Newspapers Online 09-09-2013 | ScienceTechno

Here’s something from one of the Microsoft managers:

Nokia and Microsoft worked closely together on the company’s Lumia 1020, and Microsoft made core changes to its Windows Phone operating system as a result. Sources familiar with Microsoft’s Windows Phone work have revealed to The Verge that Nokia was left frustrated by some Windows Phone restrictions on its Lumia 1020 camera software. Specifically, the restrictions made it difficult to store the large image files and make them easily accessible to phone owners.

These secrets secrets and frustrations will no longer occur, and the collaboration appears to have helped Microsoft realize its priorities elsewhere. A Bluetooth file sharing feature is particular popular in developing countries, but Microsoft wasn’t aware as US consumers don’t typically use it. “We didn’t even have that feature, and we didn’t even understand or appreciate the degree to which it was critical,” says Belfiore. And here’s a piece discussing Coase and those transactions costs:

“I found the answer,” Coase recalled in his 1991 Nobel lecture, “by the summer of 1932. It was to realise that there were costs of using the pricing mechanism… There are negotiations to be undertaken, contracts have to be drawn up, inspections have to be made, arrangements have to be made to settle disputes and so on. These costs have come to be known as transaction costs. Their existence implies that methods of co-ordination alternative to the market, which are themselves costly and in various ways imperfect, may nonetheless be preferable to relying on the pricing mechanism, the only method of co-ordination normally analysed by economists.”

It sounds simple, but it was a groundbreaking insight because it explained why, for example, companies often became vertically integrated as they grew. Transaction costs are why a manufacturer of car tyres would come to own and operate rubber plantations in some fetid tropical country; not because its executives want to farm rubber, but because the transaction costs of not owning the supplier are higher than the costs of operating it themselves.

But the LADEE spacecraft quickly ran into equipment trouble, and while NASA assured everyone early Saturday that the lunar probe was safe and on a perfect track for the moon, officials acknowledged the problem needs to be resolved in the next two to three weeks. S. Peter Worden, director of NASA's Ames Research Center in California, which developed the spacecraft, told reporters he's confident everything will be working properly in the next few days.

LADEE's reaction wheels were turned on to orient and stabilize the spacecraft, which was spinning too fast after it separated from the final rocket stage, Worden said. But the computer automatically shut the wheels down, apparently because of excess current. He speculated the wheels may have been running a little fast.

Worden stressed there is no rush to "get these bugs ironed out."

The LADEE spacecraft, which is charged with studying the lunar atmosphere and dust, soared aboard an unmanned Minotaur rocket a little before midnight from Virginia's Eastern Shore. "Godspeed on your journey to the moon, LADEE," Launch Control said. Flight controllers applauded and exchanged high-fives following the successful launch. "We are headed to the moon!" NASA said in a tweet.

It was a change of venue for NASA, which normally launches moon missions from Cape Canaveral, Fla. But it provided a rare light show along the East Coast for those blessed with clear skies.

NASA urged sky watchers to share their launch pictures through the website Flickr, and the photos and sighting reports quickly poured in from New York City, Boston, Washington, D.C., Baltimore, New Jersey, Rhode Island, eastern Pennsylvania and Virginia, among other places. The Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer or LADEE, pronounced "LA'-dee," is taking a roundabout path to the moon, making three huge laps around Earth before getting close enough to pop into lunar orbit.

Unlike the quick three-day Apollo flights to the moon, LADEE will need a full month to reach Earth's closest neighbor. An Air Force Minotaur V rocket, built by Orbital Sciences Corp., provided the ride from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility.

LADEE, which is the size of a small car, is expected to reach the moon on Oct. 6. Scientists want to learn the composition of the moon's ever-so-delicate atmosphere and how it might change over time. Another puzzle, dating back decades, is whether dust actually levitates from the lunar surface.

Holed up on bases where loudspeakers blare patriotic songs, or scattered for their safety in tented camps, Syrian soldiers are bracing for an attack by a superpower which they have little power to resist.

Orders have been given to stand firm. Headquarters buildings have been evacuated, infantry dispersed into small formations, hospitals stocked with emergency supplies and radar stations placed at the highest level of alert.

"I'm more afraid now than I was ever when we fought in Qusair or Khalidiyeh," said Saleem, referring to some of the most hard-fought battles of the past six months.

"If a foreign strike comes and the rebels manage to intensify their operations simultaneously, that's a whole new level of combat. I'm still more scared of rebel mortars than U.S. cruise missiles."

Interviews conducted remotely with more than a dozen Syrian soldiers, officers and members of militia groups backing President Bashar al-Assad reveal deep fears as they prepare for U.S. strikes at locations across the country.

Most of the soldiers were contacted by a Syrian journalist working for Reuters, now based in Beirut, who cannot be identified for security reasons. The soldiers he spoke to also requested anonymity or used only their first names.

Their comments reveal a military worried about its prospects after strikes that could reshape the battlefield in a war that has already killed more than 100,000 people and driven a third of the population of 22 million from their homes.

Many said their greatest worry is not the American missiles themselves, but the prospect that outside intervention could embolden their rebel enemies, who could launch an offensive and tip the balance of power in the two-and-a-half year civil war.

Although commanders spoke of unspecified plans to fight back against U.S. attacks, junior service members described the notion of actually taking on U.S. forces as absurd.

"Our small warships are spread around the coast on full alert, and why? To confront the U.S. destroyers? I feel like I'm living in a bad movie," said a Syrian Navy sailor reached on a vessel in the Mediterranean.

"Of course I'm worried. I know we don't really have anything to confront the Americans. All we have is God."

"WE'RE NOT IDIOTS"

The announcement came at 5:20 a.m. Tokyo time, but a large crowd watching on an outdoor video screen burst into cheers.

Tokyo previously hosted the Summer Games in 1964.

Japan's bid for 2020 billed the city as the safe choice -- despite radiation leaking from the Fukushima nuclear plant. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe personally made a presentation to the committee and promised an effective cleanup.

"I am so happy, I am overjoyed," Abe told reporters at the post-announcement press conference. "I would like to share this joy with the people back home. We've received so much support from the people of the IOC and I would also like to express my support to them. And to the people around the world.

"A safe and secure Olympic Games will be staged by us -- I think that was another hope for their support. I would like to pledge that we will be discharging this responsibility." Abe said Tokyo would try to stage a successful Games to thank the world for its support after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami that devastated parts of Japan.

"Sport has the power to unite people," he said. "We experienced that after the earthquake and tsunami in 2011, when athletes came to our country and helped us. Japan needs the power of sport, we need hopes and dreams."

Abe said Tokyo's 1964 Olympics had left a strong impression on him as a child. "I was only 10 years old but a lot of kids like me were fascinated. Like many children I dreamed of winning a medal. It was a celebration giving hopes and dreams," he said. "The joy (of winning the 2020 vote) was even greater than when I won my own election."

Tokyo's bid came in at $5 billion to $6 billion, compared to $19 billion pledged by Istanbul, said Ed Hula, editor and founder of aroundtherings.com, which covers the business and politics of the Olympic movement.

But Tokyo's government has already amassed a $4.9 billion Olympic fund to pay to prepare for the Games, Hula said. And a $1 billion national stadium that will be used for the athletic events and the Opening Ceremonies will already have been built for the rugby World Cup in 2017 and is not considered an Olympic expense.

The comment by Qatari Foreign Minister Qatari Khaled al-Attiya, while consistent with long-standing Arab positions, may have been less than what Kerry might have hoped for as he seeks to build momentum for the talks which resumed on July 29.

"There are obstacles," al-Attiya said through an interpreter at a news conference with Kerry after the U.S. secretary of state met the foreign ministers of Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and other Arab officials.

"We are talking about settlements," he added. "Each time a round of negotiations is supposed to start, it's preceded by a declaration of continued settlements or the announcement of the establishment of new settlements and this is a source of concern for us and directly affects the negotiations."

Kerry, who is to meet with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas over dinner in London, said it was vital that all sides, including the Arab world, offer support to both parties as they try to make peace.

"This meeting is almost as important as the negotiations themselves because the Arab League and the Arab community's support for a final status agreement is essential to the achievement of that agreement," Kerry told reporters.

"It is a critical component in creating momentum, and energy and seriousness of purpose in these talks," he added.

The resumption of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks after a nearly three-year hiatus is one of Kerry's major achievements since taking office on February 1, but it is unclear if they have made any progress.

U.S. officials have refused to provide any information about the substance of the talks, declining even to say how many times Israeli and Palestinian negotiators have met since the talks began.

Kerry publically reiterated his private call on the European Union on Saturday to postpone a planned ban on EU financial assistance to Israeli organizations in the occupied Palestinian territories, saying this would help the talks.

The EU imposed restrictions in July, citing its frustration over the continued expansion of Jewish settlements in territory captured by Israeli forces in the 1967 Middle East War.

The guidelines render Israeli entities operating in the occupied territories ineligible for EU grants, prizes or loans, beginning next year.

The devices, which are rapidly growing in popularity, produce a vapour containing nicotine. The findings, presented at the European Respiratory Society, showed similar numbers quitting with e-cigarettes as patches, but more had cut down. There was a call, however, for long-term data on safety.

As well as giving a nicotine hit, the e-cigarettes also mimic the sensory sensations of smoking. This has led to speculation that they may be a useful tool for people trying to quit.

A team at the University of Auckland, in New Zealand, conducted the first clinical trial comparing the devices with nicotine patches in 657 people. The results published in the Lancet showed 7.3% using e-cigarettes had quit after six months compared with 5.8% using patches. However, the study did not involve enough people to definitively prove which is the better option. 'Increasing popularity'

Prof Chris Bullen, from the University of Auckland, said: "While our results don't show any clear-cut differences between e-cigarettes and patches in terms of 'quit success' after six months, it certainly seems that e-cigarettes were more effective in helping smokers who didn't quit to cut down. "It's also interesting that the people who took part in our study seemed to be much more enthusiastic about e-cigarettes than patches.

"Given the increasing popularity of these devices in many countries, and the accompanying regulatory uncertainty and inconsistency, larger, longer-term trials are urgently needed to establish whether these devices might be able to fulfil their potential as effective and popular smoking cessation aids."

Regulations around the world are catching up with the surge in the popularity of e-cigarettes. The EU and the UK are both working towards regulating e-cigarettes in the same way as medicines. The products also divide opinion with some arguing they normalise smoking and others saying they may help people to give up. Prof Peter Hajek, the director of the Tobacco Dependence Research Unit at Queen Mary University of London, described the study as "pioneering". "The key message is that in the context of minimum support, e-cigarettes are at least as effective as nicotine patches.

A team writing in the journal Nature Geoscience says the 310,000 sq km (119,000 sq mi) Tamu Massif is comparable in size to Mars' vast Olympus Mons volcano - the largest in the Solar System.

The structure topples the previous largest on Earth, Mauna Loa in Hawaii.

The massif lies some 2km below the sea.

It is located on an underwater plateau known as the Shatsky Rise, about 1,600km east of Japan.

It was formed about 145 million years ago when massive lava flows erupted from the centre of the volcano to form a broad, shield-like feature.

The researchers doubted the submerged volcano's peak ever rose above sea level during its lifetime and say it is unlikely to erupt again.

"The bottom line is that we think that Tamu Massif was built in a short (geologically speaking) time of one to several million years and it has been extinct since," co-author William Sager, from the University of Houston, US, told the AFP news agency.

"One interesting angle is that there were lots of oceanic plateaus (that) erupted during the Cretaceous Period (145-65 million years ago) but we don't see them since. Scientists would like to know why."

Prof Sager began studying the structure two decades ago, but it had been unclear whether the massif was one single volcano or many - a kind that exists in dozens of locations around the planet.

While Olympus Mons on Mars has relatively shallow roots, the Tamu Massif extends some 30 km (18 miles) into the Earth's crust.

And other volcanic behemoths could be lurking among the dozen or so large oceanic plateaux around the world, he thought.

"We don't have the data to see inside them and know their structure, but it would not surprise me to find out that there are more like Tamu out there," said Dr Sager.

"Indeed, the biggest oceanic plateau is Ontong Java plateau, near the equator in the Pacific, east of the Solomons Islands. It is much bigger than Tamu -- it's the size of France."

Five suicide bombers were shot dead in the series of co-ordinated attacks, an hour away from the capital Kabul.

More than 100 people - mostly civilians - were injured, police said.

Separately a Nato air strike on Saturday in the eastern province of Kunar killed 15 people, including nine civilians, Afghan officials said.

But a Nato spokeswoman told the BBC that a precision attack had killed 10 insurgents and that she had no reports of civilians dying.

Huge explosion

Police say that that the suicide bombers in Wardak were targeting key government offices within the provincial intelligence department in Maidan Shar, the capital city of Wardak.

Nearby buildings and shops were destroyed, a statement from the governor's office said.

The Taliban have claimed responsibility for the attack.

Map

In a statement, the governor's office said at least six militants launched the attack shortly after a powerful car bomb was detonated by a suicide attacker.

Local shopkeepers told the BBC that the explosion was so powerful that it broke windows of homes at least 1km (0.6 miles) away.

Afghan special forces engaged the five other attackers in heavy exchanges of fire.

Taliban insurgents and al-Qaeda fighters use Wardak as a gateway to launch attacks on nearby Kabul province.

They also frequently launch attacks in Kunar province, which borders Pakistan's lawless tribal areas.

Harsh terrain

Police in Kunar told the BBC's Bilal Sarwary in Kabul that the airstrike on Saturday hit a pick-up truck soon after three Arab and three Afghan militants boarded it in the village of Gambir in the remote and mountainous Peach River Valley in Watapur district on Saturday evening. Civilian casualties are a source of tension between Afghan and Nato forces.

In February President Karzai ordered a ban on Afghan security forces calling in air strikes in residential areas after 10 civilians were allegedly killed in a Nato night attack in Kunar.

Nato troops are scheduled to withdraw from Afghanistan by the end of 2014 and have gradually been handing over responsibility for security to their Afghan counterparts, who now lead about 90% of all security operations.

Yet the Afghan air force has limited strength, so Nato air support is considered crucial, especially for operations in harsh terrain and mountainous areas.

Officials say that women and children were among the casualties.

Some commentators were impressed with the device's technical specifications including its 320 x 320-pixel, 1.63-inch AMOLED touchscreen, an 800MHz processor, a 315mAh battery, and the camera mounted in the wrist strap capable of capturing 1.9-megapixel stills and 10-second video clips. But many were disappointed by the countless features the smart watch did not include.

Prior to the Galaxy Gear's launch, the internet was awash with fervent speculation as to what the watch would do. Many hoped that it would come replete with remarkable features such as acting as a projector, or allowing you to check your pulse and body temperature.

Some commentators envisaged a watch made of radical new lightweight or transparent materials that could interface with the world around you to offer a genuine new experience not currently offered by smartphones or tablets.

At the device's glamorous launch, JK Shin, president of Samsung's IT and Mobile Division, said that the "Samsung Galaxy Gear benefits consumers by integrating smart device technology even deeper into their everyday lives, and bridges the gap between the mobile device and fashion worlds to create truly wearable technology." But does it really deliver on its promise?

CNN spoke to a number of amateur designers who had mocked up smart watch ideas of their own about their impressions of the Galaxy Gear. Most seemed united in their disappointment.

"I'm waiting for a smart watch that does something extra than just bring my phone to my wrist," says design engineer Esben Oxholm, who mocked up his own smart watch concept in February. "I can't tell you what it is, because I don't know. I just know that I'm not paying 300 to 400 bucks for a wrist attaching remote control that needs to be recharged every day."

Christoph Behling, lead designer at Tag Heuer watches, shared Oxholm's criticisms, saying that in his view the Galaxy Gear will not serve as a replacement for regular watches, because it is lacking in two fundamental aspects: both in its form and its function.

"At the moment, it is a decent enough electronics product, but it is not a decent enough watch," Behling says. "I can't see how it will benefit my life. Do I really want to leave my lovely Swiss watch at home in order to have a piece of mass produced consumer product with, in my view, limited functionality?"

Obama refused to blink after Russian President Vladimir Putin led a campaign to talk him out of military intervention at a two-day summit of the Group of Twenty (G20) developed and developing economies in St. Petersburg.

He persuaded 10 other G20 nations to join the United States in signing a statement calling for a strong international response, although it fell short of supporting military strikes, underscoring the deep disagreements that dominated the summit.

Leaders of the G20, which accounts for 90 percent of the world economy and two thirds of its population, put aside their differences to unite behind a call for growth and jobs and agreed the global economy was on the mend but not out of crisis.

But there was no joint statement on Syria, despite a 20-minute one-on-one talk between Obama and Putin on the sidelines of the summit on Friday, following a tense group discussion on the civil war over dinner late on Thursday.

"We hear one another, and understand the arguments but we don't agree. I don't agree with his arguments, he doesn't agree with mine," Putin told a closing news conference dominated by questions about Syria.

Participants at the dinner said the tension between Putin and Obama was palpable but that they seemed at pains to avoid an escalation. Obama said credit was due to Putin for facilitating the long discussion of the Syrian crisis on Thursday night.

But he defended his call for a military response to what Washington says was a chemical weapons attack by forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad which killed more than 1,400 people in rebel-held suburbs of Damascus on August 21.

"Failing to respond to this breach of this international norm would send a signal to rogue nations, authoritarian regimes and terrorist organizations, that they can develop and use weapons of mass destruction and not pay a consequence. And that's not the world that we want to live in," Obama told a separate news conference.

Putin said Washington had not provided convincing proof that Assad's troops carried out the attack and called it a "provocation" by rebel forces hoping to encourage a military response by the United States.

U.S. District Judge Denise Cote in Manhattan said Apple could not enter into agreements with five major U.S. publishers that would impede its ability to reduce e-book retail prices or offer price discounts.

The judge also said she would appoint an external monitor to review Apple's antitrust compliance policies, procedures and training for two years.

The terms of the judgment will expire after five years, but Cote's order allows for extensions in one-year increments if necessary.

The injunction followed a July 10 ruling by Cote finding Apple conspired with five publishers to undermine e-book pricing established by the dominant retailer in the market, Amazon.com Inc.

The five publishers, all of which have settled with regulators, include Lagardere SCA's Hachette Book Group Inc, News Corp's HarperCollins Publishers LLC, Penguin Random House LLC, CBS Corp's Simon & Schuster Inc and Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck GmbH's Macmillan.

The U.S. Justice Department, which sued Apple in April 2012, had initially sought an even broader injunction that could have touched on the company's agreements with suppliers of other types of content, such as movies, music and TV shows.

But Cote had made clear at a hearing last week that she would not go that far, saying she wanted the injunction "to rest as lightly as possible on how Apple runs its business.

The Justice Department nonetheless welcomed the injunction.

"Consumers will continue to benefit from lower e-books prices as a result of the department's enforcement action to restore competition in this important industry," Assistant Attorney General Bill Baer said in a statement.

Apple said on Friday that it would appeal the injunction.

On Thursday, the Guardian, the New York Times and journalistic nonprofit ProPublica published stories saying the security agency has secretly developed the ability to crack or circumvent commonplace Internet encryption used to protect everything from email to financial transactions. The stories were based on documents made public by Snowden, now a fugitive living under asylum in Russia.

The reports also said the NSA had worked with Government Communications Headquarters, its British partner, and had used a variety of means, ranging from the insertion of "back doors" in popular tech products and services, to supercomputers, secret court orders and the manipulation of international processes for setting encryption standards.

In a statement on Friday, the Office of the U.S. Director of National Intelligence, which said it was speaking on behalf of all U.S. spy agencies, did not confirm details of the media reports.

The statement did acknowledge that the U.S. intelligence community "would not be doing its job" if it did not try to counter the use of encryption by such adversaries as "terrorists, cybercriminals, human traffickers and others."