Business

Even though President Barack Obama had campaigned on a promise of closing the detention facility at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, due to many complaints, including human rights violations, the camp is still functioning with 168 captives, now in their second decade of detention. The following illegal (read: fake) wire transmission was (not) intercepted on its way out of the Gitmo detention facility, presumably headed for somewhere in the Middle East. As the government works tirelessly to track down its destination (not really), we’ve taken the liberty of translating it here for you, unedited: “Now this is the story all about how my life got flipped-turned upside down. And I’d like to take a minute, just sit right there. I’ll tell you how I became the prince of watching a show called Bel-Air . “In southwest Waziristan, I was born and raised. On the battlefield is where I spent most of my days. Chillin’ out, maxin’, relaxin’ all cool. And all shootin’ some tin cans outside of the school. When a...

Rip Empson is a writer and rabble-rouser at TechCrunch. He covers startups, music, social, mobile, health, and education. You can reach him at rip[at]techcrunch[dot]com ? Learn More Like many parents, Dan Yang was fascinated by her young daughter’s obsession with her iPhone. As she went through the process of planning the best way to introduce her to technology, apps, and games, she quickly became frustrated with the lack of educational technology made specifically for children. Unlike most parents, however, Yang is an entrepreneur and optical engineer, so she did what any entrepreneurial, geeky mom would do: She decided to hack her own solution. Yang developed VINCI Early Learning Systems and VINCI tablets — which she believes to be the first FDA-safety-compliant tablet that is designed purely for younguns. The learning tool, as she calls it, is itself built to develop (along with the content it includes) thinking skills, social, language, and literacy abilities, along with quantita...