him for the lesser crime of perjury.

Winding up a six-year trial that the 70-year-old had repeatedly insisted was politically motivated, the anti-graft court ruled that Estrada was guilty of plundering billions of pesos in tobacco excise tax kickbacks and bribes and sentenced him to reclusion perpetua.

"Accordingly accused former president Joseph Estrada is hereby sentenced to suffer the penalty of reclusion perpetua and accessory penalties of civil interdiction during the period of sentence and perpetual absolute disqualification," the decision read.

It added: "The period within accused former president Joseph Ejercito Estrada has been under detention shall be credited to him in full as long as he agrees voluntarily in writing to abide by the same disciplinary rules imposed upon convicted prisoners."

The anti-graft court, however, acquitted Estrada's co-accused in the plunder case including his son, Sen. Jose "Jinggoy" Estrada, and lawyer Edward Serapio.

The court confiscated more than P700 million in Estrada's assets including a foundation set up by the former president for Muslim youth scholars, the controversial "Jose Velarde" account that allegedly contained millions of pesos in illegal gambling bribes and the now famous Boracay mansion in New Manila, Quezon City.

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copy of erap's verdict here

related topics :
Estrada son, lawyer not guilty of plunder
Tears, approval from Calif.
Pinoys on Erap's guilty rule

Erap verdict draws mixed reaction from Filipino-Australians

Philippines' Estrada guilty of plunder, gets life

Cocaine kingpin on FBI's top 10 most-wanted list captured in western Colombia

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — A reputed drug lord on the FBI's top 10 most-wanted list was captured in western Colombia, the interior minister said Monday, in a major blow to the country's largest remaining drug cartel.

Diego Montoya, who sits alongside Osama bin Laden as the only major alleged drug trafficker on the FBI list, is accused of leading the Norte del Valle cartel and exporting tons of cocaine to the United States. The FBI had offered a reward of $5 million for information leading to his arrest.

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Chinese Woman Carried Inside Her Body 26 Sewing Needles for 31 Years! In the brain, liver, lungs and kidneys

She can consider herself lucky because had she been conceived in these times, her mother would have had an abortion. Chinese doctors have found 26 sewing needles inside the body of Luo Cuifen, a 31-year-old woman.

They suspect they were inserted into the woman's body when she was a newborn by her grandparents because they were upset she was not a boy. Some of the needles entered the vital organs, such as the lungs, liver and kidneys and one even in the woman's brain was broken into three
parts.

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upside down house

take a look at this amazing house in poland,so great and people are attracted to it.
looks weired but ,i would want have one definitely.

it took one hundred and fourteen days to build the structure.

Total Lunar Eclipse to Occur on Tuesday

Path of the Moon through Earth's umbral and penumbral shadows
during the Total Lunar Eclipse of Aug. 28, 2007.

(Pacific Daylight Time)

A total eclipse of the Moon occurs during the early morning of Tuesday, August 28, 2007. The event is widely visible from the United States and Canada as well as South America, the Pacific Ocean, western Asia and Australia. During a total lunar eclipse, the Moon's disk can take on a dramatically colorful appearance from bright orange to blood red to dark brown and (rarely) very dark gray.

An eclipse of the Moon can only take place at Full Moon, and only if the Moon passes through some portion of Earth's shadow. The shadow is actually composed of two cone-shaped parts, one nested inside the other. The outer shadow or penumbra is a zone where Earth blocks some (but not all) of the Sun's rays. In contrast, the inner shadow or umbra is a region where Earth blocks all direct sunlight from reaching the Moon.

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AdSense doesn't work with the latest version of Firefox

Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.5 was released a few days ago and it already causes problems for some of the Google users. According to the reports, Google's advertising platform AdSense is not working properly in the latest version of Mozilla's browser, the users encountering problems when trying to login into their accounts. Rajiv Sud, AdSense Publisher Support, said today that many of the
Firefox 2.0.0.5 consumers are seeing only a sign-up page instead of a login form that would allow them to login into their already created account.

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Minneapolis Bridge Collapse

who says it can only be seen in movies? but not in real life it actually happens.

The bridge, shown here in this aerial shot, was carrying rush-hour traffic over Interstate 35W in Minneapolis when it collapsed, sending numerous vehicles into the Mississippi River.

side view on land

Emergency personnel respond at the scene of a freeway bridge collapse

not only bridge been devastated.
appears to be the remains of a car, in shambles and on fire.

cars nearly dangling from it.

A school bus and several cars, surrounded by black smoke, are seen lopsided

Cars are shown crushed under debris

Cars are scattered across the remains of the bridge

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