A gunman opened fire at Gilroy, California's garlic festival Sunday, killing three before being shot dead by police. At least fifteen more were injured and a 6-year-old boy was among the dead.There was "a white man in his early to mid-30s firing a rifle," eyewitness Julissa Contreras told NBC.It was the 246th mass shooting in the US this year, according to US tracking website Gun Violence Archive.The suspect entered the festival after cutting through a perimeter fence, Gilroy Chief of Police Scot Smithee told reporters. He said witnesses reported that a second suspect may have been involved, possibly in a support role.Another eyewitness: "I could see him shooting in just every direction. He wasn't aiming at anyone specifically. It was just left to right, right to left. He definitely was prepared for what he was doing." Read the rest

Despite the user interface issues with games like Wastelands 2 and Phantom Doctrine on the Nintendo Switch, I've still waited like a mook for Obsidian's Pillars of Eternity II to break cover for the console since late last year. The last time I checked on Amazon, it wasn't going to be available until New Year's Eve, 2019. So that sucks. In the meantime, Obsidian is throwing gamers a bone: if you didn't have the opportunity to play the original Pillars of Eternity a few years back, you'll be able to pick it up for the Switch, early next month.The announcement was made by the company in a tweet, late last week:I played the original when it was released for Mac, a few years back. It was pretty good! But I never got around to investing in the additional content that came out for the game. As Obsidian is releasing Pillars of Eternity as a complete edition for the Switch, I might be persuaded to pick it up to play through and see how it feels on a handheld.Image via Flickr, courtesy of BagoGames Read the rest

Jonathan Zittrain (previously) is consistently a source of interesting insights that often arrive years ahead of their wider acceptance in tech, law, ethics and culture (2008's The Future of the Internet (and how to stop it) is surprisingly relevant 11 years later); in a new long essay on Medium (shorter version in the New Yorker), Zittrain examines the perils of the "intellectual debt" that we incur when we allow machine learning systems that make predictions whose rationale we don't understand, because without an underlying theory of those predictions, we can't know their limitations.Zittrain cites Arthur C Clarke's third law, that "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" as the core problem here: like a pulp sf novel where the descendants of the crew of a generation ship have forgotten that they're on a space-ship and have no idea where the controls are, the system works great so long as it doesn't bump into anything the automated systems can't handle, but when that (inevitably) happens, everybody dies when the ship flies itself into a star or a black hole or a meteor.In other words, while machine learning presents lots of problems when it gets things wrong (say, when algorithmic bias enshrines and automates racism or other forms of discrimination) at least we know enough to be wary of the predictions produced by the system and to argue that they shouldn't be blindly followed: but if a system performs perfectly (and we don't know why), then we come to rely on it and forget about it and are blindsided when it goes wrong. Read the rest

The field of internet technology is wide open, for those who know their way around it. And with the infrastructure that drives it changing every day, the best way to learn is to dive right in - with a credible guide, of course. Here are 8 online courses in IT, networking and security that will give you the latest know-how and get you armed for the job market fast.The A to Z Cyber Security & IT Certification Training BundleThis course pack teaches you to defend systems of any size from any angle, with dedicated classes on cloud security, GSEC certification, SQL injection and more. The complete A to Z Cyber Security & IT Certification Training Bundle is now $39.The Ultimate Cisco Networking Expert Certification Training BundleBig networks use Cisco, and they invariably need a lot of nimble minds to manage it. These nine courses cover everything you need to launch and maintain a Cisco network: CCNP routing, IPv4 and MPLS protocols, the works. Get the Ultimate Cisco Networking Expert Certification Training Bundle now for $31.The Complete IT Project Management Certification BundleIf you've got the foundation of IT knowledge but not the certification, this bundle will bridge the gap. You'll get courses that not only teach you to ace most CompTIA and Microsoft exams but give you a firm foundation in project management methodologies like PRINCE2 that will allow you to move up the ranks. Pick up the Complete IT Project Management Certification Bundle for $29. Read the rest

If racist Gemma O'Doherty (banned from Youtube for hate speech) thinks that the Halal grocer in her Irish town is cause for alarm, how does she suppose people in every city and town in every country in the world feel about their Irish pubs?O'Doherty is a garbage person who thinks the Christchurch attack was a false-flag. It's delightful to watch Twitter school her on the creeping celtification of the entire rest of the world.There's literally been an Irish pub in every single country I've ever been to https://t.co/VhwRB0CBWJ— Tom Usher (@tom_usher_) July 26, 2019(Image: Tripadvisor) Read the rest

Buffet area sealed off as booze cruise ends in, wait, what?

What if Windows 3.1 was better than Windows95? How about that, huh?Every Windows 3.1 theme Read the rest

Hey, we get it. Not everybody's a master chef - or even a chef. And when all you see on the recipe is prep time, cooking even the simplest meals can seem like a hassle.But trust us, the simple act of dicing up some fresh veggies can make you feel in control of your kitchen again - if you're using the right tools. And once you get hold of this Damasukasu 3-Piece Japanese AKUMA Master Chef Blade Set, you'll see they are not just for looks.The nitrogen cooling used in the forging process not only gives them a stylish sheen but toughens them to a minimum of 62 on the Rockwell hardness scale. They're also stain-, rust- and corrosion-resistant, with a full tang triple-riveted in the handle. To boil down all that jargon: These knives will be around for a while. And if cutting with them wasn't meditative enough, the 3-piece set includes a whetstone so you can keep that 12-degree edge honed.Pick up the Damasukasu 3-Piece Japanese AKUMA Master Chef Blade Set & Whetstone for $79.99 today. Read the rest

Cory Helford Gallery in Los Angeles is exhibiting paintings by Jana Brike. The show is called Soulsearching and it runs from August 10 to September 14, 2019.Mostly using the traditional medium of oil painting on canvas, Brike's art focuses on the internal space and state of a human soul - dreams, longing, love, pain, the vast range of emotions that the human condition offers and the transcendence of them all, the growing up and self-discovery. Her work is her poetic visual autobiographyGrowing up under Soviet occupation had a profound effect on everything from Brike's work ethic to her subject matter and aesthetic sensibilities. A self-described "reclusive and dreamy child," Brike showed burgeoning talent at a very young age. By 15 years old she was participating in international exhibitions, later going on to receive her Master of Arts degree from the Art Academy of Latvia in 2005.Brike's surreal and haunting imagery is informed by everything from Russian Realism and Soviet animation to her Grandmother's religious postcards featuring biblical works of the European masters. Her subject matter is culled from folklore, fairytales and children's book illustrations. The subjects of her oil paintings embody a fantastical quality, illustrating what Brike viewed as the "forbidden...imagery of Western pop culture" which took on a "mystical, almost religious tone for Soviet children."Over the past 15 years, Brike has created 13 solo exhibitions and been part of nearly 100 other projects and group exhibitions in established and emerging galleries in the United Kingdom, Belgium, Germany, Italy, France, Russia, Finland, Belorussia, Switzerland, Australia and several parts of the United States. Read the rest

Mary Blair was an artist who did a lot of work for Disney, including concept art for animation and Disneyland (It's a Small World After All is her great work, if you ask me). My friend Jenny Hart, who is a wonderful embroidery artist and who makes and sells embroidery pattern kits, has a new Mary Blair embroidery pattern kit with some of Blair's non-Disney work. You can see the patterns here. You can by the patterns as a hardcopy with iron ons, or as a PDF file. Read the rest

I have a Berni Wrightson zine (The Berni Wrightson Treasury) that I bought as a kid when I worked at Mile High Comics in Boulder, Colorado in the 1970s. The cover of the zine had this 1969 painting on it, but it was reproduced small and kind of blurry. What a treat to see it full size on the auction listing page! It's just one of the hundreds of incredible pieces of art offered at Heritage Auctions' "Glynn and Suzanne Crain Science Fiction Collection Auction."“This sale includes classic examples from the genre, many of which are very rare or even unique, with just single paintings typically brought to market, or even traded privately without being made available to the public,” Heritage Auctions Vice President Todd Hignite said. “To offer a collection with the breadth and quality found in this one is simply unprecedented—and we expect many bidders from diverse collecting areas to compete for these iconic images created for some of the most popular and historically important stories by the greatest writers in the genre.”Other pieces that I like:James Allen St. John (American, 1872-1957). At the Earth's Core book dust jacket, 1922. James Allen St. John (American, 1872-1957). Thuvia, Maid of Mars interior book illustration, 1920 Read the rest

If you fill in this form, Equifax will send you $125 as part of its settlement with the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau, the FTC, and 48 out of 50 states.Equifax doxed the nation and profited handsomely from it. $125 is a laughably small sum given how much damage the data they hemorrhaged all over the internet could cause you. Equifax should have faced the corporate death penalty, the execs who oversaw the disaster should have had their assets seized and diverted to anti-identity-theft measures and charities.Instead, the FTC et al are hitting the company for a maximum of $700m (how much they pay depends in part on whether you fill in this form. Equifax's market cap stands today at $16.6B, and it posted $3.412B in earnings in 2018, up 1.48% increase from 2017. As meaningless as the $125 is, as piddling as the $700m is, you should still do this. As Josephine Wolff writes for Slate, breaches should be as expensive as possible. Anything you can do to make them more expensive will help people inside companies who are arguing against data-collection and retention, making the world safer for everyone else. Anything you can do to make breaches more expensive will hit the share price of companies that overcollect our data.Go on, do it. You may be thinking, But I don’t want to give Equifax the last six digits of my Social Security number and my birthdate and mailing address after it’s demonstrated just how much it can’t be trusted! Read the rest

Once a year or so I replace our dishtowels with a new set. I learned today that Amazon has a good deal on a 24-pack of 15 x 25 inch cotton towels: . I ordered them. When they arrive the old ones will become cleaning and shop rags. Read the rest

My guest this week on the Cool Tools Show is Dan Shapiro. Dan is the founder of Glowforge, the 3D laser printer. He's also the creator of Robot Turtles, the board game that teaches programming to preschoolers. He wrote Hot Seat: The CEO Guidebook, and his latest hobby is throwing his wife and twin 10-year-olds in dungeons with dragons. You can find him on Twitter @danshapiro.Subscribe to the Cool Tools Show on iTunes | RSS | Transcript | See all the Cool Tools Show posts on a single pageShow notes:Cast iron skillet and Random orbital sanderRaw transcript excerpt: "I love cooking for the family and my favorite cooking tool is something that my wife got me for my birthday. She went on eBay and she got a 1950-something 12-inch vintage cast iron skillet. You say, "Okay, vintage cast iron. What's the fuss?" And I wound up super geeking out on this. It turns out that nowadays cast iron skillets come directly out of the cast and they have this rough bottom. You read about cast iron being the ultimate nonstick cookware, but you've got this grating surface on the bottom of your cast iron. Modern cast iron has this, but the old stuff didn't. The old stuff they actually ground down so it was smooth on the bottom. But geeking out, I wanted to figure out, is this something you could replicate today? And I found a really cheap achievable way of doing this. Read the rest

Danielle Stella is a pro-Trump candidate with aspirations to beat Minnesota Representative Ilhan Omar in the the 2020 election. She has one more thing to add to her resume that will surely win the hearts of people wondering if she is the kind of person who shares their values: felony charges for "stealing 279 items valued at $2,327.97 from a Target store," according to The Guardian. Stella has said publicly that she was the victim of a severe violent assault in 2008. She is charged with the thefts under her former surname, which the Guardian agreed not to report because she said it could endanger her safety.She is charged with felony theft over the incident at Target and faces a punishment of up to five years in prison and a fine of $10,000 if convicted, according to court filings.Police and court records said a warrant was put out for Stella’s re-arrest for alleged contempt of court on 4 April, after she failed to show up for a court hearing.Officers in nearby Bloomington then arrested Stella on 28 April after she was allegedly seen by security staff at a Cub Foods grocery store stealing a bottle of tick spray for cats, and placing other items “under her purse so that they could not be seen.”When they checked her identification, police officers discovered the open warrant for Stella’s arrest over her failure to appear in court for the earlier alleged shoplifting, their incident report said.Photograph: Bloomington police department Read the rest

In the wake of the Senate's predictably grandstanding "Protecting Digital Innocence" hearings (on how to keep kids from online harms), my EFF colleagues Elliot Harmon and India McKinney have posted an excellent, thoughtful rebuttal to proposals to segregate a "kid internet" from an "adult internet" in order to ensure that kids don't see "harmful" things.They start by pointing out that there is no consensus on what constitutes "harmful material": a ban on kids seeing "any pictures of human genitalia" (proposed by Sen. John Kennedy, R-LA) would block Our Bodies, Ourselves and even Where Did I Come From? (as a parent, I've given both to my daughter, who is now 11). Attempts to determine what is and is not "safe for kids" have resulted in a grotesque string of laughable failures, from Tumblr's hilariously terrible filter to SESTA/FOSTA, an "anti-sex-trafficking" law that has led to a resurgence in street prostitution, violence against sex-workers, and a golden age of pimping, as sex-workers seek out physical protection now that they can't use the internet to screen clients.Rather than requiring platforms to block material that might be harmful, Harmon and McKinney propose that we should empower users: allowing kids and their parents to use third-party services and tools that filter, block and sort the materials the Big Tech platforms serve to them, so they can make up their own minds about what is and is not appropriate.Particularly interesting is their critique of a proposal to put "kid material" in separate silos where there is no tracking for behavioral advertising purposes: "Platforms must take measures to put all users in charge of how their data is collected, used, and shared—including children—but cleanly separating material directed at adults and children isn’t easy. Read the rest

My eyes are loaded with floaters and I get more of them every year. I try to think of them as free entertainment, but I hope this new research into reducing floaters takes off.From Chemical and Engineering News:In experiments with human eye fluid samples, researchers have found that gold nanoparticles heated with a low-energy laser can help reduce these problematic clumps (ACS Nano 2019, DOI: 10.1021/acsnano.9b04050). The technique could lead to a clinical therapy that’s superior to those currently in use.Healthy eyeballs are filled with a transparent, jelly-like substance known as the vitreous humor that’s largely a mesh of collagen and the polysaccharide hyaluronic acid. The collagen can form insoluble globs that float within the gel, scattering light and potentially disrupting vision. Clinicians treat these problematic floaters by vitrectomy, an invasive and irreversible process that replaces the vitreous fluid with a saline solution, or by shining a high-energy laser beam into the eye to break clumps apart. Studies have found that only 38% of patients report that laser treatment helped their symptoms, and the procedure carries risks of damage to the lens or retina.Image: Shutterstock/hareluya Read the rest

Well, it's finally official. After more than a year in regulatory limbo, The United States Justice Department has approved a $26 billion dollar deal between mobile carriers T-Mobile and Sprint.Here's the official announcement from DoJ.Department of JusticeOffice of Public AffairsFOR IMMEDIATE RELEASEFriday, July 26, 2019Justice Department Settles with T-Mobile and Sprint in Their Proposed Merger by Requiring a Package of Divestitures to DishDivestiture Will Enable DISH’s Entry as a Fourth Nationwide Facilities-Based Wireless Competitor and Expedite Deployment of High-Quality 5G for American ConsumersThe Department of Justice announced today that it and the Attorneys General for five states reached a settlement with T-Mobile and Sprint regarding their proposed merger. The settlement requires a substantial divestiture package in order to enable a viable facilities-based competitor to enter the market. Further, the settlement will facilitate the expeditious deployment of multiple high-quality 5G networks for the benefit of American consumers and entrepreneurs.The Department’s Antitrust Division, along with the offices of five state Attorneys General (Plaintiff States), filed a civil antitrust lawsuit today in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to block the proposed transaction. At the same time, the Department and the Plaintiff States filed a proposed settlement that, if approved by the court, would resolve the Department’s and the Plaintiff States’ competitive concerns. The participating state Attorneys General offices represent Nebraska, Kansas, Ohio, Oklahoma, and South Dakota.Under the terms of the proposed settlement, T-Mobile and Sprint must divest Sprint’s prepaid business, including Boost Mobile, Virgin Mobile, and Sprint prepaid, to Dish Network Corp., a Colorado-based satellite television provider. Read the rest

Comic Code is a monospace version of the classic and "over-hated" Comic Sans. Comic Code was designed by Toshi Omagari and published by Tabular Type Foundry. Comic Code contains 14 styles and family package options. The font is currently #21 in Hot New Fonts.I'd make a screenshot of it in vivo, but apparently they want money for it. Read the rest

The IRS knows about the cryptocoins and wants you to pay taxes on them. The Wall Street Journal reports that the warning letters are going out.An IRS spokesman declined to say whether the letters stem from information turned over by digital-currency platform Coinbase. In mid-March of 2018, Coinbase provided data—under a federal court order—on about 13,000 accounts requested by the IRS. ... The Coinbase customers whose information was turned over bought, sold, sent or received digital currency worth $20,000 or more between 2013 and 2015. For federal tax purposes, cryptocurrencies such as as bitcoin are treated as investment property akin to stock shares or real estate.You may not be interested in paying taxes, but the government is interested in the companies that helped you not pay taxes and it turns out those companies are happy to help the government help you pay your taxes. QED! Read the rest

Taylor Jackson challenged himself to photograph cheap pre-packaged frozen dinners so the look like a fancy food photo of a dish from a posh restaurant. To get it done, he sought the help of a professional chef pal who is a master at plating. From PetaPixel:The actual shooting starts around the 14 minutes mark (in the video below), if you want to skip straight to that to see how Jackson made this shoot work using only one camera (Nikon Z6) and one lens (NIKKOR Z 35mm f/1.8S). No macro lens. No artificial light. None of those crazy food photography tricks we’ve all heard about. View this post on Instagram $3 TV Dinner Challenge! Yesterday @liamgoodvisuals and I challenged @the_nomad_chef to plate TV Dinners to look like 5 star meals. Full video out Monday. Until then - left is a Swanson’s Salisbury Steak, middle is a no name fettuccine alfredo, and the right is a Korean Beef Bowl. Shot on a Nikon Z6 with the 35mm S. #cheflife #nikon #nikonz6 #foodphotography #foodstagram #foody A post shared by 📷 Taylor Jackson (@taylorjackson) on Jul 18, 2019 at 6:19am PDT Read the rest

Emmet Till was 14 years old when he was tortured and murdered in 1955 because he was accused of offending a white woman in a grocery store in Mississippi (the woman later admitted she made up most of her story). The two white men charged with torturing and murdering him were acquitted by an all-white jury, though they later admitted killing Till. The murder and trial were instrumental in kicking off the civil rights movement.The above photo was taken and posted to Instagram in March. It shows three white men, all students of the University of Mississippi, posing in front of a sign honoring Till. Two of the men are brandishing rifles, and are grinning.From ProPublica:Kappa Alpha suspended the trio on Wednesday, after the news organizations provided a copy of the photo to fraternity officials at Ole Miss. The fraternity, which honors Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee as its “spiritual founder” on its website, has a history of racial controversy, including an incident in which students wore blackface at a Kappa Alpha sponsored Halloween party at the University of Virginia in 2002.Patrick Weems, executive director of the Emmett Till Memorial Commission, takes down a bullet-riddled sign honoring the slain youth, whose death helped propel the civil rights movement in America. (Courtesy of Emmett Till Interpretive Center)“The photo is inappropriate, insensitive and unacceptable. It does not represent our chapter,” Taylor Anderson, president of Ole Miss’ Kappa Alpha Order, wrote in an email. “We have and will continue to be in communication with our national organization and the University.”After viewing the photo, U.S. Read the rest

Jeremy Mayer is a San Francisco sculptor who creates incredibly intricate creatures from torn-apart typewriters. One of Jeremy's preying mantises has lived in my home for many years and I still marvel at its construction. Wired visited Jeremy's studio for the short documentary above. For more, here are a slew of Boing Boing posts about his astounding work. Read the rest

I've spent most of my adult life in Los Angeles, so musician/magician/actor Rob Zabrecky's new memoir Strange Cures hit home, literally. Growing up in a lower-middle-class 1980s family in Burbank, California, Rob was a shy, awkward kid who kept his wart-covered hands in his pockets. He idolized his uncle, who told Rob he was a special government agent. Rob was too starstruck and too naive to understand that his uncle was an unemployed drunk sadist, until an incident took place that made him realize just how seriously messed up Uncle Ed was. Strange Cures is one amazing true story after another, told in chronological order. During a summer spent in a village in Scotland (where his mother was born) Rob's aunt told him he could get rid of his warts by plunging his hands into warm fresh cow dung every morning. Rob followed her advice, and to his surprise, the strange cure worked. That same summer trip also brought Rob into contact with a group of kids who introduced him to punk rock (which became one of the three things that mattered to Rob, the other two being video games and junk food).When Rob returned home and went back to school, he was shocked to discover that the girls who had ignored him as a gawky, warty kid had taken a sudden interest in him. His love for music grew and he formed the band, Possum Dixon, which was signed by Interscope to much fanfare. He also developed a drug addiction. Read the rest

Amazon quietly struck deals with dozens of local law enforcement agencies across America that gave the police access to a distributed surveillance feed from its Ring "smart doorbell" products in exchange for the cops providing free advertising for the products without revealing their contractual requirement to do so.The deals also included free Ring surveillance cameras.Under the deals, the police would promote the Ring products and the associated distributed surveillance tool Neighborhood, which allows multiple Ring users to collaborate on putting their streets under surveillance.Cops then were able to see where Ring doorbells were installed and contact Ring owners via their app to informally request surveillance footage.Motherboard obtained one of the confidential memoranda of understanding that Ring used with the Lakeland, FL police force. They're live on Documentcloud. There is evidence that the number of towns and cities that have partnerships with Ring is far larger than is currently known. An email obtained by Motherboard includes an introduction of a Ring “Account Manager,” who a fellow Ring employee says “has worked with dozens of agencies in Florida.” This suggests that there are dozens of unknown partnerships between Ring and local police departments in Florida alone.This is also not Ring’s only collaboration with law enforcement. As reported by Motherboard, Amazon and Ring have provided Amazon-branded boxes, tape, lithium-ion stickers, and Ring doorbell cameras to police to craft package theft sting operations. The explicit goal of these operations is to catch someone stealing a package on a Ring doorbell camera and apprehend them. Read the rest

David Tinley developed complex spreadsheets under contract to Siemens, which used them to manage its equipment orders; Tinley hid "logic bombs" in the spreadsheets' scripts that caused them to malfunction every couple of years, which would gin up new work for him as he was called in to fix them.But when Tinley got a support call while out of town, he passed the admin passwords on to Siemens IT, which discovered the scam. Tinley has pleaded guilty and faces up to 10 years in prison and up to $250,000 in fines. Other contractors who've used logic bombs to do this sort of thing have received multi-year sentences, and Zdnet says its likely Tinley will go to prison.The spreadshees included custom scripts that would update the content of the file based on current orders stored in other, remote documents, allowing the company to automate inventory and order management.But while Tinley's files worked for years, they started malfunctioning around 2014. According to court documents, Tinley planted so-called "logic bombs" that would trigger after a certain date, and crash the files.Every time the scripts would crash, Siemens would call Tinley, who'd fix the files for a fee.Siemens contractor pleads guilty to planting logic bomb in company spreadsheets [Catalin Cimpanu/Zdnet](via Schneier)(Image: XKCD) Read the rest

Proof that yes, any party is a monster costume party, if you have the determination to pull it off.The perfect kid at a wedding.Don't know the source uploader, or the identify of those involved — anyone? I need to know the story behind this video.[via IMGUR] Read the rest

For more than a decade Shane Claiborne has worked with gun violence survivors, teaching them to use a forge to melt down guns and an anvil to makes farm implements out of the metal.Claiborne (coauthor of last year's Beating Guns: Hope for People Who Are Weary of Violence) tours America working with survivors to help them work through their trauma with fire and hammers. Last week he helped Reverend Sharon Risher, whose mother was killed in the 2015 racist Charlestown mass-shooting, to beat a gun into a plowshare.He wants to establish a nationwide collection of storefront smithies devoted to breaking down guns. Locally, Claiborne helped state Rep. Movita Johnson-Harrell smash steel a few years ago in memory of her father, her brother and her teenage son — all of whom died in gunfire. The first-term legislator, who is the first Muslim woman elected to the Pa. House, participated in a state hearing on gun violence earlier this week, working to determine causes, effects and potential solutions to gun violence.“It was very cathartic,” Johnson-Harrell told Billy Penn about the forging session. “You’re just basically hammering at the gun. It becomes soft, when you hit it with a metal hammer. It was like a release.”Using fire and force, this Philly author turns guns into garden tools [Danya Henninger/Bill Penn](Image: Shane Claiborne)(Thanks, Kathy Padilla!) Read the rest

Hard to believe it, but here we still are.House Speaker Nancy Pelosi today, to reporters, on the subject of impeachment hearings against the illegitimate and manifestly unfit president of the United States, Donald Trump: “We will proceed when we have what we need to proceed. Not one day sooner.”House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on starting an impeachment inquiry into President Trump: "We will proceed when we have what we need to proceed. Not one day sooner" pic.twitter.com/wlk3C1BU0H— CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) July 26, 2019WHATMOREDOYOUNEED?"We will proceed when we have what we need to proceed," says @SpeakerPelosi of motions for impeachment. She says she has no complaint with what more aggressive advocates of impeachement are doing. pic.twitter.com/tzzpwgiUPE— Mark Knoller (@markknoller) July 26, 2019 Read the rest

An American tourist has been released from Syria, report multiple news outlets on Friday. Negotiators from Lebanon brokered the deal, led by Lebanese security chief Abbas Ibrahim. The detained individual who is now being returned to America is not a dual citizen and not journalist Austin Tice.“Lebanon has worked on mediating through General Abbas Ibrahim to release an American and he was handed over to his family already. The American is not Tice because it is not known where he is,” the security official said.From Reuters:Syrian authorities have released a U.S. citizen and he has been handed back to his family, thanks to the mediation of Lebanon, a Lebanese security official said on Friday.The security official did not reveal the name of the released American, but said it was not Austin Tice, a journalist who disappeared in Syria in 2012.The official said that Lebanon’s security chief Abbas Ibrahim had conducted the mediation.US Citizen who is believed to be released from Syria based on twitter buzz, but no official confirmation on name yet https://t.co/bXxesnPrDD— Joyce Karam (@Joyce_Karam) July 26, 2019BREAKING: CBS News has confirmed an American tourist has been released from Syria. The Lebanese brokered the deal. The returned individual is not a dual citizen and not journalist Austin Tice.— Christina Ruffini (@EenaRuffini) July 26, 2019 Read the rest

Donald Trump says his administration will not provide any waivers or relief for Apple Mac Pro components built in China, and said Apple should instead build its products in the U.S.“Apple will not be given Tariff wavers (sic), or relief, for Mac Pro parts that are made in China,” President Trump tweeted with typos in his typically half-assed way. “Make them in USA, no Tariffs!”Apple will not be given Tariff wavers, or relief, for Mac Pro parts that are made in China. Make them in the USA, no Tariffs!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 26, 2019The new Mac Pro was announced in June, and replaces an older model that was built in Texas, and goes on sale this Fall.From Todd Haselton at CNBC:Apple asked for waivers on tariffs on the Mac Pro. Apple said it wanted to be exempt on some parts it uses for the new Mac Pro, including a power supply unit, the stainless-steel enclosure, finished mice and trackpads and circuit boards.“There are no other sources for this proprietary, Apple-designed component,” Apple said in a filing.Apple said in June that tariffs on its products will reduce its contribution to the U.S. economy. In a letter to U.S. trade representative Robert Lighthizer, Apple said tariffs would “also weigh on Apple’s global competitiveness” since Chinese companies compete with the products Apple builds. Trump met with Apple CEO Tim Cook in June to discuss trade.Trump says Apple will not be given tariff waivers or relief for Mac Pro parts made in China [via techmeme, photo: REUTERS] Read the rest

This Billy Jealousy Marked IV Life tattoo aftercare kit helps me heal up quick.I have a number of tattoos. I got the first when I was very young, and I think aftercare was some 'romantic' notion of Jack Daniels and some diaper care creme. I then stopped getting more tattoos because I realized that art required I find a real artist. Took me a long time.I will spare you photos of my tattoos, and me the shitty things that the nasty .001% of our readers will say.It took a long time to find an artist whose work I love and has a personality where we enjoy chatting for hours while he draws on me with an uncomfortable pencil. The work is fantastic, I love it, and I wanted the art to look as good as it can for as long as it can! Part of undertaking this project 'so late in life' is because the tattoos will now have a lot less time to deteriorate...Aftercare is a big deal in healing your tattoo up well and making sure it looks good for a long time. My artist recommended some very common, but very heavy salves and lotions. After a day I broke into some pimples and pores were clogging. I was worried I'd damage the new tattoo.A friend knows just how few 'beauty care' products I keep around: zero. She saw my arm and immediately took pity and brought over this kit of stuff. I had never heard of 'Billy Jealousy" before, but I am told they are a wonderful line of Man-Focused beauty aids. Read the rest

To honor MCA, the great Adam Yauch, the remaining Beastie Boys have partnered with Adidas to release a vegan shoe.VegNews:This week, shoe brand Adidas released the Adidas Skateboarding x Beastie Boys Americana vegan sneaker to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the Beastie Boys’ album Paul’s Boutique. The iconic rap group’s member Adam Horovitz (known professionally as “Ad-Rock”) and Mike Diamond (known as “Mike D”) collaborated on the design of the shoe and made it vegan in honor of longtime veganAdam Yauch—the third Beastie Boys member who died in 2012 from cancer. The shoe features a vegan canvas upper, cotton jersey liner, gum sole, Adidas’ classic three-striped pattern, and a Beastie Boys logo on the tongue. A portion of sales of the new shoes will be donated to PEACE Sisters and Little Kids Rock, organizations that work to empower young women. Read the rest

After disastrous previews —the damned things simply broke in the hands of tech journalists trying them out—Samsung is relaunching its cursed folding tablet-phone, promising a fixed and reliable device. The Galaxy Fold is coming to America in September.• The top protective layer of the Infinity Flex Display has been extended beyond the bezel, making it apparent that it is an integral part of the display structure and not meant to be removed.• Galaxy Fold features additional reinforcements to better protect the device from external particles while maintaining its signature foldable experience:• The top and bottom of the hinge area have been strengthened with newly added protection caps.• Additional metal layers underneath the Infinity Flex Display have been included to reinforce the protection of the display.• The space between the hinge and body of Galaxy Fold has been reduced.The Folding Lemon, previously: Already regretting assigning Anthony Burgess to review the Samsung Galaxy Fold Read the rest

When you're overweight, taller or shorter than average or otherwise physically different from the vast majority of folks, shopping for clothing sucks. Speaking from past experience, there's something dreadful about walking into a mall and knowing that only a handful of stores will carry clothes that not only fit, but flatter your body type. Even worse is sadness that passes through you in a change room when, having thought you'd found a pair of pants that should fit you, you discover that your size is not, according to the brand you're trying, is not your size. I don't dig shopping online—as much as I hate going out to shop, I hate having to repack something I bought and dislike to hand over the to the post office, even more. But I get it: it's convenient and, if you have any anxiety over walking into a crowded mall or don't feel comfortable with your body, being able to get stuff shipped to you might just feel better.Until bullshit like this goes down.From Jezebel:Forever 21's online customers have begun opening the packages that land on their doorstep to find the clothing they ordered—and a diet bar that they most certainly did not. The fast-fashion retailer has started sending sample Atkins lemon bars, which proudly advertise three grams of carbs, along with online orders. It isn’t clear just which orders receive this unsolicited weight loss nudge, but judging from a growing number of complaints on social media, most of the impacted customers appear to have ordered from the company’s plus-size collections. Read the rest

A shopper at a Habitat for Humanity ReStore thrift shop in Queens, New York bought a pencil drawing that turned out to be a previously unknown piece by Austrian expressionist painter Egon Schiele (1890-1918). Jane Kallir, director of New York's Galerie St. Etienne and author of Schiele: The Complete Works, authenticated the work. From The Art Newspaper:Kallir described the (owner) as a part-time art handler who often visits second-hand shops. “He’s got some art background—an eye,” she says. He prefers to remain anonymous, Galerie St Etienne says, and so was unavailable for an interview...She estimates that the drawing, which is now for sale through the gallery, is worth roughly $100,000 to $200,000. It is currently on view there in an exhibition titled The Art Dealer as Scholar...If and when the drawing is sold, the gallery says that its owner plans to donate some of the proceeds to Habitat for Humanity, a non-profit organisation that builds and repairs homes for people in need. Read the rest

The Pulp Librarian tweeted a fun history of Letraset's rub-on lettering sheets. Launched in 1959, the dry transfer letters transformed DIY design and publishing, from 'zines to record albums! Below are a few of the tweets. Click here for the whole thread!Davis and Mackenzie – both experienced designers – created Letraset as a cheaper alternative to phototypesetting, to help speed up the design process. From humble beginnings in an old factory behind Waterloo station Letraset eventually swept across the design world! pic.twitter.com/jZsHV6Jjc2— Pulp Librarian (@PulpLibrarian) July 25, 2019 In 1961 Letraset adopted the dry transfer process: letters screenprinted onto a polythene sheet were sprayed over with adhesive. You placed the sheet over the paper and used a pencil to rub over the letter, which detached from the carrier sheet and stuck to the paper. Sometimes. pic.twitter.com/nVV19tozTX— Pulp Librarian (@PulpLibrarian) July 25, 2019 Read the rest

Aquanaut is an autonomous submarine developed by Houston Mechatronics Inc. that transforms into a humanoid robot -- well, the upper half anyway -- to service underwater oil and gas rigs. IEEE Spectrum's Evan Ackerman took a dive with Aquanaut in a massive swimming pool that NASA uses to help train astronauts for microgravity. From IEEE Spectrum:The HMI engineers, who often joke that building a Transformer has been one of their long-term career objectives, are convinced that it can be done. Aquanaut has been designed primarily for servicing subsea oil and gas installations. The companies that own and operate this infrastructure spend vast sums of money to inspect and maintain it. They rely on robotic technologies that haven’t fundamentally changed in decades, largely because of the challenge of working in such an extreme environment. For HMI, however, that’s not a problem: Of its 75 employees, over two dozen used to work for NASA. Extreme environments are what they’re best at.HMI cofounder and chief technology officer Nic Radford spent 14 years working on advanced robotics projects at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, in Houston. “I’ll grant you that getting into space is harder than getting underwater,” he says. “But space is a pristine environment. Underwater, things are extraordinarily dynamic. I haven’t decided yet whether it’s 10 times harder or 50 times harder for robots working underwater than it is in space..."Aquanaut will not require a tether or a support ship. It will travel in submarine mode to its deepwater destination, where it’ll transform into its humanoid form, unfolding its powerful arms. Read the rest

Posted by redditor Cutcakenotwrists to r/confusing_perspective. Read the rest

The Aukey Dual USB Wall Charger is available at a very low price when you use code YIAZF27X. Read the rest

/r/LadyBoners is described as "A positive community that encourages, enjoys and champions ladyboner-inducers of all types, showing the rest of the internet that, yes, ladies can slobber and objectify too." A redditor with the handle FrigidShadow took the 64 most upvoted men on the subreddit and made the above composite photo. Read the rest

It's like an outtake from one of my favorite movies, Over The Edge. A kid in Bend, Oregon escaped the long arm of the law by hopping into a trash can and closing the lid. He stayed in the bin for 30 minutes before getting out, by which time the peace officer was long gone.Image: Zach Pierce/YouTube Read the rest

Mayo. Not even once.A man from Oilfield, California (near Bakersfield) with a history of mental health and methamphetamine abuse is in jail having admitted to killing his wife. His defense: a powerful clique of elites infected his brain with mayonnaise.He told investigators that he was protecting her from a group of powerful people who would "do brutal things to people, like eat them."After he was arrested as a suspect in his wife's death, Nathaniel Robertson told sheriff's detectives he beat Lidia Robertson to death with with a concrete block.When the detectives asked if he used drugs, Nathaniel Robertson said he used “ice” to help him breathe. Ice is a common street term for the illegal stimulant street drug methamphetamine. The man also said he’d been ingesting “crystal,” which a detective also understood to mean crystal methamphetamine, according to documents.Robertson, 46, pleaded not guilty to a charge of first-degree murder in the death of Lidia Robertson, who was 57. He is being held on $1 million bail.From KGET:But Robertson, in a confusing, rambling statement, said he did it to “give her compassion and mercy” as “the alignments were not in place to protect her,” according to recently released court documents.He said he had been infected by mayonnaise “they” put in him, the documents say. The “they” in this case was a group of “brutal, powerful” people Robertson said he couldn’t identify.There was something inside him releasing information from the Revolutionary War, Robertson told investigators. Read the rest

The Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday released the first volume of its bipartisan investigation report on Russia. This volume of the report deals with election security. The complete report will be five volumes in total. You can read the first volume, now, below. "If there was ever a moment when Congress needed to exercise its clear constitutional authorities to regulate elections, this is it," Democratic senator Ron Wyden of Oregon wrote in the report.There's a lot of redaction.Here's the official source link at intelligence.senate.gov.Here's a downloaded copy, which I've uploaded to Scribd.Observations, below, from Twitter.NEWS: Senate Intel has released its long awaited report on Russian interference in the 2016 election.https://t.co/i3iUqyK5TNTakeaways, via Burr & Warner: pic.twitter.com/DaPRSwa362— Andrew Desiderio (@AndrewDesiderio) July 25, 2019 Read the rest

For more than a decade, consumer rights groups (including EFF) worked with technologists and companies to try to standardize Do Not Track, a flag that browsers could send to online companies signaling that their users did not want their browsing activity tracked. Despite long hours and backing from the FTC, foot-dragging from the browser vendors and outright hostility from the big online media companies mean that setting Do Not Track in your browser does virtually nothing to protect your privacy.Do Not Track grew out of widespread public concern over invasive "behavioral advertising" that relied on tracking to target ads; despite a generation of promises from the ad industry that consumers would welcome more relevant advertising, the consistent result has been that users are freaked out by "relevant" ads because they understand that relevancy is synonymous with privacy invasion. Nothing is so creepy as ads for a product you looked into earlier following you from site to site, then from app to app, as you are tracked and retargeted by a desperate vendor's algorithm.Internet users didn't take this situation lying down. They wanted to use the Web, but not be tracked, and so they started to install ad-blockers. A lot of ad-blockers, and more every year.Ad-blockers don't just stop users from seeing ads and being tracked (and indeed, some ad-blockers actually track users!). They can also stop the publishers and marketers who rely on tracking and ad-clicks from earning money. Predictably, industry responded with ad-blocker-blockers, which prevented users from seeing their sites unless they turned off their ad-blocker. Read the rest

I wonder what it's like to live your entire life with talent like this, the burden of all that masterful skill must crush this guy every morning.This is the point of those breathing exercises in yoga class.Blow Read the rest

Here we see President Trump making the "white power" hand signal while uttering AOC's name during his speech at Young Conservatives DC summit. It's the same hand signal that Australian white supremacist Brenton Tarrant flashed in the courtroom after he'd been arrested for murdering 50 people in New Zealand mosques.Trump makes a hand gesture while saying AOC's name pic.twitter.com/2266fEvlWE— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 23, 2019From the ADL:In 2017, the “okay” hand gesture acquired a new and different significance thanks to a hoax by members of the website 4chan to falsely promote the gesture as a hate symbol, claiming that the gesture represented the letters “wp,” for “white power.” The “okay” gesture hoax was merely the latest in a series of similar 4chan hoaxes using various innocuous symbols; in each case, the hoaxers hoped that the media and liberals would overreact by condemning a common image as white supremacist.In the case of the “okay” gesture, the hoax was so successful the symbol became a popular trolling tactic on the part of right-leaning individuals, who would often post photos to social media of themselves posing while making the “okay” gesture.Ironically, some white supremacists themselves soon also participated in such trolling tactics, lending an actual credence to those who labeled the trolling gesture as racist in nature. By 2019, at least some white supremacists seem to have abandoned the ironic or satiric intent behind the original trolling campaign and used the symbol as a sincere expression of white supremacy, such as when Australian white supremacist Brenton Tarrant flashed the symbol during a March 2019 courtroom appearance soon after his arrest for allegedly murdering 50 people in a shooting spree at mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand. Read the rest

This 13-minute Vice documentary is about a fellow named Josh who made a fake meth lab in his house as a way to prank his friends. Josh also made a TV news station website that looked just like the real local news site (he cloned the website and bought a domain that looked legit) and ran a realistic video that showed his meth lab being busted and his mug shot. Then he posted the link to the video on Facebook.The problem was, he did such a good job that his friends and family believed it and freaked out. The news station also threatened to sue him for $150,000. In the end, the lawsuit threat was dropped, but some of his friends and family members think that he may have gone a bit too far.Image: YouTube/Vice Read the rest