India, the world’s largest democracy, prepares to kick off its election season in just a matter of weeks. But activists and experts worry that the government is cracking down on platforms and internet service providers to silence critical voices, and tighten its grip on the information ecosystem....
Moody’s Analytics has found 21 million “red flags” associated with shell companies that could be used to enable financial crimes, from ancient directors to dubious addresses....
THe Great Green Wall being built in Africa to halt the southern progress of the Sahara Desert is a favorite public works project of mine — it’s massive, ambitious, long-term, important, and if it works, the effect will repay the cost many times over. This video takes a quick look at some of the work being done on the wall in...
A six-year-old project to return giant tortoises to the wild in Madagascar could result in thousands of the 350kg megaherbivores re-populating the island for the first time in 600 years....
New documents filed Monday, February 26 reveal that videogame giant Nintendo is taking action against the creators of the popular emulator tool Yuzu....
A set of smart vending machines at the University of Waterloo is expected to be removed from campus after students raised privacy concerns about their software....
There hasn’t been a lot of good news out of EA lately, but here’s some: the company just launched a bunch of classic games on Steam. The new (old) releases include nine games in total, spanning franchises like Dungeon Keeper, Populous, and SimCity....
Vehicle theft is an issue that affects us all collectively. As cybersecurity and technology professionals, we recognize the importance of acting rapidly to reduce its impact on Canadians. That being said, we believe the federal government’s proposal, particularly the prohibition of security research tools, is ill-advised,...
If you have a passing interest in film and animation, you’ve likely heard of Coyote Vs. Acme, a feature film in the Roger Rabbit tradition of blending 2D animation with live action focusing on characters from Warner Brothers’ Roadrunner cartoons. The film would have focused on Wile E. Coyote suing the ubiquitous Acme...
In 1966, the Japanese physicist Yosuke Nagaoka conceived of a type of magnetism produced by a seemingly unnatural dance of electrons within a hypothetical material. Now, a team of physicists has spotted a version of Nagaoka’s predictions playing out within an engineered material only six atoms thick....
Whatever the linguistic details, one of the main roles of RSS is to supply directly to you a steady stream of updates from a website. Every new article published on that site is served up in a list that can be interpreted by an RSS reader....
It turns out that the appendix appears to have two related functions. The first function is supporting the immune system. The appendix has a high concentration of immune tissue, so it’s acting to help the immune system fight any bad things in the gut....
Google regularly launches updates to its algorithm to continuously improve search results quality. Think of these updates as a refresh of the system where rankings change: some websites see an improvement while others see a decline....
Unnerved residents of Tampa Bay, Florida, are scrambling to explain mysterious rolling bass tones that vibrate their walls at night and rob their kids of sleep....
June 1, 1952, was Whitsunday, and provided the young Michael Ventris with a convenient break from his duties as an architect. At the end of the day he would write his 20th Work Note on Minoan Language Research, with the somewhat disbelieving title, “Are the Knossos and Pylos Tablets Written in Greek?” Responsibility was...
Questions like “Which browser should I use?” regularly come up on the r/browsers subreddit. I sometimes respond to these posts, but my quick replies usually only contain one or two points. To be honest, until recently I wasn’t even sure myself why I use Firefox. Of course it’s a pretty good browser, but that doesn’t...
Action-RPG colossus Elden Ring is reportedly getting a free-to-play mobile adaptation with in-app purchases, which takes inspiration from miHoYo’s Genshin Impact. It’s being published by Tencent, who apparently acquired the licensing rights to Elden Ring back in 2022 and put a few dozen people to work on a prototype, even as...
While the majority of the world’s reefs are now under threat or even damaged potentially beyond repair, a new study reported in the journal Current Biology on March 8 offers some encouraging news: efforts to restore coral reefs not only increase coral cover, but they can also bring back important ecosystem functions, and...
Warner Bros. Discovery is telling developers it plans to start “retiring” games published by its Adult Swim Games label, game makers who worked with the publisher tell Polygon. At least three games are under threat of being removed from Steam and other digital stores, with the fate of other games published by Adult Swim...
When the Star Wars films aired in Chile, instead of cutting away from the movie for commercial breaks, the TV station “seamlessly” inserted ads for Cerveza Cristal beer. We’re talking Obi-Wan opening a chest to find a lightsaber for Luke and instead it reveals a ice-chest full of beer. Or the Emperor Force-reaching for a...
Europe’s deepest mine to become giant gravity battery (www.independent.co.uk)
An abandoned mine in Finland is set to be transformed into a giant battery to store renewable energy during periods of excess production....
This Website Tracked Hate Crimes in India. Then the Government Took It Offline (www.wired.com)
India, the world’s largest democracy, prepares to kick off its election season in just a matter of weeks. But activists and experts worry that the government is cracking down on platforms and internet service providers to silence critical voices, and tighten its grip on the information ecosystem....
Greenhouse Effect (xkcd.com)
Over 2,000 shell companies have directors aged 123 years or older, Moody’s found. The oldest known human lived to 122 (fortune.com)
Moody’s Analytics has found 21 million “red flags” associated with shell companies that could be used to enable financial crimes, from ancient directors to dubious addresses....
What the collapse of a company owing $300 billion means for the world (www.businessinsider.com)
A Hong Kong court ordered the liquidation of China Evergrande, the world’s most indebted property developer....
How the Great Green Wall Is Holding Back the Sahara Desert (kottke.org)
THe Great Green Wall being built in Africa to halt the southern progress of the Sahara Desert is a favorite public works project of mine — it’s massive, ambitious, long-term, important, and if it works, the effect will repay the cost many times over. This video takes a quick look at some of the work being done on the wall in...
Madagascar: giant tortoises have returned 600 years after they were wiped out (theconversation.com)
A six-year-old project to return giant tortoises to the wild in Madagascar could result in thousands of the 350kg megaherbivores re-populating the island for the first time in 600 years....
Nintendo is suing the creators of Switch emulator Yuzu (overkill.wtf)
New documents filed Monday, February 26 reveal that videogame giant Nintendo is taking action against the creators of the popular emulator tool Yuzu....
'Facial recognition' error message on vending machine sparks concern at University of Waterloo (kitchener.ctvnews.ca)
A set of smart vending machines at the University of Waterloo is expected to be removed from campus after students raised privacy concerns about their software....
EA just added classics like Dungeon Keeper, SimCity 3000, and Populous on Steam (www.theverge.com)
There hasn’t been a lot of good news out of EA lately, but here’s some: the company just launched a bunch of classic games on Steam. The new (old) releases include nine games in total, spanning franchises like Dungeon Keeper, Populous, and SimCity....
Vehicle thefts - Insecure vehicles should be banned, not security tools like the Flipper Zero (saveflipper.ca)
Vehicle theft is an issue that affects us all collectively. As cybersecurity and technology professionals, we recognize the importance of acting rapidly to reduce its impact on Canadians. That being said, we believe the federal government’s proposal, particularly the prohibition of security research tools, is ill-advised,...
Coyote Vs. Acme: Warner Brothers just killed a full-length animated film to avoid paying taxes (boingboing.net)
If you have a passing interest in film and animation, you’ve likely heard of Coyote Vs. Acme, a feature film in the Roger Rabbit tradition of blending 2D animation with live action focusing on characters from Warner Brothers’ Roadrunner cartoons. The film would have focused on Wile E. Coyote suing the ubiquitous Acme...
Scientists Just Discovered a New Type of Magnetism (www.wired.com)
In 1966, the Japanese physicist Yosuke Nagaoka conceived of a type of magnetism produced by a seemingly unnatural dance of electrons within a hypothetical material. Now, a team of physicists has spotted a version of Nagaoka’s predictions playing out within an engineered material only six atoms thick....
Why Everyone Should Still Use an RSS Reader in 2024 (lifehacker.com)
Whatever the linguistic details, one of the main roles of RSS is to supply directly to you a steady stream of updates from a website. Every new article published on that site is served up in a list that can be interpreted by an RSS reader....
Your appendix is not, in fact, useless. This anatomy professor explains (www.npr.org)
It turns out that the appendix appears to have two related functions. The first function is supporting the immune system. The appendix has a high concentration of immune tissue, so it’s acting to help the immune system fight any bad things in the gut....
How Google is killing independent sites like ours (housefresh.com)
Google regularly launches updates to its algorithm to continuously improve search results quality. Think of these updates as a refresh of the system where rankings change: some websites see an improvement while others see a decline....
Ranked: The Foods With the Largest Environmental Impact (infosec.pub)
Food and agriculture have a significant impact on our planet, particularly in terms of carbon emissions, water withdrawals, and land use.
Sony is erasing digital libraries that were supposed to be accessible “forever” (arstechnica.com)
How long is “forever”? When it comes to digital media, forever could be as close as a couple of months away....
Noisy fish sex keeping Florida residents up all night with bass-heavy groans (nypost.com)
Unnerved residents of Tampa Bay, Florida, are scrambling to explain mysterious rolling bass tones that vibrate their walls at night and rob their kids of sleep....
Cracking the Code of Linear B (antigonejournal.com)
June 1, 1952, was Whitsunday, and provided the young Michael Ventris with a convenient break from his duties as an architect. At the end of the day he would write his 20th Work Note on Minoan Language Research, with the somewhat disbelieving title, “Are the Knossos and Pylos Tablets Written in Greek?” Responsibility was...
Why I use Firefox (xn--ime-zza.eu)
Questions like “Which browser should I use?” regularly come up on the r/browsers subreddit. I sometimes respond to these posts, but my quick replies usually only contain one or two points. To be honest, until recently I wasn’t even sure myself why I use Firefox. Of course it’s a pretty good browser, but that doesn’t...
Elden Ring is getting a free-to-play mobile version with in-app purchases (www.rockpapershotgun.com)
Action-RPG colossus Elden Ring is reportedly getting a free-to-play mobile adaptation with in-app purchases, which takes inspiration from miHoYo’s Genshin Impact. It’s being published by Tencent, who apparently acquired the licensing rights to Elden Ring back in 2022 and put a few dozen people to work on a prototype, even as...
Good news for coral reef restoration efforts: Study finds 'full recovery' of reef growth within four years (phys.org)
While the majority of the world’s reefs are now under threat or even damaged potentially beyond repair, a new study reported in the journal Current Biology on March 8 offers some encouraging news: efforts to restore coral reefs not only increase coral cover, but they can also bring back important ecosystem functions, and...
Warner Bros. is now erasing games as it plans to delist Adult Swim-published titles (www.polygon.com)
Warner Bros. Discovery is telling developers it plans to start “retiring” games published by its Adult Swim Games label, game makers who worked with the publisher tell Polygon. At least three games are under threat of being removed from Steam and other digital stores, with the fate of other games published by Adult Swim...
Beer Me, Obi-Wan! (kottke.org)
When the Star Wars films aired in Chile, instead of cutting away from the movie for commercial breaks, the TV station “seamlessly” inserted ads for Cerveza Cristal beer. We’re talking Obi-Wan opening a chest to find a lightsaber for Luke and instead it reveals a ice-chest full of beer. Or the Emperor Force-reaching for a...