Leftovers

• Hardware

  • Ruben Schade ☛ Buying a matte screen protector

    I prefer matte displays over glossy, on both phones and laptops. Colours don’t pop like they do behind glossy, which is probably why they’ve been disappearing on consumer-facing hardware. But matte displays are easier to calibrate, and diffuse light rather that reflect it, which makes them more useful in a wider range of areas. You know, like you’ll find when using a phone or laptop.

  • Tedium ☛ Trip’s Big Interactive Reset

    Why 3DO’s true innovation wasn’t its early 3D hardware, but its business model—a model that perfectly matches its founder’s philosophy.

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ New firmware addresses defective chip maker Intel CPU gaming instability — Asus defective chip maker Intel Baseline Profile fixes crashing on Raptor Lake and Raptor Lake Refresh chips

    To alleviate the frustration with instability issues on motherboards using 13th—and 14th-generation defective chip maker Intel CPUs, Asus is taking the first step by providing a setting on a new beta BIOS that uses defective chip maker Intel settings instead of its own.

  • Hackaday ☛ Let The Solder Scroll Take Care Of Your Feed Needs

    [Victor]’s nifty tool the Solder Scroll is a handheld device that lets one feed solder out simply by turning something a little like a scroll wheel. It looks like an intuitive and comfortable design that can adapt to a wide variety of solder thicknesses, and is entirely 3D printed.

  • Hackaday ☛ Solar Panel Keeps Cheap Digital Calipers Powered Up

    There’s no doubt that cheap digital calipers are useful, especially when designing 3D-printed parts. Unfortunately, cheap digital calipers are also cheap, and tend to burn through batteries quickly. Sure, you can remove the battery when you’re done using them, but that’s for suckers — winners turn to solar power to keep their calipers always at the ready.

  • Hackaday ☛ AM Radio Broadcast Uses Phasor To Let Eight Towers Spray One Big Signal

    If you’re in the commercial AM radio business, you want to send your signal as far and wide as possible. More listeners means you can make more ad revenue, after all. [Jeff Geerling] recently visited a tower site for WSDZ-AM, which uses a full eight towers to broadcast its 20kW AM signal. To do that, it needs a phasor to keep everything in tune. Or, uh… phase.

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • Kev Quirk ☛ The Day of Rest

    Sunday. The day of rest. Yesterday, Saturday, was a busy day chock-full of household chores. But today, today, is different. I can sit on my lazy fat arse and bask in the fruits of my labour from yesterday, right?

    Wrong. So fucking wrong.

  • Ruben Schade ☛ Comments that didn’t age well

    A person with the handle “steveccc” left this big brain comment on a Sydney Morning Herald Covid article in 2020:

    Get a grip guys. The worst flu season in recent years killed 80,000 worldwide.

  • France24 ☛ Dozens of Chinese swimmers failed doping tests ahead of Tokyo Olympics

    Twenty-three Chinese swimmers tested positive for a banned drug before the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 the World Anti-Doping Agency confirmed Saturday, defending the decision to let them compete based on China's findings they had ingested it unknowingly.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Chinese swimmers who competed in Tokyo Olympics failed doping tests ahead of games

    Twenty-three Chinese swimmers tested positive for a banned drug before the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 the World Anti-Doping Agency confirmed Saturday, defending the decision to let them compete based on China’s findings they had ingested it unknowingly.

  • New York Times ☛ China’s Swimmers Tested Positive. What Happens to Their Medals?

    The short answer may be nothing. The world’s top doping regulator said there was “no credible evidence” to take further action.

  • New York Times ☛ Takeaways From Our Chinese Swimming Investigation

    A doping case involving Olympic swimmers has left unanswered questions and raised new concerns about the actions of a global antidoping regulator.

  • Excess deaths and data deficit

  • Outrageous

• Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)

  • Tom's Hardware ☛ Adding ZIP file support to backdoored Windows 30 years ago almost got the creator of Task Manager fired

    Former Abusive Monopolist Microsoft engineer and Task Manager creator Dave Plummer added ZIP file support to Windows, but initially through his own independently-sold kernel extension, VisualZIP.

• Security

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • Scoop News Group ☛ FISA reauthorization heads to Biden’s desk after Senate passage

      A two-year extension of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act clears the chamber in a 60-34 vote Saturday.

    • JURIST ☛ US Senate votes to reauthorize controversial surveillance law with changes

      The US Senate voted 60–34 early Saturday to reauthorize and amend controversial intelligence legislation known as Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), just after the provision expired at midnight.

• Defence/Aggression

  • RFERL ☛ Iran, Israel Appear To Step Back From Moves To Spark Wider Regional Conflict

    Iran and Israel appeared to be easing off actions and rhetoric that could lead to a wider Middle East conflict after a series of apparent retaliatory attacks, the latest of which featured a suspected Israeli strike on sites near the central Iranian city of Isfahan.

  • RFA ☛ Karen rebel forces attack stranded Myanmar junta troops on Thai border

    Junta sends in airstrikes to support 200 junta troops trapped by a river across from Mae Sot.

  • New York Times ☛ Iran on Edge Amid Airstrikes, Crackdowns and Fear of War

    Facing deep economic troubles and a restive population, the government seems to have adopted a policy of declaring victory over Israel and cracking down at home, analysts say.

  • New York Times ☛ Israel’s Strike on Iran Highlights Its Ability to Evade Tehran’s Air Defenses

    The retaliatory attack damaged a defense system near Natanz, a city in central Iran that is critical to the country’s nuclear weapons program.

  • New York Times ☛ Israeli Airstrikes on Gaza Kill at Least 10 Palestinians in Rafah, Including Children

    For weeks, Palestinians have been bracing for a ground offensive on the southern Gaza city, where over 1 million residents have fled.

  • New York Times ☛ Strike Was Meant to Show Iran that Israel Could Paralyze Its Defenses

    This attack used a fraction of the fire power Iran deployed last week when it launched hundreds of drones and missiles at Israel.

  • RFERL ☛ Latest Attack On Pakistani Customs Officials Kills 3

    Police in the western Pakistani city of Dera Ismail Khan say unidentified men opened fire on a vehicle carrying customs officials on April 21, killing a customs inspector and two security personnel and injuring another in the second deadly attack on customs officials in the span of four days.

  • Modern Diplomacy ☛ 2024-04-15 [Older] Why did Israel launch a strike on Iran’s consulate in Syria?

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-04-15 [Older] Syrian ex-general faces Swedish court over war crime charges

  • The Local SE ☛ 2024-04-15 [Older] Top-ranking Syrian military official to face trial in Sweden

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-04-14 [Older] Cyprus suspends Syrian asylum applications

  • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-04-14 [Older] Cyprus Suspends Syrian Asylum Applications as It Struggles With Arrivals Spike

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-04-12 [Older] Lebanon: Killing of official unleashes fury against Syrians

  • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-04-14 [Older] Most of the Iranian Drones Over Syria Were Downed by Israel,US, Intelligence Sources Say

  • BIA Net ☛ 2024-04-17 [Older] Indictment sheds light on ISIS-K's extensive network in Turkey

  • New Yorker ☛ The Morality Play Inside Trump’s Courtroom

    “This idea of the old ‘Teflon Don’ is just finished,” Evan Osnos says. “The guy is now a creature of the court.”

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • RFERL ☛ Navalnaya Warns Of Putin's Willingness To Strike In Europe

      The exiled widow of the late Russian opposition leader Aleksei Navalny has said "nobody knows" what to expect from Russian President Vladimir Putin and warned that the revanchist Kremlin leader could use nuclear weapons if he felt the need.

• Environment

  • New York Times ☛ Heavy Rains and a Water Spout Hit Southern China

    Bad weather in Guangdong Province forced evacuations as forecasters warned of more rain and potential flooding.

  • The Straits Times ☛ Guangdong’s expected massive river flooding threatens millions after it ‘rained like a waterfall’

    The authorities are enacting emergency response plans to protect more than 127 million people.

  • Energy/Transportation

    • YLE ☛ Problems delay OL3 reactor restart by 6 days

      Olkiluoto 3 was taken offline at the beginning of last month for annual maintenance.

    • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-04-10 [Older] German ports to receive security and competitiveness boost

    • US News And World Report ☛ 2024-04-12 [Older] Cable Car Accident in Turkey Sends 1 Passenger to His Death and Injures 7, With Scores Stranded

  • Overpopulation

    • Ruben Schade ☛ Singaporeans delaying or giving up on kids

      This was a draft post from November 2023 I just found again.

      Jewel Stolarchuk wrote in The Independent, a Singaporean news website:

      SINGAPORE: With statistics showing that Singaporeans have begun to delay the age at which they have children, with the situation worsening over the past ten years, a new survey has found that a whopping 40 per cent of young Singaporeans do not expect the next generation to have children.

• Finance

  • The Straits Times ☛ Tariffs or not, Chinese firms push new energy exports at nation’s largest trade fair

    Exhibitors are unfazed, with some saying they expect sales in 2024 to reach a post-pandemic high.

  • YLE ☛ Opposition MPs slam minister over claiming €100m in social sector cuts came as 'a surprise' to her

    An SDP MP accused Social Affairs and Health Minister Kaisa Juuso (Finns) of being "completely out of touch with the situation and plans at her own ministry".

  • YLE ☛ Workplace old age discrimination starts at 50, professor says

    "Age discrimination cases need to be brought to court... but that's not enough," sociology emeritus professor Harri Melin says.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong regulator to investigate PwC auditing of Chinese real estate giant Evergrande

    Hong Kong’s accounting regulator said it would start an investigation into PwC’s role in auditing Chinese real estate giant Evergrande, citing the publication of a “whistle-blower report”.

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • New York Times ☛ Lawsuit Puts Fresh Focus on Eric Hovde’s Comments About Older Voters

    Pressed on his claims of 2020 election irregularities, the Republican candidate for Senate in Wisconsin has questioned the mental capacity of nursing home residents to vote.

  • The Straits Times ☛ From Lucky Plaza to Canada: How ex-followers raised funds for Philippines’ fugitive preacher

    Donations allegedly funded church operations and the lavish lifestyle of fugitive preacher Apollo Quiboloy.

  • The Straits Times ☛ China hosts foreign naval officials amid South China Sea tensions

    The show of military diplomacy will be closely watched for signs of more engagement between Beijing and Washington.

  • The Straits Times ☛ Maldives votes in election key to its India, China relations

    MALE - Voters in the Maldives were flocking to the polls on Sunday in a parliamentary election that may determine whether the Indian Ocean island nation continues its shift toward China and away from its longstanding ties with India.

  • RFA ☛ No, Southeast Asians do not now prefer China over the US

    There is less than meets the eye in headlines showing ASEAN has tilted toward Beijing in its rivalry with Washington.

  • France24 ☛ Maldives votes in parliamentary elections seen as test for president’s tilt towards China

    Voting got under way in the Maldives Sunday in a parliamentary election likely to test President Mohamed Muizzu’s tilt towards China and away from India, the luxury tourism hotspot’s traditional benefactor.

  • Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Taiwan’s defence ministry detects 21 Chinese military aircraft amid rising tensions

    A surge of Chinese military aircraft was detected around Taiwan during a three-hour window on Saturday, Taipei’s defence ministry said, a month before the self-ruled island’s May 20 inauguration of incoming president Lai Ching-te.

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • Reason ☛ "Last Week, a … [UC Berkeley] Professor Confronted a Muslim Student During a Dinner for Graduating Law Students"

    From NBC, what strikes me as a misleading characterization of Professor Catherine Fisk's confronting a student who pulled out a microphone to orate at a dinner organized at the professor's (and Dean Erwin Chemerinsky's) house.

  • IT Wire ☛ Elon Musk's X rejects eSafety demand on stabbing videos

    The social control media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, has refused to comply with an order from the Australian eSafety commission to take down content related to the stabbing attack in Sydney, saying it does not violate its rules on violent content.

  • 43% of Left-wing nerds support the ban of opposing political ideas

    Censorship of online discourse is a major point of disagreement between the political Left and Right.

    Tech organizations perceived as "Politically Left-leaning", tend to support the banning of ideas from Online publishing platforms (Social Media, YouTube, Forums, etc.) -- Mozilla's infamous declaration of "we need more than deplatforming" being one such example.

    On the flipside, most moves towards less censorship are regarded as being "Politically Right-leaning" -- a great example being Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter, and subsequent loosening of some censorship rules on the X / Twitter platform.

• Civil Rights/Policing

  • HRW ☛ 2024-04-15 [Older] Saudi Arabia: Free Award-Winning Activist

  • Deutsche Welle ☛ 2024-04-17 [Older] 'Not safe': Saudi Arabia slammed after jailing football fans

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• Patents

  • Dennis Crouch/Patently-O ☛ Seeking Clarity on Comparison Prior Art: Seirus Petitions Supreme Court in Heat Wave Design Patent Dispute

    Seirus has petitioned for writ of certiorari in its long-running design patent monopoly dispute with Columbia Sportswear.  The petition asks two questions related to the comparison process for design patent monopoly infringement — in particular, the questions focus on what can qualify as “comparison prior art” used to provide context for the infringement analysis.