ReHacked #93: Willingness to look stupid, Yamaha DX7 Technical Analysis, Banning anonymous social media accounts is not the answer and more
It is fine to do things at the last second, but you need to know when the last second is. --internet wisdom
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Willingness to look stupid #society #psychology #longread
~ajxs/Yamaha DX7 Technical Analysis #hardware
In 1983 Yamaha Corporation released the now iconic DX7 synthesiser. Featuring a novel form of digital tone synthesis called frequency modulation, it would introduce musicians to a world of new timbral possibilities not possible with its analog contemporaries. By all accounts it was revolutionary, its brassy, metallic timbres would go on to define the characteristic sound of the decade. It would become the first commercially successful digital synthesiser, going on to sell over 200,000 units worldwide.
The frequency modulation synthesis that forms the basis of Yamaha’s FM synthesiser technology had its origins in the research of Stanford University professor John M. Chowning. Inspired by the groundbreaking work of Max Mathews at Bell Labs, Chowning shifted his course of study from music composition to focus on computer music. While experimenting with the modulation of a sound wave’s frequency, Chowning discovered that as the frequency of the modulating wave increased into the audible spectrum new and interesting harmonic partials were created in the carrier tone, while retaining the same pitch characteristics. Through a controlled application of this process a much wider range of tones could be synthesised than was possible using contemporary analog synthesisers.
Online abuse: banning anonymous social media accounts is not the answer #internet #privacy
Anonymity as a form of protectionWhile there are many examples of people using anonymous social media accounts to abuse others online, it’s equally clear that anonymity can be a lifeline to many users and communities. Posting anonymously can allow people to protect themselves – to openly discuss and deal with complex topics safely. It can allow people to speak out about abuse, and seek information.
For example, social media users in LGBTQIA+ communities have spoken about the importance of online anonymity as a way to negotiate discussions of sexuality safely, where disclosing their name might put them at significant risk of abuse and harm online and offline. Some said anonymity allowed them to access valuable information online as they navigated their own identities.
Roku tells customers it is unable to strike a deal with YouTube - Axios #copyrights #bigcorp
What they’re saying: “Since we haven’t been able to continue our conversations in good faith, our partnership for all new Roku devices will unfortunately end on December 9,” Google said in a statement. “We are, however, giving Roku the ability to continue distributing both YouTube and YouTube TV apps to all existing users to make sure they are not impacted."
People Who Jump to Conclusions Show Other Kinds of Thinking Errors - Scientific American #psychology #society
To study jumping, we worked with more than 600 people from the general population. Because much of the work on this bias comes from studies of schizophrenia (jumping to conclusions is common among people with the condition), we borrowed a thinking game used in that area of research.
In this game, players encountered someone who was fishing from one of two lakes: in one lake, most of the fish were red, and in the other, most were gray. The fisher would catch one fish at a time and stop only when players thought they could say which lake was being fished. Some players had to see many fish before making a decision. Others, the jumpers, stopped after only one or two.
We also asked participants questions to learn more about their other thinking patterns. We found that the fewer fish a player needed to see, the more errors individuals made in other beliefs, reasoning and decisions.
For instance, the earlier a person jumped, the more likely they were to endorse conspiracy theories, such as the idea that the Apollo moon landings had been faked. Such individuals were also more likely to believe in paranormal phenomena and medical myths, such as the idea that health officials are actively hiding a link between cell phones and cancer.
Finally! A cryptocurrency for everyone on the planet | WIRED UK #blockchain
Sam Altman wants to give every single person on the planet free money – or rather free cryptocurrency. It’s a lofty goal that commands a lofty name: Worldcoin. Co-founded by Altman earlier this year, the project has raised $25 million to date from grandees such as Andreessen Horowitz and Coinbase Ventures. It’s part crypto buzz, part financial inclusion dream – and Altman believes that by piggybacking on the network effect of doling out a bit of the pie to every single human on Earth, WorldCoin could evolve into a global, fairly distributed electronic currency.
God and robots: Will AI transform religion? - BBC News #futurism #video
Artificial intelligence is changing how we interact with everything, from food to healthcare, travel and also religion.
Experts say major global faiths are discussing their relationship with AI, and some are starting to incorporate this technology into their worship. Robot priests can recite prayers, deliver sermons, and even comfort those experiencing a spiritual crisis.
Spreadsheet Timeline #tools #software #productivity
Instantly generate a timeline to put in your spreadsheet.
'cuts' in the treads in the tops of plastic soda bottles. #engineering #interesting
"In response to your question, the thread "cuts" or "gaps" in the threads on both the bottle and closure are vent slots which allow the CO2 gas to escape from the inside the package during opening. This escape of gas relieves the pressure on the inside of the bottle and allows the closure to be safely removed from the package by the consumer. The reason these threads are only found on soda bottles is because soda packages are normally the only packages pressurized with CO2. Non-pressurized packages (like bottled water) normally contain smooth, non-vented threads since there is no internal pressure to be relieved from the inside of the package. Please advise if you have other questions."
DuckDuckGo as tty #fun
DIY Airless Bicycle Tires - Core77 #hardware #diy
Hacking bicycles is a common theme of YouTube channel The Q; he's the guy behind the Icycle, that ice-riding bicycle with sawmill blades for wheels. In this video, he DIYs a pair of airless bicycle tires using PVC pipe, lots of fasteners and plenty of patience.
Sunset Geometry #nature #science
Vanderbei’s analysis is an elegant and subtle exercise in classical trigonometry. In this post, I would like to present an alternative analysis in a different language: Geometric Algebra. I believe that geometric algebra is a more powerful system for formulating and solving trigonometry problems than the classical “lengths and angles” approach, and it deserves to be better known. Vanderbei’s sunset problem is simple to understand and challenging to solve, so it makes a nice benchmark.
The Utah Supreme Court is the latest stop in EFF’s roving campaign to establish your Fifth Amendment right to refuse to provide your password to law enforcement. Yesterday, along with the ACLU, we filed an amicus brief in State v. Valdez, arguing that the constitutional privilege against self-incrimination prevents the police from forcing suspects to reveal the contents of their minds. That includes revealing a memorized passcode or directly entering the passcode to unlock a device.
Hot Reload removed from dotnet watch - Why? · Issue #22247 · dotnet/sdk #software
Hot Reload functionality in dotnet watch was recently deleted and it seems that Hot Reload will be VS-only going forward. I've been using that functionality in dotnet watch happily for a while now, and this seems like a huge step backward for .NET. Most new .NET developers aren't using VS, and many aren't even on Windows.
DDoS attacks hit multiple email providers - The Record by Recorded Future #internet #security
At least three email service providers have been hit by large distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks on Friday, resulting in prolonged outages, The Record has learned.
The attacks have hit Runbox (a privacy email provider based in Norway), Posteo (a secure email provider based in Germany), and Fastmail (a privacy-first email provider based in Australia).
Facebook crisis grows as new whistleblower and leaked documents emerge | Facebook | The Guardian #socialnetworks #privacy
Facebook faced mounting pressure on Friday after a new whistleblower accused it of knowingly hosting hate speech and illegal activity, even as leaked documents shed further light on how the company failed to heed internal concerns over election misinformation.
Allegations by the new whistleblower, who spoke to the Washington Post, were reportedly contained in a complaint to the Securities and Exchange Commission, the US agency that handles regulation to protect investors in publicly traded companies.
Feasibility of a Dune Ornithopter #engineering #scifi #literature #culture #longread
Despite the limiting factors in building ornithopters similar to the ones in the Dune universe, we have successfully built multiple ornithopters. The majority of them have been designed to address the unmanned surveillance needs for the military, but their principles follow the same ones Dune's ornithopters follow, flapping wings. One example includes the Harvard's RoboBee, which derives biological inspiration from bees using small flapping wings to propel it through space. There are numerous designs from university researchers and government/military programs all over the world that follow this model, but these do not match the size and capabilities of Dune's ornithopter. The next closest aircraft in modern times is the University of Toronto's Institute for Aerospace Studies ornithopter project led by Professor James DeLaurier. This aircraft is a single man aircraft that utilizes a small petroleum engine to manipulate wing movement into a flapping motion. This motion provides a component of thrust to propel the aircraft, and with the assistance of aerodynamic lifting bodies, the aircraft is able to fly. It is even fitted with a small jet to help with propulsion, similar to the jet powered ornithopters in Dune. The downside to this aircraft is it is extraordinarily slow, only carries one passenger, cannot hover, and is extremely inefficient. For these reasons the attempt to build a commercially available ornithopter was dropped, and there is little research in manned ornithopters. But there is one more aircraft that performs just as well as Dune's ornithopter, Boeing's V-22 Osprey. This aircraft has been in operation since 2007 and is basically two large propellers attached at the end of two wings, which can be articulated to point up, forward, or anywhere in-between. This aircraft does not fly using flapping wings, but matches Dune's ornithopters capabilities nearly exactly. It can fly, hover, and land just about anywhere, especially on sand, thanks to its articulating rotors. It carries 24 passengers and can fly with the speed and range of a normal aircraft, similar to Dune's ornithopter. It can't do any space travel, as the ornithopter is led on to be capable of, but the V-22 is the closest aircraft we have too Dune's portrayal to the ornithopter today.
Experience psychedelic and mesmerizing visuals by transforming music into equations that render into a limitless array of user-contributed visualizations.
projectM is an open-source project that reimplements the esteemed Winamp Milkdrop by Geiss in a more modern, cross-platform reusable library.
Pandora Papers: European Parliament describes UK and US as global hubs for money laundering and tax evasion #world #economy
The European Parliament adopted on Thursday a resolution taking the European Commission to task for not doing enough to combat money laundering, tax evasion and tax avoidance in the member states and worldwide.
The resolution, following the recent disclosures in the Pandora Papers, was adopted by an overwhelming majority with 578 votes in favour, 28 against and 79 abstentions (21 October).
A 20-year longitudinal study finds little evidence that religiosity leads to greater life satisfaction #psychology
Findings from a study published in Personality and Individual Differences revealed a small positive correlation between religiosity and life satisfaction. However, the 20-year study found no evidence of a causal relationship between the two variables — changes in a person’s level of religiosity were not followed by changes in that same individual’s life satisfaction.
Meta-analyses have pointed to a positive relationship between religiosity and a person’s evaluation of their life, suggesting that people who are more religious tend to feel better about their lives. But researcher Mohsen Joshanloo remarks that these studies have not offered strong evidence of a causal relationship between the two variables.
As Joshanloo shares, previous studies have not differentiated between-person variance from within-person variance when analyzing change in the variables. The researcher sought to conduct a study using a statistical technique called the Random-Intercept Cross-Lagged Panel Model (RI-CLPM) that allows this separation of variance. With a longitudinal study, this method would allow him to assess whether fluctuations in a person’s level of religiosity would be followed by fluctuations in that person’s life satisfaction.
Breaking the News: New York Times Journalist Ben Hubbard Hacked with Pegasus after Reporting on Previous Hacking Attempts - The Citizen Lab #privacy #security
Signal for Help - Wikipedia #security
The signal is performed by holding one hand up with the thumb tucked into the palm, then folding the four other fingers down, symbolically trapping the thumb in the rest of the fingers. It was intentionally designed as a single continuous hand movement, rather than a sign held in one position, that could be made easily visible.
Microsoft reverses controversial .NET change after open source community outcry - The Verge #software
Microsoft is reversing a decision to remove a key feature from its upcoming .NET 6 release, after a public outcry from the open source community. Microsoft angered the .NET open source community earlier this week by removing a key part of Hot Reload in the upcoming release of .NET 6, a feature that allows developers to modify source code while an app is running and immediately see the results.
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