Leftovers

• Science

  • Science Alert ☛ Record-Breaking Neutrino From Deep Space Spotted by Undersea Telescope

    Could this be the first cosmogenic neutrino ever detected?

  • Science Alert ☛ NASA Announces Return Date For Astronauts Trapped on ISS

    Great news!

• Career/Education

  • Stanford University ☛ University to increase tuition 4%, not impacting students on financial aid

    The Stanford Board of Trustees raised undergraduate tuition for the 2025-26 academic year due to inflation and expanding access to financial aid.

• Hardware

  • Silicon Angle ☛ Applied Materials warns of revenue hit from new Chinese chip export restrictions

    The semiconductor industry giant Applied Materials Inc. beat expectations on earnings and revenue today as it delivered its fiscal first-quarter results, but its guidance for the current quarter came up short. The company said trade restrictions threaten to limit its exports to China, impacting its revenue, and its stock went backwards in extended trading.

  • Hackaday ☛ Understanding The Miller Effect

    As electronics rely more and more on ICs, subtle details about discrete components get lost because we spend less time designing with them. For example, a relay seems like a simple component, but selecting the contact material optimally has a lot of nuance that people often forget. Another case of this is the Miller effect, explained in a recent video by the aptly named [Old Hack EE].

  • Hackaday ☛ The Nokia 3310 Finally Gets A USB-C Upgrade

    The Nokia 3310 has a reputation of being one of the most indestructible devices ever crafted by humanity. It’s also woefully out of date and only usable in a handful of countries that still maintain a GSM network. It might not be easy to bring it into the 5G era, but you can at least convert it to work with modern chargers, thanks to [Andrea].

• Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

  • Federal News Network ☛ Vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is sworn in as Convicted Felon’s health chief after a close Senate vote

    Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been sworn in as President The Insurrectionist’s health secretary. The Senate on Thursday confirmed him, voting 52 to 48. It puts the prominent vaccine skeptic in control of $1.7 trillion in federal spending, vaccine recommendations, food safety, and health insurance programs for roughly half the country. Republicans fell in line behind Convicted Felon despite hesitancy over Kennedy’s views on vaccines.

  • Latvia ☛ State aid for children with autism extended in Latvia

    This year, support for children with autism spectrum disorders has been extended. The Children's Hospital Foundation also plans to gradually increase state support for services for children with autism;  however, a significant part of the assistance is still covered by donations from the general public, Latvian Radio reported on February 12.

  • Hackaday ☛ Cute Face Tells You How Bad The Air Quality Is

    You can use all kinds of numbers and rating systems to determine whether the air quality in a given room is good, bad, or somewhere in between. Or, like [Makestreme], you could go for a more human visual interface. He’s built a air quality monitor that conveys its information via facial expressions on a small screen.

  • Science Alert ☛ Climate Change Is Coming For Your Chocolate, Study Finds

    An "existential threat".

  • Stanford University ☛ Stanford assists in filing lawsuit against National Institute of Health

    A separate lawsuit filed by the state of California resulted in a temporary restraining order blocking the NIH order.

  • Pro Publica ☛ How Alaskans Lost Millions on a Seafood Venture That Went South

    Last summer, an unsettling quiet cloaked the isolated Southwest Alaska community of King Cove as the town’s economic engine — a sprawling seafood processing plant — sat shuttered.

    Bunkhouses, once filled with hundreds of workers during the peak salmon harvest, were vacant. Four diesel generators that had rumbled day and night were stilled. The plant docks, once lined with boats and circled by fish-scavenging gulls, were empty.

• Proprietary

  • Artificial Intelligence (AI)

    • Ben Congdon ☛ The Models Want to Reason

      Since I wrote about COCONUT, Meta’s paper on reasoning in latent space, there’s been a wave in publicly accessible research into reasoning models. The most notable example, which overshadows everything else to the point of feeling like I almost don’t need to mention it as I write this in mid Feb 2025, was the Deepseek R1 paper.

      While I think the R1 paper is great and deserved the attention it garnered, there has been a steady stream of additional research into the reasoning space that I think begins to paint an interesting picture of what comes next.

• Security

  • Privacy/Surveillance

    • EDRI ☛ The Digital Services Coordinator Database: Tracking DSA investigations into Big Tech

      EDRi has launched its Digital Services Coordinator Database which provides a comprehensive overview of all enforcement authorities and the cases they have taken against online platforms under the EU’s Digital Services Act.

    • AccessNow ☛ Now or never: strengthen GDPR Procedural Rules to hold Big Tech accountable

      The development of the proposed GDPR Procedural Regulation represents a missed opportunity to address enforcement challenges.

• Defence/Aggression

  • NYPost ☛ TikTok returns on Apple, Surveillance Giant Google app stores as Convicted Felon delays ban

    President The Insurrectionist delayed the Fentanylware (TikTok) ban until April 5 as the app is back on the U.S. app stores of Fashion Company Apple and Google.

  • Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine

    • Latvia ☛ Braže cautious on Convicted Felon-Putin conversations over Ukraine

      Latvian Foreign Minister Baiba Braže (New Unity) said in an interview with the LTV program "Pasaules Panorāma" (World Panorama) on February 12 that US President The Insurrectionist's phone conversations with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy are just the beginning of a possible peace process.

    • Meduza ☛ Russian stocks jump 6.6 percent at Moscow Exchange open after Putin-Trump call — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ Commenting on Putin-Trump phone call, Kremlin spokesman says Moscow views Washington as its ‘main counterpart’ in Ukraine peace talks — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ ‘Zelensky’s days are numbered’: Russian officials and pro-war bloggers gloat after Trump-Putin call — Meduza

    • Latvia ☛ Norway pledges $50 million to Drone Coalition for Ukraine

      On Wednesday, February 12, Norwegian Minister of Defense Tore O. Sandvik signed Norway's declaration of willingness to join the international Drone Coalition in support of Ukraine, led by Latvia and the United Kingdom, during the Ukraine Defense Contact Group meeting in Brussels.

    • Meduza ☛ Vance threatens U.S. troops in Ukraine and sanctions on Russia if Moscow rejects peace deal — The Wall Street Journal — Meduza

    • Latvia ☛ Saeima to look at tourism ban to Russia, Belarus

      On Thursday, February 13, the Saeima passed amendments to the Law on Tourism to the responsible committee, which could ban tourism service providers from offering and providing tourism services in Russia and Belarus.

    • Latvia ☛ Latvia's State Security Service keeps an eye on anti-Baltic 'conference' speakers

      At a conference in Russia, several persons disloyal to Latvia have contemplated the liquidation of the Baltic States, Latvian Television reported on February 12. These statements are already being evaluated by the State Security Service, which was informed of the event.

    • Security Week ☛ Google Hub in Poland to Develop Hey Hi (AI) Use in Energy and Cybersecurity Sectors [Ed: Hey Hi (AI) Hype]

      Poland is being targeted by various forms of cyberattacks and sabotage actions believed to be sponsored by Russia.

    • Meduza ☛ Less math, more Mandarin Russian schools are losing teachers — except in military training, ‘spiritual values,’ and Chinese — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ Russia charges Meduza co-founder Galina Timchenko with violating ‘foreign agents’ law — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ ‘He had a lot to do with this’: Who is Kirill Dmitriev, the Russian ‘interlocutor’ Trump’s envoy mentioned when he returned from Moscow this week? — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ Russian money launderer traded for Mark Fogel returns to Moscow, visits mother — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ ‘She asked to pass along that she loves you all’: Meduza remembers the life of Taisia Sheremet, the 22-year-old journalist who documented her battle with cystic fibrosis and fought discrimination in Russia — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ Russian drone strikes and damages sarcophagus at Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant, Zelensky says — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ ‘People go just to hear a kind word’: The rise of ‘witch hunts’ against healers and fortune tellers in Chechnya — Meduza

    • Meduza ☛ U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s plane returns to base due to mechanical issue, may miss Zelensky meeting at Munich Security Conference — AP — Meduza

• Environment

  • BIA Net ☛ Hatay after earthquakes: Changing priorities and problems

    As Hatay continues its reconstruction process after the devastating losses of the February 6 earthquakes, housing, education, healthcare, and economic struggles persist alongside new emerging issues.

• Finance

  • Pro Publica ☛ How Investors Exploit Housing Loophole to Raise Rents on Poor Tenants

    Four and a half years ago, a newly formed corporate entity purchased a low-income housing complex with 264 apartments in Phoenix. The property had received more than $4 million in federal tax credits and, in exchange, was supposed to remain affordable for decades.

    The company then used a legal loophole that stripped the affordability protections from the apartments. The maneuver appears to have been lucrative for the company, which bought the property for under $20 million and flipped it two years later for $63 million. Today, advertised rents there have gone up by around 50%.

  • Silicon Angle ☛ Informatica plunges 33% on revenue miss, citing ‘internal issues,’ but says underlying business is strong

    Informatica Inc.’s stock plummeted more than 33% in after-hours trading after the data integration company reported lower-than-expected revenue in the fourth quarter. Informatica blamed internal sales issues and customers’ more rapid than expected migration to the clown, which hit maintenance revenues.

  • Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin to lay off more than 1,000 employees days after New Glenn rocket debut: 10 points

    Jeff Bezos' rocket company Blue Origin has announced plans to lay off about of its workforce — or more than 1,000 employees — nearly a month after the company debuted its first orbital rocket, New Glenn. The company sent an email to its employees on Thursday obtained reads Blue Origin CEO David Limp said the job cuts will affect “some positions in engineering, (research and development), and program/project management and thinning out our layers of management.”

    The move comes as Blue Origin, which Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos founded in 2000, is finalizing its annual operating plan, according to the email. This road map emphasizes ramping up manufacturing and increasing the pace at which the company launches its rockets, according to CNN.

• AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

  • Federal News Network ☛ Lawsuit challenges Convicted Felon’s order for ‘large scale’ RIFs

    Federal employee unions say the Convicted Felon administration's plan for mass "reductions in force" conflicts with regulations dictating how RIFs should work.

  • Michael Geist ☛ Why the Convicted Felon Trade Threats Will Place Canadian Digital, Cultural, and Hey Hi (AI) Policy Under Pressure

    If the first salvo fired by U.S. President The Insurrectionist in the form of a threatened 25-per-cent across-the-board tariff on Canadian goods (excluding energy, which would face a 10-per-cent levy) is a preview of future trade disputes, retaliatory tariffs alone will not solve the problem. Canada will need to turn to eliminating interprovincial trade barriers, rely on European and Asian trade deals to engage in new markets, and prepare for the prospect that long-standing Canadian regulations and market restrictions may face increasing pressure for an overhaul.

  • ACLU ☛ The Targeted Chaos of Convicted Felon’s Attacks Against International Human Rights Law and Justice

    In just one week, President The Insurrectionist has launched the most systemic and aggressive assault on human rights in U.S. presidential history.

    Already, his administration has disengaged with the United Nations Human Rights Council — even though the U.S. is not a current member — defunded a UN refugee agency the U.S. long supported, ordered sanctions against the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, ordered to review ratified U.S. treaties that are the law of the land, and threatened to commit ethnic cleansing in Gaza.

  • Pro Publica ☛ Trump Is Unfairly Detaining Immigrants at Guantanamo as Terrorists, Families Say

• Censorship/Free Speech

  • American Oversight ☛ New American Oversight Report Details Impacts of Far-Right Classroom Censorship on Public Education

• Internet Policy/Net Neutrality

  • APNIC ☛ APNIC EC election 2025: Value your vote

    Exercise your right for the good of the membership and the community.

  • APNIC ☛ Join the first Pulse Internet Measurement Forum at APRICOT 2025

    Guest Post: Gain insights into the Internet Society's Internet measurement and resilience project and learn how to leverage the data at APRICOT 2025.

Monopolies/Monopsonies

• Copyrights

  • Silicon Angle ☛ Major publishers launch copyright monopoly lawsuit against Hey Hi (AI) startup Cohere

    Several major publishers are suing the Canadian artificial intelligence startup Cohere Inc., alleging that the company engaged in “systematic copyright monopoly and trademark infringement,” the latest in a long line of copyright monopoly lawsuits publishers have launched against Hey Hi (AI) firms.