*sigh*

Standing up too suddenly, I jerked the cord to my headphones and damaged the right ear. Dammit. Now I have to buy another set. And this pair cost $15 as it was.

Maybe I should just buy some computer speakers and be done with it. (Mind you, this would be for the computer at work.)

Howard Stern: Newsman

FCC Says Shock-Jock Sterns Qualifies as Newsman

Even though shock jock Howard Stern's radio and television show features scantily clad women and raunchy chatter, regulators on Tuesday ruled it a news program, exempting it from equal time rules on political coverage.

The staff decision by the Federal Communications Commission opens the way for the show to book two of the sexier candidates for California governor: Hollywood he-man Arnold Schwarzenegger and porn-star Mary Carey.

A media watchdog group immediately denounced the FCC ruling, calling it a reversal of decades of U.S. media regulation designed to promote fairness in election coverage and an informed public debate on government policy.

Executives at Infinity Broadcasting, which owns Stern's home station WXRK in New York, had been concerned that an appearance by either candidate would have required the show to make time for the more than 130 candidates running in California's hectic Oct. 7 election.

[...] The equal opportunity provision of the Communications Act of 1934 requires broadcasters to treat political candidates equally when selling or giving away air time, although regulators had made exceptions for news programs such as "Meet the Press" and "Face the Nation."

"We expected the commission to rule favorably and we're pleased with the result," said Dana McClintock, a spokesman for Infinity Broadcasting.

In a written ruling, the FCC's Media Bureau also said that other broadcasters airing programs that qualify as news programming, such as "The Howard Stern Show," would not need to seek its approval before airing interviews with candidates.

The FCC staff said that the Stern show had qualified under the law because it was regularly scheduled and that Infinity had decided which guests to book based on their newsworthiness, without looking to advance any particular candidate.

[...] Although the California governor's race is being watched by much of the nation as a kind of political comedy, the FCC decision sets a serious and dangerous precedent that would allow local broadcasters to favor certain candidates or air interviews with only those deemed most entertaining, the head of the watchdog group said.

"You shouldn't let the oddity of the California election eviscerate 75 years of sound legal principles," said Andrew Jay Schwartzman, president of Media Access. "As this applies to local radio and city council elections, it is not funny at all."

Noting that the Communications Act was meant to provide an exemption for "bona fide" news programming, Schwartzman said, "When guests are selected by the size of their bust, it is not bona fide news programming."

move over, dyslexia

Math Trouble Linked to Brain Coding System

If you're bad at math, it may be because you have an abnormal brain.

A learning disability that affects five percent of the population could be caused by abnormalities in an area of the brain involved in understanding numbers, a leading scientist said on Wednesday.

Dyscalculia impairs a person's ability to learn mathematical skills. Sufferers have problems with adding, subtracting, mental arithmetic and other numerical tasks.

Dr Stanislas Dehaene, of the French medical research institute INSERM, used brain imaging techniques to detect a coding system used in the brain to understand the quantity a number represents, which has shed new light on dyscalculia.

"We think we understand now what the code is in this area," he told the British Association for the Advancement of Science conference.

Animal research has shown that neurones in the brain are tuned to numbers such as three or five, which scientists said is useful for keeping track of their young or for foraging for food. Dehaene and his colleagues found a similar coding system exists in humans.

( Read more... )

what a way to go.

S. Korean Man Kills Himself at WTO Protests

A South Korean activist stabbed himself and died on Wednesday in violent anti-capitalism protests at a World Trade Organization meeting in Mexico's Caribbean beach resort of Cancun.

Reporters saw the man climb up onto a high security fence and wave a banner that read "WTO Kills Farmers." He then stabbed himself in the chest.

The South Korean man, in his 50s, was carried away and treated for his injuries but later died in hospital.