Newspapers Online 09-16-2013 | Politics Oba

Despite emphatic predictions of waning business prospects, some of the big Internet companies that the former National Security Agency contractor showed to be closely involved in gathering data on people overseas - such as Google Inc. and Facebook Inc. - say privately that they have felt little if any impact on their businesses.

Insiders at companies that offer remote computing services known as cloud computing, including Amazon and Microsoft Corp, also say they are seeing no fallout.

Meanwhile, smaller U.S. companies offering encryption and related security services are seeing a jump in business overseas, along with an uptick in sales domestically as individuals and companies work harder to protect secrets.

"Our value proposition had been that it's a wild world out there, while doing business internationally you need to protect yourself," said Jon Callas, co-founder of phone and text encryption provider Silent Circle, where revenue quadrupled from May to June on a small base.

"Now the message people are getting from the newspapers every day is that it's a wild world even domestically."

PROPHESIES OF DOOM

Shortly after Snowden's leaked documents detailed collaboration giving the NSA access to the accounts of tens of thousands of net companies' users, the big Internet companies and their allies issued dire warnings, predicting that American businesses would lose tens of billions of dollars in revenue abroad as distrustful customers seek out local alternatives.

In a federal court filing last week, Google said that still-unfolding news coverage was causing "substantial harm to Google's reputation and business". The company said that could be mitigated if it were allowed to comment with precision about its intelligence dealings.

Likewise, last month, six technology trade groups wrote to the White House to urge reforms in the spy programs, citing what it called a "study" predicting a $35 billion cumulative shortfall by 2016 in the vital economic sector.

That number, it turns out, was extrapolated from a security trade group's survey of 207 non-U.S. members - and the group, the Cloud Security Alliance, had explicitly cautioned that its members weren't representative of the entire industry.

"I know you want sectors and numbers, but I don't have it," said Ed Black, president of the Computer & Communications Industry Association, one of the trade groups behind the letter. "Anybody who tells you they do is making it up."

Reactor 4 at Ohi in western Japan will stop generating electricity in the early hours of Monday.

Analysts say Japan will be without nuclear power until December at the earliest, the longest shut-down since the 1960s.

The Japanese public turned against nuclear power after the meltdowns at the Fukushima plant in 2011.

Before the accident, which was caused by a massive earthquake and tsunami, nuclear plants supplied about 30% of Japan's power.

But since then the plants have been closed, either for scheduled maintenance or because of safety fears, and have not been restarted.

Japan went without nuclear power during May and June last year, but operator Kepco was allowed to restart its reactors at Ohi. The government has been under pressure to tighten safety standards to allay public fears.

Analysts say it will take around six months to clear all of the safety checks and legal hurdles involved in a restart.

So far, power companies have applied to restart about a dozen of Japan's 50 reactors.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe wants to see the reactors back on line, as they are a vital part of his plan to turn the economy around.

Since the Fukushima disaster, Japan has been forced to import huge amounts of coal, liquid natural gas and other fuels. Mr Abe's government blames these imports for the huge trade deficits posted by Japan since 2011.

The average household electricity bill has risen by 30% since Fukushima, denting the government's attempts to boost consumer spending.

But continuing problems at the Fukushima plant have hampered the government's attempts to win public support for a return to nuclear.

In the latest setback, operator Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco) said earlier this month that radiation levels had risen around tanks used to store water that has been flushed through the damaged reactor buildings.

Should I buy the iPhone 5s or the iPhone 5c?

The answer is easy: the iPhone 5s. At the iPhone event Apple touted three major advances in the iPhone 5s. The first was the 64-bit processor, which makes the phone twice as fast as the iPhone 5. And the second was the fingerprint scanner, which offers added security.

These are fine evolutions, but not the sort of thing that I think will inspire most folks to rush out the door for a new iPhone. But the clear difference in my mind is the new iSight camera on the iPhone 5s. It's a huge upgrade.

I have the iPhone 5, and while I'm enormously satisfied with it, my big wish is for a better camera.

Like most people with a smartphone, the gadget has become my default camera since it's always with me. But as anyone with the iPhone 5 (or any other previous iPhone) knows, as much as the technology has evolved, the camera is still relatively limited when it comes to taking shots involving motion or in tricky lighting situations.

The iPhone 5s offers several new features that represent gigantic leaps forward.

If you want to get the real technical low-down, let me point you to this breakdown by Brian Klug. I'm not a professional photographer, so I can't geek out that much over the granular technical details.

But as an average, mainstream user, I was immediately excited about several features of the iPhone 5s.

The iSight camera now offers 8 megapixels on both the 5s and 5c. However, on the 5s, the individual pixels are bigger, which means the camera should do better in low-light situations.

The 5s flash also represents a big advance. It's what Apple is calling "True Tone" and it has two LED flashes with two different colors stacked on top of each other.

With the True Tone flash, the phone triggers an initial flash that gauges the colors of the environment. Then the two flashes fire together in different intensities that adjust based on the light in the room. There are 1,000 flash combinations.

Finally, there is a new setting on the iPhone 5s called "burst" that snaps 10 frames per second. Of course, this means you could quickly create hundreds of photos. With iOS 7, the software suggests the best ones and lets you quickly eliminate the others.

In an interview taped Friday, the day before the United States and Russia reached a deal that would impound or destroy Syrian President Bashar Assad’s chemical stockpile by mid-2014, Obama said his decision to seek a diplomatic resolution, which critics have sharply derided, would stop Assad’s use of his most indiscriminate weapons.

“As a consequence of the steps that we’ve taken over the last two weeks to three weeks, we now have a situation in which Syria has acknowledged it has chemical weapons, has said it’s willing to join the convention on chemical weapons, and Russia, its primary sponsor, has said that it will pressure Syria to reach that agreement,” Obama told ABC’s “This Week With George Stephanopoulos,” which aired his comments Sunday.

“If that goal is achieved, then it sounds to me like we did something right.”

Forcing Assad to implement the disarmament deal, which Secretary of State John F. Kerry hammered out with his Russian counterpart in three days of intense negotiations in Geneva, could represent “a foundation to begin what has to be an international process” to reach a political settlement to end Syria’s 2½-year civil war, which has claimed more than 100,000 lives, Obama said.

After a major Aug. 21 chemical attack in the Damascus suburbs that U.S. officials have blamed on Assad’s forces, Obama said “it is hard to envision how Mr. Assad regains any kind of legitimacy.” But the diplomatic path now relies heavily on Assad’s cooperation, and includes no curbs on his use of conventional weapons. Obama reiterated that “we will not intervene militarily” to topple Assad.

The seeming contradictions have fueled criticism from lawmakers in both parties. Obama said his primary goal always has been to prevent the use or seizure by armed groups of Assad’s chemical stockpile, which he declared last year would represent a “red line” triggering a U.S. response.

“I’m less concerned about style points,” Obama said. “I’m much more concerned about getting the policy right.”

As President Bashar al-Assad's warplanes and artillery hit rebel suburbs of the capital again on Sunday, minister Ali Haidar told Moscow's RIA news agency: "These agreements ... are a victory for Syria, achieved thanks to our Russian friends."

Though not close to Assad, Ali was the first Syrian official to react to Saturday's deal struck in Geneva by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Bridging an angry East-West rift over Syria, they agreed to back a nine-month U.N. program to destroy Assad's chemical arsenal.

Kerry responded to widespread skepticism about the feasibility of the plan by saying in Israel that it had "the full ability" to remove all Syria's chemical weapons.

The agreement has effectively put off the threat of air strikes Obama made after poison gas killed hundreds of Syrian civilians on August 21, although he stressed that force remains an option if Assad reneges - and U.S. forces remain in position.

Obama embraced the disarmament proposal put forward last week by Russian President Vladimir Putin after his plan for U.S. military action hit resistance in Congress. Lawmakers feared an open-ended new entanglement in the Middle East and were troubled by the presence of al Qaeda followers among Assad's opponents.

In an interview with ABC television, Obama said criticism of his quick-changing tactics on Syria was about style rather than substance. And while welcoming Putin's willingness to press his "client, the Assad regime" to disarm, he also chided the Kremlin leader for suggesting rebels carried out the gas attack.

Defending his changes of tack on Syria, Obama said: "Folks here in Washington like to grade on style ... Had we rolled out something that was very smooth and disciplined and linear, they would have graded it well - even if it was a disastrous policy."

ASSAD "VICTORY"

National reconciliation minister Ali said Syria welcomed the terms of the U.S.-Russia deal: "They will help Syrians get out of the crisis," he said. "They have prevented a war against Syria by denying a pretext to those who wanted to unleash it."

He also echoed Kerry and Lavrov in saying it might help Syrians "sit round one table to settle their internal problems".

The Epsilon rocket is about half the size of Japan's previous generation of space vehicles, and uses artificial intelligence to perform safety checks.

Japan's space agency Jaxa says the Epsilon cost $37m (£23m) to develop, half the cost of its predecessor.

Epsilon launched from south-western Japan in the early afternoon.

Crowds of Japanese gathered to watch the launch, which was also broadcast on the internet.

It was carrying a telescope that is being billed by Jaxa as the world's first space telescope that will remotely observe planets including Venus, Mars and Jupiter from its Earth orbit.

Jaxa said the rocket successfully released the Sprint-A telescope as scheduled, about 1,000km (620 miles) above the Earth's surface.

Epsilon's predecessor, the M-5, was retired in 2006 because of spiralling costs.

Jaxa said the Epsilon was not only cheaper to produce, but also cheaper to launch than the M-5.

Because of its artificial intelligence, the new rocket needs only eight people at the launch site, compared with 150 people for earlier launches.

Western Europe's poorest country is likely to lose 40 percent of 20 million euros ($27 million) in food aid it gets from Brussels every year, according to Isabel Jonet, who heads the Food Banks charity.

Her institution supports 390,000 poor people out of Portugal's 10.5 million population. They have been helped by the EU "Food for the Needy" program but it is due to be replaced by the Fund for European Aid.

The new fund will have fewer resources for food, Jonet told Reuters. And the cash-strapped government has made no preparations to deal with the problem, she said.

"Unlike in other countries, Portugal does not yet have a plan to make up for the changes or for a delay in the new scheme coming through, so there may be an interruption in our distribution of food," Jonet said.

The number of those in need in Portugal is rising as unemployment hit record highs this year.

The economy has struggled through its worst recession in decades due to austerity measures imposed under a 78-billion-euro EU and International Monetary Fund bailout.

"Unfortunately more and more people need this help by the day. Although small, it makes a huge difference," said a tearful Maria Mendes, 50, picking up food staples at a charity that caters for 300 people in Lisbon's old neighborhood of Graca.

Official data released in July showed that last year, 22 percent of the Portuguese were suffering from material deprivation, including almost 9 percent from severe deprivation.

The minimum wage in Portugal is 566 euros a month, compared with neighboring Spain's 753 euros.

People are considered materially deprived when their income is not enough to meet basic needs like having a meal of fish or meat every other day, pay for rent, or warm their homes.

The government says it is looking at the food aid issue but gave no concrete promises to answer Jonet's concerns.

"We are working to ensure that the funds are enough to keep such a fundamental project going," Social Affairs Minister Pedro Mota Soares said. "Let's finish the negotiation process in Europe and then we'll see where we stand."

Although the current Food for the Needy scheme ends this year, there is no set deadline for the European Parliament and European Council to agree on the aid fund which will replace it.

At stake is about a third of the 44 tonnes of food that Portugal's Food Bank distributes through a network of charities and public partners every day. The rest comes from the food industry and citizens' donations.

The American is eight years older than Tony Rominger was when he won the race in 1994, and five years older than the Tour de France's most senior champion, Firmin Lambot, who triumphed in 1922.

Horner, who rides for the RadioShack team, beat Giro d'Italia winner Vincenzo Nibali by 37 seconds. Australian Michael Matthews, of Orica-GreenEdge, won the final stage. The 22-year-old claimed victory in a bunch sprint in Madrid ahead of American Tyler Farrar and Nikias Arndt of Germany.

Along with the Tour de France, won this year by Britain's Chris Froome, and Giro d'Italia, the Vuelta is one of cycling's prestigious three-week Grand Tours and represents the biggest win of Horner's career.

"I knew how hard it was going to be for this team to win the Tour of Spain," he said. "I have faced younger, great riders like Nibali, [Alejandro] Valverde and Joaquim Rodriguez. They have had a great tour so, for me, it is a legendary moment that may not be repeated.

"I know I am also the first North American to win the Tour of Spain and this makes me very proud of my work and, above all, that of my team-mates."

Horner made his first move on stage three, which he won to register his first stage victory in a Grand Tour and move ahead in the general classification.

He held the leader's red jersey for just a day as 2010 champion Nibali, riding for Astana, regained the lead, but returned to the head of the field with victory on the 10th stage. Italian Nibali responded again and seemed set for his second Tour of Spain title as he headed into the final week of the race with a 50-second lead.

But Horner made significant inroads into his advantage on the 16th and 18th stages before finally moving ahead on Friday's 19th stage.

Horner moved 37 seconds ahead of Nibali by finishing second on the penultimate day at Alto de l'Angliru and maintained that lead on the final stage. Nibali said: "I can't complain with how my year has gone. I won the Giro and I came here with the intention to win again in the Tour of Spain.

Unmanned drones have become an almost ubiquitous presence on the battlefield for U.S. and other high-tech forces.

But the market for remote controlled vehicles is evolving from the sometimes multi-tonne craft that patrol the skies over Afghanistan or Yemen, carrying out reconnaissance and targeted strikes, to tiny robots that police and even film companies can use.

The top end of the market continues to be dominated by U.S. companies such as Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and General Atomics, formerly a division of General Dynamics and creator of the Predator and Reaper drones. Other major defense firms such as BAE Systems are pushing forward with next-generation drones with stealth and other features.

Smaller companies are increasingly redefining the industry, however.

Drones on display at this week's DSEI defense fair at London's Excel exhibition center include undersea robots that can act as mini submarines or simply drive along the surface of the seabed to clear mines or conduct reconnaissance.

Remote control "quadrocopters" with four or more rotors can be launched from backpacks.

Even conventional military vehicles are becoming increasingly robotized. The stand of U.S. truck manufacturer Oshkosh Corp showcases a picture of a convoy of military trucks it says are being entirely remote-controlled.

Critics of the use of drones controlled remotely argue that they make warfare too clinical and easy, and too often end up killing innocent people. Advocates say the reality is that a drone removes the three "D"s - "difficult, dull and dangerous" - making it increasingly difficult to justify deploying human beings in certain situations.

THE THROWBOT

U.S.-based firm ReconRobotics say their products, robots designed to help soldiers or police look inside a building before they storm it or under a vehicle to detect a bomb, are already saving lives.

"It gives you eyes inside a room before you go there," said Langdon, a former Marine Corps sergeant and now director of U.S. and international military programs for the company.

"Maybe that means you see there are children in a room so you don't throw a grenade. Maybe it means you find an IED (improvised explosive device)."

The impending IPO of the microblogging phenomenon ignited a competition among Wall Street's biggest names for the prestige of managing its coming-out party. Goldman Sachs is lead underwriter, a source familiar with the matter said on Thursday, which is a major coup for the Wall Street bank.

Twitter filed for an IPO confidentially under a 2012 law intended to help emerging corporations with less than $1 billion in revenue go public.

Seven-year old Twitter, which allows users to send out streams of 140-character messages, has become an indispensable tool to governments, corporations and celebrities seeking to communicate with their audience, and for individuals seeking both news and entertainment.

Chief Executive Dick Costolo has for years waved off suggestions it intended to go public, saying the company remained flush with cash. Facebook's mismanaged 2012 debut and subsequent share-price plunge also chilled the consumer-dotcom IPO market.

Facebook, however, has clawed its way back to its $38 IPO price in July, and the stock is at a record high after touching $45 this week.

Twitter, which has been valued by private investors at more than $10 billion, should break even this year and is on track for 40 percent annual growth at a $1 billion annual revenue run rate, Max Wolff of Greencrest Capital estimated.

"It's completely conquered mobile. It has an enormous social network. It's becoming a key utility as a second screen to TV and it's literally the first draft of history," Wolff said.

"Normally a company like Twitter would have been public for some time," he said.

Since Jack Dorsey, Twitter's inventor, dispatched the first tweet from a downtown San Francisco office in March 2006, the service has grown into a worldwide phenomenon with more than 200 million regular users contributing more than 400 million posts a day.

The company makes money by inserting paid, targeted ads that resemble ordinary, user-generated content. Twitter's success with its advertising model created a new paradigm for mobile advertising and prompted Facebook last year to adopt a similar ad product, called Sponsored Stories.

But Twitter was one of the first to prove that in-stream ads could be a viable way to make money in the mobile era.

But scientists now have strong evidence that NASA's Voyager 1 probe has crossed this important border, making history as the first human-made object to leave the heliosphere, the magnetic boundary separating the solar system's sun, planets and solar wind from the rest of the galaxy.

"In leaving the heliosphere and setting sail on the cosmic seas between the stars, Voyager has joined other historic journeys of exploration: The first circumnavigation of the Earth, the first steps on the Moon," said Ed Stone, chief scientist on the Voyager mission. "That's the kind of event this is, as we leave behind our solar bubble."

A new study in the journal Science suggests that the probe entered the interstellar medium around August 25, 2012. You may have heard other reports that Voyager 1 has made the historic crossing before, but Thursday was the first time NASA announced it.

The twin spacecraft Voyager 1 and 2 were launched in 1977, 16 days apart. As of Thursday, according to NASA's real-time odometer, Voyager 1 is 18.8 billion kilometers (11.7 billion miles) from Earth. Its sibling, Voyager 2, is 15.3 billion (9.5 billion) kilometers from our planet.

Voyager 1 is being hailed as the first probe to leave the solar system. But under a stricter definition of "solar system," which includes the distant comets that orbit the sun, we'd have to wait another 30,000 years for it to get that far, Stone said. Another milestone for long after we're gone: The probe will fly near a star in about 40,000 years, Stone said.

How do we know?

Voyager, currently traveling at more than 38,000 miles per hour, never sent a postcard saying "Greetings from interstellar space!" So whether it has made the historic crossing or not is a matter of controversy.

"The spacecraft itself really doesn't know," Stone said. "It's only instruments that can tell us whether we're inside or outside." Further complicating matters, the device aboard Voyager 1 that measures plasma -- a state of matter with charged particles -- broke in 1980.

To get around that, scientists detected waves in the plasma around the spacecraft and used that information to calculate density. Vibrations in the plasma came from a large coronal mass ejection from the sun in 2012, resulting in what Stone called a "solar wind tsunami." These vibrations reached the area around Voyager this spring.

Dell, who won a battle with activist Carl Icahn to win control of the computer company, also said he will shift from a quarterly focus to a "five-year, ten-year focus."