Twelve Days In July - IT WAS the best of times, it was the worst of times

Twelve Days In July - IT WAS the best of times, it was the worst of times
Friday The Thirteenth July 2012 Edition
EventHorizon1984

The eclectic news of the first part of July was eye opening and sad.

5.  Do you know what is one of PayPal's (owned by eBay INC) largest expenses?

Visa, MasterCard reportedly close to settling retailers' lawsuit
6 July 2012

• "swipe fees, mostly for credit cards, constituted about 38% of PayPal's expenses in 2011"
• "In mid-morning trading, Visa lost 0.91% to $125.86, Mastercard fell 0.24% to $442.97, and eBay retreated 0.83% to $40.59."

4.  Keep telling yourself that "Foundation" ¹ and "Person of Interest" are fiction.  For now.

Sci-fi policing: predicting crime before it occurs
Associated Press - Greg Risling - 1 July 2012

• "Los Angeles police are aiming to beat suspects to the scene of a crime by using computers to predict where trouble might occur."

¹ Psychohistory - Isaac Asimov's Foundation series and short stories are where the predictive science of Psychohistory originates.  Psychohistory being, "combined history, psychology and mathematical statistics to create a (nearly) exact science of the behavior of very large populations of people".
Incidentally Isaac Asimov's short story "Foundation" was published in May 1942.

"Now any dogma, based primarily on faith and emotionalism, is a dangerous weapon to use on others, since it is almost impossible to guarantee that the weapon will never be turned on the user."
Ankor Jael, Foundation (1951), Isaac Asimov

3.  Change your Yahoo! passwords lately?

Yahoo investigating reported mass password breach
Associated Press - 12 July 2012

• "Yahoo Inc. said Thursday it is investigating reports of a security breach that may have exposed nearly half a million users' email addresses and passwords."
• "Technology news websites including CNET, Ars Technica, and Mashable cited hackers calling themselves the D33D Company as claiming responsibility for the attack, adding that data posted to the group's website carried more than 453,000 login credentials"

2.  Higgs Boson Discovered.  Or not.

Higgs boson-like particle discovery claimed at LHC
BBC News - Paul Rincon - 4 July 2012

"Prof Peter Higgs, after whom the particle is named, wiped a tear from his eye as the teams finished their presentations in the Cern auditorium.
"I would like to add my congratulations to everyone involved in this achievement," he added later.
"It's really an incredible thing that it's happened in my lifetime.""

Higgs Boson Imposters?  It's Possible, Say Scientists
PCWorld - James Mulroy - 12 July 2012

• "some scientists have suggested that CERN's experimental results may be the result of impostor particles, albeit Higgs-like impostors."
• "The preprint explains that the particle discovery at CERN could be either a generic Higgs doublet, a Higgs triplet, a mixture of particles including the Higgs and another particle, or of course, the Higgs boson as the Standard Model predicts."

And what is the exact mass of the Higgs Boson?

131.313 GeV?

1.  Ernest Borgnine passes away at age 95.

Ernest Borgnine, Oscar-Winning Actor, Dies at 95
The New York Times - Anita Gates - 8 July 2012

"Ermes Effron Borgnino was born on Jan. 24, 1917, in Hamden, Conn., near New Haven. His father was a railroad brakeman. His mother was said to be the daughter of a count, Paolo Boselli, an adviser to King Victor Emmanuel of Italy.

The boy spent several years of his childhood in Italy, where his mother returned during a long separation from her husband. But they returned to Connecticut, and he graduated from high school there.

He joined the Navy at 18 and served for 10 years. During World War II he was a gunner’s mate. After the war he considered factory jobs, but his mother suggested that he try acting. Her reasoning, he reported, was, “You’ve always liked making a damned fool of yourself.”"

Not enough can be said about the classic and classy actor Ernest Borgnine.

We'll let Mr. Borgnine do it.

On The Road with Ernest Borgnine

Ernest Borgnine Remembers

Ernest Borgnine on working with Tim Conway

• McHale's Navy
• McHale's Navy Sing along

Ernest Borgnine discusses "Airwolf"

• Airwolf

Ernest Borgnine on voicing "Mermaid Man" on SpongeBob SquarePants

• Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy

Ernest Borgnine Lifetime Achievement Award

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"I've been driving a cab here for 30 years and I'm telling you: you don't walk around here at night! Yes, sir! Those Crazies'll kill you and strip you in ten seconds flat!"
Cabbie (Ernest Borgnine), Escape From New York (1981)

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