Free Republic

Scary. Unacceptable. This is not America. Those are some of the comments that I have heard about the revelations regarding government snooping on our cell phones. The statement that one man made that something is wrong with you if you don’t think something is askew here -- that would be about right. If you are not upset about this situation then you are clueless. There is a dangerous extension of government that no true American could possibly endorse or accept. Our government has no right to randomly rummage through our cell phone or email records. If you think that the...

does anyone know where to get some that are legit? it seems lately that ones bought locally in Spain or Greece work for 5 minutes when they were allegedly loaded with 30 minutes worth of time to be able to call the US. are there ones that can be purchased at a legit source here in the US ? do they have any that allows my actual cell number to come up on caller ID so people will know it is me?

The FBI was last night hunting a 12-strong terrorist “sleeper cell” linked to the Boston marathon bomb brothers. Police believe Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev were specially trained to carry out the devastating attack. More than 1,000 FBI agents were last night working to track down the cell and arrested a man and two women 60 miles from Boston in the hours before Dzhokhar’s dramatic capture after a bloody shootout on Friday. A source close to the investigation said: “We have no doubt the brothers were not acting alone. The devices used to detonate the two bombs were highly sophisticated and...

Neighbors say three have been arrested in New Bedford in connection with the Boston Bombing suspect. Police apprehended suspects from the Hidden Brook Apartments on Carriage Drive in New Bedford. Neighbors say they think that the girlfriend of 19-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev may have lived in the complex and they have seen him in the area as recently as yesterday. Dzhokhar is a student at the nearby University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. Earlier on Friday his brother, also a suspect in the Boston Marathon bombing, was killed in a gun fight with police.

Complexity of Cell's 'Molecular Shredder' Revealed by Jeffrey Tomkins, Ph.D. * When genes in the cell are turned on, the result is the production of gene copies called messenger RNAs, or mRNAs. The mRNAs are then used as templates to make proteins, the key molecules that enable the cell to function. But what happens to the excess mRNAs when they are no longer needed or the RNAs that have errors in them? They certainly can't remain active in the cell or serious problems would ensue. A good analogy for the cell's solution to this problem is the example of a...

As of Saturday, your options for owning an unlocked phone become far more limited. You can ask your carrier to unlock it—and good luck with that—or you can pay a premium to manufacturers like Apple or Google for a new unlocked phone. You just can’t unlock your phone yourself—at least, not legally. That decision was made not by voters, the courts, or even Congress. It was made by one man, 83-year-old Congressional Librarian James Hadley Billington, who is responsible for interpreting the meaning of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Billington decided last October that unlocking your phone yourself is...

Cellphones seem to be increasingly attractive to the Department of Justice, documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union show. Agencies affiliated with the department used more than 37,600 court orders in 2011 to gather cellphone data, a sharp increase from previous years. They were almost equally divided between “pen register” data, which captures outgoing phone numbers, and “trap and trace” orders, which refer to incoming phone numbers, which means one phone could have two separate orders associated with it. The total number has roughly doubled since 2007, when cellphone communications were more limited. By law, the data can be...

Have any Freepers used "Straight Talk" cellular service, and if so, what has your experience been like?

LONDON –  Tweet this: The London Games will be the first Olympics told in 140 characters or less. The London Games will be the most tweeted, liked and tagged in history, with fans offered a never before seen insider's view of what many are calling the social media Olympics, or the "socialympics." Hash tags, (at) signs and "like" symbols will be as prevalent as national flags, Olympic pins and medal ceremonies. Some athletes may spend more time on Twitter and Facebook than the playing field. Mobile phones have become smarter, laptops lighter and tablet devices a must-have for technology lovers...

A largely unknown group of Justice Department officials has inserted itself into the local Florida protest movement surrounding the killing of Trayvon Martin, assisting the protestors and attending their meetings and rallies. While the officials are tasked with preventing racial violence, it appears that in carrying out their duties, they have provided significant assistance to those protesting the killing of Martin, who black, by George Zimmerman, who is half white and half Hispanic. The officials are members of the DOJ’s Community Relations Service, also known as “The Peacemakers,” a special unit established under the 1964 Civil Rights Act and empowered...

The AIRE mask is a onceptual device that allows you to charge your iPhone with the power of breath! "The AIRE mask is a concept that hails from the mind of Joao Paulo Lammoglia, where it will rely on the power of your breath, converting it to electricity thanks to tiny wind turbines. All you need to do is ensure the AIRE mask remains connected to an iOS-powered device, breathe as usual, and you are good to go."

They act like they won the war. The Muslim Brotherhood CAIR has a "candidate questionnaire." Sorta like the nazis posing these questions to Franklin D. Roosevelt, Henry A. Wallace (Democratic) and Wendell Willkie, Charles L. McNary (Republican) in 1940. Here are excerpts from the Muslim Brotherhood questionnaire see no jihad, hear no jihad, speak no jihad. Whomever they endorse, run the other way -- volunteer, donate, support the opposition to jihad. 2012 ELECTION CANDIDATE QUESTIONNAIRE -- CAIR (Note: Full answers will be published on the organization's website. The first 200 words of each answer will appear in print voter guides.)...

Finding could lead to new photodetectors or energy-harvesting devices.Graphene, an exotic form of carbon consisting of sheets a single atom thick, exhibits a novel reaction to light, MIT researchers have found: Sparked by light’s energy, the material can produce electric current in unusual ways. The finding could lead to improvements in photodetectors and night-vision systems, and possibly to a new approach to generating electricity from sunlight. This current-generating effect had been observed before, but researchers had incorrectly assumed it was due to a photovoltaic effect, says Pablo Jarillo-Herrero, an assistant professor of physics at MIT and senior author of a...

The newest version of Sprint's weekly "playbook" has been sent around to employees, and as usual, we have a copy. Sadly, this week's edition doesn't exactly inspire confidence for the future of the nation's third-largest carrier - in fact, one of Sprint's primary benefits, the Premier program, will be disappearing down the drain shortly. It's not all bad news, though, so let's dig in and see what's up and coming in the world of Sprint.

A chilling look inside the minds of female prisoners unfolds on Thursday with the première of the new TLC show, Prison Diaries. The first episode of the series focuses on Emilia Carr, one of just 63 women on death row in the U.S. Carr is seen in ankle chains and handcuffs, led by a burly, fully-armed female guard as she leaves her cell. She wears bright orange overalls and trainers, her long, dark hair allowed to fall around her hunched shoulders.

San Francisco - Transit officials said Friday they blocked cell phone reception in San Francisco stations for three hours to disrupt a planned demonstrations over a police shooting. Officials with the Bay Area Rapid Transit system, better known as BART, said they turned off the electricity to cell phone towers in four stations from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. Thursday. The move was made after BART learned that protesters planned to use mobile devices to coordinate a demonstration on train platforms. (Snip) The statement noted that it’s illegal to demonstrate on the platform or aboard the trains. BART said it

Free cell phones for the needy drawing both cheers and jeersBy Rachel Weaver, PITTSBURGH TRIBUNE-REVIEW Monday, August 1, 2011 Sharron Walters could not afford one more monthly bill. But without a phone, it would be difficult for Walters, who relies on a wheelchair, to secure rides to and from her daily errands. She also could not keep in touch with her son, who lives out of town. Three months ago, Walters, 48, of Swissvale started using Assurance Wireless, a program of Sprint subsidiary Virgin Mobile that provides free cell phones and 250 monthly minutes to people receiving government support such...

BARRIE, Ont. - Police blame some serious distracted driving for a chain-reaction crash that caused more than $100,000 in damage after a teenager struck a parked car in this city north of Toronto. Police said the driver was texting and trying to pick up her cat when the collision happened. Cops said the teenager was speeding when she lost control of the car, left the roadway and struck a car parked in a driveway. It was pushed into a boat, which was also in the driveway. The boat was then pushed into the house and a neighbour's vehicle. The driver...

Richard Stallman: iPhones and Androids are 'Big Brother' tracking devicesNearly three decades into his quest to rid the world of proprietary software, Richard Stallman sees a new threat to user freedom: smartphones. "I don't have a cell phone. I won't carry a cell phone," says Stallman, founder of the free software movement and creator of the GNU operating system. "It's Stalin's dream. Cell phones are tools of Big Brother. I'm not going to carry a tracking device that records where I go all the time, and I'm not going to carry a surveillance device that can be turned on to...

Can government subsidies help Sprint Nextel (S) bounce back? Perhaps so, in a way you may not think. Sprint, which reported fourth-quarter earnings on Thursday, seems to be having success with its Assurance Wireless brand, a prepaid offering. Sprint launched the government-subsidized Assurance program in early 2010. Sprint now markets the Assurance brand in 22 states and Washington, D.C. Sprint expanded the Assurance brand to Pennsylvania today.