2022-12-08

etc

• The US' 2k-year-old mystery mounds

Horseshit

• AI experts are increasingly afraid of what they’re creating

• Men are dropping out of the labor force, upset about their social status

• Amid inflation, just 12% of adults – and 29% of millionaires – feel ‘wealthy’

celebrity gossip

• Brittney Griner released by Russia in 1-for-1 prisoner swap for Viktor Bout

  • Yes, that Viktor Bout

  • WNBA star Brittney Griner has been freed from Russian prison

  • WNBA star Brittney Griner released from Russian detention

Obit

• John Prados, Master of Uncovering Government Secrets, Dies at 71

Musk

• Covid, vaccine misinformation 'spiking' on Twitter after Elon Musk fires mods

• Twitter Blue will cost more from iPhones to offset ‘hidden 30 percent tax’

• Elon Musk accused of turning Twitter offices into bedrooms

• Elon Musk’s Bankers Consider Tesla Margin Loans to Cut Risky Twitter Debt

• Musk lashes out over investigation into Twitter’s bedrooms for employees

• You’ve Been Referred Here Because You’re Wrong About Twitter and Hunter’s Laptop

• The Deep Twitter State? Former FBI General Counsel Fired at Twitter – JONATHAN TURLEY

• Tesla on self-driving claims: failure to realize aspirational goal is not fraud

Pestilence / Pox / COVID / VaxCult

• Letter from Top Apple Supplier Foxconn Prodded China to Ease Zero-Covid Rules

• Mass Long-Covid Disability Threatens the Economy

• On That ProPublica ‘Chinese Lab Leak’ Story

Media / ShowBiz / Advertising

• Meta won’t let staff discuss topics like abortion, gun control, vaccines at work

• Disney+ Advertising Launches Today

• I liberate the ending to Minecraft from Microsoft and give it to you | Hacker News

TechSuck

• Apple kills plans to scan for CSAM in iCloud

  • HN comments

• FBI Calls Apple's Enhanced Encryption 'Deeply Concerning'

• Shtetl-Optimized » Blog Archive » Google’s Sycamore chip: no wormholes, no superfast classical simulation either

  • HN comments

  • Publicity Stunt Fallout | Not Even Wrong

Crypto con games

• Federal prosecutors are investigating whether Sam Bankman-Fried manipulated the market for the Terra and Luna stablecoins, leading to their collapse.

• Celsius hearings, December 5: Whose stablecoins are these?

• FTX-hosted NFTs break after website is redirected to a restructuring page

• Everything SBF is doing is in singular pursuit of not going to jail

  • HN comments

• CoinDesk’s FTX scoop left a hole in its corporate overlord

Economicon / Business / Finance

• Plaid lays off 20% of staff, ‘hired and invested ahead of revenue growth’

• BlackRock chief Larry Fink pressured to resign over ESG ‘hypocrisy’

• U.S. SEC to vote on proposals that could overhaul Wall Street trading

• BuzzFeed's stock hits all-time low after announcing layoffs

• Credit Card Debt Hits All-Time High Just As US Savings Rate Plummets To 17-Year Low

• Jack Ma quits as head of leading China business group

• Blue Apron Lays Off 10% of Corporate Workforce

• The Federal Reserve Is Deflating Financial Bubbles, Without a Crash

• ExxonMobil announces $50B buyback despite political backlash

Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making

• Californians reluctant to cash in their inflation-relief debit cards: Here's why

• From the comments, on CDC reform

  The people who staff the place could either make a lot more money doing something else or they believe they could. This means that they selected into working here and did so precisely because they like some combination of the present culture and the mission as presently understood. Asking them to change is going to be treated as something tantamount to taking a major pay cut at best.

• Judicial Watch: Secret Service Has Repeatedly Changed Story on Existence of Hunter Biden Gun Records | Judicial Watch

Law Breaking / Police / Internal Security

• Chinese hackers stole at least $20M in US Covid-19 relief cash

• San Francisco reverses approval of killer robot policy

• Feds Link Attack on North Carolina Substations to Attacks on Oregon, Washington Power Stations.

• FBI Confirms It Got Tip About Colorado ‘Nonbinary’ Mass Shooting Suspect.

World

• Peru President Detained By Police After Impeachment, "Coup"

• The march of Germany’s extreme monarchists

• Reichsbürger: the German conspiracy theorists at heart of alleged coup plot

  • Germany Arrests 25 Suspected of Planning to Overthrow Government

  • Germany Arrests Dozens Accused Of Plotting To Overthrow Government | ZeroHedge

• Engineered FAMINE: German farmers ordered to SLASH nitrogen fertilizer usage to comply with EU green tyrants

Russia Bad / Ukraine War

• Putin Has Escape Plan to Venezuela If Russia Loses War: Former Speechwriter

• 2022 Time Magazine person of the year: Ukraine president V. Zelensky

• Putin: Nuclear risk is rising, but we are not mad

• War has tamed Ukraine’s oligarchs, creating space for democratic change

• Russia’s Oil Exports Nosedive Following Price Cap.

Health / Medicine

• Medically assisted deaths prove a growing boon to organ donation in Ontario

• Organ donations, transplants increase on days of largest motorcycle rallies

• Lasik Patients Should Be Warned of Complications, FDA Draft Says

• What comes up when you flush

  • HN comments

Environment / Climate / Green Propaganda

• Soil in Midwestern US is eroding 10 to 1k times faster than it forms

  • HN comments

• Reverse nature's decline or there is no future – UN

• Chemical pollution has passed safe limit for humanity, say scientists