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: 6-12 April, 2020

Summary of this week:

• Strong rumors that a less-expensive iPhone is coming this week
• Google releases its Local Home SDK
• Firefox 75 is released
• Facebook games opens its tournaments feature

Monday 6 April 2020

In an effort to save the world (not), YouTube removes videos that blame 5G for you-know-what. We must be protected, I guess.

Hunting and fishing are still permitted in some states during the physical distance times (note I didn't incorrectly write social distance).

Apple has now found and donated 20million face masks and 1million face shields to healthcare workers. Where are they finding these things?

Microsoft makes Skype more capable and easier to use.

Strong rumors that a less-expensive iPhone SE will be here in a few days. $399. Should be half that.

Amazon postpones Prime Day at least until August.

Tesla makes a video showing how they are making ventilators from car parts.

Tuesday 7 April 2020

We are going back to the crowd to find early symptoms of SARS-CoV-2. Loss of the ability to smell. Well, that comes with lots of illnesses.

Google officially releases its Local Home SDK.

Our Federal government now officially has a Committee for the Assessment of Foreign Participation in the United States Telecommunications Services Sector. This group assists our FCC in keeping out foreign ownership of our telecommunications infrastructure.

It appears that felines can catch SAR-CoV-2.

I love this. A real-life experiment with webcams on laptops. They aren't very good. No one has tried to make them good because we use our iPhones and such for video. And the iPhone is much better than the laptop webcam.

Microsoft to the rescue: US schools are switching from Zoom to Microsoft Teams over security concerns.

Who else but XKCD to summarize the day. Let's put rubber bands on our ears as the Surgeon General showed us.

Wednesday 8 April 2020

We have The Open COVID Pledge wherein large successful organizations pledge to share intellectual property to fight disease. One lesson learned in all this is that there are things we should have been doing all along and should continue to do. Why weren't we and why won't we?

It isn't just the restaurants that are hurting, Microsoft slows its hiring.

Schools are closed, but everyone is learning online...wrong. Fantasy becomes reality. Governors closed schools on the heels of bad advice and hollow promises.

Microsoft is slowly rolling out its xCloud video gaming stream.

Mozilla releases Firefox version 75.

Ahead of schedule, Facebook launches its gaming tournament feature. Again, things we should have been doing all along.

The online work business is booming as Google sees unprecedented growth in G Suite users and unreal growth in Google Meet.

Great, realistic, stuff from Seth Godin

There are three ways to tell if people are hard at work in an office:

    1 the boss can watch them go to meetings. And they can watch each other in meetings as well.
    2 the boss can watch them sit at desks in an open office.
    3 we can make promises to each other and then keep them.

Thursday 9 April 2020

Machine learning and athletic training. It is all about patterns and what breaks in pattern are good.

In defense of economic disaster.

A different take on the coronavirus. This is from someone who isn't paid by the government, so he can do actual science.

Microsoft declares that all its conferences and events will be online only for the next year. Might as well save money on these.

It doesn't pay to be a gig workers, what we used to call part-time help. It never has, it never will.

The summer job...forget it this year.

Much of government still runs on the COBOL programming language. New programmers could learn it, but don't from disdain.

Nothing works as well at transcription as humans. All the AI falls short. This is a job you can do at home during the you-know-what era.

It appears that Microsoft won't sell any new hardware this year.

Here is another booming business: selling servers that run online services that we are all using now that we are sitting in our homes.

Microsoft provides easier access to Linux files in Explorer on Windows.

Jack Dorsey (Twitter) donates a billion $$$ to you-know-what. Good for him. Many folks are doing things now that they should have done before and should do again in the future.

Friday 10 April 2020

The folks at Microsoft are sliding into the futures prediction business with remote work and learning. One day we will look back and shake our heads on all this.

A look at how Chinese groups (government) have been hacking Linux-based systems worldwide.

DARPA starts a new effort to create defenses for sensor-based artificial intelligence. Among those working on this are Johns Hopkins University, Intel, Georgia Tech, MIT, Carnegie Mellon University, SRI International and IBM's Almaden Research Center.

Another booming business these days is Google Classroom which has doubled its users due to you-know-what.

Real news that is not news: nations are spying on each other's use of Zoom and such. No doubt that companies are doing the same to their competitors.

Bill Gates warns of a pandemic every 20 years. Let's see if politicians have knee-jerk reactions in the future as well.

Saturday 11 April 2020

Lots of persons seem to want a quick vaccine for this year's virus. Anyone ready to have their kids and grandparents first in line for the experiments? Odd.

The post-virus world looks bright for Amazon. They have everything everyone needs from home order of toilet paper to cloud services to run remote businesses.

The first quarter of this year was a big one for Apple as iOS activations are at their highest in four years.

IBM and COBOL to the rescue. Unemployment claims skyrocket due to political proclamations. State systems run on COBOL. IBM to offer free training on the programming language of government.

The 2019 Mac Pro (cheese grater) is now available in the Apple refurbished store. Save 15%.

Someone speaks some sense about economic bailouts for companies owned by rich persons.

Sunday 12 April 2020

In the year of the virus, we change our attitudes about basic things. (1) mass surveillance is okay (of course no one would abuse it (not)), (2) staring at a screen all day is okay now.

Scratch jumps into the top 20 of most-used programming languages. It is sponsored by Google and Intel as well as the Cartoon Network and LEGO Foundation. Can't lose with that backing.

Skeptical of the virus numbers coming out of China? Be so about those coming out of the US as well.

A look at how easy it is to fool face detection and other systems that are supposed to follow and identify us.

For now, all this "the kids will do school at home" isn't realistic. College may work for a while, but the K through 12 won't.

How one writer worked up to $100K/year income. Steady, reliable working. 

Earning more money as a writer. Here is a simple, practical, and good tip: Ditch Content Mills and Look for Clients.

The challenge instead of the goal. The other way to consider this is that you are a writer so you write.

The importance (maybe not) of the  International Standard Book Number (ISBN).

Silly but true. Print your document on heavier paper and readers will take it more seriously.

A few ways to write a novel or plot or something.

The challenge of writing in challenging times. When is writing easy? It is always challenging.

The invaluable but rare blog that makes money for the person doing it. It is possible, but highly unlikely.

How setting a small goal, like writing ten minutes a day, can change your life and make yourself better for everyone around you.