Time is a curious beast that few understand but everyone tries to control. We’d give our right/left arm to have more time for a number of reasons. Some of us have made mistakes in the past we wish we could take back, and others wish they could enjoy a moment for just a few more minutes. Whatever the reason, times moves onward. The only chance we have at controlling the future is by taking in the past and using it to guide us in the present. With that being said, let’s venture down the road of yet another weekly recap.
We Need Answers
Last week, on Sunday, the world was informed of the tragic crash of an Ethiopian Airline flight during which a Boeing 737 MAX 8 aircraft was being flown. Aside from the friends and family members of the victims, people are concerned that the Federal Aviation Administration is hiding information, especially because a few months earlier, a crash happened with the same FAA-approved aircraft.
“Teams of FAA engineers and inspectors conduct regular oversight of an ODA to ensure any approvals or certificates issued meet the FAA’s strict safety standards..Having said that, the FAA has vey little, if anything, to do with the actual manufacture of the aircraft once it’s been approved to be manufactured…That needs to be looked at.”
–David Sourcie, former FAA safety inspector
Eggsactly What We Need Right Now
Over the weekend, an anonymous Australian teenager smashed an egg atop the head of Senator Fraser Anning, an outwardly spoken anti-Muslim member of the Australian government. For those who’ve failed to pay attention to the news, on Friday, a gunman killed over fifty people after he opened fire at two separate mosques in the city of Christchurch, New Zealand. Directly after the shooting, Sen. Anning said that “while this kind of violent vigilantism can never be justified, what it highlights is the growing fear within our community, both in Australia and New Zealand of the increasing Muslim presence. The real cause of the bloodshed on New Zealand streets today is the immigration program which allowed Muslim fanatics to migrate to New Zealand in the first place.
Following his speech, the famous teenager egged Sen. Anning, and the Senator then punched the 17-year-old boy, causing even more people to regret every voting him into office.
Welcome To The Space Web
After four years and billions in funding requests, OneWeb launched and deployed the first of six satellites in a planned constellation of hundreds several weeks ago. For those unfamiliar with OneWeb, it is one of few companies, including SpaceX, determined to use thousands of satellites to create a global-internet system for every person on the planet. Per TechCrunch’s profile on the company, OneWeb plans on launching nearly one-thousand satellites to about a 1,100-kilometer low Earth orbit, where these devices “will be able to provide broadband to practically anywhere on Earth.”
In their pursuit of covering every nook and cranny of the planet with internet, OneWeb has raised nearly $1.5 billion in funding to start mass production of their satellites. Prior to last month’s launch, investors were concerned with the future of the Company and its ability to meet its self-set deadlines. Following the launch, we now know that OneWeb means business.
“With the recent successful launch of our first six satellites, near-completion of our innovative satellite manufacturing facility with our partner Airbus, progress towards fully securing our ITU priority spectrum position, and the singing of our first customer contracts, OneWeb is moving from the planning and development stage to deployment of our full constellation…”
–Adrian Steckel, Chief Executive Officer, OneWeb
Donald Gets Twitter Happy
Most Americans are aware of the fact that President Donald Trump has a slight inkling towards using Twitter to share his feelings on a multitude of happenings around the White House, or even the country for that matter. Having said that, over the weekend, President Trump broke his personal record for tweets when he birded out twenty-nine different tweets. Contrary to his track record, none of his weekend-tweets were jarring or racist, but more so quantitative and exhaustive.
“We have a seriously dangerous normalcy bias, where we move on because we desperately want to pretend it’s okay. Trump’s Twitter meltdown today — which shows a deranged and unhinged person — will just be forgotten by Monday afternoon. But the deranged man will still control the nukes…”
–Brian Klass, Political Scientist
Google Tron
Google on Tuesday announced the unveiling of a video game streaming service called Stadia which will allow users to play the game that they love without the need for purchasing wallet-emptying consoles or computers. In terms of rendering the games for user play, this work will be handled by Google’s cloud platform. Per the details of the official announcement, with Stadia, YouTube watchers will be able to click “Play now” at the end of a video and their game will start within five seconds. Perhaps the craziest part about Stadia is that the “data center is the platform,” meaning that players can start at one platform and continue where they left off on any advice capable of connecting to Google.
Gamers can use keyboards and mice, or use a specially-designed Stadia controller that will be sold later in the year. According to Google, Stadia will support 4K gaming t 60fps with HDR, with plans to allow for 8K gaming in the near future. The only missing piece of Google’s (GOOGL) into the billion-dollar gaming industry is that the Company has yet to sign on game studios to build a gaming library for Stadia. Because the platform won’t require a console, it may very well only work with games designed for Stadia.
“The power and accessibility of streaming will give billions unprecedented opportunities to play video games in the future. We are proud to partner with Google on Stadia, building on what we’ve learned with Project Stream via Assassin’s Creed Odyssey. This is only the beginning, and we can’t wait to continue collaborating closely with Google on what’s next for Stadia.”
–Yves Guillemot, Chief Executive Officer, Ubisoft
Kamala The Way Up
We’re getting closer and closer to the upcoming 2020 presidential election and the candidates are hot on the trail to convince Americans to vote them into office. According to a new poll conducted by CNN, Sen. Kamala Harris shot up eight points on Tuesday, with her having only gained support in the week after the declaration of her candidacy. The poll also found that voter excitement is shaping up to outpace the level seen for any presidential election since 2000. 40% of respondents said they are “extremely enthusiastic” about voting for president. My hope is that those people actually get out and vote!
Europe Doesn’t Trust Google
] However, we’ve come to learn that behind all the glitz and glamor, some tech companies are always up to no good. On Wednesday, the European Commission slapped Google with a a fine for breaching EU antitrust rules. According to the official press release regarding the matter, Google has abused its market dominance by imposing a number of restrictive clauses in contracts with third-party websites which hinders any rival of the Company from placing their own ads on these sites.
In other words, Google has structured the online advertising playing field in their favor.
“Today the commission has fined Google €1.49 billion for illegal misuse of its dominant position in the market for the brokering of online search adverts. Google has cemented its dominance in online search adverts and shielded itself from competitive pressure by imposing anti-competitive contractual restrictions on third-party websites. This is illegal under EU antitrust rules. The misconduct lasted over 10 years and denied other companies the possibility to compete on the merits and to innovate – and consumers the benefits of competition…”
–Margrethe Vestager, Commissioner, European Commission
The European Commission shared that over the course of the last few years, through AdSense for Search, Google has held market shared above 90% in the national markets for general search, making it near impossible for competitors in online search advertising to sell ad space within Google’s search engine results pages.
He’s At It Again
Regardless of one’s political affiliations, we can all agree that President Donald Trump has an affinity for making sure he dominates the headlines on a near-daily basis. This time, President Trump is catching heat for accusing John McCain, the late Senator, of misleading the White House about his vote to repeal the Affordable Care Act. Let’s make one thing clear, you’re really not supposed to speak ill of the diseased, no matter who you are. Moving on, it was proven that Trump’s claims regarding McCain’s vote on the ACA, back in the day, were false. Now, Trump is getting flack for both accusing someone who isn’t alive, and for doing so in falsehood.
Facebook Cannot Keep It Together
After months of silence, it would seem that Facebook needs to tear down their “days since last incident” counter and start all over. The Company confirmed Thursday in a blog post, that during a routine security review in January, they found “that some user passwords were being stored in a readable format within their own internal data storage systems.”
In an attempt to dissuade the likely onslaught of internet rage from angry Facebook users, and other callous trolls, the Company tried to explain themselves.
“To be clear, these passwords were never visible to anyone outside of Facebook and we have found no evidence to date that anyone internally abused or improperly accessed them. We estimate that we will notify hundreds of millions of Facebook Lite users, tens of millions of other Facebook users, and tens of thousands of Instagram users…”
–Facebook official statement regarding recent password breach
According to recent statistics regarding Facebook’s password announcement, as many as 600 million users could be affected — roughly 20% of Facebook’s user base, but Facebook has yet to confirm these numbers.
Putting it as plainly as can be, data breaches are not an attractive look for any company, especially one that has been in the spotlight for potentially helping foreign entities interfere with domestic politics. One would think that Mark Zuckerberg, Chief Executive Officer and Founder of Facebook, would guide his company in a safer direction, and tighten up the loose screws. Nevertheless, he is one of the richest people on the planet and I’m sure he knows what he’s doing.
Oh, That’s The One Thing We Don’t Bring Up
If you’ve ever been to a dinner party or watched one unfold on television, then you are aware of the fact that certain topics are not brought up in conversation as to avoid awkward interactions. The Israel-Palestine conflict is one such conflict that I recommend avoiding when in mixed company. Someone failed to give this advice to President Donald Trump who on Thursday said that the United States should recognize Israel’s authority over the Golan Heights, a highly disputed territory in terms of the history of the conflict.
“After 52 years it is time for the United States to fully recognize Israel’s Sovereignty over the Golan Heights, which is of critical strategic and security importance to the State of Israel and Regional Stability!”
–President Trump on Twitter
