Google and Facebook in bidding war over Waze travel app company
The travel app company Waze is believed to be the subject of a billion-dollar bidding war between Google and Facebook, in a move apparently aimed at tying its social functions more closely into the rival firms’ networks.
A fortnight ago reports suggested that Facebook had bid $1bn for the business, in order to wrap the “social travel” element into its billion-strong social network. But those initial approaches seem to have been rebuffed – and now Google is said to have entered the fray.
Any buyout by Google or Facebook c [...]
Two held after plane alert over UK
24 May 2013
Last updated at 10:14 ET
Two men have been arrested after RAF Typhoon jets were launched to escort a passenger plane travelling from Pakistan to the UK, police have said.
Officers boarded Pakistan International Airlines flight PK709, which had been due to land at Manchester, after it was diverted to Stansted Airport.
Two men are being held on suspicion of endangerment of an aircraft, Essex Police said.
They said the men had been removed from the plane.
The plane, flight number PK709, reportedly left Lahore at [...]
A new kind of terror comes to Britain
One minute, a London street bustles with cars and shoppers. The next, a young soldier lies beheaded upon the ground. A blood drenched terrorist speaks confidently into the camera: “You people will never be safe.” This wasn’t Baghdad; this was London, May 22, 2013.
For a long time now, the UK has faced a serious threat from Sunni Islamist terrorism. There were the July 7, 2005, bombings and the failed attacks that followed just two weeks later.
There was the 2006 conspiracy to blow up transatlantic passenger planes.
There wa [...]
Vermont fights back against ‘patent trolls’
Vermont’s new law gives entrepreneurs in the state more leverage to fight back against unfair patent infringement claims.
Vermont, a patent-rich state, is cracking down on so-called “patent trolling,” a growing problem for entrepreneurs nationwide.
Patent trolls, experts say, typically snap up patents in droves. Their goal isn’t to create products themselves, but to make money by pursuing dubious infringement claims against businesses that supposedly encroach on their patents. They threaten businesses with huge [...]
‘Froch’s a real fighter, ready for hell’
Mikkel Kessler can sense the darkness rolling towards him. He knows that another brutal fight is likely to break out between him and Carl Froch on Saturday night. The amiable Dane endured a gruelling battle when he beat Froch on points three years ago in the small Danish town of Herning. Yet Kessler, a 34-year-old who has won all but two of his 48 bouts, smiles sadly at the certainty that far greater hostility will surround him at the O2 Arena when he and Froch fight for the IBF and WBA super-middleweight world titles.
“I’ve b [...]
Gomez calls Markey ‘pond scum’
Massachusetts GOP Senate candidate Gabriel Gomez called his opponent, longtime Rep. Ed Markey, “pond scum” during an interview with an NPR reporter on Thursday.
“I don’t think there’s anything more offensive,” Gomez said, according to a YouTube clip of the exchange, which took place after an event at a local Chamber of Commerce. “You know I’ve got four young kids, and they gotta sit there and gotta see an ad with their dad — who served honorably, talk to anybody I served with — whether as a pilot or as a SEAL, anybody I worked with. And f [...]
Will ‘Libido In A Pill’ Help Women Get It On?
Since Viagra came on the scene in the late ’90s, men with sexual disfunction have been able to pop a pill and get busy to their hearts’ content. For women, it’s harder: There’s not yet a cure for a lack of female arousal, though as many as 30 percent of women between 20 and 60 years old may suffer from some degree of hypoactive sexual-desire disorder (H.S.D.D.), a lack of lust so dire it creates emotional distress, according to a New York Times Magazine story.
In an adaptation from his forthcoming book, What D [...]
George Galloway’s finest moments
If you have a long car journey or plane trip coming up and you like the sound of people being harangued in a hoarse Dundee accent then, boy, has iTunes got a treat for you. Download The Best of George Galloway, Vol 1, sit back and enjoy four hours of the Respect bruiser’s finest moments, including 2005′s smash hit Galloway v Paxman and the epic Galloway v Hitchens, while mouthing along to such vintage lines as: “If you ask that question again, I’m going.”
Galloway is the only serving MP with the rhet [...]
Explosion and gunfire shake Kabul
24 May 2013
Last updated at 09:48 ET
Afghan security forces said they were responding to the attack
There has been a large explosion in the centre of the Afghan capital, Kabul, followed by heavy gunfire.
Afghan Channel One TV quoted police as saying a group of assailants had entered the Directorate of the Afghan Public Protection Force (APPF).
It said some of the attackers had taken up positions in the building.
“We are dealing with a well co-ordinated attack,” said Kabul police chief Gen Ayub Salangi. R [...]
Stocks slip for third straight day
U.S. stocks were under pressure for a third straight day Friday as worries about the Federal Reserve continue to hang over the market.
The Dow Jones industrial average, the SP 500 and the Nasdaq were all modestly lower at the opening bell.
The SP 500 is on track to end lower for the week, which would snap a string of four up weeks in a row.
Stocks have been volatile the past few days as investors wrestle with what appears to be a growing debate within the Federal Reserve over the central bank’s bond buying program.
With the m [...]
Bayern Munich ‘need to win final’
Former Bayern Munich midfielder Thomas Hitzlsperger says the Bavarians “need” to win the Champions League after losing two of the last three finals.
Everton’s
Hitzlsperger, 31, spent 11 years in Bayern’s youth ranks and knows the importance of Saturday’s Wembley final against Borussia Dortmund.
“It is massive. It is a huge game for them,” he told BBC World Service.
“They are due a title, they need to win. Dortmund are going there with less pressure.”
Bayern [...]
Storm Chasers: Born to Be Wild?
FRIDAY, May 24 (HealthDay News) — We’ve all seen them: the surfers who race to the beach when a hurricane hits, the guy who decides to ride out the storm in his overmatched boat, the tornado chasers who fearlessly steer their cars alongside a scary-looking funnel cloud.
Monday’s devastating tornado in Moore, Okla., was the most recent reminder that Mother Nature isn’t something to gamble with — that even when the best safety precautions are taken, people can still get hurt and die.
Yet, even [...]