Links 14/03/2024: Fentanylware/TikTok Ban Passed (US), Navalny Aide Attacked With Hammer
Contents
- Leftovers
- Hardware
- Health/Nutrition/Agriculture
- Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)
- Security
- Defence/Aggression
- Transparency/Investigative Reporting
- Environment
- Finance
- Censorship/Free Speech
- Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press
- Civil Rights/Policing
- Internet Policy/Net Neutrality
- Digital Restrictions (DRM) Monopolies/Monopsonies
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Leftovers
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Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong’s Ocean Park names crocodile ‘Passion’ following social control media vote
Hong Kong’s Ocean Park has christened a 1.9-metre crocodile found last April in Yuen Long “Passion,” following a public vote on its name. The theme park announced the crocodile’s name at a ceremony on Tuesday. The name Passion received the most votes in a Facebook (Farcebook) poll that also included Bo Bo, Harmony, Hope and Lotus.
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Chris ☛ Extreme Value Statistical Process Control
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Grafana Labs Dives Deeper Into Kubernetes Observability
Grafana Labs extended its observability support for Kubernetes environments to simplify monitoring and troubleshooting and reduce costs.
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Tedium ☛ Spinning The Dead
I am so obsessed with trying to figure out who Deadspin’s new owners are that it led me to some late night spam-blog sleuthing.
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Kev Quirk ☛ Selling Some Watches
I've decided to clear some space in my collection and sell a few of my watches. There's 7 of them up for sale, if you're interested, get in touch (eBay links at the end).
A collection of 50 watches is probably excessive, so I'm thinning out the heard a little. But, let's be honest, I'll only end up replacing them with something else. :-)
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James G ☛ Use a penguin avatar to navigate my personal website
TL;DR: You can now use a penguin avatar to navigate my website. To do so, press the "p" key on your keyboard. A penguin will appear on the page. This penguin has a special power: when it hovers over a link, the penguin clicks the link.
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Hardware
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Hackaday ☛ Randomly Move Marionette With Steel Balls And Geneva Drives
Over the years we have seen many marble machines, but this one on the [Karakuri channel] (hit CC for subtitles) on YouTube is somewhat special, as it uses Geneva drives to turn the motion of the steel balls going around the circuit into random movement of a marionette. The Geneva drive type of gear mechanism normally converts a constant rotary motion into intermittent rotary motion by having a singular pin on the first wheel drive the second wheel. In the demonstrated mechanism, however, the pin is replaced by the steel balls, which are only intermittently and randomly present because of how each steel ball picks one of four paths, one towards each Geneva drive.
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Hackaday ☛ Design Review: DPI-LVDS Sony Vaio LCD Devboard
Ordering a PCB with mistakes sucks. We should help each other avoid such mistakes – especially newcomers. One of the best ways to avoid these mistakes, especially if it’s your first one, is to get a few other people to look at it. You deserve to get a PCB that is as functional and as helpful as humanly possible, so that you can be happy with your project, and feel ever so slightly more confident in yourself in whatever you shall set out to do next.
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Barry Kauler ☛ Heim versus ball joint
A few weeks ago, I admired Tomek's "Street Fox" DIY recumbent trike front suspension:
https://bkhome.org/news/202402/trike-front-suspension-using-tie-rods.html
Those type of joints are known as "Heim" joints, as distinct from normal ball joints. These are also known as "Rose" joints in Britain.
There is at least one trike manufacturer using the same technique; Stein Trikes (based in Serbia). See video about the "Wild One" trike front suspension and a snapshot from the video: [...]
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Hackaday ☛ LED Choker Is A Diamond In The Junk Pile
Isn’t it great when you find a use for something that didn’t work out for the project it was supposed to? That’s the story behind the LED strips in this lovely blinkenlights choker by [Ted].
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Hackaday ☛ LEGO Keyboard Stand Fits Just Right
Split keyboards are great for many reasons, but mostly because you can place the halves as far apart as you want and really give your arms and shoulders the room they need. [Jason Cox] hit the nail on the head, though: add in a couple of palm rests, and you now have four things that will potentially shift and drift out of place on your desk or keyboard tray. It was such a problem that [Jason] hardly ever used his Kyria. That is, until he built a stand out of LEGO to hold everything.
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Hackaday ☛ An Optical Computer Architecture
We always hear that future computers will use optical technology. But what will that look like for a general-purpose computer? German researchers explain it in a recent scientific paper. Although the DOC-II used optical processing, it did use some conventional electronics. The question is, how can you construct a general computer that uses only optical technology?
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Hackaday ☛ 4D Knit Dress Skirts Waste
Regular 2D sewing of anything is inherently wasteful. You can align the pattern pieces however you want, but there’s going to be wasted everything — thread, fabric, and interfacing — whether you get it right the first time or not. Never mind the fact that people tend to create a muslin (prototype) first using inexpensive fabric (like muslin) for the purposes of getting the fit right.
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CNX Software ☛ Quectel RG255G – A MediaTek-Based 5G RedCap IoT Module Designed for Industrial & Automotive Applications
The Quectel RG255G IoT Module is a Sub-6GHz LGA module utilizing 3GPP Rel-17 RedCap (Reduced Capability) technology. The module is designed for medium-speed, large-capacity applications with features like URLLC/network slicing, and multi-constellation GNSS support, while also ensuring compatibility with LTE Cat 4 and 5G Sub-6 SA mode. With a peak data rate of 220Mbps DL/121Mbps UL and interfaces like USB 2.0 and PCIe 1.0, this device is ideal for smart grids, the internet of vehicles, and industrial automation.
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CNX Software ☛ WeAct STM32H743 Arm Cortex-M7 board ships with a 0.96-inch LCD and a choice of camera sensors
WeAct STM32H743 is a small MCU development board powered by a 480 MHz STMicro STM32H743VIT6 Cortex-M7 microcontroller and equipped with a small LCD and a camera connector taking OV2640, OV5640-AF, OV7670, or OV7725 camera sensors.
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Health/Nutrition/Agriculture
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CS Monitor ☛ When schools tap parental love
The pandemic’s impact on student learning has led educators to break down walls with parents and involve them more in education.
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Science Alert ☛ The Pandemic Dramatically Reshaped Life Expectancy, Now We Know How Much
"A more profound impact than any event seen in half a century."
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Science Alert ☛ Here's Why Cutting Carbs For Protein Might Not Help You Build Muscle
Just ask Mr Universe.
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Science Alert ☛ ADHD Medication Could Literally Add Years to Some People's Lives
A real life saver.
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YLE ☛ THL: Finland faces hepatitis E epidemic with record number of cases
The outbreak in hepatitis E infections is being attributed to a batch of mettwurst, which was withdrawn from grocery store shelves last week by Oulu-based food producer Kotivara.
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Hong Kong Free Press ☛ 6 nurses report sexual harassment at Hong Kong private hospital, prompting investigation
Six nurses at a Hong Kong private hospital have accused a member of senior nursing staff of sexual harassment, prompting an internal investigation.
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Science Alert ☛ A Simple Sticker Could Allow People With Voice Disorders to Speak Again
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Science Alert ☛ A Blood Test Could Reveal Your Biological Age And Predict Disease Risk
This might revolutionize how we combat aging.
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MIT Technology Review ☛ Building a data-driven health-care ecosystem
The application of Hey Hi (AI) to health-care data has promise to align the U.S. health-care system to quality care and positive health outcomes. But Hey Hi (AI) for health care hasn’t reached its full capacity. One reason is the inconsistent quality and integrity of the data that Hey Hi (AI) depends on. The industry—hospitals, providers, insurers, and administrators—uses diverse systems.…
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RFERL ☛ Iran Official Says Health System Faces 'Disaster' Over Nurse Exodus
A member of the leadership of Iran's Medical Council (IRIMC) says the issue of nurses migrating to other countries has become a full-blown crisis, leaving Iran's hospitals far below international standards for treating patients.
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University of Michigan ☛ UMich graduates and changemakers speak on Black maternal health disparities
More than 50 University of Michigan students and staff gathered in the Trotter Multicultural Center Tuesday to hear from three guest speakers about their experience advocating for Black maternal rights.
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Latvia ☛ Vitamin supplement withdrawn due to possible intoxication risk
The Food and Veterinary Service (PVD) has instructed to suspend the distribution of the food supplement "Nateo D pilieni Forte" (solution in oil with a stated dose of 25µg or 1000 IU per drop; batch No 262301) produced by SIA "Sagitus", the service said.
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Off Guardian ☛ Net Zero, the Digital Panopticon and the Future of Food
The food transition, the energy transition, net-zero ideology, programmable central bank digital currencies, the censorship of free speech and clampdowns on protest. What’s it all about? To understand these processes, we need to first locate what is essentially a social and economic reset within the context of a collapsing financial system.
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Proprietary/Artificial Intelligence (AI)
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Tom's Hardware ☛ Nvidia being sued by writers for unauthorized use of their works in generative Hey Hi (AI) training
Nvidia joins Microsoft, OpenAI, Meta, Google, and other parties in the various ongoing lawsuits related to generative AI. This time, its NeMo platform has been targeted by writers for training off of nearly 200,000 books without permission.
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Silicon Angle ☛ Apple eases App Store software distribution rules in the EU
Apple Inc. today announced plans to relax some of the App Store’s software distribution rules in the European Union. The move will make it easier for the company to comply with a pair of antitrust laws, the Digital Services Act and the Digital Markets Act, that EU lawmakers passed in 2022.
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AWS CloudFormation IaC Generator!
AWS recently introduced the CloudFormation IaC Generator, a powerful tool embedded in the proprietary trap AWS CloudFormation console. This compact yet robust tool simplifies the process of creating CloudFormation templates for existing resources within your proprietary trap AWS account. This blog post, we will take you on a guided tour of this tool, providing step-by-step instructions on how to harness its capabilities effectively.
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Security
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Privacy/Surveillance
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Internet Society ☛ Nevada Wants to Reduce Online Protections for Children: All Internet Users Should Benefit from Strong Encryption
Today we joined an effort to stop the State of Nevada from making it easier for children’s personal information to be obtained by child predators, criminal gangs, foreign nations, and others. The State of Nevada seems to think that children deserve less protection online.
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Techdirt ☛ Head Of Federal Prosecutors’ Association Latest To Ask For Broken Encryption
After hearing consecutive FBI directors (James Comey, Chris Wray) drone on and on about how device and communication encryption are nudging us ever closer to the criminal apocalypse, it’s kind of refreshing to hear from someone else equally as misguided.
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Techdirt ☛ Once Again, Google Caves To Political Pressure And Supports Questionable STOP CSAM Law
It’s not surprising, but still disappointing, to see companies like Google and Meta, which used to take strong stands against bad laws, now showing a repeated willingness to cave on such principles in the interests of appeasing policymakers. It’s been happening a lot in the last few years and it’s happened again as Google has come out (on ExTwitter of all places) to express support for a mixed batch of “child safety” bills.
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New York Times ☛ Airbnb Bans All Indoor Security Cameras
Widespread use of indoor security cameras has raised concerns about privacy in vacation rentals, hotels, public bathrooms, locker rooms and on cruise ships.
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EFF ☛ EFF Urges New York Court to Protect Online Speakers’ Anonymity
In the case on appeal, GSB Gold Standard v. Google, a German company that sells cryptocurrency investments is seeking to unmask an anonymous blogger who criticized the company. Based upon a German court order, the company sought a subpoena that would identify the blogger. The blogger fought back, without success, and they are now appealing.
Like speech itself, the First Amendment right to anonymity fosters and advances public debate and self-realization. Anonymity allows speakers to communicate their ideas without being defined by their identity. Anonymity protects speakers who express critical or unpopular views from harassment, intimidation, or being silenced. And, because powerful individuals or entities’ efforts to punish one speaker through unmasking may well lead others to remain silent, protecting anonymity for one speaker can promote free expression for many others.
Too often, however, corporate or human persons try to abuse the judicial process to unmask anonymous speakers. Thus, courts should apply robust evidentiary and procedural standards before compelling the disclosure of an anonymous speaker’s identity.
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Defence/Aggression
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New York Times ☛ On the Tripwire of a ‘Red Line,’ It’s Often Presidents Who Trip
Barack Obama drew one for Syria. George W. Bush drew several, for North Korea and Iran. Now President Biden has drawn one for Israel. The hard part is figuring out what to do when they are crossed.
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YLE ☛ FDF: Finnish peacekeeper racism, sexual abuse in Chad "should have been addressed"
Allegations of inappropriate behaviour by members of a Finnish peacekeeping force in Chad were revealed in a book published last week.
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ADF ☛ Report: al-Shabaab Extends Reach With Offer to Protect Somali Pirates
ADF STAFF After a six-year lull in major attacks, Somali pirates in December attacked four vessels as international navies relocated from the Indian Ocean to the Red Sea, where they protect maritime traffic from attacks by Yemen’s Houthi rebels.
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RFA ☛ Arakan Army captures Myanmar township bordering Chinese deep sea port
The seizure of Ramree follows 3 months of fighting that included daily military airstrikes and shelling.
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RFA ☛ North Koreans try to avoid forced construction work
The workers, called ‘stormtroopers,’ must endure harsh conditions working on Kim Jong Un’s 10,000 homes project.
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RFA ☛ Taiwanese film that ‘Eliminates Three Evils’ takes China by storm
The Chinese box office for the gangster movie has far exceeded its performance in Taiwan.
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RFA ☛ US ‘all in’ on Philippine chip sector as China tensions ramp up
U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo also announced $1 billion in new American investment for the Philippines.
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ADF ☛ Militant Extremist Movements Becoming More Localized
Terrorism in Sub-Saharan Africa is intensifying, and experts say the central Sahel region has replaced the Middle East as its global epicenter. Worldwide deaths from terrorism increased by 22% in 2023 to 8,352 — the most since 2017 — according to the 2024 Global Terrorism Index (GTI), published on February 29.
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ADF ☛ Report: Eritrean Troops Abducting Tigrayans Months After Cease-Fire
Sixteen months after the Ethiopian government defeated rebels in its northern Tigray region with the help of Eritrea, remaining Eritrean Defence Forces troops have been abducting farmers and stealing livestock, according to reports.
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YLE ☛ Nato exercises set to cause traffic jams
The Finnish Defence Forces say there could be congestion on the roads as we approach the end of the week.
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France24 ☛ Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry to resign in bid to restore calm
Haiti's unelected prime minister, Ariel Henry, will step down once a transition council and temporary replacement have been appointed, he said on Monday, after leading the Caribbean country since the 2021 assassination of its last president.
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Defence Web ☛ Deaths linked to militant Islamist violence in Africa continue to spiral
Fatalities linked to militant Islamist violence jumped by 20 percent in the past year, claiming more than 23,000 lives—a new record. Over 80 percent of these deaths were in the Sahel and Somalia.
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New York Times ☛ Israel Says It Targeted Marwan Issa, a Top Hamas Leader in Gaza
An Israeli military official said investigators were still determining the outcome of a strike on an underground area used by Marwan Issa, the deputy commander of Hamas’s military wing.
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New York Times ☛ Hezbollah Fires More Than 100 Rockets Into Israel
The barrage by Hezbollah was among the heaviest in the months of cross-border strikes that have fed fears that the war in Gaza could expand.
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New York Times ☛ Who Are the Top Hamas Leaders in Gaza?
Israel targeted Marwan Issa, a Hamas military leader, with a strike over the weekend. He is one of three leaders of the group in Gaza who Israel says were the main planners of the Oct. 7 attack.
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Russia, Belarus, and War in Ukraine
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New York Times ☛ Top Navalny Aide Attacked With Hammer Outside Home in Lithuania
Leonid Volkov, a top aide to Aleksei Navalny, was beaten and sprayed with tear gas as he was pulling up to his house in Vilnius.
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RFERL ☛ Navalny Aide Attacked By Unknown Assailant, Spokeswoman Says
Leonid Volkov, a close aide to late Russian opposition leader Aleksei Navalny, was attacked outside his home by an unknown assailant in the Lithuanian capital on March 12, Navalny's former spokeswoman said.
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LRT ☛ Navalny’s former chief of staff Volkov attacked in Lithuania
Leonid Volkov, former chief of staff of Alexei Navalny, was attacked outside his home in Lithuania, Navalny’s former spokesperson Kira Yarmysh has said.
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France24 ☛ Navalny ally Leonid Volkov attacked outside home in Lithuania
Leonid Volkov, a close ally of late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, was assaulted outside his home in Vilnius on Tuesday, in an incident that sparked an uproar from the Lithuanian government.
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Transparency/Investigative Reporting
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Reason ☛ Without More Accountability, Sunshine Laws Are Toothless
An AP survey found that most states have no mechanism to appeal denials of records requests, outside of filing a lawsuit.
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NYPost ☛ Family of Boeing whistleblower John Barnett blames ‘hostile work environment’ for his death
"He was suffering from PTSD and anxiety attacks as a result of being subjected to the hostile work environment at Boeing which we believe led to his death," John Barnett's family said.
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Ruben Schade ☛ Boeing board against HQ move back to Seattle
I wrote this before reading about former quality manager and whistleblower John Barnett being found dead prior to his court appearance to give testimony. Good grief, what’s going on?
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Environment
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Energy/Transportation
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ADF ☛ Kenya’s Railway Falls Far Short of Expectations; Drives Mounting Debt
The Chinese-built Standard Gauge Railway in Kenya was supposed to be profitable by transporting cargo from Mombasa to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda and Uganda, then bringing goods from those countries back to Kenya.
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H2 View ☛ UK Government targets new ‘Net Zero ready’ gas-fired power plants
Laws surrounding existing UK gas plants are to be broadened by the government to allow the conversion to low-carbon alternatives such as hydrogen.
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YLE ☛ Tampere court remands fatal taxi crash driver into custody
Tuesday's hearing was held behind closed doors, and the court also forbade photography ahead of the session when the suspect was escorted into the courtroom by police officers.
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LRT ☛ Lufthansa cancels 4 Vilnius-Frankfurt flights on Tuesday
German airline Lufthansa has cancelled all flights between Vilnius and Frankfurt scheduled for Tuesday due to a strike by its employees.
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Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Chinese tech giant Xiaomi to begin first electric vehicle deliveries by end of March
Chinese electronics giant Xiaomi will start deliveries of its first electric vehicle by the end of March, the firm’s boss said Tuesday, bringing its highly anticipated entry into the automotive industry to the brink of completion. Xiaomi — the world’s third-largest smartphone manufacturer — also produces tablets, smartwatches, headphones, and scooters.
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Wildlife/Nature
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New York Times ☛ For Some Mammals, Large Adult Daughters, Not Sons, Are the Norm
Despite a common narrative that male mammals tend to dwarf female ones, fewer than half of mammalian species display that pattern, a new study suggests.
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Science Alert ☛ Confusing Jumbles of Rocks in Africa Could Represent Oldest Known Earthquakes
'Difficult to decipher.'
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Science Alert ☛ First-of-Their-Kind Pics Capture The Moment a Seal Spat at a Swooping Eagle
And stay away!
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Science Alert ☛ Rarely Seen Hammerhead Shark Embryo Unravels The Mystery of Their Bizarre Heads
Unprecedented access to this iconic creature.
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ADF ☛ Tanzania Will Deploy Drones to Monitor Forests
The Tanzania Forest Agency (TFA) is adding drones to the tools it uses to protect dwindling woodland areas, which are under pressure from a variety of sources.
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YLE ☛ Finnish forestry firms temporarily shut paper mills, suspend wage payments
Members of the paperworkers' union are not on strike, but the companies say the plants cannot operate due to the walkout by transport and logistics workers.
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Finance
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The Straits Times ☛ Malaysian SUV owner who pockets up to $142 a day by begging has welfare allowance revoked
The man is employed with a bus company and earns a monthly salary of RM2,000.
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Reason ☛ Inflation Isn't Imaginary
Plus: Chinese border-crossers, gender transitions for kids, the politics of raw milk, and more...
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Federal News Network ☛ White House wants Congress to give IRS back promised Inflation Reduction Act funds
IRS got roughly $20 billion in funding through the Inflation Reduction Act, but congressional Republicans demanded cuts to this spending.
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The Straits Times ☛ Malaysia Edition: Bersatu dares govt to hold by-elections | Luxury retirement homes on the rise
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The Straits Times ☛ Sports and music lessons for China’s kids in sharp decline as purse strings tighten
Spending heavily on after-school activities was once par for the course for middle-class families.
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RFA ☛ Did the IMF chief say the Chinese economy performed well in 2023?
Verdict: Misleading
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Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Major Chinese property developer Vanke sees downgrade in Moody’s credit rating amid housing woes
Moody’s has downgraded one of China’s largest housing developers’ credit rating, as woes in the country’s property sector show no sign of abating. China’s real estate market is grappling with unprecedented challenges, with some developers on the verge of bankruptcy and lower property prices deterring consumers from making investments.
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France24 ☛ French and Corsican officials strike deal in ‘decisive step’ towards island’s autonomy
France’s government and Corsican elected officials have agreed on the wording of a proposed constitutional revision granting the île de Beauté (Island of Beauty) an autonomous status, six months after President Emmanuel Macron broke a longstanding French taboo on the subject of autonomy for the island scarred by decades of conflict with Paris.
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Censorship/Free Speech
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Press Gazette ☛ Phillip Schofield friend wins £90k damages from news site over false grooming claim
Politicalite's editor sent inflammatory emails to Simon Schofield's solicitors and then did not engage in the case.
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Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Article 23: Hong Kong may tighten measures against ‘absconders’ after lawmakers say draft bill ‘too lenient’
The Hong Kong government plans to amend a draft bill for the city’s new domestic security law to tighten measures against “absconders,” after lawmakers said the existing proposal was “too lenient.”
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Reason ☛ Court Orders Harvard's Investigative Report in Francesca Gino v. Harvard Largely Unsealed
The quick backstory on the litigation, from my "Scholar of Dishonesty Accused of Research Dishonesty Sues for Libel, Claiming Accusers Were Dishonest" post last year: Prof. Francesca Gino, a celebrated scholar studying dishonesty, was recently put on unpaid leave by Harvard, based on allegations that she had fabricated data in her studies; [...]
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Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Hong Kong will ‘shine even brighter’ – Beijing slams Washington Post editorial on authorities’ crackdown on city
Beijing has condemned an editorial by US newspaper The Washington Post on Hong Kong’s “painful descent into authoritarian repression” with the legislation of a new security law, accusing the outlet of “ignorance and double-standards” on Hong Kong affairs.
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EFF ☛ Congress Should Give Up on Unconstitutional TikTok Bans [Ed: EFF keeps lobbying for the Communist Party of China, which openly attacks Free speech. This is disappointing development and makes one wonder if the EFF's leadership is still intact.]
A year ago, supporters of digital rights across the country successfully stopped the federal RESTRICT Act, commonly known as the “TikTok Ban” bill (it was that and a whole lot more). And now we must do the same with this bill.
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Techdirt ☛ Trump Is Right (For The Wrong Reasons): A TikTok Ban In The US Would Be A Huge Problem
It’s potentially forgotten in all the other nonsense that has happened over the past four years, but the initial push to “ban TikTok” in the US started right after a bunch of TikTokers reserved fake seats for a rally that Trump’s campaign people thought was going to be mobbed by people and ended up being embarrassingly half empty.
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New York Times ☛ Tuesday Briefing [Ed: "Republicans target TikTok" is false. Many 'democrats' do too.]
Republicans target TikTok, despite Donald Trump’s objection.
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CS Monitor ☛ Biden, House Republicans support Fentanylware (TikTok) ban. Why does Trump oppose it?
A bill that could lead to the popular video-sharing app Fentanylware (TikTok) being banned in the United States is quickly gaining traction among House Republicans. President Biden endorsed the legislation, while former President Donald Trump is voicing opposition.
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University of Michigan ☛ Universal Music Group’s feud with Fentanylware (TikTok) ruins your favorite videos
On Jan. 31, 2024, the Fentanylware (TikTok) community underwent a tortuous change — the muting of millions of videos. With TikTok’s not-so-humble beginnings as Musical.ly, a video-sharing social control media platform focused on lip-syncing top-40 hits, not to mention the entire platform still being built upon music, this loss was not taken lightly.
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France24 ☛ US House bill could force Fentanylware (TikTok) to break ties with Chinese owner
The US House of Representatives will vote Wednesday on a bill that would force Fentanylware (TikTok) to cut ties with its Chinese owner or get banned in the United States.
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Freedom of Information / Freedom of the Press
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Hong Kong Free Press ☛ Article 23: Hong Kong condemns British outlet’s ‘misleading’ report that having old newspapers could breach new law
Hong Kong has hit out at British newspaper The Times after it published a “misleading” report suggesting that readers holding old newspapers could violate the proposed homegrown national security law. The Times published the article with the headline “Hongkongers to be jailed for keeping old newspapers” on Monday afternoon.
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Civil Rights/Policing
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RFA ☛ China pushes ‘Sinicization of Islam’ in Xinjiang as Ramadan arrives
Xinjiang’s Communist Party secretary says it is an ‘inevitable trend.’
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RFA ☛ China's ‘little pinks’ go after drinks maker over ‘Japanese’ styling
Boycott and videos of consumers dumping the drinks has sent Nongfu Spring’s stock tumbling.
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OpenRightsGroup ☛ 13 June 2023 Letter to Commissioner Reynders from LIBE Committee Chair DPDI Bill
Dear Commissioner Reynders, On 23 May 2023, LIBE committee Members held an exchange of views with the UK Information Commissioner, Mr John Edwards, which was organised as follow-up to the LIBE committee’smission to the United Kingdom in November 2022.
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OpenRightsGroup ☛ 28 August 2023 Reply from Commissioner Reynders to LIBE Committee Chair DPDI Bill
Honourable Chair, dear Juan, Thank you for your letter of 13 June 2023, in which you ask the Commission about its assessment of the UK’s Data Protection and Digital Information Bill that is currently before the UK Parliament.
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OpenRightsGroup ☛ 8 March 2024 Letter to Commissioner Reynders from LIBE Committee Chair DPDI Bill
Dear Commissioner Reynders, The LIBE Committee closely follows the matters linked to the United Kingdom’s data protection regime and adequacy findings granted to the UK by the European Commission. On 23 May 2023, LIBE committee Members exchanged views with the UK Information Commissioner, Mr John Edwards.
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OpenRightsGroup ☛ The impact of the DPDI BILL on data use for political purposes
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Internet Policy/Net Neutrality
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Public Knowledge ☛ Public Knowledge Applauds NTIA for Developing Pathway To Boost Nation’s National Spectrum Strategy
The NTIA unveils its implementation plan for the administration's National Spectrum Strategy.
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APNIC ☛ One checklist at a time: Towards simplifying satellite Internet access in the Asia Pacific
Guest Post: Comprehensive checklist aims to revolutionize satellite Internet access in the Asia Pacific.
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Beta News ☛ Fake web traffic gets more sophisticated
Bots have been around for a long time, but they're now much more sophisticated, capable of mimicking human behavior, evading detection, and perpetrating a wide range of malicious activities.
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LWN ☛ Not so quickly extending QUIC
QUIC is a UDP-based transport protocol that forms the foundation of HTTP/3. It was initially developed at Google in 2012, and became an IETF standard in 2021. Work on the protocol did not stop with its standardization, however. The QUIC Working Group published several follow-up standards. Now, it is working on four more extensions to QUIC intended to patch over various shortcomings in the current protocol — although progress has not been quick.
QUIC serves as a replacement for TCP and TLS with several interesting benefits. Combining the handshakes involved in establishing a connection and encrypting it allows QUIC to reduce the number of round trips required before applications can send data — to zero, in some cases. Combining encryption with the transport layer also allows QUIC to hide details of connections from intermediate routers ("middleboxes"). QUIC also supports sending multiple independent streams over the same underlying connection. This ability is useful for applications like web servers that want to transfer related resources over the same connection without a dropped packet in one stream delaying the rest — a problem with TCP known as head-of-line blocking.
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Digital Restrictions (DRM)
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Techdirt ☛ Max Adds More Ads, Takes Aim As Password Sharing
We’ve documented in detail how the whole AT&T–>Time Warner–>Warner Brothers Discovery merger process has been a pointless mess, resulting in no limits of layoffs and damage to the underlying brands. What was supposed to be a gambit by these companies to dominate streaming TV, wound up being a very expensive act of seppuku by over-compensated executives clearly out of their depths.
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Techdirt ☛ Warner Bros. Discovery Disappears Games People Already Purchased
And here we go again. It’s time for another abject lesson in how you don’t actually own the things you’re “buying” in this here digital age. We’ve covered a ton of these stories at this point, obviously. But there are examples of people learning that they don’t actually own the thing they spent their money on… and then there are examples. This one is certainly one of the more egregious case studies in that respect.
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Patents
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H2 View ☛ Molear nanobubble technology achieves energy efficiency improvements for hydrogen production
Molear has issued the first patents to apply its proprietary nanobubble technology to electrolytic processes for hydrogen production.
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JUVE ☛ Ones to Watch France 2024: Yasmine Azzaoui [Ed: Spam/ad disguised as article; JUVE charges fees for its bias]
Every year, JUVE Patent carries out extensive research in the French patent monopoly market, culminating in the publication of the French patent monopoly rankings.
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New Yorker ☛ America’s Last Top Models
For decades, U.S. inventors sent in models with their patent monopoly applications—gizmos that reveal a secret history of unmet needs and relentless innovation.
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Dennis Crouch/Patently-O ☛ When ‘Interlock’ Causes Gridlock: Lessons from the Federal Circuit’s Decision in CoolIT Systems v. Vidal
In a nonprecedential decision, the Federal Circuit has vacated and remanded a PTAB decision siding against the patentee. The key issue on appeal was the proper construction of the claim term “matingly engaged,” which appears in the limitation “a compliant member matingly engaged with the second side of the housing member.” CoolIT Sys., Inc. v. Vidal, No. 2022-1221 (Fed. Cir. Mar. 7, 2024). Coolit v Vidal.
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Kangaroo Courts
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Kluwer Patent Blog ☛ Trying to Make Sense of the Oracle of G 2/21: T 116/18 vs. T 681/21
Following the issuance of G 2/21 last year, we asked whether the plausibility elephant had left the room. Our Kluwer colleague and friend Miquel Montañá discussed this issue more recently here.
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Trademarks
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TTAB Blog ☛ Finding MRS. COLORADO Use-less, TTAB Grants Petition for Cancellation
The Board granted a petition for cancellation of a registration for the mark MRS. COLORADO, finding that Respondent Abundance Productions had not used the mark in commerce in connection with "Entertainment in the nature of beauty pageants" on or before the filing date of the underlying application. The registration was therefore void ab initio. Miss United States of America LLC, DBA United States of America Pageants v.Abundance Productions, LLC, Cancellation No. 92071814 (March 8, 2024) [not precedential] (Opinion by Judge Melanye K. Johnson).
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Copyrights
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Public Domain Review ☛ The Art of Sutherland Macdonald, Victorian England’s “Michelangelo of Tattooing” (ca. 1905)
Photographs of tattoos by Sutherland Macdonald, Victorian England’s first professional tattoo artist.
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Monopolies/Monopsonies
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