The carcass of a 40-foot sperm whale that apparently died as it neared the shore off of Pompano Beach on Sunday afternoon later drifted back out to sea, ending a drama that had drawn the attention of beachgoers and scientists alike.
The whale was spotted about noon offshore near the 600 block of North Ocean Boulevard, according to the Broward Sheriff’s Office.
Read the full story at Sun-Sentinel.com.
REUTERS
A woman and a child pray over candles outside Saint Rose of Lima Roman Catholic Church a day after a shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut Saturday.
NEWTOWN, Conn. — A grieving Connecticut town braced itself Monday to bury the first two of the 20 small victims of an elementary school gunman and debated when classes could resume — and where, given the carnage in the building and the children's associations with it.
The people of Newtown weren't yet ready to address the question just three days after the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, and a day after President Barack Obama pledged to seek change in memory of the children and six adults ruthlessly slain by a gunman packing a high-powered rifle.
"We're just now getting ready to talk to our son about who was killed," said Robert Licata, the father of a student who escaped harm during the shooting. "He's not even there yet."
Newtown officials couldn't say whether Sandy Hook Elementary, where authorities said all the victims were shot at least twice, would ever reopen. Monday classes were canceled, and the district was considering eventually sending surviving Sandy Hook students to a former school building in a neighboring town.
TERRIFIED STUDENTS RAN INTO DANGER
OBAMA: "THESE TRAGEDIES MUST END"
MOTHER DEVOTED HER LIFE TO HIM - THEN HE ENDED IT
The gunman, 20-year-old Adam Lanza, was carrying an arsenal of hundreds of rounds of especially deadly ammunition, authorities said Sunday — enough to kill just about every student in the school if given enough time, raising the chilling possibility that the bloodbath could have been even worse.
The shooter decided to kill himself when he heard police closing in about 10 minutes into Friday's attack, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said on ABC's "This Week."
At the interfaith service in Newtown on Sunday evening, Obama said he would use "whatever power this office holds" to engage with law enforcement, mental health professionals, parents and educators in an effort to prevent more tragedies like Newtown.
"What choice do we have?" Obama said on a stark stage that held only a small table covered with a black cloth, candles and the presidential podium. "Are we really prepared to say that we're powerless in the face of such carnage, that the politics are too hard?"
The president first met privately with families of the victims and with the emergency personnel who responded to the shooting. Police and firefighters got hugs and standing ovations when they entered for the public vigil, as did Obama.
Entrepreneurs from around the world took the stage during this packed week of entrepreneurship events in Miami: Florida International University’s Americas Venture Capital Conference (known as AVCC), HackDay, Wayra’s Global DemoDay and Endeavor’s International Selection Panel.
The events, all part of the first Innovate MIA week, also put the spotlight on Miami as it continues to try to develop into a technology hub for the Americas.
“While I like art, I absolutely love what is happening today... The time has come to become a tech hub in Miami,” said Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos A. Gimenez, who kicked off the venture capital conference on Thursday. He told the audience of 450 investors and entrepreneurs about the county’s $1 million investment in the Launch Pad Tech Accelerator in downtown Miami.
“I have no doubt that this gathering today will produce new ideas and new business ventures that will put our community on a fast track to becoming a center for innovative, tech-driven entrepreneurship,” Gimenez said.
Brad Feld, an early-stage investor and a founder of TechStars, cautioned that won’t happen overnight. Building a startup community can take five, 10, even 15 years, and those leading the effort, who should be entrepreneurs themselves, need to take the long-term view, he told the audience via video. “You can create very powerful entrepreneurial ecosystems in any city... I’ve spent some time in Miami, I think you are off to a great start.”
Throughout the two-day AVCC at the JW Brickell Marriott, as well as the Endeavor and Wayra events, entrepreneurs from around the world pitched their companies, hoping to persuade investors to part with some of their green.
And in some cases, the entrepreneurs could win money, too. During the venture capital conference, 29 companies —including eight from South Florida such as itMD, which connects doctors, patients and imaging facilities to facilitate easy access of records — competed for more than $50,000 in cash and prizes through short “elevator’’ pitches. Each took questions from the judges, then demoed their products or services in the conference “Hot Zone,” a room adjoining the ballroom. Some companies like oLyfe, a platform to organize what people share online, are hoping to raise funds for expansion into Latin America. Others like Ideame, a trilingual crowdfunding platform, were laser focused on pan-Latin American opportunities.
Winning the grand prize of $15,000 in cash and art was Trapezoid Digital Security of Miami, which provides hardware-based security solutions for enterprise and cloud environments. Fotopigeon of Tampa, a photo-sharing and printing service targeting the military and prison niches, scored two prizes.
The conference offered opportunities to hear formal presentations on current trends — among them the surge of start-ups in Brazil; the importance of mobile apps and overheated company valuations — and informal opportunities to connect with fellow entrepreneurs.
Speakers included Gaston Legorburu of SapientNitro, Albert Santalo of CareCloud and Juan Diego Calle of .Co Internet, all South Florida entrepreneurs. Jerry Haar, executive director of FIU’s Pino Global Entrepreneurship Center, which produced the conference with a host of sponsors, said the organizers worked hard to make the conference relevant to both the local and Latin American audience, with panels on funding and recruiting for startups, for instance.
Police were investigating an accident involving a 7-year-old who was struck by a vehicle in a Lauderhill neighborhood late Saturday, Lauderhill Police spokesman Rick Rocco said.
The vehicle and its driver, who has not yet been identified, remained on scene after the incident near the intersection of Northwest 27th Court and 56th Avenue.
The child was transported to Broward Health Medical Center in critical condition immediately after the incident, police said.
Details of the accident were not immediately available.
This post will be updated as we receive more information.
When Tumblr went down Wednesday evening, users flocked to Mashable to express their rage and disbelief.
Click here to view this gallery.
[More from Mashable: Mysterious Package Addressed to Indiana Jones Arrives at UChicago]
Where were you the day that Tumblr went down? Whether you were at home, at work or on the move, it’s possible that you somehow ended up on Mashable. That was the case for thousands of Tumblr users, who, desperate for their GIF fix after a Tumblr outage on Wednesday, found themselves commenting on a Mashable story about the glitch.
Frustrated Tumblr frequenters left without a blogging platform transformed the comment thread on Mashable’s story into a makeshift Tumblr dashboard. Users gathered to commiserate, voice their anger and post GIFs to express their feelings. The micro-community that sprung up in the post made these the top comments on Mashable this week.
[More from Mashable: The Top Comments on Mashable This Week]
We recently renovated our commenting system to allow readers to embed video and images, a feature Wednesday’s commenters took full advantage of. By the time Tumblr was again functional, the story had accrued over 4,000 comments. Users traded domain names, discussed their blogs and, above all, bemoaned a lack of access to the site. YouTube user moviepimpdj posted a video of the rapidly moving comment thread.
This week we also saw major changes to Facebook’s privacy settings, with our readers feeling mixed emotions about the shift. The community mused on what 2013 might hold with respect to responsive design.
What were your favorite comments from the Mashable community this week? Get involved with the discussion by signing up for Mashable Follow. You could see your voice in our next weekly roundup!
Image courtesy of Flickr, kurichan+
This story originally published on Mashable here.
Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News
As morning turned to afternoon on Friday, further details continued to emerge from Newtown, CT, a tight-knit community shaken by a massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School that took the lives of innocent students and teachers, in addition to the gunman, reportedly identified as Adam Lanza.
RELATED: President Fights Tears as He Addresses Nation
As President Barack Obama touched on in his tear-jerking press conference, this is not the first time the nation has witnessed a tragedy of this kind. The recent mass shooting at an Aurora, CO movie theater is just one instance of such violence. Columbine High School and Virginia Tech also resonate as prime examples.
Hollywood's biggest stars were quick to react to the news on Twitter and made an outcry for stricter gun control regulations.
Watch the video for ET's complete coverage of today's biggest headline.
RELATED: Celebs Tweet Reactions to CT School Shooting
TOKYO — Voting has begun in Japanese parliamentary elections expected to put the once-dominant conservatives back in power after a three-year break amid widespread voter dismay with the Democrats.
Major newspapers predict the vote will give the Liberal Democratic Party, led by the ex-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, a majority in the 480-seat lower house.
Many have soured on the ruling Democratic Party of Japan, which won a landslide victory in 2009 but could not deliver on a string of campaign pledges and passed legislation to double the sales tax.
Entrepreneurs from around the world took the stage during this packed week of entrepreneurship events in Miami: Florida International University’s Americas Venture Capital Conference (known as AVCC), HackDay, Wayra’s Global DemoDay and Endeavor’s International Selection Panel.
The events, all part of the first Innovate MIA week, also put the spotlight on Miami as it continues to try to develop into a technology hub for the Americas.
“While I like art, I absolutely love what is happening today... The time has come to become a tech hub in Miami,” said Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos A. Gimenez, who kicked off the venture capital conference on Thursday. He told the audience of 450 investors and entrepreneurs about the county’s $1 million investment in the Launch Pad Tech Accelerator in downtown Miami.
“I have no doubt that this gathering today will produce new ideas and new business ventures that will put our community on a fast track to becoming a center for innovative, tech-driven entrepreneurship,” Gimenez said.
Brad Feld, an early-stage investor and a founder of TechStars, cautioned that won’t happen overnight. Building a startup community can take five, 10, even 15 years, and those leading the effort, who should be entrepreneurs themselves, need to take the long-term view, he told the audience via video. “You can create very powerful entrepreneurial ecosystems in any city... I’ve spent some time in Miami, I think you are off to a great start.”
Throughout the two-day AVCC at the JW Brickell Marriott, as well as the Endeavor and Wayra events, entrepreneurs from around the world pitched their companies, hoping to persuade investors to part with some of their green.
And in some cases, the entrepreneurs could win money, too. During the venture capital conference, 29 companies —including eight from South Florida such as itMD, which connects doctors, patients and imaging facilities to facilitate easy access of records — competed for more than $50,000 in cash and prizes through short “elevator’’ pitches. Each took questions from the judges, then demoed their products or services in the conference “Hot Zone,” a room adjoining the ballroom. Some companies like oLyfe, a platform to organize what people share online, are hoping to raise funds for expansion into Latin America. Others like Ideame, a trilingual crowdfunding platform, were laser focused on pan-Latin American opportunities.
Winning the grand prize of $15,000 in cash and art was Trapezoid Digital Security of Miami, which provides hardware-based security solutions for enterprise and cloud environments. Fotopigeon of Tampa, a photo-sharing and printing service targeting the military and prison niches, scored two prizes.
The conference offered opportunities to hear formal presentations on current trends — among them the surge of start-ups in Brazil; the importance of mobile apps and overheated company valuations — and informal opportunities to connect with fellow entrepreneurs.
Speakers included Gaston Legorburu of SapientNitro, Albert Santalo of CareCloud and Juan Diego Calle of .Co Internet, all South Florida entrepreneurs. Jerry Haar, executive director of FIU’s Pino Global Entrepreneurship Center, which produced the conference with a host of sponsors, said the organizers worked hard to make the conference relevant to both the local and Latin American audience, with panels on funding and recruiting for startups, for instance.
A Miami-area photographer who secretly videotaped children while they changed clothes in his home studio was sentenced in federal court Friday to 10 years in prison.
Diego Tobias Matrajt, 37, pleaded guilty in September to distribution and possession of child pornography.
Last February, Matrajt distributed 10 images of child pornography to an undercover agent by using a peer-to-peer file sharing program, according to court records.
In April, FBI agents did a search of his home and computers, uncovering 26 video images of boys and girls changing clothes alone in a guest bedroom with their genitalia exposed, records show.
Matrajt admitted surreptitiously video recording children under the age of 12 as they changed clothes in the guest bedroom during photo shoots.
Westlake Ace Hardware gives a few basic steps, including caulking windows before the cold hits.
Click here to view this gallery.
[More from Mashable: Origami Self-Closing Stroller Is a Slick Gift for Techie Moms]
If you’re lucky, you’ll only feel a slight draft through a window crack. Maybe a gust of wind under the door. Either way, that Father Winter is one mean S.O.B.
Thankfully, there are easy steps you can take to make sure your home is ready for the winter season. Check out the gallery above to watch five YouTube videos with the most practical and cheapest tips for winterizing your house.
[More from Mashable: 12 Holiday Gift Ideas for Your Girlfriend]
Of course, those of you in warmer climates can ignore this advice. But for the folks gearing up for a snowy, wind-chilled couple of months ahead, we’ve got your back. And so does YouTube.
Any big tips we missed? Let us know below.
Image courtesy of Flickr, Jason Persse
This story originally published on Mashable here.
Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News
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