Zothecula writes "It appears that there's a number of customers willing to pay a lot to be in possession of a lifelike replica of their face or even their whole head ... or at least, REAL-f hopes so. The Japanese company offers extremely realistic 3D models of human faces and heads made using vinyl chloride resin, based on its own technique called 3DPFs (3 Dimension Photo Forms)."

MrSeb writes "It seems, as a culture, we have a deep-seated interest in robots and automatons, and if we can love an animal or other non-humanoid creature, what's to stop us from falling in love with a robot? Introducing Meka Robotics' S2 Humanoid Head: It has seven degrees of freedom, high-resolution FireWire cameras in each eye, zero-backlash Harmonic Drive gearing in the neck, and a ton of unnervingly-human movements and postures. She weighs 7.6kg (16.7lbs), has a pair of luminous, waggling doggy-like ears, and can be attached to a Meka torso and arm, if you prefer your robots to be slightly more corporeal. The girly, anime face is just a custom skin, incidentally: Meka will customize the shell to look like anything you desire. We're told that they value their client's confidentiality — and more importantly they don't judge. Powered by the open-source and extensible M3 control software, the S2 head (and body and arm) could be quite easily upgraded to use Hooman Samani's artificial endocrine and psychological models — and if you had the choice of falling in love with an amorphous, decidedly odd-looking furball, or a cute, perky anime girl, which would you choose?"

cramco writes "Moments ago, a U.K. software company announced at the Professional Association for SQL Server (PASS) conference in Seattle that it would send a lucky contestant to space. The sponsors, Red Gate, is holding a five-week DBA contest with the winner getting a trip to space. Why? And why put them through five weeks of quizzes and technical challenges presented within B-movie-looking videos involving rubber Martians, small dogs, alien body parts and one of their own acting very strangely? Well, as any developer knows, DBA stands for Don't Bother Asking."

First time accepted submitter Pat Attack writes "In an ironic twist of fate, Phoenix Jones, a self-styled super hero from Seattle, has landed in jail. Jones happened upon a group of people fighting in the street and tried to stop the fight using pepper spray. He was arrested by police on four counts of assault. The New York Daily News quotes Jones: 'I've been shot once and I don't really want it to happen again. I've been stabbed twice, hit with a baseball bat and had my nose broken,' he says. 'But in all those incidents I helped someone who was in danger. If someone is going to take that punishment it should be the guy in body armor,' he said."

eljefe6a writes "The Million Monkeys project has finished every work of Shakespeare. The last work was The Taming of the Shrew (insert shrewish joke here), which finished on October 6. I give my thoughts on going viral. If this article about going viral goes viral, it will create an infinite loop that will bring about the destruction of the world. The project source is released, too."

The Ohio Supreme Court will decide if a builder will have to replace magnetized parts of two couples' homes, even though they signed a limited warranty which did not specifically cover replacing positively- or negatively-charged building materials. After moving into the homes the couples found that something was not quite right. Their TV screens were distorted. Cordless phones ran into interference. Computer hard drives were corrupted. Soon after, it was discovered that steel joists in the homes had become magnetized."

It comes as no surprise that Margie Phelps of the infamous Westboro Baptist Church has already declared the church's intention to picket Steve Jobs's funeral. What is interesting, is that she did so using an iPhone. The 142 characters of wrath read: "Westboro will picket his funeral.He[sic] had a huge platform; gave God no glory & taught sin. MT @AP: Apple co-founder Steve Jobs has died at 56."

Back in 2009 we ran a story about a Chicago based non-profit company that trained high-functioning autistic people to be software testers. Two years later Aspiritech has grown to offer services in Belgium, Japan and Israel. Autistic debuggers are used by large clients like Oracle and Microsoft and have proven to be so good in fact that companies are now recruiting to meet demand. From the article: "Aspiritech's board of directors includes social service providers, therapists, a vocational expert and a software engineer. The nonprofit also received start-up advice and consultation from Keita Suzuki, who has co-founded a similar company, called Kaien, in Japan. Aspiritech has hired and trained seven recruits with Asperger's syndrome. These recruits have since worked on software-testing projects for smartphone and cloud-computing applications. Aspiritech now offers functional-, compatibility- and regression-testing, as well as test-case development, with experience in cloud-computing platforms including Salesforce."

First time accepted submitter Lindan9 writes "After an apparent increase of yeti sightings in the Kemerovo and Altai region of Siberia, a group of scientists from around the world are meeting to examine evidence possibly proving yeti existence. The scientists suspect there is a population of several dozen living in the area. The team hopes to spot a yeti or still living neanderthal man during their search of the area's mountains." I hope they find two pristine horns faster than I did.

British Airways is giving their best customers a competitive edge in the event of disaster by offering a course on surviving a plane crash. Beginning next year, members of the airline's Executive Club can cash in air miles to take the four-hour safety class. From the article: "Andy Clubb, the BA manager running the course, told the Independent: 'It makes passengers safer when travelling by giving additional skills and information, it dispels all those Internet theories about the brace position, and it just gives people so much more confidence in flying.'"

Branded the "boss from hell" by his employees, 57-year-old William Ernst lost a court battle with ex-workers over unemployment benefits. An Iowa judge has decided that Ernst's "firing contest" memo wasn't the best management strategy, saying, "The employer’s actions have clearly created a hostile work environment by suggesting its employees turn on each other for a minimal monetary prize. This was an intolerable and detrimental work environment.” The memo reads in part: "New Contest – Guess The Next Cashier Who Will Be Fired!!! To win our game, write on a piece of paper the name of the next cashier you believe will be fired. Write their name [the person who will be fired], today's date, today's time, and your name. Seal it in an envelope and give it to the manager to put in my envelope."

RedEaredSlider writes "Two toilets exploded in the General Services Administration building, hospitalizing two workers (who were in separate bathrooms, evidently). The physics is sort of interesting: older water systems operate using air to force the water through at the right pressure, but if there is some problem in the system enough pressure can build to cause the commodes to crack. Plumbers: please weigh in."

ocean_soul writes "Probably because nothing more threatening was happening and they need to prove their usefulness the school police at University of Wisconsin-Stout decided a Firefly poster with the quote: "You don't know me, son, so let me explain this to you once: If I ever kill you, you'll be awake. You'll be facing me. And you'll be armed," was a threat to the safety on campus. Wasn't that a quote about not killing people?"

alphadogg writes "The quirky Ig Nobel prizes honoring some of the world's funniest if not the most practical academic research will be handed out tonight at 7:30 EST at Harvard University. The theme this year is chemistry, but that doesn't really restrict which entries might win, judging from research that has claimed Ig Nobels in the past. For instance, last year the prize for medicine went to a Netherlands researcher who discovered that riding roller coasters alleviates asthma symptoms. The prize for engineering went to an international team 'for perfecting a method to collect whale snot using a remote-control helicopter.'" You can read more about this year's nominees and watch the live webcast here.

bazzalunatic writes "The hottest chili in the world was made by Australians earlier this year, but how did they get the chilies so hot? Seems that worm juice is the key to revving up the capsaicin. And milk and yogurt are best to douse the heat, as they have fats that can absorb the capsaicin — which actually hijacks the neurons that detect heat."

jafo writes "I can't imagine that even the most steadfast haters of Lucas' meddling in the series won't warm their cold, cold hearts a little when the new release brings the awesomeness of light sabers to the Tokyo subway system. As a promotional tie-in, the handrails have been outfitted with stickers, LEDs, and buttons, turning them into fully-functional (well, almost) Jedi weapons. Be careful, Tokyo, of what part of the handrail you reach out for!"

bazzalunatic writes "Each wet season in northern Australia dozens of colorful lorikeets have to be rescued because they appear drunk, fall out of trees and even get a hangover-like sickness. No one knows quite what's going on, but the best explanation is they get smashed from fermented fruit. From the story: 'Experts say they are not sure if the lorikeets are actually drunk, but they do have tell-tale symptoms. "They exhibit odd behavior like falling over or difficulty flying [and] they keep running into things," says Darwin vet Dr Stephen Cutter from The Ark Animal Hospital.'"

The creator of Doritos has died in Dallas at age 97. Despite being the bane of keyboards and mouse wheels, Art West's famous snacks have become a staple in the geek diet. Doritos officially arrived in the U.S. in 1964 and has since expanded to 23 flavors. Art's Daughter Jana Hacker told The Dallas Morning News that the family plans on "tossing Doritos chips in before they put the dirt over the urn."

MrSeb writes "A bunch of tea-drinking northern Brits have set a new land speed record for a gasification-powered vehicle, fueled only by coffee beans. The car is called The Coffee Car, and it was created by the Teesdale Conservation Volunteers of Durham, England. The previous gasification-powered speed record — held by some Americans called 'Beaver Energy' — was a mere 47mph, fueled by wood pellets. The Coffee Car averaged no less than 66.5mph and was granted a Guinness World Record in return. Gasification is a process in which any organic fuel is turned into 'syngas,' a mixture of carbon dioxide/monoxide, hydrogen, and methane which can be used in conventional internal combustion engines. The Coffee Car was created with the sole intention of proving that renewable/green energy sources can power cars — and it looks like it succeeded!"

chrb writes "BBC News is reporting that an Irish coroner has ruled that a dead man was killed by spontaneous human combustion. The controversial finding is a first in Irish history. From the article: 'West Galway coroner Dr Ciaran McLoughlin said it was the first time in 25 years of investigating deaths that he had recorded such a verdict. Michael Faherty, 76, died at his home in Galway on 22 December 2010. Deaths attributed by some to "spontaneous combustion" occur when a living human body is burned without an apparent external source of ignition.'"