You may remember that, in Japan, you can rent fake family members to fight loneliness (or for other reasons, like you want your kid to have a "dad"). Well, Conan O'Brien has been filming in Japan and, while in Tokyo, he hired a new wife, daughter, and father. He told them right from the start that they must laugh at his jokes (his real wife is "tired" of them, he says) and they do, even when it's inappropriate. It's funny, as are the other "Conan Without Borders" videos he and his crew shot in Japan. You can watch them all at the Team Coco website. If you love vending machines like I do, don't miss the one labeled "Tokyo." Read the rest

DJ Khaled and Floyd Mayweather both pitched deals to their followers, but did not disclose or admit they were paid to do so. Both are being fined as a result of the undisclosed sponsorships, which were, of course, for sleazy cryptocurrencies.Both took money to promote Centra Tech, an ICO that eventually led to fraud charges for several of its masterminds. The SEC found that Mayweather took $100,000 to promote the Centra token, as well as $200,000 to promote two other ICOs, in posts like an Instagram message where he told his millions of followers "You can call me Floyd Crypto Mayweather from now on." DJ Khaled was paid $50,000 to promote Centra Tech -- facts neither mentioned in their social media posts. While they avoided admitting any wrongdoing, both will have to give up the money they were paid, along with an additional $300,000 penalty for Mayweather to go with a $100,000 fine for DJ Khaled (plus interest). A phenomenon of the Twitter era is celebrities not really bothering with professional financial and business help beyond accountants. The dumb ones are easier marks than ever.Here's the SEC press release on the Centra coin shenanigan. It peaked at a $240m market cap but quickly deflated and is now nearly worthless; the founders were arrested in April. Read the rest

Sheryl Sandberg asked Facebook staff to research George Soros because he gave a speech boldly critical of the social media giant as a “menace,” reports the New York Times tonight.After Davos, "in an email in January to senior communications and policy executives," Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg "asked Facebook's communications staff to research George Soros's financial interests in the wake of his high-profile attacks on tech companies."If she was willing to do this over a mere billionaire, imagine what Facebook might have done in researching news organizations and reporters who are critical of Facebook?Fb has defended the research into Soros as normal and prudent due diligence for a large public company under attack by a onetime activist investor.They note the later Definers research -- which they say Sandberg did *not* personally order -- was based on public records.— Nick Confessore (@nickconfessore) November 30, 2018We'll add to this story as night goes. Sandberg email to Facebook executives came very soon after Soros's scathing speech at Davos attacking Facebook and Google.But company says other Fb employees had already begun the research when Sandberg wrote.— Nick Confessore (@nickconfessore) November 30, 2018EXCLUSIVE: Sheryl Sandberg asked Facebook staff to research George Soros, said people with knowledge of her request, indicating she was directly involved in the company’s response to the liberal billionaire's attacks @nickconfessore @AllMattNYT https://t.co/p6MMad4zUM— Matthew Rosenberg (@AllMattNYT) November 30, 2018By Nicholas Confessore and Matthew Rosenberg at the New York Times:Sheryl Sandberg asked Facebook’s communications staff to research George Soros’s financial interests in the wake of his high-profile attacks on tech companies, according to three people with knowledge of her request, indicating that Facebook’s second in command was directly involved in the social network’s response to the liberal billionaire. Read the rest

We're just a few Congressional signatures short of triggering the Congressional Review Act on Net Neutrality (we've already got the Senate); and that will push Trump to have to publicly reject Net Neutrality (which 87% of Americans, including a majority of Republicans, support) or override the FCC and restore Net Neutrality to America.But time is running out. Today is the National Day of Action for Net Neutrality, the last big push before this Congress dissolves. There are some Congressjerks who are on their way out of office who might sign on as a big F-U to Trump; others who might sign on in hopes of keeping their jobs the next time around.Either way, this is it, the big one. Tell your friends. Add your name. Read the rest

The Proud Boys suck at redaction: as the white nationalist extremist organization struggles with a succession crisis following founder Gavin McInnes's departure (precipitated by a Freedom of Information Act request that revealed that the FBI called them "white nationalist extremists) have published a new set of bylaws for the organization with the names of the new leaders blacked out.But the redactions were accomplished by drawing black rectangles over the text, which can still be copied and pasted to read it. This is a stupid mistake that most people stopped making a decade ago (with notable exceptions).So we can read the blacked out names the document claims are the Proud Boys' new leaders. They are: Harry Fox, Heath Hair, Enrique Tarrio, Patrick William Roberts, Joshua Hall, Timothy Kelly, Luke Rofhling and Rufio Panman.Official leadership, at least as far as the vaguely administrative wing of the group and its website goes, seems to have fallen to an “Elders Chapter,” who, in conjunction with an extremely racist lawyer named Jason Lee Van Dyke, released a new set of bylaws for the organization, which they provided to the media “with member names and exhibits redacted for public release.”The new bylaws are more of the same weird Proud Boy shit, with some changes: no head punches on their weird beat-in ritual where they sock each other while chanting cereal brands; you can only jerk off once per month; and some new rulings on the “fourth degree of initiation,” which involves getting in a fight on behalf of the club and is usually achieved during shit-stirring brawls like the one outside the Metropolitan Republican Club in NYC last month, which got several Proud Boys arrested, contributing to the leadership chaos. Read the rest

“A lawyer for Paul Manafort, the president’s onetime campaign chairman, repeatedly briefed President Trump’s lawyers on his client’s discussions with federal investigators after Mr. Manafort agreed to cooperate with the special counsel.” There it is.Attorneys for Donald Trump are said to have been briefed on what Paul Manafort told federal investigators, which further ratcheted up tensions with special counsel Robert Mueller, reports the New York Times this evening.Michael Schmidt, Sharon LaFraniere and Maggie Haberman report:A lawyer for Paul Manafort, the president’s onetime campaign chairman, repeatedly briefed President Trump’s lawyers on his client’s discussions with federal investigators after Mr. Manafort agreed to cooperate with the special counsel, according to one of Mr. Trump’s lawyers and two other people familiar with the conversations.The arrangement was highly unusual and inflamed tensions with Mr. Mueller’s office when prosecutors discovered it after Mr. Manafort began cooperating two months ago, the people said. Some legal experts speculated that it was a bid by Mr. Manafort for a presidential pardon even as he worked with the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, in hopes of a lighter sentence.Rudolph W. Giuliani, one of the president’s personal lawyers, acknowledged the arrangement on Tuesday and defended it as a source of valuable insights into the special counsel’s inquiry and where it was headed. Such information could help shape a legal defense strategy, and it also appeared to give Mr. Trump and his legal advisers ammunition in their public relations campaign against the special counsel’s office.For example, Mr. Read the rest

For the second year now, the MIT Media Lab has awarded a "Disobedience Prize" of $250,000, no strings attached, awarded to people whose disobedient work has benefitted society; this year's prize is share among three leaders of the #MeToo and #MeTooSTEM movements: BethAnn McLaughlin, Sherry Marts, and Tarana Burke.Five finalists were awarded $10K each: Katie Endicott (West Virginia teacher's strike organizer); Sarah Mardini and Yusra Mardini (refugee activists and Olympians); Tara Parrish (led and defended the Springfield Interfaith Sanctuary Coalition) and Deborah Swackhamer (led the EPA’s Board of Scientific Counselors and was pressured to change her testimony to whitewash Trump policies).The prize is funded by Linkedin founder Reid Hoffman.“This year’s winners embody the highest ideals of what the Disobedience Award is intended to honor: speaking truth to power, empowering the voiceless, accepting personal responsibility and fallout without a view to personal gain,” says Joi Ito, director of the Media Lab and co-founder of the award. “The #MeToo movement represents a sea change in American culture, in our institutions, in every professional, academic, and political arena. These three women are on the front lines of this movement, and their refusal to back down or be silenced is what will continue propelling the movement forward in the face of every kind of opposition. We have to support that kind of heroism.”Announcing the winners of the 2018 MIT Media Lab Disobedience Award [Janine Liberty/MIT Media Lab](Disclosure: I am an MIT Media Lab Research Affiliate) Read the rest

P Is for Pterodactyl: The Worst Alphabet Book Ever is a fun new alphabet book written by rapper Lushlife that shows kids just how nutty the English language really is (rules schmules!): Turning the traditional idea of an alphabet book on its head, P is for Pterodactyl is perfect for anyone who has ever been stumped by silent letters or confused by absurd homophones. This whimsical, unique book takes silent letter entries like “K is for Knight” a step further with “The noble knight’s knife nicked the knave’s knee.” Lively illustrations provide context clues, and alliterative words help readers navigate text like “a bright white gnat is gnawing on my gnocchi” with ease. Everyone from early learners to grown-up grammarians will love this wacky book where “A is for Aisle” but “Y is definitely not for Why.”This week has been so surreal. My picture book #pisforpterodactyl comes out today and hit the top 5 bestselling books on all of Amazon — between @michelleobama and #diaryofawimpykid. We just hit the front page of @reddit, too. https://t.co/7rqAjyHIVi pic.twitter.com/zvfJq9fq5S— Lushlife (@lushlifemedia) November 13, 2018(Blame it on the Voices) Read the rest

Do you remember when Barney parade balloon ate it during the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in 1997? The internet sure does. Footage of the schadenfraude-inducing incident is making the rounds again, proving that hating on the annoying purple dinosaur is timeless. The day after it happened, The New York Times reported the accident was due to high winds and that Barney wasn't the only damaged float:...For a while, the balloons seemed to be falling like flies. Barney suffered extensive damage and had to be removed at 51st Street. The Pink Panther succumbed at 42d Street. Quik Bunny and the Cat in the Hat limped away at 36th Street...The crash of Barney, the purple dinosaur beloved by preschoolers and loathed by some parents, was heart-stopping for those at the end of its ropes. ''Everything turned purple,'' said Antonella Laggiano of Mamaroneck, N.Y.''Barney attacked us,'' said a still-stunned Isabella Fasciano of Hoboken, N.J. After it fell, police officers rushed to puncture it with knives and relieve the danger.Thanks, Andy! Read the rest

Every week for the past two years, Mark Frauenfelder, Claudia Dawson, and I briefly recommend 6 things to our friends. Sometimes we suggest tools, but most items aren’t tools. Rather we recommend stuff such as our favorite places to visit, things to watch or listen to, favorite stuff to eat, as well as tips for work or home, and techniques we’ve learned, quotes we like to remember, and so on. We email these 6 brief reviews in a free newsletter called Recomendo, and by now this one-pager is sent out every Sunday morning to almost 20,000 subscribers. If you want to get a feel for what we recommend, all the back issues are available here.This autumn we collected, filtered and organized 550 of the best recommendations and put them into a book, called naturally enough, Recomendo. The book is 95 jam-packed pages. We’ve categorized the recommendations, grouping like with like. Having all the workflow tips, or household suggestions, or workshop tools, or travel recommendations all in one place is super handy. There’s an index and subject guide. Many of the items have an illustration. To make up for the fact that a book can’t have links, we’ve added QR codes, so you can instantly get a link with your phone. Everyone who has picked the book up has found something cool for them on the first page and they keep turning the pages for more. I think it’s the happiest book I’ve ever worked on.Recomendo is available now from Amazon. Read the rest

China's "invisible poor" are poor people who successfully project a facade of affluence through consumer goods, clothing, etc: a research report from Shanghai's MobData found that Iphone ownership is strongly correlated with membership in the "invisible poor," with the median Iphone owner being an unmarried woman aged 18-34, with no post-secondary education and a monthly income of less than RMB3,000 (USD430).Made-in-China brands like Huawei are correlated with affluence (Huawei owners are more likely to own their own flats, hold post-secondary qualifications, and earn RMB5,000-20,000/month).Huawei, Oppo, Vivo and Xiaomi – the four largest smartphone vendors in China, own a combined market share of nearly 80 per cent, while Apple holds 9 per cent, according to a Counterpoint research note released late October.Research highlights class divide between ‘poor’ Apple iPhone and ‘rich’ Huawei users in China [Li Tao/South China Morning Post](via Four Short Links) Read the rest

The Sentinelese are one of the world's last "uncontacted" indigenous peoples, a hunter-gatherer tribe who live on the remote North Sentinel Island in India's Andaman Islands chain. This week, John Allen Chau, 27, eager to meet the tribe and hopefully convert them to Christianity, paid local fishermen to help him get near the island. As soon as he illegally landed his canoe on the shore, the Sentinelese fired arrows. He escaped with injuries but returned twice later and was eventually killed. From CNN:"We refuse to call him a tourist. Yes, he came on a tourist visa but he came with a specific purpose to preach on a prohibited island," said (Dependra Pathak, Director General of Police of the Andaman and Nicobar islands).Chau did not inform the police of his intentions to travel to the island to attempt to convert its inhabitants..."According to the fishermen, they used a wooden boat fitted with motors to travel to the island on November 15," Pathak said."The boat stopped 500-700 meters (1,640 - 2,300 ft) away from the island and (the American missionary) used a canoe to reach the shore of the island. He came back later that day with arrow injuries. On the 16th, the (tribespeople) broke his canoe."So he came back to the boat swimming. He did not come back on the 17th; the fishermen later saw the tribespeople dragging his body around."(A) 2011 survey only spotted 15 Sentinelese on their island -- the count was done from a distance due to the danger in approaching the tribe. Read the rest

Writing in Wired, frequent Boing Boing contributor Clive Thompson praises the rise of rural broadband co-operatives that are springing up to provide internet access to their far-flung, widespread communities, comparing them to the rural electrification co-ops that sprang up to provide power to farmers neglected by the monopolistic Edison trusts. Thompson is both onto something and somewhat off the mark here. The comparison between electrification and broadband is a very apt one: without electricity, farmers were being left behind by their century's march to progress; the same is true of internet access. And as with the Edison trusts' neglect of rural customers, the broadband monopolies have left communities in the lurch, failing their children, prompting the rise of these co-ops to fill the void.But here's where Thompson misses the mark. In his article, he asks, "What if, instead of kvetching and waiting for tech monopolies to reform, we set up more user-run co-ops to operate upstart services we actually want? Imagine co-op social networks that wouldn’t need to algorithmically lure users into endless feed-scrolling “engagement” to keep the ad dollars sluicing."The problem is that the incumbent Big Cable monopolists have created insurmountable regulatory hurdles to keep new entrants out of their markets; and Big Tech has erected unassailable walls around its businesses to stop us from "disrupting" the new digital empires (disruption for thee, but not for me, is Big Tech's rallying cry).Forming co-ops is an exciting idea, but remember that (for example) Facebook was only able to grow by making tools that scraped Myspace, to let new Facebook users talk to their friends still on Myspace, so they didn't have to choose between one and the other -- and then, Facebook sued and destroyed a competitor that tried to do the same thing for people ready to move on from Facebook. Read the rest

CIT computer scientist Milan Cvitkovic conducted 46 in-depth interviews with "scientists, engineers, and CEOs" and collated their machine learning research needs into an aptly named paper entitled "Some Requests for Machine Learning Research from the East African Tech Scene," which presents an illuminating look into the gaps in the current practice of machine learning, itself an example of how rich-world priorities shape our ability to understand, compute and predict the world.Some of the gaps are predictable enough (regional languages are underrepresented in speech-to-text models) and others are somewhat surprising (speech-to-text models are really bad at recognizing when speakers "code switch" between languages mid-sentence, which is a common practice in the region) and some are really thorny (due to regional "low trust" economies, "interviewees who use machine learning with surveys or customer interaction data reported spending significant effort fighting fraud or dishonesty").Reinforcement Learning - No interviewee reported using any reinforcement learning methods. However, interest was expressed in it, particularly regard ing machine teaching and using RL in simulations, e.g. using RL in epidemiological simulations to find worst case scenarios in outbreak planning. Machine Teaching - There is a shortage of good educational resources and teachers in East Africa. Several initiatives exist that use mobile phones as an education platform. Practitioners were interested in using ideas from machine teaching in their work to personalize content delivered. However, the author did not encounter anyone who had employed any results from the machine teaching literature at this point.Uncertainty Quantification - An important factor that keeps the wealth of rich regions from moving into poorer regions like East Africa, despite the fact that it should earn greater returns there, is risk [1]. Read the rest

Damien Noll sez, "My skulls and bones are all burned (like black line tattoo) using just a magnifying lens and sunshine."My latest work is solar pyrography on animal skulls and bones, boar, beaver, cat, cow, coyote, deer etc.Many of these skulls were processed by me from animals passed to me by local hunters in Southern France, Colorado, and Texas. In processing the animal skulls, one becomes intimate with these animals. I take them through the entire process, from life to death and back again. Sometimes along that way a hearty meal is the outcome.The final markings on their skull, like a tattoo, are individual to each one. The markings become a sort of outfit for passage onto the next, more ghostly realm. The immaterial rays of sunlight giving new context, new meaning, new life,, to what would otherwise be forgotten lives.Drawing with sunlight [Damien Noll] Read the rest

Cindy Hyde-Smith is a Mississipi GOP Senator is going into a runoff election against her Democratic opponent, Black man named Mike Espy who might end up the first Black Mississipi Senator since 1883; she made headlines last week with a joke about attending a "public hanging."The day after the lynching remark, the FEC recorded a $5,000 donation from Google to Hyde-Smith's campaign. Google insists that they made the donation earlier, with the discrepancy unexplained.Google attributed their support of Hyde-Smith's campaign to her "pro-growth policies for business and technology" but added that they "do not condone these remarks and would not have made such a contribution had we known about them." Google has not asked Hyde-Smith to return the funds.Hyde-Smith was endorsed by Donald Trump during her race (and well before Google donated to her campaign). Since Trump's election, Hyde-Smith "voted in line with Trump's position more often than any other Republican senator." She has a 0% approval rating from the ACLU and is a lifetime member of the NRA, and supports a total ban on legal abortion; she is on record as supporting Trump's Muslim ban. In her official capacity, she has opposed and attempted to block same-sex marriages.Hyde-Smith followed up her remarks about public lynchings with a "joke" about the desirability of using voter-suppression techniques to make it harder for "liberal folks" to vote.Hyde-Smith has insisted that her remarks are all intended in jest and attributes the controversy to humorlessness among her opponents. Read the rest

Amazon is already known for providing dangerous working conditions, anti-union activities and treating their blue collar workforce like a disposable commodity. Since they're already screwing folks at work, it must have seemed like a natural progression to screw them at home too.From Politico:Amazon’s plans to expand into Long Island City may cost Mayor Bill de Blasio — and New York City — approximately 1,500 units of affordable housing.Two sites that will house the future offices of the e-commerce giant were originally intended for residential development, before Amazon chose them in a nationwide contest for its new headquarters.Most — if not all — of that intended housing is now off the table.According to Politico, the 14.7 acres of land Amazon's plopping out of their grossly subsidized new headquarters complex in Long Island City is owned by a company called Plaxall. Before Amazon came along, Plaxall was gearing up to ask New York City administrators for permission to build close to 5,000 new homes on their property. 1,250 of these homes would have been earmarked for use by low and middle-income earning families. In addition to this, Amazon's NYC complex is also eating up turf from a second company, TF Cornerstone: they were ready to build a complex that would contain 250 low-income housing units on the dirt where Amazon is building their new HQ. That's not going to happen anymore, either.Greed is nothing, if not consistent. Image via Wikipedia Commons Read the rest

File with "I can change the 14th Amendment with an executive order" and "no collusion". [via] Read the rest

Running on a treadmill is my number one aerobic activity, and I've taken off my sweatshirt many times while treading. Never again after watching this! Read the rest

Here are some recent game releases of note and some of what I've been up to in hobby gaming over the past month or so.Strontium DogWarlord Games, $63, 2-4 players, Ages: 12+In this skirmish game from Warlord, you play the mutant search and destroy agents, the Strontium Dogs, from the pages of the venerable UK comic magazine, 2000 AD. Designed by the masterful Andy Chambers (Warhammer 40K, Battlefleet Gothic, Blood Red Skies), the game pits the Dogs and their mutant, pirate, and renegade bounty against each other as the two forces duke it out across the galaxy. The very well put-together two-player starter set includes a 122-page rule book, a scenario book, 8 metal miniatures, dice, cards, and other components. The set even includes some cool laser-cut MDF terrain. I love when games include terrain, but you don't often see it and rarely in a game that's not well over $100. Here's a video of Andy Chambers himself describing Strontium Dog.Terrain CrateMantic Games, Prices VaryAfter a very successful Kickstarter campaign (which I backed), Mantic has now released a broad range of affordable fantasy and sci-fi terrain pieces under the Terrain Crate name. Each crate is themed (Dungeon, Battle Field, Dark Lord's Tower, Starship Scenery, Industrial Zone) and includes a generous amount of highly-detailed plastic scenery. The pieces are designed to be used as-is and they also paint up like a charm. I love playing RPGs and tabletop games with lots of evocative scenery and terrain, so I have always wanted a terrain collection this extensive, this affordable, and this well done. Read the rest

The strongest news we've heard that Bill and Ted Face the Music will actually be made is that they are now auctioning off a walk on role for charity.There are three hours left to bid. The proceeds go to Homes for Our Troops. I hope you win!From SYFY.com:With Veteran's Day starting off the week, the charity group Homes For Our Troops kicked off a celebrity-fueled series of auctions to raise funds for their cause. While you can bid on everything from a Game of Thrones sweepstakes to George Clooney's motorcycle to help build accessible homes for injured veterans, a real standout gem is a walk-on role in Bill & Ted Face the Music.Writer Ed Solomon, who penned the first two installments with Chris Matheson, announced the auction via Twitter, which is going on for one day only. And that happens to be today. Read the rest

The Wall Street Journal ranked America's 20 largest airports. The rankings contain few surprises.The top three airports—Denver, Orlando and Phoenix—have one major factor in common: strong competition among airlines. Denver is one of the few airports with three major airlines connecting customers: United, Southwest and Frontier. In Phoenix, American and Southwest compete with connecting hubs. In Orlando, the largest airline, Delta, controls only 28% of passenger traffic. Read the rest

Michael Avenatti has been arrested in Los Angeles on suspicion of domestic violence.We can confirm that today LAPD Detectives arrested Michael Avenatti on suspicion of domestic violence. This is an ongoing investigation and we will provide more details as they become available.— LAPD HQ (@LAPDHQ) November 15, 2018Avenatti is best known as the spotlight-thirsty and Trump-baiting attorney for Stormy Daniels, in a matter involving President Donald Trump. Avenatti is a perennial cable news guest, and until today, an aspiring Presidential candidate making the political rounds. He is currently in Los Angeles police custody as of Wednesday afternoon. A report on the incident in the Century City area was taken on Tuesday, said Los Angeles police.News of Avenatti's arrest was first reported by TMZ.“Avenatti's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment” by BuzzFeed News.News: Michael Avenatti has been arrested for felony domestic violence and is currently in LAPD custody, @CJRosenbaum reports— Jon Passantino (@passantino) November 14, 2018LAPD officers in West Los Angeles have responded to an incident involving Michael Avenatti, where he is detained during the process of taking an incident report, sources tell @NBCNews - @anblanx— NBC News (@NBCNews) November 14, 2018Sorry, let me translate this Michael Avenatti tweet: What this means is he's been detained, but probably hasn't been formally booked yet, which is why they aren't officially confirming. He's not in sheriff's jail locator either. https://t.co/J2Ue8Q5DBV— James Queally (@JamesQueallyLAT) November 14, 2018From TMZ:Our sources say the alleged incident occurred Tuesday, but there was a confrontation Wednesday between the two at an exclusive apartment building in the Century City area of L.A. Read the rest

We are watching Facebook unravel in real time. I hope.From the New York Times, a story I can hardly believe -- had to read some grafs twice:Excerpt: When Facebook users learned last spring that the company had compromised their privacy in its rush to expand, allowing access to the personal information of tens of millions of people to a political data firm linked to President Trump, Facebook sought to deflect blame and mask the extent of the problem.And when that failed — as the company’s stock price plummeted and sparked a consumer backlash — Facebook went on the attack.While Mr. Zuckerberg conducted a public apology tour in the last year, Ms. Sandberg has overseen an aggressive lobbying campaign to combat Facebook’s critics, shift public anger toward rival companies and ward off damaging regulation. Facebook employed a Republican opposition-research firm to discredit activist protesters, in part by linking them to the liberal financier George Soros. It also tapped its business relationships, persuading a Jewish civil rights group to cast some criticism of the company as anti-Semitic.You're gonna want to read the whole thing.This story has been 6 months in the making. It started with a question: What happened inside Facebook over the last 3 years, and what did top executives, Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg, do in the wake of crisis after crisis battering the company? https://t.co/N6kaDNqfj6— Sheera Frenkel (@sheeraf) November 14, 2018As a guy who's been lied to and about by Facebook in the past, and remained fair and tried to give them credit when due anyway, I'm just aghast. Read the rest

The American Cable Association (ACA) represents 700+ small/medium US cable operators; they've written to the Assistant Attorney General calling for an "immediate" antitrust investigation into Comcast's business practices, a call that was supported by Donald Trump in a tweet.The ACA claims that Comcast's market dominance gives it the potential to get preferential treatment for "must have" channels, and that its past conduct (including violations of its consent decree) put it at a high risk of these abuses (Trump claimed that the abuses were already "routine," which is not what the ACA alleges).Comcast owns NBC, one of the many media companies that Trump has vocally denounced.The Justice Department is currently trying to stop a merger between AT&T and Time Warner, and the ACA strategically argues that Comcast is more dangerous than those companies combined. But the department may already have its sights on Comcast. In August, Delrahim warned Comcast that it would continue monitoring potential antitrust threats even after the consent decree expired. Last month, Delrahim also said the Justice Department would investigate whether Comcast was using its 30 percent share in Hulu to undermine the streaming video service, which competes with traditional cable.The ACA’s letter also raises concerns involving Hulu, suggesting that Comcast could effectively hold the service hostage. “We have heard from ACA members that they fear that ComcastNBCU may restrict, if it is not already restricting, their ability to access Hulu and make it available to their customers as an alternative to their cable offerings,” reads the letter. Read the rest

In case you hadn't noticed from the sleigh bell-heavy music and the hues on your Starbucks cup, the holiday season hasn't shown any more patience this year. But that doesn't need to be a bad thing, especially if you're hoping to get a jump on your shopping. Retailers aren't waiting til Black Friday to dish out the deals, and neither should you. Here are's six of the more notable bargains on the radar, from booze paraphernalia to tech-minded winter wear:Knit Touchscreen GlovesSo you're walking in frostbite weather and an urgent text pops up. It's an all-too-common annoyance with an easy solution: These fashionable knit gloves, equipped with a conductive fingertip surface that lets you swipe and send with comfort in any climate. They're currently 42% off the MSRP at $10.99.TREBLAB X11 Bluetooth In-Ear HeadphonesWith passive noise-cancellation tech and HD sound, these next-gen buds will be going straight from the stocking into your music-loving friend's ear. (And with the stabilizing ear fins, they'll stay there.) Equipped with Bluetooth 4.1 CSR and a built-in mic, they're equally well suited for taking calls on the go, at the gym - anywhere you need hands-free audio. Best of all, they're $29.99 - a significant drop from the already sale-priced $54.99.Eravino Whiskey Globe DecanterHere's one for the worldly tippler on your list. Mounted on a hardwood display, this decanter holds 30 ounces of whiskey or other spirits inside an etched globe map, complete with a blown glass ship-in-a-bottle. Great for Christmas, but just as well suited as a gift for newlyweds. Read the rest

Sothebys is to auction a diamond ring created by Apple design chief Jony Ive and Marc Newson.Theirs will be created by removing material rather than adding – an ambition made possible by the extraordinary scale of the stone which will enable the ring to be completely made of this material.Creating a ring-shaped diamond is no small feat; the diamond block will be faceted with several thousand facets, some of which are as small as several hundred micrometers. The interior ring will be cylindrically cut out for the desired smoothness using a micrometer thick water jet inside which a laser beam is cast. The finished ring will have between 2000-3000 facets which has never been seen before on a single piece.It'll be made from a cultured diamond and is expected to fetch $150-$250k. It looks great, but is difficult to upgrade and tends to overheat if you leave magazines on top. Read the rest

In the debate over "responsible disclosure," advocates for corporate power say that companies have to be able to decide who can reveal defects in their products and under which circumstances, lest bad actors reveal their bugs without giving them time to create and promulgate a patch.But over and over again, this theory of corporate responsibility and security researcher intransigence falls apart. The reality is that the kinds of security researchers who want to report bugs (rather than using them to attack people) are primarily interested in improving security, and corporations that offer good-faith promises (and live up to them) can easily tempt researchers into coordinating their disclosures. When corporations threaten researchers or fail to act on their warnings, the result isn't silence -- it's uncoordinated disclosure, when a security researcher simply publishes their findings without warning the company first.The latest example of this is Sergey Zelenyuk's publication of a "100% reliable" exploit against Virtualbox, Oracle's popular virtual machine software. The exploit allows attackers to puncture the virtual machine's sandbox and access the underlying system's files and processes.Zelenyuk published the zero-day bug because of Oracle's long history of mistreatment of security researchers (including threatening customers with legal retaliation if they hire auditors to examine the software Oracle sold them), and its cavalier handling of bugs, including a 15-month lag between learning of a similar bug and issuing a patch.It's a sobering reminder that the "responsible disclosure" debate isn't about under which circumstances researchers can go public; it's about whether they choose to trust a company before going public. Read the rest

Amanda Marcotte, author of Troll Nation: How The Right Became Trump-Worshipping Monsters Set On Rat-F*cking Liberals, America, and Truth Itself, explained why Trump's followers embrace his lies even when they know they are being lied to:Thread by @AmandaMarcotte: "No one actually believes Jim Acosta did anything wrong. This is one of those situations where conservatives collectively pretend to believe […]"Image: C-Span Read the rest

Glasgow-based Collins Dictionary has chosen their 2018 Word of the Year: single-use. The adjective meaning "made to be used once only" beat out the abbreviation VAR ("video assistant referee"), floss (the dance, not the dental product), gammon (a white, angry male who supports Brexit), and plogging (a Swedish activity that involves jogging and picking up litter).Selected as the #CollinsWOTY 2018, single-use encompasses a global movement to kick our addiction to disposable products. From plastic bags, bottles and straws to washable nappies, we have become more conscious of how our habits and behaviours can impact the environment...Our records show a four-fold increase in usage of this word since 2013, with news stories and the likes of the BBC’s Blue Planet II raising public awareness of this environmental issue."Single-use" also beat out other words on this year's shortlist: whitewash, vegan, MeToo, and backstop.image via Collins Dictionary Read the rest

Equipped only with handtools, this woman harvests bamboo from a grove and makes a beautiful furniture set. It is interesting to see how she heats the bamboo over a fire to make it bendable.[via Core77] Read the rest

This "Wacky Waving Inflatable Tube Guy" makes me so happy! For $13 (plus an annoyingly steep $9 to ship to the states), you get this inspired desk toy along with a little zine that tells the origin story of the wacky tube man, aka the "Tall Boy."Watch him flail about just like his granddaddy:In related news: Inflatable air dancer humorously synced to music Read the rest

In September, a consortium of 11 of Europe's largest science funders announced, "Plan S," whereby they would no longer fund research unless the grantees promised that the results would be published in an open access journal, which anyone could read and copy for free. Two more funders quickly signed up after the announcements, bringing the total to 13. Now, Europe's two largest science funders have joined the consortium: The Wellcome Trust and the Gates Foundation, and with these 15 funders backing Plan S, nearly all science research in Europe will be open access.Plan S does not allow "hybrid" journals which mix open access and paywalled science, though Wellcome will continue to fund research for hybrid publication until 22, but only if the journal has a "transformative OA agreement" promising to transition away from its paywall. Another exception to Plan S allows publication in paywalled journals provided this takes place simultaneous with deposit in an open repository such as PubMed Central.Some publishers have bifurcated their journals, making them partially open access, but only for research funded under an open access mandate.Open access has gone from a fringe issue to one of global import. In 2013, the young technologist and activist Aaron Swartz hanged himself while facing 13 felony counts for accessing scientific papers over MIT's network, and his death created a sense of urgency for the issue that has not faded.The open access portal Sci-Hub makes the entire corpus of scientific literature available for free, without permission, and has been the subject of widespread internet censorship orders, as giant science publishers like Elsevier seek to block it on the national level. Read the rest

James Corden is back with a new episode of Carpool Karaoke. On this drive, he rides, sings, and chats with living legend Barbra Streisand. The 76-year-old singer sat in the driver's seat and shared that she once phoned Apple CEO Tim Cook in the hopes he could get Siri to pronounce her last name correctly. It worked, Siri now pronounces it the right way, "Strei-sand."Ms. Streisand has a new album out. It's called "Walls" and she created it in response to "these difficult times:"screenshot via Read the rest

FTP -- the "file transfer protocol" -- is a long-supplanted Unix tool for transferring files between computers, once standard but now considered to be too insecure to use; so it's alarming that it's running on the voting machines that will be used in elections in Wisconsin and Kentucky tomorrow.The FBI has warned that "criminal actors" use FTP in targeting US voting machines. The Wisconsin Elections Commission and DHS have reported hacker attacks on Wisconsin voting machines in the 2016 elections.Propublica portscanned the voting machines in Kentucky and Wisconsin, which are connected to the fucking internet, and found FTP services being advertised by servers on the machines.Kentucky's voting machines did not require a password to access their FTP servers.As of late Wednesday, Kentucky’s voter-registration server still allowed users to browse a list of files without a password. Even the names of the files contained clues that could conceivably help an intruder. For example, they indicated that Kentucky may use driver’s licenses on file in its motor vehicle software to verify voters’ identities.Bradford Queen, a spokesman for Kentucky’s secretary of state, declined to say if running an FTP server was problematic. “We are constantly guarding against foreign and domestic bad actors and have confidence in the security measures deployed to protect our infrastructure,” he said.“ProPublica’s claims regarding Kentucky’s website lack a complete understanding of the commonwealth’s full approach to security, which is multi-layered. Defenses exist within each layer to determine and block offending traffic.”File-Sharing Software on State Election Servers Could Expose Them to Intruders [Jack Gillum and Jeff Kao/Propublica] Read the rest

Brian Kemp is the Secretary of State for Georgia, where is he also running for governor, meaning that he is overseeing his own election -- and in that capacity, he has purged thousands of Black voters from the rolls (the total purge runs to the millions) and distinguished himself as one of the last holdouts for replacing his state's worst-of-breed insecure voting machines with ones that produce a paper audit trail that can be consulted if they are suspected of malfunction.Kemp, who is running against Stacey Abrams (a Black woman with an "unapologetic progressive" platform) has a long history of voting machine shenanigans (one set of machines was wiped right after Georgia voters filed a lawsuit involving them) and his campaign has been a mix of (semi)coded racism and performative tough-guy stunts.His latest eleventh-hour salvo has reached a new low for absurdist tragicomedy: Kemp has accused the Democratic Party of hacking into the state's voter registration system in order to steal its records (these records are sold to anyone who asks, by the State of Georgia, for $250!).Besides the "the Demmycrats hacked us to save $250" weirdness, there's plenty more surrealism in Kemp's accusation: Kemp has accused the Democrats of two separate, mutually exclusive offenses: hacking into the voter registration system to steal its data, and hacking into it to expose its vulnerabilities (vulnerabilities, mind, which have been lavishly documented and demonstrated by independent security researchers).Kemp is a serial offender when it comes to false accusations of hacking voting systems: in 2016, he accused the Department of Homeland Security of hacking Georgia's vote (in reality, someone at the DHS had visited Kemp's Secretary of State website. Read the rest

A non-negotiable feature of Disneyland's 2008 contract with Unite Local 11 -- which represents the laundry workers who clean linens from the resort's hotels and restaurants -- was a new "work-tracking" system that used "gamification" to display realtime signals about each worker's productivity on public leaderboards, colorcoded with the slowest workers' names in red, as well as color-coding indicators on individual machines to indicate whether they were underperforming.The workers called this system "the electronic whip" and they say that it had the intended effect of speeding up their work -- at the expense of bitter fighting between workers (in a workplace that had a decades-long reputation for being a good and pleasant place to work) and a sharp increase in on-the-job injuries.Disneyland has been the site of intense union organizing, a pushback that was triggered by a decades-long ratcheting-down of real wages and working conditions.While this whip was cracking, the workers sped up. ‘We saw a higher incidence of injuries,’ Topete said. ‘Several people were injured on the job.’ The formerly collegial environment degenerated into a race. The laundry workers competed with each other, and got upset when coworkers couldn’t keep up. People started skipping bathroom breaks. Pregnant workers fell behind. ‘The scoreboard incentivises competition,’ said Topete. ‘Our human competitiveness, whatever makes us like games, whatever keeps us wanting to win, it’s a similar thing that was happening. Even if you didn’t want to.’The dark side of gamifying work [Vincent Gabrielle/Aeon](Thanks, Don!)(Image: Cryteria, CC-BY) Read the rest

This week's Saudi State-sactioned Murder Wheel of Misfortune has landed upon "acid bath."A top Turkish official, presidential adviser Yasin Aktay, has said he believes Jamal Khashoggi's body was dissolved in acid after being cut up. The "only logical conclusion", he said, was that those who had killed the Saudi journalist in Istanbul had destroyed his body "to leave no trace behind".Khashoggi, a critic of Saudi rulers, was killed inside the country's consulate on 2 October. No forensic evidence has been provided to prove his body was dissolved. What will the story be next week? Tktktktkttiktick tick tick tick... tick.... "eaten by angry raccoons." Read the rest

For more than a decade, Shipping and Transit LLC (AKA Arrivalstar) has been aggressively pursuing dubious patent claims against public transit companies, shippers, and other businesses whose practices overlapped with Arrivalstar's absurd, obvious patents on using GPSes to figure out where stuff was.Now, Shipping and Transit is bankrupt, and it has valued its portfolio of 34 patents at $1. It's the most honest moment in the company's shameful history.Shipping and Transit is the poster-child for sloppiness at the US Patent and Trademark Office. The company owns a suite of patents for using GPS exactly as it was designed to work: to figure out where stuff is, and then to log and/or transmit that location. The people who filed these patents didn't invent GPS: they just took someone else's widely used invention and patented the most obvious way to use it. The US Patent and Trademark Office granted the patent, Shipping and Transit bought it, and then used it to harass and soak people who were making products and providing services (including city bus services!), while Shipping and Transit made nothing (except lawsuits).Thankfully, there have been some changes in patent rules that have made it easier to get junk patents thrown out. After a couple of significant court losses in which Shipping and Transit was ordered to pay their victims' legal fees, and facing mounting debts, the company filed for bankruptcy.Though the company made millions in settlements and "licenses" for its patent portfolio, it valued the portfolio at $1 in the bankruptcy. Read the rest

Hey you know what happens when a superpower declares that it's going to take steps that will allow it to dictate the internal policies of other nations?I'll give you a hint: nothing good. From Vox.comNational Security Adviser John Bolton just gave a modern-day “Axis of Evil” speech, this one focused on three countries in Latin America.In a 30-minute address at Miami Dade College’s Freedom Tower, Bolton said the Trump administration will take a hard line against Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua by sanctioning the countries and cutting off diplomatic relations with them until they meet US demands.“This Troika of Tyranny, this triangle of terror stretching from Havana to Caracas to Managua, is the cause of immense human suffering, the impetus of enormous regional instability, and the genesis of a sordid cradle of communism in the Western Hemisphere,” Bolton said. “Under President Trump, the United States is taking direct action against all three regimes to defend the rule of law, liberty, and basic human decency in our region.”I guess that if Trump can't stop folks from migrating to the American border (totally legal) to request asylum (very legal as well), then he and his flying monkeys will throw cash and personnel at stopping the problem at what they perceive to be the source? This sounds pretty thin.According to Vox, US relations with Cuba will become more limited. Diplomats--apparently America still has those--will attempt to force the Venezuelan government to release hundreds of political prisoners and Nicaragua, which we've talked about here extensively, will get a talking to over the 300-plus civilians that have been killed so far this year in anti-government protests. Read the rest

Katie Notopoulos of Buzzfeed has found a new way to amuse herself -- looking at houses on Zillow that cost more than $10 million, yet still suck.So I moved the sliding toggle out of the price range that might, in theory, be realistic for me, to find houses in the area that cost more than $10 million — just out of curiosity. And what I found was pure, hideous, tacky, gilded-and-marble joy.I found mansions with suits of armor in the hallway, made to look like medieval castles. Mansions clearly built in the ’80s, with custom white metal railings, by a Miami Vice fan. A mansion in Connecticut that is literally a replica of Monticello, a Nashville mansion with a giant custom pirate ship bed that belongs to Big Kenny from Big & Rich (I googled the address), a ’90s purple explosion that belonged to Eddie Murphy (I learned that when I called the realtor to ask for permission to use the photos in this article; apparently his ex-wife sold it after their divorce). Mansions on Staten Island that, well, look like mansions on Staten Island.Image: Zillow Read the rest

A drunken baggage handler for Piedmont Airlines was in Kansas City when he took a snooze on the job. Just a bit later he woke up to find himself in Chicago. The gentleman had taken his lie down in the cargo hold on a Boeing 737 American Airlines flight.Although there were 80 passengers onboard, the heated, pressurized cargo hold was empty, making for a cozy napping nook. The man wasn't hurt. He was sent back to Kansas City with no charges pressed. It's one hell of a way to fly for free.Via The Kansas City StarImage: Colin Bowern/Flickr Read the rest

The bad news is that, due to the sheer tininess of certain components, iPhones are particularly vulnerable to going haywire in the presence of helium. The good news is that helium just isn't a problem you run into often.Sure enough, Apple’s user guide for the iPhone and Apple watch admits this is a problem: “Exposing iPhone to environments having high concentrations of industrial chemicals, including near evaporating liquified gasses such as helium, may damage or impair iPhone functionality. … If your device has been affected and shows signs of not powering on, the device can typically be recovered. Leave the unit unconnected from a charging cable and let it air out for approximately one week. The helium must fully dissipate from the device, and the device battery should fully discharge in the process. After a week, plug your device directly into a power adapter and let it charge for up to one hour. Then the device can be turned on again.” (Emphasis added.) Read the rest

Vice decided to test out Facebook's commitment to positively identifying the people and organizations behind political ads, so they applied for clearance to buy ads in the names of ever sitting US Senator, showing no proof, and Facebook granted permission in each case.They didn't go on to buy ads, but if they had, those ads would have run with Facebook's standard "paid for" disclosures, as in "Paid For By Chuck Schumer."It turns out that Facebook's new anti-fraudulent political ad measure operates on the honor system.To test it, VICE News applied to buy fake ads on behalf of all 100 sitting U.S. senators, including ads “Paid for by” by Mitch McConnell and Chuck Schumer. Facebook’s approvals were bipartisan: All 100 sailed through the system, indicating that just about anyone can buy an ad identified as “Paid for by” by a major U.S. politician.What’s more, all of these approvals were granted to be shared from pages for fake political groups such as “Cookies for Political Transparency” and “Ninja Turtles PAC.” VICE News did not buy any Facebook ads as part of the test; rather, we received approval to include "Paid for by" disclosures for potential ads.We posed as 100 Senators to run ads on Facebook. Facebook approved all of them. [William Turton/Vice](via JWZ) Read the rest

Since Halloween is nearly here, Norwegian musical artist Leo Moracchioli (previously on BB) made a metal cover of Danny Elfman's "This is Halloween" from Tim Burton's 1993 classic The Nightmare Before Christmas. Prepare to headbang with a devil puppet.(The Awesomer) Read the rest

Longreads posted an excerpt from from Alec Nevala-Lee’s new book, Astounding, recounting the events that led to L. Ron Hubbard creating a religion and its origins in the golden age of science fiction: Dawn of Dianetics: L. Ron Hubbard, John W. Campbell, and the Origins of Scientology.In the summer of 1949, Campbell was thirty-nine years old and living in New Jersey. For over a decade, he had been the single most influential figure in what would later be known as the golden age of science fiction, and he had worked extensively with Hubbard, who was popular with fans. The two men were personally close, and when Hubbard, who was a year younger, suffered from depression after World War II, Campbell became concerned for his friend’s mental state: “He was a quivering psychoneurotic wreck, practically ready to break down completely.”Hubbard had sought medical treatment for his psychological problems, which he also tried to address in unconventional ways. While living in Savannah, Georgia, he began to revise Excalibur, an unpublished manuscript on the human mind that he had written years earlier. In a letter to his agent, Hubbard said that the book had information on how to “rape women without their knowing it,” and that he wasn’t sure whether he wanted to use it to abolish the Catholic Church or found one of his own. He concluded, “Don’t know why I suddenly got the nerve to go into this again and let it loose. It’s probably either a great love or an enormous hatred of humanity.”The degree of Campbell's involvement in shaping early Scientology lore came as quite a surprise. Read the rest

Deon is a project to create automated "ethics checklists" for data science projects; by default, running the code creates a comprehensive checklist covering data collection and storage, modeling and deployment: the checklist items aren't specific actions, they're "meant to provoke discussion among good-faith actors who take their ethical responsibilities seriously. Because of this, most of the items are framed as prompts to discuss or consider. Teams will want to document these discussions and decisions for posterity."The lists can be customized for your own purposes, and if you think the default list needs revising, there's a democratic process for amending it.Checklists are a powerful way to ensure that important steps are not missed out; the rise of surgical checklists made an enormous positive change in patient outcomes -- hilariously, though surgeons often chafe at having to refer to checklists while doing a procedure they've done a hundred times, they overwhelmingly say that they would prefer to have checklists in the mix any time they are the patients.First and foremost, our goal is not to be arbitrators of what ethical concerns merit inclusion. We have a process for changing the default checklist, but we believe that many domain-specific concerns are not included and teams will benefit from developing custom checklists. Not every checklist item will be relevant. We encourage teams to remove items, sections, or mark items as N/A as the concerns of their projects dictate.Second, we built our initial list from a set of proposed items on multiple checklists that we referenced. Read the rest

Have you ever wondered if someone died in your house, or worse? Enter DiedInHouse.com. A simple $11.99 search through them will tell you everything you (probably don't) want to know.A query on this website will uncover if a specific address is "stigmatized," meaning that it's got issues beyond its physical condition. Sellers are generally not under legal obligation to share if something horrible -- like a murder, suicide, or, say, a meth lab -- has happened on a property. And they certainly aren't required to disclose "paranormal" activity.Software engineer Roy Condrey founded the site in 2013 after getting a strange text.Forbes:The website’s creation begins like a ghost story. ...Condrey received a text message in the middle of the night from one of his tenants that read: “Did you know that your house is haunted?” Condrey went down a cyber rabbit hole seeking, but not finding, an easy way to determine if his property had indeed seen a gruesome crime or fatality. “I went online to find a ‘Carfax’ of sorts for deaths in homes and I didn’t find anything, but I did find pages and pages of people asking if there’s a way to find out if their house is haunted,” says Condrey, who rents out several properties. He later learned through his data collection that, in fact, at least 4.5 million homes nationwide have had documented deaths take place on the premises. The number of homeowners that know about the history of their home, however, is unknown. Read the rest

This gorgeous 1960s aerodynamic test model of a NASA supersonic transport plane from the space agency's Langley Research Center can be yours for $5,685. On offer from Agent Gallery Chicago, it's approximately 51" long with a wingspan of 24" and "built of wood and composite materials." Unfortunately, one of the fins has snapped off but I'm sure the right person could work wonders with a little balsa wood, X-acto knife, and paint."RARE 1960'S NASA AERODYNAMICS SST MODEL" (via Uncrate) Read the rest