2022-05-23

Cool

• Tomatoes gene-edited to produce Vitamin D

Worthy

• Why is it traitorous to understand the people you disagree with? Six models

  • HN comments

etc

• Coca-Cola Introducing Bottles with Caps That Stay Attached

• China Eyes Compressed Air as Battery Competitor in Energy Storage

Horseshit

• Would a BDSM Sex Robot Violate Asimov's First Law of Robotics?

• "Do not park in the active lanes of a highway" ... The Weather Network - Parking under overpass in severe weather is 'spectacularly dangerous'

• Public Camping will be a Felony in Tennessee starting June first

• Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four about liberalism not totalitarianism

• Scientists Use Gene Editing to Create Mutant Cockroaches in Breakthrough

• ‘Phones are like a scab we know we shouldn’t pick’: social media and anxiety

Rank Propaganda / Thought Policing / World Disordering

• Davos became a target for conspiracy theorists and anarchists

• Perceptions of shifts in public opinion are wildly off base

• Understanding Effective Altruism’s move into politics

• Statement on Removal of Mercedes Lackey from the Nebula Conference

  We learned yesterday that while participating in the “Romancing Sci-Fi & Fantasy” panel, Mercedes Lackey used a racial slur. First, we apologize to our attendees and the other panelists who were subjected to that slur. We’ve disabled access to the panel to avoid any additional harm being caused. Second, we are immediately removing Mercedes Lackey from the conference and the additional panels she was scheduled for, in accordance with SFWA’s Moderation Policy. The use of a racial slur violates the instruction to “Respect all cultures and communities. Do not make derogatory or offensive statements even as a joke.” That applies to everyone in a SFWA space, at all levels of their career.

• Russian Botnet Is Capable of Manipulating Social Media Trends on 'Massive Scale'

• The Cashless Society - Political Currents by Ross Barkan

• No Way Out but War - The Chris Hedges Report

Musk

• Why don’t regulators stop Elon Musk from breaking the law?

• The Coming Collapse of Elon Musk

• Elon Musk suggests cutting Twitter offer by proportion of bots

• Elon Musk lost $10B in net worth in a day after sexual misconduct claims

Abortion

• Woman Charged with Murder for ‘Self-Induced Abortion’ Won’t Be the Last

Monkeypox

• Monkeypox Outbreak Prompts WHO to Explore Sexual Contact Theory.

• Pride festival in Gran Canaria — which was attended by 80,000 people — is linked to Spanish monkeypox outbreak as well as two cases in Italy while European total reaches 100

• (2010) Goodbye smallpox vaccination, hello monkeypox (2010)

  • HN comments

• Thread on monkeypox

  Full genome sequence of a MPX case in Belgium shows that the protein coding sequence appears identical to that of a sequence from 2018 from the UK (linked to Nigeria)

• Now Monkeypox | Science | AAAS

  • HN comments

COVID / VaxCult

• A Tax-Based Alternative to Lockdowns

• Here We Go Again. CDC Recommends Covid-19 Testing

• Effects Covid-19 Lockdown on Mental Health, Environmental Concern, and Prejudice

Culture War / Tribal / Re segregation

• The Megachurch That Has Ex-Members Screaming Cult

Edumacationalizing / Acedemia Nuts

• Kids Are Far, Far Behind in School

  • HN comments

  "Republicans depend on uneducated voters; that's why they pushed the lockdowns so hard"

• I'm quitting my PhD · derhagen

  the more I understood about Quantum Computing, the better I understood that the work that had been done in my research group before had been a rather performative act, aiming to produce PDF files that would be accepted at conferences (which seems to be easy-going if you sprinkle some fancy quantum vocabulary over something and hand it in to a non-quantum conference). I felt less and less comfortable in a setting that apparently expected me to pick some low-hanging – let’s call it fruits – and call it a day.

  • HN comments

• PhD students face cash crisis with wages that don’t cover living costs

Media / ShowBiz / Advertising

• Making a Crusader Kings 3 ruler with every setting on maximum | Rock Paper Shotgun

• Substack's Founders Dive Headfirst into the Culture Wars

• Open All of the Satellite Imagery Archives

• TikTok Boom | No Mercy / No Malice

  YouTube and Instagram recruited talent faster than any business in history. Until TikTok. Fifty-five percent of TikTok users create their own videos on the platform. That’s a talent pool the depth of the Mariana Trench: 870 million people, or 1,000 times the number of people employed by the entire film and TV industry.

TechSuck

• Details on AMD's Quirky Chipset Solutions for AM5

• Qualcomm’s Snapdragon “8 Gen 1” salvage operation moves the chip to TSMC

• Broadcom reportedly in talks to buy VMware

• Nvidia to Slow Hiring

• Netlib: Tennessee's Jack Dongarra wins prestigious A.M. Turing Award

• Are sunspots/coronal mass ejections affecting your systems?

• Last payphone in NYC to be removed

Crypto con games

• Tether pays out $10bn in withdrawals since start of crypto crash

  • Tether Market Cap Has Dropped $10B Since Luna Collapse

  • Tether withdrawals top $10B as regulators raise alarm about stablecoins

• Crypto assets are ‘worth nothing,’ says ECB’s Christine Lagarde

  • HN comments

• Whistleblowers coming forth to expose foul play by UST, Terra operators

  • HN comments

• The math prodigy whose hack upended a crypto platform won't return funds

  • HN comments

• Binance promoted terra as ‘safe’ investment before $40bn collapse

Economicon / Business / Finance

• Grubhub’s Disastrous ‘Free Lunch’ Promotion Shows Why the Gig Economy Is Broken

• 'Big Short' Michael Burry warns stocks will crash and rallies won't last

• The Bad Times Are Coming for Startups

• Everyone is drafting their own startup Black Swan memo

• Cyber Insurers Raise Rates Amid a Surge in Costly Hacks

• Thrasio's Impending Doom - The Impassioned Moderate

  • As if one layer of Amazon dependence wasn't enough.

• Eurozone to end negative interest rates within months, Lagarde indicates

• The smoke and mirrors of unlimited paid time off

• Airbnb is closing its domestic business in China, sources say

Shortages

• France's Mustard Shortage

• World has 10-week supply of wheat, expert tells UN Security Council,‘This is seismic.’

• White House Mulls Tapping Emergency Diesel Stockpile To Address East Coast Crisis

Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making

• WSJ Editors Eviscerate Hillary, Lapdog Media in Blistering Op-Ed About Russia Collusion Lies

  • Hillary Clinton Did It

• How Did Mueller's $40 Million Trump-Russia Investigation 'Miss' Hillary's Hoax?

• Larry Ellison was on call with Hannity, Graham to talk overtun election result

  • Larry Ellison plotted with Trump aides about overturning election, report says

• A new court decision would blow up much of the government’s ability to operate

  The Jarkesy decision claims that the system the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) uses to enforce federal laws protecting investors from fraud is unconstitutional for at least three different reasons; that it has been unconstitutional for years; and that somehow no one has noticed this fact until two particularly partisan judges, taking liberties with existing law, discovered these defects in the Jarkesy case.

• Bush is Biden is Bush - TK News by Matt Taibbi

• They Want You to Suffer – RedState

• Florida Social Media Law Is Partially Blocked After Federal Appeal

Law Breaking / Police / Internal Security

• 198 Mass Shootings in 2022 Already

• California church shooting suspected anti-Taiwan hate crime by Chinese-American

• Goldman Sachs Employee Fatally Shot on Manhattan Subway in Unprovoked Attack

External Security / Militaria / Diplomania

• Biden says US willing to respond militarily in event of Chinese attack on Taiwan

  • Biden Says U.S. Would Intervene Militarily If China Invaded Taiwan

  • Biden "Misspeaks" In Vow To Respond Militarily If China Attacks Taiwan, White House Walks Back

World

• Kyoto, Japan's beautiful old imperial capital, is going broke fast

• Russian Ruble Is World’s Best Currency This Year

  • HN comments

• Russian Electricity Imports Halted To Another EU Nation

• Why Catalonia Failed

Health / Medicine

• (2012, PDF) What was primary mode of smallpox transmission? Biodefense Implications

Environment / Climate / Green Propaganda

• Pollution was responsible for 9M premature deaths in 2019

• HSBC exec suspended after comments about climate change

  • HN comments

  • (Video) HSBC's Stuart Kirk tells FT investors need not worry about climate risk

  Human beings have been fantastic at adapting to change, adapting to climate emergencies, and we will continue to do so. Who cares if Miami is six metres underwater in 100 years? Amsterdam has been six metres underwater for ages, and that’s a really nice place. We will cope with it."

  • HSBC Suspends Head Of Responsible Investing Over 'Nut Job' Climate-Alarmist Comments

• Summer Blackouts Bring Deadly Risk as Heatwaves Grip the Globe

• Climate Crisis: Torturous heat is breaking records and livelihoods in India

• Pakistan hits 120°F as climate trends drive spring heatwave

• Finland’s Green Party endorses nuclear power

• (Jan 2022) Backyard Wood Powered Generator

• Experts Forecast the Wind Plant of the Future to Be Taller and More Economical

Ukraine War

• YouTube removes more than 9k channels relating to Ukraine war

• Ukraine sows crops on over 80% of planned lands.

etc

• Facebook Slammed for Spreading Putin’s Propaganda in NATO’s East

• Russian soldier gets life in prison in Ukraine’s first war crimes trial

• Russian Strategist Tells TV Pundit Ukraine War Is "Rehearsal" For NATO Conflict

• Pentagon Mulls Sending Special Forces To Protect US Diplomats At Kyiv Embassy

• A Whole Age of Warfare Sank with the Moskva

• Starbucks exits Russia, shutting 130 coffee shops

  • Starbucks to exit Russia after nearly 15 years

• ‘Warmongering, lies and hatred’: Russian diplomat resigns over Ukraine invasion

• Syria’s barrel bomb experts in Russia to help with potential Ukraine campaign.