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He is a, um, something.

(Credit: The Vocal Vault/YouTube Screenshot by Chris Matyszczyk/CNET)

Like a Republican congressman with the government, Bill Nye's doctor tried to shut him down.

At the end of last week's breathless, insane attempt to be the body double of Beethoven dancing the paso doble on "Dancing With The Stars," Bill Nye injured himself.

Lunging toward the lap of his partner, Tyne Stecklein, he tore his quadriceps tendon.

Like a good scientist, he went to see the doctor. The doctor cast a smug eye at him and said he wouldn't recommend anything other than a wheelchair.

Nye decided to eschew science for pure religious faith. But he had platelet treatment, just to keep science happy.

Manfully, he decided he would perform a jazz routine, quad be damned. He might as well have mounted a quad bike.

For Stecklein produced a piece of choreography that involved trying to get Nye to move as little as possible.

In the dance, it was Nye the, um, Future Guy, looking like a disinterred moonwalker.

The music was "Get Lucky," which seemed anything but all that jazz. It was anything but lucky for Nye.

He moved with all the fluid swiftness of the line at the DMV. He stood like a futuristic Swiss Guard at the Vatican, while Stecklein tried to demonstrate the stunning flexibility in every one of her working joints.

At the end, while her teeth shone as brightly as they could, his battery ran out.

"I don't know what Bob Fosse would say about the jazz, because I didn't see any," mused judge Bruno Tonioli.

Judge Carrie Ann Inaba added: "You only had one leg to dance on."

By the end, that leg was taken from under him and tossed onto the fire. He was eliminated from the show.

He had tried his best. But with that kind of injury, not even Lance Armstrong's doctors could have put him back together again.

In the end, he fell by the wayside, just as techies Mark Cuban and Steve Wozniak had before him.

There must have been one overwhelmingly sad piece of data dancing around Nye's brain: he didn't outlast Snooki.

(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)

With Congress' failure to agree on a federal budget for 2014 on Monday night, the US government began the process of shutting down, affecting many who work in science.

The first federal government shutdown since 1996 is expected to lead to the furlough of 800,000 federal employees in a wide range of services and departments, including federal science research programs such as space exploration.

"NASA will shut down almost entirely," President Obama said Monday in a statement, meaning unpaid time off for the majority of the agency's 18,000 employees. However, he said that Mission Control employees in Houston would remain on the job to support astronauts orbiting the Earth in the Space Station.

Other agencies conducting research programs expected to be affected include the Department of Energy and National Science Foundation, which will allow work to continue on projects supported by grants but won't be making any new payments.

Most of the Environmental Protection Agency 17,000 employees will also be staying home, EPA chief Gina McCarthy said last week, according to The Hill. A few EPA officials would remain on the job "to keep the lights on and to respond in the event of a significant emergency," she said.

Meanwhile, many employees essential to the nation's safety and defense will keep working. The US military's 1.4 million active personnel would be expected to stay at their posts, their paychecks will be delayed, despite a House bill that would have ensured that troops would continue to be paid on time in the event of a government shutdown.

Also tasked with protecting the nation's security, employees of the Department of Homeland Security are exempt from the shutdown, as are most employees of the Customs and Border Protection and the Transportation and Security Administration, which will continue to screen airline passengers. The FAA said its air traffic controllers will stay on the job to prevent disruption to air travel.

The National Weather Service would continue monitoring atmospheric conditions and issuing forecasts. Similarly, employees of the National Hurricane Center and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration will stay on the job. The US Geological Survey will cease operations.

However, AsteroidWatch, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's effort to detect and track asteroids and comets that could pose a threat to Earth, said it will stop tweeting about potential threats. "In the event of government shutdown, we will not be posting or responding from this account. We sincerely hope to resume tweets soon," the office said in a tweet Monday.

Google's doodle for Tuesday celebrates the 123rd anniversary of Yosemite National Park on the same day that a federal government shutdown means the gates to Yosemite will be locked.

(Credit: Google)

Few can argue that Yosemite is one of the natural wonders of the world. It is perhaps America's most famous, and glorious, national park, with stunning attractions like Half Dome, El Capitan, Yosemite Falls, and much more bringing in millions of visitors a year.

And Tuesday is Yosemite's 123rd anniversary as a national park. To celebrate, Google created a lovely doodle commemorating the anniversary.

Tuesday is also the first day of the federal government shutdown, and thanks to Congress' inability to fund many of the government's operations, non-essential institutions like national parks are being shut down until Congress reaches an agreement on a budget.

That means that on the very day that Google is celebrating the anniversary of the opening of one of America's most cherished parks, the federal government is closing the park's gates.

Did Google do this on purpose? CNET has reached out to the search giant, and will update this story if we receive a response.

Regardless, the symbolism of the government being forced to close the doors to one of our country's most popular destinations thanks to irresponsible legislators is stark. So today, since we are unable to visit Yosemite and take in its glories, let's at least appreciate the park, and the countless others in the National Park system, as well as the work done by so many other federal agencies. It may be awhile before we're able to take advantage of them again.

(Credit: Acer)

Powerful desktop replacement laptops with 17-inch and even 18-inch screens are common, while most all-in-one systems we see have 23-inch or 27-inch displays. Acer finds some common ground with the just-announced Acer Aspire ZC-605, a 19.5-inch all-in-one that the company calls, "compact, comfortable, and affordable."

At $599, the ZC-605 is certainly at the lower end of the desktop all-in-one prince range. And with a 19.5-inch display, it's hardly larger than some of the bigger laptops we've reviewed.

On the positive side, there's a full 1TB HDD, two USB 3.0 ports (and two more USB 2.0 ports), and Wi-Fi and Bluetooth are built in. The frame itself tilts from 10 degrees to 30 degrees for easier viewing, and there's an HDMI input for using the screen as a standalone display.

We haven't seen this Pentium-powered all-in-one in person yet, but it will be interesting to see how it does with Windows 8 and its tile-based interface. The Acer Aspire ZC-605 will be available from Amazon for $599.

(Credit: Bang with Friends)

Bang with Friends has been no stranger to controversy in its short life span. But, it appears the hookup app could now be on the straight and narrow.

Not only has Bang with Friends ironed out a spat it had with Apple over its salacious name, the app has also settled a lawsuit with Zynga over alleged trademark infringement.

Here is a joint statement that Zynga and Bang with Friends sent to CNET:

Zynga Inc. and Bang With Friends, Inc. are pleased that they have reached an amicable resolution of their dispute. Although the terms of the settlement are confidential, Bang With Friends, Inc. acknowledges the trademark rights that Zynga has in its WITH FRIENDS marks and will be changing its corporate name and rebranding its services in the near future. Details on the next version of Bang With Friends can be found at www.TheNextBang.com.

More details on the terms of the settlement were not disclosed. Zynga initially filed the lawsuit against Bang with Friends in July claiming that the app infringed on its "with friends" franchise.

"Defendant's 'Bang With Friends' app caught a free ride on the coattails of Zynga's famed WITH FRIENDS family of marks and gained notoriety while simultaneously causing consumer confusion and falsely associating the 'Bang With Friends' app with Zynga," the game maker's complaint read.

Bang with Friends is an iPhone and Android app that helps Facebook users find friends who are "down to bang." The Facebook-connected app first arrived on the Web in January and by May said it had about 1 million one-night-stand seekers. The app's founders have said that they made the app in one night with the help of "a lot of Red Bull and Vodka."

Besides being slapped with the lawsuit by Zynga, Bang with Friends was also yanked from Apple's App Store in May reportedly because of its brazen approach to hookups. After months of being unavailable, the iOS version of the app finally switched its name to the more family-friendly "Down." For its part, Google Play let Bang with Friends keep its name.

One of three cross-site scripting vulnerabilities that High Tech Bridge uncovered on Yahoo's sites. It has since been fixed by Yahoo.

(Credit: High Tech Bridge)

Bug bounties from Google and Facebook regularly clear thousands of dollars for a single, high-profile bug. Yahoo finally has joined the game, also for four figures -- but with a different decimal place.

The security firm High Tech Bridge set out to see what Yahoo would pay for disclosing bugs discovered on its site, since the company hadn't stated what they were worth but did say that it encouraged researchers to report bugs.

After reporting three cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities that could compromise a user's account with what High Tech Bridge described as basic phishing techniques, Yahoo responded with its thanks within 48 hours. The research firm was rewarded with $12.50 per vulnerability, significantly lower than Facebook's or Google's lowest bounties, which come in at $500 and $100 for the lowest priority bugs, respectively.

Not only were Yahoo's bounties lower by at least a factor of 10, but the money could be spent only in where it sells company-branded tchochkes.

The bugs all had been patched by the time that High Tech Bridge published its press release on Monday.

The company wrote, "At this point we decided to hold off on further research."

A request for comment by Yahoo was not immediately returned. CNET will update the story when we hear back from Yahoo.

Pinterest didn't only become $7.2 million richer on Monday, it now also owns 100 domain names that bear a resemblance to Pinterest.com.

The social network won a judgment against alleged serial Chinese cybersquatter Qian Jin in US District Court in San Francisco on Monday. Judge Richard Seeborg awarded Pinterest $7.2 million in damages and legal fees, while also issuing an injunction against Jin to hand over the domain names he'd been sitting on, including pintesrest.com, pinterests.com, pimterest.com, and pinterest.es.

"This is a good outcome for the people who use Pinterest," a company spokesperson told CNET. "We'll continue to work to protect pinners and our trademarks."

The social network filed its complaint against Jin in August 2012 claiming that he partook in cyberpiracy, trademark infringement, and trademark dilution. According to the complaint, Jin bought 100 domain names that were strikingly similar to Pinterest.com.

"Defendant Qin Jian [sic] is a serial cybersquatter who has registered and owns hundreds of domain names that are very similar to the marks of several large companies," Judge Seeborg's order granting judgment against Jin read. "By attracting more visitors to his websites, defendant can make more money from advertising revenue."

"Pinterest contends these domains directed web traffic away from pinterest.com, harming them financially," he continued.

Cybersquatting is nothing new, but rarely have companies been able to pinpoint one distinct person gathering up so many domains. Yahoo went to Beijing in 1998 in an effort to claim its domain name from Chinese squatters and Apple has been troubled by squatters that led users to Web sites that sell pornography instead of Apple-related products.

Pinterest was seeking $12 million in damages, which was the maximum allowed. In addition to the $7.2 million damages award and the transfer of domain names to Pinterest, Judge Seeborg also issued an injunction banning Jin from registering "misleading or similar-sounding domain names or otherwise infringe upon the Pinterest mark in the future."

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg speaking in an Internet.org video.

(Credit: Screengrab by Dara Kerr/CNET)

Two thirds of the world's population doesn't have access to the Internet and this is something Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and a coalition of tech companies want to change. Their goal: bring the Internet to every single person on Earth.

While the partnership between the companies, dubbed Internet.org, was announced last month, Zuckerberg released a video on Monday explaining how the coalition aims to bring the Web to nearly 5 billion new people.

"Our plan is to make basic Internet services affordable so that everyone with a phone can join the knowledge economy," Zuckerberg said. "In order for this to be economically feasible we need to make the Internet 100 times more affordable."

To bring down the price of Internet service, Zuckerberg suggested a combination of lowering the costs associated with infrastructure and lowering the amount of data used.

To cut infrastructure costs, he said cell phone towers need to be upgraded so signals can travel further, spectrum needs to be used more efficiently, and smartphone hardware prices need to be lowered. For data, he said that apps should cache data instead of request it and that compression algorithms should be used.

A study by the Pew Internet and American Life Project released last week looked at the 15 percent of people in the US who still don't go online. According to the study, one of the contributing factors that limits people's access to the Internet is affordability.

"When I was getting started with Facebook, I could build it because I had access to the Internet and a few basic tools that gave me what I needed to build it this for the world," Zuckerberg said in the video. "If we can get to a point where everyone around the world has access to those same tools, then everyone is going to be able to benefit from the innovation and ideas and hard work of billions of people around the world."

(Credit: NASA Langley/Preston Martin)

Build a tiny plane, cover it in fluorescent oil, and use the results to improve the design of future air-based transport.

That's what researchers at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., hope to achieve with a toy-size model of a hybrid plane. The image above shows a 5.8 percent scale model of a futuristic hybrid wing body, coated in fluorescent oil before being blasted with air.

The team sent the hybrid plane through a 14x22-foot subsonic wind tunnel to "see" and document the patterns of air flowing over and around the model.

While a vast amount of data can be recorded by viewing the movement of a plane with the naked eye, using oil helps researchers view minute details and tweak designs with more precision. By documenting lift and drag in this manner, NASA hopes to improve the aerodynamics of future planes.

The space agency has been pushing research to improve flight efficiency in recent years. As an example, NASA and aircraft carrier Boeing have formed a partnership to improve the flight of craft in space and more efficiently transport crew to and from the International Space Station.

This story originally appeared on SmartPlanet.

The Ematic EGP800's specs rival the iPad Mini's, but the price sure doesn't.

(Credit: Ematic)

Looking for a tablet that's a bit larger than, say, a Google Nexus 7 or Kindle Fire HD? The poster tablet for "slightly bigger" is, of course, Apple's 7.9-inch iPad Mini, but it starts at $329.

Today, low-cost tablet maker Ematic launched the EGP008, an 8-inch model priced at $129.99. How does it compare with the Mini? You might be surprised.

The EGP008 measures 7.9 inches by 6.1 inches by 0.4 inch -- wider and thicker than the Mini, but not by much. It is, however, definitely on the heavier side at 1 pound.

Surprisingly, Ematic's tablet matches up pretty closely when it comes to the screen, at least in terms of specs: 1,024x768 pixels, same as the Mini, and 160 pixels per inch (versus 163 on the Mini). Ematic also promises the same 10 hours of run time on a charge from the EGP008's 3,000mAh battery.

Unsurprisingly, the Mini has the faster processor in the form of Apple's A5, though I'd say the EGP008 is no slouch with its 1.6GHz dual-core ARMv7 and quad-core GPU. Ematic offers only 8GB of onboard storage, but that's easily expandable (in 32GB chunks) thanks to the tablet's microSD slot. There's even an HDMI output for connecting to an HDTV.

The only real hardware limitation appears to be the fairly low-res cameras: 2 megapixels in back and just 0.3 in front. The latter may be sufficient for Skype calls, but I wouldn't count on this tablet for a lot of photography or videography.

The EGP008 runs Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean), and unlike some low-cost Android tablets, it includes full access to Google Play. That puts it on a fairly level playing field with iTunes.

Because I haven't had any hands-on time with Ematic's latest, I can't say how the user experience really compares with the Mini. I can say that it's priced a full $200 less and offers hardware that's comparable in some areas and superior in others.

Your thoughts?

One of the features in the OS X Finder is Quick Look, which lets you bring up an information window for the document, and if the system has a supported plug-in for it, enables you to preview its contents before launching a program to handle it.

If you have more than one item selected in the Finder when using Quick Look, you can use arrow keys to navigate through the selection. If only one item is selected, then pressing the arrow keys with the preview window open will move to the next item in the current Finder folder and display Quick Look information on it.

To open a Quick Look window, you can right-click a document and choose Quick Look, or you can do so from the system's File menu, where you can see that yet another option is to use Command-Y.

A more common approach is to simply tap the spacebar on your keyboard; the system will invoke Quick Look on the selected items. However, if you are using Apple's Magic Trackpad or the built-in trackpad for a MacBook, you can use a hidden gesture to invoke Quick Look. Simply use three fingers to tap the trackpad, and the current item under the mouse cursor will be targeted for Quick Look.

Unfortunately this gesture does not invoke Quick Look on a selection, and if you have items selected, it will deselect all but the item under the mouse cursor. Nonetheless, it may still come in handy as an option to use in addition to the spacebar, command hot key, and menu options.

Questions? Comments? Have a fix? Post them below or !

Be sure to check us out on Twitter and the CNET Mac forums.

The school in question.

(Credit: Screenshot by Chris Matyszczyk/CNET)

"This'll learn them. How dare they mock me in public?"

This is my imagined monologue of Judson Middle School Assistant Principal Adam Matot. For he took it upon himself to ask the law to sanction those who had taken against him.

Yes, they happened to be his students. And yes, they appear to have made parody Facebook and Twitter accounts that mocked him, presumably in a middle school sort of way.

But did it seem reasonable to invoke the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act in order to put them (and their parents) into emotional -- and, who knows, financial -- detention?

Yet, as Boing Boing reported, this is what he did.

His complaint was stunningly educative. It alleged that these growing humans had used Facebook and Twitter "without authorization." He also used terms such as "defamation," "negligent supervision," and "parental liability."

Some might imagine that, in invoking the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act -- the very same used against the now deceased Aaron Swartz -- Matot was suffering from negligent supervision of his faculties.

US District Judge Michael J. McShane wasn't impressed. In denying Matot's action, he reminded him that the idea of unauthorized computer behavior meant having no authorization to use a particular computer for any purpose. No, these kids weren't exactly hackers. They may merely have been hacked off with their principal.

One sentence from the judgment is especially poetic. Referring to another case, it said: "The Court found that 'lying on social media websites is very common.'"

Even the police, the judge noted, were known to create false profiles in order to entrap bad people.

Matot wasn't going to give up without a battle, however. When he discovered he couldn't persuade the judge on CFAA grounds, he tried to invoke RICO.

In case you aren't sure what RICO stands for, it's the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.

Yes, there were two students creating these parody account. They were clearly a criminal organization.

The judge might well have offered a hollow laugh. For, in reply, he offered: "Congress did not intend to target the misguided attempts at retribution by juvenile middle school students against an assistant principal in enacting RICO."

I fear the judge was accusing Matot of trying to parody the law.

Matot is still listed as the middle school's assistant principal on the school's Web site.

At least, I think it's the school's Web site.

The PicoBrew Zymatic can serve up your suds according to the recipe you choose.

(Credit: Kickstarter)

Craft beer and microbreweries have exploded in popularity over the last decade, prompting many enthusiasts to try making their own suds.

I've never done that, but it sounds like a lot of trouble. Not to mention a lot of time that could be better spent drinking craft beer.

Enter the PicoBrew Zymatic, billed as "the world's first fully automatic all-grain beer brewing system."

Developed in Seattle, the countertop box debuted on Kickstarter Monday, and is already more than a third of the way to its campaign goal of $150,000.

PicoBrew co-founder Bill Mitchell describes the device as "an espresso maker for beer." It consists of a brewing box and a Cornelius keg attached to it with hoses.

You load a series of containers with malted barley and hops, pour water into the keg, then select a recipe. It will produce unfermented beer in a few hours.

Then you put the stuff into the keg, add some yeast, and your beer will be ready about a week after carbonating. Check out the details here.

The developers say the PicoBrew Zymatic brings the reliability and quality of commercial brewing to the kitchen. The promo vid on the campaign page suggests that commercial brewers may also be interested in PicoBrew to experiment with new recipes.

The machine doesn't come cheap, however. It started at $1,299 for Kickstarter backers, and now it's only available for $1,399 and up.

Would you try home brewing with this? Or are you happy getting your brew from your local bar or corner store?

Menu screens on the PicoBrew Zymatic.

(Credit: Kickstater)

An artist's rendering of a 'chemical computer' executing a molecular program.

(Credit: Yan Liang/L2XY2.com)

Chemical reaction networks make up an old language of equations that detail how chemicals behave together. Now engineers at the University of Washington are taking this language into the 21st century with a computer program for chemistry that can help direct the movement of synthetic molecules.

This standardized set of instructions on how to "program" how DNA molecules interact in a test tube or cell could pave the way for smart drug delivery systems and disease detectors at the cellular level, the researchers report this week in the journal Nature Nanotechnology.

"We start from an abstract, mathematical description of a chemical system, and then use DNA to build the molecules that realize the desired dynamics," author Georg Seelig, a UW assistant professor of electrical engineering and of computer science and engineering, said in a school news release. "The vision is that eventually you can use this technology to build general-purpose tools."

Seelig calls his team's approach a "programming language" because, he says, much like how programming languages tell computers what to do, "we can tell chemistry what to do."

The language is increasingly important as scientists develop ways to design synthetic systems that mimic biological ones to help, say, support a body's natural functions.

And while the language isn't yet ready for prime time, it could ultimately be used to make molecules that self-assemble within cells to become smart sensors, programmed to carry out such duties as tracking vitals or detecting abnormalities.

The researchers received $2 million in funding from the National Science Foundation as part of a larger initiative to advance molecular programming.

This is the gritty droid you're looking for.

(Credit: Video screenshot by Amanda Kooser/CNET)

As was the case with many "Star Wars" fans, the prequels left me feeling cold. They just didn't have that sense of excitement, life, and pluckiness of the original films. I felt alienated by the CGI and the mere sight of Jar Jar Binks. I've had some difficulty putting my disappointment into words, but now Portland, Ore., ad agency Sincerely Truman has summed it all up for me in a two-minute video aimed at J.J. Abrams.

Abrams has accepted the major responsibility of carrying "Star Wars" forward. He has a massive legacy to live up to, but he also has to overcome the missteps of the prequel films. I don't envy him the task, but if anyone is up to it, he is. I sure hope he's paying attention to Sincerely Truman's sweet and simple, "4 Rules to Make Star Wars Great Again" video.

The rules are as follows: 1. The setting is the frontier. 2. The future is old. 3. The Force is mysterious. 4. "Star Wars" isn't cute.

Essentially, this is a plea to bring "Star Wars" back to its gritty space-Western origins. It's asking Abrams to let the Force be magical and to dump the cutesy stuff like the Great Jar Jar Binks Disaster of 1999.

The video is just the first volley in an effort to get Abrams' attention. There is also a Web site (Dear JJ Abrams) and petition dedicated to the cause. The agency promises to deliver the petition and a copy of the video to Disneyland if it reaches 1 million digital signatures.

I know this drive is also a bit of a publicity stunt for Sincerely Truman, but I don't care because a lot of thought went into the video and the fan-passion for "Star Wars" is obvious. I signed the petition. Here's hoping Abrams is listening.

Any potato gun or punkin' chunkin' fans can appreciate the awesomeness of launching one of these at the moon.

(Credit: NASA/JPL Near-Earth Object Program Office)

NASA has its eyes on lassoing and then studying a captive orbiting asteroid, but what happens to such a space rock when the space agency is all done with it?

"Once you're finished with it and you have no further need of it, send it in to impact the moon," Paul Chodas, scientist with the Near-Earth Object Program Office at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said at the recent Space 2013 conference, according to Space.com. "That makes sense to me."

In case you missed NASA's ambitious asteroid abduction plan, the idea is to snag one and place it in a stable orbit around Earth where it can be visited many times by astronauts, researchers, and potential space miners.

Chodas was speaking about what may happen when the asteroid has outlasted its usefulness to its captors. He figures the asteroid could stay in its orbit for at least 100 years without causing too much trouble (depending upon the amount of space junk it comes in contact with, presumably), but if we prefer to dispose of it, he said an impact trajectory with our largest satellite is one way to go.

Watch below for a video illustration of how the asteroid capture mission could go down. It's almost as awesome as the notion that we could one day get to play a modern version of the video game "Asteroids" -- only with a real asteroid ... and the frickin' moon. That's way better than lasers.

"Tower of Babble: The Confusion of Tongues," by Gustave Dore, reflects a top-down management approach.

(Credit: Wikimedia)

The Book of Genesis describes how humanity once spoke a single language. We didn't need Google Translate, interpreters, or subtitles.

We all clicked together so awesomely that it was just natural for us to want to build a skyscraper that would reach heaven. It sounded great, especially the penthouse, but God didn't like that and split our language into incomprehensible gibberish, according to the Bible.

So much for Babel. But the ancestors of more than 2 billion people alive today are believed to have spoken a common tongue, and a linguist has recorded what it might have sounded like.

Andrew Byrd of the University of Kentucky recorded short stories in Proto-Indo-European (PIE), a reconstructed tongue that may have been spoken by some of our forebears up to about 4,000 years ago.

Recently highlighted in the journal Archaeology, Byrd's recordings provide an insight into what the lost tongue may have sounded like.

They remind me of my college days studying Old English, with its many "w" and "h" sounds, as well as the bizarre modern script for writing PIE.

PIE seems to have given birth to nearly every language spoken from Europe through India, from English and Russian to Hindi and Urdu (Finnish and Hungarian, among others, came from elsewhere). PIE reconstructions such as "meH₂tér-" and "swésor" are recognizable as "mother" and "sister."

A tale dubbed "The Sheep and the Horses" was published by German linguist August Schleicher in 1868 to hear an approximation of PIE. This is how it reads in English:

A sheep that had no wool saw horses, one of them pulling a heavy wagon, one carrying a big load, and one carrying a man quickly. The sheep said to the horses: "My heart pains me, seeing a man driving horses." The horses said: "Listen, sheep, our hearts pain us when we see this: a man, the master, makes the wool of the sheep into a warm garment for himself. And the sheep has no wool." Having heard this, the sheep fled into the plain.

And here's Byrd reading it in PIE, based on more recent work by linguist H. Craig Melchert:

Another story is entitled "The King and the God," and was created in the 1990s with inspiration drawn from the Rigveda, an ancient Sanskrit text.

Once there was a king. He was childless. The king wanted a son. He asked his priest: "May a son be born to me!" The priest said to the king: "Pray to the god Werunos." The king approached the god Werunos to pray now to the god. "Hear me, father Werunos!" The god Werunos came down from heaven. "What do you want?" "I want a son." "Let this be so," said the bright god Werunos. The king's lady bore a son.

What do you think? Do any sounds seem familiar to you? Or is it all just babble?

(Via Huffington Post)