The U.S. Supreme Court refused to let Boise ban people from sleeping rough.The San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Boise would be violating the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishments by enforcing criminal penalties under its anti-camping ordinance when its three homeless shelters are full.“The state may not criminalize conduct that is an unavoidable consequence of being homeless -- namely sitting, lying, or sleeping on the streets,” the 9th Circuit said.State abuse of the homeless is one of the nastier trends in 21st century governance—the end is usually accomplished by more subtle means (pictured) than criminalization. Read the rest

Here's The New York Times's verdict on the 2010s: "The Decade Tech Lost Its Way." The individual stories--Deepfakes, self-driving cars, social media, fake news -- aren't laden with opinion, and many simply chart the development and success of particular gadgets, platforms and policies. But it all adds up, in a way that seems implicitly subtracted from everything else.News breaks of a video circulating on the internet that shows the “Wonder Woman” star Gal Gadot having sex with her stepbrother. The video is not real; someone had used artificial intelligence to superimpose Ms. Gadot’s face on the body of a pornographic actress.Phillip Isola, one of the A.I. researchers who pioneered the techniques used to create deepfakes: In 2011, 2012, deep learning started taking off. The big event was, deep nets could recognize animals in photos. It took a few years until people started to make systems that could do the opposite: not take an image and recognize that it was a cat, but take the label “cat” and synthesize an image that looks like a cat — the inverse problem. You could make photos of really low-resolution faces.Very rapidly after that, people were able to use these things for face-swapping and deepfakes and all of that.The technology advanced so quickly right around those years. It went from “O.K., this is a really interesting academic problem, but you can’t possibly use this to make fake news. It’s just going to produce a little blurry object” to “Oh, you can actually make photo-realistic faces.” Read the rest

Joshua Topolsky's new techology news site, Input, just launched. The aim, in a crowded pack? To focus on the things that are neither speculative nor mass-market but which will shape lives in the immediate future.We see technology as not just an intrinsic part of your life and ours, but a shaper of that life in a way that can be seen but is often missed. We see technology not just as a thing to be covered but a core part of the way we need to tell the story. This isn’t just about phone reviews or detailing the next Twitter meltdown (we’ll do some of that too). It’s about finding the ways technology and a life lived inside technology changes us, connects us, and moves us — and then telling you why you should care with as much honesty as possible. And hopefully, telling you in ways that make you question, think, and act.Articles include Twitter's plans to label candidates in 2020, Facebook's disinclination to cooperate with California's new privacy laws, and Nike's effort to create sneakers for people with disabilities. But there are reviews, too: the new 16-inch MacBook, the new Moto smartwatch, Boosted Beams. Read the rest

The Catholic church has plenty of weird relics stored in ornate boxes around the world. Tourists flock to these churches to get a glimpse of the vessels that allegedly contain the original Crown of Thorns, or some of Christ's dried blood that turns to liquid every now and then.And then there's Jesus's foreskin—the last (allegedly) surviving piece of flesh from God-made-flesh, chopped from the tip of his penis on New Year's Day, according to the official Roman calendar.The fact that Jesus's foreskin still allegedly exists in the world somewhere is pretty weird, but its existence alone is not the weirdest part. No, the weirdest part is that Jesus's foreskin has been missing for more than 30 years—and that in true Dan Brown style, it may have been stolen by covert agents of the Catholic church.According to "records," Charlemagne received the foreskin from an angel, and gifted it to Pope Leo II on Jesus' 800th birthday. It moved around a bit before being stolen during the Sack of Rome, then eventually turned up in a small village north of Rome called Calcata, where it remained until 1983, when it was stolen under mysterious circumstances. Calcata had become a sort of pilgrimage destination thanks to that little slice of petrified baby foreskin.The Catholic Church started to downplay the foreskin in the early 20th century, even threatening to excommunicate those who mentioned it. Meanwhile, Calcata went through some changes on its own. The whole town was condemned in the 1930s, deemed unsafe by the local government due to the crumbling volcanic cliffs nearby. Read the rest

In 1990, Brian Eno and John Cale made a wonderful experimental pop/art rock record called Wrong Way Up, released by Warner Bros. Records. At the time, the label would send out 7" records to alt.rock/college radio stations to promote their new releases. The promo series, called Soil Samples, featured different artists on each side of the record performing songs that weren't included on their new albums. Above is Brian Eno's contribution to Soil Samples #3, a sublime cover of Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire," originally written by June Carter and Merle Kilgore. Read the rest

Synth pioneer Gershon Kingsley is dead at 97.Kingsley was most famous for his 1969 song “Popcorn,” which was one of the first electronic singles to hit the airwaves. The song became a hit for the group Hot Butter in 1972, and Crazy Frog revived it again in 2005. (Aphex Twin and Muse have covered it, too). Kingsley also co-wrote “Baroque Hoedown,” which was used as the theme song to Disneyland’s Main Street Electrical Parade, with fellow synth pioneer Jean-Jacques Perrey. His song “Rebirth” has been sampled in multiple hip-hop songs, including Freddie Gibbs’ and Madlib’s “Soul Right.”Kingsley joins musical partner Jean-Jacques Perrey, who died in 2016. Read the rest

There's a scene in the fourth episode of The Mandalorian where the unnamed child (aka Baby Yoda) is literally pushing Mando's buttons, well, the buttons on his ship anyway. Since it aired, the internet has been doing its thing — imagining Baby Yoda is playing with the ship's radio. The meme started a couple of weeks ago, so there a TON of them out there. I picked out a few of my favs:And, OF COURSE...(Geekologie) Read the rest

I haven't had the chance to play any of the Witcher games (although Witcher 3 for Nintendo Switch is on my list of titles to buy, just as soon as I finish Divinity: Original Sin 2.) However, I loved the books back in the day and have high hopes for the Netflix series. The final trailer for The Witcher dropped earlier this week and it's looking good. That said, I've been disapointed by streaming service series in the past. Fingers crossed. Read the rest

In last week's Superman #18, the eponymous hero held a press conference to reveal his identity to the public. Comic book continuity is ever-shifting, of course, and the connection between Superman and Clark Kent has been known or exposed by other people before, just as the genie will someday be placed back in the bottle once again. In this particular context, Superman was inspired to come clean after learning about the lies and deceptions of his birth father, Jor-El (who also used to be dead, but now is not, because comics). This revelation also comes on the heels of an epic crossover that shattered the acronym-happy intelligence community of the DC Universe with some other truths and justices.This curiously came on the heels of the Inspector General's report on the origins of the FBI investigation into the connections between the Trump campaign and Russia. The results of this investigation were as much of a political Rorschach test as anything is these days. But one thing it did reinforce was the FBI's overconfidence in its own self-righteous status quo enforcement, for better and for worse.While there was (unsurprisingly, IMHO) no political bias found in the FBI's motives, the IG report did note a handful of oversights and omissions that had been along the way—a detail that the President's stalwart defenders have eagerly jumped on. For anyone who's ever paid attention to anything the FBI has ever done, however, this all came across as the same standard over-zealous stuff the organization's also done—again, for better, and for worse. Read the rest

A porch pirate in St. Paul, Minnesota had the gall to leave a smug "thank you" note after stealing a package off Hilary Smith's doorstep. “I do appreciate a nicely-crafted ‘thank you’ note, but this is ridiculous," Smith told WCCO. I was angry and confused and quite flabbergasted someone would actually leave a ‘thank you’ note when they steal a package."The package was a Christmas gift for her boss. In the hopes that the thief returns, Smith says she's placed a fake package on her stoop for the creep to swipe. Inside the box is "a gift from her dog." Read the rest

Tabasco isn't quite hot enough for my jaded tongue but I do like the consistent taste and the product's ubiquity. Also, the tiny bottles they sometimes include with hotel room service orders are fantastic. In the video above, "Cult Following" visits the salt dome of Avery Island where the family-owned McIlhenny Company has made Tabasco sauce for 150 years. If you're in the area, you can tour the factory too! While there, please grab me one of those sharp Tabasco hoodies the guy in the video is wearing. XXL please. Read the rest

Starbucks has apologized after two Riverside County sheriff's deputies reported that baristas ignored them when they waited to place an order. This comes just a couple weeks after an Oklahoma Starbucks employee was fired for printing the word "PIG" on a police officer's hot chocolate order label (above). And back in July, a Starbucks barista in Tempe, Arizona requested that six cops leave the store because their presence made a customer "not feel safe." From CNN:(Of the Riverside County incident,) Starbucks spokesman Reggie Borges told CNN the deputies were ignored for nearly five minutes -- and there's no excuse for that."We are deeply sorry and reached out to apologize directly to them. We take full responsibility for any intentional or unintentional disrespect shown to law enforcement on whom we depend every day to keep our stores and communities safe," Borges said.The deputies were "laughed at" and "completely ignored," (Riverside County Sheriff Chad) Bianco said in a video. "They tried to get served, they asked if anyone was going to help them," he said.Eventually, they left, Bianco said. Read the rest

This holiday season, give the delivery man a break. Who needs the extra cost and uncertainty of shipping anyway? Here are 10-holiday gifts that cut out the middleman and go straight to the nicest ones on your Christmas list.Winc Wine DeliveryOkay, we might be cheating a little with this first one, but a Winc wine delivery technically doesn't require shipping if you're gifting someone the subscription! This delivery service curates a pack of four bottles from a series of questions, delivering them straight to your doorstep - or whoever's doorstep you designate.MSRP: $52Sale Price: $26Foundr Digital Magazine: Lifetime SubscriptionKnow a go-getter looking to self-start their own empire? Give them a leg up with insider secrets and philosophies from the likes of Richard Branson, Tony Robbins and many more in this magazine dedicated to the entrepreneur's lifestyle.MSRP: $219.90Sale Price: $39Dollar Flight Club Premium: 1-Yr SubscriptionThe best deals on flights are rarely on the market for long. This service gives you alerts on when those deals show up based on your dream destinations and travel times, saving you dough that you can use on your journey.MSRP:$69Sale Price: $19.9912min Micro Book Library: Lifetime Premium SubscriptionGive the gift of knowledge, even for those who are constantly on the go. This service condenses top books into bite-sized text and narrative summaries, allowing you to get the gist on your lunch break.MSRP: $346.50Sale Price: $29Sid Meier's Civilization V: CompleteThis hit strategy series has been itching the megalomania itch for armchair world leaders since 1991. Read the rest

With just days to go before it would have to close its doors forever, San Diego's beloved science fiction bookstore Mysterious Galaxy has found a new location and new owners: Jenni Marchisotto and Matthew Berger have bought the store and will run it at its new home, 3555 Rosecrans St. Suite #107 San Diego, CA 92110.Everyone's keeping their jobs, too. It's a Christmas miracle. I'm looking forward to having lots more events with them in the years to come!From Jenni: The first books I ever loved, the ones I read over and over again until the bindings practically disintegrated, were The Song of the Lioness and The Immortals quartets by Tamora Pierce. I spent much of my childhood dreaming about having purple eyes and debating whether Alanna should have ended up Jonathan or George with my cousin Courtney. As an adult I still get carried away by reading. For my degree I focused on disability in 20th century Anglophone literature. I could talk about James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, and Shani Mootoo for hours. I’m also a sucker for romance and fantasy. Some of my favorites include Helen Hoang, Sarah J. Maas, J. R. Ward, Richelle Mead, and Jasmine Guillory. I'm currently reading Arora Blazing by Jessie Mihalik & Moving Forward Sideways Like a Crab by Shani Mootoo.From Matt: I have spent far too much time trying to figure out how to make a lightsaber work. Like, how do you get light to take a shape? Growing up, my days were filled with thoughts about the worlds authors built in my favorite series: Star Wars, Harry Potter, Feist’s Magician series, Eragon, and countless others. Read the rest

For some folks, writing notes by hand is just plain easier, but having to re-type them later can be a huge bore, not to mention time-sink.The guys from Rocketbook successfully merged the best parts of analog and digital note-taking with their Everlast notebook awhile back. And now, that tech just got a lot more portable with their Rocketbook Everlast Mini.If you haven't used an Everlast notebook before, here's the gist. The book is composed of specially-treated synthetic paper that you can write on with a special Pilot FriXion pen (included). It writes smoothly and without smudging but is completely erasable with a bit of water and a wipe. The Mini, true to its name, is pocket-sized, and the pen fits snugly in a holder flap.Want to save that work? Just scan your page with the accompanying app. You can set up a variety of destination folders in all the major cloud locations like Dropbox or Google Drive, or just drop it into an email folder - all with the touch of a single icon.A 2-pack of Rocketbook Everlast Minis is already on sale for 25% off the MSRP, but you can take an extra 15% off the final price by using the coupon code MERRYSAVE15. Read the rest

There are fast-paced card games, and some of them even require enough dexterity for a mini-workout (like Skip-Bo or Snap). But there's nothing quite like the Mokuru® Card Game, which uses an already addictive fidget toy as the centerpiece for a cutthroat game of tabletop challenges.The game is named for the toy that gets used in its challenges, a weighted cylinder that you try to roll end-over-end across a table, then catch upright with your palm. As a solo fidget device, it's engrossing yet meditative, and hard enough to do simple tricks with on your own.The card game adds other players into the with mix, throwing down the gauntlet of increasingly difficult tricks, some of which you have to do with added challenges (like being blinded). Pull it off, and you earn "belts" that move you ever closer to the winner's circle. But don't get cocky - the belts can be stolen by sneaky players with the right card and the right timing.The card game (including 3 Mokurus) is on sale already for 25% off the MSRP, but you can take an extra 15% off the final price by using the holiday discount code MERRYSAVE15. Read the rest

People who ask themselves why they need a dashcam usually have one thing in common: They've never been a serious collision. Even in fender benders, these gadgets can save you an immense amount of time and hassle, stopping headaches before they even start.If you're looking for a reliable starter cam, the myGEKOgear Orbit 110 Full HD Dashcam hits all the marks for a surprisingly low price point.The video quality is likely higher than you'll need in most cases - but better to be safe than sorry. It shoots 1080p HD video day or night, thanks to the CMOS sensor. Another crucial factor: A 120-degree wide-angle lens that allows you to capture more than just the lane in front of you.Once you mount it, you're good to go. A G-sensor will automatically detect undue braking or collisions, and the video is stored on an 8GB MicroSD card (but you can also expand your storage up to 32 GB if you like).The Orbit 110 is currently on sale for half off the retail price, but you can take an extra 15% off that by using the holiday discount code MERRYSAVE15. Read the rest

The increasingly popular social media application TikTok has a concerning relationship with the Chinese state. That link became ever the more concerning today, when reports began circulating of a brand new partnership between the company that owns TikTok, ByteDance, and the government of China.ByteDance owns the video-sharing app TikTok, and has established a joint venture with a Chinese state media group, official registration documents show. “The joint venture will focus on partnership in the digital rights of short videos,” a ByteDance spokeswoman told Reuters in response to inquiries about the deal:ByteDance, which is one of China’s fastest-growing startups, has formed a series of partnerships with state media organizations in order to feed its leading news aggregator platform, Jinri Toutiao.Under the latest deal, Beijing Liangzi Yuedong Technology Co Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of ByteDance, will own 49% of the new company, Pengpai Audiovisual Technology (Jinan) Co Ltd, with Shanghai Dongfang Newspaper Co Ltd holding the remaining 51% majority stake, the documents from the National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System showed.Shandong-based Pengpai Audiovisual was established on Dec. 10 with a registered capital of 10 million yuan, according to the documents. Pengpai is the Chinese name of ThePaper.cn, an online newspaper published by Shanghai Dongfang. ByteDance unit establishes venture with Chinese state media firm [reuters.com] Read the rest

In Utah, liquor authorities who have long been aligned with the Mormon patriarchs who more or less run everything in the state have poured thousands of gallons of drinkable beer down the drain -- no, literally-- after a change in state law allowed higher-alcohol beer. Utah's Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control destroyed roughly $18,000 worth of beer in a single day on Friday, AP reports:Authorities say they were legally required to dump the beer from state-owned liquor stores because a new law allowed those beers to be sold in private stores instead.Utah had long prohibited grocery and convenience stores from selling beer stronger than 4% alcohol by volume. Everything else was sold at state liquor stores.The law effective Oct. 31 increased that limit to 5%. Because the state-owned stores can’t stock anything available on the open market, officials discounted beers between 4% and 5% before Halloween, then threw away everything that was left.The 275 cases of bottles and cans were recycled, they say.Read More: Utah tosses thousands of gallons of beer after law change [apnews.com] Read the rest

In Georgia, a man was arrested after he called the sheriff's office to confess -- three separate times.The Thomasville Times-Enterprise reports that Lt. Tim Watkins of the Thomas County Sheriff’s Office says the suspect called at 5 a.m. on Friday to confess he'd stolen a car, and was now about 12 miles away in the small town of Boston, Georgia.“He wanted to confess and turn himself in,” said an officer. “He called three times.”"He called a third time and reported that he had broken into the Citgo and was drinking a beer," the officer told a reporter.[via AP] Read the rest

Nancy Astor was the first woman to sit in Parliament; this is true. She took her seat as a member of the Conservative Party on November 28, 1919. And so, to celebrate the centennial, the party put up a brand new statue of her outside of her former home at Plymouth Hoe. According to the BBC, the statue was made by artist Hayley Gibbs and cost £125,000, which was raised through crowdfunding.It's somewhat of a relief that they paid for it themselves. Because Astor wasn't actually the first woman elected to Parliament. No, that honor went to that incomparable badass Constance Markievicz, the Irish revolutionary, suffragette, and staunch advocate for workers' rights. In keeping with Sinn Féin's abstentionist policy, however, Markievicz refused to actually take her seat in the British House of Commons, or participate in any parliamentary processes.But okay, fine. Nancy Astor was the first woman to literally take her seat in Parliament. Whereas Markievicz famously advised women to, "Leave your jewels in the bank and buy a revolver," Astor once said, "I am the kind of woman I would run from." Case in point: while Astor claimed to despise the Nazi party for oppressing women, she also allegedly told Joseph Kennedy that she saw Hitler as a welcome solution to the “world problems” that were the Jews. According to the History News Network:Astor wrote Kennedy that Hitler would have to do more than just "give a rough time" to "the killers of Christ" before she'd be in favor of launching "Armageddon to save them. Read the rest

Now you can add some Kojima flavor to selfies or news coverage of the impeachment hearings. Erop has created two different Instagram filters. TOMORROW IS IN YOUR HANDS #DeathStranding #TomorrowIsInYourHands@Kojima_Hideo@HIDEO_KOJIMA_ENThank you @egorinogore for making this filter! It's so f*cking cool! Also, I love Higgs, you did an incredible job bringing him to life @TroyBakerVA pic.twitter.com/chA6wHx0hl— Vero Veo ☀️ (@Ronie_6) December 5, 2019you can try the filter at the link: https://t.co/eIVhm5aQuA— Егор 📞💕 (@egorinogore) December 5, 2019And speaking of Death Stranding, check out this limited edition custom PS4 controller and stand:WeAreRobots:The controller is themed after Sam’s Bridges delivery uniform featuring custom buttons, metal D-Pad, metal thumb sticks and custom touchpad styled to look like a container. The stand is styled after the BB pod with a detailed baby cast in clear yellow resin. The iconic Odradek Scanner attaches to the back of the stand to hang over the top of the controller when displayed together.BB and Odradek Scanner come packaged in a custom, high quality hard case container.Preorder closes at the end of December or once the initial 20 places have been reserved. Controllers will ship as soon as production has been completed which is expected to be March 2020 or earlier.(Via Attract Mode.) Read the rest

Consulting giant McKinsey is embroiled is a string of scandals, from the revelation thatit designed ICE's gulags to the news that it charged New York $27.5m for a fraudulent (and worse-than-useless) violence reduction program for Rikers Island, to the news that it charges US governments $3m/year for advice from fresh-out-of-college, inexperienced 23-year-olds.Reading about these scandals, you may be asking yourself how it's possible that McKinsey can be so extraordinarily terrible, and for an answer, you need look no further than the company's own internal discussions of its role in society. Propublica obtained McKinsey's 2010 internal history, in which employees are told that the firm is comparable to "the Marine Corps, the Roman Catholic Church, and the Jesuits" in that it is "analytically rigorous, deeply principled seekers of knowledge and truth" married with a sense of shared values that exceeds what "even the Catholic Church can promise."McKinsey has, since then, disclosed a number of new potential conflicts in old bankruptcy cases and paid $32.5 million to creditors and the United States trustee to settle claims over insufficient disclosures. The trustee has said that “McKinsey failed to satisfy its obligations under bankruptcy law and demonstrated a lack of candor.” The firm denies wrongdoing and says it settled “in order to move forward and focus on serving its clients.”Subsequently, McKinsey has moved, in effect, to rewrite the rules. It drafted a protocol ostensibly meant to clarify what advisers like itself need to disclose. Critics pointed out that McKinsey’s protocol allows such firms to avoid disclosing relationships they deem indirect or “de minimis.”There remains more to come. Read the rest

Ohio lawmakers introduced legislation that would see women and doctors charged with murder if they did not re-implant fetuses from ectopic pregnancies in women's uteruses, a procedure that does not exist and is impossible.Now we're getting some insight into how legislators came to introduce this bizarre bill: according to State Rep John Becker [R-Gilead/@beckergop)], the relevant passages were written by Right to Life Action Coalition of Ohio lobbyist Barry Sheets, who advised Becker that he could ignore scientists who pointed out that the only evidence that the procedure could be performed were two "case reports," one published in 1917, the other in 1980.Becker now says that if anyone is at fault, it's the medical journals, for failing to retract these two isolated reports. He told the Cincinnati Enquirer, "But these are documented. They should get the medical journals corrected if this is wrong."To the geneticist's concerns that Becker was promoting a rarely used procedure without knowing the possible side effects, Sheets responded, to a forwarded email, “That's a good one.”“The ‘side-effects’ are that the embryo was carried to full-term and a baby was given birth to, according to the 'case reports,'” Sheets wrote. “What are the 'side-effects' on the current treatment for ectopic pregnancies on the embryo? Oh, that's right — death.”Lawmaker Says He Didn't Research Ectopic Pregnancy Procedure Before Adding To Bill [AP]Emails: Lobbyist Helped Draft Bill Suggesting Docs Could Reimplant Ectopic Pregnancies [Cincinnati Enquirer](Image: Ohio House of Reps; Hulu; modified) Read the rest

Taylor Swift has been embroiled in a terrible dispute with Scooter Braun, who acquired Swift's former label for $300m, delivering him control over Swift's first six albums. Swift says that Braun had bullied and tormented her for years, and that the owner of her original label, Scott Borchetta, had sold the label to him in order to punish Swift.Since then, Braun has used his ownership of Swift catalog to bar her from performing her own hits on tour (he eventually relented after bad publicity) and to engage in general petty fuckery with no obvious business case, seemingly motivated entirely by his desire to make Swift miserable by weaponizing her own creative output.But Braun didn't just happen to have $300m lying around to use for his vendetta. He raised that money from private equity investors, who have fast become the most unpopular rich people in a crowded field of loathesome sociopaths.On Thursday, Swift accepted the "Woman of the Decade" award at Billboard's Women in Music conference, and in her speech she called out both the investment firm and the individuals who funded it as having culpability in her torment: "the Soros family, 23 Capital and the Carlyle Group." Swift went on to criticize private equity as a whole, calling it a "potentially harmful force [to] the music industry [that is] buying up our music as if it is real estate, as if it is an app or a shoe-line."According to the New York Post, one of the named investors "was stunned that the normally staid world of private equity was even mentioned at a rock ‘n’ roll event."Private equity stunned to be dragged into battle between Taylor Swift and Scooter Braun [Richard Morgan/New York Post](Thanks, Kathy Padilla! Read the rest

Every year, the AI Now Institute (previously) publishes a deep, thoughtful, important overview of where AI research is and the ethical gaps in AI's use, and makes a list of a dozen urgent recommendations for the industry, the research community, and regulators and governments.This year's report is especially important, as algorithmic discrimination, junk science, bad labor practices, and inappropriate deployments have gained salience and urgency.The Institute's top recommendations are:* Stop deploying "emotion detection" systems ("governments should specifically prohibit use of affect recognition in high-stakes decision-making processes"). These are junk science ("built on markedly shaky foundations") but they're being used for everything from medical care to insurance to student performance evaluation.* Stop using facial recognition in "sensitive social and political contexts" ("including surveillance, policing, education, and employment — where facial recognition poses risks and consequences that cannot be remedied retroactively").* Fix the industry's diversity problem "to address systemic racism, misogyny, and lack of diversity."* Expand bias research beyond technical fixes: "center 'non-technical' disciplines whose work traditionally examines such issues, including science and technology studies, critical race studies, disability studies,and other disciplines keenly attuned to social context" (see: "second-wave algorithmic accountability")* Mandatory disclosure of AI industry's climate impact: "Disclosure should include notifications that allow developers and researchers to understand the specific climate cost of their use of AI infrastructure."* Give workers the right to "contest exploitative and invasive AI" with the help of trade unions: "Workers deserve the right to contest such determinations [by "AI-enabled labor-management systems"], and to collectively agree on workplace standards that are safe, fair, and predictable."* Give tech workers the right to know what they're working on and to "contest unethical or harmful uses of their work": "Companies should ensure that workers are able to track where their work is being applied, by whom, and to what end."* Expand biometric privacy rules for governments and private actors: A call to universalize Illinois's world-beating Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA). Read the rest

Once you've cut steak or poultry with some actual quality knives, it's really tough to go back to those budget blades you bought at the department store a couple of decades ago.Consider that a fair warning about this 5-Piece Professional Damascus Chef's Kitchen Set. The holiday discount makes it easy to buy for a friend. But if you do, you might be eating dinner at their place a lot more often.The striking look on the metal is a beautiful side effect of the ancient methods that Black Forge Knives uses to produce them. The end result is Damascus steel, extremely hard and capable of being honed to a precise edge.The set includes a butcher's knife, filet knife, and other standard sizes to suit any kitchen needs, plus a leather pouch for easy carrying. Like a trusty cast-iron pan, there's a bit of oiling and care required to keep them at their best - but when they're at their best, there's nothing quite like them.The entire set is already more than 60% off retail, but you can take an extra 15% off the final price by using the coupon code MERRYSAVE15. Read the rest

Concerned about your eyesight? You probably should be. And we're not just talking about seniors here. Young or old, we're all at risk of coming down with vision issuesMost of us might get a vision test only once every couple of years or so when we get a new pair of glasses - if that. And there's not many who can afford regular preventative trips to an optometrist.Luckily, there's an effective middle ground. The vision experts at EyeQue have a range of home test kits that can help you keep track of your vision.The basic Personal Vision Tracker makes the whole procedure simple, not to mention inexpensive. You can use it multiple times over years for less than the cost of a single visit to most eye doctors. It's a device that attaches and pairs with your smartphone and allows you to get accurate readings on your vision within minutes. You can even use the results to order eyeglasses online from eyeque.com.Need a little more in-depth info? The EyeQue VisionCheck is a similar unit that you can even use with your eyeglasses on if you'd like to confirm that your current prescription is up to snuff. This unit also lets you track your vision ratings by doing tests once a month and comparing your stats.There's even the EyeQue Insight, a more full-featured version of the test that's tailor-made for kids but packed with useful info for all ages. The dual-lens device again attaches to your smartphone, and the tests are sweetened up for the younger set by way of an animated mascot and virtual prizes. Read the rest

The Miami Herald reports that a high-ranking officer in the Monroe County Sheriff's department instructed another officer to act like a "white supremacist" and a "Neo-Nazi cop" when detaining a black suspect. The officer, named as Capt. Penny Phelps, was recorded and "relieved of her command."Phelps was removed from her post as head of the major crimes and narcotics units on Wednesday, according to paperwork released to the Miami Herald Saturday. Ramsay said it is too early in the investigation to comment on whether Phelps could lose her job.“We have to have all the facts first,” he said Saturday, adding Phelps has been with the sheriff’s office about 18 years and makes about $110,000 a year.Reached by phone Saturday, Phelps said policy prohibits her from talking about the case.The Herald has the tapes. Photo: Monroe County Sheriff Read the rest

Radicalized, my collection of four novellas, is one of the Wall Street Journal's picks for best sf books of 2019! My thanks to Tom Shippey, who listed it alongside of David Walton's Three Laws Lethal, Daniel Suarez's Delta-v, Erin Craig's House of Salt and Sorrows and Michael Swanwick's The Iron Dragon's Mother! Read the rest

Facebook's decision to default to end-to-end encryption for Facebook Messenger prompted the governments of the UK, the USA and Australia to write to Mark Zuckerberg, urging him to delay implementation of the move, warning him that adding working encryption by default would make it harder for spies and cops to do their jobs.101 civil society groups have written back to the USA, UK and Australia to tell them that there is no such thing as encryption that protects good guys but lets cops spy on bad guys, so anything done to weaken security will put everyone at risk of surveillance -- from hostile foreign powers, criminal gangs, identity thieves, stalkers, domestic abusers, voyeurs, corporate espionage, and other bad actors.The letter was led by the New America Foundation, and while the signatories include some usual suspects (EFF, ACLU, Amnesty International), it also includes a roster of the world's top security experts, and several trade associations.Encryption is also essential to public safety and protecting vulnerable populations. A common, but problematic, argument law enforcement officials make in favor of encryption backdoors is that we must be willing to compromise the privacy and security protections offered by encryption in order to protect public safety. However, this argument fails to acknowledge that encryption, in fact, plays an essential role in protecting​ the public from crimes that cause physical injury and death. For instance, Cindy Southworth,the Executive Vice President at the U.S. National Network to End Domestic Violence (NNEDV), recently cautioned against introducing an exceptional access mechanism for law enforcement, in part, because of how it could threaten the safety of victims of domestic and gender-based violence and stalking.Specifically, she explained that she is ​“a proponent of encryption because it allows victims to control when and how they seek help, and that it is critical for protecting sensitive digital records, which have been stolen by abusers.”​A recent fact sheet from LGBT Tech and the Internet Society states “without encryption, LGBTQ+ individuals living in or traveling to [countries where being LGBTQ+ is considered acriminal offense] may not be able to safely and comfortably find communities and outlets forself-expression and would be left vulnerable to prosecution and persecution.”Beyond protecting national security and physical safety, encryption is also essential to reduction of other types of crime. Read the rest

[We're delighted to have Rosemary Frei back with us, this time reporting on a global transformation: once, infrastructure was created efficiently cheap central bank funding and now it's done with public-private partnerships, at much higher price-tags, creating massive transfers from taxpayers to the biggest businesses and private equity funds in the world. As we get ready for huge infrastructure buildouts to address climate change, the super-rich stand to reap trillions – money we could be spending on saving our lives and even our planet. -Cory]Trillions of dollars are being plowed into high-tech hospitals, zero-emission public transit and other megaprojects around the globe. Shiny new infrastructure is popping up virtually everywhere, from Australia to Appalachia.Yet leaders aren’t disclosing what taxpayers’ bills will be for this in the coming years.They aren’t even determining the maximum affordable amount for the infrastructure projects, the majority of which are being delivered via public-private partnerships (‘P3s’).Nor are any of the major political parties in Canada or the U.S. calling for objective value-for-money analyses, including studies of what the best greenhouse-gas-reduction bang is for each scarce public buck spent on green projects.In addition, government agencies don’t always take such basic money-saving steps as offsetting the cost of new subway or LRT stations by finding developers that will build and pay for extensive retail, commercial and residential spaces on top of those stations.This is despite already-unprecedented levels of government debt. And there are many other budget pressures: just one example is the impending loss, due to the switch to electric cars and trucks, of the more than $16 billion of gas and diesel tax collected annually by the feds and provinces in Canada. Read the rest

We love our smartphones and tablets, but we also love to write. For a while now, there hasn't been a workable solution. Either hook it up to a keyboard (which defeats the purpose of a portable gadget) or resign ourselves to typing on tiny, unresponsive glass icons.Looks like technology has finally caught up to the dilemma with a decent roll-up keyboard.The Roller Wireless Rollable Keyboard pairs up quickly and easily by Bluetooth to a tablet or smartphone. There's a cradle built-in to the design that doesn't harm the portability an ounce but makes a great mount for whichever screen you're using.The layout for the keyboard is a full-size five-row QWERTY format, with a matte finish and raised keys that respond nicely. If you're pulling an all-nighter, never fear. The battery life can handle up to 288 hours of work. When you're done, a magnetic sensor turns the whole thing off as soon as you roll it up.The Roller Wireless Rollable Keyboard is currently on sale for 20% off, but you can knock another 15% off the final price by using our holiday discount code MERRYSAVE15. Read the rest

SpotHero is an app that lets you reserve parking in advance. It seemed like a cool idea, so I installed it and gave it a try when I had a business lunch on Tuesday. I entered the name of the restaurant in Hollywood and SpotHero showed me a map of parking spots near the restaurant. I found one on the corner of Argyle and Sunset for $6. When I arrived at the parking lot, I found that the entrance was barricaded. A worker standing by the entrance told me that the entire lot had been rented for the day. I showed her my SpotHero reservation, and she called for the lot attendant who came over told me the same thing. He said I could go to another lot at the corner of Hollywood and Vine and that I "might be able to work something out with them." He described the lot, but when I drove there I couldn't find the lot he was talking about, and I had my doubts that they would let me park there anyway. At this point, I was already late for my meeting. Fortunately, I found a metered spot in the street, which is rare for this area, and paid $8 for 2 hours. So I ended up being late and paying $14 for parking. After my meeting, I contacted SpotHero through Twitter to let them know about the problem with the lot. I received a reply on Wednesday morning:This is Emily from SpotHero, our Social Media Monitor passed your information along to me. Read the rest

For years we’ve had silverfish darting around our guest bathroom floor. I bought some silverfish traps (little cardboard boxes with sticky goo to ensnare them) and they helped, but didn’t stop them. In 2017 I read that lavender oil is a good silverfish repellent. It’s only for a small bottle on Amazon, so I decided to give it a try. I wetted the end of a Q-Tip with the oil and ran it around the perimeter of the bathroom floor, adding a little extra to a seam between the floor and the wall. It smelled nice and did not see a single silverfish for two weeks. I finally saw one, reapplied lavender oil on the perimeter of the floor, and it keep the little bastards aways for an even longer time. Now I hardly ever see them, and treat the floor every few months.Image of silverfish by Christian Fischer, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link Read the rest

In honor of today, please enjoy Harry Manfedini's "Overlay of Evil/Main Title" from the score to Friday the 13th (1980). And as a bonus, here is the evolution of Jason Vorhees's handsome mug: Read the rest

The Royal soap opera continues apace in this week’s tawdry tabloids, increasingly untethered from reality.

This adorable puma is willing to play a game with its human, as long as it receives the prize, win or lose.Puma reasoning skills on display, 3 cup shuffle from r/Magic Read the rest

Security officers at Lithuania's Vilnius Airport built a Christmas tree from "items that are prohibited to carry in hand luggage and which were taken away from passengers during screening.""With knives, scissors, lighters, blades and all other sorts of dangerous goods on it - this Christmas tree has it all," they wrote on LinkedIn. Read the rest

Fish farmers on Canada's Vancouver Island spotted an eagle in the clutches of a giant Pacific octopus. Realizing the eagle would soon drown, the men freed the raptor from the cephalopod's tentacles and set it free. “He deprived the poor octopus of a good meal,” University of Lethbridge octopus expert Jennifer Mather joked to The Guardian. “They’re quite wide in their prey choice. If something is on the surface of the water, and the octopus is close to the surface of the water, it’s food.” Read the rest

Dazed Beauty reports on a rising trend in Russia called devil lips, or octopus lips. "[T] he procedure is said to involve inserting filler in the outer lip to create a wave effect across both the lips," reports the site. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Ana Cristina Ferreira (@draanacristinaferreira) on Dec 4, 2019 at 7:12pm PST View this post on Instagram A post shared by Skinsential Aesthetics (@skinsential_aesthetics) on Dec 4, 2019 at 11:32pm PSTImage: skinsential_aesthetics[via Oddity Central] Read the rest

In the above episode of the Museum of Modern Art's "The Way I See It," the patron saint of bad taste John Waters looks at Lee Lozano’s "Untitled" (1963). And below, legendary comedian and musician Steve Martin comments on work by American abstractionists Stanton Macdonald Wright and Morgan Russell. "I don't generally care about theories," he says. "They kind of get in the way of looking at the picture." Read the rest

PHOTO COURTESY Universal Pictures: Danny Aiello, second from left, with Spike Lee, John Turturro, and Richard Edson in a scene from “Do the Right Thing” (1989).Beloved blue collar tough-guy actor Danny Aiello has died. He was 86.Aiello will be remembered for his work in films including “Fort Apache, the Bronx,” “The Godfather, Part II,” “Once Upon a Time in America” and his Oscar-nominated role in Spike Lee’s “Do the Right Thing.” “The family asks for privacy at this time,” said Aiello's publicist Tracey Miller of Tracey Miller & Associates. She said he died Thursday night after a brief illness. Aiello once worked as a union president. He got his first acting break in his thirties, and kept working for decades.From AP's obituary:His breakthrough, ironically, was as the hapless lover dumped by Cher in Norman Jewison’s hit comedy “Moonstruck.” His disillusion contributed to the laughter, and although he wasn’t nominated for a supporting-role Oscar (Cher and Olympia Dukakis won in their categories), Aiello was inundated with movie offers.“Living in New York City gave me training for any role,” he said in a 1997 interview. “I’ve seen people killed, knifed. I’ve got scars on my face. I have emotional recall when I work; the idea is simply to recreate it. I’ve seen it and experienced it. I’ve played gangsters, teachers but most of my work has been in the police area. And for that I’m adored by the police in New York City.”From the New York Times:In Mr. Read the rest

A Democract-led U.S. House of Representatives committee on Friday approved charges of abuse of power and obstruction against manifestly unfit U.S. president and obvious Russian puppet Donald Trump. The Republican, Putin-aligned shitheel will almost certainly now become the third U.S. president in history to be impeached. The House Judiciary Committee voted 23 (Mostly Ds, yes) to 17 (Rs, no) along party lines to approve an article of impeachment that charges Donald Trump with abuse of power in the “drug deal” campaign to bully Ukraine into a phony investigation of Joe Biden and his son.The committee then voted on a second article, same margin of votes, that accuses Trump of obstructing Congress’ investigation of his hijinks in Ukraine by ordering White House officials not to cooperate with the impeachment inquiry. From Reuters:The full House, where the Democrats hold a majority, is likely to approve the charges next week, completing the impeachment process and sending Trump for trial in the Senate within weeks. But the Republican-led chamber is unlikely to vote to find the president guilty and remove him from office. Read the rest

Golden Face is back. This time, it's personal. Read the rest

“I still can't talk about what happened to me because of a non-disclosure agreement,” says Gretchen Carlson.In an op-ed today, former Fox News presenter Gretchen Carlson calls on Fox to release employees from the non-disclosure agreements they were forced to sign. “Buying silence instead of stopping harassment is immoral and unjust,” Carlson says.“I want my voice back. I want it back for me, and for all those silenced by forced arbitration and NDAs. ”It's a great piece. Here's an excerpt.Ironically, while most of the real women involved in the Fox News scandals remain muzzled by NDAs, two high profile Hollywood projects (Showtime’s limited series “The Loudest Voice” and Lionsgate’s upcoming feature “Bombshell”) can freely tell stories without our participation. While projects like these will certainly inspire more women to come forward, and while it’s certainly flattering (and surreal) to be depicted by such remarkable, empathetic actors as Naomi Watts and Nicole Kidman, my experience is yet another example of why the laws governing NDAs must change.In practical terms, my NDA means I am legally prohibited from discussing — in public and in private — what happened to me. It means I cannot consult with filmmakers, writers, journalists or anyone else telling my story — whether it’s about the depiction of me, my family, or the events themselves — nor can I comment on the accuracy of a final product. I don’t know precisely what Fox would do if I violated the agreement, but presumably they’d take legal and financial actions. Read the rest

Spin is a short-hire/e-scooter company -- one of those firms like Bird and Lime that fill city streets with future-ewaste vehicles that block wheelchairs. It's owned by Ford.On Dec 5, workers at Spin's San Francisco office, voted to unionize, organized under Teamsters Local 665. The workers in the union those who recover and charge Spin scooters, who are employees (unlike those who perform the same duties for Bird and Lime, who are treated as contractors, though many of them will be reclassified as W2 employees under AB5, California's law that closes the loophole that allows companies to pretend that its employees are contractors in order to deny them benefits and protections).Spin is one of four e-scooter companies authorized to operate in San Francisco, after the city cracked down on the thousands of rental scooters littering the early-adopter-packed streets earlier this year.Whether the move will inspire other e-scooter workforces, even those whose parent companies aren't the likes of Ford, which might be more used to dealing with unions than your average startup, remains to be seen.Spin's San Francisco staff becomes the first e-scooter workforce to unionize [Caitlin Welsh/Mashable] Read the rest

Punk AF music festival Burger Boogaloo has announced its initial 2020 lineup:DAY 1 /////////////////////// DAY 2 ...BIKINI KILL ///////////////// CIRCLE JERKSPLASTIC BERTRAND //// BLEACHEDPANSY DIVISION ///////// FLIPPERPANTY RAID ////////////// ALICE BAGCARBONAS /////////////// FEVERSYOUNGER LOVERS ////// MIDNITE SNAXXXTWOMPSAX ////////////// and MORE!!!John Waters is emceeing once again and tickets are available now.It all goes down Saturday July 11 and Sunday July 12, 2020 at Oakland, California's Mosswood Park. Read the rest

Nulledcast is a realtime podcast streamed on a Discord channel for the hacking forum Nulled: the hosts break into Ring and Nest cameras in realtime, blare sirens at the owners, then torment them with insults and racist slurs, livestreaming their responses to hundreds of listeners.Recent reporting on Ring hacking have spooked the hosts and forum members, who are scrambling to remove evidence of their activitiesThe NulledCast is a podcast livestreamed to Discord. It's a show in which hackers take over people's Ring and Nest smarthome cameras and use their speakers to talk to and harass their unsuspecting owners. In the example above, Chance blared noises and shouted racist comments at the Florida family."Sit back and relax to over 45 minutes of entertainment," an advertisement for the podcast posted to a hacking forum called Nulled reads. "Join us as we go on completely random tangents such as; Ring & Nest Trolling, telling shelter owners we killed a kitten, Nulled drama, and more ridiculous topics. Be sure to join our Discord to watch the shows live."Inside the Podcast that Hacks Ring Camera Owners Live on Air [Joseph Cox and Jason Koebler/Motherboard] Read the rest

Finally, a police union has identified a form of misconduct it will not defend: necrophilia.David Rojas is the LAPD cop who thought that turning off his bodycam would stop it from recording him as he fondled the breast of a dead woman. He has now been charged by the local DA, and, amazingly, his union has declined to defend him. Mind you, this is the same union that investigated 1,356 complaints of acts of racial bias committed by its members without upholding a single one. Police unions are a public enemy, defending running over protesters, sexual harassment, "get out of jail free" cards for cronies, beating up protesters who turn out to be undercover cops, purging the misconduct records of dirty cops, and perjury.But sexual assault on a corpse is a bridge too far -- as was feeding shit to a homeless person, way back in 2016."We hope that District Attorney Jackie Lacey charging Mr. Rojas for his vile alleged crime will bring some solace to the deceased woman's family during their time of grieving," the Los Angeles Police Protective League, the union representing LAPD officers, said in a statement.The union also said it will not defend the officer during his proceedings."His alleged behavior is abhorrent and an affront to every law enforcement professional working the LAPD," it said. LAPD officer charged after allegedly fondling a dead woman's breast [Christina Maxouris and Margaret Shuttleworth/CNN](Image: North Charleston, CC BY-SA) Read the rest