News gathered 2024-04-04
(date: 2024-04-04 10:13:10)
Condemned killer of 12-year-old Polly Klaas makes new bid to overturn death sentence
date: 2024-04-04, from: San Jose Mercury News
“If Polly’s killer is somehow able to prevail, this is the tip of the iceberg,” said her father, Marc Klaas.
Sleuths who cracked Zodiac Killer’s cipher thank the crowd
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Fifty-one years of community contributions, software, and clever cryptanalysis contributed
Three men received recognition in December 2020 for cracking the Zodiac Killer’s 340-character cipher (Z340) – but they want to share credit with the community of sleuths who helped with the 51-year code breaking effort.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/zodiac_killer_code/
Disney+ will crack down on password sharing in June
date: 2024-04-04, from: San Jose Mercury News
Disney is curbing password sharing for its Disney+ streaming service as part of a larger effort to boost signups and revenue.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/04/04/disney-will-crack-down-on-password-sharing-in-june/
Audi U.S. Electric Car Sales Improved 29% In Q1 2024
date: 2024-04-04, from: Inside EVs News
EV share increased to a new record of nearly 13%.
https://insideevs.com/news/714924/audi-us-electric-car-sales-2024q1/
Chance the Rapper and wife Kirsten Corley are divorcing after 5 years of marriage
date: 2024-04-04, from: San Jose Mercury News
The two said they remain committed to co-parenting despite their separation
You Have to See Renault’s EV Jetski and Snowbike
date: 2024-04-04, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
The French automaker is expanding into both land and water mobility solutions.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/714728/renault-new-electric-mobility-solutions/
Come Join Us for a Great Fishing Event
date: 2024-04-04, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
The Neal Taylor Nature Center 27th Annual Fish Derby: The derby is the annual fundraiser for the Neal Taylor Nature
The post Come Join Us for a Great Fishing Event appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/04/04/come-join-us-for-a-great-fishing-event-2/
Washington State hires David Riley: The best move the Cougars could have made under the circumstances
date: 2024-04-04, from: San Jose Mercury News
Washington State’s options were limited in the search to replace Kyle Smith, but the nephew of a famous former Pac-12 football coach has a strong resume.
Beautify Goleta Goes Big For Earth Day with Multiple Activities on April 20
date: 2024-04-04, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
GOLETA, CA, April 3, 2024 – Celebrate Earth Day with the City of Goleta on Saturday, April 20 for a special Beautify
The post Beautify Goleta Goes Big For Earth Day with Multiple Activities on April 20 appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
College Briefs for April 4
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Signal
Valencia student named to Lincoln University of Missouri’s fall 2023 dean’s list Courtney-Nicole Cooper, of Valencia, was recently named to the dean’s list of Lincoln University in Jefferson City, Missouri, for the fall 2023 semester. The Lincoln University dean’s list comprises full-time undergraduate students earning a minimum term GPA of 3.00, excluding grades in courses […]
The post College Briefs for April 4 appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/04/college-briefs-for-april-4/
Quema De Montón Programada Para Esta Semana
date: 2024-04-04, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
QUÉ: Quema controlada por montones de 4 a 5 acres tratados de tala de árboles caídos y muertos y maleza
The post Quema De Montón Programada Para Esta Semana appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/04/04/quema-de-monton-programada-para-esta-semana/
Scientists have created the largest 3D map of our universe to date…
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/04/0044331-scientists-have-created-t
Biden heralds 75th anniversary of NATO’s founding
date: 2024-04-04, from: VOA News USA
White House — President Joe Biden welcomed NATO’s 75th anniversary Thursday, as the security alliance hosted new member Sweden for the first time at a major meeting – and as Ukraine eagerly hopes for an invitation to join at an upcoming Washington summit.
Biden, in a statement, welcomed the recent addition of new members Finland and Sweden, saying “we must choose to protect this progress and build on it.”
“This is the greatest military alliance in the history of the world,” Biden said. “But it didn’t happen by accident, nor was it inevitable. Generation after generation, the United States and our fellow Allies have chosen to come together to stand up for freedom and push back against aggression — knowing we are stronger, and the world is safer, when we do.”
Biden’s Democratic allies agreed.
“Despite Putin’s attempts to splinter our alliance with his war against Ukraine, the transatlantic partnership is more united than ever before, thanks to the determined leadership of Joe Biden,” said former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. “On this monumental anniversary, we reaffirm that America’s commitment to NATO remains bipartisan and ironclad – and that we will never waver in our defense of democracy.”
NATO allies have been increasingly unnerved by the prospect of former Republican President Donald Trump returning to the White House if he defeats Biden in the November 5 U.S. presidential election.
As president, Trump frequently complained that numerous NATO countries were not meeting NATO’s recommendation that they spend 2% of their country’s economic output on defense.
In February, at a campaign rally, Trump recounted what he said was a conversation he had when he was the U.S. leader with the “president of a big country.”
“Well sir, if we don’t pay, and we’re attacked by Russia - will you protect us?” Trump quoted the unnamed leader as saying.
“I said: ‘You didn’t pay? You’re delinquent?’ He said: ‘Yes, let’s say that happened.’ No, I would not protect you. In fact, I would encourage them (Russia) to do whatever the hell they want. You got to pay,” Trump said.
Some analysts argue that the alliance remains relevant, citing Russia’s aggression in Ukraine.
“Nearly a billion people sleep more soundly at night under NATO’s protective umbrella,” Robert Benson, a senior policy analyst at the Center for American Progress, said in a message sent to VOA. “Yet a small but vocal minority views the alliance as a relic of the past, an albatross, or a distraction –– all this in a world where Russian imperial ambition has once again threatened international peace and security. The United States must continue to support Ukraine and to strengthen NATO, not out of charity or moral obligation, but because it makes us safer here at home.”
The United States will host NATO’s 75th anniversary summit in Washington in July.
https://www.voanews.com/a/biden-heralds-75th-anniversary-of-nato-s-founding/7556853.html
Prescribed Pile Burning Scheduled for this Week
date: 2024-04-04, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
WHAT: Prescribed burning of 4-5 treated acres of slash from felled dead trees and brush. WHEN: April 4. Additional series
The post Prescribed Pile Burning Scheduled for this Week appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/04/04/prescribed-pile-burning-scheduled-for-this-week-2/
Talleres Sobre Presupuestos De La Junta De Supervisores Del Condado 9 y 10 De Abril de 2024
date: 2024-04-04, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
(SANTA BÁRBARA, California) – La Junta de Supervisores del Condado de Santa Bárbara llevará a cabo talleres presupuestarios el 9
The post Talleres Sobre Presupuestos De La Junta De Supervisores Del Condado 9 y 10 De Abril de 2024 appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
Save-The-Date: DoD-NASA Lidar Technical Interchange Meeting (TIM)
date: 2024-04-04, from: NASA breaking news
Details DoD-NASA Lidar TIM August 13-15, 2024 MIT Lincoln Laboratory in Arlington, VA (Crystal City)241 18th St S, Arlington, VA 22202 MIT Lincoln Laboratory is hosting a TIM between NASA and DoD to facilitate the sharing of lidar knowledge between these institutions and identify potential areas of collaboration that maximally utilizes the strengths from each […]
https://www.nasa.gov/centers-and-facilities/nesc/save-the-date-lidar-tim/
Tesla (TSLA) turns to deep discounts as inventory piles up
date: 2024-04-04, from: Electrek Feed
Tesla (TSLA) is turning to deep discounts on new vehicles early in a new quarter as inventory is piling up.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/04/tesla-tsla-turns-deep-discounts-inventory-piles-up/
Rivian R1T is getting a new GoFast Camper and Topper to upgrade your next adventure
date: 2024-04-04, from: Electrek Feed
Your next adventure just got an upgrade. Rivian’s R1T is getting a new GoFast Camper and Topper specifically engineered for the electric pickup. The new R1T accessories are designed to limit the impact on performance and range.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/04/rivian-r1t-electric-truck-gains-new-gofast-camper-topper/
NASA taps trio of companies to build the next generation of lunar rover
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
At $4.6 billion, this Moon malarkey is getting expensive
NASA has selected three companies to develop designs for a lunar terrain vehicle (LTV) to transport astronauts around the Moon.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/nasa_lunar_rover/
County Board of Supervisors Budget Workshops April 9 and 10, 2024
date: 2024-04-04, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
(SANTA BARBARA, Calif.) – The Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors will hold budget workshops on April 9 and 10,
The post County Board of Supervisors Budget Workshops April 9 and 10, 2024 appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
April 3, 2024
date: 2024-04-04, from: Heather Cox Richardson blog
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/april-3-2024-00d
DignityMoves to Host Grand Opening of the La Posada Interim Supportive Housing Community on April 12, 2024
date: 2024-04-04, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Santa Barbara, CA, April 3, 2024 — On Friday, April 12, 2024 at 5 pm DignityMoves will host the grand opening of its La
The post DignityMoves to Host Grand Opening of the La Posada Interim Supportive Housing Community on April 12, 2024 appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
Marsha McLean | Santa Clarita’s City Hall Ceremonies
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Signal
“What greater thing is there for two human souls than to feel that they are joined for life — to strengthen each other in all labor, to rest on each other in all sorrow, to minister to each other in silent, unspeakable memories at the moment of the last parting?” — George Eliot Springtime, with […]
The post Marsha McLean | Santa Clarita’s City Hall Ceremonies appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/04/marsha-mclean-santa-claritas-city-hall-ceremonies/
Total Eclipse of the Heart, Literal Video Version
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/04/total-eclipse-of-the-heart-literal-video-version
Tech Today: Synthetic DNA Diagnoses COVID, Cancer
date: 2024-04-04, from: NASA breaking news
NASA-funded molecular research enables better disease detection
2 homicides under investigation in San Leandro include stabbing inside Safeway
date: 2024-04-04, from: San Jose Mercury News
Suspects were being sought in both killings; at this point, police don’t they are believe are related.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/04/04/two-homicides-under-investigation-in-san-leandro/
Volvo Cars achieved a global sales record in March thanks to EVs
date: 2024-04-04, from: Electrek Feed
Volvo Cars’ global BEV sales are up 43% year-over-year in March – here’s how its monthly and quarterly EV sales break down.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/04/volvo-cars-global-sales-record-march-thanks-to-evs/
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-04-04, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
I realized I had not posted this here.
Short version, "AI for Genocide" article:
https://www.972mag.com/lavender-ai-israeli-army-gaza/
Further reporting:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/03/israel-gaza-ai-database-hamas-airstrikes
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/israel-gaza-hamas-war-ai-b2523039.html
The infographics on how they determine you are an enemy of the state use cute icons:
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/112213819944433424
Radxa Zero 2 Pro is now available (Tiny Amlogic AM311D single-board computer)
date: 2024-04-04, from: Liliputing
The Radxa Zero 2 Pro is single-board computer with an Amlogic A311D processor featuring four ARM Cortex-A73 high-performance CPU cores, two Cortex-A53 efficiency cores, Mali-G52 MP4 graphics, and a neural processing unit with up to 5 TOPS of on-device AI performance. It also features a surprising amount of I/O features packed into a really tiny […]
The post Radxa Zero 2 Pro is now available (Tiny Amlogic AM311D single-board computer) appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/radxa-zero-2-pro-is-now-available-tiny-amlogic-am311d-single-board-computer/
Thank the bots, your blue check is back on X
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
What a great way to inflate those numbers Elon
What Elon taketh away, Elon also giveth. Fee-free blue checks on Twitter are back, but only for users with a certain number of followers who pay for X Premium.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/x_blue_checks_twitter/
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-04-04, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
I guess my domains moved away from Google Domains, where are we migrating to?
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/112213785867052597
BYD Releases Camouflaged Photos Of EV Truck For Global Markets
date: 2024-04-04, from: Inside EVs News
BYD says this truck will be bigger than the Toyota Hilux in size.
https://insideevs.com/news/714879/byd-pickup-truck-ev-camoflauge/
Five things we learned about the SF Giants on their season-opening SoCal trip
date: 2024-04-04, from: San Jose Mercury News
The Giants proved they can hit the ball hard, but their pitching and defense hasn’t lived up the billing.
Around the World in 175 Days, 1924: Department of State Contributions to the U.S. Army Aerial Circumnavigation: Part I
date: 2024-04-04, from: National Archives, Text Message blog
This is the first in an occasional series of blog posts. In September 1924, in an aerial trip reminiscent of the voyage of the U.S. Atlantic Fleet (also known as the “Great White Fleet”) around the world between December 1907 and February 1909, a team of U.S. Army airmen completed the first successful aerial circumnavigation … Continue reading Around the World in 175 Days, 1924: Department of State Contributions to the U.S. Army Aerial Circumnavigation: Part I
Broken Hearted
date: 2024-04-04, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Be still our beating hearts, Starshine is back with a new column!
The post Broken Hearted appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/04/04/broken-hearted/
NASA Wallops to Launch Three Sounding Rockets During Solar Eclipse
date: 2024-04-04, from: NASA breaking news
Three Black Brant IX sounding rockets for the Atmospheric Perturbations around Eclipse Path (APEP) mission are scheduled to launch from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility launch range in Virginia. The launch window opens April 8, 2024, at 2:40 p.m. EDT. Launching approximately 45 minutes before, during, and after the peak local eclipse, the APEP sounding rockets […]
An Electric Minivan Might Be the Perfect Car
date: 2024-04-04, from: Heatmap News
If you survey Americans who are considering an electric vehicle, some of
their opinions are perfectly predictable. New
polling
released last week by the car publication Edmunds found that U.S. car
shoppers want more range, they want more affordable options, and they
want lots of SUVs and crossovers. Few respondents were excited about
electric pickup trucks. Hardly anybody — just 5% — wanted a minivan
EV.
Poor, poor pitiful minivan. Even as its bigger sibling undergoes a renaissance as the road-tripping influencer’s ride of choice, few people are out there posting thirsty #MinivanLife pics of a Chrysler Town & Country. People are importing vintage Japanese microvans and embracing other oddball shapes to stand out against a world full of Toyota RAV4s. Yet, despite ongoing rumblings about a comeback, the true minivan remains mired in tired stereotypes: It is the dorky dadmobile that appears in your driveway the day you buy a white pair of New Balance sneakers.
The thing is, a minivan is exactly what people want. And in the EV age, it could get even better.
Heatmap’s Shift Key podcast recently compared the biological concept of carcinization — the way everything wants to become a crab — to the convergent evolution of cars. In Robinson Meyer’s metaphor, automotive designs keep coming back to the minivan. After all, it has the primary features most families seek, namely three-row seating and lots of cargo space for kid stuff. But because the minivan is a loathed emblem of domesticity, carmakers continue to disguise its function in other forms.
This has been going on for generations. The bulbous station wagon, effectively a shorter minivan, was once the country’s de facto family car. Its parental uncoolness led to the rise of the minivan — which then became loaded with its own “soccer mom” cultural baggage and fell out of favor. In the 1990s, parents in search of a hipper, rugged alternative embraced the squared-off SUV instead. Three decades later, those boxes on wheels have mostly morphed into the rounded crossovers that dominate the roads today — vehicles that are, fundamentally, just minivans stretched into a shape that shouts, “I am anything but.”
Tastes change, of course. And if Americans are going to switch to electric cars, then it’s imperative the car companies electrify the vehicles they want. The problem with the never-ending SUV-crossover craze is that minivans are objectively better for the lives we actually lead.
A minivan handles better because it generally has a lower center of gravity than high-riding SUVs, which were built as if their owners were going to ford a riverbed on the way to their middle child’s xylophone recital. This is one reason car journalists have continued to praise the minivan over the years even as car buyers have spurned them.
Minivans have a variety of other features that make them better family cars than crossovers are. They’re roomy. They’re easy to get into and out of, especially when you’re loading or unloading children or car seats. The sliding doors prevent your offspring from dinging the next car over in the parking lot.
But because minivans have only a cult following these days and don’t sell big numbers, the electrified options are few. Online discussions about the best EV family car often come back to the plug-in hybrid Chrysler Pacifica because three-row EV crossovers are still rare and the all-electric Volkswagen ID.Buzz, a revival of the old VW bus that would be America’s first mainstream minivan EV, hasn’t arrived yet.
Volkswagen
There are cool concepts like Mercedes-Benz’s and interesting international options like the Volvo EM90, touted as a “living room on wheels” made with a signature clean Scandinavian aesthetic. They are aimed at the Chinese market because of America’s minivan disdain.
Mercedes-Benz
Sadly, it’s looking less and less likely that the startup Canoo’s space-pod people-conveyors, which one would call “vans” for lack of a better term, will ever come to fruition. No fully electric EV minivan is on sale here so far. Google “EV minivan” and you might get sponsored ads for Tesla, Rivian, and Subaru — whose electric offerings are decidedly not vans — as well as Reddit threads that ask why we don’t have more electrified minivan options yet.
Canoo
It’s too bad, because vans are great and could get even better via electrification. A long, heavy battery slung along the bottom of a van will add to its low center of gravity while providing a large number of kilowatt-hours. The voluminous cargo space inside EV minivans (and full-size vans like the electric Sprinter) will give small businesses a way to decarbonize. A fun bonus of EV life is being able to use the battery’s electricity to power the climate control and other accessories without having to run a combustion engine the whole time. That makes it easier to keep the whole family happy even if you’re waiting in the parking lot, and it will make the cabin an enjoyable place to kill time once AI starts doing all the driving. (There is one big problem still to be solved: making a minivan’s fold-flat seats, a game-changing feature, work when there’s a big battery down there.)
As we recently noted, the family-car-sized hole in the EV market is starting to be filled in. The Kia EV9 has introduced a true three-row crossover EV to the U.S., and more like it will soon follow. It stands to reason that, eventually, today’s minivan standards like the Toyota Sienna and Honda Odyssey will electrify alongside everything else, creating a battery-powered offering for the small but growing niche populated by van people.
Still, the minivan deserves better. Perhaps when its EV version finally arrives, drivers will get bored of the conformist crossover and realize that the electric van can.
https://heatmap.news/electric-vehicles/electric-minivan-canoo-volkswagen-id-buzz-volvo-em90
Concord is playing restaurant bingo and so can you
date: 2024-04-04, from: San Jose Mercury News
Love eating? Like bingo? This month, the city of Concord is inviting locals and visitors alike to participate in a restaurant bingo game featuring prizes for committed foodies.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/04/04/concord-is-playing-restaurant-bingo-and-so-can-you/
Just Watch Shoppers Closely
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: One Foot Tsunami
https://onefoottsunami.com/2024/04/04/just-watch-shoppers-closely/
Marine protected areas boost local economies, study finds
date: 2024-04-04, from: VOA News USA
Washington — Banning fishing and other human activity in marine protected areas (MPAs) has long pitted environmentalists against fishing interests, but a new study shows that nearby fisheries benefit from these areas.
The study comes as the United States considers establishing the world’s largest MPA in the Pacific Ocean southwest of Hawaii, waters where “fishing remains a major contributor to food security … and income generation,” according to a review by the science journal BMC Public Health.
Mark Costello, a professor of biosciences and aquaculture at Norway’s Nord University and the study’s author, reviewed 51 studies of MPAs. He found that 39 of them showed increased catch in adjacent fisheries since their MPA designation.
The National Geographic Society estimates that approximately 5,000 MPAs exist worldwide, covering 0.8% of the world’s oceans.
Costello says the study’s data provides economic incentives for the Conference of Parties Global Biodiversity Framework goal set in 2022 of preserving 30% of the ocean by 2030.
“If we think of [MPAs] as a benefit to fisheries, this completely changes the conversation from setting aside 30% that nobody can do anything with to actually 30% that is like having money in the bank,” Costello said in an interview with VOA via Zoom on March 27.
He said traditional Indigenous communities often protect certain areas so fish can spawn because they want to be sure that fish are available “in a time of maybe crisis due to other food supplies not being available.”
Fish in protected areas “grow older, they’ll have more eggs, and they’ll spill over to the adjacent areas. So, you get those benefits,” Costello added.
Last year, the United States took a big step in trying to meet that 30% goal.
In March 2023, U.S. President Joe Biden proposed a marine sanctuary in the remote Pacific islands of nearly 2 million square kilometers, saying it would be “the largest protected ocean area on the planet.”
The Marine Conservation Institute’s Marine Protection Atlas shows the Ross Sea Region MPA as the largest MPA covering 1.9 million square kilometers.
Biden’s proposed MPA is bigger than the 1.5 million-square-kilometer reserve President Barack Obama established in 2016, a sanctuary that dwarfed and included the 300,000-square-kilometer sanctuary established by President George W. Bush in 2009 to protect parts of three remote Pacific island chains that are U.S. possessions.
Biden’s proposal has met with pushback in the Pacific Islands, where residents felt there wasn’t enough time for public input on a permanent change to their fishery access.
“When you are trying to create something in perpetuity … 45 days to take that away from a people is not enough,” said J.D. Tenorio, a resident of Saipan who spoke at a May 18, 2023, public meeting held in the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. territory.
According to the Marine Protection Atlas, two of the three largest MPAs are in the Pacific. They include fishing grounds off the coast of Hawaii, as well as the U.S. territories of Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands and the Marshall Islands.
Costello says not all MPAs are permanent, adding it is important to consider the idea of reviewing the MPA designations.
“Maybe everything should be relooked at in 20 years’ time,” he said. “The next generation should have a say.”
Ray Hilborn is a University of Washington professor in the School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences who serves on the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council, which covers Hawaii, the territories of American Samoa and Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and several Pacific Remote Island Areas.
The council opposes Biden’s proposed sanctuary, and Hilborn says MPAs are not a “silver bullet” for conservation in the Pacific region.
“Most of the MPAs in the world are being created in countries that have good fisheries management, like the United States, like Australia, like New Zealand, like Canada, and those benefits are not going to happen in those places,” he said in a Zoom interview with VOA on March 27.
Hilborn also said MPAs can hurt the fishing industry, especially when implemented in areas where overfishing is not an issue, as is the case for the Biden administration’s sanctuary proposal.
He cites a study published in the May 2020 edition of Marine Policy on the expansion of the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument in 2016. It concludes that the MPA designation triggered a drop of 7% in catch per unit of effort and a decrease of revenue per fishing trip by 9%, or $3.5 million during the first 16 months after it was enacted in June 2006.
Hilborn said the Costello study supports an “illusion that you’re really protecting” the ocean, but “the real protection comes by action. And those actions are regulating fisheries [and] reducing bycatch” — the fish caught by fleets that crews can’t sell, don’t want or are not allowed to keep.
https://www.voanews.com/a/marine-protected-areas-boost-local-economies-study-finds/7555722.html
New York Inmates Sue to Watch the Total Solar Eclipse
date: 2024-04-04, from: Smithsonian Magazine
The state’s corrections department has ordered all prisons to lock down on the day of the eclipse, leaving inmates stuck inside. Six men are suing the state, saying viewing the event has religious significance
California wildfire: Cartago evacuated, Highway 395 closed
date: 2024-04-04, from: San Jose Mercury News
The fire was reported around 11:30 p.m. Wednesday, and an evacuation was quickly called for the community of Cartago and the nearby Crystal Geyser plant.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/04/04/california-wildfire-cartago-evacuated-highway-395-closed/
Stellantis CEO Wants To Put EVs On A Diet
date: 2024-04-04, from: Inside EVs News
Plus, Tesla looks to India for a new factory and Key Bridge disaster will cost one auto shipper up to $10 million.
https://insideevs.com/news/714876/stellantis-ev-battery-weight-half/
Google ponders making AI search a premium option
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Ad-free search experience might not be on the cards
Google is reportedly considering tweaks to its search engine, including making some AI features subscription-only - an ad-free search experience is seemingly not on the cards.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/google_ponders_making_ai_search/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-04-04, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Doc is looking for DALL-E-3.
https://doc.searls.com/2024/04/04/looking-for-dall-e-3-help/
This Woman Deconstructs 100-Year-Old Books To Restore Them
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/04/this-woman-deconstructs-100-year-old-books-to-restore-them
700-plus units — all affordable — could sprout in San Jose near tech hubs
date: 2024-04-04, from: San Jose Mercury News
A big affordable housing development could produce well over 700 residences in north San Jose.
Advances in Understanding COPV Structural Life
date: 2024-04-04, from: NASA breaking news
The Structures Technical Discipline Team (TDT) was involved in numerous investigations this past year, but composites, fracture mechanics, and pressure vessels dominate the list. All three of these specialties are important to composite overwrapped pressure vessels (COPV). One of the TDT’s most important findings this year was the exposure of an inherent vulnerability that underpredicts […]
https://www.nasa.gov/general/advances-in-understanding-copv-structural-life/
Ivanti commits to secure-by-design overhaul after vulnerability nightmare
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
CEO addresses whirlwind start to 2024 and how it plans to prevent a repeat
Ivanti has committed to adopting a secure-by-design approach to security as it gears up for an organizational overhaul in response to the multiple vulnerabilities in Connect Secure exploited earlier this year.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/ivanti_secure_by_design/
The Rivian R1T Is The Only Pickup Truck With A Top Safety Pick+ Rating From IIHS
date: 2024-04-04, from: Inside EVs News
There isn’t any other pickup truck, electric or not, to receive the highly-coveted badge.
https://insideevs.com/news/714905/rivian-r1t-top-safety-pick-plus-iihs-safety/
Dark Energy May Be Weakening, Major Astrophysics Study Finds
date: 2024-04-04, from: Quanta Magazine
A generation of physicists has referred to the dark energy that permeates the universe as “the cosmological constant.” Now the largest map of the cosmos to date hints that this mysterious energy has been changing over billions of years.The post Dark Energy May Be Weakening, Major Astrophysics Study Finds first appeared on Quanta Magazine
https://www.quantamagazine.org/dark-energy-may-be-weakening-major-astrophysics-study-finds-20240404/
Harnessing the 2024 Eclipse for Ionospheric Discovery with HamSCI
date: 2024-04-04, from: NASA breaking news
As the total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024, draws closer, a vibrant community of enthusiastic amateur radio operators, known as “hams,” is gearing up for an exciting project with the Ham Radio Science Citizen Investigation (HamSCI) group. Our goal is clear and ambitious: to use the Moon’s shadow as a natural laboratory to uncover […]
https://science.nasa.gov/solar-system/skywatching/2024-eclipse-ionospheric-discovery-with-hamsci/
Larry Magid: Configuring your phone to enhance well-being
date: 2024-04-04, from: San Jose Mercury News
Features can help you reduce stress by creating downtime
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/04/04/configuring-your-phone-to-enhance-youre-wellbeing/
BRP Shows Sales Growth Despite Warmest Winter On Record In US, Canada
date: 2024-04-04, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
The official quarterly report mentions “unfavorable winter conditions” no less than 10 times.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/714571/skidoo-snowmobile-sales-warm-winter/
The drama of Disney and the activist shareholder
date: 2024-04-04, from: Marketplace Morning Report
Sometimes, annual corporate shareholder meetings are mundane. That was not the case this year at Disney, where there was an unusually bitter and public battle for say in how the company is run. We’ll take a closer examination of the proxy battle and its outcome. Also on the program: expectations of March job gains, the Fed’s no-win situation, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen’s trip to China and airline responses to Boeing’s production delays.
Understanding AP and RSS
date: 2024-04-04, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News
What does ActivityPub does that RSS doesn’t?
Off the top of my head, it’s not the ability to syndicate, RSS already does that. I can follow anyone on any server.
I think it’s the timeline? And the ability to delete posts. Keeping all that in sync is a lot of work, and presumably a lot of traffic?
Also replies. If I reply to a post when viewing it on another server, the reply should show up under any other view of that post.
What else??
PS: Only thinking about features that are used by Mastodon to federate, not potential future features. If that were the rule, then RSS could do anything AP could do, right – because you can always add the feature. So, just the features that are in use.
PPS: I posted this on Mastodon and may post it elsewhere, if I do I’ll link them in here.
http://scripting.com/2024/04/04/143706.html?title=understandingApAndRss
Microsoft’s playdate in Google’s Privacy Sandbox gets messy
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Targeted ads in Edge may be blocked before they even arrive
Analysis Inspired by Google’s Privacy Sandbox ad tech renovation initiative, Microsoft last month announced plans for a “privacy preserving” mechanism to deliver interest-based ads in its Edge browser.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/microsoft_sandbox_google/
German state ditches Windows, Microsoft Office for Linux and LibreOffice
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
‘Complete digital sovereignty’ … sounds familiar
Schleswig-Holstein, Germany’s most northern state, is starting its switch from Microsoft Office to LibreOffice, and is planning to move from Windows to Linux on the 30,000 PCs it uses for local government functions.…
A ‘Law Firm’ of AI Generated Lawyers Is Sending Fake Threats as an SEO Scam
date: 2024-04-04, from: 404 Media Group
Backlink scams are now leveraging fake, AI-generated ‘lawyers’ and DMCA trolling to try to pressure site owners to link to their ‘clients.’
https://www.404media.co/a-law-firm-of-ai-generated-lawyers-is-sending-fake-threats-as-an-seo-scam/
Ford delays electric three-row SUV with new EV pickup arriving in 2026
date: 2024-04-04, from: Electrek Feed
After EV sales picked up in the first quarter, Ford is scaling back as it delays plans to launch its new three-row electric SUV. Ford is pushing back EV production at its Oakville, Ontario, plant as it shifts to expand its hybrid lineup.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/04/ford-delays-electric-three-row-suv-new-ev-pickup-arriving-2026/
Stickerbombed: Star Labs StarBook Mk VI
date: 2024-04-04, from: mrusme blog
A laptop is not only a tool but also a canvas. I take great pleasure in personalizing my tools to function and look the way I want them to.
https://xn--gckvb8fzb.com/stickerbombed-star-labs-starbook-mk-vi/
Radxa’s SATA HAT makes compact Pi 5 NAS
date: 2024-04-04, from: Jeff Geerling blog
Radxa’s SATA HAT makes compact Pi 5 NAS
<div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p>Radxa's latest iteration of its <a href="https://radxa.com/products/accessories/penta-sata-hat">Penta SATA HAT</a> has been retooled to work with the Raspberry Pi 5.</p>
The Pi 5 includes a PCIe connector, which allows the SATA hat to interface directly via a JMB585 SATA to PCIe bridge, rather than relying on the older Dual/Quad SATA HAT’s SATA-to-USB-to-PCIe setup.
Does the direct PCIe connection help? Yes.
Is the Pi 5 noticeably faster than the Pi 4 for NAS applications? Yes.
Is the Pi 5 + Penta SATA HAT the ultimate low-power NAS solution? Maybe.
<span class="field field--name-uid field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden"><span>Jeff Geerling</span></span>
https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2024/radxas-sata-hat-makes-compact-pi-5-nas
Death is a Feature
date: 2024-04-04, from: Doc Searls (at Harvard), New Old Blog
When Parisians got tired of cemeteries during the French Revolution, they conscripted priests to relocate bones of more than six million deceased forebears to empty limestone quarries below the city: a hundred miles of rooms and corridors now called The Catacombes. It was from those quarries that much of the city’s famous structures above—Notre Dame, et. al.—were built […]
https://doc.searls.com/2024/04/04/death-is-a-feature/
How NASA’s Roman Telescope Will Measure Ages of Stars
date: 2024-04-04, from: NASA breaking news
Guessing your age might be a popular carnival game, but for astronomers it’s a real challenge to determine the ages of stars. Once a star like our Sun has settled into steady nuclear fusion, or the mature phase of its life, it changes little for billions of years. One exception to that rule is the […]
NASA Achieves Milestone for Engines to Power Future Artemis Missions
date: 2024-04-04, from: NASA breaking news
NASA achieved a major milestone April 3 for production of new RS-25 engines to help power its Artemis campaign to the Moon and beyond with completion of a critical engine certification test series at NASA’s Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. The 12-test series represents a key step for lead engines contractor Aerojet […]
Volta Trucks bounces back from bankruptcy, resumes ‘sharpened’ commercial EV business plan
date: 2024-04-04, from: Electrek Feed
Less than six months after a seemingly dooming bankruptcy filing, Volta Trucks has reemerged from the ashes, fresh with redemptive capital and a leaned-down business plan. The commercial EV startup can now resume its work in delivering its electric last-mile trucks to customers this year.
Slashing methane emissions: A quest on land and in space
date: 2024-04-04, from: VOA News USA
On Earth and in space, efforts are underway to curb emissions of the super-pollutant methane, a greenhouse gas. VOA’s Veronica Balderas Iglesias looks at the latest innovations and policies, as the International Energy Agency warns the clock is ticking to win the fight against climate change.
https://www.voanews.com/a/slashing-methane-emissions-a-quest-on-land-and-in-space/7556524.html
Ford Delays EV Pickup And Three-Row Electric SUV To Focus On Hybrids
date: 2024-04-04, from: Inside EVs News
Ford said the delay would allow the company to take advantage of advancements in battery technology.
https://insideevs.com/news/714959/ford-delays-electric-three-row-suv-by-two-years/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-04-04, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
I've been trying to figure out what ActivityPub does that RSS doesn't.
https://mastodon.social/@davew/112213481032208332
Microsoft unbundling Teams is to appease regulators, not give customers a better deal
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Think before you pull the trigger, warn analysts
If you’re planning to save money by cutting out the unbundled Teams product from your Microsoft 365 subscription, the decision might not be as straightforward as you’d think.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/microsoft_teams_unbundling_costs/
2024 Chevrolet Silverado EV RST Gets 440-Mile Range Rating And Is $10,000 Cheaper
date: 2024-04-04, from: Inside EVs News
The top-spec Silverado EV is now the second-longest-range electric pickup on the market, beating the Tesla Cybertruck AWD by 100 miles.
https://insideevs.com/news/714893/2024-chevrolet-silverado-ev-rst-range-price/
Kia set to export this all-electric SUV at a price that undercuts Tesla
date: 2024-04-04, from: Electrek Feed
South Korean automaker Kia has started production on its all-electric EV5 SUV for export in China, with the first markets targeted being Thailand and Australia, with Australia’s price expected to undercut Tesla’s Model Y, which is the best-selling SUV in the country. A global launch is set for next year, but will that include the US?
The Gardener
date: 2024-04-04, from: Ayjay blog
I am very pleased that my colleague Philip Jenkins has written about Rudyard Kipling’s “The Gardener,” one of the finest short stories in the world. His care not to spoil the story is exemplary, but it’s virtually impossible to say anything meaningful about the story except in light of its conclusion. So you should read […]
https://blog.ayjay.org/the-gardener/
High-End Fashion Meets Real-World Protection in Aether’s Mulholland
date: 2024-04-04, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
We’re not restricted to looking like Power Rangers or like we’re about to summit Everest. The Mulholland proves we can have it all.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/714866/aether-mulholland-motorcycle-jacket-launch/
Google Books Is Indexing AI-Generated Garbage
date: 2024-04-04, from: 404 Media Group
Google said it will continue to evaluate its approach “as the world of book publishing evolves.”
https://www.404media.co/google-books-is-indexing-ai-generated-garbage/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-04-04, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Attract Backyard Birds, Not Backyard Bears.
https://bearwise.org/how-to-attract-birds-not-bears/
BMW Somehow Sold A Brand New i3 In 2024
date: 2024-04-04, from: Inside EVs News
Some dealer had a lone BMW i3 stashed away long enough for some lucky person to nab it up.
https://insideevs.com/news/714818/bmw-i3-sold-q1-2024/
Watch Scott’s Prospect Goggles Bend Light Before Your Eyes
date: 2024-04-04, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
Riding from dawn to dusk is a dream for lots of off-roaders. The problem is you’d need a couple of pairs of goggles, but not anymore.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/714539/scott-prospect-light-sensitive-goggles/
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-04-04, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
The name of the program is “where’s daddy” in case you were wondering.
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/112213064153131546
Why Renewables Aren’t Expanding Fast Enough
date: 2024-04-04, from: Heatmap News
Current conditions: In Chile, Santiago’s 11-day heatwave has ended • Storm Kathleen could bring gale-force winds to the UK • New York City is littered with downed trees after a strong storm.
THE TOP FIVE
- Biden administration unleashes $20 billion for green banks
Vice President Kamala Harris and EPA administrator Michael Regan are in Charlotte, North Carolina, this morning to announce the award of $20 billion dollars for climate mitigation and adaptation projects. This is the official launch of the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, a $27 billion program that was part of the Inflation Reduction Act — in fact, it is the single largest and most flexible program in the IRA, reported Heatmap’s Emily Pontecorvo. The money will go to eight organizations and help “create a national clean financing network for clean energy and climate solutions.” The general idea is to funnel the money into green lending programs, colloquially known as “green banks,” that will offer low-cost loans and other financing options for consumers, community organizations, businesses, and local governments. Projects financed through the fund could do everything from residential electrification, to green public transit, to solar on schools, to storm water management.
- Report finds the world isn’t expanding renewable capacity fast
enough
A big report out today finds that even though the world is breaking records for new renewable energy installations, we’re not adding enough capacity to limit the global temperature increase to below 1.5 degrees Celsius. The findings, which come from Paris-based think tank REN21, show renewable capacity additions shot up by 36% last year, to about 473 gigawatts (GW). This is a record-breaking increase, but well below the 1,000 GW of new capacity needed each year to meet climate commitments. “We aren’t even reaching 50% of what’s needed annually,” said Rana Adib, REN21’s executive secretary. “Governments have committed, but this needs to be followed by action.” The problem is that energy demand is increasing, and the current rate of renewables expansion isn’t keeping pace due to a lack of investment in grid infrastructure. Global investment in renewables needs to total at least $1.3 trillion every year through 2030 – last year it sat at $623 billion. “We have the technology,” Adib said. “But we need the political will.” The report calls for phasing out fossil fuel subsidies and prioritizing financing the energy transition in developing countries.
- Forest loss declines in Brazil and Colombia, but climbs elsewhere
Tropical forest loss in Brazil and Colombia declined significantly last year compared to 2022, according to the World Resources Institute’s Global Forest Review. Brazil’s forest loss dropped by 36% to its lowest level since 2015; Colombia’s plummeted by 49%. Both trends coincide with new leadership, showing that political will can create meaningful change. But “the frontiers of forest loss are shifting,” WRI said. The progress was offset by increases in forest loss elsewhere, especially Bolivia, Laos, and Nicaragua.
Bolivia’s losses came mainly from fires that were initially set by humans but that grew out of control in exceptionally hot and dry conditions. Agriculture expansion is another major driver of losses. Overall, tropical forest loss last year hit 3.7 million hectares, which is like losing 10 soccer fields per minute. This deforestation resulted in 2.4 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide being released into the atmosphere. For comparison, that’s about half the total annual emissions produced by the entire United States. The report also looks at tree cover outside the tropics, and finds that Canada’s devastating wildfires increased global tree cover loss by 24%.
- Majority of recent CO2 emissions came from 57 big producers
About 80% of carbon dioxide emissions produced since 2016 came from a mix of 57 countries and businesses, according to a new analysis from London-based think tank InfluenceMap. Most fossil fuel companies (and especially state-owned ones) have ramped up production in the years since the Paris Agreement was signed. The top three emitters between 2016 and 2022 were Saudi Aramco, Russia’s Gazprom, and Coal India. “We’e seeing an increase in concentration in terms of a smaller number of producers being linked to an even larger portion of global fossil CO2 emissions,” InfluenceMap’s program manager Daan Van Acker told Axios.
- Stellantis CEO: EV batteries need to be 50% lighter
EV batteries will have to lose about half their weight over the next decade in order to limit their environmental impact, the CEO of automaker Stellantis said yesterday. Speaking at the company’s Freedom of Mobility Forum, Carlos Tavares said battery packs can weigh about 1,000 pounds and require huge amounts of raw materials. This isn’t the first time Tavares has lamented bulky batteries, and the company has said it aims to reduce the weight of its own EV batteries by 50% by 2030. Last year Stellantis invested in Lytten, a company developing lithium-sulfur batteries.
THE KICKER
“They’re essentially livestock.” –Eliza Grames, an entomologist at Binghamton University, says an increase in beehives tended to by well-meaning beekeepers is producing “domesticated” honeybees that threaten North America’s native bee species.
https://heatmap.news/economy/green-banks-biden-renewables
Ex-US Marine explains what drove him to join Ukraine’s fight
date: 2024-04-04, from: VOA News USA
Thirty-year-old American and ех-Marine from California Wolfgang Hagarty volunteered to join Ukraine’s Armed Forces in the summer of 2022. He participated in the liberation of the Kharkiv and Mykolaiv regions in 2022 and is currently fighting as a member of an air reconnaissance unit in Donbas. Anna Kosstutschenko met with him. VOA footage and video editing by Pavel Suhodolskiy
https://www.voanews.com/a/ex-us-marine-explains-what-drove-him-to-join-ukraine-fight/7556470.html
UK govt office admits ability to negotiate billions in cloud spending curbed by vendor lock-in
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
After slew of AWS deals signed under MoUs, CDDO says current approach might weaken its position
Exclusive The UK government has admitted its negotiating power over billions of pounds of cloud infrastructure spending has been inhibited by vendor lock-in.…
Eclipses Near and Far
date: 2024-04-04, from: NASA breaking news
On April 8, 2024, North America will witness its last total solar eclipse for more than twenty years. Other parts of the world will experience the rare celestial event in the coming decade. A total solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes directly between the Sun and the Earth, blocking its disk from view but […]
https://www.nasa.gov/history/eclipses-near-and-far/
NASA Partnerships Bring 2024 Total Solar Eclipse to Everyone
date: 2024-04-04, from: NASA breaking news
On April 8, NASA and its partners will celebrate the wonders of the total solar eclipse as it passes over North America, with the path of totality in the United States, from Kerrville, Texas, to Houlton, Maine. Eclipses are an important contribution to NASA’s research into the Sun’s outer atmosphere, or corona, and the part […]
https://www.nasa.gov/general/nasa-partnerships-bring-2024-total-solar-eclipse-to-everyone/
2024-04-04 An eye for an eye
date: 2024-04-04, from: Alex Schroeder’s Blog
2024-04-04 An eye for an eye
I often think about the number of dead killed in an incident and the number of dead killed in the reaction. It’s not really revenge but a sort of “we can strike back so we should” and then people don’t know when to stop.
Personally, I find that “an eye for an eye” is terrible advice.
I have no words for “a hundred eyes for an eye.”
Think about Gaza in 2024: over 30,000 dead in half a year.
As of 5 March 2024, over 31,000 people (30,228 Palestinian and 1,410 Israeli) have been reported as killed in the Israel–Hamas war, including 94 journalists (89 Palestinian, 2 Israeli and 3 Lebanese) and over 136 UNRWA aid workers.
On 7 October 2023, 1,139 Israelis and foreign nationals, including 764 civilians, were killed, and 248 persons taken hostage during the initial attack on Israel from the Gaza Strip. – Casualties of the Israel Hamas war
30228 Palestinians dead after the original incident killed 1139 is more than 25:1.
I wonder about Iraq, too: 300,000 dead in over 20 years.
Documented civilian deaths from violence: 187,116 – 210,566
Total violent deaths including combatants: 300,000 – Iraq Body Count
And why?
Another justification included the alleged connection between the regime of Saddam Hussein and that of terrorist organizations such as Al-Qaeda that had attacked the United States during the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. – 2003 invasion of Iraq
The original incident:
Excluding the hijackers, the attacks killed 2,977 people, injured thousands more … – September 11 attacks
300,000 dead after the original incident killed 2,977 is more than 100:1.
The two seem somehow related, I just can’t put it into words. High tech weapons against civilians, drones, city warfare, a population that hates the invader, news so terrible I can’t even finish reading the Wikipedia articles.
Oh, and out of curiosity, I had to look up the situation in Ukraine, too.
Ukrainian forces: ~70,000 killed, 100,000–120,000 wounded (US estimates) … Russian forces: ~120,000 killed, 170,000–180,000 wounded (US estimates) … the United Nations confirmed that by 31 January 2024, 10,378 civilians had been killed and 19,632 had been injured, but said they believe the real number is higher. – Casualties of the Russo-Ukrainian War
#Israel #Palestine #Ukraine #Russia
https://alexschroeder.ch/view/2024-04-04-eye-for-an-eye
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-04-04, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
A billionaire helped bring ‘3-Body Problem’ to Netflix. His business partner ensured he never lived to see its premiere.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/03/china/billionaire-three-body-problem-netflix-intl-hnk/index.html
Claude Monet’s ‘Moulin de Limetz’ Could Fetch $25 Million at Auction
date: 2024-04-04, from: Smithsonian Magazine
The 1888 work depicts a grain mill on the River Epte near the artist’s home in Giverny, France
How (and Why) We Added Right-Aligned Text to The Markup’s Publishing System
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Markup blog
We coded retroactively and it damn near wrecked us
A legacy to protect
date: 2024-04-04, from: Marketplace Morning Report
Thursday marks 56 years since Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. On today’s program, we hear how Dr. King’s family is fighting to maintain access to the civiil rights leader’s words, continuing to safeguard his intellectual property, and promoting a legacy of nonviolent social change and racial unity. We’ll also learn more about a decline in the number of women in c-suite positions last year.
https://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-morning-report/a-legacy-to-protect
Wheel-E Podcast: Gocycle cargo e-bike, massive bike heist, more
date: 2024-04-04, from: Electrek Feed
This week on Electrek’s Wheel-E podcast, we discuss the most popular news stories from the world of electric bikes and other nontraditional electric vehicles. This time, that includes a new cargo e-bike from Gocycle, a huge heist of over $1M in e-bikes, Harley’s new electric cruiser motorcycle, how e-scooters responded to the Taiwanese earthquake, and more.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/04/wheel-e-podcast-gocycle-cargo-e-bike-massive-bike-heist-more/
Vodafone and Three’s UK merger hits regulatory roadblock
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Watchdog concerns about price hikes and consolidation remain unresolved
Britain’s competition regulator is kicking off a deeper investigation into the potential impact caused by the merger of Vodafone and Three in the UK after neither resolved previously expressed concerns.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/vodafone_three_cma/
Yellen to press China on cheap green tech
date: 2024-04-04, from: Marketplace Morning Report
From the BBC World Service: U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is to meet officials in China for the second time in less than a year. What exactly can we expect from visit with government officials and business leaders? Then, Kenya’s health care system is in chaos as 4,000 public sector doctors and workers have gone on strike. Also: how is AI changing the next generation of prosthetics for people with disabilities?
Surveillance by the New Microsoft Outlook App
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: Bruce Schneier blog
The ProtonMail people are accusing Microsoft’s new Outlook for Windows app of conducting extensive surveillance on its users. It shares data with advertisers, a lot of data:
…The window informs users that Microsoft and those 801 third parties use their data for a number of purposes, including to:
- Store and/or access information on the user’s device
- Develop and improve products
- Personalize ads and content
- Measure ads and content
- Derive audience insights
- Obtain precise geolocation data
- Identify users through device scanning
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2024/04/surveillance-by-the-new-microsoft-outlook-app.html
Canoo spent twice its annual revenue on CEO’s private jets last year
date: 2024-04-04, from: Electrek Feed
EV startup Canoo paid $1.7 million for CEO Tony Aquila’s private jet bills, twice its total revenue last year. According to its earnings report released this week, Canoo lost $302 million in 2023 – but it’s apparently been champagne and caviar for its top executive.
Watching This Monster Chopper Build Come Together Is So Satisfying
date: 2024-04-04, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
Grind Hard Plumbing Co has clearly chosen its name for a reason, and nowhere is that clearer than on this project.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/714544/grind-hard-monster-chopper-build/
Ransomware gang did steal residents’ confidential data, UK city council admits
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
INC Ransom emerges as a growing threat as some ex-LockBit/ALPHV affiliates get new gigs
Leicester City Council is finally admitting its “cyber incident” was carried out by a ransomware gang and that data was stolen, hours after the criminals forced its hand.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/ransomware_gang_did_in_fact/
GroceriesGPT
date: 2024-04-04, from: Paolo Valdemarin’s blog
A friend this morning shared a list of vegetables, noting how hard it is to eat 30 different ones in the same week. I immediately turned to my AI chatbot to ask to create a list of commonly eaten vegetables, and of course I got a very good one. At that point I thought that … Continue reading “GroceriesGPT”
https://val.demar.in/2024/04/groceriesgpt/
65 years ago, America announced the names of its first astronauts
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
The Mercury 7: ‘Not one of us knew what he was in for’
Sixty-five years ago this week, NASA introduced its first astronauts, saying they’d be launched into space in the agency’s new capsule. They were immediately dubbed The Mercury 7.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/65_years_ago_mercury_7/
Some suggested reading: AI and dopamine
date: 2024-04-04, from: Status-Q blog
Andrew Curry’s thoughtful newletter ‘Just Two Things’ arrives in my inbox three times a week (which, I confess, is slightly too often for me always to give it the attention it deserves). The two things he talks about today included some gems, though. First, he looks at Ted Gioia’s article, The State of the Continue Reading
https://statusq.org/archives/2024/04/04/11987/
How HashiCorp’s license shakeup seeded a new open source rebel
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
We’re really just getting started, says OpenTofu community member
Interview HashiCorp might be less than impressed with the rise of the Terraform fork, OpenTofu, but where Hashi sees challenges, the maintainers of the open source project see opportunities.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/opentofu_on_forking_terraform/
The Biden Administration Is Unleashing $20 Billion for Green Banks
date: 2024-04-04, from: Heatmap News
Vice President Kamala Harris and EPA administrator Michael Regan are in
Charlotte, North Carolina this morning to announce the award of … wait
for it … $20 billion dollars for climate mitigation
and adaptation projects. This is the official launch of the Greenhouse
Gas Reduction Fund, a $27 billion program that was part of the Inflation
Reduction Act — in fact, it is the single largest and most flexible
program in the IRA. (The remaining $7 billion is earmarked for
“Solar
for All,” a separate initiative that will launch later this
year.)
The money will go to eight organizations and help “create a national clean financing network for clean energy and climate solutions.” The awardees include:
- The Coalition for Green Capital, a nonprofit that got $5 billion to help leverage a network of green lenders. More than 50% of its work under the grant will be aimed at low-income communities.
- Rewiring America, which will share a $2 billion award with four other housing and community-building groups, including Enterprise Community Partners, LISC (Local Initiatives Support Corporation), Habitat for Humanity, and United Way to create a national financing program to decarbonize housing. The initiative will focus 75% of its investments in low-income and disadvantaged communities.
- Community Preservation Corporation, a U.S. Treasury Department-certified community development financial institution and part of an umbrella coalition known as the Climate United Fund. Together with other nonprofit financial institutions, it will receive nearly $7 billion to lend to traditionally underserved populations, including rural and Tribal communities.
The general idea is to funnel the money into green lending programs, colloquially known as “green banks,” that will offer low-cost loans and other financing options for consumers, community organizations, businesses, and local governments. Projects financed through the fund could do everything from residential electrification, to green public transit, to solar on schools, to storm water management.
EPA anticipates the awardees will mobilize $7 of private capital for every $1 of federal funds — a total investment of nearly $150 billion. Each of the winners will get access to their share of the funding in the next six months, and will have until 2031 to use it.
https://heatmap.news/sparks/the-biden-administration-is-unleashing-20-billion-for-green-banks
Careers in computer science: Two perspectives
date: 2024-04-04, from: Raspberry Pi (.org)
As educators, it’s important that we showcase the wide range of career opportunities available in the field of computing, not only to inspire learners, but also to help them feel sure they’re choosing to study a subject that is useful for their future. For example, a survey from the BBC in September 2023 found that…
The post Careers in computer science: Two perspectives appeared first on Raspberry Pi Foundation.
https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/careers-in-computer-science-two-perspectives/
Lois Eisenberg | California, Here I’m Staying …
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Signal
This letter to the editor is addressed to the disgruntled people wanting to leave California for various reasons seeking greener pastures, which truly don’t exist. California has maintained its reputation as a new frontier, particularly among young people who have fueled the state with energy, and six in 10 people nationwide feel that California is […]
The post Lois Eisenberg | California, Here I’m Staying … appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/04/lois-eisenberg-california-here-im-staying/
Arthur Saginian | Literally Everyone Makes Boo-Boos?
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Signal
Wow, Hilmar Rosenast (letters, Jan. 27) really reached back to the past to respond to a letter of mine that was printed about a year ago (Jan. 28, 2023) regarding the ills of religion, and repeated a statement he made to me around that time, that “blaming religion for all of the ills of the […]
The post Arthur Saginian | Literally Everyone Makes Boo-Boos? appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/04/arthur-saginian-literally-everyone-makes-boo-boos/
Microsoft thinks bundles are great and customers love them
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Rivals and regulators might disagree, so might users that are paying for software they don’t need
It’s always interesting to see how technology executives crop their marketing messages to suit the audience.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/microsoft_bundles/
This wooden PC’s fan is driven by Raspberry Pi Pico
date: 2024-04-04, from: Raspberry Pi News (.com)
Arnov Sharma needed to cool down his home-made wooden PC so he built a Raspberry Pi Pico-powered fan driver.
The post This wooden PC’s fan is driven by Raspberry Pi Pico appeared first on Raspberry Pi.
https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/this-wooden-pcs-fan-is-driven-by-raspberry-pi-pico/
Chips, Tech, and Steel
date: 2024-04-04, from: Robert Reich on Substack
How to get “American” corporations to act in America’s interest?
https://robertreich.substack.com/p/steel-chips-and-big-tech-the-real
French Second Empire Homes in Santa Barbara? Mais Oui!
date: 2024-04-04, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Local examples of Second Empire Homes are few but easy to identify.
The post French Second Empire Homes in Santa Barbara? Mais Oui! appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/04/04/french-second-empire-homes-in-santa-barbara-mais-oui/
Can We Save the Planet from Plastics?
date: 2024-04-04, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Negotiators push for ambitious change for human and planetary health.
The post Can We Save the Planet from Plastics? appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/04/04/can-we-save-the-planet-from-plastics/
Boffins build world’s largest astronomical digital camera to map the heavens
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
3.2 glorious gigapixels to make ‘the greatest movie of all time’
Construction of the LSST Camera, destined for the Vera C Rubin Observatory in Chile has been completed at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in Silicon Valley.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/lsst_camera_chile/
Classifieds – April 4, 2024
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The Daily Trojan features Classified advertising in each day’s edition. Here you can read, search, and even print out each day’s edition of the Classifieds.
The post Classifieds – April 4, 2024 appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/04/classifieds-april-4-2024/
Today in SCV History (April 4)
date: 2024-04-04, from: SCV New (TV Station)
1893 – Large earthquake centered in Pico Canyon; locals believed oil drilling caused it. [story
https://scvnews.com/today-in-scv-history-april-4/
My parents brought me into a ‘semi-charmed life’
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Listening to ’90s music makes me feel closer to my parents despite the distance between us.
The post My parents brought me into a ‘semi-charmed life’ appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/04/my-parents-brought-me-into-a-semi-charmed-life/
Supremely misunderstood: realities of the high court
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
There are some less-publicized truths about the Supreme Court you deserve to know.
The post Supremely misunderstood: realities of the high court appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/04/supremely-misunderstood-realities-of-the-high-court/
Explore the best movie theaters in LA
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Discover the City of Angels’ cinematic destinations that are a movie lover’s paradise.
The post Explore the best movie theaters in LA appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/04/explore-the-best-movie-theaters-in-la/
Bikers aren’t the issue, safety is up to all of us
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Bikers often face distracted pedestrians, frequent thefts and a lack of infrastructure.
The post Bikers aren’t the issue, safety is up to all of us appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/04/bikers-arent-the-issue-safety-is-up-to-all-of-us/
Keck-managed resource center teaches signs of elder abuse
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The National Center on Elder Abuse will host webinars to increase awareness throughout June.
The post Keck-managed resource center teaches signs of elder abuse appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/04/elder-abuse-table/
Women’s golf teed off in Arizona
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
USC ended up in 12th after three days of stroke play at the PING/ASU Invitational.
The post Women’s golf teed off in Arizona appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/04/womens-golf-teed-off-in-arizona/
Exploring major USC Athletics renovations
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
New DI facilities come at the expense of recreational tennis and pickleball courts.
The post Exploring major USC Athletics renovations appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/04/exploring-major-usc-athletics-renovations/
Sexual assault awareness month underway
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
April’s events are to educate students on what to do in cases of gender- and power-based violence.
The post Sexual assault awareness month underway appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/04/sexual-assault-awareness-month/
UConn, NC State headline star-studded Final Fours
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The remaining teams ready for a chance to take home a national championship.
The post UConn, NC State headline star-studded Final Fours appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/04/uconn-nc-state-headline-star-studded-final-fours/
Preserving languages is a preservation of culture
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
We should all care about language extinction and can work to counteract it.
The post Preserving languages is a preservation of culture appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/04/preserving-languages-is-a-preservation-of-culture/
Ethernet advances will end Nvidia’s InfiniBand lead in AI networks
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Desire to build brainboxes will also see optical interconnects go mainstream
Three imminent improvements to the Ethernet standard will make it a better alternative to host AI workloads, and that will see vendors back the tech as an alternative to Nvidia’s InfiniBand kit, which is set to dominate for the next two years.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/gartner_generative_ai_network_trends/
April 3, 2024
date: 2024-04-04, from: Heather Cox Richardson blog
The election of 2000 was back in the news this week, when Nate Cohn of the New York Times reminded readers of his newsletter, using a map by data strategist and consultant Matthew C. Isbell, that the unusual butterfly ballot design in Palm Beach County that year siphoned off at least 2,000 votes intended for Democratic candidate Al Gore to far-right candidate Pat Buchanan.
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/april-3-2024
OpenStack pushes its first easy-to-upgrade release out the door
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
‘Caracal’ improves AI capabilities and is pitched as an alternative to VMware
The OpenInfra Foundation has loosed an update of OpenStack on the waiting world and – like everyone else that can spell “virtualization” – has pitched it as fine alternative for those pondering a move away from VMware.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/openstack_caracal_released/
White House shows no indication of restricting weapons for Israel
date: 2024-04-04, from: VOA News USA
https://www.voanews.com/a/7556210.html
TSMC shrugs off impact of Taiwan earthquake
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Nonetheless DRAM prices may yet feel slight aftershocks
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) has shrugged off the impact of yesterday’s earthquake.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/tsmc_earthquake_fine/
Infosys announces ‘In-Person Collab’ weeks
date: 2024-04-04, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Sounds so much cooler than ‘come back to the office or else’
In an effort to get its employees back into the office, Infosys has reportedly instituted mandatory in-person attendance for select roles – but dubbed the program “In-Person Collab” weeks. Because that’s how the young people talk, right?…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/infosys_collaboration_weeks/
CIF Commissioner: Support, Appreciation & History
date: 2024-04-04, from: SCV New (TV Station)
It is anticipated that the three bylaw changes proposed by the CIF Sports Medicine Advisory Committee will pass this coming Friday, April 5 at the State CIF Federated Council meeting
https://scvnews.com/cif-commissioner-support-appreciation-history/
Biden, Trump clash over immigration policy
date: 2024-04-04, from: VOA News USA
Illegal immigration is the top issue for many voters in this year’s U.S. presidential election. VOA’s Scott Stearns looks at how candidates Donald Trump and Joe Biden differ over what to do.
https://www.voanews.com/a/biden-trump-clash-over-immigration-policy-/7556085.html
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2024-04-04, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
I wonder if people know that news.scripting.com is a simple UI on top of FeedLand. It’s 98% FeedLand, 2% hiding the power so people will feel more comfortable. I’m thinking of pulling back the curtain. 😄
http://scripting.com/2024/04/03.html#a011349
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-04-04, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
More people than ever are listening to podcasts, but there never should've been a "podcast industry."
https://www.niemanlab.org/2024/04/more-people-than-ever-are-listening-to-podcasts/
White House shows no indication of restricting weapons for Israel
date: 2024-04-04, from: VOA News USA
washington — U.S. weapons sales to Israel have been under increased scrutiny amid outrage over the reported deaths of tens of thousands of people in Gaza since the start of the war, including seven aid workers killed in an Israeli airstrike this week.
President Joe Biden said in a statement on Tuesday that he was “outraged and heartbroken” by the deaths, his latest stern rebuke of Israel’s war conduct.
Israel said the strike was “unintentional” and promised an investigation.
On Wednesday, Biden ignored questions about whether he would put conditions on U.S. military aid. His aides suggest the administration is unlikely to do so, citing U.S. support for Israel’s right to defend itself against the “still viable threat” from Hamas.
The administration will wait for results of Israel’s investigation, National Security Council communications adviser John Kirby told reporters Wednesday. “I’m not going to get ahead of decisions that haven’t been made yet,” he said.
In an interview with Reuters on Wednesday, World Central Kitchen founder Jose Andres accused Israel of targeting the group’s food convoy “systematically, car by car.” He said he had established clear communication with the Israeli military about his aid workers’ movements.
Andres is a celebrity chef who is well-known in Washington. That and the fact that the victims included U.S.-Canadian citizen Jacob Flickinger has added a new level of outrage, including among lawmakers of Biden’s own Democratic Party, and renewed demands that the president condition military aid to Israel.
“Israel has killed more than 200 aid workers in 6 months. That’s not an accident. No more aid for Netanyahu’s war machine,” Democratic Senator Bernie Sanders said in a social media post Tuesday.
Weapons transfer
Israel is the largest recipient of U.S. aid, nearly $4 billion a year, most of it in the form of military assistance.
Under U.S. law, the administration must notify Congress of weapons transfers to Israel that are worth more than $25 million.
In December, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken approved two emergency weapons transfers to Israel, bypassing the congressional review requirement for foreign military sales.
Since the October 7 Hamas attack, two additional transfers have been made public, said Josh Paul, former director at the State Department agency that handles weapons transfers, who resigned in October in protest over the U.S.’s “continued lethal assistance to Israel.”
Those two were made under the direct commercial sales process and Congress was notified, Paul told VOA. “But with less visibility, because there is less information that is provided to the public on direct commercial sales,” he said.
In addition to the four that were made public, since October 7 more than 100 arms transfers to Israel have taken place without informing Congress, mainly because the packages were structured to fall below the notification threshold, according to reporting by The Washington Post, which VOA confirmed with a Department of Defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Ari Tolany, director of security assistance, arms trade and technology at the Center for International Policy, said the moves amount to a “deliberate dodge of transparency” by the administration.
“When they are publicly saying that Israel needs to take more steps to protect civilians but privately pushing through hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of weapons, there’s really no credibility,” she told VOA.
The Biden administration refuses to use the most significant source of leverage it has, she said, which is “the massive amount of arms provided to Israel.”
The Post reported that the transfers included billions of dollars in bombs and fighter jets in recent weeks, even as the administration publicly criticized Israel’s intention for a ground invasion of Rafah, where 1.5 million displaced Palestinians seek safety.
Unconditional support
Since Harry Truman recognized Israel minutes after its founding in 1948, American presidents have supported the country.
Almost all have done so unconditionally, with the exception of President George H.W. Bush, who in 1991 gave Israel an ultimatum to freeze settlements on Palestinian land in exchange for $10 billion in loan guarantees.
That approach worked. But not all agree that restricting aid will effect change.
“The emotive issue of providing for a country’s means for their own defense can sometimes trigger different responses in different theaters. It’s just been a sort of inexact tool for the U.S in the past,” said Grant Rumley, a senior fellow specializing in military and security affairs at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
“I think that’s internalized within this administration right now,” he told VOA. “That, coupled with the president’s long-standing commitment to Israel, is why you haven’t seen any real steps taken on this route.”
There is also the fear that putting conditions on aid may send the wrong signal to Hezbollah and other Iranian proxies, increasing the prospects of opening a second front to the conflict at Israel’s northern border with Lebanon.
In March, to meet the Biden administration’s requirement set out in February, Israel provided assurances that American weapons are used in accordance with international and humanitarian law, which the administration accepted.
Those assurances are “not credible,” said Human Rights Watch and Oxfam. The rights groups submitted examples of what they call Israeli violations of international humanitarian law, including “deprivation of services critical to the survival of the civilian population, and arbitrary denial and restrictions of humanitarian aid.”
Eighty Muslim and Arab American organizations sent a similar letter to Biden on Wednesday, objecting to his “administration’s decisions to falsely declare that Israel’s war on Gaza complies with U.S. legal requirements and authorize the continued transfer of U.S.-manufactured weapons.”
The groups cited the attacks on the World Central Kitchen aid workers as the latest example of Israel’s violation of the laws of war.
Deputies investigate battery and robbery charge at Newhall Metrolink Station
date: 2024-04-04, from: The Signal
Deputies received a 9-1-1 call reporting a battery at the Newhall Metrolink Station early Wednesday afternoon, according to Sgt. Joana Warren from Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station. According to Warren, it is believed that the suspect and victim knew of each other. The victim called at 12:20 p.m. “The informant was hit by the suspect,” […]
The post <strong>Deputies investigate battery and robbery charge at Newhall Metrolink Station</strong> appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-04-04, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
From the other site
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/112210242920763158
The GOP’s Costly Abortion Strategy
date: 2024-04-04, from: Dan Rather’s Steady
How Democrats could flip Florida
https://steady.substack.com/p/the-gops-costly-abortion-strategy
Scathing federal report rips Microsoft for response to Chinese hack
date: 2024-04-04, from: VOA News USA
BOSTON — In a scathing indictment of Microsoft corporate security and transparency, a Biden administration-appointed review board issued a report Tuesday saying “a cascade of errors” by the tech giant let state-backed Chinese cyber operators break into email accounts of senior U.S. officials including Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo.
The Cyber Safety Review Board, created in 2021 by executive order, describes shoddy cybersecurity practices, a lax corporate culture and a lack of sincerity about the company’s knowledge of the targeted breach, which affected multiple U.S. agencies that deal with China.
It concluded that “Microsoft’s security culture was inadequate and requires an overhaul” given the company’s ubiquity and critical role in the global technology ecosystem. Microsoft products “underpin essential services that support national security, the foundations of our economy, and public health and safety.”
The panel said the intrusion, discovered in June by the State Department and dating to May, “was preventable and should never have occurred,” and it blamed its success on “a cascade of avoidable errors.” What’s more, the board said, Microsoft still doesn’t know how the hackers got in.
The panel made sweeping recommendations, including urging Microsoft to put on hold adding features to its cloud computing environment until “substantial security improvements have been made.”
It said Microsoft’s CEO and board should institute “rapid cultural change,” including publicly sharing “a plan with specific timelines to make fundamental, security-focused reforms across the company and its full suite of products.”
In a statement, Microsoft said it appreciated the board’s investigation and would “continue to harden all our systems against attack and implement even more robust sensors and logs to help us detect and repel the cyber-armies of our adversaries.”
In all, the state-backed Chinese hackers broke into the Microsoft Exchange Online email of 22 organizations and more than 500 individuals around the world — including the U.S. ambassador to China, Nicholas Burns — accessing some cloud-based email boxes for at least six weeks and downloading some 60,000 emails from the State Department alone, the 34-page report said. Three think tanks and foreign government entities, including a number of British organizations, were among those compromised, it said.
The board, convened by Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas in August, accused Microsoft of making inaccurate public statements about the incident — including issuing a statement saying it believed it had determined the likely root cause of the intrusion “when, in fact, it still has not.” Microsoft did not update that misleading blog post, published in September, until mid-March, after the board repeatedly asked if it planned to issue a correction, it said.
Separately, the board expressed concern about a separate hack disclosed by the Redmond, Washington, company in January, this one of email accounts — including those of an undisclosed number of senior Microsoft executives and an undisclosed number of Microsoft customers — and attributed to state-backed Russian hackers.
The board lamented “a corporate culture that deprioritized both enterprise security investments and rigorous risk management.”
The Chinese hack was initially disclosed in July by Microsoft in a blog post and carried out by a group the company calls Storm-0558. That same group, the panel noted, has been engaged in similar intrusions — compromising cloud providers or stealing authentication keys so it can break into accounts — since at least 2009, targeting companies including Google, Yahoo, Adobe, Dow Chemical and Morgan Stanley.
Microsoft noted in its statement that the hackers involved are “well-resourced nation state threat actors who operate continuously and without meaningful deterrence.”
The company said that it recognized that recent events “have demonstrated a need to adopt a new culture of engineering security in our own networks,” and added that it had “mobilized our engineering teams to identify and mitigate legacy infrastructure, improve processes, and enforce security benchmarks.”
Elon Musk’s xAI poaches another engineer from Tesla in a clear conflict of interest
date: 2024-04-04, from: Electrek Feed
Elon Musk’s xAI, an artificial intelligence startup, has poached yet another engineer from Tesla in a clear conflict of interest.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/elon-musk-xai-poaches-engineer-tesla-clear-conflict-of-interest/
A training set for bike sharing forecasting
date: 2024-04-04, from: Max Halford Blog
Last night I went to a Toulouse Data Science meetup. The talks were about generative AI and information retrieval, which aren’t topics I’m knowledgeable about. However, one of the speakers was a friend of mine, so I went to support him. Toulouse is my hometown, so I bumped into a few people I knew. It was a nice evening. I chatted with an old office mate from when I interned at INSA Toulouse.
https://maxhalford.github.io/blog/bike-sharing-forecasting-training-set/
Daily EV Recap: New batteries make 1300 mile range possible
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
Listen to a recap of the top stories of the day from Electrek. Quick Charge is now available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, TuneIn and…
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/daily-ev-recap-new-batteries-make-1300-mile-range-possible/
Judge denies Trump’s request to delay his April 15 hush money trial
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
new york — A New York judge on Wednesday denied Donald Trump’s bid to delay his April 15 trial on charges stemming from hush money paid to a porn star until the U.S. Supreme Court reviews claim to presidential immunity in a separate criminal case.
The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear on April 25 the former U.S. president’s arguments that he is immune from federal prosecution for trying to overturn his 2020 election defeat to President Joe Biden.
His defense lawyers in the New York case in March asked Justice Juan Merchan to delay the trial until that review was complete, arguing it was relevant because prosecutors were seeking to present evidence of statements Trump made while he was president from 2017 to 2021.
In a court ruling on Wednesday, Merchan said Trump had waited too long to raise the issue.
“Defendant had myriad opportunities to raise the claim of presidential immunity well before March 7, 2024,” Merchan wrote.
Todd Blanche, a lawyer for Trump, declined to comment.
Trump, the Republican candidate to challenge Biden in the November 5 election, has pleaded not guilty in each of the four criminal indictments he faces.
The New York case could be the only one to go to trial before the election.
He is accused of falsifying business records to cover up his former lawyer Michael Cohen’s $130,000 payment to porn star Stormy Daniels for her silence before the 2016 election about a sexual encounter she says she had with Trump in 2006.
Trump denies any such encounter with Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford.
Trump also is seeking a delay on the basis that a deluge of news coverage of the case has led potential jurors to believe he is already guilty. Merchan has not yet ruled on that request.
Prosecutors with Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office, which charged Trump in 2023, opposed that request in a court filing made public on Wednesday.
They argued that Trump himself had generated much of the news coverage, and that they would be able to weed out biased jurors through the jury selection process.
The Supreme Court’s decision to take up Trump’s appeal in the federal election interference case was a major victory for him, delaying the trial’s start by months at least.
He also faces a state case in Georgia over his efforts to reverse the 2020 election results, as well as a federal case in Florida over his handling of sensitive government documents after leaving office in 2021. Those cases also lack firm trial dates.
No U.S. president has ever faced a criminal trial.
Nearly 1M medical records feared stolen from City of Hope cancer centers
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Is there no cure for this cyber-plague?
Nearly one million individuals’ personal details, financial account information, and medical records may well have been stolen from City of Hope systems in the United States.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/city_of_hope_data_theft/
Ken Striplin | Skyline Ranch Park- Welcoming the City’s 38th Park
date: 2024-04-03, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Feel the breeze and take in the sweeping views at the City’s 38th park, Skyline Ranch Park, a paradise for outdoor enthusiasts of all ages
https://scvnews.com/ken-striplin-skyline-ranch-park-welcoming-the-citys-38th-park/
For Mixed-Status Families Struggling With Financial Aid Forms, Advisors Urge Patience
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The LAist
Application problems are having a particularly negative impact on many Latino students, threatening their ability to go to college.
https://laist.com/news/education/latino-students-last-names-federal-financial-aid-fafsa
Leaked images tease BYD’s first electric pickup, coming to global markets this year
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
New images are showcasing what appears to be the first all-electric pickup model from Build Your Dreams (BYD). The camouflaged images show a mid- to full-size truck, confirmed to be hitting EV markets across the globe before the end of 2024.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/leaked-images-byd-first-electric-pickup-to-be-sold-globally-ev-2024/
PCIe 7.0 first official draft lands, doubling bandwidth yet again
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
The downside? You probably won’t see kit to use it until 2027
Analysis The PCIe 7.0 spec is on track for release next year and, for many AI chip peddlers trying to push the limits of network fabrics and accelerator meshes, it can’t come soon enough.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/pcie_70_draft/
Sept. 27: 2024 Economic Outlook Lands Shark Tank Keynote Speaker
date: 2024-04-03, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The SCVEDC in partnership with College of the Canyons have unveiled their plans for the 2204 Economic Outlook Event.
https://scvnews.com/sept-27-2024-economic-outlook-lands-shark-tank-keynote-speaker/
macOS Finder is still bad at network file copies
date: 2024-04-03, from: Jeff Geerling blog
macOS Finder is still bad at network file copies
<div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p>In what is becoming a kind of hobby for me, I've just finished testing another tiny NAS—more on that tomorrow.</p>But as I was testing, I started getting frustrated with the fact I’ve never been able to get a Raspberry Pi—regardless of internal storage speeds, even with 800+ MB/sec PCIe-based storage—to consistently write more than around 100 MB/sec write speeds over the network, with either Samba or NFS.
NFS would be more consistent… but it ran around 82 MB/sec:
Samba would peak around 115 MB/sec, but it was wildly inconsistent, averaging around 70 MB/sec:
I have a problem: I use macOS1.
<span class="field field--name-uid field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden"><span>Jeff Geerling</span></span>
https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2024/macos-finder-still-bad-network-file-copies
A Tesla Supercharger is Maine’s first NEVI EV charging station
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
The State of Maine just opened its first National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) Formula Program-funded EV charging station – a Tesla Supercharger with CCS compatibility.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/tesla-supercharger-maine-first-nevi-ev-charging-station/
Meet DAL-e: Hyundai’s new electric robot that can deliver 16 cups of coffee
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
If you see an electric robot roaming around the office, don’t be alarmed. It could just be DAL-e, Hyundai’s new electric delivery robot that can easily carry around 16 cups of coffee.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/hyundais-new-dal-e-electric-robot-deliver-16-cups-coffee/
US says UN not venue to negotiate Palestinian statehood
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
Washington — The United States on Wednesday opposed a Palestinian push for full membership at the United Nations, with Washington saying it backed statehood but after negotiations with Israel.
“We support the establishment of an independent Palestinian state,” U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters.
“That is something that should be done through direct negotiations through the parties, something we are pursuing at this time, and not at the United Nations,” he said, without explicitly saying that the United States would veto the bid if it reached the Security Council.
Miller said that U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has been actively engaged in establishing “security guarantees” for Israel as part of the groundwork for a Palestinian state.
U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration has increasingly highlighted support for a Palestinian state, with a reformed Palestinian Authority in charge in the West Bank and Gaza, as it looks for a way to close the ongoing war in which its ally Israel is seeking to eliminate Hamas from the Gaza Strip.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has for decades resisted a Palestinian state and leads a far-right government with members hostile to the Palestinian Authority, which holds limited autonomy in sections of the West Bank.
Under longstanding legislation by the U.S. Congress, the United States is required to cut off funding to U.N. agencies that give full membership to a Palestinian state.
The law has been applied selectively. The United States cut off funding in 2011 and later withdrew from the U.N. cultural and scientific agency UNESCO, but Biden’s administration returned, saying it was better to be present.
Robert Wood, the U.S. deputy representative to the United Nations, said that recognition of a Palestinian state by the world body would mean “funding would be cut off to the U.N. system, so we’re bound by U.S. law.”
“Our hope is that they don’t pursue that, but that’s up to them,” Wood said of the Palestinians’ bid.
The Palestinian Authority has submitted a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres asking for the Security Council to reconsider a longstanding application for statehood in April.
Any request to become a U.N. member state must first be recommended by the Security Council, where Israel’s primary backer the United States as well as four other countries wield vetoes, and then endorsed by a two-thirds majority in the General Assembly.
Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas launched the statehood application in 2011. It was not considered by the Security Council, but the General Assembly the following year granted observer status to the “State of Palestine.”
https://www.voanews.com/a/us-says-un-not-venue-to-negotiate-palestinian-statehood/7555586.html
April 9: Journalist Asaf Elia-Shalev To Offer a New Perspective on History
date: 2024-04-03, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Israeli-American journalist Asaf Elia-Shalev will discuss his most recent publication, “Israel’s Black Panthers: The Radicals who Punctured a Nation’s Founding Myth” on Tuesday, April 9, at California State University, Northridge. The event will take place from 12:30 to 2 p.m. in the University Library’s Jack & Florence Ferman Presentation Room. Light refreshments will be provided. Elia-Shalev…
Falling Object That Crashed Into Florida Home May Be Debris From the International Space Station
date: 2024-04-03, from: Smithsonian Magazine
Nobody was hurt by the mysterious, two-pound object, but experts speculate it may be a piece of batteries ejected from the station in 2021
Tribblix image structural changes
date: 2024-04-03, from: OS News
We’ve talked about Tribblix before on OSNews – it’s a distribution of illumos, built by Peter Tribble. In his latest blog post, Tribble details some of the changes he’s made to the live ISO and other images for the most recent release. All along, there’s been an overlay (think a group package) called base-iso that lists the packages that are present in the live image. On installation, this is augmented with a few extra packages that you would expect to be present in a running system but which don’t make much sense in a live image, to construct the base system. You can add additional software, but the base is assumed to be present. The snag with this is that base-iso is very much a single-purpose generic concept. By its very nature it has to be minimal enough to not be overly bloated, yet contain as many drivers as necessary to handle the majority of systems. As such, the regular ISO image has fallen between 2 stools – it doesn’t have every single driver, so some systems won’t work, while it has a lot of unnecessary drivers for a lot of common use cases. ↫ Peter Tribble Tribble then details how he addressed this issue, which is, unsurprisingly, rather clever. I’m not going to spoil it here, so go on over and read the details.
https://www.osnews.com/story/139150/tribblix-image-structural-changes/
Ford Mustang Mach-E Sales ‘Catching Fire’ After Huge Price Drop
date: 2024-04-03, from: Inside EVs News
Inventory movement has tripled since Ford’s price cuts in February 2024.
https://insideevs.com/news/714860/ford-mustang-mach-e-sales-surge-after-price-drop/
Nation’s Largest Paid Summer Internship Program Opens For L.A. County College Students
date: 2024-04-03, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The LA County Arts Internship Program will provide 228 university and community college students with paid on-the-job experience in the arts at over 160 nonprofit organizations across the L.A. region starting this summer
Farm Animal Family Photos
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/04/farm-animal-family-photos
The Marshall Star for April 3, 2024
date: 2024-04-03, from: NASA breaking news
Huntsville, Marshall Preparing to Celebrate Total Solar Eclipse By Celine Smith On April 8 between 1 and 3 p.m., the Moon will pass between the Sun and Earth to create a total solar eclipse for 15 states. While Alabama will experience a partial eclipse, area residents can enjoy some fun-filled festivities to celebrate the event. […]
https://www.nasa.gov/centers-and-facilities/marshall/the-marshall-star-for-april-3-2024/
Archaeologists Find Ancient Statue of Apollo That Probably Adorned a Magnificent Fountain
date: 2024-04-03, from: Smithsonian Magazine
The marble bust sheds new light on the layered history of a 2,000-year-old Greek city
April 17: CSUN Hosts Third Annual EV Car Show
date: 2024-04-03, from: SCV New (TV Station)
California State University, Northridge is hosting its third annual EV car show and panel discussion on the future of such vehicles on Wednesday, April
https://scvnews.com/april-17-csun-hosts-third-annual-ev-car-show/
Improvements to static analysis in the GCC 14 compiler
date: 2024-04-03, from: OS News
I work at Red Hat on GCC, the GNU Compiler Collection. For the last five releases of GCC, I’ve been working on -fanalyzer, a static analysis pass that tries to identify various problems at compile-time, rather than at runtime. It performs “symbolic execution” of C source code—effectively simulating the behavior of the code along the various possible paths of execution through it. This article summarizes what’s new with -fanalyzer in GCC 14, which I hope will be officially released sometime in April 2024. ↫ David Malcolm No matter how many more of you become a Patreon to keep OSNews alive, I’ll never be able to really add anything meaningful to articles like these.
https://www.osnews.com/story/139147/improvements-to-static-analysis-in-the-gcc-14-compiler/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-04-03, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Texas Highways Have Torn Through Communities and Dominated Our Cities.
https://www.texasobserver.org/roadmap-to-rebuilding-communities/
KDE 6 release: D-Bus and Polkit galore
date: 2024-04-03, from: OS News
The SUSE security team restricts the installation of system wide D-Bus services and Polkit policies in openSUSE distributions and derived SUSE products. Any package that ships these features needs to be reviewed by us first, before it can be added to production repositories. In November, openSUSE KDE packagers approached us with a long list of KDE components for an upcoming KDE6 major release. The packages needed adjusted D-Bus and Polkit whitelistings due to renamed interfaces or other breaking changes. Looking into this many components at once was a unique experience that also led to new insights, which will be discussed in this article. For readers that are new to D-Bus and/or Polkit, the following sections offer a summary to get a better idea about these systems. ↫ Matthias Gerstner You don’t get these kinds of in-depth looks at how a major new release like KDE 6 gets implemented in a popular distribution like openSUSE. What’s especially crazy is that this only really covers D-Bus and Polkit, and those are just two of the countless aspects of openSUSE affected by KDE 6.
https://www.osnews.com/story/139143/kde-6-release-d-bus-and-polkit-galore/
Yes I Can Introduces New Podcast ‘Breaking the Biz’
date: 2024-04-03, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Yes I Can Unity Through Music & Education is proud to announce the launch of the Breaking the Biz Podcast, showcasing weekly the remarkable journey of professionals working in the entertainment industry
https://scvnews.com/yes-i-can-introduces-new-podcast-breaking-the-biz/
Listen Live to the Total Solar Eclipse, Transformed Into a Real-Time Musical Composition
date: 2024-04-03, from: Smithsonian Magazine
A composer based at San Francisco’s Exploratorium museum will use data coming from the eclipsed sun to create an out-of-this-world “sonification” on April 8
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-04-03, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
How I'm filling the Twitter-size hole in my life.
U.S. Volkswagen ID.4 Sales Decreased By 37% In Q1 2024
date: 2024-04-03, from: Inside EVs News
It was the worst result in almost two years.
https://insideevs.com/news/714806/us-volkswagen-id4-sales-decreas/
Cyberattack hits Omni Hotels systems, taking out bookings, payments, door locks
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
As WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, other Meta bits plus Apple stuff fall offline today
Updated Omni Hotels & Resorts’ computer systems have been offline since Friday due to what the American luxury hospitality chain called a “disruption.”…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/omni_hotels_it_outage/
Crows are on the short list of animals that have domesticated humans….
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/04/0044327-crows-are-on-the-short
US Treasury Secretary Yellen visits China for high-level talks
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
https://www.voanews.com/a/treasury-secretary-yellen-to-visit-china-for-high-level-talks/7555456.html
😂 Is this thing on?
date: 2024-04-03, from: Interesting, a blog on writing
These are the jokes, folks.
https://inneresting.substack.com/p/is-this-thing-on
A Skeptic’s Take on AI and Energy Growth
date: 2024-04-03, from: Heatmap News
Will the rise of machine learning and artificial intelligence break the climate system? In recent months, utilities and tech companies have argued that soaring use of AI will overwhelm electricity markets. Is that true — or is it a sales pitch meant to build more gas plants? And how much electricity do data centers and AI use today?
In this week’s episode, Rob and Jesse talk to Jonathan Koomey, an independent researcher, lecturer, and entrepreneur who studies the energy impacts of the internet and information technology. We discuss why AI may not break the electricity system and the long history of anxiety over computing’s energy use. Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, executive editor of Heatmap, and Jesse Jenkins, a Princeton professor of energy systems engineering.
Subscribe to “Shift Key” and find this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon, or wherever you get your podcasts.
You can also add the show’s RSS feed to your podcast app to follow us directly.
Here is an excerpt from our conversation:
Robinson Meyer: Before we go any further — and I think you just hinted at your answer, here, but I want to tackle it directly — which is that I think people look at the hockey stick graphs for AI use, and they look at current energy use for AI, and they look at load growth data coming from the utilities, and they go, “Oh my gosh, AI is going to absolutely overrun our energy system. It’s going to cause emissions to shoot up,” because again, this is just extrapolating from what’s recent.
But of course, part of the whole AI mythos is like, once it starts, you can’t stop it. There is a story out there that, frankly, you see as much from folks who are worried about the climate as you do from AI boosters, which is that very soon, we’’e going to be using a huge amount of energy on AI. And I want to ask you this directly: Should we be worried about AI, number one, overrunning the energy system? Or number two, AI causing a massive spike in carbon emissions that dooms us to, let’s say, pass 2.5C that uses up the rest of our carbon budget? Is that something you’re worried about? And just how do you think about this?
Jonathan Koomey: Everyone needs to calm the heck down. So we talked about the original baseline, right? So the baseline, data centers are 1% of the world’s electricity. And maybe AI now is 0.1%, right? For Google, it’s 0.15%, whatever. But 10% of the 1% is AI.
So let’s say that doubles — let’s say that triples in the next few years, or even goes up fivefold. That gets to about half a percent. So I think it will pale in comparison to the other growth drivers that Jesse was talking about in electrification. Because if you think about light vehicles, if you electrified all light vehicles in the U.S., that’s like a 20% or 25% increase in electricity consumption.And if you did that over 20 years, that’s like 1-ish% per year. Right? So that’s, that to me is a very credible thing that’s likely to happen. And then when you add heat pumps, you add industrial electrification, a lot more.
I think there will be local impacts. There will be some places where AI and data centers more generally will be important and will drive load growth, but it is not a national story. It is a local story. And so a place like Ireland that has, I think at last count 17%, 18% of its load from data centers, if that grows, that could give them real challenges. Same thing, Loudoun County in Virginia. But you really do have to separate the national story or the global story from the local story.
Jesse Jenkins: I think it was just about a week ago, Nvidia which is the leading producer of the graphics processing units that have become now the main workhorse chips for generative AI computing, they released their new best-in-class chip. And as they revealed that chip, they — for the first time, it sounded like — started to emphasize the energy efficiency improvements of the GPU. And the basic story the CEO told is that it would take about 73% less electricity and a shorter period of time to train AIs on this new chip than it did on their previous best-in-class chip. So that’s just one generation of GPU with nearly three-quarters reduction in the amount of energy consumed per … I don’t know how you measure the units of large language model training, but per smarts trained into generative AI. So yeah, huge gains.
And one might say, well, can that continue forever? And I guess we should maybe get your thoughts on that. But it has continued at least for the last 10 to 20 years. And so there’s a lot of reason to believe that there’s continued gains to be made.
Koomey: Most people, when they think of efficiency, they think of Moore’s Law. They think of shrinking transistors. And anyone who follows this knows that every year or two, there’s another article about how Moore’s Law is ending, or slowing, or you know, it’s getting harder. And there’s no question about it, it’s absolutely getting harder and harder to shrink the transistors. But it turns out shrinking transistors is only one way to improve efficiency and performance. For a long time, the industry relied on that.
From the early days of microprocessors, starting in ’71, over time, they would ramp up the clock speed. And at the same time, they would ramp down the voltage of the chip. And that was called Dennard scaling. It allowed them to keep ramping up performance without getting to crazy levels of leakage current and heat and melting the chip and the whole thing. That worked for a long time, til the early 2000s. And then they hit the threshold voltage for silicon, which is like one volt. So once you hit that, you can no longer do that trick. And they needed new tricks.
So what they did was they, most of you remember who were around at that time, there was this big shift to multiple cores on a chip. That was an innovation in hardware architecture that allowed them, for a time, to improve efficiency by going to software that could run on multiple cores, so you could multiprocess various activities. So that’s one way you can improve things. You can also work on the software — you can improve the efficiency of the software, you can improve the algorithms that you use.
So even if Moore’s law shrinkage of transistors stops, which it hasn’t fully stopped. But even if it did, there are a lot of other things we can do. And AI in particular is relatively new. Basically, people threw a whole bunch of money at existing processors because there was this rush to deploy technology. But now, everyone’s stepping back and saying, well, look at the cost of the energy cost and the infrastructure cost. Is there a way to do this better? And sure, there definitely is, and Nvidia proved it in their presentation that you referred to.
This episode of Shift Key is sponsored by…
KORE Power provides the commercial, industrial, and utility markets with functional solutions that advance the clean energy transition worldwide. KORE Power’s technology and manufacturing capabilities provide direct access to next generation battery cells, energy storage systems that scale to grid+, EV power & infrastructure, and intuitive asset management to unlock energy strategies across a myriad of applications. Explore more at korepower.com.
Watershed’s climate data engine helps companies measure and reduce their emissions, turning the data they already have into an audit-ready carbon footprint backed by the latest climate science. Get the sustainability data you need in weeks, not months. Learn more at watershed.com.
Music for Shift Key is by Adam Kromelow.
https://heatmap.news/podcast/shift-key-episode-10-ai-data-centers
Seven Years of APFS
date: 2024-04-03, from: Michael Tsai
Howard Oakley: Although APFS has certainly had its moments over the last seven years, Apple’s gambles have paid off, and proved key to the success of Apple silicon Macs. Had there been no APFS, many of the fundamental technologies like Secure Boot and the Signed System Volume (SSV) would have been far tougher if not […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2024/04/03/seven-years-of-apfs/
A Disk So Full, It Couldn’t Be Restored
date: 2024-04-03, from: Michael Tsai
Glenn Fleishman (Mastodon): Turned out, my kid had managed a neat trick, though they were not alone: they had filled macOS’s startup volume storage so full that the operating system was incapable of deleting files in any fashion. Instead of halting the massive Steam download when the drive became disastrously full, macOS continued to write […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2024/04/03/a-disk-so-full-it-couldnt-be-restored/
Checking Bootable Systems Using bputil
date: 2024-04-03, from: Michael Tsai
Howard Oakley: Apple gives the user control over the level of security to be used, in Startup Security Utility, in Recovery. For this to work with boot volume groups (BVGs), each must have its own set of boot security policies, determined by its LocalPolicy. Without a valid LocalPolicy, Apple silicon Macs will refuse to boot […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2024/04/03/checking-bootable-systems-using-bputil/
Cal Grant Deadline Extended to May 2
date: 2024-04-03, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Good news for students hoping to secure financial aid for the 2024-25 academic year: The deadline to apply for the Cal Grant has been extended to May 2, 2024.
https://scvnews.com/cal-grant-deadline-extended-to-may-2/
Apple’s Problem With Lina Khan
date: 2024-04-03, from: Michael Tsai
Matt Stoller (ArsTechnica): As part of the claim outside of the smartphone, the Antitrust Division asserted that “Apple’s conduct extends beyond just monopoly profits and even affects the flow of speech. For example, Apple is rapidly expanding its role as a TV and movie producer and has exercised that role to control content.” Some economists […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2024/04/03/apples-problem-with-lina-khan/
Lenovo Tab P12 with Matte Display coming soon (A tablet made for reading)
date: 2024-04-03, from: Liliputing
Most modern tablets have glossy touchscreen displays which respond well to touch and generally look good indoors. But take them outside or put them under a bright light bulb and they have a habit of turning into mirrors unless you crank the brightness all the way up (assuming they even have screens that can get bright […]
The post Lenovo Tab P12 with Matte Display coming soon (A tablet made for reading) appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/lenovo-tab-p12-with-matte-display-could-be-a-tablet-made-for-readers-leaks/
CATL launches new EV battery with close to a 1 million mile, 15-year lifespan
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
Leading EV battery maker CATL released its new breakthrough battery pack with up to a nearly 1 million mile (1.5 million km), 15-year warranty.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/catl-launches-new-ev-battery-last-1-million-miles-15-yrs/
Review: Hayao Miyazaki’s “The Boy and the Heron” is a beautiful yet complicated tale on loss, grief and closure
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
“Anime was a mistake…” thankfully, not this one. From the renowned Hayao Miyazaki and his award-winning company, Studio Ghibli, comes his most recent film, “The Boy and the Heron.” This…
Comfort in Gaming: Bringing students together with PCs and consoles
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
As fraternization steadily recovers on campus post-pandemic, the Games Room is providing students with a space for recreation. Fluorescent lights shine down on hyperfocused gamers, friends entertain a pool match…
AI vs. Jobs: How AI is changing the game industry and people’s jobs
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
Game developers have used artificial intelligence since the 1950s, and as the technology develops, it is being used for shortcuts in design without the need of workers. AI has become…
AWS severs connection with several hundred staff
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
‘Necessary,’ ‘focusing our efforts,’ ‘deliver maximum impact’ … sounds just like all the other tech layoffs lately
Hundreds of Amazon Web Services employees are being shown the door this week - a move the American technology behemoth said is necessary as it, like many others, moves to streamline operations.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/amazon_aws_layoffs/
Bullying in Open Source Software Is a Massive Security Vulnerability
date: 2024-04-03, from: 404 Media Group
The Xz backdoor and a near miss on the F-Droid app store show how the entitled attitude of some people in the open source community can be used to push malicious or insecure code.
HP launches four new 14 inch Chromebooks with Alder Lake-N processors
date: 2024-04-03, from: Liliputing
HP is refreshing its Chromebook lineup with four new models packing 14 inch displays and Intel Alder Lake-N processors and starting prices ranging from $300 for an entry-level model to $600 for the fanciest new Chromebook Plus model. Three of the new Chromebooks are available now, while the third should hit the streets later this […]
The post HP launches four new 14 inch Chromebooks with Alder Lake-N processors appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/hp-launches-four-new-14-inch-chromebooks-with-alder-lake-n-processors/
“A 600-Year-Old Blueprint for Weathering Climate Change”
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/04/a-600-year-old-blueprint-for-weathering-climate-change
Review: K.Flay at Lodge Room
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
Angelenos gathered in Highland Park’s historic Lodge Room on Thursday, March 7, letting loose and singing along to every track by pop-rock artist K. Flay for the second night of…
https://sundial.csun.edu/179917/arts-entertainment/review-k-flay-at-lodge-room/
Sleek New Entry-Level Mercedes CLA EV Spotted As Tesla Model 3 Rival [Video]
date: 2024-04-03, from: Inside EVs News
After a series of questionably styled electric models, it looks like Mercedes is bringing sexy back to its EV lineup.
https://insideevs.com/news/714814/mercedes-cla-ev-spied-cold-testing/
Save $525 on Greenworks’ new Venture mountain e-bike, 27kW tankless electric water heater now $405, more
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
Greenworks just debuted its first-ever lineup of EVs at the start of the year, and now you can finally save on one of its more enticing models. The all-new Greenworks Venture All-Terrain Mountain e-bike is dropping for the first time down to $1,575 to go alongside all of today’s other best deals. That includes tankless electric water heaters at $405 and an outdoor electric tool starter kit. Plus, all of the other best new Green Deals landing this week.
Head below for other New Green Deals we’ve found today and, of course, Electrek’s best EV buying and leasing deals. Also, check out the new Electrek Tesla Shop for the best deals on Tesla accessories.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/greenworks-venture-e-bike-electric-water-heater-more/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-04-03, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
2023: I wondered it there wasn't a position for a lite version of WordPress, a user interface designed for one person, not a group.
http://scripting.com/2023/10/25.html#a200251
U.S. Steel Is Trying Carbon Capture. Experts Aren’t Impressed.
date: 2024-04-03, from: Heatmap News
Last week, the Department of Energy announced $6 billion in awards to help clean up some of the most greenhouse gas-intensive industries in the U.S., including $1.5 billion to transform iron and steel manufacturing. U.S. Steel, one of the biggest American steelmakers, was not among the recipients.
On Wednesday, U.S. Steel made an announcement of its own: It is signing a 20-year agreement with CarbonFree, a Texas-based company, to capture carbon dioxide from Gary Works, the largest integrated steel mill in the country, and turn it into a marketable product. The $150 million project is the first to capture and utilize carbon from an American steel plant at a commercial scale.
Gary Works releases an ungodly amount of carbon into the air each year — more than the entire state of Vermont. CarbonFree will use its technology, known as SkyCycle, to collect 50,000 tons of CO2 from the plant per year and transform it into high grade calcium carbonate, a valuable ingredient for the food, pharmaceuticals, paint, and plastics industries.
Something certainly has to change if U.S. Steel is going to make good on its pledge of achieving net-zero emissions by 2050, let alone stay competitive in a market that’s expected to increasingly look for greener products. It’s unclear, however, whom the company is going to convince with this project, which will capture less than 1% of the plant’s annual emissions.
“It’s deeply unserious, I think, is the words that come to mind,” Hilary Lewis, the steel director at Industrious Labs, a nonprofit that advocates for decarbonizing heavy industry, told me. The effort is especially embarrassing, she said, given that two of the company’s competitors, SSAB and Cleveland Cliffs, were awarded $500 million each by the DOE for far more transformative green steel projects. “This announcement is emblematic of how U.S. Steel is a laggard.”
U.S. Steel declined to make any of its executives available to interview for this story. In response to my request for comment, the company provided a statement that said this was a first of its kind opportunity to “significantly reduce” emissions at Gary Works, and that it was “the first step in exploring the scalability of this technology” to support the company’s goals.
CarbonFree executives, too, asserted that the Gary Works project is a stepping stone to something bigger. But outside experts I spoke with were skeptical that it would be able to scale enough to make a meaningful difference in the plant’s — or the industry’s — emissions.
The steel industry contributes about 8% of global energy-related emissions. Though the U.S. is not one of the worst offenders (we actually make some of the cleanest steel in the world) U.S. steelmakers still have a long, expensive journey ahead to decarbonize.
That’s because there are eight steel plants in the U.S. that still use blast furnaces, a dirty, coal-intensive production method. Gary Works is one of them. Though these plants only represent about 30% of the country’s steel production, they are responsible for nearly 70% of the sector’s emissions, according to the Department of Energy.
The advantage of the SkyCycle project is that it doesn’t require U.S. Steel to do very much. “We build, own, and operate the [carbon capture equipment], and we’re able to get a return based on the chemicals we sell,” Martin Keighley, the CEO of CarbonFree, told me. “So it’s a much more attractive proposition for, in this case, U.S. Steel, because they don’t have to invest large amounts of money into the plant.” More attractive than at least one alternative, that is, which is to capture the carbon and sequester it underground.
It’s a compelling argument. Carbon capture and storage adds big costs — to install the equipment, transport the CO2, and pump it into the bedrock — with no financial benefit to manufacturers. While the federal government does encourage carbon capture by offering an $85 federal tax credit for every ton of CO2 captured and stored, no law compels steel companies to do so. In many cases, the subsidy may not be not enough to get investors on board for a project, especially since tax credits can come and go depending on the whims of Congress.
But if you find someone else who can take your carbon and make money off of it, then what have you got to lose? Keighley said CarbonFree will be able to earn a slightly smaller federal tax credit — $60 — for every ton of carbon it turns into calcium carbonate, but that the company’s business model doesn’t depend on that.
“You know, we all look at 2050 and net zero, but it doesn’t stop there. To be net zero, we’re still emitting CO2, so we still have to capture it,” he said, referring to the idea that the “net” in net zero implies there will continue to be emissions that must be neutralized. “We’re going to be capturing forever. So, therefore, we need sustainable business models that aren’t reliant on government sources.”
One advantage of SkyCycle over other carbon capture technologies is that it works with raw, dirty flue gas, which might have all kinds of other gases and chemicals mixed in with the CO2. The gas is channeled through a series of chemical reactions and eventually reacts with calcium, a mineral that’s notoriously thirsty for CO2, to create calcium carbonate. Once it binds with calcium, the CO2 is essentially locked up permanently. It would take either very high heat or a very strong acid to remove it.
Keighley said the high grade calcium carbonate on the market today has much greater emissions associated with its production than CarbonFree’s process, and is about the same price. That creates a “multiplier effect,” he told me. Not only is the company reducing emissions from the Gary Works plant, it’s also reducing emissions associated with the products that incorporate the cleaner calcium carbonate. On top of that, the company is sourcing its calcium from steel slag, a waste product from the steelmaking process that nobody has really figured out what to do with. (This is different from blast furnace slag, which is valuable for decarbonizing the cement industry as a replacement for carbon-intensive “clinker.”)
So far, so good. But the issue, according to Rebecca Dell, a former Department of Energy analyst and senior director of industry at the ClimateWorks Foundation, is that the market for high grade calcium carbonate is tiny. “You’re gonna saturate these high end markets way before you get anywhere close to absorbing the full 8 or 9 million tons a year of CO2 that just the Gary Works is emitting,” she told me.
When I raised this with Keighley, he acknowledged that the market was limited. But he said the market for calcium carbonate in general, not just the high purity stuff, is much bigger, and that the company could move into other segments later. CarbonFree is already working on its next system, which will be capable of capturing 250,000 tons of CO2 per year. Calcium carbonate is essentially limestone, which is an abundant and cheap material, so it might be hard to compete in lower-grade markets without bringing down production costs. But Keighley mentioned another plan. “The beauty is, if and when you run out of market altogether, you store it,” he told me. In other words, the company could just stash the calcium carbonate on the grounds of the Gary Works plant. That assumes, however, that they’ve brought down their costs enough to make a profit off the federal tax credit for carbon storage — and that assumes the tax credit still exists.
Lewis, of Industrious Labs, raised a different issue. “If you’re choosing to invest in carbon capture, you’re locking in that reliance on coal for another 15, 20 years,” she told me. Carbon capture doesn’t address the other health-harming pollutants these steel mills rain over their surrounding community, including nitrous oxides, sulfur dioxide, and soot. She also noted that the biggest consumer of the types of steel produced by blast furnaces, the auto industry, has ambitious climate targets. While automakers have yet to make truly market-transforming commitments to buy cleaner steel, if and when they do, Gary Works could be left unprepared, threatening the job security of its more than 4,000 workers.
U.S. Steel’s plan is a stark contrast to one of the projects awarded funding by the DOE last week, Lewis said. Cleveland Cliffs, which owns five of the remaining seven blast furnace steel mills, will get $500 million to replace one of its blast furnaces at a mill in Ohio with what’s called a “direct reduced iron” plant. Direct reduction is more efficient, cleaner, and cheaper than a blast furnace; the company said it would save $150 per ton of steel produced by making the switch. Though some direct reduction plants rely on natural gas, and therefore aren’t exactly carbon-free, the process can also be done with green hydrogen. That’s what a second project announced last week, led by the Swedish steelmaker SSAB, will be using at a new plant in Mississippi.
In my interview with Keighley, I asked what he thought about the criticism that this project would keep Gary Works hooked on coal for another 20 years, and that advocates wanted to see the plant transition to direct reduction. He responded by raising questions about green hydrogen. Producing green hydrogen requires lots of renewable energy, he said. Is that the best use of that renewable energy, or could you “get more decarbonization for your buck” by using it for something else?
Later, in an email, Keighley also pointed to SkyCycle’s readiness for deployment compared to the long development timelines for other solutions. Construction is expected to start as early as summer 2024, with operations beginning in 2026. He also emphasized that CarbonFree would be able to “easily” increase the size of the plant. “There’s so many different options and everyone’s trying to second guess everybody else. Just get on with doing something, you know?”
But Chris Bataille, a research fellow at the Columbia University Center on Global Energy Policy who focuses on pathways to net-zero for heavy industry, told me the tiny scope of this project is indicative of a larger issue. “These marginal changes are attractive to people who are just used to running a blast furnace their whole careers,” he said. “You can keep the rest of your plant, but that piece of equipment needs to change.”
https://heatmap.news/economy/us-steel-carbon-capture
Ford U.S. EV Sales Almost Doubled In Q1 2024 To Over 20,000
date: 2024-04-03, from: Inside EVs News
March brought the second-highest EV sales number ever, as all models contributed to strong growth.
https://insideevs.com/news/714823/ford-us-ev-sales-2024-q1/
Daily Deals (4-03-2024)
date: 2024-04-03, from: Liliputing
Samsung launched the Galaxy Tab S9 FE series of semi-premium Android tablets last fall as a lower-cost alternative to the company’s pricier S9 series. With features like 90 Hz displays and a Samsung S-Pen, they’re pretty good tablets… even if their Exynos 1380 chips aren’t as powerful as the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chips […]
The post Daily Deals (4-03-2024) appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/daily-deals-4-03-2024/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-04-03, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Apple wouldn’t let Jon Stewart interview FTC Chair Lina Khan, TV host claims.
Rivian Has Built 100,000 EVs
date: 2024-04-03, from: Inside EVs News
Rivian has officially produced 100,000s EVs—but that doesn’t mean it has delivered them all.
https://insideevs.com/news/714838/rivian-builds-100000-vehicle-normal/
Uber Eats to rid itself of pesky human drivers with food delivery by robo Waymo
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
First they came for the taxis and I did nothing because I was not a taxi driver
Bad news if you’re income-boosting, or God forbid trying to make a living, as an Uber Eats delivery driver because the robots are coming – to one part of the United States, at least.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/uber_eats_waymo_delivery/
The Discarded by Colin Hamilton sounds interesting…an imagined librarian pulls imagined books…
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/04/0044318-the-discarded-by-colin-ha
They Can’t Be Worse Than Most Humans
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: One Foot Tsunami
https://onefoottsunami.com/2024/04/03/they-cant-be-worse-than-most-humans/
More Than Half of U.S. Landfills May Be Methane ‘Super-Emitters,’ Study Finds
date: 2024-04-03, from: Smithsonian Magazine
Aerial observations of hundreds of large landfills across 18 states found they are leaking 40 percent more methane than is reported to the EPA
Locking Diff Or No? Cybertruck, F-150 Lightning, Silverado, Rivian R1T Drivetrains Compared
date: 2024-04-03, from: Inside EVs News
Pickup trucks, including battery-powered ones, are expected to do everything, including the occasional off-road course.
FCC to reinstate net neutrality in the US until someone decides to scrap it again
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Pendulum returns to the Obama era – don’t be surprised if it swings right back
The Federal Communications Commission has confirmed proposals to vote on rules to restore net neutrality in the United States later this month – whether it’ll stick this time is anyone’s guess, though.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/fcc_net_neutrality_reinstatement/
The One Motorcycle Show Teams Up With Flat Out Friday Racing
date: 2024-04-03, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
To celebrate the show’s 15th anniversary, the One Moto Show is going (what else) Flat Out.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/714700/one-moto-show-2024-details/
Cryptographers Who Solved Zodiac Killer Cipher Publish Paper About How They Did It
date: 2024-04-03, from: 404 Media Group
The paper details the “authors’ many years of failed experiments and dead-end ideas.”
Rivian (RIVN) hits a milestone after its 100,000th EV rolls off the production line
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
EV startup Rivian (RIVN) just hit a major milestone after announcing its 100,000th EV rolled off the production line on Wednesday.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/rivian-rivn-100000th-ev/
Does Donald Trump have presidential immunity?
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
New Orleans — The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments this month about presidential immunity and whether former President Donald Trump can be tried on charges that he conspired to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
The high court’s decision will determine how some of the presumptive GOP nominee’s legal cases advance in an election year where he is facing 91 felony charges across four trials. They include the willful retention of national defense information in violation of the Espionage Act.
“Donald Trump is trying to show that a U.S. president is immune from criminal prosecution while acting in an official capacity,” University of Georgia political scientist Charles Bullock told VOA.
“But I think, at the heart of this matter, is just how broadly Trump and his lawyers define ‘official capacity,’” Bullock explained.
“They are defining it very broadly at the moment. Trump says a president should be completely immune while president, but the three-judge circuit panel that ruled against him posed the question: ‘Well, what if the president hired a hitman to take out one of their rivals? Is that in an official capacity, and are they immune from prosecution then, as well?’ I think we’d all say, of course not!”
Many Republicans continue to back Trump
This month’s case before the Supreme Court, which includes three Trump appointees, involves federal charges that Trump attempted to overturn the 2020 presidential election by spreading false information about voter fraud and by pressing Vice President Mike Pence to reject legitimate results when they were presented to Congress.
That congressional certification of electoral votes on January 6, 2021, was disrupted by Trump supporters who stormed the Capitol. For that attack, Trump is facing a charge of obstructing an official proceeding.
The former president argues he was acting in an official capacity at the time, and therefore cannot be charged. In its filing to the Supreme Court, Trump’s team wrote, “The president cannot function, and the presidency itself cannot retain its vital independence, if the president faces criminal prosecution for official acts once he leaves office.”
“A denial of criminal immunity would incapacitate every future president with de facto blackmail and extortion while in office,” the filing continues, “and condemn him to years of post-office trauma at the hands of political opponents.”
A Politico Magazine/Ipsos poll last month found that 70% of voters — including nearly half of Republicans — reject Trump’s argument that presidents should be immune from prosecution for crimes committed while in office.
Republican voter Jeff Williams from Valparaiso, Indiana, believes charges against Trump show he is being unfairly targeted by Democrats.
“It looks to me like these are all cases of Democrat-affiliated prosecutors in Democratic-leaning districts hoping for Democratic-slanted juries that will vote against Trump simply because they don’t like him,” Williams told VOA.
“Do I think a president should have total immunity from the law? No way,” Williams said. “But have I seen any evidence that suggests President Trump is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt? Absolutely not. This feels like a witch hunt.”
“Half of the country is going to have to justify voting for a criminal this year!”
“I can’t believe this is the situation we find ourselves in,” said Democratic voter Deborah Theobald of Woodstock, Georgia. “Half of the country is going to have to justify voting for a criminal this year!”
Fifty-five percent of Americans responding to a Reuters/Ipsos poll say they would not vote for Donald Trump if he was convicted of a felony by a jury, while 58% said they would not cast their ballot for the former president if he was currently serving time in prison.
“If a person has committed a crime while in office, and even a serious crime before office, then I think they should be prosecuted just as any other American would be,” said Rebecca Urrutia, a Connecticut mother who voted for Trump in both 2016 and 2020.
“Anyone who says that a president should have immunity from a prosecuted crime doesn’t stand for the Constitution or our country,” she said. “The president is a citizen and servant of our country, not a king or emperor, and if you break the law, I can’t vote for you.”
Impacting the coming election
It’s a turning point for the U.S. legal system and a pivotal political moment for Trump, says Robert Collins, a Dillard University professor of urban studies and public policy.
“Polling has shown that whether he is convicted or not has huge implications for the 2024 presidential election,” Collins told VOA. “But, outside of how these cases are ruled, the longer they go on, the more likely Trump avoids a guilty ruling in advance of Election Day.”
Independent voters are a pivotal group in swing states, with more than one-third telling a Politico Magazine/Ipsos poll that they are less likely to support Trump if he is convicted.
“But if a conviction doesn’t come in time for the election — or too close to the election for voters to change their mind — then Republican voters might stick with him,” Collins said. “And, if he wins the election, and is convicted afterwards, then he’ll make the case that as the sitting president, he’s able to pardon himself. It’s a dangerous situation.”
Melbourne, Florida voter Jillian Dani backed Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020 and says the results of his criminal cases will have a big impact on how she votes in November.
“On one hand, I wouldn’t vote for a felon,” Dani told VOA. “But on the other hand, I’m worried this is a witch hunt against someone the Democratic Party fears. I believe Clinton and Biden were criminals, too, but they weren’t convicted. If Trump isn’t convicted either, then why should he be treated differently?”
https://www.voanews.com/a/does-donald-trump-have-presidential-immunity-/7555095.html
GPD Win Max 2 (2024) handheld gaming PC with Ryzen 7 8840U coming soon (crowdfunding in late April)
date: 2024-04-03, from: Liliputing
Amongst a sea of handheld gaming PCs with similar designs, the GPD Win Max 2 stands out. Instead of a screen squeezed between a set of game controllers, this little computer is more of a mini-laptop has a 10.1 inch display and a QWERTY keyboard that’s just big enough for touch-typing. But it’s also clearly […]
The post GPD Win Max 2 (2024) handheld gaming PC with Ryzen 7 8840U coming soon (crowdfunding in late April) appeared first on Liliputing.
Kia U.S. EV Sales More Than Doubled In March 2024
date: 2024-04-03, from: Inside EVs News
The company set a new quarterly EV sales record with over 11,000 units sold.
https://insideevs.com/news/714720/kia-us-ev-sales-march2024/
Iowa sysadmin pleads guilty to 33-year identity theft of former coworker
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Actions sent homeless victim to jail and a mental hospital for more than a year
An Iowa system administrator has pleaded guilty to charges related to stealing and assuming a former coworker’s identity over a 33-year period.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/sysadmin_33_year_id_theft/
Moira Donegan: “If the post-Dobbs era has shown us anything, it is…
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/04/0044322-moira-donegan-if-the-post
Developers’ fireside chat – 6th April
date: 2024-04-03, from: RiscOS Story
This coming Saturday (6th April) is the next opportunity for anyone who is either developing on or for RISC OS, or interested in doing so, to meet up with like-minded folk and discuss that very subject. These ‘friendly fireside chats’ are held on a semi-regular basis and allow people to spend an evening at a meeting in which anyone can seek (or give) advice. It doesn’t matter if you consider yourself an expert, or you haven’t yet cut your programming teeth, or if you put yourself somewhere between those two…
https://www.riscository.com/2024/developers-fireside-chat-6th-april/
US pushes back at judge over Trump claim that classified records were personal
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
WASHINGTON — The U.S. prosecutor leading the case against Donald Trump for retaining classified documents after leaving office pushed back at a federal judge after she signaled she may accept the former president’s claim that the records were his personal property.
U.S. Special Counsel Jack Smith said in a court filing late on Tuesday that his office would appeal any decision by U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon that would instruct jurors in the case to consider what he called Trump’s “fundamentally flawed legal premise.”
Trump, the Republican candidate challenging Democratic President Joe Biden in the November 5 election, pleaded not guilty last year to a 40-count indictment accusing him of illegally keeping classified documents after leaving office in 2021 and obstructing federal government efforts to retrieve them.
Cannon, who was appointed to the bench by Trump, has signaled she is receptive to Trump’s claim that he treated the documents as personal under a 1978 law called the Presidential Records Act that lets former presidents keep records that have no connection to their official responsibilities.
Prosecutors have said the documents relate to U.S. military and intelligence matters, including details about the American nuclear program, and could not be construed as personal.
The judge on March 18 directed the prosecution and defense to propose jury instructions based on two legal scenarios assuming Trump’s argument would play a role at trial.
One scenario, in which neither the jury nor the judge could question Trump’s contention that the records are personal, would essentially direct the jury to acquit Trump, according to prosecutors. They urged Cannon to quickly decide if jurors will be told that Trump’s claim is relevant to the charges against him, arguing that the prosecution must have time “to consider appellate review.”
Smith’s filing said Cannon’s order was based on a flawed legal premise and would “distort the trial.”
This is one of four criminal cases that Trump faces. He has pleaded not guilty in all of them and has sought to cast them as politically motivated.
Trump’s lawyers in a filing on Tuesday night reiterated their argument that what they call Trump’s decision to treat the records as personal meant the charges should be tossed out before trial.
The Presidential Records Act was passed to give the U.S. government possession of official records from a president’s administration. It lets former presidents keep certain records deemed personal that have no connection to their official responsibilities.
Trump has argued that his decision to take the material to his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida showed he treated the records as his personal property. Prosecutors have argued that the records law cannot authorize a former president to keep classified information.
Trump faces charges that include violations of the Espionage Act, which criminalizes unauthorized possession of defense information, and conspiracy to obstruct justice.
A May 20 trial date scheduled in the case is widely expected to be postponed.
Chevy just revealed the Silverado EV First-Edition RST specs and it’s got 440 miles of range
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
Chevy released today what is likely the final specs for its top-of-the-line 2024 Silverado EV First-Edition RST pickup – here’s the lowdown.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/chevy-silverado-ev-first-edition-rst-specs/
Intramotev successfully deploys the first battery-electric self-propelled railcar
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
Zero-emissions freight mobility solutions developer Intramotev is touting its latest milestone today, successfully deploying its battery-electric self-propelled railcar with a mining client based in Pennsylvania.
@Chris Coyier blog (date: 2024-04-03, from: Chris Coyier blog)
Dave mentioned in Discord the other day that he listened to a podcast called Finding Drago. He said: It was recommended to me by a vagrant on the beaches of Chala and it changed my life. I powered through it and it’s a hell of a strange journey. Strongly recommended, if you feel a podcast […]
https://chriscoyier.net/2024/04/03/11257/
Software engineer helped put Sam Bankman-Fried behind bars, say prosecutors
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
CTO shared code from his laptop with investigation after FTX collapsed
Crypto-crook Sam Bankman-Fried’s conviction was expedited by the cooperation of the chief software engineer at his FTX crypto exchange, prosecutors have revealed.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/cto_role_sbf_trial/
Eating Like a Salmon Is Better Than Eating Actual Salmon, Study Finds….
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/04/0044321-eating-like-a-salmon-is
Tesla brings 0% interest loans to China as it loses market share
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
Tesla is launching 0% interest loans for a limited time in China as a new incentive amid the automaker losing market shares in the critical market.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/tesla-0-interest-loans-china-loses-market-shares/
US reckons it’s about time the Moon had its own time zone
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
What’s a few microseconds between friends? Quite a lot actually
NASA, which isn’t known for timeliness, has been tasked by the White House with implementing a Coordinated Lunar Time (LTC) zone for the Moon traceable to Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/coordinated_lunar_time/
Toyota Has A ‘We Told You’ Moment As Stock Climbs 32% Year To Date
date: 2024-04-03, from: Inside EVs News
As Tesla continues to lure customers with aggressive offers, Toyota enjoys how the EV landscape is shaping up.
https://insideevs.com/news/714827/toyota-stock-rises-as-tesla-shares-drop/
Ford takes second in US EV market after sales climb 86% as lower prices take effect
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
Ford is starting 2024 off strong with EV sales up 86% through the first three months. The growth was enough for Ford to place second in the US EV market behind only Tesla. Ford’s sales surge comes after slashing prices earlier this year.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/ford-takes-second-us-ev-market-price-cuts-take-effect/
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2024-04-03, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
Twitter is the place old friends who haven’t heard they should find a new home are still posting. There are quite a few of them. Fact. It’s kind of like what Facebook has become. There are a set of people I expect to see there regularly, and that’s why I keep going back. Again, fact.
http://scripting.com/2024/04/03.html#a152224
Motorola Edge 50 Pro is a mid-range phone with premium features (144 Hz OLED display, 125W fast charging)
date: 2024-04-03, from: Liliputing
Motorola has launched a new mid-range smartphone for the Indian market with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 processor, 256GB of UFS 2.2 storage, and at up to 12GB of RAM. But the phone also has a few premium features including a 144 Hz pOLED display, support for 125 watt fast charging, 50W wireless charging, […]
The post Motorola Edge 50 Pro is a mid-range phone with premium features (144 Hz OLED display, 125W fast charging) appeared first on Liliputing.
Why Temu prices are so low
date: 2024-04-03, from: Marketplace Morning Report
The Chinese-based platform Temu is transforming e-commerce, and it’s recently surged in popularity in the U.S. Described as being “like Amazon on steroids,” Temu’s products are often cheap and unbranded — but those low prices could be coming at high costs. Also on the program: few visible cracks in the labor market, a lack of remote work training, and an obituary for General Electric as a corporate conglomerate.
https://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-morning-report/why-temu-prices-are-so-low
Paul Simon on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/04/paul-simon-on-the-late-show-with-stephen-colbert
Opera browser dev branch rolls out support for running LLMs locally
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
150 variants from about 50 families to choose from
Opera has added experimental support for running large language models (LLMs) locally on the Opera One Developer browser as part of its AI Feature Drop Program.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/opera_local_llm/
Ideas for my dream blogging CMS
date: 2024-04-03, from: Matt Haughey blog
Ever since I changed over from Wordpress to Ghost to power this site, I've gotten emails and replies asking me if Ghost is really good and worth making the jump from any other blogging engines.
My answer is this: it's currently the least bad one out
https://a.wholelottanothing.org/a-blueprint-of-my-dream-blogging-cms/
Study abroad more competitive than ever, many students denied for Fall 2024
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Occidental News (Occidental College Student Newspaper)
In Fall 2024, more Occidental students will be studying abroad than ever, but there is a caveat. Due to an extreme increase in students applying for study abroad programs, the acceptance process was more competitive than students or the college anticipated, according to Robin Craggs, the executive director of the International Programs Office (IPO). Wendy […]
The post Study abroad more competitive than ever, many students denied for Fall 2024 appeared first on The Occidental.
Opinion: We’ve looked at LA from both sides, now
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Occidental News (Occidental College Student Newspaper)
In defense of movie magic by Will White I first saw LA through the teeny-weeny window of British Airways flight BA281. Months of prep, of forms and visa paperwork, of working at the pub to save up the money. I’d finally made it … … and it was hammering down with rain. Despite the initial […]
The post Opinion: We’ve looked at LA from both sides, now appeared first on The Occidental.
Hyundai U.S. EV Sales Doubled In March 2024
date: 2024-04-03, from: Inside EVs News
The Ioniq 5 and Ioniq 6 sales accounted for nearly 7% of the total volume.
https://insideevs.com/news/714698/hyundai-us-ev-sales-march2024/
Matadors reach 10 wins, recover from mentally draining Washington State match
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
The match against Washington State took a lot out of the Matadors. Head coach Gary Victor talked to them about their discipline after that loss, and the Matadors answered the…
Everything You Need To Know about the 2024 Distinguished Gentleman’s Ride
date: 2024-04-03, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
Motorcycles, dapper riders, and raising funds for great causes. Here’s how to get involved in the Distinguished Gentlemen’s Ride.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/714380/distinguished-gentlemens-ride-2024-dgr/
Your food delivery may show up with nobody driving, starting today
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
Starting today, if you order from Uber Eats in Phoenix, Arizona, your order might get assigned to a driverless Waymo vehicle.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/your-food-delivery-may-show-up-with-nobody-driving-starting-today/
Fake Ted Talks, long walks and lots of hikes: Professors doing (down) time
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Occidental News (Occidental College Student Newspaper)
Interactive Map Jeffrey Cannon, chemistry professor Hobby: Playing Pokémon and biking Location: Occidental College and the Rose Bowl “I play Pokémon Go, and I’ve had what I guess has become a lifelong obsession.” “One of the things about Pokémon Go is that you have to go and do things, and I’ll run into students playing […]
The post Fake Ted Talks, long walks and lots of hikes: Professors doing (down) time appeared first on The Occidental.
Rising Occidental Student Employees (ROSE) hosts a walkout in advance of impending union election
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Occidental News (Occidental College Student Newspaper)
Roughly 150 students and faculty participated in a walkout at 11 a.m. March 28 to join a rally led by Rising Occidental Student Employees (ROSE) on the steps of the Arthur G. Coons administrative building (AGC). The rally came after a March 22 demonstration where students called on President Harry J. Elam to voluntarily recognize […]
The post Rising Occidental Student Employees (ROSE) hosts a walkout in advance of impending union election appeared first on The Occidental.
Oxy-at-the-UN keynote speaker discusses the advancement of LGBTQ+ rights
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Occidental News (Occidental College Student Newspaper)
March 25-29 marked Occidental’s annual United Nations (UN) Week. This year’s theme, “Human Rights Defenders,” consisted of nine events connected to the field of international human rights. Events included an art exhibition, a student-led roundtable discussion, a film screening and a keynote speaker address. According to professor Laura Herbert from the Diplomacy & World Affairs […]
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All Brooks Hazed In Twilight
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Occidental News (Occidental College Student Newspaper)
All brooks hazed in twilight Soft hissing steam fills the air In the shadow of a falling sun The night reveals reptilian eyes Quietly searching a minefield Seeking a way forward In the dying light of the Earth An unwitting figurehead emerges One voice ringing from the lone remaining stage The disciples […]
The post All Brooks Hazed In Twilight appeared first on The Occidental.
https://theoccidentalnews.com/media/2024/04/03/all-brooks-hazed-in-twilight/2912170
Occidental Sports Medicine department helps student-athletes maximize performance
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Occidental News (Occidental College Student Newspaper)
The Occidental Sports Medicine department provides intercollegiate student-athletes injury care and prevention services. Their work helps to keep Occidental’s athletes healthy throughout the demands and rigor of their seasons. Because of the nature of athletic contests, athletic trainers work both early in the morning and late into the evening to support Occidental’s athletic program. Joseph Gonzalez, […]
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‘We knew we were champions’: Tigers claim two SCIAC titles
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Occidental News (Occidental College Student Newspaper)
Occidental is having a historic athletic year, with two SCIAC tournament wins. This fall, men’s soccer brought home the SCIAC title for the first time in school history, and this spring, women’s basketball claimed the SCIAC title for the first time since 2011. Both teams advanced to play in the NCAA DIII tournament, representing Occidental College on the national […]
The post ‘We knew we were champions’: Tigers claim two SCIAC titles appeared first on The Occidental.
Athletes of the Week Eliza Hawley and Shane Kawakami-Williams find their place in the 400-meter dash
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Occidental News (Occidental College Student Newspaper)
Eliza Hawley At the Distance Carnival and Spring Break Classic track meet March 14, Eliza Hawley (sophomore) ran the 400-meter dash in 57.23 seconds, the seventh-best time in Occidental College’s history and the second-best time among current DIII athletes in the country. Hawley said she started running track alongside cross country in high school, but initially did […]
The post Athletes of the Week Eliza Hawley and Shane Kawakami-Williams find their place in the 400-meter dash appeared first on The Occidental.
Opinion: A love letter to Dance Production
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Occidental News (Occidental College Student Newspaper)
I grew up as an athlete, going from soccer in kindergarten, to speedskating in elementary and middle school. Lacrosse was the first sport, however, that made me feel alive. I have played lacrosse for about 13 years, and I love the game so much I love my body and all the things it can do […]
The post Opinion: A love letter to Dance Production appeared first on The Occidental.
https://theoccidentalnews.com/opinions/2024/04/03/opinion-a-love-letter-to-dance-production/2912109
Attempted carjacking ends in injury shooting near Lake Merritt
date: 2024-04-03, from: San Jose Mercury News
A 66-year-old Stockton man was shot multiple times, police said.
Outlook.com trips over Google’s spam blocking rules
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Microsoft has a workaround but it’s not a great look
Emails from users with Outlook.com country domains may not be reaching Gmail addresses but fear not - Microsoft has a workaround.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/outlookcom_blocked_by_gmail/
Tesla-inspired Chinese semi gets 960kW charging from BorgWarner
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
Global auto supplier BorgWarner is launching a new, ultra-high speed 960kW EV charger that can charge up Windrose’ “Tesla-inspired” electric semi truck in about half an hour.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/tesla-inspired-chinese-semi-gets-960kw-charging-from-borgwarner/
Cutting and polishing a morganite stone into a 294 caret gem. It…
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/04/0044310-cutting-and-polishing-a-m
April 2, 2024
date: 2024-04-03, from: Heather Cox Richardson blog
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/april-2-2024-4ff
Native American artist tells tale of love, identity
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
An Indigenous graphic artist in the Southwest U.S. state of New Mexico is using a comic book to tell a story about same-sex love and identity on a Native American reservation. Gustavo Martínez Contreras has our story from Albuquerque.
https://www.voanews.com/a/native-american-artist-tells-tale-of-love-identity-/7554938.html
Sunreef Yachts unveils new luxe solar electric Explorer catamaran with over 1,000 kWh in batteries
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
Sustainable boatbuilder Sunreef Yachts is adding a sleeker, lighter solar electric catamaran to its portfolio. The new Explorer Eco 40m is the company’s smallest electric yacht to date, but debuts with some of the most advanced technology, including Sunreef’s proprietary “solar skin”
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/sunreef-yachts-unveils-new-solar-electric-explorer-catamaran/
BYD’s affordable Seagull EV poised to arrive as the UK’s cheapest electric car
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
BYD’s most affordable Seagull EV, starting under $10,000 (69,800 yuan), could arrive as the UK’s cheapest electric car. Although BYD has yet to confirm plans, UK leaders see a market for the low-cost “Lamborghini Mini” EV.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/byds-affordable-seagull-likely-launch-uks-cheapest-ev/
Cooper-Garrod Vineyards honored for leadership in going green
date: 2024-04-03, from: San Jose Mercury News
Saratoga winery wins award for sustainable winegrowing .
This Cheap Used Tesla Model S With 450,000 Miles Seems Remarkably Good
date: 2024-04-03, from: Inside EVs News
While it’s not the highest-mileage Model S we’ve ever documented, a former taxi right-hand drive example from 2017 looks really solid.
https://insideevs.com/news/714704/cheapest-tesla-model-s-high-mileage/
Want to keep Windows 10 secure? This is how much Microsoft will charge you
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-04, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Hint: It will keep going up
Updated Microsoft has laid out the ground rules for getting Windows 10 Extended Security Updates (ESU) as market share figures indicate users are still giving Windows 11 a wide berth.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/windows_10_extended_support/
I want all the information
date: 2024-04-03, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News
I
want all the information about the products I make to be instantly
available to anyone who wants to know, in exactly the form they want it.
Until ChatGPT, that was a totally unattainable dream. But now, for many
topics, it’s reality. For example, if I have a question about CSS, and
believe me, I do – if I can ask the question clearly enough, I can get a
clear and complete explanation of why the browser did the crazy thing
with layout that it did. It means I could do something beautiful and
refined like the blogroll I worked on in February and March, and the UI
stuff I’m working on in March and April.
I can’t wait until ChatGPT can answer all those questions about my stuff. But then people who make music don’t want their songs to be available the same way. As someone who wants to know as much as possible about songs I have always loved but had no idea how they were made, or what they meant to the writer, knowledge about the work is equally valuable as understanding technical topics. I think the big difference is knowing that life is short, and if we want to leave something behind of ourselves, having the information be available is a blessing, not something to fight against. I don’t see why software designers in the future should have to reinvent what my generation has already figured out. I don’t want them to have to. It keeps coming back to this one idea – to solve the problems we have as a species we’re going to have to work together, and part of that means not being so guarded and selfish about sharing what we’ve learned.
We had this problem with music before, with Napster. The users of music, such as myself, found that the ability to program our own music was so liberating. To listen to a song a few times before moving on made a huge difference, or to choose a song to hear because we just thought of it for the first time in 30 years. But we were literally mocked by music promoters and artists. But ultimately, like it or not, the users got the power they wanted. It’s got to happen that way too for ChatGPT et al. I guess some people must’ve felt that search engines were going to rob creative people of control of their creations. I guess this is something we always have to go through.
http://scripting.com/2024/04/03/140003.html?title=iWantAllTheInformation
NASA’s Webb Probes an Extreme Starburst Galaxy
date: 2024-04-03, from: NASA breaking news
Amid a site teeming with new and young stars lies an intricate substructure. A team of astronomers has used NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to survey the starburst galaxy Messier 82 (M82). Located 12 million light-years away in the constellation Ursa Major, this galaxy is relatively compact in size but hosts a frenzy of star […]
https://science.nasa.gov/missions/webb/nasas-webb-probes-an-extreme-starburst-galaxy/
BART service interrupted in East Contra Costa County
date: 2024-04-03, from: San Jose Mercury News
The service stopped about 4:45 a.m., according to BART.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/04/03/bart-service-interrupted-in-east-contra-costa-county/
Friendship Ended With GOOGLE Now KAGI Is My Best Friend
date: 2024-04-03, from: 404 Media Group
I replaced Google with Kagi, a search engine that has no ads and costs $10 per month.
https://www.404media.co/friendship-ended-with-google-now-kagi-is-my-best-friend/
Blogging for this site has taught me that I’m more of a…
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/04/0044303-blogging-for-this-site-ha
2024-04-03 Return to the office? Never!
date: 2024-04-03, from: Alex Schroeder’s Blog
2024-04-03 Return to the office? Never!
@rdonoghue wondered (mostly ironically, I suspect) about a correlation between the length of the commute and a propensity to favour Return To the Office (RTO) policies.
I used to walk 35min to the office and I still prefer the home office.
Based on what I saw during lockdown and based on what my wife tells me, I think more interesting options are:
- Do you have kids at home and prefer Return To the Office? (if older)
- Do you have parents at home and prefer Return To the Office? (if younger)
- Do you manage a team but don’t talk to team members individually and prefer Return To the Office because you can overhear them talk? (if project manager)
- Do you have a need for sycophants surrounding you and prefer Return To the Office so you keep an eye on them? (ugh)
I’m sure there are more options but those seemed to be the obvious ones.
In all fairness:
- Do you have a hard time with focus and prefer the Home Office so that you’re not exposed to noise, cross-talk and other distractions by coworkers? (me)
https://alexschroeder.ch/view/2024-04-03-rto
Chinese state, social media echo Russian propaganda on concert hall attack
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
Taipei, Taiwan — Specious theories designed to implicate Ukraine and the United States in connection with the late March terror attack in Russia are spreading on China’s state media outlets and on its heavily censored social media platform Weibo.
False claims that paint Kyiv and Washington as masterminds of the attack have fueled debate in Russia even after Islamic State-Khorasan — also known as IS, IS-K, ISIS and Daesh — claimed responsibility for killing at least 143 people and injuring nearly 200 at the Crocus City Hall music venue in suburban Moscow.
In China, an editorial in the state-run Global Times insinuated that “many observers linked the incident to the ‘hybrid war’ form of the Russia-Ukraine conflict.”
“Some Western thinkers have begun to speculate whether Washington had played a role in this terrorist attack,” it said without elaborating.
Without citing names or clear attribution, the Global Times repeated Russia’s false accusations that the U.S. failed to share “key intelligence” that could have helped Russian security services prevent the attack.
In fact, the U.S. warned the Russian authorities two weeks before the attack and shared appropriate intelligence, as it would do “for any other country,” John Kirby, White House national security communications adviser, told VOA.
“We provided useful, we believe, valuable information about what we thought was an imminent terrorist attack,” Kirby said. “We also warned Americans about staying away from public places like concert halls. So, we were very direct with our Russian counterparts appropriately to make sure that they had as much useful information as possible.”
Addressing a Russian intelligence agency board meeting three days before the attack, Russian President Vladimir Putin dismissed the U.S. warning as “outright blackmail” intended “to intimidate and destabilize our society.”
The Global Times also criticized Washington for being “slow to condemn the incident in a timely manner, which shocked the international community.”
In fact, the United States was among the first nations to condemn the Moscow attack, and on March 30, U.S. Ambassador to Russia Lynne Tracy placed flowers at the site.
With the Chinese Communist Party’s tight censorship of online content, contrarian views are quickly taken down, and the lack of independent media leave disinformation spread by state-controlled news outlets unchallenged.
Some, however, have voiced skepticism.
“I personally think it’s unlikely that the United States was behind this terrorist attack,” Jin Canrong, a scholar of international relations with an established “anti-American” reputation, wrote on Weibo.
The comments by Jin, who is a professor at the Renmin University of China, provoked heated reaction, with some Weibo users accusing him of being a U.S. sympathizer.
Since the attack, conspiracy theories echoing Russian propaganda have dominated the narrative on Weibo, typically boosted by anonymous pro-Russian and pro-Chinese influencers with millions of followers.
Weibo influencer Drunk Rabbit posted to his nearly half a million followers: “It is no wonder that the Russian people do not believe that this was done by IS. They all firmly believe that Ukraine and its masters who are at war with Russia planned and carried out this atrocity.”
To prove the point, the user posted two side-by-side video clips showing former U.S. Presidents Barak Obama and Donald Trump.
Drunk Rabbit’s caption read: “Obama: ‘We trained ISIS,’” and “Trump: ‘Obama was the founder of ISIS.’”
“Both former presidents have confirmed that the United States is the creator of ISIS,” Drunk Rabbit continued. “Regarding the terrorist attack on the Moscow Concert Hall in Russia, what other evidence is needed?”
The quotes by Obama and Trump, however, are taken out of context and, in the case of Obama’s remarks, twisted to mean the opposite of what he said.
Trump’s claim has been debunked by fact-checkers and terrorism experts who traced Islamic State’s roots to 2002, six years before Obama was elected president, and Trump himself walked the remark back, calling it “sarcasm.”
It is not out of character for the Chinese state and social media to echo Russian propaganda and disinformation, especially when it targets the United States.
Vote for the April 2004 Plus Post Topic
date: 2024-04-03, from: Computer ads from the Past
If you are a paid subscriber, voting is open for one week
https://computeradsfromthepast.substack.com/p/vote-for-the-april-2004-plus-post
3 new books for cocktail lovers and spirits enthusiasts
date: 2024-04-03, from: San Jose Mercury News
Whether you’re into French 75s, 1940s rum or Pina Colada alternatives, this trio of new cocktail books has something for every taste.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/04/03/3-new-books-for-cocktail-lovers-and-spirits-enthusiasts/
2024 Chevrolet Equinox EV Discounted By Up To $3,000 For Bolt EV Owners
date: 2024-04-03, from: Inside EVs News
Add the $7,500 tax credit to the mix and we’re talking over $10,000 off the MSRP.
https://insideevs.com/news/714796/chevrolet-equinox-ev-discount-bolt/
Bon Jovi, Billy Eilish, other musicians implore AI devs to think of humanity
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Using copyrighted material to train models affects artists’ livelihoods, says open letter
The Artist Rights Alliance has launched a petition to end the use of AI that infringes upon or devalues the work of humans.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/musicians_ai_open_letter/
Bon Jovi, Billy Eilish, other musicians implore AI devs to think of humanity
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Using copyrighted material to train models affects artists’ livelihoods, says open letter
The Artist Rights Alliance has launched a petition to end the use of AI that infringes upon or devalues the work of humans.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/ai_open_letter_musicians/
Quick Cook: ‘Eggs and Cigars’ may be the BEST name ever for this easy supper
date: 2024-04-03, from: San Jose Mercury News
Whether you call them soldiers or cigars, this is a slightly more fancy version of a classic, with lemony herbed chile butter slathered onto toast strips just before they take the plunge.
This new solid-state battery cell claims to set industry records, could offer over 1,300 mile range
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
A solid-state battery developer in China has unveiled a new cell that could help change the game for electric mobility. Tailan New Energy’s vehicle-grade all-solid-state lithium batteries offer energy density twice that of other cells in the segment, empowering the Chinese battery maker to hail the cells as a record-setter in the industry.
https://electrek.co/2024/04/03/new-solid-state-battery-cell-claims-industry-records-1300-mile-range/
‘Shame isn’t a solution’: California gives out fentanyl test strips amid surge in overdose deaths
date: 2024-04-03, from: San Jose Mercury News
California has spent more than $1 billion fighting the rise of fentanyl in recent years, but deaths keep increasing.
California man admits stealing $1.8 million in luxury items from Beverly Hills hotel, trying to sell them in Miami
date: 2024-04-03, from: San Jose Mercury News
Jobson Marangoni De Castro tricked a hotel employee into giving him a key to the victims’ room and stole all their suitcases while they were at dinner.
Backlight on a Psion 5
date: 2024-04-03, from: Tilde.news
https://www.hpcfactor.com/forums/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=21343
April’s Slackin’ for Macklin: How soon could the Sharks ‘clinch’ last place?
date: 2024-04-03, from: San Jose Mercury News
NHL: San Jose Sharks are seven points back of the 31st-place Chicago Blackhawks with just over two weeks left
Podcast: The Xz Backdoor and the AI Peer-Review Crisis
date: 2024-04-03, from: 404 Media Group
The fascinating Xz backdoor; a looming AI crisis in peer-review; and news around the infamous Lena image. That’s all on this week’s episode.
https://www.404media.co/404-media-podcast-xz-backdoor/
These Electric Cars Offer Plug & Charge In 2024
date: 2024-04-03, from: Inside EVs News
Only these EVs can simply pull up to a public fast charger, plug in and begin charging. It can be a bit more complicated for other EVs.
https://insideevs.com/news/714654/evs-plug-charge-capable/
Introducing Simpler Project Creation in Deno Deploy
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: Deno blog
Introducing a more simplified project creation flow in Deno Deploy, including seamless CI/CD setup, a more transparent build and deployment step, and more.
https://deno.com/blog/simpler-project-creation-deploy
Will Biden Make an LNG U-Turn?
date: 2024-04-03, from: Heatmap News
Current conditions: India is expecting unusually high temperatures from now through June • A late-season blizzard warning is in place for parts of Michigan • A drought disaster has been declared in Zimbabwe.
THE TOP FIVE
- Tesla’s disappointing quarter rattles investors
Global EV market leaders Tesla and BYD turned in dismal sales for the first three months of the year, sending investors into a panic and prompting speculation about what it all means. Here are a few noteworthy reactions from analysts and insiders:
- “I think both performances in Q1 have been affected by the evolving Chinese EV market, including changing incentives and more competition.” –Fred Lambert at Electrek
- “There may also be a serious demand issue.” –Deutsche Bank analyst Emmanuel Rosner
- “Tesla pioneered mass-market electric cars, but its lineup is aging.” –Auto industry writers Jack Ewing and Neal E. Boudette at The New York Times
- “They need a real sales strategy and can’t rely on cutting price alone.” –Gary Black, managing partner of investment firm Future Fund
- “Any way you put it, it was ugly. Demand is soft. Interest rates are still high. Is Elon’s brand damaging Tesla sales in the U.S.? It’s directionally a negative.” –Gene Munster, managing partner of Deepwater Asset Management
It wasn’t all bad: Other automakers including Rivian, Hyundai, and Toyota reported healthier numbers. Hyundai reported EV sales up more than 60% from the first quarter of 2023. Electric truck maker Rivian modestly surpassed expectations, beating both analysts’ and its own estimates with 13,588 deliveries in the first few months of 2024. Still, Heatmap’s Robinson Meyer says Tesla’s and BYD’s flagging sales may be signaling to investors that a general EV slowdown is coming.
- Report: Biden open to ending LNG pause to get new Ukraine aid
through Congress
The Biden administration is reportedly open to the idea of ending its pause on approvals of new liquified natural gas export terminals if it means the House will green-light an aid package for Ukraine, two White House sources told Reuters. The report follows a Sunday Fox News interview in which House Speaker Mike Johnson hinted that ending the pause might convince his fellow Republicans to support a new aid package. “We want to have natural gas exports that will help unfund Vladimir Putin’s war effort there,” said Johnson. Environmental activists applauded the White House’s January decision to pause new terminal approvals until the Energy Department can study the effect LNG projects have on the climate. A White House spokesman said the Reuters report wasn’t accurate and that the administration wants Republicans to pass the $95 billion bipartisan national security agreement, which includes Ukraine aid. The bill already passed the Senate and would be poised to pass the House, but Johnson has so far refused to bring it to a vote and is now “signaling that a LNG U-turn is table stakes for any Ukraine vote,” explained Politico’s Playbook. The House is back in session next week.
- Researchers test aerosol sprayer for solar geoengineering projects
Engineers in San Francisco yesterday conducted the first outdoor test of a device that could one day be used to cool the planet through solar geoengineering. The Cloud Aerosol Research Instrument, or CARI, is designed to spray sea salt aerosol particles into the air to brighten clouds and reflect some of the sun’s rays. The tool’s first spray test outside a lab took place Tuesday on the flight deck of the Hornet, a decommissioned aircraft carrier that’s been turned into a museum. Solar geoengineering is a contentious topic, and the research team kept this project pretty quiet. The CARI tool will remain on the Hornet for the public to view, and the researchers hope it will “demystify the concept of climate intervention technologies,” according to The New York Times.
- National Weather Service rocked by ill-timed outage
The National Weather Service experienced an outage yesterday morning just as a line of severe storms ripped across the Midwest. The disruption lasted for five hours, during which time about 50 storm alerts, including tornado warnings, were issued across the region. “Meteorologists around the Midwest were without key information that would normally be at their fingertips, and many severe-weather warnings went out to the public late, if at all,” The Washington Post reported. One meteorologist had to rely on a hand-drawn map of tornado warnings from the Weather Service. A spokesman said the agency was working to figure out what went wrong.
- California celebrates ‘average’ snowpack levels
California’s snowpack is registering just above average right now as the precipitation season ends and the warm and dry season begins, state officials announced yesterday. Snowpack is California’s largest source of stored water, so if it’s low in April – as it has been in recent years following historic droughts – residents know they should brace for water shortages in the summer months to come. On the flipside, if the snowpack is way above average, as it was last year, there’s a chance of flooding. But this year, levels are at about 110%, or just above average. Still, Governor Gavin Newsom wants residents to be mindful of their water use because “this time next year, we might be in a different place.” He said the state is preparing for a near-term future in which climate change will make water even more scarce, and is considering options like desalination and water recycling. Here is a look at how 2015 snowpack (top) compares to this year’s snowpack (bottom):
THE KICKER
“There is no guarantee of a just, nourishing, and healthy future for humanity, and hope will not catalyze the change we need.” –The authors of a new paper published in PNAS Nexus, titled “Earth at risk: An urgent call to end the age of destruction and forge a just and sustainable future”
https://heatmap.news/politics/lng-pause-ukraine-aid-house
Security pioneer Ross Anderson dies at 67
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
A man with a list of accolades long enough for several lifetimes, friends remember his brilliance
Obituary Venerable computer scientist and information security expert Ross Anderson has died at the age of 67.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/ross_anderson_obit/
Warriors provide proof of concept with defensive gem against Mavericks
date: 2024-04-03, from: San Jose Mercury News
The Warriors held the Mavericks, one of the best offenses in the NBA, to 100 points.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/04/03/warriors-defense-mavericks-gem-draymond-green/
In a rush to launch a sub-$22K EV, Renault cranks up work on new Twingo
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
Renault is ramping up development of its upcoming all-electric Twingo, hoping to shave off as much time as possible to launch the car in three years and get an EV for under $22K out to consumers.
The Savvy Senior | Which Cell Phones Are Best for Seniors?
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Signal
Dear Savvy Senior, Can you recommend some good cell phones for seniors? My 79-year-old mother needs to get a new mobile phone and has asked me to help her find one that she would like. — Searching Daughter Dear Searching, For older adults, choosing a cell phone is not a one-size-fits-all […]
The post The Savvy Senior | Which Cell Phones Are Best for Seniors? appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/04/the-savvy-senior-which-cell-phones-are-best-for-seniors/
Kurtenbach: Draymond Green will not let the Warriors go down without a fight
date: 2024-04-03, from: San Jose Mercury News
Vintage Draymond Green is a sight to behold.
As massive earthquake rocks Taiwan and shutters trains, battery-swapping e-scooters rush in
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
The largest earthquake to hit Taiwan this century rattled the entire island overnight, collapsing buildings, damaging roads, and shutting down train and subway services. Gogoro’s electric scooters quickly picked up the slack, providing a key accessible transportation option and offering free rides in the most populated area.
Google bakes new cookie strategy that will leave crooks with a bad taste
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Device Bound Session Credentials said to render cookie theft useless
Google reckons that cookie theft is a problem for users, and is seeking to address it with a mechanism to tie authentication data to a specific device, rendering any stolen cookies useless.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/google_cookie_strategy/
For College Students Living Paycheck To Paycheck, Financial Literacy Is An Investment In The Future
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The LAist
At Los Angeles City College, students turn toward financial literacy to chart a new path.
https://laist.com/news/education/lacc-financial-literacy-understanding-money-community-college
Andy Warhol ‘Mao’ Print Vanishes From a California College’s Vault
date: 2024-04-03, from: Smithsonian Magazine
The 1972 artwork, which the school had never publicly displayed, is worth an estimated $50,000
The financial wisdom of having multiple generations under one roof
date: 2024-04-03, from: Marketplace Morning Report
Multigenerational living arrangements began to decline in the 1950s, thanks to the growth of suburbs, new job opportunities for those willing to move and the rise of senior housing. Yet from 1971 to 2021, the number of people living in multigenerational family households quadrupled. Why? Housing affordability plays a big role. But first: How might Taiwan’s major earthquake impact the global supply chain for semiconductor chips?
How Stability AI’s founder tanked his billion-dollar startup
date: 2024-04-03, from: OS News
It was Stability’s armada of GPUs, the wildly powerful and equally expensive chips undergirding AI, that were so taxing the company’s finances. Hosted by AWS, they had long been one of Mostaque’s bragging points; he often touted them as one of the world’s 10 largest supercomputers. They were responsible for helping Stability’s researchers build and maintain one of the top AI image generators, as well as break important new ground on generative audio, video and 3D models. “Undeniably, Stability has continued to ship a lot of models,” said one former employee. “They may not have profited off of it, but the broader ecosystem benefitted in a huge, huge way.” But the costs associated with so much compute were now threatening to sink the company. According to an internal October financial forecast seen by Forbes, Stability was on track to spend $99 million on compute in 2023. It noted as well that Stability was “underpaying AWS bills for July (by $1M)” and “not planning to pay AWS at the end of October for August usage ($7M).” Then there were the September and October bills, plus $1 million owed to Google Cloud and $600,000 to GPU cloud data center CoreWeave. (Amazon, Google and CoreWeave declined to comment.) ↫ Kenrick Cai and Iain Martin As a Dutch person, I can smell a popping bubble from a mile away, even if tulipmania is most likely anti-Dutch British propaganda. In all seriousness, there’s definitely signs that the insane energy and compute costs of artificial image and video generation in particular are rising at such an insane pace it’s simply unsustainable for the popularity of these tools to just keep rising. Eventually someone’s going to have to pay, and I wonder just how much regular people are willing to pay for this kind of stuff.
https://www.osnews.com/story/139140/139140/
Linux Foundation marshals support for open source alternative to Redis
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Follows the vendor’s decision to overhaul licensing of the popular cache database
Cloud giants AWS, Google, and Oracle have come out in support of a Linux Foundation open source fork of Redis, the popular in-memory database frequently used as a cache, following changes to its licensing.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/open_source_redis_alternative/
RE- POST LEAVE ME ALONE
date: 2024-04-03, from: Howard Jacobson blog
apologies for errors in first post
https://jacobsonh.substack.com/p/re-post-leave-me-alone
Amazon’s ‘Just Walk Out’ checkout system consisted of 1000 people in India watching you shop
date: 2024-04-03, from: OS News
Amazon is phasing out its checkout-less grocery stores with “Just Walk Out” technology, first reported by The Information Tuesday. The company’s senior vice president of grocery stores says they’re moving away from Just Walk Out, which relied on cameras and sensors to track what people were leaving the store with. Just over half of Amazon Fresh stores are equipped with Just Walk Out. The technology allows customers to skip checkout altogether by scanning a QR code when they enter the store. Though it seemed completely automated, Just Walk Out relied on more than 1,000 people in India watching and labeling videos to ensure accurate checkouts. The cashiers were simply moved off-site, and they watched you as you shopped. ↫ Maxwell Zeff Behind every Silicon Valley innovation are underpaid poor people.
Class-Action Lawsuit against Google’s Incognito Mode
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-02, from: Bruce Schneier blog
The lawsuit has been settled:
Google has agreed to delete “billions of data records” the company collected while users browsed the web using Incognito mode, according to documents filed in federal court in San Francisco on Monday. The agreement, part of a settlement in a class action lawsuit filed in 2020, caps off years of disclosures about Google’s practices that shed light on how much data the tech giant siphons from its users—even when they’re in private-browsing mode.
Under the terms of the settlement, Google must further update the Incognito mode “splash page” that appears anytime you open an Incognito mode Chrome window after …
Total Eclipse of the Sun
date: 2024-04-03, from: National Archives, Pieces of History blog
On Monday, April 8, 2024, a total solar eclipse will cross North America, passing over Mexico, the United States, and Canada. Today’s post, an update of Riley Lindheimer’s 2017 piece, looks a solar eclipses past and present. Visit the National Archives website for more information. On April 8, 2024, the continental United States will experience … Continue reading Total Eclipse of the Sun
https://prologue.blogs.archives.gov/2024/04/03/total-eclipse-of-the-sun-2/
Watch a Honda Trail 90 Be Rescued and Then Climb Mountains Like a Proper ADV
date: 2024-04-03, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
Why wouldn’t you just point a Trail 90 at the mountains and go?
https://www.rideapart.com/news/714383/honda-trail-90-barn-find-video-off-road-watch/
The rise and fall of 3M’s floppy disk
date: 2024-04-03, from: OS News
Even with that said, those gray-hairs will frequently claim that of the many makers of floppies out there, 3M made the best ones. Given that, I was curious to figure out exactly why 3M became the most memorable brand in data storage during the formative days of computing, and why it abandoned the product. ↫ Ernie Smith I do not remember if I ever held any particular views on which brand of floppy disk (or diskettes, as we called them) was the best. We had a wide variety of brands, and I can’t recall any one of them being better than the other, but then, I’m sure people in professional settings had more experience with the little black squares and thus developed all kinds of feelings about them.
https://www.osnews.com/story/139136/the-rise-and-fall-of-3ms-floppy-disk/
Who should pay to rebuild Gaza?
date: 2024-04-03, from: Marketplace Morning Report
From the BBC World Service: A joint report from the United Nations and the World Bank suggests it would cost $18 billion to reconstruct infrastructure and buildings in Gaza. We consider where that money might come from. Plus, Taiwan has experienced its most powerful earthquake in 25 years. Then, we take a look at the Chinese-owned online retail platform, Temu. How does it manage to list products so cheaply?
https://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-morning-report/who-should-pay-to-rebuild-gaza
LEAVE ME ALONE
date: 2024-04-03, from: Howard Jacobson blog
NO! A brief ejaculation of irritation, for free… High on the list of reasons to loathe the internet are the presumptions of intimacy it facilitates - ‘Hi. Howard, hope this finds you well’ - followed by solicitations for an online review of a service of such small significance you have forgotten it by the time the solicitation for the review arrives.
https://jacobsonh.substack.com/p/leave-me-alone
How this open source LLM chatbot runner hit the gas on x86, Arm CPUs
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Way to whip that LLaMA’s ass
A handy open source tool for packaging up LLMs into single universal chatbot executables that are easy to distribute and run has apparently had a 30 to 500 percent CPU performance boost on x86 and Arm systems.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/llamafile_performance_gains/
PeerJ and Agorà – Società Italiana Di Medicina ad Indirizzo Estetico – to Launch Aesthetic & Regenerative Medicine Hub
date: 2024-04-03, from: PeerJ blog
We are excited to announce a new partnership with Agorà – Società Italiana Di Medicina ad Indirizzo Estetico/Italian Society of Aesthetic Medicine – to develop and launch an Aesthetic & Regenerative Medicine Hub. The Hub will serve as a dynamic platform for researchers and practitioners in the growing field of aesthetic and regenerative medicine. Through […]
The Super Bowl for Meteorologists
date: 2024-04-03, from: Heatmap News
On December 14, 2020, at a little past 1 p.m., meteorologist Matthew Cappucci sat down in the middle of a random field near the Chilean-Argentinian border and cried because it was cloudy.
“To say I was devastated would be an understatement,” he told me.
Cappucci had traveled from his home in Washington, D.C., to Pucón, Chile, to experience a total solar eclipse, only to be denied by an atmospheric river. Under normal circumstances, he could have driven into Argentina, where there were clear skies on the other side of the Andes, but COVID travel restrictions were still in place and the border was closed. His long months of planning and excitement, all dashed by a couple last-minute rain clouds.
All that is to say, Cappucci understands better than most the importance of making an immaculate eclipse-day forecast. In less than a week, millions of Americans will flood the 115-mile-wide, 15-state-long path of totality for the country’s last total solar eclipse until 2044. As they do so, they’ll be relying on the predictions of local and national meteorologists like Cappucci, an atmospheric scientist at MyRadar and the Capitol Weather Gang. “I will say that I’ve never personally been more stressed about an event, nor been looking forward to something as much,” Cappucci told me.
Weather teams across the country have been preparing for April 8, 2024, since as early as 2017, when the last American total solar eclipse occurred. There was a noticeable giddiness among the meteorologists I spoke to; it’s fairly unusual for the public to have a high level of interest in a forecast that isn’t potentially life-threatening. “It’ll be really fun to get to be out there and not have to be in a raincoat or have things flying through the air,” Alex Wilson, an on-air meteorologist at The Weather Channel, joked to me.
But as Cappucci alluded to, there is also an elevated sense of responsibility. Every local weather website in or near the path of totality I checked last week already had information about the eclipse-day forecast on its homepage. National publications like The Washington Post, meanwhile, are publishing new explainers, live maps, and opinion pieces daily in the lead-up to the event. Wilson told me The Weather Channel will have “a bunch of teams” stationed from Texas all the way along the path of totality to Maine; she’ll personally be on hand in Dallas for the station’s Celestron telescope live stream from Love Field.
Cappucci and the rest of the small MyRadar team are also planning to head to Texas for their coverage, which is shaping up to include a live stream and an “Eclipse Week” package that started Monday. (The company has also been giving away MyRadar-branded eclipse glasses in the lead-up to the event.) This time, Cappucci has thought of everything; he even has a StarLink subscription to ensure that the team can maintain internet connectivity if it ends up reporting from a remote corner of the state.
Fox Weather, meanwhile, has 120 meteorologists under its national, regional, and local umbrella, and has been planning its own solar eclipse package since October’s annular eclipse over Texas. The finer details were still coming together last week when I spoke to Fox meteorologist Stephen Morgan, who is based in New York City and will be anchoring from Dallas. But at a minimum, the network plans to have correspondents on air in 10 cities along the path of totality, stretching from Eagle Pass on the Mexican border to Burlington, Vermont. “We’re excited,” Morgan told me, “but I think the elephant in the room is the fact that this is happening in the month of April, which is a very tough month when it comes to forecasting.”
Joe Rao, a longtime television meteorologist and an umbraphile who has seen 13 total solar eclipses, was even more blunt when I asked him what local weather teams would be grappling with this week. “Out of the 12 months of the year, April is probably the worst month to have an eclipse,” he told me.
April is a transitional month in North America, seasonally-speaking. It is a time when severe weather begins to ramp up; it’s the second busiest month for tornadoes. The continent’s three major west-to-east storm paths also become more active. And in places like Texas, which experts said would have the best chance of anywhere in the nation for clear skies on eclipse day, you can still get a south wind that brings moisture off the Gulf of Mexico, giving clouds a chance to develop.
Houston-based Fox meteorologist Aaron Barker is keenly aware of this. He’s been sharing radar models for Central Texas on Twitter and, as of now, the region is looking pretty dicey for cloud cover next week. Like Morgan and Cappucci, though, he said the pressure to get this particular forecast right is intense. “It’s obviously less serious than a hurricane or something like that, but the importance of the forecast for a lot of people is still very, very high,” he told me.
Ironically, that’s also part of the problem; because of the danger of storms like hurricanes and tornadoes, we’ve gotten pretty good at seeing them coming. “The science has improved remarkably over the years trying to hone in on those threats, but cloud cover — my word. That’s a tough one,” Morgan said. Clouds alone aren’t usually a life or death situation. But for people spending hundreds or thousands of dollars to chase a rare celestial phenomenon, the stakes can start to feel that high.
Cappucci gets it: “I’ve done a million kajillion tornadoes, hurricanes, the Northern Lights, the whole nine yards,” he said. “Simply nothing compares to a total solar eclipse.” As he explained, the “most important thing” you can see during an eclipse is the corona — the silvery atmosphere of the sun visible around the moon that “looks like the hairs of an angel because they’re glowing and radiating out into space.” To see it, though, you need clear skies. “Even some high cirrus clouds — yeah, they’re a nuisance, but you can still see some stuff,” Cappucci went on. “But to get overcast rain is really a showstopper.”
Unfortunately, that’s precisely what Barker has been seeing on his radar models for most of Texas, and local meteorology teams in Dallas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas have begun to dampen expectations. Wilson, the Weather Channel meteorologist, admitted that she’s a little “nervous” while cautioning that it’s still early for such predictions. Meanwhile, upstate New York and Vermont, which have the worst records of clear skies this time of year, are shaping up to have the best show in the country.
Rao, the longtime eclipse-chaser, has only been clouded out at two of his 13 experiences. (If you believe in luck, note that he plans to watch this one somewhere upstate.) He has tried to calm some of the panic around the possibility of cloud cover, explaining to me that “it’s not like you’re not going to experience anything” if the sky is overcast on April 8. During one of his cloud-outs, at his first eclipse in Quebec in 1972, he watched the sky go from “battleship gray to weird colorations of saffron and pink. At one point, it was like I was looking at the clouds through the inside of a beer bottle or an iodine bottle.”
Of course, pretty clouds are just consolation; everyone wants perfect viewing conditions. The National Weather Service has even started to post a little jingle alongside its daily cloud-cover updates: “Totality or bust, check the forecast and adjust!” The meteorologists I spoke to universally agreed that they won’t start to put too much stock in the cloud models until Wednesday or Thursday at the earliest.
Wilson said she personally won’t feel confident in the hourly models until at least three or four days out, and even then, you never really know. It was overcast when she was covering the annular eclipse in San Antonio in October and “everybody was kind of freaking out. Then, about 20 minutes before eclipse time, it cleared out.”
That is the annoying truth of modern meteorology: Not even the best computers, radars, almanacs, or atmospheric scientists can predict whether a stray cloud will wander in front of the sun in the minutes before totality.
“I’m just really hoping that April doesn’t do April things and that weather-wise, it cooperates,” Morgan said. “But April is full of surprises — and clouds.”
https://heatmap.news/climate/solar-eclipse-2024-weather
2024-04-01 What’s the plan?
date: 2024-04-03, from: Alex Schroeder’s Blog
2024-04-01 What’s the plan?
@Shufei asks what we’ll do with all the billionaires if we survive the next decade, the next century. Like I said in that post about Israel and Palestine, it’s worth imagining positive outcomes and then think about the intermediate steps. So, assuming we make it, what happened?
I think the long term change we would need is extremely high taxes as a an explicit redistribution mechanism. We’ll look back and say, “during Late State Capitalism we nearly ended the planet but then we manage to curb inequality and raised inheritance tax to 80%, the max income tax bracket to 90% and the two-digit million wealth tax to 20%.”
The goal would be a society with salaries between 50k and 200k per year and family, and wealth worth one year of salary. Health insurance paid for by taxes. Retirement homes paid for by taxes. Pensions paid for by immediate redistribution (i.e., taxes) instead of investments.
@Shufei commented on this and mentioned land reform:
Rentierism in all facets has virtually no restraints in most of the world. That is sometimes 2⁄3 of capital which a family could have put to family resiliency, instead going to landlords and investment epiphenomina like gentrification. I’m not sure oldschool petite bourgeois distributionism (landed yeomanry) is the big answer there, but under a “permanent jubilee” it might be workable enough to eliminate the scourge of landlordism.
I’m not quite sure what the plan is, though.
For urban planning it seems to be state-sponsored coop housing. As soon as the percentage of sponsored housing goes up, the other rents go down, while still leaving the option of more generous housing being built. This is a lesson that was somewhat forgotten in Zürich for a few decades and that seems to explain a lot about the high rents, here.
For agriculture, what seems to have worked in Switzerland (still not enough but a lot better than in the European Union) is protectionism, direct payment, zoning laws, government fixed pricing on agricultural land, etc. not a single thing but a whole set of interlocking mechanisms. And there is still room for improvement. But I’d defer to groups active in food sovereignty to better answer that question, I guess. Maybe Via Campesina has a plan, for example.
@Sandra just posted two links, one discussing alternatives and one where she looks for the elements of the solution. Let’s talk about them.
Alternatives argues for market socialism, as I read it. In a subsequent comment on fedi she disagreed with this take and said that it was by far the weakest alternative. But I’m not so sure. Planned economy doesn’t work; small nudges is what we have and it doesn’t seem to be working either; and the last option seems to be “utopias and sundry”. That doesn’t sound promising, either. I still think that in the given list, market socialism doesn’t sound bad at all.
Worker-owned cooperatives that trade with each other on a market. That’s it. That’s the whole plan.
Then again, none of the alternatives seem pretty strong.
I’m also not sure how market socialism would work in a global environment. How would we deal with local bad harvests and war? It’s biggest benefit seems to be that it promises incremental improvements. No bloody revolution necessary. And that’s already a plus.
A big upside of this track is that it’s somewhat compatible with the other systems and with present-day market capitalism. This means that it can be implemented piecemeal wherever it make sense and I think that’s awesome.
My best guess at a climate solution is where Sandra ends with a call to regain influence in the media.
Making changes in our own lives is great (eat plants) but ideally we’d want politicians (and their overlords: mass media) to sober up and implement policies to steer industry and the rich.
Here in Switzerland (and elsewhere), the fascists like to complain about left-wing media and fight them and defund them until they have them under their thumb (remember Berlusconi’s media take-over in Italy). So we need to fight them all the way: Decry their meddling and scheming and increase the funding. Demand that they drop the airhead programming and bring back material that helps lift people up, not drag them down. Education and information is key.
I’m not a media person, so I don’t know how to do it. All I can say is that music programs that have interesting discussions surrounding the music work well for me. Podcasts work for me. Series seem to work for some. Just drop the quiz shows and reality-TV and all that order material that only serves to distract.
I guess that in my heart of hearts I feel that humanity’s main problem is sociopaths. These people are always there and they love their person gain and don’t feel other people’s pain. Therefore, the struggle is eternal. There is no solidification, no solution that will hold for generations. Every generation will have to fight this fight. All I can say is that it’s a mistake to let a generation grow up in the belief that politics is not important, that struggle isn’t necessary, or that the end of history has come.
That is never going to be true.
#Economics #Politics #Philosophy
2024-04-03. I should merge a few sentences from this page into my Priorities page.
https://alexschroeder.ch/view/2024-04-01-the-plan
2024-04-03 We need more taxes
date: 2024-04-03, from: Alex Schroeder’s Blog
2024-04-03 We need more taxes
I recently wondered about our plan for dealing with the rich. A key part is increased taxation.
Whenever I hear talk about the state crumbling (and since my wife works for the federal government in Switzerland I hear plenty of that), the first thing many people think is that the fault lies with the balanced budget amendment (“Schuldenbremse”). And indeed, that is the obvious cause for many of the problems.
Arguing about the balanced budget amendment is doomed, however. Most people don’t understand the difference between household economics and state economics. A much simpler solution exists, one that everybody understands: INCREASE TAXES FFS!
Now I know why countries like Switzerland don’t like to increase taxes: Where would all the oligarchs go? Where would all the great holdings go? And within Switzerland, same thing: as soon as one canton dropped inheritance tax they all feared that the rich would move elsewhere and started dropping their inheritance taxes. And now there is practically none, for descendants. Wealth can stay in the family, like in the good old days of feudalism.
Next up: Fighting tax evasion, fighting the free movement of capital, fighting for a global tax (do not follow the Swiss model of malevolent compliance!), and more. The fighting just never stops, I know. 😩
Progressive taxation is great. The more you own and make, the more you can afford to support the public good. Pay proportionally more!
Taxes are great for redistribution of wealth. We don’t need to argue about Universal Basic Income (I support it!) or new subsidies or anything else like that: We can simply use existing mechanisms to redistribute wealth, reducing that Gini coefficient, increasing happiness, increasing the feeling of living in a fair and just society, increasing the feeling that work can get you to the top.
Taxes are great to fight inflation, too! If the state hands out more money in a time of crisis, that excess money has to be taken back via taxes. This keeps the money flowing (and only money flowing is what counts). Of course you don’t want to bring it back via asocial taxation schemes like a fixed per-head tax, or a VAT, but something like progressive income tax or progressive wealth tax.
This makes sense, even in broken system like ours: COVID money for everybody, everybody is squeezed by landlords and industry, then tax the rich to get the money back. Virtuous cycle!
https://alexschroeder.ch/view/2024-04-03-tax
After extensive debate, USG files away complaint against senator Brandon Tavakoli
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Senators spent a considerable portion of Tuesday night’s meeting discussing whether to censure Tavakoli for repeated absences. Then they realized the bylaws didn’t even define “censure.”
The post After extensive debate, USG files away complaint against senator Brandon Tavakoli appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/usg-votes-to-table-complaints-after-hours-of-debate/
Intel’s foundry business bled $7B in 2023 with more to come
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
CEO Gelsinger promises sunny days ahead as he confirms reorg
Revenue at Intel’s foundry business declined in 2023, leading to a $7 billion operating loss, and CEO Pat Gelsinger says this year could produce even nastier numbers as he revealed a reorg to help the chipmaker behave more like its rivals.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/intel_foundry_losses_reorg/
Getting to know Earth’s ionosphere during total solar eclipse
date: 2024-04-03, from: Raspberry Pi News (.com)
This Raspberry Pi-powered data collection device measures the changes in Earth’s ionosphere particles that happen during partial and total solar eclipse.
The post Getting to know Earth’s ionosphere during total solar eclipse appeared first on Raspberry Pi.
https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/getting-to-know-earths-ionosphere-during-total-solar-eclipse/
AIs as the best of us
date: 2024-04-03, from: Enlightenment Economics
Another book of many out on AI is As If Human: Ethics and Artifical Intelligence by Nigel Shadbolt and Roger Hampson. I found this a very accessible book on AI ethics, possibly because neither author is an academic philosopher (sorry, … Continue reading
http://www.enlightenmenteconomics.com/blog/index.php/2024/04/ais-as-the-best/
Meet Real Madrid’s newest Brazilian superstar
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
As successful as the Brazil to Madrid pipeline has been, the Endrick might just surpass all of his predecessors.
The post Meet Real Madrid’s newest Brazilian superstar appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/meet-real-madrids-newest-brazilian-superstar/
A physicist, philosopher and neuroscientist walk into a bar
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Multiple fields offer explanations for whether or not humans have free will or are bound to a deterministic timeline.
The post A physicist, philosopher and neuroscientist walk into a bar appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/a-physicist-philosopher-and-neuroscientist-walk-into-a-bar/
Stop being ridiculous; Caleb Williams will be the next great one
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Some believe the Heisman-winning quarterback will be a bust for absurd reasons.
The post Stop being ridiculous; Caleb Williams will be the next great one appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/stop-being-ridiculous-caleb-williams-will-be-the-next-great-one/
UK government sets sights on £8B tech procurement overhaul
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Mega framework set to replace earlier deals coming to an end next year
The UK government has launched the procurement of a package of tech deals worth up to £8 billion ($6.36 billion), attempting to consolidate two earlier purchasing arrangements.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/ukgov_8_billion_tech_deals/
Gary Horton | Mike Garcia: The Right Guy, at the Right Time?
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Signal
Sometimes things work out well-timed, all on their own. Just serendipity. We may be experiencing that, within important limitations, with Rep. Mike Garcia. And sometimes, things happen around us – close or far – that may be far more important, far more impactful than we think, due to our disengagement or distance from the […]
The post Gary Horton | Mike Garcia: The Right Guy, at the Right Time? appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/04/gary-horton-mike-garcia-the-right-guy-at-the-right-time/
Barbara Gassner | Dreaming of the Arts
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Signal
Wouldn’t it be wonderful to expand the awareness of art in this community by using the examples of the city of Santa Paula’s Art Museum or the city of Paso Robles’ Artist Center in their town square, where art and music come together for all ages to have the opportunity to view, learn and/or watch […]
The post Barbara Gassner | Dreaming of the Arts appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/04/barbara-gassner-dreaming-of-the-arts/
Diane Zimmerman | Upholding Indigenous Representation
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Signal
In the wake of the recent William S. Hart Union High School District meeting on March 13, I feel the need to express my gratitude to board member Joe Messina for his unwavering commitment to addressing the Indian mascot issue. Despite encountering resistance from some members, Joe demonstrated admirable persistence in advocating for it to […]
The post Diane Zimmerman | Upholding Indigenous Representation appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/04/diane-zimmerman-upholding-indigenous-representation/
Eric Anthony Tosses Complete Games Shutout in Santa Barbara’s 3-0 Victory Over St. Bonaventure
date: 2024-04-03, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
The Dons sit atop the Channel League standings.
The post Eric Anthony Tosses Complete Games Shutout in Santa Barbara’s 3-0 Victory Over St. Bonaventure appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
Office hours: Biden’s biggest obstacle?
date: 2024-04-03, from: Robert Reich on Substack
I believe he’ll win, but which potential obstacle deserves most attention?
https://robertreich.substack.com/p/office-hours-bidens-biggest-obstacle
Love unleashed: USC’s ‘Heaven or Hell’ sparks new dating adventures
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The Chinese Graduate Student Association adapted “Single’s Inferno” popular South Korean dating show - into a new kind of dating event for students this Valentine’s Day.
The post Love unleashed: USC’s ‘Heaven or Hell’ sparks new dating adventures appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/love-unleashed-uscs-heaven-or-hell-sparks-new-dating-adventures/
‘Telegraph Road’ forever changed the way I think about music
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
It’s a song about the rise and fall of Detroit. But more so, it’s a song about how art is made, and the road taken to get to a masterpiece.
The post ‘Telegraph Road’ forever changed the way I think about music appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/telegraph-road-forever-changed-the-way-i-think-about-music/
Classifieds – April 3, 2024
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The Daily Trojan features Classified advertising in each day’s edition. Here you can read, search, and even print out each day’s edition of the Classifieds.
The post Classifieds – April 3, 2024 appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/classifieds-april-3-2024/
Turns out AI chatbots are way more persuasive than humans
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Next time you get in a Facebook argument, just let ChatGPT handle it
If you’re scratching your head wondering what’s the use of all these chatbots, here’s an idea: It turns out they’re better at persuading people with arguments. …
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/ai_chatbots_persuasive/
An open letter to the person watching a movie with recurring sex scenes next to me on the plane
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Humor writer Rachael Kozik finds herself inexplicably bonded to the stranger in seat 17C after pretending not to watch their raunchy historical movie.
The post An open letter to the person watching a movie with recurring sex scenes next to me on the plane appeared first on Daily Trojan.
Comic: Learning how to be an adult
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Life after graduation still scares me a little.
The post Comic: Learning how to be an adult appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/comic-learning-how-to-be-an-adult/
Today in SCV History (April 3)
date: 2024-04-03, from: SCV New (TV Station)
1917 – Castaic post office established inside Sam Parson’s general store. [story
https://scvnews.com/today-in-scv-history-april-3/
Price announces interim dean as Goldman departs
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Genevieve Giuliano will fill Goldman’s position until a permanent dean is found.
The post Price announces interim dean as Goldman departs appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/price-announces-interim-dean-as-goldman-departs/
What ‘coming to terms with death’ really means
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
As we move into adulthood, we should prioritize learning how to properly process grief.
The post What ‘coming to terms with death’ really means appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/what-coming-to-terms-with-death-actually-means/
USC kicks off Earth Month with annual sustainability report
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
USC acknowledges past achievements and looks forward to future goals.
The post USC kicks off Earth Month with annual sustainability report appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/usc-kicks-off-earth-month-with-annual-sustainability-report/
Brazilian icon Caetano Veloso wows LA Music Center
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The renowned bossa singer continued his U.S. farewell tour in excellent fashion.
The post Brazilian icon Caetano Veloso wows LA Music Center appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/brazilian-icon-caetano-veloso-wows-la-music-center/
Community celebrates APIDA culture
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
USC’s Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month kicked off Tuesday.
The post Community celebrates APIDA culture appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/community-celebrates-apida-culture/
Wear it right, say it right
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Why can we easily pronounce the names of philosophers, but not the brands of clothing we see every day?
The post Wear it right, say it right appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/wear-it-right-say-it-right/
Why do I need mocktails if all I want to do is staff a soup kitchen?
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Recognized student organizations at USC aren’t supposed to be selective. But some service groups extend their membership requirements far beyond University guidelines.
The post Why do I need mocktails if all I want to do is staff a soup kitchen? appeared first on Daily Trojan.
Welcome to AAA: Academic Avoidance Anonymous
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Perfectionism and fears of rejection are the biggest traps to procrastination.
The post Welcome to AAA: Academic Avoidance Anonymous appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/welcome-to-aaa-academic-avoidance-anonymous/
University announces slate of commencement speakers
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The speakers will deliver remarks at places around campus May 10 or earlier.
The post University announces slate of commencement speakers appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/university-announces-slate-of-commencement-speakers/
Advocacy must be inclusive, listening-focused
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Cut scholarships were reinstated, but we must learn from this experience.
The post Advocacy must be inclusive, listening-focused appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/04/03/community-advocacy-must-be-inclusive-listening-focused/
Meet clickjacking’s slicker cousin, ‘gesture jacking,’ aka ‘cross window forgery’
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Web devs advised to do their part to limit UI redress attacks
Web browsers still struggle to prevent clickjacking, an attack technique first noted in 2008 that repurposes web page interface elements to deceive visitors.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/clickjacking_heir_gesture_jacking/
Egg producing plant shut down after discovery of H5N1 bird flu
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
NATO foreign ministers to discuss proposed 100 billion euro military fund for Ukraine
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
STATE DEPARTMENT — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken held talks with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg on Wednesday on how to bolster the alliance’s long-term military support for Ukraine.
The United States will host a NATO summit in Washington from July 9 to July 11. Blinken discussed priorities for the meeting with his counterpart as the alliance celebrates its 75th anniversary this year.
“Secretary Blinken and Secretary-General Stoltenberg discussed key priorities for the Washington Summit, including strengthening our shared commitment to Ukraine, furthering NATO’s Indo-Pacific and EU partnerships, and building upon collective defense commitments,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a statement.
“They also noted the strength of the Alliance, with Finland and Sweden participating as members, and increased investment by Allies,” Miller added.
This week, NATO foreign ministers met in Brussels to discuss a proposal for creating a five-year fund, totaling 100 billion euros or approximately $108 billion, to support Ukraine’s military.
The plan, put forward by Stoltenberg, includes making NATO more directly involved in coordinating military assistance provided by member countries — a role that has been filled by a U.S.-led coalition of more than 50 countries.
Stoltenberg told reporters Wednesday it is important that support for Ukraine be less dependent on voluntary, short-term offers and more dependent on longer-term NATO commitments. He said Ukrainian commanders would be better able to make battlefield plans with more predictable support.
Stoltenberg said the plan would also send a message to Russia that it cannot win by keeping the war going until Ukraine’s allies tire of providing support.
“Ukraine has urgent needs,” Stoltenberg said. “Any delay in providing support has consequences on the battlefield as we speak.”
A final decision on the proposal would not come until the NATO summit in July. It requires consensus among its 32 members.
While individual NATO members have been providing arms to Ukraine, the organization as a whole has concentrated on providing nonlethal aid for fear of escalating tensions with Russia through a more direct involvement.
On Thursday, foreign ministers from the security bloc will meet with its partners from the Indo-Pacific.
“North Korea, China, Iran are supporting Russia’s war of aggression in different ways, so this demonstrates that security is not regional security, it’s truly global, and therefore it’s important that we work together with our Asia-Pacific partners,” Stoltenberg said on Wednesday.
Ahead of the Brussels talks, Blinken renewed calls for the U.S. Congress to release military aid for Ukraine.
“We are at a critical moment where it is absolutely essential to get Ukrainians what they continue to need to defend themselves, particularly when it comes to munitions and air defenses,” Blinken said Tuesday during a visit to a defense facility in Paris with French Defense Minister Sébastien Lecornu.
Congress has yet to approve the Biden administration’s supplementary budget request that would resupply Ukraine’s armed forces and help the country fend off Russian offensives.
Biden has called on the Republican-led U.S. House of Representatives to approve the military and financial aid package. House Republicans have delayed action on it for months, prioritizing domestic issues.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has warned that Ukrainian forces will have to retreat “step by step, in small steps,” if Kyiv doesn’t receive the U.S. military aid.
Some information for this report came from Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
Alibaba signs to explore one-hour rocket deliveries
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Chinese space startup claims it has the tech to make it happen. Yeah, right
Alibaba’s Taobao e-commerce platform is exploring one-hour delivery by – wait for it – rocket.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/taobao_alibaba_rocket_delivery/
Singapore expands regulations for digital payment token service providers
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
More entities will need a license
On Tuesday, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) extended digital payment token (DPT) restrictions that seek to prevent money laundering and financing of terrorism.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/singapore_adds_psact/
April 2, 2024
date: 2024-04-03, from: Heather Cox Richardson blog
Almost six months have passed since President Joe Biden asked Congress to appropriate money for Ukraine in a national security supplemental bill. At first, House Republicans said they would not pass such a bill without border security. Then, when a bipartisan group of senators actually produced a border security provision for the national security bill, they killed it, under orders from former president Trump.
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/april-2-2024
Bodies of foreign aid workers killed in Israeli airstrike moved toward repatriation
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
Letter from the Editor: Volume 64 Issue 8
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
From Candy Crush to Skyrim, gaming is a staple in many lives, including those at California State University, Northridge. In the third spring issue, we explore people’s relationships with games…
https://sundial.csun.edu/179955/print-editions/letter-from-the-editor-volume-64-issue-8/
TSMC evacuated fabs after M7.4 earthquake hit Taiwan
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Internet outages recorded as Japan issues tsunami warning
Video A significant earthquake has struck Taiwan, shuttering some of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing’s chip fabrication plants.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/taiwan_earthquake_tech_impact/
Biden, Xi hold ‘candid and constructive’ call
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
On a call Tuesday, President Joe Biden discussed with Chinese President Xi Jinping a range of high-level issues and reiterated his request that China not use web-based disinformation tools to interfere with the U.S. presidential election. The two leaders also discussed Taiwan – the island China claims – as it prepares to inaugurate a new leader next month. VOA’s Anita Powell reports from Washington.
https://www.voanews.com/a/biden-xi-hold-candid-and-constructive-call-/7554539.html
Defense drowns CSUN, Matadors suffer fifth consecutive loss
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
The No. 25 Matadors fell to No. 6 Long Beach at the Matador Pool on Saturday afternoon, CSUN’s second-to-last home game before starting their two-game road trip next week. The…
https://sundial.csun.edu/179946/sports/defense-drowns-csun-matadors-suffer-fifth-consecutive-loss/
US ‘outraged’ over Israeli strike that killed 7 aid workers
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
White House national security spokesman John Kirby says the U.S. was “outraged” over the Israeli airstrike that killed seven workers with a Washington-based charity, and he called on Israel to do more to ensure civilians and humanitarian aid workers are protected. VOA’s Senior Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine reports from the State Department.
https://www.voanews.com/a/us-outraged-over-israeli-strike-that-killed-7-aid-workers/7554529.html
Matadors clinch series win over UC Davis
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
After suffering defeat in the first game of the Friday doubleheader to the Aggies 4-5, CSUN (16-11, 6-3 Big West) bounced back and defeated UC Davis (14-12, 4-5 Big West)…
https://sundial.csun.edu/179937/sports/matadors-clinch-series-win-over-uc-davis/
Matadors upset ranked UC Irvine at home
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
For the first time since 2010, CSUN’s men’s volleyball defeated two top-three-ranked opponents in the same season. Just a week after the Matadors upset two-seed Hawaii in Honolulu, CSUN (11-12,…
https://sundial.csun.edu/179932/sports/matadors-upset-ranked-uc-irvine-at-home/
Microsoft slammed for lax security that led to China’s cyber-raid on Exchange Online
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
CISA calls for ‘fundamental, security-focused reforms’ to happen ASAP, delaying work on other software
A review of the June 2023 attack on Microsoft’s Exchange Online hosted email service – which saw accounts used by senior US officials compromised by a China-linked group called “Storm-0558” – has found that the incident would have been preventable save for Microsoft’s lax infosec culture and sub-par cloud security precautions.…
Microsoft slammed for lax security that led to China’s cyber-raid on Exchange Online
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
CISA calls for ‘fundamental, security-focused reforms’ to happen ASAP, delaying work on other software
A review of the June 2023 attack on Microsoft’s Exchange Online hosted email service – which saw accounts used by senior US officials compromised by a China-linked group called “Storm-0558” – has found that the incident would have been preventable save for Microsoft’s lax infosec culture and sub-par cloud security precautions.…
Simulation reveals all Japanese will have the same surname by 2531
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Konnichiwa, Sato-San
A simulation run by a Japanese professor and released on Monday revealed that by the year 2531, everyone in Japan will have the surname Sato.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/japan_all_sato/
Santa Clarita parks stand the test of time
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Signal
Inheriting a parks deficit upon 1987 incorporation, city has boosted its number of parks by 450% One element that makes Santa Clarita live up to its safe, family-oriented reputation is perhaps its dedication in ensuring that residents of all ages have access to recreational areas and facilities. The city’s parks offerings have grown as the […]
The post <strong>Santa Clarita parks stand the test of time</strong> appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/04/santa-clarita-parks-stand-the-test-of-time/
Exiled Chinese businessman Guo Wengui must face US fraud indictment
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
new york — A U.S. judge on Tuesday rejected exiled Chinese businessman Guo Wengui’s bid to dismiss an indictment accusing him of defrauding thousands of investors out of more than $1 billion.
U.S. District Judge Analisa Torres in Manhattan said prosecutors sufficiently alleged that Guo engaged in a pattern of racketeering through four fraud schemes, and that proving it was a matter for trial.
Lawyers for Guo did not immediately respond to requests for comment after business hours.
Guo has pleaded not guilty to 12 criminal charges including securities fraud, wire fraud, unlawful monetary transactions and conspiracy, including for money laundering.
According to the indictment, Guo and his accomplices defrauded investors in a media company, cryptocurrency and other ventures.
The indictment said Guo took advantage of his prolific online presence and hundreds of thousands of followers by promising outsized financial returns and other benefits.
In reality, the scheme allowed the co-conspirators to enrich themselves and family members and fund Guo’s “extravagant lifestyle,” the indictment said.
Two co-defendants face related criminal charges, and one defendant is charged with obstruction.
Also known as Ho Wan Kwok and Miles Kwok, Guo is a critic of China’s Communist Party and a business associate of former U.S. President Donald Trump’s onetime adviser Steve Bannon.
Guo has been jailed in Brooklyn, a borough in New York City, since his March 2023 arrest, with Torres and a federal appeals court rejecting his proposed $25 million bail package last year.
Jury selection in his trial is scheduled to begin on May 20.
Prosecutors also sought the forfeiture of various assets, including bank accounts, a $37 million yacht, a New Jersey mansion, a Bugatti, a Lamborghini and a Rolls Royce.
Guo filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in Connecticut in February 2022. That case was later combined with the bankruptcies of other companies he controlled. Torres has twice rejected Guo’s bid to stay the bankruptcy proceedings.
COC’s Spring Star Party to return April 12
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Signal
News release The College of the Canyons Canyon Country campus will host its spring 2024 Star Party, a part of its Science Talks series, featuring a presentation by the engineer who oversaw development of the Ingenuity Mars helicopter. The event is scheduled 6:30 to 10 p.m. April 12 at the upper plaza between the new […]
The post COC’s Spring Star Party to return April 12 appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/04/cocs-spring-star-party-to-return-april-12/
Deadly app? West Ranch group becomes national finalist for model linking Snapchat to fentanyl overdoses
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Signal
There may be no high school resumés greater than those of Brandon Chang, Omkar Guha, Kent Gao and Jayden Cho. After being part of a team that was named a finalist in the Modeling the Future Challenge last year, the four West Ranch High School students are at it again as finalists in this year’s […]
The post <strong>Deadly app? West Ranch group becomes national finalist for model linking Snapchat to fentanyl overdoses</strong> appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
Service provider for immigrants in detention ordered to pay $811M+ in lawsuit
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
NEW YORK — A company that provides services for immigrants in federal detention was ordered Tuesday to pay more than $811 million in restitution and penalties in a lawsuit alleging it used deceptive and abusive tactics.
Nexus Services must pay roughly $231 million in restitution as well as penalties of $13.8 million to New York, $7.1 million to Virginia and $3.4 million to Massachusetts, according to a judgment filed in federal court for the Western District of Virginia in Harrisonburg. The Virginia-based company, its subsidiary Libre by Nexus and its three executives must also each pay more than $111 million in civil penalties.
“This judgment is a victory for thousands of immigrant families who lost their life savings and were targeted and preyed on by Libre,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a statement. “Libre exploited vulnerable immigrants and their families to pad its pockets, and that is illegal and unconscionable.”
James joined state attorneys general in Virginia and Massachusetts and the federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in a 2021 lawsuit that accused the company of violating state and federal consumer protection laws.
The officials said the company promised to secure immigrants’ release on bond while their immigration claims were being processed but concealed and misrepresented the true nature and costs of its services. They said the company collected thousands of dollars in fees above the face value of the bonds and forced immigrants to wear painful ankle monitors.
U.S. District Judge Elizabeth Dillon noted in her decision that the company isn’t a licensed bail bond agent or a surety company certified by the U.S. Treasury but a “service provider that acts as an intermediary between immigration detainees and sureties and their bond agents.”
The company said in a statement that it intends to appeal the judgment, calling it a “shocking departure from normal American jurisprudence” as it was decided “without evidence, without a trial and without a damages hearing.”
“We continue to remain committed to serving our clients — people who suffer and sacrifice for a better life, and who do not deserve to be political pawns in an American legislature or an American courtroom,” the company added.
County gives Cali Lake tenants one year to relocate
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Signal
Residents of Cali Lake RV Resort will have one year before they are forced to find another home after the park was granted a conditional use permit for short-term stays at last week’s hearing in front of the L.A. County Regional Planning Commission. The CUP allows for Stewart Silver, owner of the RV park, to […]
The post County gives Cali Lake tenants one year to relocate appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/04/county-gives-cali-lake-tenants-one-year-to-relocate/
Hart district chronic absenteeism rate down 9%
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Signal
School districts across the state have seen an uptick in chronic absenteeism since the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the California Department of Education, chronic absenteeism rose to 30% in the 2021-22 school year before dropping to 24.9% in 2022-23, which still represents more than double the 12.1% rate from 2018-19. Chronic absenteeism has generally been […]
The post <strong>Hart district chronic absenteeism rate down 9%</strong> appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/04/hart-district-chronic-absenteeism-rate-down-9/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-04-03, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
The Miseducation of Kara Swisher.
https://thebaffler.com/latest/the-miseducation-of-kara-swisher-ongweso
Gas meter struck in Canyon Country collision
date: 2024-04-03, from: The Signal
A gas meter connected to an apartment building was struck on Tuesday afternoon in a traffic collision in Canyon Country, according to officials. According to Giovanni Sanchez, a spokesman for the L.A. County Fire Department, the single-vehicle collision at the 27100 block of Hidaway Avenue was reported at 4:48 p.m. on Tuesday, with units arriving […]
The post <strong>Gas meter struck in Canyon Country collision</strong> appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/04/gas-meter-struck-in-canyon-country-collision/
Blogroll software update
date: 2024-04-03, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News
We’re
starting to test the blogroll software with a few users, but we hit a
problem before we began. The blogroll code includes the CSS for the
Bootstrap Toolkit. I use it as if it were part of the OS, but not
everyone does, and it changes the global values of things. So when you
install it on a page that has its own ideas how things should work, you
can get an unpleasant effect (to put it mildly). So I created a
localized
subset
of Bootstrap’s styles, to be a better guest in other people’s pages.
That is now done. I expect we’ll see more of that kind of thing. Web
plugins are a new area for me. I guess that’s pretty obvious.
http://scripting.com/2024/04/02/005812.html?title=blogrollSoftwareUpdate
Barger Spotlights Availability of Free Parkway Trees During Earth Month
date: 2024-04-03, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Now that Earth Month has arrived, Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger wants residents living in Los Angeles County’s unincorporated communities to know they can obtain and plant a parkway tree at no cost.
https://scvnews.com/barger-spotlights-availability-of-free-parkway-trees-during-earth-month/
Amazon Ditches ‘Just Walk Out’ Checkouts at Its Grocery Stores
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: Daring Fireball
https://gizmodo.com/amazon-reportedly-ditches-just-walk-out-grocery-stores-1851381116
Google to delete billions of records following private browsing settlement
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
Court rulings on abortion could rattle Florida’s November elections
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
June 8: Summer Breeze Concert Series ‘A Night of Motown’
date: 2024-04-03, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The Summer Breeze concert series will present “A Night of Motown” on Saturday, June 8, 4-9 p.m. at California Institute of the Arts, 24700 McBean Parkway, Santa Clarita, CA
https://scvnews.com/june-8-summer-breeze-concert-series-a-night-of-motown/
Google to Delete Search Data From Tens of Millions of Users Who Used ‘Incognito’ Mode in Chrome
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: Daring Fireball
https://www.npr.org/2024/04/01/1242019127/google-incognito-mode-settlement-search-history
All State Parks in Big Sur Area Closed Due to Highway 1 Road Slip Out
date: 2024-04-03, from: SCV New (TV Station)
A slip-out of the cliffside underneath Highway 1 in Big Sur has forced the closure of the roadway. California State Parks have announced that due to the road slip out on Highway 1 at Rocky Creek in Monterey County, all state parks in the Big Sur Area are now closed to day use and camping.
https://scvnews.com/all-state-parks-in-big-sur-area-closed-due-to-highway-1-road-slip-out/
Stability AI reportedly ran out of cash to pay its bills for rented cloudy GPUs
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Generative AI darling was on track to pay $99M on compute to generate just $11M in revenues
The massive GPU clusters needed to train Stability AI’s popular text-to-image generation model Stable Diffusion are apparently also at least partially responsible for former CEO Emad Mostaque’s downfall – because he couldn’t find a way to pay for them.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/04/03/stability_ai_bills/
Yahoo Is Acquiring Artifact, Folding It Into Yahoo News
date: 2024-04-03, updated: 2024-04-03, from: Daring Fireball
https://www.theverge.com/2024/4/2/24118436/yahoo-news-artifact-acquisition
Daily EV Recap: Tesla Releases Disastrous Q1 2024 Delivery Results
date: 2024-04-03, from: Electrek Feed
Listen to a recap of the top stories of the day from Electrek. Quick Charge is now available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, TuneIn and…
https://electrek.co/2024/04/02/daily-ev-recap-tesla-releases-disastrous-q1-2024-delivery-results/
Crime among leading voter concerns in 2024 election
date: 2024-04-03, from: VOA News USA
Crime in the United States is one of the leading issues on voters’ minds in this year’s US presidential election. VOA correspondent Scott Stearns looks at how Joe Biden and Donald Trump are addressing those concerns.
https://www.voanews.com/a/crime-among-leading-voter-concerns-in-2024-election-/7554110.html