Volcano erupts to form new islet in Japan
Tokyo: A volcano eruption has formed a new islet about 1,000 km south of Tokyo in the Ogasawara chain.
The islet is about 200 meters in diameter and has a maximum elevation of about 20 meters above sea level.
This happened due to the result of an eruption about 500 meters southeast of uninhabited Nishinoshima in the Ogasawara Islands, the Japan Times reported.
The volcanic activity had first been observed at around 10:20 a.m. Wednesday. (ANI)
Two Saudi Arabian men arrested for offering ‘free hugs’ in Riyadh
London: Two Saudi Arabian men have been arrested for offering free hugs to passers-by in the kingdom’s capital, Riyadh.
The Saudi religious police detained the two young men for indulging in exotic practices and offending public order, the BBC reports.
The “Free Hugs Campaign” is a movement that aims to brighten up people”s lives by offering hugs to strangers.
Bandr al-Swed decided to start the campaign in Saudi Arabia, after seeing the same trend in many different countries. He posted a video of himself offering hugs to male strangers on YouTube, where it has received nearly 1.5 million views, the report added.
According to the report, his video inspired the two young Saudis, Abdulrahman al-Khayyal and a friend, who were arrested by the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (CPVPV) for offering hugs, advertised on a placard, in one of Riyadh”s main shopping streets.
The two were asked to sign a pledge that they would not offer hugs again, the report added. (ANI)
‘Ugly’ women more competent for US army jobs, says female colonel
New York: A female US army colonel has called for pictures of only “ugly” women to be used in promotional material because she believes they are more competent than sexy female soldiers.
According to the New York Post, a leaked e-mail revealed that Col. Lynette Arnhart thinks pretty girls should not be used to promote the Army because they look like they wouldn’t want to “break a nail.”
Arnhart is on a panel trying to attract more women into combat roles, the report added. (ANI)
Russian company to send 32 satellites into space
Moscow: Moscow-based operator Kosmotras said Wednesday that it will send a record 32 satellites into space in one launch.
The Dnepr rocket, with a cluster of 32 satellites on board, is to be launched at 11.10 a.m. Thursday from the Yasny-Dombarovsky launch site in Russia’s Orenburg region, Xinhua reported.
Russia is to break the record set by the US Orbital company, who sent 29 satellites into space with a single rocket 0115 GMT Wednesday.
Dnepr is converted from a strategic ballistic missile by Russian and Ukrainian enterprises.
Kosmotras has launched 65 satellites into space with 18 rockets. (IANS)
Now, social network for the dead!
Washington: An Israeli entrepreneur has unveiled a social network for the dead and their relatives to record and preserve their information.
Shelly Furman Asa spent an estimated 40,000 dollars to build “Neshama.info” in order to preserve gravestones in Israel, Fox News reports.
The website is also in English, although names of the deceased can only be searched in Hebrew, Asa said.
He hopes that Neshama, which means soul in Hebrew, will be a way for people to commemorate their loved ones, the report added. (ANI)
Leonardo Da Vinci’s 500-yr-old ‘viola organista’ brought to life
Sydney: A Polish concert pianist has managed to give life to Leonardo Da Vinci’s 500-year-old creation, ‘viola organista’, a bizarre combination of piano and cello.
Slawomir Zubrzycki, who debuted the musical and mechanical work of art at the Academy of Music in the southern Polish city of Krakow, said that the instrument has the characteristics of the harpsichord, the organ and the viola da gamba, the Sydney Morning Herald reported.
The instrument’s surface is painted in a rich midnight blue and its inside is a deep raspberry, with golden swirls painted on the side.
The instrument has 61 steel strings running across it, and each string is attached to the keyboard, complete with smaller black keys for sharp and flat notes. Zubrzycki, who has spent 3 years and 5000 hours on the instrument, added that he hopes he has made da Vinci proud. (ANI)
Morrissey brands ‘airhead’ Kate and ‘thickwit’ Pippa
London: Morrissey has attacked the Duchess of Cambridge branding her an “airhead” and also commented on her sister, calling her a “thickwit”.
In a near 2,000-word blog, the 54-year-old English singer and lyricist targeted William, Kate and Harry and said, “the future of the monarchy rests on the natural idiocy of Harry, zombified William and airhead Kate, is quite frightening”, the Mirror reported
He included Pippa Middleton in his rant, for laughing as she stood over 50 birds shot dead by her friends and herself after a “busy day’s shooting”, and called her a “thickwit”.
The former ‘Smiths’ band member wrote, “there is no outrage since the crassness and international duncery of the British so-called ‘royal family’, remains the great unsaid in British print”, on his blog entitled ‘The World Won’t Listen’.
He added that the “sick face of modern Britain will kill deer, boar, birds – any animal struggling to live, or that gets in her socialite way”.
Morrissey also attacked US TV presenter Melissa Bachman for posing over the carcass of a shot lion and Princess Anne for championing the eating of horsemeat. (ANI)
Most horrible bed-sharing habits revealed
London: From finding other people’s undies in your new boyfriend’s bedroom to farting in bed, a survey has revealed the worst bed-sharing habits.
According to the poll, conducted on 2,000 men and women by UK mattress makers, when new couples share a bed for the first time, it is not necessary that everything will end up being prefect.
Some people complained of dirty sheets, snoring, hogging the duvet and breaking wind on the first night, Metro.co.uk reported. While one man said that his new girlfriend slept with dozens of cuddly toys, another said that his new squeeze could not sleep without the cast of Glee playing in the background. (ANI)
Yahoo sued for allegedly intercepting users’ emails
Sydney: Yahoo has been sued for intercepting emails sent to users of its mail service and using personal information to earn profit from related advertisements.
The claimant, Brian Pincus, is seeking 5000 dollars in damages for each person whose privacy was allegedly invaded, a complaint filed on November 15 in federal court in San Jose, California revealed.
According to the Sydney Morning Herald, the filing said that information collected by scanning communications between users and non-users is used for tailoring advertisements to them, thereby increasing Yahoo’s revenue. The complaint said Yahoo’s automated systems scan and analyse all incoming and outgoing communications content sent and received from your account, the report said. The purpose is to ‘match and serve targeted advertising and for spam and malware detection’. Pincus is seeking to repre-sent non-Yahoo customers whose email was intercep-ted in a class-action, or group lawsuit. (ANI)