Cornell University researchers report what appears to be a statistically significant relationship between autism rates and television watching by children under the age of 3.

The researchers studied autism incidence in California, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and Washington state. They found that as cable television became common in California and Pennsylvania beginning around 1980, childhood autism rose more in the counties that had cable than in the counties that did not.

They further found that in all the Western states, the more time toddlers spent in front of the television, the more likely they were to exhibit symptoms of autism disorders. The Cornell study represents a potential bombshell in the autism debate.

Interested to read the full report? Click here! (This story ganked from Slashdot.)

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For those of you whom did not notice, I VLOGged (Video Blogged) quite a bit yesterday. I have a crappy Kodak MC3 video camera with a 16MB Flash Memory Card. It was given to me by Johnny as a Christmas present in 2002. It was cutting edge back then. It was an amazing gift to give a geek, especially from someone like John, who wasn't technical in the least! (I'm sure he got help obtaining it!) Sadly, after opening it up, I flipped into "geek mode" and played with it wanting to know everything about it -- Johnny grew jealous of the new tech device in my life, a fight ensued (which was 'business as usual' with anything that distracted me from worshiping him -- an example quote: "You love that computer more than me!!"), and the device was shelved -- for years. (Have you ever been in a relationship and fight over something silly, and because of that fight, the object/thing harbours a bad memory from that point on, causing you to avoid it? For example, a favourite song, a vacation spot, a commemorative plate, etc.? -- well that's what this MC3 was to me.)

Well, almost four years later, I'm using my camera to broadcast on YouTube... It's crappy by comparison from what I see others doing, and the sound quality sucks, and 16MB is only large enough for a short video -- but it's portable, which is a big plus! It's allowing me to take my blogging to the "next level" -- VLOGging -- does anyone care? Yeah -- I do. And that's all that matters in the long run. Let's see where this goes!

I'm still on target to start my new job on 1 November 2006. 15 days. I'll reply to Frick (and other e-mails) shortly -- I had a rough weekend working very odd hours.

For some stuff I think is good on YouTube, check out My YouTube Playlists (groups of similar videos), My YouTube Favourites, as well as My YouTube Subscriptions.

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Today's song is: Zebra - Who's Behind the Door. Zebra is a hard rock band that came together in 1975 in New Orleans, Louisiana. It features Randy Jackson (vocals/guitar), Felix Hanemann (bass/keyboards) and Guy Gelso (drums.) Their mainstream debut on Atlantic Records was in 1983, highlighted by the singles "Tell Me What You Want" and "Who's Behind The Door." Like Twisted Sister, Zebra cut their teeth on the East Coast club circuit, frequently playing at clubs in Long Island, NY.

Zebra started their career by playing covers of Led Zeppelin, Moody Blues and Rush songs: it was their early fans' reaction to their Led Zeppelin renditions that helped convince the band to bring their act to New York. Read more about Zebra.