UN Pledges Help for AU

The United Nations has announced that it is pledging $77 million for the African Union to continue it’s peace work in the troubled Darfur region.

“The aid has been offered because of Sudan’s refusal to allow a UN peacekeeping force in Darfur, Annabi told reporters.

“That (willingness) is not there today (for a United Nations peacekeeping force), so in the meantime we are looking at ways in which we can move forward by reinforcing (the African Union Mission in Sudan) to enable it to go on with its tasks effectively,” Annabi said.

The UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations in New York said the Sudanese government initially agreed to allow the United Nations to provide the AU troops with a support package worth about $22 million. Annabi was able to secure the government’s agreement to allow the rest of the $77 million aid package to go through in the last few days.”

Thanks, Shealyn

Spitting the Cure

Human saliva contains a natural painkiller according to new research. The chemical is named opiorphin may soon be able to provide a new gamut of painkillers and maybe even anti-depressent drugs.

I guess this means that YOU really are the cure.

“Its pain-suppressive effect is like that of morphine,” says Catherine Rougeot at the Pasteur Institute in Paris, France, who led the research. “But we have to test its side effects as it is not a pure painkiller,” she says. “It may also be an anti-depressive molecule.”

World Usability Day

Today is World Usability Day!

Making things easy to use is hard, and it goes unappreciated. People are more likely to complain how something is not working and hard to use than express their appreciation of things that just work.

World Usability Day wants to make the world easier to use. That sounds weird, but I assure you that it’s a good thing.

“Why doesn’t this work right? What am I supposed to do with this now?”

World Usability Day, November 14, 2006, is for everyone who’s ever asked these questions. This Earth Day style event, focused on raising awareness and visibility of usability engineering and user centered design, is currently being organized by volunteers and local event coordinators from around the world. Whether a usability professional or just an enthusiastic (or frustrated) user, each participant is making a contribution to “making life easy”.

French Kissing

Last week France, land of the French Kiss, fell far short of beating the current Guinness World Records holder for Most Kissers At Once.

At the Guinness World Records’ sponsored event, in Paris, 1,188 people showed up for simultaneous kissing.  (I know, you’re thinking, “Best. Date. Ever.”) Unfortunately, they failed to beat Budapest’s impressive 2005 record of 11,570 kissers.kissers.jpg

Some Parisians blame the location chosen for the event: La Defense, a modernist business park on the west edge of Paris.  It’s been suggested that a better known, and perhaps more inspiring spot, would have been the Eiffel Tower.

Air Shower Uses Less Water

Some Australians have invented a shower head that adds some air to water to get some super O in the H2O. The article points out that Australians are becoming more concerned about their water usage, yeah for environmental awareness.

“The scientists have developed a simple ‘air shower’ device which, when fitted into existing showerheads, fills the water droplets with a tiny bubble of air. The result is the shower feels just as wet and just as strong as before, but now uses much less water.”