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I somehow managed to get the PIC programming method described here to work, and now I have incorporated a PIC16F1455 into my random number generator circuit. I added a header to enable programming of the PIC from within the main circuit, and the setup looks like this. Schematic here. Now I need to figure out how to write the firmware for that PIC so that it will look like some kind of USB device when I plug it into a PC, and it can feed all of that random bit data coming in through RC3 (Pin 7) over the USB interface. Github project here. Looks like this is going to be a much more complicated business than designing and building the circuit in the first place!

I found a few resources on the USB programming aspects here, here, here, here, and here. I would like to avoid using the XC8 compiler or any of Microchip's proprietary libraries as far as possible, and build the project entirely using SDCC and Free Software libraries only.

".youtube.com" has added a new cookie "GPS" with the value of '1'. Is this some kind of location marker scheme?

The success of Andy Rubin's Essential Phone may depend on carriers

Android Co-Founder Introduces Essential Phone: S835, Slim Bezels, Dual Camera

The hardware inside the Essential PH-1 is what you would expect for a premium phone: Snapdragon 835 SoC, 4GB of RAM, and 128GB of UFS 2.1 storage. It comes with the latest connectivity options too, including 802.11ac Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.0 LE, NFC, and a Snapdragon X16 LTE modem that makes the phone compatible with all US networks. However, a few items some people find essential are missing; there’s no microSD card support for storage expansion, no support for dual SIMs, and no 3.5mm headphone jack (it will come with an adapter). The 3040 mAh battery, essentially the same capacity as the Galaxy S8’s 3000 mAh pack, should be adequate for most people, but power users will likely find themselves using the Essential’s 27W quick charge feature.

No thanks.

A company in Canada called Lyrebird has a new technology that can imitate any voice using a 60 second sound sample

The Montreal based startup in AI has presented a voice imitation algorithm that the team says can mimic the speech and also shift its emotional cadence — and all this with just a tiny snippet of real world audio.

So if you think fake news online is bad now, wait until there’s a tech that lets anyone generate a ‘recording’ of a person apparently incriminating themselves, trivially easily.

The company will release a online API later so that people can try the technology for themselves. Likely under some freemium model. The team has been working for more than a year on the technology at the MILA lab of the University in Montréal, and is being advised by the AI pioneer Yoshua Bengio.

CRISPR gene-editing tool causes unintended genetic mutations

CRISPR from 1987 which is a efficient and widely used DNA modification technique has been found to modify more than desired. The next mishap may very well be the one that create a superbug. Be it something like flue pandemic of 1918 etc.

In examining the entire genome from the CRISPR-treated mice, they found that the tool had successfully corrected the specific gene they were targeting, but it also potentially caused a great deal of other genetic changes. In two CRISPR-treated animals, more than 100 large gene deletions or insertions and over 1,500 single-nucleotide mutations were identified.

UPDATE: Intel Announces 4 to 18-Core Skylake-X CPUs

Previously, rumor had it that Intel would pit 12-core Skylake enthusiast processors against AMD Ryzen chips with up to 16 cores. Now, a new rumor/leak adds 14, 16, and 18 core chips to the Intel lineup. They don't appear to be Xeons either.

This isn't substantial enough for me to make a submission for it, but it's interesting. Of course, while this may be a bit of a slap in the face to AMD, it's not like Intel hasn't made 18-core (Xeon) chips before, and pricing for the 18 core, 36 thread chip could be outrageous (do I hear $2,500?).

$2,500 is just a guess, but I checked and the Intel Xeon E5-2697V4 Broadwell with 18 cores has an RCP of $2,702 and is $2,799.99 on Newegg.

I'll predict $1,250 for an AMD Ryzen 16-core.

(oblig)

I stumbled over this story, and thought some Soylentils might appreciate it.

It’s not easy living in today’s world if you are one who is attempting to live up to other people’s expectations. It’s an unhealthy way to go through life. For too many young women around the world, the imperfections they find can be damaging to them, especially when others are so willing to point them out.

Tthere is at least one Brazilian model who refuses to go along with the hype, and has instead, turned her ‘imperfection’ into a prized part of herself.

The 24 year old model, Mariana Mendes, knows all about imperfections, as she’s reminded of it every day in the mirror. Born with a black hued birthmark that covers a large portion of her face, the mark is medically termed congenital melanocytic nevus, and for most of her life, she was told that it was ugly.

But Mendes doesn’t see it that way. She is well aware the the mark is there, and she knows that many view her as different…Yet she instead believes that the mark makes her unique.

At the age of 5, because her Mother feared that Mendes would be bullied throughout her life, she underwent multiple surgeries to attempt to lessen the color of her birthmark. Yet, after enduring a year of medical procedures, Mendes decided she wanted to stop any treatment.

“My mom was worried. She didn’t want me to suffer any bullying, but I don’t remember ever having any problems in school. When I was 6, she asked me if I wanted to continue with the birthmark removal procedures that I did in Sao Paulo. I told her no.”
It was the very same birthmark on her face the pushed her to embrace it. She wasn’t going to let a mark define her, and instead sought to be an example to people everywhere to accept themselves, and find their self-confidence as she has.

“I feel more beautiful and totally different from other people because I have a nevus. Having a nevus that is as large as mine is not common, so of course there are many people who stare and who don’t like it, but I don’t care.”Mendes often will come across people that mistakenly assume that her mark is makeup. “A lot of people ask me about my birthmark, sometimes they think it’s makeup or a tattoo but I don’t mind and explain it to them.” Even though she is not without the average instigators in life – you know, those people whose only pursuits seem to be making others as miserable – Mendes has learned to just brush them off:
“I’m proud of having a nevus, it’s a part of who I am and how I learned to like myself…I find living with a facial nevus very easy because I like it a lot and I want others to feel as confident as I do about their nevi.”

All of us have our own imperfections that are totally out of our control. Embrace them, or lean to deal with them. Learning to live with the things you have no control over can be a refreshing, and liberating way to live one’s life.

Click the link, to see some photos of her. It took a moment for my eyes to decide that the blemish is hers, and not an artifact of a crap camera or photoshopping. But, she's quite pretty!

http://joeforamerica.com/2017/05/girl-born-black-face-mark-called-ugly-not-anymore/

Video of a photoshoot here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jR7w_Vhv95E

A recent investigative study by the Citizen Lab connects Russian actors to the practice of stealing, negatively altering and then releasing documents in an effort to damage the personal reputation of government officials, candidates and journalists in dozens of countries.

—SC Magazine

New evidence of a global espionage campaign involving email phishing attacks and leaked falsified documents emerged on Thursday, with clues suggesting the Russian government might have been involved.

[...]

In the incident Citizen Lab examined, documents obtained through a phishing operation in October 2016 that targeted the email account of U.S. journalist David Satter were selectively modified in an apparent attempt to discredit Satter and his work and then posted online. Satter has reported on Russia for decades and was expelled from the country in December 2013.

—CBC

On October 7, Satter received a phishing email designed to look like it was coming from Google, claiming someone had stolen his password and that he should change it right away.

As with seen with other phishing attacks targeting people affiliated with the Hillary Clinton campaign that led to the DNC leaks of last year, the email, however, didn't come from Google. It was actually from a group of hackers known as Fancy Bear, or APT28, whom many believe work for Russia's military intelligence, the GRU.

—Motherboard

The operation against the journalist led us to the discovery of a larger phishing operation, with over 200 unique targets spanning 39 countries (including members of 28 governments). The list includes a former Russian Prime Minister, members of cabinets from Europe and Eurasia, ambassadors, high ranking military officers, CEOs of energy companies, and members of civil society.

[...] we considered the Tiny.cc shortcodes found in the October 5 and 7 phishing emails sent to David Satter. Using these as a starting point, we enumerated approximately 4000 adjacent shortcodes for each, and then examined the target web addresses to which these short links redirected. From this large list, we extracted all of the associated destination links [...] which redirected to the malicious phishing domain [...]

—the report

additional coverage:

• Citizen Lab blog
• Hack Read
• Just Security
• Wired
• Valley News

related stories:
Bellingcat: Russian Military Involved in Downing of Flight MH17
A One-Man Intelligence Agency

Researchers at U.C. Berkeley has found a birth control that is hormone free, fully natural, resulted in no known side effects so far, is harmless to eggs and sperm, could be used both in the long and short-term, and it can be used either before or after conception, from ancient Chinese folk medicine... "Because these two plant compounds block fertilization at very, very low concentrations -- about 10 times lower than levels of levonorgestrel in Plan B -- they could be a new generation of emergency contraceptive we nicknamed 'molecular condoms,'" team leader Polina Lishko.

The active compounds are pregnenolone sulfate — and the two plant-derived inhibitors pristimerin and lupeol. According to the publication.

And they work by blocking ABHD2 that signals to sperms to move faster. However these compounds hit a target that is important for many cell types in the body. So these compounds are no "magic bullet" and a better comparison is that of carpet bombing.

The chemicals they studied is supposedly extracted from mangoes and dandelion roots.

DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1700367114
(useful for those scientific hubs..)

I'm no longer homeless - I've been in a subsidized apartment for a year.

The program is called "Permanent Assistive Housing". That means I could live here for the rest of my life without paying a dime. Ultimately the cost is borne by the American Taxpayer through the Federal Housing And Urban Development Administration.

However I have a really good consulting client. I cancelled my food stamps a couple months ago. I no longer have Medicare - last month was my first month of paying for Obamacare.

Because my income is very uneven, the agency which got me the housing - Community Services Northwest is waiting until August before I'm responsible for paying the rent.

Should I be out of work again, the American Taxpayer will pick up the tab.

I presently have five grand in the bank. I figured I'd spread the love by subscribing here. I'm also going to subscribe to Radio Paradise.

I expect to donate some to the Portland homeless shelters that kept me out of the rain and snow, but haven't decided yet how much to give them.

Unfortunately I've got to find a new shrink. Molina's health insurance won't pay for CSNW's Program for Assertive Community Treatment. My understanding is that the PACT Team is for the extra-special crazies. I've always wanted that feeling of belonging to something.

I expect Molina will cover a once per month visit to a psychiatrist. I'm doing well these days; once per month for a medication adjustment should be just fine.