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MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984

Data use draining your battery? Tiny device to speed up memory while also saving power

Millions of new memory cells could be part of a computer chip and [provide] speed and energy savings, thanks to the discovery of a previously unobserved functionality in a material called molybdenum ditelluride. The two-dimensional material stacks into multiple layers to build a memory cell.

Chip-maker companies have long called for better memory technologies to enable a growing network of smart devices. One of these next-generation possibilities is resistive random access memory, or RRAM for short. [...] A material would need to be robust enough for storing and retrieving data at least trillions of times, but materials currently used have been too unreliable. So RRAM hasn't been available yet for widescale use on computer chips. Molybdenum ditelluride could potentially last through all those cycles.

"We haven't yet explored system fatigue using this new material, but our hope is that it is both faster and more reliable than other approaches due to the unique switching mechanism we've observed," Joerg Appenzeller, Purdue University's Barry M. and Patricia L. Epstein Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the scientific director of nanoelectronics at the Birck Nanotechnology Center.

Electric-field induced structural transition in vertical MoTe₂- and Mo_1–xW_xTe₂-based resistive memories (DOI: 10.1038/s41563-018-0234-y) (DX)

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AnonTechie writes:

It's not often you open a mathematical research paper and find a Pablo Neruda poem. But a new study in the journal Nature Human Behavior begins just like that: "Es tan corto el amor, y tan largo el olvido." Translation? "Love is so short, forgetting is so long."

The paper, titled "The universal decay of collective memory and attention," is an ambitious attempt to turn the slow slippage of cultural memory—the way a hit song lingers, or doesn't—into a quantitative method for measuring the way our attention to various cultural products declines. It seeks, in other words, to turn the most abstract cognitive phenomenon into a cold, hard equation.

[...] The process of decline was similar among all of the artifacts the researchers studied, but the amount of time it took for each to fade varied by domain. Biographies lasted the longest, circulating in the collective memory for 20 to 30 years. Music disappeared the fastest, lasting just 5.6 years on average.

[...] The work could fuel research into our species' tendency to forget large spans of history, with landmark events tucked away into our cultural memory, sans context of the surrounding years and minus the perspective of characters we don't care for. Perhaps understanding how quickly these historical moments fade—morphing from the truth we lived to the condensed narrative we save for posterity—could keep us from constantly repeating ourselves.

How long can an event hold humanity's attention?

Sorry for the long link to the paper. The shorter link gives access to the abstract.

[Paper - Abstract] The universal decay of collective memory and attention

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MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984

As President Donald Trump threatened to allow a government shutdown if Congress did not provide funding for his proposed wall along the Mexican border, a Republican congressman from Ohio offered up alternative routes to getting the wall built: through Internet crowdfunding or through an initial coin offering.

During an interview with NPR's Morning Edition on December 12, Rep. Warren Davidson said that he had offered what he referred to as a "modest proposal" in the form of his "Buy a Brick, Build a Wall Act." The bill, which he submitted on November 30, would authorize the Secretary of the Treasury to accept monetary gifts from anyone "on the condition that it be used to plan, design, construct, or maintain a barrier along the international border between the United States and Mexico." The funds would go into an account called the "Border Wall Trust Fund," and a public website would be set up to process donations electronically.

Rep. Davidson told NPR's Steve Inskeep that the donations could come from anyone and be gathered in a number of ways."You could do it with this sort of, like, crowdfunding site," Davidson explained. "Or you could do it with blockchain—you could have Wall Coins."

Source: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/12/ohio-congressman-we-can-fund-border-wall-with-wallcoin/

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Phoenix666 writes:

VentureBeat:

Each day in India’s capital, New Delhi, hundreds of thousands of people take a quiet subway across the crowded suburbs to reach their work. The relative calm is interrupted every few minutes as the train reaches a station and an ever-growing population jostles to find a seat. Seconds later, everyone returns their attention to their smartphone screen, resuming the comedy sketch they were watching on YouTube.

More than 7,500 miles away, executives at Netflix are scrambling for new strategies to court this audience. Earlier this year, CEO Reed Hastings, who has identified sleep as the biggest competition to his service on multiple occasions, wondered out loud if the next 100 million Netflix subscribers are in India.

They probably are, but YouTube, not sleep, has already claimed them.

The story posits that YouTube is overtaking Netflix because it is more mobile-friendly.

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Phoenix666 writes:

Phys.org:

After going missing on Christmas Day five years ago, deep ocean measuring equipment belonging to the UK's National Oceanography Centre (NOC) has just been found on a beach in Tasmania by a local resident after making an incredible 14,000 km journey across the ocean.

In 2011, this deep-ocean lander instrument was deployed by NOC scientists in the northern Drake Passage, which is a narrow section of the ocean between South America and Antarctica. Measuring ocean bottom pressure here helps provide information on the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, which is the largest ocean current in the world. The instrument was due to spend two years collecting data at a depth of 1100 metres, before being recovered on Christmas Day in 2013 by a research expedition on the Royal Research Ship (RRS) James Clark Ross, operated by British Antarctic Survey. However it did not return to the surface as planned for reasons that are not clear, possibly due to something getting tangled up with the release mechanism.

After being presumed lost, the deep ocean instrument frame was discovered washed up on a beach on the western tip of Tasmania. After being made aware of the find, the manufacturers were able to use the serial numbers on two of the sensors on the frame to trace the NOC as the owners and contact them.

The image in the article serves up robust testimony to the differential ability of the probe's materials to resist marine fouling.

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Runaway1956 writes:

Measuring the "Filter Bubble": How Google is influencing what you click

Over the years, there has been considerable discussion of Google's "filter bubble" problem. Put simply, it's the manipulation of your search results based on your personal data. In practice this means links are moved up or down or added to your Google search results, necessitating the filtering of other search results altogether. These editorialized results are informed by the personal information Google has on you (like your search, browsing, and purchase history), and puts you in a bubble based on what Google's algorithms think you're most likely to click on.

The filter bubble is particularly pernicious when searching for political topics. That's because undecided and inquisitive voters turn to search engines to conduct basic research on candidates and issues in the critical time when they are forming their opinions on them. If they’re getting information that is swayed to one side because of their personal filter bubbles, then this can have a significant effect on political outcomes in aggregate.

This is a moderately long read, as web pages go. IMO, it's well worth the time.

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Phoenix666 writes:

ArsTechnica:

[...] Assuming these electric aircraft could be built, would they actually lower emissions? At present, no. Given the average emissions involved with powering the US grid, the emissions involved with powering an electric aircraft (including losses during transmission) would be about 20 percent higher than those generated by a modern, efficient jet engine. That doesn't mean they'd be entirely useless from a climate perspective, though. Once the additional warming effects of aircraft are taken into consideration, the electric aircraft comes out ahead by about 30 percent.

Future considerations complicate things pretty quickly, though. The price of renewable energy is expected to keep dropping, which will make renewables a larger part of the grid, lowering the emissions. The authors estimate that the vast majority of charging will take place during daylight hours—the peak of solar production—as well. Assuming future solar production leads to a discount on electric use during the day, it could help the economics of electric aircraft; currently, they only make sense economically with fuel at about $100/barrel.

How all of this would affect air travel is very sensitive to the capacity of future batteries. The authors estimate that an effective range of about 1,100 kilometers would allow electric aircraft to cover 15 percent of the total air miles (and corresponding fuel use) and nearly half the total flights. That would raise the total electricity demand by about one percent globally, although most of that would affect industrialized nations. Upping the range to 2,200 kilometers would allow 80 percent of the global flight total to be handled by electric aircraft.

Zeppelins still don't seem to figure into the answer.

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Phoenix666 writes:

Phys.org:

[...] only 17% of their [elderly] clients currently access the internet. As Jack explains: "Family and friends often use technology to find out things for me when I am stuck. However, most of my friends do not have internet access. They did not use technology in their working lives, as they were either farmers or manual workers. They still just ring people up or ask their children or grandchildren to use technology for them."

Technology can help, as long as it focuses on helping older people with overcoming the concerns that hold them back from meeting people outside the house. Using the insights from the research, we developed an app that draws on open data about events and volunteering opportunities nearby.

Older people can create user profiles to set their preferences for events according to cost and location. They can then review the transport options and routes to the event on an age-friendly map which includes the location of bus stops and car parks as well as nearby toilets and benches. If they select an event they want to attend, it's recorded in a calendar. The app can also be accessed by family, friends or carers who can search and plan on their behalf. This allows for the app to also be beneficial to older adults that do not have internet access.

But, even with this support, it's striking how few listings of events and transport options were available for older people over the festive period. Without more efforts to remedy the crisis of loneliness and isolation in the elderly, the festive season may still be anything but a season of cheer for many.

If kids and grandkids can't go to grandma's house, an app can help grandma come to them?

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Phoenix666 writes:

KAUST:

Microbes could become key allies in global efforts to curb carbon emissions and avoid dangerous climate change. A group of microbes called chemolithoautotrophs consume CO₂ through their natural metabolism, spitting out small organic molecules as a byproduct. These microbes could be enlisted to convert industrial CO₂ emissions into valuable chemicals, thanks to a new concept developed by Pascal Saikaly and his team at KAUST.

[...] To harness chemolithoautotroph capabilities for recycling CO₂ emissions into useful chemicals, researchers supply electrons to the microbes in a process called microbial electrosynthesis (MES). Typically, MES reactors have grown chemolithoautotrophs on a submerged flat-sheet cathode and bubbled CO₂ gas into the solution, but this setup has two key limitations, explains Manal Alqahtani, also a Ph.D student in the team. Flat-sheet cathodes are difficult to scale up and CO₂ gas has poor solubility.

The team developed an alternative MES reactor using cathodes made from stackable, cylindrical porous nickel fibers that Saikaly's group had previously applied to recover water and energy from wastewater. CO₂ is pumped through each cylinder, and electrons flow along it. "Using this architecture, we directly deliver CO₂ gas to chemolithoautotrophs through the pores in the hollow fibers," Alqahtani says. "We provided electrons and CO2 simultaneously to chemolithoautotrophs on the cathode surface."

Will the microbes demand minimum wage for remediating our excess carbon dioxide?

Porous Hollow Fiber Nickel Electrodes for Effective Supply and Reduction of Carbon Dioxide to Methane through Microbial Electrosynthesis (DOI: 10.1002/adfm.201804860) (DX)

Porous nickel hollow fiber cathodes coated with CNTs for efficient microbial electrosynthesis of acetate from CO₂ using Sporomusa ovata (DOI: 10.1039/C8TA05322G) (DX)

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MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984

Taylor Swift concert used facial recognition tech to identify stalkers

You're probably used to the presence of facial recognition cameras at airports and other transport hubs, but what about at concerts? That's the step Taylor Swift's team took at her May 18th show at the Rose Bowl, in a bid to identify her stalkers. According to Rolling Stone, the camera was hidden inside a display kiosk at the event, and sent images of anyone who stopped to look at the display to a "command post" in Nashville, where they were cross-referenced with other photos of the star's known stalkers.

As the target of numerous death and rape threats, Swift arguably has a valid motivation for leveraging such technology. However, it's unclear who has ownership of the photos of her concertgoers, or how long they will remain on file. Her representatives have also not yet responded to queries as to whether fans knew about the cameras.

Taylor Swift.

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Phoenix666 writes:

Gizmodo:

Nearly two years before the U.S. government's first known inquiry into the activities of Reddit co-founder and famed digital activist Aaron Swartz, the FBI swept up his email data in a counterterrorism investigation that also ensnared students at an American university, according to a once-secret document first published by Gizmodo.

The email data belonging to Swartz, who was likely not the target of the counterterrorism investigation, was cataloged by the FBI and accessed more than a year later as it weighed potential charges against him for something wholly unrelated. The legal practice of storing data on Americans who are not suspected of crimes, so that it may be used against them later on, has long been denounced by civil liberties experts, who've called on courts and lawmakers to curtail the FBI's "radically" expansive search procedures.

The government does store information indefinitely that can be used against you later at a more convenient time.

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MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984

Signal says it can't allow government access to users' chats

Last week, the Australian government passed the country's controversial Access and Assistance Bill 2018 into law, legislation that allows government agencies to demand access to encrypted communications. Companies that don't comply with the new law could face fines of up to AU$10 million ($7.3 million). A number of companies that stand to be affected have spoken out about the legislation, and Signal has now joined in, explaining that it won't be able to fulfill such requests if asked.

"By design, Signal does not have a record of your contacts, social graph, conversation list, location, user avatar, user profile name, group memberships, group titles or group avatars," Signal's Joshua Lund wrote in a blog post. "The end-to-end encrypted contents of every message and voice/video call are protected by keys that are entirely inaccessible to us." Lund added that Signal is open source, meaning anyone can "verify or examine the code for each release." "People often use Signal to share secrets with their friends, but we can't hide secrets in our software," he wrote. "We can't include a backdoor in Signal."

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DannyB writes:

In news that nobody could have foreseen and will be a shock to everyone:

Verizon signals its Yahoo and AOL divisions are almost worthless

The on-paper assessment represents a realization that Verizon's online ad strategy, called Oath, is a bust.

Only a year and a half after it built Oath from the assets of the communications giants Yahoo and AOL, Verizon now says they're virtually worthless. In a filing Tuesday with the Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, Verizon Communications Inc. said it was taking a $4.6 billion charge on the goodwill balance of Oath, the division it created in June 2017 after it spent billions of dollars to buy Yahoo Inc. and AOL Inc.

[...] Oath was supposed to be Verizon's big push into web-driven advertising, a bid to compete with behemoths like Google LLC and Facebook Inc. in the U.S. online ad market, which the Internet Advertising Bureau projects could top $100 billion this year. But rather than eat into Google's and Facebook's market shares, Oath's ad revenue fell by 7 percent in the third quarter, which ended Sept. 30, to just $1.8 billion.

Google's parent company, Alphabet Inc., by comparison, hoovered up $29 billion in ad revenue in the same three months, a rise of more than 10 percent over the previous quarter. [...] Meanwhile, the growth of another player, Amazon Advertising — which outpaced Oath with $2.5 billion in ad sales in the third quarter — has pushed Oath even lower down the food chain.

[...] Writing off 96 percent of its value is like "ripping off the Oath band-aid," Fritzsche wrote. [...] Verizon bought AOL for $4.4 billion in 2015, and it bought Yahoo for $4.5 billion in 2017. It then merged them into a new venture called Oath.

Who could possibly have imagined that with big names like AOL and Yahoo! this venture wouldn't compete well against the mere likes of Google, Facebook, and Amazon.

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984

Verizon cuts 10,000 jobs and admits its Yahoo/AOL division is a failure

Verizon's Oath division failing in ad market, and it could get even worse.

Related: Verizon Takes Aim at Tumblr's Kneecaps, Bans All Adult Content

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upstart writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984

Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo reaches space for the first time

Virgin Galactic has come a long way since its tragic 2014 crash. The company's SpaceShipTwo has reached space after months of testing, flying to an altitude of 271,268 feet before returning to Earth. The stay was brief (SST fired its rocket for all of a minute), but it was enough to both verify the spacecraft as well as conduct four NASA-backed scientific experiments that studied the effects of microgravity and devices that could handle life support and counteract vibration.

[...] Actual passenger flights aren't likely to happen for some time. Virgin stressed that it wanted to finish its tests "safely," not just quickly. The successful visit to space makes that more a question of when than if, though, and suggests that Richard Branson might be vaguely realistic when he talks about hopping aboard his own flight within months.

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dexcheque writes:

Some folks at NVIDIA have developed a "style-based generator architecture for generative adversarial networks", borrowing from "style transfer literature". It has been demonstrated to generate remarkably realistic (and fictitious) human faces. As impressive as it is, it's not obvious the extent to which the demonstration of this architecture is like a little old lady who only drove it to church on Sundays. Regardless, it looks like the AI overlords can now have alleged supermodel girlfriends in Canada too:

The video demonstration is at https://www.youtube.com/

Their explanation/description is at https://arxiv.org/pdf/1812.04948.pdf

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