'Contact tracing is being done after positive test in office building where many senior advisers and top officials work.'

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/white-house-cafeteria-worker-t.html

Glorious video of wildebeests on their great migration in Tanzania, stomping across a river by the thousands.

Storyful: Thousands of Wildebeests Make River Crossing During Great Migration in Tanzania

And while we're at it, here's an awesome capture of a baby wildebeest, by someone else.

We witnessed the birth of this wildebeest. It had been alive for a total of 5 minutes when this was taken. Within 10 minutes it was up and joined the migration.

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/watch-thousands-of-wildebeest.html

There's a fun livestream on right now at the Basket Cat Blog.

Blog post here, and YouTube livestream is here: 'Chibi and potato digger 200723.'

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/cat-rides-on-back-of-gardener.html

A video from Mako, the human guardian of this otter, Sakura, and a cat named Mochi. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/otter-cant-sleep-without-hug.html

What Are These Creatures In My Yard ?!

Mr. Max is a birb. Some wild turkeys showed up one day in the back yard, and Mr. Max's owner caught it on video.

At this spot, it's so funny.

It goes like this:

Max: hey big birb I have gift BANG BANG BNAG GIFT

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/cockatoo-sees-wild-turkeys-thr.html

Polls got you down? Send in the gestapo.

President Donald Trump announced a plan on Wednesday to send more camouflaged and heavily armed federal agents to more U.S. cities to 'crack down on violent crime' (read: terrorize his way to a second term).

“Today I’m announcing a surge of federal law enforcement into American communities plagued by violent crime. We’ll work every single day to restore public safety,” Pres. Trump says at news conference on protests. https://t.co/I6Cmz7Ykp1 pic.twitter.com/vw3rANaaVC

 ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) July 22, 2020

The would-be strongman's "law and order" push going into the Nov. 3 presidential election is intensifying. The horrifying violence by Trump's goons against moms and students in Portland is but a preview.

And then there was this.

Attorney General William Barr winks at @realDonaldTrump as he finished his remarks about Combatting Violent Crime in American Cities during an event in the East Room of the White House. pic.twitter.com/Tz2nOLGPLM

 Doug Mills (@dougmillsnyt) July 22, 2020

From Reuters:

Trump, joined at a White House event by Attorney General William Barr, unveiled an expansion of the “Operation Legend” program to include cities such as Chicago and Albuquerque, New Mexico, in a further effort by federal officials to tackle violence.

“Today I’m announcing a surge of federal law enforcement into American communities plagued by violent crime,” Trump said.

Trump said “we have no choice but to get involved” with a rising death toll in some major cities.

“This bloodshed must end; this bloodshed will end,” he said.

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/trump-not-done-sending-armed-t.html

Michael Barnett of the Political Violence at a Glance website asks, "Should the United Nations declare of responsibility to protect Americans from the Trump Administration?"

Should the United Nations Security Council consider a resolution calling for a responsibility to protect the people of the United States from the Trump administration’s handling of COVID-19?

Responsibility to Protect, otherwise known as R2P, is a 2005 UN resolution that declares that when a state either participates in, permits, or is unable to stop large-scale civilian deaths, it has forfeited its sovereignty and the international community has the responsibility to halt the slaughter. Has the Trump administration failed in its fundamental responsibility to protect its population, and should the international community intervene? Nothing of the kind will happen, of course—but that is because of politics, not because a case cannot be made.

[via The Browswer] Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/should-the-un-seek-to-protect.html

Fidget spinners are played out. In fact, fidget spinners were played out in 2018. So now, whether we’re absent-mindedly sitting in our home offices, talking on the phone, or just going about your day, we’re all looking for new ways to occupy our hands. 

From computer users to sportsmen, musicians to golfers to climbers, you never want to overlook the importance of strong and flexible hands, forearms, and fingers. If you’re looking to develop your hand strength and maybe even improve your performance with tasks that require some digit dexterity, the FlexEx Ultimate Hand Exerciser ($9.99, 33 percent off) might be just what you’re looking for.

Lightweight and easy to use, the FlexEx slips on to your fingers and offers different levels of resistance to help strengthen and, in some cases, even rehabilitate weakened hands, forearms and fingers. 

The three-pack includes all three different color-coded FlexEx varieties, each created for different types of hand-strengthening uses so you can gradually improve hand power and dexterity naturally.

The Yellow FlexEx offers the lightest tension, a level best suited to those engaged in physical therapy, rehabilitation, or anyone with, particularly weakened hands. Once users feel confident with the effects of that band, they can switch to the Red FlexEx, this time producing medium resistance, allowing anyone to strengthen their hands to produce a better grip, more fluidly play an instrument, or even bolster digits damaged by repetitive stress injuries.

Finally, the Blue FlexEx is the strongest resistance band, allowing users to reach a maximum level of hand strength through repeated usage. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/the-flexex-ultimate-hand-exerc.html

My new puppy, Electra, loves this Toozey play pool. I love how easy it is to fold up and put away.

This play pool will last us a long time. Made of pretty durable feeling waterproof tarp on the bottom and strong walls, the pool requires no inflating. A strong release valve holds water in, and lets it out!

At first, Electra was reluctant to play in the water, but now she jumps in and splashes about before heading for the dirt to roll about. The photo up top shows her "adjusting face." My daughter also likes to lounge in the pool. Sometimes our Cavalier joins them, but usually prefers to stay dry.

Toozey Foldable Dog Pool, Portable PVC Pet Swimming Pool, Slip-Resistant Material Kiddie Pool, Dog Pet Bath Pool for Small to Large Dogs via Amazon Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/puppy-pools-are-fun-for-puppie.html

I've been using a Kitchen IQ Edge Grip 2-Stage Knife Sharpener  for years and it's my favorite knife sharpener.  I like it because of the way you hold it with one hand along the edge of a kitchen counter and with the other hand you draw the knife through the slots. It's a safe way to sharpen a knife and I don't see how someone could make a mistake and hurt themselves. One slot is "coarse" and the other is "fine." I typically use the fine slot every week or so to restore the edge on a knife. I rarely use coarse because it removes quite a bit of steel from a knife, but sometimes that's just what's needed to sharpen a dull knife. Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/ive-tried-a-lot-of-different-2.html

My pal Dave has proclaimed that Friday, July 24th will be Dopey Day. I wrote about his popular Dopey Podcast (touted as a "dark comedy of drug addiction") in March 2018. At the time he had a co-host, Chris. Just a few months later, Chris had died of an overdose. Dopey Day is to "commemorate and celebrate" Chris' life, and to honor others who have died from addiction.

Dave explains:

Chris died on that day in 2018 from a tragic overdose of a deadly mixture of powerful drugs. He died having almost five years clean. He died as a PHD candidate. He died as a loyal boyfriend and as a man who was earning renewed trust from his family and friends. But specific to this story, Chris died as the partner and Co-Host to Dave, who together, founded Dopey - The Podcast about Drugs, Addiction and Dumb Shit.

Dopey was created by addicts for addicts, and for those that might be recovery-curious. It was a way to normalize past behavior but more importantly it was a safe place to listen, to identify with and be a part of a group of misfits that can laugh at the craziest stories, fueled by drugs and alcohol that are frankly too debaucherous to make up. This group came to be known as the Dopey Nation, now numbering in the thousands. They are a self monitoring tribe, in and out of recovery that won’t judge or shame people for their past and will offer stories of their journey when asked to provide insight on living a happy and fulfilling life.

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/dopey-day-to-honor-the-lives-o.html

Make your anti-racist voice heard every time you send a letter. Oakland-based Lea Redmond of Leafcutter Designs makes it easy through her new Postage Stamp Project. She's offering these "tiny protest signs" to "lick-and-stick" onto mail (just don't confuse them for real paid postage). She pulled in Bay Area Artist Oree Originol for the art. His Justice For Our Lives open-source portraits, which feature more than 85 marginalized POC that were killed by law enforcement, was chosen for the first phase of the project. For the next phase, Lea is inviting people to submit their own tiny protest sign designs for "possible inclusion in a future edition of crowd-sourced stamps." All details here.

You can get some of these stamps for $1 (suggested donation to cover costs) from Lea by sending her a self-addressed stamped envelope (SASE). The address is: Lea Redmond 329 15th Street Oakland, CA 94612 Edition: Say Their Names

View this post on Instagram

After coming across the #justiceforourlives installation on Lakeshore Ave. in Oakland, artist @lea_redmond was inspired to make use of my open source artwork to include in her “Postage Stamp Protest”, a series of “protest signs” to be carried through the mail system. These are lick-and-stick protest signs that you can add to the postage stamp area of your mail (as long as you have real postage!) Stick them on letters to friends as an act of solidarity or to raise consciousness and inspire action. Also stick’em on your electric bills, rent checks, other random outgoing mail, and anywhere else you’re inspired to!

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/lick-and-stick-these-tiny-pr.html

Archie Comics doesn't want people to write "Archie is a simp" in the YouTube comments on its channel, promising to ban anyone that does. The angry command is begging to get Streisandedbut perhaps getting Streisanded is the whole point. Cunning work!

Please stop writing "Archie is a simp" in the comments of our YouTube videos. You will receive a permanent ban from our channel. Thank you.

 Archie Comics (@ArchieComics) July 21, 2020

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/archie-comics-warns-people-not.html

In 2014 a photographer noticed that one of his photos had been posted to Twitter without his permission. The photo was retweeted by three other people, and Twitter's algorithm cropped out the name of the photographer. The photographer went to court to get the name of the original poster, as well as the 3 people who retweeted the photo. The case ended up in the Supreme Court, which ruled in favor of the photographer.

From The Next Web:

As a result, the High Court ordered Twitter to divulge the email addresses of both the original poster and the retweeters. That ruling didn’t sit right with Twitter, which appealed the decision, claiming its users had no control over the cropping algorithm. The argument didn’t fly in court, though.

Four out of the five judges involved in yesterday’s decision sided with the photographer. The dissenting judge argued that ruling in favor of the photographer would put the responsibility of complying with image copyrights on the users, which obviously opens a whole new can of worms.

It’s unclear what the photographer plans to do with the users’ information, but considering his zeal for legal battles, it won’t be surprising if he follows action against them. The worst bit? The ruling puts Japan’s 45 million residents at legal risk for innocuously reposting images.

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/japans-supreme-court-rules-t.html

United Airlines lost $1.6 billion in the second quarter of 2020. This is in sharp contrast to its profit of $1 billion during the second quarter of 2019. According to the New York Times United "lost an average of $40 million a day in April, May, and June." It plans to reduce that to $25 million dollars per day during the third quarter. At that rate Jeff Bezos but be able to keep United running for 20 years.

From The New York Times:

Air travel reached new lows in the second quarter, with the number of people flying falling as much as 96 percent on some days in April compared to last year. Traffic had started to recover in May and June, but stalled this month as coronavirus infections spread around the country and states imposed new travel restrictions. On Monday, the number of people screened at airport checkpoints was down 74 percent compared to last year.

As a result, United and other airlines have had to scale back schedules for August. The airline now expects to fly about 35 percent as many flights next month as it did last August and says the rest of the year will probably be much the same.

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/united-airlines-revenue-drop.html

This brief article is titled "Backing up for Mortals," and it looks like it has good advice. The author recommends 3-2-1 Rule:

The rule is simple: you have 3 backup sources: 2 are local, and 1 is remote.

2 local sources because if one fails, you can replace it and duplicate the good one over the new one.

1 remote source because if both fail, or become destroyed or stolen, your remote source can restore 2 new local sources.

The two local drives should be mirrored -- "A mirrored drive is best for backups because if any data becomes corrupt in one, the other can restore it; it's maximum redundancy."

The author recommends using Backblaze, which costs $60 a year and offers unlimited storage. I'm using IDrive, which costs $70 a year and it's limited to 5 terabytes of storage, but you can back up an unlimited number of computers, so I have the whole family backing up their computers to it.

The author also recommends encrypting backups on a file-by-file basis "(if data becomes corrupted, it's hard to recover anything without a copy"), but that seems like too much trouble for me, so I am just in encrypting everything and crossing my fingers.

[via Mike Gunderloy] Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/how-to-back-up-your-computer-h.html

twitter keeps removing my post showing police brutality in philadelphia yesterday. officers spraying mace point blank in peaceful protesters faces while they sit still and comply. disgusting abuse. please share and retweet.#BlackLivesMatter pic.twitter.com/G7qfsqCqtZ

 linds (@d0wnrrrrr) June 2, 2020

Philadelphia SWAT officer Richard P. Nicoletti was filmed last month pulling masks off peacefully kneeling protestors and blasting them with pepper spray. He turned himself in today and will likely face charges of simple assault, reckless endangerment, official oppression, and possession of an instrument of crime.

From The Inquirer:

On June 1, as demonstrators gathered on the highway, Nicoletti could be seen on video dousing three of them with pepper spray as they knelt in the middle of the road.

Video showed Nicoletti pulling down the mask of the first woman he sprayed in the face, dousing a second woman at point blank range, then spraying a man in the face several times while also shoving him to the ground.

Commissioner Danielle Outlaw and Mayor Jim Kenney described Nicoletti’s actions as unacceptable, and Outlaw said she was “disgusted.”

John McNesby, president of Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 5, said that protesters had created a dangerous situation by entering the highway, and that the union would defend Nicoletti as the department’s disciplinary process played out.

Image: Twitter Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/the-philly-cop-who-brutally-pe.html

A man in Maine, feuding with his neighbors, hired a surveyor to mark the lines of his property. When he discovered that the neighbor's garage partly occupied his property, he took a saw and cut the garage in half.

From The Bangor Daily News:

“There’s been a property-line dispute for a couple of months and obviously that was the result between Mr. Brawn and the owner of the other building,” Dover-Foxcroft police Chief Ryan Reardon said.

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/man-saws-neighbors-garage-in-h.html

Using the European Southern Observatory (ESO)'s Very Large Telescope (VLT) in northern Chile's Atacama Desert, astronomers created this dramatic image of two giant planets in orbit around a star. This is the first multiplanet system to be photographed that includes a star similar to our own Sun. The outer planet is six times more massive than Jupiter while the outer planet is 14 times heavier. The researchers published their work today in the Astrophysical Journal Letters. From ESO:

“Even though astronomers have indirectly detected thousands of planets in our galaxy, only a tiny fraction of these exoplanets have been directly imaged,” says co-author Matthew Kenworthy, Associate Professor at Leiden University, adding that “direct observations are important in the search for environments that can support life.” The direct imaging of two or more exoplanets around the same star is even more rare; only two such systems have been directly observed so far, both around stars markedly different from our Sun. The new ESO’s VLT image is the first direct image of more than one exoplanet around a Sun-like star. ESO’s VLT was also the first telescope to directly image an exoplanet, back in 2004, when it captured a speck of light around a brown dwarf, a type of ‘failed’ star.

“Our team has now been able to take the first image of two gas giant companions that are orbiting a young, solar analogue,” says Maddalena Reggiani, a postdoctoral researcher from KU Leuven, Belgium, who also participated in the study. The two planets can be seen in the new image as two bright points of light distant from their parent star, which is located in the upper left of the frame.

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/first-photo-of-multiple-giant.html

The Airbus A400M Atlas is a large military transport plane. Here's one in service with the Royal Air Force making a touch-and-go landing on a Welsh beach, then looping around to make a full one. Dafydd Phillips captured the beast in motion:

An airbus A400M from RAF Brize Norton making a rare visit to Pembrey sands to conduct natural surfaces operations. With the weather being wet prior to the aircraft arriving the pilot conducted some low approaches then some touch and go’s before the all clear to land the 76 tonne aircraft on the beach.

Read the rest

https://boingboing.net/2020/07/22/watch-an-airbus-a400m-make-a-t.html