Weird News of the World Thread

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

Oops, got that mixed up then. I knew something was killing the reefs. Gotta check my facts first next time

 

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

Man Who Ate Anonymous Tip Faces Up to Two Weeks In Jail

The executive director of Miami-Dade's Crime Stoppers defended the identity of his clients in court yesterday when, instead of turning over an anonymous tip to Judge Victoria Brennan, he began tearing up the paper and eating it.

The clip is a real marvel.

[YT]9J9huqJXuBE[/YT]

Judge Brennan found Richard Masten in contempt of court and could send him to jail for two weeks. However, Masten stands by his decision.

"We promise the people who give us information to solve murders, serious violent crimes in this community, that they can call with an assurance that they will remain anonymous and that nothing about them or their information would ever be compromised," he said. "The case today started creeping into that... it's not going to happen on my watch and I understood the consequences."
Masten was ordered to share the tip without the source—like a chip without the sauce—but maybe he was just confused. Or hungry.

http://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local/Miami-Dade-Crime-Stoppers-Head-Arrested-250351751.html

I can understand if they were trying to make him reveal the source but I don't get why he would do this when they didn't ask him to do so

 

[Teelie]

I think he was being a little too proactive there.

 

[KevanG]

It anonymous and he didn't want to divulge the identity but the judge ordered the information without the source so he ate the paper that had the info?

Am I missing something?

 

[Teelie]

That's right. He was told to give the information but not the source of the information.

 

[KevanG]

Then what was the problem? I don't really see an issue, it was to be given but the source behind it wouldn't be given so they should be, in theory, be protected.

 

[Teelie]

I re-read it again and I think this is why he did it, "nothing about them or their information would ever be compromised." Still seems excessive.

 

[KevanG]

I'm sure he could have just refused as it should be protected information and the judge shouldn't be able to force it without a full court order. (I think?)

 

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

Lego Robot With a Smartphone Brain Shatters Rubik's Cube World Record

Cubestormer 3 is a robot with just one job—to solve a scrambled Rubik's Cube as swiftly as possible. Today, at the Big Bang Fair in Birmingham, UK, it did the task in an astounding 3.253 seconds, faster than any human or robot in the world. Just look at that thing go.

The third-generation robot was built by co-inventors David Gilday and Mike Dobson for pure, blistering speed. The Samsung Galaxy S4 brain is tricked out with an Exynos octa-core processor, with four Cortex-A15 and four Cortex-A7 processors controlling eight Lego Mindstorms actuators. It's basically the SR-71 Blackbird of Rubik's Cube bots. Gilday said, "we knew Cubestormer 3 had the potential to beat the existing record but with the robot performing physical operations quicker than the human eye can see there's always an element of risk." Yeah. That fast.

The smartphone brain analyzes the cube's starting arrangement, then instructs four robot arms to carry out each step needed to get the cube to its solved state. Since the robot uses a speed cube, which allows twisting moves even when the sides aren't perfectly aligned, the robot hands must be amazingly precise to move so smoothly and quickly.

As for the previous robot record, it was held by Cubestormer 2, which clocked in at 5.27 seconds. The world record human solver could only muster a 5.55 second run back in 2013. Clearly, the robot takeover is gaining speed.

Crazy fast

 

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

Graphene Could Give You Predator-Vision Contact Lenses One Day

Imagine a future where your contact lenses gave you Predator vision. One day, it might happen, thanks to graphene.

Researchers at the University of Michigan have developed the first room-temperature light detector that can see the entire infrared spectrum of colors. And it can be small and compact, because graphene is insane and only one atom thick. Before now, however, it hadn't been a viable tool for detecting infrared light because it's so thin and can't pick up the electrical signal of that type of light wavelength. But U Michigan's crack team of resesarchs developed a new way of picking up these signals. Phys.org explains:

To make the device, they put an insulating barrier layer between two graphene sheets. The bottom layer had a current running through it. When light hit the top layer, it freed electrons, creating positively charged holes. Then, the electrons used a quantum mechanical trick to slip through the barrier and into the bottom layer of graphene. The positively charged holes, left behind in the top layer, produced an electric field that affected the flow of electricity through the bottom layer. By measuring the change in current, the team could deduce the brightness of the light hitting the graphene. The new approach allowed the sensitivity of a room-temperature graphene device to compete with that of cooled mid-infrared detectors for the first time.
The takeaway is that the pinky fingernail-sized device could one day find its way into your contact lenses, giving you heat vision at will. Yes, this is a very pie-in-the-sky idea that will likely never actually happen. Then again, that's what they said about a team of elite commandos taking on a dreadlocked alien hunter deep in the Val Verde rainforest.

http://phys.org/news/2014-03-thermal-vision-graphene-detector-span.html

I really want this to happen

 

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

School Bans Bullied 9-year-old From Carrying My Little Pony Lunchbag

A 9-year-old My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic fan won't be allowed to bring his favorite lunch sack to school anymore because administrators say it's a bully magnet that leads to class disruptions.

Grayson Bruce says he's been bullied before at his North Carolina elementary school, but it's gotten worse since he started carrying a Rainbow Dash bag.

"They're taking it a little too far, with punching me, pushing me down, calling me horrible names, stuff that really shouldn't happen," he told Asheville ABC affiliate WLOS.

The school says it's "continuing to take steps" to stop the bullying. But the first step it took was to tell Grayson last Thursday that he had to leave his pony gear at home because it's "a trigger for bullying."

Grayson's mom, Noreen Bruce, disagrees.

"Saying a lunchbox is a trigger for bullying, is like saying a short skirt is a trigger for rape. It's flawed logic, it doesn't make any sense," she told WLOS.

She's campaigning for punishment for Grayson's bullies, and for her son to be allowed to bring My Little Pony stuff to school again. And she's not alone. A Facebook page started by Grayson's friends caught the attention of the brony community, and he now has nearly 16,000 fans supporting him.

http://www.wlos.com/shared/news/features/top-stories/stories/wlos_-school-bully-concerns-15463.shtml

Dude should be able to bring whatever he wants to school without fear of being singled out, ridiculous the school banned him from bringing it

 

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

Men Claim NYPD Arrested Them for Not Handing Over White Castle

Two men who claim they were arrested after refusing to give cops their White Castle sliders are now suing the NYPD.

On Halloween 2012, Danny Maisonet and Kenneth Glover said they were walking through Coney Island when they passed a group of NYPD officers. The cops, who were in the midst of detaining a group of suspected post-Hurricane Sandy looters, allegedly demanded the two hand over their burgers. Maisonet and Glover refused.

The police officers reportedly beat the two with flashlights and arrested them. Officer Angelo Pizzarro later claimed the two stood in his way and prevented him from dealing with the alleged looters.

Maisonet and Glover were initially charged with obstructing government administration officials and disorderly conduct, though all charges were later dismissed. No word on what happened to the burgers.

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/brooklyn/brooklyn-men-sue-nypd-white-castle-article-1.1722336

I don't see how they can prove this in a court of law but I'd be pissed if they tried to steal my White Castle too haha

 

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

Huge part of a Delta airliner's wing breaks off at takeoff

The panel reportedly came loose and fell off as the plane lifted off from Orlando yesterday afternoon. According to Delta spokesman Anthony Black, the panel did not influence the aircraft's ability to fly and did not put any of the 179 passengers at risk. Still, the plane requested, and was granted, priority landing clearance and set down without any issue in Atlanta at 7:30 last night. There's still no word on why, exactly, that panel fell off in the first place.

My dad is a captain for Delta and flies this exact route all the time. I can assure you that they make them re-certify and get tested every 9 months for basically any kind of catastrophe. They earn their paychecks and this plane was never in any danger, but man would that freak me out if I was sitting there and saw that

 

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

Watch a scuba diver instantly put a shark to sleep with this neat trick

You should probably never try this when you go scuba diving but watch this scuba diver turned shark whisperer instantly immobilize a shark and put it to sleep with a touch of the nose. The diver uses a technique called tonic immobility, he basically holds the sweet spot on the shark's nose to put it in a trance.

[YT]Ak4hk8JrQdU[/YT]

He is Aquaman!

 

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

Sushi chef makes miniature sushi with a single grain of rice

Sushi is at its most delicious when it's simple. Obviously years of training is required to become a master sushi chef and details matter immensely but you can boil down the essence of sushi to rice and fish. Yum, however you slice it. But could you make sushi even simpler? One sushi chef did. He used a single grain of rice to create flavor packed nibbles.

It's so ridiculous that it sounds like a report from The Onion but it's actually from Reuters, watch below:

[YT]_flJuyaAVnw[/YT]

Mmmm sushi

 

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

Man Gets Revenge on Scammer by Texting Him Entire Works of Shakespeare

If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if we pay you for a PlayStation 3 and you never deliver, do we not spam your phone with Shakespeare until you submit?

Graphic designer Edd Joseph, of Bristol, U.K., is putting on his own personal revenge play after the gaming console he bought on Gumtree (basically the British Craiglist) never showed up.

After trying to cancel the sale—he couldn't, because he'd paid by direct bank transfer—and contacting the police to no avail, he came up with an ingenious plan. Copying and pasting passages from the web into a text message doesn't cost anything, so he sent his nemesis the complete text of 22 Shakespeare plays.

Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello, and more have blown up the scammer's phone with 17,424 texts, costing Joseph exactly nothing.

He's started to get responses, too.

"I got the first reply after an hour, and then a few more abusive messages after that. His phone must have been going off pretty constantly for hours," he told the Bristol Post, "But recently he has taken to calling me and giving me abuse on the phone. I tried to ask him if he was enjoying the plays, but he was very confused."

"I'm not a literary student, and I'm not an avid fan of Shakespeare but I've got a new appreciation you could say," Joseph added. "Especially for the long ones."

Update: To clarify, Joseph's phone carrier splits long messages into multiple texts—so he only needed to copy and paste 22 times.

http://www.bristolpost.co.uk/Bristol-man-gets-revenge-texting-works/story-20823040-detail/story.html

Pretty good way to annoy someone

 

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

British Jury Couldn't Stop Laughing About Defendant's Penis Size

The jury in the trial of a British publicist accused of sexual assault had to be dismissed from the courtroom today after they couldn't stop laughing about testimony concerning the defendant's two-and-a-half inch penis.

Max Clifford, the defendant in the case, is a publicist accused of assaulting seven women, including today's witness who testified the 70-year-old assaulted her in the 1980's when she was trying to make it as a model.

The woman said when she was 17 and trying to break into the modeling world, Clifford took advantage of her, groping her, *********ing, and possibly ejaculating on her before trying to pimp her out to Cubby Broccoli in exchange for a role in a James Bond film.

But according to court testimony, Clifford, who once claimed to have slept with Diana Ross, was so poorly endowed that even his victims made jokes about his size.

The woman said in her evidence she thought Clifford was well-endowed and his penis was very large. "I had only seen one before, I had never seen one in that proximity and that situation."

The court has heard claims that his penis is "tiny" and no more than two-and-a-half inches when erect. When Richard Horwell QC, defending, asked her about the issue, the woman remarked: "I have a small mouth. I do, my dentist has always said."
The judge then had to dismiss the jury for a "few minutes" so they could compose themselves, saying, "It is inevitable in a case dealing with this sort of graphic detail that members of the jury want to burst out laughing."

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...y-sent-out-by-judge-for-laughing-9200015.html

Imagine being laughed at by an entire courtroom

 

[Superwoman Prime]

British Jury Couldn't Stop Laughing About Defendant's Penis Size



http://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...y-sent-out-by-judge-for-laughing-9200015.html

Imagine being laughed at by an entire courtroom

He's aroused by humiliation. He went to great lengths to have many of his female clients criticize his penis.

Lol. Great lengths.

 

[Doctor Evo]

The reefs dying off is due to increased acidification of the water which is the result of increasing temperatures from the amount of CO2 and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere warming the oceans up.

At least that is the broad, simplified way I've read it explained as.

Warming isn't lowering ocean pH. Carbon dioxide is causing both warming AND acidification, however.

 

[KevanG]

Man Gets Revenge on Scammer by Texting Him Entire Works of Shakespeare



http://www.bristolpost.co.uk/Bristol-man-gets-revenge-texting-works/story-20823040-detail/story.html

Pretty good way to annoy someone

He deserves it. That's the reason I only pay with Paypal or through websites, so if some jackass decides to screw me over I get my money back.

 

[Mike_D202]

Men Claim NYPD Arrested Them for Not Handing Over White Castle



http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/brooklyn/brooklyn-men-sue-nypd-white-castle-article-1.1722336

I don't see how they can prove this in a court of law but I'd be pissed if they tried to steal my White Castle too haha

They were probably acting like drunk fools and yelling crap towards the people involved in the situation. Happens all the time where I work. They were probably asked to move along and they had a "I'm not doing anything wrong I don't have to do what you say" attitude.

 

[Teelie]

Warming isn't lowering ocean pH. Carbon dioxide is causing both warming AND acidification, however.

I did say simplified. I worded it poorly but at least I managed to get the broad strokes right. t:

 

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

Mom Turns Herself Into a Human Speed Bump to Save Kids in Runaway Car

A Massachusetts mom threw herself under a car and used her body as a speed bump to save her two-year-old twin daughters earlier this month.

Twenty-two-year-old Mindy Tran thought she had parked her Honda at her apartment building when she got out to lock her front door. But to her horror, the car—parked at the top of a steep hill leading to a busy street—began to roll away.

Tran threw herself under the car, slowing it down enough for a neighbor to jump in and get the girls out. Firefighters had to free Tran, and she was airlifted to the hospital with a broken leg and dislocated shoulder and hip.

"My daughters are my everything and I don't want to see my daughters in the hospital, and I knew at that time it was either mine or theirs," Tran told WCVB.

Tran, who had just moved to the apartment from a homeless shelter, is facing more surgery, but should be out of the hospital in a few weeks. She's currently in a wheelchair but said she's confident she'll be able to walk again.

"It was all for my kids. I'm just glad my kids are fine," Tran said.

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlin...-speed-bump-to-save-daughters-in-rolling-car/

That, my friends, is some hardcore parenting

 

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

Mentally Ill Homless Man “Basically Baked to Death” in NYC Jail

A mentally ill homeless man "basically baked to death" in a New York City jail cell last month, according to a report in the Associated Press.

Four city officials told the AP that Jerome Murdough, a 56-year-old homeless man charged with trespassing, didn't open a vent in his cell at Rikers Island's observation unit for inmates with mental illnesses. Mudough was prescribed anti-psychotic and anti-seizure medications.

Hours reportedly passed before any officials checked in on Mudough, violating the city's protocol.

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/apnewsbreak-nyc-inmate-baked-death-cell

What a horrible way to go, why did he need to vent his cell? Shouldn't anything that is going to kill him already be done so you don't have to worry about it?

 

[Teelie]

Mom Turns Herself Into a Human Speed Bump to Save Kids in Runaway Car

Spoiler

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlin...-speed-bump-to-save-daughters-in-rolling-car/

That, my friends, is some hardcore parenting

Not quite taking a bullet for someone but it's close enough.