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Phoenix666 writes:

The value of the Bitcoin virtual currency has hit a three-year high with each one now worth about $900 (£730).

At the start of 2016, single coins were only worth around $435 but their value has climbed steadily all year.

The steady upward progress has continued despite regular hack attacks on virtual currency exchanges in which coins have been stolen.

Experts said the rise in value was linked to the long-term depreciation of the Chinese Yuan.

Original Submission

butthurt writes:

SoylentNews had a story last month about temperatures in the Arctic that were 20°C (36°F) warmer than usual. That was just a warm up.

— Chicago Tribune

Now, storm activity around Greenland has caused a warm spell in the vicinity of the North Pole, with temperatures 50°F (28°C) higher than usual.

—The Weather Network

There was a similar pattern of unusually warm weather in the Arctic in November and December of 2015.

— USA Today

additional coverage:

• Washington Post
• Science Alert
• CBS News
• Gizmodo
• Scientific American
• WITI-TV (Fox)

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Germany's DEAL project (in German), which includes over 60 major research institutions, has announced that all of its members are canceling their subscriptions to all of Elsevier's academic and scientific journals, effective January 1, 2017.

The boycott is in response to Elsevier's refusal to adopt "transparent business models" to "make publications more openly accessible."

Elsevier is notorious even among academic publishers for its hostility to open access, but it also publishes some of the most prestigious journals in many fields. This creates a vicious cycle, where the best publicly funded research is published in Elsevier journals, which then claims ownership over the research (Elsevier, like most academic journals, requires authors to sign their copyrights over, though it does not pay them for their writing, nor does it pay for their research expenses). Then, the public institutions that are producing this research have to pay very high costs to access the journals in which it appears. Journal prices have skyrocketed over the past 40 years.

No one institution can afford to boycott Elsevier, but collectively, the institutions have great power.

Germany-wide consortium of research libraries announce boycott of Elsevier journals over open access.

No full-text access to Elsevier journals to be expected from 1 January 2017 on.

Original Submission

"MrPlow" writes:

Submitted via IRC for cmn32480

Carrie Fisher, the actress best known as Star Wars' Princess Leia Organa, has died after suffering a heart attack. She was 60.

Family spokesman Simon Halls released a statement to PEOPLE on behalf of Fisher's daughter, Billie Lourd:

"It is with a very deep sadness that Billie Lourd confirms that her beloved mother Carrie Fisher passed away at 8:55 this morning," reads the statement.

"She was loved by the world and she will be missed profoundly," says Lourd. "Our entire family thanks you for your thoughts and prayers."

Source: http://people.com/movies/carrie-fisher-dies/

[UPDATE:]

Submitted via IRC for martyb

NPR reports: Actress Debbie Reynolds Dies A Day After Daughter Carrie Fisher's Death.

That means that Billie Lourd, who had a minor role in Star Wars: The Force Awakens and was slated for a part in the sequel, Star Wars: Episode VIII, lost both her mother and her grandmother in the same week.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

The smartwatch isn't dead, it's just waiting for a new service pack:

Google will be launching two new flagship smartwatches in the first quarter of next year, according to Jeff Chang, product manager of Android Wear at Google. In an exclusive interview with The Verge, Chang said that the new watches will be the flagship Android Wear 2.0 devices and will be the first ones to launch with the new platform. The new smartwatches had been rumored before, but Google confirmed the upcoming launch today as part of a larger effort to convince consumers that wearables — smartwatches specifically — are still in demand.

The new models will not have Google or Pixel branding, but will be branded by the company that is manufacturing them. Chang says that Google collaborated with the manufacturer — which he wouldn't name, but said has produced Android Wear devices in the past — on the hardware design and software integration for the watches. He likened the partnership to Google's Nexus smartphone program in terms of collaboration and goals.

Quick, get in the market while Apple is bleeding! Don't forget the fitness-related branding.

More information about Android Wear operating system. In other news, Niantic has launched Pokémon Go for the Apple Watch.

Original Submission

callmeemo writes:

An experimental vaccine for Ebola has been developed by the World Health Organization and has displayed a 100% success rate on its trials in Guinea.

"It's the first vaccine for which efficacy has been shown," said Dr Marie-Paule Kieny, a WHO assistant director-general and the study's lead author.

The vaccine was distributed to 5,837 people last year in Guinea, according to the Lancet medical journal. Within 10 days, all participants were free of the virus; they were followed up on for 84 days. It has proven to be nearly free of major side-effects (minor side-effects included headaches, fatigue, and muscle pain, but what doesn't), except for 80 people who had severe problems, only 2 of which could accurately be linked to the vaccine. All recovered without complications.

Other treatments are still under study, and other strains of Ebola such as Sudan still need a vaccine.

Sources: The Lancet Al Jazeera NY Times

Original Submission

Phoenix666 writes:

Sling has lifted the curtain on a new "AirTV Player"—a set-top box that combines IPTV with an OTA antenna for local channel reception.

Like every other set-top box on Earth, the AirTV Player hooks up to your Internet connection and plays video, and here the SlingTV service is the primary provider. As a bonus you get Netflix, local TV, and access to the Google Play Store.

Thanks to Zatz Not Funny, we know the device is powered by Android. The site found the FCC docs for the AirTV Player, which indicates it was built by a company called "Technicolor." In the results database for Geekbench, a popular Android CPU benchmark, there is a "Technicolor AirTV Player" listing. The listing shows a device running Android 6.0 on a 1.2GHz ARMv8 SoC with 1GB of RAM. We're not sure if that means it's a custom build of Android or just Android TV.

Original Submission

AnonTechie writes:

Non-science students enrolled in astrophotography classes created by scientists at the University of California, Riverside reported a better understanding of how to use a telescope and camera and how to process images, according to a recently published paper about the class.

In addition, after taking the classes, the students, most of whom were UC Riverside non-STEM (Science, Technology. Engineering, Mathematics) majors, were eager to take up astrophotography as a hobby, opening the path to become future citizen scientists and amateur astronomers, groups which historically have analyzed a lot of astronomical data and made numerous discoveries.

The idea of the classes was to engage students majoring in fields such as social sciences, humanities, business and arts in science. Astronomy is considered by many a gateway into science. More than 200,000 non-science majors enroll in an introductory astronomy class every year in the United States, but this will likely be their only interaction with a natural science during their undergraduate studies.

Astrophotography is a great way to teach science in a visual and hands-on manner, De Leo Winkler said. It also provides a way to break through the mathematical anxiety that many non-science majors experience.

https://ucrtoday.ucr.edu/43195

[Paper]: Astrophotography, a portal for engaging non-STEM majors in science

[Also Covered By]: Phys.org

I believe that Amateur Radio, Amateur Radio Astronomy, Amateur Rocketry (and similar activities) also has the potential to attract people, from all walks of life, to STEM subjects. Do you people think that this could be the best way to attract people to STEM disciplines ?

Original Submission

fleg writes:

The Guardian reports on the next step of AI taking over a job that humans never imagined they would:

The world's largest hedge fund is building a piece of software to automate the day-to-day management of the firm, including hiring, firing and other strategic decision-making.

Bridgewater Associates has a team of software engineers working on the project at the request of billionaire founder Ray Dalio, who wants to ensure the company can run according to his vision even when he's not there, the Wall Street Journal reported.

[...] The firm, which manages $160bn, created the team of programmers specializing in analytics and artificial intelligence, dubbed the Systematized Intelligence Lab, in early 2015. The unit is headed up by David Ferrucci, who previously led IBM's development of Watson, the supercomputer that beat humans at Jeopardy! in 2011.

The company is already highly data-driven, with meetings recorded and staff asked to grade each other throughout the day using a ratings system called "dots". The Systematized Intelligence Lab has built a tool that incorporates these ratings into "Baseball Cards" that show employees' strengths and weaknesses. Another app, dubbed The Contract, gets staff to set goals they want to achieve and then tracks how effectively they follow through.

These tools are early applications of PriOS, the over-arching management software that Dalio wants to make three-quarters of all management decisions within five years. The kinds of decisions PriOS could make include finding the right staff for particular job openings and ranking opposing perspectives from multiple team members when there's a disagreement about how to proceed.

See also.

Original Submission

BK writes:

From WFTV news in Orlando, Florida:

A Florida company that sells online commercial payment software has sued its former chief technology officer, claiming that a porn site snapped up its web address when he allowed it to expire.

[...] The St. Petersburg company accuses co-founder and former CTO Lev Gorodinski of keeping vital passwords, software code and other sensitive information after abruptly quitting.

[...] Subsequently, all but one of Epay's 29 customers canceled their contracts, company officials said.

[...] The last customer, a preschool, left when the Epay web domain was turned into a pornography site, the lawsuit alleges.

The company's registration with GoDaddy expired and Gorodinski refused to give the company the information needed to access the account and re-establish its ownership, Epay officials claim.

Why is it always porn sites?

Original Submission

AnonTechie writes:

Disabled engineers make great contributors—if they can get past the interview

[...] People with disabilities are under represented in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) jobs compared with their numbers in the overall population, according to the Bureau of Labour Statistics and the U.S. Census Bureau. But those who succeed share qualities of acceptance, tenacity, and resilience. By necessity, these engineers and coders have well-honed problem-solving skills.

There are three examples quoted in the article. I am sure some of you have had similar experiences. What are your views on this?

Original Submission

barbara hudson writes:

Scientists have discovered that liquid water can exist in two states, or phases. (note: this is not the same as "polywater" from the 60s. the observed behavior of which was ultimately explained as contaminants in)

On the existence of two states in liquid water: impact on biological and nanoscopic systems DOI: 10.1504/IJNT.2016.079670

Original Submission

DBCubix writes:

StingRay, a suitcase-size surveillance tool, mimics a cellphone tower, allowing authorities to track individual cellphones in real time. Users of the device, which include scores of law enforcement agencies across the country, sign a non-disclosure agreement when they purchase it, pledging not to divulge its use, even in court cases against defendants the device helped capture.

That is one of the concerns of civil liberties groups, that cellphones unconnected with a law enforcement investigation are also captured by the device. While some cell-site simulators allow 911 emergency calls to pass through to legitimate towers, other calls routinely fail. Should an emergency unfold, cell users in the vicinity probably would find their calls dropped or signals jammed.

"Even if there is a 911 pass-through feature, there are still plenty of other calls that people might want to make," said Christopher Soghoian, principal technologist at the American Civil Liberties Union. "You might want to call your children's school. You might want to call your wife or husband."

It's hard to know with certainty how many innocent cellphone users have experienced jamming due to police use of cell-site simulators. Federal restrictions on information about their use prevents collecting such details.

Original Submission

Phoenix666 writes:

Sunlight allows us to make vitamin D, credited with healthier living, but a surprise research finding could reveal another powerful benefit of getting some sun.

Georgetown University Medical Center researchers have found that sunlight, through a mechanism separate than vitamin D production, energizes T cells that play a central role in human immunity.

Their findings, published today in Scientific Reports, suggest how the skin, the body's largest organ, stays alert to the many microbes that can nest there.

"We all know sunlight provides vitamin D, which is suggested to have an impact on immunity, among other things. But what we found is a completely separate role of sunlight on immunity," says the study's senior investigator, Gerard Ahern, PhD, associate professor in the Georgetown's Department of Pharmacology and Physiology. "Some of the roles attributed to vitamin D on immunity may be due to this new mechanism."

They specifically found that low levels of blue light, found in sun rays, makes T cells move faster -- marking the first reported human cell responding to sunlight by speeding its pace.

Bad news for our basement-dwelling brethren.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

California Attorney General Kamala Harris, who will be resigning soon prior to joining Congress as a U.S. Senator, has filed new "pimping" charges against the CEO and other executives of Backpage. The previous set of charges were dismissed by a judge less than two weeks ago. Backpage is an online classified advertising website known for its listings of escort services:

Harris said the new charges were based on new evidence. A Sacramento County judge threw out pimping charges against the men on 9 December, citing federal free-speech laws. In the latest case, filed in Sacramento County superior court, Harris claims Backpage illegally funnelled money through multiple companies and created various websites to get around banks that refused to process transactions. She also alleged that the company used photos of women from Backpage on other sites without their permission in order to increase revenue and knowingly profited from the proceeds of prostitution.

"By creating an online brothel – a hotbed of illicit and exploitative activity – Carl Ferrer, Michael Lacey, and James Larkin preyed on vulnerable victims, including children, and profited from their exploitation," Harris said in a statement.

Original Submission