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Buzz Out Loud 913: Purple-footed and pregnant

A new medical wiki will tell you why you shouldn't have painted your sister's toes purple, but apparently all online medical advice tells Natali she's pregnant. She's not. Facebook also backed down on its terms of service.

Tom Merritt Former CNET executive editor
3 min read

A new medical wiki will tell you why you shouldn't have painted your sister's toes purple, but apparently all online medical advice pages tell Natali she's pregnant. She's not. Facebook also backed down on its terms of service and Telstra is in trouble with Microsoft.


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EPISODE 913

Facebook backs down
http://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=54746167130

Grand Theft Auto IV adds episodic content
http://www.cnet.com/8301-18603_1-10165231-73.html

Telstra boss Sol Trujillo’s mobile phone loaded with top-secret software stolen by pickpocket
http://www.news.com.au/technology/story/0,28348,25076154-5014239,00.html

TI’s OMAP 4 bringing 1080p support to smartphones and MIDs
http://www.engadget.com/2009/02/17/tis-omap-4-bringing-1080p-support-to-smartphones-and-mids/

Europe to delay LTE rollouts; full speed ahead for U.S.
http://arstechnica.com/telecom/news/2009/02/europe-to-delay-lte-rollouts-full-speed-ahead-for-us.ars
http://www.engadget.com/2009/02/18/wimax-equipped-samsung-swd-m100d-mid-spotted-at-mwc/

Sidekick 2009 caught strutting its stuff in the wild
http://www.engadget.com/2009/02/17/sidekick-2009-caught-strutting-its-stuff-in-the-wild/

Sprint’s Simply Everything plan now includes mobile broadband
http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-10165899-1.html

If traffic growth slows, do ISPs lose a reason to throttle?
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/02/if-traffic-growth-slows-do-isps-lose-a-reason-to-throttle.ars

Apple nixes ‘potentially offensive’ South Park app
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-10165736-37.html

Hulu's content no longer available on CBS-owned TV.com; what about other partners?
http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-hulu-pulls-its-content-from-cbs-owned-tv.com/

Apparatus for allowing your cat to agree to EULAs
http://www.boingboing.net/2009/02/17/apparatus-for-allowi.html

VOICEMAIL
Ian from Colorado
Universal phone charger

E-MAIL
Hello Buz Crew,

In episode 912 you discussed about cellphone chargers.
Here in Japan, at least one cellphone carrier, NTT docomo, is selling
their standardized charger separately from their phones. (I’m not sure
about other two.)
Last year I went to a docomo store with my parents to buy cellphones
because my mother’s was more than 3 years old, and my father didn’t
have a cellphone until then.
My mother bought Fujitsu cellphone and Father bought Sharp one, and
the sales person asked us “how many chargers do you need?”
He explained that they stopped attaching a charger to a phone and now
they are selling separately because most of their customer has one
charger or more in their house already, so it will be wasteful to
attach.
My parents bought the two cellphones and only one standard charger
with them, which can be used for the both cellphones.

It was pleasant surprise for me because it means docomo could believe
that their customers would understand and accept that their paying for
a charger separately is a good thing.
Some people might think it is pure greed, and can be pure greed
exploiting so-called Green.
But I think it will really reduce waste chargers in this cellphone
fanatic country.
Although it might be an unusual case which possibly only happens in
Japan because cellphone carriers here is so strong over manufacturers
that they can force manufacturers anything they want, but I hope this
become standard practice as cellphone become commodity all over the
world.
By the way, where the those cellphones goes after every Japanese
people replaced their cellphones every year?

Love the show!
Yasutada

**********

Hi BOLtron,

I wanted to pass along this news about a project my cousin Wendy is a
part of that just came out of beta. It’s a medical wiki that allows
authoized contributors to update and help advance medical knowledge as
well as let average people peruse. My first thought was, “Now I can
fact check all the House episodes.”

http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2009/02/hands-on-medpedia-delivers-esteemed-pleasant-medical-wiki.ars

Matt in Wisconsin
a.k.a. capeless in the chat