SAP, one of the largest software companies in the world, doesn't see autism as a disability. Just the opposite, actually. It's recruiting people with autism for jobs that take advantage of a unique ability they have to focus sharply on tasks that require attention to detail, such as software testing, computer programming and data testing.

The German company is working with the nonprofit Specialisterne, which helps people with autism get jobs at technology companies. SAP is expanding a pilot program running in India and Ireland to the U.S., Canada and Germany later this year, according to Bloomberg News.

By 2020, SAP estimates, 1% of its employees around the world will have autism, a goal activists are applauding. 

Hey, Sen. James Inhofe, how does that "slush" taste?

Just days after an EF5 tornado tore through Moore, Okla., killed at least 24 people, left thousands homeless and caused roughly $2 billion in damage, Oklahoma's Republican senators found themselves in the awkward position of receiving the kind of federal disaster aid they had argued so vehemently against just months before.

In January, Inhofe and Sen. Tom Coburn both voted against a $60 billion supplemental appropriation bill that was aimed largely at providing relief to victims of Superstorm Sandy, which slammed into coastal New York and New Jersey last year.

 

McDonald's (MCD) has had a tough time giving customers what they want when they want it here in the States, but in far less judgmental Japan it has no problem backing a dump truck's worth of french fries onto a customer's tray.

Japan Today notes that McDonald's outlets there are offering customers the Mega Potato, a container of fries double the size of an order of large fries that goes for roughly $5. At 350 grams, it's more than three-quarters of a pound of fries poured into a Golden Arches-stamped cardboard trough that McDonald's has advertised as "perfect for sharing."

The food press has already begun clutching its pearls over the fat content and the potential health consequences of the boat-sized order of fries, which will be available May 24 through June. At an estimated 1,142 calories, it is the highest-calorie food served at McDonald's, reports Muripo.

 

The Xbox One is already many things to many people -- just check its Twitter stream to see the gamut of opinion -- but Slate Magazine throws out something especially provocative: Is it Steve Jobs' dream device?

The idea goes back to something Jobs, the visionary chief executive of Apple (AAPL), said before he died in 2011. According to his biographer, Walter Isaacson, Jobs mentioned a television set that could serve as the hub for all the consoles, devices and movie players in the home and easily access content online.

That's a dream that has captivated the tech industry for years, but what Jobs said was quite intriguing: "It will have the simplest user interface you could imagine," he said. "I finally cracked it."

What exactly did Jobs crack? And maybe, just maybe, did Microsoft (MSFT) crack it a couple of years later with the Xbox One? 

After a management shakeup last fall, a terrible holiday season, a first-quarter loss, a questionable spate of investments and a shifting consumer culture that's basically turned big-box stores into showrooms for online merchants, Best Buy (BBY) could really use some good news.

Well, it's finally arrived. Best Buy CEO Hubert Joly really likes his chain's Samsung Experience mini-stores and wants to expand the concept to other brands and products.

Wait, really? That's what you've got? You hold a conference call with investors on Tuesday telling them that "there will be more" mini-shop sub-branding partnerships in the future, which you hope will drive customer traffic . . . and that's the big reveal? Somebody may not have thought this all the way through.

 

As Apple's (AAPL) tax strategies take center stage amid a debate about corporate loopholes, one former chief executive says he has the solution to what many people consider an unfair taxation system. 

"The corporate tax rate ought to be zero," Harvey Golub, the former CEO of American Express (AXP), told Bloomberg Television. 

Golub, currently the chairman of financial advisory firm Miller Buckfire, said the result would not only be fair but would boost economic activity. 

"You'd see a boom you couldn't believe," Golub said. 

But that idea isn't likely to go over well with most Americans.After all, many already find it unfair that they're socked with seemingly ever-rising taxes (on property and income) while Apple and a coterie of other corporations use techniques to shield their assets and profits.

 

A champion pigeon named Bolt is now the most expensive racing bird in the world, having sold for $400,000 over the weekend.

The year-old pigeon isn't even racing anymore. The buyer, a Chinese businessman, bought him for breeding, and his offspring will be used in competitive racing, The Associated Press reports.

Bolt's sale has shocked the bird-racing world. The last record-selling bird went for $322,000 in January 2012.

Bolt got a new owner after Belgian pigeon racer Leo Heremans, 66, decided to sell his 530 racing pigeons. The online auction drew buyers from all over the world, and Heremans made an estimated $5.7 million in the sale, The Daily Mail reports. 

Facing a surge in sales as the economy rebounds, U.S. automakers are cranking up their production in North America this summer rather than following the usual seasonal practice of closing plants and furloughing workers. That's especially welcome news, given the slashed production Detroit endured during the Great Recession.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Ford (F) expects to produce 200,000 more vehicles in 2013 by reducing its planned summer shutdown and expanding its production lines. It's adding a third shift to its Kansas City, Mo., plant that produces its F-150 pickup, its most profitable vehicle. It's also hiring workers for the plant near Detroit that makes the Mustang and the Fusion sedan.