Stephen's Untold Stories

If you’re still looking for some good information of high-definition tvs, take a look at this checklist.

I am very happy with my new Hitachi 43-inch plasma tv that I bought last week.

Here is a funny comic from PHDcomics.com. It’s making me wonder if I really want to do this.

Thanks to Vicki Davis for pointing this one out to me. It seems that sitting up straight isn’t so good for our backs after all.

Researchers are using a new form of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to show that sitting in an upright position places unnecessary strain on one’s back, leading to potentially chronic back pain problems if one spends long hours sitting. The study was conducted at Woodend Hospital in Aberdeen, Scotland, and was presented earlier this week at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA).
Researchers looked at three postural positions; sitting upright (at 90 degrees), slouching forward, and reclining back (at a 135 degree angle). In the group studied, researchers found the reclining position to be the best of the three.

The research involved 22 healthy volunteers that had no history of back pain or surgery. In the study, a positional MRI unit was used, rather than the common nonweight bearing type of MRI equipment typically found in hospitals and imaging centers.

One of the problems found when using non weight bearing MRI techniques is the absence of the effects of gravity. For example, if one felt back pain while sitting but not while lying down, it would be more beneficial to get an MRI scan in the seated posture.

Link to full article

Very nice! I don’t remember seeing many good ones in color like these.

Here are the rest

Yes, Bees are going to be used to sniff out security threats. I can only hope that they don’t use this as a springboard to a complete takeover. I would, however, welcome our new bee overlords.

Scientists at a U.S. weapons laboratory say they have trained bees to sniff out explosives in a project they say could have far-reaching applications for U.S. homeland security and the Iraq war.

Researchers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico said they trained honeybees to stick out their proboscis — the tube they use to feed on nectar — when they smell explosives in anything from cars and roadside bombs to belts similar to those used by suicide bombers.

Researchers in the program, dubbed the Stealthy Insect Sensor Project, published their findings Monday.

By exposing the insects to the odor of explosives followed by a sugar water reward, researchers said they trained bees to recognize substances ranging from dynamite and C-4 plastic explosives to the Howitzer propellant grains used in improvised explosive devices in Iraq.

“When bees detect the presence of explosives, they simply stick their proboscis out,” research scientist Tim Haarmann told Reuters in a telephone interview. “You don’t have to be an expert in animal behavior to understand it as there is no ambiguity.”

The findings followed 18 months of research at the U.S. Energy Department’s Los Alamos facility, the nation’s leading nuclear weapons laboratory.

Link to article

It would be nice if they could be successful, but I’m not optimistic.

School districts in three states and the nation’s largest teachers union asked a federal appeals court Tuesday to revive a lawsuit challenging the way government-mandated programs are funded.

The National Education Association and districts in Michigan, Vermont and Texas had sued to block the No Child Left Behind law, President Bush’s signature education policy. They argued that schools should not have to comply with requirements that aren’t paid for by the federal government.

Chief U.S. District Judge Bernard A. Friedman in Detroit dismissed the lawsuit in November 2005.

Attorney Robert Chanin, representing the Pontiac, Michigan, school district and the other plaintiffs, told the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday that states submitted compliance plans based on their understanding of the level of government support that would be provided. But Congress appropriated far less than needed, leaving local school districts to make up the difference, he said.

Link to article

This is truly amazing. Two schools thousands of miles apart are engaged in a project that will bring them together in a most profound way.

The Flat Classroom project is a genuine assessment project between Julie Lindsay’s grade 11 ITGS class at International School Dhaka(ISD) in Bangladesh and Vicki Davis’ 10th grade Computer Science class at Westwood Schools in Camilla, Georgia.

n this two-week project, students will be grouped with one student from each high school classroom to explain, explore, and discuss topics from the Thomas Friedman book The World is Flat

I had the pleasure of meeting Vicki at the GaETC conference a couple of weeks ago, and she is one of the most passionate educators I’ve had the pleasure to be around.

Check out the home page for the project.

Okay, back to blogging…

I am very happy that the Supreme Court has refused to hear a case regarding the use of public funds for private religious schools. This would have set a very dangerous precedent.

The Supreme Court refused Monday to take up the issue of school choice in Maine, where a state law bars the use of public funds to send students to private religious schools.

The case could have provided a platform for a court battle over school choice and the separation of church and state. In Maine, school districts in 145 small towns with no high schools provide tuition for 17,000 students to attend high schools of their choice, public or private, in-state or out-of-state. But religious schools are not on the list.

No one involved in the case expressed surprise at the Supreme Court’s refusal to consider the issue.

Some days there just isn’t anything I want to blog about. Apparently today is one of those days.

Sorry about that. Better luck tomorrow, I guess.

Anyway, here is a picture of The Blue Angels over Niagara Falls.

Most of these have been floating around the Internet for a while, but I hadn’t seen them all.

Beware, some are a little risqué.

Get the rest here

Lots of results I wanted to see.

• South Carolina over Clemson
• Georgia over GA Tech
• Ole Miss over Miss. St.
• Wake Forest over Maryland
• USC over Notre Dame

I was also hoping that Kentucky could pull one out against Tennessee, but it was still a great day!!

The Anderson County (Tennessee) Sherrif’s office has a live 24-hour webcam where you can see what’s going on at the front desk.

This is a real life transmission of the Anderson County Sheriff’s Department. Instances of violence or sexually inappropriate behavior by detainees during the booking process may occur. Viewer discretion is advised. This is a Jail, not a simulation. The persons in this transmission are either employees of the Anderson County Sheriff’s Department or arrestees.

Tennessee Jail Cam

If you are a fan of great photography, you really need to subscribe to his photo stream. Here is an example.

Thomas’ Photo Stream 

I have to admit that I don’t download or listen to them as much as I thought I would, and I guess I’m not alone.

The Pew Internet and American Life Project said Wednesday that 12 percent of Internet users have downloaded a podcast, an increase from 7 percent earlier in the year.

However, only about 1 percent said they download a podcast on a typical day — unchanged from the survey earlier this year. The rest do so less frequently, perhaps only once.

News organizations such as National Public Radio and The Associated Press offer news podcasts throughout the day, while amateurs have produced podcasts once or twice a week to discuss their favorite television shows, among many other subjects.

“While podcast downloading is still an emerging activity primarily enjoyed by early adopters, the range of content now available speaks to both mainstream and niche audiences,” said Mary Madden, senior research specialist at Pew. “We are at a crossroads of a major transition in the way media content is delivered and consumed.”

Men and online veterans are more likely to download podcasts, according to the telephone survey of 972 adult Internet users, which was conducted Aug. 1-31 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points. The previous survey was conducted February to April.

Link to full article

The Atlanta Journal posted this today. Very helpful if you’re going to be coming through during the holidays.

Click here for larger version

I don’t usually go near any stores on the day after Thanksgiving, but if you plan to partake in that madness, here you go.

Black Friday 2006

Download Squad – This site appeals the the techie in me. They have lots of new products and reviews. They are usually one of the first sites to feature a lot of new things.

Robert Scoble – Former Microsoft employee and blogger now works for PodTech. He is always on the cutting edge, and his blog is a must read for geeks.

Moving at the Speed of Creativity – Wesley Freyer has some of best educational postings around. He is somewhat of a new discovery, but he always has quality stuff.

popurls – This site brings together top stories from Digg, Metafilter, and others. I don’t have interest in spending a lot of time at Digg like I used to, so this site just lets me take a peek at what’s popular.

Deadspin – Informative, irreverent, hilarious. Those three words describe this sports site/blog. Some of the best commenting you’ll find anywhere.

For the sake of this list, I did not include “service” sites like Bloglines or the new Google stuff like Google Reader and Calendar. Those are amazing, but I wanted to include sites that produce original content here.

I’ve been playing guitar since I was a kid, and this seems pretty cool. I don’t think I’ll be getting one anytime soon, but I’ll put it on my “wish” list.

This little marvel is a one-half watt (distorted) powerhouse that will surprise you with its apparent volume. Plug it into a 4X12 (or any 8 to 16 ohm speaker) and listen to it roar! This amp is voiced to deliver classic rock tone, with a very high level of crunch available if it’s wanted. Just crank the volume knob around to the level of distortion you desire, from a very quiet (one tenth watt) clean mode to a micro-Marshall (TM) blast when cranked up. I am making myself a little ill (gag!) trying to describe the tone of my Nano, using the same tired old phrases that all the amp and distortion box makers use, but I think it’s true… it does a great job of emulating big amps at very reasonable volumes, which makes it exceptionally nice for recording.

Click here for more

Martin Luther King
Martin Luther King
Martin Luther King
Martin Luther King
Martin Luther King
Martin Luther King
Martin Luther King
Martin Luther King
Martin Luther King

See an explanation here