■ On-line to the throne
Flushing out the secrets of America's Web surfers, a new survey of Internet use has found that more and more people are logging on -- in the bathroom. The snapshot of how the Internet has changed American life, concluded that home wireless connections were allowing people to stay connected everywhere -- even in the smallest room in the house. "A significant number of Americans use the computer connection in the bathroom," said Jeffrey Cole, of the University of Southern California Annenberg School Center for the Digital Future. Since people were unlikely to be surfing in the bath, or while brushing their teeth, Cole said he had concluded that many of them went off into cyberspace while on the throne. "Over half of those who used Wi-fi had used it in the bathroom," said Cole, remarking that he believed some people in busy homes retreated there for some privacy.
■ Cyprus counts cost of Viagra
The Cyprus government is proposing that condoms and the anti-impotency drug Viagra be included among a raft of new items being added to the monthly consumer price index that tracks inflation. The state statistics department is preparing a list of 153 more goods and services to be added in the first change to the cost of living index since 2000, according to the Greek-language Phileleftheros newspaper. The proposed list reflects the change in the eastern Mediterranean island's lifestyle trends by including the average price of hair waxing, contact lenses, hair gel, hands-free mobile phone accessories, vodka, pay-TV subscriptions, hunting licenses, blank CDs and a visit to the osteopath.
■ `12 days of Christmas' index up
One partridge in a pear tree: US$104.99, up 12.9 percent. Seven swans-a-swimming: US$4,200, up 20 percent. Overall, the cost of the items cited in the holiday song The Twelve Days of Christmas is US$18,348, up 6.1 percent over last year, according to the annual Christmas Price Index released this week by PNC Bank. "The Christmas Price Index reflects the economic trends that we have witnessed during the past year," said Jeff Kleintop, chief investment strategist for PNC Advisors. The bank said high energy costs and the impact of avian flu on imported bird prices was the main driver of Christmas inflation. Costs for domestic birds (four French hens and two turtledoves) were unchanged from a year ago.
■ Norway makes Santa its own
Norway will call in extra air traffic controllers for the Christmas rush as hundreds of thousands of tourists, primarily from Britain, take to the skies to visit Santa in Finland's far north, Norwegian officials said this week. Each year during the holiday season dozens of special daily flights link the European continent to the Arctic village of Rovaniemi, the official home of Father Christmas, creating headaches for air controllers in the countries the planes fly over, such as Denmark, Norway and Sweden. Some 400,000 tourists visit Rovaniemi each year, 90 percent of whom hail from Britain.
■ Seattle sound for literacy
Seattle, the west coast haven of coffee, culture and the Arts has been named America's most literate city. A study put Seattle directly ahead of Minneapolis, Washington, Atlanta and San Francisco in terms of literacy, which researchers said was critical to a city's long term economic and social success. Researchers at Central Connecticut State University surveyed the literacy of 69 of America's largest cities in terms of newspaper circulation, number of bookstores, library resources, periodical publishing resources, educational attainment and Internet use.
■ Monkeys have neutral accents too
To the untrained ear monkeys of a certain species may all sound the same, but Japanese researchers have found that, like human beings, they actually have an accent depending on where they live. The finding, the first of its kind, will appear in the December edition of a German scientific journal Ethology that was published yesterday, the primate researchers said this week. The research team analyzed voice tones of two groups of the same species of primates, the Japanese Yakushima macaque also known as Macaca fuscata yakui, between 1990 and 2000.
■ Caps off to Belgian office workers
The ever-efficient Belgian postal service wants to know how long it takes mailmen and women to put on and take off their motorbike helmets, a report said this week. At present, the people delivering mail have to put on their helmets when they leave or return from a trip, but are not obliged to wear them during the trip itself, the Flemish Het Nieuwsblad op Zondag newspaper reported, citing the Belga press agency. The impetus for this helmets on-off calculation is an increase in accidents among the 4,000 motorized mail carriers.
On April 26, The Lancet published a letter from two doctors at Taichung-based China Medical University Hospital (CMUH) warning that “Taiwan’s Health Care System is on the Brink of Collapse.” The authors said that “Years of policy inaction and mismanagement of resources have led to the National Health Insurance system operating under unsustainable conditions.” The pushback was immediate. Errors in the paper were quickly identified and publicized, to discredit the authors (the hospital apologized). CNA reported that CMUH said the letter described Taiwan in 2021 as having 62 nurses per 10,000 people, when the correct number was 78 nurses per 10,000
As we live longer, our risk of cognitive impairment is increasing. How can we delay the onset of symptoms? Do we have to give up every indulgence or can small changes make a difference? We asked neurologists for tips on how to keep our brains healthy for life. TAKE CARE OF YOUR HEALTH “All of the sensible things that apply to bodily health apply to brain health,” says Suzanne O’Sullivan, a consultant in neurology at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in London, and the author of The Age of Diagnosis. “When you’re 20, you can get away with absolute
May 5 to May 11 What started out as friction between Taiwanese students at Taichung First High School and a Japanese head cook escalated dramatically over the first two weeks of May 1927. It began on April 30 when the cook’s wife knew that lotus starch used in that night’s dinner had rat feces in it, but failed to inform staff until the meal was already prepared. The students believed that her silence was intentional, and filed a complaint. The school’s Japanese administrators sided with the cook’s family, dismissing the students as troublemakers and clamping down on their freedoms — with
As Donald Trump’s executive order in March led to the shuttering of Voice of America (VOA) — the global broadcaster whose roots date back to the fight against Nazi propaganda — he quickly attracted support from figures not used to aligning themselves with any US administration. Trump had ordered the US Agency for Global Media, the federal agency that funds VOA and other groups promoting independent journalism overseas, to be “eliminated to the maximum extent consistent with applicable law.” The decision suddenly halted programming in 49 languages to more than 425 million people. In Moscow, Margarita Simonyan, the hardline editor-in-chief of the
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