Facebook will start reducing the amount of political content users see while scrolling their primary feeds. From a report: The social media platform will “temporarily reduce the distribution of political content in News Feed for a small percentage of people” in Brazil, Indonesia and Canada this week, it said in a blog post on Wednesday. The changes will be applied to…
Tag: United States
UAE’s Hope mission to Mars arrives today: How to watch
The Emirates Mars Mission “Hope” is a United Arab Emirates Space Agency uncrewed mission to Mars. It’s slated to enter Mars orbit on February 9, 2021. It’ll be followed on February 10 by China’s Tianwen-1 mission and, on February 18, by NASA’s Perseverance mission. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/missions-to-mars-uae-hope-china-tianwen-1…
Anniversary of mysterious parade of meteors
On February 9, 1913, lucky observers witnessed the Great Meteor Procession, when bright meteors soared horizontally across the sky in a stately marching rank for minutes at a time. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/this-date-in-science-great-meteor-procession-of-february-9-1913…
First 3D-Printed House Goes On Sale, Foreshadowing Faster, Cheaper Homebuilding
“A company says it has listed the first 3D printed house in the United States for sale,” reports CNN. “This is the future, there is no doubt about it,” says Kirk Andersen, the director of operations at SQ4D Inc. SQ4D uses automated building methods, or 3D printing, to build structures and homes… The company can set up its Autonomous Robotic Construction…
Fake Pro-China Accounts Are Reaching Millions on Twitter
“A pro-China network of fake and impostor accounts found a global audience on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter to mock the U.S. response to the COVID-19 pandemic,” reports the Associated Press, “as well as the deadly riot in Washington that left five dead, new research published Thursday found.” Slashdot reader schwit1 shared their report:
Messages posted by the network, which also praised China,…
How the NSA’s Hubris Left America Vulnerable
A new book promises “the untold story of the cyberweapons market — the most secretive, invisible, government-backed market on earth — and a terrifying first look at a new kind of global warfare.” Its author — a New York Times cybersecurity reporter — shares the book’s story about David Evenden, a former National Security Agency analyst who later worked in Abu…
Russian Campaign Promotes Homegrown Vaccine and Undercuts Rivals
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: Russian news outlets connected to election disinformation campaigns in the United States have set their sights on a new target: convincing Spanish-speaking countries that the Russian coronavirus vaccine works better than its American competitors, according to researchers and State Department officials. The Russian campaign has focused on Latin American nations,…
Pakistan Forced Down Apps Made By a Persecuted Religious Minority
An anonymous reader quotes a report from BuzzFeed News: Over the last two years, the government of Pakistan has forced Google and Apple to take down apps in the country created by developers based in other nations who are part of a repressed religious minority. The move is part of a crackdown led by the country’s telecommunications regulator targeting the Ahmadiyya…
The moon rock in Washington National Cathedral
A moon rock collected by Apollo astronauts during the first moon landing is enshrined in a stained-glass window – known as the Space Window – in the Washington National Cathedral. Source: https://earthsky.org/human-world/moon-rock-washington-national-cathedral-stained-glass-window…
SpaceX Says Its Starlink Satellite Internet Service Now Has Over 10,000 Users
SpaceX disclosed in a public filing on Thursday that its Starlink satellite internet service now has “over 10,000 users in the United States and abroad.” From a report: “Starlink’s performance is not theoretical or experimental … [and] is rapidly accelerating in real time as part of its public beta program,” SpaceX wrote in a filing with the Federal Communications Commission. Elon…