Kenyan elephant numbers plummet by 1000 in four years

IT'S a case of up then down for Kenya's second largest population of elephants. After a promising growth spurt, the elephants are now dying faster than they are being born. The decline is being blamed on illegal poaching, driven by Asia's demand for ivory. ...

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Football: Wigan leave Redknapp still searching for first win

WIGAN, United Kingdom: QPR manager Harry Redknapp was left looking for his first win since he took over at the Premier League bottom side after a double by Ireland international James McCarthy gave Wigan a deserved 2-2 draw here on Saturday.QPR remain rooted to the bottom despite coming from behind to lead 2-1 through goals by their Kiwi captain Ryan Nelsen and substitute Djibril Cisse...

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Nook Simple Touch e-reader drops to $80

Barnes & Noble is dropping the price of its Nook Simple Touch e-reader by $20 starting tomorrow, with a new price tag of $80, the company said today.Not a full-blowntablet, the Simple Touch relies on a touch screen for flipping e-ink pages, navigating menus, and so on. CNET Reviews gave it four out of five stars and called it a "major advancement" over its predecessor.As CNET's Rick Broida noted...

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Plants Grow Fine Without Gravity

When researchers sent plants to the International Space Station in 2010, the flora wasn't meant to be decorative. Instead, the seeds of these small, white flowers—called Arabidopsis thaliana—were the subject of an experiment to study how plant roots developed in a weightless environment.Gravity is an important influence on root growth, but the scientists found that their space plants didn't...

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Australian DJs Behind Prank Call Under Fire

An outpouring of anger is being directed today at the two Australian radio hosts after the death of a nurse who was caught in the DJs' prank call to hospital where Kate Middleton was treated earlier this week.Lord Glenarthur, the chairman of King Edward VII's Hospital - the U.K. hospital where the Duchess of Cambridge was receiving treatment, condemned the prank in a letter...

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Today on New Scientist: 9 December 2012

Climate talks stumbling towards a deal As the Qatar climate summit looks set to run into the weekend, we look at some key issues, such as compensation for poor countries harmed by climate changeTwin spacecraft map the mass of the man in the moon Two satellites called Ebb and Flow have revealed the fine variations in the moon's surface with the most detailed gravity map everJust cut down on...

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Protesters break through barrier round Egypt palace

CAIRO: More than 10,000 protesters opposing Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi swarmed the square in front of his Cairo palace on Friday evening, breaking through barbed wire barriers protecting the compound.A cordon of soldiers prevented the crowd from nearing the palace's main gate, but elsewhere protesters sprayed graffiti on the outside walls, telling Morsi to "Go" and leave power, AFP...

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Want to see what the first GamePad looked like?

A look at the first GamePad.(Credit:Nintendo)Nintendo today released an image of what was its first GamePad prototype.In the latest Iwata Asks feature, in which Nintendo President Satoru Iwata holds discussions with employees on a host of topics, the company shared what was the first prototype for theWii U's GamePad.The first "GamePad" was made up of twoWii Remotes that were connected to an LCD display...

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Natural Gas Nation: EIA Sees U.S. Future Shaped by Fracking

Truck stops will need restyled fuel pumps. New factories, and some old ones, will whir to life. Ports will send new tankers onto the open seas, heralding the return of the United States to the top of the global energy scene.All these changes already are in motion, according to the new U.S. government annual energy outlook, a document that paints the clearest picture yet of the transformation...

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'Fiscal Cliff' Talks: Tax Increases Seem Inevitable

Dec 7, 2012 11:51am Another week comes to a close with seemingly little progress in the on-going “fiscal cliff” negotiations. With only 24 days left to negotiate and the House of Representatives heading out of town for a long weekend, the outlook for a deal before December 31 is looking increasingly slim, and Republicans and Democrats don’t appear to be moving away...

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Human eye proteins detect red beyond red

We all see red every now and again, but imagine seeing red beyond red. Researchers have altered the structure of a protein normally found in the human eye so that it can absorb a type of red light that we cannot normally see. The new protein could, in theory, give us the ability to see reds that are currently beyond...

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Football: Mikel handed three-match ban after United race row

LONDON: Chelsea midfielder John Obi Mikel was on Thursday suspended for three matches and fined £60,000 (74,320 euros) for clashing with match officials following the controversial 3-2 defeat to Manchester United.Mikel was reported to have stormed into the officials' dressing room at Stamford Bridge after the Premier League match in October following accusations that referee Mark Clattenburg...

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Sean Parker of Spotify joins Metallic's Lars Ulrich on stage

Daniel Ek, the CEO of Spotify, now can boast that he helped make peace between Sean Parker, the Napster co-founder, and Metallica's Lars Ulrich. The three told the audience at Spotify's press event today that the fight between them was just a misunderstanding.(Credit:Greg Sandoval/CNET)NEW YORK--Lars Ulrich of Metallica and Sean Parker, one of the founders of file-sharing service Napster, made peace...

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High-Voltage DC Breakthrough Could Boost Renewable Energy

Patrick J. Kiger Thomas Edison championed direct current, or DC, as a better mode for delivering electricity than alternating current, or AC. But the inventor of the light bulb lost the War of the Currents. Despite Edison's sometimes flamboyant efforts—at one point he electrocuted a Coney Island zoo elephant in an attempt to show the technology's hazards—AC is the primary way that electricity...

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Wash. Pot Smokers Celebrate as Feds Stand Back

Marijuana smokers breathed a puff of relief today as they lit up legally for the first time in Washington state and were not cited, ticketed, or arrested for what is still a federal offense."There are no federal agents out there busting people," Seattle police Sgt. Sean Whitcomb said today, hours after a new state law legalizing pot went into effect.Seattle police spokesman...

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Gay 'conversion therapy' enters the courtroom

FROM condemnation to the courts. Gay "conversion therapy", the controversial counselling for gay people who wish to change their sexuality, is now in the dock. Last week, four men in New Jersey filed a civil suit under the state's Consumer Fraud Act against...

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Dublin unveils sixth austerity budget

DUBLIN: Bailed-out eurozone member Ireland on Wednesday launched its sixth austerity budget aimed at raising 3.5 billion euros via painful taxation hikes and public spending cuts.Irish Finance Minister Michael Noonan, unveiling his latest budget before parliament, said however that there were clear signs that the worst of the nation's financial crisis was over."There are manifest signs...

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RIP, rear-projection TV

CNET Senior Editor Scott Stein poses in front of a 92-inch Mitsubishi TV. It's one of the last of its kind.(Credit:Sarah Tew/CNET) Rear-projection TV is dead, and there's little reason to think the technology will pull a Lazarus anytime soon. On Monday Mitsubishi confirmed it has already ceased production of its last RPTVs, and told TWICE that inventory is almost gone. "The decision to exit the category...

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Scientific Results From Challenger Deep

Jane J. Lee The spotlight is shining once again on the deepest ecosystems in the ocean—Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench (map) and the New Britain Trench near Papua New Guinea. At a presentation today at the American Geophysical Union's conference in San Francisco, attendees got a glimpse into these mysterious ecosystems nearly 7 miles (11 kilometers) down, the former visited by filmmaker...

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John McAfee Seeks Asylum, Thanks God for 'Sanity'

Eccentric software tycoon John McAfee, wanted for questioning in the shooting death of his neighbor, has made his escape from Belize to Guatemala, where he told ABC News he will be seeking asylum."Thank God I am in a place where there is some sanity," McAfee said. "I chose Guatemala carefully."McAfee, 67, has been on the run from police in the Central American country of Belize...

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Today on New Scientist: 4 December 2012

'Magnetic highway' found at solar system's edge NASA's Voyager 1 has detected a zone where charged particles can race along magnetic field lines linking the solar system with interstellar spaceBack-to-basics money shot shows a cent's battle scars The euro has taken a bit of a battering of late - and not just in the financial markets. See how a 1-cent coin looks through a powerful microscopeBattling...

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Fugitive McAfee seeks asylum in Guatemala

GUATEMALA CITY: American Internet pioneer John McAfee, wanted for questioning over the murder of his neighbor last month in Belize, is seeking political asylum in Guatemala, his lawyer said Tuesday.McAfee, 67, amassed huge wealth as a Silicon Valley entrepreneur in the 1990s, designing the hugely popular anti-virus software that bears his name and remains a leading industry product to...

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Massive day-one update won't be bundled in Wii U until 2013

TheWii U's massive update that runs after booting the hardware won't be bundled in the console for at least a few months.Speaking to Gamasutra in an interview published today, Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime said that the out-of-the-box update will be pushed out over the Web for the next few months. After that, Nintendo will install it in itsWii U hardware before shipping consoles to...

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Pictures We Love: Best of November

Photograph by Qais Usyan, AFP/Getty ImagesThe family of a five-year-old Afghan girl, victim of an alleged rape by a 22-year-old man, sits at her hospital bedside in Mazar-i-Sharif, Afghanistan, on November 12. News agencies reported that the assailant, a neighbor, was later detained by police.(Read about the continued struggle of women in Afghanistan in National Geographic magazine.)Why We Love It...

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