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Submission + - SPAM: Gulf War Syndrome Attributed to Sarin

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The bombing of Saddam Hussein's chemical weapon arsenal(WMDs) could be to blame for tens of thousands of British and US soldiers being struck down with the mysterious Gulf War syndrome, scientists say.

Puzzled researchers have spent decades searching for the root cause of the illness, which has left veterans battling fatigue, memory problems and chronic pain.

Now, a US Government-funded study claims to offer the 'most definitive' proof that the destruction of Iraq's cache of chemical weapons is responsible.

January 1991's explosions, centered around cities Muthanna and Fallujah, released sarin — a lethal nerve-agent — into the air.

Dr Hayley said: 'What makes this new study a game-changer is that it links Gulf War syndrome with a very strong gene-environment interaction that cannot be explained away by errors in recalling the environmental exposure or other biases in the data.'
Link to Original Source

Submission + - SPAM: Google Cloud Launches AlloyDB, a New Fully-Managed PostgreSQL Database Service

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Google today announced the launch of AlloyDB, a new fully-managed PostgreSQL-compatible database service that the company claims to be twice as fast for transactional workloads as AWS’s comparable Aurora PostgreSQL (and four times faster than standard PostgreSQL for the same workloads and up to 100 times faster for analytical queries). [...] AlloyDB is the standard PostgreSQL database at its core, though the team did modify the kernel to allow it to use Google’s infrastructure to its fullest, all while allowing the team to stay up to date with new versions as they launch.

Andi Gutmans, who joined Google as its GM and VP of Engineering for its database products in 2020 after a long stint at AWS, told me that one of the reasons the company is launching this new product is that while Google has done well in helping enterprise customers move their MySQL and PostgreSQL servers to the cloud with the help of services like CloudSQL, the company didn’t necessarily have the right offerings for those customers who wanted to move their legacy databases (Gutmans didn’t explicitly say so, but I think you can safely insert ‘Oracle’ here) to an open-source service.

“There are different reasons for that,” he told me. “First, they are actually using more than one cloud provider, so they want to have the flexibility to run everywhere. There are a lot of unfriendly licensing gimmicks, traditionally. Customers really, really hate that and, I would say, whereas probably two to three years ago, customers were just complaining about it, what I notice now is customers are really willing to invest resources to just get off these legacy databases. They are sick of being strapped and locked in.” Add to that Postgres’ rise to becoming somewhat of a de facto standard for relational open-source databases (and MySQL’s decline) and it becomes clear why Google decided that it wanted to be able to offer a dedicated high-performance PostgreSQL service.
Link to Original Source

Submission + - NVIDIA Releases Open-Source Kernel Modules (nvidia.com)

Submitted by exomondo
exomondo writes: For Turing and Ampere architectures, NVIDIA is now publishing Linux GPU kernel modules as open source with dual GPL/MIT license, starting with the R515 driver release. While driver development will still follow an Android-style model of publishing 'snapshots' of each release this is an important step forward for NVIDIA GPUs in the Linux ecosystem.

The source code can be found on github.

Submission + - NVIDIA Transitioning To Official, Open-Source Linux GPU Kernel Driver (phoronix.com)

Submitted by Hmmmmmm
Hmmmmmm writes: The day has finally come: NVIDIA IS PUBLISHING THEIR LINUX GPU KERNEL MODULES AS OPEN-SOURCE! Too much excitement and a sign of the times, the embargo has just expired on this super-exciting milestone that many of us have been hoping to see for many years. Over the past two decades NVIDIA has offered great Linux driver support with their proprietary driver stack, but with the success of AMD's open-source driver effort going on for more than a decade, many have been calling for NVIDIA to open up their drivers. Their user-space software is remaining closed-source but as of today they have formally opened up their Linux GPU kernel modules and will be maintaining it moving forward. Here's the scoop on this landmark open-source decision at NVIDIA.

It's genuine open-source kernel code — MIT/GPL dual licensed! NVIDIA has indicated that Canonical / Ubuntu, Red Hat, and SUSE are all preparing to package and use the open kernel modules.

NVIDIA's open kernel modules is already considered "production ready, opt-in" for data center GPUs. For GeForce and workstation GPUs, the open kernel module code is considered "alpha quality" but will be ramped up moving forward with future releases. NVIDIA has already deprecated the monolithic kernel module approach for their data center GPU support to focus on this open kernel driver solution (and their existing proprietary kernel module using the GSP). Only Turing and newer GPUs will be supported by this open-source kernel driver. Pre-Turing GPUs are left to using the existing proprietary kernel drivers or the Nouveau DRM driver for that matter. Turing and newer is a hard requirement due to being dependent upon the GPU System Processor (GSP).

Nouveau may make use of this code being opened today. Asking about it to NVIDIA, they say that hopefully Nouveau will be able to utilize the GSP firmware / open kernel modules but first will likely take time for the GSP firmware interface to be stabilized and other factors. Thus in the future when this kernel driver is in better shape, Nouveau's Mesa code may end up interfacing with this kernel driver as an alternative to the Nouveau DRM kernel driver that is in rather rough shape for hardware newer than the GTX 600/700 Kepler series. Plus for this kernel code to be upstreamed, it would need an open user-space — i.e. Nouveau Mesa code short of NVIDIA deciding later to open up their user-space libraries.

Submission + - FAA shifts gear on certifying eVTOLS, as concern grows (avweb.com)

Submitted by wired_parrot
wired_parrot writes: As a range of new manufactures are preparing to bring to market new mass air mobility vehicles in the form of eVTOLs, concerns growing about the safe certification of these new aircraft types has led the FAA to shift gear on certifying eVTOLS by revising it certification requirements for eVTOLS from small aircraft to a powered-lift category.
With the growing number of issues to resolve before eVTOLS are able to fly, so to do concerns about the viability of the eVTOL market.

Submission + - Gravity signals could detect earthquakes at the speed of light (science.org)

Submitted by sciencehabit
sciencehabit writes: Two minutes after the world’s biggest tectonic plate shuddered off the coast of Japan, the country’s meteorological agency issued its final warning to about 50 million residents: A magnitude 8.1 earthquake had generated a tsunami that was headed for shore. But it wasn’t until hours after the waves arrived that experts gauged the true size of the 11 March 2011 Tohoku quake. Ultimately, it rang in at a magnitude 9—releasing more than 22 times the energy experts predicted and leaving at least 18,000 dead, some in areas that never received the alert. Now, scientists have found a way to get more accurate size estimates faster, by using computer algorithms to identify the wake from gravitational waves that shoot from the fault at the speed of light.

“This is a completely new [way to recognize] large-magnitude earthquakes,” says Richard Allen, a seismologist at the University of California, Berkeley, who was not involved in the study. “If we were to implement this algorithm, we’d have that much more confidence that this is a really big earthquake, and we could push that alert out over a much larger area sooner.”

Submission + - Hawley introducing measure to strip Disney of copyright protections (thehill.com) 1

Submitted by jcdick1
jcdick1 writes: Senator Josh Hawley (R)-MO introduced legislation — the Copyright Clause Restoration Act — on Tuesday that would reduce copyright from its current "Life plus ..." period to a mere 28 years, with a single 28 year extension, if applied for. This would be made retroactive. It would only apply to copyright holders with a market cap of $150,000,000,000 or more. His argument is that allowing large "woke" media corporations to continue to hold out on the common good is a huge corporate handout by government. From the article:

“Thanks to special copyright protections from Congress, woke corporations like Disney have earned billions while increasingly pandering to woke activists,” Hawley said in a statement. “It’s time to take away Disney’s special privileges and open up a new era of creativity and innovation.”

Submission + - UK, US, and EU Officially Blame Russia For Cyberattack Targeting Viasat (sky.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The UK, US and EU have formally accused Russia of being behind a cyber attack targeting a satellite communications network used in Ukraine. Businesses and individuals using routers made by Viasat, an American business that provides broadband-speed satellite internet connections, were knocked offline just before tanks began to roll into the country.

"The cyberattack took place one hour before Russia's unprovoked and unjustified invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022, thus facilitating the military aggression," the EU said in its statement. "Although the primary target is believed to have been the Ukrainian military, other customers were affected, including personal and commercial internet users," the Foreign Office added. As a result of the attack 5,800 wind turbines in Germany were knocked offline as they depended upon Viasat routers for remote monitoring and control. The company said in total tens of thousands of its terminals were effectively destroyed and needed to be replaced.

Submission + - EV Automaker Hailed As The 'Next Tesla' Is Hemorrhaging Cash And Investors (dailycaller.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Rivian's stock price fell 18.72% to $23.40 per share on Monday, a whopping 87% decline from its November peak of $179.47 a share, according to market data. The company reported a net loss of $2.5 billion in the final three months of 2021 and said in March that it would produce 25,000 vehicles in 2022, half of the number it originally projected.

Amazon reported in late April that its stake in Rivian led to a $7.6 billion loss in the first quarter of 2022.

Submission + - Valve Loses Bid to End Antitrust Case Over Steam Gaming Platform (bloomberglaw.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Valve must face antitrust litigation over claims that “most favored nation” policies for its Steam distribution platform have driven up video game prices across the industry, a federal judge in Seattle ruled. Judge John C. Coughenour let part of the case move forward in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington, saying it’s plausible Valve exploits its market dominance to threaten and retaliate against developers that sell games for less through other retailers or platforms.

The company “allegedly enforces this regime through a combination of written and unwritten rules” imposing its own conditions on how even “non-Steam-enabled games are sold and priced,” Coughenour wrote. “These allegations are sufficient to plausibly allege unlawful conduct.” The May 6 decision hands a win to the consumers and game publishers leading the proposed class action after the judge twice issued preliminary rulings in Valve’s favor. Coughenour first ordered Steam subscribers to arbitrate their consumer claims in October, then tentatively dismissed the developer lawsuit the following month. Consumers who don’t subscribe to Steam—and never signed its arbitration agreement—are still involved in the case. [...]

Coughenour trimmed the Valve case May 6, rejecting claims that the Steam store and gaming platform operate in separate markets the company ties together. There are no plausible allegations of any consumer demand for “fully functional gaming platforms distinct from game stores,” he said. But the judge let the most-favored-nation claims move forward, walking back his earlier skepticism about the idea that Steam commissions are “supracompetitive.” He had previously found that their stability over time shows Valve didn’t raise prices as it gained market share. In fact, when the company competed only against brick-and-mortar retailers, it “did not need market power to charge a fee well above its cost structure because those brick-and-mortar competitors had a far higher cost structure,” Coughenour wrote. That makes the analysis apples-to-oranges, he said.

Submission + - Tech YouTubers Are Stepping Up a War Against Indian Scam Call Centers

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Former NASA engineer Mark Rober builds some awesome stuff on his YouTube channel, like devious squirrel mazes, but his most popular video series is the annual glitter bomb, a beautifully over-engineered fake package that douses porch pirates with a shower of glitter and fart spray. In an unexpected twist, last year's glitter bomb video also helped police catch and arrest someone involved in a phone scam scheme, and Rober's spent the subsequent year digging into just how these phone scam operations work. In a new video he shows off the extensive results of that effort, including hiring double agents to infiltrate several phone centers in India and hacking their security camera footage. And of course he got off a stink bomb, too.

For Rober, this crusade started when he teamed up with another YouTuber, Jim Browning, to try to send a glitter bomb to a scammer operation. Browning's whole channel, which has 3.7 million followers, is devoted to identifying the call centers behind tech support scams and refund scams. These scams typically target the elderly and less computer-savvy folks and usually rely on the scammers gaining remote access to your computer and then tricking them into giving up personal information like their bank account login. "Refund" scams make people believe they've been overcompensated with some bogus refund and trick them into sending cash in the mail to the scammers. The people who receive those cash packages in the United States are essentially underlings in these scam operations, so after getting a glitter bomb in their hands last year, Rober set his sights on the call centers themselves. With Browning's help, they were able to gain access to the CCTV of the infiltrated call centers, while another YouTube pair, Trilogy Media, traveled to Kolkata, India to run operations on the ground.

Submission + - Scientists Discover Abundance of Rare Nuclear Fusion Fuel(3He) on Earth (vice.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Helium-3, a potential source of limitless clean energy, may be ten times more common on our planet than previously thought, reports a new study.

“The inferred 3He change is more than 10x the natural geological fluxes,” Birner added. “We know that 3He is produced also by decay of tritium. Tritium was released by humans in nuclear bomb tests, by the current stockpile of nuclear warheads and is probably also made in some nuclear power plants. However, our estimate of these sources suggest they can only account for about 10% of the inferred 3He increase. It is not clear at all where the rest comes from.”

Submission + - SPAM: Russian Space Agency Head Threatens Elon Musk Over Starlink In Ukraine.

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes:

Dmitry Rogozin, the head of Roscosmos, posted a message to his Telegram channel, condemning Musk for expanding Starlink’s service to Ukraine, which is facing an ongoing invasion from Russia.

In the message, Rogozin accused Musk of supplying the Starlink dishes to the Ukrainian military, which he described as “Nazis.”

“Elon Musk is thus involved in the supply of fascist forces in Ukraine with military communications,” Rogozin added. “And for this you will have to answer in an adult way, Elon, no matter how you play the fool.”

On Sunday, Musk noticed the menacing message, which prompted him to tweet back: “The word ‘Nazi’ doesn’t mean what he seems to think it does.”

In a separate tweet, Musk also wrote: “If I die under mysterious circumstances, it’s been nice knowin ya,” a likely reference to how Russian President Vladimir Putin has been accused of poisoning his political enemies.

Time to beef up security and hire a taster.
Link to Original Source

Submission + - Research Finds Over 1.5 Million "Abandoned" Mobile Apps (infoq.com)

Submitted by ellithligraw
ellithligraw writes: Analytics company Pixalate reported over 1.5 million iOS and Android apps abandoned. This analysis comes after Apple's announcement of changes to their App Store for abandoned apps, prompting a discussion on the Web.

The story continues, "Pixalate claims they crawled the App Store and Play Store to analyze all apps available for download based on their last update to determine their degree of "abandonment". Abandoned apps were defined by Pixalate as those apps that had not received an update in over two years, with "super-abandoned apps" having not received an update in at least five years."

Note that according to Statista there are 4 million iOS apps, and 3 million Android apps available.

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