Nooks Just Turned Into Real Android Tablets

When it comes to skinned, forked, mainly-for-media-consumption Android tablets, Barnes & Noble's Nook HD and Nook HD+ offerings have always played second fiddle to Amazon's Kindle Fires, and a shortage of apps was a big part of that. Now, Nooks are taking a step into real full-fledged tabletdom with a big big update: the Google.

As of today, Barnes & Noble will be rolling out a firmware update to all Nook HD and Nook HD+ tablets that will let the devices make use of all the Google Apps they never had before. Omissions like Gmail, Google Maps, YouTube will be installed with the update, right alongside Google's own content-peddling apps like Play Books, and Play Magazines. The search giant's Play Music will serve as the first app on that can finally bring music to a Nook-user's ears, and for your web-surfing pleasure, Google Chome is the new default browser.

Along with the standard Google Apps, the Play Store Update will let users gorge on the hundreds of thousands of other apps contained therein; no longer will the slim-ish pickings of Barnes & Noble's own Nook apps be the only option. And all Barnes & Noble had to do was let Google's ecosystem ride into its gates. Holding fast and keeping the lion's share of Android apps at bay has been working out well enough for Amazon's Kindle Fire with its more robust Amazon app store, but it looks like Nook has had enough.

It's a big move, one that will definitely make the Nook HD and Nook HD+ far more appealing tablets, but they're no spring chickens (nor particularly notable in the wider Android-tab world) so this is a little late in the game to try and pick up any competitve edge. Instead, it feels more like an admission that Google-free is not the way to be. There have been rumors floating around that the bookseller has been backing away from its Nook line, and this would definitely support that theory. But it looks like there's still some love there; the kind of love that lets go.

Source: http://gizmodo.com/nooks-just-turned-into-real-android-tablets-487710743

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Obama nominates Pritzker, Froman for economic jobs

President Barack Obama looks to longtime fundraiser and philanthropist Penny Pritzker, right, in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, Thursday, May 2, 2013, where he announced that he will nominate Pritzker to run the Commerce Department and economic adviser Michael Froman, left, as the next U.S. Trade Representative. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

President Barack Obama looks to longtime fundraiser and philanthropist Penny Pritzker, right, in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, Thursday, May 2, 2013, where he announced that he will nominate Pritzker to run the Commerce Department and economic adviser Michael Froman, left, as the next U.S. Trade Representative. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

President Barack Obama speaks in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, Thursday, May 2, 2013, where he announced he will nominate Penny Pritzker, right, as Commerce Secretary and Michael Froman as U.S. Trade Representative, in Washington. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

President Barack Obama leans over to kiss Penny Pritzker, his nominee for Commerce Secretary, as Michael Froman, his nominee for U.S. Trade Representative, applauds at right, Thursday, May 2, 2013, in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

President Barack Obama arrives for a news conference in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, Thursday, May 2, 2013, to announce his nominations of longtime fundraiser and philanthropist Penny Pritzker, center, to run the Commerce Department and economic adviser Michael Froman, right, as the next U.S. Trade Representative. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

WASHINGTON (AP) ? President Barack Obama on Thursday chose two old friends with corporate executive experience for top posts on his economic team, naming longtime fundraiser Penny Pritzker as Commerce secretary and adviser Michael Froman as U.S. Trade Representative.

Pritzker, a Hyatt hotel heiress, businesswoman and philanthropist, is Obama's pick to fill a Cabinet post that has been vacant since former Secretary John Bryson resigned last summer, after he said he suffered a seizure that led to a series of traffic collisions.

Froman is one of Obama's law school classmates and senior economic advisers who previously worked as an executive at Citigroup. The Cabinet-level trade representative performs as the administration's top adviser and negotiator on international trade. If confirmed by the Senate, Froman would replace Ron Kirk, a former Dallas mayor who stepped down as trade representative in February after serving in the post throughout Obama's first term.

Obama made the nominations in the White House Rose Garden just before departing for Mexico. He said the two will help fulfill his top priority to grow the economy and create middle class jobs, in part by opening new markets overseas to sell U.S. products.

"They've got a lot of work to do, and I intend to work them to the bone as soon as they're official," Obama said to laughter from a crowd that included the nominees' families and administration staff.

If she is confirmed by the Senate, Pritzker would become the fourth woman serving as secretary in Obama's current Cabinet. She also would be the wealthiest in the Cabinet by far, with Forbes estimating her net worth at $1.85 billion and ranking her as the 277th richest American.

Pritzker is a lifelong Chicagoan who has known Obama since the 1990s and raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for both of his presidential campaigns. She was his finance chairwoman in 2008, served as co-chair of Obama for America 2012 and gave $250,000 to help put on his inaugural festivities in January.

Obama selected her for his 16-member Presidential Economic Recovery Advisory Board in 2009. When that board expired, Obama included her in his 26-member Council on Jobs and Competitiveness.

Pritzker has led several companies and currently serves as chair of investment firms Pritzker Realty Group and Artemis Real Estate Partners. She's also on the board of the Hyatt Hotels Corp., the chain co-founded by her father.

Pritzker has donated generously to education and the arts and resigned from the Chicago Board of Education in March as she was being vetted for the Commerce nomination.

"She knows from experience that no government program alone can take the place of a great entrepreneur," Obama said. He also noted he was nominating her on her 54th birthday and joked, "For your birthday present, you get to go through confirmation. It's going to be great."

Sure to come up is the Pritzker family's co-ownership of Superior Bank, a Chicago-area thrift that failed in July 2001 after losing millions on risky, high-rate mortgage loans to borrowers with bad credit. With about $1.7 billion in assets, it was at the time the largest insured U.S. financial institution to fail since 1992 and cost the deposit insurance fund $286.3 million.

Federal regulators blamed risky business strategies by Superior's management for the collapse, but they also cited failures on the part of its auditor Ernst & Young.

The Pritzker family and its partner in Superior agreed to pay $460 million without admitting any liability in a settlement with the regulators. In exchange, the owners were allowed to receive 25 percent of any money the government recovered from Ernst & Young, which came to about $31 million.

Froman, Obama's deputy national security adviser for international economic affairs, is steeped in the issues confronting the trade representative.

He has been Obama's main representative at international economic summits such as the meetings of the Group of Eight and Group of 20. He is responsible for coordinating White House policy on international trade, investments, energy, climate and development.

Obama credited Froman with helping negotiate trade agreements for South Korea, Colombia and Panama that the president said have supported tens of thousands of U.S. jobs.

"He has also won a reputation as being an extraordinarily tough negotiator while doing it," Obama said. "He does not rest until he's delivered the best possible deal for American businesses and American workers. He's fought to make sure that countries that break the rules are held accountable."

Froman served during President Bill Clinton's administration as chief of staff to Treasury Secretary Robert E. Rubin. He also worked as deputy assistant secretary for Eurasia and the Middle East and did a White House stint similar to his current job under Obama.

Before joining the Obama economic and national security teams he worked in various capacities at Citigroup, including as managing partner of the Wall Street bank. He also has been a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and a resident fellow at the German Marshall Fund.

Among the top ongoing trade issues are negotiations over the Trans-Pacific partnership, an Asia-Pacific trading bloc that is key to Obama's efforts to boost exports to Asia. Members include the U.S., Australia, Canada, Malaysia, Mexico, Vietnam, Chile, New Zealand, Brunei, Singapore and Peru. Last month, the U.S. approved Japan's entry into negotiations on the trading bloc.

___

AP White House Correspondent Julie Pace, AP Business Writer Marcy Gordon and AP writer Jim Kuhnhenn contributed to this report.

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Follow Nedra Pickler on Twitter at https://twitter.com/nedrapickler

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/89ae8247abe8493fae24405546e9a1aa/Article_2013-05-02-Obama-Nominations/id-df8b4ab5bf1a4a138a365ca79583feaa

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PepsiCo pulls Mountain Dew ad after criticism

NEW YORK (AP) ? PepsiCo is once again learning the risks of celebrity partnerships after an ad for Mountain Dew was criticized for portraying racial stereotypes and making light of violence toward women.

The soda and snack food company said it immediately pulled the 60-second spot after learning that people found it offensive. The ad was part of a series developed by African-American rapper Tyler, The Creator, and depicted a battered white woman on crutches being urged to identify a suspect out of a lineup of black men.

A goat character known as Felicia is included in the lineup and makes threatening comments to the woman, such as "Ya better not snitch on a playa" and "Keep ya mouth shut."

The woman eventually screams "I can't do this, no no no!" and runs away. The word "do" is in apparent reference to the soft drink's "Dew It" slogan.

Mountain Dew, known for its neon color and high caffeine content, is generally marketed to younger men and sometimes attempts to have edgier ads. But the controversy over its latest spot illustrates the fine line that companies must walk when trying to be hip.

In fact, Mountain Dew also was criticized recently because of its endorsement deal with Lil Wayne, whose rap lyrics compared a rough sex act to the tortuous death of Emmett Till, a black teen who was murdered in 1955 for allegedly whistling at a white woman. Last month, Reebok also ended its relationship with Rick Ross after he rapped about giving a woman a drug to have his way with her.

Laura Ries, president of Ries & Ries, a marketing firm based in Atlanta, said companies that want the "street cred" of a celebrity may end up losing control of the message they want to convey.

If PepsiCo had created an ad for Mountain Dew, for example, she said it might not have been considered edgy or cool. But by handing over control to a celebrity, she said the company ran the risk of having an ad that wasn't appropriate.

PepsiCo Inc., based in Purchase, N.Y., said it understood how the ad could be offensive.

"We apologize for this video and take full responsibility," the company said in an updated statement late Wednesday afternoon. "We have removed it from all Mountain Dew channels and Tyler is removing it from his channels as well."

Jen Ryan, a spokeswoman for PepsiCo, said the company learned from its consumer relations team on Tuesday that people found the ad offensive. She declined to explain the approval process for the ad but said it was never meant to run on TV.

Tyler, the Creator's raps have been criticized for being misogynistic and homophobic at times but he has also expressed support for the singer Frank Ocean, who revealed he was bisexual.

Management of Odd Future, the hip-hop collective led by Tyler, the Creator, issued a statement apologizing to anyone offended but said the ad was taken out of context. It noted the men in ad's lineup are Tyler's friends and Odd Future members.

The artist "absolutely never intended to spark a controversy about race," the statement said. "It was simply an, again, admittedly absurd story that was never meant to be taken seriously."

__

Follow Candice Choi at www.twitter.com/candicechoi

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/pepsico-pulls-mountain-dew-ad-criticism-153348677.html

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Printable 'bionic' ear melds electronics and biology

Thursday, May 2, 2013

Scientists at Princeton University used off-the-shelf printing tools to create a functional ear that can "hear" radio frequencies far beyond the range of normal human capability.

The researchers' primary purpose was to explore an efficient and versatile means to merge electronics with tissue. The scientists used 3D printing of cells and nanoparticles followed by cell culture to combine a small coil antenna with cartilage, creating what they term a bionic ear.

"In general, there are mechanical and thermal challenges with interfacing electronic materials with biological materials," said Michael McAlpine, an assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at Princeton and the lead researcher. "Previously, researchers have suggested some strategies to tailor the electronics so that this merger is less awkward. That typically happens between a 2D sheet of electronics and a surface of the tissue. However, our work suggests a new approach -- to build and grow the biology up with the electronics synergistically and in a 3D interwoven format."

McAlpine's team has made several advances in recent years involving the use of small-scale medical sensors and antenna. Last year, a research effort led by McAlpine and Naveen Verma, an assistant professor of electrical engineering, and Fio Omenetto of Tufts University, resulted in the development of a "tattoo" made up of a biological sensor and antenna that can be affixed to the surface of a tooth.

This project, however, is the team's first effort to create a fully functional organ: one that not only replicates a human ability, but extends it using embedded electronics

"The design and implementation of bionic organs and devices that enhance human capabilities, known as cybernetics, has been an area of increasing scientific interest," the researchers wrote in the article which appears in the scholarly journal Nano Letters. "This field has the potential to generate customized replacement parts for the human body, or even create organs containing capabilities beyond what human biology ordinarily provides."

Standard tissue engineering involves seeding types of cells, such as those that form ear cartilage, onto a scaffold of a polymer material called a hydrogel. However, the researchers said that this technique has problems replicating complicated three dimensional biological structures. Ear reconstruction "remains one of the most difficult problems in the field of plastic and reconstructive surgery," they wrote.

To solve the problem, the team turned to a manufacturing approach called 3D printing. These printers use computer-assisted design to conceive of objects as arrays of thin slices. The printer then deposits layers of a variety of materials ? ranging from plastic to cells ? to build up a finished product. Proponents say additive manufacturing promises to advance home industries by allowing small teams or individuals to create work that could previously only be done by factories.

Creating organs using 3D printers is a recent advance; several groups have reported using the technology for this purpose in the past few months. But this is the first time that researchers have demonstrated that 3D printing is a convenient strategy to interweave tissue with electronics.

The technique allowed the researchers to combine the antenna electronics with tissue within the highly complex topology of a human ear. The researchers used an ordinary 3D printer to combine a matrix of hydrogel and calf cells with silver nanoparticles that form an antenna. The calf cells later develop into cartilage.

Manu Mannoor, a graduate student in McAlpine's lab and the paper's lead author, said that additive manufacturing opens new ways to think about the integration of electronics with biological tissue and makes possible the creation of true bionic organs in form and function. He said that it may be possible to integrate sensors into a variety of biological tissues, for example, to monitor stress on a patient's knee meniscus.

David Gracias, an associate professor at Johns Hopkins and co-author on the publication, said that bridging the divide between biology and electronics represents a formidable challenge that needs to be overcome to enable the creation of smart prostheses and implants.

"Biological structures are soft and squishy, composed mostly of water and organic molecules, while conventional electronic devices are hard and dry, composed mainly of metals, semiconductors and inorganic dielectrics," he said. "The differences in physical and chemical properties between these two material classes could not be any more pronounced."

The finished ear consists of a coiled antenna inside a cartilage structure. Two wires lead from the base of the ear and wind around a helical "cochlea" ? the part of the ear that senses sound ? which can connect to electrodes. Although McAlpine cautions that further work and extensive testing would need to be done before the technology could be used on a patient, he said the ear in principle could be used to restore or enhance human hearing. He said electrical signals produced by the ear could be connected to a patient's nerve endings, similar to a hearing aid. The current system receives radio waves, but he said the research team plans to incorporate other materials, such as pressure-sensitive electronic sensors, to enable the ear to register acoustic sounds.

In addition to McAlpine, Verma, Mannoor and Gracias the research team includes: Winston Soboyejo, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at Princeton; Karen Malatesta, a faculty fellow in molecular biology at Princeton; Yong Lin Kong, a graduate student in mechanical and aerospace engineering at Princeton; and Teena James, a graduate student in chemical and biomolecular engineering at Johns Hopkins.

The team also included Ziwen Jiang, a high school student at the Peddie School in Hightstown who participated as part of an outreach program for young researchers in McAlpine's lab.

"Ziwen Jiang is one of the most spectacular high school students I have ever seen," McAlpine said. "We would not have been able to complete this project without him, particularly in his skill at mastering CAD designs of the bionic ears."

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Princeton University, Engineering School: http://engineering.princeton.edu/

Thanks to Princeton University, Engineering School for this article.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/128097/Printable__bionic__ear_melds_electronics_and_biology

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