The Young People's Development Programme (YPDP) in England, a government-backed youth development pilot program aimed at reducing teenage pregnancies, drunkenness and cannabis use not only didn't reduce teenage pregnancies or drunkenness or marijuana use, it might actually have increased pregnancies, according to research led by Meg Wiggins of the Institute of Education, University of London and Chris Bonell at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

They were commissioned by the Department of Health to carry out an independent evaluation of the YPDP, which was initiated in 2004.

HONG KONG, July 8 /PRNewswire/ --

After an intense competition among finalists chosen from a pool of more than 300,000 students from more than 100 countries and regions, Microsoft Corp. announced the winners of Imagine Cup 2009. Celebrating first place, Romania's Team SYTECH won the worldwide Software Design invitational, South Korea's Team Wafree won the Embedded Development invitational and Brazil's Team LEVV It won the Game Development challenge.

Imagine Cup, the world's premier student technology competition, empowers students to unlock their creative genius and build solutions that tackle real-world issues facing society today.

NEW YORK and BERLIN, July 7 /PRNewswire/ --

Now through July 23, artnet Auctions is presenting a special online auction of
Urban Art from 1972-Present. The sale traces the evolution of Urban Art from the
1970s to today with a spectacular range of 175 artworks by 60 artists including
Banksy, Jean-Michel Basquiat, CRASH, Faile, Keith Haring, and Mr. Brainwash.

To view the Multimedia News Release, go to:
http://www.prnewswire.com/mnr/artnet/39039/

(Photo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20090707/NY42488 )

Early New York Graffiti Art

Leading the sale is a collection of early works by some of the most influential
New York Graffiti artists of the 1970s and 1980s.  

SAO PAULO, July 7 /PRNewswire/ --

- Technology to Link Loyalty Programs From Companies in Different Industries,
Including TAM Fidelidade

Multiplus Fidelidade, the new business unit at TAM (NYSE: TAM; Bovespa: TAMM4),
and Oracle have signed a contract to implement the technological platform using
the Oracle Siebel Call Center and Oracle Siebel CRM Loyalty solutions, which
will link the loyalty programs of companies representing diverse industries --
from an airline company to gas stations, phone companies, supermarkets, hotels,
bookstores, movie theaters, banks, credit cards, internet service providers,
automobile manufacturers, and more -- and integrate them into a network of
loyalty initiative programs.

(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20080221/SPTH002LOGO )

We decide  

I have pondered writing about the transhumanism movement for a while, and the opportunity has finally landed on my desktop when I read a brief article by Kyle Munkittrick of the Institute for Emerging Ethics&Technologies. The article is in the form of a FAQ expressly addressing the question of whether aging is a moral good, and in it Munkittrick briefly explains and (thinks that he) refutes some of the standard arguments against transhumanism. Let’s take a look.

LONDON, July 7 /PRNewswire/ --

IBM (NYSE: IBM (http://www.ibm.com/investor)) was awarded the prestigious Coffey
International Award for its application of technical expertise in innovative
ways to address the greatest societal challenges of our time at the annual
Business in the Community (BITC) Awards for Excellence yesterday.

(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20090416/IBMLOGO )

IBM earned the award for World Community Grid
(http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org/), in essence the virtual equivalent in
processing power to a Top 10 supercomputer devoted to humanitarian research.
World Community Grid gains its power from the aggregated spare computing
capacity of 1.3 million PCs belonging to 460,000 volunteers from over 200
countries.  

Patrick Draper is a graduate student in physics at the University of Chicago and Argonne National Lab. He is a native of Illinois and lives in Hyde Park, Chicago with his wife Karen and parrot Felix, to whom he is grateful for their love, patience, and correcting his sign errors. He is a supporter of the international effort to put a muon collider on Mars, and is waiting for NASA to return his phone calls.
I asked Patrick to write here about his studies on the discovery reach for a MSSM Higgs boson after I saw his paper on the arxiv a month ago, and am now glad I did. Enjoy!

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, July 7 /PRNewswire/ --

Global Strategies Group (GLOBAL) has further strengthened its worldwide senior
management team as it continues to grow its Integrated Security line of business
for clients operating in challenging environments.