Apple Dethrones Microsoft In US

NEW YORK: Apple, maker of the Macintosh computer, the iPod, iPhone and iPad, dethroned software giant Microsoft on Wednesday as the largest US technology company in terms of market value.

Microsoft shares shed 4.07 percent on Wednesday to close at 25.01 dollars, dropping its market capitalization -- the number of shares outstanding multiplied by the stock price -- to 219.18 billion dollars.

Apple shares lost 0.45 percent meanwhile to close at 244.05 dollars, giving the company a market value of 222.07 billion dollars.

The only US company with a larger market capitalization than the Cupertino, California-based Apple is ExxonMobil at 278.64 billion dollars.

Apple stock has risen steadily over the past few years as chief executive Steve Jobs, who returned to Apple in 1997, piloted the release of a string of hit products starting with the iPod in 2001, following by the iPhone in 2007 and the iPad this year.

Lee DeWyze Is New ‘American Idol’

Paint store worker, Lee DeWyze, captured the “American Idol” Season 9 title over longtime season front-runner Crystal Bowersox, the cool, dreadlocked single mother with the raspy folk-rock voice.

Lee, 24, looked like he was about to burst into tears after Idol host Ryan Seacrest revealed he won the contest.

He wins the coveted title as well as a recording contract after millions of Americans placed their votes for the bluesy guitarist despite what “Idol” judges had deemed a better showing by Bowersox in her performance finale.

“He’s a fantastic singer. Throwing in the fact that he has an appealing humble and unassuming persona, it’s no wonder he won the hearts of millions,” said Maria S., a die-hard fan of Lee.

Added Kelvin Lian, who watched the finale live on TV this morning, “I’m disappointed Crystal lost out because she certainly has stronger vocals than Lee.”

DeWyze’s cover version of U2′s hit “Beautiful Day” will be released as his first single.

Was Lee your winning choice?

Baby Rolls In Pushchair In Front Of Train Survive

2nd Baby survive from the train collision at the same train station.

Blackberry Or iPhone

In the smartphone deathmatch between RIM’s Blackberry versus Apple’s iPhone, it appears that Steve Jobs’ brainchild may be pulling ahead when it comes to the choice for bankers.

British bank Standard Chartered is replacing the Blackberry, currently its standard corporate communications device, with the iPhone. The move could mean thousands of bankers switching to the Apple device for on-the-go business communications.

The London-based bank is giving its corporate Blackberry users the option of switching to the iPhone, while the company continues to pay for monthly billing for business-related phone and data services.

“It’s a group-wide initiative involving wholesale and consumer banks globally,” a Singapore-based spokesperson for Standard Chartered told Reuters.

In a similar move last June, Singapore’s Overseas-Chinese Banking Corp (OCBC) also gave its employees the choice of a Blackberry or an iPhone to access corporate email.

Peter Koh, head of technology infrastructure at OCBC, told Reuters, “This initiative is not intended to replace the Blackberry. Rather, we want to provide our colleagues with another option to access their office email and sync their contacts, notes and calendar while on the move.”

“Our colleagues can continue to enjoy the features and content available on their iPhone without the hassle of carrying another device in order to access office email,” he explained.

What does this mean for Blackberry developers, RIM?

“If more companies switch to the iPhone, this is of course bad news for RIM,” said Lu Chialin, an IT industry analyst at Macquarie Securities in Taipei. “However, it will take a long time for companies to do their own internal testing before deciding to change, so it will be a while before it has any effect on RIM.”

She explains the biggest issue for most companies choosing telephone and email hardware is data encryption. And because she feels RIM has a more effective system than other handset makers, the shift toward the iPhone is not one that will happen overnight.

So which smartphone do you prefer? Is the Blackberry in danger of being dialed out, or is the iPhone over-rated?

Huge Oil Spill Off Singapore Doubles In Size

Emergency teams are scrambling to contain nearly 5,000 tonnes of crude oil that leaked into the Singapore Strait after two vessels collided in the busy waterway, according to port officials.

The Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA) said in its latest update that 5,000 tonnes of crude had leaked from the Malaysian-registered tanker MT Bunga Kelana 3, double its estimate just a few hours earlier.

An AFP report said that a crude oil slick about four kilometres long and one kilometre wide was spotted near the east coast of Singapore hours after the pre-dawn collision.

The stench of fuel lingered over residential districts near Changi airport into the night as some of the oil evaporated in the stifling tropical heat.

The MPA said that the Malaysian-registered tanker MT Bunga Kelana 3 has been damaged in a collision with a bulk carrier MV Wally registered in St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

According to Malaysia’s Maritime Enforcement Agency, the collision tore a 10-metre gash in the Malaysian tanker.

The tanker’s operators, Malaysia-based AET, said in a statement, “Oil booms are being placed around the leaked cargo to contain the spill.”

Nobody was injured in the accident and ship traffic in the area has not been affected by the incident that took place 13 km off Singapore in the Traffic Separation Scheme at 6.10am Tuesday, according to the release.

The Traffic Separation Scheme is a commercial channel that runs along the Straits of Malacca and Singapore.

In the aftermath of the accident, both vessels were anchored off Singapore and neighbouring Malaysia and Indonesia have been notified.

Singapore’s MPA said a total of 20 vessels from Singapore and Malaysia were involved in the cleanup effort while 200 personnel were on standby to attend to coastal areas that might be affected by the slick.

It also said the damaged double-hulled tanker — designed to minimise cargo spillage in case of an accident — was carrying almost 62,000 tonnes of crude.

Ho Yew Weng, response and projects manager of disaster management firm Oil Spill Response Singapore, told AFP, “It seems to be a lot but if it is light crude, it will just evaporate.”

Ho added that Singapore’s hot climate would make the crude disperse even faster, and with the oil’s prolonged exposure to the sun since morning, “a lot of evaporation would have taken place”.

Hubble Catches Planet Being Devoured By Its Star

WASHINGTON: The Hubble space telescope has discovered a planet in our galaxy in the process of being devoured by the star that it orbits, according to a paper published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

The doomed planet, dubbed WASP-12b, has the highest known surface temperature of any planet in the Milky Way -- around 1,500 degrees Celsius (2,800 degrees Fahrenheit).

But it could be enveloped by its own parent star over the next ten million years, the paper's authors have concluded.

Using a new instrument called the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph that was installed on Hubble in 2009, the researchers observed how the planet was whipped into an elongated shape by gravitational forces.

"We see a huge cloud of material around the planet, which is escaping and will be captured by the star. We have identified chemical elements never before seen on planets outside our own solar system," team leader Carole Haswell of The Open University in Great Britain said.

Discovered in 2008, WASP-12b is located about 600 light-years from Earth in the Auriga Constellation and is more than 300 times the size of Earth.

It also has a mass 40-percent greater than that of Jupiter, the biggest planet in our solar system.

It is so close to its parent star that it orbits it in little more than 24 hours.

Astronomers already knew that stars will swallow a planet that comes too close to it, but this is the first time that the phenomenon has been observed so clearly.

The paper, which was published in the May 10 edition of The Astrophysical Journal Letters, confirms a theoretical paper published in the journal Nature last Friday by Shu-lin Li, an astronomer at Peking University in Beijing.

Shu-lin had predicted that the planet's surface would be distorted by the star's gravitational pull, and that gravitational tidal forces would make the interior so hot that it would greatly expand its outer atmosphere.

LOVE THEM: STOP The Cruelty & Abuse

LOVE THEM...

LIKE YOUR OWN CHILDREN...

They Need the tender care,

If u dun care don't hurt them...

Have a loving heart!!!!

Annoyed By Cellphones?

NEW YORK - Ever wonder why overhearing a cellphone conversation is so annoying? American researchers think they have found the answer.

Whether it is the office, on a train or in a car, only half of the conversation is overheard which drains more attention and concentration than when overhearing two people talking, according to scientists at Cornell University.

"We have less control to move away our attention from half a conversation than when listening to a dialogue," said Lauren Emberson, a co-author of the study that will be published in the journal Psychological Science.

"Since halfalogues really are more distracting and you can't tune them out, this could explain why people are irritated," she said in an interview.

Last year Americans spent 2.3 trillion minutes chatting on cellphones, according to the U.S. wireless trade association CTIA -- a ninefold increase since 2000.

Worldwide, there are about 4.6 billion cellphone subscribers, according to the International Telecommunications Union, a U.N. agency. The number is equal to about two-thirds of the world's population, leaving few corners of the globe where public spaces are free of mobile-tethered babblers.

China has the most cellphone users with 634 million, followed by India with 545 million and the United States with 270 million, figures from the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency show.

Emberson said people try to make sense of snippets of conversation and predict what speakers will say next.

"When you hear half of a conversation, you get less information and you can't predict as well," she said. "It requires more attention."

The findings by Emberson and her co-author Michael Goldstein are based on research involving 41 college students who did concentration exercises, like tracking moving dots, while hearing one or both parties during a cellphone conversation.

The students made more errors when they heard one speaker's side of the conversation than when overheard the entire dialogue.

The study shows that overhearing a cellphone conversation affects the attention we use in our daily tasks, including driving, Emberson said.

"These results suggest that a driver's attention can be impaired by a passenger's cell phone conversation," according to the study.

It recommends similar studies should be conducted with driving simulators.

Tanjong Pagar KTMB Station To Relocate

The Keretapi Tanah Melayu Berhad (KTMB station) at Tanjong Pagar will be relocated to the Woodlands train checkpoint by 1 July 2011.

In a Channel NewsAsia report, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and his Malaysian counterpart Najib Razak also agreed that Malaysia would co-locate its railway and Customs, Immigration and Quarantine (CIQ) to the Woodlands train checkpoint.

Also announced was the establishment of MS Pte Ltd. It is reported that Malaysia’s Khazanah Nasional Berhad would hold a 60 per cent stake in this company while Singapore’s Temasek Holdings will have a 40 per cent share.

MS Pte Ltd will oversee the development of three parcels of land in Tanjong Pagar, Kranji and Woodlands, and another three pieces of land in Bukit Timah.

The railway land could be swapped for real estate in two of Singapore’s most expensive districts, in Marina South and/or Ophir-Rochor area.

In a joint statement released, both sides will conduct valuations of the land and PM Lee will visit Kuala Lumpur within a month with a proposal for a land swap.

According to Song Seng Wun, a regional economist with CIMB-GK Research in Singapore, he told AFP the railway land’s worth “could be in the billions”.

Malaysia Wildlife park Under Fire Over Tiger Video

KUALA LUMPUR : A Malaysian wildlife park came under fire Sunday from wildlife activists over a video posted on YouTube showing an apparently drugged tiger being prodded and poked for the amusement of visitors.

The two-minute clip:

Shows the tiger lying on a slab at a wildlife park in the Afamosa resort while a handler invites visitors walking around it to take pictures with the animal.

The handler then prods and pokes the big cat to force it to pose and even uses his knee to jab its head into an upright pose for a photograph.

"This is horrible and a disgrace that an animal is treated in this fashion. We must stop such abuse and the perpetrators must be punished," Friends of the Earth Malaysia president S.M. Idris told AFP.

Wildlife trade watchdog TRAFFIC criticised the park's use of captive tigers for entertainment.

"If they acquire tigers for this use, it gives Malaysia a very bad reputation as it shows the park is using the tigers for entertainment instead of educational purposes," senior officer Kanitha Krishnasamy told AFP.

Afamosa resort general manager Allan Chee denied the tiger was abused at the park, which has more than 20 tigers and numerous other species.

"There was no abuse to the tiger, the tiger was just drowsy and lazy after being fed and so was being prodded by the handler to get into position," he told AFP.

He said the park in southern Malacca state prided itself on its animal performances, with elephants playing football and others allowed to roam freely.

However, state wildlife and national parks head Abdul Rahim Othman told AFP the park had been warned over having such photo sessions with animals which can be viewed as abuse.

"We have warned them and will carry out further investigations and if they continue to violate our warnings, we can take action against them including pulling their licences," he said.

Just 3,200 tigers are believed to remain in the wild, down from an estimated 100,000 a century ago.