Imagine a building with a façade that opens and closes like a flower blooming. It feels like the building is alive, but in reality, it's just inspired by life. A material that can make this happen actually does exist—it's called Flectofin, and it's based on a flower called the Bird of Paradise.
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By Kim Palmer
CLEVELAND (Reuters) - Ohio said on Monday that it does not have enough of the drug pentobarbital to carry out a scheduled execution next month, the latest U.S. state to face a scarcity after the European manufacturer banned its sale for lethal injections of prisoners sentenced to death.
Ohio is one of a number of U.S. states which have been forced to look to new suppliers such as lightly regulated "compounding pharmacies," or turn to new drugs for executions because major pharmaceutical companies are opposed to use of their drugs in carrying out the death penalty.
On October 10, Ohio published a new execution guideline which allowed the state to seek pentobarbital from a compounding pharmacy, a type of supplier that is not closely regulated by the Food and Drug Administration.
The Danish manufacturer of pentobarbital, Lundbeck LLC, has banned its sale to prisons or corrections departments for the death penalty. The European Union, of which Denmark is a member, is opposed to the death penalty and has put pressure on U.S. states to stop the practice.
On Monday, Ohio prison officials notified the state that Ohio does not have "sufficient quantity" of pentobarbital to carry out the execution of Ronald Phillips on November 14, according to Department of Rehabilitation and Correction spokeswoman JoEllen Smith.
She said the state will turn to the drugs midazolam and hydromorphone, which are not commonly used in lethal injections, for the Phillips execution.
(Reporting By Kim Palmer; Writing by Greg McCune; Editing by Alden Bentley and David Gregorio)
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ohio-runs-one-drug-executions-turns-drugs-172510171.htmlGerman officials are scrambling to gather more information and U.S. officials are assessing diplomatic options in the wake of claims that the U.S. National Security Agency has been monitoring German Chancellor Angela Merkel's cellphone for more than a decade. Renee Montagne talks to Tim Naftali of the New America Foundation about America's history of spying and what this recent news means for the U.S. relationship with its European allies.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
It's MORNING EDITION from NPR News. I'm Steve Inskeep.
RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:
And I'm Renee Montagne. The fallout from the National Security Agency leaks continues to spread. Over the weekend, Germany's leading newspapers lashed out at President Obama - once a beloved figure in Europe. Obama's Aura is Gone, read one headline. The outrage comes from reports that the Obama administration knew the U.S. government was monitoring the personal phone calls of German Chancellor Angela Merkel for more than a decade.
This comes after earlier leaks alleging that the NSA was listening in on leaders in other countries, including Mexico and Brazil, and that the NSA had collected massive amounts of data from another ally, France. For more on this I'm joined by Tim Naftali. He's a Senior Research Fellow in national security with the New America Foundation. Good Morning.
TIM NAFTALI: Good morning.
MONTAGNE: Let's begin with your reaction to these most recent revelations.
NAFTALI: I was surprised by how President Hollande of France and Chancellor Merkel of Germany did not attempt to hide their anger at the allegations of NSA spying on their country, and in the case of Chancellor Merkel, on herself. Angela Merkel showed real anger and both the French and the Germans called in our ambassadors. Which is normally not something you do with an ally.
MONTAGNE: The chancellor called in the American ambassador.
NAFTALI: Now, the thing about this is that both France and Germany are aware - we've been sharing material with them and there was a foiled terrorist plot in 2010 that apparently involved - would've involved attacks in France, the United Kingdom, and Germany. So they're aware of the nature of the materials we're collecting. What's very important about this particular scandal is that they see our collection as going beyond the pale.
We have somehow crossed a boundary that they understood existed, and where we've gone, they don't accept it anymore.
MONTAGNE: Give us a (unintelligible) of the context, of the history, of intelligence services within these allies, these long-time allies.
NAFTALI: Well, I mean, you hear this, it's true: Countries spy on each other. There's an exception and exception has to do with an historical accident. In 1940 with, you know, the British nation seemingly on the verge of extinction, Winston Churchill makes a very important decision. He's going to share his greatest secrets with the United States.
The United States doesn't have much of an intelligence community so the British actually help build our intelligence community. Over the course of World War II, Washington and London share remarkably sensitive information. By the end of the war you have, in a sense, a fusion of the two intelligence communities.
But what happened by the end of World War II is that the American and British signals intelligence communities, they decided to jointly attack communications around the world. It became a global alliance. And in subsequent years, it was a source of great tension with the French and the Germans because they weren't included.
The United States and the British Commonwealth countries were going after every single communication system, including that of allies - despite the fact that some of these allies were in NATO with them.
MONTAGNE: Has everything changed, in a sense, when it's discovered that a German chancellor has had her personal cell phone spied upon? Is that enough of a game changer that things will not go back to business as usual?
NAFTALI: I think it's enough of a game changer. In foreign spying there's a question of - it's not right or wrong, it's a matter of prudent or reckless. And when you attack the communications of an allied head of state, you're taking a huge risk. And it didn't pay off. And I cannot imagine that Angela Merkel is going to allow the intelligence sharing system that existed last week to continue.
She's going to want a big change. President Obama's challenge is that he's got to get ahead of this. This has gone so far and has such diplomatic repercussions, President Obama cannot help but take it seriously and see it as a reason to alter the way in which we share our signals intelligence with Europe.
It's going to be very hard because, of course, whatever we promise the French and the Germans, a lot of other NATO countries are going to want as well. So much of this will have to be done in secret. And the one thing we should expect, or should hope for, is that Congress will play a role and we will see a change in the leadership of the NSA.
Because a signal has to be sent abroad to our allies, that we take seriously, their concerns about the ambit of NSA collection.
MONTAGNE: Tim Naftali of the New America Foundation. Thanks very much.
NAFTALI: My pleasure, Renee. Thank you.
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Well, that was quick. Shortly after a Financial Times report to the effect, Google has confirmed that it is indeed preparing an invite system that will let current Glass owners invite up to three friends to join its Explorer program and buy a device of their own. The company isn't saying exactly ...Our children these days might be called digital natives, kids who grow up surrounded by and immersed in digital media. How does that affect childhood? How might it affect their adulthood? This week All Tech Considered kicks off a week of stories about kids and technology.
Mobile photography startup Kicksend has spent the last year inking partnerships with brick-and-mortar retail chains like Walgreens, Target and CVS so it can bring its promise of dead-simple photo sharing and printing to the masses.
Now it looks like Kicksend has another notable feather in its cap — the Mountain View-based company just announced on its blog that it has locked down a deal with Walmart so users can remotely send print jobs to some 3,800 additional stores across the U.S.
It’s certainly a sweet deal for the Kicksend team, especially as they’re finally starting to hit their stride in terms of monthly generated revenue. CEO Pradeep Elankumaran noted that the startup was seeing revenue in the “very low tens of thousands” back in March 2013, but the past six months have seen those figures surge pretty dramatically.
“We’re generating over $150K/month in revenue,” Elankumaran added. “And we’ve been growing 30 percent month-over-month for the past 6 months.” While that’s at least partially a side-effect from Kicksend’s expansion into prominent retail chains, that lift in revenue is also being pegged on strong mobile performance — some 45 percent of Kicksend app users are being converted into paying customers.
So now that Kicksend has locked up a slew of notable photo partners, what’s next on the agenda? Those outreach and partnership programs have been a major focus for the startup since last year, as has a push to go international with its photo deliveries, but Elankumaran and the rest of the team are looking forward to doubling down on the digital side of the business. Currently users are allowed to privately share hundreds of full resolution photos with the people they care about, and it seems as though the team isn’t done tweaking that particular formula just yet.
In this Oct. 24, 2013 photo, Amy Risinger, right, watches her son Mark Risinger, 16, at their home in Glenview, Ill. Mark Risinger is allowed to use his smartphone and laptop in his room, and says he spends about four hours daily on the Internet doing homework, using Facebook and YouTube and watching movies. An influential pediatricians group is recommending strict limits on texting, tweeting and other media use, including banning smart phones, iPods and other Internet access from kids' bedrooms. Mark’s mom said she agrees with restricting kids’ time on social media but that deciding on other media limits should be up to parents. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh)
In this Oct. 24, 2013 photo, Amy Risinger, right, watches her son Mark Risinger, 16, at their home in Glenview, Ill. Mark Risinger is allowed to use his smartphone and laptop in his room, and says he spends about four hours daily on the Internet doing homework, using Facebook and YouTube and watching movies. An influential pediatricians group is recommending strict limits on texting, tweeting and other media use, including banning smart phones, iPods and other Internet access from kids' bedrooms. Mark’s mom said she agrees with restricting kids’ time on social media but that deciding on other media limits should be up to parents. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh)
In this Oct. 24, 2013 photo, Mark Risinger, 16, checks his Facebook page on his computer as his mother, Amy Risinger, looks on at their home in Glenview, Ill. The recommendations are bound to prompt eye-rolling and LOLs from many teens but an influential pediatrician's group says unrestricted media use has been linked with violence, cyber-bullying, school woes, obesity, lack of sleep and a host of other problems. Mark’s mom said she agrees with restricting kids’ time on social media but that deciding on other media limits should be up to parents. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh)
In this Oct. 24, 2013 photo, Mark Risinger, 16, checks his smartphone at home in Glenview, Ill. Risinger is allowed to use his smartphone and laptop in his room, and says he spends about four hours daily on the Internet doing homework, using Facebook and YouTube and watching movies. An influential pediatrician's group is recommending strict limits on texting, tweeting and other media use, including banning smart phones, iPods and other Internet access from kids' bedrooms. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh)
CHICAGO (AP) — Doctors 2 parents: Limit kids' tweeting, texting & keep smartphones, laptops out of bedrooms. #goodluckwiththat.
The recommendations are bound to prompt eye-rolling and LOLs from many teens but an influential pediatricians group says parents need to know that unrestricted media use can have serious consequences.
It's been linked with violence, cyberbullying, school woes, obesity, lack of sleep and a host of other problems. It's not a major cause of these troubles, but "many parents are clueless" about the profound impact media exposure can have on their children, said Dr. Victor Strasburger, lead author of the new American Academy of Pediatrics policy
"This is the 21st century and they need to get with it," said Strasburger, a University of New Mexico adolescent medicine specialist.
The policy is aimed at all kids, including those who use smartphones, computers and other Internet-connected devices. It expands the academy's longstanding recommendations on banning televisions from children's and teens' bedrooms and limiting entertainment screen time to no more than two hours daily.
Under the new policy, those two hours include using the Internet for entertainment, including Facebook, Twitter, TV and movies; online homework is an exception.
The policy statement cites a 2010 report that found U.S. children aged 8 to 18 spend an average of more than seven hours daily using some kind of entertainment media. Many kids now watch TV online and many send text messages from their bedrooms after "lights out," including sexually explicit images by cellphone or Internet, yet few parents set rules about media use, the policy says.
"I guarantee you that if you have a 14-year-old boy and he has an Internet connection in his bedroom, he is looking at pornography," Strasburger said.
The policy notes that three-quarters of kids aged 12 to 17 own cellphones; nearly all teens send text messages, and many younger kids have phones giving them online access.
"Young people now spend more time with media than they do in school — it is the leading activity for children and teenagers other than sleeping" the policy says.
Mark Risinger, 16, of Glenview, Ill., is allowed to use his smartphone and laptop in his room, and says he spends about four hours daily on the Internet doing homework, using Facebook and YouTube and watching movies.
He said a two-hour Internet time limit "would be catastrophic" and that kids won't follow the advice, "they'll just find a way to get around it."
Strasburger said he realizes many kids will scoff at advice from pediatricians — or any adults.
"After all, they're the experts! We're media-Neanderthals to them," he said. But he said he hopes it will lead to more limits from parents and schools, and more government research on the effects of media.
The policy was published online Monday in the journal Pediatrics. It comes two weeks after police arrested two Florida girls accused of bullying a classmate who committed suicide. Police say one of the girls recently boasted online about the bullying and the local sheriff questioned why the suspects' parents hadn't restricted their Internet use.
Mark's mom, Amy Risinger, said she agrees with restricting kids' time on social media but that deciding on other media limits should be up to parents.
"I think some children have a greater maturity level and you don't need to be quite as strict with them," said Risinger, who runs a communications consulting firm.
Her 12-year-old has sneaked a laptop into bed a few times and ended up groggy in the morning, "so that's why the rules are now in place, that that device needs to be in mom and dad's room before he goes to bed."
Sara Gorr, a San Francisco sales director and mother of girls, ages 13 and 15, said she welcomes the academy's recommendations.
Her girls weren't allowed to watch the family's lone TV until a few years ago. The younger one has a tablet, and the older one has a computer and smartphone, and they're told not to use them after 9 p.m.
"There needs to be more awareness," Gorr said. "Kids are getting way too much computer time. It's bad for their socialization, it's overstimulating, it's numbing them."
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Follow AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner at http://www.twitter.com.LindseyTanner
Associated PressSource: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/495d344a0d10421e9baa8ee77029cfbd/Article_2013-10-28-Curbing%20Kids%20Online/id-650fe35d097b4e3cbbb8f7ee548d3108