Ahead of a summit between Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un, authorities in Vietnam have kicked out Kim impersonator Howard X. Howard is on his way back to Hong Kong, reports the Beeb.Howard X says officials have since told him his visa is "invalid", but says he has received no further explanation."Satire is a powerful weapon against any dictatorship. They are scared of a couple of guys that look like the real thing," Howard X, who was wearing a black suit and thick black glasses in the style of Kim Jong-un, told reporters. Read the rest

Sam Bennett makes art out of stones, driftwood and other natural materials found on the beach. It's like Andy Goldsworthy, but fun instead of spooky.The tides may wash away his work but he says its ephemeral nature is key to why he does it."It's there for a moment and gone the next, I'm just moving nature around," he says of his art. Read the rest

Having difficulties using a butter knife or rubber spatula to get the last ounce of peanut butter out of the jar? Or maybe you're sick of having your too-soft bread being ripped apart by peanut butter (wait, what?). Not to worry first-world citizens, inventor Andy Scherer of Burbank, California has got you covered. His Peanut Butter Pump promises to clean the jar for you. The jar-cleaning gadget won't, however, clean itself. But, it will squeeze out peanut butter in ribbons or in a stream. Get one of Scherer's patented gizmos for $25 through his Indiegogo campaign. Over 1400 backers have already funded the project. images via The Peanut Butter Pump/Indiegogo(Delish) Read the rest

On Twitter, Bret Taylor recalls a meeting at Google which almost resulted in satellite maps being termed "Bird mode." [via Jason Kottke]There was a geeky holy war on the Maps team. When Lars checked in the code to switch between maps and imagery, he called it “Satellite.” We were quickly informed that a significant % of the images were taken from airplanes — “Aerial Photography.” Our name was factually incorrect. Being the product pragmatist I am, I thought, who cares? “Aerial Photography” doesn’t fit on a button, and every person in our usability study got what “Satellite” meant. Unfortunately, to the Keyhole GIS engineers, we were basically destroying humanity with our lies.Speaking of which, the term for engineers thinking they're experts in everything is apparently "engineer's syndrome."1. And thereby the bitter knowitall hogwash they choked internet discussion with for decades until their model of the human mind was baked into emergent channels of mass communication and everything collapsed under the weight of the resulting bullshit and gave the world over to fascism and ruin. Read the rest

Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?"William Waiirua got more help from Hātea Kapa Haka than he bargained for when his car broke down..."NZ Herald:The harmonic voices of Hātea Kapa Haka took to the stage yesterday with their rendition of Freddie Mercury's Bohemian Rhapsody.The group, from Whangārei, have found online fame last year after their cover of Queen's iconic hit in te reo Māori went viral on Facebook.The group, who collaborated with internet sensation William Wairua, created the music video as a way to pay tribute to the band's lead singer, Freddie Mercury, and to celebrate the release of the Queen biopic, also titled Bohemian Rhapsody.(MetaFilter, Nag on the Lake) Read the rest

Welcome to the town with the longest name in Europe: Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwyllllantysiliogogogoch in Wales. It was, originally, a name contrived to draw tourists. But that was 150 years ago, it's legit, and it's long been enjoying the consequences.Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwyllllantysiliogogogoch recently achieved viral fame after Channel 4 producers decided to drop it on meteorologist Liam Dutton, who nailed it effortlessly. Which stands to reason, him being Welsh? Anyway, it's a joy to watch and hear:His flawless pronunciation of the 58-letter place name - the longest in Europe - garnered a total of more than 20 million views on YouTube and Facebook within a week and dominated the media around the world.Liam was interviewed by Wales Online, BBC Radio 5 Live, Canadian breakfast television and beyond, as well as featuring in Time magazine, the New York Times, MTV and Perez Hilton.He was praised by Catherine Zeta Jones, and TV anchors around the world were so impressed by his mind-blowing effort that they tried to outdo him, but with little success. Read the rest

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the Freshman Force is a new one-off graphic novel anthology from Chicago's highly topical Devil's Due comics, featuring Josh Blaylock, Tim Seeley, Hoyt Silva, Marguerite Dabaie, Dean Haspiel, Jill Thompson, Jose Garibaldi, Christa Cassano, Travis Hymel, Pat Shand, ​K. Lynn Smith, Kit Caoagas, Larry Watts, Bob Sikoryak, Adam McGovern, Nick Accardi, Shawn DePasquale, Elizabeth Marley Kim, Jason Goungor, Sherard Jackson, Peter Rostovsky, Jeffrey Burandt and Sean Von Gorman; the title is a tribute to one of her greatest Twitter moments to date. Ships in May, pre-order now (there's also a variant cover!)(via Naked Capitalism) Read the rest

Anyone who really listens to vinyl knows the medium is far from dead. But convincing others of its appeal can be an uphill battle. For one thing, there's the gear: A quality record player takes up a lot more space than, say, a smartphone packed with thousands of streaming songs at the ready. But here's where RokBlok: The World's Smallest Record Player excels. It not only makes your listening party portable but a heck of a lot more fun.What we have here is essentially an audiophile's robot buddy. Lay any 33 1/3 or 45 RPM record on a flat surface, and the RokBlok roves around on top of it with vinyl-safe rubber wheels, playing the songs through its own built-in speaker. Made of bamboo and MDF, it's smaller than a record itself at just 2" x 4", which means you can take it anywhere. And if you want a sound boost, it can transmit to Bluetooth-enabled speakers within 30 feet.Right now, you can pick up the RokBlok for $99. Read the rest

Costa Rica had been measles-free for five years, until Feb 18, when visiting French tourists took their unvaccinated five-year-old son to a doctor to investigate a "rash" that turned out to be measles -- the boy's mother was also unvaccinated.The boy's French classmates have also experienced a measles outbreak. It's not clear why the boy and his mother were not vaccinated. The boy is being kept in medical quarantine.Many countries will not admit tourists without a certificate of yellow fever vaccination; given the number of rich-world people who have decided to expose themselves and their neighbors to the risks of other preventable illnesses by eschewing vaccination, perhaps poor countries should institute a policy of turning away visitors who have not received the MMR and other vaccines. The health ministry issued a statement saying: “Our country enjoys very good vaccination coverage in general. However, in order to avoid particular cases and their possible complications, it is important that those in charge of minors ensure that children have the complete vaccination scheme.Measles returned to Costa Rica after five years by French family who had not had vaccinations [Adam Lusher/Independent](via Reddit) Read the rest

Swiss banking giant UBS has been hit with the largest fine in French history: €3.7b, the result of a 7-year investigation of the bank's role in helping the wealthiest French citizens hide €10b from tax authorities. The fine is more than ten times larger than the next-largest fine in French history, when HSBC paid €300m over its wrongdoing. The fine represents 92% of the bank's 2018 profits. After the financial crisis, Swiss law was changed to allow foreign tax authorities to pierce the veil of anonymity on Switzerland's notorious anonymous bank accounts. This allowed France's National Financial Prosecutor's office to investigate capital flows from France to Switzerland from 2004 to 2012, and to conclude that the bank and its directors "were perfectly aware that they were breaking French law."The bank's defense was that it had been duped by its French customers, who misled bank compliance staff by falsely claiming that they had declared their assets in Switzerland, but could not supply any details of which customers had so misled them. Instead, prosecutors showed that UBS had sent bank officials to gatherings of the super rich to court their business with promises of help to evade taxation, and that they had used a second set of books to track the money their clients sent to Switzerland, using the euphemisms "milk tickets" and "milk cans" to stand in for money.The record fine was also augmented with a €800m damages award to the French state, and a €15m fine for UBS's French subsidiary. Read the rest

Germany's Alternative For Germany (AfD) party (previously) are an insurgent neofascist movement with ties to senior mainstream politicians and the country's super-wealthy would-be oligarchs; the party put on a hard push in the the 2018 Bavarian elections and their meme warfare was full of familiar voter-suppression tactics, from garden-variety disinformation to exhortations to stay home on election day.Also prominent in the group's messaging: hashtags and tropes from the US far-right conspiracy theory Qanon (previously), an incoherent toxic stew of antisemitism, murder accusations, numerology, Islamophobia, and other pathologies of the moment.The connection between Qanon and AfD comes from an unreleased report from the London School of Economics-affiliated Institute for Strategic Dialogue, which bills itself as an "anti-extremist think tank"; some details of the study have been reported in the German and US press.The researchers traced the inclusion of Qanon-affiliated hashtags in AfD social media, including German translations and adaptations of popular Qanon tags (e.g. #linksliegenlassen, #MerkelMussWeg); as with the US-based Qanon activists, the German Qanon phenomenon was driven by small numbers of incredibly prolific social media users -- not bots (Erin Gallagher's research found that Qanon tweeters posting 500+ messages/day were often "older retired people with a lot of free time").There's evidence that US-based Qanon activists forged alliances with German neofascists; some popular fascist hashtags ("#ChemnitzIstDerAnfang") originated with US Qanon accounts.Qanon is becoming a kind of ideological signifier among far-right groups: members of the far-right who have adopted the yellow vest for street demonstrations in Canada and the UK have been spotted decorating the vests with Qanon memes and carrying Qanon-boosting signs. Read the rest

Lime scooters have been recalled in Switzerland and cleared off the streets of New Zealand following a string of injuries, including multiple broken bones, caused by a software bug that brings the scooters to an abrupt halt, throwing their riders off (the scooters are still available in the USA despite an account of a similar incident in Texas).The company says it has found the bug: "[I]n very rare cases—usually riding downhill at top speed while hitting a pothole or other obstacle—excessive brake force on the front wheel can occur, resulting in a scooter stopping unexpectedly."There's an important underlying issue here that illustrates one of the ways in which devices whose rental terms are enforced by software do not fail safe: Lime scooters are designed so that they can be remotely immobilized, over the internet, if your credit runs out or if the scooter is doing something else the company disfavors. This design constraint means that the users of the scooter can't (in some circumstances) override the brakes. Malicious code, or code with errors in it, poses a constant risk for the scooter rider, because if it triggers this braking function, then by design the system will treat attempts by the rider override the immobilization command as an attack.In an ideal world, we'd design the control systems for devices that can harm their users to fail safe, with overrides for owners that let them judge when safety features are inappropriately triggered. But when the "safety" that these features ensures is the safety of a rental company, not the user of the device, then the "fail safe" mode is one that elevates the protection of the owner's capital investment over the user's physical wellbeing. Read the rest

Richard Sackler is the only known member of the powerful opioid family (previously) to have been deposed; the 2015 deposition was published last week by Propublica and it reveals Sackler's bizarre rationalizations for his family company's deliberate creation of the opioid epidemic.Sackler talks like the kind of powerful man who gets to say whatever bullshit comes into his mind while everyone around him nods their heads and praises him for his wisdom (see also: D. Trump).For example, when asked why he sent an email expressing seeming delight at the dismayed warning by Oxycontin inventor Robert Kaiko that the company's sales plan would lead to widespread adoption, Sackler said that he was only being polite, and that really, he planned on abandoning the plan (he didn't abandon the plan).Then there's a long section where Sackler discusses what was meant by internal company documents that detailed plans to encourage doctors to view Oxycontin as "weaker" than morphine (Oxycontin is twice as powerful as morphine), but he was using "weaker" to mean "less threatening" rather than more potent.As Ars Technica's Beth Mole points out, this is all laughable bullshit -- the only thing remarkable about it is that Sackler said it with a straight face.In 1997, Richard was involved in discussion with employees of a Sackler-owned company in Germany over whether they could get regulatory authorities there to let them sell OxyContin as an uncontrolled drug. Though OxyContin developer Robert Kaiko warned that this was a terrible idea, Richard seemed supportive of the idea, asking in a subsequent message: “How substantially would it improve your sales?” But in his deposition, Richard insisted he was never a fan of the idea, arguing, “we were not in favor of this, but we were trying to be polite and solicitous rather than saying, this is a terrible idea, forget it, don't do it.”When the idea ultimately failed, Richard sent a message to an employee in Germany saying, “When we are next together we should talk about how this idea was raised and why it failed to be realized. Read the rest

More and more, software companies are using DevOps methodology to better integrate their development and operations teams. Essentially, it's a system of tools and philosophies that get an entire staff on the same page. The result: Better code, delivered faster. If you're looking to learn how, the DevOps Certification Training Master Class Bundle is a good way to start.In 75 hours of lectures and exercises, you'll learn the relevant methodologies that are key to DevOps, such as Agile Scrum. You'll also get the nitty-gritty details about how to apply that knowledge with a walkthrough on tools such as Puppet and Microsoft Azure Services. The courses teach how to build a scalable system from the top down on the Amazon Web Services cloud platform, and configure a range of devices across Linux or Windows. By the end of the bundle, you'll be certified in the use of software like Git Docker, Jenkins, Ansible and many more.The DevOps Certification Training Master Class Bundle is currently priced at $69. Read the rest

Congressional staffers are notoriously underpaid and the job is one of those high-pressure gigs for high-achieving 20-somethings that requires a second job to make ends meet, even as it demands 80-hour work-weeks.Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has announced an end to this practice for her staffers, who will earn a starting wage of $53,000, paid for through cuts to the pay of the more senior members of her team, whose pay will be capped at $80,000/year (as opposed to the customary $150k+). The story appears in Roll Call, parent company of the political dirty tricksters suspected of sabotaging the FCC's Net Neutrality process by stealing the identities of millions of Americans in order to submit millions of comments supporting the corporate objectives of the country's largest telcoms operators.The low Congressional wages are part of a long, bipartisan austerity campaign that sought to demonstrate the fiscal prudence of lawmakers by forcing staffers to work for starvation wages, and whose principle effect was to exacerbate the extent to which Congressional staffers were drawn from wealthy backgrounds with familial subsidies that could make up for the miserable pay. Pagon Marchena and other employees in Ocasio-Cortez’s office pointed to their own biographies to show that the policy has real benefits.One prominent study found that only one in four House members from the previous Congress had a senior staffer of color. Pagon Marchena is Afro-Latina. She came to D.C. from Miami on a rare paid internship with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute.“My parents don’t help me out,” she said. Read the rest

The final text of the EU Copyright Directive has emerged from the "trilogue" committee (composed of reps from the EU Parliament, the national governments of EU member-states, and the EU presidency) and it is virtually identical to the compromise struck by the governments of France and Germany, a draft so terrible it has sparked demonstrations across Germany and a national movement to topple Germany's ruling party to punish it for its support for this proposal.The most contentious issue in the Directive is Article 13, which makes online communities, services, and platforms liable if their users post any infringing materials, even if these materials are promptly removed. Though Article 13 no longer explicitly calls for automated filters, there is no conceivable way that every word, image, video, audio clip, etc could be vetted for its copyright status without automated systems (there literally haven't been enough trained copyright lawyers in the history of the human race to accomplish even a tenth of a percent of this task).Obviously, this will kill off every service that lacks the hundreds of millions of euros it will cost to build and maintain these filters. The final language contains an absurdly, unusably narrow exemption for small companies with less than ten million euros/year in revenues: they don't need filters, but only for their first three years of existence, and then they do. It's not clear that even the US-based Big Tech companies could afford this, but as the media companies have repeatedly said, they don't want Big Tech to follow the rules in Article 13: they want a rule that's impossible to follow, so that Big Tech will have to pay virtually unlimited sums for "licenses" that immunise it from prosecution under the rules. Read the rest

Fourth Seal Studios has everything you could possibly want from high-end prop eyeballs, including $40 "camera-ready" eyes ("Gray cores darken the the 'white' of the eye and can add a more realistic sense to the overall piece the eyes are being featured in"); $22-40 sculptural eyeballs in a variety of scales; "Undead and Creature" eyes (including Red Lich, Hemorrhage, Goat Eyes, etc); kits for making your own eyes and irises; painting and display stands, and custom eyeballs to order. Check back frequently for discounts on seconds and imperfections. (via JWZ) Read the rest

If you need to build an app quickly and easily, you might decide to use Facebook's SDK, which has lots of bells and whistles, including easy integration of Facebook ads in your app's UI.The quid pro quo is that your app will send all your users' sensitive data to Facebook, and Facebook stores that data forever and uses it in every conceivable way.That means that menstruation-tracking apps like Flo Period and Ovulation, real estate apps like Realtor, and fitness trackers like Instant Heart Rate send incredibly sensitive personal data to Facebook, with unique identifiers that allows Facebook to track individuals across different apps, even when those individuals don't have Facebook accounts.Notably, none of these apps' privacy disclosures mention Facebook. When called by the Wall Street Journal, the companies behind the apps had a variety of responses, from denial to lying to shock and horror. Facebook -- predictably -- blamed the app vendors for not understanding that the apps they built would spy on their users on Facebook's behalf. Apple and Google -- who distribute these apps -- threw up their hands and blamed everyone except themselves (of course).A Facebook spokesperson told CNBC, "Sharing information across apps on your iPhone or Android device is how mobile advertising works and is industry standard practice. The issue is how apps use information for online advertising. We require app developers to be clear with their users about the information they are sharing with us, and we prohibit app developers from sending us sensitive data. Read the rest

Natalie Brennan is general manager of Muffin Break -- a multinational fast-food franchise business owned by Foodco -- and she's really angry that today's young people will not work for her for free.Ms Brennan says that a decade ago, she had a glut of desperate young people who would repeatedly call her and beg her to let her work for free (Brennan has been with Foodco for 18 years) while today's applicants are interested in getting paid, and want to know how long they'll have to work at sub-survival wages before they can expect a raise. Some of these young people have had the gall to condition their willingness to work for her on her giving them a higher wage than she initially offered.Brennan -- who characterizes the unpaid laborers of years gone by as "backing themselves" with "passion and enthusiasm" -- calls this new breed of workers "clueless" and "entitled" with an "inflated view of their self-importance," a phenomenon she attributes to Instagram.Ms Brennan recalls how, after she went overseas to a conference for two weeks, one of her subordinates demanded a payrise for “looking after the department” while she was gone.“I said, ‘Actually you didn’t, I wasn’t on leave. You had maybe an extra 10 emails to deal with for two weeks. That was part of your job. If you had solved this problem or saved us money, that’s a thing to bring to me.’”Muffin Break boss says unpaid work is dead because Insta-obsessed Gen Y have ‘inflated self-importance’ [Frank Chung/News.com.au] Read the rest

Looking to de-clutter your kitchen counter? Start with those multiple, tangled charging cables for your multiple, power-hungry devices. There's a workhorse solution for all those power needs, and it's just as just as well suited to travel as home use: The Scout Wireless 5000mAh Charger.Compact and sleek at nine ounces, it doesn't look like the swiss army knife of chargers. But sure enough, the sides of the Scout hold a Lightning cable, micro-USB, USB-A and USB-C - enough variety of plug-ins to cover not only your iPhone, Android, tablet, and AirPods but also your camera and even compatible drones. What's more, there's a fold-out AC plug in the back. Just plug the Scout into any wall outlet, and it can charge itself while also supplying a pass-through charge for your devices. Take it on the go, and it can also juice up any Qi-enabled gadget wirelessly and quickly. With built-in sensors that protect against overcharging and short-circuits, it's the charger you'll want around no matter where you are, or what tech you're packing.Right now, the Scout Wireless 5000mAh Charger is $39.99, a full 50% off the MSRP. Read the rest

Wisconsin's Pardeeville Area Shopper is a one-person family business run by Candace Lestina, whose mother founded the weekly paper; like all businesses, the Shopper needs internet service, and like most American businesses, the Shopper is at the mercy of a terrible, monopolistic ISP, in this case, Frontier.Frontier's service was unusably bad: six months into Lestina's three-year contract, she concluded that that she couldn't use the service anymore, plagued by frequent outages and slowdowns. Lestina decided to switch to Charter (a company that is also terrible in every way).But when she canceled her service, she got an "early termination" bill from Frontier for $4,300. Lestina offered the company a $500 settlement, which they turned down, insisting on the full amount. Lestina says her contract does not spell out this termination clause, but Frontier is insisting that she is legally obliged to pay it in any event.Frontier has since sent a collections agency after Lestina.The Frontier Internet service "was dropping all the time," Lestina told the news station. This was a big problem for Lestina, who runs the paper on her own in Pardeeville, a town of about 2,000 people. "I actually am everything. I make the paper, I distribute the paper," she said. Because of Frontier's bad service, "I would have times where I need to send my paper—I have very strict deadlines with my printer—and my Internet's out."In Pardeeville, Frontier's website lists offers for DSL Internet service plans with speeds from 3Mbps to 12Mbps, but not for higher-speed fiber lines that are generally only available in bigger cities and towns. Read the rest

The Eastern District of Texas is home to a crooked court that is in the pocket of patent trolls, handing down ludicrous rulings in favor of the trolls, whose "head offices" are tiny, unoccupied offices in empty, dusty office buildings, the rent on which entitles patent trolls to claim that their rights are being infringed in the demense of the Eastern District's terrible judges.A report in Macrumors cites "five sources familiar with the matter" and claims that Apple is now planning to shutter all the Apple Stores within the Eastern District, replacing them with a giant store in the Galleria Dallas, just over the line from the Eastern District, reported to be opening on April 13. The closures were officially confirmed by Apple in a statement to Techcrunch.Such a move would help Apple avoid the Eastern District's jurisdiction, escaping the residency requirement that cases be heard "where the defendant has committed acts of infringement and has a regular and established place of business." Apple Willow Bend in Plano, Texas and Apple Stonebriar in Frisco, Texas, both located in the northern suburbs of Dallas, are expected to permanently close in mid April. One source said each store's final day of business will be Friday, April 12. Employees were briefed about the plans earlier this week. Apple Plans to Close Stores in Eastern District of Texas in Fight Against Patent Trolls [Updated] [Joe Rossignol/Macrumors](via Super Punch) Read the rest

Inspired by the success of Judges' Guild, Kickstarter has launched Zine Quest, a challenge to crowdfund an RPG-themed zine ("must either contain an RPG or feature RPG-related content like maps, adventures, monsters, comics, articles, interviews, etc."); there's an impressive array of entrants already. Read the rest

Where once was Coca-Cola, now there is Apple. Where once was Nokia, now... no idea. Read the rest

The new Colonel Sanders is RoboCop? I'm not even going to pretend to understand what is going on at KFC HQ but this is really happening. The campaign starts with a mockumentary video. Something about the Colonel's Secret Recipe needing better protection. Of course, that's where RoboCop comes in. He's been reprogrammed with a new prime directive to protect those precious 11 herbs and spices. It ends with RoboSanders walking the digital recipe in a briefcase to Stockholm's Bahnhof Data Center, a real underground storage bunker "built to survive Armageddon." Apparently, the Secret Recipe is actually being stored there."FauxBoCop," as Britt Hayes of AV Club perfectly dubbed him, also appears in two ads. The first one is called "Hungry Boy":If you're wondering, yes, FauxBoCop is really voiced by the original RoboCop, Peter Weller, according to /Film:I haven’t been able to confirm if it’s actually the 71-year-old actor wearing the suit in these commercials. I called his agents and confirmed that he was involved in this campaign, but when I specifically asked if Weller was wearing the suit, his agent told me “We have no comment on that.” Uh, okay then? I guess they really want to keep the mystery alive of whether their client got suited up or if he’s just lending his voice and a double is doing all of the physical stuff. Cool.The second is called "Secret Recipe" and Carrie Brownstein, is that you?(AV Club) Read the rest

US government agencies can't just make up rules: they're require to show that the rules they make reflect the best evidence, and part of that is a "notice and comment" period for major policy shifts where the public gets to weigh in on proposals.When Trump's FCC Chairman Ajit Pai decided to kill Net Neutrality, he knew he had to open his systems up for public comment, but the anti-Net-Neutrality side had that figured out: they flooded the FCC with millions of fraudulent comments that used stolen identities (dead people, people caught in massive breaches, sitting US Senators!) to rehearse a word-salad of cable lobbyist talking points against Net Neutrality.Despite the mountains of evidence that the real comments were almost entirely in support of Net Neutrality, the FCC said it would give both bots and humans equal weight in its deliberations, and then it shut down the commenting system and stonewalled the States attorneys generals who were investigating the fake comments as a criminal matter.Now, Gizmodo writers Dell Cameron and Jason Prechtel have done incredible work, using freedom of information act requests to correlate the precise moment at which known-fake comments appeared in the FCC's comment system with the API keys used to submit comments a few seconds before the fake comments were registered, and were thus able to produce a high-confidence guess about the identities of the astroturfers who violated federal laws and defrauded the US government and the American people in order to help Ajit Pai kill Net Neutrality. Read the rest

So much fluff! Cloud floof puppies.From @siamthailanddog on Instagram. View this post on InstagramA post shared by บ้านหมายักษ์ เชียงใหม่ (@siamthailanddog) on Oct 29, 2018 at 8:06am PDT NOTE: Apparently this video of an incredibly adorable malamute pupper is from a dog breeder in Thailand who exports to Asia. I am posting this with the hope they are professional, compassionate, and the dogs are treated well. I support adopting rescue pets, and encourage anyone moved by this video to consider adopting a dog in need, rather than buying a living creature. View this post on InstagramA post shared by บ้านหมายักษ์ เชียงใหม่ (@siamthailanddog) on Oct 29, 2018 at 1:46am PDT View this post on Instagram 📣 #เปิดให้จองเด็กๆไจแอนท์ชุดใหม่แล้วจ้า‼️‼️ For sale / สำหรับขาย ***************************************** Giant Alaskan malamute puppy Good quality,big sizes structure,healthy and furry hair have the FCI. ลูกสุนัข ไจแอนท์ อลาสกัน มาลามิว สายพันธุ์แท้ คุณภาพดี โครงสร้างขนาดใหญ่ สุขภาพดี ขนแน่นๆฟูๆ ✅สามารถรับสุนัขหลังอายุ 2 เดือนขึ้นไป หรือหลังตรวจสุขภาพและลงวัคซีนครบเท่านั้น (มีสมุดวัคซีน) ✅มีใบเพตดีกรีรับรองสายพันธุ์ จากสมาคมพัฒนาสุนัข (ประเทศไทย ) FCI -💠 ยินดีรับบัตรเครดิต ทุกธนาคาร 💠 💠ทั้งในและนอกสถานที่ทั้วประเทศ 💠 ✈️สามารถจัดส่งได้ทั้งในประเทศและส่งออกต่างประเทศ✈️ For more information / สอบถามข้อมูลเพิ่มเติม Pls contact / ติดต่อ “บ้านหมายักษ์ เชียงใหม่” By Siam Thailand Dog Chiang mai 💢พูดคุยกับเรา💢 ... (กดตามลิ้งค์) ... http://m.me/SiamthailanddogChiangmaihttp://m.me/SiamthailanddogChiangmai Tel / โทร : (+66)929900090 LINE : [ กดเพิ่มเพื่อน ] https://line.me/R/ti/p/%40siamthailanddog หรือค้นหา ID LINE: @add6220k WhatsApp: 0929900090 Viber : 0929900090 Instagram : siamthailanddog #ยินดีรับบัตรเครดิตทุกธนาคาร #ทั้งในและนอกสถานที่ทั้วประเทศ ********************************* เราเลี้ยงด้วยอาหารเกรดพรีเมียม เสริมเนื้อนมไข่และวิตามิน สุนัขจึงมีสุขภาพที่ดี เรากล้ารับประกัน สุนัขตรงตามสายพันธุ์ทุกตัว ขอบคุณคะ / ครับ 🌀 #siamthailanddog #giant #Alaskan #malamute #Dog #ไจแอนท์ #อลาสกัน #มาลามิว #สุนัข #บ้านหมายักษ์เชียงใหม่ 🔅🔆🔅🔆🔅🔆🔅🔆🔅🔆🔅🔆🔅🔆🔅🔆🔅A post shared by บ้านหมายักษ์ เชียงใหม่ (@siamthailanddog) on Oct 29, 2018 at 7:42am PDT [via] Read the rest

Remember Darkmatter, the UAE-based cybermercenaries who worked with the beltway bandit firm Cyberpoint to recruit ex-NSA spies to infiltrate and expose dissidents, journalists, even children who opposed the despotic regime in the Emirates? (Darkmatter is also one of the least-discriminating cybermercenary bands in the world, available to help torturers, murderers and thugs hang onto power by attacking opposition movements and letting the secret police know who to arrest, torture and kill).Now Darkmatter has applied to Mozilla to become a "Certificate Authority," which means they'd get the ability to produce cryptographically signed certificates that were trusted by default by Firefox and its derivatives, giving them the power to produce cyberweapons that could break virtually any encrypted web session (though Certificate Transparency might expose them if they're careless about it).And since Moz's root of trust is used to secure Linux updates, this could affect literally billions of operating systems. Without being too hyperbolic about this: HOLY FUCKING SHIT IS THIS A BAD IDEA.Actually, it's bad already: Digicert division Quovadis has already issued an "intermediate" certificate to Darkmatter, which could allow the company to undertake all kinds of genuinely horrible shenanigans with your web-session. Yes, you.As Cooper Quintin writes on EFF Deeplinks, this is a terrible idea and Mozilla should tell them to go pound sand. Moreover, Moz should revoke Darkmatter's intermediate cert. The root of trust is for entities committed to helping improve encryption and privacy: Darkmatter's mission is to subvert encryption and destroy its targets' privacy.Update: Moz is on it! Read the rest

Special counsel Robert Mueller's report on Trump will not be delivered next week as CNN and other news organizations previously reported, said a senior Justice Department official on Friday. “Reports that the Attorney General will receive the report from the Special Counsel by the end of next week are incorrect. They will not receive the report by the end of next week,” a senior Justice Department official tells @JuliaEAinsley— Geoff Bennett (@GeoffRBennett) February 22, 2019.@realDonaldTrump says he has not spoken to Attorney General William Barr about releasing the #MuellerProbe report— Jeff Mason (@jeffmason1) February 22, 2019Breaking now on @MSNBC: The Justice Department will not receive the Mueller report next week, a senior Justice Department official tells NBC’s Julia Ainsley.— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) February 22, 2019From @juliaEAnsley Reports that the Attorney General will receive the report from the Special Counsel by the end of next week are incorrect. They will not receive the report by the end of next week.— Tony Capra (@tcapra) February 22, 2019Hearing from sources that the Mueller probe will end at some point.— Philip Bump (@pbump) February 22, 2019NEW: In the Oval, when asked about Mueller's report President Trump says "the nice part" is there was no collusion, and if it's an "honest" report it will say that. If it's not an honest report it won't.— Alexandra Limon (@AlexLimonNews) February 22, 2019When will Mueller issue his report?— Rick Hasen (@rickhasen) February 22, 2019Guess he needs a lil more time to mueller it over— Xeni Jardin (@xeni) February 22, 2019 Read the rest

Governor Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) on Friday ordered two New York state agencies to investigate reports that Facebook could have access to a lot more of your personal data, if you're a smartphone user, than anyone realized before.That data includes information about health and other sensitive stuff, and it's not just New York users who are affected. Perhaps we'll see similar cases in other states.Reuters:The directive to New York’s Department of State and Department of Financial Services came after The Wall Street Journal said testing showed that Facebook collected personal information from many smartphone apps within seconds of users entering it, even if the users had no connection to the social media company. Read the rest

What's worse than the salad and the comb thing? Klobuchar’s office reportedly required staff to stay on after taking family leave for a newborn.

In an epic blog post, writer and law expert @emptywheel (Marcy Wheeler) dissects Thursday's hearing in court for Trump ratfucker and reckless Instagrammer Roger Stone. Judge Amy Berman Jackson called Stone and his lawyers to her court and demanded that they explain why Stone shouldn't be gagged or jailed on the spot. Roger Stone ended up testifying, and it was a moment for the ages.Judge Jackson ("ABJ" as she's now nicknamed online) imposed a gag on Stone at the end of Thursday's hearing, in response to his Instagram post of an image of her with crosshairs above her head.In her post, Marcy breaks down the genius behind each step ABJ took to slice and dice Roger Stone's lies, and reveal his schtick for what it is: toxic speech that has real-world consequences for other human beings. This @emptywheel on Roger Stone in ABJ’s legal crosshairs is PURE GOLD. Don’t @ me go READ IT. https://t.co/H9eAOTvv67 pic.twitter.com/85VUeHYIIH— Xeni Jardin (@xeni) February 22, 2019Here's a snip from the post:Here’s why, I think, this was allowed to happen. For Stone’s entire life, the press has coddled Stone, treating him as a nifty character whose toxic speech doesn’t damage society. ABJ was having none of that, and used both Rogow’s position as an officer of the court and Stone’s insane willingness to take the stand to get them to acknowledge that his speech is toxic, that it does pose a threat to society. Stone presumably wasn’t prepared for that because no one has called him on his toxic speech before. 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.Android: Shadow of the BeanstalkFantasy Flight Games, $60, Players, Ages: 12+I have been looking forward to this book ever since it was announced by FFG following their retirement of the Netrunner card game, also set in the Android universe. Shadow of the Beanstalk is a 256-page sourcebook for use with the Genesys Roleplaying System. Two years ago, I got to talk to the creators of Genesys at NovaCon before they got scooped up by FFG. Genesys is a GURPS-like universal RPG system that allows you to roleplay any time period, setting, theme. Also like GURPS, it is designed to greatly encourage narrative play and DIY themes and settings. Shadow of the Beanstalk is a campaign setting for the Android universe centered on New Angeles, the city that is home to the beanstalk, the space elevator that has afforded humanity cheap and easy access to space (and has subsequently attracted every megacorp, criminal enterprise, and hacker/"runner" faction). When The Worlds of Android background book came out, many said it was so close to an RPG setting, they ached for the game mechanics to actually play it. These mechanics have arrived with Genesys and Shadow of the Beanstalk.Cosmic EncounterFantasy Flight Games, $60, 3-5 Players, Ages: 14+The classic alien negotiation and conquest game, which many consider one of the greatest board games ever made, is back with a slightly tweaked "42nd anniversary" edition. Read the rest

A reporter for Pennsylvania's Orange Street News rode her bike near the Arizona-Mexico border on an assignment when a marshal in the town of Patagonia threatened to arrest her. He wanted her to stop what she was doing. The reporter, Hilde Lysiak, is only 12 years old. According to her story in the Orange Street News, when she gave him her name and phone number and told him she was working for a news organization, he said, “I don’t want to hear about any of that freedom of the press stuff. I’m going to have you arrested and thrown in juvey."A bit later, she approached him to ask what he meant about sending her to juvey. "What exactly am I doing that's illegal?"He tells her if she puts his face on the Internet it's against the law in Arizona. He then talks in circles, not ever giving a valid reason of how she was breaking the law.Via USA Today:He went on to tell her that he was worried about her safety and had told her not to follow the marshals because they were going into an area where people have seen mountain lions. From Patterson's perspective, Hilde had ignored a lawful order, the video shows.Hilde wasn't satisfied."Yeah, how is that illegal?" Hilde asked. "I understand that you're concerned about the safety, but what exactly am I doing?"Patterson insisted she disobeyed and also lied about where she was going. He told her she originally said she was going to her friend's house when he first stopped her, and instead she followed him, the video shows. Read the rest

This amusement never ends. Read the rest

Elizabeth Holmes, the "millennial Madoff" who built a $9 startup on a non-existent technology, gets her vanities tossed into a bonfire by Vanity Fair's Nick Bilton:Holmes had always enjoyed a certain lifestyle. From the early days of the company, she had insisted on flying in a private jet. As the company’s legal problems mounted, its costs skyrocketed, but Holmes had a hard time weaning herself off certain luxuries. She still had her own personal security detail, drivers, personal assistants, and a personal publicist who was on retainer for $25,000 a month, according to one of the former executives. Theranos had an indemnity agreement with Holmes and Sunny Balwani, the company’s C.O.O., with whom she had been romantically involved. (They are no longer dating.) Theranos paid all their legal bills, which totaled millions of dollars a month, according to both executives.By late 2017, however, Holmes had begun to slightly rein in the spending. She agreed to give up her private-jet travel (not a good look) and instead downgraded to first class on commercial airlines. But given that she was flying all over the world trying to obtain more funding for Theranos, she was spending tens of thousands of dollars a month on travel. Theranos was also still paying for her mansion in Los Altos, and her team of personal assistants and drivers, who would become regular dog walkers for Balto.But there were few places she had wasted so much money as the design and monthly cost of the company’s main headquarters, which employees simply referred to as “1701,” for its street address along Page Mill Road in Palo Alto. Read the rest

The Velogemel is a wooden bike that was invented in Grindelwald, Switzerland in 1911. It looks like a lot of fun to ride on down a snowy mountain at a speed of 25 mph. No brakes, though. You have to use your feet to slow down.Image: YouTube/Great Big Story Read the rest

On Tuesday morning, an Australian pilot took some artistic liberties with his flight path. ABC News:The Diamond Star plane, operated by Flight Training Adelaide, spent a little over three hours in the air on Tuesday to draw the letters over South Australia.The message was not seen by people on the ground, but was visible to aviation followers watching live flight tracking programs and websites.It is believed the pilot, who was working out of Parafield Airport, north of Adelaide, was "running in" a new engine.The FlightAware website captured the pilot's work between 8:53am to 11:57am.The pilot flew several loops, creating some somewhat explicit graffiti along the coast, before tracing "I'm bored" over the Princes Highway.Retired Qantas A380 pilot Chris Wilson said he thought the message was "harmless".screenshot by Flightaware via ABC News(Gizmodo) Read the rest

The BBC, citing Estonia's Postimees, reports that workers there "bundled a wild wolf into their car" thinking that it was a dog. In any case, the big fella was in big trouble out in the ice.Speaking to the Estonian newspaper Postimees, one of the men, Rando Kartsepp, said: "We had to carry him over the slope. He weighed a fair bit. ... He was calm, slept on my legs. When I wanted to stretch them, he raised his head for a moment," he added. ... The wolf recovered from its brush with death within the day and, after being fitted with a GPS collar by researchers from the national environmental agency, was released back into the wild."We are so happy for the outcome of the story, and wish to thank all the participants – especially these men who rescued the wolf and the doctors of the clinic who were not afraid to treat and nurture the wild animal," EUPA said. Read the rest

Zombie deer disease is a clicktastic term for chronic wasting disease, a spongiform ecephalopathy suffered by ungulates. Much like Mad Cow Disease, Scrapie in sheep, and Creutzfeldt-Jakob's disease in humans, misfolded proteins slowly destroy the brain, causing listlessness, discoordination, dementia and finally death. Now, what if you were to eat Zombie Deer?On March 13, 2005, a fire company in Oneida County, New York, fed the meat of a deer that tested positive for chronic wasting disease to 200 to 250 people. The company didn't know the meat was from a diseased deer. Laboratory tests for one of the deer served came back positive for CWD later. ... in a study published in the peer-reviewed medical journal Public Health, researchers found the group had "no significant changes in health conditions."The only significant outcome of eating Zombie Deer is subsequently "eating less venison." Read the rest

Oh no, here's something we definitely didn't ask for: sweet-and-savory meat-flavored cereals. On March 7 (to sync with National Cereal Day), Post is releasing two new limited-edition Honey Brunches of Oats flavors, Chicken & Waffles and Maple Bacon Donut. Both will be available at Walmart stores for a limited time.Popsugar:...the Chicken and Waffles cereal will feature mini chicken drumsticks and tiny waffle shapes, while the Maple Bacon Donuts flavor will feature doughnut-shaped cereal sprinkled with individual "bacon" bits. Boxes will sell for $2.98 each, and once they're gone, they're gone for good.(Geekologie) Read the rest

The waves of protests and walkouts that swept Google last year had many grievances and concerns, from the company's Pentagon contract to supply AI for drones to the secret creation of a censored search tool for the Chinese market, but one central flashpoint was the revelation that the company had paid Android exec $90 million to quietly leave the company after a string of disturbing sexual harassment and abuse incidents came to light.The Rubin incident was compounded by the company's practice of forcing its employees to accept binding arbitration contracts as a condition of employment (binding arbitration clauses mean that you surrender your right to seek justice in court, including as part of a class-action suit, and instead agree to have your disagreements heard by a corporate "aribitrator" paid for by the company you're upset with, who generally -- unsurprisingly -- sides with that company). The binding arbitration contracts meant that women who had suffered systematic discrimination and abuse at Google could not sue the company, especially not collectively through class action suits, which are often the only economically feasible way for groups of people to get redress from giant, powerful corporations -- under binding arbitration, women who'd been abused at Google couldn't even sue to be released from their confidentiality clauses so that they could publicly discuss their experiences.Last month, a group of activist googlers launched the #endforcedarbitration campaign, which actively made the connection between #metoo and forced arbitration. Though the activists' long-term goal was the elimination of forced arbitration clauses in all employment contracts, their first target was Google's employment contracts, and they scored a hit on that first attempt: Google has retroactively waived all existing binding arbitration clauses in employee contracts, expanding on the company's November 2018 decision to remove arbitration from new hires' contracts. Read the rest

Pro Idee's £369 Paper Bed is made of folds of rigid paper that collapse to a narrow sliver and then expand to 200cm length when needed; the materials are lightweight (total weight, 14.5k) and it can support up to 300kg, and the manufacturer claims it's comfortable, albeit with the addition of a foam pad. (via Yanko Design) Read the rest

I am hoping this is medical and not government surveillance.NBC:The World Health Organization says that an epidemic of measles in Madagascar has caused more than 900 deaths.According to WHO figures, there have been more than 68,000 cases of the disease, in which 553 deaths were confirmed and 373 suspected from measles since the outbreak began in September.Madagascar has launched a nationwide campaign to try to bring the outbreak under control, through mass vaccination campaigns and surveillance. Read the rest

“No, Mr. Stone, I’m not giving you another chance,” Judge Amy Berman Jackson said. "I have serious doubt whether you learned any lesson at all."

"Until Google can protect our brand from offensive content of any kind, we are removing all advertising from YouTube," an AT&T spokesperson told CNBC.

Monkees star Peter Tork, who played bass and keyboard on hits like "Daydream Believer" and co-starred in the band's popular 1960s comedy TV show, has died at 77. The bassist and singer played with The Monkees from their earliest days as a made-for-TV sixties pop band, through their recent reunion performances. Tork died Thursday of causes that have not been publicly detailed. He was 77. Tork’s sister, Anne Thorkelson confirmed his death to The Washington Post.“I am told he slipped away peacefully,” his Monkees bandmate Michael Nesmith said in a statement. “Yet, as I write this my tears are awash, and my heart is broken. Even though I am clinging to the idea that we all continue, the pain that attends these passings has no cure.” Read the rest

“The Chinese authorities turned to a Massachusetts company and a prominent Yale researcher as they built an enormous system of surveillance and control.”This is a heck of a story about how genetic surveillance, powered by American know-how, is being used to oppress the Muslim minority Uighur population and others in China, from the New York Times.The Uighur people of China are mostly Muslim, and China does awful things to make them comply with state rule. More than a million people, many Uighur, have been detained in what Xi Jinping's administration calls “re-education” camps. Now, DNA technology has become a useful weapon.China used Thermo Fisher’s equipment to map the genes of its people, according to five Ministry of Public Security patent filings. Authorities in Xinjiang said that Thermo Fisher's machines are important for DNA inspections in criminal cases and have “no substitutes in China.”— Sui-Lee Wee 黄瑞黎 (@suilee) February 21, 2019Thermo Fisher is the Massachussetts-based firm highlighted in this report. They're on Twitter. And Yale geneticist Kenneth Kidd is the American whose expertise was so central to the plan. Excerpt from Sui-Lee Wee's NYT report:Collecting genetic material is a key part of China’s campaign, according to human rights groups and Uighur activists. They say a comprehensive DNA database could be used to chase down any Uighurs who resist conforming to the campaign.Police forces in the United States and elsewhere use genetic material from family members to find suspects and solve crimes. Chinese officials, who are building a broad nationwide database of DNA samples, have cited the crime-fighting benefits of China’s own genetic studies. Read the rest

Evan from Fight for the Future writes, "It seems like every day we learn more about the creepy things big tech companies are doing with our personal data. But so much is still shrouded in secrecy. That's why we're launching a new campaign calling on employees of Silicon Valley companies to blow the whistle on unethical uses of technology. And poetically, we're crowdfunding and using Facebook's own microtargeting system to target video ads directly at employees of the biggest tech companies. We need to show people who work in tech that we'll have their back if they stand up for what's right. Check out the video and please share! Read the rest

During a recent power outage, deprived of espresso, I was lucky to have a Stanley French Press on hand.When the power went out at 3am and the various squeal of whatever the hell devices squeal when electricity disappears (smoke detectors?) woke the dogs, my night's sleep was shot. The road was flooded, power was out, and my espresso machine a useless block of stainless steel. Tea was not going to provide the miracle I needed.I still did not wish I had an Aeropress. They are just fine, but not what I choose.In my camping gear, I keep a hand grinder and a Stanley French Press. I braved the rain and fetched it from my VW camper.The super sturdy thermos-type shell of the Stanley keeps coffee drinkable for 2-3 hours. Long ago I tired of breaking glass French Press carafes. Slightly smaller than a full 12-cup pot of coffee, one of these is pretty much my morning as a solo adult camper with the kid in tow. At home, with two bored dogs and a cat that wished the dogs were not bored, I went through quite a few pots waiting on PGE.Stanley Classic Vacuum French Press, 48 oz, Hammertone Green via Amazon Read the rest