Meshach writes "A new plug-in for Outlook will warn you if an email you are about to send is 'too emotional.' Basically the plug-in scans the email for emotions such as elation, humiliation, excitement and fear. A user can set how much emotion they want to allow in their messages and if exceeded the threshold a warning will pop up."

If you're one of the three people in the world who actually reads Playboy for the articles, today is your lucky day. Every young boy's favorite magazine to find in their uncle's closet has launched a "safe for work" website. From the article: "TheSmokingJacket.com will contain none of the nudity that makes Playboy.com NSFW — not suitable for work. Instead, it'll rely on humor to reach Playboy's target audience, men 25 to 34 years old, when they are most likely to be in front of a computer screen."

A 3-year-old Onion video titled "Martial Law Plans Revealed?" has swept across the internet recently, and taken the gullible along with it. The video has some preaching from the highest mountain top about the evils of a government turning fascist, and an equal number explaining until red in the face what The Onion is.

38-year-old Daryl Simon decided it would be a good idea to submit fake pictures of himself at charity events, and forged letters of support from various charitable organizations to the court before he was sentenced for credit card fraud. Unfortunately for Daryl, he is as good at Photoshop as he is at credit card scams, and Judge Stephen Robinson was not amused. Simon was sentenced to 285-months in prison — 50 months more than the maximum under sentencing guidelines. From the article: "Daryl Simon's bald-faced move included sticking a picture of himself into a shot with a physical-therapy patient, then flipping the image and placing it next to a teen student. 'Evidence that his image was inserted and flipped can be seen by examining the single detail on his shirt above his fingers — that detail appears on the left side of the shirt in the top photograph, and on the right side of the shirt in the bottom photograph,' prosecutors wrote."

38-year-old Roberto Cabrera was arrested at Mexico City's international airport after authorities discovered his monkey girdle. Cabrera was carrying 18 endangered titi monkeys in the many-pouched undergarment. He says he used the girdle to smuggle the primates because he was afraid x-rays would hurt them if they were in a suitcase. It's good to see that the animal smuggling undergarment business is getting more sophisticated. The 18-monkey girdle is a substantial upgrade from 13-songbird socks.

China's National Tourism Administration has put out an advisory for tourists warning them that Hong Kong tour guides might insult them or force them to shop. From the article: "'An undated video clip currently circulating on the Internet shows a Hong Kong tour guide allegedly abusing a group of visitors from the Chinese mainland and forcing them to shop, triggering a backlash from the mainland public,' the Xinhua news agency said Saturday. Budget Chinese tour packages often try to pad out profits by taking tourists to shops which return a percentage of the sales revenue to the agency. The practice is common both in mainland China and on overseas tours offered by Chinese agencies."

DMandPenfold writes "A multi-billion dollar European Union IT research fund will help study the behavior of three-legged dogs, it has been revealed. The fund will support extensive studies into how three-legged dogs move. There is a particular focus on how the dogs balance and function, given their missing limb."

In addition to feeding a lot of hungry people, a food bank in Clearwater, Fla. tried to ensure its customers had a shiny coat. A can labeled "Senior Holistic Superfood" turned out to be dog food. From the article: "'It's the first time I've ever heard of something like this. We don't take pet food donations,' Lisa Matzner, director of development for RCS, which provides food to about 7,000 people every month, said." If it's good enough for Mad Max, it's good enough for my grandma.

rmaureira writes "An awesome 33-foot-tall, 6 ton Optimus Prime replica is being shown at Beijing's Olympic Park. Made from junked car parts and scrap metal parts, it is impressive."

theodp writes "Even usually snarky Gawker loves the idea of living in a science museum for a month. Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry is 'looking for someone to take on a once-in-a-lifetime assignment: spend a Month at the Museum, to live and breathe science 24/7 for 30 days. From October 20 to November 18, 2010, this person's mission will be to experience all the fun and education that fits in this historic 14-acre building, living here full-time and reporting your findings to the outside world.' Oh, and if you're The Chosen One, you'll also walk away with $10,000, a package of tech gadgets, and an honorary lifetime membership to MSI. Visit the Month at the Museum site for details and to apply — the deadline is August 11th."

bbretterson writes "A community writer on Bitmob recently stumbled across a website filled with hundreds of images that blur the line between video game screenshots and legitimate photography. Using screen capture software, Dead End Thrills frames shots in PC games that could hang on the wall of any SoHo gallery."

A 12-year-old girl who was being assaulted by her mother's ex-boyfriend used some quick thinking by sending a message on her iPod to a friend's Facebook account for help. The friend was able to contact the girl's mother who then contacted the police. 42-year-old Raymond Ernest Cesmat was arrested and charged with two counts of criminal sexual conduct in the first degree. He is being held at the Dakota County Jail on $175,000 bail.

DARPA is working on a project that will convert energy from the human body to power a variety of military gadgets. From the article: "Obviously, our bodies generate heat — thermal energy. They also produce vibrations when we move — kinetic energy. Both forms of energy can be converted into electricity. Anantha Chandrakasan, an MIT electrical engineering professor, who is working on the problem with a former student named Yogesh Ramadass, says the challenge is to harvest adequate amounts of power from the body and then efficiently direct it to the device that needs it." If I remember the movie correctly, this didn't turn out so well for the humans.

ehrichweiss writes "The Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics is warning parents and teachers of a new threat to our children: sounds. Apparently kids are now discovering binaural beats and using them to get 'physiological effects.' The report goes on with everyone suggesting that such aural experiences will act as a gateway to drug usage and even has one student claiming there are 'demons' involved. Anyone who has used one of those light/sound machines knows all about the effects that these sounds will give and to state that they will lead kids to do drugs is nonsense at best. It seems the trend in scaring the citizens with a made-up problem has gone to the next level."

Lanxon writes "A shop has opened in China that's filled with furniture, cutlery and electronics — not for sale, but to be smashed, beaten and destroyed by frustration-venting women, reports Wired. With a 'No Men' sign at the door, the shop is designed to look like a typical Chinese home, separated into several zones including a TV and mobile phone-filled living room and a bedroom. A kitchen is planned, too. All the electronics are real, purchased second-hand and ready to be smashed with the provided baseball bats (and motorbike helmets for safety)."

wiredmikey writes "After switching to a Mac recently, I decided to put my old laptop up for sale to help recoup a little of the Mac cost. I received an email almost immediately from a girl named Rebecca and we had this email exchange." My favorite part is the fake letter from the FBI demanding tracking numbers.

DWF3046 writes "There are lots of things you can infer from Twitter. But while we're learning what we're eating or where we're flying, we haven't been able to use Twitter to determine how we're feeling. Researchers at Harvard and Northwestern have created a video that shows the mood in the US, as inferred using over 300 million tweets, over the course of the day. The results? The early morning and late evening appear to provide the highest levels of happiness. Geographically, the data points to a significantly happier west coast, which is consistently three hours behind the east coast."

thefickler writes "The Pacific Ocean trash dump is twice the size of Texas, or the size of Spain combined with France. The Pacific Vortex, as it is sometimes called, is made up of four million tons of plastic. Now, there's a proposal to turn this dump into 'Recycled Island.' The Netherlands Architecture Fund has provided the grant money for the project, and the WHIM architecture firm is conducting the research and design of Recycled Island. One of the three major aims of the project is to clean up the floating trash by recycling it on site. Two, the project would create new land for sustainable habitation complete with its own food sources and energy sources. Lastly, Recycled Island is to be a seaworthy island. While at the moment the project is still more or less a pipe dream, it's great that someone is trying to work out what to do with one of humanity's most bizarre environmental slip-ups."

Vienna officials say public pools lose 5,000 liters of water a day from swimmers swallowing water, and they can't afford to replace it. From the article: "Replacing that much water also has an environmental as well as financial cost, authorities say, due to the need to chemically treat the water." I can't wait to see what happens when someone tells them about evaporation.

SharpFang writes "In a series of studies in 2005 and 2006, researchers at the University of Michigan found that misinformed people, particularly political partisans, rarely changed their minds when exposed to corrected facts in news stories. In fact, they often became even more strongly set in their beliefs. Facts, they found, were not curing misinformation. Like an underpowered antibiotic, facts could actually make misinformation even stronger."