The Live Indian Entertainment Blog

At least one of the two "runaway Prius" incidents from last week has been labeled questionable, and Toyota disagrees with the statements made by its driver, James Sikes. An earlier speculative report by Jalopnik raised questions about Sikes, who is bankrupt.

The statement by Toyota Motor Sales spokesman Mike Michels, made Monday afternoon during a press conference, said:

"There are significant inconsistencies between the event of March 8 and the findings of this investigation."

Toyota read the electronic data from Sikes' 2008 Prius. According to that data, he had applied the brakes and the accelerator alternately at least 250 times. Additionally, while Sikes' front brakes were worn away, his rear brakes were "fine."

However, Michels said that Toyota was not calling Sikes a liar. "We are not calling him anything," he said.

According to Toyota's press release:

• The accelerator pedal was tested and found to be working normally with no mechanical binding or friction. It should be noted that the Prius is not subject to a recall for sticking accelerator pedals and the Prius component is made by a different supplier than the one recalled.

• The front brakes showed severe wear and damage from overheating. The rear brakes and parking brake were in good condition and functional.

• A Toyota carpeted floor mat of the correct type for the vehicle was installed but not secured to the retention hooks. It was not found to be interfering or even touching the accelerator pedal.

• The pushbutton power switch worked normally and shut the vehicle off when depressed for 3 seconds as the 911 operator advised Mr. Sikes to do.

• The shift lever also worked normally and neutral could be selected. The neutral position is clearly marked and can be easily engaged by moving the lever left to the “N” marking.

• There were no diagnostic trouble codes found in the power management computer, nor was the dashboard malfunction indicator light activated. The hybrid self-diagnostic system did show evidence of numerous, rapidly repeated on-and- off applications of both the accelerator and the brake pedals.

• After examination of individual components, the front brakes were replaced and the vehicle was test driven, during which the vehicle was observed to be functioning normally.

• During testing, the brakes were purposely abused by continuous light application in order to overheat them. The vehicle could be safely stopped by means of the brake pedal, even when overheated.

The Prius braking system uses both conventional hydraulic friction brakes and a regenerative braking system which switches the electric drive motors into brakes to generate electricity.

The system features a sophisticated self- protection function which cuts engine power if moderate brake pedal pressure is applied and the accelerator pedal is depressed more than approximately 50 percent, in effect providing a form of “brake override.”

This function, which is intended to protect the system from overload and possible damage, was found to be functioning normally during the preliminary field examination.

In fact, a technician drove Sikes' car for two hours. During the test drive, when the technician pushed both the gas pedal and the brakes to the floor, the car shut off, as it should have. This would support Toyota's statements regarding the braking system on the Prius.

In the second "runaway Prius" incident last week, a 2005 Prius hit a stone wall last Tuesday, slightly injuring its 56-year-old driver. Toyota is sending representatives to Harrison, New York to read the electronic data from the Prius. The readings will be taken Wednesday.

You can watch CNN video of the press conference below:

On Monday, during his keynote at South by Southwest (SXSW), Twitter CEO Evan Williams announced a new “@anywhere” platform. @anywhere will allows sites to integrate Twitter functionality by using a few lines of Javascript, rather than implementing APIs.

The @anywhere feature is near launch, according to a Twitter blog post, but they didn't give a timeline. What they did do was announce a set of partners who will be ready to go with it when it launches.

When we're ready to launch, initial participating sites will include Amazon, AdAge, Bing, Citysearch, Digg, eBay, The Huffington Post, Meebo, MSNBC.com, The New York Times, Salesforce.com, Yahoo!, and YouTube. Imagine being able to follow a New York Times journalist directly from her byline, tweet about a video without leaving YouTube, and discover new Twitter accounts while visiting the Yahoo! home page—and that’s just the beginning. Twitter has proven to be compelling in a variety of ways. With @anywhere, web site owners and operators will be able to offer visitors more value with less heavy lifting.

Future announcements regarding the platform will come from the @anywhere Twitter account, username anywhere, located (where else) Here. There. Everywhere.

The Pew Research Project's State of the News Media 2010 report shows some dismal news for newspapers, like the New York Times, that plan to charge for online news. Of those surveyed, only 7 percent said they would be willing to pay for access to any news site.

While the Wall Street Journal stands out as a pay-for-access site, requiring a subscription for much of its content, the New York Times would be the first general newspaper of size to do so. It announced its plans in late January of this year, and scheduled the change for the beginning of 2011. The plan will essentially be metered: users will be able to view a certain number of stories per month, before being prompted to pay.

If you're not going to pay for news at a site, a consumer should expect ads. And 81 percent say they do not mind ads if it means they can get the content free. However, that could be because a) they simply ignore them, b) they use some sort of ad blocker. 79 percent said they never or rarely click on ads.

Additionally, loyalty isn't a big deal among online news readers. Only 35 percent of online news readers have a favorite site, with most consumers using multiple sites. However, of those, 57 percent rely on just two to five sites.

That loyalty equation extends to the "paywell" that some sites are thinking of putting up, requiring pay-to-view. 82 percent of those with a favorite site said they would switch if a paywall was erected.

The report also discusses other media sources, such as cable news. For the portion of the survey focused on online news, the project surveyed 2,259 people from Dec. 28, 2009, to Jan. 19, 2010. The margin of error is plus or minus five percentage points.