News gathered 2024-08-01
(date: 2024-08-01 08:19:14)
East Bay candy factory will shut down after selling site two years ago
date: 2024-08-01, from: San Jose Mercury News
A candy factory that was founded 70 years ago by a Russian immigrant will cease operations at its long-time East Bay site.
FBI, CISA remind US voters that DDoS attacks can’t touch election systems
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
PSA comes amid multiple IT services crises in recent days
US law enforcement and cybersecurity agencies are reminding the public that the country’s voting systems will remain unaffected by distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks as the next presidential election fast approaches.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/fbi_cisa_election_ddos/
“A light at the end of the tunnel” for mortgage rates?
date: 2024-08-01, from: Marketplace Morning Report
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has set the stage for the central bank’s first rate cut in four years — but we’ll still likely have to wait a few weeks. Anticipation of a rate cut has already had ripple effects across markets, including for mortgage rates. Then, there’s a shortage of poll workers. What’s being done to boost hiring? Plus, the Biden administration takes another crack at student loan relief.
Park Fire: Many evacuation orders/warnings lifted, 361 structures destroyed, 389,791 acres burned, 18% containment
date: 2024-08-01, from: San Jose Mercury News
Temperatures are expected to continue to get warmer this week and there is a chance of thunderstorms in the foothills and mountains.
Fewer digital news outlets launched last year
date: 2024-08-01, from: Ben Werdmuller’s blog
<div class="known-bookmark">
<div class="e-content">“The number of digital news startup launches has been slowing since 2022 in Europe, Latin America, and North America, according to the new Global Project Oasis report. Global Project Oasis, a research project funded by the Google News Initiative that maps digital-native news startups globally, cited economic challenges, slow growth, and political conflicts as potential reasons for the drop.”
This report is in-depth and fascinating. It seems obvious to me that having more news sources with specific focuses is a really good thing, but also that ensuring that they are sustainable is crucial. Many journalistic outlets were created by journalists with business models as almost an afterthought, so as certain kinds of funding dried up they became less viable.
One thing that I really wish was present in this report: platform. What was Substack’s influence here? Or Ghost’s? Are these WordPress shops? How many of them were aided by Automattic’s Newspack, for example? These details could also be revealing.
We need journalism that keeps us more informed, and it’s not a secret that many of our incumbent outlets are not doing the job. A healthy news startup ecosystem is one way we can get to a more informed voting population and stronger democracies in our local communities, nationally, and globally.
<p>[<a href="https://www.niemanlab.org/2024/07/fewer-digital-news-outlets-launched-last-year-according-to-a-new-global-report/">Link</a>]</p>
</div>
</div>https://werd.io/2024/fewer-digital-news-outlets-launched-last-year
Larry Magid: Satisfying my obsession with label makers
date: 2024-08-01, from: San Jose Mercury News
There is an episode of the Big Bang Theory where Sheldon puts a label on his label maker and then a smaller label to designate where the label is. I’m not quite that obsessed with labels, but I’m a close second to the main character in that TV series. I, too, have a label maker. […]
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/08/01/larry-magid-obsessed-with-label-makers/
@IIIF Mastodon feed (date: 2024-08-01, from: IIIF Mastodon feed)
The Call for Proposals for the 2024 #IIIF Online Meeting is now open.
To read the full call for proposals, including information about themes, proposal instructions, and other important details, please visit: https://iiif.io/event/2024/online-meeting/
https://glammr.us/@IIIF/112887270262889753
What Happens in a Mind That Can’t ‘See’ Mental Images
date: 2024-08-01, from: Quanta Magazine
Neuroscience research into people with aphantasia, who don’t experience mental imagery, is revealing how imagination works and demonstrating the sweeping variety in our subjective experiences.The post What Happens in a Mind That Can’t ‘See’ Mental Images first appeared on Quanta Magazine
https://www.quantamagazine.org/what-happens-in-a-mind-that-cant-see-mental-images-20240801/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-08-01, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
VCs for Kamala.
Cal and Stanford prepare for life in the ACC with a nine-figure hole in their budgets, no firm plans to solve the “revenue challenge”
date: 2024-08-01, from: San Jose Mercury News
The Bears and Cardinal agreed to join the ACC at substantial discounts for nine years. How will they offset the revenue disparity?
Low-cost airline commits to San Jose-Japan flights for months to come
date: 2024-08-01, from: San Jose Mercury News
A low-cost airline has instead committed to continue service linking San Jose and Japan for months to come.
Microsoft and Reddit Are Fighting About Why Bing’s Crawler Is Blocked on Reddit
date: 2024-08-01, from: 404 Media Group
Reddit says that it doesn’t want companies scraping the site for AI. Microsoft says it’s not doing that.
Uber and China’s BYD agree deal to roll out 100,000 EV fleet
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
No timeline yet, but drivers beware: Plans include collaboration on autonomous-capable vehicles
Uber and BYD have struck a deal to bring 100,000 BYD electric vehicles onto the Uber platform, starting with Europe and Latin America.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/uber_byd_deal/
One dead in crash involving semi truck on Interstate 80 in Berkeley
date: 2024-08-01, from: San Jose Mercury News
The crash happened about 3:40 a.m.
7 terrific Bay Area things to do this weekend, Aug. 2-4
date: 2024-08-01, from: San Jose Mercury News
From an engaging new coming-of-age movie set in Fremont to a cat video festival and delicious grilling ideas, it’s shaping up as a killer weekend.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/08/01/7-terrific-bay-area-things-to-do-this-weekend-aug-2-4/
Fatal crash in Walnut Creek shuts down stretch of Ygnacio Valley Road
date: 2024-08-01, from: San Jose Mercury News
Few details of the crash were available early Thursday.
How Does Math Keep Secrets?
date: 2024-08-01, from: Quanta Magazine
Cryptography is the thread that connects Julius Caesar, World War II and quantum computing, and it now lies under nearly every part of modern life. In this week’s episode, computer scientist Boaz Barak and co-host Janna Levin discuss the past and future of secrecy.The post How Does Math Keep Secrets? first appeared on Quanta Magazine
https://www.quantamagazine.org/how-does-math-keep-secrets-20240801/
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-08-01, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
Every time I flip through an outdoor furniture catalog, the only thing I can think of is “that’s a nice chair for mosquitos to feed from”
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/112886962332519674
Ask the Motor Cop | A primer on California speed laws
date: 2024-08-01, from: The Signal
Question: Jerry, I am concerned about the many drivers speeding on our local streets and highways, especially motorcyclists. What are the laws on speeding? – Walt Answer: Many people are […]
The post Ask the Motor Cop | A primer on California speed laws appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/08/ask-the-motor-cop-a-primer-on-california-speed-laws/
Northern California wildfire arson suspect testifies, denies wrongdoing
date: 2024-08-01, from: San Jose Mercury News
Devin Lamar Johnson, who says his role in the 2021 Hopkins Fire in Mendocino County was accidental, is being tried in Marin because of a change-in-venue motion by the defense.
Qualcomm bullish on AI, teases flagship platform coming in October
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Chip outfit boosted by Chinese market, but goals for smartphones, PCs are ambitious
Qualcomm is confident its bet on AI in phones and Arm PCs will pay off, buoyed by more than 50 percent growth in revenue from Chinese handset makers and a promise of $700 Copilot+ PCs coming next year.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/qualcomm_q3_2024/
Santa Cruz Mountains residents on edge as series of fires investigated as potential arson
date: 2024-08-01, from: San Jose Mercury News
The four incidents took place over the course of 11 days.
Researchers Decipher Cuneiform Tablet—and Discover It’s a Furniture Receipt
date: 2024-08-01, from: Smithsonian Magazine
The small clay rectangle is engraved with an ancient Semitic language known as Akkadian
Visible Ink
date: 2024-08-01, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
We lament Old Spanish Days, when the ranchers pitted, in small corrals, Spain’s most powerful animal, the bull, against Chumash culture’s most powerful, the grizzly.
The post Visible Ink appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/08/01/visible-ink/
Serpent OS prealpha0 released
date: 2024-08-01, from: OS News
Serpent OS, a new Linux distribution with a completely custom package management system written in Rust, has released its very very rough pre-alpha release. They’ve been working on this for four years, and they’re making some interesting choices regarding packaging that I really like, at least on paper. This will of course appear to be a very rough (crap) prealpha ISO. Underneath the surface it is using the moss package manager, our very own package management solution written in Rust. Quite simply, every single transaction in moss generates a new filesystem tree (/usr) in a staging area as a full, stateless, OS transaction. When the package installs succeed, any transaction triggers are run in a private namespace (container) before finally activating the new /usr tree. Through our enforced stateless design, usr-merge, etc, we can atomically update the running OS with a single renameat2 call. As a neat aside, all OS content is deduplicated, meaning your last system transaction is still available on disk allowing offline rollbacks. ↫ Ikey Doherty Since this is only a very rough pre-alpha release, I don’t have much more to say at this point, but I do think it’s interesting enough to let y’all know about it. Even if you’re not the kind of person to dive into pre-alphas, I think you should keep an eye on Serpent OS, because I have a feeling they’re on to something valuable here.
https://www.osnews.com/story/140384/serpent-os-prealpha0-released/
Cheaper Windows PCs with Qualcomm Snapdragon X chips coming in 2025
date: 2024-08-01, from: Liliputing
The cheapest computer with a Qualcomm Snapdragon X series processor is a mini PC that’s positioned as a development kit. And at $899 it may be the least expensive model, but it’s not exactly cheap. Meanwhile, laptops and tablets with Qualcomm’s new chips for Windows PCs start at $999. But that could change next year. During […]
The post Cheaper Windows PCs with Qualcomm Snapdragon X chips coming in 2025 appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/cheaper-windows-pcs-with-qualcomm-snapdragon-x-chips-coming-in-2025/
The impact of AI on computer science education
date: 2024-08-01, from: OS News
Yesterday I highlighted a study that found that AI and ML, and the expectations around them, are actually causing people to need to work harder and more, instead of less. Today, I have another study for you, this time focusing a more long-term issue: when you use something like ChatGPT to troubleshoot and fix a bug, are you actually learning anything? A professor at MIT divided a group of students into three, and gave them a programming task in a language they did not know (FORTRAN). One group was allowed to use ChatGPT to solve the problem, the second group was told to use Meta’s Code Llama large language model (LLM), and the third group could only use Google. The group that used ChatGPT, predictably, solved the problem quickest, while it took the second group longer to solve it. It took the group using Google even longer, because they had to break the task down into components. Then, the students were tested on how they solved the problem from memory, and the tables turned. The ChatGPT group “remembered nothing, and they all failed,” recalled Klopfer, a professor and director of the MIT Scheller Teacher Education Program and The Education Arcade. Meanwhile, half of the Code Llama group passed the test. The group that used Google? Every student passed. ↫ Esther Shein at ACM I find this an interesting result, but at the same time, not a very surprising one. It reminds me a lot of that when I went to high school, I was part of the first generation whose math and algebra courses were built around using a graphic calculator. Despite being able to solve and graph complex equations with ease thanks to our TI-83, we were, of course, still told to include our “work”, the steps taken to get from the question to the answer, instead of only writing down the answer itself. Since I was quite good “at computers”, and even managed to do some very limited programming on the TI-83, it was an absolute breeze for me to hit some buttons and get the right answers – but since I knew, and know, absolutely nothing about math, I couldn’t for the life of me explain how I got to the answers. Using ChatGPT to fix your programming problem feels like a very similar thing. Sure, ChatGPT can spit out a workable solution for you, but since you aren’t aware of the steps between problem and solution, you aren’t actually learning anything. By using ChatGPT, you’re not actually learning how to program or how to improve your skills – you’re just hitting the right buttons on a graphing calculator and writing down what’s on the screen, without understanding why or how. I can totally see how using ChatGPT for boring boilerplate code you’ve written a million times over, or to point you in the right direction while still coming up with your own solution to a problem, can be a good and helpful thing. I’m just worried about a degradation in skill level and code quality, and how society will, at some point, pay the price for that.
https://www.osnews.com/story/140379/the-impact-of-ai-on-computer-science-education/
The Gig Is Up
date: 2024-08-01, from: Care
<p>“The eight-hour workday was a hard-won victory by labor organizers of yesterday. Today, gig corporations are actively undermining those victories.”</p>https://logicmag.io/issue-21-medicine-and-the-body/the-gig-is-up
Mozilla follows Google in losing trust in Entrust’s TLS certificates
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Compliance failures and unsatisfactory responses mount from the long-time certificate authority
Mozilla is following in Google Chrome’s footsteps in officially distrusting Entrust as a root certificate authority (CA) following what it says was a protracted period of compliance failures.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/mozilla_entrust/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-08-01, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Doctors told Pelosi of concern for Trump’s mental health, ex-speaker says in book.
https://www.theguardian.com/books/article/2024/aug/01/nancy-pelosi-trump-book
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-08-01, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Earth Is Still Breaking Heat Records.
https://www.texasobserver.org/earth-heat-records-climate/
Renewable Energy Developers Eye Interest Rate Relief
date: 2024-08-01, from: Heatmap News
Current conditions: 192 people are still missing after heavy rains set off a torrent of flash floods in the Indian state of Kerala • Spain’s heat wave is believed to have peaked after an observatory near Barcelona recorded an all-time high • Temperatures in Antarctica soar to more than 50˚F above normal.
THE TOP FIVE
- A September rate cut could bring relief to renewable energy
developers
The Federal Reserve once again voted to hold interest rates steady at 5.3% but signaled that a rate cut could arrive as soon as September. That rate cut would be music to the ears of renewable energy developers, who have struggled to cope with higher borrowing costs. Compared to fossil fuels, renewable energy is more vulnerable to interest rate changes because upfront capital expenditures comprise a greater share of the total project cost. As Joel Dodge wrote for Heatmap in March, high interest rates have hit the offshore wind industry particularly hard, contributing to cost overruns and even cancellations.
In a press conference on Wednesday, Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell cited “further progress” towards the Fed’s goal of 2% inflation. “A reduction in our policy rate could be on the table” for the September meeting, said Powell. Renewable developers will certainly hope so.
- Senate energy permitting bill passes through committee
The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee approved a bipartisan energy permitting bill in a 15-4 vote on Wednesday. The bill has a little something for everyone: sped-up permitting for renewable energy, requirements for oil and gas leases, and LNG approval time limits. It’s a joint effort by Republican Senator John Barrasso and Independent Senator Joe Manchin, who effused that the bill’s passage marked “a tremendous day for all of us.” Critics of the bill include over 360 environmental groups, who view the fossil fuel provisions as an affront to climate action. Three Democratic-caucusing senators and one Republican senator have already signaled that they will oppose the legislation. The White House has yet to weigh in, though senior climate policymakers have previously said that permitting reform is necessary to unlock the benefits of the Inflation Reduction Act.
- Global battery investment declines for the first time this decade
After growing for four years straight, global investment in batteries is set to decline this year, according to analytics firm Rystad Energy. The main culprit, Rystad says, is a slump in the Chinese market, where industry consolidation and supply chain constraints have put a damper on the firehose of investment that marked 2021 and 2022. If the spending dip bears out, it could pose challenges for the global EV industry. Sustained technological improvements and cost declines – largely driven by Chinese investments – have made EVs more affordable and driven their adoption in Asian and Western markets alike.
What this means for the future of the battery industry is unclear, says Duo Fu, Rystad’s vice president for battery market research. He noted that “collaboration across the entire supply chain is crucial for the industry’s health.”
- Grid-enhancing technology gets a raise
TS Conductor closed a $60 million growth investment round, the company announced on Wednesday. The U.S.-based manufacturer of advanced power lines plans to use the money to open a second production facility, with its Southern California plant nearly at capacity. TS’s power lines offer an upgrade on the traditional stock by decreasing line losses, reducing sag, and accommodating up to triple the power during peak generation hours.
The National Renewable Energy Laboratory estimates that transmission capacity will have to nearly triple by 2035 if the U.S. is to integrate the renewable energy required to meet its climate goals. Transmission lines, however, are notoriously costly and time-intensive to build. Grid-enhancing technologies like TS’s can ease the burden on new construction by allowing grid operators to increase the capacity of their existing lines.
- BYD and Uber strike a deal
Uber has announced that it will purchase 100,000 EVs from Chinese auto company BYD as part of an effort to shift Uber’s fleet of vehicles to electric. Uber drivers will be offered a host of discounts – on things like leasing, charging, and maintenance – to encourage them to make the jump to an EV. The vehicles will hit the streets first in Europe and Latin America, with Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the Middle East further down the road.
The deal comes as political leaders in the United States and Europe scramble to stem the flow of low-cost Chinese EVs over worries that they will outcompete Western manufacturers. In May, the Biden administration announced that it would impose a 100% tariff on Chinese EVs, and European lawmakers imposed their own tariff (albeit smaller) on the cars in July.
THE KICKER
$120 billion — that’s the total cost of natural disasters in the first half of 2024, according to German insurance company Munich Re. It’s a slight decrease from the same period last year, but still well above the average for the past three decades.
https://heatmap.news/economy/renewable-energy-developers-eye-interest-rate-relief
How the government is deploying nearly $1 trillion two years on
date: 2024-08-01, from: Marketplace Morning Report
It’s been about two years since President Joe Biden signed the CHIPS and Science law. A week after that anniversary marks two years since the signing of the the Inflation Reduction Act. Today, we’re joined by Heather Boushey, a member of the White House’s Council of Economic Advisers, to discuss what the arrival of federal investments is beginning to look like. But first, we’ll break down Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s remarks at yesterday’s press conference.
On speaking to AI
date: 2024-08-01, from: One Useful Thing
Voice changes a lot of things
https://www.oneusefulthing.org/p/on-speaking-to-ai
NASA pops repair kit in the mail so astronauts can fix leaky ISS telescope
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Upcoming spacewalk should help NICER see more nicely
NASA is preparing to launch a repair kit to the International Space Station (ISS) for a telescope that was never designed to be tinkered with by astronauts.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/nicer_repair_kit_iss/
Jim de Bree | The Question Begs: Is Harris Electable?
date: 2024-08-01, from: The Signal
After President Joe Biden’s announcement that he will no longer seek re-election and endorsements of Kamala Harris by Democratic Party leaders, as of this writing, Harris seems poised to win […]
The post Jim de Bree | The Question Begs: Is Harris Electable? appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/08/jim-de-bree-the-question-begs-is-harris-electable/
Michael Zima | A Cherished Memory
date: 2024-08-01, from: The Signal
My jaw dropped when reading The Signal’s July 27 article, “Faces of the SCV: Santa Clarita native keeps big-band music alive,” chronicling David Weston’s musical journey. The article included a […]
The post Michael Zima | A Cherished Memory appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/08/michael-zima-a-cherished-memory/
Thomas Oatway | Time to Switch, a Rebuttal
date: 2024-08-01, from: The Signal
A response to “When It’s Time to Switch,” letters, Rob Kerchner, May 5: When is it time to switch parties? Here are (some) telltale signs: If your party’s nominee pays […]
The post Thomas Oatway | Time to Switch, a Rebuttal appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/08/thomas-oatway-time-to-switch-a-rebuttal/
Michael Reagan | Democrats: The Enemy of Democracy
date: 2024-08-01, from: The Signal
We had two big speeches from Washington last week. Neither one was very encouraging for those of us who worry about our fragile democracy and the futures of our kids […]
The post Michael Reagan | Democrats: The Enemy of Democracy appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/08/michael-reagan-democrats-the-enemy-of-democracy/
What to expect as the EU’s sweeping AI rule goes into effect
date: 2024-08-01, from: Marketplace Morning Report
From the BBC World Service: The world’s first comprehensive set of rules governing artificial intelligence has come into force across the European Union, but it’ll take two years for the law to be fully implemented. Plus, tensions between Israel and the militant group Hezbollah are making a dire economic situation even worse for people in Lebanon. And later, young people in Nigeria are taking to the streets over economic hardship.
The Interim Computer Museum
date: 2024-08-01, from: Tilde.news
Microsoft services partly down Down Under for Kiwi users
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Maybe time to play the cloud hokey pokey? You put your workload in. You take your workload out…
Updated Microsoft Azure went down for customers in New Zealand earlier today, taking with it parts of Microsoft 365 and bite-sized chunks of the working day for employees still dealing with the effects of previous outages.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/microsoft_services_nz_outage/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-08-01, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
What to Do if Your Phone Gets Lost or Stolen?
https://gizmodo.com/what-do-to-if-your-phone-gets-lost-stolen-2000480509
Celebrating Astro Pi 2024
date: 2024-08-01, from: Raspberry Pi (.org)
About the projects Over the past few months, young people across Europe have run their computer programs on the International Space Station (ISS) as part of Astro Pi Mission Zero and Mission Space Lab. Mission Zero offers young people the chance to write a simple program that takes a reading from the colour and luminosity…
The post Celebrating Astro Pi 2024 appeared first on Raspberry Pi Foundation.
https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/celebrating-astro-pi-2024/
College Brief for Aug. 1
date: 2024-08-01, from: The Signal
Over 20 local students named to Biola University dean’s list Approximately 1,600 students were named to the Biola University dean’s list in Fall 2023. Biola students are placed on the […]
The post College Brief for Aug. 1 appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/08/college-brief-for-aug-1/
Beetle mania: How bugs are inspiring the next gen of robot aviators
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Deploying and folding wings without power might be useful in a tight spot
The rhinoceros beetle turns out to be an unlikely source of engineering inspiration for tiny flying robots that can fold their wings when resting or after a collision.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/rhino_beetle_robot_design/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-08-01, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Louisiana Makes It Illegal to Disobey a Cop’s Order to Back Away.
https://www.propublica.org/article/louisiana-police-buffer-law
Sols 4261-4262: Drill Sol 1…Take 2
date: 2024-08-01, from: NASA breaking news
Earth planning date: Wednesday, July 31, 2024 As Cat mentioned on Monday, today’s plan is a second attempt at our Drill Sol 1 activities. We’ve shifted the target on Kings Canyon a little bit, but the activities remain the same — a preload test to ensure that we’re able to safely drill here, and contact […]
https://science.nasa.gov/blogs/sols-4261-4262-drill-sol-1take-2/
Linux updates with an undo function? Some distros have that
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Snapshots, failover, recovery, and uninstallation on a plate
The big names mostly can’t yet, but some lesser-known Linux distributions offer the ability to undo updates and recover from damage, even automatically.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/linux_rollback_options/
Laurene Weste | Back to School Safety
date: 2024-08-01, from: The Signal
“Remember that safety is not a gadget but a state of mind.” – Eleanor Everet I hope you all had a fantastic summer filled with fun and memorable moments with […]
The post Laurene Weste | Back to School Safety appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/08/laurene-weste-back-to-school-safety/
UK court rules in Intel’s favor in R2 Semi power patent case
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Legal woes are still ongoing in Italy, France, and Germany
The High Court of England and Wales has sided with Intel in a multinational patent dispute brought by R2 Semiconductor alleging the x86 giant infringed on its voltage regulation tech.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/uk_intel_patent/
Raspberry Pi Pico makes this portrait’s eyes follow you around the room
date: 2024-08-01, from: Raspberry Pi News (.com)
Is it Halloween yet? This project creates a creepy portrait with eyes that follow you around the room.
The post Raspberry Pi Pico makes this portrait’s eyes follow you around the room appeared first on Raspberry Pi.
Today in SCV History (Aug. 1)
date: 2024-08-01, from: SCV New (TV Station)
1963 – Leona Cox Community School breaks ground in Canyon Country [story
https://scvnews.com/today-in-scv-history-aug-1/
Guava Health Revolutionizes Health Tracking
date: 2024-08-01, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Santa Barbara health startup aims to improve users’ access to health information with innovative personal health tracker.
The post Guava Health Revolutionizes Health Tracking appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/08/01/guava-health-revolutionizes-health-tracking/
Arm’s lackluster Q2 outlook overshadows strong Q1 revenue growth
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Execs blame gap in licensing revenues for lost momentum, while hawking AI
Brit chip design champ Arm posted its fourth consecutive quarter of growth on Wednesday with Q1 revenues up 39 percent year-over-year to $939 million and profits of $233 million.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/arm_q2_outlook/
Choosing Tools
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: Tantek Çelik’s blog
https://tantek.com/2024/213/b1/choosing-tools
Germany names China as source of attack on government geospatial agency
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Meanwhile, US apparently considers further AI hardware sanctions
Germany’s government has named China-controlled actors as the perpetrators of a 2021 cyber attack on the Federal Office of Cartography and Geodesy (BKG) – the official mapping agency.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/germany_accuses_china_of_cyberattack/
Xen hypervisor quadruples its possible core count for version 4.19
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Pesky test infrastructure woes seem to be solved, too
The Xen Project has delivered a new cut of its open source hypervisor.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/xen_4_19/
Infosys denies it owes $4B in taxes to India
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Taxman disagrees with the outfit that built the tax portal
IT services giant Infosys is facing a demand for almost $4 billion in tax demand from Indian state of Karnataka, relating to expenses incurred by its overseas branches.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/infosys_india_tax_dispute/
Families of Boeing crashes want company to pay higher fine, have jury trial
date: 2024-08-01, from: VOA News USA
Young fencer shows NY grit on Paris 2024 stage
date: 2024-08-01, from: VOA News USA
EAUBONNE, France — Growing up in cutthroat New York gave Lauren Scruggs the competitive mindset needed to claim an unexpected fencing silver medal on her Olympic debut in Paris.
The 21-year-old Queens native shared the podium with fellow American Lee Kiefer, who retained her Olympic title in the women’s individual foil event gold medal bout on Sunday.
“I’ve grown up in New York my whole life. It can be kind of rough sometimes,” Scruggs, the first Black American fencer to win an Olympic medal in a women’s individual event, told Reuters.
“You develop a hard shell, and in terms of how that translates to my fencing, I think it came out, that energy and that toughness.”
When Scruggs found herself neck-and-neck with then world No. 2 Arriana Errigo in the quarterfinals, she managed to score the last touch, knocking out the Italian 15-14.
“I think that was my toughest bout of the day in terms of energy, and going past my limits, and I have definitely New York to thank for that,” said Scruggs, one of the rare Black fencers at the highest level.
“Fencing is predominantly white, I think for a multitude of reasons, it’s just the history of the sport, and the lack of representation and encouragement,” she explained.
“To have this accomplishment is a big deal for me, because when I was younger I only had a few people to look up to in the sport, so to be someone that little kids now can look up to is very special to me.”
They can draw inspiration from her impressive grit, which coach Sean McClain described in the U.S. training venue in Eaubonne, in the outskirts of Paris, saying that since she was eight, Scruggs only cared about winning medals.
“And she’s maintained that distaste for losing her entire career,” he said. “I really think in an event like the Olympics, it’s more about how you compete.”
Expensive sport
Born in the U.S. to Jamaican immigrants, Scruggs grew up in Queens with her mother and grandmother.
“I was in a single-parent household early on, so my family had to basically cut some corners around here and there to support us,” said Scruggs, whose brother was the first to get into fencing and inspired her to take up the sport.
Now a college student at Harvard, where she trains every day, Scruggs had to fight to make it into a “pretty expensive” sport.
“It was not easy growing up, trying to fence while being from where I’m from, just income-wise,” she said.
“If you have the funds, it makes it a lot easier to pursue the sport and feel comfortable asking that from your family.
“But if you’re coming from a lower-income background, it might push you harder. And I think it’s what happened with me. I just wanted it more than my peers.”
On paper, Scruggs did not have a big medal chance, but she showed her mettle at the Grand Palais arena.
“Fencing skill wise, Lauren is on par with the better fencers in the world, but she’s not better than them. What made the difference was that competitiveness,” said McClain, who has also become Scruggs’ stepfather.
“That comes from my wife,” he added. “I knew it was possible, but I didn’t really think Lauren was going to win a medal in her first Olympics. But my wife did. She was like, she’d better win a medal. So that’s where it comes from – that’s the fiery spirit!”
With Kiefer and alongside teammates Jackie Dubrovich and Maia Weintraub, Scruggs will represent the U.S. against China on Thursday in the quarterfinals of the women’s foil team event.
Scruggs is aiming for gold this time and is dreaming already of qualifying for the next Games, which will take place in Los Angeles in four years’ time.
“I can’t imagine myself not fencing,” she said. “It’s not even love, it’s just a part of me. It’s connected to who I am,” she said.
https://www.voanews.com/a/young-fencer-shows-ny-grit-on-paris-2024-stage/7725592.html
U.S. strengthens Indo-Pacific alliances – but are they ready for potential conflict?
date: 2024-08-01, from: VOA News USA
The United States has moved to significantly strengthen its alliances in the Indo-Pacific in recent days amid the security threat from China – including a major upgrade of its military command in Japan. Just how ready are the United States and its allies to act if conflict erupts? Henry Ridgwell reports from Tokyo.
Meta to boost training infra for Llama 4 tenfold, maybe deliver it next year
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Sweet sweet GenAI money not yet flowing, Zuck reckons other ML efforts are paying off
Meta has told investors generative AI won’t bring it revenue this year, but that the massive investments it’s planning will pay off over time – and be configured so they’re not tied to training workloads.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/meta_q2_2024/
Trump questions Harris’ racial identity
date: 2024-08-01, from: VOA News USA
In the U.S. presidential contest, Republican candidate Donald Trump and likely Democratic candidate Kamala Harris are both out on the campaign trail, where Trump questioned Harris’ racial identity and Harris challenged Trump to debate. With fewer than 100 days before Election Day, VOA correspondent Scott Stearns looks at the state of the race and what voters are saying about the candidates.
https://www.voanews.com/a/trump-questions-harris-racial-identity/7725589.html
Lilbits (chips edition): Intel Lunar Lake, Google Tensor G4, and Qualcomm Snapdragon 4s Gen 2
date: 2024-08-01, from: Liliputing
Intel’s next-gen chips are set to launch in a little over a month and while Intel, like most chip makers these days, is playing up the AI capabilities of its upcoming Lunar Lake processors, I’m much more interested to see if the chips live up to Intel’s promises that we can expect up to a […]
The post Lilbits (chips edition): Intel Lunar Lake, Google Tensor G4, and Qualcomm Snapdragon 4s Gen 2 appeared first on Liliputing.
Harris says Trump’s false claims about race same old show’ of divisiveness, disrespect
date: 2024-08-01, from: VOA News USA
WASHINGTON — Vice President Kamala Harris said Wednesday that former President Donald Trump’s false assertions about her race were the “same old show” as she emphasized the need for Black women to organize for his defeat this November.
Addressing the Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority Inc. — one of “Divine Nine” historically Black fraternities and sororities — in Houston, Harris told the crowd, “When I look out at everyone here, I see family.”
She drew knowing chuckles from the audience as she mentioned Trump’s comments earlier in the day at the annual meeting of the National Association of Black Journalists. Trump said Harris, the first Black woman and Asian American to serve as vice president, had in the past promoted only her Indian heritage.
“I didn’t know she was Black until a number of years ago when she happened to turn Black and now she wants to be known as Black. So, I don’t know, is she Indian or is she Black?” Trump said while addressing the NABJ in Chicago.
Harris responded briefly during her address to the sorority, saying Trump’s display was “the same old show: the divisiveness and the disrespect.”
She added: “And let me just say, the American people deserve better. The American people deserve better.”
“Our differences do not divide us, they are an essential source of our strength,” Harris said.
Referencing the combative tone of Trump’s interview at the NABJ convention, she said, “The American people deserve a leader who tells the truth, a leader who does not respond with hostility and anger when confronted with the facts.”
Harris is the daughter of a Jamaican father and an Indian mother, both immigrants to the U.S. As an undergraduate, Harris attended Howard University, one of the nation’s most prominent historically Black colleges and universities, where she also pledged the historically Black sorority Alpha Kappa Alpha. As a U.S. senator, Harris was a member of the Congressional Black Caucus.
Speaking to Sigma Gamma Rho members, Harris said, “Our nation is counting on you” to register people to vote and ensure they go to the polls. “When we organize, mountains move,” she said.
Black Greek life is often seen as a lifelong involvement, leading many members to return to regular gatherings — or “boulés” in the organizations’ phrasing — that gather tens of thousands of members each. Harris has attended three such events in the last month, including the boulé for her own sorority, Alpha Kappa Alpha.
The Divine Nine organizations, which are officially apolitical, emphasize public service as a mission and have deep networks in politics, business and media.
June Penny, 66, of Georgia, an attendee at Harris’ speech in Houston, said Trump’s comments about Harris’ race reminded her of how he tried to discredit then-President Barack Obama.
“I’m not surprised he would try to find something like that,” Penny said.
She said Trump’s views don’t reflect the reality of race in the country, noting, “I have biracial grandchildren” — her son-in-law is white — “and the world views them as Black.”
More than 30 members of Congress are affiliated with a Black Greek letter organization. Close advisers to President Joe Biden, including Stephen Benjamin, Cedric Richmond and Keisha Lance Bottoms, are members of Divine Nine organizations. Harris has welcomed such connections to staff her operation and build her own network in Washington.
China sanctions US lawmaker
date: 2024-08-01, from: VOA News USA
Washington — China issued sanctions on U.S. Representative Jim McGovern, the sponsor of a bill advocating for a peaceful resolution of the China-Tibet dispute China views Tibet as an “inseparable part of China since ancient times,” despite supporters of the Tibetan Government in Exile and the Dalai Lama saying that Tibet has historically been independent.
Framed as a response to McGovern’s efforts to undermine Chinese territorial sovereignty, the sanctions freeze the representative’s Chinese assets, prohibit organizations or individuals in China from engaging with him, and ban him and his family from entering Chinese territory, according to a publication from Chinese state-media agency Xinhua.
McGovern has no assets or business dealings in China, according to The Associated Press.
McGovern’s Tibet-China Dispute Act, which passed through the House in mid-June, gives the State Department increased authority to counter Chinese disinformation about Tibet and promotes the resumption of talks between Chinese leaders and the Dalai Lama. No such talks have occurred since 2010.
President Joe Biden signed the legislation into law on July 12.
China stands accused of large-scale human rights abuses in Tibet, which the congressman hoped to alleviate with this legislation.
McGovern’s office did not respond to a VOA request for comment.
In a statement released on June 12 when the bill passed the House, McGovern said, “The People’s Republic of China has systematically denied Tibetans the right to self-determination and continues to deliberately erase Tibetan religion, culture, and language.”
“The ongoing oppression of the Tibetan people is a grave tragedy, and our bill provides further tools that empower both America and the international community to stand up for justice and peace,” he said.
Among the signees of the statement were House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, Senator Todd Young, McGovern and Senator Jeff Merkley.
In a response, Chinese state-sponsored media Xinhua said the Tibet-China Dispute Act “grossly interferes in China’s internal affairs,” violates international law and distorts historical facts to suppress China and encourage Tibetan separatist movements.
This is not the first time China has sanctioned a U.S. representative for their involvement in an issue that threatens Chinese territorial homogeneity. Over the last year, China has sanctioned both Representative McCaul and former Representative Mike Gallagher over their support for Taiwan.
https://www.voanews.com/a/china-sanctions-us-lawmaker/7725532.html
Judge OKs settlement in lawsuit over US detention of Iraqi nationals
date: 2024-08-01, from: VOA News USA
DETROIT — A judge approved a settlement Wednesday in a 2017 lawsuit that challenged the detention of Iraqi nationals who were targeted for deportation during the Trump administration.
The agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, known as ICE, sets strict conditions for future detentions before any proposed removals, the American Civil Liberties Union said.
“Too often, immigrants are locked up for months or years for absolutely no reason other than they want what so many of us have already: the chance to build a life in America. The settlement will make it easier for them to do that,” ACLU attorney Miriam Aukerman said.
An email seeking comment from ICE was not immediately answered.
The lawsuit involved about 1,400 people, many of whom had been allowed to stay in the U.S. for years, holding jobs and raising families, because Iraq had no interest in taking them back.
That suddenly changed in 2017 when Iraq’s position apparently shifted. ICE arrested people around the U.S., especially in southeastern Michigan, and detained them based on old deportation orders. Some were in custody for more than a year. Protesters filled streets outside the federal courthouse in Detroit.
The ACLU argued that their lives would be at risk if they were returned to their native country. The goal of the lawsuit was to suspend deportations and allow people to at least return to immigration court to make arguments about safety threats in Iraq.
U.S. District Judge Mark Goldsmith made key rulings in their favor. Although those decisions were reversed by a higher court in 2018, there were opportunities in the meantime to win release and get into immigration court because of Goldsmith’s orders.
Some people were granted asylum or became U.S. citizens. Roughly 50 people who were being held by ICE decided to go back to Iraq, Aukerman said.
“They were so distraught about being in detention, they just gave up,” she said. “The vast majority remain in the United States. … What we’re seeing now is very limited removals.”
Superclusters too big, but single servers too small? Oracle offers AI Goldilocks zone
date: 2024-08-01, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Adds L40 bare metal option to the O-Cloud, plus A100 and H100 VMs. And teases a GH200 beast
Oracle has created a pair of for-rent AI infrastructure options aimed at medium-scale AI training and inference workloads – and teased the arrival of Nvidia’s GH200 superchip in its cloud…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/08/01/oracle_l40s_clusters/
Ocean Water Warning for July 31
date: 2024-08-01, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health cautions residents who are planning to visit the below Los Angeles County beaches to avoid swimming, surfing, and playing in ocean waters
https://scvnews.com/ocean-water-warning-for-july-31/
City Cinemas in the Park: Barbie
date: 2024-08-01, from: The Signal
The city of Santa Clarita kicked off their “Cinemas in the Park” series last Friday night with a screening of “Barbie” at Central Park. People brought food, lawn chairs, blankets […]
The post City Cinemas in the Park: Barbie appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/07/city-cinemas-in-the-park-barbie/
Dr. Christina Ghaly | Extreme Heat
date: 2024-08-01, from: SCV New (TV Station)
I hope you are all enjoying your summer. As the days get longer, it is tempting to spend more time outside, and it is important to take some basic precautions to protect your health during days with extreme heat
https://scvnews.com/dr-christina-ghaly-extreme-heat/
Saugus school district bond measure vote set for Thursday
date: 2024-08-01, from: The Signal
A special meeting is set for Thursday at 6 p.m. for the Saugus Union School District governing board to vote on putting a bond measure on the November ballot. The […]
The post Saugus school district bond measure vote set for Thursday appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/07/saugus-school-district-bond-measure-vote-set-for-thursday/
Saugus school district cabinet members extend contracts to 2027
date: 2024-08-01, from: The Signal
Contracts for each of the Saugus Union School District executive cabinet members were extended until 2027 at Tuesday’s governing board meeting. The contracts were previously set to expire at the […]
The post Saugus school district cabinet members extend contracts to 2027 appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/07/saugus-school-district-cabinet-members-extend-contracts-to-2027/
Caring Costco Staff
date: 2024-08-01, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Costco has almost everything, and that includes heroes.
The post Caring Costco Staff appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/07/31/caring-costco-staff/
System-Wide Safety Project Description
date: 2024-08-01, from: NASA breaking news
A new era of aviation is here, and NASA’s System-Wide Safety (SWS) project is developing innovative data solutions to assure safe, rapid, and repeatable access to a transformed National Airspace System (NAS). SWS was created in 2018 and is part of NASA Aeronautics’ Airspace Operations and Safety Program. SWS evaluates how the aerospace industry and […]
https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/armd/aosp/sws/about-system-wide-safety/
Aug. 1: SUSD Special Meeting on Facilities Bond
date: 2024-08-01, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The Saugus Union School District Governing Board of Trustees will hold a special meeting on Thursday, Aug. 1 at 6 p.m. to consider placing a facilities bond measure on the November ballot.
https://scvnews.com/aug-1-susd-special-meeting-on-facilities-bond/
System-Wide Safety Project Leadership
date: 2024-08-01, from: NASA breaking news
System-Wide Safety (SWS) project leaders are listed here. Project ManagerDr. Kyle Ellis Deputy Project ManagerSummer Brandt Associate Project ManagerDr. Wendy Okolo Associate Project ManagerMichael Vincent Project ScientistDr. Paul Miner Senior Technical Advisor for Aviation SafetyDr. Lance Prinzel Senior Technical Advisor for AutonomyDr. Joseph Coughlan Senior Technical Advisor for AssuranceDr. Natasha Neogi Safety LiaisonDr. Misty Davies […]
https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/armd/aosp/sws/sws-project-leadership/
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-07-31, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
I just learned about this jewel by @nicklockwood - and I had to share it:
https://github.com/nicklockwood/Euclid
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/112883773646225102
Review | ALObero Landing
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Santa Barbara–born and now popular jamband scenester band ALO finds a happy venue home at the Lobero Theatre.
The post Review | ALObero Landing appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/07/31/review-alobero-landing/
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-07-31, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
There are a few things I am removing on purpose.
I looked at the GitHub history for some of these, and they seem to serve a niche - I am not convinced they are necessary, so I am pruning in advance, and that buys me some screen real estate.
Might have to add them back, or find a better home, but this can always be done later.
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/112883757044997055
New Battery Rebate for Central Coast Community Energy Customers
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Thousands offered for power backup systems to help shrink fossil-fuel footprint.
The post New Battery Rebate for Central Coast Community Energy Customers appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
Ransomware infection cuts off blood supply to 250+ hospitals
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Scumbags go for the jugular
A ransomware attack against blood-donation nonprofit OneBlood, which services more than 250 American hospitals, has “significantly reduced” the org’s ability to take, test, and distribute blood.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/ransomware_blood_supply_hospital/
UC System Breaks Admissions Record with Largest, Most Diverse Class for Fall 2024
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
UC Santa Barbara accepted 47,698 students, increasing offers to California residents by more than 15 percent.
The post UC System Breaks Admissions Record with Largest, Most Diverse Class for Fall 2024 appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-07-31, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
Next step in the iPad-fication of Godot.
Converting the 3D menus and options.
First image shows a collage of the various parts I need to convert. Second image is a prototype of the different screens I am replacing it with.
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/112883662549539579
US arrests a former Green Beret over the failed 2020 raid into Venezuela to remove Maduro
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
CARACAS, Venezuela — A former U.S. Green Beret who in 2020 organized a failed cross-border raid of Venezuelan army deserters to remove President Nicolas Maduro has been arrested in New York on federal arms smuggling charges.
A federal indictment unsealed this week in Tampa, Florida, accuses Jordan Goudreau and a Venezuelan partner, Yacsy Alvarez, of violating U.S. arms control laws when they allegedly assembled and sent to Colombia AR-styled weapons, ammunition, silencers, night vision goggles and other defense equipment requiring a U.S. export license.
Goudreau, 48, also was charged with conspiracy, smuggling goods from the United States and unlawful possession of a machine gun, among 14 counts. Goudreau appeared in federal court following his Tuesday arrest in Manhattan, but it was not clear a day later whether he would be released from custody pending trial. He was being held at a federal detention center in Brooklyn.
Goudreau, a three-time Bronze Star recipient for bravery in Iraq and Afghanistan, claimed responsibility in 2020 for the amphibious raid by a ragtag group of soldiers that had trained in clandestine camps in Venezuela’s neighbor Colombia. He said he and others were acting to protect Venezuela’s democracy after Maduro’s 2018 reelection was boycotted by the opposition and condemned as undemocratic by the U.S. and dozens of other countries.
Two days before the incursion, The Associated Press published an investigation detailing how Goudreau had been trying for months to raise funds for the harebrained idea from the Trump administration, Venezuela’s opposition and wealthy Americans looking to invest in Venezuela’s oil industry should Maduro be removed.
While then-opposition leader Juan Guaidó was initially enthused by the coup idea, signing an agreement with Goudreau to explore such an option, little financial support arrived and the rural homes along Colombia’s Caribbean coast that housed the would-be liberators suffered from a lack of food, weapons and other supplies.
Despite the setbacks, the coup plotters went forward in a comical if tragic way in what was widely ridiculed as the “Bay of Piglets,” in reference to the 1961 Cuban fiasco. The group was easily mopped up by Venezuela’s security forces, which had already infiltrated the group. Two of Goudreau’s former Green Beret colleagues spent years in Venezuela’s prisons until a prisoner swap last year with other jailed Americans for a Maduro ally held in the U.S. on money laundering charges.
The arrest comes as Maduro is once again facing pressure over his increasingly authoritarian moves. Election authorities declared him the winner of Sunday’s presidential vote but a growing chorus of nations refuse to recognize the results, demanding Venezuela release individual precinct tallies. The opposition has presented records from 80% of the polling booths showing that its candidate, Edmundo González, defeated Maduro by a two-to-one margin.
Prosecutors in their 22-page indictment of Goudreau documented the ill-fated plot, citing text messages between the defendants about their effort to buy military-related equipment and export it to Colombia, and tracing a web of money transfers, chartered flights and large-scale purchases.
One November 2019 message from Goudreau to an equipment distributor said: “Here is the list bro.” It included AR-15 rifles, night-vision devices and ballistic helmets, prosecutors said.
“We def need our guns,” Goudreau wrote in one text message, according to the indictment. Prosecutors said he also identified a storage unit in Phoenix where an unnamed associate — who the AP has learned was another former Green Beret — would pick up the ammo.
In another message, prosecutors said, Alvarez asked Goudreau if she would be “taking things” with her on an upcoming flight from the U.S. to Colombia.
The equipment was shipped to Miami. Separately, Goudreau purchased several components to assemble about 60 AR-type firearms. Prosecutors said he also spent $90,000 on a used yacht — named Silverpoint, according to AP reporting — that left U.S. waters in February 2020 with Goudreau, an associate and several cans of ammunition, body armor plates and magazines for AR-15 rifles.
A month later, Colombian police found at a checkpoint near the Caribbean city of Santa Marta the stockpiled gear in the back of a car hired by Alvarez. From there, the plot — or at least Goudreau’s involvement in it — quickly unraveled.
Alvarez was an associate of a Venezuelan businessman who was so close to the government of the late Hugo Chávez that he spent almost four years in a U.S. prison for trying to cover up clandestine cash payments to its allies.
Franklin Duran was also the owner of the Venezuela-registered Cessna Citation II that was sometimes used to transport Alvarez and Goudreau, an AP investigation found. Duran over two decades has had numerous business ties with the socialist government of Venezuela, making him an odd choice to help a band of would-be-mercenaries overthrow Maduro. He was arrested in 2020 by Maduro for his involvement in the plot.
The U.S. indictment makes no mention of Duran but does say that in furtherance of the conspiracy, Goudreau, Alvarez and unnamed others traveled at least three times on a private airplane between Miami’s Opa-Locka airport and the Colombian city of Barranquilla, where Alvarez and Goudreau registered a Colombian affiliate of his Melbourne, Florida-based company Silvercorp.
Earlier this year, Goudreau’s main partner in the would-be coup, Cliver Alcalá, a retired three-star Venezuelan army general, was sentenced in Manhattan federal court to more than two decades for providing weapons to drug-funded rebels in an unrelated case.
Goudreau attended the court proceedings and wrote a letter praising Alcalá, as a freedom-loving patriot who deserved to have his sentence reduced. But he refused then and on other occasions to speak to AP about his role in the attempted coup. His attorney, Gustavo J. Garcia-Montes, said his client is innocent but declined further comment.
The U.S. Justice Department declined to comment. An attorney for Alvarez, Christopher A. Kerr, told AP that Alvarez is “seeking asylum in the United States and has been living here peacefully with other family members, several of whom are U.S. citizens.”
“She will plead not guilty to these charges this afternoon, and as of right now, under our system, they are nothing more than allegations.”
If convicted, Goudreau and Alvarez face between 5 and 20 years in prison for each of the violations in the indictment.
https://www.voanews.com/a/us-veteran-arrested-for-role-in-failed-venezuelan-coup/7725128.html
New Yorkers increasingly seek in-person social events over online connections
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
new york — Over 8 million people live in New York City and yet lasting romantic relationships can still seem hard to come by.
Because of this, many singles in the city have ditched swiping on dating apps for socializing in real life through in-person events such as running clubs, reading parties and singles meetups.
In the early 2010s, dating apps such as Tinder and Hinge became a prominent way to meet potential partners, and though they have produced countless successful love stories, many New York City singles are beginning to grow weary of them.
“I think there’s some disenchantment with dating apps overall. A feeling like they’re an option, but maybe not the best option,” said Kathryn Coduto, assistant professor of media science at Boston University and dating researcher. “An in-person meeting, a group maybe, where there’s similar interests, allows people to connect in person and have that initial conversation without the phone as an intermediary.”
Dating app fatigue paired with recent years of COVID-19 isolation has contributed to a recent upward trend of in-person social events. According to Eventbrite, in-person dating activities in the United States saw a 42% increase in attendance from 2022 to 2023.
Amber Soletti, founder of in-person singles dating event company Single and the City, has seen this trend, too, noting that her business is up 67% in event attendance from a year ago.
“People have this app fatigue, this swipe fatigue,” Soletti said. “They are ready to go back to in-person events and make authentic connections with people in real life.”
This is exactly the goal of the viral Lunge Run Club, a running club based in Manhattan targeted toward singles looking for love.
Founded earlier this year by Steve Cole and Rachael Lansing, the club meets every Wednesday in Manhattan for a 5-kilometer run followed by drinks at a bar. Lunge Run Club started with only 30 people and has since taken the city by storm, raking in hundreds of attendees each week.
The club encourages people to wear black if single and colors if taken, hoping to take some of the mystery and fear out of in-person dating events.
“People always use run clubs or recreational sports, anything like that, as a way to meet people,” Lansing said. “We kind of just took away that mask of, ‘I’m going and maybe I’ll meet someone’ and now it’s the intentional, ‘I’m showing up. I’m wearing all black. I’m saying I’m single. I’m looking to either meet some great friends or someone special.’”
Lunge Run Club is not alone in its mission, but rather a part of a movement of people seeking connection in one of the largest cities in the world. Soletti’s Single and the City hosts speed dating events and specialized singles mixers focused on shared interests, hobbies or even physical characteristics, such as height.
“Having something in common is a great starting point for a relationship, and that could be a friendship, but could also be a romantic relationship,” Coduto said. “That makes a lot of sense when you have something in common with someone, it gives you something to talk about.”
While Lunge Run Club and Single and the City are specifically marketed as dating scenes, other events are more broadly focused on facilitating community in general.
In June 2023, Ben Bradbury, Tom Worcester, Charlotte Jackson and John Lifrieri founded Reading Rhythms, “reading parties” during which people meet at various venues to read and socialize, helping people build community, friendships and possibly even more.
Bradbury explained how in-person interactions, such as those at Reading Rhythms, can facilitate connection in a way that cannot always be replicated online.
“Authentic connection, you can’t fake it when you’re in person. It’s either authentic or it’s not,” Bradbury said. “I think people are really enjoying that, that feeling of having people together and, also, just remembering what it’s like to connect in person. I think society is really wanting that right now.”
Despite not necessarily being advertised as a place to find romantic love, Reading Rhythms has seen an outpouring of support and engagement similar to Lunge Run Club and Single and the City’s events. Reading Rhythms has hosted over 120 parties with 7,500 readers looking for an in-person connection over a shared interest.
“It’s hard to feel someone’s energy when you just see them online. I think with this day and age of social media, and curating our online presence, you get one layer of who someone is,” said Nikki D’Ambrosio, host and longtime participant of Reading Rhythms. “What I love about Reading Rhythms is it’s not just, ‘Hi, my name is Nikki and this is what book I’m reading.’ It’s really going deeper.”
From running to reading to speed dating, people are yearning for in-person connection and New York City has countless opportunities to offer.
Tesla that killed motorcyclist was in Full Self-Driving mode
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
28-year-old mowed down in US state where cars ordinarily aren’t allowed to operate autonomously
Washington State Patrol investigators have found that the Tesla involved in the death of a motorcyclist on Friday, April 19, 2024 was operating in Full Self-Driving (FSD) mode.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/tesla_fsd_motorcyclist_killed/
Are run clubs replacing dating apps in New York City?
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
Every Wednesday, a run club in New York City brings together hundreds of people who are not only looking to stay fit but also searching for love. A three-mile run is followed by beers at local bars, during which the club’s members try to find romantic partners or make new friends. June Hsu reports. Camera: Michael Eckels.
https://www.voanews.com/a/7725110.html
Three Sept. 11 suspects to plead guilty at Guantanamo, New York Times reports
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
Aug. 6: SCV Water Regular Board Meeting
date: 2024-07-31, from: SCV New (TV Station)
SCV Water Agency will be holding their next regular board meeting next Tuesday on Aug.
https://scvnews.com/aug-6-scv-water-regular-board-meeting/
Oct. 6: Samuel Dixon Family Health Center to Host Their 21st Annual Dixon Duck Dash Fundraiser
date: 2024-07-31, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The 21st Annual Dixon Duck Dash presented by Samuel Dixon Family Health Center, Inc. is ready to make another splash on Oct, 6 at the Santa Clarita Aquatic Center from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m
Analysts question if Russian political prisoner movements signal imminent swap
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
Washington — The movement inside Russia of several high-profile political prisoners in recent days is fueling speculation that a prisoner swap with Western countries may be close.
Lawyers and relatives of at least eight individuals say they seem to have been moved from detention facilities across Russia. Those detained had been jailed for criticizing the Kremlin or spreading what Moscow views as false information about the Russian military.
At the same time, legal action by Belarus and Slovenia on foreign nationals has added to speculation in Western media that a multicountry swap, potentially involving Russia, the United States and Germany, may be in the works.
Among those detained in Russia whose location is currently unknown are former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan; British Russian activist and journalist Vladimir Kara-Murza, who contributes to The Washington Post; and Liliya Chanysheva, who worked closely with late opposition leader Alexey Navalny.
Whelan is serving a 16-year prison sentence on espionage charges that he denies. His lawyer told the Interfax news agency she cannot contact him, adding, “There are rumors of a possible exchange.”
The Post reported late Wednesday that prison officials had confirmed Kara-Murza had been moved from a prison colony but would not say where he was taken. The columnist is serving a 25-year prison sentence after being accused of treason because he criticized Russia’s war in Ukraine.
While some analysts believe the disappearances may be a sign of an imminent prisoner swap, others, like Russia expert Keir Giles, are more skeptical.
“We need to bear in mind that the people that we see reported are only the tip of the iceberg, and there are so many others that don’t get that worldwide media attention,” Giles, who works at the British think tank Chatham House, told VOA.
“To be disappeared within the system for a period of days or weeks or even longer is not that unusual,” Giles added. “It’s hard to tell what within the Russian prison system is deliberate cruelty and what is simply the result of inefficiency and incompetence, but the net effect, of course, on the victims is exactly the same.”
Navalny, for instance, was abruptly moved in secret from a prison in central Russia to one above the Arctic Circle in December 2023. The move took 20 days, Giles said. The opposition leader died at the prison in February.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry and Washington embassy did not immediately reply to VOA’s emails requesting comment for this story.
Other political prisoners missing this past week include German Russian citizen Kevin Lik; opposition activist Ksenia Fadeeva; anti-war artist Sasha Skochilenko; and critical politician Ilya Yashin.
The online Russian media outlet Agenstvo reported that at least six special Russian government planes had flown to and from the regions where some of these prisoners were located. VOA could not immediately verify that.
Their disappearances come on the heels of other developments.
In Belarus on Tuesday, President Alexander Lukashenko unexpectedly pardoned Rico Krieger, a German who had been sentenced to death on terrorism charges. Belarus and Russia are close allies.
And on Wednesday, a Slovenian court sentenced two Russians to time served for espionage and said they would be deported to Russia.
Sergei Davidis doesn’t think the timing can be a coincidence. He is the head of the Political Prisoners Support Program and a member of the board at the Russian human rights group Memorial.
Memorial’s co-chair, Oleg Orlov, is among the political prisoners to recently vanish.
“It seems that there is no other reasonable explanation than expectations of some swap,” Davidis told VOA from the Lithuanian capital, Vilnius.
He added that Russian President Vladimir Putin would need to pardon those involved in any potential swap as a formality.
The Daily Beast reported that the swap would take place in Ankara, Turkey, and that a “second part” would potentially occur in Doha.
Putin has previously signaled he would be willing to trade Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich for a Russian man named Vadim Krasikov, who is serving a life sentence in Germany for killing a Chechen dissident in Berlin.
Gershkovich is one of two American journalists imprisoned in Russia. The other is Alsu Kurmasheva. Both were convicted in secret trials on July 19 on charges that are widely viewed as bogus.
Russia state media, meanwhile, reported that four Russians jailed in the United States had disappeared from a database of prisoners that the U.S. Federal Bureau of Prisons operates. It named them as Alexander Vinnik, Maxim Marchenko, Vadim Konoshchenko and Vladislav Klyushin.
Commenting on remarks made by Putin earlier this year about a possible swap for Gershkovich, Giles said, “It is not a process that is pretending particularly hard to be legitimate. It’s just a straightforward extortion.”
The United States and Russia have been engaging in prisoner swap negotiations for months.
“The United States continues to be focused on working around the clock to work to get our wrongfully detained American citizens home,” State Department deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel told VOA at a Wednesday press briefing.
When asked about any updates on a potential prisoner swap, Patel said he had no updates.
Prisoner swaps are typically cloaked in secrecy.
Although the U.S. government has previously faced criticism for exchanging legitimate Russian criminals for innocent Americans, hostage advocate Diane Foley maintained that it is Washington’s duty to do everything it can to protect its citizens.
“They need to have the moral clarity to recognize that their citizen’s life is their responsibility. It’s their responsibility to do all they can to prioritize that life,” Foley told VOA.
Foley founded the Foley Foundation after the abduction and killing in Syria of her son, American journalist James Foley, in 2014. She says the U.S. has made some improvements in assisting families, but the burden still largely falls on relatives whose loved ones are unjustly held abroad.
Since launching a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russia has cracked down hard on anything perceived as criticism of the Kremlin, leading to the arrests of scores of activists and journalists. In late 2023, rights group Memorial estimated there were nearly 1,000 political prisoners jailed in Russia.
The biggest prisoner swap since the Cold War occurred in 2010 and included 14 people in total.
Some information in this report came from Reuters.
Public Health Confirms Measles Case in Los Angeles County
date: 2024-07-31, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health has been notified of one case of measles in a non-Los Angeles County resident who traveled to Los Angeles International airport while infectious on July 26,
https://scvnews.com/public-health-confirms-measles-case-in-los-angeles-county-2/
Trump questions Harris’ race at gathering of Black journalists
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
University of California president Michael Drake to step down
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The LAist
Drake started as UC president in July 2020, charged with leading the UC system through the COVID-19 pandemic.
https://laist.com/news/education/university-of-california-president-michael-drake-will-step-down
More than 83K certs from nearly 7K DigiCert customers must be swapped out now
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Small stay of execution in ‘exceptional circumstances’ promised as lawsuits start to fly
As the DigiCert drama continues, we now have a better idea of the size and scope of the problem – with the organization’s infosec boss admitting the SSL/TLS certificate revocation sweep will affect tens of thousands of its customers, some of which have warned that the short notice may have real-world safety implications and disrupt critical services.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/digicert_certificates_extension/
Summer Reading Finishes Strong with Record-Breaking Stuffed Animal Sleepover
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
GOLETA, CA, July 31, 2024 – The 2024 Summer Reading Program, Adventure Begins at Your Library, came to a close on Saturday, July
The post Summer Reading Finishes Strong with Record-Breaking Stuffed Animal Sleepover appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
Russia takes aim at Sitting Ducks domains, bags 30,000+
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Eight-year-old domain hijacking technique still claiming victims
Dozens of Russia-affiliated criminals are right now trying to wrest control of web domains by exploiting weak DNS services.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/domains_with_delegated_name_service/
LASD Teams with L.A. Rams for Deputy Sheriff Recruitment
date: 2024-07-31, from: SCV New (TV Station)
In a new collaboration, the Los Angeles Rams have teamed up with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department to supercharge recruitment efforts for deputy positions.
The Marshall Star for July 31, 2024
date: 2024-07-31, from: NASA breaking news
SLS Core Stage Rolls Inside Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy NASA’s SLS (Space Launch System) rocket core stage for the Artemis II mission is inside the Vehicle Assembly Building at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center. Tugboats and towing vessels moved the barge and core stage 900-miles to the Florida spaceport from NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility, where it was […]
https://www.nasa.gov/centers-and-facilities/marshall/the-marshall-star-for-july-31-2024/
LA County leaders rebuff Newsom and push for shelter to be offered when clearing encampments
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The LAist
In a unanimous vote, the five supervisors said they’re not changing the county’s longstanding approach in the jurisdiction they control.
State Supe Launches Initiative to Add Housing Units
date: 2024-07-31, from: SCV New (TV Station)
State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond today launched a statewide effort to accelerate housing development by utilizing the significant amount of developable land owned by California’s local education agencies
The Largest T. Rex Could Have Been 70 Percent Heavier Than Fossils Suggest
date: 2024-07-31, from: Smithsonian Magazine
Two scientists used modeling to predict how big the giant carnivores could have really grown, making a point that fossils likely don’t represent the largest or smallest individuals of a species
A Picture-Perfect Portrait: Eliza Hoffman’s Take on Dorothy Vaughan
date: 2024-07-31, from: NASA breaking news
On July 19, 2024, NASA officially named Johnson Space Center’s building 12 the “Dorothy Vaughan Center in Honor of the Women of Apollo.” A portrait of Dorothy Vaughan is now the central feature at the entrance of the newly named building. This portrait was hand-painted by Eliza Hoffman, an accomplished artist who is also a […]
Dos Pueblos Little League Junior All-Stars Eliminated After Historic Run to West Region Tournament
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
The Dos Pueblos Little League All-Stars captured a Southern California Championship and won two games at the West Region Tournament.
The post Dos Pueblos Little League Junior All-Stars Eliminated After Historic Run to West Region Tournament appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
At LA’s infamous Cecil Hotel, formerly unhoused tenants report a plague of problems
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The LAist
The iconic Skid Row building went from the true crime spotlight to homeless housing. But some residents wonder if they were better off before moving in.
2024 Software of the Year Co-Winner – Orbital Debris Engineering Model (ORDEM)
date: 2024-07-31, from: NASA breaking news
NASA Johnson Space Center: ORDEM represents the state of the art in orbital debris models intended for engineering analysis. It is a data-driven model, relying on large quantities of radar, optical, in situ, and laboratory measurement data. When released, it was the first software code to include a model for different orbital debris material densities, population […]
2024 Software of the Year Award Co-Winner -Prognostics Python Packages (ProgPy)
date: 2024-07-31, from: NASA breaking news
NASA Ames Research Center: ProgPy is an open-source Python package supporting research and development of prognostics, health management, and predictive maintenance tools. Prognostics is the science of prediction, and the field of Prognostics and Health Management (PHM) aims at estimating the current physical health of a system (e.g., motor, battery, etc.) and predicting how the […]
Barger Statement on County’s Homeless Encampment Strategy
date: 2024-07-31, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Supervisor Kathryn Barger issued a statement following the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors’ discussion about the County’s work to address homeless encampments
New National Park Site Spotlights School Segregation in Texas
date: 2024-07-31, from: Smithsonian Magazine
The Blackwell School was once Marfa’s only public school for Mexican and Mexican American students
Intel prepares to cut ‘thousands’ of workers
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Employees hate this one simple trick to fix failing business empires
Intel is said to be considering laying off thousands of its employees to alleviate the x86 giant’s unsteady financial situation.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/intel_layoff_rumors/
Like Lummis
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
The advice of Charles Fletcher Lummis for Santa Barbara should be heeded today as the character of this graceful city is at stake on lower State.
The post Like Lummis appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/07/31/like-lummis/
Vega Vineyard Welcomes All Ages to Buellton
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
The Buellton farm’s family-friendly cabanas now open as food service caters to both casual and classy tastes.
The post Vega Vineyard Welcomes All Ages to Buellton appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/07/31/vega-vineyard-welcomes-all-ages-to-buellton/
Aristocratic Tomb Discovered in Italy Offers Clues to a Mysterious Pre-Roman Civilization
date: 2024-07-31, from: Smithsonian Magazine
The burial site, rife with Iron Age artifacts like a chariot and a helmet, likely belonged to a Piceni prince
Remember Nokia? Amazon’s lawyers do, in patent infringement suit
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Finnish firm started the networking and cloud fight, Amazon could finish it
Amazon has filed a complaint against Nokia accusing the Finnish tech firm of violating a dozen of its patents.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/amazon_nokia_lawsuit/
2024 Invention of the Year Winner – Thrust Chamber Liner and Fabrication Method
date: 2024-07-31, from: NASA breaking news
NASA Marshall Space Flight Center: A thrust chamber assembly (TCA) is the critical and central component in a rocket engine that provides thrust to propel a launch vehicle into space. Since the 1960s, while small improvements in TCA performance have been made, little has been done to reduce weight, improve development timelines, and reduce manufacturing cost. […]
https://www.nasa.gov/organizations/otps/2024-invention-of-the-year-winner/
Upcoming US export rules on chipmaking tools won’t apply to friendly countries
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
37 nations on good terms with Uncle Sam spared incoming restrictions, report claims
The US is said to be tightening its export rules on chipmaking equipment, but will provide exceptions for allied and friendly nations.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/us_export_rules_chipmaking/
AI Companion Device Releases Diss Track Against ‘Friend’
date: 2024-07-31, from: 404 Media Group
The maker of Friend said he had “no relation” to the person who released the diss track.
https://www.404media.co/ai-companion-device-releases-diss-track-against-friend/
What If We Just Build More Normal Nuclear Plants?
date: 2024-07-31, from: Heatmap News
More than any other form of zero-carbon energy, nuclear energy seems to be stuck between its past and its future. There are currently 94 working reactors in the United States, fewer than there were in 1990. With the country’s growing energy needs in mind, the federal government has made generous incentives and tax credits available for constructing new nuclear power, operating existing plants, and for re-opening shuttered plants. It has also literally rewritten the rulebook for nuclear power to encourage the development of smaller advanced reactors that are supposed to be, eventually, cheaper to build at scale.
But in the meantime, there’s the confused present.
Despite more reactors closing than opening in the past decade, nuclear
remains the largest source of carbon-free energy on the U.S. grid. Right
now, there are only a handful of reactor designs certified by the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, but no actual plans to build any more of
them. The two most recently built reactors in the U.S., Vogtle 3 and 4,
are both AP1000s, the latest version of the workhouse United States
nuclear design — massive light water reactors, the most common reactor
type, which use regular water as a coolant. (The other approved designs
include the ESBWR, a GE-Hitachi reactor, and the APR-1400 — both
versions of large, light-water reactors, both more likely to be built
overseas than at home.) The NRC has approved just one small modular
reactor design, but a recent attempt to actually build it for a
coalition of utilities
fell
through.
The two reactors that have been built recently, Georgia’s Vogtle 3 and 4, were each delivered years behind schedule and billions of dollars over budget. “So there was a feeling in the industry that we weren’t going to build anymore AP1000s,” Jessica Lovering, co-founder and executive director of the Good Energy Collective, told me. “And that was a shame because we just got all this experience from doing this big project.”
Lately, however, utilities have been asking a provocative question. What if, instead of waiting for one of the many nascent advanced reactor technologies to take off, we just … keep building AP1000s, instead?
Anyone who wants to build or buy new nuclear power might have a new
partner in The Nuclear Company, which wants to build a 6 gigawatt fleet
of reactors — to start — using “proven, licensed technology,” according
to the company’s public statements. Juliann Edwards, The Nuclear
Company’s chief development officer, wouldn’t specify which technology
in particular the company is planning on deploying, but she did tell me
it plans on doing so one after the other, in sequence, hoping to drive
down the massive price of building a new reactor. “We’re definitely
focused on fleet scale deployment,” Edwards said.
“Six has been this magic number that comes back again and again and again,” Ted Nordhaus, founder and executive director of the Breakthrough Institute told me. The Energy Policy Act of 2005, for instance, called for 6,000 megawatts — a.k.a. 6 gigawatts — of new nuclear built with a new production tax credit as an incentive, exactly what Edwards and crew are planning to deliver.
The Nuclear Company won’t be designing or operating the reactors. Instead, Edwards told me, “picture us as the front end as well as throughput to operations. That’s ensuring that a project gets developed, licensed, all the necessary environmental permits, interconnect filings,” working with utilities that have licensed and permitted development sites already lined up. The company is focusing particularly on the big new sources of electricity demand — data centers and manufacturing — which likely means it will concentrate its activities in the East and Southeast. As far as areas where nuclear development has already been approved, Utility Dive identified sites in Florida and South Carolina that are licensed for AP1000, while others in Michigan and Virginia are authorized to use GE-Hitachi reactors.
The reason having this fleet approach matters, Lovering told me, is that building out a supply chain and getting the requisite investment is much easier when everyone involved knows there’s going to be six reactors’ worth in the pipeline, and costs could fall as the reactors are constructed. “If it was just a one-off project, I’d be much more skeptical,” she said. “It’s always easier to get financing for a proven project that’s already up and running.”
John Kotek, the head of public policy for the Nuclear Energy Institute, concurred. He told me in an emailed statement that The Nuclear Company’s business model “demonstrates the innovation needed to meet the demand for clean, reliable nuclear energy.”
But there’s a reason much of the nuclear advocacy and policy community has seen advanced reactors as the solution to building out the scale of nuclear power needed to help power a growing grid without carbon emissions. Nordhaus’ Breakthrough Institute is one of the biggest boosters of nuclear, with a focus on reforming the regulatory system in order to make advanced nuclear more economical.
“The market for a 1 gigawatt reactor is a very large public works project,” Nordhaus said. “No one in the world has ever built one of these things on spec. Instead, they’re typically built by national energy companies, or, in the United States, by utilities who are able to essentially charge their customers for the massive costs of construction.”
While the nuclear industry has, with lots of intellectual and public support from groups like Nordhaus’s Breakthrough, oriented its energies toward advanced reactors, The Nuclear Company likely has fans in the Department of Energy, which would really like to see more large reactors getting built soon. “There’s a lot of energy right now, being driven in part by [Secretary of Energy Jennifer] Granholm and [the Loan Programs Office’s] Jigar [Shah], who are like, We need to get nuclear steel in the ground and get more AP1000s built,” Nordhaus said.
Granholm has called for a buildout of new nuclear “at a scale not seen since the ’70s and ’80s.” The Department of Energy’s Loan Program Office, meanwhile, has been supporting nuclear since its founding following the Energy Policy Act of 2005, and Shah has scolded utilities and state regulators for demanding the government essentially provide cost overrun insurance before they even think about building a new AP1000, pointing to the incentives and loans available from the feds.
Nordhaus, who called himself “skeptical” about The Nuclear Company’s plans, told me that his goal was “to get technology to market that would be feasible to build outside a vertically integrated market. I don’t see how nuclear has a future in this country if you don’t do that.”
That’s Edwards’s goal, too. She’s confident that The Nuclear Company could build even in restructured electricity markets where utilities can’t tap their ratepayers to build expensive new plants, she told me. “We need to be able to get in a cycle where maybe we’re breaking ground and by the late 2020s. And then we’re going into putting neutrons on the grid by the mid 2030s.”
https://heatmap.news/climate/the-nuclear-company-reactors
Divers Find Crates of Unopened Champagne in 19th-Century Shipwreck
date: 2024-07-31, from: Smithsonian Magazine
Discovered near Sweden, the vessel was loaded with bottles of sparkling wine, mineral water and porcelain
Ancient Mesoamerican ‘Pyramid of the Moon’ May Align With Summer and Winter Solstices
date: 2024-07-31, from: Smithsonian Magazine
New research suggests the monument in Teotihuacán, along with the larger Pyramid of the Sun, were designed based on astronomical movements
Ranger 7 Snaps the Moon
date: 2024-07-31, from: NASA breaking news
On July 31, 1964, the Ranger 7 spacecraft took this photo, the first image of the Moon taken by a United States spacecraft. 17 minutes later, it crashed into the Moon on the northern rim of the Sea of Clouds as intended. The 4,316 images sent back helped identify safe Moon landing sites for Apollo […]
https://www.nasa.gov/image-article/ranger-7-snaps-the-moon/
Tech Today: Remote Sensing Technology Fights Forest Fires
date: 2024-07-31, from: NASA breaking news
Enabled by NASA Sensors and Technical Assistance
https://www.nasa.gov/general/tech-today-remote-sensing-technology-fights-forest-fires/
South Carolina Supreme Court rules state death penalty including firing squad is legal
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
columbia, south carolina — South Carolina can execute death row inmates by firing squad, lethal injection or the electric chair, the state’s high court ruled Wednesday, opening the door to restart executions after more than a decade.
All five justices agreed with at least part of the ruling. But two of the justices said they felt the firing squad was not a legal way to kill an inmate and one of them felt the electric chair is a cruel and unusual punishment.
The state allowing inmates to choose from the three execution methods is far from an effort to inflict pain but a sincere attempt at making the death penalty less inhumane, Justice John Few wrote in the majority opinion.
As many as eight inmates may be out of traditional appeals. It is unclear when executions could restart or whether lawyers for death row inmates can appeal the ruling.
Governor Henry McMaster said the justices interpreted the law correctly.
“This decision is another step in ensuring that lawful sentences can be duly enforced and the families and loved ones of the victims receive the closure and justice they have long awaited,” he said in a statement.
Lawyers for the death row inmates said they were reviewing the 94-page ruling before commenting.
South Carolina has executed 43 inmates since the death penalty was restarted in the U.S. in 1976. Nearly all inmates have chosen lethal injection since it became an option in 1995.
“Choice cannot be considered cruel because the condemned inmate may elect to have the State employ the method he and his lawyers believe will cause him the least pain,” Few wrote.
South Carolina hasn’t performed an execution since 2011. The state’s supplies of drugs for lethal injections expired and no pharmaceutical companies would sell more if they could be publicly identified.
Lawmakers authorized the state to create a firing squad in 2021 to give inmates a choice between it and the old electric chair. The inmates sued, saying either choice was cruel and unusual punishment prohibited by the Constitution.
In spring 2023, the Legislature passed a shield law to keep lethal injection drug suppliers secret and the state announced in September it had the sedative pentobarbital and changed the method of lethal injection execution from using three drugs to just one.
The Supreme Court allowed the inmates to add arguments that the shield law was too secret by not releasing the potency, purity and stabilization of lethal injection drugs.
South Carolina has 32 inmates on its death row. Four prisoners are suing, but four more have also run out of appeals, although two of them face a competency hearing before they could be executed, according to Justice 360, an advocacy group for inmates.
The state said in its argument before the state Supreme Court in February that lethal injection, electrocution and firing squad all fit existing death penalty protocols.
“Courts have never held the death has to be instantaneous or painless,” wrote Grayson Lambert, a lawyer for the governor’s office.
But lawyers for the inmates asked the justices to agree with Circuit Judge Jocelyn Newman, who stopped executions with the electric chair or firing squad.
She cited the inmates’ experts, who testified at a trial that prisoners would feel terrible pain whether their bodies were “cooking” by 2,000 volts of electricity in the chair, built in 1912, or if their hearts were stopped by bullets — assuming the three shooters were on target — from the yet-to-be used firing squad.
On the shield law, the attorneys for the inmates said they need to know if there is a regular supplier for the drug, which typically only has a shelf life of 45 days, and what guidelines are in place to test it and make sure it is what the seller claims.
Too weak a dose, and inmates may suffer without dying. Too strong, and the drug molecules can form tiny clumps that would cause intense pain when injected, according to court papers.
“No inmate in the country has ever been put to death with such little transparency about how he or she would be executed,” Justice 360 lawyer Lindsey Vann wrote.
Lawyers for the inmates did tell the justices in February that lethal injection appears to be legal when it follows proper protocols, with information about the drug given to the condemned in a manner that matches what other states and the federal government use.
South Carolina used to carry out an average of three executions a year and had more than 60 inmates on death row when the last execution was carried out in 2011. Since then, successful appeals and natural deaths have lowered the number to 32.
Prosecutors have sent only three new prisoners to death row in the past 13 years. Facing rising costs, the lack of lethal injection drugs and more vigorous defenses, they are choosing to accept guilty pleas and life in prison without parole.
Boeing’s Q2 nosedive buoyed by appointment of new CEO
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
It lost billions and missed expectations, but fresh blood at the top has pleased shareholders
Boeing missed the mark on pretty much every analyst expectation in Q2 as it continues to struggle to recover from a series of devastating engineering failures.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/boeing_q2_2024/
J.D. Vance Fought Health Protections For Steelworkers And Their Communities
date: 2024-07-31, from: The Lever News
The Republican VP nominee pressured regulators to weaken limits on cancer-causing emissions from steel industry manufacturing.
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-07-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
A Forgotten 1990s Law Could Make It Illegal to Discuss Abortion Online.
https://newrepublic.com/article/167178/1990s-law-abortion-online-illegal-cda
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-07-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
2022: IndieWeb should love RSS (and OPML).
http://scripting.com/2022/10/15/133405.html?title=indiewebShouldLoveRss
Five signs that the GenAI honeymoon is over
date: 2024-07-31, from: Gary Marcus blog
And why that might be a good thing
https://garymarcus.substack.com/p/five-signs-that-the-genai-honeymoon
US denies involvement in killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
The United States said it was not involved in the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh in an overnight strike in Tehran. Haniyeh is the second Iran-backed militant group leader assassinated this week. White House Bureau Chief Patsy Widakuswara has the story.
US withholds $95 million in assistance from Georgian government
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
US strengthens Indo-Pacific alliances
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
Tokyo — The United States this week moved to significantly strengthen its alliances in the Indo-Pacific amid a perceived security threat from China, including a major upgrade of the U.S. military command in Japan.
Washington and Tokyo insist the changes are purely defensive, but questions remain about the military readiness of the United States and its allies if conflict erupts.
The United States has around 55,000 troops stationed in Japan, with most of them deployed in the southern Okinawan islands. The Kadena Air Base outside the Okinawan capital, Naha, is America’s largest in the Pacific region.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin held so-called “2+2” talks with their Japanese counterparts in Tokyo on Sunday and announced a major shift in defense relations.
“The United States will upgrade the U.S. Forces Japan to a joint force headquarters with expanded missions and operational responsibilities. This will be the most significant change to U.S. Forces Japan since its creation and one of the strongest improvements in our military ties with Japan in 70 years,” Austin told reporters.
“Our decision to move in this direction is not based upon any threat from China. It’s based on our desire and our ability to work closer together and to be more effective,” he said.
The upgraded military command is expected to be led by a three-star general, with the possibility of a four-star general in future leadership.
Analysts said it marked a profound change in the U.S. approach to its forces in Japan.
“That means the Americans are serious. The Americans are really serious about fighting a war [alongside] Japan. Against whom? I don’t know. Whoever wants to change the status quo by force, we may have to fight,” Kunihiko Miyake, president of the Tokyo-based Foreign Policy Institute, told VOA.
The move is designed to complement Japan’s new Joint Operations Command, which is due to launch in March 2025.
Grant Newsham, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Center for Security Policy, welcomed the change.
“It’s a good first step … toward getting the Americans and the Japanese in a position where they can actually fight together,” he told VOA. “But what remains to be seen — and this is important — is how much authority will it have? What units will be assigned to it? What responsibility will it have in the event of a contingency?”
The U.S. and Japan also agreed to numerous other defense measures, including joint missile development and the possible deployment of American troops alongside Japanese forces in outlying islands.
Discussions also focused on so-called U.S. “extended deterrence” — whether Washington would be willing to use its nuclear weapons to defend Japan.
Japanese capabilities
Tokyo last year announced plans to double its defense spending to 2% of its gross domestic product by 2027.
Newsham said the Japanese military needs huge investment in recruitment, weapons and logistics.
“So, there’s a number of practical things that Japan needs to do to be ready to fight a war. And then you ask yourself, ‘Well, how are you going to actually link up with the Americans to fight? Have you done the necessary planning and training so that you can just fall right in and deal with a real-world contingency?’” he said.
There are fears that such a contingency is dangerously close. The U.S. and Japan on Sunday labeled China the “greatest strategic challenge” facing the region, amid Beijing’s rapid military buildup in the disputed South China Sea and ongoing military exercises around Taiwan.
Chinese President Xi Jinping has pledged to reunify the island with China, and there is speculation he is planning to do so by force.
‘Lattice’ of alliances
In such a volatile region, U.S. officials say Washington is seeking to interconnect its regional alliances with the United States and each other, creating a “lattice” framework to protect Indo-Pacific security.
There are limits to such cooperation, Miyake said.
“Of course, we cannot have a NATO-type collective alliance system, because we have a different historical background. But what we needed to have is multilayered security arrangements.”
The Philippines is emerging as a key U.S partner in the region. Visiting Manila Tuesday alongside Austin, Blinken announced a $500 million military aid package for Manila, describing it as a “once-in-a-generation investment to help modernize the Filipino armed forces and coast guard.”
The “Quad” grouping of the United States, Japan, India and Australia provides another layer of regional security. Foreign ministers of those nations met in Tokyo on Monday, a day after the U.S.-Japan bilateral meetings, and issued a joint statement calling for a “free and open” Pacific.
The AUKUS alliance between the U.S., Australia and the United Kingdom offers further scope for security coordination in the Indo-Pacific.
But effective military alliances require more than agreements on paper, Newsham said.
“For this so-called latticework of a range of alliances and agreements that the Americans have tried to put together — well, with whom can they do a real-world short notice operation? That means if you had to go out and really do something for real, like fight, who could they do it with? And that is a very, very short list. It’s pretty much got nobody on it, except for the United States Navy and the Japanese navy,” he said.
China checkmated?
Speaking to ABC News on July 6, U.S. President Joe Biden said the network of alliances Washington had built in the Indo-Pacific region were “checkmating” China. Newsham questioned that assertion.
“Look at Chinese operations around Taiwan. These are nonstop, almost every day, and they’re getting closer and closer to Taiwan. They’re surrounding Taiwan. And you might ask the Taiwanese if they think the Chinese are checkmated,” Newsham said.
“Additionally, the Chinese and the Russians are doing more together militarily than they ever have, circumnavigating Japan, getting close to Alaska with nuclear-capable bombers. Well, the Chinese aren’t showing any sign of having been checkmated. Their military buildup continues unabated,” he said.
But the value of U.S. regional alliances — especially that with Japan — shouldn’t be underestimated, said Miyake.
“Allies are the people or the countries who fight for you and bleed for you. Who wants to fight against the Americans for the Chinese? I don’t know. Even the Russians don’t want to do that,” Miyake said.
Beijing denies that it poses a threat to Indo-Pacific security. A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson urged the U.S. and Japan to abandon what it called a “Cold War mentality,” adding that the $500 million of U.S. military aid for the Philippines would increase insecurity.
Russia on Wednesday said the U.S. and Japan appeared to be preparing “for a large-scale armed conflict in the Asia-Pacific region.” Russian Foreign Ministry deputy spokesperson Andrei Nastasin told reporters that Moscow was consulting with China and North Korea on how best to respond.
https://www.voanews.com/a/us-strengthens-indo-pacific-alliances/7724479.html
ONEXPLAYER M1 is a mini PC with Intel Core Ultra 9 185H, OCuLink, and USB4 for $699 and up
date: 2024-07-31, from: Liliputing
The ONEXPLAYER line of handheld gaming PCs have been around since 2021. But parent company One Netbook has been selling other types of computers including mini-laptops and tablets for even longer. Now the company is branching out with the introduction of a mini PC positioned as a compact gaming solution, although the ONEXPLAYER M1 could […]
The post ONEXPLAYER M1 is a mini PC with Intel Core Ultra 9 185H, OCuLink, and USB4 for $699 and up appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/onexplayer-m1-is-a-mini-pc-with-intel-core-ultra-9-185h-oculink-and-usb4/
Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Dev Kit mini PC now available for pre-order, has the most powerful Snapdragon X Elite chip to date
date: 2024-07-31, from: Liliputing
The Qualcomm Snapdragon Dev Kit for Windows is a mini PC may be aimed at developers, but it’s also the most powerful PC you can buy with a Snapdragon X Elite processor… and it’s also one of the cheapest. First announced in May, the little desktop computer is now available for pre-order from Arrow for […]
The post Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Dev Kit mini PC now available for pre-order, has the most powerful Snapdragon X Elite chip to date appeared first on Liliputing.
Chrome adopts app-bound encryption to stymie cookie-stealing malware
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Windows users now get macOS-grade secret security
Google says it’s enhancing the security of sensitive data managed by Chrome for Windows users to fight the scourge of infostealer malware targeting cookies.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/chrome_appbound_encryption/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-07-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Trump anti-vaccine vow is depraved indifference to human life.
https://dangillmor.com/2024/07/30/trump-anti-vaccine-vow-is-depraved-indifference-to-human-life/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-07-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
About the demise of Google Podcasts.
In LA, your chic vacation rental may be a rent-controlled apartment
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The LAist
Amid an affordable housing crisis, dozens of rent-controlled buildings are listed on short-term rental websites. A 2018 law was supposed to stop that, but the city is struggling to enforce it.
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-07-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Jeff Bezos’s leadership rules are revered and imitated by CEOs everywhere—Can they survive the Andy Jassy era at Amazon?
New “Maracasalsa” video previews our 2024-25 season!
date: 2024-07-31, from: L.A.G.Q. news
LAGQ looks forward to U.S. and European dates in 2024-2025. Our program will include “Maracasalsa”, a wonderful piece by our newest member, Douglas Lora. This wonderfully appealing piece is a Brazilian-inspired Toccata and Fugue! Here is a video we had a chance to record while on tour in Spring, 2024.
https://www.lagq.com/news/2024/7/31/new-maracasalsa-video-previews-our-2024-25-season
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-07-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Guy Kawasaki: How to Keep an Open Mind.
Two senior board execs leave SAP as restructuring hits the fan
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
German vendor maintains departures follow increase in job cuts
On the back of an expanded workforce restructuring, two execs responsible for revenue and marketing depart have departed SAP’s board.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/sap_board_execs_leave/
macOS 14.6
date: 2024-07-31, from: Michael Tsai
Juli Clover (release notes, security, developer, enterprise, full installer, IPSW): macOS Sonoma 14.6 includes bug fixes and security improvements, and it is recommended for all Macs that run the macOS Sonoma operating system. Juli Clover: The macOS Sonoma 14.6 update that Apple released today includes dual display support, an important feature specifically for the 14-inch […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2024/07/31/macos-14-6/
macOS 13.6.8 and macOS 12.7.6
date: 2024-07-31, from: Michael Tsai
Apple (full installer): This document describes the security content of macOS Ventura 13.6.8. Apple (full installer): This document describes the security content of macOS Monterey 12.7.6. Adam Engst: Our general advice is that these updates are all worth installing soon, but with one exception, you can wait until it’s convenient since none of the vulnerabilities […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2024/07/31/macos-13-6-8-and-macos-12-7-6/
iOS 17.6 and iPadOS 17.6
date: 2024-07-31, from: Michael Tsai
Juli Clover (release notes, security, developer): There are no notable features in the iOS 17.6 and iPadOS 17.6 updates, with Apple adding unspecified bug fixes and security updates. Nothing new was discovered during the beta testing process. Eric deRuiter: Updating to iOS 17.6 now prompts to enable Stolen Device Protection on the first boot. This […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2024/07/31/ios-17-6-and-ipados-17-6/
watchOS 10.6
date: 2024-07-31, from: Michael Tsai
Juli Clover (release notes, security, developer): The watchOS 10.6 update does not add any new features, and instead focuses on bug fixes and security improvements. Previously: watchOS 10.5
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2024/07/31/watchos-10-6/
tvOS 17.6
date: 2024-07-31, from: Michael Tsai
Juli Clover (release notes, security, developer): There were no new features found during the beta testing process. Previously: tvOS 17.5.1
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2024/07/31/tvos-17-6/
visionOS 1.3
date: 2024-07-31, from: Michael Tsai
Juli Clover (release notes, security, developer): There are no new features in the visionOS 1.3 update, but it does bring small bug fixes and security improvements. Previously: visionOS 2 Announced
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2024/07/31/visionos-1-3/
AYANEO Pocket DMG and Pocket Micro hit Indiegogo (Handheld Android game systems)
date: 2024-07-31, from: Liliputing
AYANEO’s latest handheld game consoles are Android-powered systems with retro-powered designs. The AYANEO Pocket DMG is a powerful system designed to look a bit like a Game Boy. And the AYANEO Pocket Micro meanwhile is a smaller, cheaper device that puts an emphasis on portability rather than bleeding edge performance. First announced earlier this year, they’re both […]
The post AYANEO Pocket DMG and Pocket Micro hit Indiegogo (Handheld Android game systems) appeared first on Liliputing.
Boeing announces new CEO amid ‘challenging’ year
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
https://www.voanews.com/a/boeing-announces-new-ceo-amid-challenging-year-/7724356.html
Sergey Durmanov opened issue #151: IN operators dont work with SET64 for 32-bit CPUs at Felix Oliver Friedrich / Oberon A2
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: Oberon A2 at CAS
IN operators dont work with SET64 for 32-bit CPUs, because in FoxIntermediateBackend.EvaluateBinaryExpression after calling the Convert procedures the argument types are system.setType
https://gitlab.inf.ethz.ch/felixf/oberon/-/issues/151
When what looks like one restaurant is actually dozens
date: 2024-07-31, from: Marketplace Morning Report
Restaurants are having a tough year, with high prices keeping customers away. Cue some innovation. Today, we’ll visit Wonder on New York City’s Upper West Side, which looks like a typical fast-food place from the outside but is actually a startup serving dishes from multiple restaurant brands. We’ll also learn more about Boeing’s space travel business, corporate investments in AI and Microsoft’s calls for laws on deepfake fraud.
Sergey Durmanov opened issue #150: INCL/EXCL operators dont work with SET64 for 32-bit CPUs at Felix Oliver Friedrich / Oberon A2
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: Oberon A2 at CAS
INCL/EXCL operators dont work with SET64 for 32-bit CPUs, because in FoxIntermediateBackend.DesignateBuiltinCallDesignator after calling the Convert procedure the argument types become 64-bit, but in the I386.Builtins module for shifts the second parameter is 32-bit.
https://gitlab.inf.ethz.ch/felixf/oberon/-/issues/150
Samsung confirms Exynos 2500 chip as profit skyrockets on back of AI memory boom
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Strikes? What strikes?
Samsung Electronics is riding the AI wave with an increase in sales and a huge jump in operating profit thanks to a recovery in the memory market, and the firm expects demand from server AI to stay strong for the rest of the year.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/samsung_q2_2024/
Sergey Durmanov opened issue #149: issue with SET64 constructor for 32-bit CPUs at Felix Oliver Friedrich / Oberon A2
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: Oberon A2 at CAS
SET64 constructor does not work for 32-bit CPUs
MODULE TestSet2;
IMPORT KernelLog;
PROCEDURE Do*;
VAR s: SET64;
BEGIN
s := { 7..13 };
Set(s);
s := { 27..53 };
Set(s);
END Do;
PROCEDURE Set*(x: SET64);
VAR first := TRUE: BOOLEAN; bit := {0}: SET64; i: INTEGER;
BEGIN
KernelLog.Char("{");
FOR i := 0 TO MAX(SET64) DO
IF bit * x # {} THEN
IF ~first THEN KernelLog.Char(",") ELSE first := FALSE END;
KernelLog.Int(i,1);
END;
bit := SHL(bit, 1);
END;
KernelLog.Char("}");
END Set;
END TestSet2.
System.Free TestSet2~
TestSet2.Do~https://gitlab.inf.ethz.ch/felixf/oberon/-/issues/149
Biden prods Congress to act to curb fentanyl from Mexico as Trump paints Harris as weak on border
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden is prodding Congress to help him do more to combat the scourge of fentanyl before he leaves office.
The Democratic administration is making the new policy push as Republican former President Donald Trump steps up attacks against Vice President Kamala Harris, painting her as Biden’s feckless lieutenant in the battle to slow the illegal drugs and immigrants without authorization coming into the United States from Mexico.
The White House on Wednesday announced a series of proposals from Biden aimed at curbing the ongoing drug epidemic. These include a push on Congress to pass legislation to establish a pill press and tableting machine registry and enhance penalties against convicted drug smugglers and traffickers of fentanyl.
Biden also wants to tighten rules on importers shipping small packages into the United States, requiring shippers to provide additional information to Customs and Border Protection officials. The move is aimed at improving the detection of fentanyl precursor chemicals that frequently find their way into the United States in relatively low-value shipments that aren’t subject to customs and trade barriers.
The president’s new efforts at combating fentanyl may also benefit Harris, the likely Democratic nominee, as Trump and his surrogates are trying to cast her as a central player in the Biden administration’s struggles at the U.S.-Mexico border throughout his term.
“Still, far too many of our fellow Americans continue to lose loved ones to fentanyl,” Biden said in a statement. “This is a time to act. And this is a time to stand together — for all those we have lost, and for all the lives we can still save.”
Biden said he will also sign a national security memorandum on Wednesday aimed at improving the sharing of information between law enforcement and federal agencies to improve understanding about the flows of production and smuggling of the synthetic opioid that has ravaged huge swaths of America. In the last five months, more than 442 million doses of fentanyl were seized at U.S. borders, according to the White House.
The Trump campaign launched its first television ad of the general election cycle on Tuesday, dubbing Harris the “border czar” and blaming her for a surge in illegal crossings into the United States during the Biden administration. After displaying headlines about crime and drugs, the video brands Harris as “Failed. Weak. Dangerously liberal.”
Border crossings hit record highs during the Biden administration but have dropped more recently.
The Trump campaign has so far reserved $12.2 million in television and digital ads through the next two weeks, according to data from the media tracking firm AdImpact.
Biden tasked Harris early in his administration with addressing the root causes of migration. Border crossings became a major political liability for Biden when they reached historic levels. Since June, when Biden announced significant restrictions on asylum applications at the border, arrests for illegal crossings have fallen.
House Republicans passed a symbolic resolution last week criticizing Harris’ work on the border on behalf of the Biden administration.
The White House reiterated its call on Congress to pass sweeping immigration legislation that includes funding for more border agents and drug detection machines at the border. GOP senators earlier this year scuttled months of negotiations with Democrats on legislation intended to cut back record numbers of illegal border crossings after Trump eviscerated the bipartisan proposal.
The proposed pill-pressing registry floated by Biden aims to help law enforcement crackdown on drug traffickers who use pill presses to press fentanyl into pills.
Authorities say most illicit fentanyl is produced clandestinely in Mexico, using chemical precursors from China. Synthetic opioids are the biggest killers in the deadliest drug crisis the U.S. has ever seen. In 2014, nearly 50,000 deaths in the U.S. were linked to drug overdoses of all kinds. By 2022, the total was more than 100,000, according to a tally by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. More than two-thirds of those deaths — more than 200 per day — involved fentanyl or similar synthetic drugs.
Meeting with China
Meanwhile, administration officials and Chinese government officials are expected to meet Wednesday to discuss efforts to curb the flow of chemical precursors coming from China, according to a senior administration official.
Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping announced at a November summit in California that Beijing had agreed to press its chemical companies to curtail shipments to Latin America and elsewhere of the materials used to produce fentanyl. China also agreed to a resumption of sharing information about suspected trafficking with an international database.
But a special House committee focused on countering the Chinese government in April issued a report that China still is fueling the fentanyl crisis in the U.S. by directly subsidizing the manufacturing of materials that are used by traffickers to make the drug outside the country.
The official, who spoke under the condition of anonymity under ground rules set by the White House, said China had taken “important steps,” but there is much more to do.
Name that Ware, July 2024
date: 2024-07-31, from: Bunnie’s Studio Blog
The Ware for July 2024 is shown below. Thanks again to jackw01 for contributing this ware! The last two images might be killer clues that give away the ware, but they are also so cool I couldn’t not include them as part of the post.
https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/2024/name-that-ware-july-2024/
Winner, Name that Ware June 2024
date: 2024-07-31, from: Bunnie’s Studio Blog
The Ware for June 2024 is a hash board from an Antminer S19 generation bitcoin miner, with the top side heatsinks removed. I’ll give the prize to Alex, for the thoughtful details related in the comments. Congrats, email me for your prize! I chose this portion of the miner to share for the ware because […]
https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/2024/winner-name-that-ware-june-2024/
Sergey Durmanov opened issue #148: issue with set constructor (range order) at Felix Oliver Friedrich / Oberon A2
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: Oberon A2 at CAS
If the order of the elements is in the range from largest to smallest, the set constructor produces an incorrect result.
MODULE TestSet1;
PROCEDURE Do*;
VAR s: SET;
BEGIN
s := { 13..7 };
TRACE(s);
s := { 7..13 };
TRACE(s);
END Do;
END TestSet1.
System.Free TestSet1~
TestSet1.Do~https://gitlab.inf.ethz.ch/felixf/oberon/-/issues/148
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-07-31, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
As I was telling a friend, If you are not running iOS 18.1 you might as well just run Android or live in a cave.
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/112881574260230389
Santa Clara County fire responds to one-acre blaze in Lexington Hills area
date: 2024-07-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
At least one other fire has burned in same area this month.
‘This species could blink out’: Park Fire jeopardizing one of California’s most iconic species
date: 2024-07-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
The fire is moving into areas where salmon are waiting to spawn. Already in dire shape, experts worry that the Park Fire could be the deathblow to these fish.
Five months after takedown, LockBit is a shadow of its former self
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
An unprecedented period for an unparalleled force in cybercrime
Feature For roughly two years, LockBit’s ransomware operation was by far the most prolific of its kind, until the fateful events of February. After claiming thousands of victims, extorting hundreds of millions of dollars, and building a robust army of sophisticated cybercriminals, the life’s work of its mastermind, LockbitSupp – whom cops claim is Russian national Dmitry Khoroshev – is now hanging by a thread.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/five_months_after_lockbit/
DHS Cracks Large-Scale Apple Counterfeiting ‘Refund Fraud’ Ring
date: 2024-07-31, from: 404 Media Group
A traffic stop in Alabama led to the discovery of a large-scale counterfeiting ring.
https://www.404media.co/dhs-cracks-large-scale-apple-counterfeiting-refund-fraud-ring/
Scammer Allegedly Makes $600,000 a Month Holding Instagram Accounts Hostage
date: 2024-07-31, from: 404 Media Group
The case of Unlocked4Life, who outed himself on Adam-22’s No Jumper podcast, shows how Instagram account scammers have escalated to violence and intimidation too.
https://www.404media.co/unlocked4life-instagram-scam-no-jumper/
Car Insurance Rates Up
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Not only are home insurance rates going to increase, but many car owners should be sitting down when they open their auto insurance premium notice.
The post Car Insurance Rates Up appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/07/31/car-insurance-rates-up/
49ers poll: Is Brock Purdy’s run of interceptions a big deal?
date: 2024-07-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
Brock Purdy has seven interceptions in the last two days at training camp, his first as the full-time starter.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/07/31/49ers-poll-is-brock-purdys-run-of-interceptions-a-big-deal/
Skype goes ad-free, which is unusual for Microsoft
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Feedback prioritized, unless it’s about a feature customers really miss
Microsoft has announced an ad-free update for Skype, now headed to testers in the company’s Insider program. However, this update is unlikely to appease users who are still missing features previously dropped from the once-premier chat app.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/skype_adfree/
‘Insufficient evidence’: DA drops cases of 27 pro-Palestine protesters arrested at Cal Poly Humboldt
date: 2024-07-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
Some of the cases “have been rejected for filing of charges based upon insufficient evidence to prove a crime beyond a reasonable doubt and/or interests of justice grounds,” District Attorney Stacey Eads said.
Toilet paper and flat tires — the strange ways that Californians ignite wildfires
date: 2024-07-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
Californians trigger thousands of wildfires every year with poor choices and reckless behavior. The Park Fire, ignited by a man pushing a burning car, was one.
Podcast: Google, Reddit, and the Robots.txt Rebellion
date: 2024-07-31, from: 404 Media Group
We go long on robots.txt, AI scraping, and what it means for search and the web today. Also, a leaked document shows a multibillion dollar AI company scraped YouTube videos from specific creators, and we discuss Skibidi.
https://www.404media.co/podcast-google-reddit-and-the-robots-txt-rebellion/
This 14 inch Windows tablet with AMD Mendocino sells for under $400
date: 2024-07-31, from: Liliputing
AMD’s Ryzen 7020 “Mendocino” processors launched about two years ago as budget chips for inexpensive laptops with decent performance and long battery life. From time to time they’ve also been used in other devices like handheld gaming PCs. Now Chinese PC company SZBOX has launched a 14 inch Windows tablet with an AMD Mendocino processor […]
The post This 14 inch Windows tablet with AMD Mendocino sells for under $400 appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/this-14-inch-windows-tablet-with-amd-mendocino-sells-for-under-400/
NASA’s First-Ever Quantum Memory Made at Glenn Research Center
date: 2024-07-31, from: NASA breaking news
Bringing bright minds together has once again proven to be the key to unlocking the mysteries of the universe. Researchers developed technology that will store information within a cloud of atoms. Together with Infleqtion Inc., researchers at NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland produced NASA’s first-ever quantum memory. This technology is NASA’s first step in […]
https://www.nasa.gov/general/nasas-first-ever-quantum-memory-made-at-glenn-research-center/
‘Error’ in Microsoft’s DDoS defenses amplified 8-hour Azure outage
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
A playbook full of strategies and someone fumbles the implementation
Do you have problems configuring Microsoft’s Defender? You might not be alone: Microsoft admitted that whatever it’s using for its defensive implementation exacerbated yesterday’s Azure instability.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/microsoft_ddos_azure/
Former Raiders coach Jon Gruden asking full Nevada Supreme Court to reconsider NFL emails lawsuit
date: 2024-07-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
Gruden is asking the entire Nevada Supreme Court to reconsider a decision by a three-justice panel to throw out a lawsuit he filed against the NFL over emails leaked to the media before he resigned as coach of the Las Vegas Raiders in 2021.
Why 49ers’ Juszczyk swallowed his pride and took a pay cut after 7th Pro Bowl
date: 2024-07-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
Fullback Kyle Juszczyk lived up to his contract but was asked to take less anyway by the 49ers.
AI causing burnout, lower productivity
date: 2024-07-31, from: OS News
Is machine learning, also known as “artificial intelligence”, really aiding workers and increasing productivity? A study by Upwork – which, as Baldur Bjarnason so helpfully points out, sells AI solutions and hence did not promote this study on its blog as it does with its other studies – reveals that this might not actually be the case. Nearly half (47%) of workers using AI say they have no idea how to achieve the productivity gains their employers expect. Over three in four (77%) say AI tools have decreased their productivity and added to their workload in at least one way. For example, survey respondents reported that they’re spending more time reviewing or moderating AI-generated content (39%), invest more time learning to use these tools (23%), and are now being asked to do more work (21%). Forty percent of employees feel their company is asking too much of them when it comes to AI. ↫ Upwork research This shouldn’t come as a surprise. We’re in a massive hype cycle when it comes to machine learning, and we’re being told it’s going to revolutionise work and lead to massive productivity gains. In practice, however, it seems these tools just can’t measure up to the hyped promises, and in fact is making people do less and work slower. There’s countless stories of managers being told by upper management to shove machine learning into everything, from products to employee workflows, whether it makes any sense to do so or not. I know from experience as a translator that machine learning can greatly improve my productivity, but the fact that there are certain types of tasks that benefit from ML, doesn’t mean every job suddenly thrives with it. I’m definitely starting to see some cracks in the hype cycle, and this study highlights a major one. I hope we can all come down to earth again, and really take a careful look at where ML makes sense and where it does not, instead of giving every worker a ChatGPT account and blanket demanding massive productivity gains that in no way match the reality on the office floor. And of course, despite demanding massive productivity increases, it’s not like workers are getting an equivalent increase in salary. We’ve seen massive productivity increases for decades now, while paychecks have not followed suit at all, and many people can actually buy less with their salary today than their parents could decades ago. Demands imposed by managers by introducing AI is only going to make this discrepancy even worse.
https://www.osnews.com/story/140365/ai-causing-burnout-lower-productivity/
SFPD and street cleaners take aggressive approach to clearing homeless encampments
date: 2024-07-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
In California, which is home to nearly a third of an estimated 650,000 homeless people in the U.S., Gov. Gavin Newsom last week ordered state agencies to begin removing tents and structures on state land.
Opinion: California crackdown on ‘junk fees’ overlooks credit card companies
date: 2024-07-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
Americans are drowning in credit card debt – mostly due to bank fees – and deserve a cheaper, fairer financial system.
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-07-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Vance’s History Of Extremist Remarks On Family Doesn’t Stop At ‘Childless Cat Ladies’.
Labor Protections Are So Hot Right Now
date: 2024-07-31, from: Heatmap News
Current conditions: Temperatures are expected to hit 99 degrees Fahrenheit today in Chico, California, hampering efforts to quell the country’s largest wildfire • North Korean state media says over 4,000 homes have been flooded after heavy rainfall near the Chinese border • Strong winds and high temperatures are fanning wildfires in Greece, Croatia, and North Macedonia.
THE TOP FIVE
- Americans support extreme heat protections
Earlier this month, the Department of Labor proposed a new rule that would require employers to take steps — such as mandatory rest breaks and illness prevention plans — to protect workers from extreme heat. A new poll from Data for Progress suggests that the rule is broadly popular, with 90% of respondents either “strongly” or “somewhat” supporting the requirements.
The Biden Administration is framing the rule as part of a broader response to extreme weather during a summer when wildfires, tropical storms, and extreme heat are afflicting large swaths of the country. Texas Rep. Greg Casar, a Democrat and an outspoken supporter of the rule, said in a statement, “Protecting workers from the heat unites voters across the aisle in a way that virtually nothing else does.”
Photo
by Mario Tama/Getty Images.
- Methane levels rise dangerously
Methane has long been recognized as a dangerous greenhouse gas, shorter-lived in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide, but more than 80 times more potent in its first 20 years there. A new paper in Frontiers in Science finds that methane emissions are growing at an alarming rate. Annual emissions in the 2020s are clocking in at about 30 million tons more than during the previous decade. While the study acknowledges there is no single reason for this, the authors point to fossil fuel processing, livestock, and wetlands as contributing factors. This spells trouble for the climate, particularly over the next couple decades. “Reducing CO2 will protect our grandchildren — reducing methane will protect us now,” one of the study’s authors told The Guardian.
- Kairos Power begins construction on a new reactor
Kairos Power, a nuclear technology company founded in 2016, began construction on its Hermes Low-Power Demonstration Reactor in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, the company announced on Tuesday. The reactor uses a modular design, allowing Kairos to manufacture it in Albuquerque before shipping it to the construction location, and employs fluoride salt cooling technology, a departure from the light water cooling that is the norm in the U.S. nuclear industry. In fact, the reactor was the first non-light water reactor to receive construction approval from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in more than 50 years when the agency issued it a permit last year. Kairos aims to have the reactor operational in 2027.
- New climate change accounting standards
The International Accounting Standards Board sets the norms for companies in 140 jurisdictions — including the U.S., Canada, the E.U., and Japan — on how to record and report financial data. On Wednesday, the Board proposed guidance for companies to show how climate change might affect their bottom lines. Both climate impacts (like floods and extreme heat) and targets (like net-zero strategies) have a bearing on a firm’s financial performance, the IASB said. Wednesday’s guidance, which now enters a consultation period, aims to provide a standardized approach to reporting these factors to investors.
The guidance follows a March announcement by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that it will require companies to disclose climate change-related information to investors. As Heatmap’s Emily Pontecorvo wrote at the time, “The rule is also set to spark an explosion in the businesses of corporate emissions accounting and climate risk analysis,” making robust standards that much more important.
- Meet Maximo, the solar-panel-installing robot
On Tuesday, electric utility AES introduced a new hire: Maximo, a pickup truck-sized robot charged with installing panels at the company’s solar farms. AES says Maximo can install these heavy panels at twice the rate a human could, using artificial intelligence to line them up. The company plans to employ Maximo first on its solar-plus-battery project in Kern County, California, later this year.
If Maximo proves effective, he may get some siblings. Large solar farms can take 12 to 18 months to build and often require workers to operate in extreme heat. Robots could reduce risks to workers and help companies accelerate their construction timelines. The flipside? The number of solar workers in the U.S. is expected to double by 2033, and these workers may find some stiff competition from Maximo.
Image
courtesy of AES.
THE KICKER
Add exploding Siberian craters to the list of climate-change-related hazards. Ongoing research suggests that longer thawing periods are allowing buildups of gas to escape (or detonate) from beneath the permafrost.
https://heatmap.news/climate/heat-protections-kairos-methane
EU AI Act still in infancy, but those with ‘intelligent’ HR apps better watch out
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Users and developers warned to prepare for what’s coming with human resources a focus in ‘high-risk’ category
As the world’s first legislation specifically targeting AI comes into law on Thursday, developers of the technology, those integrating it into their software products, and those deploying it are trying to figure out what it means and how they need to respond.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/eu_ai_act/
Why ‘You’re Being Weird’ Works So Well
date: 2024-07-31, from: Dave Karpf’s blog
The Republican Party stopped trying to appeal to normies a long time ago.
https://davekarpf.substack.com/p/why-youre-being-weird-works-so-well
Evacuated animals headed home following Park Fire relocation
date: 2024-07-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
For Paradise ridge residents, the devastating and raging Camp Fire will never be forgotten. Park Fire brought back all those memories.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/07/31/evacuated-animals-headed-home-following-park-fire-relocation/
LAUSD ordered to hand over records in long-running funding dispute with archdiocese
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The LAist
The district cut federal Title I funding by 90% for low-income students in Catholic schools.
https://laist.com/news/education/lausd-ordered-to-hand-over-records-dispute-with-archdiocese
New rent hike limits largely unchanged for LA and OC residents. How to watchdog an illegal increase
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The LAist
Rent hike limits under a key state law stayed steady for many SoCal renters in 2024. Here’s what to do if your landlord demands more.
Komodo Dragons Have Iron-Coated Teeth, Study Finds
date: 2024-07-31, from: Smithsonian Magazine
New research provides the first evidence of the adaptation in a carnivorous reptile, and it might hold clues to understanding the teeth of dinosaurs
Gary Horton | COC’s Dynamism Paused for Review
date: 2024-07-31, from: The Signal
Signal readers are well informed of the machinations of the existing College of the Canyons governing trustees. After a four-week public flaying of COC’s mega-builder Dianne Van Hook, this scorched-earth […]
The post Gary Horton | COC’s Dynamism Paused for Review appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/07/gary-horton-cocs-dynamism-paused-for-review/
It’s decision day for the Federal Reserve
date: 2024-07-31, from: Marketplace Morning Report
Central bankers can adjust something called the Fed Funds interest rate in a way that makes borrowing more or less expensive in their campaign to bring inflation down to a healthy rate. But it’s like a lot of things in life: Timing is everything. We’ll discuss what to expect. Also on the show: Home purchase deals fell apart in June, and Roblox, the online game platform for kids, is grappling with a predator problem.
Is Princess Leia’s ‘Star Wars’ Bikini the Most Controversial Costume in Sci-Fi History?
date: 2024-07-31, from: Smithsonian Magazine
A version of the gold outfit worn by Carrie Fisher on the set of “Return of the Jedi” fetched $175,000 at auction
It is 60 years since a US spacecraft first took a close-up of the Moon
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Ranger 7 finally gets its shot. Five years later, humans would follow
It has been 60 years since a spacecraft snapped the USA’s first close-up images of the lunar surface, a mere five years before astronauts set foot on the Moon. Ranger 7 finally achieved the feat in July 1964.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/ranger_7_60_years/
Logitech has an idea for a “forever mouse” that requires a subscription
date: 2024-07-31, from: OS News
Logitech CEO Hanneke Faber talked about someting called the “forever mouse”, which would be, as the name implies, a mouse that customers could use for a very long time. While you may think this would mean an incredibly well-built mouse, or one that can be easily repaired, which Logitech already makes somewhat possible through a partnership with iFixIt, another option the company is thinking about is a subscription model. Yes. Faber said subscription software updates would mean that people wouldn’t need to worry about their mouse. The business model is similar to what Logitech already does with video conferencing services (Logitech’s B2B business includes Logitech Select, a subscription service offering things like apps, 24/7 support, and advanced RMA). Having to pay a regular fee for full use of a peripheral could deter customers, though. HP is trying a similar idea with rentable printers that require a monthly fee. The printers differ from the idea of the forever mouse in that the HP hardware belongs to HP, not the user. However, concerns around tracking and the addition of ongoing expenses are similar. ↫ Scharon Harding at Ars Technica Now, buying a mouse whose terrible software requires subscription models would still be a choice you can avoid, but my main immediately conjured up a far darker scenario. PC makers have a long history of adding crapware to their machines in return for payments from the producers of said crapware. I can totally see what’s going to happen next. You buy a brand new laptop, unbox it at home, and turn it on. Before you know it, a dialog pops up right after he crappy Windows out-of-box experience asking you to subscribe to your laptop’s touchpad software in order to unlock its more advanced features like gestures. But why stop there? The keyboard of that new laptop has RGB backlighting, but if you want to change its settings, you’re going to have to pay for another subscription. Your laptop’s display has additional features and modes for specific types of content and more settings sliders, but you’ll have to pay up to unlock them. And so on. I’m not saying this will happen, but I’m also not saying it won’t. I’m sorry for birthing this idea into the world.
ByteDance’s Singapore workers suffer mass food poisoning
date: 2024-07-31, from: Marketplace Morning Report
From the BBC World Service: Dozens of employees at ByteDance, the company behind TikTok, have been hospitalized after what seems to be a food poisoning outbreak. Then, heavy rains have caused deadly landslides In the Indian state of Kerala, known for its tea plantations. And South Africa is the latest country to welcome remote workers known as digital nomads, but in Cape Town, locals are unhappy.
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-07-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
How Hungary's Orbán uses control of the media to escape scrutiny and keep the public in the dark.
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-07-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
The climate is changing so fast that we haven’t seen how bad extreme weather could get.
OpenTofu hits version 1.8 with more crowd-pleasing features
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Open source TerraForm rival introduces a new file extension so users can ‘keep older code around for compatibility’
Terraform alternative OpenTofu has reached version 1.8 amid further signs of fragmentation.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/opentofu_version_18/
Rick Barker | Who Is Checking?
date: 2024-07-31, from: The Signal
In re: Sandy Cassidy, “A New Low in California,” letters, June 30. While I agree with where Ms. Cassidy is coming from, I would point out a flaw in her […]
The post Rick Barker | Who Is Checking? appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/07/rick-barker-who-is-checking/
Arthur Saginian | Obama’s Third Term
date: 2024-07-31, from: The Signal
If anyone thinks that President Joe Biden is responsible for anything beyond having his name placed on policies and positions … hmm. I once Googled, “Who is pulling President Biden’s […]
The post Arthur Saginian | Obama’s Third Term appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/07/arthur-saginian-obamas-third-term/
Dan Walters | California’s Town Creation Trend Stalls
date: 2024-07-31, from: The Signal
When California emerged from its colonial beginnings nearly two centuries ago and began coalescing into a distinct society, its towns and villages tended to be located either on navigable rivers, […]
The post Dan Walters | California’s Town Creation Trend Stalls appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/07/dan-walters-californias-town-creation-trend-stalls/
Compared to other distros, Vanilla OS 2 ‘Orchid’ is rewriting how Linux works
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
In front, unmodified GNOME; underneath, it’s all a bit strange, but purposefully so
Vanilla OS is an experimental distro testing out new implementations of immutability, cross-distro packaging, A/B failover, and more.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/vanilla_os_friendly_radical/
Article Spotlight: Bat evolution study supports gliding-to-flying hypothesis
date: 2024-07-31, from: PeerJ blog
A Climate Answer to Project 2025
date: 2024-07-31, from: Heatmap News
It has been a strange year for the climate left’s relationship with the word “if.” Over the past several months, some activists and advocates had begun to use the word with me in such a way that it started to sound an awful lot like “when.” If Donald Trump is reelected… If Republicans return to power…
The tone wasn’t hypothetical; it was resigned.
In the past week and a half, however, “if” has gotten its mojo back. Early this morning, the climate policy group Evergreen Action released what it’s calling the “Evergreen Action Plan 2.0” — essentially, a green wishlist for an incoming Democratic administration. Had the document been published a month earlier, after President Biden’s disastrous debate performance, it might have come across as vaguely farfetched; now, judging by the polls, there’s a real chance that some of its proposals could actually become law in 2025.
Started by former staffers of Washington Governor Jay Inslee’s presidential campaign, Evergreen Action has advised Kamala Harris on her climate policies before. The group also boasts that the Biden-Harris administration has made progress on 85% of the policy recommendations issued in its original 2020 Evergreen Action Plan. Although Evergreen Action doesn’t hold the same sway over a future Harris administration as the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 does over Donald Trump (to his apparently increasing concern), it does seem pretty safe to say that Evergreen Action 2.0 has the potential to be an enormously influential document in a Harris White House.
So — what’s in it?
Unsurprisingly, the Evergreen Action Plan 2.0 aims to extend the gains made by Biden’s administration and the Inflation Reduction Act — the words “continue” or “continuing” are used 43 times in the document, “further” 38 times, and “expand” or “expanded” 28 times. The plan is broken into seven core strategies that are broadly framed around climate, jobs, and justice, including “Cementing a Clean and Effective National Grid,” “Promoting Healthy Communities With a Modern Transportation System,” “Achieving Healthy Neighborhoods With Zero-Emission Homes and Commercial Buildings,” and “Supporting All Communities to Build a Thriving Clean Energy Economy and Move Away From Fossil Fuels.”
Within these sections, stand-out proposals include:
- Setting a first-of-its-kind federal clean energy standard to fully decarbonize the grid by 2035.
- Passing a “national grid law creating an inter-regional transfer capacity and shared grid management entity” in order to “align federal authority to manage and site necessary transmission, and … ensure full uptake of valuable IRA incentives for clean energy.”
- Finalizing carbon limits for existing gas plants “no later than the end of 2025” and ideally by December 2024.
- Issuing an industrial decarbonization Day 1 Executive Order that commits the country to a “rapid decarbonization strategy for each industrial category.” Such an order could help “prioritize innovation projects … leading to the development of regional hubs for industrial decarbonization,” spur the EPA to begin a “standard-setting process to tackle industrial climate pollution,” and encourage the agency to further use grants, Superfund, and planning and permitting programs to “accelerate the deployment of clean industrial technologies and repurposing and clean up legacy industrial sites.”
- Joining an international “carbon club” via legislation that “adds duties or fees to imports of similar goods produced using high-carbon methods in other countries.”
- Focusing on building out a zero-emissions freight sector by issuing “clear standards to help decarbonize sources like trains, freight facilities and ports, off-road vehicles, ships, and planes.”
- Adopting a “climate test” to guide all federal energy extraction decisions; cutting subsidies and statutory loopholes for fossil fuel companies; ending exports of liquefied natural gas; withdrawing East Coast waters from oil drilling, and more.
The most radical section of the Evergreen Action Plan 2.0, however, comes at the end. Acknowledging both the volatility of our national politics and the reality that it will take longer than four more years to put the U.S. on the right course of decarbonization, the plan extends the definition of “climate policy” to include proposals intended to shore up public and democratic institutions. Some of those include:
- Abolishing the filibuster rule that “prevents the Senate from acting on climate and other policies the public overwhelmingly supports.”
- Repealing the “Congressional Review Act,” which has been used to “block needed climate standards and other common-sense public health and safety measures.”
- Ensuring the Supreme Court is “governed by a binding ethics code,” and potentially “adding justices to the Court, adding term limits, and exploring appropriate statutory guidance to limit or reverse the Court’s recent spate of radical attacks on environmental laws.”
- Working with Congress to restore the Chevron doctrine.
- Pursuing other democratic reforms “including restoration of the Voting Rights Act and federal legislative remedies for improper gerrymandering, along with long-term efforts to reform or abolish the Electoral College, would further shake loose fossil fuel control of Congress and enable equitable policymaking nationwide.”
Of course, the Evergreen Action Plan 2.0 is nothing more than a wishlist — it is far from a binding document — and there are still a whole lot of “ifs” standing between it and implementation.
But for the climate left, “if” is a start.
https://heatmap.news/climate/evergreen-action-harris-plan
The Savvy Senior | How Extreme Heat Affects Seniors: Tips to Stay Safe
date: 2024-07-31, from: The Signal
Dear Savvy Senior, I work for a county health department and every summer we’re seeing more and more seniors get sick and even die from heat-related illiness. Can you write […]
The post The Savvy Senior | How Extreme Heat Affects Seniors: Tips to Stay Safe appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/07/the-savvy-senior-how-extreme-heat-affects-seniors-tips-to-stay-safe/
UK Electoral Commission slapped for basic cybersecurity fails
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
It took 13 months to notice 40 million voters’ data was compromised
The UK’s Electoral Commission has received a formal slap on the wrist for a litany of security failings that led to the theft of personal data belonging to around 40 million voters.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/uk_electoral_commission_ico/
Sergey Durmanov closed issue #146: issue with system.val(float, constant) at Felix Oliver Friedrich / Oberon A2
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: Oberon A2 at CAS
Issue with system.val for float constant
MODULE TestCast;
IMPORT SYSTEM;
CONST pi = UNSIGNED64(0x40091EB851EB851F); (*3.14*)
PROCEDURE Do*;
VAR d: RECORD f: FLOAT64; bits { OFFSET=0 }: SET64 END;
BEGIN
d.f := 3.14;
TRACE( d.f, d.bits);
d.bits := SET64(pi);
TRACE( d.f, d.bits);
VAR u64 := pi: UNSIGNED64;
d.f := SYSTEM.VAL(FLOAT64, u64); (* OK *)
TRACE( d.f, d.bits);
d.f := SYSTEM.VAL(FLOAT64, pi); (* BAD *)
TRACE( d.f, d.bits);
END Do;
END TestCast.
System.Free TestCast ~
TestCast.Do ~https://gitlab.inf.ethz.ch/felixf/oberon/-/issues/146
Microsoft Dynamics 365 called out for ‘worker surveillance’
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Redmond disputes some claims made in Cracked Labs probe
Insight Microsoft Dynamics 365 provides “field service management” that allows customers to monitor mobile service workers through smartphone apps – allegedly to the detriment of their autonomy and dignity.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/microsoft_dynamics_365_surveillance/
Welcome To The Crypto Election
date: 2024-07-31, from: The Lever News
The crypto industry is spending big money on the election to sway policy in their favor — and this is what they want.
https://www.levernews.com/welcome-to-the-crypto-election/
Embrace Your Personal Style
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Whether industrial, beachy, or cottagecore, embrace your personal style.
The post Embrace Your Personal Style appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/07/31/embrace-your-personal-style/
Today in SCV History (July 31)
date: 2024-07-31, from: SCV New (TV Station)
1939 – Recording artist, music promoter and longtime Sand Canyon resident Cliffie Stone marries singer Dorothy Darling in Hollywood [story
https://scvnews.com/today-in-scv-history-july-31/
China stops worrying about lack of GPUs and learns to love the supercomputer
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
The workaround is going to be inevitable in the future anyway, say Chinese boffins
Leading Chinese computer scientists have suggested the nation can build large language models without imported GPUs – by using supercomputers instead.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/china_supercomputer_not_gpu_plan/
curl 8.9.1
date: 2024-07-31, from: Daniel Stenberg Blog
Some annoying regressions triggered this. Numbers the 259th release0 changes7 days (total: 9,630)28 bugfixes (total: 10,559)43 commits (total: 32,748)0 new public libcurl function (total: 94)0 new curl_easy_setopt() option (total: 306)0 new curl command line option (total: 263)19 contributors, 5 new (total: 3,211)10 authors, 1 new (total: 1,288)1 security fixes (total: 158) Download the new curl … Continue reading curl 8.9.1
https://daniel.haxx.se/blog/2024/07/31/curl-8-9-1/
Canceled meeting between US and UAE throws fresh scrutiny on Microsoft-G42 deal
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
All a simple misunderstanding, we’re told
A meeting intended to allay fears that Emirati AI firm G42’s deal with Microsoft could result in China accessing advanced US technology was reportedly cancelled by the UAE ambassador to the US.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/uae_g42_microsoft_us/
Back, and in reasonable working order …
date: 2024-07-31, from: Logic Matters blog
With huge thanks to the terrific (and uniformly kind) medical staff at the much admired Royal Papworth Hospital, here I am back home, after needed but non-urgent open-heart surgery, complete with a patched ascending aorta and a new heart valve. Some residual aching and annoying post-operative insomnia, but nine days after surgery I was already […]
The post Back, and in reasonable working order … appeared first on Logic Matters.
https://www.logicmatters.net/2024/07/31/in-more-than-reasonable-working-order/
‘Undue Burden’: One family’s fight for American journalist’s freedom
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
Prague/Washington — Portraits of Alsu Kurmasheva are scattered throughout the Prague apartment she shares with her husband and two daughters. But the journalist has not set foot here in more than a year.
Perhaps the most striking of the paintings, all of which were done by her husband, Pavel Butorin, is the one that remains unfinished, perched on an easel in the living room. Butorin started it after Kurmasheva, 47, was jailed in Russia in October 2023 on charges that are widely viewed as baseless and politically motivated.
Painting, Butorin says, is just one way he has tried to cope with his wife’s absence.
“Even to say, ‘We miss Alsu,’ doesn’t quite convey the emotion that we go through,” Butorin told VOA at the family’s home. “I get up, and the first thing in my head is Alsu. I’ve just been really unable to escape this.”
With their lives intertwined — from raising their daughters Bibi and Miriam, to working at the same news network — he is never far from reminders that his wife is 1,700 miles away, in a prison in the city of Kazan.
“In the evening, we sit at this table. We see an empty chair,” Butorin said, his eyes fixed on the seat at the large, wooden table, as if he were willing his wife to appear. “It signifies a broken family, a family torn apart by an unjust, merciless, heartless regime.”
When Butorin spoke with VOA in Prague in July, his wife — who has dual U.S.-Russian citizenship — was approaching nine months in custody. Less than one week later, on July 19, she was convicted behind closed doors of spreading what Moscow says is false information about its military and sentenced to six and a half years in prison.
On the same day, about 450 miles east, in the city of Yekaterinburg, Russia, a secret Russian court convicted American journalist Evan Gershkovich to 16 years behind bars.
The U.S. government has called for the immediate release of both journalists. Press freedom groups, meanwhile, have condemned the trials as shams and said the cases underscore how Moscow’s war in Ukraine means American journalists are at a heightened risk of being used as political pawns by the Kremlin.
Kurmasheva and Gershkovich count themselves among the 22 journalists jailed in Russia at the end of 2023, more than half of whom are foreign nationals, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry and embassy in Washington did not reply to VOA’s emails requesting comment for this story.
Despite the international condemnation, Butorin has largely shouldered the responsibility of advocating for Kurmasheva’s release by himself. For months, he has found himself balancing the roles of father, journalist and advocate as he shuttles between Prague and Washington.
Hostage experts say his experience is common for American families who have a loved one held hostage or unjustly detained.
A decade ago, Diane Foley was one of them as she tried to navigate complex bureaucracy and conflicting information when Islamic State militants kidnapped and later killed her son, American journalist James Foley, in 2014.
Her experience led her to establish the Foley Foundation, which supports families and advocates for Americans unjustly jailed abroad.
“A lot of families don’t have any idea how to contact media or get their story heard, how to contact their congressman, how to get their voices heard through the bureaucracy. So we seek to help them navigate that,” she told VOA during one of her regular trips to Washington.
The U.S. government has made progress in these policy areas, she says. But so much more still needs to be done.
A longtime journalist at the Tatar-Bashkir Service of VOA’s sister outlet Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, or RFE/RL, Kurmasheva had planned only a brief visit to Russia to care for her ailing mother.
Her desk at work remains relatively untouched. Business cards are still spread out on the table. And the calendar — still set to May 2023 — shows where she underlined in black ink the dates of the ill-fated trip.
In the weeks following Kurmasheva’s jailing, her colleague Ramazan Alpaut said he still turned around at his desk, half-expecting to see Kurmasheva sitting behind him.
“We miss her here as a person and as a colleague,” he told VOA.
Kurmasheva’s arrest came as a shock for the team, and a warning that travel to see family in Russia is no longer an option.
That fact, says Tatar-Bashkir Service chief Rim Gilfanov, crystallizes an already difficult reality for exiled Russians grappling with the fallout of the war in Ukraine.
But more immediately, he says, he just wants a key member of his team back.
“Alsu is our veteran journalist,” Gilfanov says. “The main quality that comes to my mind when I think of Alsu is constant eagerness and preparedness to help everyone.”
Authoritarian regimes have long targeted RFE/RL and its journalists. Russia has designated the outlet a foreign agent and an undesirable organization. And Kurmasheva is one of four of its journalists currently in prison, including two in Belarus and one in Russian-occupied Crimea.
“It’s a grim reality that starts to set in that we are targets,” RFE/RL president and CEO Stephen Capus told VOA. “They’re trying to make the pursuit of journalism a crime.”
“They are taking me to the investigative committee right now.”
Butorin was at work when he got this distressed voice message from his wife. It was October 18, 2023, and agents dressed in black and wearing balaclavas had arrived at the home of Kurmasheva’s mother to arrest the journalist.
The next time he heard his wife’s voice was in April 2024, when she spoke to reporters from a glass defendant’s box about the poor prison conditions she was experiencing.
“We love to hear her voice. But it’s also painful to see her in a glass cage,” Butorin said.
Butorin, director of Current Time TV, a Russian-language television and digital network led by RFE/RL in partnership with VOA, was at work when he listened to the message.
His office is now part shrine, filled with photos and posters and newspaper articles about his wife. On the whiteboard, Free Alsu magnets depict a cartoon of her face. Butorin drew the image for Kurmasheva’s Gmail profile picture, he said. Now it’s on magnets and buttons — like the one pinned to the lapel of his dark blue suit jacket this July afternoon.
In a corner, next to a Lego diorama of the set of the TV show “Seinfeld” — a series the family loves to watch — is a stack of copies of No to War. The book, which Kurmasheva helped edit, features stories of 40 Russians who opposed Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Pro-Russian media have reported that Kurmasheva’s arrest is linked to that book. But to date, authorities have failed to publicly provide evidence to substantiate its charges against her.
“It’s a harmless little book,” Butorin said. “It just reminds me how incredibly arbitrary this detention is.”
Butorin has spent an unknown number of hours thinking about his wife’s captors. Are they evil personified? Or, à la Hannah Arendt and the banality of evil, are they just bureaucrats “thoughtlessly” doing their jobs?
The answer likely lies somewhere in the middle, he recognizes, but Butorin still finds himself wondering whether the judges and prosecutors once listened to her deep voice on the radio, back when she hosted a show for audiences in Tatarstan.
Kurmasheva’s long absence has been marked by bittersweet birthdays and holidays, more media interviews than Butorin can count, and five trips to Washington to press lawmakers and U.S. government officials to do more for his wife.
In his office, just a few days before he departs for one of those trips, he admits that, like many journalists, he prefers to be behind the camera instead of being the story.
But that preference for privacy is no more.
“I fear if I don’t keep this story in the news, and if I don’t keep Alsu’s story alive, that U.S. policymakers, members of the administration, of any administration, will just start forgetting about her,” Butorin said. “I see a problem there.”
Butorin, who is also a U.S. citizen, is quick to voice appreciation for the support officials and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have offered. It turns out that press freedom is one of the few issues that Democrats and Republicans can agree on.
But the trips to the American capital are also stained with frustration.
Requests to meet with Secretary of State Antony Blinken have been denied, Butorin said. (Blinken also serves as an ex officio member of the board that oversees the entities under the U.S. Agency for Global Media, including RFE/RL and VOA.) To date, the highest-ranking official Butorin has met with is Assistant Secretary for Consular Affairs Rena Bitter.
Feeling optimistic can be difficult, Butorin said, when, in meeting after meeting, the same officials regurgitate the same talking points and offer little concrete information.
“Sometimes I walk out with a sense of desperation, and sometimes I find these meetings very unsatisfactory,” he says.
It’s a problem familiar to Diane Foley.
When Islamic State militants kidnapped her son in 2012, she says, the process was even more opaque.
“Our government doesn’t seem to trust these desperate families, who want their loved one back, with what information they have,” she said.
To Foley, “an undue burden” is still placed on families to fight for the U.S. government’s attention.
“It’s all on the family in the U.S. That hasn’t changed a whole lot,” she said. “It was all on me, all on our family, when Jim was taken — all on us to figure it out. And now it’s still all on the family.”
Foley and her foundation are helping Butorin navigate the process, including by working behind the scenes to push the State Department.
In that time, she has grown close to the couple’s daughters. “When I see Bibi and Miriam, God bless them. They shouldn’t, as teenagers, be dealing with this,” she said.
In late July, she and Butorin took part in a Foley Foundation event in the Capitol Building, to mark the release of its annual report on U.S. hostage policy. The foundation counts 46 Americans held hostage or unjustly detained around the world.
At the panel, Dustin Stewart, the deputy special presidential envoy for hostage affairs, spoke about the support the government offers.
Butorin rebutted that because Kurmasheva has not been declared wrongfully detained, his family is not receiving any of that support.
At the panel, Stewart told VOA, “On the process, I’ll just say, it’s ongoing.”
The designation opens up extra resources and support for families and commits the government to secure their release.
It is the biggest difference between the cases of Kurmasheva and Gershkovich, the other American journalist jailed in Russia. In the latter case, the United States declared The Wall Street Journal reporter wrongfully detained within two weeks of his arrest. Press freedom groups have criticized the State Department for not declaring Kurmasheva wrongfully detained, too.
When pressed as to if and when Kurmasheva will be designated, the State Department has on several occasions sent VOA identical or nearly identical statements that say the Department “continuously reviews the circumstances” of Americans detained overseas to determine if they are wrongful. Roger Carstens, the special presidential envoy for hostage affairs, has denied VOA’s multiple requests for an interview about Kurmasheva’s case.
To cope, Butorin says compartmentalizing has become a necessary strategy.
“It may come across as a little disingenuous, but you do have to treat all these little areas of your life as projects,” he said. Those “projects” range from calling on Blinken to declare his wife wrongfully detained to dealing with the “Kafkaesque bureaucracy” of the Czech postal system that prevents him from collecting his wife’s mail.
In public events and interviews, Butorin leans toward the stoic, which he notes is unlike Kurmasheva, who can go into a room and “walk away with five or 10 new friends.”
“Some people may think that I lack emotion,” Butorin said. “But it’s all a front. I’m hurting on the inside.”
It’s when Butorin is by himself that he says he feels the most pain. “When the girls go to bed, I usually go to bed soon, too,” Butorin said, “so I’m not left alone with my thoughts.”
And when he is with the couple’s daughters, there are glimpses of the joy and the humor the family still manages to share.
After an interview in Washington, Butorin excitedly showed videos from an Olivia Rodrigo concert he attended with his daughters. Nearby, Bibi, 16, and Miriam, 12, were writing postcards to friends in Prague. Butorin made fun of one of them for how she wrote the number seven.
“You cross your sevens? That’s un-American,” he said with a smirk, provoking laughter from both girls.
When Kurmasheva eventually returns, Butorin quipped that she will find their daughters taller than she is. “But more importantly, she will see very strong young women who have had to grow up really quickly,” he said.
Sometimes, when Butorin sees videos or photos of his wife in court, he finds himself wondering whether she’s still the same person. In any case, he and his daughters aren’t.
“It’s hurting my family a lot that my mom isn’t here with us,” Bibi said. “It’s been so long already, and we just don’t want to get used to our mom not being here, because we’re getting close to that, unfortunately.”
Back in the family’s Prague apartment, the teenager alternates between talking about Taylor Swift and calling on Russian President Vladimir Putin to release her mother. On the wall opposite her, an abstract painting by her father depicts Kurmasheva pregnant with Bibi.
“At the dinner table, I always feel like there’s something missing because she’s not there. And it’s weird having to cook for one less person. And it’s weird being in the car with one less person. And it’s weird, because we were always a family of four. And now there’s one of us missing,” Bibi said.
Butorin doesn’t like to dwell on the past, and by that he primarily means Kurmasheva’s decision to travel to Russia in the first place. They were both well aware of the risks, he said.
She had traveled there without incident in 2022. But the day she left in 2023, he recalls Kurmasheva saying to him, “Tell me everything will be OK.”
Some days, Butorin wishes he hadn’t let her go. But then, Kurmasheva wouldn’t be Kurmasheva if she hadn’t gone.
“She is known as a selfless friend,” Butorin said. “That empathy and her responsibility as a devoted daughter, that was what really drove her to go to Russia.”
Bibi agreed. “She pays attention to every single person around her, and she’s really willing to give up so many things about her and her life to help others.”
As the family waits for any progress in her case, Butorin channels his wife’s unselfishness and his daughters’ resiliency.
“I don’t have the luxury of just falling apart. Honestly, that’s not an option for me,” Butorin said. “It’s just something that we have to live with. I think I’m a fairly unremarkable person. It’s just something that a father — any father — I think would do.”
https://www.voanews.com/a/russia_us_journalist_alsu_kurmasheva_jailed/7719832.html
The Lens and Research Strategies Australia Partner to Support Australian Government Innovation
date: 2024-07-31, from: Lens.org news
The Lens and Research Strategies Australia (RSA) are thrilled to announce a strategic partnership, culminating in becoming an approved provider to government of research performance data and analytical services. Dr Richard Jefferson, CEO of Cambia (doing business as The Lens), expressed his enthusiasm for the collaboration: “This partnership signifies a major step forward in our …
Microsoft remains massively profitable, investors await AI payoff
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Everyone loves Copilot, execs claim – and hope they can say the same for Copilot Plus PCs
Microsoft has tried to convince investors that AI is paying off, but they appear unimpressed by news of customer adoption and revenue revealed Tuesday in the software giant’s Q4 and full-year results for 2024.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/microsoft_q4_2024/
Peter Easthope commented on issue #141 at Felix Oliver Friedrich / Oberon A2
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: Oberon A2 at CAS
@fnec.ece · 4 weeks ago
Hi, I have corrected the problem for oberon subsystem in the MyUnix.KbdMouse.Mod file. Could you test after HotKeys disabled?
Best regards,
MyUnix.KbdMouse.Mod
Today, compiled MyUnix.KbdMouse.Mod in repository A2, Linux64.
Now, after <F12>, the <F1> key sets the * marker. The <delete> key remains inactive.
Auto switching keyboard functionality according to focus would be ideal. Oberon functionality when focus is in Oberon; A2 functionality when focus is in A2. Prior to release 10272 that worked.
Thanks, … P.L.
https://gitlab.inf.ethz.ch/felixf/oberon/-/issues/141#note_194106
Ridesharing makes new and unique mess in Japan’s taxi industry
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Minister accuses cab drivers of gaming algos to score more lucrative fares
Taxi drivers are gaming ride-sharing algorithms in Japan to find more and more lucrative fares, according to digital transformation minister Taro Kono.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/ride_hailing_japan_accusation/
Fiesta 2024 Listings
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Make plans to celebrate 100 years of S.B. Fiesta with authentic food, music, and dance with open-air mercados, historic tours, and curated art exhibitions in S.B.’s most comprehensive guide to Old Spanish Days Fiesta 2024.
The post Fiesta 2024 Listings appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/07/30/fiesta-2024-listings/
Celebrating 100 Years of Fiesta
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
A comprehensive guide to the history, happenings, and who’s who of Santa Barbara’s century-old celebration.
The post Celebrating 100 Years of Fiesta appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/07/30/celebrating-100-years-of-fiesta/
One Hundred Years of Fiesta
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Unraveling the origins of Santa Barbara’s iconic celebration.
The post One Hundred Years of Fiesta appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/07/30/one-hundred-years-of-fiesta/
In Memoriam Kathy Cota 1941-2024
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
At this time of year, the city starts to buzz with the thought of the weeklong party called Fiesta. It
The post In Memoriam </br > Kathy Cota </br> 1941-2024 appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/07/30/in-memoriam-kathy-cota-1941-2024/
Get to Know 2024’s Old Spanish Days Fiesta Luminaries
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Get to know more about this year’s El Presidente, Spirit of Fiesta, Jr. Spirit of Fiesta, and Saint Barbara.
The post Get to Know 2024’s Old Spanish Days Fiesta Luminaries appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/07/30/get-to-know-2024s-old-spanish-days-fiesta-luminaries/
Our Readers Remember
date: 2024-07-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Fiesta celebrations never forgotten.
The post Our Readers Remember appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/07/30/our-readers-remember/
Back-to-School For SCV Students Nears
date: 2024-07-31, from: SCV New (TV Station)
For students in the Santa Clarita Valley summer is fading fast as back-to-school dates loom. High school and junior high students in the SCV will return to school on Monday, aug. 12. Elementary schools in the four SCV school districts will spread out first day of school dates from Aug. 12-
https://scvnews.com/back-to-school-for-scv-students-nears/
Aug. 3: Saugus High Football Cornhole Fundraiser
date: 2024-07-31, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Saugus High School Gridiron Booster Club will host a Saugus High Foortball Cornhole Tournament Fundraiser at Lucky Luke Brewery on Saturday, Aug. 3.
https://scvnews.com/aug-3-saugus-high-football-cornhole-fundraiser/
Barger Honors West Ranch Team for Animal Adoption Efforts
date: 2024-07-31, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Fifth District Supervisor Kathryn Barger honored the West Ranch High School cross country team for the “Run with Dogs” program at the Los Angeles Board of Supervisors meeting held Tuesday, July 30.
https://scvnews.com/barger-honors-west-ranch-team-for-animal-adoption-efforts/
Asia’s regional internet registry APNIC names new director general
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
ICANN’s local boss Jia Rong Low gets the gig – and a challenging to-do list
The Asia Pacific Network Information Center (APNIC) has named its new director general: ICANN regional managing director and vice president Jia Rong Low.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/apnic_director_general_appointment/
Income gap between Black and white US residents shrank between Gen Xers and millennials, study says
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
AMD sold $1B of Instinct GPUs last quarter, driving triple-digit datacenter growth
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-07-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Which is nice, but way behind Nvidia, while other segments are soft and supply-chain pain persists
AMD has told investors that its Instinct MI300X GPUs – the chip designer’s alternative to Nvidia AI accelerator hardware – landed over $1 billion of datacenter revenues in Q2 this year.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/amd_q2_2024/
DigiCert gives unlucky folks 24 hours to replace doomed certificates after code blunder
date: 2024-07-31, updated: 2024-08-01, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
For the want of an underscore
DigiCert has given unlucky customers 24 hours to replace their SSL/TLS security certificates it previously issued them – due to a five-year-old blunder in its backend software.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/07/31/digicert_certificates_revoked/
US carries out strike in Iraq as regional tensions worsen
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
BAGHDAD/WASHINGTON — The United States on Tuesday carried out a strike in Iraq in self-defense, U.S. officials told Reuters, as regional tensions rose after an Israeli airstrike in Beirut that Israel said killed Hezbollah’s most senior commander.
Iraqi police and medical sources said the strike inside a base south of Baghdad used by Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) killed four members of the group, which includes several Iran-aligned armed militias, and wounded four others.
In a statement after the blasts, the Popular Mobilization Forces made no accusation about who was responsible.
U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the United States carried out an airstrike in Musayib, in Babil province, but did not provide more details on the location.
The officials added that the strike targeted militants that the U.S. deemed were looking to launch drones and posed a threat to U.S. and coalition forces.
The officials did not comment on any casualties.
“This action underscores the United States’ commitment to the safety and security of our personnel,” one of the officials said.
Multiple rockets were launched last week toward Iraq’s Ain al-Asad airbase housing U.S.-led forces, U.S. and Iraqi sources said, with no damage or casualties reported. U.S. officials said none of the rockets hit the base.
Tuesday’s action was the first known U.S. strike in Iraq since February, when the U.S. military launched airstrikes in Iraq and Syria against more than 85 targets linked to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and Iran-aligned militias.
The 150,000-strong Popular Mobilization Forces, a state-sanctioned grouping of Iraqi paramilitaries, is dominated by heavily armed and battle-hardened groups loyal to Iran and with close ties to its Revolutionary Guards.
Iraq, a rare ally of both the U.S. and Iran that hosts 2,500 U.S. troops and has Iran-backed militias linked to its security forces, has witnessed escalating tit-for-tat attacks since the Israel-Hamas war erupted in October.
Iraq wants troops from the U.S.-led military coalition to begin withdrawing in September and to formally end the coalition’s work by September 2025, Iraqi sources have said, with some U.S. forces likely to remain in a newly negotiated advisory capacity.
The issue is highly politicized, with mainly Iran-aligned Iraqi political factions looking to show that they are again pushing out the country’s one-time occupier, while U.S. officials want to avoid giving Iran and its allies a win.
U.S.-led forces invaded Iraq in 2003, toppled former leader Saddam Hussein and then withdrew in 2011, only to return in 2014 to fight Islamic State at the head of a coalition.
https://www.voanews.com/a/us-carries-out-strike-in-iraq-as-regional-tensions-worsen/7719828.html
County officials reaffirm ‘care-first’ strategy for homeless crisis
date: 2024-07-31, from: The Signal
L.A. County officials reaffirmed at Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting that a “care-first” approach will be used when dealing with homeless encampments. Questions had been raised by cities across the […]
The post County officials reaffirm ‘care-first’ strategy for homeless crisis appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/07/county-officials-reaffirm-care-first-strategy-for-homeless-crisis/
Community responds to help family of residents killed in crash
date: 2024-07-31, from: The Signal
Support has poured in from all over for a Santa Clarita Valley family that tragically lost two of its members in a fatal crash in Arizona earlier this month. Heather […]
The post Community responds to help family of residents killed in crash appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/07/community-responds-to-help-family-of-residents-killed-in-crash/
US needs to do more to compete with China, says official
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
washington — U.S. State Department Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell says that whether it is exploring for rare earth minerals, establishing military bases in Africa, or building more ships and submarines, the United States needs to do more to compete with China.
Speaking at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing Tuesday, Campbell called China the “defining geopolitical challenge confronting modern American diplomacy.”
“We need to do more, and we have to contest Chinese actions, not only in terms of their forward basing strategy, but their desire to go after Africa’s rare earths that will be critical for our industrial and technological capabilities,” he said.
Campbell added that China has presented U.S. diplomats with a global challenge that extends from economics and defense to information and human rights.
Bipartisan desire to compete
Lawmakers from across the political divide who attended the hearing agreed with that assessment and the need to compete with China’s influence.
Republican Senator Marco Rubio from Florida expressed concern about China being the “world’s leading shipbuilder” and “undisputed king of basic industrial inputs.”
Campbell agreed with the senator, noting that the difference between the two countries was “deeply concerning,” and that the U.S. “has to do better” in shipbuilding.
He also said the United States submarine program needs more attention.
In his opening remarks, Ben Cardin, a Democratic senator and chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the United States needs to offer the Global South an alternative to China.
“In order to address these challenges, the United States should not only be investing in our military, but also our diplomatic and economic development tools,” Cardin said.
Technology and critical rare earth minerals used to make everything from semiconductor chips to batteries in electric vehicles was an area of particular focus during the hearing, given China’s dominance.
In 2022, China was the largest source of rare earth mineral imports for the United States at 70%, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. It is also the world’s biggest supplier of rare earth minerals.
“If you look at a balance sheet of the top 40 trace elements and minerals that are necessary for batteries or for semiconductors, the vast lion’s share of those supplies are now controlled by China,” Campbell said. He noted that while the U.S. was initially in an unfavorable position, it has stepped up signing critical mineral agreements with Japan and Australia.
Campbell also said the Lobito corridor project in Africa — a railway that will run through mineral-rich Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo to an Atlantic port in Angola — would help meet U.S. demand for the minerals.
Hearing looks at relations with Africa
Increasing diplomatic relations with Africa was a key focus of the hearing.
Campbell said he has traveled to Africa twice since his appointment in February and has plans for a third trip. He also noted that there are 14 ambassador nominations for posts on the continent yet to be approved by the Senate.
Several senators at the hearing stressed the need to increase the U.S. diplomatic footprint and fill empty ambassadorial posts, particularly within the Global South.
Campbell said the lack of U.S. ambassadors in key posts is “embarrassing” and “antithetical to U.S. strategic interests.”
During the hearing, lawmakers also discussed the need for U.S. involvement in international infrastructure development projects, continued support of Ukraine against Russia’s invasion, and the need for more efforts to combat Chinese misinformation and press manipulation in third countries.
https://www.voanews.com/a/us-needs-to-do-more-to-compete-with-china-says-official/7719471.html
Intermittent Social media fasting
date: 2024-07-31, from: Om Malik blog
As a diabetic, my life is a constant balance between hypoglycemic and hyperglycemic levels—and proper food consumption is key to maintaining steady blood sugar levels. Work, travel and access to the right kinds of food determine how successfully I can keep my sugar levels in my desired range. At the start of the pandemic lockdown, I decided to embrace intermittent fasting. Losing weight wasn’t the primary motive; instead, I wanted to bring some discipline to when and …
https://om.co/2024/07/30/intermittent-social-media-fasting/
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-07-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Democracy Will Suffer a Relatively Quiet Death. We Simulated It.
https://www.thebulwark.com/p/democracy-suffer-quiet-death-simulated-trump
After destroying nearly 200 structures, US wildfire threatens thousands more
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
FOREST RANCH, California — Fire crews worked Tuesday to hold on to the progress made against the largest blaze in California this year ahead of warming temperatures forecast for later this week.
Authorities said containment was 14% and lifted evacuation orders in some communities of Butte County, where the Park Fire started last week before spreading to a neighboring county and scorching an area bigger than Los Angeles. The massive fire continues to burn through rugged, inaccessible terrain with dense vegetation, threatening to spread to two other counties.
“That’s going to be a continued challenge for us moving forward over the next couple of days,” said Mark Brunton, an operations section chief with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.
Cooler weather has helped firefighters stop the blaze’s path near some communities like Forest Ranch, where some people began returning to unscathed homes Tuesday.
Christopher and Anita Angeloni have lived in the community of 1,600 for 23 years and have had to evacuate several times due to wildfires, including the 2018 Camp Fire that killed 85 people and decimated the town of Paradise, about 8 miles (13 kilometers) south.
Christopher Angeloni said he constantly worked on creating defensible space around his home and was happy to return home nearly a week after evacuating to see his hard work paid off.
“We were prepared to possibly lose everything,” he said.
Anita Angeloni said it has been a stressful week.
“We have not been sleeping enough, very tense, praying all the time, teary eyes,” she said. “But we’re here. We’ll see for how long.”
The Park Fire, now the fifth largest in the state’s recorded history, was one of more than 100 large active wildfires burning in the U.S. on Tuesday. It has scorched nearly 600 square miles (1,551 square kilometers), according to CAL Fire. For comparison, the city of Los Angeles covers about 470 square miles (1,217 square kilometers).
Some blazes were sparked by the weather, with climate change increasing the frequency of lightning strikes as the western U.S. endures blistering heat and bone-dry conditions.
The Park Fire started last Wednesday after authorities say a man pushed a burning car down a ravine in Chico. It has destroyed nearly 200 structures and is threatening thousands more. The suspect, Ronnie Dean Stout II, was charged with arson on Monday. His public defender, Nicole Diamond, said in an email she had no comment.
Some progress against the fire was made after cooler temperatures, more humidity, and calmer winds in the last few days helped firefighters reach 14% containment as of Tuesday.
In the small forest community of Cohasset in Butte County, Ron Ward ignored evacuation orders last week and stayed behind with his son to defend his property, seeing Park Fire flames hundreds of feet high approach his family ranch.
He had lost insurance coverage on the property just a month earlier as companies increasingly drop California homeowners due to the growing risk of wildfires in the state.
He said the flames reached within 70 feet (21 meters) of his house. Then they stopped.
“It hit our sprinklers and kind of died down and then went around our property and missed, missed all of our structures,” Ward said. His 100-year-old ranch was saved.
Ward had to be the one to call his bookkeeper and neighbors to tell them their homes were gone.
“They haven’t even been able to get back to look at their homes,” he said, tearing up as he recounted last week’s experience to The Associated Press in an interview Monday.
All through Cohasset, there were remnants of the devastation, with charred mailboxes and vehicles covered with pink fire retardant dropped by aircraft. The husks of a washer and dryer set were surrounded by burned debris and a blackened motorcycle was propped upright, balancing on rims after its tires melted away.
Evacuation orders were in effect Tuesday on 25 wildfires, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. More than 27,000 wildland firefighters and support personnel are assigned to wildfires that have burned more than 3,200 square miles (8,288 square kilometers) nationwide, the center said.
In Southern California, people in Kern and Tulare counties were ordered to evacuate because of a fire sweeping through the Sequoia National Forest. The Borel Fire scorched through almost the entirety of the historic mining town of Havilah, officials said.
California Governor Gavin Newsom is scheduled to visit the town of 250 people later Tuesday.
“We’re seeing so many of these iconic places in California . . . being quite literally devastated by these new realities,” Newsom said.
The fires burning throughout the state have overwhelmed California’s firefighting capacity and outside help has started to arrive, officials said. Newsom thanked Texas Governor Gregg Abbott on Tuesday for sending more than two dozen fire engines to help combat the Park Fire this week.
U.S. Fire Administrator Dr. Lori Moore-Merrell said one-third of U.S. residents live in an area where human activities and wildland vegetation intersect, creating a higher potential for wildfires, according to a statement.
“We question living here for sure,” Ward said of his ranch in Cohasset. But generations have remained since his wife’s great-grandfather settled there in 1905, and he isn’t the one to leave, he said.
“There’s a lot of history here,” Ward said. “So we live on this ranch, and we’re committed to this ranch and preserving the ranch.”
Granada Hills man faces multiple felony counts in domestic violence case
date: 2024-07-31, from: The Signal
Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station deputies investigated and arrested a man accused of terrorizing his ex-girlfriend on multiple occasions who was charged with 10 felony counts, one of which involved […]
The post Granada Hills man faces multiple felony counts in domestic violence case appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
White House pushes Biden’s Supreme Court proposal despite Republican objections
date: 2024-07-31, from: VOA News USA
WHITE HOUSE — The White House plans to continue President Joe Biden’s push for sweeping reforms of the U.S. Supreme Court during his final months in office, despite the proposal having little chance of passing the Republican-controlled House of Representatives.
“What we welcome is a debate,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in response to VOA’s question during her briefing Tuesday.
Jean-Pierre said there is broad public support for reform of the court. She sidestepped questions on whether the proposal is mainly a messaging strategy ahead of the November presidential election rather than a legislative goal for Biden, who is not seeking reelection.
“As many times as the president introduced legislation, or some ideas of how the direction of the legislation that’s important to the American people, we see a healthy debate,” she said.
On Monday, Biden urged Congress to eliminate lifetime appointments for Supreme Court justices and establish a system in which the sitting president would appoint a justice every two years to spend 18 years in service on the court.
His proposal would “reduce the chance that any single president imposes undue influence for generations to come,” Biden said.
Under the American political system, presidents appoint justices who are confirmed by the U.S. Senate and serve on the Supreme Court until they die or resign. The highest court of the land provides the final word on legal interpretations of the U.S. Constitution.
Speaker of the House of Representatives Mike Johnson dismissed the plan as part of Democrats’ “ongoing efforts to delegitimize the Supreme Court.”
“It is telling that Democrats want to change the system that has guided our nation since its founding simply because they disagree with some of the Court’s recent decisions,” he said in a statement. “This dangerous gambit of the Biden-Harris Administration is dead on arrival in the House.”
Biden’s proposal would “tilt the balance of power and erode not only the rule of law, but the American people’s faith in our system of justice,” he added.
Six of the nine Supreme Court justices were appointed by Republican presidents, including three by former President Donald Trump.
Biden also wants legislation to establish an enforceable ethics code for the court’s nine justices. Currently, the justices are free to police themselves under ethics rules that were put in place last year following revelations that Justice Clarence Thomas had received expensive gifts from Republican donors and that the wife of Justice Samuel Alito flew two flags often used by followers of Trump’s Make America Great Again movement.
The ethics part of the proposal is “the most politically feasible,” said Claire Finkelstein, professor of law and philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania and the director of the Penn Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law.
Chief Justice John Roberts’ failure to discipline his own members “cast great opprobrium on the court,” and makes it “illegitimate to a large degree,” she told VOA, adding that there may be bipartisan support “to rescue the court from its own problematic conduct.”
The third part of Biden’s reform proposal requires lawmakers to ratify a constitutional amendment limiting presidential immunity.
An amendment would reverse the court’s recent landmark ruling in favor of Trump that presidents are allowed some immunity from criminal prosecution for acts conducted while in office.
“This nation was founded on the principle there are no kings in America,” Biden said. “Each of us are equal before the law. No one is above the law. For all practical purposes, the court’s decision almost certainly means the president can violate their oath, flout our laws, and face no consequences.”
Messaging push
Passage of the proposal seem unlikely in light of Republican control of House and the Democrats’ slim majority in the Senate.
Passage of a constitutional amendment requires two-thirds support in both congressional chambers, or approval by two-thirds of the states at a special convention. Either way, it would then need to be ratified by three-fourths of the state legislatures.
Biden’s proposal is “both a messaging push and a warning to the Roberts court to clean up its act,” said Democratic Party strategist Julie Roginsky.
“It underscores the fact that the Supreme Court’s recent decisions have posed a grave threat to democracy and that the next president will have an opportunity to shape the court and, with it, the future of our democracy,” she told VOA.
Only 41% of Americans have a favorable opinion of the Supreme Court, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted in June.
American confidence in the Supreme Court has declined in recent years as more people see the institution as partisan. A majority of Americans (53%) say that they think Supreme Court justices rule mainly on the basis of their partisan political views, according to a 2023 poll by ABC News/Ipsos, up 10 percentage points from 2022.
Various polls show that voters of both parties are in favor of term limits for justices, including a Fox News poll in July that show most Americans strongly favor mandatory retirement.
“Biden’s proposals bundle some of the most popular reforms while avoiding some of the more politically divisive,” said Chris Jackson, senior vice president at Ipsos, referring to a court-packing proposal pushed by some progressives that would expand the size of the Supreme Court to quickly eliminate the court’s lean to the right.
“It remains to be seen if this will be an effective campaign message for the Harris campaign heading into the election,” he told VOA.
Vice President Kamala Harris, the likely Democratic presidential nominee, backed Biden’s proposal on Monday.
“President Biden and I strongly believe that the American people must have confidence in the Supreme Court,” she said in a statement. “Yet today, there is a clear crisis of confidence facing the Supreme Court as its fairness has been called into question after numerous ethics scandals and decision after decision overturning long-standing precedent.”
Trump, meanwhile, dismissed it.
“It’s going nowhere,” he said in a Fox News interview Monday. “He knows that, too.”
VOA’s Kim Lewis contributed to this report.
Weekly farmers market to launch in Valencia beginning Sunday
date: 2024-07-31, from: The Signal
News release A new certified farmers market is coming to Valencia on Sundays from 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. The market will feature fresh meats and produce direct from local […]
The post Weekly farmers market to launch in Valencia beginning Sunday appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/07/weekly-farmers-market-to-launch-in-valencia-beginning-sunday/
Less Coffee, Better Sleep
date: 2024-07-31, from: Marginallia log
As an experiment, I’ve reduced my coffee-intake to a single cup a day for about a week now. It’s made an enormous difference in sleep, mood and energy. I get tired at night, fall asleep quickly, and wake up refreshed. As mentioned previously in the context of morning sunlight exposure—another thing that’s aided my sleeping habits, but is somewhat less practical to sustain as it requires fair weather—I’ve always been slow to get going in the morning, active at night, bad at getting to bed at sane hours.
https://www.marginalia.nu/log/a_109_sleep2/
pg_ivm 1.9 released
date: 2024-07-31, from: PostgreSQL News
IVM Development Group is pleased to announce the release of pg_ivm 1.9.
Changes since the v1.8 release include:
Bug fixes
-
Add support for PostgreSQL 17 (Yugo Nagata, Takuma Hoshiai, reshke)
This contains the following changes:
-
Change functions to use a safe search_path during maintenance operations when used with PostgreSQL 17
This prevents maintenance operations (automatic maintenance of IMMVs and refresh_immv) from performing unsafe access. Functions used by IMMVs that need to reference non-default schemas must specify a search path during function creation.
-
refresh_immv can be executed by users with the MAINTAIN privilege when used with PostgreSQL 17
About pg_ivm
pg_ivm is an extension module that provides Incremental View Maintenance (IVM) feature.
Incremental View Maintenance (IVM) is a way to make materialized views up-to-date in which only incremental changes are computed and applied on views rather than recomputing. pg_ivm provides a kind of immediate maintenance, in which materialized views are updated immediately after a base table is modified.
Source repository: https://github.com/sraoss/pg_ivm
https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/pg_ivm-19-released-2902/
Announcing postgres-contrib.org | Contributions to PostgreSQL
date: 2024-07-31, from: PostgreSQL News
We are pleased to announce postgres-contrib.org, a new website started in July 2024 by members of the PostgreSQL community, highlighting contributions to the project by the amazing people standing behind it.
Many contributions to and for the PostgreSQL Project happen outside of
writing code. This was the topic of the
Increase
Community Participation session at
PGConf.dev
2024.
postgres-contrib.org has
weekly posts listing contributions, but they will likely not be complete
— if you spot something which is worth noticing, please contact us by
email.
The following people contributed to this list, and the general idea: Andreas Scherbaum, Boriss Mejías, Chris Ellis, Floor Drees, Jimmy Angelakos and Pavlo Golub.
PGConf NYC 2024 Schedule Announced!
date: 2024-07-31, from: PostgreSQL News
PGConf NYC 2024 (September 30 - October 2, 2024, New York City) is packed with user stories and best practices for how to use PostgreSQL. Join us in New York City and connect with other developers, DBAs, administrators, decisions makers, and contributors to the open source PostgreSQL community! We’re expecting to sell out - we’re not just saying that - so please register today to secure your spot!
The schedule is now available! You can see the schedule here:
https://postgresql.us/events/pgconfnyc2024/schedule/
PGConf NYC 2024 also has lots of content relevant to how you’re running PostgreSQL, including case studies on managing large fleets and workloads on PostgreSQL, how to improve your query performance, hot topics like the intersection of AI and databases, different ways to minimize your downtime, and learning about upcoming PostgreSQL features!
PGConf NYC 2024 is not possible without the generous support of our sponsors. PGConf NYC takes place in one of the largest markets of PostgreSQL users. Your sponsorship lets you connect with decision makers, developers, DBAs, and PostgreSQL contributors, helps keep ticket prices low, and helps grow the PostgreSQL community. We have sold out our Platinum and Gold sponsorships, but we still have other sponsorships available. For more information on sponsorship, please visit the below link:
https://2024.pgconf.nyc/sponsors/
Can’t wait to participate in PGConf NYC 2024? Registration is available:
https://2024.pgconf.nyc/tickets/
We look forward to seeing you in New York!
https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/pgconf-nyc-2024-schedule-announced-2903/
This game would be perfect if it wasn’t gacha
date: 2024-07-31, from: Ze Iaso’s blog
TL;DR: Zenless Zone Zero is a fantastic game that’s ruined by its gacha system. It’s a shame that it’s a gacha game, because it’s so good otherwise. 8/10
https://xeiaso.net/videos/2024/zzz-review/
CloudNativePG 1.23.3 and 1.22.5 Released!
date: 2024-07-31, from: PostgreSQL News
We are delighted to announce the latest updates for the CloudNativePG Operator, now available for versions 1.23 and 1.22.
Patch releases 1.23.3 and 1.22.5 bring essential bug fixes and enhancements to ensure greater stability and resilience for your systems.
Important Notice: Version 1.22 has now reached End-of-Life (EOL). The 1.22.5 release is the final update for this version.
Upgrade Now: We strongly recommend updating your operator to take advantage of these improvements and ensure your system remains robust.
For comprehensive details on the changes, please review the release notes:
Thank you for your continued support. We are committed to providing you with a seamless experience with the CloudNativePG Operator. If you are using our operator in production, we invite you to add your organization as an adopter of the project.
Your support is invaluable to us and helps us grow and improve!
About CloudNativePG
CloudNativePG stands as a groundbreaking open-source Kubernetes Operator designed explicitly for PostgreSQL workloads. Seamlessly orchestrating the entire life cycle of a PostgreSQL cluster, CloudNativePG takes charge from bootstrapping and configuration to ensuring high availability, connection routing, and comprehensive backup and disaster recovery mechanisms. Leveraging PostgreSQL’s native streaming replication, CloudNativePG efficiently distributes data across pods, nodes, and zones using standard Kubernetes patterns. This enables seamless scaling of replicas in a Kubernetes-native manner, with the operator autonomously and safely reconfiguring replication as needed. Originally conceived and supported by EDB, CloudNativePG represents a paradigm shift in managing PostgreSQL workloads within Kubernetes environments.
https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/cloudnativepg-1233-and-1225-released-2900/