32% of Young People Use Social Media in the Bathroom

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Huston's "Infrared" wins Bad Sex fiction prize

LONDON (AP) — It's the prize no author wants to win.

Award-winning novelist Nancy Huston won Britain's Bad Sex in Fiction award Tuesday for her novel "Infrared," whose tale of a photographer who takes pictures of her lovers during sex proved too revealing for the judges.

The choice was announced by "Downton Abbey" actress Samantha Bond during a ceremony at the Naval & Military Club in London.

Judges of the tongue-in-cheek prize — which is run by the Literary Review magazine — said they were struck by a description of "flesh, that archaic kingdom that brings forth tears and terrors, nightmares, babies and bedazzlements," and by a long passage that builds to a climax of "undulating space."

Huston, who lives in Paris, was not on hand to collect her prize. In a statement read by her publicist, the 59-year-old author said she hoped her victory would "incite thousands of British women to take close-up photos of their lovers' bodies in all states of array and disarray."

The Canada-born Huston, who writes in both French and English, is the author of more than a dozen novels, including "Plainsong" and "Fault Lines." She has previously won France's Prix Goncourt prize and was a finalist for Britain's Orange Prize for fiction by women.

She is only the third woman to win the annual Bad Sex prize, founded in 1993 to name and shame authors of "crude, tasteless and ... redundant passages of sexual description in contemporary novels."

Some critics, however, have praised the sexual passages in "Infrared." Shirley Whiteside in the Independent on Sunday newspaper said there were "none of the lazy cliches of pornography or the purple prose of modern romantic fiction" — though she conceded the book's sex scenes were "more perfunctory than erotic."

Huston beat finalists including previous winner Tom Wolfe — for his passage in "Back to Blood" describing "his big generative jockey" — and Booker Prize-nominated Nicola Barker, whose novel "The Yips" compares a woman to "a plump Bakewell pudding."

Previous recipients of the dubious honor, usually accepted with good grace, include Sebastian Faulks, the late Norman Mailer and the late John Updike, who was awarded a Bad Sex lifetime achievement award in 2008.

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Online: http://www.literaryreview.co.uk

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Stocks close lower as budget talks continue

Stocks are closed slightly lower on Wall Street as budget talks continue in Washington.

The Dow Jones industrial average fell 14 points to close at 12,952 Tuesday. It traded in a narrow range of just 82 points.

The Standard and Poor's 500 index lost two points to 1,407. The Nasdaq composite was down five and a half points at 2,997.

Investors are waiting on developments from Washington in the budget talks, which are aimed at avoiding a series of sharp government spending cuts and tax increases that begin to kick in Jan. 1.

Big Lots soared after the discount retailer raised its forecast for full-year profits.

Falling stocks narrowly outnumbered rising ones on the New York Stock Exchange. Volume was light at 3.2 billion shares.

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Two Mexican nationals charged in killing of U.S. Coast Guardsman

Federal prosecutors charged two Mexican nationals in connection with killing U.S. Coast Guardsmen Terrell Horne III after they allegedly rammed his vessel with a drug-smuggling panga boat.

The two men, boat captain Jose Mejia-Leyva and Manuel Beltra-Higuera, are expected to appear in court Monday afternoon to face charges that they killed a federal officer.

Horne, 34, of Redondo Beach, was killed Sunday after suspected smugglers in a panga rammed his vessel off the Ventura County coast. He died of severe head trauma, officials said.

The Redondo Beach resident was second in command of the Halibut, an 87-foot patrol cutter based in Marina del Rey. Authorities said they could not recall a Coast Guard chief petty officer being killed in such a manner off the coast of California.

Early Sunday morning, the Halibut was dispatched to investigate a boat operating near Santa Cruz Island, the largest of California's eight Channel Islands. The island is roughly 25 miles southwest of Oxnard.

The boat, first detected by a patrol plane, had come under suspicion because it was operating in the middle of the night without lights and was a "panga"-style vessel, an open-hulled boat that has become "the choice of smugglers operating off the coast of California," said Coast Guard spokesman Adam Eggers.

The Coast Guard cutter contains a smaller boat, a rigid-hull inflatable used routinely for search-and-rescue operations and missions that require a nimble approach. When Horne and his team approached in the inflatable, the suspect boat gunned its engine, maneuvered directly toward the Coast Guard inflatable, rammed it and fled.

The impact knocked Horne and another guardsman into the water. Both were quickly plucked from the sea. Horne had suffered a traumatic head injury. While receiving medical care, he was raced to shore aboard the Halibut. Paramedics met the Halibut at the pier in Port Hueneme and declared Horne dead at 2:21 a.m.

The second crew member knocked into the water suffered minor injuries and was treated and released from a hospital later Sunday. He was not identified.

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Four Things Google’s Nexus 4 Has in Common with the iPhone 4

Besides being each company’s flagship smartphone (and having the number 4 in their names), Google‘s new Nexus 4 and the 2010 iPhone 4 have a fair bit in common with each other.

This could be a good thing, if you remember just how popular the iPhone 4 was. Unfortunately, in this case it’s more of a bad thing, and hearkens back to “Antennagate” and the iPhone 4′s other problems. Do any of these features remind you of anything?

​A glass back

With the iPhone 5, Apple finally moved from a crack- and scratch-prone glass backplate to a solid, aluminum unibody construction. Google doesn’t seem to have gotten the memo that the former may have been a bad idea, however, and the Nexus 4 has a sparkly glass back surface.

While sparkly things obviously have their fans, the Nexus 4′s chassis also seems to lean towards the brittle side. Joshua Topolsky, who reviewed the Nexus 4 for The Verge, managed to crack the glass when he accidentally knocked his phone off the table. Meanwhile, Droid-Life’s Kellex found that setting the phone on a stone countertop caused its glass back to fracture in two.

​No 4G

Even Topolsky’s glowing review of the Nexus 4 said “It feels slow,” and “There’s simply no way to ignore this deficit.” That’s because, like the iPhone 4, the Nexus 4 lacks a 4G radio (even though it has the chip to support one if it had it).

The iPhone 4, however, was released in 2010, when 4G was still a new thing and the Android “superphones” which supported it had enormous screens and horrible battery life. Today, even the iPhone has 4G. Possibly because of bad blood between Google and the wireless carriers, which appear to resent Google’s selling phones unsubsidized and sans “customizations,” the Nexus 4 does not.

​Selling out fast

Every one of Apple’s iPhone models has sold out faster, and more dramatically, than the one before. Google’s Android devices, in contrast, haven’t tended to do so … although the new Nexus smartphones and tablets are starting to have this problem.

How bad is it? After Google finally got a new wave of Nexus 4s up for sale, they sold out in about a half-hour. Google claims that it hasn’t actually sold out, but even if you spotted the Nexus 4 on Google Play, chances are you ran into technical glitches which kept it out of your shopping cart. Tipster “Syko Pompos” told the Android Police blog how to get around this and place your order, but expect to wait months to receive it.

​Public relations nightmares

It hasn’t quite reached Antennagate levels yet, perhaps partly because the Nexus brand isn’t as well-known as the iPhone (the iPhone 4′s antenna problems were actually shared by many smartphones). But most of the press coverage of the Nexus 4 lately has been about how you can’t get one. Or else, how if you want one you’ll have to either buy it on contract or pay a lot more to get it unsubsidized from T-Mobile.

On the plus side (for the Nexus), this problem is only partly caused by the Google Play store’s technical errors. The biggest reason it’s taking so long to get out to people is, like with the iPhone 4, simply how popular it is.

Jared Spurbeck is an open-source software enthusiast, who uses an Android phone and an Ubuntu laptop PC. He has been writing about technology and electronics since 2008.

Linux/Open Source News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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'Twilight' wins weekend, 'Skyfall' trails closely

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Holdover films remained tops at the weekend box office as the "Twilight" finale finished at No. 1 again with $17.4 million and the James Bond tale "Skyfall" ran a close second with $16.6 million.

The top 20 movies at U.S. and Canadian theaters Friday through Sunday, followed by distribution studio, gross, number of theater locations, average receipts per location, total gross and number of weeks in release, as compiled Monday by Hollywood.com are:

1. "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn — Part 2," Summit, $17,416,362, 4,008 locations, $4,345 average, $254,598,866, three weeks.

2. "Skyfall," Sony, $16,555,894, 3,463 locations, $4,781 average, $245,585,083, four weeks.

3. "Rise of the Guardians," Paramount, $13,388,852, 3,672 locations, $3,646 average, $48,836,105, two weeks.

4. "Lincoln," Disney, $13,376,696, 2,018 locations, $6,629 average, $83,566,169, four weeks.

5. "Life of Pi," Fox, $12,151,853, 2,928 locations, $4,150 average, $48,512,994, two weeks.

6. "Wreck-It Ralph," Disney, $6,948,550, 3,087 locations, $2,251 average, $158,184,813, five weeks.

7. "Killing Them Softly," Weinstein Co., $6,812,900, 2,424 locations, $2,811 average, $6,812,900, one week.

8. "Red Dawn," FilmDistrict, $6,500,245, 2,781 locations, $2,337 average, $31,272,953, two weeks.

9. "Flight," Paramount, $4,479,067, 2,603 locations, $1,721 average, $81,465,903, five weeks.

10. "The Collection," LD Entertainment, $3,104,269, 1,403 locations, $2,213 average, $3,104,269, one week.

11. "Silver Linings Playbook," Weinstein Co., $3,090,131, 371 locations, $8,329 average, $10,740,112, three weeks.

12. "Anna Karenina," Focus, $2,245,570, 384 locations, $5,848 average, $4,106,921, three weeks.

13. "Argo," Warner Bros., $2,010,349, 1,043 locations, $1,927 average, $100,990,766, eight weeks.

14. "Talaash," Reliance Big Pictures, $1,638,706, 172 locations, $9,527 average, $1,638,706, one week.

15. "Taken 2," Fox, $467,975, 496 locations, $943 average, $137,163,554, nine weeks.

16. "Hitchcock," Fox Searchlight, $408,692, 50 locations, $8,174 average, $787,574, two weeks.

17. "Pitch Perfect," Universal, $387,070, 403 locations, $960 average, $63,099,243, 10 weeks.

18. "The Sessions," Fox, $333,315, 226 locations, $1,475 average, $4,582,181, seven weeks.

19. "Cloud Atlas," Warner Bros., $243,338, 194 locations, $1,254 average, $26,181,455, six weeks.

20. "Here Comes the Boom," Sony, $224,797, 334 locations, $673 average, $42,352,250, eight weeks.

___

Online:

http://www.hollywood.com

___

Universal and Focus are owned by NBC Universal, a unit of Comcast Corp.; Sony, Columbia, Sony Screen Gems and Sony Pictures Classics are units of Sony Corp.; Paramount is owned by Viacom Inc.; Disney, Pixar and Marvel are owned by The Walt Disney Co.; Miramax is owned by Filmyard Holdings LLC; 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight are owned by News Corp.; Warner Bros. and New Line are units of Time Warner Inc.; MGM is owned by a group of former creditors including Highland Capital, Anchorage Advisors and Carl Icahn; Lionsgate is owned by Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.; IFC is owned by AMC Networks Inc.; Rogue is owned by Relativity Media LLC.

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Global Update: GlaxoSmithKline Tops Access to Medicines Index

Sang Tan/Associated Press

GlaxoSmithKline hung on to its perennial top spot in the new Access to Medicines Index released last week, but its competitors are closing in.

Every two years, the index ranks the world’s top 20 pharmaceutical companies based on how readily they get medicines they hold patents on to the world’s poor, how much research they do on tropical diseases, how ethically they conduct clinical trials in poor countries, and similar issues.

Johnson & Johnson shot up to second place, while AstraZeneca fell to 16th from 7th. AstraZeneca has had major management shake-ups. It did not do less, but the industry is improving so rapidly that others outscored it, the report said.

The index was greeted with skepticism by some drugmakers when it was introduced in 2008. But now 19 of the 20 companies have a board member or subcommittee tracking how well they do at what the index measures, said David Sampson, the chief author.

The one exception was a Japanese company. As before, Japanese drugmakers ranked at or near the index’s bottom, and European companies clustered near the top. Generic companies — most of them Indian — that export to poor countries are ranked separately.

Johnson & Johnson moved up because it created an access team, disclosed more and bought Crucell, a vaccine company.

The foundation that creates the index now has enough money to continue for five more years, said its founder, Wim Leereveld, a former pharmaceutical executive.

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Text messaging celebrates 20th anniversary

You might not believe it, but text messaging is already past its teen years.

The thumb-numbing communications format that has become a favorite of teenagers and created a language of its own turned 20 on Monday.

The very first SMS was sent out on Dec. 3, 1992 when English engineer Neil Papworth, while working at the English tech company Sema, wrote "Merry Christmas" on his computer and sent it off to Vodafone director Richard Jarvis. 

Quiz: What set the Internet on fire in 2012?

You can hear a little more about the original text message from the very first person to send one in this commercial below by Best Buy, which was released earlier this year.

Since that time, of course, text messaging has changed quite a bit. We've gone from T9 predictive text messaging, to full QWERTY keyboard devices such as BlackBerrys, touchscreen smartphones and most recently, we can tell our voice-dictation services such as Siri to write our messages for us.

Text messaging has also gone mainstream, from being an activity exclusive to teens and young adults to becoming an essential way to communicate for many older adults.

According to a study by Experian, a research and analysis firm, 85% of adults 18 to 24 in the U.S. text message. On average they send and receive nearly 4,000 messages each month. That's followed by adults 25 to 34, about 80% of whom send and receive more than 2,000 messages every month. Even adults 55 and older are sending and receiving about 500 text messages on a monthly basis, though only about 20% of them text.

In recent years, alternative, free Internet-based text messaging services such as Apple's iMessage, Facebook messages and apps like WhatsApp and textPlus have also grown in popularity and dug into the number of SMS-based messages we send.

According to Chetan Sharma, a consulting firm, the 2012 third quarter was the first time text messaging in the U.S. saw a decline in both volume and revenue. Chetan Sharma's report listed free alternatives as the major reason for the decline.

But regardless of what the future may hold, hppy bday, txting :).

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Northridge residents stunned by multiple slayings

Shane Grady woke up "from a dead sleep" early Sunday when he heard gunshots.

He dropped to the floor and looked out his window, but the traffic on Devonshire Street blocked his view.

"If there was yelling or screaming, I couldn't hear it," he said.

Police arrived minutes later and began canvassing the neighborhood, a helicopter flying low overhead. By mid-morning, detectives were still at the house across from Grady's, where four people were found shot dead.

Investigators are still working to determine a motive and found no weapon at the scene, LAPD Cmdr. Andrew Smith said. No suspects are in custody.

L.A. Councilman Mitchell Englander, whose district includes parts of the San Fernando Valley, said the incident appeared to be isolated. He said the home was believed to be an unlicensed boarding home with multiple tenants.

Neighbors said rooms at the home were rented out and the residents appeared to be single men who primarily kept to themselves. At least four people live in an upstairs area, they said, but they did not know how many boarders in all reside there.

The neighbors also said there was nothing unusual about the home, except for some occasional loud music.

One woman who lives around the block from the residence said she heard loud music and yelling from the house about 1:30 a.m. She fell asleep about an hour later but said the music was still playing.

"I just figured it was a party that was out of control," she said.

Others described the street as quiet, the kind where neighbors know one another and people walk to the Jewish temple just houses away from where the shooting occurred. There have been a few incidents — a car chase last summer, a murder 10 years back — they said, but nothing like this.

"It's usually sleepy-time America," said Richard Rutherford, 58.

Rutherford heard the shots as well. The helicopter that came next, he said, was so low it "was shaking the rooftop."

Jeff Kaye, 62, said the helicopters weren't unusual — the Devonshire police station is just a few blocks away. But the shootings were unusual, he said.

"It concerns you," he said. "You want to know what's going on."

Englander said he was "shocked" by the shootings.

"Typically, you don't have these kinds of incidents in this type of community," he said.

Grady said the same thing.

"How often in this neighborhood do you hear about four dead bodies?" Grady said.

Crime for last six months in Northridge:
Violent crimes (89)
   
Property crimes (895)
   
The violent crime rate for Northridge falls in the middle of all Los Angeles city neighborhoods, but homicide is rare in the community, according to LAPD data analyzed in The Times Crime L.A. database. In the previous six months, Northridge had one homicide among the 89 violent crimes reported. The location of the homicides discovered Sunday is on the border with Granada Hills, which typically has a much lower violent-crime rate than Northridge.

Since 2007 -- prior to Sunday's quadruple homicide -- Northridge had 11 homicides, all but one south of Nordhoff Street, according to L.A. County coroner's data compiled in The Times Homicide Report. The most recent took place Sept. 25, when Louis Villegas, 25, was fatally shot near Balboa Boulevard and Parthenia Street. Villegas was riding in a Lexus that had pulled over to the side of the road when a man approached and began shooting.

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Here’s How to Turn Nicki Minaj into Jay-Z

We realize there’s only so much time one can spend in a day watching new trailers, viral video clips, and shaky cell phone footage of people arguing on live television. This is why every day The Atlantic Wire highlights the videos that truly earn your five minutes (or less) of attention. Today:

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This is silly, but it’s Friday and a unicorn lair has been found in North Korea, rendering all other silliness moot. But the folks over at Reddit seem to dig the idea of slowing down Nicki Minaj’s songs so much that they sound like an over-enunciating Jay-Z. And well, it’s oddly relaxing: 

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Another week has passed by and we still haven’t figured out the Fiscal Cliff situation. Let’s fix it—and not just because we want to avoid getting downgraded (again). Because honestly, we just don’t think CNBC’s Rick Santelli can make it another two weeks: 

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James Lipton, let’s hang out: 

Finally, it’s Friday. What are you still doing here?  Go enjoy the weekend or something or … watch this video of a husky which sort of sounds like Dame Edna at time imitating a baby until 6 p.m. rolls around: 

Wireless News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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