The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, or ACTA to its friends, is coming under fire in the EU from those who fear it will lead to online censorship. But it has received particular attention from the public of Poland and that has been reflected by some of the nation’s politicians.

ACTA is a far-reaching agreement. It’s designed to harmonize international standards on protecting the rights of those who produce music, movies, and god knows what else, and part of that includes tackling online piracy. Those who oppose it worry that the EU authorities will start blocking internet content.

Not everyone in the Polish government opposes ACTA, of course, but officials from the Palikot’s Movement do, and they decided to make it known by holding the famed Anonymous/Guy Fawkes masks to their faces in Parliament. Don’t you wish some US politicians took this kind of approach?

NASA released dramatic new findings from the planet-scouting Kepler spacecraft project Thursday. Looks like the universe is way, way more crowded than we had realized.

The Space Administration announced Thursday that the Kepler Spacecraft has discovered 26 new exoplanets in 11 systems. This nearly doubles the number of confirmed exoplanets, bringing the tally to 60, and upping the number of known extra-solar star systems to 16. Another 2,300 celestial candidates are awaiting confirmation of their planet-ness. And, according to Kepler program scientist Doug Hudgins, all of these bodies were discovered, “in just two years staring at a patch of sky not much bigger than your fist.” Not a bad haul for such a small swath of space.

The new planets range in size from 1.5-times the size of Earth to larger than Jupiter. You can put away your “Take Me to Your Leader” t-shirts, though—every one of the new 26 planets orbits its star far more closely than Venus does; placing them well out of the habitable zone needed to sustain life and liquid water.

SOURCE via The Register

Facebook could file papers for its IPO, or initial public offering of company stock, as early as next Wednesday. This according to the Wall Street Journal, citing unnamed people familiar with the matter.

Facebook itself has not commented, nor have Morgan Stanley or Goldman Sachs, which have been vying to handle the offering. The Journal said Morgan Stanley was in the lead, and cautioned that the filing for the IPO may not come for a few weeks.

Jonathan Thaw of Facebook sent an email to ABC News: “Our position on this is that we don’t participate in IPO-related speculation.”

Reports before today said Facebook would likely be valued at $75-100 billion.

“If it comes to pass, this will be the largest tech IPO in history, yielding around $10 billion for the social network,” wrote Chris Taylor of Mashable. “Google’s 2005 IPO, as big a deal as it was, didn’t even reach the $2 billion mark.”

To put it blandly, an IPO would not be a surprise. It has been talked about for months. There is a secondary market for Facebook shares among the investors who have backed the company up to now, and it has been widely reported that trading in privately-held shares has been halted.

You know the story by now: Facebook began in 2004 with Mark Zuckerberg, then a student at Harvard, who joined with a couple of friends (some of them now ex-friends) to find a way for schoolmates to connect online. The idea caught on. Facebook now claims more than 800 million active users worldwide.

SOURCE via ABC News

Singapore’s Marina Bay Sands hotel is home to one of the most-photographed and internet beloved swimming pools on the planet. It’s atop a massive tower, and looks seamless, like a levitating mirror. So why not leap off off of it?

Not only is this BASE jumping expedition one of the craziest I’ve seen, the video is easily the most beautiful; Singaporean haze, alien warship architecture, that fantastically indulgent pool, and people slowly dropping through the air. It’s almost enough to make me try it myself! Or just sit in the pool.

We’ve seen scientists explore a number of ways to make paint “smarter” over the years, and now a team of researchers at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow have devised a method that they say could do nothing short of “revolutionize structural safety.” The key to that is some novel nanotechnology that effectively turns the paint into a sensor network that’s able to detect minor structural faults before they become a severe problem. More specifically, the paint consists of a mix of highly aligned carbon nanotubes and a recycled waste material known as fly ash — when the nanotubes bend, the conductivity changes, indicating that there could be a structural problem developing. What’s more, the fly ash is also said to give the paint a cement-like structure, which the researchers say could let it be used in harsh conditions where traditional structural monitoring can prove difficult (and expensive).

You can forget about hanging it from your belt, because this miniature sun—masquerading as a flashlight—is heavy enough to need two hands to operate. And with 15,000 lumens, the XM18 is bright enough to illuminate a small planet.

As you can see, it’s actually composed of 18 smaller LED flashlight components, all wrapped in a custom housing powered by 32 lithium batteries and cooled with its own fan. LEDs are definitely more efficient than incandescent, but 15,000 lumens worth still produces a lot of excess heat.

What’s even crazier is that the $2,500 photon cannon (built only as a custom order) is shaped like a hexagon so multiple units can be easily mounted together. Because apparently the company is worried that 15,000 lumens might not be enough for their most discerning customers who need to blind entire herds of deer at once.

What’s next after Minecraft Lego? Well… Rejoice! Lego has sent us all the official images of all the Lego Lord of the Rings minifigs. That includes the first look of the awesome Gollum, the Ringwraiths, the Uruk-hais, Moria Orcs and the Mordor Orcs. It also has a clear shot of Frodo, Gandalf and the rest of the gang. They are so cute! These are not coming soon enough. We will have more exclusive images soon from New York’s Toy Fair where Lego is launching them.