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Need help setting up that home computer or Internet connection? Frustrated by that new cell phone? You’re not alone. A survey released on Sunday found that nearly half of Americans need help from others booting up their new devices, and an even larger percentage need outside assistance when they encounter technical problems.

“A new gadget or service can become popular well before the technology itself is understood by the average user,” said Sydney Jones, co-author of the report by the Pew Research Center’s Internet and American Life Project.

“Naturally, some users catch on to new technology more quickly than others, and those who have more trouble grasping the technology are left confused, discouraged, and reliant on help from others when their technology fails.”

Forty-eight percent of the 2,054 adults surveyed by the Pew Center said they usually need help from others to set up new devices or services such as home computers, cell phones or Internet connections and to show them how they work.

When encountering technical problems, 28 percent said that they fixed the problems themselves, with men (39 percent) more likely than women (22 percent) to go it alone.

But most people need assistance.

Thirty-eight percent said they contacted user support for help, 15 percent said they fixed the problem with help from friends or family and two percent said they found help online.

Fifteen percent just gave up, unable to fix their devices at all.

As to the frequency of the problems, 44 percent of those with home Internet access said their connection failed to work properly at some time in the past year.

Thirty-nine percent of those with desktop or laptop computers said their machines did not work properly at some time in the previous 12 months.

Twenty-nine percent of cell phone users said their device failed at some time in the past year and 15 percent of those with an iPod or MP3 player said their devices did not work properly at some time in the past 12 months.

As for the most recent failure, 46 percent said it was their home Internet connection, 28 percent said it was their computer, 21 percent said it was their cell phone and three percent said it was their iPod or other MP3 player.

Cell phones were the device least likely to be fixed, the survey found, with 23 percent of those with broken cell phones saying they were unable to get them working again.

Nineteen percent of those with broken computers reported not being able to fix them, while just seven percent of those with Internet connection problems said they were unable to reconnect to the Web.

Forty-eight percent of those surveyed said they felt discouraged with the amount of effort needed to fix the problem and 40 percent felt confused by the information that they were getting.

“Struggles with modern gadgetry mean less engagement with the services they enable,” said John Horrigan, associate director at the Pew Internet Project and co-author of the report.

“Time spent dealing with set-up or outages means less time using modern communication services to connect with friends or find information that might help people be more productive.”

The survey was conducted between October 24 and November 2 with a margin of error of plus or minus 2.4 percent.

If you thought that the days of waiting lists for telephone connections are over, think again. About 30,000 people are waiting for new broadband connections that offer Internet and telephone in a bundle from state-run Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd (MTNL) in Delhi and Mumbai.

This is despite three private national telecom players - Bharti Airtel, Reliance Communications and Tata Teleservices offering broadband services in the two metros besides MTNL. MTNL officials say the queue is for value-for-money services, and the waiting list will be eliminated because the company is busy building capacity to overcome constraints. We have an edge over our competitors both in terms of quality of services and pricing, said R.S.P. Sinha, chairman and managing director of MTNL. That is why people prefer waiting for our services rather than going to our competitors.

MTNL has a broadband subscriber base of over 6.2 lakh lines in the two metros, of which 3.46 lakh lines are in Mumbai and the remainder in Delhi. With addition of new capacity, we will wipe out waiting list, Sinha said.

MTNL will have a capacity of about 10 lakh lines by the November and plans to set up another 10 lakh lines for which a tender is planned to be floated by the end of the fiscal year. The company also has a waiting list of 7,000 for IPTV services.

IPTV is provides digital TV over telephone lines, with two-way interactive facilities. Currently, there are 10,000 subscribers for IPTV services.

Monitoring changes to water levels in the sea, in rivers and lakes, in ice sheets and even under the ground, with the help of observations from satellites, has revealed that since the start of 1993, sea level has been rising by 3.3 mm a year, almost double the rate of the previous 50 years.

Sea level rise in one of the major consequences of global warming, but it is much more difficult to model and predict than temperature.

Since the 1990s, a number of altimeter satellites have been measuring the height of the ocean surface and this has dramatically improved our understanding of sea level rise.

Currently, three altimeter satellites cover the entire globe every 10 to 35 days, and can measure the height of the sea surface to a precision of 1 to 2 cm.

These measurements show that since the start of 1993, sea level has been rising by 3.3 mm a year, almost double the rate of the previous 50 years.

“For several years now, the rate of rise has not changed significantly,” said Anny Cazenave, from the Laboratoire d’Etudes en Geophysique et Oceanographie Spatiale (LEGOS) in Toulouse.

Cazenave’s team, and other groups, calculate that for 1993-2003, about half of the sea level rise was due to the oceans expanding as they became warmer, and the other half was due to shrinking land ice.

Since 2003, ocean warming has had a temporary break but sea level has continued to rise.

Now, about 80 percent of the annual sea level rise can be attributed to accelerated land ice loss from glaciers, Greenland and Antarctica.

This has been revealed by a brand new satellite technique, called space gravimetry.

The method has shown that the Greenland ice sheet is losing about 150 gigatonnes of ice each year, two thirds of which is large chunks of ice flowing rapidly into the sea.

Using GRACE, Cazenave and others have also looked at changes in water storage in river basins. In the period from 2002-2006, they found that some basins, including the Congo and the Mississippi, have been losing water, but river systems in the boreal regions are gaining water.

Meanwhile, scientists at the European Space Agency, collaborating with DeMontfort University in the UK, have begun to use data from the satellites that measure sea level, to assess lake and river levels on land.

With US markets closing with gains overnight and Asian markets showing gains Friday morning, Indian equities markets opened strong Friday but began to slide with a key index down more than 150 points two hours into trading, revealing underlying nervousness, analysts said.

Two hours into trading the 30-share benchmark sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) was ruling at 9,371.50, down 164.83 points or 1.73 percent from its previous close Wednesday at 9,536.33 points.

The Sensex opened strong at 9,799.25, up 262.92 points or 2.76 percent from its previous close Wednesday, hit a high of 9,836.11 but then began to slide to hit a low of 9,352.41 before inching up a bit to its current value.

The broader-based 50 share S&P CNX Nifty of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) also showed a similar trend and was ruling at 2818.65, down 29.8 points or 1.05 percent from its previous close Wednesday at 2848.45 points.

The BSE midcap index was ruling at 3,240.46, down 40.81 points or 1.24 percent from its previous close Wednesday at 3,281.27 points.

The BSE smallcap index was ruling at 3,787.50, down 25.88 points or 0.68 percent from its previous close Wednesday at 3,813.38 points.

The evidence continues to mount on the health benefits of adequate sleep. A new study published this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association finds that sleeping less than seven and a half hours a day may be associated with a greater risk for heart disease, particularly for those whose blood pressure spikes overnight.

“Sleep habits have a huge impact on human health,” says the study’s lead author, Dr. Kazuo Eguchi of Jichi Medical University in Tochigi, Japan. Past studies have linked improper sleep habits - sleeping either too little or too much - to disorders such as obesity and diabetes as well as a higher risk of heart attacks and premature death. (See TIME’s A-Z Health Guide.)

Eguchi’s study examined the connection between sleep and heart disease among elderly people. Over a 50-month period, researchers monitored 1,225 people with an average age of 70 and a history of hypertension. For the duration of the study, participants recorded their nightly sleep habits in a sleep diary; their blood pressure was monitored all day and night, using an ambulatory blood pressure monitor, a small halter-like device that takes readings every 30 minutes 24 hours a day. Cardiovascular events including stroke, heart attack and sudden cardiac death were tracked among the participants.

The study found that 99 cardiovascular events occurred among all volunteers. The incidence rate was about 33% higher among people who slept less than seven and a half hours a night and had elevated overnight blood pressure - the so-called “riser pattern” - compared with longer sleepers. But those who slept less than seven and a half hours a night yet experienced no overnight hypertension showed no increased cardiac risk; their rate of heart disease was the same as that of the long sleepers. Particularly when it comes to elderly patients, the authors write that “physicians should inquire about sleep duration in the risk assessment of patients with hypertension.”

“Sleep is important [for everyone], from children to the elderly,” Eguchi says. “But it is more important when someone has some cardiovascular risk factors like hypertension.”

Normally, blood pressure drops during sleep, but if people don’t get enough shut-eye, it can exacerbate hypertension - or even cause it - and lead to depression and weakened immunity, according to previous research. Longer sleep is, therefore, especially vital for patients who already have high blood pressure. Maintaining a consistent sleep pattern is also important - tampering with the body’s circadian rhythm is associated with a variety of hormonal, metabolic and cardiovascular problems. In late October, Swedish researchers reported that the rate of heart attacks jumped following daylight savings time shifts in the spring and fall. “Our data suggest that vulnerable people might benefit from avoiding sudden changes in their biologic rhythms,” Dr. Imre Janszky of the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm wrote.

Research generally suggests that seven to eight hours sleep a night is optimal for adults. Eguchi says his study underscores the special need for elderly, hyptertensive patients to get a good night’s sleep. “It’s a very important issue in their health,” Eguchi says, adding that still more studies need to be done to differentiate between “good” and “bad” sleep. The participants in his study recorded the duration of sleep, but not the quality - for instance, whether they experienced disturbances or nocturnia, the medical term for the need to get up and urinate at night, a common condition among the elderly.

Probing further into the nature of sleep, say researchers, may help determine the precise benefits of sleep - largely still a mystery - regardless of age or medical condition.

Google is pushing its voice-recognition technology to Apple’s iPhone first, before devices running its own Android mobile platform.

The New York Times offered photographs of Google employees Vic Gundotra and Gummi Hafsteinsoon using an iPhone for a voice search. The free application was expected to be available on Apple’s App Store on Friday. Google reportedly will soon offer the technology for other devices, presumably including the T-Mobile G1, which uses Android.

“This is an expansion of types of applications Google has already been developing,” said Greg Sterling, principal analyst at Sterling Market Intelligence. “Google has GOOG411, which is the underlying technical engine. They also have a voice-search client for the BlackBerry which is limited to maps. So this is an evolutionary step.”

Inside Google Voice Search

Here’s how it works: The iPhone user asks a question, such as “Where’s the closest Burger King?” or “How wide is the Grand Canyon?” The user’s voice is converted to a digital file and transmitted to Google’s servers.

Google Search then serves up the results — in a matter of seconds if the user has a fast wireless network, the Times reports. The search results always include any local information.

“The question with these types of technologies is how good is the speech recognition? It’s getting much better, and that’s why Google feels this is the right time to introduce this,” Sterling said. “Google has confidence now that voice recognition is good enough to open it up to the full Web search as opposed to the much more structured search on GOOG411.”

Google is playing catch-up, in a sense. Yahoo and Microsoft already offer a voice-recognition option for mobile phones. Microsoft’s Tellme service offers users information in specific categories, such as movies, maps or directions. Yahoo offers voice services through its oneSearch platform.

“In one sense this is new, but it’s not new, because Yahoo and Microsoft have been doing versions of voice recognition — and so has Google — for some time,” Sterling said. “A company called Dial Directions was the first to formally introduce voice search for the iPhone, but it was limited to selected local sites through the Safari browser.”

Building a Killer App

Could voice recognition be the next killer app for mobile? The market is growing at breakneck speed. Voice-recognition technology sales topped $1 billion in 2006 for the first time. Datamonitor expects that number to swell to $2.6 billion by 2009.

The market is heating up — and going global. Voice-recognition software maker Nuance Communications earlier this month acquired Austria-based Philips Speech Recognition Systems for $96.1 million. Philips develops speech-recognition solutions in 25 languages.

Voice recognition on the mobile phone is still not completely accurate, and may not see mainstream use until it improves. But Sterling said it is ever-improving and thinks Google’s voice search will be a popular mobile-phone feature.

Specifically, he sees the new Google application for the iPhone as most useful when a user might need to call directory assistance or do a simple search, but can’t do it safely on a keyboard while driving. Another benefit is the ability to enter potentially long search queries that would be difficult to type. But accuracy is still a factor.

“This is an evolutionary step in the whole realm of voice search,” Sterling said. “So far it has not proven to be the killer app for mobile, but it’s getting there and it’s very useful in selective situations.”

Carrying too much flab around the middle can almost double your risk of dying prematurely, even if the overall weight is normal, a shocking new research has revealed.

The study, which included over 350,000 people across Europe, has been published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The study provides strong evidence that storing excess fat around the waist poses a significant health risk, even in people not considered to be overweight or obese.

It suggests that doctors should measure a patient’s waistline and their hips as well as their body mass index as part of standard health checks, according to the researchers, from Imperial College London, the German Institute of Human Nutrition, and other research institutions across Europe.

Comparing subjects with the same body mass index, the risk of premature death increased in a linear fashion as the waist circumference increased.

The risk of premature death was around double for subjects with a larger waist (more than 120cm or 47.2in for men and more than 100cm or 39.4in for women) compared to subjects with a smaller waist (less than 80cm or 31.5in for men and less than 65cm or 25.6in for women).

Body mass index is commonly used to assess if a person is of ”normal” weight.

Each 5cm increase in waist circumference increased the mortality risk by 17percent in men and 13 percent in women.

The ratio of waist to hips was also revealed as an important indicator of health in the study. Lower waist-hip ratios indicate that the waist is comparatively small in relation to the hips. The ratio is calculated by dividing the waist measurement by the hip measurement.

Waist to hip ratio varied quite widely in the European populations in the study. In 98 percent of the study population, waist to hip ratio ranged between 0.78 and 1.10 in men and between 0.66 and 0.98 in women. Within these ranges, each 0.1 unit higher waist-hip-ratio was related to a 34 percent higher mortality risk in men and a 24 percent higher risk in women.

An increased risk of mortality may be particularly related to storing fat around the waistline because fatty tissue in this area secretes cytokines, hormones and metabolically active compounds that can contribute to the development of chronic diseases, particularly cardiovascular diseases and cancers, suggest the authors.

Privatdozent Dr Tobias Pischon, the lead author of the paper from the German Institute of Human Nutrition in Potsdam-Rehbrücke, said: “The most important result of our study is the finding that not just being overweight, but also the distribution of body fat, affects the risk of premature death of each individual.

“Abdominal fat is not only a mere energy depot, but it also releases messenger substances that can contribute to the development of chronic diseases. This may be the reason for the link.”

Brown clouds of pollution are hanging over Asia, making “cities from Beijing to New Delhi” darker, melting glaciers in ranges like the Himalayas faster and turning weather systems more extreme, the UN said on Thursday.

Formed as a result of burning of fossil fuels and biomass, the Atmospheric Brown Clouds (ABCs), made of soot and other manmade particles, are more than three km-thick, said a new report by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP).

The layer that stretches from the Arabian Peninsula to China and the western Pacific Ocean, are in some cases and regions aggravating the impacts of greenhouse gas-induced climate change, a team of experts drawn from research centres in Asia, including China and India, said.

Globally, however, brown clouds may be countering or “masking” the effects of climate change by between 20 and up to 80 per cent, said the report.

The cloud is having impacts on air quality and agriculture in Asia increasing risks to human health and food production for three billion people.

Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary General and Executive Director, UNEP, said: “I expect the Atmospheric Brown Cloud to be now firmly on the international community’s radar as a result of today’s report”.

The five regional hotspots for ABCs identified in the report includes the Indo-Gangetic plains in South Asia from the northwest and northeast regions of eastern Pakistan across India to Bangladesh and Myanmar, the UNEP said in a press statement.

New Delhi, Kolkata and Mumbai feature in the list of 13 megacities where ABCs are reducing the sunlight hitting the Earth’s surface, making the cities “darker or dimmer”.

The upcoming Pakistan-India series may be played at a neutral venue like Abu Dhabi if India refuses to tour on security grounds, a Pakistan Cricket Board official said Thursday. “In a worst scenario, if India has its reservations (to tour Pakistan), we can consider playing at a neutral venue,” PCB’s chief operating officer Salim Altaf said.

India is scheduled to play three tests and five one-day internationals during its Jan. 4-Feb.

19 tour to Pakistan. “Of course our first priority will be that foreign teams start playing top level cricket in Pakistan,” Altaf said.

“However, we don’t rule out playing at the neutral venue because we want to generate funds and don’t want to become an isolated cricketing nation.” Earlier this week, India’s government refused permission to its junior hockey team to tour Pakistan due to security concerns.

Abu Dhabi has emerged as the one of the options to host Pakistan-India test matches. “So far the PCB has not approached us, but if we are asked, we will be ready to host the test matches,” Abu Dhabi Cricket Council’s chief executive Dilawar Mani told The Associated Press on Thursday.

“We want cricket to flourish in Pakistan and the first priority should be that India tours Pakistan in January as per schedule,” Mani added. Pakistan is currently playing a three-match limited-overs series against the West Indies in Abu Dhabi.

The International Cricket Council is eager to use the Pakistan-India series as the benchmark to convince other teams especially non-Asian countries that it’s safe to play cricket in Pakistan and a transfer to a neutral venue would undermine that message. Pakistan is the only test-playing nation among the nine competing in top format of the game which will end 2008 without playing a test match.

It was scheduled to play three home tests in March, but world champion Australia canceled its tour due to security reservations. September’s Champions Trophy was also postponed until next year after four leading teams South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and England expressed apprehensions about security.

Trikona Group, which contributes to India’s growth in a socially aware manner by creating new asset classes around real estate and infrastructure, announced that Brijesh Kumar, a 36-year industry veteran, has been named Independent Director of Panthera Developers, a development company affiliated with the Trikona Group.

Kumar brings extensive experience in organizational development, process restructuring, and managerial oversight, having held key positions with several PSUs and the Indian government. His government roles most recently included the Secretary of the Department of Information Technology.

As former Chairman and CEO of the Greater Noida Industrial Development Authority, Uttar Pradesh, Kumar was responsible for many successful urban planning and implementation initiatives. He also served as Managing Director of Air India; Chairman and Managing Director of Indian Airlines; and Secretary to the Uttar Pradesh Government in numerous departments.

Brijesh Kumar joins Dr. P.S. Rana, Chairman of Trikona Development and former Chairman and Managing Director of the Housing and Urban Development Corporation Limited (HUDCO), to advise on real estate and infrastructure development projects. Panthera Developers is currently involved in developing over 25 million square feet of projects across the residential, commercial, retail and hospitality sectors in India.

“A long-term commitment to India’s growth is the core foundation of the Trikona Group. Since starting my career with the Indian Administrative Service in 1968, I have been passionate about ensuring the economic development of my country,” said Brijesh Kumar, Independent Director of Panthera Developers. “I am delighted to join an experienced management team that has the dedication to create real estate and infrastructure projects in a sustainable manner.”

“Trikona must continue to invest and develop projects that will build India’s economy and help urbanize its lower and middle classes,” said Dr. P.S. Rana, Chairman of Trikona Development. “As Trikona expands its presence through a socially responsible approach, Brijesh Kumar’s experience with PSUs and expertise in urban policy, planning and implementation will be invaluable to its efforts.”

“Brijesh Kumar has been one of the key proponents for the liberalization of the Indian economy. As demonstrated by his success in the development of Greater Noida, he has built an organizational model for sustainable growth in India,” said Aashish Kalra, Co-Founder and Managing Director of Trikona Capital.

“Trikona also understands the economic, social and political complexities facing the continued growth of India, and we are pleased to have Brijesh Kumar share our vision and help establish new asset classes,” he added.