US safety group: ban cellphones in cars

The National Safety Council, which campaigned to get U.S. states to enforce seatbelt laws, is taking on cellphones, saying on Sunday it was starting a campaign to ban all use of mobile phones while driving. Even so-called hands-free devices should be banned, because studies show they do not make it any safer to talk on the telephone while driving, the group said. “It’s time to take the cellphone away,” said Janet Froetscher, president and chief executive officer of the non-profit group. “Studies show that driving while talking on a cellphone is extremely dangerous and puts drivers at a four times greater risk of a crash,” Froetscher said in a telephone interview.
Many states and Washington, D.C. have laws requiring the use of a hands-free device while driving and using a cellphone. But several recent studies have shown drivers are far more distracted when speaking on a mobile phone, even with a speaker or headset, than talking to a live passenger. Last month Dave Strayer of the University of Utah and colleagues demonstrated that drivers using a hands-free device drifted out of their lanes and missed exits more frequently than drivers talking to a passenger. Strayer’s team has also shown that drivers using mobile telephones are as impaired as drivers who are legally drunk. A study from the Harvard Center of Risk Analysis estimates that cellphone use while driving contributes to 6 percent of crashes. Froetscher’s group says that translates to 636,000 crashes, 330,000 injuries and 2,600 deaths in the United States each year.
Source: Reuters

CES: 1-inch thick wireless plasma from Panasonic

The epic battle between plasma and LCD manifests itself in numerous ways–Hz oneupsmanship, contrast ratio and viewing angle specs, lifespan claims–but until now, panel depth was a frontier comfortably dominated by LCD, with ultrathin models like the Hitachi UT37X902. Now Samsung and Panasonic aim to claim that frontier themselves, the latter with the new inch-thick Z1. Panasonic’s press material uses the term “Z1 series,” which indicates to us that the company is planning other screen sizes with inch-deep panels. But for now the only size the company sees fit to announce is the 54-inch TC-P54Z1, due in summer for an undisclosed, but surely sizable, chunk of change.



Thin panels pose a number of design quandaries, such as where to connect the cables. Panasonic solves the problem by supplying a separate AV box, with a tuner and connections like HDMI and component-video, which streams audio, video, and control signals to the panel wirelessly. The company uses a 60GHz millimeter wave radio system that sounds similar to the one employed by LG for its wireless displays, and like LG claims the ability to transmit full, uncompressed 1080p video. Aside from Digital Cinema Color, the Z1 incorporates all of the features of the thicker V10 models, including improved 24p compatibility, VieraCast; the power-saving, high-contrast, NEO PDP panel; “infinite black;” and a 600Hz sub-field drive.

Source: Cnet

Application Yellowsn0w: unlock your iPhone

The cat and mouse game between iPhone hackers and Apple has taken a new interesting turn, as the hackers have unlocked the device from the shackles of AT&T. Presenting an incredible New Year gift to the iPhone owners who simply don’t want to be restricted to AT&T network, iPhone hackers have unleashed a software, tagged as “Yellowsn0w”, which is now available as free download for the users. In addition, the software could also be useful to the residents of the places where AT&T’s network is not available yet. A part of the iPhone developer team met at the 25th Chaos Communication Congress, the team members Planetbeing, Pytey, Bushing, and Musclenerd, in conjunction with several anonymous Russian speakers, have demonstrated the way of unlocking and jailbreaking the device in a one hour presentation.

While discussing the unlocking procedure, the hackers kicked-off their demonstration with describing iPhone’s basic design, its boot sequence and baseband, and all such entities that were required to unlock the iPhone. The iPhone dev team discussed the various exploits they used for the purpose, which differed starkly from the efforts required for first- and second-generation handsets, along with the manner the unlock code executes, and the method of delivering payload.

Source: IT Pro