Dependent

23 April 2011 - A 75-year-old Georgian woman who says she has never even heard of the internet is facing a possible prison sentence for single-handedly cutting off the web to an entire country. Georgian police arrested Hayastan Shakarian after she allegedly hacked through a fibre optic cable that runs through Georgia to Armenia, while digging for copper. With one stroke, the pensioner plunged 90% of internet users in Armenia into online darkness for nearly 12 hours. The episode is a timely reminder that all it takes in our hi-tech world to shut down thousands of companies for a day is a determined old lady with a spade. Research carried out in October 2010 by Avanti Communications offered a snapshot of just how fundamental the internet had become to businesses. The survey of companies worldwide suggested only 1% could function adequately without the internet. More than a quarter (27%) of those surveyed said they could not function at all if the internet went down, and one in five said a week without being online would be the death of their company. "In the past, network downtime might have prevented a batch of communication at the end of the day," says Chris Kimm, vice-president network field operations EMEA at Verizon Business. "Today it could mean no phones, no e-mail, no customer database, no ordering systems, no supply chain visibility and effectively, no capability to conduct business."

Great Picture (33)

22 April 2011 - I really like the photo series by Marcel Scheeres in the Dutch newspaper Parool about how common Amsterdam folks spend their Saturday morning. The photos give great insight in Dutch style of living and are often very touching, inspiring and warm. It was difficult to select one picture - but I picked this one as it looks a bit like Hopper paining.

Asian Unicorn

20 April 2011 - Vietnam is setting up a nature reserve to protect one of the world's rarest animals - an antelope-like creature called the saola. It intends to create a 160sq/km (61 sq/mile) area in the central province of Quang Nam for the animal, which is also known as the Asian unicorn. The existence of the saola was confirmed only two decades ago and sightings are very rare. Wildlife experts say the reserve could be vital to its survival. "This decision has brought new hope for the survival of the saola, an animal that is on the brink of extinction in the world," said Vu Ngoc Tram of conservation group WWF. There are no saola in captivity and no scientist has ever reported seeing one in the wild. Photographs that do exist have been captured by local villagers and automatic cameras. In August 2010, villagers across the border in the Laos province of Bolikhamxay caught an adult saola, but it died shortly afterwards. Pham Thanh Lam, director of Quang Nam's forest bureau, said the reserve area was home to an estimated 50-60 of the animals.

Taxi please!

19 April 2011 - Nasa has given an indication of the companies it thinks may be closest to offering commercial systems to carry American astronauts into space. With its shuttles about to retire, the agency has offered $270m (£166m) of funds to four firms to help them mature designs for new orbiting vehicles. Blue Origin, Boeing, Sierra Nevada Corp and SpaceX hope to sell astronaut "taxi" services to Nasa by mid-decade. Until then, US crews will have go to the space station on Russian rockets. "The next American-flagged vehicle to carry our astronauts into space is going to be a US commercial provider," said Ed Mango, Nasa's Commercial Crew Programme manager. "The partnerships Nasa is forming with industry will support the development of multiple American systems capable of providing future access to low-Earth orbit." The winning companies have a range of concepts under developments.

Tut's Trumpet

18 April 2011 - Tutankhamun's trumpet was one of the rare artefacts stolen from the Cairo Museum during the recent uprising, adding poignancy to a story from the early days of BBC Radio and an attempt to recreate its original sound. Among the "wonderful things" Howard Carter described as he peered by candlelight into the newly discovered tomb of Tutankhamun in 1922 were two trumpets, one silver and one bronze. For more than 3,000 years they had lain, muted, in the Valley of the Kings, close to the mummy of the boy king. Found in different parts of Tutankhamun's tomb, both were decorated with depictions of Egyptian gods identified with military campaigns. Both became exhibits at the Cairo museum, but when it was broken into during the recent uprising, the bronze instrument vanished. Luckily, the silver one was away on exhibition tour. Egyptologists were already reeling from the loss of many of the country's antiquities, and many found the theft of one of the oldest surviving musical instruments in the world particularly poignant. Many such objects would have been looted and melted down in ancient times, says Oxford Egyptologist Margaret Maitland. "There was a real lack of precious metal so there was systemic retrieval," said Ms Maitland. The trumpet was recently found - reportedly with other Tutankhamun artefacts in a bag on the Cairo Metro.

Statue of Liberty

17 April 2011 - The US Postal Service regrets issuing a stamp featuring a photo of a Las Vegas casino's replica Statue of Liberty rather than the original in New York harbour, a spokesman has said. But the postal service printed three billion of the first-class stamps and will continue to sell them, he said. And the agency would have selected the photograph anyway, he said. A stamp collector discovered the mix-up after noting discrepancies between the stamp image and the copper original. The mix-up was first reported by Linn's Stamp News, a publication for philatelists. It points out that the photo used on the stamp shows a rectangular patch on the crown that is present on the 14-year-old statue at the New York-New York Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, but not on the 305ft (93m) copper statue in New York. In addition, the facial features on the Las Vegas replica are more sharply defined than on the original.