2025-03-20

etc

• How Los Angeles Is Getting Scorched by Its Homeless Problem

• Let Brandon Cook - Cal Newport

  As someone who writes a lot about knowledge work in the digital age, I’m fascinated by this model of cooking, which I define as follows: a workflow designed to enable someone with a high-return skill to spend most of their time applying that skill, without distraction. What doesn’t make sense to me is why this cooking model is so rare in knowledge work more generally. To be clear, this approach doesn’t apply to all jobs.

  there are many jobs where, like for Sanderson, letting individuals focus on a single high-return activity could really boost the bottom line. I’m thinking, for example, of programmers, researchers, engineers, and any number of creative industry positions. And yet, we almost never see something like Sanderson’s focused setup replicated.

• Commuter plane that crashed in Alaska was half a ton overweight for conditions

Horseshit

• Validate me, please Why other people's approval is so intoxicating

• Betting on the Pope was the original prediction market

  The phenomenon of a “New Pope in 2025?” market isn’t new; until 1918, gambling on papal deaths and elections was punishable by excommunication. The 500-year-old story behind it is an illustration of how prediction markets influence narratives, behavior, and the perception of institutions — and why it might not be healthy that there’s already real money riding on the Pope’s recovery.

• Football's relentless hunt for profits still not matching global popularity

• 'Bluey's World': How a Cute Aussie Puppy Became a $2B Juggernaut

• Why Airline Pilots Feel Pushed to Hide Their Mental Illness

• 'Space Advertising' Could Outshine the Stars–Unless It's Banned First

• People Are Using AI to Create Influencers with Down Syndrome Who Sell Nudes

• The demise of doggie bags: why restaurant leftovers are being left behind

• For Many of America's Aging Workers, 'Retirement Is a Distant Dream'

• Installing safety nets on Golden Gate Bridge linked to 73% decline in suicides.

• Drones Will Do Some Schlepping for Sherpas on Mount Everest

celebrity gossip

• Iron Maiden's plane has been broken into parts and put up for sale

• Magnus Carlsen rules out classical World Chess Championship return

Musk

• Attorney General Bondi Statement on Violent Attacks Against Tesla Property

  “The swarm of violent attacks on Tesla property is nothing short of domestic terrorism. The Department of Justice has already charged several perpetrators with that in mind, including in cases that involve charges with five-year mandatory minimum sentences. We will continue investigations that impose severe consequences on those involved in these attacks, including those operating behind the scenes to coordinate and fund these crimes.”

• Dan McCrum: $1.4B is a lot to fall through the cracks, even for Tesla

• Elon Musk's X obtains $44B valuation in sharp turnaround

  • Elon Musk's X Secures $1B in New Funding, Valued at $32B

  • Elon Musk's X Raises Almost $1B in New Equity Funding

• Tesla Removed from Vancouver Auto Show

  • Tesla Booted from Vancouver International Auto Show over 'Safety'

• Canada Has Had Enough of Tesla

• Teslas set on fire with Molotov cocktails and shot with gun in Las Vegas attack.

• Left Ramping Up the Domestic Terrorism Something Fierce.

• Elon Musk Installs Quick and Dirty Turbines to Power XAI's Memphis Data Centers

• Elon Musk promotes negative Tesla survey turned positive by bots

• Anonymous sources: Starship needs a major rebuild after 2 consecutive failures

  • Fundamental miscalculation in the design of Starship V2 and its engine section

• Tesla owners doxxed. Only way to get off the list? Sell your car

  • Website mapped Tesla owners and their personal information amid a wave of attack

• Tim Walz says he 'boosts mood' by looking at Tesla stock

Electric / Self Driving cars

• Tesla Wins California Permit to Begin Offering Rides

• NIO and CATL form new partnership to build world’s largest battery swap network

Religion / Tribal / Culture War and Re-Segregation

• Google agrees to pay $28M in racial bias lawsuit

  Google has agreed to pay $28m (£21.5m) to settle a lawsuit that claimed white and Asian employees were given better pay and career opportunities than workers from other ethnic backgrounds, a law firm representing claimants says. The technology giant confirmed it had "reached a resolution" but rejected the allegations made against it. The case filed in 2021 by former Google employee, Ana Cantu, said workers from Hispanic, Latino, Native American and other backgrounds started on lower salaries and job levels than their white and Asian counterparts.

  • Google to pay $28M to settle claims it favoured white and Asian employees

• On the Origin of the Pork Taboo

  Thousands of clay tablets uncovered across Mesopotamia show that scribes gave short shrift to an animal that was difficult to tax. And excavations reveal that those living in wealthy households, palaces, and temples came to prefer mutton and beef, likely reflecting pork’s lowly reputation. Ruminants also provided lucrative secondary products including milk and wool, which became economic mainstays for better-off residents of these first cities. The Hittites, who ruled over Anatolia from around 1600 to 1200 b.c., are known to have commonly sacrificed pigs in ritual acts. As the Bronze Age progressed, however, swine were gradually excluded from rituals across the region, and pork consumption dropped. By 1600 b.c., less than one in 20 bones found at sites in the Levant typically come from pigs, and most of those appear to be wild boars that were hunted. At the dawn of the Iron Age, some 500 years later, pig-rearing had virtually ceased. “There’s no sign of a sudden taboo, disease, or environmental change,” says Price. “What is clear is that sheep, goats, and cattle took over.” Price suspects that a host of factors contributed to this gradual decline, including more frequent droughts, loss of nut-bearing forests, and the rise of the wool and milk-product trade. “Pigs lost their status,” Price says, as they were increasingly seen as scavengers with an insatiable appetite for food and sex. The stage was set for a more widespread and all-encompassing taboo.

Edumacationalizing / Acedemia Nuts

• Want to Go to College? Pay the College Board

• University of California orders hiring freeze, cuts

Info Rental / ShowBiz / Advertising

• Why do people keep buying printers they hate?

  This phenomenon — of people who are pathetically grateful in the year 2025 to have found a product which does what it’s meant to do — tells an interesting story about capitalism and consumer psychology at a time of technological change.

• Vinyl record sales continue to rise amid music streaming's dominance

• As if hey didn't have enough problems: Video game workers in North America now have an industry-wide union

• EU confirms Apple can make a portless iPhone without USB-C

• It Might Be Time to Admit the Great VR Experiment Has Failed

• Bluesky made more money selling T-shirts mocking Zuckerberg than custom domains

TechSuck / Geek Bait

• The Capacitor Plague Of The Early 2000s | Hackaday

  Although often blamed on a single employee stealing an (incomplete) Rubycon electrolyte formula, the video questions this narrative, as the problem was too widespread. More likely it coincided with the introduction of low-ESR electrolytic capacitors, along with computers becoming increasingly more power-hungry, and thus stressing the capacitors in a much warmer environment than in the early 1990s.

  • No one ever mentions the environmental regulations that took entire classes of these chemicals off the market around that time, necessitating the development of new alternatives. Which took some years to stabilize and triage out failures.

• Final Draft of PCI Express 7.0 Specification Published

• ESDI Adventures | OS/2 Museum

  there is an old Usenet post where the author complains that with 54 sectors per track, “the thing ran ridiculously slowly”. The drive’s own manual notes that 53 sectors is the most common setting, but does not explain why it would be. I strongly suspect that the slowness is caused by the controller’s inability to handle 1:1 interleave at 54 sectors per track. If the drive misses every single sector when accessing the disk, that would sure slow things down a lot.

AI Will (Save | Destroy) The World

• Nvidia Bets Big on Synthetic Data

• FTC alleges that AI fraudsters at Amazon misled investors

Space / Boomy Zoomers / UFO

• Starliner Astronauts Return to Earth After More Than 9 Months in Space

• The Boeing Starliner astronauts returned to Earth today | The Verge

• Can NASA remain nonpartisan when basic spaceflight truths are shredded? - Ars Technica

• The things 286 days in space does to a human body

  From 'chicken legs' and 'baby feet' to an increased risk of cancer, experts warn that the stranded astronauts could face years of health complications. As Williams, 59, and Wilmore, 62, emerged from their SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule yesterday, medical teams rushed to help them onto stretchers. This is a normal procedure for astronauts returning from space since their weakened muscles make it difficult to walk under the force of Earth's gravity. The pair will now undergo several days of intensive medical checks at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston but health experts have already noticed signs of physical decline in the stranded astronauts. And even while they were on the ISS, experts expressed concern over the pair's gaunt appearance and apparent weight loss.

Crypto con games

• El Salvador's Bukele Says Bitcoin Purchases Won't Stop Due to IMF Deal

• BlackRock's Bitcoin ETF Registers Highest Trading Volume in 3 Months

Economicon / Business / Finance

• Meta's Potential Exit from Delaware

• Yet another way the poor are subsidizing the rich: Credit Cards

• Datacenter vacancies hit record low as power shortages stall projects

• The Nastiest Fight in Fintech: Deel and Rippling

  • Both companies are in "international hiring"; ie skilled worker temp agencies renting out indentured Indians who work cheap and cannot say "no".

• Employment for computer programmers in the U.S. at lowest level since 1980

• Federal Reserve issues FOMC statement, holds rates steady

• Why Canada has plenty of eggs – and the U.S. doesn't

• Everyone Wants Debt, Not Equity

• Following acquisition, Brightcove to lay off 198 workers, 2/3 of U.S. staff

Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making

• JFK Assassination Records - 2025 Documents Release | National Archives

  In accordance with President Donald Trump’s directive of March 17, 2025, all records previously withheld for classification that are part of the President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection are released.

  • Trump makes public files related to JFK assassination

• The 1960s 'Chicken Tax' Shows the Lasting Impact of Tariffs

• FCC Commissioner Starks Resigns

• Justice Department Announces Actions to Combat Cost-of-Living Crisis

  the Department is withdrawing 11 pieces of guidance to streamline Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) compliance resources for American businesses. Next, the Department is raising awareness about tax incentives for businesses related to their compliance with the ADA.

Trump

• Trump to sign order to shut down Department of Education, White House says

  • President expected to sign executive order shuttering Dept. of Education

• Trump Floats Idea of U.S. Owning Ukrainian Power Plants as He Pushes Cease-Fire

• RFK Jr. Launches ‘Operation Stork Speed’ To Protect Baby Formula After Shortages Rocked Biden.

Democrats

• Dothan man arrested again weeks after Biden commuted sentence.

  Dothan Police charged Willie Frank Peterson on Monday with possessing cocaine, hydrocodone, marijuana, and two counts of illegally possessing firearms, according to WTVY. Biden commuted Peterson's prior sentence and those of many other criminals in his final days in office. According to WTVY, court records show Peterson was sentenced to 75 months in August 2023. Biden commuted his sentence on January 17, and he was released from prison the following week. A commutation isn’t a full pardon but rather a lesser penalty substituted for the punishment given after a conviction.

Left Angst

• Trump fires FTC's only two Democrats: 'The President just illegally fired me'

  • Trump expels Democratic regulators at FTC

  • Democratic FTC commissioners say they were illegally fired by President Trump

• Kennedy's Alarming Prescription for Bird Flu on Poultry Farms

• US suspends some efforts to counter Russian sabotage

• Sticking Starlink in the House Definitely Isn't a Major National Security Risk

• 'Segregated facilities' are no longer explicitly banned in federal contracts

  After a recent change by the Trump administration, the federal government no longer explicitly prohibits contractors from having segregated restaurants, waiting rooms and drinking fountains.

  • How many places with "safe spaces" were in violation of those rules when they were in effect?

• How Generative A.I. Complements the MAGA Style - The New York Times

  As soon as this visual style became familiar, it seemed to become the dominant aesthetic of the pro-Trump internet. With the possible exception of venture capitalists, the demographic that appears to have embraced A.I. most enthusiastically is MAGA meme accounts, possibly because the people who have most loudly rejected it — graphic designers, journalists, photographers, filmmakers, musicians, teachers — are archetypal liberals. In the reactive logic of the MAGA rank and file, A.I. is good because the right people hate it.

• Tim Roth: Trump Will Censor Artists.

• And they wonder why no one trusts them anymore

  These are just two stories out of many that we’ve seen that were grossly misreported as fact when they were so incorrect as to be laughable. These are, of course, the same media voices that scream out about misinformation on the regular, but their own misinformation is all good. And they seem to forget that this all can be fact-checked by people who don’t share their agenda, that people like Luna can call them out on their journalistic malpractice—both The Daily Beast and the book’s writer and publisher—at the drop of a hate. It’s weapons-grade stupid, and they can’t see it.

• Reddit Becomes a Lifeline for Federal Workers Scared of Losing Their Jobs

• FCC to get Republican majority and plans to "delete" as many rules as possible

• I'm the Canadian who was detained by ICE for two weeks

• Biden-Appointed LGBT Judge Blocks Trump's Military-Transgender Ban | ZeroHedge

• Defiance and Threats in Deportation Case Renew Fear of Constitutional Crisis

• Sensitive Complex Housing CIA Facility Was on GSA's List of Properties for Sale

• VA IT contract cancellation DOGE boasted about was due to end in 10 days anyway

• The Cost of the Government's Attack on Columbia

• French researcher denied entry for a personal opinion on Trump administration

  • French scientist denied US entry after phone messages critical of Trump found

  • French Scientist Reportedly Denied U.S. Entry Due to Trump Criticism

• Medal of Honor recipient depicted in movie 'Glory' erased from Pentagon website

• Poisoned Wells

  This is "through the looking glass" stuff. The domestic press standing shoulder to shoulder in lament over the death of a state-owned foreign propaganda complex and calling it a death knell for the "free press" says everything that needs to be said about it. These people are unironically decrying the end of a state-owned press agency as dangerous to a free press. The mind fairly boggles. Whatever its mission was, and whatever its past performance was, it had poisoned its own well and become just another skin suit.

  • They are no less state propaganda; the distinction being they never pretended to serve the USA.

• CISA fires, now rehires and benches security crew on full pay

• A Billion-Dollar ICE Contractor Pays Detainees as Little as $1 a Day to Work

• Trump is surveying Australian academics about gender diversity and China

• Trump Administration Ends Tracking of Kidnapped Ukrainian Children in Russia

Law Breaking / Police / Internal Security

• Two Men Found Guilty in Theft of $6M Gold Toilet

• Furious at FCC, Arkansas jail cancels inmate phone calls rather than lower rates

External Security / Militaria / Diplomania

• 'Danish Viking blood is boiling.' Danes and other Europeans boycott US goods

• Ex-US Cyber Command chief: Europe and 5 Eyes can't replicate US Intel

• Germany tightens travel advice to US after three citizens detained

• Admin considers giving up NATO command held exclusively by US since Eisenhower

• New US airstrikes hit Yemen as Ansarallah pledges to meet 'escalation with escalation'

  “After engaging with our armed forces, US aircraft carrier retreated as far as 1,300 km north of the Red Sea,” Ansarallah leader Abdul Malik al-Houthi said on Monday. “We are confronting US aggression by targeting its aircraft carrier, warships, and naval vessels, with greater escalation options if it persists. If the situation and responsibility require us to take a bigger step or bigger action, we will not hesitate, and we are ready for this option,” Houthi said during a televised speech.

World

• Live metrics show Turkey has restricted access to multiple socialmedia platforms

• Turkey orders detention of Istanbul's mayor, a key rival of President Erdogan

• Euro techies call for sovereign fund to escape US dependency

• Germany votes for historic boost to defence spending.

• Solar Generation Surge Sends European Power Prices Below Zero

• The EU is betraying users, weakening their privacy for politics

• The UK's war on encryption is dangerous

• France preparing 'survival manual' for every household, report says

Russia Bad / Ukraine War

• Trump-Putin Discuss Ceasefire in Historic Call, Agree on Prisoner Exchange

China

• Cheap Chinese Cars Are Taking over Roads from Brazil to South Africa

• China delays approval of BYD's Mexico plant

• China's Xi Is Angered by Panama Port Deal That Trump Touted as a Win

Health / Medicine

• Verbal Fluency Selectively Predicts Survival in Old and Very Old Age

• Long-acting injectable HIV therapy offers hope for those unable to take pills

• The Colorado psychedelic mushroom experiment has arrived

• Brucellosis:Florida man eats feral pig meat, contracts rare biothreat bacteria - Ars Technica

  In the fall of 2020, a 77-year-old man in Florida realized he had gotten one of the worst gifts imaginable—one that kept on giving. According to a case report published in this month's issue of Emerging Infectious Diseases, the man showed up at a Gainesville hospital with chest pain that just wouldn't go away. For nearly two years prior, the man—a pastor living on a rural farm with dogs and goats—had been in and out of hospitals and on and off of various antibiotics. Generally, the man wasn't in the best health. His medical history included Type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and heart failure with reduced ejection fraction.

  In the US, there are only about 80 to 140 brucellosis cases reported each year, and they're mostly caused by B. melitensis and B. abortus. People tend to get infected by eating raw (unpasteurized) milk and cheeses. B. suis, however, is generally linked to hunting and butchering feral pigs and hogs.

• Florida lawmakers looking to ban fluoride statewide

Pox / COVID / BioTerror AgitProp

• Covid Vaccines Have Paved the Way for Cancer Vaccines

  • They have destroyed the public trust in the word "vaccine" and those who use that word in the new sense of "any injection"

• H5N1 influenza viral lineages beginning to evade human immunological defenses

Environment / Climate / Green Propaganda

• WMO report documents spiralling weather and climate impacts

• Securing Children's Fundamental Climate Rights

• Hope for endangered penguins as no-fishing zones agreed off South Africa

• NOAA study says cooking contributes substantially to ozone pollution in L.A. area - UPI.com

• Unveiling the mysterious ‘red sprite’ lightning strikes over the Himalayas.

• Greenpeace must pay millions over Dakota pipeline protests, says jury

  • Court finds Greenpeace liable in case over Dakota Access Pipeline

• Email signatures are harming the planet and could cost people their lives