PC industry faces tough holiday season in US
It’s looking like it may be a slow holiday season for PC Plus, an independent retailer in Austin, Texas, that sells Toshiba and Acer computers.
Business has dropped off significantly in the past month, says the company’s president, Austin Bollfrass, who blames the decline on consumers’ fears...

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Google offers Silicon Valley home free wireless Internet
Internet giant Google is offering to cloak its home city in Silicon Valley with free wireless “Wi-Fi” computer service, the company confirmed.
Google’s proposal to “unwire the city” will be considered by the Mountain View city council on Tuesday, according to Ellis Berns, manager of economic...

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Man buys virtual space station for $100,000
In one of the largest sales yet of property in an online game, a Miami resident has bought a virtual space station for $100,000 and wants to turn it into a cross between Jurassic Park and a disco.
Jon Jacobs, a director of independent films, plans to call the space resort, in the science-fiction...

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Video game sales take hit
US retail sales of video games in October fell to $365 million, down 24 percent from a year earlier, when publishers released a slew of blockbuster titles, analysts said on Friday.
Citing figures from market researchers NPD Group, analysts said October console game sales were around $294 million,...

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Hackers use Sony BMG to hide on PCs
A computer security firm said on Thursday it had discovered the first virus that uses music publisher Sony BMG’s (6758.T) controversial CD copy-protection software to hide on PCs and wreak havoc.
Under a subject line containing the words “Photo approval,” a hacker has mass-mailed the so-called...

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Poppy goes high-tech
Britain’s remembrance poppies have gone high-tech — digital versions of the red paper flowers are now available for downloading to mobiles.
The poppies’ move into cyberspace is a bid to get younger Britons aware of the sacrifices made by those who fell in battle, the Royal British Legion charity...

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Senior citizen bloggers defy stereotypes
Forget shuffleboard, needlepoint and bingo. Web logs, more often the domain of alienated adolescents and home to screeds by middle-aged pundits, are gaining a foothold as a new leisure-time option for senior citizens.
There’s Dad’s Tomato Garden Journal, Dogwalk Musings, and, of course, the...

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INFO @ Net:
Weekly downloads
Argentum Backup 2.50
Argentum Backup is a handy tray tool that lets you easily backup your documents and folders. It safely protects you from accidental deletes and overwrites. The program is designed to be suitable for both beginners and advanced users. Backups are...

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PC games: 1. The Movies
2. Gun
3. Civilization IV
4. Star Wars: Battlefront II
5. The Matrix: Path of Neo
6. Call of Duty 2
7. ParaWorld
8. Age of Empires III
9. F.E.A.R.
10. Need for Speed Most Wanted

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INFO FAQs:
How do you change the default location of My Document folder?
My Document folder is situated on your C: drive. If you use a separate partition to store all of your data it may be advantageous to move the My Document folder to another location. A further advantage to this move is that, if...

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H E A L T H: China reports new bird flu outbreak
China reported its eighth outbreak of bird flu in less than a month, as Thai authorities rushed to investigate the first confirmed human infection in the capital Bangkok.
China’s latest outbreak, which killed 2,500 birds, occurred in two villages in Jingshan county, part of Hubei province in...

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Asia’s first combined kidney, bone marrow surgery
A team of doctors in Singapore has successfully carried out Asia’s first combined kidney and bone marrow transplant, on a 43-year-old man. Patient Koh Hock Heng did not qualify for a regular kidney transplant because of his leukemia, so surgeons decided to treat the Singaporean by performing both stem...

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Sleepy students perform worse
Staying up an hour or two past bedtime makes it far harder for kids to learn, say scientists who deprived youngsters of sleep and tested whether their teachers could tell the difference. They could.
If parents want their children to thrive academically, “Getting them to sleep on time is as important...

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Aspirin doubles risks of death after brain haemorrhage
Regular use of aspirin doubles the risk of death after a brain haemorrhage, according to a Finnish clinical study. Neurologists at the Oulu University Hospital in northwestern Finland said their findings showed people who suffered brain haemorrhages and regularly used anti-coagulants such as aspirin...

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Some children outgrow nut allergies
Nine percent of children allergic to tree nuts such as almonds and pecans eventually outgrow their allergy, even those who have had severe reactions, researchers said on Wednesday.
And a blood test looking at a tree nut antibody provides a good indicator of when or if a child has lost the allergy,...

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Warning issued for birth-control patch
The Food and Drug Administration warned users of the popular Ortho Evra birth control patch that they are being exposed to more hormones, and are therefore at higher risk of blood clots and other serious side effects, than previously disclosed.
Until now, regulators and patch-maker Ortho McNeil,...

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S C I E N C E: Global warming moved plants northward
An increase in the planet’s temperature 55 million years ago prompted major shifts in plant distribution, researchers reported Thursday. A study of plant fossils from the Bighorn Basin in Wyoming shows the arrival of plants from warm southern areas, displacing those that had been growing there previously,...

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Eskimos try new explosive in whale kill
Eskimo whale hunters are switching from 19th-century black powder to an explosive considered more humane. During a traditional bowhead whale hunt, a hunter in a wooden-ribbed boat hurls a harpoon with a black-powder grenade attached to it. The grenade penetrates near the whale’s blow hole and explodes,...

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Genetic change makes mice thinner
In a discovery with implications for fighting obesity in humans, Canadian scientists have discovered a molecular switch in specially bred laboratory mice that makes the animals skinnier than their normal brethren. The altered mice, which lack a certain gene, have half as much fat as normal mice — and...

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Million-dollar science centre almost complet
Fake lava bursts from a 26-foot volcano at the Bishop Museum’s new $17 million Science Center, which hopes to increase attendance with dramatic new exhibits about the Pacific island chain. Museum officials tout the volcano as one of the nation’s leading exhibits, as reporters toured the 16,500-square-foot...

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Micronesia settled at least 5,000 years ago
New evidence found in the Northern Mariana Islands suggests human settlement in the Pacific islands of Micronesia began at least 5,000 years ago, researchers said. The earliest documented archaeological sites in the US-administered territory are Saipan’s Unai Achugao site from 1800 BC or 3,800 years...

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