Items I happen to view each day. Science, Technology, Management, Culture, and Writing

    This is my day book for this week. It is a log of things I see on the Internet.

This week: 7-13 October, 2019

Summary of this week:

• MacOS Catalina is released
• Supreme Court time in the US
• Google's Grasshopper learn to code software comes to the desktop
• It seems that everyone is in trouble with China
• Apple's value surpasses $1Trillion

Monday 7 October 2019

Our Dept of Homeland Security moves its biometrics program to the cloud. It should work better, and that could be a problem.

The Houston Rockets have long been popular in China. The GM tweeted in favor of the protestors in Hong Kong. The governors of China didn't like it. He retracted his statement. Everyone is now mad at him.

The push for a space elevator is gaining momentum. The proponents, however, don't seem to have any money.

"Joker" sets some sort of box-office record for the weekend. To date, there haven't been any of the predicted shootings.

Tuesday 8 October 2019

Automobile deaths are falling, but pedestrian deaths are rising. Some background on the issue.

MacOs Catalina is now here.

International trade, Uyghurs, surveillance, technology. I guess we can throw in the Houston Rockets as well. Beware when doing business in China.

The UAW strike at GM is about electric cars, which have fewer, parts, are easier to build, and require far fewer assembly line workers.

Where the money is: Apple has succeeded in putting its Watch in the healthcare industry and is available through some Medicare supplements.

Wednesday 9 October 2019

If it wins the $10Billion DoD cloud computing contract, Amazon will move in with the big, traditional defense contractors.

Facebook now claims 3million paid users for its Workplace version.

Ring is working with over 500 local law enforcement units across the US. Some civil rights groups want this to stop.

Google announces that its Grasshopper learn-how-to-code software is now running on the desktop via a web browser.

Take care when doing business in China. Game maker Blizzard runs into the same trouble as the NBA.

Andy Rubin, of Android fame, hints at a new "phone like" device with a completely different form factor.

China appears to have a shortage of pork, so farmers are raising 1,000-pound hogs. What could possible go wrong?

If you watch the habits of the American teenager, we find that they now prefer YouTube over Netflix.

For those of us who thought there was nothing more to learn...we find 20 more moons around Saturn, hence it now has more moons than Jupiter.

Who needs Freedom of Speech in California where the governors outlaw deepfake political videos during campaigns.

Thursday 10 October 2019

Astrophysicists and other scientist are leaving their fields to make money as data scientists in unlikely places like men's clothing.

A look at Google's product inclusion team. Trying to help the tech folks understand social norms and other things.

California is having major power outages due to wildfires.

Disney offers deals on Disney+ as low as $5 a month.

News Flash (not): International regulators are changing the rules to extract more money from succe$$ful American companies.

Ever since the wrong person was elected president, it is bad to have a government contract.

Worker productivity continues to increase; pay, not so much.

Friday 11 October 2019

Video from Amazon "Cloud Cam" (a home webcam) is being watched by employees in India and Romania. Privacy?

Facebook releases PyTorch 1.3 for machine learning.

A major part of the new PyTorch release is that it allows running the classification app on a mobile phone.

A look at how the governors of China are using their cyber tools to monitor and squelch subjects outside its borders. This isn't a nation state attacking another nation state via cyber tools. It is attacks on individuals in other places.

A sneak peak at Google's next laptop computer.

Yet another look at working remotely. Telecommunications and computing have changed how we do this and we discover the unintended consequences.

Leonardo da Vinci was right after all. His bridge design, radical and rejected 500 years ago, would have worked just fine.

Saturday 12 October 2019

And someone made a site where teenagers could tell each other where they were and what they just say. Again, Presidential candidates challenge its "policies." It's just Twitter. Policies?

Researchers show how easy and inexpensive it is to attack supply chains.

The governors in California pass a law banning the use of facial recognition software in law enforcement body cameras.

Apple TV+ steps in with the big boys of entertainment and lands "Masters of the Air"—stories of the 8th Air Force in WWII.

Researchers find more efficient computer vision algorithms that can run on smartphones. They can also run on smaller, less expensive processors spread all over the place.

Believe it or not...we are all moving at 1.3million miles per hour.

Apple quietly sets a new record for its value as it moves above $1Trillion (with a Tr).

Roku—they make those little sticks you connect to the back of your TV—has grown in value 300% this year.

The group of companies that deliver Amazon packages (they drive the trucks with the Amazon logo) have laid off 2,000 persons this month.

Big financial players leave Facebook's Libra project.

HP releases Chromebooks aimed at business, i.e., HP has lost sight of what a Chromebook is.

Sunday 13 October 2019

Interesting story as we learn that the design of the Armalite Rifle does not conform to Congress' definition of a firearm. Our government has sort of "made it up" for a few decades in illegal regulation.

Some of the Jeffrey Epstein fallout falls on Bill Gates. Epstein's life has to be made into a movie or something. He is the prototypical con artist who understood how to manipulate others. And more troubles for Richard Stallman, who was tied to Epstein as well.

Strong rumors about what we might see at this week's big event from Google.

The email newsletter makes a return, sort of. A few are making money with the revival.

"Clothing" that fools facial recognition technology. It isn't difficult, but I have yet to see one that works that isn't as obvious as these.

Researchers find an error in a Python library used in chemistry calculations. The result is that an untold number of research papers contain incorrect results.

According to a recent study...automation won't create unemployment all at once, but instead is already eroding earnings at a significant but not startling rate.

Unix turns 50 this week. Bell Labs will celebrate the event.

Some tips on writing to length, i.e., when given a 750-word limit, don't write a 3,000-word draft that needs pruning.

One writer's tips for writing the first draft faster. The author doesn't consider sketching, outlining, research, etc. parts of writing—at least not in this piece.

A brief reminder: when writing a first or nth draft, nobody is watching. Nobody is reading. Keep at it.

If you want to earn money from your writing...and that is a B I G   I F ... there are types of writing that will help achieve this goal. This piece discusses the matter. Entertain. Educate. Inspire.

A few dozen places to find dozens and dozens of writing prompts. Open a phone book (still have those?).  Open a Holy Bible, lots of them in that book, and you might find some other good thoughts there as well.

Recognizing bad writing advice. It is quite easy as some 98.6% of writing advice is bad.

Writing a novel? "You need to write a query letter (ugh). You need to write a synopsis (ouch). And you need to be able to sum up your entire novel in one simple sentence (how?!)."