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Submission + - Apple uses more suppliers from China than Taiwan for first time, data shows (theguardian.com)

Submitted by AmiMoJo
AmiMoJo writes: Apple used more suppliers from China last year than it did from Taiwan for the first time, highlighting the difficulty the United States government will have in persuading companies to become less reliant on its superpower rival.

Despite Donald Trump’s trade war against China, the tech company had 51 suppliers based in China and Hong Kong in 2020, according to a Nikkei Asia analysis of the annual Apple supplier list released last week.

The figure compares with 42 in 2018 and it knocks Taiwan – led by the flagship semiconductor producer TSMC – off the top spot for the first time. Apple did not release data for 2019.

Nikkei Asia said the list, which has been released almost every year since 2013, covers 98% of Apple’s parts and production expenditure for the previous year.

Submission + - SPAM: Google diversity chief apologizes for anti-Semitism

Submitted by Entrope
Entrope writes: After posting a blog entry saying that Jewish people have an "insatiable appetite for war", Google's global lead for diversity strategy and research, Kamau Bobb, sent an email apologizing for it to a mailing list of Jewish employees of the company.

In a marked departure from how Google handled much less inflammatory commentary by James Damore, the company has not yet made any public comment on Bobb's original post.
Link to Original Source

Submission + - Fauci Emailed Zuckerberg About COVID Vaccine Trial Budget Concern in Feb 2020 1

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: Through FOIA requests, the Washington Post, Buzzfeed News and CNN obtained thousands of private emails from US infectious disease chief Dr Anthony Fauci. Dated from Jan-Jun 2020, the emails have revealed the concern and confusion at the start of the pandemic. Among the 3,000+ pages of email exchanges obtained by Buzzfeed were some interesting ones between Fauci and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

On Feb 27, 2020, Zuckerberg wrote. "Tony: I was glad to hear your statement that the covid-19 vaccine will be ready for human trials in six weeks. Are there any resources our foundation can help provide to potentially accelerate this or at least make sure it stays on track? Mark." A day later, Fauci responded. "Mark: Thanks for the note. If we start in April (~6-7 weeks from now) with a phase 1 trial of 45 subjects, it will take another 3-4 months to determine safety and some immunogenicity. The next step is phase 2 for efficacy. We may need help with resources for the phase 2 trial if we do not get our requested budget supplement. I believe that we will be OK. If this goes off track, I will contact you. Many thanks for the offer. Much appreciated. Best regards, Tony."

And on Mar 15, 2020, Zuckerberg contacted Fauci about "a few ideas of ways we could help you get your message out," estimating that Facebook's still-under-wraps Coronavirus Information Hub could reach "200+ million Americans, 2.5 billion people worldwide" and offering to do a livestreamed Q&A with Fauci to "use my large following on the platform (100 million followers) to get authoritative information out as well". The final "interesting" idea Zuckerberg pitched — one that NIH Office of Communications and Government Relations Director Courtney Billet excitedly told Fauci was "an even bigger deal" — was unfortunately completely redacted in the FOIA response, citing Exemption (b)(4), which "applies to confidential information submitted to the government by a person and for which disclosure may reasonably be expected to impair the legitimate commercial, financial, business, or research interests of that person." Two days later, Fauci informed Billet, "I will write to or call Mark and tell him that I am interested in doing this [Facebook Live Q&A, conducted on Mar 19, 2020]. I will then tell him that you will get for him the name of the USG point of contact [regarding Zuckerberg's redacted even-bigger-deal idea]. I agree it should be Bill Hall [HHS Deputy Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs for Public Health] who could then turf [turn?] to the White House Comms if he wishes."

Submission + - SPAM: Radar Data Confirms USS Omaha Was Surrounded By Up To 9 Unidentified Objects

Submitted by alaskana98
alaskana98 writes: On July 14, 2019 something odd happened off the coast of San Diego. In a story from the website "Mystery Wire", a video shows the USS Omaha's x-band radar systems tracking up to 9 unknown flying objects at once. Allegedly the orb-like object previously filmed dropping into or disappearing near the surface of the ocean, also taken from the Omaha, was part of this event.

While the radar footage shows up to 9 objects surrounding the Omaha, filmmaker Jeremy Corbell, who obtained the video, states that this was but a small depiction of a much larger event: "But we’re talking about up to 100 targets at one time, out in this area, swarming nine different warships, all with a very similar thing going on where there is one stationary above each vessel, and then others swarming around, kind of playing with like, massive, massive lights on.”

A portion of the transcript from the video reveals bewildered radar operators trying to track the objects:

[intercom] “CSM TAO Maintain track, maintain track as best you can.”
“Track 781 just sped up to 46 knots. 50 knots. Closing in.”
“138 knots. Holy s***. They’re going fast. Oh, it’s turning around.”
“That one’s pretty much perfectly zero zero zero relative, right?”
“Yeah.”
“263 at 3 miles. 55 knots, speed.”
Link to Original Source

Submission + - How to negotiate with ransomware hackers (newyorker.com)

Submitted by jhylkema
jhylkema writes: In a lengthy New Yorker article, self-described "ransomware negotiator" Kurtis Minder, 44, discusses what to do when your company gets hit with a ransomware attack. The FBI says not to pay, but the City of Atlanta spent 20 times the demanded $50,000 ransom on digital forensics and system rebuilding. Is paying a ransom abetting crime?

Submission + - The origin of COVID: Did people or nature open Pandora's box at Wuhan? (thebulletin.org) 1

Submitted by berghem
berghem writes: An in depth article on the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists details how COVID could have been created in the Wuhan virology lab and then escaped — and all this using USA scientific funding and French training. Interesting highlights from the paper include biological clues on the origin of COVID19 in the very sequence of its RNA:

1. the presence of a furin cleavage site, a formation previously unheard of in SARS-related beta-coronaviruses but previously used to increase virus infectiousness in made made viruses: “At least 11 gain-of-function experiments, adding a furin site to make a virus more infective, are published in the open literature, including [by] Dr. Zhengli Shi, head of coronavirus research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.”

2. a specific genetic sequence in the RNA, typically associated with human genetic material rather than viral one: "Human cells like to designate arginine with the codons CGT, CGC or CGG. But CGG is coronavirus’s least popular codon for arginine. ... how did SARS2 acquire a pair of arginine codons that are favored by human cells but not by coronaviruses?".

Other clues as to the origin of the virus are the lack of intermediate variants of the virus, which unleashed its explosive infectiveness onto a large city in Northern China (far from the caves in the South of China where Coronaviruses-hosting bats are known to live) as well as its quoted poor ability to infect bats.

Comment UI failure (Score -1) 194

by johnck (#61444602) Attached to: Firefox 89 Arrives With Controversial Proton Interface

I wish someone would do a documentary on the failure of UI design post 2010-ish. It's like every industry everywhere became intent on Hold-My-Beering yet another brain dead design made by perhaps some of the most untalented craftsmen to talk the planet.

The new Firefox interface style stands in a long line of UI failures going back to Microsoft's Metro design, proof that some people need to be fired and publicly shamed for their sheer lack of talent and propensity to suck horribly in life at virtually everything they attempt.

Comment benefits (Score -1, Troll) 203

by johnck (#61437106) Attached to: Millions Can Now Run Linux GUI Apps in Windows 10

For everyone who would immediately think this is just Microsoft attempting to subvert Linux desktop users, consider that many developers might not care at all about linux support for their application because of the headache of setting up a build environment and targeted hardware. This drastically cuts down barriers to entry of having a fully supported linux build of anything from video games to utility software.

Even better, it may start to treat people who suffer from the mental illness that leads one to prefer open source desktop environments. The fact remains that if you actually like Gnome, you should be committed to a mental institution and chemically castrated, and then studied for what causes your intense brand of mental retardation so that it doesn't spread to the rest of the human race (that is if Gnome users can still be thought of as human).

Comment Vampire scum (Score -1, Troll) 125

You know Bitcoin has succeeded when the value sucking vampires from which there's no escape want their cut. Hopefully soon the IRS can be dissolved and its employees publicly identified and deported along with their families. There's no place for the IRS in civilization.

Comment Notepads and VSC (Score 1) 148

by johnck (#61402110) Attached to: What is your preferred word processor?

I use Windows 10 with WSL and I love Notepads (quite possibly the only good UWP app in existence) for non-code stuff, and for anything code/script in windows or linux I very much enjoy Visual Studio Code just by whipping out a code . to pick up the directory then kill the window after I'm done.

Submission + - AT&T Preparing To Spin Off And Merge WarnerMedia With Discovery (bloomberg.com)

Submitted by phalse phace
phalse phace writes: AT&T Inc. is preparing to spin off its media business and merge it with Discovery Inc. in a tax-friendly deal, according to people with knowledge of the matter, a surprise reversal for a company that spent $85 billion to acquire the assets less than three years ago.

The idea is to combine Discovery’s reality-TV empire with AT&T’s vast media holdings, building a business that would be a formidable competitor to Netflix Inc. and Walt Disney Co. Any deal would mark a major shift in AT&T’s strategy after years of working to assemble telecommunications and media assets under one roof. AT&T gained some of the biggest brands in entertainment through its acquisition of Time Warner Inc., which was completed in 2018.

The deal would underscore the difficulty telecom companies like AT&T and Verizon Communications Inc. have had finding a payoff from their media operations. Through its WarnerMedia unit, AT&T owns CNN, HBO, Cartoon Network, TBS, TNT and the Warner Bros. studio. Discovery, backed by cable mogul John Malone, controls networks such as HGTV, Food Network, TLC and Animal Planet.

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