The doctor is calling me?

Turning the health-care model upside down, a small Australian company is working on bluetooth technology that logs and transmits medical observation data to a central network through a mobile phone - so your doctor can call YOU when a problem is developing. Alive's bluetooth technology is already proving useful in the recovery of cardiac outpatients and the diagnosis of sleep apnea - and a range of products in development aim to make advancements in health monitoring for diabetics, mountaineers and athletes in training.

The core of the Alive technology is a fairly simple idea - bluetooth enabled health monitoring devices such as heart rate & activity monitors, ECGs, blood oximeters and blood glucose meters that communicate with software on your mobile phone to log and upload information to a central internet server.

Lose weight and read e-mails

"Did you know you could lose as much as 66 pounds by sweating on your PC? Well using the Mayo Clinic's vertical workstation, that just might be the weight loss wave of the future. The vertical workstation is basically a desk mounted over a treadmill that lets office workers to kill two birds with one stone — send emails, check invoices and write reports and burn calories at the same time, say Professors James Levine and Jennifer Miller of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, who came up with the machine/desk. http://www.networkworld.com/community/?q=node/15170

Forget the Shredder

Software to Piece Back Shredded Files

Researchers in Germany have developed a software program that can re-assemble shredded documents. The software relies on special algorithms to help piece everything back together as it scans and analyses documents based on their color, shape, handwriting, texture and typeface. The software can even piece together files shredded by machines, which I find both cool and a little nerve-racking to be honest. – Louis Ramirez

USA Foreclosure Listing Activity Heats Up Toward Summer:

Bargain Foreclosure Trend Report U.S Activity By Month

During the March 2007 period, the four states with the highest levels of foreclosure listing activity accounted for 52 percent of total foreclosure filings. California recorded more than 32,500 homes entering some phase of the foreclosure process. Florida was second on the list in terms of foreclosure filings with over 27,000, followed by Colorado and Illinois at approximately 11,000 filings.

Hand Over Your Wallet

If you recognize your password, you may as well hand over your wallet or purse to the first person you see on the street.

1. password
2. 123456
3. qwerty
4. abc123
5. letmein
6. monkey
7. myspace1
8. password1
9. blink
10. (your first name)




Here are some better ways to create a strong password.

http://www.mytsoftware.com/dailyproject/PassGen/PassGen.html

http://www.passwordchart.com/

http://strongpasswordgenerator.com/

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Boys and their toys

from Ubergizmo:



Jet-powered toilet


So what if you own a Ferrari that hits 60 from 0 in three seconds? Paul Sender, a mechanic from US, has spent £5,000 building a toilet that is powered by a Boeing jet engine, making this officially the fastest and only jet-powered toilet in the world. Fireballs as long as 30 feet result from the toilet moving from a standstill to speeds in excess of 70mph while you're busy doing your business. I presume at that speed, unloading your crap will probably be the last thing on your mind as you wouldn't want to end up as a crash victim with your pants down. No idea on how this thing is steered or whether there are any brakes attached to it.

Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely

From an article by David Keene
April 30, 2007
Almost every member of the House and Senate lusts after a seat on the Appropriations Committee and hopes one day to achieve the status of Cardinal. The Cardinals chair the various Appropriations Committee subcommittees and literally control the billions of dollars.

California Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D) chairs the Senate Rules Committee, but she’s also a Cardinal. She is currently chairwoman of the Interior, Environment and Related Agencies subcommittee, but until last year was for six years the top Democrat on the Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies (or “Milcon”) sub-committee, where she may have directed more than $1 billion to companies controlled by her husband.

If the inferences finally coming out about what she did while on Milcon prove true, she may be on the way to morphing from a respected senior Democrat into another poster child for congressional corruption.

The problems stem from her subcommittee activities from 2001 to late 2005, when she quit. During that period the public record suggests she knowingly took part in decisions that eventually put millions of dollars into her husband’s pocket — the classic conflict of interest that exploited her position and power to channel money to her husband’s companies.

Melanie Sloan, the executive director of Citizens for Responsible Ethics in Washington, or CREW, usually focuses on the ethical lapses of Republicans and conservatives, but even she is appalled at the way Sen. Feinstein has abused her position.

And the director of the Project on Government Oversight who examined the evidence of wrongdoing assembled by California writer Peter Byrne told him that “the paper trail showing Senator Feinstein’s conflict of interest is irrefutable.”


In spite of the blatant appearance of corruption, no major publication has picked up on the story, the Senate Ethics Committee has reportedly let her slip by, and she is now chairing the Senate Rules Committee, which puts her in charge of making sure her colleagues act ethically and avoid the sorts of conflicts of interest with which she is personally and so obviously familiar.

http://tinyurl.com/367n4y