A French Solution??

Raging tenant armed with a sledgehammer destroys apartment after landlord refused to give back his $2,500 security deposit

One irate Frenchman who was furious that his deposit was being withheld decided to take a sledgehammer to his apartment in order to express his fury.

Raging at his $2,500 security being kept, the unidentified tenant smashes his bathroom mirror, toilet, shower cubicle and door.

Explaining his actions to a helpful friend who recorded the entire incident, presumably for his landlords benefit, the angry man proceeds to batter the living daylights out of his soon to be vacate apartment.

A Good Imagination?

Cereal fan snaps ghostly face in bowl of Cheerios

A cereal fan didn’t need a coffee to wake her up in the morning after she spotted a ghostly figure in her bowl of Cheerios.

The breakfast eater was tucking into her daily dose of corn, oats and rice when she saw the blank-faced cheerio looking back at her.

Clearly not something she was used to seeing everyday, the Cheerios fan decided to take a picture of her amusing discovery to share with the world online.

‘The day my breakfast tried to eat my soul,’ she explained. ‘I ate it out of fear that if I didn’t it may rise up and destroy the earth.’

After numerous stories detailing the distress of people who find weird objects in their supermarket meals, before posing unhappily next to them, it’s refreshing to see a funnier side to snapping food.

Crazy Pussies?

Cats suffering from 'Tom and Jerry' syndrome

Vets warn of a new phenomenon whereby cats suffer seizures triggered by everyday sounds around the house, like the clicking of a computer mouse or the tapping of a boiled egg

If you ever irritated by the sound of your spouse crinkling a packet of crisps, or rustling with a newspaper, then spare a thought for your cat.

Vets are investigating an apparently new phenomenon whereby pet cats are suffering seizures triggered by everyday sounds around the house.

As well as the sounds of newspapers and crisps packets, the animals have also been observed having the reaction to the clicking of a computer mouse, the tapping of a boiled egg and even the sound of a tin of cat food being opened.

The bizarre phenomenon - likened to the cartoon Tom and Jerry - has also been triggered by the popping of pills from blister packs, the dropping of metal items on tiled floors or ceramic bowls and the hammering of nails, as well as the sounds of owners slapping their foreheads or clicking their tongues.

The new research began after International Cat Care (ICC), a feline charity, began receiving reports from owners across the country reporting the strange behaviour in their pets.

The seizures in cats do not appear to be related to volume, because many of the “trigger sounds” are relatively quiet. The noises do not appear to be particularly unexpected, either, as most are relatively familiar, such as the noise of food being opened.

Mark Lowrie, from Davies Veterinary Specialists, said: “We want to see if other vets and owners are aware of the problem. It could be they haven’t even associated these fits with noise. I’m sure that a pattern will emerge. It doesn’t seem to be occurring at times of stress. It is often when the cats are being fed – which is probably one of their happier times of the day.”

The reactions suffered by the animals are described as being similar to a fit, with the cats displaying a jerking motion. Others have less severe reactions, from being jumpy to freezing suddenly. They all recover, once the noise has stopped and the seizure ceased.

One owner reported their cat, Moochi, had seizures caused by repetitious clicking or tapping sounds, which caused him to convulse and lose control of his balance.

Another animal, Jeffrey, has fits of around a minute in length, caused by mouse clicks and the tapping of boiled eggs. Gracie suffered a similar reaction to the sound of a newspaper, which caused her to run in circles and collide with furniture. After that, she convulses.

Claire Bessant, chief executive of International Cat Care, said: “It is hard not to smile, because it does all sound rather Tom and Jerry, but it would be very nice to get to the bottom of it. People seem to be getting around it, by making sure they tip toe around their animals and try to avoid making the noise.”

We’re Watching You!

LG Smart TVs Collect Your Personal Info

It recently turned out that LG Smart TV was displaying adverts on the Smart landing screen. LG even has some corporate video to advertise their information collection practices to potential advertisers. The company explains that LG Smart Ad can analyze what people like watching, what they do online, and collect search keywords and other data that can help offer relevant adverts to target audiences. In addition, the company offered ad performance reports to demonstrate actual advertising effectiveness.

So, how do they do this? There appeared to be an option in the system settings named “Collection of watching info”, which is turned on by default. To find it, the users have to scroll down. Moreover, this setting, unlike others, has no “balloon help” to explain what it is for.

If you do some traffic analysis to find out what was being sent from your TV, you will learn that viewing data is being sent regardless of whether the setting is turned on or off. Apparently, the system transmits a channel name and a unique device ID. This data is sent back unencrypted and in the clear to the company each time you change channel – even if you switched the setting “Collection of watching info” off.

This is not all. You can find that within the packet data dumps there are filenames being posted to LG’s servers – the ones stored on your external USB hard drive. It is easy to check – once you create a mock file with unique filename and copy it to your USB stick, you’ll see it transmitted. It is unclear how the system filters the data – sometimes the names of the contents of an entire folder are posted, other times nothing is sent.

By the way, the URL that the information is being sent to doesn’t even exist, as the destination brings the HTTP 404 response from LG’s server. However, this collection URL could as well be implemented by the company on its server tomorrow, and allow to transparently collect detailed data on what content you have stored. The aim is clear – this feature would allow to infer the presence of adult material or files downloaded from file-sharing networks.

When contacted, LG claimed that since its customers accepted the Terms and Conditions on their devices, their concerns would be best directed to the retailer, while LG is unable to pass comment on their actions. So, the company can’t help, but you should prevent this from happening, as you own your router and have absolute jurisdiction of any traffic you allow to pass. The only way to do this is to block the list of Internet domains to stop spying and advertising on TVs. So far the list is the following:

ibis.lgappstv.com

ad.lgappstv.com

smartclip.net

smartclip.com

yumenetworks.com

smartshare.lgtvsdp.com

This move can help you stop seeing adverts plastered on your screen and having your viewing behavior monitored. The most important part is that you will still be able to update firmware.

Vatican = Pirates??

Vatican Faced Problem with Pirates

It recently became known that Vatican, one of the few theocratic states ever created by a fascist regime, faced a pirate problem. Back in 2012, the release of the videogame Football Manager had code inside which would let the Sega developers track the IP of everyone who pirated a copy of the game.

So, the experiment showed that over 10 million copies were distributed illegally. As usual, the most pirated areas were China, Turkey and Portugal. In addition, the developers managed to trace one pirated copy inside the Vatican. In other words, the state with a population of 839 is statistically likely to have at least one pirate in its ranks. In comparison, the game was pirated by 540,000 Italians, with Italy having a population of 61.321 million – as you can see, one pirate in the Vatican isn’t that much higher on the ratio scale.

However, the consequences differ. While in Italy the worst that a pirate can expect is for the entertainment industry to sue them, in the Vatican they can expect excommunication and eternal damnation. The industry experts point out that this is just another proof that stiff sentences for piracy don’t work in real life.

This case had some pabulum for reflection: conspiracy theorists pointed out that the videogame was downloaded in the same year that Pope Benedict suddenly cleared out his desk and moved to Castle Gandolfo to spend time “in seclusion and prayer”.

In the meantime, Football Manager boss Miles Jacobson claimed that one pirated copy didn’t equal one sale lost – instead, he believes it added up to 176,000 lost sales ($3.7 million lost revenue).

For Ever Young??

Woodworm??

Man makes VW Beetle - out of wood

A retired Volkswagen worker has carved himself a unique VW Beetle - out of wood.

Momir Bojic made everything from the bonnet to the gearstick in his garden workshop - with help from understanding wife Nada.

The couple created wooden pedals, wheel caps, bumpers, signal lamps, tail-lights, wipers, door mirrors, steering wheel, parcel shelf, dashboard, clock and even the radio aerial.

The bodywork features thousands of thumbnail-sized, finely sliced sections of oak designed to replicate the wooden-tiled roofs of Mr Bojic's homeland of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Each tile involved a process involving no less than 23 separate procedures, including cutting, chamfering, bevelling, drilling and smoothing, before they could be applied to the vehicle.

Mr Bojic, who worked at a Volkswagen Transporter manufacturing plant in Hanover, spotted the 1975 Beetle for sale at a fair and got a metalwork company to take off the roof, doors and strip the chassis.

He said: "I told my wife Nada that I was none too sure exactly what I was going to do with this addition to the household, but whatever decision I came to it would be something original and worthwhile."

The painstaking task to transform the VW took 18 months, with the determined couple working morning, noon and night in order to get it finished.

Mr Bojic, who is in his 60s, said: "I was intending to undertake the task by myself, but after my wife saw the amount of effort involved she felt I was crazy to try and do it all on my own."

And he is already planning his next project, adding: "I've an idea in mind; something along the lines of a sporty looking car with dual rocket-style pods and, of course, trimmed throughout with thousands of pieces of wood

Whoops!!

Giant plane gets stuck at tiny airport

One of the world's biggest cargo planes is stuck after accidentally landing at a tiny airport with a runway too short for it to take off again.

The Boeing 747 Dreamlifter was heading for McConnell air force base in Wichita but instead touched down at nearby Colonel James Jabara airport.

Local media reported that the jet may be too large to take off from Jabara's 1,860m (6,100ft) runway.

The Dreamlifter normally requires a runway of 2,780m (9,119ft) to take off at maximum weight, reports the BBC.

Boeing sent a tug to the airport to turn the plane around but it broke down en route and it is not clear how the plane will leave Jabara airport.

The Dreamlifter is a modified 747-400 passenger aeroplane which can carry more cargo by volume than any aeroplane in the world.

Boeing uses them to transport large assembled aeroplane components from suppliers around the world to the final assembly location.

Cute!!

Meet Remi, the world’s saddest dog

When your dog looks this bummed about you going out, it’s got to be pretty hard to ever leave the house.

The pup has a look that suggests his high school football team just lost the big game, he has just learnt magic isn’t real and that there are a bunch of cats frolicking nearby woefully un-chased all in one.

Nothing’s wrong with the little guy, he’s just sad about his owner nipping out, shunning his toys and even the crumbs of his biscuits as he gives the most mournful yet cute expression.

If Remi is the world’s saddest dog, a dog that popped up on YouTube earlier this week has got to be the most polite.

The pooch is seen carefully wiping his feet before entering the house in a video, showing a rather charming respect for his owner’s carpets