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6/24/2013
Singapore's severe air pollution (video)
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Amazon's on-line grocery business
(Reuters) - Amazon.com Inc is planning a major roll-out of an online grocery business.
One of the people familiar with AmazonFresh's expansion plans said new warehouses will have refrigerated areas for food, but also space nearby to store up to one million general merchandise products.
The company started testing AmazonFresh in its hometown of Seattle five years ago, delivering fresh produce such as eggs, strawberries and meat with its own fleet of trucks.
Amazon is now planning to expand its grocery business outside Seattle for the first time, starting with Los Angeles as early as this week and the San Francisco Bay Area later this year.
If those new locations go well, the company will launch AmazonFresh in 20 other urban areas in 2014, including some outside the United States.
Amazon is searching for new, large markets to enter. The grocery business in the United States, which generated $568 billion in retail sales last year, may be a ripe target.
Amazon's expansion plans are a potential threat to grocery chains such as Kroger Co, Safeway Inc and Whole Foods Market, as well as general-merchandise retailers Wal-Mart Stores Inc and Target Corp, which also sell a lot of groceries.
Amazon is not alone in wanting to expand in the online grocery business.
Wal-Mart is testing same-day and next-day delivery of online grocery and general merchandise orders in the San Francisco Bay Area and operates a grocery delivery business in Britain.
"We are ready and able to expand grocery delivery in the U.S. as the market demands," Wal-Mart spokesman Dan Toporek said.
FreshDirect delivers food to homes and offices in some parts of New York City and its trying to expand its service into the Bronx.
from Reuters
6/17/2013
Ex Microsoft manager plans to create first U.S. marijuana brand
Jamen Shively, a former Microsoft corporate strategy manager, said "I am sure my Seattle-based enterprise will become the leader in both recreational and medical cannabis - much like Starbucks is the dominant name in coffee."
Shively, 45, whose six years at Microsoft ended in 2009, said he is soliciting investors for $10 million in start-up money.
The use, sale and possession of marijuana is illegal in the United States under federal law. However, Washington state and Colorado became the first two U.S. states to legalize recreational marijuana when voters approved legalization in November. There are 18 states that allow it for medical use.
"The marijuana industry is a giant market in search of a brand," Shively said. "We will be happy if we get 40 percent of it worldwide." A 2005 United Nations report estimated the global marijuana trade to be valued at $142 billion.
Shively laid out his plans, along with his vision for a future in which marijuana will be imported from Mexico, at a Thursday news conference in downtown Seattle.
Joining him was former Mexican President Vicente Fox, a longtime advocate of decriminalizing marijuana. Fox said he was there to show his support for Shively's company but has no financial stake in it.
The sale of cannabis or marijuana remains illegal in much of the world although in countries mainly in Europe and the Americas the possession of small quantities of it is legal. A larger number of countries allow cannabis for medical use.
Shively is interested in buying dispensaries that comply with local and state rules and are less likely to attract the scrutiny of authorities.
"If federal officials want to come talk to me, I'll be delighted to meet with them," he said. "I'll tell them everything that we're doing and show them all our books."
Some months ago Shively acquired the rights to the Northwest Patient Resource Center, a medical marijuana operation that includes two Seattle store fronts. He will soon acquire another dispensary in Colorado, as well as two more each in Washington state and California, with the owners given the option to retain a stake in their businesses.
Shively said " I plan to create separate medical and recreational-use marijuana brands. I will soon launch a study of the effectiveness of concentrated cannabis oil in the treatment of cancer and other illnesses".
Washington state's marijuana consultant, Mark Kleiman, said he was skeptical of Shively's plans, and feared that the businessman is seeking to profit off others' addiction.
"It's very hard for me to understand why anybody seriously interested in being in the marijuana business, which after all is against the federal law, last Thursday publicly announced his conspiracy to break that law," said Kleiman, a professor of public policy at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Emily Langlie, spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Seattle, referred questions to the Department of Justice headquarters. Department officials did not immediately return calls seeking comment.
edited from REUTERS
6/10/2013
Big Brother at work (audio)
America’s intelligence community is clearly not pleased with Edward Snowden. His revelations about the extent of the snooping on all kinds of communications by America’s super-secretive National Security Agency (NSA) call for a public debate about where the line should be drawn between intelligence gathering and personal privacy in the digital era.
According to some reports, America’s Justice Department will open an investigation into the leaks and the chairs of the intelligence committees in both houses of Congress expect the whistleblower to be prosecuted if possible.
Both Barack Obama and James Clapper, America's director of national intelligence, defend the PRISM system and another initiative involving the gathering of “metadata” about phone calls (which includes things such the calls' duration and the phone numbers involved). They argue that such data-gathering is necessary to safeguard the nation, and that it is conducted within strict legal guidelines. But some lawmakers are questioning the legal basis for broad surveillance programs, such as PRISM.
There are other significant issues. One is the extent to which private companies such as internet firms and phone companies should share data with the intelligence community—and how they do so. Both Larry Page, the boss of Google, and Mark Zuckerberg, the head of Facebook, claim that their companies do not give American intelligence "direct access" to data about customers. But they are clearly sharing information in more indirect ways.
Another issue is the role of private-sector firms in providing services to the intelligence community. Mr Snowden was an “infrastructure analyst” employed by Booz Allen Hamilton, a consulting company that handles many government projects. The firm put out a statement saying that if the reports that he leaked information are true, his actions would constitute a “grave violation” of the firm’s code of conduct and its core values.
Given all this, it is hardly surprising that Mr Snowden is expecting reprisals for his leak. “I understand I will be made to suffer for my actions,” he says in the video. But he adds that his biggest fear for America is that, in spite of his disclosures about PRISM, nothing much will change.
adapted from The Economist
Click on the Play Button to listen to the Economist's correspondents discuss the scale of the USA government's domestic
surveillance programs and the type of information being collected. 
France will Ban Electronic Cigarettes in Public
PARIS — France will ban electronic cigarette smoking in public places by imposing the same curbs enforced since 2007 to combat tobacco smoking, Health Minister Marisol Touraine said on Friday.
The so-called e-cigarettes will face a ban on smoking in public spaces and sales to minors and a blackout on media advertising.
The near-odorless electronic battery-driven e-cigarettes are gaining ground in no-go zones such as bars, cafes, trains, waiting rooms and offices.
A government-commissioned report said this week that around 500,000 people in France are now smoking e-cigarettes, which look like cigarettes although some come in different colors.
Health officials in many countries believe that the electronic alternative will increase the general temptation to smoke. Former smokers may start smoking again and smokers may use them alongside regular cigarettes.
In the United States, the number of smokers who have tried out e-cigarettes doubled to one in five in 2011 and the number of all adults trying it doubled too, to 6 percent, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The expert in charge of the French report advised against an outright ban on e-cigarettes, however, saying they still seemed safer than tobacco.
6/09/2013
6/02/2013
The world’s highest base jump
Valery Rozov, 48, jumped from 7,220 meters above sea level in a special wing suit. He glided for about a minute, reaching speed of 201 kilometers per hour before landing on a glacier at 5,950 meters.
The feat, which was timed with the 60th anniversary of the first ascent of Everest, was sponsored by energy drink maker Red Bull and took place on May 5. The company released the video May 29.
The ascent began on the Chinese side on the famous north route and took Rozov and four Sherpas four days to climb from base camp to the jumping location, according to the Red Bull website. At precisely 2:30 p.m. local time on May 5th, with temperatures at -18 Celsius, he jumped.
"Because the cliff at the top was not very high, the initial moments of the leap in the rarified high altitude air were the most critical phase," according to Red Bull's website. "Rozov needed more time than usual in the thin air to transition from free fall to flying."
An experienced base jumper with over 10,000 jumps under his belt, Rozov planned the Everest jump for two years.
In 2009, Rozov jumped into an active volcano on the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia's Far East. In 2010, he leaped from Ulvetanna in Antarctica and in 2012 he jumped from 6,420m from Shivling in the Himalayas.
Photo Credit: Thomas Senf/Red Bull Content Pool
Sources: Reuters and Red Bull Content Pool
1. 48
2. a special suit
3. a minute
4. around 200 km per hour
5. on a glacier
6. 60 years ago
7. May 5
8. Red Bull
9. On May 29
10. On the Chinese side on the famous north route
11. With 4 Sherpas
12. 4 days
13. Because the cliff at the top was not very high
14. For 2 years
15. Yes, he did
16. Yes, he is
Click HERE to see some amazing photographs and watch a short video on the jump.
Tips to minimize cybercrime risks (video)
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