Free Republic

The new software issue was discovered during the Starliner's flight, according to panel member Paul Hill. A software fix was made just hours before the capsule returned. "While this anomaly was corrected in flight, if it had gone uncorrected, it would have led to erroneous thruster firings and uncontrolled motion during [service module] separation for deorbit, with the potential for a catastrophic spacecraft failure," he said, according to Space News. In a blog post Friday, NASA said its investigation with Boeing has found 11 "top-priority corrective actions" so far with more to be identified. "There were numerous instances where the...

The other two are duds who were on this week. Ken whats his name and the other guy. Or maybe Rush is back today.

Ajit Pai, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), has been a one-man wrecking machine to China’s plans to leapfrog U.S. military and technological superiority by becoming the first to operationalize 5G. Now, however, Beijing is fighting back with delay tactics which, if not handled properly, can lead to China pulling a fast one on the FCC and, by default, America’s national security. For those who aren’t familiar, 5G is the next-generation wireless network that will bring download and processing speeds to just a fraction of what they are currently. China has seen the new technology as a way to...

The app used to report early results in Iowa's Democratic Presidential primary caucus was rudimentary in many ways, according to analyses by multiple Android app development experts and cybersecurity professionals who decompiled and studied the app after it was obtained by Motherboard. The app, called IowaReporterApp and developed by a company called Shadow Inc., malfunctioned during the caucus, causing mass chaos and delaying the public reporting of results until Tuesday evening. The app was designed to rapidly report early results, not tabulate final vote counts. That means its failure will not result in the election result being altered. But, until...

Shadow, a branch of the glossy digital strategy startup, was a mess from the start. _____________________________________________________________________ Acronym, as the groupÂ’s founder and CEO Tara McGowan has told seemingly any reporter who would listen in the last year, was supposed to shake up Democratic politics. Faced with Republican opponents that now actually know how to campaign on social media, the non-profit digital strategy organization intended to offer an effective Democratic countermeasure, guided by digitally savvy hands of the Obama 2012 and Clinton 2016 campaigns. After the disastrous Iowa Caucus on Monday, itÂ’s hard to imagine that anyone is buying this story...

DES MOINES - Iowa’s caucus-reporting meltdown was painful. But another grenade from Monday night, just beyond the line of sight, may be just as consequential. For more than a year, Democrats have been preparing for high turnout in 2020, powered by an electorate juiced by rage against President Donald Trump. But in their first test of the year, early data suggested Tuesday that turnout was “on pace for 2016,” the Iowa Democratic Party said, far below levels many observers predicted. In other words: Democrats were counting on Barack Obama-levels of enthusiasm. They got Hillary Clinton numbers, instead. Looking at the...

MSNBC political analyst Zerlina Maxwell referred to the Iowa caucuses as the “perfect example of systemic racism.” Reacting to reports of mediocre turnout, Maxwell also took a shot at President Trump's hard-line immigration policies. “The Iowa caucus is essentially the perfect example of systemic racism,” Maxwell said Monday on MSNBC. “91% of the voters in Iowa are white. The reason why you see a drop in turnout, I’m just speculating here, it could be perhaps that white children are not in the cages.” Maxwell is not alone in claiming that white people have an outsized influence in the Iowa caucuses....

In the past I've always used Malwarebytes and SpyBot to scan my computer. Recently Malwarebytes doesn't pickup anything, probably because I use the free. Looking to replace Malwarebytes.....any suggestions. THX

If you’re looking to keep up with Maine author Stephen King on Facebook, don’t bother. He isn’t there anymore. King tweeted Friday night that he is quitting Facebook. A search for his page on Facebook Saturday morning came up empty. King said on Twitter he is “not comfortable with the flood of false information that’s allowed in its political advertising.” He also expressed doubts over Facebook’s ability to protect users’ privacy. Facebook said last month that it would not ban or fact-check political ads, a position that has drawn criticism.

The Harris County Toll Road Authority plans to take a three-week pause in construction on the new Houston Ship Channel Bridge along the Sam Houston Tollway so engineers can agree on a solution to a possible design flaw found nearly 20 months into the project. The $1 billion bridge — the costliest infrastructure project in the county’s history — was designed by the Dallas office of FIGG Bridge Group. The company, based in Florida, came under scrutiny when its Tallahassee office designed a pedestrian bridge that collapsed in February 2018 at Florida International University, killing six. FIGG and its consultants...

One of the most common and beloved tropes on a reality show comes when a contestant announces, often with a melodramatic flourish, that they are “not here to make friends.” It’s an ingenious and endlessly useful phrase — one that is both recognizably true (the contestant’s only real goal is victory) and terrifying in its implications... they'll do whatever it takes to become become the bachelorette. I thought of the phrase on Wednesday while reading Mark Zuckerberg’s comments, during Facebook’s quarterly earnings call, about his new goal for the 2020s. He said (emphasis mine):“We’re also focused on communicating more clearly...

My updated Windows 10 PC using Google Chrome version 79 won't play news videos from Fox News website. No support found searching the net. Any ideas?

'We are focusing on defending systems over identifying and pursuing the person behind the cyber-crime'Enigma A plague of ignorance and misplaced priorities in government and law enforcement, from neighborhood cops all the way up to international bodies, is allowing cyber-crime to run rampant. So says Mieke Eoyang, long-time US government policy adviser and veep of the national security program at Washington DC think tank Third Way. Speaking at the 2020 Enigma conference in San Francisco on Wednesday, Eoyang made the case for allocating more time and money to finding and snaring internet crooks, hauling them into court, and shutting down...

Research presented at the ACM FAT 2020 conference in Barcelona today supports the notion that YouTube’s platform is playing a role in radicalizing users via exposure to far-right ideologies. The study, carried out by researchers at Switzerland’s Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne and the Federal University of Minas Gerais in Brazil, found evidence that users who engaged with a middle ground of extreme right-wing content migrated to commenting on the most fringe far-right content. A March 2018 New York Times article by sociologist Zeynep Tufekci set out the now widely reported thesis that YouTube is a radicalization engine. Followup reporting...

The Unicode Consortium announced Wednesday that a variety of transgender inclusive emoji will be added to platforms like Apple and Android in 2020, including an emoji of a gender neutral Santa. The new emoji come as part of the Unicode Consortium’s addition of 117 new emoji for 2020, including a polar bear, bubble tea, an emoji showing people hugging, a woman or gender inclusive person wearing a tuxedo, and a transgender flag, according to Tech Crunch. Google reportedly sponsored five of the new emoji and co-sponsored the transgender flag emoji with Microsoft.

The Document Foundation announced today the general availability of the LibreOffice 6.4 open-source and cross-platform office suite for all supported platforms.LibreOffice 6.4 has been development during the past five months, but the final release is now available to download for GNU/Linux, macOS, and Windows systems. This is a major release that introduces several new features, multiple performance improvements, especially when working with presentations and spreadsheets, as well as better compatibility with Microsoft Office documents. “LibreOffice 6.4 is the first new release available in 2020. During the year, the community will celebrate the 10th anniversary of the best free office suite...

The Free Software Foundation really set the bar high there Good news everybody! The Free Software Foundation has blown through its self-imposed target of 7,777 signatories in its efforts to persuade Microsoft to make Windows 7 open source.We noted last week the GNU-gang's attempt to coax the born-again open-sourcerer formerly known as "The Beast Of Redmond" into making a surprise deposit into GitHub.The thinking was that since Windows 7 has now come to the end of the road, as far as free security updates are concerned, then perhaps Microsoft might release it as open software?We put it to the Free...

Apple today released iOS 13.3.1, iPadOS 13.3.1, and macOS Catalina 10.15.3 Samuel Axon for Ars Technica: Today, Apple released updates for its operating systems for iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Apple Watch, Mac, HomePod, and Apple TV devices. iOS 13.3.1 is the most substantial of the updates, but they are all incremental updates that fix bugs or address user complaints or privacy concerns. macOS 10.15.3 The macOS Catalina 10.15.3 update improves the stability, reliability and security of your Mac, and is recommended for all users. This update: Optimizes gamma handling of low gray levels on Pro Display XDR for SDR workflows...

Apple today announced financial results for its fiscal 2020 first quarter ended December 28, 2019. The Company posted quarterly revenue of $91.8 billion, an increase of 9 percent from the year-ago quarter and an all-time record, and quarterly earnings per diluted share of $4.99, up 19 percent, also an all-time record. International sales accounted for 61 percent of the quarter’s revenue. Apple record results — Apple founded the trillion-dollar market value club“We are thrilled to report Apple’s highest quarterly revenue ever, fueled by strong demand for our iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro models, and all-time records for Services and...

n the wake of NBA legend Kobe Bryant's death, the Better Business Bureau is warning basketball fans everywhere not to let their grief cloud their judgment online. "The tragic death of Kobe Bryant is likely to generate scams exploiting fans' eagerness for information and memorabilia," the BBB wrote in a press release. One such scam, according to the BBB, is spear phishing emails, which are directed toward a person, organization or business with a catchy headline. The sender claims to be from a reputable news organization showcasing trending news. There's usually a link that will lead the user to a...