[Off Topic] Hsieh Forbes Column On Vaccination And Freedom Of Choice

[Off topic] My latest Forbes column is now out: "Not Everyone Wants To Be Vaccinated. I’m OK With That"

Brain Implants And Identity

"Do Brain Implants Change Your Identity?"

More Toothpaste

"Colgate's New High-Tech Nonstick Toothpaste Tubes Help You Squeeze Out Every Drop". (Via H.R.)

Vagus Nerve Hacking

"A new crop of medical devices are trying to hack the vagus nerve to treat disease"

iOS 14.5 Privacy

"Why the new iOS update is such a big deal"

Liquid Metal Update

"Shape Shifting Liquid Metal Could Revolutionize Robotics"

Knitting Roads

"Weaving traffic: how to knit a road"

Origami Structures For Building

"Large-scale origami locks into place under pressure"

High-Tech Letter Reading

"Algorithm Virtually Unfolds a Historical Letter without Unsealing It"

21st Century Headline Of The Day

Today's 21st century headline: "'I just became a dogecoin millionaire': This 33-year-old invested his savings in the meme cryptocurrency with inspiration from Elon Musk"

Monkey-Human Hybrids

"First monkey–human embryos reignite debate over hybrid animals"

Solar Winds Details

"How Russia Used SolarWinds To Hack Microsoft, Intel, Pentagon, Other Networks"

The USPS Is Watching You

"The Postal Service is running a 'covert operations program' that monitors Americans' social media posts"

[C]ivil liberties experts expressed alarm at the post office's surveillance program. "It's a mystery," said University of Chicago law professor Geoffrey Stone, whom President Barack Obama appointed to review the National Security Agency’s bulk data collection in the wake of the Edward Snowden leaks. "I don’t understand why the government would go to the Postal Service for examining the internet for security issues." ...

[Rachel Levinson-Waldman, deputy director of the Brennan Center for Justice's liberty and national security program] also questioned the legal authority of the Postal Service to monitor social media activity. "If the individuals they're monitoring are carrying out or planning criminal activity, that should be the purview of the FBI," she said. "If they're simply engaging in lawfully protected speech, even if it's odious or objectionable, then monitoring them on that basis raises serious constitutional concerns."

Whitest White

"Researchers Created the Whitest White Paint Ever"

Naked Zoom

"Canadian lawmaker caught naked during video conference"

"This was an unfortunate error," Amos said in a statement sent by email.  "My video was accidentally turned on as I was changing into my work clothes after going for a jog. I sincerely apologize to my colleagues in the House of Commons for this unintentional distraction. Obviously, it was an honest mistake and it won’t happen again."

 

Reporting Dissent

"China launches app to report people with 'mistaken opinions'".

I'm just glad no one would ever want to implement something similar here in the US!

Surviving An Asteroid

Wired: "How To Survive A Killer Asteroid"

Calebresi's Fable

Calebresi's Fable. (Source NYT, 19 April 2021).

Related link.

 

Skynet Wants To Go On A Date

"Artificial Intelligence Learns To Flirt Thanks To Colorado Scientist Janelle Shane". (Via D.M. and J.S.)

Tell-Tale Tattoos

"A Mafia fugitive hiding out in the Dominican Republic was arrested when investigators found his YouTube cooking channel and identified him by his distinctive arm tattoos." (Via Bruce Schneier.)

Tastes Great, More Filling

"Human Taste Buds Can Tell The Difference Between Normal And 'Heavy' Water". (Via H.R.)

Bad Algorithm

"Life's a Bitche: Facebook says sorry for shutting down town's page"

Life’s a Bitche for one historic town in north-east France that has received an apology from Facebook after its page was shut down for apparently using offensive language.

Bitche in the Moselle, population 5,000 and home to the Bitchois, fell foul of the social network’s algorithm, which deemed it insulting and removed it without explanation last month.

On Tuesday, after reports of the Facebook suspension spread, the social network restored the Ville de Bitche page.

 

FBI Hacking Others' Computers

"The FBI is remotely hacking hundreds of computers to protect them from Hafnium "

Printing Bone

"3D Printing Bone Directly Into the Body". (Via H.R.)

Court Reporter Typewriters

"This Is How A Court Reporter Typewriter Works"

New Map Particles And Forces

"A New Map of All the Particles and Forces"

Algorithm Vs. Heuristic Vs. Machine Learning

"Algorithm Vs. Heuristic Vs. Machine Learning" explained. (Via FB.) 

SCOTUS And APIs

EFF's take on SCOTUS decision on fair use and APIs: "The Supreme Court Reverses the Federal Circuit in Oracle v. Google"

Particle Update

"'Last Hope' Experiment Finds Evidence for Unknown Particles"

Alternatives To Injections

"Scientists have spent nearly 100 years searching for a better way to give vaccines"

Universal Language Traits?

"Alien Languages May Not Be Entirely Alien to Us".

I suspect the author might still be thinking too narrowly about how languages could develop.

Cosmic Rays In Japan

"Cosmic rays causing 30,000 network malfunctions in Japan each year"

Kaku And Aliens

Physicist Michio Kaku: "Reaching out to aliens is a terrible idea"

Synchronization

Video: "The Secret of Synchronization"

Soviet LOTR

"Soviet TV version of Lord of the Rings rediscovered after 30 years"

Lotsa Drones

"Genesis broke a world record for the most drones in the sky"

Fake Sounds For Nature Documentaries

"How Sounds Are Faked For Nature Documentaries: Meet the Artists Who Create the Sounds of Fish, Spiders, Orangutans, Mushrooms & More"

New Spider

"'Cute' new spider species named 'Nemo' after animated fish". (Via H.R.)

Origami House

"This Tiny Prefab Cabin Unfolds Like Origami in Just Three Hours"

Canary Traps 2.0

"Cybersecurity Researchers Build a Better 'Canary Trap'"

The "canary trap" technique in espionage spreads multiple versions of false documents to conceal a secret. Canary traps can be used to sniff out information leaks, or as in WWII, to create distractions that hide valuable information.

WE-FORGE, a new data protection system designed in the Department of Computer Science, uses artificial intelligence to build on the canary trap concept. The system automatically creates false documents to protect intellectual property such as drug design and military technology...