Author: kenmay

Newly Discovered Virus Widespread in Human Gut

A newly discovered virus has been found by a San Diego State University team to live inside more than half of all sampled human gut cells sampled. Exploring genetic material found in intestinal samples, the international team uncovered the CrAssphage virus. They say the virus could influence the behaviour of some of the most common bacteria in our gut. Researchers say the virus has the genetic fingerprint of a bacteriophage – a type of virus known to infect bacteria. Phages may work to control the behaviour of bacteria they infect – some make it easier for bacteria to inhabit in their environments while others allow bacteria to become more potent. [Study lead Dr. Robert] Edwards said: “In some way phages are like wolves in the wild, surrounded by hares and deer. “They are critical components of our gut ecosystems, helping control the growth of bacterial populations and allowing a diversity of species.” According to the team, CrAssphage infects one of the most common types of bacteria in our guts. National Geographic gives some idea why a virus so common in our gut should have evaded discovery for so long, but at least CrAssphage finally has a Wikipedia page of its own. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Follow this link:
Newly Discovered Virus Widespread in Human Gut

Find Out Your Uber Passenger Rating with this Script

Uber is a great way to get a ride without having to hail a cab. When you finish a ride, you get a chance to rate your driver and your experience. However, the drivers get to rate you too. Here’s how to find out your rating, which is normally a closely-kept secret. Read more…

Original post:
Find Out Your Uber Passenger Rating with this Script

A New Pure Lithium Battery Could Double Your Phone’s Life

Virtually all of your gadgets tote lithium ion batteries—but while they’re the best you can hope for at the moment, new engineering means that pure lithium batteries are now a possibility , and they could double the life of your phone. Read more…

More here:
A New Pure Lithium Battery Could Double Your Phone’s Life

Suddenly Visible: Illicit Drugs As Part of Silicon Valley Culture

The recent death by overdose of Google executive Timothy Hayes has drawn attention to the phenomenon of illegal drug use (including abuse of prescription painkillers) among technology workers and executives in high-pay, high-stress Silicon Valley. The Mercury News takes a look at the phenomenon; do the descriptions of freely passed cocaine, Red Bull as a gateway drug, and complacent managers match your own workplace experiences? From the Mercury News article: “There’s this workaholism in the valley, where the ability to work on crash projects at tremendous rates of speed is almost a badge of honor, ” says Steve Albrecht, a San Diego consultant who teaches substance abuse awareness for Bay Area employers. “These workers stay up for days and days, and many of them gradually get into meth and coke to keep going. Red Bull and coffee only gets them so far.” … Drug abuse in the tech industry is growing against the backdrop of a national surge in heroin and prescription pain-pill abuse. Treatment specialists say the over-prescribing of painkillers, like the opioid hydrocodone, has spawned a new crop of addicts — working professionals with college degrees, a description that fits many of the thousands of workers in corporate Silicon Valley. Increasingly, experts see painkillers as the gateway drug for addicts, and they are in abundance. “There are 1.4 million prescriptions … in the Bay Area for hydrocodone, ” says Alice Gleghorn with the San Francisco Department of Public Health. “That’s a lot of pills out there.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Read more here:
Suddenly Visible: Illicit Drugs As Part of Silicon Valley Culture

Do Apple and Google Sabotage Older Phones? What the Graphs Don’t Show

Harvard economics professor Sendhil Mullainathan takes a look in the New York Times at interesting correlations between the release dates of new phones and OSes and search queries that indicate frustration with the speed of the phones that people already have. Mullainathan illustrates with graphs (and gives plausible explanations for the difference) just how different the curves are over time for the search terms “iPhone slow” and “Samsung Galaxy slow.” It’s easy to see with the iPhone graph especially how it could seem to users that Apple has intentionally slowed down older phones to nudge them toward upgrading. While he’s careful not to rule out intentional slowing of older phone models (that’s possible, after all), Mullainathan cites several factors that mean there’s no need to believe in a phone-slowing conspiracy, and at least two big reasons (reputation, liability) for companies — Apple, Google, and cellphone manufacturers like Samsung — not to take part in one. He points out various wrinkles in what the data could really indicate, including genuine but innocent slowdowns caused by optimizing for newer hardware. It’s an interesting look at the difference between having mere statistics, no matter how rigorously gathered, and knowing quite what they mean. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Taken from:
Do Apple and Google Sabotage Older Phones? What the Graphs Don’t Show

Nasty Business: How To Drain Competitors’ Google AdWords Budgets

tsu doh nimh (609154) writes KrebsOnSecurity looks at a popular service that helps crooked online marketers exhaust the Google AdWords budgets of their competitors.The service allows companies to attack competitors by raising their costs or exhausting their ad budgets early in the day. Advertised on YouTube and run by a guy boldly named “GoodGoogle, ” the service employs a combination of custom software and hands-on customer service, and promises clients the ability to block the appearance of competitors’ ads. From the story: “The prices range from $100 to block between three to ten ad units for 24 hours to $80 for 15 to 30 ad units. For a flat fee of $1, 000, small businesses can use GoodGoogle’s software and service to sideline a handful of competitors’ ads indefinitely.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Continue Reading:
Nasty Business: How To Drain Competitors’ Google AdWords Budgets

Homer for iPhone lets you peek at the apps your friends use

Ever had the urge to peek at your friends’ phone screens, whether it’s to learn about their favorite apps or simply pry into their digital lives? Well, you can now do that without having to either strike up an awkward conversation or get overly nosy. PayPal co-founder Max Levchin and the HVF crew have launched Homer , an iPhone app that lets you share your app picks with fellow users. All you do is take screenshots of your home screens and submit them; Homer scans the pictures and identifies the apps, making it easy to compare them with pals in your contacts or on social networks. As you’d hope, there’s some privacy features baked in. Besides the voluntary nature of screen captures, you can hide individual apps you’d rather keep a secret — you don’t have to share your Tinder addiction with the rest of the world. There’s no mention of Homer versions for other platforms (or people outside the US, for that matter), but you can try it today if you have both an iPhone and an unquenchable curiosity about your buddies’ mobile habits. Filed under: Cellphones , Internet , Mobile Comments Via: GigaOM Source: App Store , HVF Labs

See the article here:
Homer for iPhone lets you peek at the apps your friends use

Bose accuses Beats of using patented noise-cancelling tech

Bose Corp. filed a lawsuit on Friday that accuses popular headphone maker Beats Electronics of infringing upon several of its patents. The suit claims that Bose lost sales because Beats—which Apple announced it would acquire for $3 billion in May—used patented noise-cancelling technology in its Studio and Studio Wireless headphone lines. Beats’ products that allegedly use the technology “can also be used for noise cancellation when no music is played, a feature that Beats also advertises,” the suit states. “Thus, Beats specifically encourages users to use the infringing functionality. Beats advertises no method to turn off features that cause end users to directly infringe.” Read 5 remaining paragraphs | Comments

Read this article:
Bose accuses Beats of using patented noise-cancelling tech

Enraged Verizon FiOS Customer Seemingly Demonstrates Netflix Throttling

MojoKid (1002251) writes The ongoing battle between Netflix and ISPs that can’t seem to handle the streaming video service’s traffic, boiled over to an infuriating level for Colin Nederkoon, a startup CEO who resides in New York City. Rather than accept excuses and finger pointing from either side, Nederkoon did a little investigating into why he was receiving such slow Netflix streams on his Verizon FiOS connection. What he discovered is that there appears to be a clear culprit. Nederkoon pays for Internet service that promises 75Mbps downstream and 35Mbps upstream through his FiOS connection. However, his Netflix video streams were limping along at just 375kbps (0.375mbps), equivalent to 0.5 percent of the speed he’s paying for. On a hunch, he decided to connect to a VPN service, which in theory should actually make things slower since it’s adding extra hops. Speeds didn’t get slower, they got much faster. After connecting to VyprVPN, his Netflix connection suddenly jumped to 3000kbps, the fastest the streaming service allows and around 10 times faster than when connecting directly with Verizon. Verizon may have a different explanation as to why Nederkoon’s Netflix streams suddenly sped up, but in the meantime, it would appear that throttling shenanigans are taking place. It seems that by using a VPN, Verizon simply doesn’t know which packets to throttle, hence the gross disparity in speed. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

See the original article here:
Enraged Verizon FiOS Customer Seemingly Demonstrates Netflix Throttling

UV-Powered Blood Test Could Make Universal Cancer Detection Possible

Early detection is the best tool to fight cancer, but biopsies can be painful and inconclusive. New research shows a simple blood test can detect cancers by blasting white blood cells with UV and seeing how they respond. Painless, universal cancer detection could be a drop of blood away. Read more…

Visit site:
UV-Powered Blood Test Could Make Universal Cancer Detection Possible