43-year-old Raffi Stepanian makes money searching New York City streets, but it's not loose change or soda cans he's looking for, it's gold. Stepanian says he can make almost $1000 a week scouring the diamond district's streets for bits of gold, platinum, and precious gems. "Material falls off clothes, on the bottom of shoes, it drops off jewelry, and it falls in the dirt and sticks to the gum on the street. The percentage of gold out here on the street is greater than the amount of gold you would find in a mine . . . It comes close to a mother lode because in the street, you're picking up gold left by the industry," he says.

Long before Stewart or Colbert were on TV you could count on The Onion to bring you your daily dose of fake or funny news. After the recent publication of their 1000th issue, a small but growing movement has started pushing for the Pulitzer Prize to be awarded to the satirical site. The Americans for Fairness in Awarding Journalism Prizes website encourages readers to submit videos on why they think The Onion deserves the honor. The movement has grown so large that you can find videos from Tom Hanks and Arianna Huffington among the user submissions.

f1vlad writes "A 59-year-old man has been jailed in Gastonia, N.C., on charges of larceny after allegedly robbing an RBC Bank for $1 so he could get health care in prison. Richard James Verone handed a female teller a note demanding the money and claiming that he had a gun, according to the police report."

Marine Isaias Hernandez has been able to grow back most of the missing muscle from his leg, including skeletal muscle, thanks to an experimental treatment involving an injection of a a growth promoting substance extracted from pig bladders. Hernandez lost 70% of his right thigh muscles from a mortar exploded attack in Afghanistan. Normally this type of injury would lead to an amputation. From the article: "In preparation for the operation, corporal Hernandez was made to build up the remaining 30 per cent of muscle left on the damaged thigh. Surgeons then sliced into the thigh, placing a thin slice of a substance called extracellular matrix. The surgery is the result of a $70 million investment by the US military into regenerative medicine research."

ideaz writes "A village in India has decided to rename itself and henceforth be known as Snapdeal.com Nagar (which means town). Snapdeal.com being an online couponing company that recently raised $12 million and has the lead over Groupon in India in the local ecommerce space. Snapdeal has adopted a remote village in India and enabled clean drinking water facilities for its people by installing manual pumps. To show their gratitude, the village's residents have decided to rename their village to Snapdeal.com Nagar, actually taking the company by surprise."

An anonymous reader writes "A website which claims to only allow 'beautiful people' to become members claims to have been hit by the 'Shrek virus,' which allowed 30,000 less attractive people to sign-up. Many media outlets are reporting the story as factual, but security firm Sophos claims that it is a publicity stunt."

siliconbits writes "US Electronics retailer Best Buy has been slow but steady in the fight to protect its Geek Squad trademark, but some are wondering whether the 800-lb gorilla of the tech retailing sector is going too far in its war to right some wrongs. The word 'Geek' is a century-old word that used to mean 'fool' or 'crazy,' but has, since the beginning of the 1980s, been associated with fans of technology in general and computers in particular. That hasn't prevented a number of geek-themed companies from being hit by Best Buy's legal team over the last decade, including Geek Housecalls, Rent a Geek, Geek Rescue, Speak with A Geek and, not surprisingly, arch-rival Newegg."

An anonymous reader writes "Sega Corp joins the ranks of video game companies to be hacked in recent time with one small twist, it seems LulzSec was not behind this one. They reached to Sega's official twitter account and offered to destroy the hackers that attacked them. From the article: 'In its offer to assist Sega, the Tweet from Lulz hinted that its leaders might count themselves among a small but highly loyal group of gamers who still play on the aging Dreamcast console. "Sega - contact us," Lulz said in its Tweet to the video game developer. "We want to help you destroy the hackers that attacked you. We love the Dreamcast, these people are going down."'"

mcgrew pointed out a story about a new study that found the average person is born with 60 genetic mutations, very few of which involve weather manipulation or an amazing healing factor. This number was less than expected, leading the researchers to believe human evolution happens more slowly than previously thought. From the article: "Sixty mutations may sound like a lot, but according to the international team of geneticists behind the new research, it is actually fewer than expected. 'We had previously estimated that parents would contribute an average of 100 to 200 mistakes to their child,' Philip Awadalla, a geneticist at the University of Montreal who co-led the project, said in a press release. 'Our genetic study, the first of its kind, shows that actually much fewer mistakes, or mutations, are made.'

FaxeTheCat writes "The Norwegian Public broadcaster is doing a five-and-a-half-day, around-the-clock broadcast from the coastal liner 'Hurtigruten.' Not only is this (according to them) the world's longest direct TV broadcast, the material will be made available as torrents with a Creative Commons license, and there is a 'mashup' competition. Not your average action show, but if you like fjords and mountains and a slow pace, this may be just the thing for you."

Artist Larry Moss's balloon art is truly amazing. Some of his most renown creations include a ten-room haunted house, the world’s first piloted balloon sculpture, and a pre-historic museum exhibition. If the whole professional artist thing doesn't work out, I'm sure he'll have a huge career as a birthday party clown.

An anonymous reader writes "Sing it with us: What lives in the rainforest, under a tree? Spongiforma squarepantsii, a new species of mushroom almost as strange as its cartoon namesake. Scientists from the San Francisco State University have discovered a new species of mushroom in Borneo with sponge-like properties. Its strange behavior convinced them to name it after the famous Bob. There is no word on whether or not their chances of getting future grant money will be improved by this choice." Did you know (prior to clicking on the Wikipedia link above) that SpongeBob was created by a marine biologist?

Kittenman writes "Slate is carrying some details of how eccentric treasure hunter Bill Warren is proposing looking for the body of Osama Bin Laden in the Arabian sea. He plans on using sonar, and a remotely operated submersible. If he finds the remains, he'll photograph them to confirm Bin Laden's death to the world. Warren says, 'There is still a $25 million reward that no one has collected, and the reward says dead or alive, well, if -- in fact -- he is dead, then I could collect the $25 million reward. Why not?'"

An anonymous reader writes "Iceland is finally overhauling its constitution, and it has turned to the Internet to get input from citizens. More specifically, the 25-member council drafting the new constitution is reaching out to its citizens through Facebook. Two thirds of Iceland's population (approximately 320,000) is on Facebook, so the constitutional council's weekly meetings are broadcast live not only on the council's website, but on the social network as well. 'It is possible to register through other means, but most of the discussion takes place via Facebook,' said Berghildur Bernhardsdottir, spokeswoman for the constitutional review project."

An anonymous reader writes "Hold on to your hamburgers — Japanese scientist Mitsyuki Ikeda at the Environmental Assessment Center in Okayama has invented an artificial meat substitute made from human feces. The unseemly meal is made by extracting protein and lipids from 'sewage mud.' The lipids are then combined with a reaction enhancer and whipped into 'meat' in an exploder. Ikeda makes the 'meat' more palatable by adding things like soy protein."

An anonymous reader writes "According to Copyright lawyer Ben Sidbury, Senate bill 978 could make it a criminal act for someone to lip sync to a song and post the said video on Youtube, even if credits are given. 'The way the statute is written... It would now criminalize anybody that performs a copyrighted work, which is essentially nowadays any song under the sun. In theory at least, the record companies or the Department of Justice could go after a 9-year old or a 12 year old or a 30 year old for publicly performing a song.' said Sidbury."

Danny Rathjens pointed out a story about the DIY weapons created by Libyan rebels. One of the more interesting is a machine gun drone created from a Power Wheels-style ATV. Rebels outfit the toys with a small cannon and attach controls via long wire. A solider can hide while he uses a small television and simple controls to move the vehicle and fire the gun. A similar system is also outfitted to a toy truck with a machine gun on top.

Elliot Chang writes "Last month Germany announced plans to completely phase out the use of nuclear power by 2022 in favor of renewable energy sources — however what is to become of the nation's nuclear plants after they have been shut down? Enter East Germany's Wunderland Kalkar — an incredible adaptive reuse project that transformed a never-used nuclear reactor into an amusement park. The remarkable renovation attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors every year."

gizmodolt writes "The entrenched Malaysian governing party, Barisan Nasional, has spent almost $600,000 on six Facebook pages promoting tourism in the country. This has sparked criticism from opposition parties, decrying the 'ridiculous' reasoning behind this waste of taxpayer funds and garnered widespread recrimination from Malaysians around the globe, who have made their sentiments known, quite publicly, on those very same Facebook pages."

fysdt writes "Cookies are a pretty awesome treat, but sometimes making them from scratch can be a bit of a chore. Fortunately, there is now a robot created to specifically bake cookies--although it probably isn't good enough to replace human kitchen staff or grandma just yet. Created by MIT Lab student Mario Bollini, the PR2 Bakebot loves nothing more than to bake up a batch of cookies from scratch. The robot's left hand holds onto the mixing bowl, while its right hand does the hard work, mixing ingredients with a rubber spatula. Its head contains a laser scanner and sensor camera used to determine what each ingredients is and how much mixing and stirring it needs to do."