Inter-agency group to look into family justice reforms

SINGAPORE: An inter-agency group is being set up to consider reforms when it come to dealing with family justice.

The group will made up of Supreme Court judges and representatives from the Law Ministry and Social and Family Development Ministry.

Singapore Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon said the reforms should be aimed at reducing acrimony which is inherent in family disputes.

He was speaking at the opening of the 2013 legal year.

CJ Menon said family justice is just one of the areas that the Subordinate Courts will look into this year.

Another is opportunities for the legal profession outside of Singapore. This includes international arbitration

CJ Menon said, Judge of Appeal Justice VK Rajah, together with Senior Minister of State for Law Indranee Rajah, will study the viability of setting up the Singapore International Commercial Court.

Also speaking at the ceremony was the new President of the Law Society, Mr Lok Vi Ming. He said the number of local lawyers holding practising certificates for the first time exceeded 4,000 in 2012. However, between 2007 and 2012, the growth of foreign lawyer numbers have been faster.

Mr Lok said this suggests that the profession is growing steadily in terms of numbers and that the number of foreign lawyers is expanding faster than that of locals. He said these trends are not likely to be reversed in the short term.

Two Senior Counsel were also appointed at this year's ceremony. They are Mr Lionel Yee, the second Solicitor General, and Mr N Sreenivasan, a lawyer in private practice. This brings the number of senior counsel in Singapore to 40.

-CNA/ac

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Illegal file-sharer gets hit with 5-year prison sentence

Convicted file-sharer Jeramiah Perkins has been handed the longest prison sentence even given in a U.S. file-sharing lawsuit: five years.

The 40-year-old man from Portsmouth, Va., was given the sentence today by U.S. District Judge Arenda Wright Allen, according to Wired. During his lawsuit, Perkins pled guilty to conspiracy to commit copyright infringement by file-sharing movies, music, games, and more on the Internet.

Perkins -- a.k.a. Butch Perkins, Stash, and theestas -- is said to have been the head of a group that went to theaters, camcorded the movies, recorded the audio, synched the files, and then distributed the product on the Internet. The group, known as IMAGiNE, became one of the most prolific piracy release groups in the world between 2009 and 2011, according to Wired.

"The conspirators informally identified themselves as the IMAGiNE Group and sought, among other things, to be the premier group to first release to the Internet copies of new motion pictures only showing in movie theaters," IMAGiNE's indictment (pdf) reads. "It was further a part of the conspiracy to use computer software to digitally refine and to edit the video and audio portions of a motion picture and to combine or synchronize the two components into audiovisual movie files."

One of the goals of the group was to make movies available before the public release of DVDs, according to the indictment. IMAGiNE rented servers in France, Canada, and the U.S. and hosted several Web sites, such as "unleashthe.net." The Web sites included member profiles, a torrent tracker, discussion forums, a message board, news, and rules. The group got money through donations and payments from people downloading the copyrighted works. Among the movies known to have been pirated by IMAGiNE were, "Friends With Benefits," "Captain America: The First Avenger," and "Avatar."

U.S. courts have become considerably more strict in recent file-sharing cases. In November, illegal file-sharer Kywan Fisher was handed a whopping $1.5 million fine -- the largest BitTorrent damages award ever -- for sharing 10 movies on a file-sharing site. And the well-known case of Jammie Thomas, who was found liable for sharing 24 copyrighted songs on the Web, recently announced that she is taking her case to the Supreme Court because of the "crippling statutory damages" awarded by an appeals court.

Five members of Perkins cohort also pled guilty and have been handed prison sentences for being involved in IMAGiNE. According to Wired, co-defendant Gregory Cherwonik received 40 months, Sean Lovelady was given 23 months, Willie Lambert got 30 months, and the fifth defendant is scheduled to be sentenced in March.

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Pictures We Love: Best of 2012

Photograph by Mindy Schauer, Orange County Register/AP

Powder-splattered, and powder-splattering, runners cross the finish line of The Color Run 5K in Irvine, California, on April 22. Each kilometer (0.6 mile) of the event features a color-pelting station dedicated to a single hue, culminating in the Pollock-esque riot at kilometer 5.

The "magical color dust" is completely safe, organizers say, though they admit it's "surprisingly high in calories and leaves a chalky aftertaste."

See more from April 2012 >>

Why We Love It

"Vibrant color floating through the air automatically brings to mind festive Holi celebrations in India. We expect to see revelers in Mumbai but instead find a surprise in the lower third of the frame—runners in California!"—Sarah Polger, senior photo editor

"There are a lot of eye-catching photographs of the festival of Holi in India that show colored powder in midair, but this particular situation has the people all lined up in a row—making it easy to see each of their very cinematic facial expressions."—Chris Combs, news photo editor

Published January 3, 2013

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Ex-USC Player: Painkiller Injections Caused Heart Attack

Despite stated label risks of possible fatal heart attack, stroke or organ failure, college football players across the country are still being given injections of a powerful painkiller on game days so they can play while injured, an ABC News investigation has found.

The drug, a generic version of Toradol, is recommended for the short-term treatment of post-operative pain in hospitals but has increasingly been used in college and professional sports, and its use is not monitored by the NCAA, the governing body of college sports.

Only two of the country's top football programs, Oklahoma and the University of Nebraska, reported to ABC News that they have limited or stopped the use of the drug in the wake of growing concern about its risks.

Which Top-Ranked College Football Teams Use Toradol?

Oklahoma said it stopped using the painkillers in 2012 after using them repeatedly in 2010 and 2011.

Nebraska said its doctors now restrict its use.

SEND TIPS About Painkiller Use in College Sports to Our Tipline

"While team physicians reserve the option to use injectable Toradol, it is rarely prescribed, and its use has been avoided this season following reports of heightened concern of potential adverse effects," Nebraska said in a statement to ABC News.

Stephen Dunn/Getty Images

Despite Risks, College Football Still Uses Powerful Painkiller Watch Video

The top two college football programs, Notre Dame and Alabama, refused to answer questions from ABC News about the painkiller. They play for the national college championship on Jan. 7.

Controversy surrounding the drug has grown this year following claims by former USC lineman Armond Armstead that he suffered a heart attack after the 2010 season, at age 20, following shots of generic Toradol administered over the course of the season by the team doctor and USC personnel.

"I thought, you know, can't be me, you know? This doesn't happen to kids like me," Armstead told ABC News.

The manufacturers' warning label for generic Toradol (ketorolac tromethamine) says the drug is not intended for prolonged periods or for chronic pain and cites gastrointestinal bleeding and kidney failure as possible side effects of the drug.

In addition, like other drugs in its class, the generic Toradol label warns "may cause an increased risk of serious cardiovascular thrombotic events, myocardial infarction (heart attack), and stroke, which can be fatal."

"This risk may increase with duration of use," the so-called black box warning reads.

In a lawsuit against the school and the doctor, Dr. James Tibone, Armstead claims the school ignored the stated risks of the drug and never told him about them.

"He was a race horse, a prize race horse that needed to be on that field no matter what," said Armstead's mother Christa. "Whether that was a risk to him or not."

Armstead says he and many other USC players would receive injections of what was known only as "the shot" in a specific training room before big games and again at half-time.

"No discussion, just go in. He would give the shot and I would be on my way," Armstead told ABC News.

Armstead said the shot made him feel "super human" despite severe ankle, and later shoulder pain, and that without it, he never could have played in big USC games against Notre Dame and UCLA.

"You can't feel any pain, you just feel amazing," the former star player said.

USC declined to comment on Armstead's claims, or the use of Toradol to treat Trojan players.

An ABC News crew and reporter were ordered off the practice field when they tried to question USC coach Lane Kiffin about the use of the painkiller. USC says the ABC News crew was told to leave because they had not submitted the appropriate paperwork in advance to attend the practice session.

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Humble coin toss thrust to heart of multiverse debate

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Creative industry in China on the rise

SHANGHAI: The creative industry is becoming a new growth area of the Chinese economy.

As one of the cities boasting the fastest growth in this sector, Shanghai's municipal government is injecting another US$32 million to further support its development.

Located in one of Shanghai's creative industry parks, KRT is a young local design firm. It is known for doing detailed work that showcases its customers' unique character.

From a three-member team redesigning apartment bathrooms, it now has 20 employees and focuses on high-end residential design and construction projects in the millions of dollars.

Kevin Hsu, design director of KRT Architecture & Interior Design Co., said: "In the past few years, we moved up from doing designs for small projects to big ones for really high-end customers. We don't need to do as many projects as we used to. Instead, we only need five to 10 projects a year to achieve the same amount of growth and profit as before."

Located five minutes away is Adopted -- formed only four months ago. It makes phone accessories which are sold by Apple.

Its small size did not stand in the way of a collaboration with the tech giant.

David Watkins, founder of Adopted, said: "Pretty much the entire team has a lot of experience working for building products for the Apple's retail eco-system. And as a small company, we are able to react and be a lot more nimble than a lot of larger companies."

According to CCID Consulting, China's largest consulting firm, the value of the creative industry in China exceeded US$172 billion in 2011, and the average annual growth rate was more than 26 per cent over the past five years.

This growth can be attributed to the higher value placed on the industry amid the realisation that China needs to move beyond just manufacturing.

In recent years, China's central and local governments have launched various plans to support the industry -- including encouraging schools to set up creative industry departments, and giving subsidies and tax relief to companies in this sector.

For example, Shanghai has just injected another US$32 million into the industry, which will be used to grow the industry, including training more local talents and attracting overseas talents to come to Shanghai.

The total value of the sector in China is expected to reach US$331 billion by 2014 - almost double its current value.

-CNA/ac

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Special Intel 'Ivy Bridge' chips to enable new laptops, tablets

Very power efficient Core processors can enable more designs like Acer's 0.48-inch thick Aspire S7 touch-screen ultrabook.

(Credit:
Brooke Crothers)

Intel will talk more about limited-run versions of its Ivy Bridge chips next week at the Consumer Electronics Show that are expected to be used by select device vendors, as it tries to take on rivals with increasingly power-efficient Core series processors.

"Limited SKUs" of Intel's 3rd Generation processor, aka Ivy Bridge, will have a power rating below 10 watts, allowing the silicon to throttle down to a sub-10-watt power envelope, an Intel spokesperson told CNET. This "will enable new ultrabook designs" and the chip is "coming very soon," he added.

That power-efficiency rating is an important yardstick because Intel's mainstream Core series processors have ratings no lower than 17 watts -- those versions are used in ultrabooks and Apple's
MacBook Air laptops today. And anything below 10 watts from Intel has historically been limited to its lower-performance Atom chips used in
tablets and smartphones.

Typically, the lower the power rating, the better the battery life and the thinner the device's design can be.

Intel did not say how far below 10 watts these special "Y" series Ivy Bridge processors will go, though Intel vice president Kirk Skaugen is expected to talk about the processors at
CES.

These Ivy Bridge chips were first mentioned at Intel's annual developer conference last year but it wasn't clear at that time if Intel and its partners would go forward with designs. But it appears that some PC vendors will have select models in the coming months, according to Intel.

"The designs wins that are out there include ultrabooks, convertibles, and tablets," the Intel spokesperson said.

Skaugen will also talk about the future Haswell processor -- due later in the year. Y versions of that chip are expected to offer even better power efficiency than the low-power Ivy Bridge chips.

And the Intel spokesperson was careful to point out that he doesn't expect an explosion of new designs based on the special low-power Ivy Bridge chip as "we are right on the cusp of Haswell."

Intel is more focused than ever on making its mainstream Core chips as power efficient as possible as rivals that supply chips based on the power-sipping ARM design crank up performance.

Samsung, for example, is now offering a quad-core ARM design for phones, and Apple continues to get better at designing higher performance A series chips for its iPhone and iPad.

To date, Intel's answer to ARM has been the Atom line of processors, but the newest versions have been criticized for their lackluster performance when running more-demanding applications in Windows 8.

Atom chips will move to entirely new design later this year that is expected address this performance gap and get them closer to Intel's mainstream processors in performance.

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Pictures: Errant Shell Oil Rig Runs Aground Off Alaska, Prompts Massive Response

Photograph courtesy Jonathan Klingenberg, U.S. Coast Guard

Waves lash at the sides of the Shell* drilling rig Kulluk, which ran aground off the rocky southern coast of Alaska on New Year's Eve in a violent storm.

The rig, seen above Tuesday afternoon, was "stable," with no signs of spilled oil products, authorities said. But continued high winds and savage seas hampered efforts to secure the vessel and the 150,000 gallons (568,000 liters) of diesel fuel and lubricants on board. The Kulluk came to rest just east of Sitkalidak Island (map), an uninhabited but ecologically and culturally rich site north of Ocean Bay, after a four-day odyssey, during which it broke free of its tow ships and its 18-member crew had to be rescued by helicopter.

The U.S. Coast Guard, state, local, and industry officials have joined in an effort involving nearly 600 people to gain control of the rig, one of two that Shell used for its landmark Arctic oil-drilling effort last summer. "This must be considered once of the largest marine-response efforts conducted in Alaska in many years," said Steve Russell, of Alaska's Department of Environmental Conservation.

The 266-foot (81-meter) rig now is beached off one of the larger islands in the Kodiak archipelago, a land of forest, glaciers, and streams about 300 miles (482 kilometers) south of Anchorage. The American Land Conservancy says that Sitkalidak Island's highly irregular coastline traps abundant food sources upwelling from the central Gulf of Alaska, attracting large numbers of seabirds and marine mammals. The largest flock of common murres ever recorded by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service was in Sitkalidak Strait, which separates the island from Kodiak. Sitkalidak also has 16 wild salmon rivers and archaeological sites tied to the Alutiiq native peoples dating back more than 7,000 years.

Shell incident commander Susan Childs said Monday night that the company's wildlife management team had started to assess the potential impact of a spill, and would be dispatched to the site when the weather permitted. She said the Kulluk's fuel tanks were in the center of the vessel, encased in heavy steel. "The Kulluk is a pretty sturdy vessel," she said. " It just remains to be seen how long it's on the shoreline and how long the weather is severe."

—Marianne Lavelle

*Shell is sponsor of National Geographic's Great Energy Challenge initiative. National Geographic maintains editorial autonomy.

Published January 2, 2013

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Hillary Clinton Discharged From Hospital

Jan 2, 2013 7:18pm

Hillary Clinton, rear center, leaving hospital. Frank Franklin II/AP Photo.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has been released from the hospital following treatment for a blood clot in her head, the State Department confirmed on Wednesday.

In a statement, Deputy Assistant Secretary Philippe Reines said Clinton’s medical team “advised her that she is making good progress on all fronts, and they are confident she will make a full recovery.  She’s eager to get back to the office.”

Clinton’s daughter Chelsea tweeted, “Thank you to the doctors, nurses & staff at New York Presbyterian Hospital Columbia University Medical Center for taking great care of my Mom.’

State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland told reporters on Wednesday that the secretary has been “quite active on the phone,” working from the hospital, regularly speaking to State Department staff.

Last Sunday, Secretary Clinton was admitted for treatment of a blood clot in her head that developed following a concussion she sustained earlier this month after fainting from illness. The  pictures of Clinton, smiling and wearing sunglasses,  are the first time she has been seen in public since Dec. 7.

Earlier on Wednesday the Secretary was seen by journalists leaving a building at New York-Presbyterian Hospital with her husband and daughter. Officials told the Associated Press that Clinton was just having tests done at another location on the sprawling hospital campus.

Hours later, she was released for good, driving away in a black van with her family.

SHOWS: World News

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In-depth 2012: The best long reads of the year

Read more: "2013 Smart Guide: 10 ideas that will shape the year"

Dig deeper, look closer and think harder – these are the goals of New Scientist's in-depth articles. Each one is perfect for saving in your favourite read-it-later app and curling up in front of a glowing tablet for a good long read.

These are our editors' picks of our best features of the year, and all are prime examples of the amazing breadth of big ideas that were ripe for the tackling in 2012. When you have finished digesting these readable meals, visit our in-depth articles archive if you're hungry for more.

Richard Webb: "You might not have heard of the algorithm that runs the world." I certainly hadn't, or that its mathematical foundations are starting to look a little wobbly. An eye-opening examination of how seemingly abstruse mathematics is in fact deeply embedded in modern life: "The algorithm that runs the world"

Sally Adee: Gastric bypass surgery is the best surgery you're not getting, said Dr Oz on his popular medical advice show in the US. Because of enthusiasm from people like him, this operation has become massively popular – but by whimsically hacking at our stomach, might we might be messing with a system far more complicated than anyone really understands? Samantha Murphy had the surgery and began to realise that losing 45 kilograms could come with some profound neurological trade-offs: "Change your stomach, change your brain"

Michael Le Page: Nowadays most people either haven't heard of the 1970 book The Limits to Growth, or believe – wrongly – that the research it was based on has been discredited. But the main message of Limits is perhaps more relevant than ever – that a delayed response to mounting environmental problems leads to catastrophe further down the line: "Boom and doom: Revisiting prophecies of collapse"

Richard Fisher: This is a simple story about a scientific mystery. Strange rumbles, whistles and blasts have been reported all over the world for centuries. In New York state, they are called "Seneca guns"; in the Italian Apennines they are described as brontidi, which means thunder-like; in Japan they are yan; and along the coast of Belgium they are called mistpouffers – or fog belches. Yet the cause is often unexplained – what on Earth could be behind them? "Mystery booms: The source of a worldwide sonic enigma"

Valerie Jamieson: It's been a sensational year for particle physics, but the Higgs boson isn't the only fascinating particle in town. Meet 11 more particles that change our understanding of the subatomic world: "11 particles for 11 physics puzzles"

David Robson: What is the secret of the legendary "flow state" that seems to mark out genius in everyone from piano virtuosos to tennis champions? With the latest brain stimulation techniques, it may soon be within everyone's reach, and Sally Adee writes with panache as she describes her own use of the technology during a terrifying marksmanship training session. This has everything I want to read in a story – drama, a revolutionary idea and some practical advice for anyone to try at home: "Zap your brain into the zone: Fast track to pure focus"

Graham Lawton: The writer of this article, Christopher Kemp, is a self-confessed lover of marginalia – nooks and crannies of science that are often overlooked. But as this beautifully written story reveals, those nooks and crannies often contain rich and fascinating material. Material, in fact, like ambergris: "Heaven scent: The grey gold from a sperm whale's gut"

Ben Crystall: Many people may remember the wonder material Starlite from an episode of BBC TV's Tomorrow's World – it seemed to have a miraculous ability to withstand fire and heat. So what happened to it? In this feature Richard Fisher uncovers the strange tale of Starlite and its eccentric inventor Maurice Ward, and on the way reveals fascinating details about Ward and his creation. And though Ward is dead, the story may not be over – it now looks like Starlite could get a second chance… "The power of cool: Whatever became of Starlite?"

Clare Wilson: I enjoyed working on this feature the most this year because to me it truly represents the future of medicine. New Scientist often predicts that some new medicine or technology will be available in five years' time. When it comes to using gene therapies or stem cell therapies on babies in the womb – the subject of this feature – the timeline is probably more uncertain, yet I don't see how anyone can doubt that some day it will happen: "Fetal healing: Curing congenital diseases in the womb"

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