WASHINGTON (Reuters) – People using CIA and FBI computers have edited entries in the online encyclopedia Wikipedia on topics including the Iraq war and the Guantanamo prison, according to a new tracing program. The program, WikiScanner, was developed by Virgil Griffith of the Santa Fe Institute in New Mexico and posted this month on a Web site that was quickly overwhelmed with searches. The program allows users to track the source of computers used to make changes to the popular Internet encyclopedia where anyone can submit and edit entries. Griffith said he developed WikiScanner “to create minor public relations disasters for […]
KILLADELPHIA: 3 More Dead Since U Went To Bed
BY PETER MUCHA/INQUIRER As midnight approached last night, a period of violence started scattering across the city, leaving three men dead and four others wounded, police said.This year’s murder toll now stands at 262. Shortly after 11:30 p.m., a 21-year-old was shot at least twice in the 1900 block of South Salford Street. Jeffrey Parks was taken to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, where he was pronounced dead a few minutes before midnight, according to Officer Raul Malveiro. At 11:46 p.m., police found a stabbing victim outside in the 800 block of East Willard Street. The 29-year-old, who […]
VERSION 2.0: Utah Cave-In Kills 3 Rescuers, Injures 6
The problem-plagued effort to rescue six miners trapped in a Utah coal mine suffered its most grave setback Thursday night, when a seismic shudder sent rock tumbling onto rescue workers, killing three and injuring six, authorities said. The mountain “bump” occurred about 6:30 p.m., as the group of more than 100 rescue workers continued to carefully tunnel through the collapsed Crandall Canyon Mine. Since Aug. 6, when a predawn cave-in buried the miners, regular seismic tremors have slowed the dig to a virtual crawl. There has been no indication of whether the trapped miners are alive, and officials emphasized that […]
GOD SAVE THE QUEEN: Amy Winehouse In Rehab
Tour Postponed, Tower Date Doubtful Amy Winehouse confessed to her mother-in-law that she is heroin addict. The troubled singer — who was rushed to hospital last week after allegedly overdosing on a cocktail of ecstasy, cocaine, ketamine and alcohol — poured her heart out to Blake Fielder-Civil’s mother Georgette during a family crisis meeting called by Amy’s father Mitch at Hampshire’s Four Season Hotel last Friday (10.08.07). Hair salon boss Georgette, 42, told Britain’s Daily Mirror newspaper: “We can’t force them to give up drugs, it has to come from them, but we can encourage them to get help. “I […]
Max Roach & MLK: I Have A Dream
ASSOCIATED PRESS: NEW YORK — By his 30th birthday, Max Roach was already considered the greatest jazz drummer ever by his peers. By the time he died this week, the 83-year-old master percussionist was known worldwide as much more: innovator, activist, teacher, genius. Roach, whose rhythmic innovations and improvisations defined bebop jazz during a career marked by expectations defied and musical boundaries ignored, died late Wednesday in a Manhattan hospital after a long illness. No additional details were available, said Cem Kurosman, spokesman for Blue Note Records, where Roach played on seminal recordings with Thelonius Monk, Duke Ellington and Miles […]
30 YEARS GONE: You Are Always On My Mind
BY REAGAN GAVIN RASQUINHA/TIMES OF INDIA — Elvis Aaron Presley certainly isn’t going to be lonesome tonight. The hound dog whose famous baritone has been immortalised in vinyl, film and disc will be remembered by legions of his fans who couldn’t help falling in love with The Voice. Today, it’s 30 years since the King passed on, claimed by his love for excess. But that kindly light that shone throughout his unbelievable career still shines on. BT asked some of the city’s diehard Elvis fans about how they remember their hero on this day… Who can forget Elvis’s initial charm […]
NPR 4 THE DEF: Giving Public Radio Edge Since 2006
FRESH AIR By the mid-1960s, Peter Fonda was not a conventional “leading man” in Hollywood. As Playboy magazine reported, Fonda had established a “solid reputation as a dropout.” He had become outwardly nonconformist and grew his hair long, alienating the “establishment” film industry. Desirable acting work became scarce. Through his friendships with members of the Byrds, Fonda visited The Beatles in their rented house in Benedict Canyon in Los Angeles in August, 1965. While John Lennon, Ringo Starr and George Harrison were under the influence of LSD, Lennon heard Fonda say, “I know what it’s like to be dead.” This […]
HOLLA: Yo! Bum Rush The Show
BY JAMES ‘WOOK’ DOOLITTLE To think it was only a few years ago that the most amazing thing about Flavor Flav‘s life post-Public Enemy was that he never felt the urge to release a solo LP. Then go look what he does – release a piece of inconsequence entitled Hollywood last Halloween. Mercifully, practically nobody knows of this record. To this day, I still proclaim to the oblivious that the most amazing thing about Flavor Flav is that he’s never released a solo LP, never cashed in on his wiggity wackiness on da mic, never tainted his immortal sidekick status […]
KILLADELPHIA: The Kindness Of Strangers
BY STEPHANIE FARR/DAILY NEWS In her cramped basement, standing at a workbench lit by a single desk lamp, Lizz Brown stares at the picture of the boy who was slain for his dirt bike, the picture of the boy who didn’t get out of the way fast enough, the picture of the boy whose obituary was left blowing in the street. Then, she paints. Using only items from her local craft store, Brown, 57, of Northeast Philadelphia, has created more than 200 personalized memorial plaques for families of the city’s dead children. Brown buys unfinished, precut wood pieces from a […]
SHERIDAN: Will The Real Slim Shady Please Sit Down
There is compelling evidence that Donaghy engaged in such deplorable behavior. ESPN has reported that the first 15 NBA games Donaghy officiated last season in which betting action moved the Las Vegas line more than 11/2 points all resulted in big wins for those betting against Vegas. According to gambling expert R.J. Bell of Pregame.com, the odds against that randomly happening 15 times in a row are 32,768 to 1. And it would take more than information about a sprained ankle or a referee’s dislike of a particular superstar to pull that off. It would take someone actively manipulating the […]
HELTER STUPID: Yazidi ‘Blasphemers’ Get Infinite Justice, Upwards of 500 Dead, 350 Critically Wounded
MARK OF THE BEAST: Or just garden variety Yazidi Pigeon Angel Man? BAGHDAD — Rescuers used bare hands and shovels Wednesday to claw through clay houses shattered by an onslaught of suicide bombings that killed at least 250 and possibly as many as 500 members of an ancient religious sect in the deadliest attack of the Iraq war. The U.S. military blamed al-Qaida in Iraq, and an American commander called the assault an “act of ethnic cleansing.” The victims of Tuesday night’s coordinated attack by four suicide bombers were Yazidis, a small Kurdish-speaking sect that has been targeted by Muslim […]
KILLADELPHIA: 5 Shootings, 3 Dead, 6 Maimed
INQUIRER: A series of shootings during a two-hour period this afternoon — at least four separate incidents in different neighborhoods in the city — left five people with sever wounds and two people dead. The first incident occurred about 4 p.m., when a 23-year-old man was found severely wounded in East Germantown. The fourth in the cluster happened shortly after 6 p.m., when a gunfight broke out among spectators attending a youth basketball game at a recreation center in North Philadelphia near Brewerytown. When that exchange was over, a 17-year-old boy was left dying of multiple shots to the torso; […]