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Bump’s New App Makes Photo Sharing Between Phones And PCs A Simple, Physical Gesture

ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS HIT YOUR SPACE BAR USING YOUR PHONE! YOUR PHOTOS ARE TRANSPORTED.

It’s easy to share photos with anyone anywhere in the world, but when it comes to sharing with the one person closest by--ourselves--the task is as complicated as it is annoying.

Two days after the announcement of Qualcomm stake acquisition, Airtel announced a 4G internet services to Delhi and Mumbai, where it doesn't have its own 4G airwaves.

Airtel will roll out 4G services in Delhi and Mumbai in partnership with Qualcomm. The GSM service provider has inked a deal with the Qualcomm to roll out 4G services on its behalf.

Qualcomm had bagged BWA (Broadband Wireless Access)spectrum or 4G licenses for Delhi, Mumbai, Haryana and Kerala. Now it has signed an agreement with Bharti Airtel under which it has authorised the teleco to operate its 4G services in the four circles till 2014.

Bharti already has BWA licenses in four circles - Kolkata, Karnataka, Punjab and Maharashtra - and 3G licenses in thirteen circles in India. With this agreement, Bharti has secured a nation-wide broadband leadership through a combination of 4G and 3G, with its own networks in 18 circles. Airtel has already launched its 4G services in Kolkata and Karnataka circles.

Commenting on the partnership Sunil Bharti Mittal, chairman and managing director, Bharti Airtel said, "We are delighted to partner with Qualcomm, who shares our commitment to the government's agenda of broadband for all. This partnership will combine the strength of Bharti's national telecom footprint and Qualcomm's technological leadership in the LTE TDD space. With a broadband ready network across India, Bharti is well positioned to lead the next phase of Indian's telecom revolution."

Qualcomm expects to provide technical assistance to Bharti in connection with network architecture and optimisation, infrastructure and device testing, as well as continuing to develop and support the underlying technology and the LTE TDD ecosystem.

It’s never been easier to contact someone. Technology hasn’t only enabled us to reach anyone on the globe instantly, but to reach them casually. A text is the ultimate in casual conversation--read it now or later, whatever. The same can be said for tweets and photos. In 2012, we don’t have flying cars just yet, but sharing media any time, any place, has been figured out.

So to bridge these words and images into a more intrinsic level of communication, Triverio built a messaging app prototype called Feel Me. The interface is simple. When a friend is typing, you can see where they’re touching on your own screen. And when your fingers match up, from halfway across the world, haptic feedback can allow you to serendipitously touch. In a text-me-later culture, Feel Me enables communication that’s transient and visceral. It’s an idea so compelling that it helped land Triverio a job at IDEO, and we’ve already seen the premise (borrowed?) in an app called Pair.

Is Feel Me a gimmick? Sure, but it’s a brilliant one. In this precise iteration, Feel Me’s interaction model is more a nice sentiment than a watershed technology that will make cross-continental romances viable, but the basic concept--one that doesn’t rely on miming emoticons to convey feeling--could always scale as technology improves.

Imagine an iPhone that you could kiss, and the screen would be warm and supple, matching the texture and temperature of a lover’s lips. On second thought, that’s gross.

Imagine putting your hand in your pocket, and the lining is flesh, a friend’s hand to hold during a crisis. On second thought, that’s necrotically creepy. (And on that note, I’m going to have to carry my wallet around from now on. I’ve grown frightened of what’s lurking inside my own pockets.)

Alright, so maybe forget the idea of scaling the concept for a moment, and just appreciate the idea for what it is: a means to communicate the tacit through current technology, to literally “reach out and touch someone.”

tPod5 ready for shipments

Available for shipment this summer, the device is called the Tellurex tPOD5™ and is packaged with a five-volt USB standard computer cable. The unit produces sufficient electricity to power a smartphone in real time during voice calls, texting, GPS mapping, email messaging or game playing. Or, it can be used to recharge a depleted battery in the smartphone, tablet or any other electronic device that accepts a USB cable.

The rugged tPOD5 can be placed directly over a standard camping stove or stove top burner and within five minutes will generate a steady five watts of charge through a USB cable that in turn plugs into a rechargeable electronic device.

For those of us without green thumbs, growing plants at home can be hard. But this new system allows you to hook up simple sensors to your hydroponic plants and receive helpful reminders when it’s time to care for them.

Converse with your plants
Ever wonder how your tomato plants are feeling? Or maybe you’ve always wanted to grow your own thriving garden full of flowers and vegetables, but didn’t know where to start? Well now there’s hope!

Bitponics is your shortcut to a green thumb. It’s designed to be an add-on to any existing hydroponics system, and it will simplify and automate your growing process. Once you tell it what you’re trying to grow, it will use a database of knowledge built up by the community to create a “growing plan” for you. Bitponics will automate anything that can be controlled by a power outlet, like water pumps and lights. No more need for a bunch of bulky mechanical timers crowding your power strip! For things we can’t automate (like flushing and refilling your reservoir), we’ll remind you by whatever means you choose: email, text, or in-app notifications. Our plug and play solution is designed to be as simple as possible to set up and won’t require a bunch of technical know-how.
Why Hydroponics?

Hydroponics is an innovative approach that’s ideal for environments where plants can’t normally grow, like apartments and harsh climates. It’s basically any method of growing plants without soil, and instead providing nutrients directly to the roots with a nutrient solution. The root systems don’t need to reach as far, so more plants can be grown in the same amount of space. But because you’re essentially creating the entire growing environment, it has a steeper learning curve compared to traditional soil gardening.

Our goal with Bitponics is to allow more people to grow plants, no matter where they are or how much experience they have. We want to make hydroponic gardening easy for everyone.
How will it work?

Bitponics is made up of two parts: a sensor device and your online account. Once you sign up, you enter in the details of what you’re growing and the type of hydroponic system you have. The next step is to generate a growing plan: Bitponics can either create one for you or you can create your own. The growing plan is the step-by-step roadmap for how to take care of your plants. It will tell you:

• Rival Big Pharmas Strike $285 Million Antibiotic Deal More...

Nepal will grant citizenship certificates to LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) community, recognising their sexual orientation for the first time.

Nepal's Home Ministry has issued directives to this effect.

Now third-gender people will have separate head as "others" in their citizenship certificates, according to Home Ministry spokesperson Shankar Koirala.

"We have already issued directives to the Ministry of Law to add the "others" head in all necessary forms, documents and indexes," he said.

The decision to grant citizenship to gays and lesbians with their identity is being implemented over four years after the landmark decision of the Supreme Court to recognise the identity of the third-gender community while granting citizenship certificates.

Welcoming the decision, gay activist and lawmaker Sunil Babu Panta said that the decision will provide the community easy access to health and education facilities as well as employment opportunities.

"Now the discriminatory practices in schools, hospitals and workplaces against third-gender people will end", said Panta.

We have been facing various problems for years due to the lack of our separate identity but now we, all the third-gender people are happy and proud to have received citizenship with our separate identity, said Bhumika Shrestha, another young gay activist.

In the past, many people with different sexual orientation had been deprived from employment opportunity, education and even getting our passports to travel abroad due to the discriminatory practices, which has now ended, she pointed out.

Around 8 to 10 percent of the total population of the country belongs to the third-gender category though, many people have not disclosed their sexual orientation due to discrimination.

Cricket Kenya have confirmed that the International Cricket Council (ICC) has launched an investigation into alleged spot-fixing by a Kenya player during a 2011 World Cup pool match against Pakistan. Kenya bowled a record-equaling 37 wides in that match in Hambantota en route to a 205-run hammering.

Tom Sears, the Cricket Kenya chief executive, told Press Association Sport that his body was aware of an investigation into the alleged fixing. "We have been told to refer all enquiries to the ICC, we are in contact with them and are aware that there is an investigation," he said. "Apart from that we can't say much more other than we will co-operate fully with the ICC over this."

Petrol has become a sensitive political commodity not because the aam aadmi has enough money to own cars or two-wheelers, but because a deliberately flawed policy has made it so.

Here’s a counter-intuitive idea: we should be pricing cars and two-wheelers higher, not petrol.

In a nation of 1.21 billion people, cars and two-wheelers should not be privileged over public transport. But, thanks to the lobbying powers of the automobile majors, the Indian government has repeatedly succumbed to the lure of making India an auto hub at the cost of public transport.

A government ostensibly run for the aam aadmi is rooting for non-aam modes of transport.

From the launch of the Maruti in the early 1980s to the latest Audis and BMWs that have become status symbols in urban India, policy has been hijacked by the wrong ideas and the wrong people. We need a people’s car like Maruti only when more than half the population can afford one; we need Beamers like a hole in the head.

What India really needs is a policy that clearly favours public transport over private. Reuters

What India really needs is a policy that clearly favours public transport over private. But such is the power of the automobile lobby, that we hesitate to subsidise public transport, but are willing to spend Rs 1,40,000 crore in subsidising petro-fuels and gas (this was our effective subsidy bill in 2011-12).

Now compare this with the Delhi Metro’s Phase 1 cost of Rs 10,000-and-odd crore. Quite clearly, if we abandon the petroleum subsidies, we can subsidise public transport in all our metros and cities. This kind of subsidy would not dent the public exchequer much since it would be financed from higher taxation of private taxation.

Instead, consider how we have compounded our problems by privileging private transport.

Two-wheelers and four-wheelers (cars and SUVs), India puts out over 14 million personal transport vehicles every year. This means over 1.1 percent of India’s population is buying its own set of wheels every year. But this is not an adequate way of analyzing the problem. Assuming a household of five, it means 5 percent of India is shifting to private transport every year.

We are privatising our transport preferences and compounding our economic woes at the same time.

In Mumbai, and most metropolitan cities, municipal corporations are unable to maintain roads in line with the growth in the automobile population, making driving a stressful and hazardous affair even for those who can afford it.

While no one actually questions the need for much bigger investment in public transport, the policy stance adopted actually ends up promoting private transport at the cost of public ones.

This is how policy discriminates in favour of private transport.

One, on the plea that we need to move towards a unified value-added tax system, taxation on cars and two-wheelers has been consistently brought down over the last decade.

Two, most cities prefer to levy a one-time tax at the time the vehicle is bought on the ground that this is simpler to administer. This is economically unsound, since most vehicles are used for at least five years, and sometimes for more than a decade or even 15 years. Mumbai’s Premier Padminis and Kolkata’s and Delhi’s ubiquitous Ambassador taxis, manufactured in the last century, are still on the roads. The one-time vehicle tax is thus regressive – and pro-rich.

Three, two-wheelers are often levied a lower tax on the ground that they are driven by the middle class. However, the fact is that two mobikes occupy as much road space as a car when in motion – especially given their faster speeds. In Mumbai, two-wheelers face no city entry tolls – again, for no economic reason.

Four, the sheer growth in vehicular traffic makes mass public transport systems less viable. When you build metros in cities choked with cars and bikes, the cost of building a metro goes up since there is less space and time available for digging and construction during daytime. Metro projects invariably exceed cost estimates for this reason. Put another way, private transport is making public transport unviable. Like Gresham’s law, which says bad money drives good money out of circulation, bad private vehicles are (essentially) driving good public vehicles off the road.

The numbers show it: In the last 50 years, the share of public transport in India’s total automobile fleet has fallen from 11 percent to less than 1 percent.

So what is the remedy?
In order to promote public transport, five things are vital. Automobile taxes and other charges should be annual, and not one-time. The excise and sales taxes also need to be significantly higher. Conversely, taxes on buses and people carriers of various sizes should be at the lowest taxation slabs.

• Cars should be taxed based on the number of city miles they run, or the number of crowded areas they ply in. RFID (radio frequency ID) chips implanted in cars can tell you how many miles a car has run every month and road charges should be levied like electricity bills every month depending on usage. The principle: the more road you use, the more you pay. This would penalise excess use of cars – and help fund public transport.

• Taxation should be inversely related to fuel efficiency and polluting potential. The higher the fuel-efficiency, the lower the tax. The higher the pollution, the higher the tax.

• Annual taxation should rise during the life of a vehicle. Taxes should vary depending on the age of the vehicle – a lower tax for vehicles in the 0-3 years range, a bit higher for the next three years, and much higher after that. After 10 years, all vehicles should be scrapped or retested for pollution and minimum fuel-efficiency. This policy, combined with tax rebates for scrapping, will mitigate any reduction in automobile demand due to higher taxation.

• In overcrowded metros with low road ratios (Mumbai, for example), cars and two-wheelers should be banned during peak hours on the main trunk routes. Car usage should be restricted to, says, 8pm to 8am, with public transport getting pride of passage during the workday. This policy should be preceded by a very large induction of buses of various sizes to cater to every need: AC buses, regular buses, standees-only buses for short distances, minibuses, and minivans (for low-traffic graveyard shift hours). A Singapore-like system of auctioning car permits in metros with low road space would restrict car purchases to only those who really need it.

Let’s be clear: if we get our public transport policy right, the public would make little fuss over the price of petrol.