DUD: The Nightmarish Dangers of Drowsy Driving

Driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs is known to increase the chances of causing an accident. For instance, marijuana can impair drivers' reaction time. But what about drowsiness? As many as a third of all fatal car crashes might involve fatigued drivers, according to research by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
And a new study finds that driving while under the influence--of drowsiness--is exceedingly common.
More than one in 25 people report actually having fallen asleep behind the wheel at least once within the past month, according to a new study from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Unsurprisingly, drivers who are at risk of dozing are more likely to cause crashes that result in injuries or death than are alert drivers. "Drowsiness slows reaction time, makes drivers less attentive and impairs decision-making skills," the report authors noted.
The researchers, led by Anne Wheaton, an epidemiologist at the CDC, analyzed responses from more than 147,000 adults who participated in the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System phone survey. Respondents hailed from 19 states and the District of Columbia; within these areas, Texas--with its 3,200-plus miles of interstates-had the highest rate of severely tired drivers, with 6.1 percent of respondents saying they had slumbered at the wheel, and Oregon had the lowest, with just 2.5 percent.
Not surprisingly, people who reported having zonked out while driving were more likely to say they most often got six or fewer hours of shuteye and/or snored, which can be a sign of sleep apnea. Older drivers--those 65 and up--were the least likely to report having caught some winks while driving (just 1.7 percent had), whereas those ages 25 to 34 and 35 to 44 were the most likely (6.3 percent and 5.5 percent, respectively). Those in these age categories might be more likely to be working shifts or slogging through long commutes, while those who are retired were by far the least likely to have reported falling asleep (1 percent), suggesting they might be getting ample rest and not feel compelled to drive when they are not up for it.
These numbers are likely to be below the actual rate of somnolent automobilists because they rely on self-reported responses; many people who nod off for just a second or so don't even realize it has happened. Additionally, these stats represent those who have actually dozed at the wheel; more than a quarter of adults report driving while they feel bushed in a given month, according to a recent poll by the National Sleep Foundation.
Those most at risk for being severely sleepy at the wheel included commercial drivers, people with sleep disorders who are not being properly treated, people who take sedatives, people who generally do not get enough sleep, and people who work long or night shifts.
Shift workers often operate short on sleep. Research published last year by the CDC also showed that those working in dangerous industries--including transportation jobs such as commercial driving. In fact, that study found that nearly 70 percent of people who worked overnight shifts in transportation or warehousing industries often got fewer than six hours of z's.
Most fatigue-induced accidents occur in the afternoon and nighttime. The best thing to do to avoid dangerous drowsiness is to pull over and rest. Common "techniques to stay awake while driving, such as turning up the radio, opening the window, and turning up the air conditioner, have not been found to be effective," the authors of the new CDC study reported. It remains to be seen whether new car technology to sense and alert drowsy drivers can help. In the meantime, hopefully the road safety worries aren't enough to cause any more lost sleep.

Read More..

Budget battles threaten to limit Obama's second-term agenda

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - After a brutal "fiscal cliff" battle, President Barack Obama's looming budget confrontation with Congress threatens to sharply curtail his second-term agenda and limit his ambitions on priorities such as immigration reform and gun control.
Obama has vowed to push ahead with other legislative priorities during the fiscal fight, but faces the likelihood that they will be elbowed aside in a fierce struggle with Republicans over approaching deadlines to raise the limit on federal borrowing, cut spending and fund government operations.
Obama and Congress must agree by the end of March on increasing the $16.4 trillion debt ceiling, the fate of $85 billion in delayed automatic spending cuts and passage of a bill to fund the government after a temporary measure expires.
Those budget battles could be even more intense than the weeks-long "fiscal cliff" fight that ended on New Year's Day with an agreement to raise taxes on the wealthy, leaving divided Republicans itching for revenge and a fractured relationship between Obama and Republican House Speaker John Boehner.
"We always felt that a bipartisan and amicable conclusion to the fiscal cliff would lead to a very positive agenda for the next two years, and the opposite occurred. It bodes poorly for Obama's other major priorities," said Jim Kessler, senior vice president for policy at the centrist think tank Third Way.
"There is a high level of dysfunction. They haven't cracked the code yet on how to work with each other," Kessler said of Obama and congressional Republicans.
The fiscal cliff fight overwhelmed nearly everything else at the White House for two months. A similar result in the budget battle would be bad news for Obama, cutting into the narrow one-year to 18-month window when second-term presidents traditionally still have the political clout to achieve their most significant legislative victories.
"From a Republican standpoint, if you don't want Obama to get any oxygen on these other issues, focusing on the fiscal cliff and all these budget issues is a very good way to run out the clock on him," said Republican strategist John Feehery, a former Capitol Hill aide.
Obama has promised to pursue a broad second-term agenda focused on comprehensive immigration reform, bolstering domestic energy production, fighting climate change and gun control. After the "fiscal cliff" deal, he said he would not curtail his agenda because of the looming budget fights.
"We can settle this debate, or at the very least, not allow it to be so all-consuming all the time that it stops us from meeting a host of other challenges that we face," Obama said on New Year's Day before boarding a flight to Hawaii to resume a holiday interrupted by the fiscal cliff fight.
"It's not just possible to do these things; it's an obligation to ourselves and to future generations," he said.
PRIMED FOR A FIGHT
Republicans are primed for the coming fight, believing they have more leverage against Obama than during the fiscal cliff battle. Failure to close a deal on the debt ceiling could mean a default on U.S. debt or another downgrade in the U.S. credit rating like the one after a similar showdown in 2011.
A failure to reach agreement on a government funding bill could mean another federal shutdown like brief ones in 1995 and 1996.
Republicans say they will not back an increase in the federal debt ceiling without significant spending cuts opposed by many Democrats, particularly to popular "entitlement" programs such as the government-funded Medicare and Medicaid healthcare plans for the elderly and poor.
"When you look at what's coming down the pike, it will make the fiscal cliff look like a day in Sunday school," said Democratic strategist Chris Kofinis.
"You're talking about a battle that's going to last weeks or months. If they get a deal, it's going to be ugly, it's going to be brutal. Once you get past that, where do you find the will to address other issues? It's going to be very hard," he said.
Administration officials promise to move quickly in January in pursuit of new legislation on gun control and immigration. The gun control effort will be led by Vice President Joe Biden, who was appointed to develop a response to the deadly Connecticut school shootings in December.
But what seemed to be fresh momentum for new measures such as a ban on assault rifles after the mass killing in Connecticut could be stalled by a protracted focus on the seemingly never-ending budget showdowns.
Obama also plans to introduce comprehensive immigration legislation this month. Republicans will have fresh incentive on the issue after Hispanics soundly rejected Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney in the November election, giving Obama more than 70 percent of their vote.
But a Senate Republican leadership aide said economic issues would be the prime concern of Congress for months, pushing back consideration of gun control and immigration. The aide blamed Obama.
"The lack of leadership on spending and debt has put us behind on a number of other issues. That is not something that can be resolved quickly," the aide said.
When blocked in Congress, Obama has shown a willingness to use executive orders and agency rules to make policy changes. During last year's campaign, Obama ordered an end to deportations of young undocumented immigrants who came to the country as children and had never committed a crime.
This week, the Department of Homeland Security changed its rules to make it easier for undocumented immigrants to get a waiver allowing them to stay in the country as they seek permanent residency.
With Republicans motivated to improve their standing with Hispanics, there is a chance Congress will work with the White House to pass an immigration bill that both bolsters border security and offers a pathway to legal status for undocumented immigrants who pay their back taxes and fines.
Finding the rare sweet spot where Obama and Republicans actually agree on an issue could be the key to second-term legislative success.
"The only thing that gets done outside of the economy are things that Republicans decide they have to get done for their own political futures," Feehery said.
But Kessler said he was skeptical that Obama and Congress can find common ground on a comprehensive immigration measure that provides a long-term solution for the country's 12 million illegal immigrants.
"Will something get done on immigration? Probably. But a major deal that addresses all undocumented immigrants in a comprehensive way? We're much less confident than we were two weeks ago," Kessler said.
"The question now is, do they even know how to make deals with each other?" he said.

Read More..

2012 was worst year for whooping cough since 1955

The nation just suffered its worst year for whooping cough in nearly six decades, according to preliminary government figures.
Whooping cough ebbs and flows in multi-year cycles, and experts say 2012 appears to have reached a peak with 41,880 cases. Another factor: A vaccine used since the 90s doesn't last as long as the old one.
The vaccine problem may continue to cause higher than normal case counts in the future, said Dr. Tom Clark of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
"I think the numbers are going to trend up," he said. The agency provided the latest figures on Friday.
Last year, cases were up in 48 states and outbreaks were particularly bad in Colorado, Minnesota, Washington state, Wisconsin and Vermont.
The good news: Despite the high number of illnesses, deaths didn't increase. Eighteen people died, including 15 infants younger than 1.
Officials aren't sure why there weren't more deaths, but think that the attention paid to bad outbreaks across the nation resulted in infected children getting diagnosed faster and treated with antibiotics.
Also, a push last year to vaccinate pregnant women — a measure designed to pass immunity to infants — may have had some small measure of success, Clark said.
The final tally will be higher but unlikely to surpass the nearly 63,000 illnesses in 1955, he said.
Whooping cough is a highly contagious disease that can strike people of any age but is most dangerous to children. Its name comes from the sound children make as they gasp for breath.
It used to be a common threat, with hundreds of thousands of cases annually. Cases gradually dropped after a vaccine was introduced in the 1940s.
For about 25 years, fewer than 5,000 cases were reported annually in the U.S. But case counts started to climb again in the 1990s although not every year. Numbers jumped to more than 27,000 in 2010, the year California saw an especially bad epidemic.
Experts looking for an explanation have increasingly looked at a new vaccine introduced in the 1990s, and concluded its protection is not as long-lasting as was previously thought.
Children are routinely vaccinated with five doses beginning at 2 months, and a booster shot is recommended at around 11 or 12. Health officials are considering recommending another booster shot, strengthening the vaccine or devising a brand new one.

Read More..

Poll: Fight obesity crisis but keep the junk food

WASHINGTON (AP) — Everyone could use a little help keeping those New Year's resolutions to slim down. But if it means the government limiting junk food, the response is an overwhelming, "No."
Americans call obesity a national health crisis and blame too much screen time and cheap fast food for fueling it. But a new poll finds people are split on how much the government should do to help — and most draw the line at attempts to force healthier eating.
A third of people say the government should be deeply involved in finding solutions to the epidemic. A similar proportion want it to play little or no role, and the rest are somewhere in the middle, according to the poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.
Require more physical activity in school, or provide nutritional guidelines to help people make better choices? Sure, 8 in 10 support those steps. Make restaurants post calorie counts on their menus, as the Food and Drug Administration is poised to do? Some 70 percent think it's a good idea.
"That's a start," said Khadijah Al-Amin, 52, of Coatesville, Pa. "The fat content should be put up there in red letters, not just put up there. The same way they mark something that's poisonous, so when you see it, you absolutely know."
But nearly 6 in 10 people surveyed oppose taxes targeting unhealthy foods, known as soda taxes or fat taxes.
And when it comes to restricting what people can buy — like New York City's recent ban of supersized sodas in restaurants — three-quarters say, "No way."
"The outlawing of sugary drinks, that's just silly," said Keith Donner, 52, of Miami, who prefers teaching schoolchildren to eat better and get moving.
"People should just look at a Big Gulp and say, 'That's not for me.' I think it starts when they are young and at school," he added.
Despite the severity of the problem, most of those surveyed say dealing with obesity is up to individuals. Just a third consider obesity a community problem that governments, schools, health care providers and the food industry should be involved in. Twelve percent said it will take work from both individuals and the community.
That finding highlights the dilemma facing public health experts: Societal changes in recent decades have helped spur growing waistlines, and now a third of U.S. children and teens and two-thirds of adults are either overweight or obese. Today, restaurants dot more street corners and malls, regular-sized portions are larger, and a fast-food meal can be cheaper than healthier fare. Not to mention electronic distractions that slightly more people surveyed blamed for obesity than fast food.
In the current environment, it's difficult to exercise that personal responsibility, said Jeff Levi of the nonprofit Trust for America's Health, which has closely tracked the rise in obesity.
"We need to create environments where the healthy choice becomes the easy choice, where it's possible for people to bear that responsibility," he said.
The new poll suggests women, who have major input on what a family eats, recognize those societal and community difficulties more than men do.
More than half of women say the high cost of healthy food is a major driver of obesity, compared with just 37 percent of men. Women also are more likely than men to blame cheap fast food and to say that the food industry should bear a lot of responsibility for helping to find solutions.
Patricia Wilson, 53, of rural Speedwell, Tenn., says she must drive 45 minutes to reach a grocery store — passing numerous burger and pizza joints, with more arriving every year.
"They shouldn't be letting all these fast-food places go up," said Wilson, who nags her children and grandchildren to eat at home and watch their calories. She recalls how her own overweight grandmother lost both her legs and then her life to diabetes.
More than 80 percent of people in the AP-NORC poll said they had easy access to supermarkets, but just as many could easily get fast food. Another 68 percent said it was easy for kids to purchase junk food on their way to school, potentially foiling diet-conscious caregivers like Wilson, who doesn't allow her grandchildren to eat unhealthy snacks at home.
"If they say they're hungry, they get regular food," she said.
Food is only part of the obesity equation; physical activity is key too. About 7 in 10 people said it was easy to find sidewalks or paths for jogging, walking or bike-riding. But 63 percent found it difficult to run errands or get around without a car, reinforcing a sedentary lifestyle.
James Gambrell, 27, of Springfield, Ore., said he pays particular attention to diet and exercise because obesity runs in his family. He makes a point of walking to stores and running errands on foot two to three times a week.
But Gambrell, a fast-food cashier, said he eats out at least once a day because of the convenience and has changed his order at restaurants that already have begun posting calorie counts. He's all for the government pushing those kinds of solutions.
"I feel that it's a part of the government's responsibility to care for its citizens and as such should attempt to set regulations for restaurants that are potentially harmful to its citizens," he said.
On the other side is Pamela Dupuis, 60, of Aurora, Colo., who said she has struggled with weight and has been diagnosed as pre-diabetic. She doesn't want the government involved in things like calorie-counting.
"They should stay out of our lives," she said.
The AP-NORC Center survey was conducted Nov. 21 through Dec. 14. It involved landline and cellphone interviews with 1,011 adults nationwide and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4.2 percentage points.

Read More..

Massachusetts governor seeks tighter rules on compounding pharmacies

BOSTON (Reuters) - Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick on Friday proposed new state rules to more closely regulate the type of pharmacy at the heart of a U.S. meningitis outbreak that has killed 39 people.
The proposed legislation would require special licenses for compounding pharmacies, allow the state Board of Pharmacy to fine companies that violate its rules and require out-of-state pharmacies that ship drugs to Massachusetts to be licensed by the state.
The aim is to more closely monitor companies that cross the line from mixing the raw materials of drugs for individual prescriptions and those that begin to operate more like large-scale manufacturers.
An injectible steroid produced by the Framingham, Massachusetts-based New England Compounding Center (NECC) was linked to an outbreak of bacterial meningitis that has sickened 656 people in 19 states, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
"The regulations that we have in place and governing authority hasn't kept up with an industry that's changed," Patrick told reporters on Friday. "It's really built around the corner drug store, but we've seen and experienced with NECC that businesses that call themselves pharmacies are actually doing a form of manufacturing."
Federal investigators have found multiple violations of standard sterility practices at NECC, which has closed and, on December 21, filed for bankruptcy protection.
Companies registered as pharmacies are regulated by the individual states, while drug manufacturers face the tighter oversight of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Patrick's legislation calls on Massachusetts to more closely work with the FDA to ensure that larger pharmacies do not escape oversight.
The state has since ordered the temporary shutdown of four other compounding pharmacies where investigators found problems.
The FDA last month urged states to crack down on loopholes that allowed compounding pharmacies to produce drugs on an industrial scale without drawing FDA scrutiny.

Read More..

Short and social workouts led fitness trends in 2012

NEW YORK (Reuters) - From mud races to sweat parties to CrossFit competitions, workouts turned smarter, shorter and more social in 2012, experts say, as fitness was sweetened with a little help from smart phones and friends.
"Everything is about making fitness fun," said Jenna Autuori-Dedic, senior fitness editor at Fitness Magazine.
Even those grueling indoor cycling classes were a chance to mingle.
"I truly think that spinning was one of the biggest things to come out of 2012," said Autuori-Dedic. "They (fitness studios) made it fun. You can go with your friends, match your workout to the music. When you work out with friends, you don't realize you're working out."
She said 2012 also saw the rise of the sweat party.
"Instead of hitting the bars for that bachelorette party or night out with the girls, women are going in groups to fitness studios," she explained. "You don't have to choose between working out and meeting your friends, you can do both."
Working women have begun treating clients to boot camp classes in lieu of happy-hour, she added, and more co-workers host conference room workouts at lunchtime.
Mud runs were another 2012 trend that Autuori-Dedic expects to grow in the new year, along with fun obstacle-type races in general, during which participants can get blasted with paint or chased by "zombies," often for charity.
Donna Cyrus, senior vice president of programming at the Crunch national chain of fitness centers, said dance classes and short, results-driven workouts dominated group fitness.
"Going into 2012 everybody was looking for the next Zumba," said Cyrus of the Latin-based dance fitness craze. "We find that people are looking for fun easy-to-follow dance moves."
Crunch created 2FLY, a dance class based on music of the ‘80's and ‘90's that strives to feel more like a house party than a workout.
The other big trend from 2012, according to Cyrus, is the 30-minute workout.
"Everybody is realizing that you can get results in 30 minutes," she said, so this year was also about hard core, body-sculpting, CrossFit-type classes.
CrossFit is an intense, constantly varied, strength and conditioning program.
Autuori-Dedic said the CrossFit games, which are competitions that grew out of the workout regimen, mushroomed from only 4,000 participants to nearly 70,000 this year.
Richard Cotton, national director of certification programs for the American College of Sports Medicine, said 2012 signaled a welcome shift back to the basics of training people to be prepared for daily living.
"We're finally getting smart about what functional exercise actually is," Cotton said. "Simpler and basic, easier to do at home, there are fewer silly ball exercises, (such as) balancing on a ball while doing bicep curls."
Cotton said personal trainers increasingly apply troubleshooting, motivational interviewing and coaching techniques to their sessions with clients.
Autuori-Dedic said 2013 will see more trainers displaying their wares online.
"Trainers are live-streaming workouts and putting things on Twitter, iTunes, everywhere," she said.
And sophisticated tracking apps are here to stay.
Autuori-Dedic cited a study showing that people lost an average of 15 pounds and kept it off for at least a year just by tracking their statistics with an app.
"It used to be that stepping on a scale once a week would tell you how far you've come," she said. "Now with our smartphones we can log in at any time and see how we're doing every step of the way.

Read More..

Olympics, elections and horsing around in odd 2012

Presidential preening, golden Olympic gaffes, a royal windfall for a skydiving British queen on her diamond jubilee and the endless end of days marked the odd stories in 2012 which pranced across the news in Gangnam Style.
The year opened with a tale that flocks of magpies and bears had been spotted in mourning for North Korea's "Dear Leader", Kim Jong-il who died in December 2011 and was succeeded by his 20-something son Kim Jong-un.
Winter weather was so cold in Brussels that the Manneken-Pis, a bronze statue of a young boy urinating had to stop peeing because of sub-zero temperatures.
There was slightly warming news about Mondays in Germany, where crematoriums are struggling to adapt to an increasingly obese population and a boom in extra-large coffins.
"We burn particularly large coffins on Monday mornings when the ovens are cold," one crematorium said.
In March Polish media reported that kite surfer Jan Lisewski fought off repeated shark attacks and overcame thirst and exhaustion in a two-day battle of survival on the Red Sea with just his trusty knife as protection.
"I was stabbing them in the eyes, the nose and gills."
In other animal news, dairy cows across the world mourned the loss of "Jocko", the world's third most-potent breeding bull and Yvonne the German cow who evaded helicopter searches and dodged hunters landed a film deal: "Cow on the Run".
A Nepali man who was bitten by a cobra snake bit it back and killed the reptile after it attacked him in his rice paddy.
"I could have killed it with a stick but bit it with my teeth instead because I was angry," Mohamed Salmo Miya said.
A scathing resignation letter of a Goldman Sachs executive published in the New York Times inspired a sheaf of online spoofs, including Star Wars villain Darth Vader.
"The Empire today has become too much about shortcuts and not enough about remote strangulation. It just doesn't feel right to me anymore," Vader wrote in a published letter.
Austerity in Europe saw a once-thriving Greek sex industry become the latest victim of the country's debt crisis with Greeks spending less on erotic toys, pornography and lingerie.
But lust appeared to be in the rudest of health elsewhere.
Turkish emergency workers rescued an inflatable sex doll floating in the Black Sea and a German disc jockey vowed to press charges against a woman who locked him in her apartment and ravaged him for hours until he rang the police.
"She was sex mad and there was no way out of the flat," Dieter S. told police.
@ROYALFETUS
Britain's Queen Elizabeth celebrated her 60th year on the throne with Diamond Jubilee celebrations that saw a 1,000-ship rain-sodden flotilla sail down the River Thames, a massive party in front of Buckingham Palace, street parties across the country and a spoof incarnation of her majesty on Twitter.
"OK, fire up the Bentley. Let's rock," tweeted "Elizabeth Windsor", the comic online alter ego of the British monarch in a typical tweet from the spoof Twitter account @Queen_UK, a virtual monarch with a razor-sharp wit and a penchant for gin.
And Twitter positively exploded with spoof royal accounts later in the year when Elizabeth's grandson William and his wife Kate announced she was pregnant with a future monarch.
"I may not have bones yet, but I'm already more important than everyone reading this," was the tweet from @RoyalFetus.
Leadership and change was a theme which ran through a year in which socialist Francois Hollande defeated incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy and Mimi the clown to become French president, Vladimir Putin was elected Russian president again and U.S. President Barack Obama won re-election over Republican Mitt Romney.
Amid the tight election race, Obama met a gaffe-prone Romney for an exchange at a charity dinner ahead of the November poll, where America's first black president poked fun at Hollywood actor Clint Eastwood for lecturing an empty chair as if it were Obama during the Republican convention.
"Please take your seats," Obama told the crowd, "or else Clint Eastwood will yell at them."
"THE MODFATHER"
Sporting news was dominated by the London Olympics during the summer, where the opening ceremony included a vignette of Queen Elizabeth being escorted by James Bond before apparently skydiving into the Olympic stadium for her arrival.
"Good evening Mr. Bond," was her only line.
Olympic embarrassments were few, but they began early with organizers forced into apologies for displaying the South Korean flag on a video screen for North Korea's women's soccer team.
British cycling sensation Bradley "the Modfather" Wiggins became the first Briton to win the Tour de France, sparking a craze among fans for cutout cardboard sideburns modeled on his own and shouting "here Wiggo" as he raced to Olympic gold.
London's eccentric and loquacious Mayor Boris Johnson fell rather awkwardly silent when he got stuck dangling from a zip wire, waving two Union flags in drizzling rain.
Olympic chiefs urged youthful athletes to drink "sensibly".
But there was anything but restraint for Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt, who declared an early night at one point only to be photographed later with three members of the Swedish women's handball team. Early one Sunday morning Bolt also dazzled dancers at a London night club with a turn in the DJ booth.
"I am a legend," Bolt shouted out to a packed dance floor from the decks with his arms raised in the air.
Towards the close of the year, tens of thousands of mystics, hippies and tourists celebrated in the shadow of ancient Maya pyramids in southeastern Mexico as the Earth survived a day billed by doomsday theorists as the end of the world.
"It's pure Hollywood," said Luis Mis Rodriguez, 45, a Maya selling obsidian figurines and souvenirs.
Finally, a chubby, rapping singer with slicked-back hair and a tacky suit became the latest musical sensation to burst upon the world from South Korea, via a YouTube music video that has been seen more than a billion times.
Decked out in a bow tie and suit jackets varying from pink to baby blue, as well as a towel for one sequence set in a sauna, Psy busts funky moves based on horse-riding in venues ranging from playgrounds to subways.
The video by Psy has been emulated by everyone from Chinese dissident artist Ai Weiwei to students at Britain's elite Eton College, gurning politicians, spotty teens and embarrassing dads worldwide.
"My goal in this music video was to look uncool until the end. I achieved it," Psy told Reuters.

Read More..

Ban on demanding Facebook passwords among new 2013 state laws

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Employers in California and Illinois will be prohibited from demanding access to workers' password-protected social networking accounts and teachers in Oregon will be required to report suspected student bullies thanks to new laws taking effect in 2013.
In all, more than 400 measures were enacted at the state level during 2012 and will become law in the new year, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL).
Some of the statutes, which deal with everything from consumer protection to gun control and healthcare, take effect at the stroke of midnight. Others will not kick in until later in the year.
The raft of measures includes a new abortion restriction in New Hampshire, public-employee pension reform in California and Alabama, same-sex marriage in Maryland, and a requirement that private insurers in Alaska cover autism in kids and young adults, NCSL said.
In New Hampshire, a rarely used form of late-term abortion will become illegal except to save the life of the mother - and even then only if two doctors from separate hospitals certify the procedure is medically necessary.
John Lynch, the state's outgoing Democratic governor, had vetoed the measure, saying it would threaten the lives of women in rural areas. But the state's Republican-controlled legislature later overrode him.
In California and Illinois, laws that take effect at 12:01 a.m. local time will make it illegal for bosses to request social networking passwords or non-public online account information from their employees or job applicants.
Michigan's Republican Governor Rick Snyder signed a similar measure into law earlier this month that took effect immediately. The Michigan law also penalizes educational institutions for dismissing or failing to admit a student who does not provide passwords and other account information used to access private internet and email accounts, including social networks like Facebook and Twitter.
But workers and job seekers in all three states will still need to be careful what they post online: Employers may continue to use publicly available social networking information. So inappropriate pictures, tweets and other social media indiscretions can still come back to haunt them.
Gun violence - in places where it's all too common, such as Chicago, and in places where it's unexpected, such as Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut - was big news in 2012. But only a handful of new state firearms laws are set to take effect in 2013.
In Michigan, the definition of a "pistol" under the law will now include any firearm less than 26 inches in length. The new definition encompasses some rifles with folding stocks and will make the weapons subject to the same restrictions as pistols.
In Illinois, certain guns currently regulated by state law, including paintball guns, will be excluded from the definition of a firearm and participants in military re-enactments will be exempt from some weapons laws.
Another big story in 2012 was the effort by lawmakers in a number of cash-strapped states to put their public employee pension funds on a sounder financial footing.
In California and Alabama, reforms designed to begin to address the unfunded liabilities of those retirement systems will take effect in 2013.
Among the other new laws on the books in 2013:
* In California, prison workers and peace officers will now be prohibited from having sex with inmates and prisoners in transport.
* In Illinois, sex offenders will be prohibited from distributing candy on Halloween, or playing Santa or the Easter Bunny.
* In Oregon, employers won't be allowed to advertise a job vacancy if they won't consider applicants who are currently out of work.
* In Kentucky, residents will be prohibited from releasing feral or wild hogs back into the wild and Illinois will ban the possession and sale of shark fins.
* And in Florida, the term "motor vehicle" will no longer apply to the specialized all-terrain vehicles with over-sized tires known as "swamp buggies" that are popular in some parts of the state.

Read More..

Zynga carries out planned games shutdown, including "Petville"

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Social games publisher Zynga Inc confirmed on Monday that it has carried out 11 of the planned shutdowns of 13 game titles, with "Petville" being the latest game on which it pulled the plug.
Zynga in October said it would shut down 13 underperforming titles after warning that its revenues were slowing as gamers fled from its once-popular titles published on the Facebook platform in large numbers and sharply revised its full-year outlook.
The San Francisco-based company announced the "Petville" shutdown two weeks ago on its Facebook page. All the 11 shutdowns occurred in December.
The 11 titles shut down or closed to new players include role-playing game "Mafia Wars 2," "Vampire Wars," "ForestVille" and "FishVille."
"In place of 'PetVille,' we encourage you to play other Zynga games like 'Castleville,' 'Chefville,' 'Farmville 2,' 'Mafia Wars' and 'Yoville,'" the company told players on its 'PetVille' Facebook page. "PetVille" players were offered a one-time, complimentary bonus package for virtual goods in those games.
"Petville," which lets users adopt virtual pets, has 7.5 million likes on Facebook but only 60,000 daily active users, according to AppData. About 1,260 users commented on the game's Facebook page, some lamenting the game's shutdown.
Zynga has said it is shifting focus to capture growth in mobile games. It also applied this month for a preliminary application to run real-money gambling games in Nevada.
Zynga is hoping that a lucrative real-money market could make up for declining revenue from games like "FarmVille" and other fading titles that still generate the bulk of its sales.
Zynga shares were up 1 percent at $2.36 in afternoon trade on Monday on the Nasdaq.

Read More..

Judge rejects part of Apple App Store suit vs Amazon

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A U.S. judge on Wednesday rejected part of Apple Inc's lawsuit against Amazon.com Inc's use of the term App Store, ruling Apple cannot bring a false advertising claim against the online retailer.
U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton in Oakland, California, granted Amazon's motion for partial summary judgment, which only challenged Apple's false advertising allegations. Apple leveled other claims against Amazon, including trademark infringement.
An Apple spokeswoman declined to comment, and an Amazon representative could not be reached immediately.
Amazon has stepped up competition against Apple in recent years, launching its cheaper Kindle tablet computer to go after the dominant iPad and trying to lure mobile application developers to its Kindle platform.
One of the first public clashes in their tussle was Apple's 2011 lawsuit.
Apple accused Amazon of misusing what it calls its APP STORE to solicit developers for a mobile software download service. However, Amazon said its so-called Appstore has become so generic that its use could not constitute false advertising.
In a legal filing last year, Amazon added that even Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook and his predecessor, Steve Jobs, used the term to discuss rivals. Cook commented on "the number of app stores out there" and Jobs referred to the "four app stores on Android."
In her ruling on Wednesday, Hamilton wrote that the mere use of "Appstore" by Amazon cannot be taken as a representation that its service is the same as Apple's.
"Apple has failed to establish that Amazon made any false statement (express or implied) of fact that actually deceived or had the tendency to deceive a substantial segment of its audience," Hamilton wrote.
A trial on Apple's remaining claims is scheduled for August.
The case is Apple Inc v. Amazon.com Inc et al, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, No. 11-01327.

Read More..