Mozilla

Mozilla Moves To Monetize Thunderbird, Transfers Project To New Subsidiary (zdnet.com) 108

The Mozilla Foundation announced today that it was moving its Thunderbird email client to a new subsidiary named the MZLA Technologies Corporation. From a report: Mozilla said that Thunderbird will continue to remain free and open source, but by moving the project away from its foundation into a corporate entity they will be able to monetize the product and pay for its development easier than before. Currently, Thunderbird is primarily being kept alive through charitable donations from the product's userbase. "Moving to MZLA Technologies Corporation will not only allow the Thunderbird project more flexibility and agility, but will also allow us to explore offering our users products and services that were not possible under the Mozilla Foundation," said Philipp Kewisch, Mozilla Product Manager. "The move will allow the project to collect revenue through partnerships and non-charitable donations, which in turn can be used to cover the costs of new products and services," Kewisch added.
The Almighty Buck

US Files Lawsuits Over Robocall Scams, Cites 'Massive Financial Losses' (reuters.com) 60

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: The U.S. government on Tuesday sued five U.S. companies and three individuals, alleging they were behind hundreds of millions of fraudulent robocalls that scammed elderly Americans and others into "massive financial losses." The U.S. Justice Department lawsuits said most of the calls originated in India and used voice over internet protocol (VoIP) carriers, which use internet connections instead of traditional copper phone lines.

The companies named in the suits include Tollfreedeals.com, Global Voicecom Inc., Global Telecommunication Services Inc and KAT Telecom Inc. The Justice Department said the robocalls led to "massive financial losses to elderly and vulnerable victims across the nation." U.S. Attorney Richard Donoghue, who overseas the Eastern District of New York office, said that for the first time, the Justice Department was targeting "U.S.-based enablers" and seeking temporary restraining orders to block further calls. The government said the firms were warned numerous times they were carrying fraudulent robocalls.

Communications

2 Satellites Will Narrowly Avoid Colliding Over Pittsburgh On Wednesday (space.com) 85

Two defunct satellites traveling at 32,800 mph will narrowly miss colliding with one another over Pittsburgh on Wednesday evening. "If the two satellites were to collide, the debris could endanger spacecraft around the planet," reports Space.com. From the report: It will be a near miss: LeoLabs, the satellite-tracking company that made the prediction, said they should pass between 50 feet and 100 feet apart (15 to 30 meters) at 6:39:35 p.m. local time. One is called the Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS). Launched in 1983, it was the first infrared space telescope and operated for less than a year, according to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The other is called the Gravity Gradient Stabilization Experiment (GGSE-4), and was a U.S. Air Force experiment launched in 1967 to test spacecraft design principles, according to NASA. The two satellites are unlikely to actually slam into each other, said LeoLabs CEO Dan Ceperley. But predictions of the precise movements of fairly small, fast objects over vast distances is a challenge, Ceperley told Live Science. (LeoLabs' business model is selling improvements on those predictions.)

If they did collide, "there would be thousands of pieces of new debris that would stay in orbit for decades. Those new clouds of debris would threaten any satellites operating near the collision altitude and any spacecraft transiting through on its way to other destinations. The new debris [would] spread out and form a debris belt around the Earth," Ceperley said.

Security

7 Years Later, Emergency Alert Systems Still Unpatched, Vulnerable (securityledger.com) 24

chicksdaddy writes: The Security Ledger is reporting that more than 50 Emergency Alert System (EAS) devices made by Monroe Electronics (now Digital Alert Systems) are un-patched and accessible from the public Internet, seven years after security researchers alerted the public about security flaws in the devices. More than 50 EAS deployments across the United States still use a shared SSH key, a security vulnerability first discovered and reported by IOActive in 2013, according to a warning posted by the security researcher Shawn Merdinger on January 19, seven years after the initial vulnerability report was issued.

Security Ledger viewed the exposed web interfaces for Monroe/Digital Alerts Systems EAS hardware used by two FM broadcasters in Texas and an exposed EAS belonging to a broadband cable provider in North Carolina. Also publicly accessible: EAS systems for two stations (FM and AM) serving the Island of Hawaii. Residents there received a false EAS alert about an incoming ICBM in 2018. That incident was found to be the result of human error but prompted the FCC to issue new guidance about securing EAS systems. Digital Alert Systems said it is aware of the problem and is contacting the customers whose gear is exposed. However, a search using the Shodan search engine suggests that few have taken steps to remove their EAS systems from the public Internet in the past week. Security Ledger is withholding the names of the broadcasters whose EAS systems were exposed for security reasons. None of the stations contacted for the story was able to provide comment prior to publication.

Medicine

White House Tells Airlines It May Suspend All China-US Flights Amid Coronavirus Outbreak (cnbc.com) 81

The White House has told airline executives it's considering suspending flights from China to the U.S. amid an escalating outbreak of a new coronavirus that has infected thousands of people across the world. CNBC reports: The Trump administration is looking at a variety of measures to contain the fast-spreading virus that has infected roughly 4,700 people across the globe, U.S. health officials told reporters on a conference call Tuesday. White House officials called executives at major U.S. carriers on Tuesday, telling them that a temporary ban on China flights is on the table, according to people familiar with those conversations.

United Airlines, which has the most service of the U.S. airlines to Hong Kong and mainland China with about a dozen daily flights, on Tuesday announced it would cancel dozens of flights next month to Hong Kong and mainland China as the outbreak worsens. The Chicago-based airline said it has experienced a âoesignificant decline in demand for travel to China.â United and its rivals Delta and American are waiving cancellation and change fees for travelers booked to China. The restrictions could affect flights into and out of China, as well as airports across the United States, administration officials said. They declined to be named because no final decision has been made.

Privacy

Clearview AI Is Struggling To Address Complaints As Its Legal Issues Mount (buzzfeednews.com) 19

An anonymous reader quotes a report from BuzzFeed News: Clearview AI, the facial recognition company that claims to have amassed a database of more than 3 billion photos scraped from Facebook, YouTube, and millions of other websites, is scrambling to deal with calls for bans from advocacy groups and legal threats. These troubles come after news reports exposed its questionable data practices and misleading statements about working with law enforcement. Following stories published in the New York Times and BuzzFeed News, the Manhattan-based startup received cease-and-desist letters from Twitter and the New Jersey attorney general. It was also sued in Illinois in a case seeking class-action status.

Despite its legal woes, Clearview continues to contradict itself, according to documents obtained by BuzzFeed News that are inconsistent with what the company has told the public. In one example, the company, whose code of conduct states that law enforcement should only use its software for criminal investigations, encouraged officers to use it on their friends and family members. In the aftermath of revelations about its technology, Clearview has tried to clean up its image by posting informational webpages, creating a blog, and trotting out surrogates for media interviews, including one in which an investor claimed Clearview was working with "over a thousand independent law enforcement agencies." Previously, Clearview had stated that the number was around 600. Clearview has also tried to allay concerns that its technology could be abused or used outside the scope of police investigations. In a code of conduct that the company published on its site earlier this month, it said its users should "only use the Services for law enforcement or security purposes that are authorized by their employer and conducted pursuant to their employment." It bolstered that idea with a blog post on Jan. 23, which stated, "While many people have advised us that a public version would be more profitable, we have rejected the idea."
"Clearview exists to help law enforcement agencies solve the toughest cases, and our technology comes with strict guidelines and safeguards to ensure investigators use it for its intended purpose only," the post stated.

But in a November email, a company representative encouraged a police officer to use the software on himself and his acquaintances. "Have you tried taking a selfie with Clearview yet?" the email read. "It's the best way to quickly see the power of Clearview in real time. Try your friends or family. Or a celebrity like Joe Montana or George Clooney. Your Clearview account has unlimited searches. So feel free to run wild with your searches."
Education

US Colleges Are Trying To Install Location Tracking Apps On Students' Phones (theverge.com) 139

Some U.S. colleges are now apparently requiring students to install a location tracking app to track attendance. Sean Hollister writes for The Verge: The Kansas City Star reported that at the University of Missouri, new students "won't be given a choice" of whether to install the SpotterEDU app, which uses Apple's iBeacons to broadcast a Bluetooth signal that can help the phone figure out whether a student is actually in a room. But a university spokesperson told Campus Reform on Sunday that only athletes are technically required to use the app, and a new statement from the university on Monday not only claims that it's "completely optional" for students, but that the app's being piloted with fewer than 2 percent of the student body.

What the reports do agree on: the app uses local Bluetooth signals, not GPS, so it's probably not going to be very useful to track students outside of school. "No GPS tracking is enabled, meaning the technology cannot locate the students once they leave class," reads part of the university's statement. SpotterEDU isn't just used at the University of Missouri, though -- it's being tested at nearly 40 schools, company founder and former college basketball coach Rick Carter told The Washington Post in December. The Post's story makes it sound remarkably effective, with one Syracuse professor attesting that classes have never been so full, with more than 90 percent attendance. But that same professor attested that an earlier version of the app did have access to GPS coordinates, if only for a student to proactively share their location with a teacher.
The Post reports that Degree Analytics is also being used in an additional 19 schools, but unlike SpotterEDU, it uses Wi-Fi signals instead of Bluetooth.

The New York Times also reported in September of a similar app from a company called FanMaker that provides "loyalty points" to students who stick around to watch college sports games at the stadium instead of skipping out. That app is in use at 40 schools, the Times wrote.
Businesses

Apple Posts Record Revenue As iPhone Sales Smash Expectations (cnbc.com) 47

Apple reported revenue and profit significantly higher than what Wall Street analysts expected. According to CNBC, "Apple's revenue was up 9% to $91.8 billion," thanks in large part to iPhone revenue, "which was up 8% on the strength of new iPhone models." The report also that Apple's "Other Products" did $10 billion in sales during the quarter, and that Apple Watch, AirPods, and Beats headphones alone would be a "Fortune 150" company. Here's how Apple did compared to Refinitiv consensus estimates: EPS: $4.99 vs. $4.55 estimated
Revenue: $91.8 billion vs. $88.50 billion estimated
iPhone revenue: $55.96 billion vs. $51.62 billion estimated
Services revenue: $12.7 billion vs. $13.07 billion estimated
Other products revenue: $10 billion vs. $9.52 billion estimate
Gross margin: 38.4% vs. 38.1% estimated
Q2 revenue guidance: $63 billion to $67 billion vs. $62.45 billion
Q2 margin guidance: 38% to 39% vs. 38.2%
"Apple's range of guidance for next quarter is wider than typical," the report concludes, "a change that Cook attributed to uncertainty caused by the deadly coronavirus, which has shut down travel in parts of China."
AI

Google To Translate and Transcribe Conversations In Real Time (cnet.com) 28

At a press event in San Francisco today, Google announced a feature that'll let people use their phones to both transcribe and translate a conversation in real time into a language that isn't being spoken. The tool will be available for the Google Translate app in the coming months, said Bryan Lin, an engineer on the Translate team. CNET reports: Right now the feature is being tested in several languages, including Spanish, German and French. Lin said the computing will take place on Google's servers and not on people's devices. The search giant announced the tool at a press event in San Francisco, where the company showed off other artificial intelligence projects, including initiatives in health tech and touch controls for fabrics.

The search giant has also talked a lot lately about how AI should be developed in the future. Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said last week that he thinks AI should be regulated, to prevent the potential negative consequences of things like deepfakes and facial recognition. "There is no question in my mind that artificial intelligence needs to be regulated," Pichai wrote in an op-ed for the Financial Times. "It is too important not to. The only question is how to approach it." [...] At the event, Google also previewed a handful of other AI initiatives. One project is called I/O Braid, which lets people control a device by interacting with a wire. For example, you could start, stop and control the volume of music on your phone by twisting or pinching the fabric wire of the earbuds. Another project, part of Google Health, was aimed at trying to detect anemia in patients.

Privacy

Facebook Rolls Out Privacy Tool To Manage How You're Tracked Across the Web (cnet.com) 49

Facebook has been determined to give people privacy controls while they're on the social network, but on Tuesday, it rolled out a long-promised tool that hopes to give people control from the social network. From a report: In a blog post on Data Privacy Day, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that the "Off-Facebook Activity" tool would finally be launched globally, a tool that allows people to manage how Facebook tracks them across the internet. Zuckerberg had promised this feature since May 2018, which at the time he called a "Clear History" button. While it had slow roll-outs around the world, starting last August, it should be available now to the 2.4 billion people who use Facebook every month, Zuckerberg said. In the blog post, he explained the delay was because "we had to rebuild some of our systems to make this possible." "Other businesses send us information about your activity on their sites and we use that information to show you ads that are relevant to you," Zuckerberg said in the post. "Now you can see a summary of that information and clear it from your account if you want to."
Windows

iPad Launch Blindsided Windows Team, Reveals Former Microsoft Executive (twitter.com) 109

The launch of the iPad ten years ago was a big surprise to everyone in the industry -- including to Microsoft executives. Steven Sinofsky, the former President of the Windows Division at Microsoft, shares Microsoft's perspective as well as those of the other industry figures and press on the iPad: The announcement 10 years ago today of the "magical" iPad was clearly a milestone in computing. It was billed to be the "next" computer. For me, managing Windows, just weeks after the launch of Microsoft's "latest creation" Windows 7, it was a as much a challenge as magical. Given that Star Trek had tablets it was inevitable that the form factor would make it to computing (yes, the dynabook...). Microsoft had been working for more than 10 years starting with "WinPad" through Tablet PC. We were fixated on Win32, Pen, and more. The success of iPhone (140K apps & 3B downloads announced that day) blinded us at Microsoft as to where Apple was heading. Endless rumors of Apple's tablet *obviously* meant a pen computer based on Mac. Why not? The industry chased this for 20 years. That was our context. The press, however, was fixated on Apple lacking an "answer" (pundits seem to demand answers) to Netbooks -- those small, cheap, Windows laptops sweeping the world. Over 40 million sold. "What would Apple's response be?" We worried -- a cheap, pen-based, Mac. Sorry Harry!

Jobs said that a new computer needed to be better at some things, better than an iPhone/iPod and better than a laptop. Then he just went right at Netbooks answering what could be better at these things. "Some people have thought that that's a Netbook." (The audience joined in a round of laughter.) Then he said, "The problem is ... Netbooks aren't better at anything ... They're slow. They have low quality displays ... and they run clunky old PC software ... They're just cheap laptops." "Cheap laptops" ... from my perch that was a good thing. I mean inexpensive was a better word. But we knew that Netbooks (and ATOM) were really just a way to make use of the struggling efforts to make low-power, fanless, intel chips for phones. A brutal takedown of 40M units. Sitting in a Le Corbusier chair, he showed the "extraordinary" things his new device did, from browsing to email to photos and videos and more. The real kicker was that it achieved 10 hours of battery life -- unachievable in PCs struggling for 4 hours with their whirring fans.

There was no stylus..no pen. How could one input or be PRODUCTIVE? PC brains were so wedded to a keyboard, mouse, and pen alternative that the idea of being productive without those seemed fanciful. Also instant standby, no viruses, rotate-able, maintained quality over time... As if to emphasize the point, Schiller showed "rewritten" versions of Apple's iWork apps for the iPad. The iPad would have a word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation graphics. Rounding out the demonstration, the iPad would also sync settings with iTune -- content too. This was still early in the travails of iCloud but really a game changer Windows completely lacked except in enterprise with crazy server infrastructure or "consumer" Live apps. iPad had a 3G modem BECAUSE it was built on the iPhone. If you could figure out the device drivers and software for a PC, you'd need a multi-hundred dollar USB modem and a $60/month fee at best. The iPad made this a $29.99 option on AT&T and a slight uptick in purchase price. Starting at $499, iPad was a shot right across the consumer laptop. Consumer laptops were selling over 100 million units a year! Pundits were shocked at the price. I ordered mine arriving in 60/90 days.

At CES weeks earlier, there were the earliest tablets -- made with no help from Google a few fringe Chinese ODMs were shopping hacky tablets called "Mobile Internet Devices" or "Media Tablets". Samsung's Galaxy was 9 months away. Android support (for 4:3 screens) aways. The first looks and reviews a bit later were just endless (and now tiresome) commentary on how the iPad was really for "consumption" and not productivity. There were no files. No keyboard. No mouse. No overlapping windows. Can't write code! In a literally classically defined case of disruption, iPad didn't do those things but what it did, it did so much better not only did people prefer it but they changed what they did in order to use it. Besides, email was the most used too and iPad was great for that. In first year 2010-2011 Apple sold 20 million iPads. That same year would turn out to be an historical high water mark for PCs (365M, ~180M laptops). Analysts had forecasted more than 500M PCs were now rapidly increasing tablet forecasts to 100s of million and dropping PC. The iPad and iPhone were soundly existential threats to Microsoft's core platform business.

Without a platform Microsoft controlled that developers sought out, the soul of the company was "missing." The PC had been overrun by browsers, a change 10 years in the making. PC OEMs were deeply concerned about a rise of Android and loved the Android model (no PC maker would ultimately be a major Android OEM, however). Even Windows Server was eclipsed by Linux and Open Source. The kicker for me, though, was that keyboard stand for the iPad. It was such a hack. Such an obvious "objection handler." But it was critically important because it was a clear reminder that the underlying operating system was "real" ...it was not a "phone OS". Knowing the iPhone and now iPad ran an robust OS under the hood, with a totally different "shell", interface model (touch), and app model (APIs and architecture) had massive implications for being the leading platform provider for computers. That was my Jan 27, 2010.
Further reading: The iPad's original software designer and program lead look back on the device's first 10 years.
United Kingdom

Huawei Allowed Limited Access To UK's 5G Networks as Britain Defies US Pressure (cnbc.com) 86

Britain will allow Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei to play a limited role in its next generation 5G mobile networks. From a report: The U.K. government said that Huawei will be restricted from being involved in "sensitive functions" in a network of features labeled as "core." There is also a limit in place on how much equipment networks can buy from one "high risk vendor" for a particular part of the infrastructure known as the Radio Access Network (RAN.) This is essentially the part of the network that hooks up your devices with the actual 5G signal. That cap is set at 35%. "The cap at 35% ensures the U.K. will not become nationally dependent on a high risk vendor while retaining competition in the market and allowing operators to continue to use two Radio Access Network (RAN) vendors," the U.K.'s National Cyber Security Centre said in its review of the country's telecommunications supply chain on Tuesday.
Privacy

Government Privacy Watchdog Under Pressure To Recommend Facial Recognition Ban (thehill.com) 31

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Hill: The Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB), an independent agency, is coming under increasing pressure to recommend the federal government stop using facial recognition. Forty groups, led by the Electronic Privacy Information Center, sent a letter Monday to the agency calling for the suspension of facial recognition systems "pending further review." "The rapid and unregulated deployment of facial recognition poses a direct threat to 'the precious liberties that are vital to our way of life,'" the advocacy groups wrote.

The PCLOB "has a unique responsibility, set out in statute, to assess technologies and polices that impact the privacy of Americans after 9-11 and to make recommendations to the President and executive branch," they wrote. The agency, created in 2004, advises the administration on privacy issues. The letter cited a recent New York Times report about Clearview AI, a company which claims to have a database of more than 3 billion photos and is reportedly collaborating with hundreds of police departments. It also mentioned a study by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, part of the Commerce Department, which found that the majority of facial recognition systems have "demographic differentials" that can worsen their accuracy based on a person's age, gender or race.

Music

Billie Eilish Won Multiple Grammys Using Budget Studio Gear, Logic Pro X (engadget.com) 137

Longtime Slashdot reader SpaceGhost writes: Per Engadget, Ms. Eilish and her older brother (Finneas O'Connell) produced her massively popular album When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? with minimal studio gear out of a bedroom studio in their parents' house. They used equipment that many aspiring artists could afford (about $1,000 worth of Yamaha monitors for instance, and at first a $100 microphone.) The 18-year-old singer swept all four of the night's biggest prizes -- Best New Artist, Song of the Year, Record of the Year and Album of the Year -- along with honors for Best Pop Vocal Album.

According to a Pro Sound Network interview with O'Connell, their production setup included a pair of $200 Yamaha HS5 nearfield monitors with a $450 H8S subwoofer, a Universal Audio Apollo 8 interface and Apple's Logic Pro X. The duo reportedly used to record with a $99 Audio Technica AT2020 mic. "The stems (that is, individual layers of instruments and music) were then sent to mix engineer Rob Kinelski to compile," adds Engadget.
Social Networks

Hackers Target NFL Teams On Twitter Ahead of Super Bowl (cnet.com) 17

CaptainDork shares a report from CNET: The Twitter accounts of several NFL teams were hacked on Monday ahead of this weekend's Super Bowl game. Around 15 teams, including the Green Bay Packers, Chicago Bears, Dallas Cowboys and San Francisco 49ers, were all targeted. The accounts had their profile images removed and some included messages from OurMine, the Saudi Arabia-based hacker group that appears to be responsible. "We are here to show people that everything is hackable," a message on a handful of hacked accounts reads. "To improve your accounts security contact us." The message includes an email address and Twitter handle for OurMine, though the account was suspended. The NFL's main account was hijacked in the hacking spree. Some teams also had their Instagram and Facebook accounts hacked.
Government

Maryland Bill Would Outlaw Ransomware, Keep Researchers From Reporting Bugs (arstechnica.com) 85

A proposed law introduced in Maryland's state senate last week would criminalize the possession of ransomware and other criminal activities with a computer. However, CEO of Luta Security Katie Moussouris warns that the current bill "would prohibit vulnerability disclosure unless the specific systems or data accessed by the helpful security researcher were explicitly authorized ahead of time and would prohibit public disclosure if the reports were ignored." Ars Technica reports: The bill, Senate Bill 3, covers a lot of ground already covered by U.S. Federal law. But it classifies the mere possession of ransomware as a misdemeanor punishable by up to 10 years of imprisonment and a fine of up to $10,000. The bill also states (in all capital letters in the draft) that "THIS PARAGRAPH DOES NOT APPLY TO THE USE OF RANSOMWARE FOR RESEARCH PURPOSES."

Additionally, the bill would outlaw unauthorized intentional access or attempts to access "all or part of a computer network, computer control language, computer, computer software, computer system, computer service, or computer database; or copy, attempt to copy, possess, or attempt to possess the contents of all or part of a computer database accessed." It also would criminalize under Maryland law any act intended to "cause the malfunction or interrupt the operation of all or any part" of a network, the computers on it, or their software and data, or "possess, identify, or attempt to identify a valid access code; or publicize or distribute a valid access code to an unauthorized person." There are no research exclusions in the bill for these provisions.
"While access or attempted access would be a misdemeanor (punishable by a fine of $1,000, three years of imprisonment, or both), breaching databases would be a felony if damages were determined to be greater than $10,000 -- punishable by a sentence of up to 10 years, a fine of $10,000, or both," the report adds. "The punishments go up if systems belonging to the state government, electric and gas utilities, or public utilities are involved, with up to 10 years of imprisonment and a $25,000 fine if more than $50,000 in damage is done."
Security

Intel Is Patching Its 'Zombieload' CPU Security Flaw For the Third Time (engadget.com) 24

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Engadget: For the third time in less than a year, Intel has disclosed a new set of vulnerabilities related to the speculative functionality of its processors. On Monday, the company said it will issue a software update "in the coming weeks" that will fix two more microarchitectural data sampling (MDS) or Zombieload flaws. This latest update comes after the company released two separate patches in May and November of last year.

Compared to the MDS flaws Intel addressed in those two previous patches, these latest ones have a couple of limitations. To start, one of the vulnerabilities, L1DES, doesn't work on Intel's more recent chips. Moreover, a hacker can't execute the attack using a web browser. Intel also says it's "not aware" of anyone taking advantage of the flaws outside of the lab.
In response to complaints of the company's piecemeal approach, Intel said that it has taken significant steps to reduce the danger the flaws represent to its processors.

"Since May 2019, starting with Microarchitectural Data Sampling (MDS), and then in November with TAA, we and our system software partners have released mitigations that have cumulatively and substantially reduced the overall attack surface for these types of issues," a spokesperson for the company said. "We continue to conduct research in this area -- internally, and in conjunction with the external research community."
iMac

Apple Imagines iMac Built Into Curved Sheet of Glass (theverge.com) 59

Apple applied for a patent for an ambitious design for a new all-in-one computer which integrates both its keyboard and screen into a single curved sheet of glass. The Verge reports: The patent application, which was first spotted by Patently Apple, and which was filed in May last year, describes how the iMac-like computer's "input area" and "display area" could be built into a single continuous surface, while a support structure behind the display could then contain the computer's processing unit, as well as providing space for all the machine's ports.

It's a pretty striking design for a couple of reasons. For one thing, the amount of curved glass involved is far more than Apple has ever used in one of its products before. It's also interesting to see that the company is thinking about taking the iMac's all-in-one design even further, by integrating not just the computer and display together, but also a keyboard and touchpad as well (although the application also describes how the keyboard could be detached during use).
The patent also describes how one could dock a MacBook into the device and output the screen to the iMac's display, while its keyboard would pass through a hole in the middle of the machine to let you use it as normal.

Additionally, "the application suggests that its single sheet of glass could fold down its middle to allow you to pack it away when not in use," reports The Verge.
Power

GM To Invest $2.2 Billion In First All-Electric Vehicle Plant, Create 2,200 Jobs (nbcnews.com) 186

An anonymous reader quotes a report from NBC News: General Motors confirmed Monday it will invest $2.2 billion to convert an aging Detroit assembly plant into the manufacturing heart of its "all-electric future." The Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly Plant was one of five North American factories GM said it would close in November 2018 but the automaker reversed course as part of an aggressive plan to launch more than 20 battery-electric vehicles, or BEVs, by 2023. The first to roll out of what is known locally as the "Poletown Plant" will be an all-electric pickup that will reportedly be the subject of an upcoming Super Bowl ad. It is widely expected to bring back the name, "Hummer," used for a brand GM abandoned in 2010 after emerging from bankruptcy.

The plant will be capable of using an extremely flexible vehicle "architecture," said GM President Lloyd Reuss, industry-speak for its underlying platform. It will allow the automaker to produce multiple products "for multiple brands, with multiple variants, with multiple customers (offering) different ranges of performance at different price points to meet customers wherever they are." After a news conference at the plant, Reuss told NBC News there will be multiple pickup truck models. The Poletown plant also will have the capacity to produce SUVs and crossovers, he said. What is expected to be called the Hummer pickup will go into production in late 2021. It will be followed in early 2022 by a version of the Cruise Origin, the fully driverless ride-sharing vehicle announced last week by Cruise, GM's autonomous vehicle subsidiary.
The $2.2 billion that GM will spend on the plant "is part of a broader investment of $3 billion authorized as part of the contract it negotiated last autumn with the United Auto Workers Union," adds NBC News. That includes a number of other projects, including a plan to set up a factory in Lordstown, Ohio to build batteries.
Google

Google Drive Is Down for Some Users 19

Google Drive and its suite of services -- including Google Doc and Sheet -- are facing issue, many users said Monday. DownDetector, a popular third-party service, reports it has received over 23,000 outage complaints in the last few minutes. Google has acknowledged the issue.

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