Archive for July, 2014
Britain: Government Accused of Dishonesty Over GM Babies
July 27th, 2014Via: Independent: The Government has been accused of misleading the public over the introduction of a new in vitro fertilisation (IVF) technique that some experts believe will result in the birth of “genetically modified babies”. Leading scientists, including Lord Winston, an early pioneer of fertility treatment, have criticised the Department of Health for trying to […]
Fox Warner?
July 27th, 2014Via: New York Times: The much-admired Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black may be rolling in his grave at the prospect of a merger between 21st Century Fox and Time Warner Inc., which would reduce control of the major Hollywood studios to five owners, from six, and major television producers to four, from five.
Government Surveillance and Internet Search Behavior
July 27th, 2014Via: SSRN: This paper uses data from Google Trends on search terms from before and after the surveillance revelations of June 2013 to analyze whether Google users’ search behavior shifted as a result of an exogenous shock in information about how closely their internet searches were being monitored by the U.S. government. We use data […]
International Flights Spread Ebola
July 27th, 2014Via: Irish Independent: Nigerian health authorities raced to stop the spread of Ebola after a man sick with one of the world’s deadliest diseases brought it by plane to Lagos. That the traveller from Liberia could board an international flight also raised new fears that other passengers could take the disease beyond Africa due to […]
The Typical Household, Now Worth a Third Less
July 26th, 2014Via: New York Times: Economic inequality in the United States has been receiving a lot of attention. But it’s not merely an issue of the rich getting richer. The typical American household has been getting poorer, too. The inflation-adjusted net worth for the typical household was $87,992 in 2003. Ten years later, it was only […]
If TaskRabbit Is the Future of Employment, the Employed Are Fucked
July 25th, 2014Welcome to the IT industry of the mid 2000s. Via: ValleyWag: The employment of the future is here, and it’s terrific for everyone except the people doing the work. TaskRabbit, which lets you outsource the things you don’t want to do to people who need money, is at the forefront of this chore revolution, and […]
1960s: Secret Plans for U.S. Moonbase
July 25th, 2014Via: CNN: After a thorough justification of the scientific, political and military need for the base, the proposal — two documents and more than 400 typewritten pages — calculated out the details of what could be done on the outpost and what it would take to make it reality. It offered graphs and mathematical formulas; […]
JIBO “Family Robot”
July 25th, 2014Via: My Jibo:
Microsoft’s Station Q Researching Quantum Computing
July 25th, 2014Via: Tech Week Europe: Microsoft has set up a laboratory dedicated to producing quantum computers that will push computing power to a higher level. Station Q, based at the University of California, Santa Barbara will work on ways to construct machines with multiple quantum bits (qubits), under the leadership of Dr Michael Freedman, a mathematician […]
Superpower for Hire: Rise of the Private Military
July 25th, 2014Via: Vice: Vice takes an unprecedented look into the shadowy industry of Private Military Companies. For the past two decades these private companies, like Black Water, Aegis and G4S have silently consumed military operations around the world, doing everything from back end logistics, protection of government VIP’s and diplomats to actual combat duties. In this […]
