Tupac's Workout Bench For Sale --$100k

The old Death Row Records gym equipment Tupac once used is up for grabs, and the seller wants a king's ransom for it.
A little backstory ... when Death Row went bankrupt everything in the office was sold -- from Suge Knight's engraved cigar cases to the famous electric chair ... it all went to the highest bidders.
The gym set -- which Tupac used for his 1995 post-prison interview on MTV -- went for $1,166. We're told the buyer actually pumped iron with gear ... but is now hoping it can score him a heavy sack of cash on eBay. The starting bid is $100k.
Check out the pics ... it's hardly Gold's Gym quality equipment, but Gold's probably doesn't have a bench where Tupac did his things.

Olympics puts mobile communications technology to the test

Telecoms firms say their networks will cope with the strain of the hundreds of thousands of spectators, workers and athletes using mobile devices across London's Olympic Park in East London.

Thirty mobile phone masts have been fitted across the 500 acre (2,000 square metre) site, 14 of them for inside stadiums and other buildings.

In addition, BT says it has created the UK's largest single wi-fi installation.

Content providers have also taken steps to limit data usage.

The nine venues on site can hold more than 160,000 spectators at any one time.

Twenty thousand members of the media are expected, and the Olympic village houses about 17,500 athletes and officials. They will be joined by thousands more workers and security staff.

The chair of the the body representing UK mobile operators and content providers described providing coverage to the Olympic Games as being similar to dealing with four simultaneous FA Cup Finals over a 17-day period.

"At peak time when one set of spectators leaves and another arrives you will have between 200,000 to 300,000 people on site," Stuart Newstead told the BBC.

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"It's as well prepared as it can be. The key to the planning has been co-operation between the operators to maximise the laws of physics, allowing a far denser configuration of masts and antennas than normal to ensure as much capacity as possible."

Organisers say that means that everyone should be able to make calls, send texts, browse the internet and upload material to social networks even at the busiest times.

Wi-fi vouchers
To relieve strain on 3G data services BT has installed about 1,000 wi-fi hotspots.

Subscribers to BT broadband, O2 mobile and Tesco Mobile will be offered free access.

Vodafone, Three, Everything Everywhere and other subscribers will have to buy vouchers ranging in price from £5.99 for 90 minutes to £39 for 4,000 minutes.

Overseas visitors are offered a rate of 500 minutes for £28.

BT says it expects to be able to handle peak traffic of 1.7 gigabits per second: the equivalent of 13,200 webpage downloads every minute.

"We have done a huge amount of capacity planning work, including reviewing and learning from events like the World Cup, Royal Wedding and the Super Bowl,"

Spectators are forbidden from bringing in Mifi devices or using their tablets and phones to create personal wi-fi hotspots to connect other devices.

Data management

Content providers whose material is likely to be popular with attendees have been asked to strike a balance between the kind of material they want to offer and its impact on data usage.

"The BBC's iPlayer will adjust throughput speeds [affecting video quality] depending on the capacity available because the broadcaster is working with operators to control that," said Mr Newstead.x

"We have also encouraged developers including the creators of Locog's [London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games] official app to gather as much pre-loaded information as possible before the user arrives at the site."

Mobile phone and computer users are not the only ones using the wireless spectrum.

• Broadcasters to use wireless cameras, microphones and talkback systems
• Olympic organisers to use wireless timing and scoring equipment
• Olympic officials, team members, support staff and emergency services to have reliable communication systems.

To secure capacity it borrowed spectrum from the Ministry of Defence and has used frequencies freed up by the switch-off of analogue TV signals.

It says it will also have between 30 and 40 staff on site at any one time to check users do not suffer interference from either each others' equipment or deliberate jamming by malicious parties.

It also has spare frequencies that it can hand out to mitigate any problems.

Source : BBC

Facebook reports loss after shareholder payouts

Facebook has reported a $157m (£100m) loss on payments to shareholders such as chief executive Mark Zuckerberg in its first results since its eagerly anticipated stock market listing in May.

Second quarter costs and expenses nearly quadrupled, up 295% to $1.93bn from the same period last year.

Excluding staff share schemes, Facebook would have made a profit of $295m.

The figures compare with a $240m profit in the same period last year.

In its statement, Facebook said the rise was driven primarily by "share-based compensation expense".

Shares fell 11% in after-hours trade in New York to a record low of $23.94.

In May, investors had queued to snap up Facebook shares for $38 each.

Sales rose 32% to $1.18bn for the three months to the end of June.

But, according to BBC technology correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones, that rise in revenue may have been due to all the hype surrounding the company's stockmarket share sale.

The number of monthly active users (MAUs) rose 29% from the same period last year to 955 million, but some analysts question the reliability of this data given the number of bogus profiles on the social network.

Going mobile

Mobile daily active users surged 67% year-on-year to 543 million.

But, Facebook has yet to resolve how it generates profits as users move from the computer desktop version to accessing the site via mobile phone.

The company is now making less money from each user as it becomes more difficult to generate advertising revenue.

Its operating profit margin fell to 43% in the period compared with 53% a year earlier.

"What's very clear is that Facebook needs to make a huge and concerted push into mobile. Mobile is the future but for the time being it's acting as a fundamental drag on the stock," said David Wain-Heapy of Best Response Social.

source : BBC

Mario Balotelli - I Need A Paternity Test To Prove

Eeehhh this guy again.....lets see what he is up to this time.I love him though.......

Mario Balotelli is demanding a paternity test after Italian showgirl Raffaella Fico claimed on Monday that she is carrying the Manchester City forward’s baby.

The Italy international’s former girlfriend told Chi magazine that she informed the striker on the eve of last Thursday’s Euro 2012 semi-final clash with Germany that she was four-months pregnant with his child.

Balotelli has now issued a press release in which he claims that he has no intention of shirking his responsibilities, but is seeking a DNA test to prove that he is indeed the father.

“Although I would have preferred not to speak about my private life in public, I feel obliged to clarify, once and for all, my relationship with Raffaella Fico,” the 21-year-old explained.

“Our relationship ended at the start of April and since then we have not met, nor heard from one another.

“I have not had anything to do with her life and Raffaella has not had anything to do with my life.

“Raffaella knows well that since we parted company with one another that I had, and have, no intention of returning to her.

“But because of what there was between us, I never wanted to talk about it, even when there were untrue things being said and written about us.

“A few days ago I came to learn from others that Raffaella was pregnant. For this reason, I decided to contact her and only after my question was it confirmed to me that it was true.

“I am very disappointed. I do not think it’s normal not to know anything until the fourth month [of the pregnancy].

“I do not understand why she did not contact me immediately to tell me something of such importance.

“I’ll assume all my responsibilities when I have the proof of my paternity.”

Balotelli continued: “Also, it annoys me to see that she has already sought to make money from this story by selling photos and interviews.

“I think that Rafaella is already famous enough not to have to take advantage of this story for publicity purposes.

“This is the first and only time I will discuss this topic in public and so I have no intention of replying independently to what is said or written by Raffaella.”

Fico had claimed that Balotelli, who netted twice in the Azzurri’s 2-1 victory over Germany, had been overjoyed with the news that she was expecting.

Source : AFP