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Monday, June 7, 2010

An acrobatic group known by the name of Spelbound has been declared as the winner of Britain’s Got Talent 2010, a televised variety talent show competition broadcast on ITV in the United Kingdom. As the winning act of the show, Spelbound have won £100,000 (US$144,580, €120,313, A$175,079) and a place at The Royal Variety Performance, an annual gala evening that is attended by senior members of the British Royal Family.

In no particular order, the top three acts were revealed to be two dancers known by their stage name of Twist and Pulse, gymnastic group Spelbound and Kieran Gaffney, whose act involves playing on the drum kit. After Kieran Gaffney was revealed to be in third place, Anthony McPartlin, who hosts Britain’s Got Talent with Declan Donnelly, said to Kieran: “Well done Kieran. Kieran, you’re a star, you came back, you got all the way to the final. I know you’ve loved this. You’ve loved this, haven’t you?” In response to this, Kieran Gaffney stated: “Thank you very much. Thank you, everyone for supporting me. Thank you.”

Shortly afterwards, on the episode that was broadcast live on ITV1 on Saturday, Anthony announced: “After tens of thousands of auditons, five semi-finals and an amazing final, this…this is it. One of you is about to walk away with £100,000 and a place at this year’s Royal Variety Performance. The winner of Britain’s Got Talent 2010 is…Spelbound!” Glen Murphy from Twist and Pulse commented about finishing in second place, stating: “Yeah, it’s amazing. I can’t even believe it. I can’t believe it at all.”

Alex Uttley, a 24-year-old member of Spelbound, commented on the gymnastic group’s victory, commenting: “Oh, my god. This is unbelieveable. We just want to say thank you to everyone out there. It just shows that all our hard work has paid off.” One of the coaches of Spelbound, named Neil Griffiths, stated about Spelbound: “Oh, they’ve worked so hard over the last few weeks. Um, since the semi-final, we…we really had to pull out the stops to try and up the game. They’ve not known they’ve worked in the gym from six in the morning till twelve…twelve o’clock of the night. I couldn’t have asked for more. Um, it’s a team of coaches. I don’t take all the credit myself. There’s, uh, two people up there that know who they are who’ve been fantastic.”

Spelbound consists of 24-year-old Alex Uttley, Nicholas Illingworth, aged 24, Adam Buckingham, aged 21, 20-year-old Adam McAssey, 19-year-old Douglas Fordyce, 18-year-old Edward Upcott, 18-year-old Leighanne Cowler, 17-year-old Katie Axten, 17-year-old Lauren Kemp, 15-year-old Jonathan Stranks, Abigail Ralph, aged 15, 13-year-old Hollianne Wood and Amy Mackenzie, aged 12. Bookmakers had previously predicted that Spelbound would be the most likely act to become the winner of the series.

The running order for the final started with Twist and Pulse. The second act to perform was Liam McNally, a 14-year-old singer. The running order subsequently continued with 40-year-old impressionist Paul Burling, singer Christopher Stone, aged 28, Tina & Chandi, a woman and dog dancing act, Connected, a five-piece singing group, Kieran Gaffney, aged 12, 22-year-old Tobias Mead, a dancer, 80-year-old singer Janey Cutler and Spelbound in that particular order.

Earlier on in the final, Britain’s Got Talent judge Amanda Holden has stated to Spelbound: “We are hosting the 2012 Olympics and I think ‘what a brilliant opening act’.” Fellow judge Piers Morgan also commented that “[t]he purpose of this show is to identify hidden great British talent. You are that act.” After Spelbound won in the final, another judge, named Simon Cowell, stated that “the right boys and girls won on the night” and that he could “only say on live TV that that was one of the most astonishing things I have ever seen. Seriously.”

Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Japanese multinational company Fujitsu launched a website for a dog pedometer which allows customers to monitor their dog’s health online. The device measures data while attached to the dog’s collar. Customers are also able to add more data to the website manually, then it displays the complete set of data graphically. Fujitsu launched the website today (Tuesday) and plans to start the sales in Japan tomorrow (Wednesday).

The pedometer is called “Wandant”, from Japanese “Wan” equivalent to “woof”, and the “dant” of “pendant”. The latter refers to the pedometer, because it is attached to a dog collar. The users can transfer data to an Android phone using a touch-card to make it available online.

Fujitsu said Wandant would be the first cloud-based dog health-care service.

The data include walking, temperature, and shaking motion statistics. The users can manually enter additional data such as food quantities, weight, custom notes, and photos.

Fujitsu said, “The data are presented graphically on a custom website that makes trends in the dog’s activities easy to understand at a glance. This helps owners get a stronger sense of their dog’s health, while enabling communication with the dog.”

Saturday, October 9, 2010

Health Minister of Chile, Jaime Mañalich, announced on Friday the rescue of the 33 Chilean miners trapped in San José Mine, Copiapó is to begin this Tuesday, October 12.

Mining Minister Laurence Golborne announced that the tunnel the miners will ascend “will be ready in the next 24 hours. [The tunnel] could be done by this night or tomorrow’s early morning.” However, he couldn’t “assure an hour because it is not exact.”

“The rescue will take place between three and eight days (after finishing the perforation), depending on the decisions that are taken about the encamisado (process of coating the tunnel with a metal pipe),” Golborne added. He also said the miners “have no anxiety,” saying that “they’ve waited a few months now for their rescue and are aware that they will have to wait some more days.”

The thirty-three miners have been trapped at the bottom of San José Mine, Copiapó, Atacama Region, Chile since August 5. It was discovered they were alive on August 22, when they sent the note “We are fine in the shelter the 33 [of us].”

Friday, March 28, 2008

2008 Taipei International Cycle Show (Taipei Cycle) & Taipei International Sporting Goods Show (TaiSPO) not only did a best reunion with conjunctions of the launch of Taipei World Trade Center Nangang Exhibition and the concurrent cycling race of 2008 Tour de Taiwan but also provide opportunities and benefits for sporting goods, bicycle, and athlete sports industries to establish the basis of the sourcing center in Asia and notabilities on the international cycling race.

Although the Taipei cycle was split from the TaiSPO since 1988, but the trends of sporting good industry in Taiwan changed rapidly and multiply because of modern people’s lifestyles and habits. After the “TaiSPO Innovation Award” was established since 2005, the fitness and leisure industries became popular stars as several international buyers respected on lifestyle and health.

For example, some participants participated Taipei Cycle and TaiSPO with different product lines to do several marketing on bicycle and fitness equipments, this also echoed the “Three New Movements” proposed by Giant Co., Ltd. to make a simple bicycle with multiple applications and functions. As of those facts above, Wikinews Journalist Rico Shen interviewed Ideal Bike Corporation and Gary Silva, designer of “3G Steeper” to find out the possibilities on the optimizations between two elements, fitness and bicycle.

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Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Buffalo, New York —Two weeks after a 19th century stable and livery on Jersey Street partially collapsed and caused 15 homes to be evacuated in Buffalo, New York, residents still do not have answers from the city despite a court order to work with them and come to an agreement on a way to save some or all of the building, Wikinews has learned. Despite the frustration from residents, the city is planning on suing the building’s owner. A rally was held at the stable’s site where residents are hoping to bring more awareness to the situation and gain more support to save the building.

On June 11, a significant portion of the stable’s right side wall collapsed into the yard of a resident’s home. Authorities, including the Buffalo Fire Department were called to the scene to evaluate the collapse and evacuate 15 homes of residents surrounding the stable as a precautionary measure. The following day, the city ordered an emergency demolition on the building, which was stopped by a restraining order residents with Save The Livery (www.savethelivery.com) won on June 14. Two weeks later, five homes are still evacuated and residents don’t know when they will be able to return.

On June 19, Judge Justice Christopher Burns of the New York State Supreme Court ordered a halt to the emergency demolition and ordered the city and residents to come to an agreement to save the building, or at least a significant portion of it. Despite a court date today, no agreement has yet been reached between the two parties.

“It is in the interest of the city to have a safe environment–but also important to maintain a sense of historical preservation,” stated Burns in his June 19th ruling. The court ruled that a limited demolition could take place and that the city was only allowed to remove material in immediate danger to residents and pedestrians, but stated that the demolition could only be performed with “hand tools.” The court also ordered that any rubble which had fallen into neighboring yards when the building collapsed, to be removed. Since then, most of not all the significantly damaged portions of the building or portions in immediate danger of falling have been demolished. The roof has also been removed to put less stress on the stable’s walls.

“Its been over three years since we have been having problems with part of the livery falling down. There was an implosion two weeks ago and suddenly the city wanted to have an emergency demolition,” said Catherine Herrick who lives on Summer Street immediately behind the stable and is the main plaintiff in the lawsuit against the city. Many homes on Summer are small cottages which were used as servants quarters when the stable was in operation, many of which were built in the 1820’s. At least seven homes on Summer border the stable’s back walls. Residents in those homes have significant gardens which have been planted against the building and growing for decades.

“Both parties are to continue to work together to see how we can meet everybody’s needs. This is the third time we have been in that courtroom, and that is what we were basically told to do,” added Herrick who said the rally was held today because this “is Buffalo’s history. Buffalo is a wonderful place to live because of its history and this is a historical, beautiful building and we need to keep those beautiful buildings.”

Herrick states that the city is working with residents, but also believes that its “slow moving” and they are allowing the owner to get away with neglect on the property.

“I believe right now that they are letting the owner get off. The owner was negligent for 20 years, and hasn’t done anything to it despite what he has claimed to say. Now that this is an emergency situation, the city has a lot to say about it,” added Herrick.

Currently the building is owned by Bob Freudenheim who has several building violations against him because its poor condition. He has received at least five violations in three months and residents who live near the building state that Freudenheim should be “100% responsible” for his actions.

Freudenheim gave the city permission to demolish the building on June 12 during an emergency Preservation Board meeting, because he would not be “rehabilitating the building anytime soon.” Freudenheim, along with his wife Nina, were part-owners of the Hotel Lenox at 140 North Street in Buffalo and were advocates to stop the Elmwood Village Hotel from being built on the Southeast corner of Forest and Elmwood Avenues. They also financially supported a lawsuit in an attempt to stop the hotel from being built. Though it is not known exactly how long Freudenheim has owned the stable, Wikinews has learned that he was the owner while fighting to stop the hotel from being built. Residents say that he has been the owner for at least 22 years. Attorneys for Freudenheim confirm that the city is starting proceedings against him for his violations beginning as early as Wednesday June 25. Freudenheim has not released a statement and could not be reached for comment.

Many residents want the building preserved and Herrick states that their engineer can have it stable in “four days” as opposed to the 14-30 days it would take to demolish the building and “at a lesser cost than what it costs to demolish it.”

It will cost the city nearly US$300,000 to demolish the building which is paid for with tax money collected from residents in the city. The Buffalo News reports that fees are approaching $700,000. Though reports say there is a potential buyer of the stable, Wikinews cannot independently confirm those reports.

Residents say the stable was designed by Richard A. Waite, a 19th century architect, and was first owned by a company called White Bros., used as a stable and housed at least 30 horses at any given time. It also stored “coaches, coupes, broughams, Victorias and everything in the line of light livery,” stated an article from the West Side Topics dated 1906. According to the article, The company first opened in 1881 on Thirteenth Street, now Normal Avenue, and later moved into the Jersey building in 1892. The Buffalo Fire Department believes the building was built around 1814, while the city property database states it was built in 1870. It is believed to be only one of three stables of this kind still standing in the country.

At about 1950, the stable was converted into an automobile body shop and gasoline station.A property record search showed that in 1950 at least four fuel storage tanks were installed on the property. Two are listed as 550 square feet while the other two are 2,000 square feet. All of the tanks are designated as a TK4, which New York State says is used for “below ground horizontal bulk fuel storage.” The cost of installing a tank of that nature according to the state, at that time, included the tank itself, “excavation and backfill,” but did not include “the piping, ballast, or hold-down slab orring.” It is not known if the tanks are still on the property, but residents are concerned the city was not taking the precautions to find out.

Wikinews has called the city along with the Mayor’s office several times, but both have yet to return our calls. There are conflicting reports as to the date of the next hearing. According to Herrick, the next hearing is July 1, 2008 though the Buffalo News states the next hearing is July 8. The News also states that Burns will make a final ruling on the stable at this time.

Sunday, December 21, 2008

The British government has decided to sell off its stake in the British nuclear weapon manufacturer, Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE). The move has been met with anger and claims of cover up by the opposition parties. The news was broken by Jacobs Engineering, the California based company who bought the government’s shares, and by a single line comment on the British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) website. British Nuclear Fuels plc, a government owned company, held one third of the shares in AWE’s operating company, with British firm Serco and American defence contractor Lockheed Martin each having a further third. The Atomic Weapons Establishment, which is based in Aldermaston, produces the warheads for the Lockheed Martin Trident D5 missile used by the Royal Navy’s Vanguard class ballistic missile submarines.

The details of the deal have not been published, though opposition Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman Vince Cable suggested the deal was “probably in the millions rather than the billions”, echoing fears that the firm may have been undervalued in its sale. Both the methods of the deal’s announcement and the deal itself have been attacked by both opposition parties. There is anger in some quarters over the deal being revealed on a website rather than through the commons, the Liberal Democrats describing such a failure as staggering. The Liberal Democrats have also raised the issue of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, their defence spokesman Nick Harvey questioned “The whole argument used for Britain having a separate weapons establishment is that this is required by the non-proliferation treaty, as technology sharing is not allowed. We must therefore query the rationale of a US company having a majority shareholding in AWE. How does this all square?”

The Tories have also raised doubts over the decision, with Commons Public Accounts Select Committee member Richard Bacon suggesting that they may involve the National Audit Office. The Tory defence spokesperson, Gerald Howarth, commented that the firm was “critical” and said “What I’m absolutely determined is that the United Kingdom should have total control of its independent nuclear capability”. Mr Howarth criticised handing over control to American firms, saying that the British people would want to know “their politicians are in command of the research and development of this capability”.

The Ministry of Defence has defended the decision, saying “the UK Government not AWE that sets the UK’s nuclear policy”. The MoD also assured that the sale would have no affect on the independence of the British nuclear deterrent or on the safe operation of AWE. These statements have been backed up by news from the government that it has retained the ability to re-assert control over the site should it feel the need, due to a “Special Share”.

Saturday, March 31, 2007

Many lights in Sydney, Australia‘s largest city, were turned off for one hour at 19:30 local time (09:30 UTC) on March 31, 2007 to raise awareness of climate change. This Earth hour, which was organised by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), received support from the government of New South Wales, many environmental groups and some businesses.

Many famous buildings such as the Opera House, Sydney Harbour Bridge and Luna Park took part.

Organisers also hoped the event would encourage Australians to conserve energy, claiming if various electronics were switched off when they were not in use the country’s greenhouse gas emissions could reduce by up to 5%.

Saturday, April 25, 2009

A University of Georgia marketing professor has allegedly killed three people and injured two others today in the southeastern United States.

The shooting took place approximately 12:25 p.m around the Athens Community Theater in the Athens-Clarke County, in the northeast part of Georgia.

Authorities suspect George Zinkhan in the shooting and have issued a nationwide alert for him and his 2005 red Jeep Liberty with Georgia license plate AIX1376.

The Atlanta Journal Constitution (AJC) reports that two handguns were found at the scene.

Athens-Clarke County Police Captain Clarence Holeman reported that two others were injured by shrapnel, and the extent of their injuries is unknown. A discussion took place before an evening performance between the alleged shooter and one of the victims.

The AJC reports that the victims were Marie Bruce, 47, Ben Teague, 63, and Tom Tanner, 40. Clarke County coroner Sonny Wilson said Saturday night that all three were shot multiple times.

Bruce was the wife of the alleged shooter and president of the theater company, while the others were part of a production of Sherlock Holmes: The Final Adventure. Tanner was performing in the production, and Teague was a member of the production crew.

Police also report that Zinkhan was involved in an argument with an unidentified man before the shooting occurred.

According to Capt. Clarence Holeman of the Athens-Clarke County Police Dept., the two people wounded suffered non-life-threatening injuries and were taken to St. Mary’s Hospital in Athens. Holeman also confirmed that both victims were injured by ricochet: one in the leg and one in the foot.

Zinkhan is reported to have left his two youngest children in the car while at theater, and then left to drop them off at the home of his his neighbor Robert Covington. Zinkhan reportedly told Covington that there had been an emergency and would be gone for about an hour.

“Our first thoughts are for safety of the university community and for prompt apprehension of the person responsible. Our thoughts and prayers are with the families of all those who have been affected,” University of Georgia President Michael F. Adams said in an official statement.

Matt Hardy, 22 years old, was at the scene of the crime, and had seen his friend Tom Tanner being shot twice. His father John Hardy commented to reporters that “at 22 you’re not supposed to watch people die.” Matt Hardy spoke to investigators and departed with his parents.

The university sent text messages and e-mails to students advising them of the potentially dangerous situation.

Police are requesting that anyone who comes in contact with the suspect dial 911 and exercise extreme caution. Zinkhan has been described as a 57-year-old Caucasian with a goatee-style beard and full mustache. He has blue eyes and brown hair worn above the ear according to his most recent photograph. He was reported to have been wearing blue shorts with a polo shirt at the time of the shooting, and he may be driving the red Jeep.