Long-time Slashdot reader schwit1 shares this report from ProPublica: As Turkey launched a military offensive against Kurdish minorities in neighboring Syria in early 2018, Facebook’s top executives faced a political dilemma. Turkey was demanding the social media giant block Facebook posts from the People’s Protection Units, a mostly Kurdish militia group the Turkish government had targeted. Should Facebook ignore the request,…
Tag: message
The Mars Perseverance Rover’s Parachute Contained a Secret Message
“The huge parachute used by NASA’s Perseverance rover to land on Mars contained a secret message,” reports the Associated Press — thanks to the rover’s puzzle-loving systems engineer Ian Clark. “During a live stream discussing the landing, one Nasa commentator said: ‘Sometimes we leave messages in our work for others to find. So we invite you all to give it a…
Did you find the message hidden in Perseverance’s parachute?
The striped pattern on the parachute used by the Perseverance rover to land on Mars contained a hidden message. Internet sleuths were able to figure it out within a few hours. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/perseverance-secret-message-dare-mighty-things…
Apple Mail and Hidden Tracking Images
John Gruber, writing at DaringFireball: In my piece yesterday about email tracking images (“spy pixels” or “spy trackers”), I complained about the fact that Apple — a company that rightfully prides itself for its numerous features protecting user privacy — offers no built-in defenses for email tracking. A slew of readers wrote to argue that Apple Mail does offer such a…
Apache Software Foundation Ousts TinkerPop Creator
Frosty P writes: The Apache Software Foundation (ASF) has removed Marko Rodriguez from the TinkerPop project he co-founded because his provocative Twitter posts were said to have violated the ASF Code of Conduct. “I was removed from the project I started 11 years ago for ‘publishing offensive humor that borders on hate speech,'” Rodriguez explained in an email to The Register….
Amazon Prime Video Direct and the Dystopian Decision To Stop Accepting Documentaries
When Amazon made a unilateral decision in early February to stop accepting documentaries and short films via Prime Video Direct (a policy that also covers “slide shows, vlogs, podcasts, tutorials, filmed conferences, monologues, toy play, music videos, and voiceover gameplay”), the announcement also served as a quiet purge. Amazon also has been dropping long-running documentary titles from the service, with stakeholders…
Mars rover’s giant parachute carried secret message
The huge parachute used by NASA’s Perseverance rover to land on Mars contained a secret message, thanks to a puzzle lover on the spacecraft team. Source: https://phys.org/news/2021-02-mars-rover-giant-parachute-secret.html…
Hidden ‘madman’ message on ‘The Scream’ traced back to Munch himself
Experts have long debated the identity of the inscriber, with some suggesting a dissatisfied vandalizer is the author, while others pointed fingers at the Norwegian painter himself. Source: https://www.livescience.com/scream-inscription-written-munch-himself.html
Parler Apparently Temporarily Blocked Its Own Co-Founder and Former CEO
“Parler, the social media site popular among conservatives, appeared to have banned its cofounder and former CEO on Friday,” reports BuzzFeed News, “before restoring his access later in the day.” An anonymous Slashdot reader shares their report:
John Matze, whom Parler’s management fired earlier this month, told BuzzFeed News that he believed he had been banned after making several posts and comments…
Why Is America Getting a New $100 Billion Nuclear Weapon?
“America is building a new weapon of mass destruction, a nuclear missile the length of a bowling lane,” writes the contributing editor for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (in an article shared by Slashdot reader DanDrollette): It will be able to travel some 6,000 miles, carrying a warhead more than 20 times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on…