Leftovers

• Ruben Schade ☛ SEO spam that says it isn’t

  This put a smile on my face this morning:

  Note: - Though this is not an automated email, (i.e., to ensure that we do not contact you again for this matter), please send a blank mail to it with NO as Subject.

• Ruben Schade ☛ Now a 1:7 Claynel Ryza fig exists! Also acrylic stands

  I’ve never heard of Claynel before, but they’ve already manufactured some impressive figs, including Clara’s favourite Hololive JP character Kanata, and the legendary Takina and Chisato duo from Lycrois Recoil.

  This rendition of Ryza from her namesake Atelier franchise is adorable, and a reminder that I still, still haven’t blogged about those games yet.

• Pro Publica ☛ Elkhart, IN, Prosecutor Accused of Misconduct for Making Contradictory Allegations

  A new motion has accused the elected prosecutor in Elkhart, Indiana, of misconduct, alleging she presented contradictory versions of the truth against two men in connection with a shooting that occurred more than 20 years ago.

  The case stems from the drive-by shooting death of a woman on Aug. 13, 2003. Prosecutors have always maintained the shooter was Ignacio Bahena. But as to who gave Bahena the gun, the prosecution offered two different versions, pinning the act on one man, then pinning it on another, according to a motion filed by one of the men’s lawyers.

• Ruben Schade ☛ I’m on Neopets again

  I resisted making another account for two decades, but the time finally came. I couldn’t believe how much was the same as I remember. The Tiki Tack Tombola!

  There’s plenty of blame to go around here, but the bulk of it goes to my sister. She has the second-oldest active account on the site, with a Neopet who’s 25. I made an account around the same time, but had it frozen in 1999 when I left it logged in at school, and kids did what kids do. I’ll admit, childhood Ruben was shattered.

• New York Times ☛ A Look at Roberto Cavalli’s Designs Through The Years

  The fashion designer who made maximalism cool.

• YLE ☛ Friday's papers: Welfare state woes, excessive consumption and an Arctic air mass

  As of today, Finland has consumed of a year's worth of natural resources.

• Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Interview: One artist, many instruments and a ‘melting pot’ of genres – FKJ brings his unique style back to Hong Kong

  By Martina Igini After an electrifying performance at last year’s Clockenflap, multi-instrumentalist FKJ is returning to Hong Kong this May for a more intimate performance – the first of its kind for the Frenchman.

• Reason ☛ Review: It's Cloned Mammoths vs. Billionaire Hunters in This New Sci-Fi Novel

  Ray Nayler's The Tusks of Extinction explores the value of nonhuman intelligence.

• Science

  • Stanford University ☛ Hundreds watch partial solar eclipse at Oval

    On April 8, hundreds of Stanford community members gathered on the Oval at an eclipse viewing party organized by the earth and planetary sciences department. From Stanford, the moon covered about 35% of the sun during the first total solar eclipse observable from much of United States in seven years.

  • Science Alert ☛ NASA Mission Accidentally Sends Space Rocks Hurtling Towards Mars

    Whoops!

  • Science Alert ☛ NASA Is Set to Launch Its Next-Gen Solar Sail Into Deep Space

    "We have a limitless source of propulsion."

  • Science Alert ☛ Blinking Actually Boosts Your Vision, And We Never Even Noticed

    Open your eyes.

  • Science Alert ☛ Your Sex Could Affect How Well You Sleep at Night. Here's Why That Matters.

  • Science Alert ☛ Eye Infections Can Be Far More Serious Than You Realize, Expert Warns

  • Science Alert ☛ Scientists Find Gene Variant Giving Up to 70% Protection Against Alzheimer's

    A huge new target for drug development.

  • James G ☛ Watching space in my living room

    When I was young, in the mid 2000s, I used computers to navigate four websites: the BillBC kids games, the PBS kids games, and, later, the NASA Hubble Telescope photographs and Club Penguin. I could sit on the family computer, a backdoored Windows machine about which I know nothing other than I could play games on it, and play games. And watch space.

    Earlier today, I saw a website that lets you watch the James Webb Space Telescope, the successor to the Hubble Telescope. The web application lets you zoom in to incredible levels of detail. You can see the stars. Galaxies of distances I do not know. Comphension of scale is still not in my limits, but I need not know much about space to see the beauty of these images.

  • Jeff Geerling ☛ Photographing the 2024 Total Solar Eclipse (results)

• Hardware

  • Hackaday ☛ No Lathe? Build Your Own

    If you need to make round things, you probably need a lathe. Can you build one as nice as one you can buy? Probably not. But can you build one that will work and allow you to do more things than having no lathe at all? [Mikeandmertle] say absolutely! You can see the contraption in operation in the video below.

  • Hackaday ☛ Electromagnets Make Vertical CNC Cutter A Little Stickier

    Workholding is generally not a problem on a big CNC plasma cutter.; gravity does a pretty good job of keeping heavy sheet steel in place on the bed. But what if your CNC table isn’t a table? The answer: magnets — lots of magnets.

  • Hackaday ☛ Beating IBM’s Eagle Quantum Processor On An Ising Model With A Classical Tensor Network

    The central selling point of qubit-based quantum processors is that they can supposedly solve certain types of tasks much faster than a classical computer. This comes however with the major complication of quantum computing being ‘noisy’, i.e. affected by outside influences. That this shouldn’t be a hindrance was the point of an article published last year by IBM researchers where they demonstrated a speed-up of a Trotterized time evolution of a 2D transverse-field Ising model on an IBM Eagle 127-qubit quantum processor, even with the error rate of today’s noisy quantum processors. Now, however, [Joseph Tindall] and colleagues have demonstrated with a recently published paper in Physics that they can beat the IBM quantum processor with a classical processor.

  • Hackaday ☛ Crank-Powered Train Uses No Batteries Or Plugs

    The prolific [Peter Waldraff] is at back it with another gorgeous micro train layout. This time, there are no plugs and no batteries. And although it’s crank-powered, it can run on its own with the flip of a switch. How? With a supercapacitor, of course.

  • Hackaday ☛ HDMI DDC Keypad Controls Monitor From Rack

    Sometime last year, [Jon Petter Skagmo] bought a Dell U3421WE monitor. It’s really quite cool, with a KVM switch and picture-by-picture support for two inputs at the same time. The only downside is that control is limited to a tiny joystick hiding behind the bezel. It’s such a pain to use that [Jon] doesn’t even use all of the features available.

  • CNX Software ☛ Qualcomm QCC730 low-power Arm Cortex-M4F WiFi 4 SoC targets battery-powered IoT applications

    Qualcomm has unveiled the “micro-power” QCC730 Arm Cortex-M4F dual-band WiFi 4 microcontroller for the IoT market that targets similar applications as the Espressif ESP32 microcontrollers but potentially at lower power consumption with claims of up to 88% lower power than “previous generations” making it suitable for battery-powered industrial, commercial and consumer applications.

  • CNX Software ☛ SolidRun Bedrock R8000 is the first Industrial PC to feature AMD Ryzen Embedded 8000 series

    Israeli embedded systems manufacturer, SolidRun, has recently introduced the Bedrock R8000, a new fanless, Industrial PC targeted at edge Hey Hi (AI) applications. The Bedrock R8000 integrates the newly-announced AMD Ryzen Embedded 8000 series processors with 8 Zen 4 cores and 16 threads clocked at up to 5.1 GHz. The Ryzen Embedded 8000 Series has a 16 TOPS NPU for Hey Hi (AI) workloads and offers up to 10 years of guaranteed availability. Also, up to 3 Hey Hi (AI) accelerators (either Hailo-10 or Hailo 8) can be combined with the onboard NPU to achieve over 100 TOPS for generative or inferencing Hey Hi (AI) workloads.

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ Nvidia blames defective chip maker Intel for GPU VRAM errors, tells GeForce gamers experiencing 13th or 14th Gen CPU instability to contact defective chip maker Intel support

    Nvidia's patch notes for its latest drivers affirm that Intel's latest 13th and 14th Gen CPUs are having instability problems right now affecting gamers. Nvidia steers users to defective chip maker Intel support if they are having instability issues with their Raptor Lake machine.

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • New York Times ☛ New Zealanders Are Crazy for This Fruit. It’s Not the Kiwi.

    Like the kiwi fruit, the feijoa, or pineapple guava, is not native to the island nation, but it has become something of a national obsession.

  • A female physician responds to hack journalist Paul Thacker

    Earlier this month, I deconstructed a particularly vicious, yet at the same time profoundly silly, hit piece targeting a young female physician named Dr. Allison Neitzel. I call it vicious, because it was clearly planned to target Dr. Neitzel and encourage a pile-on to bury this young physician (which it did), but it’s also profoundly silly in that it relies nearly entirely on a cherry picked, legalistic definition of what a “physician” is. The perpetrator was a journalist named Paul Thacker, who had long ago become far more of an ideologically motivated conspiracy mongering hack than anything resembling an actual “investigative journalist,” although the latter is what he calls himself. If you don’t believe me, I was reminded of a rather amusing Tweet (back when the hellscape that is now X was the less hellish hellscape known as Twitter) by Amy Harmon in response to a humorous thread on what we should call a group of trolls:

  • Science Alert ☛ The EPA Just Issued New Drinking Water Limits For 'Forever Chemicals'

  • The Kent Stater ☛ Harris heads to Arizona days after restrictive abortion ruling, hoping to use reproductive rights to galvanize voters

    Vice President Kamala Harris will travel to Arizona on Friday, hoping to use this week’s restrictive abortion ruling to mobilize voters who see November’s election as a referendum on women’s health rights.

  • New Yorker ☛ How a Republican and a Democrat Carved out Exemptions to Texas’s Abortion Ban

    Rare across-the-aisle coöperation in Austin aims to protect some people who need abortions and the doctors who provide them. Plus, a band rehearsal with the songwriter and actor Maya Hawke.

  • JURIST ☛ Poland legislature votes on abortion rights issues, facing EU criticism for near-total abortion ban

    After a contentious debate Thursday, the Sejm, the lower house of the Polish legislature, voted on four abortion–related proposals Friday and created an Extraordinary Committee to draft new abortion laws.

  • France24 ☛ PM Donald Tusk faces uphill battle on reforming Polish abortion rights

    Polish lawmakers voted Friday to advance bills that would lift a near-total ban on abortion in place since 2020, reviving an extremely polarising debate in the traditionally Roman Catholic country. But by launching an effort to liberalise abortion laws, Prime Minister Donald Tusk is moving to fulfil a campaign promise.

  • CS Monitor ☛ Pregnant Black women feel lost in the medical system. Doulas offer guidance – and a voice.

    As Black expectant mothers try to navigate a medical system in which they have little confidence, Black doulas have become trusted members of their pregnancy teams.

  • The Kent Stater ☛ The power of utilizing art for mental well-being

    From painting and drawing to music and writing, students turn to creative outlets as a way to cope with stress and mental health challenges. Alongside this practice, there is a growing recognition of utilizing art for enhanced mental well-being.

  • RFA ☛ Never mind the overcapacity, have some dim sum!

    Why did China's state media focus so intently on what US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen ate?

  • NYPost ☛ US drug shortages hit all-time high, pharmacists warn

    Data shows that there are 323 active drug shortages.

  • Federal News Network ☛ DHA, AFGE cement workplace policies for 38K DoD health employees

    For the first time ever, a new bargaining agreement between DHA and AFGE outlines cohesive policies on leave, work hours, official time, telework and much more.

  • Digital Music News ☛ Another K-Pop Superstar Death — Park Bo Ram Passes Away, Aged 30

    South Korean singer Park Bo Ram has passed away at the age of 30, just as she was preparing to celebrate her tenth anniversary in the K-pop industry. The latest in an unfortunate trend of K-pop singers dying young, Park Bo Ram was just 30 years old.

  • YLE ☛ Survey: Vast majority opposed to food VAT hike

    The government is aiming to save billions, and has hinted that doing so could involve raising the value added tax on groceries.

• Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ RTHK’s Hey Hi (AI) presenters ‘enhance productivity’ and relieve staff shortages, Hong Kong broadcaster says

    Hong Kong’s government-backed broadcaster RTHK has begun to use Artificial Intelligence-generated (AI) voices in place of some human presenters, saying that generative Hey Hi (AI) was increasingly pervasive and helped “relieve the staff shortage pressures.” Journalist Aaron Busch spotted the Hey Hi (AI) voice being used to host sports news on RTHK English-language channel Radio 3 this week.

  • Federal News Network ☛ Plan for Hey Hi (AI) to handle tax-return preparation

    Millions of Americans are sweating over one of the most intrusive processes known to mankind.

• Security

  • Integrity/Availability/Authenticity

    • Bruce Schneier ☛ Smuggling Gold by Disguising it as Machine Parts

      Someone got caught trying to smuggle 322 pounds of gold (that’s about 1/4 of a cubic foot) out of Hong Kong. It was disguised as machine parts:

      On March 27, customs officials x-rayed two air compressors and discovered that they contained gold that had been “concealed in the integral parts” of the compressors. Those gold parts had also been painted silver to match the other components in an attempt to throw customs off the trail.

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • New York Times ☛ What is FISA, and What Does It Mean for U.S. Surveillance and Spying?

      Under Section 702, the government is empowered to collect, without a warrant, the messages of Americans communicating with targeted foreigners abroad.

    • Reason ☛ Democrats Tank FISA Warrant Requirement

      The measure would have required federal agents to get a warrant before searching American communications collected as part of foreign intelligence.

• Defence/Aggression

  • RFA ☛ Thailand ready for any scenario on Myanmar border, foreign minister says

    Thousands of new civilians have been displaced following the rebel capture of Myawaddy, according to the Karen health department.

  • YLE ☛ Sixth graders not returning to school shooting classroom

    "The pupils will attend school at other facilities this spring, and then move to the middle school in the autumn," Vantaa's basic education chief says.

  • Press Gazette ☛ BBC says omission of trans identity of murderer Scarlet Blake was breach of accuracy rules

    The BBC's style guide says journalists should "generally" use a person's preferred terms and pronouns.

  • JURIST ☛ India reportedly withdraws 3 out of 15 lookout notices in 2023 London embassy attack

    India’s National Investigation Agency (NIA) reportedly withdrew Friday three out of 15 lookout notices against suspects of the attack on the Indian High Commission in London in March 2023, according to Indian national newspaper Indian Express.

  • Democracy Now ☛ “Council of War”: Walden Bello on Biden’s Trilateral Summit with Philippines & Japan to Contain China

    President Biden hosted Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Philippines President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. at the White House on Thursday, the first meeting of its kind, which comes as the U.S. moves to expand its military presence in the South China Sea to counter China. The Philippines has deepened military ties with both the United States and Japan in recent years as maritime confrontations with China have escalated. The trilateral summit at the White House resembled a “council of war,” according to Filipino scholar Walden Bello. He says the U.S. is the primary driver of tensions with China, building up its military footprint in the region as Pentagon officials openly muse about war, while China has focused primarily on its economic reach. “This militarization of the Pacific is very dangerous,” says Bello.

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • CS Monitor ☛ These Russian soldiers refuse to fight Putin's war. But escape is nearly impossible.

      Asylum claims from Russians have surged in the U.S., France, and Germany as growing numbers of Russian soldiers seek to escape the war in Ukraine. Few claims have been granted as countries consider the threat to national security.

    • Meduza ☛ Swapping repressive practices What to expect from Vladimir Putin and Alexander Lukashenko’s ever closer union — Meduza

    • European Commission ☛ Statement of Commissioner for Energy Kadri Simson on record post-winter gas storage levels in Europe

      Europe is emerging from its second winter since Russia's illegal invasion of Ukraine.

    • Atlantic Council ☛ State of the Order: Continuing challenges to the world order raise the urgency for Gaza ceasefire and Ukraine aid

      The State of the Order breaks down the month's most important events impacting the democratic world order.

    • Atlantic Council ☛ Dispatch from Kyiv: Ukraine is fighting for its economic survival, too

      The longer the war lasts, the more it will consume funds initially meant for long-term investments and reconstruction.

    • France24 ☛ China helping Moscow in biggest military expansion since Soviet times, US says

      China is helping Russia undertake its biggest military expansion since Soviet times, US officials said Friday, stepping up public pressure as concerns rise over Ukraine.

    • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ US says China helping Moscow in biggest defence expansion since Soviet era

      China is helping Russia undertake its biggest military expansion since Soviet times, US officials said Friday, stepping up public pressure as concerns rise over Ukraine.

    • LRT ☛ Lithuanians advised against travelling to countries popular among Russian tourists

      Lithuanian Foreign Ministry Chancellor Inga Černiuk on Friday advised vacationers against travelling to destinations popular among Russians because of potential tensions over differing views on the war in Ukraine.

    • LRT ☛ Only political platform for peace talks is proposed by Kyiv, says Zelensky in Vilnius

      The only platform for peace talks is the one proposed by Kyiv, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said during the Three Seas Summit in Vilnius.

    • RFERL ☛ China Is Surging Equipment Sales To Russia For Ukraine War, U.S. Finds

      China has surged sales to Russia of machine tools, microelectronics, and other technology that Moscow in turn is using to produce missiles, tanks, aircraft, and other weaponry for use in its war against Ukraine, according to a U.S. assessment.

    • RFERL ☛ Netherlands Pledges Additional 1 Billion Euros In Military Support For Ukraine

      The Netherlands will provide Ukraine with an additional 1 billion euros ($1.06 billion) in military support this year, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy announced on April 12.

    • RFERL ☛ Former Ukrainian Secret Service Employee Injured When Car Explodes In Moscow

      A former Ukrainian secret service employee was injured when a device under his car exploded in Moscow on April 12.

    • RFERL ☛ Ukraine, Russia Exchange Bodies Of More Than 120 Fallen Troops

      The bodies of 99 fallen Ukrainian soldiers were returned to Kyiv, Ukraine's Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War reported in a message on April 12.

    • RFERL ☛ Brussels Says It Suspects Russia Of Interfering In EU Elections

      Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo announced on April 12 an investigation into suspected Russian interference in European-wide elections in June, saying his country’s intelligence service has confirmed the existence of a network trying to undermine support for Ukraine.

    • RFERL ☛ Russia Strikes More Ukraine Energy Infrastructure

      An energy facility in Ukraine's southern region of Dnipropetrovsk has sustained damage after catching fire following a Russian drone attack early on April 12, the Ukrainian military and a regional official said.

    • New York Times ☛ Johnson Floats Voting on Senate Ukraine Bill, With Conservative Policies as Sweeteners

      The Republican speaker has weighed bringing up a $95 billion Senate-passed bill to aid Ukraine and Israel in tandem with a separate package geared toward mollifying G.O.P. critics.

    • New York Times ☛ J.D. Vance: The Math on Ukraine Doesn’t Add Up

      Ukraine needs more men than it can field, even with draconian conscription policies. And it needs more material than the United States can provide.

    • New York Times ☛ War or No War, Ukrainians Aren’t Giving Up Their Coffee

      Coffee shops and kiosks are everywhere in Ukraine’s capital, their popularity both an act of wartime defiance and a symbol of closer ties to the rest of Europe.

    • New York Times ☛ Back From Ukraine, a House Republican Makes the Case for More Aid

      Representative Chuck Edwards, a first-term North Carolinian, has emerged as a vocal proponent for U.S. aid to Ukraine in a party that has grown hostile to it. He recently saw the war up close.

    • Democracy Now ☛ “A Stalemate and Attritional Grind”: Journalist Luke Mogelson on 2 Years of Russia’s War in Ukraine

      We speak with The New Yorker war correspondent Luke Mogelson about the war in Ukraine, where the government has just passed a controversial bill that expands military conscription and cracks down on draft dodgers in an effort to replenish the depleted ranks of the army, more than two years since Russia launched its invasion. Military leaders have warned that Russian forces outnumber Ukrainian troops tenfold in the east. Mogelson says the Ukrainian military ranks are filled with “predominantly working-class men from rural areas or smaller villages,” while people in Kyiv and other large cities, where the elites live, can more easily avoid the full impact of the war. “You can really feel the gap between the two worlds widening,” says Mogelson, adding that most people realize the war cannot be sustained indefinitely and that “at some point there needs to be a negotiation” to end the fighting. Mogelson is the winner of this year’s prestigious George Polk Award for magazine reporting for his article “Two Weeks at the Front in Ukraine.”

    • Meduza ☛ Former Ukrainian Security Service officer reportedly hospitalized after car explodes in Moscow — Meduza

    • France24 ☛ Russian military instructors, air defence system arrive in Niger amid deepening ties

      Russian military instructors have arrived in Niger with an air defence system and other equipment as part of the West African nation’s deepening security ties with Moscow, state television announced late Thursday.

    • France24 ☛ Belgium opens probe into Russian ‘interference’ in European Parliament

      Belgian prosecutors have opened a probe into Russian “interference” in the European Parliament following allegations lawmakers were paid to spread Kremlin propaganda, Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said Friday.

    • RFERL ☛ Russia Summons French Ambassador Over Minister's 'Unacceptable' Comments

      Russia on April 12 summoned the French ambassador to Moscow following "unacceptable" comments by French Foreign Minister Stephane Sejourne, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

    • RFERL ☛ Moscow Expels Slovenian Diplomat In Tit-For-Tat Move

      Russia has ordered a Slovenian diplomat to leave the country in a retaliatory move after Ljubljana expelled a Russian diplomat, Russia's Foreign Ministry said in a statement on April 12.

    • teleSUR ☛ French Minister Sejourne Hinders Bilateral Dialogue: Russia

      Russian authorities summoned Ambassador Levy to speak about Stephane Sejourne's statements.

    • teleSUR ☛ Russia's Orenburg City Braces for Flooding Peak

      The water levels in the Ural River in the city had continued to rise and reached 1.12 meters.

    • Tom's Hardware ☛ Nearly 90% of chips used in Russia come from China despite US sanctions: Report

      Sanctions drive prices of chips for Russia considerably, but they cannot stop the flow of Western technologies into the aggressive nation.

    • YLE ☛ Estonia: Russia used nationals abroad to sow discontent over Finland's border closures

      "Without concealing its involvement or fearing reputational damage, Russia openly sent migrants to the Estonian and Finnish borders," the Estonian Internal Security Service said.

    • Meduza ☛ ‘Children behind bars’: Russian minor sent to pre-trial detention for anti-war statements — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ Hacked emails reveal intelligence agent’s harassment of theater luminaries and infiltration of Russia’s performing arts industry — Meduza

    • Security Week ☛ In Other News: Moscow Sewage Hack, Women in Cybersecurity Report, Dam Security Concerns

      Noteworthy stories that might have slipped under the radar: Moscow sewage system hacked, a new women in cybersecurity report, PasteHub domain seized by law enforcement. 

    • RFERL ☛ Tajik Foreign Minister Speaks Out About Treatment Of Crocus City Hall Suspects

      Tajikistan's foreign minister on April 12 condemned the treatment of the mostly Tajik suspects in last month’s terrorist attack on a Moscow-area concert hall that killed more than 140 people.

• Environment

  • Energy/Transportation

    • YLE ☛ Finland sees rise in boating-related deaths in 2023

      Some 34 people lost their lives in Finland last year due to boating accidents.

    • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ In China, a factory turns old wedding photographs into a source of electricity

      At a dusty warehouse in northern China, Liu Wei feeds photos of beaming bridal couples into an industrial shredder — turning stories of heartbreak into a source of electricity.

  • Wildlife/Nature

    • Meduza ☛ Forest gumption In Poland’s ancient Carpathian woodlands, an ‘invisible national park’ promises hope and healing — Meduza

• Finance

  • YLE ☛ Summer jobs few and far between this year

    The number of available summer positions has decreased significantly compared to last year, with students saying they're struggling to find work.

  • YLE ☛ Find out which Finnish firms receive the biggest public subsidies

    Well-known companies are some of the main recipients of taxpayer-funded corporate grants.

  • New York Times ☛ Bank of England Will Overhaul Its Forecasting After Inflation Surprises

    The review, which was led by Ben S. Bernanke, a former Federal Reserve chair, came after the central bank had been criticized for underestimating inflation.

  • New York Times ☛ Stocks Suffer Sharpest Weekly Decline of 2024

    Investors had been put on edge by a stronger-than-expected inflation report earlier in the week. Rising tension in the Middle East heading into the weekend gave them another reason to retreat.

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • Atlantic Council ☛ As Sogavare seeks reelection in the Solomon Islands, China’s influence is on the ballot

    The April 17 elections in the Solomon Islands will determine whether the country doubles down on its ties with China or changes course.

  • Atlantic Council ☛ Global China Newsletter – Risky Business: The Challenge of Reducing Dependencies on China

  • New York Times ☛ China’s ‘Special Place’ in Modi’s Heart Is Now a Thorn in His Side

    As Narendra Modi seeks a third term as prime minister, India’s rupture with China looms over a pillar of his campaign: making his country a major power.

  • New York Times ☛ Campaign Puts Trump and the Spy Agencies on a Collision Course

    As president, Donald Trump never trusted the intelligence community. His antipathy has only grown since he left office, with potentially serious implications should he return to power.

  • RFA ☛ With new trilateral partnership, Philippines eyes more foreign investment

    Manila, Tokyo and Washington forged closer security and strategic ties at a White House summit.

  • RFA ☛ Hong Kong jails Portuguese national for overseas social control media posts

    Court hands down 5-year sentence 'incitement to secession' for posts to Facebook, X, Instagram and Telegram.

  • JURIST ☛ Hong Kong court sentences Portuguese national to 5 years prison over inciting secession

    The District Court of Hong Kong sentenced Portuguese national and former president of the now-dissolved Hong Kong Independence Party Joseph John on Thursday to five years in prison for conspiring to incite others to commit secession under the China-imposed National Security Law. John is the first European citizen jailed under the law.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong must remain vigilant against ‘soft resistance,’ city’s no.2 official warns

    The Hong Kong government will step up national security education through activities organised by disciplinary forces, schools and community groups, Chief Secretary Eric Chan has said, as he warned the city to be cautious about “soft resistance.”

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ 90% of Hong Kong protest, national security cases have been through court, as judiciary’s manpower woes persist

    Hong Kong’s judiciary has handled around 90 per cent of cases on national security and the 2019 protests.

  • New York Times ☛ China Feels Boxed In by the U.S. but Has Few Ways to Push Back

    China seeks to project military power in the seas around its coastline, yet also faces pressure to mend relations with neighbors for the good of its economy.

  • The Straits Times ☛ China top legislator says Beijing, Pyongyang set on developing friendly relations: KCNA

    SEOUL - China's top legislator, Zhao Leji, said it is Beijing's consistent strategic policy to defend and develop friendly relations between China and North Korea, North Korean state media KCNA said on Saturday.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ China’s top legislator, senior North Korean official hold talks on cooperation in Pyongyang

    China’s top legislator met with a senior North Korean official for talks on cooperation during a visit to Pyongyang this week, North Korean state media said Friday, in one of the most high-level meetings between the allies in years.

  • The Straits Times ☛ Malaysia’s King is world’s first private owner of China’s most expensive car

    The Hongqi L5 is currently available only in China.

  • The Straits Times ☛ China willing to enhance North Korean ties, top legislator says on visit: Report

    Mr Zhao Leji is on an official goodwill visit to North Korea from April 11 to 13.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Beijing slams US-Japan-Philippines summit, saying South China Sea actions ‘lawful’

    Beijing on Friday criticised the United States, Japan and the Philippines and defended its actions in the South China Sea as “lawful” after US President Joe Biden hosted a trilateral meeting in Washington.

  • The Straits Times ☛ China natural disasters cost $4.4 billion in first quarter, government says

    The disasters killed 79 people and affected 10.4 million people across 26 regions and provinces.

  • The Straits Times ☛ Return of the relics: China’s push to reclaim its lost treasures

    Its efforts to claw back its lost relics are likely to continue apace, potentially with more help from some friends.

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ Chinese gamers can't RMA their RTX 4090s due to US sanctions — users are being very careful with how they treat their top-tier GPUs

    Chinese publication HKEPC details how different brands carry out the RMA process for GeForce RTX 4090 graphics cards in China

  • Misinformation/Disinformation/Propaganda

    • RFA ☛ Episode F: Factual Correctness

      RFA staffer Shen Ke tells us all about the Asian Fact Check Lab

    • Reason ☛ Combat Disinformation With Better Norms, Not More Laws

      Fight back through better information and discourse, not by empowering the government.

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • RFA ☛ Uyghur activist receives Roosevelt freedom of worship award

    Zumretay Arkin says China needs to be held accountable for rights violations against Uyghurs.

  • Techdirt ☛ Ctrl-Alt-Speech: Watch Out, AI Is Getting More Persuasive

    Ctrl-Alt-Speech is a weekly podcast about the latest news in online speech, from Mike Masnick and Everything in Moderation‘s Ben Whitelaw.

  • Techdirt ☛ Once Again, ExTwitter Makes Links Dangerous; The Kind Of Thing A Trust & Safety Team Would Catch

    Just a few weeks ago, we pointed out that the purpose of a trust & safety team is not, as Elon Musk falsely claims, to “censor” users, but rather to make sure they’re safe on the site. We were highlighting this in the context of Elon’s site disguising posted links in a manner that made it easier for scammers to trick people into thinking they were going to a reputable site, when they were not.

• Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong media mogul Jimmy Lai provided HK$1.5 million loan to activists during 2019 demos, court hears

    Hong Kong media mogul Jimmy Lai was willing to provide “all kinds of help,” including a HK$1.5 million loan, to activists launching a global advertising campaign in June 2019, the mogul’s national security trial has heard.

• Civil Rights/Policing

  • University of Michigan ☛ Inclusive History Project examines UMich history of discrimination and activism

    The University of Michigan Inclusive History Project works to expand and support research that examines the University’s history through the lens of diversity, equity and inclusion. The IHP aims to construct a comprehensive retelling of U-M history from all three campuses to help inform future decision making for the University.

  • FAIR ☛ Chris Bernadel on Haiti

  • Techdirt ☛ Cops Battered A Man Suffering A Seizure, Cooked Up Criminal Charges To Cover Up Their Actions

    It often seems that anything not immediately comprehensible to a law enforcement officer must be responded to with violence. Sure, we get to hear plenty about officers’ “training and expertise,” but the tool set seems extremely limited when it comes to dealing with unforeseen circumstances.

  • Public Knowledge ☛ Privileged Conversations | May 2024

    Public Knowledge has the pleasure of inviting you to a multifaceted program focused on training and developing the next generation of tech policy experts and public interest advocates that reflects the diversity of voices and experiences in our society. Please join us for our monthly Career Breakfast Series.

• Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

  • Techdirt ☛ The FCC’s New ‘Broadband Nutrition Label’ Doesn’t Solve The Actual Problem: Unchecked Telecom Monopoly Power

    For the better part of the last decade, the FCC had been pondering the idea of requiring a sort of “nutrition label” for broadband access. The idea is to make ISPs — which routinely mislead consumers about pricing, speeds, restrictions, usage caps, and everything else — be more transparent with the end user at the point of sale.

  • Internet Society ☛ Protection for Intermediaries Is Vital for the Internet in Mexico

    We often overlook the factors that enable the Internet to accommodate a wide range of applications, from real-time surgeries to viral memes, and individual expression. Some of those factors are technical and some are policy.

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• CCIA ☛ The FTC’s Case Against Meta Shows an Antipathy Towards Mergers, but Lacks Legal Grounds

  Last Friday, Meta filed a Motion for Summary Judgement (MSJ) in its ongoing case against the FTC for alleged monopolization.

• Patents

  • JUVE ☛ ATL and Hogan Lovells victorious in lithium-ion battery battle with CosMX Power

    China-based company Ningde Amperex Technology, better known as ATL, is one of the world’s biggest manufacturers of rechargeable lithium-ion batteries. ATL has accused various CosMX Power subsidiaries of infringing its European patent monopoly EP 3 627 606 B1 with its lithium-ion batteries, which are mainly installed in laptops.

  • Dennis Crouch/Patently-O ☛ The Design Law Treaty and the Struggle for International Harmonization of Industrial Design Protection

    The international IP community is moving toward further harmonizing legal protection for industrial designs. For almost twenty years, member states of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) have been negotiating a Design Law Treaty (DLT) that would streamline and align procedural requirements for obtaining registered design rights across jurisdictions. If successful, the DLT would make it “significantly easier for small and medium-sized enterprises to obtain industrial design protection overseas as a result of simplified, streamlined and aligned procedures and requirements.”[1]  The DLT can be seen as parallel to the Patent Law Treaty (PLT) adopted in 2000 that helped to harmonize and standardize the formal patent monopoly procedures such as the filing requirements sufficient for obtaining a filing date.

• Trademarks

  • Lidl v. Tesco: Supermarket Wars in Court

    Supermarkets compete aggressively for our custom. The entry of upstart discount supermarkets Lidl and Aldi into the market has created new pressures on the established brands, including Tesco— ironically, the original "pile it high and sell it cheap” operation. Supermarkets benchmark their prices against those charged by their competitors and offer loyal customers benefits, including, extremely attractive special offers when customers use their loyalty cards. They are no less aggressive when it comes to using and protecting their trademarks.

  • TTAB Blog ☛ CAFC Partially Remands "HERE COMES THE JUDGE" Appeal to TTAB for Production of AEO Materials

    In its remand order, the CAFC stated: "the court finds it appropriate to remand to allow the Board to consider whether the protective order should be modified to allow Mr. Chisena access to appellees’ AEO-designated material referenced in either the trial briefs or the Board’s final decision to ensure he has a fair opportunity to prosecute his case on appeal."

    On April 10, 2024, the Board issued an order [here] requiring the parties to "meet and confer in good faith to (i) identify the AEO-designated materials to which the parties’ trial briefs or the Board’s final decision referred, and (ii) determine which of those AEO-designated materials, if any, can be redesignated as 'CONFIDENTIAL' by agreement of the parties."

• Copyrights

  • Techdirt ☛ Court Rules For Paramount In Lawsuit Over ‘Top Gun’ Movies

    A couple of years back, Mike wrote about a lawsuit brought against Paramount Pictures over its Top Gun movies. There were several things that colluded to make this lawsuit a thing, as Mike laid out. First was the mess that is copyright termination rights and the second is movie studios’ habit for licensing factual articles for movie rights.