Humanitär kris hotar i Kongo-Kinshasa.

En cyklist blev påkörd av en bil i en korsning i Kungsbacka på tisdagskvällen.

MrSeb writes "In a year or two, augmented reality (AR) headsets such as Google Glass may double up as a virtual dieting pill. New research from the University of Tokyo shows that a very simple AR trick can reduce the amount that you eat by 10% — and yes, the same trick, used in the inverse, can be used to increase food consumption by 15%, too. The AR trick is very simple: By donning the glasses, the University of Tokyo's special software 'seamlessly' scales up the size of your food. You pick up an Oreo cookie, and then the software automatically scales it up to 1.5 times its natural size. Using a deformation algorithm, the person's hand is manipulated so that the giant Oreo appears (somewhat) natural. In testing, this simple trick was enough to reduce the amount of food eaten by 10%. The inverse is also true: shrinking the Oreo down to two-thirds its natural size increased food consumption by 15%. This new research dovetails neatly with an area of nutritional science that has received a lot of attention in the United States of Obesity recently: That the size of the serving/plate/cup/receptacle directly affects your intake. The fact is, there's a lot more to dieting than simply reducing your calorific intake and exercising regularly. Your state of mind as you sit down to eat, and your perception of what you're eating, are just as important — which is exciting news, because both of those factors can be hacked."

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Presto Vivace writes "Under the right conditions, online activism can be very effective. U.S. Senator Patrick Leahy has already abandoned his warrantless e-mail surveillance bill we discussed this morning. 'The Vermont Democrat said today on Twitter that he would "not support such an exception" for warrantless access. ... A vote on the proposal in the Senate Judiciary committee, which Leahy chairs, is scheduled for next Thursday. The amendments were due to be glued onto a substitute (PDF) to H.R. 2471, which the House of Representatives already has approved. Leahy's about-face comes in response to a deluge of criticism today, including the ACLU saying that warrants should be required, and the conservative group FreedomWorks launching a petition to Congress -- with over 2,300 messages sent so far -- titled: "Tell Congress: Stay Out of My Email!""

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This piece has an extensive quote from Reed Hastings as a departing Microsoft board member about Microsoft's thinking behind the odd way Windows 8 is organized.

They think there's a transition to touch taking place that's analogous to the transition to the mouse in the 80s and 90s. So they're putting the windows part of Windows into a compatibility box, the way they put DOS inside a window on Windows. You can still get to your Windows apps, but they're betting you will prefer to use the touch-based apps. That don't yet exist. But will soon. That's their bet.

My opinion: Wow. Why bet the company's user base and cash cow on that when they could just switch to Mac, as I'm sure a lot of them already want to, and get a "traditional" desktop.

Apple has been edging up to the same idea, in a much more conservative and rational way, imho. Testing the theory before betting what is not their biggest revenue source (Apple is now a devices company, iPad and iPhones make up most of their revenue). If Apple is being conservative, well Ballmer thinks, I'll make the big bet. And hope I'm not wrong.

Problem is this -- desktop computers as touch devices is not a new idea. HP's first PC, in 1983, was touch-based. It failed. Not because there was no software, there was. The reason is that it's really painful to hold up your arm and touch the screen as a way of controlling the computer when the screen is vertical, not horizontal. The keyboard won.

Touch belongs in a tablet interface, for sure. But desktop computers need a pointing device like a mouse. I think Apple realizes that now, and isn't pushing the Mac in that direction. But this appears to be a bet-the-cash-cow move for Microsoft. Let's hope they have a Plan B ready to go!

Calm returns to the main city of eastern DRC after days of fighting between government forces and M23 rebels.

Israeli forces renew their bombardment on Gaza, leavin at least six more Palestinians killed.

Mephistophocles writes "Ever since the beginning of Operation Pillar of Defense, hackers have been working overtime to strike a blow against the Israeli government's computer systems, Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz said Sunday. No fewer than 44 million attacks have been recorded since the operation began five days ago — with nearly all of them failing, thanks to the recent strengthening of computer defense systems in Israel. Speaking at a special press conference at the Government Computing Center in Jerusalem about the cyber war against Israel that has accompanied Hamas's rocket attacks, Steinitz said that hackers 'are trying to disable the symbols of Israeli sovereignty, to enter web sites and install anti-Israel content, thus compromising information and data and damaging the government's ability to serve the public.' Most of the attacks, he said, were against government sites, like the Prime Minister's Office site, and security-related sites, such as that of the Home Front Command, the body charged with informing Israelis on how to protect themselves in the event of an attack. Out of those 44 million-plus attacks on government and defense related sites, said Steinitz, only one succeeded – partially. One site, which he did not name, was 'wobbly for a few minutes,' but quickly recovered. Even though the government has been successful in warding off hack attacks, Steinitz said that government sites were fully backed up and mirrored, meaning that they could be replaced by a duplicate site instantly if the original site were compromised."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.