In this video, Claude Debussy's Clair de Line is presented on a modular synthesizer. The accompanying Haiku says all:

from the modular, a landscape a wee sterile, just a reflection ~

The performer is ann annie, who can be found on Instagram and Bandcamp. There are only a few other recordings on YouTube, but they're all wonderful. Here's "North Wind":

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/20/debussys-clair-de-lune-on-mo.html

Sega Arcade: Pop-Up History [Read Only Memory] is a beautifully-illustrated hardcover book about six classic Sega "body sensation" arcade cabinets  Hang-On, Space Harrier, Out Run, After Burner, Thunder Blade and Power Drift  complete with pop-up cardboard models.

Accompanying this 3D showcase is a written history from Guardian games writer and best-selling novelist, Keith Stuart, punctuated by specially restored production artwork and beautifully reproduced in-game screens. The book features contributions from arcade game innovator Yu Suzuki, who offers first-hand insight into the development of these groundbreaking games and the birth of the Taiken cabinet phenomenon.

The book's lb35 and shipping now.

’SEGA Arcade Pop-Up History’ book. It looks like augmented reality. But it’s real reality. pic.twitter.com/yDJIO0WjJP

 @mikko has entered the chat (@mikko) February 20, 2020

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/20/pop-up-book-of-classic-sega-ar.html

In this video, Xenos moutoni are carefully extracted from hornets. Xenos parasites, in the order Strepsipsera, live their entire lives in the abdomens of wasps and similar insects, altering the host's behavior. Here's a story about Xenos vesparum, which parasitizes paper wasps. And here's a scientific paper about Xenos myrapetrus, which lives within swarm-founding wasps.

The infected wasp begins to suffer nutritionally, then flies to meet with other infected wasps. The male parasite exits the wasp's abdomen and mates with the female parasites which stay inside their host. Wasps infected with the male parasite die. Wasps infected with the female parasite then fatten themselves up much like queen wasps do. They then fly to meet with other uninfected queen wasps. Then when the parasite is mature, the infected wasp flies to mingle with other uninfected wasps, thereby spreading brood and larvae into new environments.

Tiny tweezers and a steady hand. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/20/watch-parasites-removed-from.html

Two-thirds of American adults drink coffee every day. On average, they’re each drinking about three cups per day, which works out to nearly 400 million cups downed each and every day.

We don’t have stats on what percentage of those cups are God awfully bad, but you have to assume with so many ways to screw it up, lots of Americans are draining bad brews just to get through the day.

The Ratio Six Coffee Maker is a home brewing system funded by a Kickstarter campaign that wants to bring a world-class cup of joe with each and every pour.

Consistency and convenience without compromise are the Ratio Six rallying cry. Just add your water and grounds, then push the button. That’s it. The meticulously handmade unit kicks into action, simulating the pour-over technique of a skilled barista. Hot water is slowly dispersed over the bloom with sharp precision, offering more evenly extracted grounds and an excellent cup of coffee.

Brewing up to 40 ounces at a time, the Ratio Six looks as good as it brews, cutting a sleek stainless steel profile that helps it fit in on any countertop. The Ratio folks are also backing their quality machine with a 5-year warranty, so you know that it’s built to last.

The Ratio Six Coffee Maker is just now rolling out to Kickstarter buyers, but you can still get one now at $35 off the regular price, just $310.99. Boing Boing readers can save an additional 10% when using code RATIO10 at checkout. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/the-ratio-six-is-a-single-butt.html

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has opened an investigation into a former Google employee’s pregnancy discrimination case, CNBC reports.

Chelsey Glasson worked as a former user experience researcher with Alphabet’s Google for five years. She wrote an internal memo that went viral in the summer of 2019 called “I’m Not Returning to Google After Maternity Leave, and Here is Why.”

This newest investigation adds to a growing pile.

Google is facing a number of federal probes and widespread employee dissent, reports Jennifer Elias for CNBC:

In [“I’m Not Returning to Google After Maternity Leave, and Here is Why”], she alleged her supervisor made discriminatory remarks about pregnant women. She also claimed that the company retaliated against her with poor performance ratings and unfairly denied her a leadership position.

Glasson told CNBC in December that Google’s human resources department did not investigate her complaint until after she hired an attorney, adding that she was never interviewed by HR before Google said it did not find her claims credible. At the time, Google didn’t respond to requests for comment. Glasson filed a complaint with the EEOC late last year with the allegations, which had more detail, including that one of the alleged supervisors was on the Google Cloud team.

The company responded to the EEOC complaint in January, saying it found no evidence of discrimination and that it didn’t make Glasson a manager due to insufficient headcount, according to materials viewed by CNBC.

The agency transferred Glasson’s case to the EEOC’s investigation division Wednesday, where the Seattle field office will take it on.

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/google-hit-with-new-federal-in.html

Post-Brexit, Google plans to move UK user accounts out of the control of European Union privacy regulators, and will place them under U.S. jurisdiction instead, where privacy protections are weaker, reports Joseph Menn at Reuters.

Excerpt:

The shift, prompted by Britain’s exit from the EU, will leave the sensitive personal information of tens of millions with less protection and within easier reach of British law enforcement. The change was described to Reuters by three people familiar with its plans. Google intends to require its British users to acknowledge new terms of service including the new jurisdiction.

Ireland, where Google and other U.S. tech companies have their European headquarters, is staying in the EU, which has one of the world’s most aggressive data protection rules, the General Data Protection Regulation.

Google has decided to move its British users out of Irish jurisdiction because it is unclear whether Britain will follow GDPR or adopt other rules that could affect the handling of user data, the people said.

Read more: Exclusive: Google users in UK to lose EU data protection - sources

.@google never has to follow any government regulations because they are more powerful than any government.

Good luck, UK. https://t.co/Dd6oazD5Cd

 Sleeping Giants (@slpng_giants) February 19, 2020

“The shift, prompted by Britain’s exit from the EU, will leave the sensitive personal information of tens of millions with less protection and within easier reach of British law enforcement.” https://t.co/Y4b1GoWfnf

 blmohr (@blmohr) February 19, 2020

Sure, we lose data protection but BLUE PASSPORTS!

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/google-users-in-uk-will-soon-l.html

Back in 2017, the new EPA Director Scott Pruitt -- a fantastically pampered shill for corporations whose income is proportional to the noxious effluvia they eject into our air, soil, and water -- passed a policy barring scientists from participating on the EPA’s Scientific Advisory Board if they had ever received a grant from the EPA.

This sneaky-clever move was clearly designed to create the illusion that it was “draining the swamp” by preventing any potential conflicts of interest between scientists and money. Except that most academic scientists rely on EPA (and other) grants. Which limited the pot of scientific advisors on the scientific advisory board to scientists who worked for corporations. Who … somehow … didn’t have any conflicts of interest between their money and their science?

It was, as the NRDC put it, a “pernicious scheme to stack the deck in favor of big polluters by trying to shut out the voices of scientists—all to pump more pollution into our lives.” They added:

Pruitt claimed that his 2017 directive reduced bias on the EPA’s nearly two dozen advisory panels, which offer scientific expertise that then guide policy decisions on environmental pollutants, such as industrial chemicals or airborne particles from power plants. But unsurprisingly, Pruitt’s rule was not extended to scientists and consultants with ties to chemical or fossil fuel companies, allowing the agency to soon fill some open seats with industry insiders who disputed the known harm of pollutants, like ozone and PFOA.

Fortunately, Judge Denise Cote of the U.S. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/federal-court-rules-that-scott.html

Have you heard of the Goblin? It's a likely dwarf-sized planet named that because it was discovered around Halloween, 2015. The Goblin travels in a 32-thousand-year orbit around our sun. It is currently 7.5 billion miles away, somewhere in the mysterious Oort Cloud area of the solar system. The Goblin is one of the farthest known objects within our solar system.

Image: YouTube Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/getting-to-know-2015-tg-387-a.html

Personal information for more than 10 million former guests of MGM resorts has been posted on a hacking forum. Among the notable data breach victims: Twitter and Square CEO Jack Dorsey. The leaked data includes home addresses, and is said to only affect guests who stayed at the hotel chain's properties before 2018.

MGM Resorts says the security incident took place in the summer of 2019, and that impacted guests were told last year. Catalin Cimpanu reporting for ZDNet:

According to our analysis, the MGM data dump that was shared today contains personal details for 10,683,188 former hotel guests.

Included in the leaked files are personal details such as full names, home addresses, phone numbers, emails, and dates of birth.

ZDNet reached out to past guests and confirmed they stayed at the hotel, along with their timeline, and the accuracy of the data included in the leaked files.

We got confirmation from international business travelers, reporters attending tech conferences, CEOs attending business meetings, and government officials traveling to Las Vegas branches.

MGM told ZDNet:

"Last summer, we discovered unauthorized access to a cloud server that contained a limited amount of information for certain previous guests of MGM Resorts,"

"We are confident that no financial, payment card or password data was involved in this matter."

Read more: Exclusive: Details of 10.6 million of MGM hotel guests posted on a hacking forum

[via techmeme.com, Catalin Cimpanu for Zero Day | February 19, 2020 -- 23:27 GMT] Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/mgm-resorts-data-breach-expose.html

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/mass-shooting-in-hanau-germany.html

E. Jean Carroll, who has written an advice column at ELLE magazine for three decades, and last year accused President Donald Trump of raping her in the mid-1990s, today said she was fired from her longtime editorial position as a direct result of Trump's public debasement of her character.

“Because Trump ridiculed my reputation, laughed at my looks, & dragged me through the mud, after 26 years, ELLE fired me,” Carroll wrote on Twitter. “I don’t blame Elle. It was the great honor of my life writing ‘Ask E. Jean.’”

Trump denies her rape accusation, as he has with all the other countless sexual discrimination, harassment, and abuse allegations, over these many decades.

From NBC News:

Carroll's announcement of her termination from ELLE follows her lawyers' move to block a request from Trump that her suit be delayed.

“Our client filed this lawsuit to prove that Donald Trump lied about sexually assaulting her and to restore her credibility and reputation. From the very beginning, Trump has tried every tactic lawyers can think of to halt this case in its tracks and keep the truth from coming out," wrote Kaplan in a statement. "His latest effort — a motion to stay our client’s case until the New York Court of Appeals decides the Summer Zervos case likely after November 2020 — is yet another obvious delay tactic that is not grounded in the law and, like his previous attempts to stall this case, will be rejected by the court.”

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/e-jean-carroll-fired-from-ell.html

Larry Tesler, the Xerox PARC computer scientist who coined the terms cut, copy, and paste, has died.

Born in 1945 in New York, Tesler went on to study computer science at Stanford University, and after graduation he dabbled in artificial intelligence research (long before it became a deeply concerning tool) and became involved in the anti-war and anti-corporate monopoly movements, with companies like IBM as one of his deserving targets. In 1973 Tesler took a job at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) where he worked until 1980. Xerox PARC is famously known for developing the mouse-driven graphical user interface we now all take for granted, and during his time at the lab Tesler worked with Tim Mott to create a word processor called Gypsy that is best known for coining the terms “cut,” “copy,” and “paste” when it comes to commands for removing, duplicating, or repositioning chunks of text.

Read the rest of his obit on Gizmodo.

[H/t Jim Leftwich]

Image: Yahoo! Blog from Sunnyvale, California, USA - Larry Tesler Smiles at Whisper, CC BY 2.0, Link Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/larry-tesler-the-father-of-cu.html

Alexandra Kopytova accepted the proposal at the barrel of a gun. Or 16 guns, technically, which were attached to a fleet of T-72B3 Soviet Battle Tanks that her now-fiance, Lieutenant Denis Kazantsev, brought in as part of an elaborate military maneuvering drill to ask his beloved's hand in marriage. From RT (because of course it's from RT):

Though Valentine’s Day is not really a Russian tradition, the spirit of the day was not lost on Kazantsev’s commanders, who gave the go-ahead for the mission at the Alabino testing grounds, southwest of Moscow. On Thursday morning, 16 tanks rolled onto the range for a maneuvering drill in which they formed two columns and lined up in a heart formation.

The mission’s success, however, hinged on the approval of one person who was neither a major nor a general. With her eyes covered, 19-year-old Alexandra was led into the middle of the formation by Denis, 23. When she opened her eyes, she saw Kazantsev kneeling with a bouquet of red roses.

"I postponed the proposal for about one month to organise all this so it would be unforgettable, once in a lifetime," Kazantsev told the Daily Mail. "It was not easy but with time my commanders agreed to let me do this."

This awkwardly-sweet-in-a-distinctly-Russian-way fairytale gets even weirder when you realize that Koptyova and Kazantsev were … actually already married. He had previously proposed on New Year's Eve 2017, at a time when they were living in separate cities, and got to enjoy a whole two weeks of marriage in St. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/russian-soldier-proposes-with.html

One of the strangest contradictory sensations of the Trump era is the man's relationship towards and with the various U.S. intelligence agencies. In many cases, Trump's broad criticisms about the unaccountable and seemingly limitless scope of intelligence gathering are valid. Or would be, anyway, if the man actually cared about those issues for any reason beyond his larger tantrum over the way those agencies have undermined his ego. Or if he wasn't simultaneously trying to use that same wide jurisdiction to target his own political enemies.

In other words, Trump's not necessarily wrong about the potential abuses of secret and/or warrantless surveillance (or "wiretapping" as he puts it). But he's only mad about those things because they can be used to threaten him and his friends, instead of reinforcing his hunches. Otherwise, illegal spying and invasions of privacy are totally fine with him—as long as they target the right people.

There are moments, then, where it becomes a case of "My enemy's enemy is my friend" — except that "friend" is also an enemy of sorts, which further complicates the whole mess. Case in point: this recent Just Security post by Douglas London, a former CIA operative. In it, London talks about the way that the CIA's priorities have been forced to shift from general intelligence gathering to just kind of soothing Trump's ego, and retroactively justifying all of the man's random baseless instincts:

The revealing and most disconcerting aspect of this episode was not that Pompeo presumed the worst from his workforce before getting the full story, nor his vicious dressing down of a dedicated senior official and decorated officer.

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/what-its-like-inside-the-cia.html

The Fashion Institute of Technology has apologized for a "clearly racist" show where a black model was asked to wear giant red lips and black plastic ears. The model refused, but white colleages were photographed on the catwalk wearing the bizarre prostheses. The college's president is not sure if there was an explicitly racial comment being made, but is looking into it, reports the BBC:

"Currently," its president Joyce F Brown said in a statement, "it does not appear that the original intent of the design, the use of accessories or the creative direction of the show was to make a statement about race.

"However, it is now glaringly obvious that has been the outcome. For that, we apologise - to those who participated in the show, to students, and to anybody who has been offended by what they saw."

Amy Lefevre, the model who declined, talked to the New York Post and shared a test shot (above) taken before the show in which she wore the accessories.

“I stood there almost ready to break down, telling the staff that I felt incredibly uncomfortable with having to wear these pieces and that they were clearly racist,” Amy Lefevre, 25, told The Post.

“I was told that it was fine to feel uncomfortable for only 45 seconds.”

The designer, Junkai Huang, is reportedly "from China" and unaware of the racial connotations of the mask. Richard Thornn, the producer of the show, is reported to have "screamed" at a student who objected before the show and has more explaining to do. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/new-york-fashion-school-apolog.html

For those with a writing flair, the thought of building a career as a professional copywriter should probably have some appeal. Thankfully, it’s also an in-demand job skill with the average copywriter making a healthy $60,000 a year for their efforts.

But even if you have a way with words, you still need the industry training and background to get hired or even to start up your own thing as a freelance copy pro.

Either way you choose, the training found in The 2020 Complete Digital Copywriting Master Class Bundle ($38.99, over 90 percent off) can help you get there, even if you’ve got no previous experience with how the whole business works.

The package features 11 courses that can take the first-time copywriting student and begin building up your skills and knowledge to take on the pros.

It all begins with The Business Writing Course, where 30-year content writer Alan Sharpe shows students the basics of the copywriting game. That training expands into greater depth with the 3-part Copywriting for Beginners courses, as students learn the seven vital questions surrounding any copywriting project, how to use headlines and openers to great effect, and the right buttons to push to persuade all manner of audiences to join your cause.

In addition to training in crafting persuasive and profitable digital sales pages, there are also deep examinations on the 10 most common mistakes made by new copywriters as well as the biggest takeaways that still resonate today from one the “best ad campaign of all time,” the powerful 1960s and 1970s Volkswagen newspaper ads. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/this-training-can-help-make-20.html

I bought this solar powered LED illuminated street address sign earlier this month and am really happy with it. The light is is bright and makes it easy for people to find our house. It comes with several sheets of adhesive numbers that you stick onto a white plastic panel. It also comes with mounting screws, but I attached it to the side of a metal mailbox so I used outdoor mounting tape instead. My address has five numbers and I had no problem fitting them on the panel, using the included cardboard placement template.

I paid full price for it, but the seller has a code 5UZYEDUV to let you buy it at a good discount. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/a-good-golar-powered-led-illum.html

This "ultrasonic" pest repellent just has circuit to control LEDs inside from r/assholedesign

This Adtala ultrasonic bug and rat repellent device is advertised as having an "Upgraded Smart Chip." Reddit user SoggyMonsoon opened the case and found a circuit with 2 LEDS, 2 diodes, and three resistors, but no Upgraded Smart Chip. Does it even emit an ultrasonic tone? A commenter said: "this circuit WOULD emit ultrasonic sound. It looks like it would oscillate between the lights. Of course it would be extremely quiet since there is no amplification circuit here to the point that I highly doubt any living thing would be affected by it, but this circuit would in fact make 2 different pitches based on the light that was currently on / diodes in use. All electric circuits have a frequency. So along those lines any electronic device would be about as effective as this thing."

Below, a video of a test with a Bell and Howell Ultrasonic Rodent Repeller. It didn't work. In fact, rats seem to be attracted to it:

Image: Reddit Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/this-electronic-ultrasonic-bug.html

Today is the 75th anniversary of the beginning of the Battle of Iwo Jima, when the US Marines and Navy invaded and captured the island from the Imperial Japan Army. Almost 7,000 Allied troops and 18,000 Japanese soldiers were killed. The University of South Carolina's Moving Image Research Collections is now helping the History Division of the Marine Corps digitize and make public mostly unseen film footage shot by marines in combat during the battle. There are 14,000 cans of film undergoing the digitization and preservation process. The videos above and below are barely a teaser of what's to come. From the University of South Carolina:

From the beginning, Marine Corps leaders knew they wanted a comprehensive visual account of the battle — not only for a historical record but also to assist in planning and training for the invasion of the Japanese main islands. Some Marine cameramen were assigned to the front lines of individual units, and others to specific activities, such as engineering and medical units. Films from these units show the daily toll of the battle such as Marines being treated in the medical units or being evacuated off the island to hospital ships as well as essential behind-the-lines tasks of building command posts or unloading and sorting equipment on beaches....

Another goal of the Marine Corps film project is to identify and label as much of the historical information in the films as possible, such as Marine Corps units and equipment. In addition to manually scanning the films for this information, Moving Images Research Collections has partnered with Research Computing and the university’s Computer Vision Lab, a research group within the College of Engineering and Computing, to use artificial intelligence to recognize text in the films to help identify units as well as individual Marines, airplanes and ships.

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/powerful-iwo-jima-wwii-footage.html

News 24 reports that "No SA National Defence Force (SANDF) members were injured after a Rooikat light armoured vehicle hit a fence during a practice run ahead of the annual Armed Forces Day commemorations in Polokwane on Monday."

Image: News24/YouTube Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/02/19/armored-vehicle-almost-flatten.html