Daily Link

OMG! Earthquake!
The U.S. Geological Survey is scouring the popular microblogging site Twitter soon after a temblor hits to pinpoint regions where shaking occurred.
"People like to tweet after earthquakes," USGS seismologist Paul Earle said Monday during an American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco.
There is usually a lag between when an earthquake strikes and when researchers can analyze the data that floods in from seismic stations. During that gap, scientists combing through hundreds of tweets can get an initial picture of where the shaking was felt and areas of potential damage.
A prototype system aggregates tweets based on key words such as "earthquake" or the equivalent in different languages. It can then send an e-mail listing the cities where the tweets came from and what the tweets said.
"It would give you a little information about what potentially happened in that earthquake," Earle said.
There are still wrinkles to be worked out. Scientists are developing filters to distinguish tweets about a real temblor from say, an earthquake drill that can cause scores of people to pound out 140 characters.
Follow the USGS Twitter earthquake detector here.

-- The Associated Press

You have presents to wrap, cookies to bake and halls to deck. The last thing you need to do this time of year is standing around waiting for Santa while he takes his state-mandated lunch breaks. Here's our annual guide to Santa's office hours in the South Bay:

Del Amo Fashion Center
310-542-8525

Santa will be at the mall during business hours through Dec. 24.
Those hours are:
Mon to Fri: 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Breaks from 1 to 2 p.m. and 5:15 to 6 p.m.
Sat: 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Breaks from 1 to 2 p.m. and 5:15 to 6 p.m.
Sun: 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Breaks from 2 to 3 p.m.

Galleria at South Bay
310-371-7546

Santa will be there through Dec. 24.
Nov. 24 and Nov. 25: 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Breaks from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. and 5:15 to 6 p.m.
Nov. 27 and Nov. 28: 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Breaks from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. and 5:15 to 6 p.m.
Nov. 29: 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Breaks from 2 to 3 p.m.
Nov. 30 to Dec. 4: 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Breaks from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. and 5:15 to 6 p.m.
Dec. 5: 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Breaks from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. and 5:15 to 6 p.m.
Dec. 6 to Dec. 11: 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Breaks from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. and 5:15 to 6 p.m.
Dec. 12: 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Breaks from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. and 5:15 to 6 p.m.
Dec. 13: 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Breaks from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. and 5:15 to 6 p.m.
Dec. 14 to Dec. 20: 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Breaks from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. and 5:15 to 6 p.m.
Dec. 21 to Dec. 23: 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Breaks from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. and 5:15 to 6 p.m.
Dec. 24: 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Breaks from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m.

The Web site also has a detailed list of photo packages and prices.

Manhattan Village Mall
310-546-5555

Santa arrives Nov. 27 and stays until Dec. 24.
Mon to Sat: 11a.m. to 8 p.m., breaks at 1-2 p.m. and 4:15-4:45 p.m.
Sun: Noon to 6 p.m., breaks from 2 to 3 p.m.
The Web site has a list of packages and prices.

Promenade on the Peninsula
310-541-0688

Pictures with Santa, on two Saturdays only: Nov. 28 and Dec. 19, 1-4 p.m. each day.

Santa's main focus while he's at the Promenade is to spread the holiday cheer, so please bring your own camera so you can get your holiday pictures for free. Free pictures may be especially popular this year, so bring a candy cane snack and be prepared to wait your turn.

Plaza El Segundo
310-647-3431

Santa will park his sleigh next to Toy Jungle for one day only.
Nov. 27: 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

South Bay Pavilion at Carson
310-366-6636

Santa arrives on Nov. 27 and will hang around until Dec. 24.
Mon to Sat: 11 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Sun: Noon to 5 p.m.

RELATED:
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Track Santa online
Helping hands for Secret Santas
Take Christmas photos like a pro

These days, even sharks have online social networks.

The nonprofit Iemanya Oceanica announced last week that a team including several South Bay residents had successfully tagged three whale sharks, bringing the group's family of trackable sharks to 10.

The new additions -- a type of shark with mouths so big "you could drive a Volkswagen into" them, Iemanya board member Patty Civalleri has said, and that is particularly vulnerable to boat collisions and overfishing -- were found during Iemanya's inaugural tagging expedition, in Bahia de Los Angeles, Mexico.

"We opened up 20 seats on this expedition to the public," said Civalleri, a Manhattan Beach resident, "and because of the assistance from the media, we were able to fill those seats quickly with volunteers who came to us with various levels of water skills and a general knowledge of nature and the ocean. We couldn't have asked for a better group."

That group worked with researchers to attach tags to the sharks' dorsal fins. Through those tags -- and satellite transmission -- Iemanya will learn air and water temperatures, diving patterns, daily and seasonal movement and calving and feeding habits.

And it's sharing it all with you.

"People can now go online and adopt a shark as an educational gift," said Laleh Mohajerani, Iemanya's executive director. "Then every day they can track the movement of their shark," she added.

Get yours. And read Staff Writer Andrea Woodhouse's original Daily Breeze story about the Iemanya tagging expedition.

Stargazers interested in snagging a bleacher seat along the red carpet during next year's Oscar ceremony will have one week beginning Monday to enter an online lottery.

The online registration will begin at 9 a.m. Monday and end at 9 p.m. Sept. 20.

Only 700 bleacher seats are available for the March 7 event.

In early October, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will notify the winners, who will then be required to submit additional information for security information and final approval.

According to the academy, as many as 20,000 people have applied online in past years for a shot at the coveted seats.

In addition to sitting along the red carpet prior to the Oscars, winners will also be invited to watch the telecast at a nearby private location, according to the academy.

September is here, and it signals the start of a new television season.

Besides cable, satellite, DVRs, DVDs and now Hulu, there's a different way to watch TV: Take your favorite show and "reverse engineer" it into constituent parts.

TV Tropes is a Wiki that shows how a program is built together out of "atoms" of character, dialogue and plot devices -- some plausible, others mostly serviceable for the sake of getting on with the show.

On the main page, it says "tropes are devices and conventions that a writer can reasonably rely on as being present in the audience members' minds and expectations."

For instance, take any episode from the "Law & Order" franchise. Every week, buddy cops go on a reverse whodunit to find the freak of the week based on a true crime story. In the hour, the squad must connect the deaths while being hampered by the suspect's amoral attorney and jurisdiction friction. The shows then end with variants on courtroom antics.

Click on each link to go to TV Tropes and find out what they mean and where and when they are used. Warning: Some entries contain obscenities.

You don't have to leave your desk to watch the whales and dolphins play in the Pacific Ocean off Southern California.

David Anderson has mounted seven cameras and built an underwater viewing pod on his 50-foot high-tech, high-speed catamaran and will take anyone along for a virtual ride.

Anderson, a documentary filmmaker whose "Wild Dolphins and Whales of Southern California" was a winner at the Wildscreen Film Festival, wanted his latest venture to be more than a webcam.

"It's like a reality show. We have mikes on the captain and crew. You will hear things even the passengers don't hear. My crew was not real keen on this and there is a little friction but they understand why we are doing it," he said.

When the boat is out, the cameras are on, the mikes are connected and the action is live.

If you sign up on his Web site in the morning, he will Tweet you when the boat is approaching a group of whales or a pod of dolphins. That lets you log on for the best of each trip. Recaps will also be available on the Web site each night, he said.

It took more than a year to get Coast Guard approval for the viewing pod on Anderson's boat, the Manute'a. The viewing pod, made of 36 square feet of bulletproof glass, holds just a couple of people at a time and they can find themselves very intimate with the dolphins.

So your kid wants to be the next Beckham, but you've always been more of a Michael Jordan fan. Maybe iSoccer.org can help.

The Web site aims to provide the mentors of today's soccer-playing future with tools that assess players' skills as well as technical training videos for players of all skill levels.

"Knowing what to teach and how to teach it has always been a real challenge for youth soccer coaches, many of whom are well-meaning parent volunteers who lack formal training," says iSoccer founder Scott Leber.

If iSoccer is able to produce results similar to what Leber has achieved, the investment may be worth it. He was the Gatorade High School Player of the Year, and played NCAA Division 1 soccer at Stanford, where he studied industrial engineering. Before developing iSoccer, he started an East Coast youth soccer training business.

Leber's program tailors training guides to a player's current abilities. The cost of an individual session ranges from about $7 to $12 (you get a better rate when buying a package of sessions), and a session can include anywhere from nine to 22 exercises.

Covered topics and skills include laces, passing and aerial control, and each installment can be downloaded to an iPod and taken to the field. There, players practicing on their own or with their teams can watch the skill demonstrations and try out what they've learned on the spot.

If you're thinking about taking the leap and trading your clunker for cash, you should consider the total impact on the family budget of owning a new car. And think about that old car you'll be trading in -- in particular, the fact that it may have meant no car payment, cheaper insurance and lower licensing fees than you're about to face.

Some questions and answers about whether it makes financial sense to leave your clunker behind.

Q: What factors should I consider?

A: Although the $3,500 or $4,500 you'll save through the government's cash-for-clunkers program seems very enticing, be sure to look at all the other costs associated with owning a new car.

The most obvious cost is your new car payment. But even if you've already factored this in -- say, if you were already planning to buy a new car before this program came along -- don't forget that a new car will likely also increase your insurance premium and annual licensing fees.

Of course, the new car likely will save you money on gas and maintenance costs.
How will the numbers balance out?

Try this online calculator, which allows you to compare all the costs of your old car with those of a new car to see how your situation adds up.

You might also want to plug a used car you might consider buying into the calculator and compare its cost with that of the new one with the rebate.

And keep in mind another cost associated only with new cars: depreciation.

Q: How can I assess the cost of keeping my older car, to figure out whether it's a good idea to trade it in?

A: The cost of owning a car includes more factors than you might think. Edmunds.com, an auto consumer Web site, has identified eight components: depreciation, interest on financing, taxes and fees, insurance premiums, fuel, maintenance, repairs and any federal tax credit.

A Web calculator on the Edmunds site will help you figure the true cost of owning a car.

By The Associated Press
The mid-movie dash to the restroom can turn us into calculating Hussein Usain Bolt wannabes: Ah, this looks like a lull -- time to dash.
When we return to our seats, we pray the answer to "What did I miss?" isn't "Darth Vader is really Luke's father" or "the girlfriend is really a guy."
The Web site RunPee.com can help with such anxious guesswork.
The site provides recommended opportunities to race to the restroom. It tells you when the action or romance wanes, and gives you a cue ("Baby O.J. is taken from Bruno") for your exit.
The site tells you how long you've got and even summarizes what you missed. Since early July, RunPee.com is available as an iPhone app, too.
Launched in August 2008, RunPee took off earlier this summer. It's been one of the season's runaway hits -- a clever idea that has spawned a lot of word-of-mouth from moviegoers.
"Helping your bladder enjoy going to the movies as much as you do," the site boasts.
It was created by Dan Florio, a 42-year-old Flash developer who got the idea during the three-hour-plus "King Kong" remake in 2005.
Florio, who lives in Orlando, Fla., with his wife, does everything for the site, though he gets some help from his wife and his mother. He's become a regular opening day attendee of movies, busily taking notes in the back row.
Friday, he sat through a double feature of "Funny People" -- which runs nearly 2½ hours -- and "Aliens in the Attic."
"I never intended to refocus my energies on this," says Florio. "And I never thought that I'd be seeing every single movie that comes out, either."
The site averages 3,000-6,000 visitors a day, Florio says. The iPhone app is available on iTunes for $1. It's not a huge moneymaker (Florio estimates he'll make $800 this month) but is providing him a little extra cash.
He believes that not only do moviegoers benefit from the service, but theater owners do, too.
"Lots and lots of people comment: 'Ah! I can get that 64-ounce drink now!'" Florio says.
Florio designed the site to be wiki-based with break times submitted by users, but it has turned out that he has done most of the work. Finding the right moments and recording the correct time is more work than it might sound -- most moviegoers leave their stopwatches at home.
"It's not fun," says Florio. "I would literally have to pay someone to do this."
Generally, the better the movie is, the harder it is to find a break.
There are, of course, limits to the usefulness of RunPee. But it has also found friends in cyberspace like WhereToWee.com, a site in the works that tells you where the nearest restroom is.

Ford, the Chambers of Commerce and Cities of Hermosa Beach, Manhattan Beach, Redondo Beach, Torrance and Los Angeles County Department of Beaches and Harbors present the 2009 International Surf Festival July 31 through August 2. Area lifeguards and youth compete in challenges include bodysurfing, sand volleyball, paddleboarding and a 2-mile run.

Find out which events take place where and when here including the Dwight Crum Pier-to-Pier swim and the Velzy-Stevens Pier-to-Pier Paddleboard Championship. The site also has photos and results from past events.