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martyb writes:

According to SpaceFlight Now, SpaceX's SES-9 launch was again aborted in the final minutes. That launch was, in itself, originally planned for Wednesday February 24, 2016.

As of this writing, no new launch date/time has been announced. Per SES's Twitter feed: SES and SpaceX are now targeting to launch #SES9 on Sunday, 28 February, at 6.46pm ET, with a backup date on Monday, 29 February. (Hat tip to gman003.)

What's the problem? Well, for one, this IS rocket science. For background, please refer to the eminently-readable explanation written by Space Shuttle Flight Engineer Don Pettit: The Tyranny of the Rocket Equation. Overcoming Earth's gravity takes a lot of energy. The greater the payload and/or the altitude, the more fuel and oxidizer you need to get there. But, that has its own mass, which requires even more power to lift. In short, something like 90%-95% of the rocket's launch mass ends up being fuel and oxidizer.

The SES-9 communications satellite is destined for GTO (Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit) That is much higher than LEO (Low Earth Orbit) where, for example, the ISS (International Space Station) orbits. The Falcon-9 is designed to deliver up to 4.85 mT (4850 kg) to GTO. This is where things get interesting. SES-9 comes in at a hefty 5330 kg — 480 kg over nominal lift capacity to that altitude. So, the challenge becomes how can SpaceX get something so massive to such a high orbit?

SpaceX has found a way to increase the lifting capacity of the Falcon-9 by using fuel and liquid oxygen that have undergone additional chilling. How does that help? The SpaceFlight Now article explains it well:

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takyon writes:

Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckerberg has asked his employees to stop crossing out "Black Lives Matter" and replacing it with "All Lives Matter" on the company's wall. The physical wall inside one of Facebook's buildings in Menlo Park, CA, allows employees to write and share various thoughts:

In an internal memo obtained by Gizmodo, Zuckerberg said he was disappointed by the "several recent instances of people crossing out 'black lives matter' and writing 'all lives matter' on the walls at MPK." MPK, one of Facebook's buildings in Menlo Park, Calif., has a wall reminiscent of the early days of Facebook for employees to write their thoughts.

The memo in full:

There have been several recent instances of people crossing out "black lives matter" and writing "all lives matter" on the walls at MPK.

Despite my clear communication at Q&A last week that this was unacceptable, and messages from several other leaders from across the company, this has happened again. I was already very disappointed by this disrespectful behavior before, but after my communication I now consider this malicious as well.

There are specific issues affecting the black community in the United States, coming from a history of oppression and racism. 'Black lives matter' doesn't mean other lives don't -- it's simply asking that the black community also achieves the justice they deserve.

We've never had rules around what people can write on our walls -- we expect everybody to treat each other with respect. Regardless of the content or location, crossing out something means silencing speech, or that one person's speech is more important than another's. Facebook should be a service and a community where everyone is treated with respect.

This has been a deeply hurtful and tiresome experience for the black community and really the entire Facebook community, and we are now investigating the current incidents.

I hope and encourage people to participate in the Black@ town hall on 3/4 to educate themselves about what the Black Lives Matter movement is about.

Original Submission

-- OriginalOwner_ writes:

El Reg reports

Linux users are piling on Microsoft after the long-neglected Skype client on the open-source OS suddenly lost the ability to join calls from other versions of the software.

Since [February 22], users running the latest Linux build of Skype have been unable to chat to friends who are using Skype for OS X and Windows, it appears.

Fed up with this situation, Dutch student Nick Vernij and his pal Lem Severein decided to call attention to the issue by setting up a webpage. Here, they take Microsoft to task for the latest headache to befall Skype for Linux, which was last updated in June 2014.

"We do understand that Linux is a competitor of Microsoft's Windows. But we do not understand why this results in a lack of support for Skype", the pair's online protest states.

"Linux is actively being used by power users who can not or do not want to use Windows because of a lack of features, and now, those (paying) users who used Skype for both Business and Private purposes are dropped by Skype."

What are Soylentils using in place of Skype? What's missing from that alternative?

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Bytram (with the assistance of MrPlow on IRC) submitted:

Here’s a tricky task. Pick a photograph from the Web at random. Now try to work out where it was taken using only the image itself. If the image shows a famous building or landmark, such as the Eiffel Tower or Niagara Falls, the task is straightforward. But the job becomes significantly harder when the image lacks specific location cues or is taken indoors or shows a pet or food or some other detail.

Nevertheless, humans are surprisingly good at this task. To help, they bring to bear all kinds of knowledge about the world such as the type and language of signs on display, the types of vegetation, architectural styles, the direction of traffic, and so on. Humans spend a lifetime picking up these kinds of geolocation cues.

So it’s easy to think that machines would struggle with this task. And indeed, they have.

Today, that changes thanks to the work of Tobias Weyand, a computer vision specialist at Google, and a couple of pals. These guys have trained a deep-learning machine to work out the location of almost any photo using only the pixels it contains.

Source: https://www.technologyreview.com/s/600889/google-unveils-neural-network-with-superhuman-ability-to-determine-the-location-of-almost/

Paper: http://arxiv.org/abs/1602.05314

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Absolutely.Geek writes:

This showed up on my FB feed the other day; it raises a very good point.

Maori.Geek writes a very good post on something I never considered before. Why are these essentially simple machines so very expensive?

After seeing one in person regularly over the last 9 months it struck a nerve; how useful would it be to have an ultrasound machine available at every doctor's surgery? Or in every bio-lab at high school?

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

A Japanese utility reactivated a nuclear reactor Friday, the fourth unit brought back online under updated regulations following the triple meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi plant in 2011.

Kansai Electric Power restarted Reactor 4 at the Takahama nuclear plant on the Sea of Japan coast, 400 kilometres west of Tokyo, following the resumption of Reactor 3 at the same complex in late January.

The latest resumption comes amid growing concerns about the safety of Reactor 4 following a leak of radioactive coolant water Saturday in a building attached to the unit.

In August, Kyushu Electric Power reactivated two reactors last year at the Sendai nuclear plant on the south-western island of Kyushu.

The other 44 reactors in Japan remain offline amid lingering public fears of nuclear power following the 2011 disaster.

links: http://www.dpa-international.com/news/top_stories/japan-restarts-fourth-nuclear-reactor-under-new-rules-a-48430025.html
link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takahama_Nuclear_Power_Plant

Original Submission

darkfeline writes:

Ars Technica reports:

The Walt Disney Company has a reputation for lobbying hard on copyright issues. The 1998 copyright extension has even been dubbed the “Mickey Mouse Protection Act” by activists like Lawrence Lessig that have worked to reform copyright laws.

This year, the company is turning to its employees to fund some of that battle. Disney CEO Bob Iger has sent a letter to the company’s employees, asking for them to open their hearts—and their wallets—to the company’s political action committee, DisneyPAC.

In the letter, which was provided to Ars by a Disney employee, Iger tells workers about his company's recent intellectual property victories, including stronger IP protections in the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a Supreme Court victory that destroyed Aereo, and continued vigilance about the "state of copyright law in the digital environment." It also mentions that Disney is seeking an opening to lower the corporate tax rate.

Specific points:

- This is apparently common.
- Disney even offers automatic deduction from your payroll; how thoughtful!
- Legally, this isn't supposed to affect you and your employment (not provably, at least).

This is kind of ridiculous.

Original Submission

martyb writes:

A newly-released article in the Journal Nature reports on research which claims it has found the 'missing matter' that prior research had failed to identify.

The abstract's Editor's summary succinctly notes:

This paper reports the discovery, with the Parkes radio telescope, of a fast radio burst, FRB 150418. A multi-wavelength multi-telescope follow-up study detected a radio transient two hours after the initial burst, lasting about six days before fading to a quiescent level. The authors interpret this fading source as the afterglow of the FRB. Fast radio bursts are transient radio pulses lasting only a few milliseconds and previously it has not been possible to localize such a burst and determine a redshift. The source of FRB 150418 is identified as an elliptical galaxy with redshift of 0.492.

An article at Phys.org, New fast radio burst discovery finds 'missing matter' in the universe, elaborates:

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takyon writes:

In response to a newspaper reporter's investigation into law enforcement troublemakers, the Virginia Senate has passed a bill that would make the identities of all police officers secret:

The Virginia Senate voted 25-15 on Monday to keep the names of all police officers and deputy sheriffs a secret. SB552 by Sen. John Cosgrove, R-Chesapeake, applies to any local or state officer, including officers from agencies such as the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control and the Virginia Marine Police.

Cosgrove said during an earlier subcommittee hearing that he filed the bill in response to a November court ruling allowing The Virginian-Pilot access to names, agencies and employment dates for current Virginia police officers. The newspaper is examining how often officers who got in trouble were able to find other jobs in law enforcement.

Cosgrove said Monday that his bill, which exempts law enforcement officers from Freedom of Information Act requirements, should be passed to protect officers and their families from being targeted for violence. "Unfortunately, our culture has changed," he said. "Many times, police officers are considered fair game."

The bill has been panned by critics, including the newspaper directly targeted by the legislation, The Virginian-Pilot. The Columbia Journalism Review has provided some additional context for this legislation:

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-- OriginalOwner_ writes:

El Reg reports:

HP Ink--the PC and printers half of the Hewlett-Packard split--has blamed Windows 10 for a ho-hum quarter of declining sales.

[...] It's HP Ink's first quarter as a standalone company since the Great HP Split of 2015.

We were told Microsoft's software hasn't, so far, apparently, spurred enough people into buying HP-branded PCs. Well, that may explain the 13 per cent fall in the company's personal systems revenues.

How about its printers, though? People love printers, right? Always buying them. Always having fun on cold Sunday evenings reinstalling drivers. Unjamming the paper trays. Buying new cartridges. Revenues fell 17 per cent. Ah.

This should have been a boom quarter for HP Ink as the period covered the Christmas shopping season.

[...] Currency swings, the free giveaway of Windows 10 (normally people buy a new machine to get a new Microsoft OS), and the fact that no one uses printers any more is punishing a company primarily relying on printer and PC sales.

[...] "It's all bad", said tech analyst Anand Srinivasan, which is perhaps the most upbeat thing you can say right now about HP Ink.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

SeaWorld has admitted in a statement that multiple employees participated in spying against animal rights activists:

US marine amusement park SeaWorld has admitted some of its employees posed as animal activists to spy on its critics. SeaWorld CEO Joel Manby said in a statement on Thursday that his company would no longer use such practices. The revelation came out after a worker from the San Diego park was discovered posing as an activist last year. The company has faced intense criticism by animal rights activists who say it is enslaving marine animals at its 11 parks across the US.

"The board has directed that the company's management team end a practice in which certain employees posed as animal rights activists," Mr Manby announced on Thursday. He said the decision to send people undercover was "to maintain the safety and security of company employees, customers, and animals in the face of credible threats that the company had received".

SeaWorld employee Paul McComb was briefly suspended in July after the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) accused him of trying to incite violence among peaceful protesters whilst posting as an activist. But SeaWorld announced on Thursday that he has since returned to work in a different department.

This article from last year has some more details about the spying operation:

Separately, Peta said it was investigating the possibility that between three to five other people who had acted as supporters may have been operating undercover in some capacity for the theme park, having shown similar behaviour to McComb. Dr Jeffrey Ventre, who worked as a SeaWorld trainer in the early 1990s but has since become a vocal critic of keeping orcas in captivity, claimed: "It's bigger than Peta. The spy ring is much more sophisticated." Ventre, who appeared in Blackfish, said McComb had shadowed people involved with the CNN Films documentary, recording presentations that were meant to be closed door.

[...] The Pasadena police department's decision to release McComb (then going by Jones) after arresting him during a protest at the January 2014 Rose Parade first sparked suspicion among Peta members. Peta filed suit against Pasadena on Thursday for failing to produce documents under a Freedom of Information Act request that might show why the alleged undercover SeaWorld employee was released during the protests when Peta members were not.

Samantha Berg, another former SeaWorld trainer, said SeaWorld protesters had suspected undercover operatives may have been at a protest in Orlanda, Florida, in April. She said four unidentified individuals held signs reading "support social communism" under a hammer and sickle. "The protesters knew them, because they had been showing up over a period of months every time they would have a protest," said Berg. The belief among protesters at the time, according to Berg, was that SeaWorld had dispatched those four in order to "make the regular protesters look a little crazy".

Original Submission

GungnirSniper writes:

As someone who has worked to get up the IT ladder, I have been building my LinkedIn connections to help aid further advancement. An ex-colleague and dotted-line-subordinate sent me a request recently. I have not touched his request as his profile has falsified, inflated information about his role at our former mutual company. He lists himself as both a Manager and a Team Lead when he was hired as a Co-Op student and was promoted to a full time Engineer later. He never had any management role or responsibilities.

Of the eight bullet points he lists, seven of them are false or grossly misleading. He uses phrases like "intrusion prevention" and "complex infrastructure configuration" which seems aimed more at the jobs he wants, not the one he actually had. I did not have a good or bad rapport with the guy, so I am unwilling to assume he will say positive things about me if asked. Am I being too cautious here? Is my shunning of this resume-steroids user justified?

How would my fellow Soylentils handle this?

Original Submission

hubie writes:

The 7.3 GW of cumulative energy production added in 2015 in the United States from installations of solar photovoltaics (PVs) surpassed nearly all other sources of electricity including natural gas. Most of the energy was added in California, but the number of states that added at least 100 MW is now up to 13.

Despite the geographical diversification, Greentech Media analyst Shayle Kann said that the US solar market remained concentrated in key states. “The top ten states accounted for 87 per cent of installed capacity in 2015,” he pointed out. “But growth has been widespread, and 24 of the 35 states that we track saw market growth in 2015.”

By sector, US photovoltaic production has historically been dominated by commercial installations, but 2015 saw the residential installations expand 66 percent and now accounts for about one-third of the market. This is in contrast to the European market where capacity from new installations has been dropping and is now at about one-third from its peak in 2011. One of the driving differences between the two markets is that the EU has removed many Green Energy subsidies, while the US Congress unexpectedly extended the solar investment tax credit set to expire in 2016.

However, all of this needs to be kept in perspective:

But while the cumulative PV capacity installed now tops 25 GW (at peak output), new figures from the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) state that total electricity generating capacity in the country currently stands at around 1.1 TW – meaning that PV accounts for just over 2 per cent of total capacity.

Original Submission

-- OriginalOwner_ writes:

El Reg reports

Whatever choice of hardware you make--on-premises, cloud, roll-your-own, converged, or hyperconverged--don't expect to save any money.

So says Keith Townsend, a consultant, speaker, and writer who El Reg saw in action in Sydney, Australia at the local VMware user group conference.

At the event, Townsend gave a talk titled "When to Select Hyper-Converged Solutions" during which he said "There is no such thing as saving money. You move it from one bucket to another; you'll spend it on opex or capex."

[...] Sometimes hardware [spending] isn't the place to look for savings. "SAP HANA costs $20M to $70M to implement and $5M to $20M of that is hardware", Townsend said. You could argue over the price of that hardware but the real savings come from looking at other aspects of a project like the savings in database [licenses] to be had.

What say Soylentils?

Original Submission

takyon writes:

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration and Centers for Disease Control announced on Monday that they are investigating a multi-state salmonella outbreak linked to alfalfa sprouts produced by Sweetwater Farms LLC. However, foodborne illness outbreaks linked to sprouts (such as alfalfa, mung bean, red clover or radish) are common:

For something many deem a "health food," sprouts regularly appear on official outbreak lists. Since 1998 there have been at least 49 foodborne outbreaks, including 24 multi-state outbreaks and 1,737 illnesses tied to sprouts, according to a tally kept by Colorado State University.

Sandwich chain Jimmy John's experienced multiple outbreaks linked to sprouts in 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2012. Sprouts are still on the menu, but place your order online, and a less than appetizing warning pops up: "The consumption of raw sprouts may result in an increased risk of foodborne illness and poses a health risk to everyone. Click 'Yes' if you understand the potential risks, or 'Cancel' if you'd like to continue without adding sprouts."

Jimmy John's may feel comfortable behind their warning label, but offering sprouts is a risk that Kroger and Wal-Mart no longer take — both grocery retailers have deemed sprouts too dangerous to sell. In announcing its decision in 2012, Kroger said it was based on a "thorough, science-based" review.

Sprout seeds need warmth and humidity to grow — which also happen to be ideal conditions for pathogens to flourish. Because of the number of outbreaks associated with sprouts, the FDA developed special requirements (pdf) for sprout growers within the Food Modernization and Safety Act that is just going into effect. A few years ago, the agency also helped launch the Sprout Safety Alliance, with the Institute for Food Safety and Health at the Illinois Institute of Technology.

Sprouting at Wikipedia.

Original Submission