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AnonTechie writes:

Due to completely messed up U.S. tax policies, some even got a rebate check. Only small businesses pay taxes. Big companies often pay nothing at all.

Look at a new report from Citizens for Tax Justice ( http://ctj.org/ctjreports/2015/04/fifteen_of_many_reasons_why_we_need_corporate_tax_reform.php#.VSbihhPF8QY ), a Washington, D.C. group. It finds that some of nation's most famous brands have paid remarkably little to the government over the last five years. In fact, many actually enjoyed a negative tax rate: They received a nice rebate check from the U.S. Treasury.

The 15 giants highlighted by CTJ were chosen to represent a wide range of industries among Fortune 500 companies. They include CBS, Mattel, Prudential, and the California utility PG&E. Together, they paid no federal income tax in 2014, despite profits totaling $23 billion. CTJ's point is that these companies are not anomalies, they are examples.

http://www.fastcoexist.com/3044873/15-companies-that-paid-zero-income-tax-last-year-despite-23-billion-in-profits

takyon writes:

The Wisconsin Historical Society has asked University of Wisconsin textile expert Majid Sarmadi to run a blood test on a bedspread that may have covered President Abraham Lincoln after he was shot 150 years ago. Sarmadi and the state's crime lab have run their own preliminary tests, and the FBI may be asked to conduct its own test.

If blood is present, Sarmadi said he hoped to confirm eventually whether it was Lincoln's blood through DNA tests on other assassination artefacts.

No DNA test has been conducted on any artefacts such as a pillow on display at the Ford's Theatre museum known to contain Lincoln's blood, because of fears of ruining them, Bellais said.

"Technology now has it that you can actually test these things without destroying the pieces," Bellais said. "I wouldn't be surprised that fairly soon we will have Lincoln DNA on record."

Yes, it is almost time to clone Lincoln.

takyon writes:

Sharp has announced its intention to manufacture the world's sharpest display, a 5.5" IGZO screen with a 4K/UHD 3840x2160 resolution (806 pixels per inch), for some 2016 smartphones. Is 806 PPI too much? Tom's Hardware notes the drawbacks while celebrating the new milestone:

Although devices that are 1440p or even 4K will look even more stunning, there are indeed diminishing returns benefits-wise as the cost, the power consumption, or the GPU resources required to handle such high resolutions are significantly higher than the previous generations.

That's not to say that a 4K display today will necessarily cost more than a 1440p display did last year, but it does cost significantly more than a 1440p display being sold this year. Although the price ratios for components may remain relatively the same for the new technologies inside a new smartphone, if the benefits are increasingly smaller, then there's an opportunity cost, as well.

For instance, the extra cost to get a 4K display over a 1440p display this year could be used instead towards improving the device's camera. (OEMs could use a sharper lens, a larger sensor, improved OIS, and so on.) This sort of balance should always be taken into consideration.

[...] That doesn't mean higher resolution displays in smartphones are not useful. However, they could be even more useful for other applications; for example, 4K displays are ideal for VR. In order to have a VR experience that makes you completely forget you have a screen in front of your eyes, you'll need at least a 4K resolution screen.

Higher-resolution displays will also help lower the cost of lower resolution panels.

Phoenix666 writes:

io9 reports:

As 2014 comes to a close, it's time to reflect on the most futuristic breakthroughs and developments of the past year. This year's crop features a slew of incredible technological, scientific, and social achievements, from mind-to-mind communication to self-guiding sniper bullets. Here are 15 predictions that came true in 2014.

It's a bit deep into 2015 for a 2014 round-up, but there are some in their list you may not have heard of.

wantkitteh writes:

Fudzilla have 'obtained' a slide showing details of a forthcoming APU from AMD based on their new "Zen" architecture.

The highest end compute HSA part has up to 16 Zen x86 cores and supports 32 threads, or two threads per core. This is something we saw on Intel architectures for a while, and it seems to be working just fine. This will be the first exciting processor from the house of AMD in the server / HSA market in years, and in case AMD delivers it on time it might be a big break for the company.

Each Zen core gets 512 KB of L2 cache and each cluster or four Zen cores is sharing 8MB L3 cache. In case we are talking about a 16-core, 32-thread next generation Zen based x86 processor, the total amount of L2 cache gets to a whopping 8MB, backed by 32MB of L3 cache.

This new APU also comes with the Greenland Graphics and Multimedia Engine that comes with HBM memory on the side. The specs we saw indicate that there can be up to 16GB of HBM memory with 512GB/s speed packed on the interposer. This is definitely a lot of memory for an APU GPU, and it also comes with 1/2 rate double precision compute, enhanced ECC and RAS and HSA support.

The new APU sports quad-channel DDR4 support, with up to 256GB per channel at speeds of up to 3.2GHz. No information yet on which processor socket this APU will use, but it's safe to assume the DDR4 support alone will render it incompatible with all AMD's current motherboards. Support is also included for secure boot and AMD's encryption co-processor.

takyon writes:

The UK is opposing international efforts to ban "lethal autonomous weapons systems" (Laws) at a week-long United Nations session in Geneva:

The meeting, chaired by a German diplomat, Michael Biontino, has also been asked to discuss questions such as: in what situations are distinctively human traits, such as fear, hate, sense of honour and dignity, compassion and love desirable in combat?, and in what situations do machines lacking emotions offer distinct advantages over human combatants?

The Campaign to Stop Killer Robots, an alliance of human rights groups and concerned scientists, is calling for an international prohibition on fully autonomous weapons.

Last week Human Rights Watch released a report urging the creation of a new protocol specifically aimed at outlawing Laws. Blinding laser weapons were pre-emptively outlawed in 1995 and combatant nations since 2008 have been required to remove unexploded cluster bombs.

[...] The Foreign Office told the Guardian: "At present, we do not see the need for a prohibition on the use of Laws, as international humanitarian law already provides sufficient regulation for this area. The United Kingdom is not developing lethal autonomous weapons systems, and the operation of weapons systems by the UK armed forces will always be under human oversight and control. As an indication of our commitment to this, we are focusing development efforts on remotely piloted systems rather than highly automated systems."

takyon writes:

ICANN has been asked by its formal advisory body, the Intellectual Property Constituency (IPC), to investigate Vox Populi Registry Inc. for alleged wrongdoing in regards to the ".sucks" gTLD.

According to the BBC:

Specialist online website Domain Incite reports that actor "Kevin Spacey, Microsoft, Google and Apple have already bought up '.sucks' sites in a bid to protect their reputations". This practice is known as "defensive registering".

Icann granted Vox Populi permission to sell the ".sucks" names but is now concerned at the price levels the Canadian company has set. Kevin Murphy, from Domain Incite, told the BBC two key elements of the way Vox Populi was handling the sale were causing concern.

"They are charging a $2,000 'sunrise' premium to those wishing to register '.sucks' addresses early, before the addresses go on sale to the general public [next month]," he said. "Also they are using a list of words or names that have been defensively registered in the past, for which they are charging the top amount."

Mr Murphy said the company was working from a list of keywords that had been part of web addresses bought up early on in similar new domain web address sales and using that to decide which ".sucks" addresses to charge more for.

Although ICANN has been urged to end the shakedown by the likes of US Senator Jay Rockefeller, the CEO of Vox Populi has defended .sucks, claiming that the pricing strategy was intended to strike a balance between the rights of trademark holders and the ability of critics to lampoon people and brands, as originally intended by Ralph Nader when his group Consumer Project for Technology proposed the TLD back in 2000.

"gewg_" writes:

The Center for American Progress reports

The anti-vaccine sentiments that originated with a [completely] discredited British study linking the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) shot to autism have made their way to other western countries like Australia.

According to the government agency that tracks Australia's childhood vaccination rates, the rate of kids going without their shots has doubled over the past decade.

[...]Australia has announced an aggressive new approach in this area: Cutting off government benefits to parents who refuse to inoculate their children.

Under the proposal, parents who claim philosophical objections to vaccines will no longer be eligible for welfare payments and childcare rebates that can equal up to $11,500 per child in American dollars. Prime Minister Tony Abbott announced the policy change on Sunday, although it still has to be approved by Parliament.

Hugh Pickens writes:

Even as more people opt for interment in simple shrouds or biodegradable caskets, urban cemeteries continue to fill up and cremation is a problematic option for the environmentally conscious, as the process releases greenhouse gases. Now Catrin Einhorn reports at the NYT that architect Katrina Spade has designed a facility for human composting that is attracting interest from environmental advocates and scientists. “Composting makes people think of banana peels and coffee grounds,” says Spade. But “our bodies have nutrients. What if we could grow new life after we’ve died?” The Urban Death Project's plans call for a three-story-high polished concrete composting structure in Seattle called "the core," which would be surrounded by contemplative spaces for visitors. After a ceremony - religious or not - friends and family would help insert the body into the core. Over several weeks a body would turn into about one cubic yard of compost, enough to plant a tree or a patch of flowers.

For most people in the US, there are two options after death: You are buried or you are burned. The costs, both environmental and financial, are significant, but we accept these options because they are all that we know. Conventional burial is anything but natural. Cadavers are preserved with embalming fluid containing formaldehyde, a carcinogen then buried in caskets made of metal or wood, and placed inside a concrete or metal burial vault. The tradition of embalming in the United States is relatively new, beginning in the Civil War when northern families needed to get their dead men home from the South. Spade understands the idea of human composting may be icky to some, but it’s an important part of her concept, the thing that differentiates it from natural burial, which requires extensive land. "I’m sure I’ll continue to get pushback, but I’ll continue to be stubborn because I think it’s really important that we’re part of a larger ecosystem.”

takyon writes:

The Register, MarketWatch, and Mashable are reporting an estimated 1 million sales of Apple's wrist augment based on Slice Intelligence's analysis of ereceipt data. Demand has been strong enough to push back deliveries by weeks, and "Apple is set to sell all of its production volume for the first three months".

Putting those figures together, that means Apple could have shifted 1.24 million watches on its first day of preorders on Friday. How does that stack up in Apple history? Back in 2007, it took the company 74 days to sell its one millionth iPhone, and it took two years to get to that milestone with the iPod. [It took Apple 28 days to sell 1 million iPads.]

Apple seems to have underestimated short-term demand for its latest product, and may intend to sell 20 million Apple Watches in the first year of availability.

Phoenix666 writes:

One major issue faced in the quest to colonize other heavenly bodies is how to get all the raw materials transported in a financially feasible manner.

Trove reports a possible solution using 3-D printers to build materials required using native reources as ink:

That might be all they need if a plan by Niki Werkheiser and her engineering team at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center works out. They are experimenting with a 3-D printer that would make bricks suitable for airtight buildings and radiation-proof shelters using the grit that blows across Mars’s red surface. In Huntsville, Ala., Ms. Werkheiser, NASA’s 3-D print project manager, is starting to print curved walls and other structures using imitation Martian sand as an ink. Engineers at the European Space Agency are exploring ways to use lunar dust as an ink to print out an entire moon base. London-based architects Foster + Partners have designed a printable lunar colony.

It would make sense for colonization to send automated or remote-controlled fabrication units ahead to prepare a settlement for human habitation, but does that sensible step endanger the science due to the risks of contamination?

"gewg_" writes:

Common Dreams reports

After months of massive flesh-and-blood protests against Spain's draconian new "gag law", deemed "the worst cut of rights and freedoms since the Franco regime", enterprising activists held the world's first virtual protest, with thousands of ghost-like figures marching before the Spanish Parliament to prove that holograms will soon have more freedom than people. Almost 100 groups organized the action under the monikers Hologramas Por La Libertad and No Somos Delito--We Are Not A Crime.

The controversial Citizen Safety Law, blasted by human rights groups since its approval in the Spanish Congress, is scheduled to take effect on July 1. Its oppressive measures [are essentially the] government's over-the-top response to widespread anti-austerity, pro-democracy protests known as the 15M. The law's three texts--The Penal Code, the new Anti-Terror Law, and the Law on Citizen Safety--ban and punish with heavy fines and/or jail a vast array of fundamental freedoms of expression and assembly.

[...]To many, the surreal hologram protests perfectly capture the Orwellian quality of the restrictions: In the new Spain, says one protester, "If you are a person, you can not express yourself freely--you can only do (that) if you become a hologram."

Phoenix666 writes:

The Washington Post reports that Adm. Michael S. Rogers is continuing to advocate for weakened encryption as the White House explores a number of possible schemes, as illustrated by this infographic.

For months, federal law enforcement agencies and industry have been deadlocked on a highly contentious issue: Should tech companies be obliged to guarantee government access to encrypted data on smartphones and other digital devices, and is that even possible without compromising the security of law-abiding customers?

Recently, the head of the National Security Agency provided a rare hint of what some U.S. officials think might be a technical solution. Why not, suggested Adm. Michael S. Rogers, require technology companies to create a digital key that could open any smartphone or other locked device to obtain text messages or photos, but divide the key into pieces so that no one person or agency alone could decide to use it?

"I don't want a back door," Rogers, the director of the nation's top electronic spy agency, said during a speech at Princeton University, using a tech industry term for covert measures to bypass device security. "I want a front door. And I want the front door to have multiple locks. Big locks."

[...] The split-key approach is just one of the options being studied by the White House as senior policy officials weigh the needs of companies and consumers as well as law enforcement — and try to determine how imminent the latter's problem is. With input from the FBI, intelligence community and the departments of Justice, State, Commerce and Homeland Security, they are assessing regulatory and legislative approaches, among others.

The White House is also considering options that avoid having the company or a third party hold a key. One possibility, for example, might have a judge direct a company to set up a mirror account so that law enforcement conducting a criminal investigation is able to read text messages shortly after they have been sent. For encrypted photos, the judge might order the company to back up the suspect's data to a company server when the phone is on and the data is unencrypted. Technologists say there are still issues with these approaches, and companies probably would resist them.

Google, Apple, and others have been pretty badly burned by the NSA's crimes, so it's probably safe to say Mike Rogers should file that idea under Norfolk & Way.

Phoenix666 writes in with a Quartz report on the new recipes being churned out by IBM's Watson natural language processing system:

Steve Abrams, the director of IBM's Watson Life research program, told Quartz that Watson scanned publicly available data sources to build up a vast library of information on recipes, the chemical compounds in food, and common pairings. (For any budding gastronomers out there, Abrams said Wikia was a surprisingly useful source.) Knowledge that might've taken a lifetime for a Michelin-starred chef to attain can now be accessed instantly from your tablet.

The Watson team has actually published a cookbook of its AI-inspired dishes in partnership with the Institute of Culinary Education (ICE), which launches April 14. While Quartz has not been able to test out Watson's esoteric parings yet, here are some that stood out:

• Belgian bacon pudding, a desert containing dried porcini mushrooms
• Vietnamese apple kebab, with the vaunted mushroom-and-strawberry pairing
• Portuguese lobster roll, with appetizing "saffron fluid gel"
• Hoof-n-Honey ale, with veal stock
• Thai-Jewish chicken, with potato latkes and rice balls
• The shrimp cocktail, which is a beverage with actual shrimp in it
• Kenyan Brussels spouts, with cardamom

It sounds like another sort of molecular gastronomy. Have any Soylentils eaten recipes like that? Does it work?

AnonTechie writes in about the NSA's effort to counter inconvenient insider threats:

Snowden's stream of leaked NSA secrets about classified surveillance programs shined the public spotlight on the clandestine government organization. Though the stream has now dissipated to a trickle, the impact to the intelligence community continues.

[...] Within NSA's Fort Meade, Maryland, headquarters, no one wants to face another Snowden. With NSA's widespread adoption of cloud computing, the spy agency may not have to.

NSA bet big on cloud computing as the solution to its data problem several years ago. [...] NSA's GovCloud - open-source software stacked on commodity hardware - creates a scalable environment for all NSA data. Soon, most everything NSA collects will end up in this ocean of information.

At first blush, that approach seems counterintuitive. In a post-Snowden world, is it really a good idea to put everything in one place -- to have analysts swimming around in an ocean of NSA secrets and data? It is, if that ocean actually controls what information analysts in the NSA GovCloud can access. That's analogous to how NSA handles security in its cloud.

NSA built the architecture of its cloud environment from scratch, allowing security to be baked in and automated rather than bolted on and carried out by manual processes. Any piece of data ingested by NSA systems over the last two years has been meta-tagged with bits of information, including where it came from and who is authorized to see it in preparation for the agency's cloud transition.