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If you’re on the planet tomorrow night, you may just want to check out Engadget’s own podcast producer, Trent Wolbe, on his WFMU radio show. Sure, Trent can be found assaulting the airwaves there every single Monday, but this coming one (March 30th), the show will be live from the Solar One facility on the East River in NYC, and the broadcast will be entirely solar-powered. Oh, there’s going to be live performances by some great 8 bit / handlheld, artists too. We love that. Hit up WFMU.ORG for all the details, or to listen to the show live tomorrow night, from 8-10 PM EST. Should be awesome, friends.

Filed under: Announcements

Solar-powered broadcast on WFMU New York Monday night may just change your life originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 29 Mar 2009 13:26:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You know what’ll be awesome? Actual end products resulting from this presumably nonstop research on piezoelectric nanowires. Yet again we’re hearing of a new group of researchers that have figured out a way to harness electricity from life’s simplest things: walking, a heart beating or even the flowing of blood. Put simply, the gurus have discovered how to use zinc oxide nanowires in order to generate an electric current when “subjected to mechanical stress.” The difference here, however, is that these critters could actually be implanted under the skin, though the scientists have made quite clear that there isn’t a timetable for commercial production. In other words: yawn.

[Via textually, image courtesy of NSF]

Filed under: Cellphones, Portable Audio, Portable Video, Science

Piezoelectric nanowires could lead to blood-powered iPods, cellphones originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 29 Mar 2009 11:54:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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In a relatively hush-hush manner, Intel recently slipped out energy saving versions of its Core 2 Quad Q8200, Q9400 and Q9550 CPUs, all of which are suffixed with a simple “s.” Put simply, these S-Series chips are built using the same 45 nanometer process technology as used on the regular models, and aside from TDP, all the specifications are exactly alike. The difference comes in power consumption, as the S crew sucks down just 65 watts compared to 95 watts in the standard issue models. Tom’s Hardware had a chance to handle, benchmark and report on these new power sippers, and lucky for you, they found performance to be equal to that of the higher power chips. Granted, you’ll have to pony up a few extra bucks in order to treat Mother Earth (and your energy bill) better, but at least we’re working down the power ladder instead of the other way around.

[Via Tom's Hardware, thanks Jonathan]

Filed under: Desktops

Intel Core 2 Quad S-Series shaves power consumption to 65W originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 29 Mar 2009 10:44:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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While the shortly flaunted N83 never did amount to anything back in the day, we can safely say the device you see above is definitely not what the suits in Espoo had in mind. The touchscreen-based smartphone looks about as thick as an N95, though we can’t recall ever seeing a flavor of Symbian look anything like this. If you care to know, the phone sports a 400 x 240 resolution panel, 0.3 megapixel camera (ha!), dual SIM card slots, Bluetooth, FM radio module, about two to three hours of talk time and a 3.5 millimeter headphone jack. But hey, it’s only a buck ‘o five off-contract, or exactly the price of freedom according to certain puppets.

[Thanks, facelessloser]

Filed under: Cellphones

Keepin’ it real fake, part CXCIV: Nokia N83 is not a Nokia N83 originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 29 Mar 2009 09:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The AP reports that Huffington Post is going to announce tomorrow the creation of a $1.75 million fund with various donors to pay for investigative reporting. First target: the economy.

This, I’ve long held, is where foundation and public support will enter into the new ecosystem of journalism: not by taking over newspapers but by funding investigations and other slices of a new journalistic pie.

I’ve been hoping to get the resources to preform an audit of the current resource allocation in journalism: Take a town, add up all the journalistic spending there (paper, TV, radio, magazine) and then see how much is spent on investigative reporting (I’ll wager it will be tiny; a fraction of a percent of the total) as well as the beat reporting that feeds it – and judge the value of the results.

When we see that number, I predict, it will be feasible to imagine support from foundations and the public (that is, in the NPR and Spot.US models) to pay for investigative journalism. Indeed, I’ll bet that we could multiply the amount spent on and the output of investigative reporting today. This is how to subsidize news. It’s happening now, as Pro Publica stories run in The New York Times. That is a form of subsidy.

Now to touch the third rail in the debate over the future of news: This is how paid content will work, how news will get money from its public — not by putting content behind walls and charging all readers (the few who’ll remain) to see it but instead by setting up systems to take advantage of the 1 percent rule online that decrees you need only a limited number of contributors (of money or effort) to support great things in a gift economy. See: Wikipedia and NPR. But the public’s contributions won’t go to lifting the sinking Titanics of the old-media failures; I don’t want to contribute to failed newspapers anymore than I want my tax money to go to failed banks and their dividends and salaries. Instead, contributions will need to go directly to supporting work people care about.

The future of journalism is not about some single new-fangled product and company taking over from the old-fangled and monopolistic predecessor. News come from a broad ecosystem with many players adding in under many models for many reasons. News organizations will organize news in this diverse new framework, aggregating, curating, organizing. Laid-off journalists are starting blogs, alongside other bloggers. Some people will volunteer, podcasting their school-board meetings, just because they care. When we demand transparency from government as a default, data will become part of the news ecosystem we can all examine. Some of this will be supported by advertising, some by contributions from foundations, some by contributions from individuals, some by volunteer effort. And it will all add up to a new pie, one slice of which will be efforts such as the one HuffPo is about to announce.

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TORONTO — A vast electronic spying operation has infiltrated computers and has stolen documents from hundreds of government and private offices around the world, including those of the Dalai Lama, Canadian researchers have concluded.

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SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea’s plans to launch a rocket as early as this week in defiance of warnings threatens to undo years of fitful negotiations toward dismantling the regime’s nuclear program.

The U.S., South Korea and Japan have told the North that any rocket launch _ whether it’s a satellite or a long-range missile _ would violate a 2006 U.N. Security Council Resolution prohibiting Pyongyang from any ballistic activity, and could draw sanctions.

North Korea said sanctions would violate the spirit of disarmament agreements, and said it would treat the pacts as null and void if punished for exercising its sovereign right to send a satellite into space.

“Even a single word critical of the launch” from the Security Council will be regarded as a “blatant hostile act,” a spokesman with North Korea’s foreign ministry said Thursday, according the North’s state-run Korean Central News Agency. “All the processes for the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, which have been pushed forward so far, will be brought back to what used to be before their start and necessary strong measures will be taken.”

That would be a sharp reversal from June 2008 when the North made a promising move toward disarmament, dramatically blowing up a cooling reactor at its main Yongbyon nuclear complex.

But the regime routinely backtracks on agreements, refuses to abide by international rules and wields its nuclear program like a weapon when it needs to win concessions from Washington or Seoul, analysts say.

“History has shown them that the more provocative they are, the more attention they get. The more attention they get, the more they’re offered,” Peter M. Beck, a Korean affairs expert who teaches at American University in Washington and Yonsei University in Seoul, said Sunday.

Despite years of negotiations and impoverished North Korea’s growing need for outside help, it’s clear the talks have done little to curb the regime’s drive to build _ and sell _ its atomic arsenal, experts say.

“If this is Kim Jong Il’s welcoming present to a new president, launching a missile like this and threatening to have a nuclear test, I think it says a lot about the imperviousness of this regime in North Korea to any kind of diplomatic overtures,” Defense Secretary Robert Gates said in an interview broadcast on “Fox News Sunday.”

North Korea, a notoriously secretive country, has been challenging the international community with its atomic ambitions since 1993, when the regime briefly quit the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty amid suspicions it was secretly developing atomic weapons.

In 1994, North Korea and the U.S. worked out an agreement that promised Pyongyang oil and two light water nuclear reactors if the country would give up its nuclear ambitions. The power-generating reactors cannot be easily used to make bombs.

Four years later, North Korea fired a multistage Taepodong-1 missile over Japan and into the Pacific Ocean. The North pledged in 1999 to freeze long-range missile tests, but later threatened to restart its nuclear program and resume testing missiles amid delays in construction of the reactors.

In 2002, Pyongyang admitted to a secret nuclear weapons program in violation of the 1994 agreement, prompting the U.S., Japan and South Korea to halt oil supplies promised as part of the pact. The North withdrew again from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty in 2003, and announced it had reactivated its nuclear power facilities.

That August, six nations _ the two Koreas, China, Japan, Russia and the U.S. _ began negotiations on disarmament now known as the “six-party talks,” eventually resulting in a landmark accord on Sept. 19, 2005. The agreement called for North Korea to abandon its nuclear program in exchange for economic aid, diplomatic recognition and a security guarantee from Washington.

As the talks continued in fits and starts, the North in 2006 carried out a surprise 5 a.m. test-fire of six missiles, including its Taepodong-2 long-range missile, which U.S. and South Korean officials believe has the potential to strike Alaska.

The rocket fizzled just 42 seconds after takeoff but the launch, denounced as “provocative” by Washington, angered even North Korea’s longtime ally and main donor, China, which agreed to a U.S.-sponsored U.N. Resolution 1695 condemning the move.

Later that year, an underground nuclear test prompted U.N. Resolution 1718, which bans the North from any ballistic activity. The U.S., South Korea and Japan say that sending satellites into space since the technology for launching a satellite and a missile are virtually the same.

By February, Pyongyang agreed to concrete steps toward disarmament: disabling its main nuclear facilities in exchange for the equivalent of 1 million tons of energy aid and other concessions. Disablement began that November.

But the North halted the process in 2008 amid a dispute with Washington over how to verify its 18,000-page account of past atomic activities. The last round of talks _ in December 2008, weeks before President Barack Obama moved into the White House _ made little apparent progress.

Analysts speculated that North Korean leader Kim Jong Il was holding out for talks with Obama. But in forming its North Korea policy, the fledgling Obama administration has made it clear it will work through the six-party process.

The rocket launch scheduled for April 4-8, at a time when Pyongyang has custody of two American reporters detained March 17 at North Korea’s border with China, could provide the opening North Korea needs to force direct talks with Washington, analysts said.

“The timing couldn’t be better for North Korea. It strengthens the North’s bargaining position with the U.S. in dealing with the nuclear issue. They can try to link these two issues in some way,” said Daniel Pinkston of the International Crisis Group.

Bringing everyone, including North Korea, back to the talks will be “rough going,” said Paik Hak-soon, an analyst at the Sejong Institute think tank.

But South Korea’s envoy expressed confidence the talks would be back on track soon. “I am looking forward to seeing the talks resume after certain amount of time, and I am not deeply worried or concerned about resumption of the talks,” Wi Sung-lac said last week.

Ultimately, the talks may never achieve their aim, Beck said.

“It may very well be that in the end, the North will try to play it both ways: continue to negotiate for goodies while never giving up its nuclear trump card,” he said in his House testimony. “After all, that is essentially what it has done for the past 16 years.”

___

Associated Press writers Hyung-jin Kim and Kwang-tae Kim contributed to this report.

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LONDON — Britain’s Home Secretary apologized Sunday for putting five pay-per-view movies on her parliamentary expense account _ including two X-rated ones screened by her husband.

Jacqui Smith admitted she should not have claimed any of the movies and said all the money would be paid back. She attributed the mistake to not being careful enough with a service package that included both Internet and TV.

“I am sorry that in claiming for my Internet connection, I mistakenly claimed for a television package alongside it,” Smith said in a statement. “As soon as the matter was brought to my attention, I took immediate steps to contact the relevant parliamentary authorities and rectify the situation.”

Smith put on her expenses two unnamed adult movies shown on pay-per-view television channels at her family home in April 2008 at 5 pounds ($7) each, as well as three other movies _ two viewings of “Ocean’s Thirteen” and one of “Surf’s Up” at 3.75 pounds ($5) each.

Smith’s spokeswoman said the adult movies were X-rated and had scenes of a sexual nature.

“X-rated is not the same as porn,” the spokewoman said, refusing to elaborate. She spoke anonymously in line with government policy and would not release the names of the X-rated movies.

British media reported that the adult movies were watched by Smith’s husband Richard Timney _ who said he was sorry for any embarrassment he caused his wife.

“I can fully understand why people might be angry and offended by this,” he said. “Quite obviously a claim should never have been made for these films, and as you know that money is being paid back.”

Smith is already under investigation by the parliamentary ethics watchdog over the thousands of pounds (dollars) in expenses she has claimed on her home in Redditch, in central England. She says that house is her second home _ with her sister’s home in London being her main residence.

The government backed Smith on Sunday.

“Jacqui Smith has done the right thing by taking steps to rectify this inadvertent mistake as soon as she became aware of it,” Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s office said.

The Home Secretary is in charge of Britain’s police and anti-terror forces, as well as enforcing the country’s immigration and drug laws.

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DOHA, Qatar — Qatar’s leader embraced Sudan’s president in a red-carpet welcome Sunday as he arrived to attend an Arab Summit in his most brazen act of defiance against an international arrest warrant on charges of war crimes in Darfur.

For host Qatar _ a key U.S. ally that is home to American warplanes and more than 5,000 U.S. troops _ the Arab League meeting beginning Monday also showcases its desire to stake out a prominent role in regional affairs even at the risk of angering the West.

Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir had promised to attend the 22-nation gathering after assurances from members they would not enforce the International Criminal Court’s arrest order issued March 4. But his lavish arrival sent an apparent message that al-Bashir will have a center stage role at the two-day meeting.

Wearing a traditional Sudanese robe and white turban, a smiling al-Bashir was greeted at the airport with an embrace and kiss by Qatar’s emir. They later had coffee with the head of the Arab League, Amr Moussa.

It was a low-risk trip for al-Bashir with high symbolic value for his Arab backers, who argue that carrying out the ICC’s arrest would further destabilize Sudan as the Darfur conflict between the Arab-led government and ethnic African rebels enters its seventh year.

Only Jordan and two other tiny Arab League members, the Comoros and Djibouti, are party to the ICC charter, but can take no action on Qatari soil. Arab foreign ministers have endorsed a draft resolution for the summit rejecting the ICC’s arrest warrant.

ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo has said that al-Bashir should be arrested once he leaves Sudanese airspace, but it was unclear whether any military forces were monitoring his flight. The United States does not recognize the ICC’s jurisdiction, citing fears that Americans would be unfairly prosecuted for political reasons. But President Barack Obama earlier this month denounced the “genocide” in Darfur.

The Sudanese government’s battle against rebels in the western Darfur region has killed up to 300,000 people and driven 2.7 million from their homes since 2003, according to the United Nations.

“The president is performing his duties and is going to visit more countries either on bilateral bases or for regional meetings,” said al-Bashir’s foreign policy adviser, Mustafa Osman Ismail. The Sudanese leader also visited Eritrea, Egypt and Libya over the past week.

“What is required from all of us is to stand with our brothers in Sudan and its leadership in order to prevent dangers that affect our collective security,” Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem said.

But the Arab ministers rejected an offer from Sudan to host an emergency Arab summit. Instead, Arab governments promised to increase diplomatic visits to Sudan.

The Doha gathering is another chance for Qatar to enhance its role as a regional broker _ with the growing confidence to occasionally break ranks with traditional regional heavyweights Egypt and Saudi Arabia and their Western allies.

In January, Qatar hosted a Gaza crisis conference that included two leaders sharply at odds with Washington: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal. The following month, Qatar mediated preliminary talks between Sudan’s government and the most powerful Darfur rebel group.

But Qatar’s rulers are careful not to step too far from the Western-leaning fold.

The nation serves as a strategic military hub for U.S. operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Qatari officials who have also invested huge efforts to become an international sports venue _ including bidding for the 2022 World Cup _ worry that a maverick reputation could harm their chances.

Human Rights Watch issued an appeal for Arab leaders to press Sudan to allow the return of 13 foreign humanitarian aid groups expelled in retaliation for the warrant.

The Arab League also “should not reward Sudan’s behavior by supporting a suspension of al-Bashir’s case, which would only encourage further abuses,” said Richard Dicker, director of the group’s international justice program.

___

Associated Press Writer Salah Nasrawi contributed to this report.

(This version CORRECTS that total number of displaced is 2.7 million.)

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