Britain: Young People Suffering Their ‘Worst Economic Prospects for Several Generations’
November 2nd, 2015Via: Independent:
Young people are suffering the “worst economic prospects for several generations” as a worrying age inequality gap is opening up in Britain, according to a major state-of-the-nation report.
In its biggest review yet of equality across the country, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) identified the winners and losers in modern Britain.
Younger people have been hit by the greatest drop in income and employment in recent years compared with older age groups. They also face even greater barriers to achieving economic independence and success than they did five years ago.
Finland Drawing Up Plans for Citizens’ Basic Income Model
November 2nd, 2015Via: YLE:
The Finnish Social Insurance Institution is to begin drawing up plans for a citizens’ basic income model. The preparation’s director Olli Kangas says that full-fledged basic income would net Finns some 800 euros a month.
U.S. Army Tests Swarms of Consumer Grade Drones in Major Exercise
November 2nd, 2015Via: IT World:
The U.S. Army has for the first time tested swarms of consumer drones during a major military training exercise and determined the low-cost technology is at a stage where it could be used offensively.
Off-the-shelf drones have brought what was previously complex and expensive technology into the reach of consumers, and the military was curious to see how much of a threat that might pose.
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In one exercise, for example, a swarm of drones with cameras on board was deployed in support of opposing forces in an attempt to discover the defensive positions of friendly soldiers.
The Army also tested flooding a chunk of airspace with a drone swarm to generate a disruptive radar signature.
“It has been proved that consumer [drones] can be used for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, distraction tactics and, in the future, the ability to drop small munitions,” said Barry Hatchett with the Army’s Program Executive Office for Simulation, Training and Instrumentation.
On its own, a consumer drone doesn’t pose a huge threat or offer much in the way of an advantage on the battlefield. It’s range is limited, it can’t lift much, it isn’t defended against radio jamming and can be easily brought down with a shot from a rifle.
But they are cheap.
A military drone, like the RQ-16 T-Hawk, costs hundreds of thousands of dollars — putting them well out of the reach of most people.
But for a fraction of that price, a handful of consumer drones can be deployed simultaneously. When that happens, they become more viable as a weapon.
And unlike complicated military drones, almost no training is required to use consumer models because software takes away most of the complexity of flying.
Their low cost and relatively low sophistication also gives them an element of disposability, allowing them to be deployed with less worry about their potential loss.
The Army is worried that a swarm of small drones could easily overwhelm a small defensive position because they would represent too many targets moving too fast to successfully repel.
Hillary: “Too Big to Jail”
November 2nd, 2015Via: McClatchy:
“She’s too big to jail,” said national security attorney Edward MacMahon Jr., who represented former CIA employee Jeffrey Sterling in 2011 in a leak case that led to an espionage prosecution and 3½-year prison term. He cited a pattern of light punishments for top government officials who have mishandled classified information while lower level whistleblowers such as Sterling have faced harsh prosecutions for revealing sensitive information to expose waste, fraud or abuse in government.
U.S. Announces Plans to Deal with EMP Threat
November 2nd, 2015In other news, Naval Academy Reinstates Celestial Navigation.
Via: USA Today:
Space weather, which can disrupt satellites, stifle communications networks and paralyze the electric power grid, is getting some special scrutiny from the Obama administration.
The White House announced a new strategy Thursday to identify and respond to interstellar phenomena such as solar flares that pose a looming threat to national security and the global economy.
The plan calls for clearer identification of space weather events, improved protection of vulnerable targets, and better forecasting.
“As technological systems become increasingly intertwined and interdependent, as more and more applications take advantage of GPS technologies, as power grids become smarter, the potential threats that space weather poses to our economic vitality, our national security and our daily routines gets more concerning,” said John Holdren, the top science and technology advisor to President Obama
Holdren spoke Thursday at a White House-sponsored symposium that brought together federal agencies, congressional lawmakers, state officials and representatives of industries, such as airlines and utilities, most affected by space weather.
The administration’s six-point plan calls for: establishing benchmarks for space weather events, enhancing response and recovery capabilities, improving protection and mitigation efforts, improving prediction of impacts on critical infrastructure, improving space weather forecasting, and increasing international cooperation.
Washington: How a Group of Neighbors Created Their Own Internet Service
November 2nd, 2015Via: Ars Technica:
When you live somewhere with slow and unreliable Internet access, it usually seems like there’s nothing to do but complain. And that’s exactly what residents of Orcas Island, one of the San Juan Islands in Washington state, were doing in late 2013. Faced with CenturyLink service that was slow and outage-prone, residents gathered at a community potluck and lamented their current connectivity.
“Everyone was asking, ‘what can we do?’” resident Chris Brems recalls. “Then [Chris] Sutton stands up and says, ‘Well, we can do it ourselves.’”
Robot Buses Are Coming To America
October 30th, 2015Via: Fast Company:
Self-driving buses are coming to America. The Bishop Ranch business park in San Ramon, California will be the first place in the U.S. to use French robo-buses to ferry passengers around.
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The EZ10 is a driverless bus designed for short hops. It has been deployed in Europe—in Finland, France, and is just about to launch in Spain. The electric vehicles carry up to ten passengers, and have ramps for wheelchairs and strollers. The idea is that they carry you the “last mile” of your journey, and one of their main uses is in theme parks.
China Decides to Abolish 1-Child Policy, Allow 2 Children
October 29th, 2015Via: AP:
China’s ruling Communist Party announced Thursday that the country will start allowing all families to have two children, abolishing an unpopular policy that limited many urban couples to only one child for more than three decades.
The decision is the most significant easing of family-planning policies that were long considered some of the party’s most onerous intrusions into family life and had been gradually relaxed in recent years. The restrictions led to an imbalanced sex ratio because of a traditional preference for boys, and draconian enforcement that sometimes included forced abortions.
Wifi Networks Can Now Identify Who You Are Through Walls
October 29th, 2015Via: Gizmodo:
Who needs a peep hole when a wifi network will do? Researchers from MIT have developed technology that uses wireless signals to see your silhouette through a wall—and it can even tell you apart from other people, too.
The team from MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab are no strangers to using wireless signals to see what’s happening on the other side of a wall. In 2013, they showed off software that could use variations in wifi signal to detect the presence of human motion from the other side of a wall. But in the last two years they’ve been busy developing the technique, and now they’ve unveiled the obvious — if slightly alarming — natural progression: they can use the wireless reflections bouncing off a human body to see the silhouette of a person standing behind a wall.
Not only that, the team’s technique, known is RF-Capture, is accurate enough to track the hand of a human and, with some repeated measurements, the system can even be trained to recognise different people based just on their wifi silhouette. The research, which is to be presented at SIGGRAPH Asia next month, was published this morning on the research group’s website.
Medication Errors Found in 1 Out of 2 Surgeries
October 29th, 2015Via: Harvard:
The first study to measure the incidence of medication errors and adverse drug events during the perioperative period — immediately before, during and right after a surgical procedure — has found that some sort of mistake or adverse event occurred in every second operation and in 5 percent of observed drug administrations.
The study of more than 275 operations at Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), which will appear in Anesthesiology, also found that a third of the errors resulted in adverse drug events or harm to patients. The report is being published online to coincide with a presentation at the Anesthesiology 2015 annual meeting in San Diego, Calif., Oct. 24-28.
“We found that just over one in 20 perioperative medication administrations resulted in a medication error or an adverse drug event,” said Karen C. Nanji of the MGH Department of Anaesthesia, Critical Care, and Pain Medicine, lead author of the report.
“Prior to our study, the literature on perioperative medication error rates was sparse and consisted largely of self-reported data, which we know under-represents true error rates. Now that we have a better idea of the actual rate and causes of the most common errors, we can focus on developing solutions to address the problems.
