SheZow has arrived

Television’s latest animated superhero sports a purple skirt and cape, pink gloves and white go-go boots – and is, you might say, a transformer.images-1

She is also a he.

“Meet SheZow, the star of a cartoon debuting Saturday on the Hub, a kids’ cable channel co-owned by cable programming giant Discovery Communications and toy manufacturerHasbro Inc. The story is being reported widely. Below is coverage from the LA Times.

“In “SheZow,” a 12-year-old boy — named Guy — uses a magic ring to transform himself into a legendary crime fighter. When evil lurks, Guy says, “You go girl!” and becomes SheZow.

“When I first heard about the show, my reaction was ‘Are you out of your minds?'” said Margaret Loesch, chief executive of the Hub. “Then I looked at it and I thought, ‘This is just funny.'”

“The Hub is hoping some of SheZow’s magic powers rub off on it so it can better battle the giants of children’s television:Nickelodeon, Disney Channel and Cartoon Network.

“Launched in October 2010, the Hub has barely registered a blip in the highly competitive kids’ TV marketplace. It has a few minor successes including “My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic” and “Transformers,” but overall its ratings are tiny. Among kids 2 to 11, the Hub’s primary target, it averages 56,000 viewers a day, according to Nielsen. Disney and Nickelodeon each average 934,000 kids in that group. Continue reading “SheZow has arrived”

Cyberwar against Israel

“The Israeli government said that its websites logged about 44 million hacking attempts following the bombardment of Gaza Strip since Wednesday,” says the technology site, The Droid Guy in an article today entitled “Israeli Websites Under Attack.” The essay continues:

“Yuval Steinitz, the country’s Finance Minister, said that an unnamed government website was successfully hacked only once, but it  was back online after 10 minutes.

“Government websites in Israel are typically hit hundreds of times in a typical day, the Finance Ministry said. Websites related to national defense of Israel were hit the hardest although the site of the country’s president also logged 10 million hacking attempts. The Foreign Ministry site was hacked 7 million times while the prime minister’s site experienced about 3 million attempts.

“Although sources of the attacks came from around the world, most of them originated from Israel and Palestinian territories. Minister Steinitz said: ‘The ministry’s computer division will continue to block the millions of cyber attacks. We are enjoying the fruits of our investment in recent years in developing computerized defense systems.’”

“He has reportedly instructed the ministry to use back up systems to counter the hacking attempts on government websites. Both combatants have utilized social media recently to gain support around the world.  The Israeli Defense Force is using almost all social media sites while Palestinian terrorists are embracing Twitter. For complete story, see, “Israeli Websites Under Attack.”