Hitler memorabilia 'attracts young Indians' Slowly but steadily, a decade-old business around the dead and universally despised dictator Adolf Hitler is emerging as a small-scale industry in India. Books and memorabilia on the German leader's life have found a steady market in some sections of Indian society where he is idolised and admired, mostly by the young.
The numbers are small but seem to be growing. Latest reports say Bollywood is now planning to cash in. A film - Dear Friend Hitler - is due to be released by the end of the year, focusing on the dictator's relationship with his mistress Eva Braun. It's hard to narrow down what makes the dictator popular in India, but some young people say they are attracted by his "discipline and patriotism". Most of them are, however, quick to add that they do not approve of his racial prejudices and the Holocaust in which millions of Jews were killed. But the truth is that books, T-shirts, bags and key-rings with his photo or name on do sell in India. 'Bestseller' 'Positive and negative' The truth is not out there. Let me be completely honest. I do not believe in alien UFOs. Nothing could persuade me that extra-terrestrials are hovering above us or getting ready to drop in for tea. It is an issue, in fact, on which I am uncharacteristically closed-minded.
There is no evidence you could cite that would make me change my mind. I would always regard it as far more likely that the evidence was planted by earthlings trying to convince of us of UFOs, rather than by Martians themselves. But am I interested in UFO sightings? You bet. I love them in the films and documentaries that you find on the channels in the lower reaches of your television's electronic programme guide. Until this week, that was the only place I had heard of the Rendlesham Forest incident of 26 December 1980. I have never felt any need to read up about "Britain's Roswell", completely sure as I was that an alien craft had not been seen in the skies over Suffolk. But nonetheless, this week I went out to the woods to investigate. BBC - Earth News - Humpback whales form friendships that last years. Searching for a friendly female? Humpback whales form lasting bonds, the first baleen whales known to do so. Individual female humpbacks reunite each summer to feed and swim alongside one another in the Gulf of St Lawrence, off Canada, scientists have found.
Toothed whales, such as sperm whales, associate with one another, but larger baleen whales, which filter their food, have been thought less social. The finding raises the possibility that commercial whaling may have broken apart social groups of whales. Friends reunited Details of the discovery are published in the journal Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology. Dr Christian Ramp and colleagues of the Mingan Island Cetacean Study group based in St Lambert, Canada have been studying whales in the Gulf of St Lawrence since 1997. Together with researchers from Germany and Sweden, the scientists are recording the movements of baleen whales including blue, fin, minke and humpback whales, adding to a set of data that stretches back 30 years. The ancient art of hidden writing. 2 July 2010Last updated at 12:38 By Mark Ward Technology correspondent, BBC News Trithemius wrote a long text about the art of hiding messages in text The arrest of 10 alleged spies in the United States has thrust the ancient practice of steganography into the limelight.
Several of the suspects are accused of using the method to conceal data being transmitted from the US to Russia. As you might expect for a technique that involves hiding information, steganography has always had a shady reputation. That question mark over it dates from the text in which the word was coined, Steganographia, which was written in 1499 by Johannes Trithemius but not published until 1606. The name of the book derives from the Greek for concealed writing and steganographic techniques involve hiding messages in otherwise innocent-looking media - be that text, images or video. Steganographic techniques can be applied to lots of different media Banned texts Making sense This also reveals the key to understanding it.
Archaeologists unearth Neolithic henge at Stonehenge. 22 July 2010Last updated at 13:53 The new "henge" is about 900m (2,950ft) from the giant stones Archaeologists have discovered a second henge at Stonehenge, described as the most exciting find there in 50 years. The circular ditch surrounding a smaller circle of deep pits about a metre (3ft) wide has been unearthed at the world-famous site in Wiltshire. Archaeologists conducting a multi-million pound study believe timber posts were in the pits. Project leader Professor Vince Gaffney, from the University of Birmingham, said the discovery was "exceptional". The new "henge" - which means a circular monument dating to Neolithic and Bronze Ages - is situated about 900m (2,950ft) from the giant stones on Salisbury Plain. Images show it has two entrances on the north-east and south-west sides and inside the circle is a burial mound on top which appeared much later, Professor Gaffney said. "This is probably the first major ceremonial monument that has been found in the past 50 years or so.
Second life - cultura. A couple have divorced after the wife saw the husband having online sex in the virtual world of Second Life. So how do avatars have sex? Wife walks in and finds husband in a compromising position on the sofa with another woman. Wife feels betrayed. Wife files for divorce. It's a familiar scenario in soap operas, but for one married couple it was all too real. Amy Taylor and David Pollard met in an online chatroom in 2003, got married and shared their interest in Second Life, a virtual world in which users create avatars to interact with each other. But the marriage ended after Ms Taylor's online character saw her husband's avatar having sex on a sofa with a female prostitute. So how do computerised characters have sex? "First you need to buy genitals," says technology journalist Adrian Mars, explaining the process in Second Life. "But there's not much in the way of exciting mechanics.
"You can touch and jiggle about a bit and you can emote and gesture in a way the other person would see.