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Submission Summary: 0 pending, 137 declined, 80 accepted (217 total, 36.87% accepted)

Submission + - Netflix documentary: Titan devles into OceanGate disaster (netflix.com)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: A new documentary released last week on Netflix goes into detail about events leading up to the destruction of OceanGate's submersible, Titan that imploded on June 18, 2023 while attempting to visit the wreckage of the RMS Titanic off the coast of Newfoundland. The Titan used a carbon-fiber hull instead of more traditional materials like steel or titanium.

Through exclusive access to whistleblower testimony, pivotal audio recordings, and footage from the company’s early days, the film provides an unprecedented look at the technical challenges, moral dilemmas, and shockingly poor decisions that culminated in the catastrophic expedition.

Some highlights:

  • Titan's original carbon-fiber hull had been replaced with a second carbon-fiber one after the first one developed noticeable cracks.
  • Three scale models of the second hull failed tests. OceanGate decided to manufacture the second hull regardless of these failures.
  • Loud pops were heard in many dives; CEO Stockton Rush dismissed these as "seasoning".
  • Many employees raised numerous safety concerns. They were fired like lead pilot and head of marine operations, David Lochridge. Or they quit.
  • Some employees like Emily Hammermeister wanted to quit earlier, but external conditions like the COVID pandemic made it difficult. After the scale models failed, she refused to bolt anyone in the future submersible. She was given the two options of being fired or quit; she quit in the middle of the pandemic.
  • Rush's blindness to inconvenient facts: After the crack was discovered, Rush questioned Director of Engineering, Tony Nissen, about why Nissen did not anticipate the possibility of a crack. Nissen: "I wrote you a report that showed you it was there." Nissen had warned repeatedly that the hull's fibers were breaking (the pops) with each dive. Rush: "Well, one of us has to go."
  • Poor decisions by Rush extended beyond engineering decisions. After Rush fired Lochridge for raising safety concerns , Rush wanted Bonnie Carl, the company's accountant, to be his replacement pilot. While Carl was an experienced scuba diver, she quit as she was extremely uncomfortable being a pilot. Her explanation: "Are you nuts? I'm an accountant."

Submission + - GamersNexus: Effect of 32-bit PhysX removal on older games (youtube.com)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: Gamer's Nexus performed tests on the effect of removing legacy PhysX on the newest generation of NVidia cards with older games, and the results are not good. With PhysX on, the latest generation NVidia was slightly beaten by a GTX 580 (released 2010) on some games and handily beaten by a GTX 980 (2014) on some games.

With the launch of the 5000 series, NVidia dropped 32-bit CUDA support going forward. Part of that change was dropping support for 32-bit PhysX. As a result older titles that used it would perform poorly with 5000 series cards as it would default to CPU for calculations. Even the latest CPUs do not perform as well as 15 year old GPUs when it comes to PhysX.

The best performance on the 5080 was to turn PhysX off however that would remove many effects like smoke, breaking glass, and rubble from scenes. The second best option was to pair a 5000 series with an older card like a 980 to just handle the PhysX computations.

Submission + - Elon Musk claims of SSN fraud shows his ignorance of data (usatoday.com)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: Elon Musk, the self-proclaimed top Path of Exile player, has tweeted his claims of fraud with the Social Security Administration records. Among his claims "cursory examination of Social Security showed people in there that are about 150 years old" and "just learned that the social security database is not de-duplicated, meaning you can have the same SSN many times over". His first claim is regarding the fact that there are 18.9M individuals in the database who were born before 1920 but not marked as dead. These are "vampires" according to Musk who are receiving benefits. The actual explanation is that the SSA has never received proof of death to flag these individual as dead. Especially who died before the digital age, these individuals' death records may not exist. Being marked as alive in the database; however, does not mean that these individuals are receiving benefits.

An audit in 2015 found that exactly 266 individuals over the age of 112 were receiving benefits. Of those 253 were found to be not actually over 112 with only 13 individuals recorded with the correct age. Social Security benefits however terminate at age 115.

As for his second claim of duplicate SSNs, without further context, it is difficult to assert that duplicate SSNs in a database is even a problem. For some types of data like contribution and payment records, duplicate SSNs is normal as one should expect multiple records can exist for one unique SSN.

Submission + - Supreme Court rejects Martin "Pharma Bro" Shkreli's price hike appeal (arstechnica.com) 1

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: The Supreme Court rejected the case of Martin Shkreli (Federal Trade Commission et al v. Martin Shkreli) without comment. Known as "Pharma Bro", Shkreli is infamous for raising the price of Daraprim, a life-saving drug used to treat toxoplasmosis for decades, from between $13.50 and $17.50 to $750 back in 2015. The FTC joined with seven states sued for antitrust claims including illegal anticompetitive grounds. In January 2022, U.S. District Court Judge Denise Cote ruled in the FTC's favor and ordered a fine of $64.6 million in disgorgement from Shkreli. An appeals court agreed in January 2024, and Shkreli appealed to the Supreme Court. Shkreli argued that the disgorgement fine was unjust as it was his company that raised the prices and not him even though he was founder and owner of the company.

This is the second rejection by the Supreme Court as they previously rejected his appeal of his securities fraud conviction in 2017. In that case Shkreli was convicted of running a ponzi like scheme at his former company, MSMB Capital Management and Retrophin. He was ordered to surrender $7.36 million in that case and agreed to forfeit the WuTang album, Once Upon a Time in Shaolin as part of that case. The album is a one of a kind 31-track CD that included a 174 page leather-bound book with lyrics and background.

This is not the last of legal troubles for Shkreli as he is being currently sued by PleasrDAO, a digital art collective who purchased the album in 2021. Shkreli purchased the album in November 2015 for $2 million with the agreement that that it could not be commercially sold until 2103. However, Shkreli made backup digital copies and has threatened to publicly release the album. Federal Judge Judge Pamela K. Chen granted PleasrDAO's preliminary injunction that Shkreli turn over all copies. Shkreli argued he was not obliged to turn over all copies to prosecutors but only the physical copy back in 2017.

Submission + - Supreme Court won't hear Twitter appeal over Trump subpoena (apnews.com)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: The Supreme Court turned down without comment an appeal by X (formerly Twitter) over a subpoena of Trump's messages and metadata on the platform. Special counsel Jack Smith sent a search warrant to Twitter for all messages and metadata of the former President regarding his private account. Fearing destruction of evidence, one condition of the subpoena was that Trump was not to be told about the search. Twitter challenged the subpoena arguing that it was their First Amendment right to tell the former President about the investigation as well as Trump's private account could be considered Executive Privilege.

The DC Court rejected Twitter's challenge and also fined them $350,000 for contempt of court in failing to respond to the subpoena in a timely manner. Higher courts agreed with the lower court on the rejection and the fine. The subpoena was disclosed after Trump was charged with felonies last summer. Twitter appealed all the way to the Supreme Court. While SCOTUS did not indicate why they rejected the appeal, it was likely because any appeal was moot since the subpoena had already been disclosed to Trump.

Submission + - Level 1 Techs: Intel 13th and 14th Core i9 problems may be widespread (level1techs.com) 1

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: Upon hearing the issues with Intel 13th and 14th Gen Core i9 processors crashing during games, Level 1 Techs did some investigation on their own and found the problem might be more widespread than just limited to gamers pushing their computers. Wendell from Level 1 Techs posted a video of their investigation and analysis. Combing through different crash report data, what they have found is that Intel 13900K and 14900K processors have a much higher incidence of crashes than comparable AMD CPUs or even Intel's own 12900K. While initially a factor was believed to be gamers overclocking their CPUs for games, their analysis shows that is not the only population that is affected and that the problem is not solved by removing the overclocking settings.

Initially it was believed the problem was some gamers were overclocking their CPUs and pushing performance beyond recommended settings. Level 1 Techs found that there are a significant number of crashes when 13900K and 14900K CPUs are used in datacenter servers. In a server environment, settings are conservative to favor stability over performance, and server hardware like motherboards (W680) and ECC memory have no options to overclock. The crash problem is pronounced enough that at least one datacenter service provider is charging premium support for those two CPU generations as they have replaced many Intel CPUs. That provider is strongly recommending that their customers switch to AMD's 7950x platform instead.

Additionally, Level 1 Techs have found that recommended changes like lowering settings like in the BIOS only helps somewhat but does not solve the problem. The initial culprit was thought to be motherboard manufacturers that pushed their BIOS settings too far and that reverting to more conservative settings would solve the problem. As datacenters run both Windows and Linux, the problem could not be attributed to OS settings or code. One subset of servers that used single DIMM configuration had slightly better stability than those that used dual DIMM configuration.

In testing their own machines, Level 1 Techs found that the crashes were random even when running the latest BIOS. Sometimes a specific test in a suite would fail but on the next attempt would pass yet another test in the suite would fail. Lowering memory speed and disabling the E-cores also did not solve the problem. Replacing the CPU appears to be the only way to solve the problem at the moment and that solution may be temporary as the replacement CPU may need to be replaced in the future.

Submission + - Tattoo artist Kat Von D wins copyright lawsuit over Miles Davis photo (billboard.com)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: Jurors on Friday, January 26, 2024 ruled in favor of celebrity tattoo artist Kat Von D (real name Katherine von Drachenberg) in a copyright lawsuit regarding a photo of Miles Davis in that her use of the photo was not copyright infringement. The photographer of the photo, Jeffrey Sedlik, sued Von D in February 2021 after she used the photo as the basis for a tattoo she inked on a friend. Kat Von D, who gained fame in the reality shows about tattoo artists "LA Ink" and "Miami Ink", put the tattoo on her friend's arm in 2017 as a gift. The jury found that the tattoo was not "substantially similar" to the photo and were also persuaded that the non-commercial nature of the work meant her use of the photo would be fair use. The plaintiff Sedilk said he is planning to appeal the ruling arguing it contradicts the Supreme Court ruling in Warhol Foundation vs Goldsmith where the artist Andy Warhol made a silkscreen print of Lynn Goldsmith's photo of Prince. The main difference pointed out by Von D's lawyers is that Warhol charged $10,000 for his print whereas Von D did not charge her friend for the tattoo and that is was closer to "fan art".

Submission + - Billy Mitchell and Twin Galaxies settle lawsuits on Donkey Kong world records (gamesradar.com)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: Billy Mitchell and Twin Galaxies announced they have settled their lawsuits regarding the Donkey Kong high scores. In April 2018, Twin Galaxies removed Billy Mitchell from their list of official scores in citing anomalies in the official submissions of his Donkey Kong scores. Twin Galaxies believed that Mitchell used a MAME emulator instead of original unmodified hardware and banned him from further submissions. In 2019, Mitchell sued for defamation. After 5 years, this settlement ends Mitchell's lawsuit as well as Twin Galaxies' counter suit. Twin Galaxies will not reinstate Mitchell's scores on the official list and will not allow him to submit new scores. Twin Galaxies will create a web accessible database that contains archived, historical scores. This database reflects all high scores when the current owner bought Twin Galaxies in 2014. It also contains entries of other players that have since been removed due to allegations of cheating like Todd Rogers. Mitchell is treating this as a win in Twitter in that Twin Galaxies "reinstated all my world records".

Submission + - United and Alaska find loose parts on Boeing 737 Max 9 door plugs (theguardian.com)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: Following the incident on Alaska Airlines 1282 on Friday where a door plug blew off mid-flight, the FAA ordered all Boeing 737 Max 9 airplanes to be grounded and the door plugs to be inspected. Both United Airlines and Alaska Airlines have reported finding loose parts on their planes with United specifically listing "bolts” where Alaska only referring to "hardware". Both airlines have repaired the situation and put the planes back into service. It remains to be answered why the parts were loose and what further issues could arise.

Submission + - Microsoft releases software to remove unwanted HP printer software (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: Microsoft has released a new software tool to remove printer software from HP that was installed without user permission or system need. A few weeks ago, users noticed that Windows update installed HP printer software even if they did not have HP printers or printers at all. Affecting Windows 10 and 11, consumers reported that this update sometimes caused problems as it could rename their non-HP printers as HP printers causing some printing features to be inaccessible. Microsoft has not disclosed the root cause of the issue.

Submission + - Coinbase will completely remove Bitcoin SV by January 9 (decrypt.co)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: Coinbase, America's largest cryptocurrency exchange, has announced they are completely removing all support for Bitcoin SV by January 9. All current holders of that cryptocurrency on the exchange will need to withdraw or the assets will be liquidated after that date. Bitcoin SV is not the original Bitcoin but a fork supported by Craig Wright. This removal follows a delisting in 2021 after the cryptocurrency suffered a "51% attack". Since that time clients have not been about to buy or sell Bitcoin SV on the exchange.

Submission + - nChain CEO resigns, doubts that employee Craig Wright is Satoshi (forbes.com)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: Christen Ager-Hanssen has resigned his CEO position at nChain Global with a public declaration that Ager-Hanssen doubts that Wright is Satoshi. "I’m today myself convinced that Dr Craig Wright is NOT Satoshi . . .The board didn’t take action and my job became clearly untenable." nChain Group has not only backed Wright's fork Bitcoin SV but employs him as a Chief Scientist. The former CEO is convinced that Wright has manipulated court documents in an attempt to deceive everyone. Ager-Hanssen also leaked emails showing the company’s billionaire backer Calvin Ayre also shares his doubts.

Submission + - Bitcoin developers allege Craig Wright never owned coins in lawsuit (coindesk.com)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: In 2021 Craig Wright sued 12 Bitcoin developers sued who refused help him recover 111,000 Bitcoins he claimed were lost in a hack. His company Tulip Trading wanted the developers to put in a backdoor mechanism in Bitcoin that would override the ownership of the coins and it was the developers "fiduciary duty" to assist him. The developers allege that Tulip and Wright never owned the coins and the evidence of ownership provided is "fabricated".

Submission + - YouTuber Trevor Jacob pleads guilty to obstruction in faked plane crash (justice.gov)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: YouTuber Trevor Jacob has pled guilty to felony federal obstruction of an investigation for removing and destroying wreckage of his airplane that he intentionally crashed in November 2021 for online YouTube views. Maximum sentence is 20 years.

On November 24, 2021 Jacob was flying solo from Lompoc City Airport to Mammoth Lakes, California. He reported to the FAA that he had engine trouble and had to abandon the plane using a parachute. After the FAA launched an active investigation, Jacob lied about not knowing the location of wreckage for the next several weeks despite his video footage that he found the wreckage shortly after landing on the ground. On December 10, 2021 Jacob and a friend lifted the wreckage away from the national forest crash site using a helicopter. Jacob transported the wreckage back to Lompoc City Airport with a truck. He then cut up and disposed of the wreckage over then next several days using the airport's trash bins.

On December 23,2021 Jacob posted a YouTube video titled, "I Crashed My Airplane" which showed his account of engine trouble and the crash. Keen viewers were immediately skeptical of Jacob's account of a flight "emergency" noting he had multiple cameras recording the event including a selfie stick and that Jacob was wearing a parachute before the engine trouble occurred. Pilots commented how Jacob failed to follow basic procedures like attempting to restart the plane or contacting air traffic control with a mayday before ditching the plane. Largely based on the his YouTube video, the FAA revoked his pilot's license in April 2022.

Submission + - UK court: Craig Wright cannot copyright Bitcoin file format (decrypt.co)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: UK Judge James Mellor has thrown out Craig Wright's cases against Bitcoin derivatives like Bitcoin Cash as Wright cannot claim copyright on the Bitcoin file format. Wright had sued forks of Bitcoin claiming they breached his copyrights to prevent them from operating. The judge disagreed noting that Wright had failed to meet a requirement of copyright called "fixation" detailing where/when/how the original expression was first recorded somewhere in any media.

“Whilst I accept that the law of copyright will continue to face challenges with new digital technologies, I do not see any prospect of the law as currently stated and understood in the caselaw allowing copyright protection of subject-matter which is not expressed or fixed anywhere.” wrote Judge Mellor

In other words Wright has failed to show any evidence that he wrote down the file format somewhere to claim that he created the file format. This is not the first time Wright has failed to produce credible evidence in a court case: in a Oslo, Norway case last year Wright claimed he destroyed a hard drive in 2016 containing the Nakomoto original keys despite telling a US court in 2020 that he was waiting on the same keys to be delivered by a special courier. Those keys were later ruled to be fictitious.

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