The first church of artificial intelligence has shut its conceptual doors. From a report: Anthony Levandowski, the former Google engineer who avoided an 18-month prison sentence after receiving a presidential pardon last month, has closed the church he created to understand and accept a godhead based on artificial intelligence. The Way of the Future church, which Levandowski formed in 2015, was…
Tag: REFORM
Tonight is New Year’s Eve in the Julian calendar
Happy Julian New Year! January 13, 2021, marks the last day of the year in the old-style Julian calendar. Why, and what happened when the calendars switched. Source: https://earthsky.org/tonight/julian-calendar-new-years-eve…
Trump Considers Clemency For Silk Road ‘Kingpin’ Ross Ulbricht
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Daily Beast: In his final weeks in office before Joe Biden’s inauguration, President Donald Trump is weighing granting clemency to Ross Ulbricht, the founder and former administrator of the world’s most famous darknet drug market, Silk Road, The Daily Beast has learned. According to three people familiar with the matter, the White House…
Sluggish start for Arctic sea ice freeze-up
Early ice retreat amid warm Arctic air temperatures set the stage for the slow refreeze in 2020. Source: https://earthsky.org/earth/sluggish-start-for-arctic-sea-ice-freeze-up-2020…
Massachusetts Lawmakers Vote To Pass a Statewide Police Ban On Facial Recognition
An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: Massachusetts lawmakers have voted to pass a new police reform bill that will ban police departments and public agencies from using facial recognition technology across the state. The bill was passed by both the state’s House and Senate on Tuesday, a day after senior lawmakers announced an agreement that ended months of deadlock….
From Thailand To Indonesia, Taxes Tighten for Digital Businesses
Governments across the Association of Southeast Asian Nations are moving to impose more taxes on digital companies, stirring unease among multinational internet businesses that have boomed amid the coronavirus pandemic. From a report: From Thailand to Indonesia, new levies have kicked in or are being introduced. They threaten to chip away at the earnings of technology companies that are reaping benefits…
What is the Common Era?
If you encounter a date in the CE (Common Era) or BCE (Before Common Era) format, don’t fret. They mean exactly the same thing as AD (anno Domini) and BC (before Christ). Source: https://earthsky.org/human-world/definition-common-era-bce-ce-bc-ad…
How Jupiter’s moon Io gets its hellish atmosphere
Hot, active volcanoes produce almost half of Jupiter’s moon Io’s sulfur atmosphere, according to new observations using the ALMA telescope. The rest comes from cold sulfur deposits that freeze on the surface, then sublimate in sunlight. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/io-sulfur-volcanoes-hot-so2-cold-so2…
T-Mobile Will Pay $200 Million To Settle Sprint’s Alleged Lifeline Abuse
T-Mobile is paying the price for the reported misdeeds of its recent acquisition. From a report: The carrier has agreed to pay a $200 million settlement over FCC allegations Sprint abused the Lifeline program for low-income communications, claiming subsidies for 885,000 customers that weren’t using the initiative. The agreement also requires that T-Mobile honor the rules of a consent decree.The provider…
FCC Will Move To Regulate Social Media After Censorship Outcry
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: On Thursday, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai said that the agency will seek to regulate social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter at the behest of the Trump administration’s executive order signed earlier this year. “Members of all three branches of the federal government have expressed serious concerns about the prevailing…