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schwit1 quotes TheBlaze: Digital gold from Blizzard's massive multiplayer online game "World of Warcraft" is worth more than actual Venezuelan currency, the bolivar, according to new data. Venezuelan resident and Twitter user @KalebPrime first made the discovery July 14 and tweeted at the time that on the Venezuela's black market -- now the most-used method of currency exchange within Venezuela according to NPR -- you can get $1 for 8493.97 bolivars. Meanwhile, a "WoW" token, which can be bought for $20 from the in-game auction house, is worth 8385 gold per dollar. According to sites that track the value of both currencies, KalebPrime's math is outdated, and WoW gold is now worth even more than the bolivar.
That tweet has since gone viral, prompting @KalebPrime to joke that "At this rate when I publish my novel the quotes will read 'FROM THE GUY THAT MADE THE WOW GOLD > VENEZUELAN BOLIVAR TWEET.'"

Hugh Pickens writes writes "Farhad Manjoo writes that there are a number of technologies that gunmakers could add to their products that might prevent hundreds or thousands of deaths per year. One area of active research is known as the 'smart gun' — a trigger-identification system that prevents a gun from being fired by anyone other than its authorized user. Researchers at New Jersey Institute of Technology created a working prototype of a gun that determines whether or not to fire based on a user's 'grip pattern.' Gunmakers have been slow to add other safety technologies as well, including indicators that show whether a gun is loaded, and 'magazine safeties' that prevent weapons from being fired when their ammunition magazine is removed (PDF). That could save 400 lives a year. So why aren't gunmakers making safer guns? Because guns are exempt from most of the consumer safety laws that have improved the rest of American life. The Consumer Product Safety Commission, charged with looking over thousands of different kinds of products, is explicitly prohibited from regulating firearms. In 2005, Congress passed and President George W. Bush signed the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, which immunizes gun makers against lawsuits resulting from 'misuse' of the products. If they can't be sued and can't be regulated, gunmakers have no incentive to make smarter guns." Note that gun safety features (not universally loved) like loaded-chamber indicators, grip safeties, and magazine disconnects are constantly evolving and have been available in some form and in various combinations for many decades, so gun makers seem to have some incentive to produce and improve them, and that the PLCAA does not prevent consumer safety lawsuits, but does shield gun makers from suits based on criminal conduct by gun buyers (though imperfectly).

New submitter Shotgun writes "I heard on the radio that there were some issues with voting machines in Greensboro, NC (my hometown), and the story said the machines just needed "recalibration". Which made me ask, "WTF? Why does a machine for choosing between one of a few choices need 'calibration'?" This story seems to explain the issue."

Penurious Penguin writes "A few days ago, news of an ex-marine detained for his Facebook posts reached far and wide throughout the interweb. It was a hotly debated affair and considered from many perspectives. Today, a judge has ordered the release of Brandon Raub, citing a lack of facts regarding the detention. It's a strange case, undoubtedly, but perhaps even stranger when taking into account a few things. For example, Raub reportedly made claims that one of the psychiatrists involved in the case threatened him with forced medication. For history polymaths, government proposals of forced medication may not be a surprise; you may remember the case of Susan Lindauer. The situation may also remind of 2009, when Fusion Centers targeted Ron Paul supporters, certain universities, and conspiracy theorists as threats to national security, even logging anti death-penalty and anti-war activists into federal terrorism databases. Personally, I find myself wondering what sorts of epic dangers someone like Noam Chomsky might seem to pose after a stressful day and a few beers, if overheard by certain departments."

halfEvilTech writes "A North Carolina mom is irate after her four-year-old daughter returned home late last month with an uneaten lunch the mother had packed for the girl earlier that day. But she wasn't mad because the daughter decided to go on a hunger strike. Instead, the reason the daughter didn't eat her lunch is because someone at the school determined the lunch wasn't healthy enough and sent it back home. What was wrong with the lunch? That's still a head-scratcher because it didn't contain anything egregious: a turkey and cheese sandwich, banana, potato chips, and apple juice. But for the inspector on hand that day, it didn't meet the healthy requirements."

New submitter dcbrianw writes "A non-surgical procedure that treats joint pain involves removing stem cells from a patient's blood and reinserting them into the joint. The facility conducting these procedures resides in Colorado, but because it orders equipment to perform the procedure from outside of Colorado, the FDA claims it must regulate this process and that it can classify stem cells as a drug. This issue opens the debate of what the FDA, or other regulatory bodies, may regulate within each of our own bodies." Quick: Name five activities with no possible plausible effect on interstate commerce.

Local ID10T writes with this excerpt from The Blaze: "In a case explicitly decided to set a precedent, the California Appellate court has determined police officers can rifle through your cellphone during a traffic violation stop. ... Florida and Georgia are among the states that give no protection to a phone during a search. In particular, Florida law treats a smartphone as a 'container' for the purposes of a search, similar to say a cardboard box open on the passenger seat, despite the thousands of personal emails, contacts, and photos a phone can carry stretching back years. But after initially striking down cell phone snooping, California has now joined the list of states that allow cops to go through your phone without a warrant." Interesting additional commentary, too, from UCSD law professor Shaun Martin.

Hugh Pickens writes writes "The Atlantic Wire reports that Superman — Kal-El, the Man of Steel, the Last Son of Krypton — renounces his American citizenship in the latest issue of Action Comics. The moment everyone's talking about comes in a story called 'The Incident,' where Superman wants to fly to Tehran and offer moral support to Iranians protesting an oppressive regime but he's told that Iran will take it as an act of war. Superman decides to get out in front of the problem. 'I intend to speak before the United Nations tomorrow and inform them that I am renouncing my U.S. citizenship,' he tells the president's national security adviser. 'I'm tired of having my actions construed as instruments of U.S. policy.' While some conservative commentators opine that Superman just wants to get out of paying criminally high taxes to a certain merciless Democratic president, Scott Thills concludes that 'the genius of Superman is that he belongs to everyone, for the dual purposes of peace and protection. He's above ephemeral geopolitics and nationalist concerns, a universal agent unlike any other found in pop culture.'"