Government
Pentagon buries evidence of $125 billion in bureaucratic waste washingtonpost
Pentagon leaders had requested the study to help make their enormous back-office bureaucracy more efficient and reinvest any savings in combat power. But after the project documented far more wasteful spending than expected, senior defense officials moved swiftly to kill it by discrediting and suppressing the results.
Censorship
EU Threatens Action if Facebook ‘Hate Speech’ Not Censored in 24 Hours breitbart
In May of this year, the U.S. tech giants signed a “code of conduct” europa.eu, promising to work with the Commission and national law enforcement to “criminalize” and “sanction” “individual perpetrators” as well as committing to “promoting independent counter-narratives” that the EU favours.
Speaking on Sunday, the EU’s justice commissioner added “fake news” to the list of what they want censored online.
Privacy
AR startup Blippar added real-time facial recognition to its app businessinsider
The new technology blippar enables users to scan or "Blipp" faces — either in-person, or a printed photo, or television — through their smartphone cameras to unlock a "unique augmented reality experience for people who have a recognized face profile" the company said in a press release.
Amazon
Amazon’s new grocery store will let you pick items off shelves and walk out without paying recode.net v
Called Amazon Go, the store will allow Amazon customers to shop for grocery staples, prepared meals and sandwiches, and then walk right out without stopping to pay at a cashier or kiosk. Customers need only to scan their phone using the new Amazon Go app on the way into the store, and their Amazon account will be charged for items taken.
This is both cool...and scary :)
Medical
With 21st Century Cures Act, the Future of Regenerative Medicine Is “Inject and See” wired
In some ways, the legislation lives up to its name: It includes ambitious goals to advance biomedical science, and will inject $4.8 billion into a long-stagnating National Institute of Health nih.gov budget. But attached to those promises is a roadmap for abandoning the gold standard of medicine in favor of an expedited “middle path” for drugs, medical devices, and regenerative therapies. Critics say it’s deregulation in sheep’s clothing—and worry that both science and patients are going to suffer.
Environmental
Tornado cluster sizes skyrocket, and no one knows why foxnews
"The meteorological factors that are related with tornado outbreaks have also become more extreme," Tippett told Live Science in an email. "The surprising finding was that the change in meteorological factors did not have the expected signature of climate change."
Israel
Biblical sheep in Israel for first time in millennia timesofisrael
The sheep have landed. After three years of high-level negotiations between the Israeli and Canadian governments, 119 heritage sheep livestockconservancy.org, which trace their lineage back 5,000 years to the Middle East, began arriving in Israel on November 30. It is the first time that the breed, called Jacob’s sheep, has been represented in Israel since biblical times.
[the ranchers] also found meaning in the fact that the first sheep arrived during the week leading up to the reading of the Torah portion of Vayetzei, which is the first time that the uniquely speckled Jacob’s sheep are mentioned in the Torah in Genesis.
Germany
Angela Merkel, Seeking Re-Election, Calls For Burqa Ban time v
“In communication between people, which is of course essential to our living together, we have to show our faces,” she told delegates at the annual Christian Democrats (CDU) britannica party conference in the northwestern city of Essen. “So the full veil should be forbidden wherever legally possible.”
Also see Angela Merkel calls for burqa ban 'wherever legally possible' in Germany independent.co.uk v
Syria
Aleppo battle: Russia and China veto UN truce resolution bbc
Russia said the document infringed the council rule allowing countries 24 hours to consider the final wording.
The US dismissed this as a "made-up alibi", saying Russia wanted to preserve recent military gains by Syrian government troops in Aleppo.
Others...
No comments :
Post a Comment