CHICAGO (Reuters) - A revolutionary bodysuit has divided the world of swimming into the haves and the have nots just weeks before the Beijing Olympics, testing relationships between federations, athletes and rival suppliers.

Slunečné počasí láká v létě všechny výletníky i rodiny s dětmi k návštěvě některého z našich mnoha zámků. Historické interiéry a nádherné zahrady nabízejí relaxaci a skýtají představu o tom, jak žili naši předkové.

Pokud vláda přes léto nenavýší minimální mzdu a tarify pro platy ve státní a veřejné správě, podá ČSSD vlastní návrh na jejich navýšení. Minimální mzda by se měla zvýšit o 1500 na 9500 korun a tarify o zhruba sedm až osm procent. Řekl to poslanec Zdeněk Škromach (ČSSD). Minimální mzda se naposledy navyšovala za vlády ČSSD v roce 2006.

Vysoké škole ekonomické se dostalo významného mezinárodního ocenění. V celosvětovém projektu Eduniversal vedeném francouzskou konzultantskou firmou SMBG byla pražská VŠE hodnocena jako škola s univerzálním mezinárodním vlivem. Zároveň si vysloužila nejlepší hodnocení nejen v rámci České republiky, ale i celé východní Evropy.

Jak funguje program Erasmus a co konkrétně studentů nabízí jsme vám popsali v minulých třech dílech. Pokud vás erasmácká nabídka dostatečně nalákala a jste odhodláni vycestovat do zahraničí za novými zážitky, čtěte pozorně dál – v následujícím díle vám přinášíme zkušenosti studentů, kteří již mají zahraniční pobyt za sebou.

The music of performer 50 Cent has zero appeal to me, but the man is undoubtedly smart, as the following words (via TorrentFreak) attest:

Q: “How are G-Unit Records doing in these times of file-sharing?

“Not so good….The advances in technology impacts everyone, and we all must adapt. Most of all hip-hop, a style of music dependent upon a youthful audience. This market consists of individuals embracing innovations faster than the fans of classical and jazz music.”

“What is important for the music industry to understand is that this really doesn’t hurt the artists.”

“A young fan may be just as devout and dedicated no matter if he bought it or stole it.”

“The concerts are crowded and the industry must understand that they have to manage all the 360 degrees around an artist. They, (the industry), have to maximize their income from concerts and merchandise. It is the only way they can get their marketing money back.”

“The main problem is that the artists are not getting as much help developing as before file-sharing. They are now learning to peddle ringtones, not records..They don’t understand the value of a perfect piece of art.”

The key parts: file sharing doesn’t hurt the artist, concert and merchandise sales are the key to profiting from music, not direct music sales and the music industry is clueless and busy peddling ringtones. Now if only the record industry would pay attention. Those looking to support 50 Cent can find his works on BTJunkie here.

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

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God is a hot niche category on the Internet right now. Long ago we covered GodTube, a YouTube for Jesus types. More recently News Corp bought BeliefNet, a news and community site for Christians.

So the timing for LifeInTheFishBowl is spot on. It’s a social network and content site for Christians. It’s still in development but you can sign up for the site on the home page, read their blog and watch an overview video, below. By the look of things, they really need a web designer.

You’ll enjoy the site if you want to hang out with like minded people and debate Darwin v. the Bible, etc. But even better, these sites tend to attract women in droves. Sure, Facebook is almost 2/3 women, but Christian focused sites tend to be even more women dominated (BeliefNet’s au­dience is 70% women). So if you are Christian, or want to pretend you are Christian to date women, sign up for LifeInTheFishBow­l now.

Also, if you’re Lutheran, you can get on the board of directors of the company. Founder Joe Burnham writes “I’m writing because I’m looking for young Lutheran (http://lcms.org) geeks who might be interested in being part of the projects Board of Directors. We’re not asking for a huge commitment time wise, but we’d like to have some younger, tech savvy input as the project continues to develop over time.” Not sure why you have to be Lutheran as opposed to one of the other Christian cults, but those are the rules. And since God is backing this startup, those stock options just might be worth something some day.

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

We’ve now had five 2008 presidential candidates on TechCrunch: Senator Obama, Senator Edwards, Governor Romney Senator McCain and now Senator Mike Gravel. As always, we are posting this simultaneously on TalkCrunch, where you can subscribe to the RSS feed and get the podcasts as enclosures.

Senator Gravel is a far left Democrat. In many ways he’s to the Democrats what Ron Paul is the the Republicans – he keeps them honest and frustrates the hell out of them by being vocal about issues that they’d rather not shine a spotlight on. For his views on mainstream political issues, see the video of his talk at Google a couple of months ago. He’s anti war, but he’s also in favor of, for example, selling marijuana at the local liquor store (yeah I know, that’s awesome – make a donation to his campaign here).

But in our talk we focused only on technology policy issues. And on these issues he’s surprisingly mainstream. In general he’s a supporter of Net Neutrality and fair rules in the spectrum allocations. He wants to help bridge the digital divide and he wants to support alternative energy science – in fact he’s the only candidate so far who’s said explicitly that he’d like to see a tax on carbon emissions. And if you’re in need of engineers you’ll love Senator Gravel – he’s in favor of eliminating the quota on H1B visas. Actually, he’s in favor of wide open borders and free immigration, but we got off topic in the podcast for a bit.

On a lighter note, Gravel is the first of the five candidates who says he’s a Mac guy. He switched this year and loves it. He’s also embraced YouTube and other user generated content sites. In one video he looks silently at the camera for a minute or so, then goes and throws a rock in a lake (see the transcript for his explanation). In another he actually raps, talking about the fact that the Democratic party is trying to keep him quiet:

So, yeah, he’s a little crazy. But the man speaks his mind and leaves little doubt about his position on issues. I enjoyed the conversation immensely, which went on for more than forty minutes, and I’m glad it was recorded to share it with TechCrunch readers. Listen to the podcast below or on TalkCrunch, and the transcript is at the end of the post.

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<![CDATA[ Rich Kulawiec writes in after digging a bit deeper into a well publicized study done for Verizon, claiming that most Americans have a false sense of security on their computers. Digging a little deeper, you realize that the „study“ is really a marketing ploy for a new security service Verizon is offering with RadialPoint (oddly, this seems to come just two months after Verizon announced a different security service). As for this new offering, there's a free scan and then a subscription service. Of course, in order to run the security scan on your computer you need to: (1) be running windows (2) disable your pop-up blocker and (3) run IE. As Kulawiec notes, „none of which are good ideas for anyone who actually cares about security.“ Kulawiec then went to check out the terms of service for the subscription offering and found some questionable claims:

a. You acknowledge, agree and consent to the following: (i)
the Radialpoint Software, in its default configuration, does
not block ads from third parties or Verizon or its affiliates
and business partners, and may not identify as spyware certain
websites and applications from Verizon and its affiliates or
business partners,

and

(ii) Radialpoint Inc. and/or Verizon and
its affiliates have the right and do access and modify the
Software as well as the software (including registry settings
on your computer) and/or your hardware for various purposes
in connection with the Service (e.g. for the installation and
implementation of the Software and updates to it) as well as
to download, install and/or gather, obtain, collect and then
use, in relation to the delivery and operation of Services,
various information and data, including information necessary
to identify you and your computer to ensure that Services are
received as well as information necessary for the reporting of
these services , and (iii) use of such information and data by
Verizon will be in accordance with Verizon's privacy policy.

 

That certainly sounds like Verizon won't block spyware from ad partners and will also spy on you and report the data back to Verizon. Yikes. No wonder people's computers aren't as secure as they think. If they're installing Verizon's anti-spyware offering, the company's own terms of service make it clear that you're basically opening up your computer to them. As for not blocking partner company's spyware, that's the same thing that Yahoo got into trouble over years ago – but apparently Verizon hopes people have forgotten.

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<![CDATA[ Anyone that watches late night television is constantly reminded of America's growing beltline. To combat our obesity epidemic, infomercials abound with the latest exercise gizmos that promise to make us all fitter. But, most of these gadgets end up gathering dust in the corner since they don't do anything to motivate us to actually use them. So, need help getting off that couch? Have your computer call you. Stanford researchers have found that an automated computer message reminding people to get out and exercise is nearly as effective as a human counselor. People who were called by the computer exercised an average of 157 minutes per week, as compared to 118 minutes for the people who weren't called. Not bad – if only someone could figure out how to actually get the computer to do the exercising, that would truly be the killer app.

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