Wireless world offers study tools for exams

While technology like smartphones, iPads and the Internet are usually considered to be a distraction from finals studying, there are also ways to use them to your advantage while you’re trying to cram for exams. Whether you’re calculating the grades you need to pass or trying to memorize facts, as always, there’s an app for that.

SelfControl for Mac

This OS X application will block access to certain websites, but still allow you to get to the rest of the Web. For example, you can set the app to block your Facebook, email, Twitter and any other distractions for a certain length of time, such as 30 minutes or three hours. The best — and worst — part: Once you start the timer, there’s no stopping it. Even if you delete the program or turn off your computer, you can’t get to those sites until the time runs out. There’s no turning back!

Flash Card Apps

Flash cards are a key study tool, but carrying them everywhere can be a hassle. Fortunately, there are apps for Mac, iPhone, Android and iPad that provide the usefulness of flash cards with the convenience of constantly having them with you. There are a lot of applications out there for this, both free and with a low cost. Some even allow you to upload premade flash cards from certain websites, along with the option of making your own. The best part is that you can easily review your cards anywhere, from the library to the bus ride to class, without having to deal with the stack of paper.

Content-Specific Apps

There are plenty of applications out there to be your personal tutor in whatever subject you need. Depending on your market, you can download apps for history, physics, psychology and many other topics. Some are better and more specific than others, so reading the reviews before downloading is always a good idea.

iTunes U

This treasure trove is full of podcast lectures on various topics. Although the University does not have much available, there are lectures by professors at other major universities on everything from U.S. history to anatomy to computer programming. This is a useful tool if you’re suddenly realizing that you’ve, ahem, missed a few classes this semester and are looking for a basic overview of the topic. Keep in mind, however, that these podcasts are given by professors teaching other classes and may not be specific to what you need to know for your own exams.

Grade Calculators

If you’re trying to figure out how hard to study for that final in order to pass the class, these apps will make your life easier.
There are plenty available on the markets, and each works differently, but this app will allow you to calculate the exact scores you need to pull off a certain grade in the class.
Basically, you’ll put in the percentages each assignment in a class is worth and keep track of what grades you have received. From there, you can estimate your final exam results to predict a final grade or choose a goal for your final grade and calculate how well you need to do on the exam.

U of I’s GPA Calculator

Luckily for students, the University provides simple ways to calculate and predict your GPA, app-free. Online, the Office of the Registrar gives simple instructions on how to figure out your GPA for the semester and directions for how to find your cumulative GPA on your transcripts. The advising department also provides a very easy to use GPA calculator online — just type in your cumulative GPA, total graded hours and grade and credit hours for each class you’re taking this semester, and it will compute your semester and cumulative GPA so far.

Wireless world offers study tools for exams

While technology like smartphones, iPads and the Internet are usually considered to be a distraction from finals studying, there are also ways to use them to your advantage while you’re trying to cram for exams. Whether you’re calculating the grades you need to pass or trying to memorize facts, as always, there’s an app for that.

SelfControl for Mac

This OS X application will block access to certain websites, but still allow you to get to the rest of the Web. For example, you can set the app to block your Facebook, email, Twitter and any other distractions for a certain length of time, such as 30 minutes or three hours. The best — and worst — part: Once you start the timer, there’s no stopping it. Even if you delete the program or turn off your computer, you can’t get to those sites until the time runs out. There’s no turning back!

Flash Card Apps

Flash cards are a key study tool, but carrying them everywhere can be a hassle. Fortunately, there are apps for Mac, iPhone, Android and iPad that provide the usefulness of flash cards with the convenience of constantly having them with you. There are a lot of applications out there for this, both free and with a low cost. Some even allow you to upload premade flash cards from certain websites, along with the option of making your own. The best part is that you can easily review your cards anywhere, from the library to the bus ride to class, without having to deal with the stack of paper.

Content-Specific Apps

There are plenty of applications out there to be your personal tutor in whatever subject you need. Depending on your market, you can download apps for history, physics, psychology and many other topics. Some are better and more specific than others, so reading the reviews before downloading is always a good idea.

iTunes U

This treasure trove is full of podcast lectures on various topics. Although the University does not have much available, there are lectures by professors at other major universities on everything from U.S. history to anatomy to computer programming. This is a useful tool if you’re suddenly realizing that you’ve, ahem, missed a few classes this semester and are looking for a basic overview of the topic. Keep in mind, however, that these podcasts are given by professors teaching other classes and may not be specific to what you need to know for your own exams.

Grade Calculators

If you’re trying to figure out how hard to study for that final in order to pass the class, these apps will make your life easier.

There are plenty available on the markets, and each works differently, but this app will allow you to calculate the exact scores you need to pull off a certain grade in the class.

Basically, you’ll put in the percentages each assignment in a class is worth and keep track of what grades you have received. From there, you can estimate your final exam results to predict a final grade or choose a goal for your final grade and calculate how well you need to do on the exam.

U of I’s GPA Calculator

Luckily for students, the University provides simple ways to calculate and predict your GPA, app-free. Online, the Office of the Registrar gives simple instructions on how to figure out yourGPA for the semester and directions for how to find your cumulative GPA on your transcripts. The advising department also provides a very easy to use GPA calculator online — just type in your cumulative GPA, total graded hours and grade and credit hours for each class you’re taking this semester, and it will compute your semester and cumulative GPA so far.

US 'super-committee' fails to agree on debt reduction plan

A congressional committee tasked with reducing the deficit by $1.2tn (£762bn) has failed to come to an agreement.

The panel of six Republicans and six Democrats confirmed after the New York Stock Exchange closed that its work had ended without a deal.
The outcome means automatic cuts outlined in the bill that created the committee should take effect from 2013.
The US national debt has just risen above $15tn.
The panel was set up in August, the result of a last-minute deal between the two sides in Congress to raise the debt ceiling and avert a default on US debt payments.
Blame game
"After months of hard work and intense deliberations, we have come to the conclusion today that it will not be possible to make any bipartisan agreement available to the public before the committee's deadline," Democratic Senator Patty Murray and Republican Representative Jeb Hensarling said in Monday's joint statement.

"We remain hopeful that Congress can build on this committee's work and can find a way to tackle this issue in a way that works for the American people and our economy," it added.

In a White House news conference later on Monday, President Barack Obama said it was Republicans' fault.
"There's still too many Republicans in Congress that have refused to listen to the voices of reason and compromise," he said.
President Obama said he would veto any attempt to reverse the automatic cuts to government spending.
They are to be applied over the next 10 years, split between defence and domestic budgets. A few programmes are to be protected, including Social Security and Medicaid.
Republicans said Democrats had never been serious about making cuts to entitlement programmes for the elderly and the poor.
Senator Pat Toomey said: "Unfortunately, our Democratic colleagues refused to agree to any meaningful deficit reduction without $1 trillion in job-crushing tax increases."
But Democrats said the Republicans were solely to blame for the failure - because they ruled out tax rises for the wealthiest Americans.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Republicans had "never found the courage to ignore the tea party extremists" and "never came close to meeting us half way".
US voters are already deeply disillusioned with Washington.
The BBC's Steve Kingstone in Washington says the political finger-pointing is likely to continue through to next November's congressional and presidential elections.
Congressional approval ratings in recent polls have been at historic lows.
As the reductions triggered by Monday's announcement are not set to take effect until January 2013, lawmakers have the time to change or repeal the automatic cuts.
Republican senators John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina are already working on legislation that would undo the automatic defence reduction, replacing it with cuts across the federal government.
The panel's work was contentious from the beginning, with Senator Murray's request that the negotiations should not be leaked to the press largely ignored.
Democrats initially proposed a $3tn package, including $1.3tn of new revenue and $400bn in Medicare savings.
Republicans rejected the plan's tax rises.
Senator Pat Toomey, one of the Republican members of the panel, proposed a $1.2tn deal, with about $300bn in new revenue through tax changes, including lowering the top tax rate from 35% to 28%. However, his own party officials did not endorse the plan publicly.
Democrats objected to the proposed permanent lowering of tax rates paid by the top bracket.
Last week, Republican House Speaker John Boehner, who was not a member of the committee, proposed a new plan of nearly $650bn in savings, well below the $1.2tn goal.
The package included $543bn in spending cuts, $3bn of new revenue generated by closing a tax loophole for businesses to buy private jets, and $98bn saved from lower interest payments.
Democrats rejected the offer, saying it focused too heavily on spending cuts.

Google, Facebook, Zynga oppose new SOPA copyright bill

Foes of a controversial copyright measure have gained some high-profile allies: Google, Facebook, Twitter, Zynga, and other Web companies have joined the ranks of the bill's opponents.
They sent a letter (PDF) last night to key members of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, saying the Stop Online Piracy Act, or SOPA, "pose[s] a serious risk to our industry's continued track record of innovation and job creation, as well as to our nation's cybersecurity."
The protest was designed to raise objections in advance of a hearing before the full House Judiciary committee tomorrow at 10 a.m. ET (7 a.m. PT). The letter, also signed by eBay, Mozilla, Yahoo, AOL, and LinkedIn, asks politicians to "consider more targeted ways to combat foreign 'rogue' Web sites."
SOPA, which was introduced last month in the House to the applause of lobbyists for Hollywood and other large content holders, is designed to make allegedly copyright-infringing Web sites, sometimes called "rogue" Web sites, virtually disappear from the Internet.
An announcement of tomorrow's hearing leaves little doubt about where House Judiciary Chairman Lamar Smith, a Texas Republican, stands. It says SOPA reflects a bipartisan "commitment toward ensuring that law enforcement and job creators have the necessary tools to protect American intellectual property from counterfeiting and piracy."
Not only is Smith SOPA's primary House sponsor, but opponents are outgunned in both congressional chambers. SOPA's backers include the Republican or Democratic heads of all the relevant House and Senate committees, and groups as varied as the Teamsters and the AFL-CIO have embraced it on the theory that it will protect and create U.S. jobs.
Smith pointedly declined to invite any civil-liberties groups that have criticized SOPA, such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation, to testify before his committee tomorrow. The Motion Picture Association of America did get an invitation, however, as did the AFL-CIO and Pfizer.
Google will be the only dissenting voice, a tactic that may allow SOPA's supporters to characterize corporate opposition as limited, especially because the Mountain View, Calif., company has been enmeshed in so many copyright battles of its own. The Web companies' letter will let Katherine Oyama, Google's policy counsel, demonstrate that opposition is broader than one firm.
In addition, opponents were scheduled to hold a press briefing this morning inside the Capitol Visitors Center complex. They had invited Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) and Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) to speak.
SOPA is so controversial--EFF calls it "disastrous"--because it would force changes to the Domain Name System and effectively create a blacklist of Internet domains suspected of intellectual-property violations.
A Senate version of the bill called the Protect IP Act, which a committee approved in May, was broadly supported by film and music industry companies. But Google Chairman Eric Schmidt was sharply critical, as were prominent venture capitalists, civil-liberties groups, and trade associations representing Web companies.
Even pop star Justin Bieber has weighed in.
In a recent radio interview designed to promote his Christmas album, Bieber said, referring to Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), who sponsored the Senate version: "Whomever she is, she needs to know that I'm saying she needs to be locked up, put away in cuffs... I just think that's ridiculous."
Update, 10:30 a.m. PT: Members of Congress opposed to SOPA have circulated their own letter (PDF), which was signed by Zoe Lofgren and Anna Eshoo, both California Democrats, and Ron Paul, the Republican presidential candidate from Texas, among others. They say SOPA will invite "an explosion of innovation-killing lawsuits and litigation." Lofgren (see CNET's previous report) has been critical of MPAA-backed copyright bills before.
Update, 1:40 p.m. PT: The we-hate-SOPA letters keep flooding in. A few dozen civil-liberties and left-leaning advocacy groups from around the globe now are circulating their own letter (PDF), which says that "through SOPA, the United States is attempting to dominate a shared global resource." Signers include Bits of Freedom in the Netherlands, the Electronic Frontier Finland, Reporters Without Borders, and, in the United States, Free Press and Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility. Notably absent are the two biggest such advocacy groups: Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International.
And another! This letter (PDF) is from a slew of law professors, including Stanford's Mark Lemley, Elon's David Levine, Temple's David Post, and UCLA's Eugene Volokh. They seem even more generous in their criticism than the other letters, warning that SOPA "has grave constitutional infirmities, potentially dangerous consequences for the stability and security of the Internet's addressing system, and will undermine United States foreign policy and strong support of free expression on the Internet around the world

Book describes troubled Walter Payton

They called him Sweetness, but Chicago Bears great Walter Payton had a dark side, according to a biography to be released Oct. 4.
An excerpt of "Sweetness: The Enigmatic Life of Walter Payton," by Jeff Pearlman will appear in the Oct. 3 issue of Sports Illustrated and describes the Hall of Famer as suicidal, abusing pain medication and dealing with a crumbling family situation.
Payton, who retired as the then-all-time leading rusher in NFL history after the 1987 season, was depressed and suicidal in the mid-1990s. Pearlman cites a letter to a friend in which Payton said he imagined himself killing those around him and then turning a gun on himself.
"Walter would call me all the time saying he was about to kill himself, he was tired," Payton's longtime agent Bud Holmes said, according to SI.com. "He was angry. Nobody loved him. He wanted to be dead."
Payton's executive assistant, Ginny Quirk, echoed those sentiments.

"He would call and say, 'you won't see me when you get to the office tomorrow,' " she said. " 'Enjoy life without me.' "
Payton died of a rare liver disease and bile duct cancer in November 1999.
According to the book, Payton used pain pills and liquids to deal with injuries during his playing days and the practice continued after he retired. Sources told Pearlman that Payton took a cocktail of Tylenol and vicodin and kept tanks of nitrous oxide in his garage.
"Walter was pounding his body with medication," Holmes said. "I wish I knew how bad it was, but at the time I really didn't."
According to the book, in 1988 Payton visited dentist offices complaining of tooth pain. He secured several prescriptions for morphine but raised red flags with at least one pharmacist, who called police. Payton was visited by officers but received only a warning
Even seemingly great times in Payton's life were filled with confusion, according to the book.
Payton had been living apart from his wife Connie since his retirement but hadn't gone public because of his desire to protect his children and his image. He had been seeing a woman for five years when he was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1993, and both women showed up for the ceremonies.
"The introduction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame is supposed to be the greatest moment in his life," said Quirk, who was charged with keeping the women apart. "And in truth, it was probably the worst. ... Four full days, and Lita (not the real name of Payton's mistress) and Connie were like two ships passing in the night. If Connie was scheduled to come late, I'd make sure Lita was there early. If Connie was there early, Lita would be there late. I can't describe the horror of that trip."
Nonetheless, the women did end up meeting.
"I introduced the two of them, and they sat and talked for a quite a while," Holmes said, according to the excerpt. "They were friendly, chatty. There was no hair pulling. It was very civil."
Connie had asked for the meeting, and according to Holmes, told Lita: "You can have him. He doesn't want me or the children."
Despite stories of depression and personal chaos, the book does recount Payton's courageous side. Knowing he was going to die, Payton spent his final months hosting former Bears.
"I never heard him say, 'Why me?' " fellow Hall of Famer Mike Singletary said, according to the book. "I know I would have been saying, 'Why me? Why me? There are other guys out there killing people -- why me?' I never heard Walter say that."
Former Bears offensive lineman Jimbo Covert also marveled at Payton's grace under dire circumstances.
"I was there with about 30 other guys," he said. "Walter took time to go around to everybody personally and grab him and say, 'What are you doing?' -- just getting the down low on how you'd been. Can you imagine how strong a person he had to have been to do that? He knew he was going to die."