175554123
submission
whoever57 writes:
A productivity study by researchers at Stanford looked at company repositories and concluded that about 9.5% of engineers produce almost no code. The authors refer to these people as "ghost engineers", who collect 5-figure salaries, with no output. The study gives little information on the algorithm used for the analysis, but suggests that these ghost engineers may have multiple jobs.
174790572
submission
whoever57 writes:
A powerful storm sank the "Bayesian", a superyacht which was carrying Mike Lynch and some guests. In total there is one confirmed death and another 6 missing, including Mike lynch and his daughter. It is believed that the yacht is effectively owned by Lynch. The 56 meter yacht had an aluminum hull and could carry 12 guests and a crew of up to 10.
173610740
submission
whoever57 writes:
Toyota Mirai owners are fed up and disillusioned. Hydrogen fuel pumps are hard to find and, rather than new pumps opening, they are closing down. Owners feel misled about the costs and availability of hydrogen fuel stations. Even if a Mirai owner can find a fuel station, it may not be operating.
Moreover, refuelling is frequently a long and problematic process, with pumps taking over an hour to fill a tank and cars getting stuck to the fuel pump for hours. It would be quicker to charge a battery EV.
Naturally, resale values of these cars are plummeting. Even without those problems, once the hydrogen fuel cars that Toyota gives now owners has expired or is out of funds, the hydrogen fuel is very expensive.
173163368
submission
whoever57 writes:
The Guardian has an interesting article on aphantasia, which is the inability to picture objects in your mind. People with this condition tend to go into STEM fields and remember different aspects of objects and people. Personally, I never realized before reading this article that people could create mental images.
Try the red apple test.
171953201
submission
whoever57 writes:
This opinion piece notes that the Linux foundation spends only a tiny fraction of its budget on the Linux Kernel, while spending much of its budget on projects related to blockchain, AI, "Best Practices" and others. The shortening of the time for which long-term support will be provided to LTS kernels is now so short that LTS is little more than a joke.
167716737
submission
whoever57 writes:
Would you trust your communications to a company that has links to a spyware company and claims that its address is a UPS store in Toronto? You probably already do.
The Washington Post has an article about TrustCor Systems and its troubling links to spyware and interception of encrypted communications. "The company’s Panamanian registration records show that it has the identical slate of officers, agents and partners as a spyware maker identified this year as an affiliate of Arizona-based Packet Forensics,"
The company also offers what is claimed to be end-to-end encrypted email, but analysis of how this actually works shows that this claim is not true, since the company retains individuals' private keys.
The article suggests that the company has links to the US government.
Gift link to article (no paywall) is: https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwapo.st%2F3DU1LYw
145298808
submission
whoever57 writes:
Just before the end of the Trump administration, an obscure Florida company began announcing routes to IP addresses owned by the Pentagon. This is the largest shift in IP address space and the company has now claimed 175 million IP addresses.
The Pentagon has confirmed that this is a DoD project, but the overall purpose of the program remain unclear, however, one purpose may be to prevent misuse of the Pentagon's IP address space.
144655224
submission
whoever57 writes:
A blind person with a guide dog was denied rides and harassed because of her guide dog. She sued Uber, which tried to blame its contractors and deny liability. However an arbitrator has rejected that argument and found the company liable, awarding the blind passenger $1.1M.
The arbitrator found that Uber staffers coached drivers on how to deny rides to disabled passengers without it appearing to be a violation of the law. The staffers also advocated to keep problematic drivers on the platform.
95507385
submission
whoever57 writes:
We may be headed for an ice apocalypse which could result in the flooding of coastal cities before the end of this century. Glaciers in Antarctica may break and release ice, exposing taller cliffs, resulting in faster melting. "In the past few years, scientists have identified marine ice-cliff instability as a feedback loop that could kickstart the disintegration of the entire West Antarctic ice sheet this century — much more quickly than previously thought." ... "A wholesale collapse of Pine Island and Thwaites would set off a catastrophe. Giant icebergs would stream away from Antarctica like a parade of frozen soldiers. All over the world, high tides would creep higher, slowly burying every shoreline on the planet, flooding coastal cities and creating hundreds of millions of climate refugees."
90920239
submission
whoever57 writes:
The Guardian has an interesting article describing how Robert Mercer, Steve Bannon and Nigel Farage used techniques developed within the military to influence Britain's vote to exit the EU. Although it appears that the companies involved (AggregateIQ and Cambridge Analytics) are private companies, they have deep roots within the military.
The article describes Britain as a "managed democracy", with major decisions controlled by a US Billionaire.
88376973
submission
whoever57 writes:
Patent trolls rely on the fact that they have no assets and, if they lose a case, they can fold the company that owned the patent and sued, thus avoiding paying any the defendant's legal bills. However, in a recent case, the judge has told the winning defendant that it can claim its legal bills from the law firm. The decision is based on the plaintiff's law firm using a contract under which it would take a portion of any judgment, making it more than just counsel, but instead a partner with the plaintiff. This will likely result in law firms wanting to be paid up front, instead of offering a contingency-based fee.
87964609
submission
whoever57 writes:
The commission that is responsible for ensuring the integrity of voting machines was itself hacked. The hacker gained access to non-public reports on weaknesses in voting machines. The hack occurred after the election, so it is unlikely that this hack resulted in changing the result. However, if one hacker can break in, how does anyone know that there was not a prior hack?
The hack used an SQL injection flaw to gain access to usernames and passwords which were then cracked.
87222165
submission
whoever57 writes:
Navinder Sarao, the British trader who was accused of causing the "flash crash" in 2010 and was extradited to the USA this week has pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud and one count of spoofing. No details of the plea deal have been released, but it is believed that he has agreed to forfeit $13M. Several years of jail time are also expected for Mr. Sarao
86740777
submission
whoever57 writes:
Navinder Sarao has lost his appeal and is set to be extradited to the USA, where he faces charges with a possible maximum sentence of 380 years. He is accused of causing the "flash crash" in 2010, when the Dow Jones index dropped by 1000 points. He ran his trading from his bedroom in his parents' house and it is claimed that he made more than £30M (approximately $40M) in 5 years. His parents had no idea what he was doing, nor the scale of his income. He is accused of placing trades that he never intended to fill, so, to this naive person, it's hard to distinguish what he did from that of the large high-speed trading firms.
86615923
submission
whoever57 writes:
The CEO of Backpage was recently arrested for "pimping". It is likely that the charges will not stick because of section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA), under which publishers are protected from liability for the postings of their users. However, this could just be the first shot in the battle to weaken section 230. . This could endanger other sites, such as Craigslist, and ultimately, any site with user-written content.
