Thursday, October 31, 2019

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New law in Greece against asylum-seeking criticised

New law will make it more difficult to claim asylum. Rights groups say law falls short of European standards.

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Chile unrest: Gov't says cost of damages 'surpasses $1bn'

Sporadic looting, rioting in Chile despite government concessions to protesters demanding economic and social reforms.

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US Interior Department grounds China-made drones

Fleet of 810 drones in focus amid US concerns about security risk posed by China-made electronics.

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Wild eats: Malaysia's top chefs find jungle inspiration

Contemporary chefs are learning from indigenous people to incorporate wild, domestic produce into their dishes.

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Nepal's KP Sharma Oli discharged from hospital after dialysis

Leader of Nepal was admitted to the intensive care unit of a hospital in Kathmandu raising concerns country's future.

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South Korea searching for survivors of medical helicopter crash

Helicopter had picked up an injured fisherman before it crashed on Thursday night near the disputed Dokdo islets.

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More than a dozen dead as truck dives into ravine in Philippines

At least 19 killed, and several others injured when driver of truck lost control on steep mountain road.

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Your Friday Briefing

ISIS, Brexit, Greta Gerwig: Here’s what you need to know.

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Deep Sleep May Help the Brain Clear Alzheimer's Toxins

An anonymous reader quotes a report from NPR: The brain waves generated during deep sleep appear to trigger a cleaning system in the brain that protects it against Alzheimer's and other neurodegenerative diseases. Electrical signals known as slow waves appear just before a pulse of fluid washes through the brain, presumably removing toxins associated with Alzheimer's, researchers reported Thursday in the journal Science. The finding could help explain a puzzling link between sleep and Alzheimer's, says Laura Lewis, an author of the study and an assistant professor in the department of biomedical engineering at Boston University. The finding also suggests that people might be able to reduce their risk of Alzheimer's by ensuring that they get high-quality sleep, says William Jagust, a professor of public health and neuroscience at the University of California, Berkeley, who was not involved in the study.

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Thai boot camp-style courses aim to instill loyalty to king

King Vajiralongkorn formalising and organising public devotion in ways not seen since absolute monarchy came to an end.

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AirPods Pro Teardown Confirms That They're Just As Disposable As Ever

iFixit's teardown of Apple's latest AirPods reveals just how difficult it will be to fix them if they break. "The organization awarded the noise-canceling buds a big fat zero repairability score, noting that their 'non-modular, glued-together design and lack of replacement parts makes repair both impractical and uneconomical,'" reports The Verge. "That's the same score as both versions of the original AirPods." From the report: The teardown does reveal a couple of interesting details about the design of the earbuds. First is the fact that they're a whole third heavier than the original AirPods, thanks to new features like active noise-cancellation, and an inward-facing microphone. The teardown also notes that the one user-replaceable part of the earbuds, the silicone ear-tip, uses a custom design that makes them incompatible with third-party models. That said, the popularity of the AirPods all but guarantees other companies will be making third-party tips soon. Most intriguing is the discovery of a watch-style battery inside each earbud. iFixit notes that it's a similar battery to what it found in Samsung's Galaxy Buds which could be replaced. However, the same is not true of the AirPods Pro, whose battery is tethered by a soldered cable. TL;DR: If your $249 AirPods Pro die you'll have to send them back to Apple for recycling, or take part in Apple's "battery service" program at a cost of $49-per-earbud out of warranty.

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'Satisfaction': N Korea confirms tested multiple rocket launcher

North Korea is expanding its weapons capabilities with de-nuclearisation talks with the United States in limbo.

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Beer With Bella: Benjamin Law

The author and essayist shares insights on immigrant striving, social media and Australia’s imperfect meritocracy.

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Spain Agrees to Host Key Climate Talks After Chile Pulls Out

Madrid has offered to hold the next United Nations climate talks, the leaders of Spain and Chile announced on Thursday.

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China Says It Will Roll Out ‘National Security’ Steps for Hong Kong

Communist Party leaders announced the move after months of protests in the city, but gave no details. Here is an explanation of that measure and others they approved.

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Incognito Mode For Google Maps Arrives On Android

Incognito Mode for Google Maps is rolling out to Android users to prevent your search queries and real-time tracked location from being recorded onto your Google account. Engadget reports: It's not something you'll want to use all the time as some features will be disabled, and it's important to note that it doesn't turn off all tracking. The places you go won't be saved to your Location History (if you have that enabled), your searches won't be saved to your account and it won't use your information to personalize the experience. Still, you could be tracked by internet service providers, other apps, or if you're using Assistant and other Google services. Similar to incognito on Chrome, it's more useful as a depersonalized look at recommendations than as a full-fledged privacy protector, and a way to make sure that whatever you're searching for in this instance doesn't affect your recommendations later -- don't worry, we're not judging.

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Helvetica's Evil Twin, Hellvetica, Will Haunt Your Nightmares

Freshly Exhumed shares a report from Fast Company: Hold your favorite graphic design tome close. We now know what the classic typeface Helvetica would look like if it came from the underworld. Yes, it will keep type enthusiasts up at night. The design darling Helvetica -- that ubiquitous sans-serif typeface developed by Max Miedinger in 1957, representative of the crisp Swiss design aesthetic of that period, and star of its own documentary by the same name -- has made a deal with the kerning devil. The results aren't pretty. They're not meant to be. Zack Roif and Matthew Woodward, both associate creative directors at the international advertising agency R/GA, have released a new typeface available free to download, Hellvetica, and it will make all your worst kerning nightmares come true. While each character has the same form as the classic typeface it's riffing on, Hellvetica utilizes inconsistent, variable spacing between each letterform to give an overall effect that something has gone terribly astray. Nope, that wasn't a mistake. You might just say it was intentionally erroneous. The project is a study in playfulness and rule-breaking, "an exercise in going against the 'designer instincts' to fix up that awful kerning. Hundred percent break the rules," says Woodward. "Don't listen to your gut. Forget your training... and make that logo kern in hell!"

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Toronto’s City of Tomorrow Is Scaled Back Amid Privacy Concerns

The overhaul envisioned by a sibling company of Google has been lauded for its innovations. It’s also been called a “corporate surveillance state.”

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Uber Allegedly Paid $100K Ransom and Had Hackers Sign NDAs After Data Breach

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CBS News: New details about how Uber responded to a massive hack attack in 2016 raise questions about the way it handled sensitive customer information. Instead of reporting the hackers to police, the company allegedly paid $100,000 in exchange for a promise to delete 57 million user files the men stole off a third party server, prosecutors said. Within weeks of paying the ransom, Uber employees showed up at Brandon Glover's Winter Park, Florida, home and found Vasile Mereacre at a hotel restaurant in Toronto, Canada, the Justice Department said. The pair admitted their crimes, but Uber didn't turn them over to the cops. Instead, they had the hackers sign non-disclosure agreements, promising to keep quiet. The two hackers pleaded guilty on Wednesday. But there was a third person involved who was unknown to Uber, U.S. attorney for Northern California Dave Anderson told CBS News correspondent Kris Van Cleave in an exclusive interview. Anderson, who investigated the hack, said there's "no way to know definitively" what actually happened to the stolen data. [...] The hackers also targeted a company owned by LinkedIn in December of 2016, but prosecutors say LinkedIn did not pay and promptly reported the hack to police. Uber eventually did as well -- a year after the hack, when new CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi, publicly disclosed the attack. The two known hackers were eventually arrested and pleaded guilty on Wednesday to conspiracy to commit extortion charges. They face a maximum of five years in prison. The third person involved remains at large.

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Fiat Chrysler Automobiles and PSA Group Are Merging To Become World's Fourth-Largest Automaker

williamyf writes: This puts Alfa Romeo, Citroen, Chrysler, Dodge, DS, Fiat, Jeep, Maserati, Opel, Peugeot, Ram, and Vauxhall under a single corporate parent and merges operations. PSA Group boss Carlos Tavares will be CEO of the 11-person board, with FCA's John Elkann as chair. Fiat Chrysler and PSA said that the 50:50 merger should save more than $4 billion a year from "run-rate synergies without any plant closures." Why is this news for nerds and stuff that matters? Because there are car nerds too, and cars use a lot of software nowadays.

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Asthma Carbon Footprint 'As Big As Eating Meat'

Cambridge University researchers say some inhalers are bad for the environment because they release greenhouse gases linked to global warming. They recommend patients with asthma talk to their doctors to see if there's a "greener" medication they could switch to to help cut their carbon footprint and save the environment. The BBC reports: There are more than five million people with asthma in the UK. The research looked at the environmental impact of different inhaler medications prescribed to patients on the NHS in England. In 2017, about 50 million inhalers were prescribed. Seven out of every 10 of them were metered-dose inhalers - the type that contain greenhouse gases. The gas -- hydrofluoroalkane -- is used as a propellant to squirt the medicine out of the inhaler. Metered-dose inhalers account for nearly 4% of NHS greenhouse gas emissions, according to experts. The researchers estimate replacing even one in every 10 of these inhalers with a more environmentally friendly type (dry powder inhalers) would reduce carbon dioxide equivalent emissions by 58 kilotons. That's similar to the carbon footprint of 180,000 return car journeys from London to Edinburgh, they say. And at the individual level, each metered-dose inhaler replaced by a dry powder inhaler could save the equivalent of between 150kg and 400kg (63 stone) of carbon dioxide a year - similar to the carbon footprint reduction of cutting meat from your diet.

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Fire Engulfs a Speeding Train in Pakistan, Killing Dozens

Passengers jumped to escape the flames after a cooking stove exploded on board. At least 65 people were killed with dozens seriously injured.

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UK Grenfell Tower inquiry: fire services, construction at fault

First part of UK Grenfell inquiry finds fire services, building materials responsible for 2017 fire in London.

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Wednesday, October 30, 2019

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Alarm as demolitions make way for new-look Uzbekistan

Residents say they are sidelined in talks over regeneration projects as officials pursue drive to modernise country.

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Third strong quake in a month jolts Philippines' Mindanao island

At least one killed, several buildings damaged after magnitude 6.5 quake - the third to hit the region this month.

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Several killed in gas canister blast and fire on Pakistan train

Some passengers were killed when they jumped from the moving train to escape the flames that engulfed three carriages.

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Ongoing fighting, abuses in Myanmar's northern Shan State

Amnesty International says Myanmar military, ethnic armed groups guilty of abuses amid fighting in northern state.

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Your Thursday Briefing

ISIS, Germany, Twitter: Here’s what you need to know.

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Anxious and Cooped Up, 1.5 Million Kashmiri Children Are Still Out of School

With soldiers and militants claiming the streets, and most schools simply shuttered, education has been on hold through months of crisis in Kashmir.

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Sydney cloaked in 'hazardous' smoke as Australia bushfires rage

Authorities warn of 'hazardous' air quality with higher concentration of particles per million than cities like Jakarta.

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CIA-backed Afghan forces possibly committing war crimes: HRW

In a damning report, Human Rights Watch says night raids and aerial strikes have led to mounting civilian casualties.

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Your Thursday Briefing

ISIS, Germany, Facebook: Here’s what you need to know.

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Interior Department Grounds Chinese-Made Drones Amid Review

The grounding is the latest precaution taken against Chinese drones being used in federal government work.

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DeepMind's StarCraft 2 AI Is Now Better Than 99.8 Percent of All Human Players

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: DeepMind today announced a new milestone for its artificial intelligence agents trained to play the Blizzard Entertainment game StarCraft II. The Google-owned AI lab's more sophisticated software, still called AlphaStar, is now grandmaster level in the real-time strategy game, capable of besting 99.8 percent of all human players in competition. The findings are to be published in a research paper in the scientific journal Nature. Not only that, but DeepMind says it also evened the playing field when testing the new and improved AlphaStar against human opponents who opted into online competitions this past summer. For one, it trained AlphaStar to use all three of the game's playable races, adding to the complexity of the game at the upper echelons of pro play. It also limited AlphaStar to only viewing the portion of the map a human would see and restricted the number of mouse clicks it could register to 22 non-duplicated actions every five seconds of play, to align it with standard human movement. Still, the AI was capable of achieving grandmaster level, the highest possible online competitive ranking, and marks the first ever system to do so in StarCraft II. DeepMind sees the advancement as more proof that general-purpose reinforcement learning, which is the machine learning technique underpinning the training of AlphaStar, may one day be used to train self-learning robots, self-driving cars, and create more advanced image and object recognition systems. "The history of progress in artificial intelligence has been marked by milestone achievements in games. Ever since computers cracked Go, chess and poker, StarCraft has emerged by consensus as the next grand challenge," said David Silver, a DeepMind principle research scientist on the AlphaStar team, in a statement. "The game's complexity is much greater than chess, because players control hundreds of units; more complex than Go, because there are 10^26 possible choices for every move; and players have less information about their opponents than in poker."

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Historic Shuri Castle in Japan's Okinawa ravaged by fire

The centuries-old castle is a symbol of Okinawa's cultural heritage from the time of Ryukyu Kingdom from 1429 to 1879.

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Abused Bangladeshi housemaids struggle for justice at home

Interviews with 110 workers show 86 percent did not receive their full salaries while 14 percent were sexually abused.

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Japan PM Abe's justice minister quits over poll fraud scandal

Katsuyuki Kawai is the second member of prime minister's cabinet to leave in a week over election-related controversy.

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US releases footage, provides more detail on al-Baghdadi raid

General who oversaw operation gives more detail on weekend raid, as Defense Department releases short snippets of video.

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Philippines Struck by Second Big Earthquake in Three Days

The magnitude-6.5 earthquake hit about 25 miles southwest of Davao City, a regional capital of 1.6 million people.

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New Electric Battery Design Can Charge an Electric Vehicle In 10 Minutes

ted_pikul writes: Penn State University researchers report in the journal Joule that they've designed an electric battery that can charge an EV for 200 miles in about 10 minutes. The key to their approach is quickly heating the nickel foil-covered battery to a high temperature and more slowly cooling it to ambient temperatures. The researchers report that in addition to the fast charging time, this approach mitigated performance-draining "battery plaque" that can build up on batteries.

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Hundreds of U.S. Troops Leaving, and Also Arriving in, Syria

Once the comings and goings are done, the number of U.S. forces in Syria is expected to reach about 900 — close to the 1,000 troops on the ground when President Trump ordered the withdrawal.

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'OK Boomer' Is the New Retort To Older Generations

Teens are increasingly using the phrase "OK boomer" to fire back at older generations' criticisms. Slashdot reader ItsJustAPseudonym shares an excerpt from an NBC News article: In recent months, the phrase "OK boomer" has become a common retort in the parts of the internet inhabited by teenage and young adult users. On Instagram, the phrase appears as a hashtag alongside memes and artwork mocking the older generation. On Twitter, the phrase is hurled at someone for making an outdated statement. And on TikTok, where it is arguably the most prolific, it appears in artwork, audios and makeup tutorials as a way to mock an older generation, and the hashtag has been viewed on the platform 18 million times. [...] The phrase is a culmination of annoyance and frustration at a generation young people perceive to be worsening issues like climate change, political polarization and economic hardship. The 10 teens and young adults who spoke to NBC News about the phrase said "OK boomer" marked a boiling point for Gen Z and younger millennials, who feel pushed around or condescended to by older generations.

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Iraq Prime Minister Pressed to Quit as Protests Clog Streets

A powerful Shiite cleric, Moqtada al-Sadr, is playing a leading role in negotiations to name a new Iraqi leader.

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India's defences eat away at farmland along border with Pakistan

After India revoked autonomy of Kashmir, farmers in border areas fear losing even more of their land to the military.

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They Sought a Brighter Future in Britain. Instead, Their Families Are Mourning Them.

For the poor in Vietnam, human smuggling offers a chance at a better life. “If an electrical pole had legs, it would go too.”

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Chile inequality: Government fails to contain unrest

Despite the huge number of protesters, the government says it would not allow them to reach the presidential palace because they have no one to negotiate the terms with.

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'National tragedy': Koalas burned to death in Australia bushfire

Fires believed to have been sparked by lightning lay waste to more than 2,000 hectares in northern New South Wales.

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AI Will Soon Be Able To Decode Your Poop

Microbial health company Seed is launching a campaign to collect 100,000 fecal photos to build what developers say is the world's first poop image database. The campaign dares you to "give a shit" for science by uploading photos of your feces so that scientists can use it to train an AI platform launched out of MIT. Developers say that your photos could potentially help the approximately 1 in 5 people in the U.S. who have chronic gut conditions like irritable bowel syndrome. The Verge reports: Here's how citizen scientists can contribute to the cause. To participate, go to seed.com/poop on your phone (because taking your laptop to the loo is weird, and the page doesn't allow you to submit a photo unless you're using your phone). Click on the big purple button that says "#GIVEaSHIT." You'll be prompted to enter your email address and whether you're on a morning, afternoon, or evening poop schedule. Then, if you've already dropped a deuce, you can take or upload your photo or you can ask for an email reminder to be sent to you according to the time you indicated. After you've submitted your stool for posterity, the image is separated from the metadata (your email address and other potentially identifying information) so that your donation can remain anonymous and HIPAA compliant. A team of doctors will diligently look through every image received. (Yes, that is a real job for seven gastroenterologists who take notes on what they see in the pictures.) Poop can fall into seven categories identified along the Bristol stool scale, which can tell you and your doctor whether you're constipated, lacking fiber, have a serious case of the runs, or somewhere in between. The doctors' insights into your poop will help train artificial intelligence models to understand the same things the doctors see in the image. Similar training systems are used to teach self-driving cars how to identify a tree or a cat in the road, according to David Hachuel, a co-founder of the startup Auggi, which is building the platform.

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Tuesday, October 29, 2019

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Thailand's sugarcane production: Oversupply sends prices south

Oversupply, strength of Thai baht affects Thailand's sugarcane industry leading to expected loss of $329m this season.

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Roma Holocaust: Amid rising hate, 'forgotten' victims remembered

New London exhibition includes harrowing Nazi directives and testimony from persecuted Roma and Sinti minorities.

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After making Olympic history, Nigeria seeks more bobsled talent

Women's bobsleigh team made Olympic history as the first Africans to compete. Now, a race is on to popularise the sport.

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Trump snubs meeting with ASEAN leaders in Bangkok

Analysts say US president's absence will add to concerns about Washington's reliability as a strategic regional partner.

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Gagged: Performers face jail in Myanmar for raucous satire

Members of the Peacock Generation were detained after they poked fun at the military in popular street performances.

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Your Wednesday Briefing

Brexit, impeachment, Russia: Here’s what you need to know.

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After Spike In Deaths, New York To Get 250 Miles of Protected Bike Lanes

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: Riding a bicycle in New York City is often a harrowing journey across a patchwork of bike lanes that leave cyclists vulnerable to cars. The dangers came into focus this year after 25 cyclists were killed on city streets -- the highest toll in two decades. Now Mayor Bill de Blasio and the City Council have agreed on a $1.7 billion plan that would sharply expand the number of protected bike lanes as part of a sweeping effort to transform the city's streetscape and make it less perilous for bikers. Its chief proponent, Corey Johnson, the City Council speaker, calls it nothing less than an effort to "break the car culture.'' Such ambitions show how far New York has come since around 2007 when the city, under Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, started aggressively taking away space for cars by rolling out bike lanes and pedestrian plazas. Under pressure from the City Council, the city would be required to build 250 miles of protected bike lanes in the coming years, along with a dizzying list of other street upgrades that safety advocates have long called for. The city now has about 1,250 miles of bike lanes, including 126 miles on city streets that are protected, meaning that a barrier separates the lanes from vehicles. The bill calls for the Transportation Department to release a plan every five years to make streets safer and to prioritize public transit, starting in December 2021. The city must hit targets every year, including building 150 miles of bus lanes that are physically separated from other traffic lanes or monitored by cameras over five years.

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'Evil conduct': Thai king fires four more palace officials

Latest announcement follows the King's shock move last week to strip the royal consort of all her ranks and titles.

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China warns US criticism on Uighurs not 'helpful' for trade talks

US was among 23 countries that criticised China's policies in Xinjiang at the United Nations on Tuesday.

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MIT Taught Self-Driving Cars To See Around Corners With Shadows

Researchers from MIT have developed a system that could help cars prevent collisions by, essentially, looking around corners. They call it ShadowCam. ExtremeTech reports: ShadowCam uses a sequence of four video frames from a camera pointed at the region just ahead of the car. The AI maps changes in light intensity over time, and specific changes can indicate another vehicle is approaching from an unseen area. This is known as Direct Sparse Odometry, a way to estimate motion by analyzing the geometry of a sequential image -- it's the same technique NASA uses on Mars rovers. The system classifies each image as stationary or dynamic (moving). If it thinks the shadow points to a moving object, the AI driving the car can make changes to its path or reduce speed. The researchers tested this system with a specially rigged "autonomous wheelchair" that navigated hallways. ShadowCam was able to detect when a person was about to walk out in front of the wheelchair with about 70 percent accuracy. With a self-driving car in a parking garage, the researchers were able to tune ShadowCam to detect approaching vehicles 0.72 seconds sooner than lidar with an accuracy of about 86 percent. However, the system has been calibrated specifically for the lighting in those situations. The next step is to enable ShadowCam in varying light and situations.

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