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=San Jose's Garbage Trucks May Do Police Surveillance With License Plate Readers The government of San Jose, Calif. has come forward with a proposal to mount license plate readers to the city’s garbage trucks in an effort to expand police surveillance beyond department cruisers. Have no fear, innocent citizen, for the trash companies may be stepping up to help our friends in blue. San Jose, California happens to be America’s tenth largest city - that makes it pretty difficult for the police force to keep up with everybody. In a story by the local San Jose Mercury News, the new...

Lena Dunham has canceled two book tour dates in Europe amid accusations that she molested her sister when they were children. The actress tweeted on Monday that she was no longer going to attend events in Belgium and Germany. "To my Belgian readers, so very sorry to miss the Antwerp Book Fair today but I can't wait to come back and eat fries with you. Much love," she wrote. "German readers: I am deeply sorry to miss tomorrow's event in Berlin. I am so grateful for your energy and support. Mit viele liebe." The "Girls" star, 28, has been criticized...

SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- Onondaga County has 5.2 million records showing where drivers have been over the past year. But if you'd like to know what the county has on your travels, you're out of luck. Police cars throughout the county are outfitted with special cameras -- license plate readers -- that take hundreds of pictures of license plates a minute. Those records, showing the plate and where it was photographed, are warehoused in the county's database and held for a year. Onondaga County denied a Freedom of Information Law request from me for all records they had on my license...

President Downgrade cut his vacation short to make an appearance at the Hurricane Command Center for a few pictures yesterday. Apparently, not everyone was impressed with this obvious publicity stunt. Here is a sampling of the comments from the Yahoo report:

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was voted "Man of the Year" for 2010 by readers of CNN's Arabic language website on Sunday. Erdogan won the honor by a large margin, receiving 74% of the vote. His nearest competitor was Syrian President Bashar Assad, who received 20% of the vote. (Snip) The website adds that Erdogan has been hailed in the Arab world for returning Turkey's allegiance to the East after decades of trying to "join the European club."

Can fart jokes save the reading souls of boys? You better hope so. Boys have lagged behind girls in reading achievement for more than 20 years, but the gender gap now exists in nearly every state and has widened to mammoth proportions -- as much as 10 percentage points in some, according to the Center on Education Policy. "It certainly should set off alarm bells," said the center's director, Jack Jennings. "It's a significant separation." Parents of reluctant readers complain that boys are forced to stick to stuffy required school lists that exclude nonfiction or silly subjects, or have teachers...

Anxious to lift an outright ban on comments, The Attleboro (Mass.) Sun-Chronicle has begun requiring two things of online readers who want to leave their thoughts on stories: 99 cents and their real names.The newspaper should expect much criticism from various quarters, but it's a fascinating experiment and a bold response to the endless trolling, vitriol and drivel that is enabled by anonymity in online forums.Pay little attention to the 99 cents; it's not important here. The fee is a one-time payment designed not to generate revenue - this isn't about "saving newspapers" -- but to reliably enable identity verification...

Hi, everyone! It's time again for my quarterly "What Are You Reading Now?" survey. As you know, I consider Freepers to be among the more well-read groups currently on the Internet. Each quart, I like to find out what everyone is reading. It can be anything...a technical journal, a NY Times best-seller, a trashy pulp novel...in short, anything! Please do not ruin this thread by posting something inane like "I'm reading this post". It became very unfunny a long time ago. I'll start. I'm reading a historical biography called "John L Lewis: Labor Leader" by Robert Zieger. I have found...

New York Times Chairman Arthur Sulzberger Jr. appears close to announcing that the paper will begin charging for access to its website, according to people familiar with internal deliberations. After a year of sometimes fraught debate inside the paper, the choice for some time has been between a Wall Street Journal-type pay wall and the metered system adopted by the Financial Times, in which readers can sample a certain number of free articles before being asked to subscribe. The Times seems to have settled on the metered system.

Perhaps the most anticipated popular fiction offering of the year for readers of this column is Heart of the Assassin, (Scribner, $25.95) Robert Ferrigno's final volume in his trilogy about a future America split by civil war and dominated by Islamic rule. http://frontpagemag.com/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=36278#disqus_thread

It's time again for my quarterly "What Are You Reading Now?" thread! It can be anything...a NY Times bestseller, a technical journal, a trashy pulp novel...in short, anything! DO NOT answer by saying "I'm Reading This Thread". It stopped being funny a long time ago. Here's what I'm reading. I'm just about finished with "Blockaders, Refugees & Contrabands: Civil War on Florida's Gulf Coast 1861-1865." It's a very interesting book about how the US Navy was able to turn a substantial portion of Florida's Gulf Coast population against the Confederacy, creating a civil war within that part of Florida. So...

Hi everyone! And a Happy New Year as well! ity's time for my quarterly "What Are You Reading Now?" thread. I do this to gauge what Freepers (who by the way, are a very well-read group) are reading right now. It can be anything...a best seller, a technical journal, an old classic, even a trashy pulp novel. Please do not defile this thread by replying "I'm Reading This Thread". It became very unfunny a long time ago. Serious replies only, please. I'll start. I'm about 5 pages into "One Day In September" by Simon Reeve. It's about the disaster involving...

OK everyone, it's time for my quarterly "What Are You Reading Now" survey. I do this to gauge what Freepers are reading these days. Amongst many Internet sites, I find Freepers to be some of the most well-read. It can be anything...an old classic, a trashy pulp novel, a technical journal, etc. Please do not defile this thread by replying "I'm reading this post". It became extraordinarily un-funny a long time ago. I'll start. I'm two pages into "Inside Gitmo: The True Story Behind the Myths of Guantanmo Bay" by Gordon Cucullu. It looks to be quite interesting. Barack Obama...

OK everyone, it's time again for my quarterly "What Are You Reading Now?" survey. I always ask this because I consider most Freepers to be extremely well-read, possibly some of the more well-read groups on the Web. What you are currently reading can be anything - a technical journal, an NY Times bestseller, a classic novel, in short anything. Please do not defile this thread by replying "I'm reading this thread". It became un-funny a long time ago. I'll start. I'm reading "The Approaching Fury: Voices Of The Storm (1820-1861) by Stephen Oates. This book covers the major controversies and...

Well, it's time again for my quarterly "What Are You Reading Now?" thread. I do this thread to gauge what other Freepers are reading. As all of you know, Freepers are probably some of the more well-read individuals on the Internet and I'm always curious as to what we're reading. It can be anything, a classic work of fiction, a NY Times bestseller, a technical journal, a trashy pulp novel...in short anything. Please do not ruin this thread by replying "I'm reading this thread". It become un-funny a long time ago. I'll start. I'm about halfway thru "The Horrid Pit:...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – As US newspapers shrivel up and die, an unlikely figure is emerging as their potential savior: News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch. The much-villified Australian-born media tycoon is preparing to battle against the practice many hold largely responsible for newspapers' current plight -- the "original sin" of giving away their content for free online. The 78-year-old Murdoch announced this week that the days of free are over. He said he planned to begin charging readers of the websites of News Corp. newspapers "within the next 12 months," testing the scheme "first on some of our stronger ones. "We...

SALEM — In a paranormal public hearing last night, dozens of psychics argued before a city licensing panel about what the future holds if Salem cracks down on rogue clairvoyants. Unfortunately, no clear vision emerged from the meeting. One side told councilors the city needs to embrace its standing as the Witch City by allowing more licensed psychics. But opponents warned that oversimplifying the process could bring predators bent on making an easy dollar, rather than ethically telling fortunes. The debate unfolded before a hearing of the City Council's licensing committee, which is pondering tightening its regulation of Salem's fortunetelling...

The editors of most of California’s metro newspapers will gather in Santa Barbara next month to have a few drinks and compare notes. They will wring their hands wondering why their readers are fleeing. They will show each other the beautiful new products they’ve developed and the other-than-English material that they produce in an effort to retain subscribers. They will discuss in serious tones the threat from the liars on talk radio and the amateurs on the blogosphere. I could offer them some advice, but I have not been invited. Although I am a former colleague and remain friends with...

Will someone please marry Maureen? Using her bully pulpit at The Times, she has managed to spin her inability to find a suitable mate into a national crisis. LEE ROSENBAUM Fort Lee, N.J. Regarding Maureen Dowd: Perhaps a hint of a smile? A bit of humor? Life does not have to be unpleasant; it can be enjoyed. JACK HAWKINS Lafayette, Ind. What's a modern girl to do? Well, maybe she's to stop calling herself a girl when she's on the backside of 50. And perhaps she shouldn't call herself modern, either, when the entire article is your basic baby-boomer whine...

Good news for Web log publishers with aspirations of making money off their sites--compared to the average Internet user, visitors to Web logs, or blogs, tend to be younger and to belong to a wealthier household, a study has found. Blog visitors are also more likely to shop online and to connect to the Internet using a broadband connection, according to the study "Behaviors of the Blogosphere" conducted by comScore Networks. Unsurprisingly, blog visitors are also more active online, visiting almost twice as many Web pages as the average Internet user. ComScore defines blogs as "mostly amateur online diaries." In...