Download MediaPortal (Windows)

Windows only: Turn your PC into a full-fledged media center with MediaPortal, an open-source alternative to Microsoft's own Media Center Edition OS.

MediaPortal can play, record and timeshift TV; play videos and DVDs; run photo slideshows; play your music library and FM radio; show local weather; and much more. In short, it offers everything a good media-center application should, all wrapped in a friendly, attractive interface. It even comes with open-source MPEG-2 decoders, a nice extra for systems that don't already have one.
>>Download here

Design a logo of letters

Design magazine Before & After shows you how to turn letters into a logo using a variety of techniques.

These include creating a mid-letter crossbar, removing part of a letter's stroke, interlocking letters and more. The examples are all colorfully illustrated within the tutorial, which also includes the fonts and colors in case you want to crib them for your own design. This professional-quality guide is actually an 18-page PDF that's free to download. >>Check it Here

Download of the day: reSizer (Win)

Manage windows from keyboard and kill the mouse.
Windows only: Freeware system tray utility reSizer provides keyboard shortcuts to help you resize and organize your open windows from the comfort of your keyboard.
Keyboard shortcuts for moving and resizing active windows.
Change the opacity and always-on-top properties.
Instant window placement to fit specific areas on the screen.
Faster-switching between visible applications only.
User-definable application shortcut mappings.
Multimonitor support.

Using your Windows key in conjunction with other keys, you can change your window's location, size, and transparency (seems like every system tray app throws in transparency these days), among a few other features. I've been using GridMove ever since we posted it in September for quick and easy window sizing, but if you're looking for a different flavor with a few more features, reSizer may be worth checking out and Download Now

Drug Testing on the Poor

This one-eyed child was born in early August at the Kasturba Gandhi Hospital for Women and Children in Chennai, India. The baby girl, diagnosed with a rare chromosomal disorder known as cyclopia, was born with a single eye in the center of her forehead, no nose and her brain fused into a single hemisphere.
Photo: Scott Carney

You know, just when I thought I have seen everything, I stumble upon this incredible story and horrifying at the same time.

The horrifying thing is that this one-eyed baby appears to have been born not by natural causes (rare chromosomal disorder), but because of possible exposure to a new drug being tested by numerous American pharmaceutical companies as a possible cancer treatment drug. The drug in question is called CYCLOPAMINE. The connection to this drug came out from a internal hospital report that mentioned the drug by name as a possible cause for the deformity.

Child without Pain

The Pakistani boy and six relatives had mutations in a single gene that left them incapable of experiencing pain, even though their sense of touch was normal.
All have suffered severe injuries as a result of not feeling pain, and the performer died on his 14th birthday after jumping from a roof.
Their cases, however, are of huge medical significance and could help millions of people who suffer intractable pain.
The discovery of a single gene that can switch painful stimuli on and off without affecting other body systems raises the prospect of a new class of analgesics with none of the side-effects of conventional painkilling drugs.

The gene, SCN9A, is responsible for making a protein called a voltage-gated sodium channel, which seems essential to pain perception. In normal people, this protein is found in high concentrations at the end of pain-sensing neurons. When a painful stimulus is felt, the protein amplifies it and excites the neuron, sending an electrical signal to the brain.
The mutation disrupts this process, making the sodium channel protein useless. Painful stimuli thus fail to reach the pain-sensing neurons, and no signal is sent to the brain.

The discovery, by a team led by Geoffrey Woods of the University of Cambridge, is particularly exciting because the abnormality appears to have no adverse effects in the children with the mutation, apart from the dangers that come with pain insensitivity.

This suggests that a drug that blocked the protein's activity could fight pain without the side effects that are produced by all the main analgesics available today.
The findings also raise the prospect that other, smaller variations in the SCN9A gene could influence the way different people have different thresholds of pain tolerance.
In the research, published in the journal Nature, Dr Woods's team identified the mutated SCN9A gene in six related children, who were aged between four and 14 when examined. The performer died before he could be tested, but his mother carried the mutation and Dr Woods believed he had it.

They were of normal intelligence and otherwise healthy, and could feel other tactile stimuli such as touch, pressure, temperature and tickling. "All six affected individuals had never felt any pain," Dr Woods said. "They would bump into things as they didn't get hurt, they were covered in bruises. They wear out their bodies. Life without pain sounds like a blessing, but it isn't."

Source: The Times

Parasite That Gives And Takes Away Sex Appeal

In short, it can make men behave like alley cats and women behave like sex kittens." "Infected men have lower IQs, achieve a lower level of education and have shorter attention spans. They are also more likely to break rules and take risks ... and are deemed less attractive to women. "On the other hand, infected women tend to be more outgoing, friendly, more promiscuous, and are considered more attractive to men. "

Source:www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,20977296-29677,00.html

Saddam called on Iraqis not to hate the U.S.

Saddam Hussein called on Iraqis not to hate the U.S.-led forces that invaded Iraq in 2003 in a farewell letter posted on a Web site Wednesday, a day after an appeals court upheld the former dictator's death sentence and ordered him to be hanged within one month.

One of Saddam's attorneys, Issam Ghazzawi, confirmed to The Associated Press in Jordan that the letter was authentic, saying it was written by Saddam on Nov. 5 — the day he was convicted by an Iraqi tribunal for ordering the killings of scores of Shiite Muslims in the city of Dujail in 1982. >> Read Here

Sex ID, How your Mind Works

Some researchers say that men can have 'women's brains' and that women can think more like men. A series of visual challenges and questions used by psychologists in the BBC One television series
Find it here(bbc)

2007 is around, what are your resolutions

When the clock strikes twelve on December 31st,
people all over the world cheer and wish each other a very Happy New Year.
For some, this event is no more than a change of a calendar.
For others, the New Year symbolizes the beginning of a better tomorrow.
So, if you look forward to a good year ahead, spread happiness with these wonderful
New Year Wishes
2007, its knocking...
What are your resolutions for 2007 or how this year will be

Post your comments...!

Dreams, God's forgotten language- analysis

Acquiring the ability to interpret your dreams is a powerful tool. In analyzing your dreams, you can learn about your deep secrets and hidden feelings. No one is a better expert at interpreting your dreams than yourself. Every dream of yours suggests something. Find out A-Z meaning of your dreams in Dream Analysis.

To see the letter "A" in your dream, represents superiority. You are moving on to something new and grand. Alternatively, it may indicate the name or initial of a person

>>ReadMore

Beware: Cola Drinkers, Body Effects

In The First 10 minutes: 10 teaspoons of sugar hit your system. (100% of your recommended daily intake.) You don’t immediately vomit from the overwhelming sweetness because phosphoric acid cuts the flavor allowing you to keep it down.

20 minutes: Your blood sugar spikes, causing an insulin burst. Your liver responds to this by turning any sugar it can get its hands on into fat. (There’s plenty of that at this particular moment)

40 minutes: Caffeine absorption is complete. Your pupils dialate, your blood pressure rises, as a response your livers dumps more sugar into your bloodstream. The adenosine receptors in your brain are now blocked preventing drowsiness.

45 minutes: Your body ups your dopamine production stimulating the pleasure centers of your brain. This is physically the same way heroin works, by the way.

60 minutes: The phosphoric acid binds calcium, magnesium and zinc in your lower intestine, providing a further boost in metabolism. This is compounded by high doses of sugar and artificial sweeteners also increasing the urinary excretion of calcium.

60 Minutes: The caffeine’s diuretic properties come into play. (It makes you have to pee.) It is now assured that you’ll evacuate the bonded calcium, magnesium and zinc that was headed to your bones as well as sodium, electrolyte and water.

60 minutes: As the rave inside of you dies down you’ll start to have a sugar crash. You may become irritable and/or sluggish. You’ve also now, literally, pissed away all the water that was in the Cola. But not before infusing it with valuable nutrients your body could have used for things like even having the ability to hydrate your system or build strong bones and teeth.

Therefore, to resume what was just written, drinking cola is just like filling up your car's gas tank with dangerous super-fuel. It will give you a little boost of energy for a short while, but in the long term, your engine will suffer from it.
(orangish)