Yoenis Cespedes won baseball's Home Run Derby on Monday night, becoming the firs...

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NEXT From APPLE ?The ?iWATCH?

High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. See our?Ts&Cs?and?Copyright Policy?for more detail. Email?ftsales.support@ft.com?to buy additional rights.?http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0a3cbfce-ec0f-11e2-bfdb-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz2Z6rUIN6n

Apple?has embarked on a hiring spree to tackle design problems with its ?iWatch? wrist computer, bringing in fresh expertise amid concern that the launch of its first new product since the death of Steve Jobs could be at least a year away.

The company has begun hiring ?aggressively? for the project in recent weeks, say people familiar with Apple?s plans for the wearable device, a move that shows it has stepped up development but which raises questions over the ability of its own engineers to develop wearable technology.

As Apple moves from iPods, iPhones and iPads into an entirely new category of product, it is looking beyond its existing staff in Cupertino for the talent required to build it ? an indication that the endeavour involves ?hard engineering problems that they?ve not been able to solve?, according to one source.

Tim Cook, Apple?s chief executive, could still decide not to launch the product, just as past ideas have been scrapped, these people said. However, the?iWatch ? a brand for which Apple has made several applications to trademark?? has now progressed from an exploratory phase to having several dozen employees dedicated to its development.

The timing of the hiring spree implied the iWatch would not be ready for launch until the latter part of next year, said people familiar with Apple?s thinking, a blow to some investors who have been eager to see evidence that Apple?s innovators still have the ability to create or redefine new product categories.

Apple declined to comment, but Mr Cook said in April?s earnings call: ?Our teams are hard at work on some amazing new hardware, software and services that we can?t wait to introduce this fall and throughout 2014.?

While that is expected to include a new lower-cost iPhone with colourful plastic casing later this year, Mr Cook has recently expressed enthusiasm for wearable technology. Speaking at an AllThingsD conference in June, he said it was an area ?ripe for exploration? and ?incredibly interesting?.

Earlier this month,?Apple hired Paul Deneve, the outgoing chief executive of fashion house Yves Saint Laurent, to work on undefined ?special projects?, reporting to Mr Cook. His experience in fashion and luxury goods has been seen as potentially useful in a move into watches, as well as branding.

Apple?s iWatch recruitment drive has included seeking out acquisitions of early-stage start-ups working on connected devices. Making so-called ?acqui-hires? such as this has become common practice in Silicon Valley, where engineering talent carries a high premium, even for top companies such as Apple.

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Source: http://www.secretsofthefed.com/next-from-apple-the-iwatch/

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Induced seismicity? Recent spike of earthquakes in the central and eastern U.S. may be linked to human activity

[unable to retrieve full-text content]The number of earthquakes has increased dramatically over the past few years within the central and eastern United States. More than 300 earthquakes above a magnitude 3.0 occurred in the three years from 2010-2012, compared with an average rate of 21 events per year observed from 1967-2000. This increase in earthquakes prompts two important questions: Are they natural, or human-made? And what should be done in the future as we address the causes and consequences of these events to reduce associated risks? U.S. Geological Survey scientists have been analyzing the changes in the rate of earthquakes as well as the likely causes, and they have some answers.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/strange_science/~3/gKivY1-iG4o/130712095205.htm

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Officials: NSA programs broke plots in 20 nations

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Top U.S. intelligence officials say information gleaned from two controversial data-collection programs run by the National Security Agency thwarted potential terrorist plots in the U.S. and more than 20 other countries.

No other new details about the plots or the countries involved are part of newly declassified information released to Congress on Saturday and made public by the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Intelligence officials say that fewer than 300 phone numbers were checked last year against the database of millions of U.S. phone records gathered daily by the NSA. Under the program, the records can only be examined for suspected connections to terrorism.

Also revealed: The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court reviews the two data-collection programs every 90 days, and the data gathered must be destroyed every five years.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/officials-nsa-programs-broke-plots-20-nations-233703820.html

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Pentax WG-3 GPS

The Pentax WG-3 GPS ($349.95 direct) is the latest in the company's line of go-anywhere point-and-shoot cameras. The 16-megapixel shooter offers numerous upgrades compared with last year's WG-2 GPS including a faster, sharper lens, support for inductive charging, sensor shift image stabilization, and overall improved image quality. Its photos are a bit noisy, and they don't look quite as good as images captured by our current Editors' Choice rugged camera, the Olympus Tough TG-1 iHS. That model has been replaced by the Olympus TG-2, which we haven't tested? yet?the TG-2 features the same lens, image sensor, and imaging engine as the TG-1, so we expect it to perform similarly.

Design and Features
The WG-3 features a bold design that combines bright, metallic colors?green or purple?with a body style that's a bit wider than most compact cameras. It measures 2.5 by 4.9 by 1.3 inches and weighs 8.1 ounces. Compare this with the funky, rugged Canon PowerShot D20, despite having some curvy lines as part of its design, the D20 is more traditionally proportioned?it measures 2.8 by 4.4 by 1.1 inches and weighs 8 ounces. In addition to a standard flash, there are six LEDs that surround the lens to provide even illumination when shooting in macro mode. They can be activated via the menu, and automatically turn on when you set the shooting mode to Digital Microscope?a special setting that lets you focus on objects as close as 1 centimeter from the lens.

The lens is a 4x zoom design that is fairly wide when zoomed out. The 25-100mm f/2-4.9 (35mm equivalent) zoom is also quite bright at the wide end, which is helpful for underwater shooting. As a general rule of thumb, you'll want to get as close as possible to what you're photographing under the sea, as even the cleanest water will cloud your field of view when you're further away from the fish or coral reef that you're trying to capture. The lens doesn't capture as much light when zoomed in, but that shouldn't be an issue when using the camera outdoors in the daylight.

The shutter release and power button are located on the top of the WG-3, with other controls on the back to the right of the LCD. There's a zoom control button, a dedicated movie button, as well as controls to activate the self-timer, enable macro shooting, change the shooting mode, and control the flash. It's a Pentax camera, so you also have the company's trademark Green button, which brings up a software menu that has four customizable functions, each mapped to a different direction on the standard four-way control pad. By default these adjust ISO, EV Compensation, the focusing area, and enable automatic macro shooting, but you can customize them to best suit your shooting style.

The 3-inch 460k-dot LCD is wider than what you'll usually see on a point-and-shoot camera. It has a 16:9 aspect ratio, the same as HD video. The image sensor is actually a 4:3 design, but there's a crop mode that records 12-megapixel 16:9 images if you prefer to shoot wider. It's not as crisp as the 610k-dot OLED found on the Olympus TG-1 and TG-2, but it's much crisper than the 230k-dot display found on the budget-minded Panasonic Lumix DMC-TS20.

The camera is rated for use in water as deep as 45 feet, which is five feet deeper than the previous model. It's strong enough to withstand pressure of up to 220 foot-pounds and to survive drops from heights of 6.6 feet. And it can shoot in temperatures as low as 14?F, good news for those who live in or enjoy spending time in frigid environments. It can go a bit deeper than the Olympus TG-1, that's limited to 40 feet, but the newer TG-2 hits 50 feet.

The integrated GPS took about a minute to lock onto a signal upon turning it on for the first time. The GPS in the Olympus TG-1 locks on in a shorter time, about forty seconds. Once the signal is acquired, the WG-3 GPS automatically adds your exact geographic location to every photo that you capture. There's also a version of the camera available without a GPS, the $299.95 WG-3 that also omits inductive charging and the front monochrome LCD. The front display can be set to show the time of day and the current barometric pressure in hectopascals. It's always on, even when the camera is off, and is backlit?just tap the shutter button when the camera is powered down and a pleasing orange light illuminates it.

Performance and Conclusions
The WG-3 starts and captures an in-focus shot in about 2.5 seconds, can fire off shots continuously with 0.7 second between each photo, and records a 0.2-second shutter lag. The Canon D20 is faster to operate?it starts and shoots in 1.4 seconds, fires off a photo every 0.5 second, and records a 0.2-second shutter lag.

The WG-3's startup speed is hindered by a bit of human reaction time that normally isn't a factor in our testing. Holding down the shutter release all the way after hitting the power button is our usual methodology, but doing so with the WG-3 activates a pan focus function that focuses on distant objects and doesn't engage the autofocus system. The camera is able to start up and grab a shot in this mode in about 1.8 seconds, which is still not the speediest result. If you don't take care when shooting a photo while you're out and about you can fall into the trap of accidentally triggering pan focus when you'd rather focus on something closer. You can disable it by engaging the macro shooting function?it will always confirm focus when capturing a photo if that is on. Unfortunately, the camera does not remember to leave macro on after powering down.

I used Imatest to check the sharpness of photos captured by the WG-3's lens. At its widest angle and aperture it scored 1,948 lines per picture height. This is better than the 1,800 lines we require for a photo to be sharp, and it's an exceptional score for a rugged camera with such a fast lens.? This is one area in which the Olympus TG-1 struggles; it only scored 1,656 lines, mainly due to softness at the edges and corners of photos.

As you increase a camera's ISO it becomes more sensitive to light, but with that extra sensitivity comes noise in the form of graininess and loss of detail. The WG-3 doesn't do a great job in this regard; it can only keep noise below 1.5 percent through ISO 200. Detail is pretty decent at ISO 400, even with 1.7 percent noise, but once you've set the camera to ISO 800 or above, image quality deteriorates quickly. Images are a huge step up from the WG-2, but can't keep up with competitors in this class at higher ISO settings. The Canon D20 controls noise through ISO 800 and its images at ISO 1600 and ISO 3200 are much better than those from the WG-3.

Video quality is a mixed bag. The WG-3 does capture footage at 1080p30, 720p60, or 720p30 in QuickTime format. Footage is sharp and colors are accurate, but the sound of the lens refocusing is audible on the soundtrack. In fact, if you zoom in or out, the sound of the lens moving is overwhelming.

There's a micro HDMI port, housed in the battery compartment, as well as a proprietary USB port. The latter doubles as the connector for in-camera charging, and the WG-3 GPS also supports inductive charging via the Qi system. If you have a Qi charging mat you simply place the camera on it to recharge the battery. There's no dedicated battery charger included. Standard SD, SDHC, and SDXC memory cards are supported.

The WG-3 GPS is one of the more interestingly designed tough cameras on the market. Its lens is fast and sharp, it can go deep underwater, and the LED lights around the lens are a great tool for macro photography. ?Its image quality is noticeably better than the WG-2, but it still lags behind the Olympus TG-1 at medium to high ISO settings. Added features like GPS and inductive charging set it apart from the standard version of the WG-3, which is available for $50 less. If you generally shoot in brighter light, you'll be quite happy with the images you'll get from the WG-3, but if you find yourself in situations where you need to shoot at a higher ISO the same-price Canon PowerShot D20 is a better choice.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ziffdavis/pcmag/~3/G2_eHh-hhXQ/0,2817,2417869,00.asp

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Binge drinking in college can lead to heart disease later in life

Apr. 23, 2013 ? Frequent binge drinking in college can cause more than a hangover. Regularly consuming multiple drinks in a short window of time can cause immediate changes in circulation that increase an otherwise healthy young adult's risk of developing cardiovascular disease later in life, according to research published online today in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

"Regular binge drinking is one of the most serious public health problems confronting our college campuses, and drinking on college campuses has become more pervasive and destructive," said Shane A. Phillips, PT, PhD, senior author and associate professor and associate head of physical therapy at the University of Illinois at Chicago. "Binge drinking is neurotoxic and our data support that there may be serious cardiovascular consequences in young adults."

College students age 18 to 25 years old have the highest rates of binge drinking episodes, with more than half engaging in binge drinking on a regular basis. Prior studies have found that binge drinking among adults age 40 to 60 years old is associated with an increase in risk for stroke, sudden cardiac death and heart attack, but the effect on younger adults has not been studied.

Researchers looked at two groups of healthy nonsmoking college students: those who had a history of binge drinking and those who abstained from alcohol. Binge drinking was defined as consuming five or more standard size drinks (12 ounces of beer, 5 ounces of wine, 1.5 ounces of 80 proof spirits or 8-9 ounces of malt liquor) in a two-hour period for males and four or more standard size drinks in a two-hour period for females. On average, the students who binge drink had six such episodes each month over four years. Abstainers were defined as having consumed no more than five drinks in the prior year.

Students were also questioned about their medical history, diet, history of family alcohol abuse and frequency of binge drinking.

The study found that the binge drinkers had impaired function in the two main cell types (endothelium and smooth muscle) that control blood flow. These vascular changes were equivalent to impairment found in individuals with a lifetime history of daily heavy alcohol consumption and can be a precursor for developing atherosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries, and other cardiovascular diseases such as heart attack and stroke.

Binge drinkers were not found to have increased blood pressure or cholesterol, which are well-established risk factors for heart disease; however, both high blood pressure and cholesterol cause changes in vascular function similar to what the students demonstrated.

"It is important that young adults understand that binge drinking patterns are an extreme form of unhealthy or at-risk drinking and are associated with serious social and medical consequences," Mariann Piano, PhD, RN, co-author of the study and professor and head of the department of biobehavioral health science at the University of Illinois at Chicago, said. "Discoveries and advances in many different areas of medical science have cautioned against the notion that youth protects against the adverse effects of bad lifestyle behaviors or choices."

According to the investigators, more research is needed to determine if damage caused by binge drinking in young adulthood can be reversed before the onset of cardiovascular disease and to determine the timeframe for onset of disease.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by American College of Cardiology, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

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Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/living_well/~3/oGNW1F2-wWE/130423161905.htm

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'Unjustly enriched': Government sues Lance Armstrong

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) ? The federal government is going after Lance Armstrong's money. As much as it can get.

The Justice Department unveiled its formal complaint against Armstrong on Tuesday, saying the cyclist violated his contract with the U.S. Postal Service and was "unjustly enriched" while cheating to win the Tour de France.

The government had previously announced it would join a whistle-blower lawsuit brought by former Armstrong teammate Floyd Landis under the federal False Claims Act. Tuesday was the deadline to file its formal complaint.

The Postal Service paid about $40 million to be the title sponsor of Armstrong's teams for six of his seven Tour de France victories. The filing in U.S. district court in Washington, D.C., says the USPS paid Armstrong $17 million from 1998-2004.

The lawsuit also names former team Armstrong team director Johan Bruyneel and team management company Tailwind Sports as defendants.

"Defendants were unjustly enriched to the extent of the payments and other benefits they received from the USPS, either directly or indirectly," the complaint said.

The financial costs for Armstrong and Bruyneel could be high. The government said it would seek triple damages assessed by the jury. Armstrong has been dropped by his personal sponsors and left the cancer-fighting foundation he started in 1997.

Armstrong had previously tried to negotiate a settlement, but those talks fell through before the government announced it would join the Landis lawsuit. Settlement talks could resume as the case proceeds to trial.

Armstrong, who in January admitted using performance-enhancing drugs after years of denials, has argued that the Postal Service's endorsement of his team earned the government agency far more than it paid him.

Armstrong attorney Elliot Peters called the government's complaint "opportunistic" and "insincere."

"The U.S. Postal Service benefited tremendously from its sponsorship of the cycling team. Its own studies repeatedly and conclusively prove this," Peters said. "The USPS was never the victim of fraud. Lance Armstrong rode his heart out for the USPS team, and gave the brand tremendous exposure during the sponsorship years."

The government must prove not only that the Postal Service was defrauded, but that it was damaged somehow.

Previous studies done for the Postal Service concluded the agency reaped at least $139 million in worldwide brand exposure in four years ? $35 million to $40 million for sponsoring the Armstrong team in 2001; $38 million to $42 million in 2002; $31 million in 2003; and $34.6 million in 2004.

Landis attorney Paul Scott dismissed the idea that money gained by the Postal Service should negate the claims of fraud. Scott the Postal Service is tainted by the drug scandal.

"Even if the USPS received some ephemeral media exposure in connection with Mr. Armstrong's false victories, any illusory benefit from those times will be swamped over time immemorial by the USPS forever being tied to the largest doping scandal in the history of sports," Scott said.

The formal complaint against Armstrong appears to rely heavily on evidence and statements supplied by Landis and gathered by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency for its 2012 investigation that exposed a doping program on the USPS team. Armstrong has been banned from sports for life and stripped of his seven Tour de France victories.

As Armstrong's teammate, Landis participated in the doping program. He was later stripped of his 2006 Tour de France title won with another team because of his own doping violations.

Bruyneel, who lives in London, also has been charged by USADA with doping violations but is fighting that case in arbitration.

The government notes the contract with the Postal Service required riders to follow the rules of cycling, which included bans on performance-enhancing drugs and methods. Armstrong now admits using steroids, blood boosters and other illegal performance-enhancing drugs and measures to win.

By breaking the rules and covering it up, Armstrong and Bruyneel committed fraud against the U.S. government, the complaint said.

The complaint said that for years, team officials assured the Postal Service that the team wasn't doping.

Armstrong had been the target of a federal criminal grand jury, but that case was closed without charges in February 2012. Armstrong has previously tried to settle the Landis whistleblower lawsuit, but those talks broke down before the government announced its intention to join the case.

Armstrong also is fighting a lawsuit from Dallas-based promotions company SCA to recover about $12 million it paid him in bonuses, and a lawsuit from the London-based Sunday Times, which wants to get back $500,000 it paid him to settle a libel case.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/justice-says-armstrong-unjustly-enriched-223928621--spt.html

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