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stormwyrm writes:

From the Hollywood Reporter: Apple is turning the classic computer game Oregon Trail into a big budget action-comedy movie.

Grab your wagons and oxen, and get ready to ford a river: A movie adaptation of the popular grade school computer game Oregon Trail is in development at Apple.

The studio landed the film pitch, still in early development, that has Will Speck and Josh Gordon attached to direct and produce. EGOT winners Benj Pasek and Justin Paul will provide original music and produce via their Ampersand production banner. Sources tell The Hollywood Reporter that the movie will feature a couple of original musical numbers in the vein of Barbie.

Sounds like a good day to die of dysentery.

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quietus writes:

The other thing is that in order to learn, children need to have fun. But they have fun by really being pushed to explore and create and make new things that are personally meaningful. So you need open-ended environments that allow children to explore and express themselves.

(This Inventor Is Molding Tomorrow's Inventors, IEEE Spectrum)

IEEE Spectrum has a (short) sit-down with Marina Umaschi Bers, co-creator of the ScratchJr programming language and the KIBO robotics kits. Both tools are aimed at teaching kids to code and develop STEAM skills from a very young age. Other examples of such tools are the mTiny robot toy and the Micro:bit computer.

Being able to code is a new literacy, remarks Professor Bers, and like with reading and writing, we need to adapt our learning tools to children's developmental ages. One idea here is that of a "coding playground" where it's not about following step-by-step plans, but about inventing games, pretend play and creating anything children can imagine. She is currently working on a project to bring such a playground outside: integrating motors, sensors and other devices in physical playgrounds, "to bolster computational thinking through play".

Given how fast complicated toys are being thrown aside by young children, in contrast to a simple ball -- or a meccano set, for the engineering types -- I have my doubts.

At least one of the tools mentioned above is aimed at toddlers. So put aside your model steam locomotive, oh fellow 'lentil, and advice me: from what age do you think we should try to steer kids into "coding" or "developing", and which tools should or could be used for this?

Feel free to wax nostalgic about toys of days past, of course, in this, one of your favorite playgrounds: the soylentnews comment editor.

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AnonTechie writes:

A new study reveals it would take far longer than the lifespan of our universe for a typing monkey to randomly produce Shakespeare. So, while the Infinite Monkey Theorem is true, it is also somewhat misleading.

A monkey randomly pressing keys on a typewriter for an infinite amount of time would eventually type out the complete works of Shakespeare purely by chance, according to the Infinite Monkey Theorem.

This widely known thought experiment is used to help us understand the principles of probability and randomness, and how chance can lead to unexpected outcomes. The idea has been referenced in pop culture from "The Simpsons" to "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" and on TikTok.

However, a new study reveals it would take an unbelievably huge amount of time—far longer than the lifespan of our universe, for a typing monkey to randomly produce Shakespeare. So, while the theorem is true, it is also somewhat misleading.

More information: Stephen Woodcock et al, A numerical evaluation of the Finite Monkeys Theorem, Franklin Open (2024). DOI: 10.1016/j.fraope.2024.100171

[Source]: University of Technology, Sydney

[Journal Ref]: A numerical evaluation of the Finite Monkeys Theorem

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upstart writes:

Voyager 1 Ghosts NASA, Forcing Use of Backup Radio Dormant Since 1981:

Voyager 1 can't seem to catch a break. The interstellar traveler recently recovered from a thruster glitch that nearly ended its mission, and now NASA's aging probe stopped sending data to ground control due to an unknown issue.

On Monday, NASA revealed that Voyager 1 recently experienced a brief pause in communication after turning off one of its radio transmitters. The space agency is now relying on a second radio transmitter that hasn't been used since 1981 to communicate with Voyager 1 until engineers can figure out the underlying issue behind the glitch.

The flight team behind the mission first realized something was amiss with Voyager 1's communication when the spacecraft failed to respond to a command. On October 16, the team used NASA's Deep Space Network (DSN)—a global array of giant radio antennas—to beam instructions to Voyager 1, directing it to turn on one of its heaters.

Voyager 1 should've sent back engineering data for the team to determine how the spacecraft responded to the command. This process normally takes a couple of days, as the command takes about 23 hours to travel more than 15 billion miles (24 billion kilometers) to the spacecraft and another 23 hours for the flight team to receive a signal back. Instead, the command seems to have triggered the spacecraft's fault protection system, which autonomously responds to onboard issues affecting the mission.

The spacecraft's fault protection system lowered the rate at which its radio transmitter was sending back data to use less power, according to NASA. However, while conserving the spacecraft's power, this mode also changes the X-band radio signal, a frequency range within the electromagnetic spectrum that the DSN's antennas listen for.

The flight team was able to locate the signal a day later but then, on October 19, communication with Voyager 1 stopped entirely. Voyager 1's fault protection system appeared to have been triggered twice more, and it turned off the X-band transmitter altogether. The spacecraft switched to a second radio transmitter called the S-band, which uses less power but transmits a significantly fainter signal. Voyager 1's S-band transmitter hadn't been used since 1981, and the flight team was not sure its signal could be detected due to the spacecraft being much farther away today than it was 43 years ago.

Still, the team of engineers didn't want to risk sending another signal to the X-band transmitter, and decided to give it a shot. On October 22, the team sent a command to confirm whether the S-band transmitter is working and was finally able to reconnect with Voyager 1 two days later. NASA engineers are currently working to determine what may have triggered the spacecraft's fault protection system in its attempt to resolve the issue.

Voyager 1 launched in 1977, less than a month after its twin probe, Voyager 2, began its journey to space. The spacecraft took a faster route, exiting the asteroid belt earlier than its twin and making close encounters with Jupiter and Saturn. Along the way, it discovered two Jovian moons, Thebe and Metis, as well as five new moons and a new ring called the G-ring around Saturn. Voyager 1 ventured into interstellar space in August 2012, becoming the first spacecraft to cross the boundary of our solar system.

The spacecraft has been flying for 47 years, and all that time in deep space has taken a toll on the interstellar probe. NASA engineers have had to come up with creative ways to keep the iconic mission alive. The team recently switched to a different set of thrusters than the one the spacecraft had been relying on, which became clogged with silicon dioxide over the years, using a delicate procedure to preserve Voyager 1's power. Earlier this year, the team of engineers also fixed a communication glitch that had been causing Voyager 1 to transmit gibberish to ground control.

Voyager 1 is no spring chicken, and its upkeep has not been an easy task over the years, especially from billions of miles away. But all-in-all, humanity's long-standing interstellar probe is well worth the effort.

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Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

After countless years pondering the idea, the FCC in 2022 announced that it would start politely asking the nation’s lumbering telecom monopolies to affix a sort of “nutrition label” on to broadband connections. The labels will clearly disclose the speed and latency (ping) of your connection, any hidden fees users will encounter, and whether the connection comes with usage caps or “overage fees.”

Initially just a voluntary measure, bigger ISPs had to start using the labels back in April. Smaller ISPs had to start using them as of October 10. In most instances they’re supposed to look something like this [image].

As far as regulatory efforts go, it’s not the worst idea. Transparency is lacking in broadband land, and U.S. broadband and cable companies have a 30+ year history of ripping off consumers with an absolute cavalcade of weird restrictions, fees, surcharges, and connection limitations.

Here’s the thing though: transparently knowing you’re being ripped off doesn’t necessarily stop you from being ripped off. A huge number of Americans live under a broadband monopoly or duopoly, meaning they have no other choice in broadband access. As such, Comcast or AT&T or Verizon can rip you off, and you have absolutely no alternative options that allow you to vote with your wallet.

That wouldn’t be as much of a problem if U.S. federal regulators had any interest in reining in regional telecom monopoly power, but they don’t. In fact, members of both parties are historically incapable of even admitting monopoly harm exists. Democrats are notably better at at least trying to do something, even if that something often winds up being decorative regulatory theater.

The other problem: with the help of a corrupt Supreme Court, telecoms and their Republican and libertarian besties are currently engaged in an effort to dismantle what’s left of the FCC’s consumer protection authority under the pretense this unleashes “free market innovation.” It, of course, doesn’t; regional monopolies like Comcast just double down on all of their worst impulses, unchecked.

If successful, even fairly basic efforts like this one won’t be spared, as the FCC won’t have the authority to enforce much of anything.

It’s all very demonstrative of a U.S. telecom industry that’s been broken by monopoly power, a lack of competition, and regulatory capture. As a result, even the most basic attempts at consumer protection are constantly undermined by folks who’ve dressed up greed as some elaborate and intellectual ethos.

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quietus writes:

Our last meeting of the state visit, in the Great Hall of the People, was with Li Keqiang, the premier of the State Council and the titular head of China's government. If anyone in the American group had any doubts about China's view of its relationship with the United States, Li's monologue would have removed them. He began with the observation that China, having already developed its industrial and technological base, no longer needed the United States. He dismissed U.S. concerns over unfair trade and economic practices, indicating that the U.S. role in the future global economy would merely be to provide China with raw materials, agricultural products, and energy to fuel its production of the world's cutting-edge industrial and consumer products.

H.R. McMaster: How China Sees The World. The Atlantic Monthly, May 2020.

China has the world's largest manufacturing sector, accounting for about 31% of total global manufacturing output. The EU's manufacturing sector has a global production share of 20%, while the United States accounts for about 17%.

In the United States, around 12.3 million people work in manufacturing; for the EU this number is 29.7 million. China's manufacturing sector employs over 120 million people.

Some of the hallmarks of the Biden Administration are its Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL), and the CHIPS and Science Act. Both IRA and CHIPS act combined aim to inject close to a trillion dollars into specific sections of the manufacturing sector, while the INVEST in America Act (BIL) adds another 1.2 trillion dollar investment into transportation and road projects and electric grid renewal.

On June 12 of this year, the Joint Economic Committee of the US Senate held a hearing, titled "Made in America: The Boom in U.S. Manufacturing Investment". For that hearing, 4 witnesses were called.

For two of the witnesses, the future for US manufacturing looks bright, with the help of the acts mentioned above. If we want to remain a rich country, we need to invest in advanced manufacturing, they claim.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

A group of researchers in the UK affiliated with the BSS (British Sleep Society) published a paper this week calling for the permanent abolition of Daylight Saving Time (DST) and adherence to Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), in large part because modern evidence suggests having that extra hour of sunlight in the evenings is worse for our health than we thought back in the 1970s when the concept was all the rage in Europe.

Not only does GMT more closely align with the natural day/light cycle in the UK, the boffins assert, but decades of research into sleep and circadian rhythms have been produced since DST was enacted that have yet to be considered.

The human circadian rhythm, the 24-hour cycle our bodies go through, drives a lot about our health beyond sleep. It regulates hormone release, gene expression, metabolism, mood (who isn't grumpier when waking up in January?), and the like. In short, it's important. Messing with that rhythm by forcing ourselves out of bed earlier for several months out of the year can have lasting effects, the researchers said.

According to their review of recent research, having light trigger our circadian rhythms in the mornings to wake us up is far more important than an extra hour of light in the evenings. In fact, contrary to the belief that an extra hour of light in the evenings is beneficial, it might actually cause health problems by, again, mucking about with the human body's understanding of what time it is and how we ought to feel about it.

"Disruption of the daily synchronization of our body clocks causes disturbances in our physiology and behavior … which leads to negative short and long-term physical and mental health outcomes," the authors said. 

That, and we've just plain fooled ourselves into thinking it benefits us in any real way.

[...] And for the love of sleep, the researchers beg, don't spring forward permanently.

"Mornings are the time when our body clocks have the greatest need for light to stay in sync," said Dr Megan Crawford, lead author and senior lecturer in psychology at University of Strathclyde. "At our latitudes there is simply no spare daylight to save during the winter months and given the choice between natural light in the morning and natural light in the afternoon, the scientific evidence favors light in the morning."

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Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

The US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has finalized a rule that requires banks, credit card issuers, and most other financial firms to provide consumers with access to their personal financial data - and to help them transfer it, generally at no cost.

When the rule eventually takes effect – anywhere from 2026 to 2030 depending upon financial firm assets and revenue, with the largest institutions having the least time to comply – it aims to make financial services more competitive by allowing consumers to move to different vendors more easily.

Under this "open banking" rule, covered financial firms: "shall make available to a consumer, upon request, information in the control or possession of the covered person concerning the consumer financial product or service that the consumer obtained from such covered person, subject to certain exceptions."

This data has to be made available in an electronic form usable by consumers and authorized third parties.

[...] "Too many Americans are stuck in financial products with lousy rates and service," said CFPB director Rohit Chopra in a statement. "Today's action will give people more power to get better rates and service on bank accounts, credit cards, and more."

The rule also outlines required privacy protections for personal financial data, specifying that third parties can only use data for a requested product or service.

"They cannot secretly collect, use, or retain consumers’ data for their own unrelated business reasons – for example, by offering consumers a loan using consumer data that they also use for targeted advertising," the CFPB said.

The rule prohibits data providers from making consumer data available to third parties through screen scraping and it requires that businesses delete consumer data when a person revokes access.

[...] "Enabling secure transfer or sharing of financial data will incentivize financial companies to compete for customers by providing better interest rates and customer service.

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Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

Despite an official ban on Russian government workers using the iPhone, an unreliable report says that sales have risen dramatically.

It was in 2023 that Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) tried banning government staff from using iPhones. Purportedly, it was because the FSB believed the US was using the iPhone for eavesdropping.

Now according to Reuters, local Russian sources are saying the ban rather failed. While the figures have yet to be confirmed by any other source, the Vedomosti business daily claims that purchases of iPhones from January 2024 to September would four times higher year over year.

[...] That rather dispels any idea that Russian officials are rebelling against the ban en masse. But it also points to how the original ban was seemingly far from a blanket one.

Equally, that destroys the idea that the FSB can be serious in its allegations of iPhone wiretapping. It's always been more likely that any ban is a retaliation for how Apple has ceased directly doing business in Russia since the start of the war with Ukraine.

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Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

Researchers at the University of Chicago and Argonne National Lab have developed a new type of optical memory that stores data by transferring light from rare-earth element atoms embedded in a solid material to nearby quantum defects. They published their study in Physical Review Research.

The problem that the researchers aim to solve is the diffraction limit of light in standard CDs and DVDs. Current optical storage has a hard cap on data density because each single bit can't be smaller than the wavelength of the reading/writing laser.

The researchers propose bypassing this limit by stuffing the material with rare-earth emitters, such as magnesium oxide (MgO) crystals. The trick, called wavelength multiplexing, involves having each emitter use a slightly different wavelength of light. They theorized that this would allow cramming far more data into the same storage footprint.

The researchers first had to tackle the physics and model all the requirements to build a proof of concept. They simulated a theoretical solid material filled with rare-earth atoms that absorb and re-emit light. The models then showed how the nearby quantum defects could capture and store the returned light.

One of the fundamental discoveries was that when a defect absorbs the narrow wavelength energy from those nearby atoms, it doesn't just get excited – its spin state flips. Once it flips, it is nearly impossible to revert, meaning those defects could legitimately store data for a long time.

While it's a promising first step, some crucial questions still need answers. For example, verifying how long those excited states persist is essential. Details were also light on capacity estimates – the scientists touted "ultra-high-density" but didn't provide any projections against current disc capacities. Yet, despite the remaining hurdles, the researchers are hyped, calling it a "huge first step."

Of course, turning all this into an actual commercial storage product will likely take years of additional research and development.

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upstart writes:

"Spreading misinformation suddenly becomes a noble goal," Redditor says:

A trend on Reddit that sees Londoners giving false restaurant recommendations in order to keep their favorites clear of tourists and social media influencers highlights the inherent flaws of Google Search's reliance on Reddit and Google's AI Overview.

In May, Google launched AI Overviews in the US, an experimental feature that populates the top of Google Search results with a summarized answer based on an AI model built into Google's web rankings. When Google first debuted AI Overview, it quickly became apparent that the feature needed work with accuracy and its ability to properly summarize information from online sources. AI Overviews are "built to only show information that is backed up by top web results," Liz Reid, VP and head of Google Search, wrote in a May blog post. But as my colleague Benj Edwards pointed out at the time, that setup could contribute to inaccurate, misleading, or even dangerous results: "The design is based on the false assumption that Google's page-ranking algorithm favors accurate results and not SEO-gamed garbage."

As Edwards alluded to, many have complained about Google Search results' quality declining in recent years, as SEO spam and, more recently, AI slop float to the top of searches. As a result, people often turn to the Reddit hack to make Google results more helpful. By adding "site:reddit.com" to search results, users can hone their search to more easily find answers from real people. Google seems to understand the value of Reddit and signed an AI training deal with the company that's reportedly worth $60 million per year.

But disgruntled foodies in London are reminding us of the inherent dangers of relying on the scraping of user-generated content to provide what's supposed to be factual, helpful information.

Apparently, some London residents are getting fed up with social media influencers whose reviews make long lines of tourists at their favorite restaurants, sometimes just for the likes. Christian Calgie, a reporter for London-based news publication Daily Express, pointed out this trend on X yesterday, noting the boom of Redditors referring people to Angus Steakhouse, a chain restaurant, to combat it.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

Not all winged dinosaurs were necessarily capable of full flight, but this anatomical feature may have enabled them to travel further by flapping or gliding

Tiny tracks in South Korea symbolise a moment 120 million years ago when a dinosaur took advantage of its wings to cover ground in large leaps – the oldest track evidence of wing-assisted movement in these extinct animals.

Whether the creature, which was a raptor and not part of the lineage that led to birds, took full flight is uncertain. But the tracks support previous ideas that aerodynamics evolved multiple times across prehistoric lines, says Alexander Dececchi at Dakota State University in South Dakota.

“It’s pretty rare to find these kinds of [pre-flight] tracks, and then to find them in an animal that’s not even a bird – that’s pretty special,” he says.

Velociraptors and other raptors (dromaeosaurids) are the ancestors of modern birds, but their lineage split into avian and non-avian, or “paravian”, lines about 170 million years ago. Despite having feathers and wings, paravian dinosaurs generally seemed to lack the wingspan needed to offset their body weight, says team member Michael Pittman at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

But Pittman, Dececchi and their colleagues suspected that some paravian dinosaurs could fly, or at least glide, before full flight evolved in birds, based on muscles in their upper bodies. That suspicion grew stronger as they investigated more than 2600 rows of dinosaur tracks around the world.

One set of tracks, discovered during the construction of a shopping centre in south-eastern South Korea, showed surprisingly long spacing between steps made by a sparrow-sized raptor called Dromaeosauriformipes rarus.

[...] Further calculations and comparisons with fossil anatomy suggested he was right: the animal could not have made that stride with its legs alone. It was clearly flapping or gliding, possibly while launching or landing, says Pittman.

“I think the vast majority of feathered dinosaurs were probably doing what this guy was doing – using the wings to augment running, jumping, braking and turning,” says Pittman.

Journal reference: Theropod trackways as indirect evidence of pre-avian aerial behavior. DOI: https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2413810121

Original Submission

https://www.uniladtech.com/science/space/nasa-astronauts-iss-brace-emergency-evacuation-093405-20241029

Astronauts on the ISS brace for emergency evacuation after NASA finds 50 'areas of concern'

NASA has raised the threat level to the highest rating

NASA astronauts aboard the International Space Station are preparing for a possible evacuation as they face a worsening air leak problem.

The US space agency and its Russian counterpart, Roscomos, are tracking 50 'areas of concern' related to a growing leak aboard the station.

In a recent report from NASA's Office of the Inspector General (OIG), the cracks in a Russian service module have reached a 'top safety risk,' marking it a five-out-of-five threat level.

This story is the only one I can find. Can someone please corroborate this?

Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

Ramanujan brings life to the myth of the self-taught genius. He grew up poor and uneducated and did much of his research while isolated in southern India, barely able to afford food. In 1912, when he was 24, he began to send a series of letters to prominent mathematicians. These were mostly ignored, but one recipient, the English mathematician G.H. Hardy, corresponded with Ramanujan for a year and eventually persuaded him to come to England, smoothing the way with the colonial bureaucracies.

It became apparent to Hardy and his colleagues that Ramanujan could sense mathematical truths — could access entire worlds — that others simply could not. (Hardy, a mathematical giant in his own right, is said to have quipped that his greatest contribution to mathematics was the discovery of Ramanujan.) Before Ramanujan died in 1920 at the age of 32, he came up with thousands of elegant and surprising results, often without proof. He was fond of saying that his equations had been bestowed on him by the gods.

More than 100 years later, mathematicians are still trying to catch up to Ramanujan’s divine genius, as his visions appear again and again in disparate corners of the world of mathematics.

The English mathematician G.H. Hardy, after receiving a letter from Ramanujan and recognizing his brilliance, arranged for him to study and work with him in Cambridge.

Ramanujan is perhaps most famous for coming up with partition identities, equations about the different ways you can break a whole number up into smaller parts (such as 7 = 5 + 1 + 1). In the 1980s, mathematicians began to find deep and surprising connections between these equations and other areas of mathematics: in statistical mechanics and the study of phase transitions, in knot theory and string theory, in number theory and representation theory and the study of symmetries.

Most recently, they’ve appeared in Mourtada’s work on curves and surfaces that are defined by algebraic equations, an area of study called algebraic geometry. Mourtada and his collaborators have spent more than a decade trying to better understand that link, and to exploit it to uncover rafts of brand-new identities that resemble those Ramanujan wrote down.

“It turned out that these kinds of results have basically occurred in almost every branch of mathematics. That’s an amazing thing,” said Ole Warnaar of the University of Queensland in Australia. “It’s not just a happy coincidence. I don’t want to sound religious, but the mathematical god is trying to tell us something.”

owl writes:

https://github.com/RamboRogers/rfhunter

This project is an RF Signal Scanner built using an ESP32, AD8317 RF detector, and various other components. It's designed to detect and measure RF signals in the environment and display the signal strength on an OLED display. It's useful to find hidden cameras, wiretapping devices, and other RF-enabled devices.

Original Submission