Trump’s Twitter Ban Prompts Outcry From Germany and France

Donald Trump received unexpected backing from Germany and France after the U.S. president was shut off social media platforms including Twitter and Facebook, extending Europe’s battle with big tech. From a report: German Chancellor Angela Merkel objected to the decisions, saying on Monday that lawmakers should set the rules governing free speech and not private tech companies. “The chancellor sees the…

Google Stadia, Nvidia GeForce Now Support is Coming To LG’s 2021 TVs

Game streaming has been slowly growing in recent years with the launches of Nvidia’s GeForce Now, Google’s Stadia, Microsoft’s xCloud and Amazon’s Project Luna. This year, however, it looks to finally be picking up more steam. At CES 2021, LG announced that some of its 2021 TVs will support apps for playing games from Google Stadia and GeForce Now right on…

Evidence of water movement found in meteorites that only recently fell to Earth

A team of researchers affiliated with institutions in Australia, the U.S. and France has found evidence of relatively recent water movement in meteorites that only recently collided with the Earth. In their paper published in the journal Science, the group describes their study of carbonaceous chondrite (CC) meteorites that landed on the surface of the Earth within the past century and…

Superflare detected on an ultracool star

Using Xinglong observatory’s Ground-based Wide Angle Cameras (GWAC), astronomers from China and France have detected a new superflare of an ultracool star known as SDSS J013333.08+003223.7. The newly found event, designated GWAC 181229A, appears to be one of the most powerful flares on ultracool stars so far discovered. The finding is reported in a paper published December 28 on arXiv.org. Source:…

The map of nuclear deformation takes the form of a mountain landscape

Until recently, scientists believed that only very massive nuclei could have excited zero-spin states of increased stability with a significantly deformed shape. Meanwhile, an international team of researchers from Romania, France, Italy, the USA and Poland showed in their latest article that such states also exist in much lighter nickel nuclei. Positive verification of the theoretical model used in these experiments…

Global Digital-Tax Detente Ends, as US and France Exchange Blows

Detente is ending in the global fight over tech taxes. Earlier this year, France agreed to suspend collection of a tax on digital revenue from large technology companies such as Facebook, Amazon and Alphabet’s Google. Meanwhile, the U.S. delayed the application of tariffs it was putting on French goods in retaliation for the tax. But now France has resumed collecting what…

France Bans Use of Drones To Police Protests In Paris

France’s top administrative court has backed privacy campaigners by imposing a ban on police use of drones for covering public protests in Paris. The BBC reports: The Council of State said Paris police prefect Didier Lallement should halt “without delay” drone surveillance of gatherings on public roads. The ruling comes weeks after MPs backed a controversial security bill that includes police…

Global Chip Shortage Threatens Production of Laptops, Smartphones and More

Makers of cars and electronic devices from TVs to smartphones are sounding alarm bells about a global shortage of chips, which is causing manufacturing delays as consumer demand bounces back from the coronavirus crisis. From a report: The problem has several causes, industry executives and analysts say, including bulk-buying by U.S. sanctions-hit Chinese tech giant Huawei Technologies, a fire at a…

Is that a UFO?! There’s probably an explanation

Most Unidentified Flying Objects aren’t actually unidentified. Here’s a list of phenomena, either natural or human-made, that people often mistake for UFOs. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/if-its-not-a-ufo-what-is-it…