2025-01-05

mug recall, Wells was a jerk, crowd surfing fail, boom tubes, fake AI frens, wrong audiences, advertising on news, Biden medal-ing, bomber manifestos, French wine decline, breast enhancement shots?

etc

• Nazi Ties to Credit Suisse Ran Deeper Than Was Known, Hidden Files Reveal

• Delve into the Physics of the Hula-Hoop

• Why the thinnest Japanese paper drawing customers from around the world

• Cutting Edge Calligraphy

  • An ancient art form from the 1980's, usually rendered in the medium of cocaine.

Horseshit

• Why does modern life often feel like the seven circles of digital hell?

• The World-Altering 'Black Swan' Events That Could Upend Life in '25

• Samsung's 'AI fridge' has cameras to 'order food when you're low'

• As a child psychiatrist, I see what smartphones are doing to kids' mental health

  • What Smartphones are doing to kids' mental health is NOT terrifying

• Jimmy Carter Was Right About Materialism But, Alas, Wrong About Us

• UK gravestone carvers condemn blatant reproduction of their designs

• 70 Years of Height Evolution in the NBA

• Stanley Recall 2.6M Switchback and Trigger Action Travel Mugs Due to Burn Hazard

• The tradition of town criers is slowly dwindling

celebrity gossip

• Louis Farrakhan Loses Defamation and First Amendment Lawsuit Against Anti-Defamation League and Others.

• HG Wells was awful in every way

  Amusingly most of Wells’ utopian writing was forgotten: largely because it sucked. It also had the sort of IQ eugenics baloney which is popular with a certain kind of nerdoid today. While almost all of our contemporary kakistocracy believes something like this in private, IQ-eugenics is not the sort of thing which is presently popular to say out loud. Earlier nerdoid clerk types had no such inhibitions.

  as a human being he was a nasty piece of work. His womanizing was absolutely ridiculous and disgusting. It was done in a time (Edwardian) when such antics were socially, even medically destructive, and he conducted his affairs with a sociopathic frenzy which was both vile and shockingly contemporary. I say this as someone who admired Casanova’s autobiography. Wells wasn’t a Casanova; he was a bounder and a cad. Also a male feminist: a tribe generally disgusting in their treatment of the female sex, since they’re usually in it for the pussy: Wells absolutely was.

• Bob Dylan has some Dylanesque thoughts on the "sorcery" of technology

• Democrats Rewrite History to Praise Jimmy Carter | RealClearWire

• Soundgarden Team-Up With Fat Activist Vocalist Ends With Disastrous Crowd Surf Attempt | ZeroHedge

  Shaina Shepherd is heard exclaiming "I knew I was too heavy for you motherfuckers..." as the crowd struggled to prop her up after her embarrassing face-plant. She then stumbled back to the stage in a daze. Shepherd's miscalculation was one of basic physics, combined with the fact that the majority of Soundgarden fans are now in their 50s and quickly moved out of the way to avoid yet another expensive trip to their chiropractor.

Obit

• World's oldest person dies Tomiko Itooka dies at 116

Bluesky

• Why Bluesky Is Not Ready for Marketing

Musk

• I deleted all my tweets

• Elon Musk gets new support in growing lawsuit against OpenAI

• Who is Tommy Robinson and why does Elon Musk want him freed from jail?

• Internal SpaceX docs show sweet stock deals offered to investors A16Z, Gigafund

• Elon Musk makes 23 posts urging King Charles III to overthrow UK government

  • Like Chuck aint bent too....

Electric / Self Driving cars

• Self driving 1993 Volvo with open pilot

• Self-driving Tesla steers Calif. tech founder onto train tracks

Religion / Tribal / Culture War and Re-Segregation

• Climate group that called for Gaza ceasefire risks losing federal funding

• ‘Climate justice’ group calls on Northwestern University to become ‘fossil free campus.’

• Yale course asks if black and white women can be friends.

Edumacationalizing / Acedemia Nuts

• Low-cost dust explosion tube offers more bang for the buck

  Vanessa Campbell, a fourth-year University of Virginia student, was testing the Department of Chemical Engineering's adaptation of the Hartmann tube. Commercial versions have long been used in industry to test the explosibility of airborne dust, a common manufacturing hazard—but those can cost tens of thousands of dollars. UVA's cost is less than $700. "Our design focuses on being affordable and functional for educational use," said Campbell, who designed UVA's latest "Affordable Hartmann Tube" prototype.

  • poly-carbonates shatter, and thus aren't great for potato cannon. this application should not be holding pressure and might be OK.

• Nations grapple with tightening research security as China's dominance grows

• Community colleges gear up to train workers for proposed manufacturing future

• UK Lowest graduate salaries 'on a par with minimum wage'

Info Rental / ShowBiz / Advertising

• Meta scrambles to delete its own AI accounts after backlash intensifies

  • Instagram/Facebook will allow AI-generated accounts to interact in the platforms

  • Meta nukes 'Black queer momma of 2 and truth-teller' AI account after backlash

  • Meta scrambles to delete its own AI accounts after backlash intensifies

• YouTube chief Neal Mohan bets on AI and 'creators' to supercharge growth

• Samsung and Google's new spatial audio format will take on Dolby Atmos this year

• Bench, the VC-backed accounting startup that imploded over the holidays

• Honey Extension loses 3M users, hits 10k+ one-star reviews

• The Top Movies of 2024: ‘Wicked’ and Nine Sequels - The New York Times

  The problem is that Americans tend to say one thing and do another: They complain that Hollywood does not make enough original films, only to stay home or go elsewhere when studios call their bluff. Over the past year, the moviegoing masses rejected originals like “Here,” “Fly Me to the Moon,” “Argylle,” “Horizon: An American Saga,” “Harold and the Purple Crayon,” “Lisa Frankenstein,” “Y2K” and “Megalopolis.” To be fair, all of those films received soft-to-poor reviews, diminishing their appeal. More than ever, moviegoers want insurance: Is this activity going to be worth my time and money? Ticket prices have increased. Throw in the cost of popcorn, parking and a babysitter and — yikes, maybe let’s not take the chance on an original movie: Two tickets for “Sonic 3,” please. We at least had fun at the second one. We know what we’re getting. For the most part, however, originals with terrific reviews did not break out, either.

• Advertisers Keep Avoiding News Sites, and Publishers Have Had Enough of It - WSJ

  The Washington Post’s crossword puzzle was recently deemed too offensive for advertisers. So was an article about thunderstorms. And a ranking of boxed brownie mixes. Marketers have long been wary about running ads in the news media, concerned that their brands will land next to pieces about terrorism or plane crashes or polarizing political stories. That advertising no-go zone seems to keep widening. It is a headache that news publishers can hardly afford. Many are also grappling with subscriber declines and losses in traffic from Google and other tech platforms, and are now making an aggressive push to change advertisers’ perceptions. Advertisers’ aversion to news was on full display in the past election, when many marketers paused campaigns, and it hasn’t fully abated, according to industry executives. The news cycle since the election has remained hectic and unattractive to advertisers, with stories about President-elect Donald Trump’s controversial cabinet picks, global wars and the shooting of a health insurance executive in New York.

• Kodak increases film production capacity to meet commercial, consumer demand

• US newspapers are deleting old crime stories, offering subjects a 'clean slate'

  • I'd bitch about changing history, but the stories were unlikely to have been contaminated by truth in the first place. Also, what of the archive sites?

• Is There An "Anime Bubble" on the Verge of Bursting?

• Getty Images explores merger with Shutterstock, Bloomberg News reports

• Is GitHub a trustworthy keeper of our code?

TechSuck / Geek Bait

• Modern Generic SVGA driver for Windows 3.1

• Nascar and its teams are embracing 3D printing

• How to use distributed shared memory in CUDA for inter-thread-block communication

  what the fine people at NVIDIA did with their Hopper Architecture is add a new address-space to the memory-model, which let’s us access a different’s thread-block memory without going to main memory. This is implemented via some inter-streaming-multiprocessor communication-net the details of which seem to still be obscured, but that also doesn’t matter too much for us. It is to note though that with the current architecture CUDA only supports this for thread-blocks that are in the same thread-block-cluster (clusters are limited to a total size of 16 blocks).

  you won’t be able to use this feature if you’re not running on a Compute-Capability 9.0 (or higher if you’re reading post-Blackwell release) CUDA-Card (i.e H100/H200), this also means that we need to compile our CUDA kernel to be specific to the architecture

AI Will (Save | Destroy) The World

• Football coaches could soon be calling on AI to scout the next superstar

• FTC Order Requires AccessiBe to Pay $1M for Deceptive AI Accessibility Claims

• DeepSeek's optimizations could highlight limits of US sanctions

• How much of that is budgeted to PR? Microsoft expects to spend $80B on AI-enabled data centers in fiscal 2025

  • Microsoft to Spend $80B on AI Data Centers This Year

  • Microsoft is planning to spend $80 billion on AI datacenters in 2025.

• Ellison declares Oracle all-in on AI mass surveillance, keep everyone in line

• Why AI Did Not Upend the Super Year of Elections

Space / Boomy Zoomers / UFO

• Eutelsat resolves OneWeb leap year software glitch after two-day outage

  • Rival to SpaceX's Starlink Goes Dark After Failing to Account for Leap Year

Crypto con games

• Community-driven tokens propel memecoin index to record-breaking year

• Do Kwon, the person behind $40B Luna/Terra collapse, extradited to US

  • Do Kwon pleads not guilty to US fraud charges in $40B crypto collapse

• The Teenager Who Lived a Secret Double Life as a Millionaire Crypto Bandit

Economicon / Business / Finance

• Intel's Problems Are Even Worse Than You've Heard

• Natural Diamonds Had a Rough Year

• U-Haul Growth Metros and Cities of 2024: Dallas Top Metro for In-Migration

• Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac shares surge after fed agency reveal privatization path

• JetBlue fined $2M by DOT for 'chronically delayed flights'

• VW will offer "highly competitive" leases on ID.4 as sales restart

• Rolex watches and other luxury names declined in value last year

• Permit issued for Perpetua's Idaho antimony and gold mine

• Alcohol stocks tumble after US surgeon general warns of cancer risks and pushes for warning label.

Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making

• Federal appeals court strikes down FCC net neutrality rules

  • The Death of Net Neutrality Is a Bad Omen

  • In striking down net-neutrality rule, Sixth Circuit asserts judicial supremacy

• NYC Congestion Pricing Set to Take Effect After Years of Delays

Trump

• Trump Names One-Time Liberal Activist Turned MAGA Supporter As State Dept. Spokesperson

Democrats / Biden Inc

• Is Biden Teeing Up an Iran War for Trump?

• Biden awards Medal of Freedom to Hillary Clinton and George Soros

  President Joe Biden on Saturday named former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and billionaire political activist and philanthropist George Soros recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, part of a group of 19 people selected for the nation's highest civilian honor. Others to be presented the Presidential Medal of Freedom by the outgoing president at a White House ceremony Saturday include U2 frontman Bono, actor Michael J. Fox, actor Denzel Washington, chef José Andrés and William Sanford Nye, better known as television's "Bill Nye the Science Guy." From the sports world, decorated professional soccer player Lionel Messi of Argentina and retired NBA legend Earvin "Magic" Johnson will also receive the medal.

  • Biden awards Anna Wintour, George Soros and Bono with Medal of Freedom

  Billionaire philanthropist and major Democrat donor George Soros and US politician Hillary Clinton are also among recipients. In 2018, Soros, a Hungarian-born financier, was one of the high-profile critics of Donald Trump to be targeted by a mail bomber. Clinton, the former US secretary of state, will receive the award just weeks before her former political rival is sworn in as president. She lost to Trump in the 2016 election.

  • Biden to give George Soros, Hillary Clinton the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

  • Biden to present Hillary Clinton, George Soros and 17 others the Presidential Medal of Freedom

Left Angst

• Manufacturing Dissent ⋆ Brownstone Institute

  What these gatekeepers fail to grasp is that this smug dismissiveness, this refusal to engage with substantive arguments, is precisely what fuels growing public skepticism. Their panic seems to grow in direct proportion to Kennedy’s proximity to real power. This orchestrated dismissal is more than a journalistic flaw—it reflects a larger institutional dilemma, one that becomes unavoidable as Kennedy gains traction.

• A Mole Infiltrated the Highest Ranks of American Militias

  • These organizations are entirely creations of the FBI

• ‘Nobody was tricked into voting for Trump’: Why the disinformation panic is over: Eight years ago, Trump and Brexit sparked fears social media was corroding reality. Now, that narrative is crumbling.

Law Breaking / Police / Internal Security

• "TIME TO WAKE UP!": 'Cybertruck Bomber' Had Several Manifestos, Warned Of Drones Using 'Gravatic Propulsion' | ZeroHedge

  Officials say that after 37-year-old Green Beret Matthew Livelsberger drove a rented Cybertruck to Trump hotel, he shot himself in the head, after which the Cybertruck packed with fireworks, mortars and fuel canisters detonated, somehow. While a body was found in the vehicle which was burned beyond recognition, a passport miraculously survived!

  • Soldier in Tesla Blast Had PTSD and Feared U.S.'Collapse,' Officials Say

  • Tesla data helped police after Las Vegas truck explosion

• Rank-and-file FBI agents dismayed, ‘embarrassed’ by bureau’s handling of New Orleans terror attack

• SFPD refuses to say where they've placed 400 automated license plate readers

External Security / Militaria / Diplomania

• Encryption backdoor debate done and dusted, former White House tech advisor says

World

• French red wine in sharp decline as tastes change among young drinkers

  “With every generation in France we see the change. If the grandfather drank 300 litres of red wine per year, the father drinks 180 litres and the son, 30 litres,” said CIVB board member Jean-Pierre Durand. The industry is also grappling with a sharp fall in demand from China, one of its main export markets, and the impact of climate change.

• Mexico Has a Surplus of Tequila as Demand for the Spirit Slows

• How the grooming gangs scandal was covered up

• EU rules to improve Gender Balance in corporate boards enter into application

• In 2025, German auto industry faces make-or-break year

• Dutch suburb where residents must grow food on at least half of their property

Russia Bad / Ukraine War

• Putin orders Russian government to develop AI cooperation with China

China

• China's overqualified youth taking jobs as drivers, labourers and film extras

• China is the manufacturing superpower

• China Proposes Further Export Curbs on Battery, Critical Minerals Tech

• Chinese Underwater Sea Glider Drone Caught by Fisherman in the Philippines

• Foreign phone sales plunge 47% in China, spelling trouble for Apple

• Why Chinese EVs will not take over the world

Health / Medicine

• The "Pfizer Boob Job": A Case of Unexplained Gigantomastia

  True parenchymal breast changes following COVID-19 vaccination are exceedingly rare. Equally rare are incidences of pseudoangiomatous stromal hyperplasia (PASH)-associated gigantomastia. The patient in this case report presented with both occurrences and experienced massive breast enlargement 1 week postadministration of the Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, which worsened after her second dose. Definitive treatment was achieved through reduction mammoplasty,

• Intense exercise found to suppress appetite more than moderate workouts

• Should Canada put cancer warnings on alcohol?

• Thermometers Are Hot Garbage

• Intermittent fasting suppresses hair follicle regeneration

• The natural chemicals that could give you a healthy heart and low blood pressure

• Dietary cholesterol or moderate egg intake not associated with risk of obesity

• TB rates plunge when families living in poverty get a monthly cash payout

Pox / COVID / BioTerror AgitProp

• Fact Check True! Yes, Fauci Funded Research in Wuhan and Lied to Congress.

• How the U.S. Lost Control of Bird Flu, Setting the Stage for Another Pandemic

Environment / Climate / Green Propaganda

• Researchers 'Translate' Bat Talk. Turns Out, They Argue–A Lot

• Great Whales Can Live a Lot Longer Than We Thought – If We Leave Them Alone

• One less thing to worry about in 2025: Yellowstone probably won't go boom

• Parasitic worms 'manipulate' mantises onto asphalt roads, say researchers

• New 'Hades' moray eel discovered by accident

• Climate-driven sea level rise will overwhelm major oil ports, study shows

• Birth of IVF calf Hilda could speed up farmers' net zero progress

• Carbon offsets can help bring energy efficiency to low-income Americans

• EPA Report Finds That Formaldehyde Presents "Unreasonable Risk" to Public Health