Space tourism one step closer
BBC News
Virgin Galactic boss Richard Branson has been talking about his plans to open up space to tourists.
So far Branson says 529 people, thought to include Hollywood stars Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, have signed up to his SS2 trip which will take passengers up to the edge of space.
The first flights are hoped to take place in 2016 but they aren’t cheap – each one costs over £100,000.
Maldives Twitter campaign hijacked
New York Daily News
An attempt by tourism authorities in the Maldives to harness the power of social media has backfired after pro-democracy campaigners hijacked its Twitter hashtag.
Officials at VisitMaldives.com, the state tourist web site, set up the hashtag #sunnysideoflife in an effort to promote the country to foreign holidaymakers.
It asked Twitter users to tweet about their experiences of visiting the Maldives, with the aim of turning the slogan into a catchphrase associated with the country.
However, the term is now being used by hundreds of people to highlight alleged human rights abuses carried out by the current government.
Six hurt, including US tourist, in Pamplona bull run
AFP
Six people were hospitalised Thursday after running through the streets with charging bulls at Spain’s San Fermin festival, including one visitor from the United States, authorities said.
Those injured in the sixth bull-run of the colourful fiesta included a 62-year-old local and a person from San Francisco, California, both of whom were treated for head injuries, the regional government said in a statement.
Strange religious bedfellows unite for letter against hotel porn
CNN
A letter penned by two notable scholars – a Christian and a Muslim – and sent to a number of different hotel industry executives has asked those hotels to remove pornography from their company’s in-room movie selections.
Robert P. George, a professor at Princeton University and the past chairman of the conservative National Organization for Marriage, and Shaykh Hamza Yusuf, co-founder of Zaytuna College, a Muslim school, wrote the letter to urge hotels “to do what is right as a matter of conscience.”
“We are, respectively, a Christian and a Muslim, but we appeal to you not on the basis of truths revealed in our scriptures but on the basis of a commitment that should be shared by all people of reason and goodwill: a commitment to human dignity and the common good,” reads the letter.
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