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Cute 4-year-old Marvel trivia whiz shows off her skills

You might think you're a Marvel super-fan, but little 4-year-old Mia Grace will crush you. She shows no mercy as she deftly handles Marvel trivia questions from her parents, all while calmly riding in a car seat on the way to the store.

Mia's dad posted a video of his daughter tossing off answers like "Loki" and "vibranium" as if they were answers to questions about her favorite color or what she likes to eat. The young comic book fan has managed to build up quite a store of superhero knowledge, no doubt thanks to some quality geek parenting.… Read more

Instagram follows Tumblr, Pinterest; bans self-harm posts

Instagram, the popular online photo-sharing service that was recently bought by Facebook for $1 billion, is banning images and accounts that condone "self-harm" behavior such as eating disorders, cutting oneself, or committing suicide.

In a blog post Friday, the company said the following:

Going forward, we won't allow accounts, images, or hashtags dedicated to glorifying, promoting, or encouraging self-harm. Should users come across content of that nature, we recommend flagging the photo or flagging the user as a "Terms of Service" violation for our Support team to review. It is important to note that this … Read more

Solar CIGS reach 18.7 percent efficiency

Swiss scientists have broken an energy conversion efficiency record for flexible thin-film CIGS solar cells, Empa, the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology, announced last week.

In collaboration with the Swiss solar start-up Flisom, Empa has achieved an 18.7 percent efficiency for CIGS (copper indium gallium selenide) flexible solar cells, which the lab says was made possible by mounting them on a polymer substrate. This breaks Empa's record of 17.6 percent when mounting the CIGS on steel foil substrates, according to the Swiss lab.

Solar efficiency is the amount of electricity per square inch that … Read more

Solar CIGS reach 15.7 percent efficiency

The Department of Energy has confirmed that MiaSole's thin-film photovoltaic solar modules have reached an efficiency of 15.7 percent, the company announced today.

That is an efficiency improvement of more than 1 percent since last year when the company was given a 14.3 percent efficiency rating from the DOE's 's National Renewable Energy Laboratory, according to MiaSole.

Solar panel efficiency ratings signify how much power one gets out of a solar panel per square inch, something obviously of great interest to companies and consumers evaluating which solar panels to purchase for projects.

Santa Clara, Calif.-based … Read more

Long Verizon tech support call spawns M.I.A. song

Lesson to Verizon: Neon-spandexed globe-trotting hip-hop-ish superstars like M.I.A. should not be subjected to three-hour tech support calls, because her resulting song "I'm Down Like Your Internet Connection" is bound to become the new "shake it like a Polaroid picture."

The best part about "I'm Down Like Your Internet Connection"--which is due to appear on the British singer's forthcoming followup to "Kala" this summer--is that she actually got Filipino Verizon workers to sing the hook. Says M.I.A.:

I was having issues with my cable … Read more

Radiohead to play Grammys with marching band

I'm not a fan of the Grammy awards--I think they offer too many awards and give the big ones to too many has-beens or otherwise undeserving acts--but this year's show, scheduled for Sunday, sounds like the best in years. In particular, several blogs are posting rumors that Radiohead will be playing with the University of Southern California marching band, as Outkast did a few years back.

The rumors vary on song selection, but my bet's on "15 Step"--that electronic percussion intro would be perfect for a marching band drum corps. Add to that performances … Read more