Back in February we wrote about Facebook’s secret Project Titan —

a web-based email client that we hear is unofficially referred to internally as its “Gmail killer”. Now we’ve heard from sources that this is indeed what’s coming on Monday during Facebook’s special event, alongside personal @facebook.com email addresses for users...

This isn’t a big surprise — the event invites Facebook sent out hinted strongly that the news would have something to do with its Inbox, sparking plenty of speculation that the event could be related to
Titan. Our understanding is that this is more than just a UI refresh for
Facebook’s existing messaging service with POP access tacked on.
Rather, Facebook is building a full-fledged webmail client, and while it
may only be in early stages come its launch Monday, there’s a huge
amount of potential here.

Facebook has the world’s most popular photos product, the most popular events product, and soon will have a very popular local deals product as well. It can tweak the design of its webmail client to
display content from each of these in a seamless fashion (and don’t
forget messages from games, or payments via Facebook Credits). And
there’s also the social element: Facebook knows who your friends are and
how closely you’re connected to them; it can probably do a pretty good
job figuring out which personal emails you want to read most and
prioritize them accordingly.

Oh, and assuming our sources prove accurate, this explains the timing of the Google/Facebook slap fight over contact information.

We’ll keep digging for more details and will have full coverage on Monday...

Posted on: Friday, 12 November 2010, 06:59 CST

British scientists have created genetically modified sterile mosquitoes in an experiment to kill off others in their species, and researchers are hopeful that early field trials could help to stave off the rapid spread of dengue fever.

This is the first time genetically altered mosquitoes have been set loose in the wild, after years of lab experiments and calculations. But while scientists believe the trial could lead to a breakthrough in halting the disease, critics argue that mutant mosquitoes could possibly wreak havoc on the environment.

Dengue fever, a potentially life-threatening febrile disease that occurs in the tropics, is spread through the bite of infected female Aedes aegypti mosquitoes. More than 2.5 billion people are at risk and the World Health Organization estimates there are at least 50 million cases every year. There is no treatment or vaccine.

“This test in the Cayman Islands could be a big step forward,” Andrew Read, a professor of biology and entomology at Pennsylvania State University, who was not involved in the project, told the Associated Press (AP). “Anything that could selectively remove insects transmitting really nasty diseases would be very helpful.”

Scientists from Oxitec, a company that uses modern biotechnology to develop insect strains that are sterile and that can be used to control pests of both public health and agriculture, ran a small trial with the Mosquito Research and Control Unit (MRCU) in the Cayman Islands in the Caribbean. They found that releasing the genetically altered insects into a small 40-acre area three times a week from May to October managed to wipe out 80 percent of the species in just six months.

Luke Alphey, Oxitec's chief scientist and co-founder, said with such a small area, it would have been very difficult to detect a drop in dengue cases. But their modeling estimates suggested an 80 percent reduction in mosquitoes should result in fewer dengue infections.

“The idea is based on releasing sterile males who will go out ...and mate with wild females,” Alphey told Reuters. “One of the main advantages is that the males actively look for the females -- that's what they are programmed to do.”

Larvae are produced but most die before they hatch and the rest survive only a short time as mosquitoes.

While there currently is no treatment for dengue fever, French drugmaker Sanofi-Aventis is one of various groups seeking to develop vaccines. It is testing its candidate in late stage clinical trials, but experts say it could be many years before a vaccine is on the market.

Alphey’s team bred male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes which can attract and mate with females but are genetically engineered to die if they do not feed on a certain antidote, in this case an antibiotic called tetracycline.

“We put a segment of DNA into the mosquito which means it will die unless it gets the antidote,” Alphey told Reuters at a briefing in London on Thursday.

“By giving them tetracycline in the lab, we can keep them alive and breed large numbers of them, but when we release the males into the environment and they mate with wild females, all the offspring inherit a copy of the gene that kills them if they don't get the antidote...so they die,” he said.

Angela Harris of the Cayman MRCU, told Reuters that she was very encouraged by the results of the trial. “This kind of technology really has a place for reducing dengue and having an impact on human health,” she said.

“One of dengue's main problems is that there's no cure, there's no vaccine and there are no drugs you can take to avoid it or get better from it. So the only control you can really come by ... is killing the mosquitoes and making sure they're not there to transmit the virus in the first place,” she added.

But some experts warn that the genetically modified mosquitoes could become an environmental nightmare.

“If we remove an insect like the mosquito from the ecosystem, we don't know what the impact will be,” Pete Riley, campaign director of GM Freeze, a British non-profit group that opposes genetic modification, told AP.

Mosquito larvae might be food for other animal species, which could starve if the larvae disappear, said Riley. Or taking out adult mosquito predators might open up a slot for other insect species to slide in, potentially introducing new diseases.

The track record of humans interfering with natural ecosystems has been rather sketchy, he said. In the past, such interventions have led to overpopulation of species including rabbits and deer. “Nature often does just fine controlling its problems until we come along and blunder into it,” said Riley.

Alphey said the genetically modified mosquitoes cannot permanently change the ecosystem because they only live for a single generation. But to halt dengue in endemic areas like Asia and South America, billions of the modified mosquitoes would likely be needed to choke off their wild counterparts.

Yeya Toure, who leads the World Health Organization's team on Innovative Vector Control Interventions, told AP that the Cayman Islands trial was promising and said it's worth continuing the genetic modification experiments.

He said genetically altered mosquitoes aren’t meant to replace existing applications such as insecticides, but to compensate for their limitations, especially when mosquitoes develop resistances.

Alphey said his Oxford-based firm is talking with officials from various countries, including Malaysia, Brazil and Panama about conducting larger trials in those countries to stifle dengue fever.

Meet the Top 7 of Glo Naija Sings – Find Out Who Is On TOP & Decide Who will EXIT this week

7-foot 14-year-old from India is ready to follow in Yao's footsteps

By Kelly Dwyer

Size, in and of itself, is no guarantee when it comes to trying to predict NBA stardom. Or even a chance at an NBA roster.

Through the years, we've seen countless 7-footers from several countries fall short, so to speak, time and time again when it comes to trying to hold
their own at the NBA level. The Americans clearly lead the league in
failing at this aspect, but a dozen other countries have flubbed as
well.

One country that hasn't taken to the ring, or the court, yet? India. And though this massive nation hasn't had a player play or even be drafted by an NBA team, it's not easy to see why Satnam Singh
Bhamara might not be the exception to the rule. After all, the 7-footer
has scouts drooling over his skills.

The catch?

He's only 14.

But he's also 7-feet tall.

Once again, if you missed that: 7-feet tall, and 14 years of age.

[Rewind: Terrell Brown may be the largest football player you've ever seen]

Tim Povtak of FanHouse has the story:

"Satnam is on track to be a very, very good long-term basketball player,'' said Dan Barto, director of player development at IMG Basketball Academy,
who recently returned from India where he conducted several coaching
clinics. "His biggest weakness now is our biggest strength here when it
comes to developing players -- neuromuscular firing -- overall body
control. His potential is pretty amazing.''

That potential starts with his size, which is incredible itself. At age 14, he is expected to
grow for another couple of years. For now, he wears a size-22
basketball shoe. His hands swallow the ball. His father, Balbir Singh
Bhamara, is 7-2. His grandmother on his father's side is 6-9.

He already has a man's body with broad shoulders and a thick chest.
Although his leg strength is not good yet, there is nothing skinny about
him. Through the normal maturation process -- if he continues to work
-- he should become quite a specimen in the next five years...

It's a bad joke at this point, but if you're a 7-footer and you can walk and chew gum, then you have a shot at the NBA. And, to be fair, most of the
7-foot NBA washouts just didn't have the coordination needed to compete
at this level.

An attempt to immortalise late Ken Saro-Wiwa, an Ogoni environmental activist who was hanged in 1995 by the military regime of Sani Abacha, was on Thursday blocked at the senate.

The proposal came through a motion sponsored by Lee Maeba (PDP River state) which sought the senate’s consent to name a prominent national monument and major road in Abuja after the late Saro-Wiwa. Mr. Maeba was also seeking that the senate declare 11th November of every year to be named and recognised as ‘Ken Saro-Wiwa Day’ in Nigeria.

However, all his pleas were turned down by his colleagues at the senate...

The senators argued that if the motion was accepted, it will contradict the state action which carried out the execution of Mr. Saro-Wiwa and that it will only attract unwanted public attention that can’t be afforded now.

Human rights groups had condemned the military tribunal that found Mr Saro Wiwa and other Ogoni activists guilty,

saying it was closed to the public and did not meet global standards of fairness.

But some of the senators who opposed the motion to honour the man argued that it excluded several other late pro-democracy fighters such as Moshood Abiola and Shehu Yar’Adua who lost their lives to military governments. Incidentally, an earlier motion to honour Mr Abiola was also rejected by the lawmakers.

No silence in senate

But while leading the debate on the motion, Mr. Maeba argued that the late Saro-Wiwa, who was the founder of the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People, dedicated himself to solving the problems of oil rich region through a non-violent movement for social and ecological justice.

He said the late Saro-Wiwa was a strong advocate of the actualisation of the rights of the Ogoni people as articulated in the Ogoni Bill of Rights.

“Saro-Wiwa’s devotion of his life to human rights and environmental struggle in the Niger Delta lead to his unjust imprisonment for several months without trial and his execution for trumped-up charges along with eight others,” Mr. Maeba said.

However, not even his prayer that a minute silence be held in his honour was admitted by the senate.

A 13-year old boy, Kabiru Sanni has drowned in an abandoned soak away pit at 17, Orisanu Street, Ijegun in Alimosho Local Government Area of Lagos State, Nigeria.

It was learnt that Kabiru drowned in the pit covered by flood as the victim attempted to pass through it.

P.M.NEWS gathered that the landlord of the house, the late Ogunsake Saba attempted to construct the soak away but could not complete it before he died a few years ago.

The house was inherited by the late Ogunsake’s children. But they also did not complete the soak-away.

According to the tenants, they paid advance rent to enable the landlord’s children complete the soak-away but they did not do it or refund their money.

Efforts by the tenants to compel them to complete the project did not yield any result until the incident occurred.

Following the death of Kabiru Sanni, the owners of the storey building were arrested by the police at Isheri Oshun for allegedly causing the death of the boy.

Those arrested were Idowu Saba and Kehinde Saba while other members of the family have gone into hiding to escape arrest.

When P.M.NEWS visited Isheri Oshun Police Station, the reporter was referred to the State Criminal Investigation Department, SCID, Yaba, Lagos where further investigation has commenced on the matter after the suspects were transferred there.

At the time of filing this report, the suspects were still in SCID custody.

Photo:previous soakaway pit victims from enugu

Enugu Incident in June:

On Friday 22 May, the staff of One With God Sewage Services in Enugu had finished evacuating the septic tank at 15 Umuaniabor Street Awkunanaw, Garki, Enugu and were about to go when a woman in the house asked them whether they had done a thorough job. Confident that his team had done a marvelous job, Sunday Chukwu, one of the staff of the sewage company who cleared the faeces, opened the lid of the pit. But the pungent fumes emanating from the pit overpowered him. He fell into the pit, unconscious.

The Killer Soak-away pit

When Chukwu did not come up, Chibuike Okoye, a Nigerian Law School student and tenant in the said house who invited the sewage company, went into the tank to rescue him. But he, too, fell unconscious. This prompted a third person to attempt a rescue. This ended in disaster as the man also succumbed to the fumes and passed out. When tenants of the house saw that the three men in the pit were lying motionless in the tank, they fled from the building, screaming and crying.

At this juncture, personnel of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, NSCDC, led by Mr Paul Inaya, arrived the scene but discovered that they were too late to save the three men. Officials of the Enugu South Local Government Health Department later came to dilute the strong gas in the tank with chemicals and water before people could go down to bring out the corpses. But before this was done, a live cock was dropped inside the tank and it survived. The dried up corpses of the three men were later released to the Police coroner for autopsy.

The Coordinator of the Health Department, Mr. Christian Egbo said the tragedy occurred because the septic tank was not allowed to cool for at least two hours before the men went in. He added that human feaces has chemicals that can kill. Egbo advised sewage service providers to always study the environment of houses/yards they intend working on for air escape routes before opening such tanks. He also urged them use ample chemicals to neutralise the poisonous gas before going inside septic tanks..

The landlord of the building, Mr. Bartholomew Mbaorji was said to have travelled. But his wife was later detained and released by the Police in Awkunanaw. She absolved herself of any blame, saying that she engaged the services of a registered sewage company which ought to know its job...

President Goodluck Jonathan is making efforts to pacify chieftains of the Peoples’ Democratic Party in Delta State bent on ensuring that Emmanuel Uduaghan, who was recently sacked as the state governor, does not contest the rerun election expected to take place in the next three months.

Mr. Jonathan is reportedly talking to Edwin Clark, a foremost Ijaw leader who is allegedly bent on truncating the re-election bid of Mr. Uduaghan.

The former governor who was in Abuja on Wednesday to meet Mr. Jonathan told journalists at the Presidential Villa that he had come to, “brief President Jonathan, the leader of our party, on the political development in my state.” He later met with the president in the evening, and Mr Jonathan was said to have assured him of his support.

The national leadership of the PDP is also working to reconcile all warring parties in the state to ensure that all those likely to work against the re-election of Mr. Uduaghan listen to the appeal of the president and work in “one accord” to make sure the party wins the rerun election.

Mr. Uduaghan has had a long-running battle with a faction of the party under the influence of Mr Clark. The group had publicly celebrated the former governor’s ouster and announced its opposition to his nomination as the party’s candidate in the rerun election expected to hold by early February. Mr. Clark is also one of the staunchest supporters of Mr. Jonathan in the country.

Mr. Jonathan, a source privy to the meeting said yesterday, threw his weight behind the former governor, just as he has done in previous cases in which he had supported incumbent PDP governors.

This support is critical for Mr. Uduaghan, who is currently battling to return to the Delta State Government House, amidst strong oppositions ahead of the re-run election for the gubernatorial seat in the state....

Mend thy ways

A presidency source said although Mr. Jonathan re-assured the former governor of his support, he admonished Mr Uduaghan to be more amenable to his critics in the future.

“The president may have really been angry with the former governor because of his past alleged disloyalty. However, he reassured the governor of his support to re-contest the seat,” the source said.

“The former governor has been directed to go and do a few things to correct his past mistakes,” the source added.

The former governor had earlier told journalists at the presidential villa that he was set to do battle with his political opponents in the rerun election.

Obviously counting on the president’s support, Mr. Uduaghan said he was confident that he would win the election, maintaining that he was confident in the electorate, whom he said “will decide.”

New voters register

Meanwhile, a body known as Good Government Initiative (GGI) has called on the Independence National Electoral Commission (INEC) to use the conduct of the re-run election in Delta State to prove it has the ability to conduct a free and fair election. The group, in a statement signed by Eric Omare, its coordinator, urges INEC not to use the present voters register to conduct the re-run election in the state because it is fraught with irregularities.

The statement condemned what it called the inconsistent judgments of various panels and tribunals, adding that yesterday’s judgement was an indictment on the Nigerian judiciary.

“The voters register was deliberated manipulated in the last voters’ registration to favour Emmanuel Uduaghan. This manipulation was done in some wards in some local government areas where Dr.Uduaghan was perceived to have strength,” he said. “We therefore call on Jega to ensure compilation of a new voters register before conducting the re-run election in Delta State. The present voters register in Delta State cannot guarantee a free and fair election”, the statement said.

Super Falcons beat Cameroun 5-1 to qualify for the finals of the ongoing Africa Women's Championships in South Africa.

The victory has also secured a place for Nigeria in next year's Women's World Cup billed to take place in Germany.

A hat trick from Perpetua Nkwocha and a brace from Ugochi Oparanozie secured victory for the Nigerian ladies who have remained unbeaten in this championships and are on course to win a record sixth African title.

I read about Mallam Hassan Tukur a few weeks ago and Nigerian did not fail to amuse me. I have known for more than a decade and he is a perfect gentleman who respects good friendship.

He does not discriminate even on religious background.

continue its flight despite the 'no flight' order by the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) as a result of the strike action that began today when he was attacked by an officer of the Nigeria Police who opened fire on him.

He was said to have been hit by bullets in his hand...

Though, he did not lose his life, he was said to have sustained serious injuries from the gunshot and has been rushed to an unknown hospital within the State.

As a result, the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) have passed an order stopping supplies of aviation fuel to the airline till further notice.
Reacting to this incident, National Secretary of NUPENG, Tokunbo Korodo, described it as ridiculous and barbaric.

"It has to be condemned by labour leaders. Politicians should not forget that we are the same labour leaders who brought democracy back to the country from military junta.

"You people (politicians) absconded the country when we confronted the military without weapons.

"Is this our own dividend of democracy?" He asked.

National Assistant Secretary of NLC, Denja Yaqub, who spoke on phone told huhuonline.com that the policeman has been arrested.

"We just got an information now that the man was arrested in Lagos while disembarking from Arik Airline.

"We are calling for his prosecution for this inhuman act," he said.

However,NEC of NLC has resolved that Arik Airline be boycotted and Endorsed NUPENG's embargo on supply of aviation fuel to Arik Airline.

It also resolved that the policeman with service number: 97775 be dismissed immediately.

I got to know of the social activist Ken Saro Wiwa, as a child, reading the opening credits of his long-running TV series, Basi and Company. Today for most Nigerians, marks the 15th anniversary of his Military execution. Ken Saro-Wiwa was killed for speaking out against injustice and oppression of the minority ethnic groups in the Niger Delta Region by the Nigerian government and by the multinational oil companies, especially Shell.

Kenule Beeson Saro Wiwa, most known as Ken Saro-Wiwa, was born to a prominent Bori family in October 1941. He was a native of Ogoni, in todays Rivers State, South-South Nigeria. Previously an academic, Ken Saro Wiwa went into politics as the Civilian Administrator for the Port of Bonny, near his hometown of Ogoni during the Nigeria-Biafra civil war (1967-1970) and later as regional Commisioner of Education in the Rivers State cabinet. During the 1970s he built up his businesses in real estate and retail and in the 1980s concentrated on his writing, journalism and television production. It was in 1990 that Ken Saro-Wiwa decided to concentrate his efforts to speaking and campaigning about the problems of the oil producing regions of the Niger Delta. He focused on his homeland, Ogoni, and launched the non-violent Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP).

Basi & Co, his popular soap opera, may have often been too advanced for me when it ran on TV, however it had some very engaging characters, with distinctive names, dressings and manners of speech. I thoroughly enjoyed the dialogue and often acted out some of the scenes with my siblings after the show had ended. As one with great imagination, and even then, the stirrings of a writing muse, I was inspired by writers, and as such, the name of the writer of this witty drama stuck with me. As a young teenager, I found and read some of his books and followed his activism. Several children’s adventures later, I was working on a romance novella and waiting to take the entrance exams to university when the news of the execution broke. Ken Saro-Wiwa had been hanged, along with eight others (the Ogoni Nine), by the Nigerian military junta of the day.

I was stunned with disbelief. Saro-Wiwa was a thinker and activist who I had looked up to and aspired to be like. I had been too young to remark the military regime of the now late Gen. Sani Abacha, but then I was forced to consider how they stifled free speech, and how this might affect my own writing, my life. It was not an encouraging picture I saw. As it was, the hangings caused an international outcry and the immediate suspension of Nigeria from the Commonwealth – which lasted three years – as well as the calling back of many foreign diplomats. As the next few years dragged on, several writers, journalists and authors alike, were hounded and prosecuted, several went to jail or prison, and many left the country for asylum elsewhere.

Things are a bit better now. In the years in between Ken Saro Wiwa’s death and today, I had read two more of his books of his experiences during the Nigeria-Biafra civil war. Sozaboy: a Novel in Rotten English, of a naive village boy recruited into the army; and On a Darkling Plain, his personal diary. The first I read as a political university student, active in my faculty and department, an official in some groups and associations. The other I read as a young woman, living and working in Abuja, the new capital city of Nigeria. Both books and most of his others made references to the abuse he saw around him, as the oil companies took riches from beneath the soil of Ogoni land, and in return left them polluted and unusable. The fed into my world view of how the world worked, and why I needed to tell my own story however I could.

Today, 15 years later, I am more grown up and socially aware. I live in the United States by choice and will travel to Nigeria in the next couple of weeks. I am a full time writer, editor and author. My book, A Heart to Mend, has also been published and is doing very well in Nigeria. In March of this year, I established and currently serve as managing editor for a critique website for Nigerian writers called Naija Stories. The aim of the website is to provide a platform of opportunities to aspiring Nigerian writers and get them telling their stories on their own terms. In a press release yesterday by the Niger-Delta Restoration of Hope, two of Naija Stories members had won in a writing competition held to commemorate the death of Ken Saro-Wiwa. Their entries were appropriately titled “Road to Martyrdom” and “Life before Death”.

In his closing statement to the Nigerian military-appointed special tribunal, Ken Saro-Wiwa said;

“We all stand before history. I am a man of peace, of ideas. Appalled by the denigrating poverty of my people who live on a richly endowed land, distressed by their political marginalization and economic strangulation, angered by the devastation of their land, their ultimate heritage, anxious to preserve their right to life and to a decent living, and determined to usher to this country as a whole a fair and just democratic system which protects everyone and every ethnic group and gives us all a valid claim to human civilization, I have devoted my intellectual and material resources, my very life, to a cause in which I have total belief and from which I cannot be blackmailed or intimidated. I have no doubt at all about the ultimate success of my cause, no matter the trials and tribulations which I and those who believe with me may encounter on our journey. Nor imprisonment nor death can stop our ultimate victory.”

On Friday, the 10th of November 1995, Ken Saro-Wiwa was killed. He died for speaking out and making his voice relevant. I, and others will continue speaking.

____________________________________

About Myne Whitman

Award winning Myne Whitman is the author of A Heart to Mend. Her blog is the Nigerian Blog of the Year 2010 and she also writes for BellaNaija, Afrikan Goddess, Femme Lounge, and other online publications.

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