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takyon writes:

Saudi Aramco and Alphabet/Google may cooperate on a "technology hub" within Saudi Arabia, or at least build some data centers:

Saudi Aramco, the world's largest energy company, and Google parent Alphabet have entered discussions to create a technology hub in Saudi Arabia, the Wall Street Journal reports.

The kingdom is embarking upon an ambitious plan, led by the 32-year-old Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, to diversify the nation's oil-dependent economy. The foundation of the effort is a plan to create a huge sovereign wealth fund, underwritten by selling shares in the state-owned Aramco.

The initial public offering, which could happen this year, is expected to be the world's biggest-ever share sale. Aramco President and CEO Amin Nasser recently told CNBC his company is ready for the IPO this year, but is waiting on the government to choose an international list venue.

Alphabet and Aramco have discussed forming a joint venture that would build data centers around the kingdom, sources familiar with the matter tell the Journal. It remains to be seen which customers the data centers would serve and how large the joint venture would be, but it could be listed in the Saudi stock exchange, the sources said.

Data centers are just a "tangible" area of cooperation, not necessarily the entire purpose of the joint venture. Saudi Arabia has talked about building a $500+ billion "megacity" that would be technology-focused.

Meanwhile, slightly-less-of-a-billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal has been put back to work:

Fnord666 writes:

Backblaze has released its hard drive statistics for 2017.

Beginning in April 2013, Backblaze has recorded and saved daily hard drive statistics from the drives in our data centers. Each entry consists of the date, manufacturer, model, serial number, status (operational or failed), and all of the SMART attributes reported by that drive. As of the end of 2017, there are about 88 million entries totaling 23 GB of data. You can download this data from our website if you want to do your own research, but for starters here's what we found.

[...] For 2017 we added 25,746 new drives, and lost 6,442 drives to retirement for a net of 19,304 drives. When you look at storage space, we added 230 petabytes and retired 19 petabytes, netting us an additional 211 petabytes of storage in our data center in 2017.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

These Tools Upend Our View of Stone-Age Humans in Asia

Long ago in what's now southern India, early humans showed a knack for disruption that would've made Silicon Valley tech wizards envious. Over time, the ancient innovators rejected bulky hand-axes and cleavers, instead opting for sleek flakes of stone meant for cutting and tipping spears.

Similar disruptions occurred in Africa among the forebears of modern humans around the same time. But the timing of the Indian transition, spotted in the soil layers of a site called Attirampakkam, is eye-popping. At 250,000 years old—and possibly up to 385,000 years old—this tool transition occurred far earlier than it did at other sites in India.

The discovery, described in Nature on Wednesday [DOI: 10.1038/nature25444] [DX], pushes back the start of what's called the Middle Paleolithic culture in the region by more than a hundred thousand years. That, in turn, could reshape how scientists view the global spread of hominins—humans and their ancient relatives—before modern humans migrated out of Africa some 60,000 years ago.

Also at The Verge.

Related: Earliest Human Remains Outside of Africa Discovered

Original Submission

aristarchus writes:

From a fine publication, The Modern Farmer, an intriguing exposé!

Twitter, specifically, has been a source of contention. It all started when the official National Park Service account was asked to stop tweeting after it shared photos that compared the crowd size of Trump's inauguration to the crowd size of Obama's inauguration in 2009. Then the official Badlands National Park Twitter went rogue and started tweeting facts about climate change. The tweets were later removed and blamed on "a former employee who was not authorized to use the park's account."

Since those tweets were removed, over 40 "alt" or "rogue" Twitter accounts have sprouted up to fill in for many agencies and National Parks. Some of them already have a pretty big following—currently, AltUSNatParkService has more than 1.27 million followers. So far we're seeing climate facts, inspirational quotes about the environment, cute photos of animals, and a lot of snark (this is Twitter, after all).

TFA includes the a few of the more interesting ones, including:

• AltEPA: He can take our official Twitter but he'll never take our FREEDOM. Unofficial EPA #resistance. #factsmatter. If loving science is wrong, we don't wanna be right. #factsmatter
• AltUSForestService: The unofficial, and unsanctioned, #Resistance team for the U.S. Forest Service. Not an official Forest Service account, not publicly funded, citizen run. Read it while you can! https://t.co/rTbMl0n3Zc
• AltUSDA: Resisting the censorship of facts and science. Truth wins in the end. Read the USDA Climate Change Solutions page while you still can: https://t.co/99G1M2zuYG #resist #science #climatechange.
• AltFDA: Uncensored FDA
• AltUSFWS: The Alt U.S. Fish Wildlife Service (AltUSFWS) is dedicated to the conservation, protection and enhancement of fish, wildlife and plants and their habitats

Being Twitter, some of these seem to have difficulty staying on-topic and seem to think that anything is fair game.

Original Submission

canopic jug writes:

Karen Sandler of the Software Freedom Conservancy delivered a keynote presentation last week at linux.conf.au 2018 (LCA) in Sydney, Australia. Specifically she spoke about her multi-year odyssey to try to gain access to the source code for the pacemaker attached to her heart and upon which her life currently depends. Non-free software is having an increasingly (negative) impact on society as people entrust more of their lives to it. That software is found in an increasing number of places, both high and low, as all kinds of devices start to run fully networked microcomputers.

In her first LCA keynote 6 years ago, Karen first told the people of LCA about her heart condition and the defibrillator that she needed to have implanted. This year she described her continued quest to receive the source code for the software running in her defibrillator, and how far she has been able to get in obtaining the source code that she's been requesting for over a decade now.

Source : Karen Sandler Delivered Keynote at Linux.conf.au

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

'Game Changer': Maya Cities Unearthed In Guatemala Forest Using Lasers

By raining down laser pulses on some 770 square miles of dense forest in northern Guatemala, archaeologists have discovered 60,000 Maya structures that make up full sprawling cities.

And the new technology provides them with an unprecedented view into how the ancient civilization worked, revealing almost industrial agricultural infrastructure and new insights into Maya warfare.

"This is a game changer," says Thomas Garrison, an archaeologist at Ithaca College who is one of the leaders of the project. It changes "the base level at which we do Maya archaeology."

The data reveals that the area was three or four times more densely populated than originally thought. "I mean, we're talking about millions of people, conservatively," says Garrison. "Probably more than 10 million people."

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Fire good. AI better:

Google CEO Sundar Pichai says artificial intelligence is going to have a bigger impact on the world than some of the most ubiquitous innovations in history. "AI is one of the most important things humanity is working on. It is more profound than, I dunno, electricity or fire," says Pichai, speaking at a town hall event in San Francisco in January.

A number of very notable tech leaders have made bold statements about the potential of artificial intelligence. Tesla boss Elon Musks says AI is more dangerous than North Korea. Famous physicist Stephen Hawking says AI could be the "worst event in the history of our civilization." And Y Combinator President Sam Altman likens AI to nuclear fission.

Even in such company, Pichai's comment seems remarkable. Interviewer and Recode executive editor Kara Swisher stopped Pichai when he made the comment. "Fire? Fire is pretty good," she retorts. Pichai sticks by his assertion. "Well, it kills people, too," Pichai says of fire. "We have learned to harness fire for the benefits of humanity but we had to overcome its downsides too. So my point is, AI is really important, but we have to be concerned about it."

Also at CNN and Gizmodo.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Truck Driver Plows Over Peru's 2,000-Year-Old Nazca Lines, Leaving 'Deep Scars'

A semitrailer driver ignored warning signs and drove over Peru's famous Nazca Lines on Saturday, causing significant damage to the UNESCO World Heritage site.

The driver, identified as 40-year-old Jainer Jesús Flores Vigo, was detained and released, according to newspaper Peru21.

[...] The rig left "deep scars" across a 50 meter by 100 meter (164 feet by 328 feet) area, the Culture Ministry said, affecting the surface of the ancient site and damaging three of the geoglyphs.

Argentine newspaper Clarín reports that the driver said he didn't know the area because he had never traveled there before and that he left the road because of a mechanical problem. The newspaper speculated that the driver actually drove off the Pan-American Highway to avoid paying a toll.

[...]

This isn't the first time people have damaged the site. In 2014, Greenpeace activists left footprints as they planted a message there in advance of U.N. climate talks in Lima.

Original Submission

linkdude64 writes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F8JCh0owT4w

When it comes to repair, farmers have always been self reliant. But the modernization of tractors and other farm equipment over the past few decades has left most farmers in the dust thanks to diagnostic software that large manufacturers hold a monopoly over.

Farmers using Eastern European cracking software for their tractors, and MS, Apple, etc. want to stop them.

Related: Right to Repair

Original Submission

Apparition writes:

Microsoft revealed today that Office 2019 will ship in the second half of 2018, and will run exclusively on Windows 10.

Microsoft's General Manager for Windows, Bernardo Caldas, and General Manager for Office, Jared Spataro announced changes to Office and Windows servicing and support today.

[...] Office 2019 applications will only be supported on a limited number of Windows client and server operating system versions. In particular, Office 2019 will only be supported on the following systems:

• Any supported Windows 10 SAC (Semi-Annual Channel) release.

• Windows 10 Enterprise Long Term Servicing Channel 2018.

• The next Long Term Servicing Channel release of Windows Server.

Unless I'm misreading Microsoft's announcement, Office 2019 won't be available for Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, or older Server versions.

[...] The company plans to support Office 2019 for five years of mainstream support and about two years of extended support.

[...] Office 2019 support will end around the same time that Office 2016 ends. It is unclear why Microsoft made the decision; one explanation is that the company plans to move all-in in regards to Office 365 and Office in the cloud and that 2025 may be the year Microsoft might make that switch.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Doctors have been given permission to create the UK's first "three-parent" or "three-person" babies to mitigate the risk of inheritable mitochondrial diseases:

Doctors have received permission to create the UK's first "three-person" babies for two women at risk of passing inheritable diseases to their children.

The two cases involve women who have mitochondrial diseases, which are passed down by the mother and can prove fatal.

Three-person babies involve an advanced form of IVF that uses a donor egg, the mother's egg and the father's sperm.

Doctors at the Newcastle Fertility Centre will carry out the procedure.

The decision was approved by the UK Fertility Regulator, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA).

Also at New Scientist.

Previously: Mitochondrial DNA Manipulation and Ethics
Approval for Three-Parent Embryo Trials
Fatal Genetic Conditions Could Return in Some 'Three-Parent' Babies
Baby Girl Born in Ukraine Using Three-Parent Pronuclear Transfer Technique
FDA Warns Doctor Against Marketing Three-Person IVF Technique

Related: First Human Embryo Editing Performed in the UK

Original Submission

"Arthur T Knackerbracket" has found the following story:

Scores of Rohingya villagers in Myanmar have been massacred and buried in 5 mass graves, according to an exclusive investigation by the Associated Press news agency.

The report by the news agency on Thursday includes witness testimony from two dozen survivors and relatives of victims, as well as time-stamped mobile phone footage of the aftermath of the attack.

Estimates suggest 400 members of the persecuted minority were killed by Burmese troops.

In one massacre, a group of men were picking teams for a local football-like game called 'chinlone' in the village of Gu Dar Pyin, when soldiers began firing at them.

A survivor named Noor Kadir later found six of his friends buried in two separate mass graves. He said the bodies of the victims were only recogniseable through the colour of their shorts.

The mass killing is believed to have taken place on August 27 and survivors told the Associated Press that soldiers had tried to cover up evidence of the atrocity.

Video obtained by the agency indicates attempts at using acid to remove the bodies.

[...]

Widely regarded as one of the most persecuted minorities in the world, the mainly Muslim Rohingya people, are denied citizenship by the Burmese government, which claims they are not native to Myanmar.

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for Bytram

[...] When I first got interested in the subject, in the mid-1970s, I ran across a letter written in 1947 by the mathematician Warren Weaver, an early machine-translation advocate, to Norbert Wiener, a key figure in cybernetics, in which Weaver made this curious claim, today quite famous:

When I look at an article in Russian, I say, "This is really written in English, but it has been coded in some strange symbols. I will now proceed to decode."

[...] The practical utility of Google Translate and similar technologies is undeniable, and probably it's a good thing overall, but there is still something deeply lacking in the approach, which is conveyed by a single word: understanding. Machine translation has never focused on understanding language. Instead, the field has always tried to "decode"—to get away without worrying about what understanding and meaning are. Could it in fact be that understanding isn't needed in order to translate well? Could an entity, human or machine, do high-quality translation without paying attention to what language is all about? To shed some light on this question, I turn now to the experiments I made.

It is a bit on the long side but Douglas Hofstadter very clearly exposes what language translation is and that Google Translate does not do it that way

Source: The Shallowness of Google Translate

Original Submission

Justin Case writes:

2,304 times last year (in just one state) so-called self driving cars, ahem, didn't self-drive, according to this report at auto connected car news.

The technology is not safe unless it is monitored by a human behind a steering wheel who can take control, Consumer Watchdog said.

Reasons for disengagement include:
    [a lot of human factors -- which "AI" does not understand]
        * Hardware discrepancy.
        * Errors in detection.
        * GPS signal issues.
        * Software crash.

While 50 companies are licensed to test autonomous vehicles in California, only 19 companies were required to file disengagement reports covering 2017.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Russia plans to allow paying tourists who visit the International Space Station (ISS) to go out on spacewalks. Russia's Energia is also building a "comfortable" new module to transport tourists to the ISS:

Russia is planning to send paying tourists on the International Space Station out on spacewalks for the first time, an official from the country's space industry said Thursday.

"We are discussing the possibility of sending tourists on spacewalks," Vladimir Solntsev, the head of Russian space company Energia, told Russian tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda. "Market analysts have confirmed this: wealthy people are ready to pay money for this," Solntsev told the paper.

He said the cost of such a trip could be around $100 million (80 million euros), "possibly less for the first tourist". The tourists will be able to "go out on a spacewalk and make a film, (or) a video clip".

Energia, which was behind the launch of the first man in space Yuri Gagarin in 1961, is currently building a new module dubbed NEM-2 to transport tourists to the International Space Station (ISS). Solntsev said the NEM-2, the name of which is still to be confirmed, will accommodate four to six people. It will be fitted with "comfortable" cabins, two toilets and internet access.

Original Submission