The unimportant news thread

[greg]

In other news, Sega's Building #2 in Akihabara, Tokyo, is closing.

Hopefully none of the others do the same, those arcades are too awesome to close.

https://soranews24.com/2020/08/04/akihabara-saying-goodbye-to-landmark-as-giant-sega-arcade-announces-its-closing-for-good/

[drogulus]

     Could We Force the Universe to Crash?

The question is: how do you bring down a simulation of reality from inside it? The most obvious strategy would be to try to cause the equivalent of a stack overflow—asking for more space in the active memory of a program than is available—by creating an infinitely, or at least excessively, recursive process. And the way to do that would be to build our own simulated realities, designed so that within those virtual worlds are entities creating their version of a simulated reality, which is in turn doing the same, and so on all the way down the rabbit hole. If all of this worked, the universe as we know it might crash, revealing itself as a mirage just as we winked out of existence.

     All in favor signify by saying "aye".

[JBS]

Opens Twitter
Reads Twitter for five minutes
Closes Twitter
Votes "aye"

[MusicTurner]

Stories from Belarus rarely get much attention; the authoritarian society seems static. But about a month ago, some experts predicted that Lukashenko would probably repressively take the upcoming elections on August 9th; however, he'd then begin loosing his power for real. Maybe the predictions are correct; we'll see.

"It's exciting to see the change of Belarus' opposition leadership. After male candidates were kicked out from the race, these brave women took the lead - Maryja Kalesnikava, Vieranika Capkala, and Sviatlana Cichanouskaja. Lukashenka still underestimates their power. He is wrong."

https://twitter.com/franakviacorka/status/1284824702083530753

(...)

Increased signs of the Belarus pyramid cracking - severe, exorbitant police violence, protest manifestations, strikes in some major companies (and from the Belarus Philharmonic), some defectors and disobedience among lower ranks of the police and army, protests from some public figures, including Nobel laureate and a TV propaganda host. Still no major defectors though.

Some have noted that there's been no or very little violence from the protestors' side.

[drogulus]

     Intel's run at the GPU market begins with Tiger Lake onboard graphics

     For most of my PC life I've been on Team Red (AMD CPUs and GPUs both). My current PC is an Intel with a Radeon card. That came about because I bought a Dell instead of having a custom rig built as I had in the past.

     If Intel can offer CPUs with better graphics I might want to stick with them, because a high end Intel chip with better graphics would give me 2 paths for video encoding.

[Todd]

Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny in coma with suspected poisoning: spokeswoman

It was an accident.

[Todd]

Evidently, the Graun is set to sue itself:

Guardian takes legal action to shut down parody headline generator

[greg]

Evidently, the Graun is set to sue itself:

Guardian takes legal action to shut down parody headline generator

I tried guardianmeme.win, too bad the link isn't working.

Seem The Guardian is only concerned about guarding itself, like every news media outlet.

[MusicTurner]

Not the kind of news you tend to hear from China perhaps, but a court in Shanghai has punished nine people there with up to six years in prison, because they had produced illegal, domestic copies of LEGO kits and sold them there.

[steve ridgway]

It wasn't this one was it?

[T. D.]

US Open 2020: Novak Djokovic defaulted after hitting ball at line judge

https://www.bbc.com/sport/tennis/54051920

[steve ridgway]

Not sure which thread this post belongs in - it's unimportant news to me.

John Cage musical work changes chord for first time in seven years

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-54041568

[Todd]

Edinburgh University renames David Hume Tower over 'racist' views

American stupid spreads overseas.

[Pohjolas Daughter]

US Open 2020: Novak Djokovic defaulted after hitting ball at line judge

https://www.bbc.com/sport/tennis/54051920

That was a pretty big story in tennis.  A lot of people thought that he was a sure bet for winning that slam.  I'm a bit surprised that they didn't give him a warning earlier when, in anger, he fired off a shot at some side hoarding....perhaps that might have made him re-think things?  I imagine that it would be a bit harder on the judges this year as there were almost no spectators in the stands.  I saw one male player earlier in the rounds fire off one into the stands (forget who it was), but he didn't get any warning (as far as I could see).  Should the rules be interpreted differently due to almost no crowds?  I don't know them well enough but do know that 'intent' doesn't matter.  The irony:  if Novak had been playing on any other courts than Armstrong and Ashe (think that I have this straight), there wouldn't have been a lines person there (Hawkeye instead).  The rules, though, seem to be rather more complicated--at least according to an article that I read by Ben Rothenberg.  https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/06/sports/tennis/us-open-disqualification-defaulted-djkovic.html

I should add that I did see the shot; the lineswoman was hit in the throat and heard her cries of pain and also I think struggling to breathe too (don't know all the details from her side, but watching it via t.v. was scary).  Did you watch any of this via live or online T.D.?

PD

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

That was a pretty big story in tennis.  A lot of people thought that he was a sure bet for winning that slam.  I'm a bit surprised that they didn't give him a warning earlier when, in anger, he fired off a shot at some side hoarding....perhaps that might have made him re-think things?  I imagine that it would be a bit harder on the judges this year as there were almost no spectators in the stands.  I saw one male player earlier in the rounds fire off one into the stands (forget who it was), but he didn't get any warning (as far as I could see).  Should the rules be interpreted differently due to almost no crowds?  I don't know them well enough but do know that 'intent' doesn't matter.  The irony:  if Novak had been playing on any other courts than Armstrong and Ashe (think that I have this straight), there wouldn't have been a lines person there (Hawkeye instead).  The rules, though, seem to be rather more complicated--at least according to an article that I read by Ben Rothenberg.  https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/06/sports/tennis/us-open-disqualification-defaulted-djkovic.html

I should add that I did see the shot; the lineswoman was hit in the throat and heard her cries of pain and also I think struggling to breathe too (don't know all the details from her side, but watching it via t.v. was scary).  Did you watch any of this via live or online T.D.?

PD

https://www.facebook.com/1791761364387076/posts/2825846807645188/

[T. D.]

That was a pretty big story in tennis.  A lot of people thought that he was a sure bet for winning that slam.  I'm a bit surprised that they didn't give him a warning earlier when, in anger, he fired off a shot at some side hoarding....perhaps that might have made him re-think things?  I imagine that it would be a bit harder on the judges this year as there were almost no spectators in the stands.  I saw one male player earlier in the rounds fire off one into the stands (forget who it was), but he didn't get any warning (as far as I could see).  Should the rules be interpreted differently due to almost no crowds?  I don't know them well enough but do know that 'intent' doesn't matter.  The irony:  if Novak had been playing on any other courts than Armstrong and Ashe (think that I have this straight), there wouldn't have been a lines person there (Hawkeye instead).  The rules, though, seem to be rather more complicated--at least according to an article that I read by Ben Rothenberg.  https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/06/sports/tennis/us-open-disqualification-defaulted-djkovic.html

I should add that I did see the shot; the lineswoman was hit in the throat and heard her cries of pain and also I think struggling to breathe too (don't know all the details from her side, but watching it via t.v. was scary).  Did you watch any of this via live or online T.D.?

PD

Sorry I didn't notice your post...No, I didn't see the incident live; I no longer watch or seriously follow pro sports (gave up watching TV about 10 years ago, so it wasn't too difficult).
Comments from expert observers mostly said that the punishment was merited, so I didn't follow up. I suspect he had a history of such behavior.
I was once a Nole fan of sorts, but wrote him off earlier this year after his "Djokovid" tournament fiasco.

[T. D.]

Funny story...if you weren't already down on the US fast food industry or the US Food and Drug Administration, check this out:

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-54370056

Subway rolls ruled too sugary to be bread in Ireland

Story concludes with

It is not the first time Subway's bread has been in the spotlight. In 2014, the company announced it was removing azodicarbonamide - the so-called "yoga mat" chemical - from its rolls.The chemical is used to whiten flour and improve the condition of dough. It is also used to make vinyl foam products such as yoga mats and the underlay for carpets. Subway stopped using the agent six years ago but the US Food and Drug Administration continues to approve the use of the chemical in produce.

[Pohjolas Daughter]

Funny story...if you weren't already down on the US fast food industry or the US Food and Drug Administration, check this out:

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-54370056

Subway rolls ruled too sugary to be bread in Ireland

Story concludes with

It is not the first time Subway's bread has been in the spotlight. In 2014, the company announced it was removing azodicarbonamide - the so-called "yoga mat" chemical - from its rolls.The chemical is used to whiten flour and improve the condition of dough. It is also used to make vinyl foam products such as yoga mats and the underlay for carpets. Subway stopped using the agent six years ago but the US Food and Drug Administration continues to approve the use of the chemical in produce.

I heard the news via NPR ...pretty sad state of fast food industry.

Just read this news regarding "Stairway to Heaven" and charges of plagiarism.  The Supreme Court has apparently refused to hear the case, so that's it!  https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-54423922

PD

[MusicTurner]

A tiny bird has been documented to fly 12,200 km in 11 days, from Alaska to New Zealand.

A busy little fellow ...

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/oct/13/jet-fighter-godwit-breaks-world-record-for-non-stop-bird-flight

[Pohjolas Daughter]

A tiny bird has been documented to fly 12,200 km in 11 days, from Alaska to New Zealand.

A busy little fellow ...

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/oct/13/jet-fighter-godwit-breaks-world-record-for-non-stop-bird-flight

Neat story!  Can't believe that the birds can actually shrink their internal organs too.