Kinect Reveals The Next Job To Be Replaced By Computers: Sports Coaches

NBA-Baller-Beats-for-Xbox-360"It's just as good as getting a personal instructor," says basketball coach Julio Agosto, speaking on the Xbox Kinect's new dribbling game, NBA Baller Beats. Agosto, an?Emerald City Academy Basketball coach?and father to b-ball Internet phenom, Jashaun Agosto, tells TechCrunch that Kinect's digital eye is able to recognize and reward enough advanced dribbling skills that the new NBA game could replace human instruction at his basketball camp (at least the dribbling portion). This latest Microsoft development brings one more job closer to the chopping block of skills that can be done cheaper and more conveniently by a computer: sports and fitness coaches. Baller Beats plays a lot like Rock Band?but with a basketball;?gamers are rewarded for dribbling to a (rockin') beat, with the familiar vertical scroll of colorful, raised buttons indicating when users should bounce the ball, and in what direction around the body.

mike kelly kristen bell colbert super pac colbert super pac sloth birth control pill recall ground hog day

Home Health Care Nursing | Health & Fitness - Alphonsorojas3182's ...

The letters and numbers you entered did not match the image. Please try again.

As a final step before posting your comment, enter the letters and numbers you see in the image below. This prevents automated programs from posting comments.

Having trouble reading this image? View an alternate.

the host hoodie hoosiers temperance world bank kim kardashian flour bomb hunger games box office

Horse trainer 'Drug' O'Neill has plenty of company

Doug O'Neill, trainer for I'll Have Another, walks to the track during training at Belmont Park in Elmont, N.Y., on Thursday, June 7, 2012. I'll Have Another, the winner of the Kentucky Derby and Preakness, will attempt to win the Belmont Stakes and Triple Crown on Saturday. (AP Photo/Mike Groll)

Doug O'Neill, trainer for I'll Have Another, walks to the track during training at Belmont Park in Elmont, N.Y., on Thursday, June 7, 2012. I'll Have Another, the winner of the Kentucky Derby and Preakness, will attempt to win the Belmont Stakes and Triple Crown on Saturday. (AP Photo/Mike Groll)

Doug O'Neill, trainer for I'll Have Another, talks to a reporter at Belmont Park in Elmont, N.Y., on Thursday, June 7, 2012. I'll Have Another, the winner of the Kentucky Derby and Preakness, will attempt to win the Belmont Stakes and Triple Crown on Saturday. (AP Photo/Mike Groll)

Trainer D. Wayne Lukas, right, rides a horse after watching his Belmont Stakes entrant Optimizer workout at Belmont Park, Thursday, June 7, 2012 in Elmont, N.Y. Lucas was kicked in the forehead earlier in the week and has a scar over his left eye. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan)

Trainer Bob Baffert talks with reporters at Belmont Park, Thursday, June 7, 2012 in Elmont, N.Y. Baffert's horse Paynter is entered is Saturday's Belmont Stakes.(AP Photo/Mark Lennihan)

(AP) ? The affable man with the horse that may become the first Triple Crown winner in more than a generation can't seem to outrun his unflattering nickname: "Drug" O'Neill.

But Doug O'Neill is far from the only trainer in Saturday's Belmont Stakes with a history of improperly medicated horses. The Associated Press reviewed the histories of all 11 trainers with horses in the race and found that 10 had at least one violation of medication regulations set by state racing boards.

O'Neill has been under the most scrutiny because his colt, I'll Have Another, won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes and is the 4-5 favorite to add the Belmont and complete the first Triple Crown in 34 years.

"We had the black cloud before he won the Derby," D. Wayne Lukas, the elder statesman among trainers, said of horse racing's drug problems. "Now it's just gotten darker."

Lukas, who will run 20-1 Optimizer in the Belmont, didn't mention his own record. He has had almost as many violations as O'Neill, though spanning a longer career with a larger stable and including none in the last 13 years.

That's something Penny Chenery, the doyenne of the sport and owner of the great Triple Crown champion Secretariat, apparently didn't realize when she told The Atlantic magazine that I'll Have Another's owner, J. Paul Reddam,"should be embarrassed that the trainer he has chosen does not have a clean record."

In fact, only one trainer in the Belmont has a clean record ? Kelly Breen, whose horse, My Adonis, was a last-minute entry. Five of the others have had a single violation, typically for medications commonly used either to control inflammation or to prevent internal bleeding while racing. Their use is legal only within bounds.

AP's review included hundreds of rulings from state racing commissions collected by the Association of Racing Commissioners International, which represents the sport's regulators. The majority of violations were unrelated to medications; improper paperwork was common, and there were a few for profane tirades as well.

O'Neill shrugs off his nickname and denies the behavior it implies.

"Not good," he said when asked how it makes him feel. "But it just happens that my name rhymes with that.

"You can say whatever you want. I know at the end of the day I love my horses and I take great care of my horses."

For the 11 Belmont trainers, AP found 64 medication violations in the association's database, which is regarded as the industry's most comprehensive. The database did not include two violations O'Neill had in California for elevated levels of carbon dioxide in his horses' blood. Adding those two, O'Neill had 17 rulings against him dating to 1997.

Only the two biggest names in the sport, Lukas and Bob Baffert, were anywhere close to that number. According to the association's data, Baffert actually had more, with 20, and Lukas had 15.

Dale Romans, who will saddle second-choice Dullahan, had five violations, four of them for improper administration of commonly used medications. His most recent were two violations three years ago in Florida. Ken McPeek, the only trainer with two horses in Saturday's race, had four violations, the last a positive test for the anti-inflammatory drug diclofenac in Illinois in 2005.

The five trainers with one violation were Manuel Azpurua, Chad Brown, Michael Matz, Dominick Schettino and Doodnauth Shivmangal.

One longtime testing official who reviewed O'Neill's violations record for AP said he didn't find it particularly egregious.

"There are a lot of people in racing that have records similar to his," said Richard Sams, director of the HFL Sport Science Laboratory, the official testing lab for Kentucky and Virginia's racing commissions. "He's getting a lot of attention right now obviously because he has the horse to beat."

The amounts that state boards fined Baffert and Lukas were much lower than O'Neill's total, generally reflecting the more routine nature of most of the violations. Lukas was assessed $500, Baffert $5,800 ? and O'Neill $32,550.

Lukas did, however, have one of the most serious violations ? a positive test for the narcotic painkiller oxymorphone ? more than 30 years ago. And Baffert ? who trains Derby and Preakness runner-up Bodemeister but will run 8-1 shot Paynter on Saturday ? got in trouble in 2001 after one of his horses tested positive for morphine. He blamed contaminated feed.

Baffert said the case was dismissed.

"If a trainer has a big barn, things are going to mess up," he said. "It's mainly mistakes."

While Lukas was last cited in 1999, and Baffert's horses have been relatively problem free in recent years, O'Neill's violations have been stacking up.

His latest troubles are particularly ill timed.

Just last month, the California Horse Racing Board decided to suspend him 45 days, starting after the Belmont, because one of his horses had elevated carbon dioxide levels in its blood. High carbon dioxide levels reflect a change in blood chemistry that is believed to help a horse combat fatigue by limiting lactic acid buildup.

While California's board didn't rule that O'Neill intentionally doctored the levels ? typically done by feeding the horse a "milkshake" of bicarbonate of soda, sugar and electrolytes ? the authorities concluded that because O'Neill is responsible for the care of his horses, he should be punished. Along with the suspension, he was fined $15,000. The horse finished eighth.

O'Neill vigorously fought the most recent charges, and still can appeal. It was the third time California's board sanctioned him for an elevated carbon dioxide level in the past several years, to go with one in Illinois in 2010.

This year, New York state racing regulators reinstated a rule that horses in the Belmont be housed in a "detention barn" where their diets and medicines are strictly monitored. The explanation: They want to ensure that the race is run with clean horses.

Some trainers worry the change of scenery will upset their horses, and have bristled at the rule. Not O'Neill, whose comments have been, as usual, public-image savvy.

"I like the thought of showing the general public that all the horses are in the same locker room," he told reporters. "The transparency that our game probably lacks is key."

O'Neill has said all of his violations were for "therapeutic medications" in excess of allowable limits, not for banned drugs.

That is debatable, according to Sams, the testing lab official.

"I think from his point of view, he sees everything as something to help the horse ? and in his mind that is therapeutic," Sams said. "I think racing regulators see things a bit differently than he sees them, and with reason."

Sams specifically cited findings of the anti-inflammatory drugs etodolac and naproxen in O'Neill-trained horses as examples of drugs that are generally prohibited in the sport.

Not everyone was quick to indict.

"I don't think that anything Doug has done is on purpose, and if it's happened it's probably been for some silly reason," McPeek said.

Lukas called O'Neill a "good horseman" who wouldn't do anything illegal but said the problem is the perception "that horse wasn't perfect in the first two legs."

"That is a ridiculous assumption," he said. "Just that perception will be a black eye. People will say, 'Well, they've cleaned it up and now he got beat.' That's a terrible assumption."

___

AP Racing Writer Beth Harris in New York contributed to this report.

Associated Press

fab melo tyler perry face transplant maundy thursday google glasses kim kardashian and kanye west henrik stenson

NPR 'Car Talk' duo retiring; reruns to continue

[ [ [['Connery is an experienced stuntman', 2]], 'http://yhoo.it/KeQd0p', '[Slideshow: See photos taken on the way down]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['Connery is an experienced stuntman', 7]], ' http://yhoo.it/KpUoHO', '[Slideshow: Death-defying daredevils]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['know that we have confidence in', 3]], 'http://yhoo.it/LqYjAX ', '[Related: The Secret Service guide to Cartagena]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['We picked up this other dog and', 5]], 'http://yhoo.it/JUSxvi', '[Related: 8 common dog fears, how to calm them]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['accused of running a fake hepatitis B', 5]], 'http://bit.ly/JnoJYN', '[Related: Did WH share raid details with filmmakers?]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['accused of running a fake hepatitis B', 3]], 'http://bit.ly/KoKiqJ', '[Factbox: AQAP, al-Qaeda in Yemen]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['have my contacts on or glasses', 3]], 'http://abcn.ws/KTE5AZ', '[Related: Should the murder charge be dropped?]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['have made this nation great as Sarah Palin', 5]], 'http://yhoo.it/JD7nlD', '[Related: Bristol Palin reality show debuts June 19]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['have made this nation great as Sarah Palin', 1]], 'http://bit.ly/JRPFRO', '[Related: McCain adviser who vetted Palin weighs in on VP race]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['A JetBlue flight from New York to Las Vegas', 3]], 'http://yhoo.it/GV9zpj', '[Related: View photos of the JetBlue plane in Amarillo]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['the 28-year-old neighborhood watchman who shot and killed', 15]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/photos/white-house-stays-out-of-teen-s-killing-slideshow/', 'Click image to see more photos', 'http://l.yimg.com/cv/ip/ap/default/120411/martinzimmermen.jpg', '630', ' ', 'AP', ], [ [['Titanic', 7]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/titanic-anniversary/', ' ', 'http://l.yimg.com/a/p/us/news/editorial/b/4e/b4e5ad9f00b5dfeeec2226d53e173569.jpeg', '550', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['He was in shock and still strapped to his seat', 6]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/photos/navy-jet-crashes-in-virginia-slideshow/', 'Click image to see more photos', 'http://l.yimg.com/cv/ip/ap/default/120406/jet_ap.jpg', '630', ' ', 'AP', ], [ [['xxxxxxxxxxxx', 11]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/photos/russian-grannies-win-bid-to-sing-at-eurovision-1331223625-slideshow/', 'Click image to see more photos', 'http://l.yimg.com/a/p/us/news/editorial/1/56/156d92f2760dcd3e75bcd649a8b85fcf.jpeg', '500', ' ', 'AP', ] ]

[ [ [['did not go as far his colleague', 8]], '29438204', '0' ], [ [[' the 28-year-old neighborhood watchman who shot and killed', 4]], '28924649', '0' ], [ [['because I know God protects me', 14], ['Brian Snow was at a nearby credit union', 5]], '28811216', '0' ], [ [['The state news agency RIA-Novosti quoted Rosaviatsiya', 6]], '28805461', '0' ], [ [['measure all but certain to fail in the face of bipartisan', 4]], '28771014', '0' ], [ [['matter what you do in this case', 5]], '28759848', '0' ], [ [['presume laws are constitutional', 7]], '28747556', '0' ], [ [['has destroyed 15 to 25 houses', 7]], '28744868', '0' ], [ [['short answer is yes', 7]], '28746030', '0' ], [ [['opportunity to tell the real story', 7]], '28731764', '0' ], [ [['entirely respectable way to put off the searing constitutional controversy', 7]], '28723797', '0' ], [ [['point of my campaign is that big ideas matter', 9]], '28712293', '0' ], [ [['As the standoff dragged into a second day', 7]], '28687424', '0' ], [ [['French police stepped up the search', 17]], '28667224', '0' ], [ [['Seeking to elevate his candidacy back to a general', 8]], '28660934', '0' ], [ [['The tragic story of Trayvon Martin', 4]], '28647343', '0' ], [ [['Karzai will get a chance soon to express', 8]], '28630306', '0' ], [ [['powerful storms stretching', 8]], '28493546', '0' ], [ [['basic norm that death is private', 6]], '28413590', '0' ], [ [['songwriter also saw a surge in sales for her debut album', 6]], '28413590', '1', 'Watch music videos from Whitney Houston ', 'on Yahoo! Music', 'http://music.yahoo.com' ], [ [['keyword', 99999999999999999999999]], 'videoID', '1', 'overwrite-pre-description', 'overwrite-link-string', 'overwrite-link-url' ] ]

angelina jolie oscars chardon high school christopher plummer viola davis school shooting in ohio shooting at chardon high school sasha baron cohen

Too Young for Facebook

Then there?s the work of Stanford professor Clifford Nass. With a colleague, Nass surveyed about 3,500 girls ages 8 to 12 and found that the girls who used online media heavily had fewer good feelings about their friendships than other girls their age and had more friends whom their parents considered a bad influence. The single predictor in the study of healthy emotional interactions, the study found, was lots of face-to-face communication. I called Nass to ask him what he thought about Facebook?s idea of signing up kids in the young age group he has studied. He?s skeptical, and to explain why, he drew an analogy to child obesity. ?Our research shows a link between face-to-face contact and good relationships because that?s the best way to learn to read other people?s emotions,? he said. ?It?s how kids learn empathy, and they have to practice. So it?s like the in-person socializing is the healthy food, and Facebook is the empty calories. It?s like junk food, and the more of it kids have, the less time they may have for the healthy stuff.?

joshua komisarjevsky barney frank barney frank rob gronkowski kim richards robert hegyes mary louise parker

Cracks show in Turkey's once dominant military

FILE - In this Oct. 29, 2010 file photo, Turkish army generals walk to the mausoleum of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, founder of modern Turkey, in Ankara, Turkey. These are unsettled times for the Turkish military, once the nation's arbiter. The civilian government gutted its political power, hundreds of retired and active-duty officers are in jail on coup plot charges and now military dissenters are lobbying on Facebook and Twitter for better pay and benefits.(AP Photo/Burhan Ozbilici, File)

FILE - In this Oct. 29, 2010 file photo, Turkish army generals walk to the mausoleum of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, founder of modern Turkey, in Ankara, Turkey. These are unsettled times for the Turkish military, once the nation's arbiter. The civilian government gutted its political power, hundreds of retired and active-duty officers are in jail on coup plot charges and now military dissenters are lobbying on Facebook and Twitter for better pay and benefits.(AP Photo/Burhan Ozbilici, File)

FILE - In this May 5, 2012 file photo, mourning sisters hold a photograph as Turkish politicians and military commanders attend the funeral prayers of Mehmet Coskun Kilic, 21, one of three Turkish soldiers killed in clashes with Kurdish rebels in eastern Turkey, in Ankara, Turkey. These are unsettled times for the Turkish military, once the nation's arbiter. The civilian government gutted its political power, hundreds of retired and active-duty officers are in jail on coup plot charges and now military dissenters are lobbying on Facebook and Twitter for better pay and benefits.(AP Photo/Burhan Ozbilici, File)

FILE - In this May 5, 2012 file photo, Turkish army officers attend funeral prayers for Mehmet Coskun Kilic, 21, one of three Turkish soldiers killed in clashes with Kurdish rebels in eastern Turkey, in Ankara, Turkey. These are unsettled times for the Turkish military, once the nation's arbiter. The civilian government gutted its political power, hundreds of retired and active-duty officers are in jail on coup plot charges and now military dissenters are lobbying on Facebook and Twitter for better pay and benefits.(AP Photo/Burhan Ozbilici, File)

FILE - In this May 5, 2012 file photo, Turkish army officers attend funeral prayers for Mehmet Coskun Kilic, 21, one of three Turkish soldiers killed in clashes with Kurdish rebels in eastern Turkey, in Ankara, Turkey. These are unsettled times for the Turkish military, once the nation's arbiter. The civilian government gutted its political power, hundreds of retired and active-duty officers are in jail on coup plot charges and now military dissenters are lobbying on Facebook and Twitter for better pay and benefits.(AP Photo/Burhan Ozbilici, File)

(AP) ? These are unsettled times for the Turkish military, once the nation's arbiter. The civilian government gutted its political power, hundreds of retired and active-duty officers are in jail on coup plot charges ? and now military dissenters are lobbying on Facebook and Twitter for better pay and benefits.

????????????????The campaign on social media provides a rare glimpse of dissatisfaction within the armed forces of NATO's biggest Muslim member, which battles Kurdish rebels and has troops in Afghanistan. Turkey has talked about setting up a buffer zone along the border with violence-torn Syria if border security deteriorates, and the military would be key.

???????????????? Yet the concerns of hundreds of former and current noncommissioned officers, or NCOs, are closer to home. They want better compensation and an end to alleged discrimination by their superiors. It is the first such public protest since a group of noncommissioned officers marched with their spouses in the 1970s.

?????????????????"NCOs who say enough is enough," is their slogan on Facebook, where the group has 219,000 followers. Some 17,000 follow their Twitter campaign. Several people in the group declined to comment when contacted by The Associated Press, citing military rules in a sign that they are not prepared to break ranks entirely.

??????????????????In a separate Facebook campaign, another group of soldiers made similar demands, saying they "want to become humans."

??????????????????The military was already shaken by arrests of dozens of generals on charges of plotting to topple a government that they allegedly deemed to have an Islamist agenda. Dozens of more active-duty and retired generals have been jailed in a separate case over their alleged role in the 1990s ousting of an Islamist prime minister. A botched airstrike in December, aimed at Kurdish rebels, instead killed 34 civilians and further besmirched the military's reputation.

?????????????????The noncommissioned officers are apparently emboldened by a visible "meltdown in the military's chain of command," said Nihat Ali Ozcan, a political analyst at the Economic Research Foundation of Turkey in Ankara.

?"The rising voice of noncommissioned officers is proof that age-old values of absolute obedience are becoming eroded," he said recently.

? Noncommissioned officers rise through enlisted ranks and handle daily routines, including conscript training and the maintenance of weapons systems. Their highest-ranking is below a reserve officer, a civilian on obligatory military service. There are nearly 95,000 noncommissioned officers in Turkey's 718,000-strong military.

The government responded to the campaign on social media by passing a law in Parliament last month that improves the salary scale for noncommissioned officers and shortens their obligatory service time within the military from 15 years to 10 years.

Ahmet Keser, president of Turkey's Retired Noncommissioned Officers' Association, said the amendment was "purely symbolic" because the salaries would only rise by a small amount. He said he was aware of a proposal by the military to increase noncommissioned officer salaries by 13 percent, but claimed that also falls short of needs.

?"We feel betrayed," Keser said. The servicemen grouped on Facebook and Twitter because they sought an end to discrimination and were not able to "raise their voices" through the chain of command, he said.

? The military, which has no Facebook page or Twitter feed, has denied allegations of discrimination against the noncommissioned officers in a statement. It accused some NCOs of trying "to provoke active-duty personnel," and assured that steps to improve their salaries and working conditions were on the way.?

? Apart from low pay, complaints include refusal to appoint noncommissioned officers who graduated from law schools as military prosecutors or judges, exclusion from military guesthouses as well as lodging in separate wards from regular officers.?

"We want an end to discrimination against us," Keser said on Wednesday. "We've been alienated for years. We want justice."

Associated Press

truffles alabama vs lsu alabama vs lsu bcs championship game beyonce baby detroit auto show tebow broncos

Nintendo Wii U Pro Controller hands-on (video)

Nintendo Wii U Pro Controller handson

Although we managed to get our mitts on the Wii U and updated GamePad here at E3 following Nintendo's keynote, the recently unveiled Pro Controller turned out to be harder to find. We were thankfully able to visit the company's amusement park massive booth on the show floor where we discovered the wireless peripheral, along with a GamePad, tethered to a demo of the upcoming title, Rayman Legends. Join us past the break for our initial impressions in text and on camera.

Continue reading Nintendo Wii U Pro Controller hands-on (video)

Nintendo Wii U Pro Controller hands-on (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 07 Jun 2012 03:28:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

west virginia university michele bachmann jessica biel tim howard west virginia rob roy gaslight

When aliens attack, will we put up a fair fight?

1 hr.

As summer blockbuster season revs up, one thing is clear: The aliens are coming to get us. Can we, as the movies promise, band together in time to defend ourselves and planet Earth?

Enter the?Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers.

IEEE raised the question in a Q&A with Seth Shostak, a senior astronomer with the SETI Institute in Mountain View, Calif., who spends his time hunting for aliens and helping Hollywood depict them on the big screen. He doubts we?ll survive any attack.

?Whoever takes the trouble to come visit us is probably a more aggressive personality. And if they have the technology to come here, the idea that we can take them on is like Napoleon taking on (the) U.S. Air Force,? he told IEEE. ?We?re not going to be able to defend ourselves very well.?

That doesn?t mean humans won?t try to put up a good fight, however. Foreign Policy has a cheeky look at the weaponry under development at the Pentagon and the world?s largest weapons manufacturers ?to make the battle for Earth a fair fight.?

Highlights from the list, which is well-worth a perusal, include:

Whether any of this weaponry will be sufficient to save us from attack is questionable, according to my colleague Alan Boyle, who writes msnbc.com?s Cosmic Log. An alien-generated electromagnetic pulse, or EMP, he noted, would likely render most of our weapons useless.

Our best hope may be the Pentagon?s secretive robotic space plane, the X-37B, which can theoretically be hooked up to so-called ?rods from God? kinetic weapons. ?How fearsome would the Predator look with a depleted-uranium spear from space sticking out of its back?" noted Boyle.

--Via IEEE and Foreign Policy?

John Roach is a contributing writer for msnbc.com. To learn more about him, check out his website and follow him on Twitter. For more of our Future of Technology series, watch the featured video below.

final four 2012 bridesmaids winning lottery numbers megamillions winner kansas jayhawks mega millions results louisville