Sox Vs. Cards: 5 Things To Know About The World Series

Jonny Gomes of the Boston Red Sox celebrates after defeating the Detroit Tigers in Game Six of the American League Championship Series at Fenway Park on Sunday.

Jared Wickerham/Getty Images

Jonny Gomes of the Boston Red Sox celebrates after defeating the Detroit Tigers in Game Six of the American League Championship Series at Fenway Park on Sunday.

Jared Wickerham/Getty Images

The Boston Red Sox clinched the American League pennant last night during a 5-2 win over the Detroit Tigers in game 6 of the American League Championship Series.

That means the World Series matchup is set: It'll be the Red Sox vs. the St. Louis Cardinals beginning Wednesday in Boston.

With that, here are five things you should know about the upcoming championship series:

— The Sox have redeemed themselves this year. Last season, they ended in last place with only 69 wins; this season, they clinched the American League East with 97 wins, tying with the Cards for the best season in baseball.

— This will be the first time since the Braves and Yankees played in 1999 that league win leaders will face off in the World Series.

— MLB.com reports that the Cards and Sox have met in the world Series on four previous occasions — in 1934, 1946, 1967 and 2004. The first three meetings went to game seven and all three ended with a Cardinals win.

— As the AP reports, the 2004 series marked the third Series visit for the Sox during the past decade. They steamrolled St. Louis in a four-game sweep and won their first championship since 1918. That said, the two teams have not played each other since 2008.

— The Cardinals are a formidable — and surprising — organization. They have captured four pennants in 10 years and won the World Series in 2006 and 2011, as well as 10 other times in their history. The New York Times reports that it would be easy to say the Cards are the Yankees of the National League. But, they managed their wins without the kind of stars the Yankees have. In fact, the Cardinals "develop names that most have never heard of." So keep an eye out for Carlos Martinez, the 22-year-old reliever who throws 99 mph fast-balls and had never played anything above Double-A baseball before this season.

Source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/10/20/238309669/sox-vs-cards-5-things-to-know-about-the-world-series?ft=1&f=
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How Financial Markets View Fiscal Deal

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Source: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=236212112&ft=1&f=3
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Kris Jenner Loves TV Ratings More Than Hubby Bruce?! New Deets On How Her Desire For Fame Destroyed Their Marriage!

Kris Jenner might be the hardest working woman in show business these days!

She's got to juggle managing daughter Kim Kardashian's career, she's still trying to get her own talk show off the ground, and oh yeah, she's got three grandchildren to look after now too!

If you got a glimpse at her personal calendar, it would just be cover-to-cover business meetings. And nowhere would you find any dates with the word "BRUCE" circled inside!

And we hear THAT is why her marriage of 22 years to Bruce Jenner is coming to an end!

A family source has recently come forward to point the finger at Kris for causing their split! The insider claims:

"Everything in Kris’ life is about ratings. Bruce was never her priority and he was totally sick of it."

Poor Bruce!

Even though he tried at first to keep up with the Kardashians' go-go pace, he's had enough! Because as other sources claim, he just wanted the woman he married back! Not some super star! A family friend revealed:

"She was so hungry, hungry, hungry all the time. Bruce got tired of Kris’ ambition. It was awful to see how Kris treated Bruce. She was critical of his looks, she’d complain about his clothes, and she’d never call him loving names, only referring to him as ‘he.’"

Yikes…

Hard work is one thing, but you've GOT to make time for the ones you love! And not just the time when cameras are capturing your every word!

[Image via AXELLE/BAUER-GRIFFIN.]

Tags: bruce jenner, divorce, kim kardashian, kris jenner, love line, marriage, ratings

Source: http://perezhilton.com/2013-10-17-kris-jenner-love-of-tv-ratings-to-blame-for-failed-marriage-with-bruce-jenner
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Italy: Protesters Throw Eggs At Finance Ministry

ROME (AP) — Anti-austerity protesters in Rome threw eggs and firecrackers at the Finance Ministry during a march Saturday to oppose cuts to welfare programs and a shortage in low-income housing. Police said 11 people were detained.

More than 4,000 riot police were dispatched to maintain order as some 25,000 protesters marched through the capital on Saturday. There were moments of tension when demonstrators passed near the headquarters of an extreme-right group, but police intervened when a few bottles were thrown.

Later, demonstrators threw eggs, firecrackers and smoke bombs outside the Finance Ministry. Police reacted by dispersing the protesters, detaining 11 of the demonstrators. There were no reports of injuries.

Ahead of the march police detained some anarchists believed to pose a security threat.

Source: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=237742509&ft=1&f=
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Nestle may be hinting at Android 4.4 KitKat launch on October 28th

We know that Google is fond of puzzles, and it may be using a few of them to tease the launch of Android 4.4 KitKat. Nestle's @KitKat Twitter account has posted two musical references (embedded after the break) that suggest the OS could appear on October 28th. The first, "everybody dance now," ...

Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/JQgNLQ285fU/
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Backdoor found in D-Link router firmware code

A backdoor found in firmware used in several D-Link routers could allow an attacker to change a device's settings, a serious security problem that could be used for surveillance.

Craig Heffner, a vulnerability researcher with Tactical Network Solutions who specializes in wireless and embedded systems, found the vulnerability. Heffner wrote on his blog that the Web interface for some D-Link routers could be accessed if a browser's user agent string is set to "xmlset_roodkcableoj28840ybtide."

[ Prevent corporate data leaks with Roger Grimes' "Data Loss Prevention Deep Dive" PDF expert guide, only from InfoWorld. | Stay up to date on the latest security developments with InfoWorld's Security Central newsletter. ]

Curiously, if the second half of the user agent string is reversed and the number is removed, it reads "edit by joel backdoor," suggesting it was intentionally placed there.

"My guess is that the developers realized that some programs/services needed to be able to change the device's settings automatically," Heffner wrote. "Realizing that the Web server already had all the code to change these settings, they decided to just send requests to the Web server whenever they needed to change something.

"The only problem was that the Web server required a username and password, which the end user could change. Then, in a eureka moment, Joel jumped up and said, 'Don't worry, for I have a cunning plan'!"

The technology industry has been rattled by documents leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, which indicate the spy agency pursues ways to subvert security measures through backdoors. But developers sometimes make mistakes and in other cases, make poor security decisions.

With access to a router's settings, an attacker could potentially steer someone's Internet traffic through another their own server and read their unencrypted data traffic.

To find other vulnerable D-Link router models, Heffner used a special search engine called Shodan, which is designed to find any device connected to the Internet, ranging from refrigerators to CCTV cameras to routers.

The affected models likely include D-Link's DIR-100, DI-524, DI-524UP, DI-604S, DI-604UP, DI-604+, TM-G5240 and possibly the DIR-615. The same firmware is also used in the BRL-04UR and BRL-04CW routers made by Planex, Heffner wrote.

A Web search turned up the suspicious user agent string in a post on a Russian forum three years ago, Heffner wrote, which means somebody has known about it for a while.

D-Link officials could be immediately reached for comment on Monday.

Send news tips and comments to jeremy_kirk@idg.com. Follow me on Twitter: @jeremy_kirk.

Source: http://www.infoworld.com/d/security/backdoor-found-in-d-link-router-firmware-code-228725
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The Rise of the Coffee Machines

Coming soon to an airport, college, hospital, or office near you.

Courtesy Briggo

Starbucks is, by most accounts, a decent place to work. It trains its employees thoroughly. It gives them benefits, even if they’re part-time. It calls its baristas “partners,” which is hokey but also indicative of its desire to make them feel valued. Not only is Starbucks a responsible employer—it’s a vast and still-growing one. That’s because, while U.S.-based companies can stitch clothes in Bangladesh, build iPhones in China, or outsource call centers to India, a hot latte has to be made pretty darn close to where it’s served. The food-service industry is considered by economists to be part of the “nontradable sector,” meaning that its jobs can’t be outsourced.

But what if they could be automated? What if Starbucks were to someday replace its 100,000-odd baristas with machines?

Christopher Mims asked those questions in a Quartz story this week headlined “An army of robot baristas could mean the end of Starbucks as we know it.” In July, Businessweek wrote a similar piece: “Baristas, Meet the Robot That Wants Your Job.”

To be clear, there’s no indication that Starbucks has any plans to dump its workers for machines. A spokeswoman for the company told Quartz that it wouldn’t move in the direction of automation because that would “diminish what we offer every day.” But even if Starbucks doesn’t do it, others will. And if they succeed, it could have broad implications for the future of the economy.

Robots may be more reliable than humans. But what about soothing the feelings of unsatisfied customers?

The stories center on an Austin, Texas-based startup called Briggo, which has created a fully automated, one-stop coffee kiosk that churns out what it believes is a superior cup of joe. You can order and pay by smartphone, customize the brewing process to your precise specifications, and schedule it to be ready for pickup the minute you arrive. And it really doesn’t care if you say “venti” instead of “large.”

Robot-brewed coffee might sound like a bizarre, even retrograde concept in an industry that fetishizes the artisanal and eschews mass production. Anyone who has tried coffee from an office vending machine can vouch for the value of the human touch. But, contrary to what you might expect, Briggo’s goal in automating coffee is not to make it cheaper or more portable. It’s to make it better.

Here’s the concept, as explained to me by Briggo CEO Kevin Nater: “There’s this unbelievably beautiful supply chain for coffee,” he says, from the way the beans are painstakingly cultivated and harvested in countries like Honduras to the way they’re packed and shipped and roasted to perfection—“and then, at the last step, when you’ve spent all this time and money trying to make the perfect product, there’s a person brewing the coffee. And that has the potential to really just kill the customer experience. So why not automate it?”

As Quartz’s Mims points out, Nespresso machines, which automatically brew a cup when you insert a vacuum-sealed capsule, have topped hand-brewed coffee in tastings. Briggo applies similar concepts on a larger scale. Each 50-square-foot, Yves Béhar-designed kiosk is stocked with fresh milk, beans, and other ingredients, and whips up frothy, made-to-order cups according to a process the company developed with the help of an award-winning barista. From the Quartz story:

Inside, protected by stainless steel walls and a thicket of patents, there is a secret, proprietary viscera of pipes, storage vessels, heating instruments, robot arms and 250 or so sensors that together do everything a human barista would do if only she had something like perfect self-knowledge. “How is my milk steamer performing? Am I a half-degree off in my brewing temperature? Is my water pressure consistent? Is there any residue buildup on my brewing chamber that might require me to switch to a backup system?”

Source: http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2013/10/briggo_coffee_robot_should_starbucks_replace_baristas_with_machines.html
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