I’m lazy. This is why I’ve been trying to outsource as many of my day-to-day responsibilities as possible to robots. I started with masturbation, and I’ve since extended this policy to vacuuming. But there’s no reason why you couldn’t start the opposite way – and we’ve got the perfect thing to introduce you to the wonders of automation. Why do you I need a Roomba, I’m not as lazy as you are, you might say....
It’s the first commercial phone in the world with a 108-megapixel camera. And how exciting would it be if you could be one of the first to get your hands on a handset?. Lucky for you, Gearbest has a super deal. You can get the phone for just $499, down from $609, by using the coupon code GBMINOTE10. Take a look at these specifications before you make the purchase:...
The findings — disclosed by cybersecurity firm Check Point Research — show the operations were carried out over a period of seven months between December 2018 and June 2019, and leveraged spear phishing tricks to lure victims into opening dubious emails that downloaded malware on to their machines. The hacking group — dubbed Rancor — engaged in clever social engineering tactics by sending malicious documents from real email addresses belonging to government officials to make them seem more legitimate....
Global investment in LED and smart streetlighting, as well as additional sensors attached to streetlight infrastructure, is forecast to reach a total of US$28.1 billion over the next decade, according to Northeast Group’s latest market forecast. The smart infrastructure market intelligence firm expects coronavirus to cause only “limited disruption” to the smart streetlighting sector but predicts an increase in the use of new financing models and market consolidation. Globally, there are 326 million streetlights and this is expected to grow to over 361 million by the end of 2029....
According to Autocar, Ford bosses are banking on its engineers to make a “high-output, full-hybrid” drivetrain for the new Focus RS in order to meet average fleet CO2 emissions. The new Focus RS was originally planned to be a “mild-hybrid,” using a battery and electric motor to supplement power and reduce emissions. But Ford wants to pivot to a “full-hybrid” to further improve the vehicle’s emissions figures and meet EU regulations....
New Jersey man Darren Carter (29) is said to have swiped a Connecticut resident’s phone at a Californian airport in April. He then used it to siphon funds from the victim’s Coinbase account. Investigators were able to trace the pilfered cryptocurrency back to Carter as it had been moved to a PayPal account within hours of the phone being taken, albeit after it was converted to US dollars via Coinbase....
— Rep. Matt Gaetz (@RepMattGaetz) October 23, 2019 Their leader, Florida Man Matt Gaetz, claims he organized the stunt in an effort to force the members of the committee investigating a series of whistleblower complaints to open their process up to all members of congress. In essence, Gaetz is demanding the House turn its legal inquiry into the President’s alleged high crimes into a public trial. The House inquiry involves both Republicans and Democrats and isn’t required or meant to be a public hearing....
Tech giant Tencent has launched a time-sensitive facial recognition system that prevents minors from binging on video games after dark. The platform, called “Midnight Patrol,” arrives amid a moral panic over gaming addiction among children in China. Under-18s are now barred from gaming between 10PM and 8AM, and must register for games using their real names and government ID numbers. Tencent’s system uses a facial verification system connected to a public identity database to detect minors posing as adults during the curfew....
Marketed as a “high-end solution for VR locomotion,” Cybershoes are an accessory device for VR systems that are compatible with Steam VR. This means they can be used with Oculus, HTC, Pimax, and other headsets. They ship with a ‘special’ carpet and require the use of a rotating chair or stool – you can’t stand up and walk around in them. A roller embedded into to the bottom of the shoes translates your walking and running motions into movement in game....
However, I’m not that much into art and paintings. So, I can’t really spend hours looking at famous artworks thinking about all the things that are wrong with my life. I’m a sucker for unusual museums. Last year, during my Euro trip, I loved going to the Sex Machines Museum in Prague and the Spy Museum in Berlin. So, today’s Daily Distraction is dedicated to museums you can visit while sitting at home....
The kitchen has been thankfully one of those places where I can escape screens and the news cycle that makes you anxious and tired — even if it’s only for a while. A few weeks ago, my colleague Abhimanyu took over this column and wrote about some fantastic YouTube channels to help you with your quarantine cooking. Today, I’m bringing you some great apps, websites, and tools to make lip-smacking meals:...
Well, following Nintendo’s E3 presentation this week, that criticism is no longer a concern. The Switch is brimming with games. First off, the E3 announcements. Who expected a sequel to the aforementioned Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild? Not I, for one. That’s got me more excited than I can fathom. Then the fact that Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Complete Edition (AKA 2015’s game of the year) is coming out?...
When George Floyd was killed in May after a police officer pressed a knee into the man’s neck, millions of Americans protested, demanding civic leaders dismantle long-standing police practices and fundamentally reimagine public safety. PredPol’s marketing manager Emmy Rey called the tragedy in Minneapolis a “breakdown of the social contract between the protector and the protected.” And she offered PredPol’s crime-predicting technology as a solution. “PredPol was founded on the audacious premise that we could help make the practice of policing better in America....
I was a co-author of the paper recently published in Nature showing that an AI system developed by Google was better at spotting breast tumors than doctors. Now, researchers in the US have reported that AI-supported laser scanners are faster than doctors at detecting brain tumors. These are very exciting developments that will, ultimately, have a big impact on the accuracy, logistics, and speed of diagnosis. There is a multitude of similar projects underway that employ artificial intelligence in the early detection of macular degeneration, acute kidney failure, skin cancer, sepsis, Alzheimer’s disease, and depression, among others....
The vulnerability, CVE-2019-12280, was identified in Dell’s SupportAssist application for business (version 2.0) and home PCs (version 3.2.1 and prior). The issue in SupportAssist could have allowed outsiders to take over a machine and read the stored physical memory, according to cybersecurity firm SafeBreach, which discovered and reported the vulnerability. Since the troubleshooting program runs with system-level privileges, the researchers demonstrated it’s possible to load insecure code libraries (dynamic link libraries or DLLs for short) from user-controlled folders specified via the PATH environment variable....
As you continue in your career, you might want to stay in your specialization as a developer without moving into management, but it seems like you’d miss out on the same salary increases. How can you negotiate that? According to Stack Overflow’s 2020 survey, which covers global developer salaries, an Engineering Manager makes $92K, while the lowest-paid developer makes $43K. For the sake of simplicity, let’s say that your goal is to negotiate for doubling your pay....
Fifteen years ago, physicists at Brookhaven National Laboratory discovered something perplexing. Muons – a type of subatomic particle – were moving in unexpected ways that didn’t match theoretical predictions. Was the theory wrong? Was the experiment off? Or, tantalizingly, was this evidence of new physics? Physicists have been trying to solve this mystery every since. One group from Fermilab tackled the experimental side and on April 7, 2021, released results confirming the original measurement....
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 9, 2020 Here’s the full text of the impeached president’s tweet: Let’s start with the immutable facts. Multiple videos taken of the incident clearly show Gugino standing peacefully in front of police. He engages two officers, Aaron Torgalski and Robert McCabe, who clearly push him while he’s trying to back away. Gugino impacts on the ground and blood can be seen pooling under his head....
The research opportunities enabled by social media data are undeniable. However, researchers often analyze this data with tools that were not designed to manage the kind of large, noisy observational sets of data you find on social media. We explored problems that researchers might encounter due to this mismatch between data and methods. What we found is that the methods and statistics commonly used to provide evidence for seemingly significant scientific findings can also seem to support nonsensical claims....
— ???? ?????? (@romero) May 31, 2019 The new expansion is called “Sigil”, and it’s the unofficial fifth episode in the game’s story (three episodes were part of the original release, a fourth was added with the Ultimate Doom edition from 1995). It contains nine single-player levels and nine deathmatch levels and is “megawad”-sized, meaning it’s almost the same size as a commercial game. Despite the popularity of its excellent 2016 reboot, the original Doom still has a massive, devoted community of players and modders....
