BaSH PR0MPT

• Fault on iPhone 4G yields no service
• Apple blames firmware
• Industry experts blame design
• 30 day refund period offered

Apple says a fault on its new iPhone 4 is causing it to incorrectly display the phone’s signal. Most of you are aware of the fault with the iPhone 4G, where users who gripped the phone on the lower left-hand side noticed the signal strength and reception fell away. This is happening because the metal band around the chassis is broken into two insulated parts, one being a wifi antenna and the other being for telephonic usage. By bridging the gap between these two parts it faults out the signal and kills it outright.

Apple says the problem relates to an error on how the signal bars are displayed, rather than the signal, which even a cusory glance at the fault is incorrect and merely the cheapest way to ‘fix’ the problem and try and make customers happy. Many industry experts say that there may be a deeper signal problem than a cosmetic design flaw. While Apple is promising a patch fix “within a few weeks” (which ultimately will NOT fix the issue) they have also stated that users may also choose to get a full refund within 30 days of purchase.

In a statement, Apple said the iPhone 4 had been “the most successful product launch in Apple’s history” and that all phones gripped in “certain ways will reduce its reception by one or more bars”. “We have discovered the cause of this dramatic drop in bars, and it is both simple and surprising,” the statement read. “Upon investigation, we were stunned to find that the formula we use to calculate how many bars of signal strength to display is totally wrong.

“Our formula, in many instances, mistakenly displays two more bars than it should for a given signal strength. For example, we sometimes display four bars when we should be displaying as few as two bars. Users observing a drop of several bars when they grip their iPhone in a certain way are most likely in an area with very weak signal strength, but they don’t know it because we are erroneously displaying four or five bars. Their big drop in bars is because their high bars were never real in the first place.”

Apple said it was going to adopt AT&T’s formula for calculating how many bars to display for a given signal strength.

The theory now is that, once the patch update has been applied, iPhone’s bars will report signal strength “far more accurately” providing users a better indication of the reception in a given area.

But Stuart Miles, editor of technology site Pocket Lint, was sceptical. Speaking to BBC News, Mr Miles said the news raised a few questions. “Why, for the first time, has Apple released a bumper for their phone, and why does no one else have this problem,” he asked. “HTC makes metal phones, but they seem to work just fine. Changing the display may make some people feel better, but it doesn’t really fix the problem,” he added.

Apple said the new software to fix this would be released in a few weeks, claiming that as the problem also existed in the original iPhone, it would also be available for the iPhone 3GS and iPhone 3G. However, there have been few – if any – complaints about older iPhones losing signal strength when held in a certain way, although users with them can immediately kill their signal by locating the antenna portion of the phone from schemata online and then obstructing it with their hands.

Apple’s previous advice for iPhone 4 owners to overcome the problem of the device losing signal was to not place your hand on the lower left corner. Apple chief executive Steve Jobs said: “Just avoid holding it in that way.” This latest approach is an unusual admission from the company, which has apologised for “any anxiety we may have caused”.

The iPhone 4 went on sale on in June, with hundreds of people queuing Apple’s flagship stores across the globe. Many new owners reported that signal strength dropped when the phone was held. The problem is thought to be particularly acute for left-handed owners who naturally touch the phone in the sensitive area. Apple sells a rubber “bumper” that shields the sensitive area, as do many other firms.

When Mr Jobs introduced the iPhone 4 at Apple Worldwide Developers Conference, he described the integrated antenna as “really cool engineering”.

Extended antennae can be bought on eBay, and for most users who aren’t in an urban environment, extended antennae are the essential item for almost all phones given that phone producers seem to make their internal antenna out of diamonds and gold held together with baby seal eyeballs and thus are stupifyingly idiotic about how little ribbon you actually get in your phone, given how small ribbon antenna technology is they could easily afford to provide a huge antenna in quite a small case; something many mobile phone users would be willing to even pay a higher optional fee to obtain IN the cosmetic case instead of having to attach an external.

An object in the sky spreads radiation over North America. Fearing terrorism, U.S. Homeland Security agents are dispatched to investigate and contain the damage. What they discover will have implications for the entire world. So reads the bi-line of one of the, pun intended, pioneer films shot with intent for torrent release.

Pioneer One is the latest project from Josh Bernhard and Bracey Smith whose previous indie feature The Lionshare, became VODO’s biggest success to date with over 450,000 downloads since its release. The success of the project inspired the writer/director duo to develop this quality drama in collaboration with VODO and its distribution partners. With a successful distribution of the pilot they’re hunting for the donors and sponsors that will make the continuation of the show possible.

The show’s pilot was shot for just $6000, raised through the micro-funding platform Kickstarter. “This production was possible due in no small part to the willingness of talented, professional people working for free,” explains Bernhard. “From actors to composers, they did this because they believed in the project and wanted to see it happen.The production was a journey in and of itself. Check out the video blogs that were posted to the web that tell the story from script to finished episode”: vimeo.com/channels/pioneerone.

The initial pilot is very short, and you really don’t see where they dropped the $6k in donations, aside from knowing they’re operating one camera. Or someone, rather, is operating one camera, who is clearly not qualified to be doing so based on the very amateur film studentish angles used and the inability to smoothly frame a shot. It feels as though the entire thing was shot in one take day with no reshooting scenes that didn’t play out well, especially during a lot of the two person conversations where the camera is trying to stick to the rule of thirds but the persons are so close to each other they’re basically cutting a person out each time the opposite speaks and vice versa.

I don’t mean to overly criticise it, it’s a good attempt, but it just lacks a lot, and doesn’t seem to be worth the $6k spent. They better bust into zombie apocalypse and bunker survival soon because they can drop their costs dramatically if they went the route of true survival horror. Oh well, here’s hoping.

Just watching the live broadcast of the E3, telecast globally, and even comandeering the time square big TV. This will be a rambling review as it’s 4AM in Australia and I’m writing this as it happens. Some win announcements are Call of Duty: Black Ops with Xbox and Activision signing a contract that everything CoD will be Xbox first. The biggest downside is how ‘on rails’ it feels, all movement lacks kinetics of realism requisite for immersion. 10 years of Xbox, they definitely have some exciting things in store.

The new CoD will be out 11.09.10. Project Natal launched, being renamed Kinect (a play on kinetics and connect) with a world premier of new experiences promised. Kinect is a diminuitive set top addition that reads signatures of the attachments on the player.

This makes Nintendo seem as anachronistic as it’s lame mario franchises, which it always was as only tards bought them because they lacked any decent games and yes whilst it had some kinetic interaction the Nintendo Power Glove (for those old enough to remember if from the early 90′s) did exactly what Wii did and it flopped massively. Kinect seems to corner a multi-purpose application.

The stupidly named Metal Gear Solid Lightning Bolt Action Rising was launched by Konami with Kojima Productions where yaoi-to-be stars with oversized hair using their epic ninja skills can cut giant cyborgs ten times their size in half. I already want to scream at the head of anyone who’d buy something so stupid and lame.

Phil Spencer of Microsoft Game Studio lauded the industry defining multiplayer and graphics prowess of their Xbox platform before unveiling Gears of War 3, the gameplay looks fun but it’s definitely nothing that would be a blockbuster, except amongst teenage boys perhaps. One dynamic I liked was the fact you can use cover, like in Mass Effect 1 and 2, unsure whether this was in previous versions, as I said before, not my cup of tea due to it being too unrealistic / scifi fantasy.

Peter Molyneux, the creative director of MS Games Studios Europe announced another Xbox 360 exclusive, Fable 3, set 50 years after Fable 2. Loaded with choice and consequence, with action packed game play in a more immersive realm. Set to release 26.10.10, set in Albion you get to play a super awesome character that goes from revolutionary to emperor of win as per .. well, the other two. It’s very on-rails, but the graphics are very pretty albeit stereotypical of a fantasy game.

Microsoft’s newest partner Crytek revealed a very awe inspiring trailer for the dickily named Codename Kingdoms, look it up on YouTube, looks seriously cool from the trailer alone but don’t hold me to any promise of quality there.

After 34,000,000 games sold and 2b online hours Halo Reach was announced by Bungie, on the heels of the Halo Reach beta, citing it as the most ambitious game they’ve ever created. The unveiled world premier was of gameplay as opposed to cinematography, which makes the September shipping game look very impressive to the point where I’d say I may even jump in on the Halo franchise finally. That being said if they advertised it’s storyline better as zombies in space I would have been all over that shit. The music, ambience, cinematics, and dynamics of movement make it seem like it may very well be a blockbuster.

Kinect was explained as having an impact on more than just gaming, waving at Kinect will let it recognise who you are and sign you in simply by waving at it. Waving at it again will bring up a controller free menu, where you can interact using just hand gestures. There are no apparent things attached to the player, like we seemed to think, it just views the player optically. That does however mean that lighting will be an issue. It also enables voice commands, in a very in depth manner by addressing the device and following it with a verbal command. It really does look like Microsoft are trying to launch a tech-savvy household entertainment centre as part of the functionality of Kinect. To my chagrin they played Bustin’ Jeiber as a demonstration of how effortless it is to listen to music verbally.

An unexpected announcement was that on Windows Phone 7 Kinect and your Xbox will sync with it, allowing you to integrate your stuff in a more streamlined fashion. Using VideoKinect you can even watch movies with friends in other states, or even countries, online at the same time. Amusingly they chose Avatar Last Aidbender, with a comment about the ‘game about that’ and ‘boosting’ gamer scores. Lollip0p and Velveteen, two sisters, demo’d this but aside from the obvious potential of the technology were boring as batshit and so rigid in delivery.

My brain shut down when the ESPN logo came up, there was some rabble about some games based on sports, blah boring. Okay, sports aside, the USC graphics quality is AMAZING, it looks like you’re watching a sports match not playing a video game. It’s also interesting watching them interact with it through Kinect.

Kudo Tsunoda, the creative director for Kinect (Gamertag: Kudo) addressed his promise that Kinect would revolutionise the way you have fun, lauding the ‘it just works’ natural interaction system using your body and your voice–something that is usually reserved more for Apple products–Kinect promises to unite people socially, bringing people together in the same room or around the world in a lot of new ways. He went on to point out some six odd Kinect release games.

Kinect is slated for release November 4th globally.

• Kinectimals are a fun bunch of interactive pets you can play with with your hands, interacting with the animals like they were in your living room. On screen the pet interacted with the young girl in some novel ways, even when she hid from it it cutely animated pressing up against the screen peering around trying to find where it’s owner went. The young girl also issued verbal commands, telling it which toys to go and get, one amusing animation was a matrix like barrel roll over a jump rope. You can adopt 40 animals with over 30 unique activities.
• Kinect Sports had some English bloke taunting a crowd of avatars in a stadium, the first game they played was a track and field match where they ran on the spot and jumped imaginary hurdles. I refuse to put in that much effort to play a game, if I wanted that I’d get a friggen Wii. Other sports include soccer, bowling, running, javlin, long jump, table tennis, boxing, beach volleyball, and more.
• Kinect Joy Ride is a controllerless car racing game, the graphics and dynamics look as novice as a Wii game, and having to use an ‘imaginary’ wheel is just ridiculous, all interactions seem to be automatic aside from the wheel. It really looks like a Wii game, except instead of a dicky Nintendo character from the 1980′s you have dicky avatar characters in their stead.
• Kinect Adventures is some retarded rollercoaster ride where you have to dodge, jump and generally interact with crap from a static platform, a rollercoaster and a water raft being two examples shown. It does however seamlessly add in a new player when someone stands beside the current player, again though it’s far more motion than a real gamer is going to invest in playing what is fundamentally such a sophmoric game that it’s almost designed for the mildly retarded.
• YourShape: Fitness Evolved, exlusive for Kinect from Ubisoft, will sink Wii Fit, doing everything Wii fit does and then some, with full body monitoring of your exercising to the point of even being able to tell if you’re doing aerobics in time, or dipping a knee to 90 degrees in certain exercises. The advert for it is outstanding and very creative, and the demonstration of the game environment portrays you and your entire body shape and interactions. It also gives you a glimpse as to how you look to the Kinect module, a yellow and orange blob with vague definitions of your more intricate features. If can measure your appendages, estimate your height, and calibrate in a manner that it entire absorbs you and tailors fitness routines to your exact shape.
• Dance Central, from Harmonix, comparable to DDR on crack with liberal dashings of MTV. The quality of interaction with the game is pretty smashing, and it’s a very revitalising take on DDR without having a lame mat, or worse, a Nintendo product in your house.
• Star Wars OMFG Lucasarts and Microsoft gaming studios team up to release a Kinect only star wars game where you get to weild a light saber and do .. starwarsy things. The graphics are very primative compared to other SW franchise games, but it looks like it has a lot of promise. This game alone will sink the evil Wii, but unfortunately there was little more than a teaser of gameplay and a note that it’s due 2011.

Turn 10 cam on to chat about Forza, talking about a Ferrari (GASP, no Audi?) discussing the way that it’ll allow you to use Kinect, using an imaginary steering wheel, but also allowing you to angle your head to look around the cabin of your vehicle which is a very handy feature. Marrying Forza 3′s amazing graphics with intuitive gameplay interaction is going to allow Turn 10 to provide radical car experiences. Browsing car designs just got better, you can interact with any part of the car and get the details of anything from headlights to carbon ceramic breaks, or walk around the vehicle to examine different parts. I’m praying that Kinect also implements with car design, I’m very well known for releasing some stunningly designed cars in Forza 3 and my main excuse is a friggen huge screen and patience, with this kind of intuitive interaction I should be able to release even more amazing designs. The previewing of cars also illustrated an internal examination where you can look at and interact with any feature of the vehicle.

The Xbox E3 closing speech came with a surprise, a NEW Xbox 360, sleaker, cooler looking, and shipping NOW, expect them to be in the stores by the end of the week. For those who’ve read through this rambling post (and I apologise, but it’s now five am and I’m shattered) I hope you enjoy this news and I look forward to gaming with you all in the future! Also, check out my YouTube channel for a peep at Halo Reach and the closing speech showing off the new Xbox at: http://www.youtube.com/user/bashpr0mpt

Ever notice smart phones tend to lag before disconnection? Ever notice how much screwing around it takes to hang up on a caller if you’re using your hands free kit and have the phone in your pocket? It’s usually easier to let them hang up than scramble for your phone, home key, swipe, key in your pin, home key, tap the call, tap end call (in the case of iPhones) right? Well I got to wondering, just why do modern smart phones, even when you DO hang up, take so long to drop the connection? I figure it’s big money.

Let’s assume you don’t roll over into a new 30 second block, and merely pay per second, and let’s give it a really conservative estimate of 1 cent per second. The average time to drop carrier for my iPhone 3G’s and my iPhone 3GS is between 6-8 seconds. There are over 4.6 billion mobile phone subscriptions in the world. Let’s assume that all of these lag 6 seconds for efficacy of fact. That’s $240,000,000 in phone fees just from one design flaw coming out of every mobile phone owners pocket.

Let’s go one step further and assume that each phone makes one call per business day of the week, that’s $1.2 billion per week. I guess designing flaws in your technology is big business, because you know there’d be kick backs. Let’s not even count in the money makers of voice mail, or other scammy crap. $62.4 BILLION per annum, and remember these are conservative estimates.

A $5 million dollar bike share has been announced by the state of Victoria in an attempt to make their state seem more ‘revitalised and european’. Gordon Oakley RACV Member & Motoring Services was interviewed regarding it and pointed out some utter failures of the system, you have to bring your own helmet (in Australia it’s illegal to ride a bike without a helmet) and if you ‘subscribe’ you can only use it for half an hour at a time. So, it’s a $5m white elephant state project as the target audience has been marginalised dramatically and it’d barely get used as opposed to what it could achieve.

It’s a brilliant idea, given how many ports they’re setting up for them, however it’s 2010, if they had even half a clue the helmet would be attached to the bike and ‘unlock’ for use when the bike is released from the port, and the bikes would have rudimentary electric motors (I believe the going rate of such a bike in China is about $50 AUD IIRC.) and would recharge from a simple solar cell added to the base station.

Who knows, maybe some company searching for keywords during the data mining part of their marketing team research might see this and pick up the game in the corporate sector providing a real transport solution for their state.

“God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him…”
Friedrich Nietzsche. The Gay Science (1882), s126.

Long have we theorised the above line by a madman bearing a labtern not to be talking about the literal God believed in by so many theists. Instead, we interpret, he is talking about what this god represented for European culture, the shared cultural belief in God which had once been its defining and uniting characteristic.

So to has man thrown off the yolk of theism, every element of the divine has been replicated at large through science, trickery, art, illusionism except one final element; the creation of life.

Until yesterday when flamboyant geneticist Craig Venter held true to the pledge he made nearly 15 years ago, unveiling his magnum opus. This landmark of scientific progress, published in the Journal of Science, stands on the shoulders of his race to decode the human genome in his own laboratory, egotistically his own DNA I might add.

The madman carrying this lantern has indeed created the first instance of purely synthetic life, opening the doors nanoscience falter at with the potential to create designer microbes for special jobs such as production of biofuels, pharmaceuticals, through to filtering contaminents from air and water.

“This is the first synthetic life that has been made, and we call it synthetic because the cell is totally derived from a synthetic chromasome, made with four bottles of chemcals on a synthesizer from information on a computer,” Dr Venter said.

Lauded as a tour de force by Prof. Mattick from the Australian Research Council, Dr. Venters work is as ground breaking as science gets these days, the applications for man made life are phenominal and limited only by our imagination. That being said, mans imagination can often be self destructive, so think of all the fantastic synthesized zombie viruses the US military will make with this!

The bacterium used decoded DNA from Mycoplasma mycoides imprinting the synthetic DNA and inserting it into living bacterium, in this case Mycoplasma capricolum, allowing the bacterium to flourish with both it’s own and the synthetic DNA within, then finally using an antibiotic designed to kill all but the synthetic DNA allowing only the synthesized organism to proliferate and produce protein strands from the original Mycoplasma mycoides creating, simply, artificial life.

Klatu barada neck-tie?

Lisa, Lisa, Lisa. Where do I begin? I recently saw an advert for her upcoming show, that was filmed by the Lifetime channel. She opens with her common pitch line, “Do you want to know everything?” What you won’t hear her telling you is that she is merely a charlatan who exploits the pain and suffering of people grieving using cold reading. Let’s set one thing straight, psychics and mediums do not exist. Conmen and women do. There has not been, in thousands of years of scientific documentation, one SINGLE example of the supernatural or paranormal existing under ANY scrutiny by learned and educated persons. It’s not because academics are closed minded, or have it in for the little guy, or have ANY other motivation other than pushing forward common sense, critical thought, and legitimate honesty of fact. Many deluded people out there honestly think it goes as far as there being complex conspiracies to conceal the ‘truth’ about ‘human psychic potential’, et cetera. In 1988 the U.S. National Academy of Sciences gave a report on the subject that concluded there is “no scientific justification from research conducted over a period of 130 years for the existence of parapsychological phenomena.”^[1]

Let’s examine this critically: Not a scrap of evidence ever put forwards that can stand up to scrutiny, or giant illuminati plot to enslave and opress humanity. You tell me which one comes up in that fight.

Cold reading, combined with warm or hot reading, is the method by which all ‘psychics’ operate. Many people do this for a living as mentalists, or magicians; these people when asked will usually be outright honest about their art and it’s complete lack of supernatural or paranormal involvement. In 2004, Williams gave a reading to a senior staff member of TV host Merv Griffin. As a result, Griffin worked with her to host a show of her own. The proverbial path to ruin is laid with good intent.  Lisa Williams: Life Among the Dead aired for two seasons on the Lifetime network 2006-2007 and is set to air in Australia shortly. Her show Lisa Williams: Voices From the Other Side ran for five consecutive nights on the network in October 2008. The shows followed Williams on a typical day, as she claims to have ‘communicated with the dead,’ ‘investigates haunted houses,’ and conducts other ‘spirit-seeking activities.’ She claims she has spoken to Bob Hope, Princess Diana, Natalie Wood, Marilyn Monroe and Ray Charles after they died.

Let’s examine a well known psychic critically: A 2001 Time article reported that psychic John Edward allegedly utilized hot reading on his television show, Crossing Over, where an audience member who received a reading was suspicious of prior behavior from Edward’s aides, who had struck up conversations with audience members and asked them to fill out cards detailing their family trees.^[2] In December 2001, Edward was alleged to have used foreknowledge to hot read in an interview on the television show Dateline, where a reading for a cameraman was based on knowledge gained in conversation some hours previously, yet presented as if he was unaware of the cameraman’s background.^[3] In his 2001 book, John Edward denied ever using foreknowledge, cold or hot reading.^[4]

I am VERY familiar with these methods and have used them out of the blue on random people in the streets of Sydney to illustrate the power of commonality to friends, and I know a close friend of mine, mentalist and stage magician Ryle Hilton, is exceptional at his art and absolutely blows peoples minds. I am not detracting from the SKILL involved in these acts, merely that using it to con and exploit people into believing only YOU can give them closure with their dead loved ones is abhorrent.

The following is sourced under fair use from Same Same, a publication for the Australian Gay and Lesbian Community that addresses some of the core elements of fail that is applied when handling ‘psychics’ in the press, with my comments in brackets.

Over the years Lisa has been challenged by many skeptics, including her own father. “He’s one of the biggest skeptics around!” she laughs. “But Dad has also seen first hand what I can do, and he’s seen how I give people a feeling of closure, and he says ‘you know what Lisa, I can’t take that away from you’.” [The closure given is fair enough, but the financial exploitation is unforgivable.]

One of the most public challenges Lisa has faced was with a skeptic named Laura on an episode of ‘The Oprah Winfrey Show’. Lisa said that during the reading she kept offering Laura details that should have resonated – like her father’s name, or that he was a ballroom dancer – but Laura remained unconvinced, and was intent on getting cold, hard facts. [Note the use of negative terms such as 'skeptic' just because someone was unconvinced.]

“I gave her the name John, but she wanted his full name, that kind of thing. I told her ‘I am only telling you what he is giving me, I can’t make it change’. I almost got up and walked away. I said, ‘if you’re not open to this then there’s no point in me being here’.” [Ie: Dummy spit.]

Lisa says that she often reads comments about her in online forums, where people dispute her authenticity. “People say ‘oh Lisa Williams gets all the ticket data and uses that to do background checks on people who come to her show’. Well hello, it’s just me. I don’t have a team of researchers. I certainly don’t put microphones in the bathrooms or under the seats. I laugh at it. Of course, when it comes to TV, the producers get given a certain story. The talent tells them ‘I want to communicate with my mum because of…’ but often there’s another story that comes out or that I bring out. [Lol.]

The last paragraph was the best, she admits that–like John Edwards–she has access to the core information, the ‘other story’ that ‘comes out’ is where the cold/warm/hot reading elements come into this.

I figured I would take these channels publishing her crap to bat and sent an email, given that the Lifestyle Channel and W are sponsors of my online life and commonly compensate me for critical evaluation (public or otherwise) of their programs or services, and considering I have a larger demographic reach than Lisa it will be interesting to see if they make a stoic legitimate call or just kowtow to a fast easy buck like a heroin dealer down a dark alley.

Here is a copy of one of my emails in it’s entirety: -

I am writing as a blogger who [details of financial arragements excised]. I write specifically to request that–in an effort to maintain fairness, legitimacy, honesty and integrity–that you cease publication of Lisa Williams, the ‘medium’ and other such charlatans.

Sure, you get viewers, sure you make a quick buck; but these people are exploiting the ignorance and idiocy of the masses, much like a drug dealer who peddles his wares amongst the foolish. These lecherous conmen and women exploit the pain and suffering of people by lying through their teeth, and there are avenues to be pursued for large financial and fame rewards if any individual can prove ANY element of the supernatural or paranormal exists through JREF, however most of these scum refuse to claiming they don’t want ‘wealth’ (even though they charge extortionate fees to fundamentally give people a pat on the back and tell them their dead family still love them), and none of these people pursue this proof of their talents for obvious reasons.

I am posting this letter on my blog, which will be replicated throughout my social networks and blogs demographic reach meaning over half a million people will view this within 24 hours. I would like a reply to this, and I advise you now it will be published as will your choice to continue to air these exploitative shows or otherwise. I hope you make the right decision.

So for now, I advise all of you to pass this on to your wanky airy fairy friends who believe in the supernatural and like a suppository of testicular fortitude it should thwart their idiocy, and stay tuned for the results of my correspondence to these networks, if they even dare reply. Oh, and Lisa, and I know your PR agent has shown you this because with my reach they wouldn’t be worth a pinch of shit if they haven’t, this isn’t a PR nightmare for you honey; it’s just a wake up call that you should get a day job that DOESN’T involve exploitation. In 50 years people like you will be locked up in prison for these crimes you perpetrate on innocent and vulnerable people.

And people like me, who’re probably only in for a night stay due to drunk and disorderly in public, will make sure you drop the soap. ;)

References:

1. ^ Druckman, D. and Swets, J. A. eds. (1988). Enhancing Human Performance: Issues, Theories and Techniques. National Academy Press, Washington, D.C.. p. 22. ISBN 0-309-07465-7.
2. ^ Leon Jaroff (2001-02-25). “Talking to the Dead”. Time Magazine. http://www.time.com/time/columnist/jaroff/article/0,9565,100555,00.html. Retrieved 2006-06-14.
3. ^ Joe Nickell. “John Edward: Hustling the Bereaved”. CSICOP. http://www.csicop.org/si/2001-11/i-files.html. Retrieved 2006-06-14.
4. ^ Edward, John (2001). Crossing Over. Jodere Group. ISBN 1-58872-002-0.

Many of you remember my encounter with TPG and the drama that ensued because Telstra reconnected 40 year old infrastructure instead of replacing it with a new connection as contracted to do. That led to me (four months and 120+ phone calls later) calling Telstra’s complaints department and talking to a lovely girl in the Gold Coast named Janice, she didn’t quite understand my complaint (re: infrastructure) and put me through to bloke named John, her supervisor. He didn’t understand my problem and told me that the ‘network boundary’ is the line-in of my property; which I later found out is incorrect, as I stated to him, and the network boundary is the first point inside the house, which meant the fault on the line was on their equipment which made sense as I sure as fuck had nothing connected to it.

He seemed frustrated and asked why I don’t just use Bigpond so Telstra can immediately fix the line problem, I pointed out that they’re easily 50-60 times the price of their competitors, he disagreed and said he can offer me 200gb @ 20mbps for $89, I said hell yeah sign me up. He bumped me back through to Janice, and ten minutes in my phone died. After calling back, repeatedly, no one at Telstra would match the price offered to me. The closest offer I got was $110 for 100GB @ 20mbps inclusive of line rental (at $9 pm) and a promise that if I filed a complaint someone will get back to me as to the original pricing and fix it up.

My first bill came in for the phone line, $348. What .. the fuck? I called them, turns out they ballsed up and had an installation fee attached to the account creation, even though the line was in place and had been in place for six months, I called up to complain, the guy asked ‘how much of your bill are you contesting?’ and I asked him whether that’s how they price things, they just charge you random large amounts then ask how much you’re willing to pay. They said they’d fix it.

Then I get my first internet bill, $756.20. What the fuck? I’m glad I made sure on my contract that they MUST provide the service at 20 MBPS or I’m not paying a cent, because I’m definitely not paying $756.20 for what three major service providers would charge $39.95 for.

So, this is me venting again about another useless as tits on a bull ISP, and I bloody well hope they read this, and realise, that my 340,000 viewer demographic all know they’re stupid.

Telstra, contact me about this immediately, and if you don’t have this problem fixed by the time you call me, and if you aren’t offering to HALF the cost of my ‘ADSL2+’ because it’s only running at HALF the speed you GUARANTEED, then save me the effort and just remind me to file a TIO complaint and take you through the local consumer tribunal.

A Microsoft employee may have inadvertently given away the biggest secret in gaming this year.

Project Natal is Microsoft’s attempt to revolutionise motion-control in video games.

An add-on for the XBox 360, it does away with handheld controllers altogether, relying solely on body motion and gestures caught on camera to control the on-screen action.

In a slow year for game fans – at least when it comes to hardware – Natal’s release couldn’t come soon enough.

And thanks to Microsoft marketing manager Syed Bilal Tarig, it may be coming sooner than expected.

In an interview with GamerTag radio, Tariq revealed Natal would get a worldwide release in October – a full two months before the end-of-year date that Microsoft had been peddling.

“I do have great news to share with everybody that Project Natal will be launched in Saudi Arabia at the same time it will be launched in the rest of the world, that is to be sometime in October,” he said.

“Definitely it is going to be October 2010, we will have it in Saudi Arabia for sure.”

He also confirmed that it would be unveiled at the E3 games expo in June, as rumoured.

Project Natal is one of a series of updates to the console that Microsoft claims will enable it to remain relevant for gamers until at least 2015.

It first appeared in public at last year’s E3 expo, where a basic unit showed it was capable of motion-tracking up to four players at once.

A notice sent out by Microsoft earlier this year suggests the exact date for the completed unit’s unveiling will be June 13, a day before the start of E3 2010.

Most of you have probably seen me evangelize the wonders of API functional clients for Twitter, I have several very large Twitter accounts, @bashpr0mpt is just the one you know me as, the rest are for business, and some for pleasure. Some are just to blow off steam anonymously even. But all are pretty bloody big. So when it comes to clients, I don’t have time to fuck around with various trialware, shareware, etc. Many of you know I’m a no nonsense kind of guy and I’m not some cash strapped welfare twit either, so I’m willing to fork out some dosh for a good product. I previously threw $10 at my first API client, it was (well, later named) MyPostButler, I used it for quite some time effectively but also used several other mass-managers for Facebook and MySpace.
Ideally I eventually want to make a good multiple-network manager software, I’ve thrown up a few adverts on Freelancer to hire me some code monkeys to make this happen but unfortunately that’s a project that’s in the medium-term goals as of yet (and no you can’t have it free, but I’ll make sure it’s as near ‘at cost’ as I can make it depending on how much out of pocket I’ll be). In the interim I’m still using the dodgy mass managers for my other networks, but MPB is sadly closing it’s doors. Well, no, the owner is selling it off. The downside is there’s no assurance that the new owner will honour previous clients by providing free updates everytime Twitter change their API. Future-proofing is integral to any marketing campaign, even if you’re only marketing yourself, with your name being a brand and your product being your words, views, opinions.

Thus it became time to review Twitter managers. I tried about six in total, only one seemed to be what I needed. TweetAttack came close but it’s license fees are too steep ($200ish), TweetAdder is near identical however it lacks a few ‘spammer’ tools TweetAttack has. It should be noted that ‘spammer tools’ when used in every day life for a non-profit entity just makes managing huge bloody friends lists easier for the most part. TweetAdder does all the mass-management I need though.

5 of the main selling features for me: -

1. I can dump a heap of tweets and let it tweet while I’m asleep so I can keep in touch with my friends across the big puddle.
2. It manages who I add, and removes them if they don’t follow back within X days (I set it to a fortnight, try before you buy style.)
3. It remembers who you remove so you don’t add them again.
4. It let’s me target followers by adding people by niche interest so I -am- finding friends and not just numerics for epeen.
5. It keeps track of … well, EVERYTHING, and can automate everything so my life is much easier.

As many of you know, and are probably waiting for, I’m putting together a tome of the arcane magic of social networking (for fun or profit) based on my encounters with tens of thousands of fellow net socialites, so expect an entire bloody chapter on this beautiful little piece of software. I forked out $188 for my license for it, but I’ve signed up as an affiliate so I can get a discount for friends, family and followers alike, the link for it for $50 is: – http://tinyurl.com/264hl8m

Even if you’re a tight arse and never want to pay a cent for a Twitter client, hit it up and at least play with the demo and enjoy a day of power-user Twittering for the lullz. There’s no catch, no con, no sign up, no … well, nothing, just a sweet little API accessing client that’ll make your daunting user list seem easy, or make your scrawny userlist grow. :)

The downsides of this client, I might add, is the fact it’s for PC and Mac only and thus isn’t for portable devices. Which I tend to use 99% of the time. But bleh, horses for courses.

Apple made the announcement late last night, two days before it was officially due to begin taking international orders for its breakthrough entry into the touchscreen tablet market.

All six models will be available to the market on outside the US on May 28 – three wi-fi, three 3G – and surprisingly, Australians will also be able to immediately access Apple’s iBookstore, with titles available for download immediately.

Prices for the iPad in Australia are as follows:

Wi-Fi models:

16GB: $629

32GB: $759

64GB: $879

Wi-Fi + 3G models

16GB: $799

32GB: $928

64GB: $1049

The device will also go on sale in eight other countries from May 28: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland and the UK.

Since its US launch on April 3, the “revolutionary and magical” machine, as Apple calls it, has created daily fodder for the media, right from its first day on sale when teenager Justin Kockott bought three of them, just so he could trash one and post the destruction on YouTube.

Kenny Irwin put his in a microwave and sealed it in resin.

It’s currently for sale on eBay and bidding this weekend pushed past its $575 sale price.

It’s been made into a skateboard, accused of coming up short when it comes to streaming video and its possibly drawn Apple into a court case after the company chose not to support Adobe’s Flash multimedia platform. Although that being said given the proliferation of PDF and the extortionate costs to use Adobe formats, it serves them right for being gluttons and shows a lot of balls on behalf of Apple.

Apple’s legendary ability to generate publicity has seen it shift a million iPads in 28 days in the US, selling twice as quickly as Apple sold its first million iPhones. Developers have created more than 5000 new apps for iPad that take advantage of its multi-touch interface, large screen and high-quality graphics. Demand for the “magical” device was so intense that its worldwide release was delayed, but the announcement it will available so soon will come as welcome relief for Apple’s Australian fanbase.

It was originally expected to take at least six weeks from the order date to arrive, with the iBookstore app not available until next year.

Publishing organisations have hailed the device as a possible saviour for newspapers as demand shifts from print to digital, and the iBookstore announcement comes on the heels of Google’s announcement that it will opens its online bookstore Google Editions, by the end of June.

The devices will be sold at Apple stores and Apple resellers and will be released in other countries including New Zealand and Singapore from July.

This is also clearly the end of the Amazon Kindle and it’s crappy black and grey LCD screen. :)

I’ve always said if they don’t give us what we want when we want it we’ll pirate it. Screw going to the movies, my plasma is higher def than your projector and my sound quality is vastly superior. Screw waiting years to see 20 minute shows stretched to 1.5 hours of adverts, I’ll download my shows and watch them nao kthx. :P Below are the results of News Ltd’s survey, please note a lot of their inferences are based on the assumption that all persons answered honestly (ie: ‘rich get stingy’, more like people lie about their income, etc) so evaluate it with critical thought: -

WHY do people turn to the web to get TV shows, movies and music without paying for them when they know they should?

We asked more than 7000 illegal downloaders to tell us just that. Here’s the breakdown of their answers.

Overview

The online survey was completed by 7324 respondents who said they had illegally downloaded or streamed TV shows, movies or music in the past 12 months.

Respondents were asked to choose the most applicable reasons for illegally downloading or streaming media from a list of about 12 possible choices, for each type of media — TV shows, movies and music.

They were also asked how much they would be prepared to pay for a similar legal and convenient service if it existed.

Some of the key findings were:

CONVENIENCE was as much of a motivating factor as money for people who illegally downloaded or streamed media.

MORE than two-thirds of respondents say they would be prepared to pay for a similar legal service if it existed.

GEN Y is prepared to pay more for legal downloads of TV shows and movies than any other age group, while people between 31 and 50 are more likely to pay top dollar for music.

THE young (under 20) and elderly (61 and over) are least likely to say they would pay for legal content.

TV shows are illegally downloaded more regularly, and by more people, than movies or music.

Click here to read the original story

Read on for more results on each type of media.

TV shows

6694 respondents said they had illegally downloaded or streamed a TV show in the past 12 months. Of these, 86.8 per cent said they did so regularly.

When given multiple choices to explain why they illegally downloaded or streamed TV shows, most respondents chose:

1) I’ll have to wait too long to see it on TV (50.7 per cent)
2) I want to be able to watch it whenever I want (41.5 per cent)
3) It doesn’t have ads (38.9 per cent)
4) It isn’t shown on TV at all (35.9 per cent)
5) It’s convenient (35.6 per cent)

When asked how much they would pay for a convenient legal option, respondents chose:

1) $1 per episode (39.2 per cent)
2) Nothing (33.6 per cent)
3) $2 per episode (18.7 per cent)
4) $3 per episode (8.4 per cent)

Shows not so social: Less than 1 per cent of respondents said they downloaded TV shows to share them with friends.

Movies

5902 respondents said they had illegally downloaded or streamed a movie in the past 12 months. Of these, 72.7 per cent said they did so regularly.

When given multiple choices to explain why they illegally downloaded or streamed movies, most respondents chose:

1) Going to the cinema is too expensive (43.5 per cent)
2) It’s convenient (42.4 per cent)
3) I want to be able to watch it whenever I want (42.4 per cent)
4) It’s free (28.7 per cent)
5) It’s an old movie I can’t find on DVD or Blu-ray (25.8 per cent)

When asked how much they would pay for a convenient legal option, respondents chose:

1) $2 per episode (45.6 per cent)
2) $5 per episode (28.3 per cent)
3) Nothing (21.6 per cent)
4) $10 per episode (4.4 per cent)

Paying promise: More pirates said they would pay $5 per film through a convenient legal service than those who wouldn’t pay anything. The most popular choice was $2.

Rebel retirees?: Respondents aged 61 or above were the most likely of all age groups to say they illegally downloaded movies once a week or more.

Music

5712 respondents said they had illegally downloaded or streamed music in the past 12 months. Of these, 69.5 per cent said they did so regularly.

When given multiple choices to explain why they illegally downloaded or streamed music, most respondents chose:

1) I want it in MP3 format without copy protection (43.2 per cent)
2) It’s convenient (37.0 per cent)
3) CDs are too expensive (36.5 per cent)
4) It’s free (33.2 per cent)
5) I want to know if I like it before I decide whether to buy it (28.2 per cent)

When asked how much they would pay for a convenient legal option, respondents chose:

1) 50c per song (48.8 per cent)
2) Nothing (33.6 per cent)
3) $1 per song (14.7 per cent)
4) $2 per song (2.8 per cent)

The rich get stingy: Respondents with an annual household salary of more than $350,000 were more likely than other income groups to admit illegally downloading music on a regular basis.

The news.com.au illegal downloads survey was carried out between April 16 and April 22 in conjunction with market research firm CoreData.

This information is disemmination of news data as per the Copyright Act.

The SciFiTv channel in Australia has been airing a lot of crappy infomercial-disguised-as-edgy-hipster-shows of late, the most recent shows the advertising heavyweight of the ‘zombie’ genre mixed with allusions to viral marketing. First, here’s what wiki has to say:

“Woke Up Dead is an American horror/comedy web series starring Jon Heder (best known for Napoleon Dynamite) as a young man who awakes in a full bathtub after ‘drowning’ and has no heartbeat, prompting his friends to believe him to be a zombie.

The show premiered on Sony Pictures Entertainment owned Crackle on October 5, 2009. Woke Up Dead is a production of Electric Farm Entertainment, a company that produced Afterworld, which currently runs on Crackle, along with Gemini Division and Valemont.

The show is executive produced by Brent V. Friedman, Stan Rogow, and Jeff Sagansky. Heder’s co-stars are Krysten Ritter, Josh Gad, and Wayne Knight. New episodes streamed weekdays through the end of October 2009.

The first episode was included on the Zombieland DVD. A season one DVD is in production. It is currently unknown if there will be a second season.”

Those familiar with Afterworld will remember it was a good concept wrecked by bad production and so intermittant you’d never follow the plot, not to mention unless you were in the US you couldn’t view episodes online.

Gemini Devision went one step further into the bowels of Internet fail by portraying it’s narrative as the vlog of some silly bitch on some urgent super mission being leaked. It was PACKED with promotional advertising which left you boggling at how they squeezed ten seconds of trashy hack narrative into four minutes of epilepsy inducing sub and paraliminal marketing gaffes.

So to does this next ‘feature’ from Electronic Farm disappoint. With blatent advertising segues in dialogue disengaging the viewer it forcibly pimps Kodal, Jeep, Ford, Doritos and Motorola. Many items are changed to have their logo physically in view, where logos aren’t found on the items in the real world.

Electric Farm breeds a lot of cows, because they sure as fuck shovel out more bullshit than any other ‘production company’ at present. Maybe film makers will take note of it’s limited success even with horrible advertising, or that of Dead Set (a zombie serial aired on BBC) and bring us a REAL zombie series?

As most of you are aware I’ve been examining online ‘money making’ drivel and usually exposing the bullshit behind it and the con artists who’re reaping the rewards. From ‘get paid to tweet’ to MLM I’ve pointed out quite a few organisations and people who are dodgy. This time I’ve been proven wrong. WHAT? ME? WRONG? Only marginally though. $5 in a month is NOT an income.

Credit where credit is due, if you really want to be a knob and try and make a buck on the internet, try Sponsored Tweets, they’re run by IZEA a ‘Social Media Marketing’ business with decent sponsors. Lifestyle Channel have taken an interest in my blog adventures and whilst I am being derisive by saying $5 in a month that’s because it took a month for them to send me an offer, it works out to be $5 per tweet they feed into my stream, which could be a money winner if you talk about crap that will attract the right sponsors I guess? Their banners aren’t all that crappy too if you’re into the whole affiliate marketing crap, but I for one don’t see any value for time in that stuff. Example below.

Anyway, that’s as much as an update you’re going to get, so you CAN make money online but not enough to buy a beer down the pub. :)

Whilst many of you may misconstrue my socialist nation as a key indicator of my political leanings I tend to be rather centrist. What’s that you say? I snub my nose at the free market economy and objectivism? Because I pirate stuff? Nay, I too have wasted money whilst sitting on the toilet with my iPhone, which is I might add my current place of publication of this update!

So, app store crap, what’s the dub? I’d love to get a bit of feedback (tweet @bashpr0mpt) about your experience with apps, purchased and free. I’ve bought numerous crappy apps that sound great, but weren’t.

My main gripe with the app store is the amount of IDENTICAL games sold as different games all based off the mafia wars model, rock bands, vampires, zombies, racing, high school, all the same bloody crap rebadged and rehashed. Apple need to rm -rf anything with ‘farm’ or ‘wars’ in it’s title IMHO.

Last Day of Work have given me compartment syndrome from toilet seats with their inane yet quirky and addictive series of games, many of which you can grab at flash games locales online–but hey iPhones and iPods don’t support flash–but also available for a small price (a few bucks) in the app store and horribly addictive. Most centre on a closed economic system with very limited upgrade models but the realms or theatres of the game are persistant.

Persistant realms are nothing new but make IRL timelines interesting, or in the case of idiots like me merely make you roll your phones clock forwards to get that instant fix.

I tried Sim City, addictive but buggy and crashes lots after you get your city big. Also tried Sims 3, it was as absolutely crap as the insanely limited Sims 2 for the PSP which has a low playability, low graphics, sound, gameplay and replayability if you ask me. Those, sadly, cost more for one than ALL the LDOW publications available.

So, your turn. What have you played that’s fun and … well, not crap?

I was recently suggested a read by a friend, Dr. John L. Turner (add him on twitter, @DrJohnLTurner), of a document entitled Bioelectromagnetic Healing, A Rationale for Its Use by Thomas F. Valone, Ph.D. published in 2003. This work was vanity published by his own sock puppet ‘charity’ organisation called the ‘Integrity Research Institute,’ which he is, surprise surprise, the President of. A brief review of his curriculum vitae reveals that he has no published works in any respectable scientific journal, nor any peer reviewed scientific journal or publication out of all his publications; they’re all primarily through his ‘Integrity Research Institute.’

REMEMBER: PSEUDOSCIENCE KILLS.
Click here to review individual instances of pseudoscience and alternative medicine being at fault in over 368,379 people dying, 306,096 injured and over $2,815,931,000 in economic damages.

I don’t mean to rag on him too much by the way, he seems to be a TAFE teacher (by Australian standards, or primarily a ‘community college’ instructor by US standards) and has clearly worked with some brilliant chaps too; my disdain isn’t against this individual but merely his actions as a proponent of deadly conspiracy and pseudoscience peddling. That being said he can be found on YouTube making an ass of himself talking about UFOs and conspiracies.

Before reading through this review, or maybe even after, watch this video on critical thinking for a general primer on how to approach … well, just about anything utilising the illumination of critical thought and the scientific mind!

I was cynical from the commencement reading this material, as I have read hundreds of papers debunking magetic therapy, the dedication at the begining of the work mentioning a naturopath was not reassuring. The preface is a very stereotypical opening shot of anecdote, as with most ‘alternative medicine‘ someone always knows someone who X, Y and Z, but sadly none of these people manage to deliver even a scrap of scientific proof nor are any of these wonderous revolutionary discoveries ever distributed to peer reviewed journals where the reading (and commenting) audience are medically or scientifically trained. We all know why that is.

The kicker that already got my eyes rolling out of my head was the defecting Russian scientist, who spoke of awesome ‘energy healing‘ methods through magnetic devices which, when pointed at the ear of a subject with an ear infection for a few minutes, would destroy the infection. If ANYONE can reproduce that in a lab under ANY form of scientific scrutiny, I will gladly sell all my possessions, hand them the cash, then promptly jump off a cliff. I shit you not, I WILL stake my entire life on the fact that ALL alternative medicine is a farce. A dangerous farce at that, killing millions the world over who, through ignorance, or irresponsibility of others putting forth puff where one should be proposing medicine and science, die and cause massive financial, emotional, and general harm to people every day. I feel safe in my bet on this one though: -

“I know of no scientist who takes this claim seriously…It’s another fad. They come and go like copper bracelets and crystals and all of these things, and this one will pass too.” –Robert Park of the American Physical Society.

“Iron atoms in a magnet are crammed together in a solid state about one atom apart from one another. In your blood only four iron atoms are allocated to each hemoglobin molecule, and they are separated by distances too great to form a magnet. This is easily tested by pricking your finger and placing a drop of your blood next to a magnet. ” –Michael Shermer*

“The more extreme claims of magnetic therapy, such as curing cancer by hanging supermagnets around your neck, are not only nonsense but also dangerous, since they may divert patients from seeking appropriate treatment from mainstream medicine. Magnetic jewelry and most other magnetic-therapy products probably are harmless beyond a waste of money.” –James D. Livingston*

By page 4 the author is already claiming magnets are ‘the medicine of the future’, an ongoing cliche comment from all alternative medicine and snake oil peddlers in general. This magnet shit was mostly hashed out in the 70′s, with magnetic rooms, or ion charging units in sweat lodges in Europe would charge tens of thousands for ‘therapy,’ or the pleasure of sitting on a seat awkwardly in the middle of a room in your underwear whilst your healers snort the cash you’ve given them like hoovers. The whole ‘electro’ fad was exhausted by the 1930′s and debunked by most educated fellows.

One can’t go very far in the realm of ‘alternative medicine’ without striking on an Edison or Tesla reference, this work doesn’t disappoint, albeit I did find the uber professionalism of the author in one outstanding statement that pretty much sets the feel for the rest of the narrative of pseudoscience: -

Key sections are noted with a :) symbol to indicate importance.

Brilliant, right? In the 1930′s, as the author even states, such ridiculous claims were put forwards such as Tesla’s high frequency currents “are bringing about a highly beneficial result in dealing with cancer, surpassing anything that could be accomplished with ordinary surgery.” Statements like that are what people term as anecdotal; they’re not scientific, nor is any credential other than that of the conman or his associates put on the line. If it were submitted for peer review scientific journals by modern standards they’d be ridiculed openly and debunked, if not outright exposed, as phoneys. We all know electricity won’t cure cancer. If it did, we wouldn’t be spending billions in cancer research, nor spending even more in socialist states like Australia to fund the treatment of cancer patients if mere electro-shock will cure it.

Tim Harlow, general practitioner, Colin Greaves, research fellow, Adrian White, senior research fellow, Liz Brown, research assistant, Anna Hart, statistician, Edzard Ernst, professor of complementary medicine conducted a large scale scientific examination of energy healing, with a focus on magnets, these findings were published in an esteemed and peer reviewed journal, British Medical Journal, Dec. 2004.

Skip to the bottom of this article to see other findings from other scientists that have been submitted to REAL journals and published BY presses that aren’t owned by those conducting the research.

That being said, we still have some whacky psychiatrists (mostly in Western Australia at Graylands (movies have been made about that place and this practice) who believe that electro-shock therapy is effective in dealing with depression and anxiety conditions. The figures probably come from the fact people will behave the way the doctors want because they don’t want a fucking jumper cable put to their temples again; not to mention in extreme cases these practices cause indirect lobotomies, but have as unpredictable a result as inserting a screw driver into your cars ignition, hitting it with a 20 lb sledge hammer, and hoping it starts.

By page 12 the author had lost me with far too much blatent pseudo-science, so I decided to look into him a bit more, examine his writing style. He seems to apply many footnotes, but I noticed that there are none beyond the 90s if not even the 70s that AREN’T published in some wanky new age touchy feely hippy publication, or vanity pressing. All the rest of the footnotes are from things from the late 1870s through to the 1930s, so we’re already dealing with someone who is structuring their research to suit their argument, as opposed to conducting research to present their argument be it right or wrong.

By page 13 the author is citing conspiracy theory books claiming that there is suppression by ‘big pharma’ to prevent the world being this wonderful utopia as peddled by snake oil salesmen. At this point I realised I could not go any further without losing all respect for myself. Cute read, non-scientific, all point of view, all flawed research.

Further reading:

• Colbert, A. P., Wahbeh, H., Harling, N., Connelly, E., Schiffke, H. C., Forsten, C., Gregory, W. L., Markov, M. S., Souder, J. J., Elmer, P., King, V. (2009). Static Magnetic Field Therapy: A Critical Review of Treatment Parameters. Evid Based Complement Alternat Med 6: 133-139 [Abstract] [Full text]
• Boutron, I., Moher, D., Altman, D. G., Schulz, K. F., Ravaud, P., for the CONSORT Group, (2008). Extending the CONSORT Statement to Randomized Trials of Nonpharmacologic Treatment: Explanation and Elaboration. ANN INTERN MED 148: 295-309 [Abstract] [Full text]
• Rumbaut, R. E., Mirkovic, D. (2008). Magnetic therapy for edema in inflammation: a physiological assessment. Am. J. Physiol. Heart Circ. Physiol. 294: H19-H20 [Full text]
• Barron, M. C., Rubin, B. R. (2007). Managing Osteoarthritic Knee Pain. J Am Osteopath Assoc 107: ES21-ES27 [Abstract] [Full text]
• Pittler, M. H. MD PhD, Brown, E. M. BSc, Ernst, E. MD PhD (2007). Static magnets for reducing pain: systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized trials. CMAJ 177: 736-742 [Abstract] [Full text]
• Katz, W. A. (2007). Themed Review: Nonpharmacologic Approaches to Osteoarthritis. AMERICAN JOURNAL OF LIFESTYLE MEDICINE 1: 249-255 [Abstract]
• Kuipers, N. T., Sauder, C. L., Ray, C. A. (2007). Influence of static magnetic fields on pain perception and sympathetic nerve activity in humans. J. Appl. Physiol. 102: 1410-1415 [Abstract] [Full text]
• Bjordal, J, Conaghan, P G (2006). NSAIDs in osteoarthritis: irreplaceable or troublesome guidelines?. Br. J. Sports. Med. 40: 285-286 [Full text]
• Finegold, L., Flamm, B. L (2006). Magnet therapy. BMJ 332: 4-4 [Full text]
• Rubin, B. R. (2005). Management of Osteoarthritic Knee Pain. J Am Osteopath Assoc 105: S23-S28 [Abstract] [Full text]
• Winemiller, M. H., Billow, R. G., Laskowski, E. R., Harmsen, W. S. (2005). Effect of Magnetic vs Sham-Magnetic Insoles on Nonspecific Foot Pain in the Workplace: A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Trial. Mayo Clin Proc. 80: 1138-1145 [Abstract]
• McDonald, H. L (2005). Patients who wore standard magnetic bracelets reported reduced pain from osteoarthritis of the hip or knee compared with patients wearing placebo bracelets. Evid. Based Nurs. 8: 89-89 [Full text]
• McCrory, P (2005). The power of placebo. Br. J. Sports. Med. 39: 125-125 [Full text]
• (2005). Robin Goodfellow (44-3). Rheumatology (Oxford) 44: 418-418 [Full text]

Photos of Apple’s new iPhone have been leaked on the internet by technology news website Engadget.

Engadget claims someone left an iPhone 4G on the floor of a bar in San Jose.

The website said the phone was hidden inside an iPhone 3G case and featured a front-facing camera, 80Gb of storage and a new operating system.

The discovery was quickly branded a fake, as similar pictures had surfaced weeks earlier that turned out to be Japanese or Chinese mock-ups.

But then Engadget followed up their news with another surprise discovery – they claimed they had unwittingly had a photo of the new iPhone 4G sitting in their office “for months”.

Not one, but two apparently new iPhones were discovered in a picture leaked the night before the iPad was officially revealed, overlooked in all the excitement surrounding Apple’s latest release.

The blurred image seemed to show one “4G” sitting on the iPad itself and the corner of another showing just out of shot.

The iPhone on the iPad has an aluminium case, revisiting the design of the first iPhone in June 2007.

Engadget said a source had since confirmed to them that the device was the new iPhone.

The source said the new camera would be higher-res and have a flash, while the 4G’s screen would also be higher-res and the phone would take a MicroSIM card.

Photos leaked on Twitpic back in February show a new button on the side of the phone which may confirm the rumours of the MicroSIM card addition, but Apple is claiming the photos have been faked, despite their similarity to the mysterious iPhone seen sitting on the iPad in Engadget’s photo.

The new iPhone is expected to be unveiled on June 22, after Apple recently booked the Yerba Buena Centre in San Francisco for that date.

The last event Apple held at the Yerba Buena Centre was the iPad launch.

A game retailer revealed that it legally owns the souls of thousands of online shoppers, thanks to a clause in their terms and conditions.  FOXNews.com reported the retailer, British firm GameStation, added the “immortal soul clause” to the contract shoppers signed before making any online purchases earlier this month.

It states that customers grant the company the right to claim their soul.

“By placing an order via this Web site on the first day of the fourth month of the year 2010 Anno Domini, you agree to grant Us a non transferable option to claim, for now and for ever more, your immortal soul. Should We wish to exercise this option, you agree to surrender your immortal soul, and any claim you may have on it, within 5 (five) working days of receiving written notification from gamesation.co.uk or one of its duly authorised minions.”

GameStation’s form also points out that “we reserve the right to serve such notice in 6 (six) foot high letters of fire, however we can accept no liability for any loss or damage caused by such an act. If you a) do not believe you have an immortal soul, b) have already given it to another party, or c) do not wish to grant Us such a license, please click the link below to nullify this sub-clause and proceed with your transaction.”

The terms of service were updated on April Fool’s Day as a gag, but the retailer did so to make a very real point.

They said no one reads the online terms and conditions of shopping and companies are free to insert whatever language they want into the documents.

The company noted that it would not be enforcing the ownership rights and planned to email customers nullifying any claim on their soul.

For more switched on American’s this is good news, as Goldman Sachs utilised the GFC and government funds to exploit American tax payers, with tax payers money they bought out people’s homes that were foreclosed and sold them back into the market with a massive markup months later, shafting everyone along the way. Excerpt below: -

A US watchdog has charged top Wall Street firm Goldman Sachs with financial fraud and raised the prospect of a wider crackdown.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), in a civil suit, accused Goldman of “defrauding investors by misstating and omitting key facts” about a product based on sub-prime mortgage-backed securities.

The securities were a key contributor to the financial crisis that peaked in 2008 because many contained risky mortgages.

The SEC said Goldman failed to tell investors that a major hedge fund which helped put together the so called collateralised debt obligation (CDO), was at the same time betting against it.