ICC announces 2012 World T20 schedule

The International Cricket Council (ICC) Wednesday announced the match schedule and unveiled the event logo of the World Twenty20 to be staged in Sri Lanka from September 18 to October 7 next year.

Reigning champion England will start their title defence at the R. Premadasa Stadium in Colombo against one of the two qualifiers for the tournament. Stuart Broad's side will complete its opening group commitments two days later against 2007 champions India at the same venue.

Australia, chasing the one global trophy to have eluded them, will go head-to-head with the other qualifier in Colombo Sep 19, part of a double-header that also features India and a qualifier.

Sri Lanka, who lost to England in the semi-final of last year's tournament in the West Indies, will open their campaign against Zimbabwe under lights in Hambantota Sep 18 before taking on South Africa at the same venue on Sep 22.

Pakistan, who won the 2009 tournament in England, have been grouped with New Zealand and Bangladesh, and will play their matches in Pallekele Sep 23 and 25 respectively. Pallekele will also host the New Zealand-Bangladesh match Sep 21.

Groups and fixtures:

Group A: England, India, Qualifier 2
Group B: Australia, West Indies, Qualifier 1
Group C: – Sri Lanka, South Africa, Zimbabwe
Group D: – Pakistan, New Zealand, Bangladesh

Super Eight (S8) Groups
Group 1: A1, B2, C1, D2
Group 2: A2, B1, C2, D1

Fixtures

Tues, Sep 18: Sri Lanka v Zimbabwe (1930-2230), Hambantota

Wed, Sep 19: Australia v Q1 (1530-1830), Colombo

Wed, Sep 19: India v Q2 (1930-2230), Colombo

Thurs, Sep 20: South Africa v Zimbabwe (1930-2230), Hambantota

Fri, Sep 21: New Zealand v Bangladesh (1530-1830), Pallekele

Fri, Sep 21: England v Q2 (1930-2230), Colombo

Sat, Sep 22: Sri Lanka v South Africa (1530-1830), Hambantota

Sat, Sep 22: Australia v West Indies (1930-2230), Colombo

Sun, Sep 23: Pakistan v New Zealand (1530-1830), Pallekele

Sun, Sep 23: England v India (1930-2230), Colombo

Mon, Sep 24: West Indies v Qualifier 1 (1930-2230), Colombo

Tues, Sep 25: Pakistan v Bangladesh (1930-2230), Pallekele

Thurs, Sep 27: C1 v D2 (1530-1830), Pallekele

Thurs, Sep 27: A1 v B2 (1930-2230), Pallekele

Fri, Sep 28: D1 v C2 (1530-1830), Colombo

Fri, Sep 28: B1 v A2 (1930-2230), Colombo

Sat, Sep 29: A1 v D2 (1530-1830), Pallekele

Sat, Sep 29: C1 v B2 (1930-2230), Pallekele

Sun, Sep 30: B1 v C2 (1530-1830), Colombo

Sun, Sep 30: D1 v A2 (1930-2230), Colombo

Mon, Oct  1: B2 v D2 (1530-1830), Pallekele

Mon, Oct 1: A1 v C1 (1930-2230), Pallekele

Tues, Oct 2: B1 v D1 (1530-1830), Colombo

Tues, Oct 2: A2 v C2 (1930-2230), Colombo

Thurs, Oct  4: 1st semi-final S8 Group-1 first v S8 Group-2 second (1900-2200), Colombo

 Fri, Oct 5: 2nd semi-final S8 Group-2 first v S8 Group-1 second (1900-2200), Colombo

 Sun, Oct 7: Final (1900-2200), Colombo

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Satellite will strike Earth this week

NASA scientists are doing their best to tell us where a plummeting six-ton satellite will fall later this week. It's just that if they're off a little bit, it could mean the difference between hitting Florida or landing on New York. Or, say, Iran or India. Pinpointing where and when hurtling space debris will strike is an imprecise science. For now, scientists predict the earliest it will hit is Thursday U.S. time, the latest Saturday. The strike zone covers most of Earth. Not that citizens need to take cover. The satellite will break into pieces, and NASA put the chances that somebody somewhere will get hurt at just 1-in-3,200.

As far as anyone knows, falling space debris has never injured anyone. Nor has significant property damage been reported. That's because most of the planet is covered in water and there are vast regions of empty land.

If you do come across what you suspect is a satellite piece, NASA doesn't want you to pick it up. The space agency says there are no toxic chemicals present, but there could be sharp edges. Also, it's government property. It's against the law to keep it as a souvenir or sell it on eBay. NASA's advice is to report it to the police.

The 20-year-old research satellite is expected to break into more than 100 pieces as it enters the atmosphere, most of it burning up. Twenty-six of the heaviest metal parts are expected to reach Earth, the biggest chunk weighing about 300 pounds (136 kilograms). The debris could be scattered over an area about 500 miles (800 kilometers) long.  Jonathan McDowell, for one, isn't worried. He is in the potential strike zone — along with most of the world's 7 billion citizens. McDowell is with the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

All told, 1,200 pounds (544 kilograms) of wreckage is expected to smack down — the heaviest pieces made of titanium, stainless steel or beryllium. That represents just one-tenth the mass of the satellite, which stretches 35 feet (10.7 meters) long and 15 feet (4.6 meters) in diameter. 


The strike zone straddles all points between latitudes 57 degrees north and 57 degrees south. That's as far north as Edmonton and Alberta, Canada, and Aberdeen, Scotland, and as far south as Cape Horn, the southernmost tip of South America. Every continent but Antarctica is in the cross hairs

Back when UARS, the Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite, was launched to study the ozone layer in 1991, NASA didn't always pay attention to the "what goes up must come down" rule. Nowadays, satellites must be designed either to burn up on re-entering the atmosphere or to have enough fuel to be steered into a watery grave or up into a higher, long-term orbit.

The International Space Station — the largest manmade structure ever to orbit the planet — is no exception. NASA has a plan to bring it down safely sometime after 2020. Russia's old Mir station came down over the Pacific, in a controlled re-entry, in 2001. But one of its predecessors, Salyut 7, fell uncontrolled through the atmosphere in 1991. The most recent uncontrolled return of a large NASA satellite was in 2002.

The most sensational case of all was Skylab, the early U.S. space station whose impending demise three decades ago alarmed people around the world and touched off a guessing game as to where it might land. It plummeted harmlessly into the Indian Ocean and onto remote parts of Australia in July 1979.

The $740 million UARS was decommissioned in 2005, after NASA lowered its orbit with the little remaining fuel on board. NASA didn't want to keep it up longer than necessary, for fear of a collision or an exploding fuel tank, either of which would have left a lot of space litter.  Predicting where the satellite will strike is a little like predicting the weather several days out, says NASA orbital debris scientist Mark Matney.

Experts expect to have a good idea by Thursday of when and where UARS might fall, Matney says. They won't be able to pinpoint the exact time, but they should be able to narrow it to a few hours. Given the spacecraft's orbital speed of 17,500 mph (28,162 kph), or 5 miles (8 kilometers) per second, a prediction that is off by just a few minutes could mean a 1,000-mile (1,609-kilometer) error. It probably won't be clear where it fell until afterward, Matney says.

Space junk in general is on the rise, much of it destroyed or broken satellites and chunks of used rockets. More than 20,000 manmade objects at least 4 inches (10.2 centimeters) in diameter are being tracked in orbit.

It's mostly a threat to astronauts in space, rather than people on Earth. In June, the six residents of the International Space Station took shelter in their docked Soyuz lifeboats because of passing debris. The unidentified object came within 1,100 feet (335.2 meters) of the complex, the closest call yet.

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Are celebs the newest target for hackers?

Last week, hackers allegedly stole nude photos from actress Scarlett Johansson and then plastered them all over the Internet. Before then it was the rapper Kreayshawn, who wrote on her blog that her Twitter account was hacked in August when naked photos of her showed up there. In March, Vanessa Hudgens of "High School Musical" underwent a similar ordeal after photos were reportedly stolen from her Gmail account.

Finally, in December, police in Germany alleged two young men had used computer-hacking skills to get access to the e-mail accounts and photos of more than 50 celebrities, according to Britain's The Telegraph, including the likes of Lady Gaga and Ke$ha. In the wake of all this juicy Hollywood hoopla, people have started to assume these photo leaks are the newest front in the so-called "hacktivist" wars, as waged by big-name hacking rings such as Anonymous and LulzSec. Those groups have claimed responsibility for taking down bank and government websites. But security experts said connections between celeb hacks and groups such as Anonymous are thin or nonexistent.

The first real case of a celebrity attack was in 2005 when hackers logged into Paris Hilton's phone and stole photos of her, said Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer at F-Secure, another computer security company. Those hackers reportedly were able to break into Hilton's phone by correctly guessing the not-so-secret answer to her security question, which was "tinkerbell," the name of her pet Chihuahua. The real issue here, the researchers said, is the prevalence, and accessibility of, nude photos.

If celebrities didn't take and store nude photos of themselves on their phones or on computers, they wouldn't be stolen and published online. Who is behind the recent string of stolen celebrity photos -- and how exactly they got them -- remains unclear. The FBI office in Los Angeles has opened an investigation into the incidents of computer hacking but declined to elaborate on the cases involved.

Some people have pointed to a supposedly new hacker ring called Hollywood Leaks, which operates a Twitter feed to discuss these sorts of incidents.

On Monday, the group wrote that it didn't have anything to do with the Johansson photos: "WE DID NOT LEAK THE SCARLETT JOHANSSON PICS, WE WOULD HAVE RELEASED IT HERE FIRST! So stop the speculating!" the group wrote. "I don't think there's a clear link" between the celebrity hacks and hacking groups such as Anonymous and LulzSec, said Hypponen, "but obviously these groups are amoebas, and they change shape and they're so different from each other." Their motives are also unclear.

Well, at least until the pretty actresses stop taking nude photos.

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Apple to unveil iPhone 5 on October 4

Apple plans to unveil its next generation iPhone next month, technology blog AllThingsD said on Wednesday.

AllThingsD cautioned that Apple could "change its plans anytime," but said the present plan calls for Apple's new chief executive Tim Cook to preside over the launch of the iPhone 5 on October 4.

Cook, 50, replaced Apple's ailing co-founder Steve Jobs as chief executive of the Cupertino, California-based gadget-maker last month.

Citing "sources close to the situation," the Dow Jones-owned AllThingsD said the iPhone 5 would go on sale within a few weeks after the announcement.

Jobs, 56, the Silicon Valley visionary behind the Macintosh computer, the iPod, iPhone and iPad, stepped down as Apple's CEO on August 24.

Jobs has presided over Apple's splashy product launches in the past and AllThingsD said "the pressure will be on Cook to turn in a good performance."

"What will be interesting to see, of course, is if Jobs himself will also make an appearance, which is something that is likely to be determined by his health, in a decision that will be made very close to the event," it said.

Jobs underwent an operation for pancreatic cancer in 2004 and a liver transplant in 2009.

Apple released the iPhone 4 in June 2010 and sold 20.34 million of the devices last quarter.

Apple shares have been trading at record highs this week and the stock was up 1.37 percent at $419.13 on Wall Street on Wednesday.

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3 Reasons Why Windows 8 May Be Dead on Arrival

There was a time in the tech business when your company could be as slow as molasses in January yet still prevail based on sheer market size. That day disappeared in the rear view mirror many years ago, as Microsoft is about to learn as it prepares to introduce a major Windows upgrade.

If you haven't heard of Windows 8, it's understandable. (Most of us have been distracted by all those iPhone 5 rumors, Netflix pricing complaints, and Kendra.) Microsoft has been giving software developers the big pitch to introduce new features and get them to create software for the new operation system.

Windows 8 will feature more tablet and touch-like features, as well as erase the interminable boot up time that it currently takes a PC to start up. And Windows 8 will be available for desktops, laptops, and tablets. It will also look remarkably like the company's mobile phone software, which uses customized tiles you flip through -- and the Xbox 360 will follow suit with a changed interface to match. Unfortunately, Windows 8 may be dead on arrival.

First there are the usual complaints about compatibility issues. One striking piece of news: The tablet-style version of Windows 8 (called Metro) is going to pull a Steve Jobs and stubbornly refuse to work with Adobe's Flash. Yes, the dominant way that consumers watch videos on the Internet will not function in the glitzy version Windows 8. It will work in a "classic" desktop version of Windows 8, but who wants that old software on their shiny new Windows tablet?

Furthermore, you won't be able to get any old application to work with the Metro version of Windows 8. Shunning the one feature that helped make Windows a near monopoly -- just about every program worth having worked on it -- Microsoft will switch to a gated community approach like that of Apple. Want a new app for your Windows Metro tablet? You'll only be able to purchase it through the Microsoft Store. (We'll see how well that model works against the iPad.)

Annoying as these problems may be -- and things may change before the final version is released -- the biggest problem for Windows 8 is simply that the world may have passed it by.

The last version of Windows was released in 2009. Since then, the iPad was introduced, TVs connected to the Internet have become commonplace, and smart phones have become the computers we use most. Not to mention the fact that more people have become accustomed to using their game consoles as Web browsers. Even the cybercriminals and hackers have begun turning away from desktop computers and Windows and begun to focus more on infecting Web sites and smartphones.

The point is that it's a different world now. What Microsoft feared back in 1994 has come to pass: Most of our work is online -- documents, calendars, photos, music, movies, and information -- so we have become operating system agnostic. Windows or OS X or Linux? Who cares? It just isn't a very important issue any more.

Back in the day, just the mere whiff of a rumor that Microsoft was going to release a new version of its OS would freeze the market. Companies would halt IT purchases. Consumers would stop upgrading or buying new applications. No one would buy hardware. All for fear that whatever was purchased today, wouldn't work with the new version of Windows tomorrow. But we're not in a holding pattern any more.

All of this is not to say that Windows 8 won't be better than Windows 7 (and certainly better than Windows Me). And yes, market analysts will contend that Microsoft will still sell gazillions of copies of Windows 8 when it's released, perhaps early next year (Microsoft hasn't set an official date). 

Corporate and equipment manufacturers may snap it up too -- though some analysts think the operating system may flop there too. But no one will be be buying it with the same zeal they did back in 1995 -- or even 2009.

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A Nano car now worth Rs 22 crore

The Tata Group Monday unveiled a Nano car - made with gold and silver, and studded with precious stones - worth an astronomical over Rs.22 crore. But, it's not for sale - the valuable and fully functional car is a unique branding and promotional initiative by Goldplus Jewellery, part of Titan Industries, a Tata Group company, an official said. The Goldplus Nano Car pales the average Rs.1.40 lakh Nano, which started with a Rs.1 lakh price tag at its launch .

The Goldplus Nano Car is billed as the world's first ever gold jewellery car and celebrates the 5,000 years of jewellery making industry in India.The car's body is made with 80 kg 22 carat solid gold, 15 kg silver, precious stones - including diamonds, rubies - and other expensive gemstones, the official said.

After its glittering launch in Mumbai Monday evening, the Goldplus Nano Car will travel to all the Goldplus showrooms at 29 locations around the country. The car incorporates beautiful designs, made with the precious stones of different colours, set on the gold and silver body of the car.

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Facebook to be blocked in Pakistan

The Lahore High Court has directed Pakistani authorities to block access to all websites, including Facebook, that are involved in "spreading religious hatred" and to submit a compliance report by October 6.

In an order issued yesterday, Justice Sheikh Azmat Saeed directed the information Technology Ministry to "deny access to all websites in Pakistan involved in spreading religious hatred".

However, the judge directed the ministry that access to Google or other search engines should not be denied. He directed the authorities to submit a report on the implementation of the court’s order by October 6.

The judge issued the order in response to a petition seeking a permanent ban on US-based Facebook for hosting a competition on blasphemous caricatures of Prophet Mohammed.

Lawyer Muhammad Azhar Siddique, who had filed the petition, said Islamic values were being insulted in the name of access to information and this was hurting the feeling of billions of Muslims across the world.

Despite an earlier order of the High Court, the Information Technology Ministry had not blocked websites spreading religious hatred, Siddique claimed.

Siddique also asked the court to direct the federal government to stop the display of material considered blasphemous by any religion or insulting to the Prophet Mohammed on all websites in Pakistan.

He said the government should be directed to establish a permanent authority with legal status, which could monitor such "objectionable activities" across the world.

Pakistani authorities had briefly barred access to Facebook last year on the orders of the Lahore High Court.

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