Maccas in damage control over Seriously McDonald's picture hoax

• Fast food giant on the warpath over picture hoax
• Sign claimed African-Americans charged $1.50 extra
• Image top trending on Twitter, but may be years old

THIS picture is a hoax. McDonald's isn't charging African Americans an extra $1.50 "as an insurance measure due in part to a recent string of robberies".

But the image is all the rage on Twitter and has forced McDonald's to go into damage control to protect its online reputation.
The picture, which has since been removed from Twitter, displayed the offensive sign taped to a window outside what appeared to be a McDonald's restaurant.
The sign included an 800-number that connected callers to the customer satisfaction hotline of rival KFC, which is owned by Yum! Brands.
People tweeted and retweeted the photo, using the words "Seriously McDonalds" to express their disappointment with the fast-food chain.
On its official Twitter account, McDonald's said: "That pic is a senseless & ignorant hoax McD's values ALL our customers. Diversity runs deep in our culture on both sides of the counter."

Despite the official denials, the hoax gained momentum over the weekend as #SeriouslyMcDonalds ranked on Twitter's Trends list.
"It's a completely senseless, ignorant hoax by some pranksters," McDonald's spokeswoman Heidi Barker said.
Ms Barker added that she had "no idea" who carried out the hoax.
Some have claimed that the picture is an old meme that began recirculating a few days ago.

Chinese techie makes his own 'DIY iPad 3' for $285 Read

AN enterprising Chinese man has come up with a solution for gadget nuts who desperately want Apple's popular iPad tablet computer but cannot afford it.
The answer? DIY.
In a 20-minute video posted on Youku — the Chinese equivalent of YouTube — Liu Xinying demonstrates how to assemble an iPad look-a-like using computer parts, a touch screen and a case with a keypad, to the sound of metal music.
At the end of the video dubbed "DIY IPAD 3", the IT whizz shows off the finished version — an apparently functional tablet computer that looks like a thick iPad but runs on Windows, an operating system made by rival Microsoft.
News of Liu's apparent feat spread on several foreign and Chinese technology websites, as well as on the nation's Twitter-like Weibo service.
When contacted by AFP, the 21-year-old from the eastern province of Shandong said that since he posted the video online a month ago, he has knocked back requests from a dozen people wanting him to make them a DIY iPad.

"I did this for fun," said Liu, who works at a computer store in Jinan city.
"It cost me 2000 yuan ($285) to make it, so I guess that's how much it's worth."
By comparison, the cheapest version of the iPad 2 sells for 3688 yuan in China, while the most expensive model costs 5288 yuan.
iPads and iPhones are hugely popular in China — the world's largest internet market with 457 million online users — and the launch of new models has been known to trigger fights and even crimes.
Last month, a court in the southern province of Guangdong sentenced three people to prison for stealing the design to the iPad 2 and using it to make fake tablet computers.
Apple was also forced to compensate a customer who sustained injuries in a fight at its Beijing flagship store in May when the iPad 2 was launched.

growing like a weed

Google, trying to take a stand with its new social network, requires people to use real-world names on Google+. The real world, though, turns out to be more complex than a simple rule can accommodate.
Now two weeks old and growing like a weed, Google+ is facing issues that became common once the Internet made people's identity into information that can reach potentially anyone on the planet. With Google+ and the Google Profiles service on which it relies, the company is trying to build a service without pseudonyms, anonymous cowards, or impersonation.

Google Profiles is a product that works best in the identified state. This way you can be certain you're connecting with the right person, and others will have confidence knowing that there is someone real behind the profile they're checking out," according to the Google help files for Google+. "For this reason, Google Profiles requires you to use the name that you commonly go by in daily life." Most people are known by the name that appears on their driver's license or school registry and probably won't think twice about using that when joining a social network. There are plenty of advantages to that approach: anonymous forums are often degraded by trolling, attacks, and flame wars. Using real names brings some measure of accountability, since your reputation is on the line when you voice an opinion.
But there are acres of gray area, too. Political dissidents may want to avoid persecution. Those who've been harassed may want to avoid more of it. And plenty of people want both online interactions and privacy.
There is some practical merit to the advice that Google's then-Chief Executive Eric Schmidt offered on CNBC: "If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place." But that doesn't mean everything that's not public is bad.
Here's one identity issue that's cropped up already: People's online names, while not on their birth certificates, often are a real persona--reputation and all. Second Life, the virtual world where it was difficult to use a real-world name even if you wanted, is populated by pseudonymous characters. Some of those names didn't sit well with Google, though.

Google wields data openness against Facebook

Google is accelerating efforts to make its new social network look like a more open and attractive alternative to Facebook.

The latest: Google will allow users to export a list of Web sites that they've recommended through the "+1" button.

While only a modest change, it highlights how Google is trying to use openness--the ability to extract your data from its servers with the click of a button--to differentiate itself from its far larger and more established rival.
"When your users can leave you you're going to work as hard as you can to keep them," Google engineering manager Brian Fitzpatrick told reporters during a video conference today using Google Hangout. A service announced last month called Google Takeout makes it easy to move to rival services.
Facebook, on the other hand, has taken a different approach to who owns user data. Last week, it blocked a tool written by developer Mohamed Mansour that allowed users to extract contact information their friends have shared with them.
This week, it blocked another by Open-Xchange, which allowed people to reconstruct their Facebook contact list on Google+.
It's not exactly a new debate: Google tried to ratchet up the pressure on Facebook to be more open last November, although the discussion at the time was about searchability rather than the possible threat of Google+. An early round in the skirmish took place as far back as 2008.
Facebook, of course, is in the enviable position of being enmeshed in the daily lives of hundreds of millions of users. The hassle and inconvenience of reconstructing a social network on a rival's service, coupled with what economists call network effects, is a significant barrier to Google+ becoming as successful.
Facebook does allow users to download much of their data, but not instantly and not in a format that can be easily imported to rival services. It's "not in an open portable format at all," says Fitzpatrick, the Google manager. When asked why it wasn't, he declined to speculate: "I have no explanation."
A spokesman for Facebook did not immediately respond to a CNET request for comment.
Facebook has taken some positive steps in the past, says Steve Repetti of the Data Portability Project, which advocates for ready data availability in a useful format.
"Now what they're doing is they're picking and choosing and removing functionality," Repetti says. "'We did it. But now we're undoing it because we don't want to benefit Google.'"
Mansour's now-blocked Chrome extension allowed users to copy the information your Facebook contacts have shared with you--name, e-mail address, phone number, birthday, Web site, address--then letting you save it as a spreadsheet file or import it directly into your Gmail address book.
It arguably ran afoul of Facebook's terms of service, which says: "You will not collect users' content or information, or otherwise access Facebook, using automated means (such as harvesting bots, robots, spiders, or scrapers) without our permission."
Repetti of the Data Portability Project says: "There has to be an element of accountability. If you say you're going to be open, be open. Even if you say you're not open, at least I know that going in."

Baby cut out of pregnant US woman in Kentucky Read more

A US woman used a stun gun to subdue a pregnant woman before killing her and cutting the baby boy from her body, a police investigator has testified. Kentucky State Police Detective Chad Winn, speaking during a preliminary hearing in Warren County District Court today, said Kathy Michelle Coy told 21-year old Jamie Stice they were going shopping for baby supplies but took her instead to a wooded area with plans to kill her.

Amazon Strategy Relies on Tax-Averse Californians

Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN), the world’s largest online retailer, seeks to derail a new California law that requires the company to collect sales taxes by giving residents a chance to reject the levy through a ballot measure.

Rise of the violent 'Little Emperors'

Rise of the violent 'Little Emperors'

Children are becoming increasingly violent towards their parents when they do not get their own way, a leading psychologist has warned.The ‘little emperors’ of this ‘spoilt generation’ lash out both at home – particularly at mothers who stand in their way – and school or even nursery. Exper
ts have blamed the decline in respect for authority on a lack of clear parental boundaries and rules, as well as an emphasis on children’s rights.The problem is getting worse and spans the class divide, according to Dr Aric Sigman, a fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine.