Leftovers

• James G ☛ Coffee experiences

  Next time you make a cup of coffee, take a moment to reflect on the experience. Do you start drinking the coffee when it is a bit too hot? Do you wait until the temperature is just right? Do you forget about the coffee but drink it anyway? How does the cup feel against your lips? How does the coffee feel? Rich? Bold? Thin?

  I have spent countless hours learning how to make coffee, yet the best coffee I have is usually that made by others. The coffee need not be speciality: there is good coffee everywhere; it is the experience around a coffee that makes the drink great.

• James G ☛ Memories

  My meal arrived on the plane. I like airline food. I was served a chicken and pasta meal, coleslaw, an apple and custard crunch dessert, bread, and water. I should note that the proportions of chicken to pasta were heavily favoured toward pasta, but that was okay. For the best part of the meal is always the dessert. I was delightfully surprised by an apple and custard dessert. It even contained cinnamon, a spice whose scent and taste always make me happy.

  The water was by a brand called Rocwell. This got me thinking about the Rockwell Turbo Encabulator, a made-up tool on which there is a presentation that lasts at least a minute long on YouTube. The video is a testament to how you can make text that sounds gramatically correct but contains absolutely no content.

  After pondering my meal with excitement -- for I have not eaten anything more than a snack in hours! -- my mind started to drift: back to childhood, a topic that perhaps came to mind because of how my mind wanders on travel.

• James G ☛ Post scriptum

  When I was young, I learned that P.S. was used to attach an additional message at the end of a letter or email. I vaguely remember hearing it on the television. But, I was never taught what P.S. meant.

  It all started with a blog post, as it often does. I was thinking about whether there was an appropriate Latin abbreviation to use in the post, similar to how I have titled a post with "&c." (et. cetera) in the past. Herein started an adventure in the vast and wonderful knowledge repository that is Wikipedia.

  I came across the "List of Latin abbreviations" page that documents Latin abbreviations. Scrolling through, looking for the right term, I saw P.S: "post scriptum". The definition: "after what has been written".

• Ruben Schade ☛ Zebra crossings and right of way

  A post by jbauer on Mastodon about zebra crossings made me evaluate how I cross the street too.

  Like with many juristictions, zebra crossings in Australia require cars to stop to let you cross. At least, in theory. They’re popular around schools, or long blocks where the nearest intersection may be far away. Places like Singapore and Kuala Lumpur tend to build large overpasses in lieu of where Australia may plonk a pedestrian crossing, but they come with their own problems, and are still ultimately car-centric infrastructure. But I digress!

• Ruben Schade ☛ Fixed a few bugs

  In no particular order:

  Is a phrase with four words. Mmm, that’s quality humour.

  There were a few elements not showing up properly in dark mode on single pages. You might need to force a refresh to get the most recent CSS.

  Some Dublin Core metadata wasn’t quite correct.

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-04-03 [Older] Taiwan quake: Everything you need to know about earthquakes

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-04-03 [Older] India election: Will Kejriwal arrest boost opposition?

• US News And World Report ☛ 2024-04-09 [Older] South African Court Rules Former Leader Jacob Zuma Can Contest Election

• Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-04-09 [Older] IEC clears South Africa ex-president Zuma for election run

• Chuck Carroll ☛ Four Months Into Using Kagi as My Default Search Engine

  I've been using the Kagi search engine for the past several months and wanted to share my thoughts. For those not in the know, Kagi is a paid, ad-free search engine that's supported by subscriptions rather than advertising. Unlike search engines like Google and DuckDuckGo (DDG), Kagi does not make it's money off of serving advertisements to it's users.

• Steve Ledlow ☛ Why Do I Have a Newsletter?

  The expanded title for this post should really be Why do I have a newsletter and a blog? This question was posed to me by a new internet friend over email. He asked it without any intention other than to spark something for future discussion. His inquisitive prompt has been rattling around in my brain ever since. In fact, I can’t stop thinking about it, which usually means I should write about it. Do I write about it on the blog, or in the newsletter?

• Jarrod Blundy ☛ Humane pinned their launch date, if not their pin

  Say what you will about Humane’s Ai Pin, I have to give them credit for nailing the timeline they set years ago, perhaps at the very outset of the company. Their whole brand and logo, revealed in 2018 and solidified in 2022 with their “It’s time for change” video, revolves around an eclipse, and now they’re shipping their first product within days of the massive solar eclipse event across North America.

• Atlas Obscura ☛ Hike the Trail Trekked by Snowshoe Thompson, a Mailman from the Gold Rush Era

  Snowshoe Thompson was a mailman who delivered mail on skis (which he called snowshoes) through some of the most punishing and snowbound mountain passes in the nation—the same region that trapped the Donner Party in the winter of 1846-47. Starting from a nearby but no longer extant post office, Thompson accomplished this journey between Placerville and Genoa, Nevada again and again, carrying up to 100 pounds of mail on his back—not just envelopes but packages, too.

• Standards/Consortia

  • Kansas Reflector ☛ AM car radios seem quaint. But when the twister comes, you'll want that dial.

    Commercial AM radio is about 100 years old. The first federally licensed station was KDKA in Pittsburgh, which went on the air in 1920. But experimental AM goes back a few years more, to inventor Reginald Fessenden. He may have been the first to broadcast voice and music over the airwaves when, on Christmas Eve 1906, he played a violin solo of “O Holy Night” and read from the Gospel of Luke to astonished ship crews in the North Atlantic who were expecting good old-fashioned Morse code. At least, that’s the way Fessenden described it in a letter years after the fact.

• Science

  • Science Alert ☛ The Mystery of The Cleanest Air on Earth Can Finally Be Explained

    The cloudiest place on our planet.

  • Science Alert ☛ Mysterious Fossil Fragments Traced to Ancient Leviathans of The Ocean

    We may have finally solved it.

  • Science Alert ☛ This Freaky Worm Has 'Outstanding Vision', And Scientists Don't Know Why

    Jeepers creepers!

  • Science Alert ☛ Radical NASA Study Says This Spacecraft Formation Could Reveal New Physics

    Something we've never seen before.

  • Science Alert ☛ This Tiny Frog Emits a Powerful Ultrasonic Scream No Human Can Hear

    We've finally confirmed it.

  • Science Alert ☛ The Most Powerful Space Explosion Ever Seen Reveals a Surprise Twist

    This is so strange.

  • Science Alert ☛ NASA's About to Make a Big Announcement About Mars. Here's What We Know.

    Nail-biting!

  • Science Alert ☛ Shocking Study Reveals Many Fast-Tracked Cancer Drugs Offer No Clinical Benefit

    This is not what we wanted to see.

• Education

  • Nicolas Fränkel ☛ Dissolving Design Patterns In Design Elements

    The book’s importance lies in its effort to review the software production done up at that moment, giving more structure to the concept of Software Design. At the same time, it reports the schematization of recurring problems and their possible solution families in the form of design patterns. The text has become a controversial element today, sometimes demonized. It’s an important work, no longer modern, which is misunderstood today due to the need for pragmatism compared to the book’s analytical content.

  • Brett Scott ☛ Tech doesn’t make our lives easier. It makes them faster

    It matters how we frame this question. If you ask ‘are we working less than before’, research is ambiguous. In rich countries people work less than labourers who toiled during the 19th century industrial revolution, but more than our ancient ancestors. If you ask ‘are our lives more leisurely than ever’, the answer is less ambiguous. Many people feel their lives are frenetic. We’re not only expected to work a lot. We’re expected to consume a lot. Ask ‘are we more chilled out than ever?’ and the answer is no. People are strung out, stressed out, and burned out.

  • Matt Birchler ☛ Just Some Tips Anyone Can Use to Level Up Their Design Game

    Hello, everybody. Welcome to the very succinctly titled, "Just Some Tips Anyone Can Use to Level Up Their Design Game." This isn't going to be a very heady conversation about design. We're not going to talk about hard and fast rules or great theories about the practice or anything. What I wanted to do today, knowing the audience, especially developers who have varying levels of passion for design– I know some of you really love it– and I wanted to just give some tips that are good things to keep in mind while you're working on things. Because while oftentimes you're given an exact spec to work from and know exactly what to deliver, sometimes you're making decisions on your own, and I wanted to give some tips that might help with that.

• Hardware

  • AnandTech ☛ Corsair Enters Workstation Memory Market with WS Series XMP/EXPO DDR5 RDIMMs

    Corsair's family of WS DDR5 RDIMMs includes 16 GB modules operating at up to 6400 MT/s with CL32 latency as well as 32 GB modules functioning at 5600 MT/s with CL40 latency. At present, Corsair offers a quad-channel 64 GB kit (4×16GB, up to 6400 MT/s), a quad-channel 128GB kit (4×32GB, 5600 MT/s), an eight-channel 128 GB kit (8×16GB, 5600 MT/s), and an eight-channel 256 GB kit (8×32GB, 5600 MT/s) and it remains to be seen whether the company will expand the lineup.

  • Hackaday ☛ A Slew Of AI Courses To Get Yourself Up To Speed

    When there’s a new technology, there’s always a slew of people who want to educate you about it. Some want to teach you to use their tools, some want you to pay for training, and others will use free training to entice you to buy further training. Since AI is the new hot buzzword, there are plenty of free classes from reputable sources. The nice thing about a free class is that if you find it isn’t doing it for you, there’s no penalty to just quit.

  • Hackaday ☛ Danish Vintage LRC Meter Reveals Inside

    Modern test equipment is great, but there’s something about a big meter with a swinging needle and a mirror for parallax correction that makes a device look like real gear. [Thomas] shows us a Danish LCR meter (or, as it says on the front, an RLC meter). The device passes AC through the component and uses that to determine the value based on the setting of a range switch. It looks to be in great shape and passed some quick tests. Have a look at it in the video below.

  • Hackaday ☛ Voice Control For A Vintage Heathkit Radio

    Most modern ham rigs have a voice activated transmission (VOX) mode, although we don’t know many people who use it often. When a transmitter is in VOX mode, it starts transmitting when you talk, and then, when you pause for a second or two, the transmitter turns off. Many old ham transmitters, though, didn’t support VOX, so Heathkit sold the VX-1 “electronic voice control” to add VOX to older transmitters. [Jeff Tranter] shows us inside a clean-looking unit.

  • CNX Software ☛ Blues launches $19 Notecard XP cellular IoT module and Notecarrier XP series carrier board

    Blues has recently released the latest entry to its Notecard family, the Notecard XP (External Power supply), an updated and more cost-effective version of its existing Notecard Cellular. This new model reduces costs by not including certain components, such as SIM switching hardware, an embedded SIM with a data plan, and conformal coating while retaining all key features and functionalities.

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • Project Censored ☛ 2024-04-10 [Older] Male Birth Control Gel Progressing through Clinical Trials

  • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-04-08 [Older] Southern Africa Faces Hunger as El Nino Drought Kills Crops

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-04-06 [Older] Africa's fight against health risks of urban air pollution

  • Modern Diplomacy ☛ 2024-04-08 [Older] From Scarcity to Sustainability: The GCC’s Journey Towards Water Security

  • NPR ☛ How to give kids autonomy? 'Anxious Generation' author says a license to roam helps

    American kids are being walloped by a hurtful combination, says social psychologist Jonathan Haidt: too much screen time and too little autonomy.

    In his new book, The Anxious Generation, Haidt argues that these two key factors have combined to cause the mental health crisis now facing America's teenagers. A study by the health policy research organization KFF shows that 1 in 5 adolescents reports symptoms of anxiety and depression. Haidt's book offers a series of recommendations for flipping both of these factors around.

  • Science Alert ☛ Psychedelics Could Pose Risks For People With Personality Disorders, Study Finds

    A pattern of negative experiences.

  • Science Alert ☛ Massive Study Links Vaping to a Much Higher Risk of Heart Failure

    This goes far beyond lung damage.

• Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)

  • Electrek ☛ Tesla (TSLA) is rumored to be preparing a massive round of layoffs

    Tesla announced to Gigafactory Texas employees that it will shorten Cybertruck production shift amid rumors that it is preparing a round of layoffs.

    We received several reports today from Tesla employees hearing rumors of an important round of layoffs happening this week at the company.

    Some of them are talking about layoffs as high as 20% of the workforce, which would mean tens of thousands of employees.

  • Tesla Cybertruck Deliveries Reportedly Halted

    Tesla (TSLA) has halted Cybertruck deliveries, according to social media chatter, possibly to address a problem with the accelerator pedal.

  • Project Censored ☛ 2024-04-08 [Older] ChatGPT Security Issues Raise Ethical Questions about Artificial Intelligence

  • Thorsten Ball ☛ A Feat of Engineering

    In other words: they’re pretty good at what they’re doing and chances that their file system migration would end up bricking devices were probably very, very slim. Near zero, possibly zero.

    But, still. Take near-zero and multiply it with hundreds of millions and I ask you: would you click the button that rolls out that update? How much testing would you want to do before you press it? How many test devices? How many different configurations? I don’t know how to answer these questions with anything except “a lot”, but I do know this: more than sweat would leave my body before clicking that button.

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ Microsoft lifts two-year-old block that prevented some users from upgrading to backdoored Windows 11 — fix finally arrives after a long wait for Rocket Lake CPUs

    Microsoft fixes a bug preventing PCs with specific defective chip maker Intel drivers from using backdoored Windows 11 without crashes and allows affected PCs to upgrade from backdoored Windows 10.

  • Medium ☛ Master WSL 2: A Concise Guide for Windows Subsystem for Linux [Ed: This is the wrong way to do it; this is Windows, not Linux, and it is Microsoft's trap]

  • Linux Links ☛ FIREBAT T8 Plus Mini PC Running Linux: Windows Subsystem for Linux 2 [Ed: The wrong approach; people do not need Windows at all, it can be replaced and WINE fitted in]

• Security

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • Project Censored ☛ 2024-04-10 [Older] A Pivotal EU Parliamentary Move To Preserve Online Encryption

    • Modern Diplomacy ☛ 2024-04-08 [Older] Data Privacy and Security Essential Considerations for Startup Software Development

    • The Register UK ☛ FISA Section 702 renewal approved by House

      The amendment [PDF] that would ban warrantless surveillance of US persons, proposed by Andy Biggs (R-AZ), failed to pass on a split vote of 212-212. Which means US citizens who find themselves in communication with foreigners the government is watching will continue to be surveilled without a warrant. Additional amendments – included in the PDF linked in this paragraph – all passed.

      The full bill to reauthorize Section 702 surveillance – which was rushed through the House to prevent it from lapsing on April 19 – later passed the House with bipartisan support despite all the clamoring to end warrantless surveillance. The Senate will now have to pass the bill before the April 19 expiration, giving the body all of this week to do so.

    • Security Week ☛ House Passes Reauthorization of Key US Surveillance Program After Days of Upheaval Over Changes

      The legislation approved Friday would extend the surveillance program for two years, rather than the full five-year authorization first proposed. Johnson hoped that the shorter timeline would sway GOP critics by pushing any future debate on the issue to the presidency of Donald Trump if he were to win back the White House in November.

    • AntiWar ☛ The CIA Wants More Power To Spy on Americans - Antiwar.com

      Americans need to be aware of the unbridled propensity of federal intelligence agencies to spy on all of us without search warrants as required by the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

      These agencies believe that the Fourth Amendment – which protects the individual right to privacy – only regulates law enforcement and does not apply to domestic spying.

      There is no basis in the constitutional text, history or judicial interpretations for such a limiting and toothless view of this constitutional guarantee. The courts have held that the Fourth Amendment restrains government – all government. Last week, the CIA asked Congress to expand its current spying in the United States.

      Here is the backstory.

    • VOA News ☛ Instagram blurring nudity in messages to protect teens, fight sexual extortion

      Instagram said scammers often use direct messages to ask for "intimate images." To counter this, it will soon start testing out a nudity-protection feature for direct messages that blurs any images with nudity "and encourages people to think twice before sending nude images."

• Defence/Aggression

  • The Strategist ☛ Vietnam adopts the Women, Peace and Security agenda

    Vietnam has become the third country in the Association of South East Asian Nations to adopt a national action plan for the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda [...]

  • JURIST ☛ Cyprus suspends processing of Syria refugees asylum applications

    Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides announced on Saturday that the Mediterranean country had suspended processing asylum applications from Syrian nationals. In a post on X (formerly known as Twitter), Christodoulides announced that the decision was made “in light of recent mass arrival of Syrian political asylum seekers by sea” to Cyprus.

  • Futurism ☛ The UN’s Climate Chief Says We Have Just Two Years to Save the Planet

    "We still have a chance to make greenhouse gas emissions tumble, with a new generation of national climate plans. But we need these stronger plans, now," Stiell said.

    The two years he touted is a definite acceleration, Reuters notes, because climate experts have typically been saying that the world needs to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 so worldwide temperatures don't rise above 1.5 degrees Celsius.

  • Reuters ☛ U.N. climate chief says two years to save the planet

    Yet last year, the world's energy-related CO2 emissions increased to a record high. Current commitments to fight climate change would barely cut global emissions at all by 2030. Simon Stiell, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change said the next two years are "essential in saving our planet". "We still have a chance to make greenhouse gas emissions tumble, with a new generation of national climate plans. But we need these stronger plans, now," he said.

  • The Atlantic ☛ The Complicated Psychology of the Victims of Boko Haram

    In the years following the 2014 kidnapping, I spoke with many of the teenagers’ parents. The raid was part of an extended campaign of violence by Boko Haram—whose name roughly translates to “Western education is sin”—to create an Islamic state in Nigeria. The kidnapped girls, most of whom were Christian, were taken to Boko Haram’s stronghold in the Sambisa forest, where they endured harsh conditions and were subjected to Islamic instruction sessions lasting up to 11 hours a day.

  • New York Times ☛ She Was Kidnapped a Decade Ago With 275 Girls. Finally, She Escaped.

    But before Ms. Dauda could jump, she said, one girl raised the alarm, shouting that others were “dropping and running.” Their abductors stopped, secured the truck and continued toward what, for Ms. Dauda, would prove a life-changing nine years in captivity.

    “If she hadn’t shouted that, we would have all escaped,” Ms. Dauda said in a series of interviews this past week in the city of Maiduguri, the birthplace of Boko Haram’s violent insurgency.

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ Nigeria's Chibok girls: What happened in April 2014?

    During the night of April 14, 2014, dozens of fighters from the Boko Haram Islamist militant group stormed a school dormitory for girls in the remote town of Chibok, a small Christian enclave in the majority-Muslim north of Nigeria.

    The 276 schoolgirls, mostly aged between 16 and 18, were herded at gunpoint through the forest to waiting trucks after the militants set fire to the school buildings.

  • [Old] HRW ☛ “Those Terrible Weeks in their Camp”: Boko Haram Violence against Women and Girls in Northeast Nigeria

    Boko Haram, Nigeria’s homegrown Islamist insurgency, whose name in Hausa roughly translates as “Western education is forbidden,” has abducted at least 500 women and girls from northern Nigerian since 2009 and has perpetrated numerous human rights abuses against them in captivity. The April 14, 2014 abduction of 276 girls from a secondary school in Chibok, a rural town in Borno State, focused a much-needed spotlight on this increasing scourge.

    While much has been written about Boko Haram and the horrific threat it poses, very little is known about the abuses endured by women and girls in captivity. Such victims are obviously hard to find. This report, based on field research, including interviews with victims and witnesses of abduction, documents the abduction of women and girls by Boko Haram, highlighting the harrowing experiences of some of the abducted women and girls. There remain many more women and girls in captivity whose stories have not yet been told.

  • Amnesty International ☛ Ten years on: The women of Chibok speak out - Amnesty International

    Ten years ago, 276 schoolgirls were abducted from a government secondary school in Chibok, a town in Borno State, Nigeria. Some of the girls escaped captivity on their own, while others were released following intense campaigning efforts from organizations, including Amnesty International. However, 82 remain in captivity, while more than 1,400 children have been abducted in subsequent attacks.

    Amnesty International spoke with some of the young women who were safely returned and the mothers of those who are still missing.

  • VOA News ☛ Nigerian families cope with trauma of more school kidnappings

    Treasure's ordeal is part of a worrying new development in Nigeria, Africa's most populous country where the mass abduction of 276 Chibok schoolgirls a decade ago marked a new era of fear —with nearly 100 of the girls still in captivity. Since the Chibok abductions, at least 1,500 students have been kidnapped, as armed groups increasingly find in them a lucrative way to fund other crimes and control villages in the nation's mineral-rich but poorly policed northwestern region.

    The Associated Press spoke with five families whose children have been taken hostage in recent years and witnessed a pattern of trauma and struggle with education among the children. Parents are becoming more reluctant to send their children to school in parts of northern Nigeria, worsening the education crisis in a country of over 200 million where at least 10 million children are out of school — one of the world's highest rates.

  • New York Times ☛ After Bondi Stabbing Rampage, Australia Asks How and Why

    The police have yet to determine a motive for Saturday’s attack, which left six people dead, but said the assailant had mental-health problems.

  • The Straits Times ☛ China stops short of condemning Iran, as it continues its balancing diplomacy

    The two countries have forged close economic and strategic ties in recent years.

  • The Straits Times ☛ Voters in Indian town near contested border not intimidated by India-China row

    The north-eastern state is simultaneously having parliamentary and assembly elections on April 19.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ German Chancellor Olaf Scholz walks tightrope on trade and politics in China

    German Chancellor Olaf Scholz arrived in China on Sunday, kicking off a trip in which he faces a tough balancing act as he aims to shore up economic ties with Berlin’s biggest trading partner. Scholz touched down in the southwestern megacity of Chongqing on Sunday morning, Chinese state broadcaster CCTV said, accompanied by a large […]

  • France24 ☛ Germany's Scholz walks tightrope on trade and politics in China

    German Chancellor Olaf Scholz arrived in China on Sunday, kicking off a trip in which he faces a tough balancing act as he aims to shore up economic ties with Berlin's biggest trading partner.

  • YLE ☛ Stubb, Orpo condemn Iran's "reckless" attack on Israel

    Finnish leaders called on the countries to show restraint and de-escalate the crisis.

  • New York Times ☛ Johnson Says the House Will Vote on an Israel Bill in the Coming Days

    Speaker Mike Johnson left unclear whether the vote on the security package, coming after Iranian attacks on Israel, would also include aid for Ukraine.

  • RFERL ☛ U.S. Speaker Says Will Try To Pass Israel Aid, But Ukraine Package Uncertain

    U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson on April 14 said he would try to pass aid to Israel in the upcoming week, after Iran's mass drone and missile attack, but didn’t say whether the legislation would also include assistance for Ukraine and other U.S. allies.

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • Latvia ☛ Civil protection preparedness still lukewarm in Latvia

      Hope for the best but expect the worst – this was the motto with which Latvian municipalities were asked to update their civil protection plans in the event of a military threat following Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Some have still not done so, Latvian Television's De Facto reported on April 14.

    • JURIST ☛ Committee to Protect Journalists calls for investigation into alleged targeting of Ukraine journalist

      The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) called on Friday for a comprehensive and transparent inquiry into recent events where Ukrainian military officials allegedly tried to serve an investigative summons to Yevhen Shulhat, a journalist working for the Ukrainian investigative outlet Slidstvo.Info.

    • LRT ☛ Poland would defend Lithuania, I cannot imagine any other way – interview with President Duda

      In an interview with LRT, Polish President Andrzej Duda discusses the situation in Ukraine, how to protect the interests of Polish farmers, and whether or not the Polish military would come to Lithuania’s defence if it were attacked.

    • RFERL ☛ Ukraine's Zelenskiy Calls For Urgent Aid To Counter Russian Air Strikes

      President Volodymyr Zelenskiy called on Ukraine's allies to provide additional support, while his defense minister visited outmanned and outgunned troops on the "tense" front lines as conditions worsened near the embattled town of Chasiv Yar.

    • RFERL ☛ Ukraine Commander Says Moscow Seeks Fall Of Chasiv Yar By May 9

      Russia's top leadership has ordered the military to capture the city of Chasiv Yar, in the Donetsk region, in time for the May 9 commemoration of the Soviet contribution to victory in World War II, Ukraine's top military commander said.

    • University of Michigan ☛ Ukraine’s devastation manifested in statistician’s ceramic art

      Irina Bondarenko, a statistician lead for the biostatics department at Michigan Medicine, grew up in Ukraine and has created works of art inspired by her homeland.

    • New York Times ☛ Far Right’s Ties to Russia Sow Rising Alarm in Germany

      As cases proliferate, opponents fear the Alternative for Germany party is becoming a tool of Russian influence operations to undermine support for Ukraine.

    • RFERL ☛ Russian Officials Urge Evacuation Of Parts Of Kurgan Region Amid Flooding

      Officials in Russia's Kurgan region in the southern Urals are urging residents of districts threatened by flooding to evacuate immediately.

    • The Straits Times ☛ Russia and China trade new copper disguised as scrap to skirt taxes, sanctions

      Russian Copper Company (RCC) and Chinese firms have avoided taxes and skirted the impact of Western sanctions by trading in new copper wire rod disguised as scrap, three sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.

    • The Straits Times ☛ Rising waters in Russia's Kurgan expected to peak on Monday

      Flooding is expected to peak on Monday in Russia's Kurgan region straddling the Tobol River near the border with Kazakhstan, as officials said waters maintained a sharp rise.

    • JURIST ☛ Belarus dissident rock band sentenced to 2 years correctional labour

      A district court in Minsk sentenced a dissident Belarusian rock band to two and a half years of correctional labour on Friday after being convicted of active participation in group actions that grossly violate public order, according to human rights group Mayday Team. The band has been behind bars since their arrest in January.

• Environment

  • Greece ☛ Greece’s rivers running dry, lakes disappearing

    On the upside, modern technology and satellite imaging are making the task easier. One such tool is a NASA mission mapping global soil moisture. Its satellite images show negative anomalies in many parts of the country during the spring of 2021, 2022 and 2023, compared with the averages of 2015-2023. The image of Evros from the spring of 2023 is especially telling, particularly since a devastating fire broke out in the area the following August, decimating the Dadia Forest.

  • University of Michigan ☛ Keep Michigan pure and shut down Line 5

    An executive order to stop oil transport through Line 5 may be a way for Biden to gain popularity among young voters. He ran on the most ambitious climate action plan of any presidential nominee in U.S. history, yet lost significant support after approving the Willow Oil Project in Alaska in 2023. Taking action on this matter would demonstrate that he intends to follow through on his campaign promises ahead of a decisive 2024 presidential election. But, most importantly, it would ensure the safety of Michigan’s ecosystems and the security of those whose livelihoods depend on them.

    Enbridge and Line 5’s history of environmental destruction should have warranted a shutdown years ago. Since 1968, Line 5 has ruptured 33 times, spilling 1.1 million gallons of oil into Michigan due to poor maintenance. In 2018, a different Enbridge-owned pipeline ruptured and spilled more than a million gallons of oil into the Kalamazoo River. The National Transportation Safety Board found that widespread organizational failures at Enbridge led to the leak.

  • YLE ☛ Residents evacuated as flood waters rise in western Finland

    The worst-affected region, North Ostrobothnia, experienced warm temperatures on Sunday – but the forecast calls for snow and lows of -11C later in the week.

  • Energy/Transportation

    • Ruben Schade ☛ Zebra crossings and right of way

      Like with many juristictions, zebra crossings in Australia require cars to stop to let you cross. At least, in theory. They’re popular around schools, or long blocks where the nearest intersection may be far away. Places like Singapore and Kuala Lumpur tend to build large overpasses in lieu of where Australia may plonk a pedestrian crossing, but they come with their own problems, and are still ultimately car-centric infrastructure. But I digress!

    • SFGate ☛ They were just sitting in SF traffic. Then came the tow truck.

      “At first I thought, oh, that Waymo must be disabled, and this is the tow truck that they’ve hired to come get it,” he told SFGATE over the phone. But then, to everyone’s shock, the truck started backing up and putting its arm mechanism under the car full of people instead. Once he realized what was happening, Ferland pulled out his phone and started filming.

    • Tesla tells Cybertruck employees that shifts will be shorter at the Austin Gigafactory

      Tesla told employees who work on the Cybertruck that shifts will be shorter on the production line at the Austin Gigafactory, according to an internal messaged viewed by Business Insider.

      Previously, workers clocked 12 hour shifts from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. and 6 p.m. to 6 a.m.. They will now be working 11 hour shifts during the day and 10.5 hour shifts at night — from 6 a.m. to 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. to 4:30 a.m. — the memo said.

    • Tesla Considering Layoffs? Employees Fear Job Cuts at Austin Gigafactory and Fremont Factory

      >

    • Tesla tells Cybertruck employees that shifts will be shorter

    • TechCrunch ☛ Microsoft OpenAI-backed Ghost Autonomy shuts down

      The shutdown comes just five months since the startup partnered with OpenAI through the OpenAI Startup Fund to gain early access to OpenAI systems and Azure resources from Microsoft.

    • Project Censored ☛ 2024-04-10 [Older] Corporate Green Policies Are So Much Hot Air

  • Wildlife/Nature

    • Project Censored ☛ 2024-04-10 [Older] Planned Release of Tigers Raises Ethical Questions

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • SFGate ☛ Google to limit access to Calif. news amid fight with state lawmakers

    At issue is Assembly Bill 886, officially called the “California Journalism Preservation Act.” The measure, which Wicks introduced last year, would require large platforms like Google to pay websites for articles the platforms feature on their sites. Critics of the measure, like the California Taxpayers Association, have called the bill a “link tax.”

  • The Straits Times ☛ India's BJP election manifesto lacks plans for structural economic reforms, Citi says

    MUMBAI - Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) skipped any reference to structural economic reforms, such as changes to labour and land laws, in its manifesto ahead of elections, Citi economists said in a note on Monday.

  • JURIST ☛ Europe and Palestine human rights groups sue Germany over arms exports to Israel

    The European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR), along with Palestinian human rights organizations Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR), Al Mezan Center and Al-Haq, filed a lawsuit on Friday at the Administrative Court of Berlin to block German arms exports to Israel amid its war in Gaza.

  • JURIST ☛ Thousands march in Poland against attempt to liberalize abortion law

    Thousands of people protested in Poland on Sunday against an attempt by the Sejm, the lower house of the Polish legislature, to further advance parliamentary works that would amend the strict abortion law currently in power.

  • France24 ☛ Hundreds of Manchester arena attack survivors file lawsuit against MI5

    More than 250 survivors of the 2017 Manchester Arena attack have filed a lawsuit against Britain's domestic intelligence services, their lawyers said in a statement Sunday.

  • JURIST ☛ Haiti government announces establishment of nine-member transitional council

    Haiti’s government officially established a nine-member transitional presidential council on Friday, aiming to restore security in the gang-afflicted Caribbean nation. This development marks a crucial step towards addressing Haiti’s security crisis. The creation of the council comes amidst escalating gang violence, prompting mass displacements and severe shortages of essential goods.

  • The Straits Times ☛ China says Hong Kong must 'tightly hold' national security line to safeguard development

    China's top official on Hong Kong affairs said the city should "tightly hold" onto the bottom line of national security.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Safeguarding national security is essential to ensure the safety of Hong Kong, No. 2 official says

    Hong Kong’s No. 2 official has highlighted the link between China’s national security and the safety of Hong Kong and the general public during a speech to celebrate the city’s 9th National Security Education Day.

  • The Straits Times ☛ Explainer-China, health system top issues as Solomon Islands holds national election

    SYDNEY - The Solomon Islands holds a national election on April 17, the first since Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare signed a security pact with China that prompted concern from the United States and South Pacific neighbours.

  • Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

    • Futurism ☛ Netflix Uses Seemingly AI-Manipulated Images in True Crime Doc

      The images that appear around the 28-minute mark of Netflix's "What Jennifer Did," have all the hallmarks of an AI-generated photo, down to mangled hands and fingers, misshapen facial features, morphed objects in the background, and a far-too-long front tooth.

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • CPJ ☛ 2024-04-10 [Older] CPJ welcomes South Africa’s abolition of criminal defamation, calls for further legal reforms

  • New York Times ☛ Undeterred, Salman Rushdie Discusses His New Memoir, ‘Knife’

    “I want to remind people in the room who might not remember that ‘Valley of the Dolls’ was published in the same publishing season as Philip Roth’s ‘Portnoy’s Complaint,’” he said, riffing on an earlier speaker’s mention of Jacqueline Susann’s potboiler. “And when Jacqueline Susann was asked what she thought about Philip Roth’s great novel” — with its enthusiastically self-pleasuring main character — “she said, ‘I think he’s very talented but I wouldn’t want to shake his hand.’”

  • The Hill ☛ Salman Rushdie reflects on near-fatal stabbing two years later in new book ‘Knife’

    Rushdie, who became a targeted man after Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa against him for his depiction of the prophet Muhammad in “The Satanic Verses” in 1989, recalled the evening in August 2022 when the most recent attempt on his life nearly succeeded.

  • RFERL ☛ Iranian Student Still Missing Days After Being Detained

    A university law student who has been a supporter of Iran's Women, Life, Freedom movement is still missing several days after her arrest by security forces, the second time she has been detained since unrest broke out over the death of a young woman in custody for an alleged violation of the head-scarf law.

• Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

  • CPJ ☛ 2024-04-03 [Older] Haitian journalist, YouTuber kidnapped by gang members, released

  • ANF News ☛ Journalist Dilan Oyunş released

    Journalist Dilan Oyunş, who has been held in Ankara Sincan Women's Closed Prison since 2016 on the allegation of being a "member of a terrorist organization", was released. Oyunş was welcomed by her family, journalist friends and members of the Lawyers Association for Freedom (ÖHD) when she left Sincan Prison.

  • The Atlantic ☛ Democracy Dies Behind Paywalls

    According to the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, more than 75 percent of America’s leading newspapers, magazines, and journals are behind online paywalls. And how do American news consumers react to that? Almost 80 percent of Americans steer around those paywalls and seek out a free option.

    Paywalls create a two-tiered system: credible, fact-based information for people who are willing to pay for it, and murkier, less-reliable information for everyone else. Simply put, paywalls get in the way of informing the public, which is the mission of journalism. And they get in the way of the public being informed, which is the foundation of democracy. It is a terrible time for the press to be failing at reaching people, during an election in which democracy is on the line. There’s a simple, temporary solution: Publications should suspend their paywalls for all 2024 election coverage and all information that is beneficial to voters. Democracy does not die in darkness—it dies behind paywalls.

  • The Atlantic ☛ Right-Wing Media Are in Trouble

    What’s going on? The obvious culprit is Facebook. For years, Facebook’s mysterious algorithms served up links to news and commentary articles, sending droves of traffic to their publishers. But those days are gone. Amid criticism from elected officials and academics who said the social-media giant was spreading hate speech and harmful misinformation, including Russian propaganda, before the 2016 election, Facebook apparently came to question the value of featuring news on its platform. In early 2018, it began deemphasizing news content, giving greater priority to content posted by friends and family members. In 2021, it tightened the tap a little further. This past February, it announced that it would do the same on Instagram and Threads. All of this monkeying with the internet’s plumbing drastically reduced the referral traffic flowing to news and commentary sites. The changes have affected everyone involved in digital media, including some liberal-leaning sites—such as Slate (which saw a 42 percent traffic drop), the Daily Beast (41 percent), and Vox (62 percent, after losing its two most prominent writers)—but the impact appears to have been the worst, on average, for conservative media. (Referral traffic from Google has also declined over the past few years, but far less sharply.)

• Civil Rights/Policing

  • NL Times ☛ 2024-04-08 [Older] Israeli women accuse Schiphol security employee of harassing, humiliating them

  • YLE ☛ Crackdown on Helsinki taxis: One in four drivers fined

    “Many small players have entered the industry. Incompetence has been observed, as well as indifference to obligations and fulfilling them. Missing sales and undeclared work are the most common signals of the grey economy in the industry,” said Tarja Valsi, Deputy Director of the Tax Administration.

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• Project Censored ☛ 2024-04-10 [Older] Fanatics Is Running a De Facto Sports Apparel Monopoly

• Matt Birchler ☛ An app that’s good enough for most people still benefits from competition

  I bring this up in the wake of recent legislation that has people freaking out about the idea of enabling more apps to compete in the mobile space. “Apple Wallet is already really good, why do we need other wallets?” Just because something’s good doesn’t mean we don’t deserve other options, and just because something is good for most people doesn’t mean there aren’t people who would benefit from something else.

• India Times ☛ Apple denies violating US court order in Epic Games lawsuit

  IPhone maker Apple on Friday denied violating a court order governing its App Store and urged a California federal judge to reject a request by "Fortnite" developer Epic Games to hold it in contempt.

  Apple made the arguments in a filing to U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in Oakland, who presided over Epic's lawsuit in 2020 accusing Apple of violating antitrust law with its tight controls over how consumers download apps and pay for transactions within them.

• India Times ☛ After long peace, Big Tech faces US antitrust reckoning

  After more than a decade of leaving Big Tech largely to itself, US antitrust enforcers have cranked up the heat, with several high-profile cases underway that could radically change the way the industry's giants do business.

  Launched under both the Trump and Biden administrations, five major cases from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Department of Justice (DOJ) are moving forward against major US technology companies -- including two against Google that could see the company split up.

• Patents

  • Dennis Crouch/Patently-O ☛ What I’m doing with LLM-Based GenAI Tools

    As many of you know, I have done machine learning work for many years — starting in the 1990s while in college.  However, like most of the world, I have been surprised and amazed by the power of LLM-based GenAI technology and have been trying to figure out ways to use it both for patent monopoly practice and in my job as a law professor.  I hope that it helps me become both more effective and more efficient.

  • Dennis Crouch/Patently-O ☛ Patent Term Adjustment and Obviousness-Type Double Patenting: Cellect’s Bid for Supreme Court Review

    by Dennis Crouch

    The Federal Circuit’s August 2023 decision in In re Cellect, LLC has set-up a significant question regarding the interplay between the patent monopoly term adjustment (PTA) statute, 35 U.S.C. § 154(b), and the judicially-created doctrine of obviousness-type double patenting (OTDP). Now, Cellect is seeking Supreme Court review, recently filing a petition for an extension of time that also indicated its intent to file. Cellect’s petition is now due May 20, 2024, and I expect significant support from the patent monopoly owner community.

• Copyrights

  • Digital Music News ☛ Twitch Is 'Pretty Close' to Inking Major Label Licensing Deals

    Following more than a few takedown-related headaches – complete with many muted videos and justifiably irked streamers – Twitch is poised to ink licensing deals with the major labels, according to the Amazon subsidiary’s CEO.

  • Torrent Freak ☛ DMCA Notice Targeting 'Bypass Paywalls Clean' Isn't The Thing to Get Angry About

    Bypass Paywalls Clean (BPC) allows users to bypass paywalls that exist for the sole purpose of granting access to news in return for payment. According to its developer, the browser extension has been removed from GitLab after being hit with a DMCA takedown notice. Many users of BPC are venting their frustrations right now, mostly in respect of the takedown itself. In reality, the things that led up to the takedown notice are more worthy targets.