Thursday, February 24, 2005

A paste containing synthetic tooth enamel can seal small cavities without drilling. Kazue Yamagishi and colleagues at the FAP Dental Institute in Tokyo say that the paste can repair small cavities in 15 minutes.

Currently, fillers don’t stick to such small cavities so dentists must drill bigger holes. Hydroxyapatite crystals, of which natural enamel is made, bond with teeth to repair tiny areas of damage.

Yamagishi and colleagues have tested their paste on a lower premolar tooth that showed early signs of decay. They found that the synthetic enamel merged with the natural enamel. The synthetic enamel also appears to make teeth stronger which will improve resistance to future decay. As with drilling, however, there is still the potential for pain: The paste is strongly acidic to encourage crystal growth and causes inflammation if it touches the gums.

The paste is reported in the journal Nature.

Thursday, October 29, 2020

Professor Jo Jorgensen of South Carolina, the U.S. Libertarian Party’s 2020 presidential nominee, answered some questions about her campaign from Wikinews accredited reporter William S. Saturn.

Jorgensen is a psychology professor at Clemson University.   In 1992, with the Libertarian Party’s backing, she ran for public office, seeking South Carolina’s 4th congressional seat in the United States House of Representatives. She finished the race in third place with almost 2.16 percent of the total vote. Four years later, the Libertarian Party tapped Jorgensen to be its vice presidential nominee. She joined a ticket with the late Harry Browne. Browne-Jorgensen appeared on every state ballot and received a total of 485,798 votes, which was roughly 0.5 percent. This marked the best performance for the party since 1980 and would not be topped percentage-wise until 2012 when former New Mexico governor Gary Johnson attained 0.99 percent of the vote. Johnson bested that performance in 2016 as the party’s presidential nominee for a second time, earning 3.27 percent of the vote, the highest percentage for the party since its 1971 inception.

For the 2020 nomination, Jorgensen navigated through a primary campaign that featured the short-lived campaigns of former Rhode Island governor Lincoln Chafee and Congressman Justin Amash of Michigan, the first sitting Congressman to be a member of the Libertarian Party. At the virtual 2020 Libertarian National Convention, Jorgensen won the nomination on the fourth ballot, edging attorney Jacob Hornberger, performance artist Vermin Supreme and activist Adam Kokesh, among others. Podcaster Spike Cohen, originally the running mate of Supreme, was picked to be the party’s vice presidential nominee. Cohen spoke to Wikinews back in June. The Jorgensen-Cohen ticket has since secured ballot access in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

As a libertarian, an ideology that advocates for lesser government, both in the social and economic realms, Jorgensen’s issue positions include a mix of traditionally liberal and conservative stances. She supports both LGBT rights and gun rights. She opposes the police state and the taxing authority equally. And, she supports an open immigration policy while arguing against the welfare state.

With Wikinews, Jorgensen discusses her background, COVID-19, her potential cabinet, gridlock, and an assortment of issues including climate change, foreign affairs, free speech, and race relations.

Sunday, November 6, 2005

Authorities are looking for USD$75,000 in frozen bull semen stolen Sunday from liquid nitrogen tanks at a farm in Frederick County, Maryland. Eric Fleming, the owner, says the semen took 4 to 5 years to collect from 40 to 50 bulls. He had planned to sell the semen at an upcoming Denver cattle show.

The collection and storage of semen can be a very profitable business—the ease of transportation reduces the costs normally associated with insemination, namely the transport of bull and cow to one another. Collection can be tricky, however, as bulls do not always produce as expected and the process is not particularly easy.

“I will give a nice fat reward for any information on semen that was stolen from my tank today,” Fleming posted to a livestock breeder’s message board. “It was a mother load of semen.”

Thursday, March 9, 2006

Toronto’s public utility, Toronto Hydro Telecom, will make Canada’s largest city into a huge wireless hotspot.

“This is both an exciting and very important initiative for the city of Toronto”, said Toronto’s mayor, David Miller. “It puts us on the leading edge of the telecommunications industry nationwide and globally.”

Toronto Hydro Telecom will offer customers free access for the first six months. After that, it will begin to charge for services.

“Wi-Fi technology is the new benchmark for urban living”, stated Toronto Hydro president David Dobbin. “It’s standard equipment in many electronic devices, from laptops to portable entertainment units.”

Private telephone companies are questioning why a public utility needs to compete with the private sector.

Mike Lee of Rogers Communications Inc. questioned why the city of Toronto wanted to enter the internet access business.

“It will not be an easy business”, Lee told the National Post. “In this day and age, the focus should be on core operations more than anything. I was surprised to see they are looking to get into this business.”

Brian Sharwood, a telecom analyst in Toronto, said the municipality will likely install the wireless transmitters and receivers on its lamp posts as a way to blanket the city, a process known as “wireless mesh networking”.

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Former Salt Lake City mayor and human rights activist Rocky Anderson took some time to discuss his 2012 U.S. presidential campaign and the newly-created Justice Party with Wikinews reporter William S. Saturn.

Anderson served as mayor of Salt Lake City for eight years (2000–2008) as a member of the Democratic Party. During his tenure, he enacted proposals to reduce the city’s carbon emissions, reformed its criminal justice system, and positioned it as a leading sanctuary for refugees. After leaving office, Anderson grew critical of the Democratic Party’s failure to push for impeachment against President George W. Bush, and for not reversing policies on torture, taxes, and defense spending. He left the party earlier this year and announced that he would form a Third party.

Anderson officially established the Justice Party last week during a press conference in Washington D.C.. He proclaimed “We the people are powerful enough to end the perverse government-to-the-highest-bidder system sustained by the two dominant parties…We are here today for the sake of justice — social justice, environmental justice and economic justice.” The party promotes campaign finance reform and is attempting to appeal to the Occupy Wall Street movement. It is currently working on ballot access efforts, and will hold a Founding Convention in February 2012 in Salt Lake City.

Among other issues, Anderson discussed climate change, health care, education, and civil liberties. He detailed his successes as mayor of Salt Lake City, stressed the importance of executive experience, and expressed his views on President Barack Obama and some of the Republican Party presidential candidates. He spoke in depth about former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, with whom he worked during the 2002 Winter Olympics, and fellow Utahan, former governor and U.S. ambassador to China Jon Huntsman, Jr..

Tuesday, June 16, 2009

An Oklahoma police officer is on paid administrative leave, following an altercation with ambulance personnel while they were transporting a patient to the hospital. Trooper Daniel Martin, a member of the Oklahoma Highway Patrol (OHP), was caught on video by his police vehicle’s dashboard-camera in a physical struggle with paramedic Maurice White, Jr. after Martin pulled the ambulance over. Martin had previously passed the ambulance while en route to another call, but came back and pulled over the ambulance. The incident occurred on May 24, and footage from the police dash-cam was released following a tort claim filed by paramedic White.

It has also been suggested that the previous call had in-fact been to pick up his wife from a police station who was then present in the car during the incident between Martin and the ambulance.

Footage by the OHP released Friday shows the ambulance personnel repeatedly informing Trooper Martin that they have a patient in the back of the ambulance that they are in the midst of transporting to the hospital. Martin yells at the ambulance driver for making what he claims was an obscene gesture – the ambulance driver asserts he raised both hands signalling confusion at the police officer’s actions. Trooper Martin can be heard telling the ambulance driver “I’m going to give you a ticket for failure to yield, and when I go by you saying ‘What’s going on?’ you don’t need to give me no hand gestures now, I ain’t going to put up with that [expletive], do you understand me?”

The video from the police dash-cam is eight minutes long, and paramedic White can be seen twice being pushed up against his ambulance by Trooper Martin. In one instance, Martin shoves White up against the ambulance while gripping his neck tightly with his other hand. In a written statement, paramedic White described the hold placed on him by the Trooper, stating “he engaged my trachea in a claw-like grip digging his nail into my neck while partially shutting off my air supply.”

The sister of the patient in the ambulance, Clara Harper, was following the ambulance and witnessed the incident. Harper later viewed the footage from the police dash-cam, and she stated to Tulsa World paramedic White “never once became aggressive to that trooper.” She asserted that “He did nothing wrong.” After the ambulance was allowed to continue transporting the patient to the hospital, Harper got into the ambulance to be with her sister. “She was scared, and I was trying to calm her down and telling her everything was going to be all right,” said Harper.

Paramedic White was interviewed by KOKI-TV, and recounted his thoughts as the incident was taking place. He stated his main concern was for his ambulance patient: “It was surrealistic because I’ve never had such an experience. My biggest concern was for the patient. If there’s any nightmare from this, it’s because of what that mother, that patient, had to go through.” White’s attorney told KOKI-TV that if White deemed the arrest to be unlawful, he had the right to resist it. White is a paramedic for Creek Nation Emergency Medical Services in Oklahoma. He told FOX News he was surprised at the actions of the police trooper. “He’s taken an oath, just as I have, to protect and serve. I could not believe that this was happening,” said White.

The Oklahoma Department of Public Safety decided to release the police dash-cam video publicly after amateur video of the incident was posted to the video-sharing website YouTube. Captain Chris West, spokesman for the OHP, explained why the video was not released earlier. “We’ve been well aware of the fact that this incident has drawn enormous attention, but made the decision to protect the integrity of the investigation, any and all relevant evidence, as well as the rights of the department employees,” said West. Prior to the release of the dash-cam video, a relative of the patient had posted video of the incident to YouTube. The son of the ambulance patient can be seen in a video stating to the camera “Highway patrolman pulled over my mom’s ambulance because he’s mad we didn’t pull over, and he tried to arrest … the EMT from taking my mother to the hospital.”

Richard O’Carroll, the lawyer for paramedic White, said that Trooper Martin abused his authority as a police officer. “Everything on this needs to relate back to why are we here? One man is there protecting a patient and one man is there abusing his authority and throwing his weight around,” said O’Carroll. White’s attorney filed a tort claim on behalf of his client in order to get the video of the police vehicle’s dash-cam released. Trooper Martin’s lawyer says he did not realize a patient was in the ambulance at the time of the incident.

O’Carroll explained the decision of paramedic White not to use sirens while transporting his patient to the hospital: “There was a reason he wasn’t running sirens. There was a suggestion of chest pains and a heart condition and sirens aggravate these conditions by increasing the blood pressure.” However the attorney for Trooper Martin, Gary James, said that the ambulance was not exempt from regulations because it did not have its sirens on. “If they’re not running their sirens or lights, they don’t get afforded any emergency vehicle exemptions,” said James. The OHP chief is handling an internal review into the incident. As of June 1, Trooper Martin has been on paid administrative leave.

Thursday, January 8, 2009

Electronic Gaming Monthly is now dead. EGM was one issue away from its 20th anniversary in February 2009. An internal email leaked to industry website Gamasutra on Tuesday revealed that EGM was to be closed following the acquisition of the online element of the 1UP network by competitor Hearst Corporation‘s UGO Entertainment and that the January 2009 issue (with Wolverine on the cover) would be the final printed issue of the iconic magazine. Ziff Davis‘s sale, brokered by GCA Savvian Advisors also includes Mycheats.com, Gametab.com, and GameVideos.com. Hearst Interactive is the owner and operator of UGO Entertainment.

According to CEO Jason Young, the court proceedings help Ziff Davis “pay down debt and shift our full focus to our core PCMag Digital Network Business.” Davis had been focusing on PCMag Digital Network. As a result, around 30 employees of Ziff Davis’ Game Group, including EGM Magazine’s staff, 1UP Network’s web staff, podcast and video producers lost their jobs. A UGO spokesman explained that “the reality is that UGO Entertainment is saving over 25 jobs, the company is retaining a core group of editorial all-star performers.” Ziff Davis Holdings Inc (ZFDH.PK), which publishes EGM and about 15 Web sites, obtained Manhattan, New York Court Judge Burton Lifland’s approval of a reorganization plan under Chapter 11, Title 11, United States Code. It was able, therefore, to emerge from its duly filed March bankruptcy protection petition.

UGO Entertainment CEO J Moses left a note on EGM’s gaming legacy, saying, “since we started UGO 11 years ago, we have served the gamer community and built a world-class online publishing platform.” Ziff Davis Media CEO Jason Young further noted: “We believe this is a smart transaction for Ziff Davis Media that places these market leading assets and teams in a great environment poised for further success. The transaction allows us to pay down debt and shift our full focus to our core PCMag Digital Network business. We thank our 1UP team members for their contributions and wish them the best of success into the future.” In July 2007, Hearst acquired the 11-year-old UGO Networks (Hearst Interactive) for an estimated price of $100 million. Established in 1998 by CEO J Moses, UGO is an online site targeting men aged 18 to 34.

J Moses stated categorically that his company just saved 1UP and UGO never tried to acquire EGM. “Closing EGM has absolutely nothing to do with UGO. We have just hired 24 people and have expanded UGO by 33 percent, because our business is robust and growing. We only wanted to buy 1UP and related sites. That was our interest as a dot-com company and that’s all we’ve ever been for 11 years.” Sam Kennedy, editorial director of 1UP, further explained that Ziff Davis was insolvent and 1UP was not financially healthy. “The reality of the market was that no company, including UGO, was willing to sustain 1UP as it was so the cuts were very painful but necessary to the survival of 1UP,” he added.

Electronic Gaming Monthly, which has been synonymous to video games for generations of gamers, was an American consumer video game magazine mainstay. It was published by Ziff Davis as part of the 1UP Network and released 12 issues a year (and an occasional extra “13th” issue for the Christmas season, also known as the “Smarch” issue, a reference to an episode of The Simpsons). As ZD’s sole print magazine, EGM, a stalwart of the videogame industry and dubbed the New York Times of games journalism, has been losing money. The 20-year-old publication had 236 issues total, since its debut in 1989.

In 2008, the company closed 27-year Games for Windows Magazine, or Computer Gaming World. In late 2006, Ziff-Davis also shuttered its Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine, while its Xbox-focused XBN and Electronics Boutique in-store mag GMR were terminated in 2004. EGM’s February issue, which is completed, will only be available digitally. Print publications have been suffering for years now, due to the global economic meltdown.

The time is 20:00 (UTC) on August 10th, 2006, and this is Audio Wikinews News Briefs.

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