Leftovers

• Scott Willsey ☛ Cool Site Spotlight

  If the web is ever going to be cool again, this is how it starts: finding and linking to things that make it a better place.

• EAPL.mx ☛ [EN] Notifications

  I think we have 2 opposite extremes:

  - Being obsessed checking something due to FOMO, every time your mind asks for it

  - Being interrupted in any random moment, so you 'have' to stop what you are doing to check the notification

• Jack Baty ☛ The current blog situation - Jack Baty

  Hooboy, it’s happened again. I made the mistake of falling in love with too many tools. Combine that with my short attention span, and I’ve spread myself too thin, blog-wise.

  The problem is that one day I want to burn it all down and find One True Blog. Other days, most days, I want to use them all. Why force a decision when I can waffle between a half-dozen playgrounds?

• Standards/Consortia

  • India Times ☛ EU's new tech laws are working - small browsers gain market share

    Independent browser companies in the European Union are seeing a spike in users in the first month after EU legislation forced Alphabet's Google, Microsoft and Apple to make it easier for users to switch to rivals, according to data provided to Reuters by six companies.

    The early results come after the EU's sweeping Digital Markets Act, which aims to remove unfair competition, took effect on March 7, forcing big tech companies to offer mobile users the ability to select from a list of available web browsers from a "choice screen."

  • Bryan Lunduke ☛ Myth: "HTML was invented by Tim Berners-Lee"

• Science

  • Niall Murphy ☛ Rice's Theorem and Software Failures

    Enter computational theory.

    Rice’s Theorem is related to the Halting Problem, which we won’t itself specifically discuss here, except to say that it is hugely important and generally well covered in undergraduate Computer Science.

    Rice’s Theorem, a generalization of the Halting Problem, states that all non-trivial semantic properties of programs are undecidable.

• Education

  • BIA Net ☛ Educators' union urges scrapping of intelligence agency's Children's Day event

    The activities of institutions like MİT and Diyanet targeting children “exceed their constitutional boundaries and responsibilities,” according to the Eğitim-Sen union.

  • Barry Hess ☛ My First Program

    In the early 80’s my aunt and uncle sent our family a TI-99/4A for Christmas. It came with a couple code listing books and some games: [...]

  • Jim Nielsen ☛ You Are What You Read, Even If You Don’t Always Remember It

    Then a couple days later my wife sent me this quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson:

    "I cannot remember the books I've read any more than the meals I have eaten; even so, they have made me."

    YES!

  • Juha-Matti Santala ☛ Prepare, Perform, Ponder

    Over the years, I’ve adopted a three-step feedback cycle to my life. To make it sound cool in a title of a blog post, I wanted to make it into an alliteration Prepare, Perform and Ponder. I like the sound of it.

    I use it for most of the things I do in my life: from work projects to meetings to doing talks to my goals in life.

• Hardware

  • CNX Software ☛ Maiyunda M1 Alder Lake-N mini PC comes with four quick-release M.2 NVMe SSD slots, four 2.5GbE ports

    Maiyunda M1 is an unusual defective chip maker Intel N100 or Core i3-N305 Alder Lake-N mini PC and soft router equipped with four M.2 NVMe SSD slots so users can replace storage devices without having to open the enclosure, as well as four 2.5GbE ports for networking applications.

  • CNX Software ☛ Arm Ethos-U85 NPU delivers up to 4 TOPS for Edge Hey Hi (AI) applications in Cortex-M7 to Cortex-A520 SoCs

    Arm has just Introduced its third-generation NPU for edge Hey Hi (AI) with the Arm Ethos-U85 that scales from 256 GOPS to 4 TOPS or up to four times the maximum performance of the previous generation Ethos-U65 microNPU, while also delivering 20% higher power efficiency. While previous Arm microNPUs were paired with Cortex-M microcontroller-class cores potentially embedded into a Cortex-A application processor, the new Ethos-U85 can be married with Cortex-M microcontrollers and Cortex-A application processors up to the Cortex-A510/A520 Armv9 cores.

  • CNX Software ☛ Axelera Metis PCIe Arm Hey Hi (AI) evaluation kit combines Firefly ITX-3588J mini-ITX motherboard with 214 TOPS Metis AIPU PCIe card

    Axelera has announced the general availability of several Metis PCIe Hey Hi (AI) Evaluation Kits that combine the company’s 214 TOPS Metis AIPU PCIe card with x86 platforms such as Dell 3460XE workstation and Lenovo ThinkStation P360 Ultra computers, Advantech MIC-770v3 or ARC-3534 industrial PCs, or the Firefly ITX-3588J mini-ITX motherboard powered by a Rockchip RK3588 octa-core Cortex-A76/A55 SoC.

  • India Times ☛ Google unveils Arm-based data center processor, new AI chip

    Google's tensor processing units (TPUs) are one of the few viable alternatives to the advanced AI chips made by Nvidia, though developers can only access them through Google's Cloud Platform and not buy them directly.

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • JURIST ☛ Norfolk Southern reaches tentative $600M settlement in train derailment class action suit

    Norfolk Southern Corporation (NSC) announced on Tuesday that it had reached a tentative settlement of $600 million in a class action lawsuit regarding the February 2023 freight train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio.

  • The Conversation ☛ Young people are getting unhappier – a lack of childhood freedom and independence may be partly to blame

    Younger generations have less freedom and independence than previous generations did. The area where children are allowed to range unsupervised outside has shrunk by 90% since the 1970s.

  • The Revelator ☛ Bioplastics Are Not the Solution

• Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)

  • Bitdefender ☛ Targus business operations disrupted following cyber attack

    But if it is ransomware, chances are that the attackers have not just encrypted systems, but have also exfiltrated large amounts of data from Targus's network and are threatening to release it to the wider world if the company doesn't give in to the extortionists' demands.

    Without SEC regulations that came into effect late last year, we might not have known so quickly about the problems Targus was experiencing.

  • Arduino ☛ Arduino featured in the 2024 State of the Edge AI Report

    “Simplicity is the key to success. In the tech world, a solution is only as successful as it is widely accepted, adopted and applied — and not everyone can be an expert. You don’t have to know how electricity works to turn on the lights, how an engine is built to drive a car, or how large language models were developed to write a ChatGPT prompt: that plays a huge part in the popularity of these tools,” Violante adds. “That’s why, at Arduino, we make it our mission to democratize technologies like edge AI — providing simple interfaces, off-the-shelf hardware, readily available software libraries, free tools, shared knowledge, and everything else we can think of. We believe edge AI today can become an accessible, even easy-to-use option, and that more and more people across all industries, in companies of all sizes, will be able to leverage this innovation to solve problems, create value, and grow.”

  • Wevolver ☛ 2024 State of Edge AI Report

    This is the second in-depth report on Edge AI by Wevolver after its inaugural report in 2023, which focused primarily on the technological side of Edge AI. This report explores Edge AI’s application side and its impact on the various industries mentioned above. Will Edge AI be one of the world’s fundamental technologies going forward? Will it continue to reshape our industries and become ubiquitous? If so, how? Let’s find the answers in the chapters below.

  • The Conversation ☛ To understand the risks posed by AI, follow the money

    We ought to heed Collingridge’s warning that technology evolves in uncertain ways. However, there is one class of AI risk that is generally knowable in advance. These are risks stemming from misalignment between a company’s economic incentives to profit from its proprietary AI model in a particular way and society’s interests in how the AI model should be monetised and deployed.

  • NYPost ☛ Waymo offering paid robotaxi rides in LA

    Despite pushback from local officials who cited safety concerns following the self-driving vehicles’ rocky test period, more than 50,000 people are sitting on the waitlist to try out the futuristic venture.

  • Axios ☛ Robotic dogs could take charge of work tasks instead of humanoid robots

    • Spot is a four-legged dog-shaped robot that's being used by first responders as well as for industrial inspections. About 1,500 are at work for Boston Dynamics customers, handling around 200,000 industrial inspections per quarter.

    • Stretch is a rolling warehouse worker that can lift up to 50 pounds and move boxes for up to 16 hours on a single charge — more than four times longer than today's humanoid robots.

    • Orbit is fleet management software for robots that was introduced in January.

  • CBC ☛ Tesla settles lawsuit on eve of trial in deadly automated-driving crash

    The settlement, the terms of which were not disclosed, came as Chief Executive Elon Musk is making major promotions of self-driving technology, which he has touted as key to the financial future of the world's most valuable automaker.

    The 2018 accident killed 38-year-old Walter Huang. His family had alleged that Autopilot steered his 2017 Model X into a highway barrier. Plaintiffs' lawyers asked a Tesla witness whether the company knew drivers would not watch the road when using its driver-assistance system, Reuters reported last month citing deposition transcripts.

  • The Register UK ☛ Arm looks to generative AI models at the edge with Ethos-U85

    Arm is aiming to boost AI performance at the edge with its latest embedded neural processing unit (NPU) and a Reference Design Platform for it to slot into, and said it expects to see devices based on it running generative AI models next year.

  • Futurism ☛ AI Can Pretend To Be Stupider Than It Really Is, Scientists Find

    Published in the journal PLOS One, researchers from Berlin's Humboldt University found that when testing out a large language model (LLM) on so-called "theory of mind" criteria, they found that not only can AI mimic the language learning stages exhibited in children, but seem to express something akin to the mental capabilities related to those stages as well.

    In an interview with PsyPost, Humboldt University research assistant and main study author Anna Maklová, who also happens to be a psycholinguistics expert, explained how her field of study relates to the fascinating finding.

• Security

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • NPR ☛ The government announced winners of a contest to tell real voices from deepfake audio

      OriginStory's technology leverages sensors in existing hardware, though it's not available in all recording equipment - newer Android phones and iPhones don't have them. Berisha says they are focusing on hardware that already can use it.

    • [Repeat] NYOB ☛ 'Pay or Okay' explained: Why more and more websites make you pay for your privacy

      So-called pay or consent systems are on the rise in Europe. First introduced by journalistic websites that were suffering from the loss of advertising revenue to big tech platforms, Meta adopted the approach for Instagram and Facebook in November 2023. In this video, we explain what this is all about and why this approach is dangerous for free consent online.

    • Scoop News Group ☛ FCC looks to limit how domestic violence abusers use connected cars

      Vehicle manufacturers have in recent years increased the number of communication services included in cars. These include GPS and remote start-up features that are offered as conveniences but can be used by abusers to track or harass their victims.

      “No survivor of domestic violence and abuse should have to choose between giving up their car and allowing themselves to be stalked and harmed by those who can access its connectivity and data,” FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said in a statement. “We can — and should — do more to make sure these new forms of communications help keep survivors safe.”

  • Confidentiality

    • [Old] Bruce Schneier ☛ Academic: The Risks of Key Recovery, Key Escrow, and Trusted Third-Party Encryption

      A variety of “key recovery,” “key escrow,” and “trusted third-party” encryption requirements have been suggested in recent years by government agencies seeking to conduct covert surveillance within the changing environments brought about by new technologies. This report examines the fundamental properties of these requirements and attempts to outline the technical risks, costs, and implications of deploying systems that provide government access to encryption keys.

• Defence/Aggression

  • YLE ☛ Court documents show possible domestic violence behind fatal McDonald's stabbing

    The man suspected in woman's deadly stabbing was previously under a restraining order.

  • Defence Web ☛ Op Aspides repels 11 Red Sea attacks in two months

    In less than two months the newest European Union (EU) naval force – Operation Aspides concentrated on the Red Sea – repelled 11 attacks and escorted close to 70 ships in the Indian Ocean inlet between Africa and Asia.

  • ADF ☛ Trilateral Exercise Strengthens Maritime Security in Indian Ocean

    Piracy is making a resurgence in the western Indian Ocean, and the region is rife with other sea crimes such as illegal fishing, drug smuggling, and human and weapons trafficking.

  • ADF ☛ Allied Democratic Forces Attack Threat has Uganda on High Alert

    ADF STAFF Ugandan security forces are on high alert after members of the Allied Democratic Forces terrorist organization entered the country from the Democratic Republic of the Congo in mid-March.

  • France24 ☛ Security stepped up for PSG-Barcelona Champions League match over terrorist 'threat'

    Security will be "considerably reinforced" at Wednesday's Champions League match in the French capital between Paris Saint-Germain and Barcelona after a "threat" from the Islamic State group, the interior minister said.

  • New York Times ☛ Champions League: Security Increased After ISIS Threats

    Online messages urged violent attacks on four matches, prompting the police in England, France and Spain to step up precautions.

  • ADF ☛ Intercommunal Violence Continues to Plague South Sudan

    Violence between rival communities has a long history in South Sudan, but the past year has seen a worrying rise in attacks that observers fear could become a wider crisis.

  • France24 ☛ Germany denies aiding 'genocide' in Gaza, says Israeli security at 'core' of foreign policy

    Israel's security is at the "core" of German foreign policy, the UN's highest court heard on Tuesday, where Berlin has denied a claim that it is aiding in a "genocide" in Gaza.

  • Los Angeles Times ☛ The U.S. might ban TikTok. Record labels are cutting ties. What's music's Plan B?

    In February, Universal Music Group, the largest record label conglomerate in the world, pulled its catalog from TikTok. Videos using music from Taylor Swift or Bad Bunny suddenly fell silent. After a contentious U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce hearing about ByteDance, the app’s Chinese parent firm, and its potential risks for data security and political influence, the House overwhelmingly passed a bill in March that could force a sale or ban TikTok (President Biden has said he’s open to signing that bill). The Senate has held closed-door meeting on the topic, and TikTok urged its users to contact Congress to protest.

  • Tech Central (South Africa) ☛ TikTok owner ByteDance is now bigger than Tencent

    The results mark the first time that ByteDance has overtaken arch-rival Tencent both in revenue and profit, as it leveraged its popular short-video platforms to expand into international e-commerce and sustain its global popularity. While ByteDance’s internal figures haven’t been independently audited, they suggest the ad-churning social media juggernaut became one of the world’s fastest-growing tech giants in 2023.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ US will hold China responsible if Russia makes gains in Ukraine

    With Moscow renewing its Ukraine offensive amid a deadlock in the US Congress on approving more weapons to Ukraine, Campbell warned that Russian territorial gains could “alter the balance of power in Europe in ways that are, frankly, unacceptable.”

    “We have told China directly, if this continues, it will have an impact on the US-China relationship. We will not sit by and say everything is fine,” Campbell said.

  • NPR ☛ Prosecutors say an Idaho man planned a church attack to support the Islamic State

    The recording was to accompany a photo the informant took of Mercurio in front of the IS flag holding up a knife and his index finger in a gesture commonly used by the group, the statement alleged.

    After attacking the church, Mercurio told the informant he planned to attack others in town — as many as 21 — before being killed in an act of martyrdom, according to the statement.

  • Truthdig ☛ Everything You Need to Know About the TikTok Debate

    Earlier this month, the U.S. House of Representatives made international headlines when it gave the green light on a bipartisan bill to force ByteDance, the majority owner of TikTok, to divest or face a nationwide ban in the United States. Invoking “national security,” officials expressed two fears: that TikTok will hand data on Americans to the Chinese government, and that the Chinese government will use its algorithm to influence American politics. To the chagrin of teenagers and influencers hooked on the app, the ban has support from nearly half of America.

  • [Repeat] Digital Music News ☛ Senator Mitch McConnell Comments on Potential TikTok Ban

    “This is a matter that deserves Congress’ urgent attention. And I’ll support, common sense, bipartisan steps to take one of Beijing’s favorite tools of coercion and espionage off the table,” he adds. “With TikTok, we’re not talking about meddling or hijacking an American platform. In this case, PRC influence and control have been baked in from the beginning. With Beijing’s blessing, TikTok’s algorithm pours gasoline on alarming trends.”

  • RFA ☛ Analysts: White House summit to bolster South China Sea security ties

    The leaders of the Philippines, Japan and the US will meet amid friction with Beijing over its maritime claims.

  • The Straits Times ☛ Expect more joint South China Sea patrols, US says ahead of summits with allies

    WASHINGTON - More joint patrols can be expected in the South China Sea after drills by the United States, Australia, the Philippines and Japan last weekend, U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan said on Tuesday, ahead of U.S. summits this week with the Japanese and Philippine leaders.

  • teleSUR ☛ Egypt, Jordan, France Urge Immediate Ceasefire in Gaza

    Al-Sisi, Abdullah II, and Macron called for the implementation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 2728.

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • Latvia ☛ Aven wins court case in Europe, but sanctions remain in place for now

      According to a release from the Latvian Ministry of Foreign Affairs April 10, Latvian citizen and Russian businessman Petr Aven has won a European-level court case seeking to annul sanctions imposed upon him in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. However, the ruling does not mean sanctions will be immediately lifted against him, the MFA stressed.

    • Latvia ☛ Two detained for damaging Ukrainian flag in Rīga

      State Police said April 10 it had detained two people who had torn a Ukrainian flag off a building in Rīga and filmed it.

    • Latvia ☛ Latvia and Ukraine to sign long-term support agreement

      On April 9, 2024, the Latvian Cabinet decided at its weekly meeting to support the signing of an Agreement between Latvia and Ukraine on Long-Term Support and Security Commitments.

    • AntiWar ☛ US Should Adopt the Mearsheimer Plan

      During a recent panel discussion sponsored by the Neutrality Studies YouTube channel and The American Committee for US-Russia Accord, the distinguished political scientist John J.

    • France24 ☛ Switzerland to host 'high-level' Ukraine peace summit in mid-June, says Russia will not attend

      The Swiss government on Wednesday announced that it would host a high-level peace conference for Ukraine in mid-June, but said Russia would not attend.

    • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Beijing ‘does not accept criticism or pressure’ over ties with Russia, Chinese foreign ministry says

      China vowed Wednesday it would not accept “criticism or pressure” over its ties with Russia, after Washington warned that it will hold Beijing responsible if Moscow makes gains in Ukraine.

    • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ US warns it will hold China responsible if Russia makes gains in Ukraine, after Beijing renews Moscow support

      The United States warned Tuesday that it will hold China responsible if Moscow makes gains in Ukraine, after Beijing renewed pledges of cooperation during a visit by Russia’s top diplomat.

    • RFA ☛ With eyes on Beijing, US and Japan pledge stronger ties

      ‘Ukraine today may be East Asia tomorrow,’ Japan's prime minister said at the White House.

    • RFERL ☛ Russia Ranked Top Of Global Cybercrime Index, With Ukraine Second

      Russia, Ukraine, and China have been named as the world’s cybercrime hotspots in a new study ranking the most significant sources of cybercrime threats.

    • RFERL ☛ Top U.S. General Tells Congress Ukraine 'Cannot Sustain Fight Against Russia Alone'

      The top U.S. general in Europe has warned that Ukraine cannot sustain its fight against Russia alone as a major spending bill languishes in the House of Representatives, blocked by a small number of Republicans who believe domestic matters should take priority.

    • RFERL ☛ Siberian Court Sends Man To Prison For Attempt To Join Pro-Ukrainian Militia

      A court in the Siberian city of Nizhnevartovsk on April 10 sentenced a 20-year-old man to nine years in prison for attempting to join the so-called Russian Volunteers' Corps (RDK) that has fought alongside Ukraine's armed forces against occupying Russian troops.

    • RFERL ☛ Former Pro-Russia Lawmaker Detained During Attempt To Leave Ukraine

      The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) said on April 10 that its officers had detained a former regional lawmaker of the banned pro-Russia Party of Regions as he tried to leave the country.

    • RFERL ☛ Igor Girkin, Imprisoned Russian Nationalist, Plans To Join Troops Invading Ukraine

      Russian nationalist Igor Girkin (aka Strelkov), who was sentenced to four years in prison in January on a charge of making public calls for extremist activities, will apply to join Russian troops invading Ukraine, his lawyer told the RBK news agency on April 10.

    • RFERL ☛ Russia Seeks To Recruit 400,000 Contract Soldiers This Year, U.K. Says

      Russia is aiming to sign up 400,000 contract soldiers this year to beef up its forces that have suffered huge losses in the Ukraine war, Britain's Ministry of Defense said in an intelligence update.

    • RFERL ☛ Russia Accuses Ukrainian Gas Company Linked To Biden’s Son Of Financing Terror

      Russia's top investigative body said it had opened a probe into a Ukrainian company that formerly had ties to the son of U.S. President Joe Biden, in what likely is an effort to spread disinformation in the midst of the heated U.S. presidential election campaign.

    • RFERL ☛ 2 Russians Jailed For Attempting To Join Legion Fighting For Ukraine

      A military court in Russia on April 10 sentenced two men to nine years in prison each in separate cases for their plans to join the Freedom of Russia legion fighting with Ukraine against Russian forces.

    • RFERL ☛ Russian Helicopter Downed In Crimea, Ukrainian Navy Says

      A Russian Ka-27 helicopter was destroyed in Ukraine's Moscow-occupied Crimea region, Ukrainian Navy spokesman Dmytro Pletenchuk wrote on Facebook (Farcebook) on April 10.

    • New York Times ☛ Ukraine’s New Draft Unsettles the Young

      Reporters from The New York Times spoke to men who could be affected by the change.

    • Latvia ☛ MEP Ždanoka gets penalty from European Parliament

      On Wednesday, April 10, the European Parliament (EP) sanctioned MP Tatjana Ždanoka of the Russian Union of Latvia for violating the European Parliament's code of conduct, Latvian Radio and Latvian Television reported.

    • Latvia ☛ More Russians could be required to pass Latvian language test

      Several thousand more Russian citizens in Latvia could be required to pass a Latvian language exam. These are the persons who received a permanent residence permit in Latvia in 1992. The Saeima will begin to view the relevant amendments this week, Latvian Television reported.

    • Latvia ☛ Survey suggests most schools plan to replace Russian with German

      Instead of Russian, schools could offer to teach German, French and Spanish as a second foreign language, according to a survey conducted by the Ministry of Education and Science (IZM), LETA reported on April 9.

    • France24 ☛ Tens of thousands evacuated in Russia, Kazakhstan amid worst floods in decades

      Russia and Kazakhstan ordered more than 100,000 people to evacuate after swiftly melting snow swelled mighty rivers beyond bursting point in the worst flooding in the area for at least 70 years.

    • LRT ☛ Tajik opposition activist arrested in Lithuania over alleged terrorist links

      Tajik opposition activist Sulaimon Davlatov has been detained in Lithuania for two months, his representatives say. According to the State Security Department (VSD), Davlatov has links to terrorist organisations.

    • JURIST ☛ ECHR rules Russia violated Georgia citizens’ humans rights following 2008 conflict

      The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled Tuesday that Russia’s occupation and border enforcement of two regions in Georgia systematically violated Georgians’ human rights.

    • LRT ☛ Kaunas mayor’s company exported dual-use goods to Russia – LRT Investigation

      A Lithuanian company co-owned by the mayor of Kaunas has been exporting sanctioned items, classified as “battlefield goods”, to Russia, the LRT Investigation Team has found. Vičiūnai Group admits it was shipping goods needed to maintain its factory in Kaliningrad, but claims it was not aware the items were sanctioned.

    • RFERL ☛ Kara-Murza's Wife Accuses Russia Of Using Punitive Cell To Hasten Prisoners' Illnesses

      The wife of Russian opposition politician Vladimir Kara-Murza said her husband has been held in solitary confinement for the last six months in a jail cell that is just a few square meters with a single stool, a tiny window covered with bars, and a bed that folds into the wall.

    • RFERL ☛ Russia Issues Arrest Warrant For Ex-Chief Of Memorial's Branch In Perm

      A court in the Russian city of Perm on April 10 issued an arrest warrant for Robert Latypov, the self-exiled former chief of the Nobel Prize-winning Memorial human right group's branch in the city.

    • RFERL ☛ 'Very Tense': Anger Rises To Surface Over Government Response To Kazakh, Russian Floods

      Floodwaters continue to submerge large areas of southern Russia and northern Kazakhstan with officials predicting the worse is yet to come as a massive snowmelt amid unseasonably warm temperatures forced tens of thousands from their homes.

    • RFERL ☛ Russia Investigates Online Post By Journalist In Exile

      Russia's government-linked Baza Telegram channel said on April 10 that the Investigative Committee had launched a probe against Zalina Marshenkulova, a self-exiled activist journalist, on a charge of justifying terrorism.

    • RFERL ☛ Romania Cancels Showing Of 2 Russian Movies

      Romania's Culture Ministry has canceled the showing of two Russian movies after RFE/RL publicized an initiative by the Russian Center, which ostensibly promotes Russian culture, to show films dedicated to a celebration of Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin's first flight into space in 1961.

    • RFERL ☛ Russian Space Agency Scrubs Launch Of Rocket For Second Day In A Row

      Russia's space agency scrapped the launch of a heavy-lift rocket from a new facility for the second day in a row.

    • RFERL ☛ Former Russian Anti-War Lawmaker Reportedly Wanted In Murder Case

      Magomed Gadzhiyev, a self-exiled former member of Russia's State Duma, is reportedly wanted for ordering the assassination of Maksud Sadikov, the rector of the Institute of Theology and International Relations, and his driver in Daghestan in 2011.

    • teleSUR ☛ 7,700 Evacuated in Russia's Orenburg Region Due to Floods

      Russia and Kazakhstan will intensify cooperation to address floods affecting border regions.

    • The Straits Times ☛ Water levels rise in Russian rivers in flooding zone

      Water levels in the Ural and Tobol rivers kept rising on Thursday near Russia's cities of Orenburg and Kurgan, respectively, authorities said in the regions hit by unusually strong spring floods.

    • New York Times ☛ Floods in Russia and Kazakhstan Force Thousands to Evacuate

      More than 100,000 people had to leave their homes after spring floods engulfed cities and villages in vast sections of neighboring countries.

    • Meduza ☛ ‘If we didn’t take them, they’d die’: A dam breach in Russia’s south forced thousands to flee their flooded homes. Volunteers describe trying to save the animals left behind. — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ ‘He had no chance’: Ilya Bakharev thought joining the Russian army would be a ticket to exoneration. His unit mates tortured him to death. — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ War criminal Igor Strelkov, jailed in Russia for hardline Kremlin criticism, seeks to enlist in the military — Meduza

    • LRT ☛ Belarusian businesses in Lithuania feel the squeeze under prospect of more restrictions

      As politicians in Lithuania call for more restrictions on Belarusians, the latter say this makes it difficult for them to run businesses that relocated after the 2020 repressions. They are asking for clearer rules and for Vilnius to continue its previously declared open-door policy.

    • LRT ☛ Lithuanian MPs debate restricting Belarusian travel home

      Lithuanian MPs are considering new restrictions on Belarusian nationals residing in Lithuania. One proposal would not let them return home more than once a year.

    • New York Times ☛ Nijole Sadunaite, Lithuanian Nun Who Opposed Soviet Rule, Dies at 85

      A dissident who promoted democracy and religious freedom, she was arrested by the K.G.B. After independence from Moscow, she was honored by Lithuania’s Parliament.

    • Techdirt ☛ Putin Orders Russian Tech Companies To Somehow Make Competitive Game Console In 3 Months

      Back when Vladimir Putin launched his aggressive war on Ukraine, even before western government sanctions began rolling out, the video game industry started its own mini warfront on Russia. Companies began suspending sales in Russia entirely and otherwise disallowing Russian citizens to participate in global gaming culture. Groups like Itch.io began selling game bundles with proceeds going to groups that provide medical services to the people in Ukraine. And because of this and other sanctions, Russia voiced plans to essentially legalize copyright infringement on products from “unfriendly” countries.

• Transparency/Investigative Reporting

  • NPR ☛ A Boeing whistleblower raises fresh concerns about the 787, and the FAA investigates

    Longtime Boeing engineer Sam Salehpour went public Tuesday with claims that he observed problems with how parts of the plane's fuselage were fastened together. Salehpour warns that production "shortcuts" could significantly shorten the lifespan of the plane, eventually causing the fuselage to fall apart in mid-flight.

• Environment

  • Wired ☛ The Honeybees Versus the Murder Hornets

    Teams of volunteers now hunt Asian hornets landing on British soil, but detection is only the tip of the iceberg, says Elmes. The true challenge is tracing the hornet back to its nest, to destroy the colony. “If something can automate and help us, it will shave off time,” he says. This is the rationale behind Pollenize’s latest project—a network of AI-camera bait stations that can detect and track Asian hornets.

  • Energy/Transportation

    • DeSmog ☛ EPA’s New Rule Aims to Cut Toxic Emissions, But Cancer Alley Air Pollution Could Worsen

      Leaders in the fight for clean air from Louisiana’s Cancer Alley joined the Environmental Protection Agency’s Administrator Michael Regan on April 9 in Washington, D.C., for the announcement of a new rule governing air toxics-spewing chemical plants. The rule is intended to prevent cancer in surrounding low-income and minority communities.

      The announcement represents a milestone for environmental justice in communities historically overburdened by air-toxics pollution. But a growing number of proposed industrial projects threaten to further pollute the mostly low-income black neighborhoods along the Mississippi River between Baton Rouge and New Orleans — already home to a large number of petrochemical plants and refineries. 

    • The Register UK ☛ AI datacenters might consume 25% of US electricity by 2030

      Haas estimates that while US power consumption by AI datacenters sits at a modest four percent, he expects the industry to trend towards 20 to 25 percent usage of the US power grid by 2030, per a report from the Wall Street Journal. He specifically lays blame at popular large language models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT, which Haas described as "insatiable in terms of their thirst."

      The Arm CEO isn't alone in making this prediction. The International Energy Agency's (IEA) Electricity 2024 report [PDF] expects power consumption for AI datacenters around the world to be ten times the amount it was in 2022. Part of the problem is that LLMs like ChatGPT require far more power than traditional search engines like Google. The IEA estimates that one ChatGPT request consumes almost ten times as much power as a Google search.

  • Overpopulation

    • Overpopulation ☛ Overpopulation Is Still a Huge Problem: An Interview with Jane O’Sullivan

      Jane: “Declining sharply” and “dropping rapidly” are emotive terms that exaggerate the trends and distract from the far more rapid growth elsewhere. Globally we increase by somewhere between 70 million and 90 million annually, and that pace has been unrelenting for more than 40 years. We don’t have hard evidence that the curve has started to bend, let alone that it is on track to peak any time soon. So, the problem hasn’t gone away, and the impacts of the human population get more serious and intractable every year.

    • CBC ☛ Water is in short supply in southern Alberta. Is a massive expansion of irrigation possible?

      The brown area in the photo is very concerning because it means virtually zero to no snowpack in an expanse that extends across the Prairies, said Tricia Stadnyk, a professor and Canada Research Chair in hydrologic modelling with the University of Calgary's Schulich School of Engineering.

      "It's highly unlikely that we can avoid drought at this point. Because without the snowpack, we don't have the soil moisture, which means that the ground is dry," she said.

      "That's going to have a significant impact on agriculture."

    • US News And World Report ☛ The Losing Battle Against Greece's Tumbling Birthrate

      "To have a family these days, you need to become a hero," Giannakidis said on the sideline of a recent soccer practice. "To have a second child, more money must come into the house."

      As much of Europe struggles with tumbling birthrates that experts say threaten long-term economic wellbeing, Greece is a stark example of how hard it will be to reverse the trend.

• Finance

  • India Times ☛ American IT company cuts 800 jobs across India and US to hire talent with these skills

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • Breach Media ☛ The Big China Con

    How Canada’s establishment media manufactured the foreign interference scandal

  • TwinCities Pioneer Press ☛ House to delay sending Mayorkas impeachment articles to Senate

    Speaker Mike Johnson will not send the House’s articles of impeachment against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to the Senate this week as previously planned. Republican senators have requested more time Tuesday to build support for holding a full trial. The sudden change casts fresh doubts on the proceedings, the historic first impeachment of a Cabinet secretary in roughly 150 years. House Republicans impeached Mayorkas over the Biden administration’s handling of security and immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border. Democrats, with control of the Senate, are expected to swiftly dismiss the charges against Mayorkas, arguing they do not rise to impeachable offenses.

  • Latvia ☛ The little bit of Beethoven in the heart of Rīga

    Only about a hundred meters from the building of the Latvian National Art Museum, on Skolas Street 3, there is a four-story brick building with elements of romanticized historical styles.

  • Tech Central (South Africa) ☛ Starlink profits are more elusive than investors think

    People familiar with the finances of one of the world’s most valuable private companies say Starlink has — at times — lost hundreds of dollars on each of the millions of ground terminals it ships, casting doubt on claims by CEO Elon Musk and the company’s top brass that the business is in “profitable territory”.

  • India Times ☛ Italy considers tougher penalties for AI-related crimes

    Italy's government is mulling tougher penalties for crimes using Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools including market rigging and money laundering, according to a draft law bill seen by Reuters on Tuesday.

    The 25-article draft bill lays down general principles "on research, experimentation, development, adoption and application" of AI in Italy, to cope with "the impact on fundamental rights" and related economic and social risks.

  • Scoop News Group ☛ House hurtles toward showdown over expiring surveillance tools

    Foremost among those prospective amendments is a requirement for U.S. government officials to get a warrant to query the communications of Americans collected under the authority of Section 702. Privacy hawks say such a requirement is necessary to overhaul a law that has been implicated in past abuses, such as improper searches of government officials and protesters. Biden administration and law enforcement officials argue such a requirement would badly inhibit their ability to conduct timely queries, including in cybersecurity cases.

  • Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

    • RFA ☛ Media Watch: Baltimore bridge collapse floods internet with rumors

      The incident fuels rumors and inaccurate information both in English and Chinese media outlets.

    • Digital Music News ☛ Meta Pledges to Label More AI-Generated Content Across Photo, Video, & Audio

      As AI-generated content runs rampant on Facebook (Farcebook) and Instagram, Meta says it is making some changes to how it labels manipulated media. Meta says it agrees with the Oversight Board’s argument that the company’s existing approach to AiIcontent is not enough since it only covers images in which a person is being manipulated.

    • Defence Web ☛ Mapping a surge of disinformation in Africa

      Disinformation campaigns seeking to manipulate African information systems have surged nearly fourfold since 2022, triggering destabilizing and antidemocratic consequences.

      The proliferation of disinformation is a fundamental challenge to stable and prosperous African societies. The scope of these intentional efforts to distort the information environment for a political end is accelerating. The 189 documented disinformation campaigns in Africa are nearly quadruple the number reported in 2022. Given the opaque nature of disinformation, this figure is surely an undercount.

    • VOA News ☛ Nigerian presidential adviser falsely claims Nigeria is safer than US

      Nigeria is plagued by kidnappings, terrorist attacks, banditry and multiple other crimes.

      The Global Terrorism Index, a report published annually by the Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP), a global think tank headquartered in Sydney, Australia, ranks Nigeria eighth among the ten countries most impacted by terrorism.

      In its most recent annual ranking, the Global Organized Crime Index, produced by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime (GI-TOC), a Geneva-based international non-governmental organization, assessed Nigeria as having the world’s sixth “highest criminality rate,” far worse than the U.S., which it ranked 67th.

    • Scoop News Group ☛ Civil society groups press platforms to step up election integrity work

      Over 200 nonprofits, online research organizations and civil society groups are calling on social media platforms to step up their content moderation efforts ahead of elections in the United States and dozens of other countries this year.

      In an open letter sent to executives at 12 major tech and social media companies, the groups chided the platforms over their lack of investment in personnel and resources to combat election-related disinformation and influence operations.

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • Reason ☛ Louis Farrakhan Loses Lawsuit Against Anti-Defamation League

    From Friday's decision by Judge Denise Cote (S.D.N.Y.) in Farrakhan v. Anti-Defamation League: The challenged statements referring to Farrakhan as antisemitic are non-actionable statements of opinion. The communications in which they were published contain "a recitation of the facts on which [they are] based"—namely, direct quotes from Farrakhan.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong student charged with loitering in store linked to 47 democrats case said he was ‘just playing around’

    A Hong Kong student charged with loitering at a chain store linked to the city’s largest national security case has said he was “just playing around.” The student, who was 14 when he was arrested last year, is among five people standing trial after pleading not guilty to a charge of “loitering causing concern.”

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Tiananmen vigil trio turn to Hong Kong’s top court to try and challenge convictions over nat. security request

    Three former organisers of the annual Tiananmen vigils in Hong Kong are seeking to take a challenge against their convictions over refusing to comply with a data request from national security police to the city’s top court.

  • RFERL ☛ 'I'm Not Going To Quit': Facing Prison, Soviet-Era Dissident Skobov Speaks Out Against War, Repression

    Aleksandr Skobov has been a thorn in the side of authoritarian governments for more than four decades, from the Soviet era to President Vladimir Putin's long rule. And now, in pretrial detention in St. Petersburg and facing prison, he is in no mood for compromise.

    "On principle I refuse to comply with fascist laws," he told RFE/RL late last month, shortly after the Russian government designated him a "foreign agent" on March 22. "I don't intend to get into debates with the government. I will not try to prove my innocence. I will not label my writings, and I will not write any financial reports for them."

• Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Beijing’s security law prompted Hong Kong activists to consider setting up ‘gov’t-in-exile,’ Jimmy Lai trial hears

    The enactment of a national security law in Hong Kong prompted activists to discuss the prospect of setting up a “government-in-exile” to continue lobbying international allies against the city, the trial of media mogul Jimmy Lai has heard.

  • The Guardian UK ☛ Biden says he is ‘considering’ Australian call to drop Julian Assange charges

    Biden’s comment is the latest indication that his administration may have cooled on the idea of putting Assange on trial, which could prove politically toxic in an election year. Last month, the Wall Street Journal reported that the Biden administration was exploring the possibility of allowing the WikiLeaks founder to cut a plea deal that would see him admit to a misdemeanor offense of mishandling classified documents in return for an early release.

  • CNN ☛ Biden says US is considering Australia’s request to drop prosecution of Julian Assange

    Asked Wednesday about Australia’s call to end Assange’s prosecution, Biden told reporters at the White House, “We’re considering it.” CNN has reached out to the National Security Council for additional comment on the president’s remark.

  • NBC ☛ Biden says he is 'considering' Australia's request to end Julian Assange's prosecution

    Assange, an Australian citizen, has been engaged in a battle against U.S. extradition efforts from prison in the United Kingdom for more than a decade. He spent seven years in self-exile in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London and the last five years in the high-security Belmarsh Prison on the outskirts of the British capital.

  • New York Times ☛ Biden Says U.S. Is Considering Dropping Assange Case

    President Biden said on Wednesday that the United States was considering dropping its prosecution of Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder who has been jailed in London for years while fighting extradition to face U.S. charges related to his publication of classified documents.

  • CPJ ☛ Turkish authorities attack, threaten, arrest several journalists during post-election unrest

    Police intervened in the protests with arrests, tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannons, targeting several field reporters, some of whom were taken into custody. Multiple journalists also reported receiving threats and insults online and offline.

• Civil Rights/Policing

  • VOA News ☛ European court tells nations to shield people from climate change in case with wide implications 

    "The most important thing is that the court has said in the Swiss women's case that governments must cut their emissions more to protect human rights," said 19-year-od Sofia Oliveira, one of the Portuguese plaintiffs. "Their win is a win for us, too, and a win for everyone!"

    The court — which is unrelated to the European Union — ruled that Switzerland "had failed to comply with its duties" to combat climate change and meet emissions targets.

  • Site36 ☛ New Schengen Border Code leads to 70 % more warrants and alerts stored by German police in SIS

  • Democracy Now ☛ Arizona Supreme Court Revives 1864 Abortion Ban Passed Before Women Could Even Vote

    In a historic ruling, Arizona’s conservative Supreme Court has upheld an 1864 law banning almost all abortions in the state. The court sent out this warning: “Physicians are now on notice that all abortions, except those necessary to save a woman’s life, are illegal.” The 160-year-old law predates Arizona becoming a state and was passed decades before women could even vote. Although Arizona’s Attorney General Kris Mayes said she will not enforce the “draconian law,” the ruling sent shockwaves across the nation. “The central strategy of the anti-abortion movement is to roll back the clock to the Victorian era, because they know that they cannot win through the democratic process,” says Amy Littlefield, abortion access correspondent at The Nation, who says conservatives supporting these unpopular restrictions face an uphill battle this fall. “Democrats are banking on this being a huge way to lift their boats in the next election.” Activists are preparing a November ballot measure to enshrine abortion rights in the Arizona Constitution, and reproductive rights will be a key issue in the state’s closely watched Senate race.

• Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

  • NBC ☛ FCC chair holds roundtable on net neutrality in Campbell ahead of agency vote

    “We, as carriers, should not be — in my opinion — picking and choosing not only what people can get to, but how it performs when they interconnect,” Jasper said.

    Stanford law professor Barbara van Schewick at the meeting pointed out, in the case of firefighters losing [Internet] access, it doesn’t matter who was right or wrong.

    “What matters is, as they were fighting a fire — in the middle of one of the worst fires in California history — there was nobody firefighters could turn to to ensure that they get connection first and resolve the issue later,” said van Schewick,

  • David Rosenthal ☛ The Little Garden

    Below the fold is the story of how I got a full-time Internet connection at my apartment 32 years ago next month, and the incredible success of my first ISP.

    The reason I'm now able to tell this story is that Tom Jennings, the moving spirit behind the ISP has two posts describing the history of The Little Garden, which was the name the ISP had adopted (from a Chinese restaurant in Palo Alto) when I joined it in May 1993. Tom's perspective from the ISP's point of view contrasts with my perspective — that of a fairly early customer enhanced by information via e-mail from John Gilmore and Tim Pozar, who were both involved far earlier than I.

• Digital Restrictions (DRM)

  • Stian Kristoffersen ☛ The Open Secret about Confidential Computing

    The three main technologies used by Azure and GCP are AMD SEV-SNP (VM), Intel SGX (enclave) and Intel TDX (VM). Intel TDX uses Intel SGX for attestation. Both Intel SGX and AMD SEV have had their attestation keys extracted. In the case of Intel SGX this was used to break UHD Blu-Ray DRM. There are so many side channels in Intel SGX that they used a table to keep track of which CPUs are vulnerable to which attacks. When Google looked at both AMD SEV-SNP and Intel TDX they found a bunch of issues in both. This week further issues in both solutions were published by researchers at ETH Zurich.

  • Ruben Schade ☛ Rubenerd

    I’ve decided my time is worth more than this. I agree with Marcel; if your page implements these, I make like a cliché Gainax character and bounce.

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• APNIC ☛ Email is getting harder to self-host. Or is it?

  A post recently featured on Hacker News (HN) discusses the modern dilemma of implementing anti-spam control features in self-hosted email. It refers to XOMedia’s article titled ‘A Deep Dive into Email Deliverability in 2024‘, which explores the application of three email-securing features: SPF, DKIM and DMARC.

  This post is particularly relevant now as Google, Yahoo, and Outlook (Microsoft) have recently disclosed their plans to enforce stricter compliance standards on self-hosted email implementers starting in the second quarter of this year. Implementing these measures likely has already begun, indicating a tightening of regulations in this domain.

• Trademarks

  • TTAB Blog ☛ TTABlog Test: How Did These Three Recent 2(d) Appeals Turn Out?

    A TTAB judge once said to me that one can predict the outcome of a Section 2(d) appeal 95% of the time just by looking at the marks and the involved goods/services. Here are the three such appeals recently decided by the TTAB. How do you think these three came out? No hints this time. [Answers in first comment.]

  • TTAB Blog ☛ Divided 9th Circuit Says District Court Has Power to Adjudicate TM Applications

    Section 1119 of the Trademark Act gives a federal district court the power to "determine the right to registration, order cancelation of registrations, in whole or in part, restore canceled registrations, and otherwise rectify the register with respect to the registrations of any party to the action." Does it give a court power to invalidate pending trademark applications? A divided panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals said yes in BBK Tobacco & Foods LLC d/b/a HGI v. Central Coast Agriculture, Inc., Appeals Nos. 22-16190 and 16281 (9th Cir. April 2, 2024).

• Copyrights

  • New York Times ☛ Da Vinci’s Been Dead for 500 Years. Who Gets to Profit from His Work?

    In the late 15th century, when the Italian Renaissance artist Leonardo da Vinci completed “Vitruvian Man” — one of his most famous drawings, which depicts the proportions of the human body — he could not have predicted it would be reproduced onto cheap notebooks, coffee mugs, T-shirts, aprons, and even puzzles.

    Centuries later, the Italian government and the German puzzle maker Ravensburger are battling over who has the right to reproduce “Vitruvian Man” and profit from it.

  • Digital Music News ☛ New Bill Would Force AI Companies to Disclose Copyright Use

    Called the Generative AI Copyright Disclosure Act, the legislation would require anyone creating training datasets or making significant changes to an existing dataset to submit a notice to the Register of Copyrights. That notice must contain a “detailed summary of any copyrighted works used” and the URL for any publicly available material. The Register of Copyrights would then publish a publicly available online database containing all the notices.

  • Digital Music News ☛ Twitter/X Refutes Remaining Claims in NMPA Copyright Suit: ‘Any Infringement Was Innocent and Was Not Willful’

    Twitter/X has officially pushed back against the remaining copyright monopoly infringement claims it’s facing in a complaint levied by the National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA). The social control media platform just recently submitted its answer to the NMPA’s suit, which was filed in June of 2023.

  • Silicon Angle ☛ New bill aims to force Hey Hi (AI) firms to disclose use of copyrighted material

    Lawmakers in the U.S. Congress introduced a new bill on Tuesday that would force artificial intelligence companies such as Proprietary Chaffbot Company and Surveillance Giant Google LLC to reveal exactly what copyrighted material they use to train their large language models, which power generative Hey Hi (AI) chatbots such as Abusive Monopolist Microsoft Chaffbot and Bard.

  • Torrent Freak ☛ 'X' Denies Music Companies' Remaining Piracy Liability Claims in Court

    Elon Musk's social media platform X has denied all copyright infringement claims in response to a 'piracy' complaint filed last year by a group of record labels. The Nashville federal court already dismissed several key allegations and X hopes to defeat the remaining contributory infringement claims as well. Among its defenses, X notes that the music companies demand "unconstitutionally excessive and disproportionate" damages.

  • Torrent Freak ☛ MPA: Site-Blocking Will Stop Pirate Site Owners Who Abuse Kids & Traffick Drugs

    After a wait of more than 12 years, rightsholders in the United States will again seek legislation that will provide the framework for a site-blocking regime to combat online piracy. After promoting and guiding similar regimes in dozens of countries overseas, the push will see the Hollywood studios of the Motion Picture Association urge Congress to bring the United States up to date.

  • EFF ☛ The Motion Picture Association Doesn’t Get to Decide Who the First Amendment Protects

    What the MPA wants is the power to block entire websites, everywhere in the U.S., using the same tools as repressive regimes like China and Russia. To it, instances of possible copyright infringement should be played like a trump card to shut off our access to entire websites, regardless of the other legal speech hosted there. It is not simply calling for the ability to take down instances of infringement—a power they already have, without even having to ask a judge—but for the keys to the internet. Building new architectures of censorship would hurt everyone, and doesn’t help artists.

    The bills known as SOPA/PIPA would have created a new, rapid path for copyright holders like the major studios to use court orders against sites they accuse of infringing copyright. Internet service providers (ISPs) receiving one of those orders would have to block all of their customers from accessing the identified websites. The orders would also apply to domain name registries and registrars, and potentially other companies and organizations that make up the internet’s basic infrastructure. To comply, all of those would have to build new infrastructure dedicated to site-blocking, inviting over-blocking and all kinds of abuse that would censor lawful and important speech.

    In other words, the right to choose what websites you visit would be taken away from you and given to giant media companies and ISPs. And the very shape of the internet would have to be changed to allow it.