Wednesday, January 20, 2021
QPORIT XR NEWSROOM
2021-01-21 (THU JAN 21, 2021)
- President Biden
- Rejoined the World Health Organization (WHO) and is sending Dr. Fauci to the next meeting as head of the US Delegation.
- Rejoined the Paris Climate Accord.
- Directed non-citizens to be included in the census.
- Changed immigration policies, creating a path to citizenship for many immigrants.
- Ended restrictions on travel from "Muslim" countries.
- Canceled the "1776 Commission" and changed some regulatory procedures.
- Halted construction of the "border wall".
- Had a genuine, old-fashioned Press Briefing, handled by the new Press Secretary.
- Vice-President Harris
- Presided over the Senate for the first time.
- Swore in three new Senators.
- Thereby making the Senate 50-50, and with her tie-breaking vote making the Democrats the majority party in the Senate.
- That made Senator Schumer the Majority Leader, able to set the agenda and schedule for the Senate.
- Here's the official site for all the information about Biden's choices for staff and government positions:
2021-01-14 (THU JAN 14, 2021)
- 01 FRI - HAPPY NEW YEAR'S DAY!
- 02 SAT - President Trump calls the Secretary of State in Georgia and pressures him to "find" enough votes to to flip the state from Biden to Trump.
- 03 SUN - The recording of Trump's call is released to the public.
- 04 MON - Biden, Harris, Trump and others campaign in Georgia before the Senate runoff election.
- 05 TUE - Runoff election in Georgia. Very close, but both Democratic candidates win. The Senate will be 50R - 50D. With Kamala Harris breaking the tie, the Democrats will narrowly hold control of the Senate.
- 06 WED - As a joint session of Congress is counting the electoral votes a mob, incited by a Trump speech falsely claiming the election was stolen and asking them to "fight" and march to Congress, overwhelms the police and storms through Congress.
- At least 5 people die
- One is a female rioter trying to break in.
- One is a policeman murdered by someone in the crowd.
- There are cries of "Hang Pence".
- There are anti-semitic and white power extremist slogans worn on people's clothing.
- American flags are used as weapons.
- Trump calls the rioters "patriots" and says he "loves" them.
- Trump does nothing for hours to stop the rioters.
- Congresspeople are ushered to safe rooms in the building.
- Some Republican congressmen refuse to wear masks
- Subsequently, several Congresspeople develop COVID .
- After several hours, police reinforcements arise and expel the rioters.
- 06 WED - After the rioters are expelled, BIDEN and Harris are certified by Congress as the President-Elect and Vice-President Elect.
- A large group of Republican Congresspeople and a small group of Senators try to postpone the certification with specious denials of the validity of Biden's election.
- 07 THU - As more and more information about the riot is revealed, the seriousness of the attack, the amount of deliberate planning that went into it, and the danger the Congresspeople faced becomes more and more evident.
- 08 FRI - Senator Lindsey Graham, who expressed (mild) displeasure with the President and an acceptance of the result of the election is accosted by an angry mob at the airport.
- 09 SAT - The House drafts an Article of Impeachment for "Incitement of Insurrection".
- 11 MON - THE CORONAVIRUS
- has caused more than 90 million cases world-wide;
- has caused more than 1.9 million deaths world-wide;
- has caused more than 22 million cases in the US;
- has caused more than 383 thousand deaths in the US;
- is getting worse.
- 12 TUE - The House considers an Article of Impeachment,'
- 13 WED - Donald J Trump is impeached for Incitement of Insurrection.
- He is the only President to be impeached twice.
- 10 Republicans join the Democrats in passing the resolution of impeachment
- 14 THU - President-Elect Biden proposes an expansive stimulus and relief bill as millions remain unemployed, and unemployment filings are increasing.
- Meanwhile, the stock market is doing well.
2021-01-06 (WED JAN 6, 2021)
- "The President of the Senate shall, in the Presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the Certificates, and the Votes shall then be counted. The Person having the greatest Number of Votes shall be the President"
- The Congress is not given the opportunity here in the Constitution to change the vote.
- The President of the United States in the last few days
- Cajoled, bullied, pressured, and tried to convince the Secretary of State in Georgia to change the vote count, citing "rumors" but no evidence to invalidate the election of the Biden electors.
- Has been trying, according to reports, to invalidate the electoral college victory of Biden when the vote is counted in Congress, with action from Pence (the President of the Senate) and other Congresspersons and Senators.
- Attempts by anyone, including a sitting President, to change election returns, or to circumvent the Constitution to change the results of a Presidential election, should be treated as an attempted coup and an attack on the United States, its Constitution, and on democracy itself.
- In the case of a President, it would be a violation of the Constitutional Oath to "faithfully execute the office of President of the United States" and to "protect and defend the Constitution of the United States".
- It should be treated seriously,
- with consequences for anyone who participated in the attempted coup;
- with legislation or constitutional changes to prevent any future similar attempt from even being contemplated.
2021-01-05 (TUE JAN 5, 2021)
- No charges were filed against any police officers in the shooting of Jacob Blake.
- This once again re-emphasizes the necessity of appropriate and stricter national standards for the use of guns, deadly force, no-knock warrants, and other tactics and violence by police on civilians, including easier prosecution and a wide range of measures to deter these tragedies.
2020-12-30 (WED DEC 30, 2020)
SIMPLE PREDICTIONS for 2021
·
Technological development will continue to increase
exponentially.
o It
will be a difficult challenge to equitably distribute the benefits of
technology to all social, geographical, age, financial and other demographics.
o There
will be new cameras and new headsets for Virtual Reality.
o There
will be progress in developing Augmented & Mixed Reality.
o AI
will have new techniques and new business applications .
§ Chinese
AI companies will do very well.
§ Robotics
will improve significantly.
§ Automated
vehicles will make big advances.
o 5G
will continue to roll out, and there will be a few notable applications.
§ Getting
fast 5G to rural areas will go very slowly.
·
(“5G” includes several different technologies
of different speeds.)
o Cloud
services will be a big business.
o Cyber
security and regulation of technology will be major issues.
§ But
they are complicated and there will be no major solutions in 2021.
§ New
laws and new ways of thinking about technology may be needed.
§ It
may even be necessary to change the fundamental TCP/IP and other protocols that
govern Internet communications.
·
The most urgent issue will be to stamp out COVID-19.
o All
predictions of timing depend on mutations of the coronavirus leaving vaccines
intact and the modes of transmission relatively similar.
o The
first quarter, and the first month especially, will see continued high levels
of illness and mortality.
o Mass
vaccinations will be increasing through the summer.
o There
will be tentative attempts at a "new normal” in the fall of 2021.
§ There
will continue, throughout the year, to be improvements in remote work, education,
and entertainment.
§ This
will continue as part of the “new normal".
·
President Trump will continue to make trouble --
through the certification of Biden as the new President, the inauguration and beyond,
unless he is stopped (for example by being banned from social media, or being sued,
or being arrested; or by seriously overstepping in his quest to reverse the election result).
·
There will be major systemic issues that must be
dealt with. These include:
o A
high level of long-term unemployment due to the depression of travel,
entertainment, in-person dining and shopping, that is likely to continue at
least until late summer or fall.
o The
financial difficulties of state and local governments.
§ If
not dealt with, this could spread to economic problems throughout the economy.
o Mistreatment
of minorities -- by police and other parts of government and society.
o An
infrastructure that has been ignored for too long and needs a massive upgrade.
§ In
some cases, there may be critically dangerous situations.
§ In
many cases of public utilities, the prevalence of power outages, internet
outages, water purity, and other chronic conditions must be stopped.
o A
foreign policy that has distanced the US from its allies, allowed our international
adversaries to benefit, and damaged the reputation of the US.
§ This
must be reversed.
§ International
cooperation must be accelerated, for example, with respect to
·
Global warning
·
Pandemics
·
Space laws
·
International cyber issues
·
Crime.
o The
system of oversight of the executive branch.
§ It
must be strengthened.
o The
system of national elections.
·
Possible actions include a study or movement
toward national election laws, such as
o an
independent election commission or
o abolishing
the electoral college in favor of a national popular vote.
o The
skewed distribution of wealth and income.
§ National
legislation may be needed.
§ Excessive
wealth by a few does not leave enough for everyone else.
§ Poverty
in the US is unacceptable.
o Immigration.
§ The
whole process needs to be changed to allow a respect for immigrants from their
application through citizenship.
o The
changing climate.
§ Efforts
must accelerate to
·
Ameliorate the effects of climate change.
·
Reduce (or reverse!) global warming.
o National
health.
§ Every
person in the US (for any reason)
·
Should be able to find affordable medical care
at any time.
o Including
affordable medications.
o Education
and culture.
§ Every child should have a good education from pre-kindergarten on.
§ Every child should have access to the digital tools (such as fast Internet and a good computer) necessary for online learning.
§ Every
person in the US should be able to get a free college education.
§ The
level of every citizen needs to be raised with respect to
·
Understanding the American system of government
o The
issues facing society
·
Mathematics
·
All the sciences
· World history and world geography
· Literature and the arts.
2020-12-28 (MON DEC 28, 2020)
- After VETOing the Defense Appropriation Bill and raising new objections to the relief bill, the relief bill (together with government funding) was signed.
- The Democrats are moving to increase the relief payments.
- Trump called for $2,000 payments. Will he - and the GOP - actually follow through?
- Biden says that he is not getting full cooperation in the transition, including aspects vital to national security.
- Trump is handing out "get-out-of-jail-free" pardons to his supporters, without a formal process,
- regardless of former convictions, or confessions, or plea deals, or whether national security was involved, or corruption.
- COVID-19 is raging and neither Trump nor Pence ("head" of the COVID "task force") is making any effort to discourage holiday travel or parties, which are likely to cause an even greater new surge of cases and deaths in January.
- There was a massive cyber hack of government and corporate computer systems, probably from Russia.
- Trump continues to claim that he only lost because of voting fraud, a claim that has been completely disproved.
- If he knows the truth, he is lying; if not, he is delusional or deranged. These all pose a threat to democracy and the office of the Presidency.
2020-12-14 (MON DEC 14, 2020)
- at their respective states have met and confirmed the election of Biden for President and Harris for Vice President.
- The votes are "officially counted" by Congress on January 6.
- The vote for two Senators from Georgia will take place on Jan 5.
- From the Constitution:
[Article XII] (12th Amendment – Election of President)
The Electors shall meet in their respective states, and vote by ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves; they shall name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as Vice-President, and they shall make distinct lists of all persons voted for as President, and of all persons voted for as Vice-President, and of the number of votes for each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate;—The President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates and the votes shall then be counted;—The person having the greatest number of votes for President, shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed; and if no person have such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice. And if the House of Representatives shall not choose a President whenever the right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of March next following, then the Vice-President shall act as President, as in the case of the death or other constitutional disability of the President. THIS HAS CHANGED. SEE AMENDMENT BELOW —The person having the greatest number of votes as Vice-President, shall be the Vice-President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed, and if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers on the list, the Senate shall choose the Vice-President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.
Article [XX] (20th Amendment – Terms of President, Vice President, Members of Congress: Presidential Vacancy)
3: If, at the time fixed for the beginning of the term of the President, the President elect shall have died, the Vice President elect shall become President. If a President shall not have been chosen before the time fixed for the beginning of his term, or if the President elect shall have failed to qualify, then the Vice President elect shall act as President until a President shall have qualified; and the Congress may by law provide for the case wherein neither a President elect nor a Vice President elect shall have qualified, declaring who shall then act as President, or the manner in which one who is to act shall be selected, and such person shall act accordingly until a President or Vice President shall have qualified.
2020-12-12 (SAT DEC 12, 2020)
- at their "investor day".
- Here is the (more than 3 hour) video of the announcements:
2020-12-11 (FRI DEC 11, 2020)
- Texas tried to file a lawsuit objecting to the results of the Presidential election in several other states.
- The Supreme Court denied the standing of Texas to file such a suit:
- "Dec 11 2020 The State of Texas’s motion for leave to file a bill of complaint is denied for lack of standing under Article III of the Constitution. Texas has not demonstrated a judicially cognizable interest in the manner in which another State conducts its elections. All other pending motions are dismissed as moot. Statement of Justice Alito, with whom Justice Thomas joins: In my view, we do not have discretion to deny the filing of a bill of complaint in a case that falls within our original jurisdiction. See Arizona v. California, 589 U. S. ___ (Feb. 24, 2020) (Thomas, J., dissenting). I would therefore grant the motion to file the bill of complaint but would not grant other relief, and I express no view on any other issue."
- https://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docket/docketfiles/html/public/22o155.html
2020-12-10 (THU DEC 10, 2020)
- Facilitating or fighting on the side of COVID in the war against the US in any of the following ways should be treated as domestic terrorism...
- not wearing a mask with anyone nearby
- discouraging people from wearing masks
- holding events with more than a very few people
- holding events without social distancing, especially indoors
- lying about the severity of the disease
- lying about treatments for the disease
- holding political rallies, especially without masks or distancing
- holding parties, especially without masks or distancing
- holding concerts, especially without masks or distancing
- threatening public officials who are trying to save American lives
- threatening businesses or their owners who are trying to conduct business safely
- discouraging or interfering with effective testing
- discouraging or interfering with contact tracing
- failure to quarantine when you have been exposed to COVID
- Public officials whose behavior is on this list should resign, or be impeached and removed from office.
- Here's the official site for all the information about Biden's choices for staff and government positions:
- https://buildbackbetter.gov/nominees-and-appointees/
- UPDATE (1/20/2021)
- https://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/
- Here's the official site for all the information about everything Biden, including a link where you can apply for a position! (see "join us" at the bottom!)
COMING: 2020-11-24 (TUE NOV 24, 2020)
- Eric Roffman (that's me, publisher & editor of QPORIT)
- will present a survey of where we stand now in the development of XR
- The talk will cover:
- Hardware - including new HMD's & the "fine print" about 5G;
- Software - including webXR
- also known as the Spatial Web & web 3.0;
- Content - including experiments with digital live Avatar theater;
- Issues - including possible regulation;
- Rumors - including Apple's plans
- And more, much much more...
- TUE NOV 24 6:30-8:30 EST
- For more info:
- To register:
2020-11- 20 (FRI NOV 20, 2020)
2020-11-17 (TUE NOV 17, 2020)
- in the final weeks of his administration, is reported to:
- have seriously considered a military attack on Iran;
- be planning a major military withdrawal from the Mideast;
- be expressing anger at the Vaccine Makers for not announcing their progress sooner, to help his reelection campaign;
- be obstructing the transition to the Biden Presidency;
- be spreading distrust about American Democracy, by making false claims of Democratic Party voting fraud;
- be making no effort to help immediately slow the virulent growth of COVID-19 infections and deaths.
- The actions described above are not "a new normal";
- they are serious assaults on the United States;
- they are not the "faithful execution of the Office of the President".
- Congress should conduct a serious, immediate investigation on
- whether new legislation is needed to inhibit any President who may be working against the interests of the United States;
- whether Impeachment and Removal of President Trump and Vice President Pence (the head of the COVID "Task Force") is warranted by the facts, and necessary to help curb the virulent growth of COVID-19 during the next 2 months.
2020-11-10 (TUE NOV 10, 2020)
- announced three upgraded laptops in its "one more time" event.
- More importantly, it announced a new home-grown Apple Silicon Chip, the M1.
- The M1 is an impressive chip, and marks the progress Apple is making in its creation of its own silicon, custom designed to work with its own hardware and operating systems.
- M1 features include
- 8 core CPU (faster processing)
- 8 core GPU (faster, better graphics)
- 16 core neural processing (faster, more useful AI)
- dedicated security processing
- 5 nanometer technology
- low power usage
- integration with the OS
- As a march to the future, the ability to continue to create upgraded silicon, extending the life of Moore's law (which predicts exponential growth of digital power with a doubling period of about 2 to three years), means the continued extension of digital processing to every facet of human life.
- The laptops themselves do not seem to be the real story. As John Hodgeman in a postscript to the main announcement pointed out, the fact that the laptops have longer battery life is nice but, gee, you can plug them in.
- The story is the chip, not the new laptops.
- To me, the problem with this event was
- 1) "One More Thing" is what Steve Jobs used to say before he introduced a whole new category of product.
- To focus on the laptops, or even the chips, is different from creating a whole new category of computing.
- It is the evolution and continuation of the current computing paradigm.
- 2) The slick Apple product launch is extremely slick, but we've seen that style of presentation before. Marketing has to innovate as well as perfect a style.
- 3) I did not, actually, learn much about the MACs that were announced:
- How are they really different from each other, except form factor? They all use the same chip and OS and the laptops have the same 13" size screen.
- What is the current screen resolution?
- What is the memory/storage system? How big?
- Do the new connectors (Thunderbolt / USB 4) and the new chip & OS mean that the Apple ecosystem will become even more isolated from the PC & Android world than it is now?
- From the perspective of xR innovation (that's lower case x as in a variable, which refers to VR, AR and MR) this event was both hopeful and disappointing:
- It was disappointing because it (xR) was never mentioned, and not the "one more thing" I was hoping for.
- It was encouraging because VR, AR, and MR all need better silicon than they now use, and the effort Apple is investing in xR development could be transformative if they are also making customized silicon for xR.
- Here is a very detailed discussion of what Apple has been doing in xR:
- https://www.macrumors.com/roundup/apple-glasses/
2020-11-09 (MON NOV 9, 2020)
- reports positive results from its latest (not yet completed) trials
- 90% effectiveness (28 days after the first dose of a 2 dose regimen),
- relatively safe.
- This is based on a test with about 45,000 participants,
- about 40,000 had the full 2 doses.
- This is good news, but not yet the end of COVID-19
- The estimate is at best 25M vaccinations worldwide in 2020.
- A reasonable, optimistic estimate is still
- Summer 2021 before vaccines are widely available;
- Fall 2021 before vaccines significantly improve worldwide health
- That is in line with estimates in Jan 2020 that it would be at least 18 months before vaccines begin to make a substantial difference in world health and protection from COVID-19
- Here is the Pfizer announcement:
- https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-detail/pfizer-and-biontech-announce-vaccine-candidate-against
- Currently there are
- more than 50,000,000 cases worldwide
- more than 1,250,000 deaths worldwide
- record numbers (more than 9,000) of daily deaths worldwide
- more than 10,000,000 cases in the US (most in the world)
- more than 240,000 deaths in the US (most in the world)
- more casualties, every week, than in the 9/11 terrorist attack.
- more than 1,000,000 cases in Texas
- more than 10,000 new cases today in Illinois.
- is currently working very hard on XR technology
- they seem most interested in AR and MR, adding information as you view the real world (rather than VR, completely immersive experiences).
- They have released several generations of the ARkit software.
- They have added LiDAR distance sensing to top level iPhones.
- They purchased NEXT, the premiere real-time live streaming platform.
- They purchased several important smaller companies and hired many experienced XR developers that had worked with other XR companies.
- Here is a very detailed discussion of what Apple has been doing:
- Apple is having a "One More Thing" event tomorrow (see the post from Nov 2 below).
- It is not known whether XR will be in that program.
- Apple ONE MORE THING event: 1:00 EST Tue Nov 10, 2020:
2020-11-07 (SAT NOV 7, 2020)
- ACCORDING TO THE ASSOCIATED PRESS BIDEN WINS PENSYLVANIA, SO:
- I will be the President of all Americans.
- It is "a time to heal".
- I will spare no effort to turn around this pandemic.
- (Today: more than 124,000 new cases; more than 1,025 deaths.)
2020-11-03 (TUE NOV 3, 2020)
- If you haven't already, cast your ballot: VOTE!
- Every vote matters!
- Keep your distance! Wear your mask!
- In case of a long wait, bring water, food, outdoor weather appropriate clothes!
- If you haven't already, cast your ballot: VOTE!
- Every vote matters!
- We described five crises below: See the Nov 1, 2020 item.
- Trump and his fellow Trumpublicans in the Senate have made all of them worse.
- The Senate has
- promoted right wing extremist judges to lifetime appointments,
- blocked needed legislation including a desperately needed relief bill
- stonewalled the Impeachment trial
- (removing Trump would have prevented Trump's disastrous response to COVID)
- and in a triumph of hypocrisy, did the exact opposite of what they "promised" four years ago, and confirmed a Supreme Court judge just days before a Presidential election.
2020-11-02 (MON NOV 2, 2020)
- announced a "One more thing" event for Tue, Nov 10.
- For those who've never watched the live stream of an Apple event when Steve Jobs was alive:
- He would end a keynote full of new products by saying... "and, One more thing",
- And that thing was the introduction of a new kind of product, like the first iPhone or the first iPad.
- Three guesses would be
- 1) something related to Apple's home-made new chips;
- 2) something related to TV; or
- 3) the first Apple AR headset. (!!????)
- The event address is:
- https://www.apple.com/apple-events/
2020-11-01 (SUN NOV 1, 2020)
- HEALTH:
- More than 9 million people have been sickened.
- More than 225 thousand have died.
- It is getting worse.
- Trump & Trumpublicans are aggravating the epidemic, not dealing with it.
- FIRES, STORMS & THE ENVIRONMENT:
- People are dying, and property is being destroyed by
- Massive fires in the West,
- Huge storms in the South and Midwest
- Floods in some places,
- Droughts in other places,
- with a deteriorating infrastructure that can not withstand environmental stresses, and sometimes is even the cause of deadly events.
- These, together with the threat of irreversible environmental damage and irreversible global warming
- require urgent government attention, yet
- Trump & Trumpublicans are ignoring the issues, except when aggravating the problems with regulatory changes and suppression of scientific studies.
- EXTRA-JUDICIAL MURDERS AND A PREJUDICED JUDICIAL SYSTEM:
- The treatment of black Americans is intolerable.
- The problem is historical
- The original constitution was biased.
- US was a country with slaves less than 175 years ago.
- Trump & Trumpublicans are providing support to anti-equality groups and issues.
- It has to stop. Now.
- ECONOMIC INEQUALITY AND LOOMING COLLAPSE:
- We have a K shaped economy.
- The rich are getting richer.
- The poor are getting poorer (and dying faster).
- The rich: APPLE (1.9 $T), AMAZON, MICROSOFT, AND GOOGLE are each worth more than $1 TRILLION (That's 1,000,000,000,000 dollars).
- Together they are worth more than 5 trillion dollars.
- Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos are each worth more than 100 billion dollars.
- The not rich: More than 8 million people were unemployed in September; several million without any job since the March lockdown.
- Protections against evictions are expiring.
- Travel, restaurants, and arts events are not coming back soon.
- Colleges have lost revenue.
- State and local governments have had additional expenses, but have lost tax revenues.
- An inverted yield curve last year "predicted" financial distress next year.
- Trump & Trumpublicans did not provide support: neither to individuals, nor to local and state governments, with another economic relief bill.
- Are they defunding the police?
- Among the casualties, if governments have trouble balancing their budgets, are essential services like fire departments and policemen.
- DEMOCRACY -- INCLUDING TRUTH AND IMPARTIAL JUSTICE:
- Democracy itself is under threat when the government does not take responsibility for preventing:
- Voter suppression, including
- intimidation;
- interference with the postal service to complicate mail-in voting;
- inadequate staffing of polling places causing long delays for certain voters.
- Attacks on the legitimacy of the election, including
- baseless claims of fraud.
- refusal to commit to a peaceful transition of power.
- Threats of criminal prosecution of political opponents outside the systematic process of criminal law.
- Systematic lying.
- Ridiculously vain and false bragging, and requiring obeisance of subordinates.
- Suppression of accurate, truthful reporting by government agencies.
2020-10-29 (THU OCT 29, 2020)
- have developed an OLED technology that would allow pixel densities of 10,000 pixels per inch.
- This would be about 20 times the density of current displays.
- It would mean really good resolution in VR headsets!
- https://news.stanford.edu/2020/10/22/future-vr-employ-new-ultrahigh-res-display/
- Technical paper, full text (for a price):
- https://science.sciencemag.org/content/370/6515/459.full
2020-10-24 (SAT OCT 24, 2020)
- 230,068 deaths, the most in the world.
- 784 deaths today, the most in the world.
- 8,827,154 total cases, the most in the world.
- 78,671 new cases today, the most in the world.
- 2,855,475 active cases now, the most in the world.
- 16,367 critical & serious cases now, the most in the world.
- The "president" continues to organize superspreader events around the country.
- Ask not what your country can do for you, Donald, ask what you can do for your country.
- Source: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ 2020-10-24 20:50 EST
2020-10-22 (THU OCT 22, 2020)
2020-10-20 (TUE OCT 20, 2020)
THE DEPARTMENT OFF JUSTICE
- has filed a complaint against Google, charging anti-competitive behavior.
- Any resolution of this will likely take months to years.
- The final verdict/decision in the Microsoft case helped trigger (I believe) the massive market selloff in 2000.
- The Judge ordered a break-up of Microsoft on June 7, 2000.
- Around August 1, the Nasdaq and Dow averages began a major slide.
- Regulatory and legal challenges, domestic and international, to Google, Apple, Facebook, and Amazon are fueled by issues of possible
- excessive harm to consumers
- excessive suppression of competitors
- excessive concentration of wealth
- as well as political and competitive interests.
- Microsoft is currently relatively free of these pressures.
- Here is the full text of the complaint:
2020-10-19 (MON OCT 19, 2020)
THE MAJORITY STAFF OF THE HOUSE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE
- has issued a comprehensive report on their
- "Investigation of Competition in Digital Markets"
- with Recommendations.
- Here is the full text of the Report:
2020-10-14 (WED OCT 14, 2020)
THE HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE
- will hold hearings, tomorrow (THU Oct 15, 2020 1:30 PM ET), on Misinformation And Conspiracy Theories Online
- Here is the notice:
- https://intelligence.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=1092
- The hearing will be available online here:
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9vU8xQf2QM
2020-10-13 (TUE OCT 13, 2020)
APPLE
- announced the iPhone 12 series, with some MAJOR features that are the opening salvo in the next generation of technology.
- (They also announced a new mini audio device.)
- The biggest feature is that all iPhones in the 12 series will have 5G support.
- 5G is in its infancy, but this support is essential!
- The next most important feature is that some model(s) will have LiDAR support.
- LiDAR is an accurate distance measuring "camera" that will improve focus in poorly lit spaces and accelerate Augmented Reality (and, ultimately, photogrammetry, 3D photography and volumetric videography also).
- Powering these advances is new chip technology.
- Apple claims 40% and more improvement in their new A14 "Bionic" processors.
- "Bionic?" -- As far as I know they contain no living parts.
- The phones will be available within weeks, at prices similar to the previous generation of iPhones.
- But headphones and charger may not be included in the box!
- https://www.apple.com/iphone/
2020-10-12 (MON OCT 12, 2020)
TOMORROW, TUE OCT 13, IS A BIG DAY:
- AMAZON
- The start of PRIME Day.
- https://www.amazon.com
- APPLE
- The announcement is expected of new 5G iPhones.
- https://www.apple.com/apple-events/
- OCULUS / FACEBOOK
- The release of the QUEST 2 VR headset.
- https://www.oculus.com/quest-2/
- (THE HP/MS/VALVE REVERB G2 is expected next month).
2020-10-12 (MON OCT 12, 2020)
DISNEY
- has announced a major restructuring
- the news was reported by CNBC
- Disney+ has been extremely successful.
- Other parts of Disney have suffered from the pandemic.
- This restructuring is designed to focus on direct-to-consumer streaming.
2020-10-12 (MON OCT 12, 2020)
THE 2020 NOBEL PRIZE IN ECONOMICS
- The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2020 was awarded jointly to
- Paul R. Milgrom and
- Robert B. Wilson
- "for improvements to auction theory and inventions of new auction formats."
- https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/economic-sciences/2020/summary/
2020-10-10 (SAT OCT 10, 2020)
IT'S 2020-10-10
- Or 10/10/2020
- Always nice to have a day with an "interesting" date.
2020-10-09 (FRI OCT 9, 2020)
THE 2020 NOBEL PEACE PRIZE
- The Nobel Peace Prize 2020 was awarded to
- the World Food Programme (WFP)
- "for its efforts to combat hunger, for its contribution to bettering conditions for peace in conflict-affected areas and for acting as a driving force in efforts to prevent the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict."
- https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/10644350/7277031683435010266
2020-10-08 (THU OCT 8, 2020)
THE 2020 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE
- The Nobel Prize in Literature 2020 was awarded to
- Louise Glück
- "for her unmistakable poetic voice that with austere beauty makes individual existence universal."
- https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/2020/summary/
2020-10-07 (WED OCT 7, 2020)
THE 2020 NOBEL PRIZE IN CHEMISTRY
- The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2020 was awarded jointly to
- Emmanuelle Charpentier and
- Jennifer A. Doudna
- "for the development of a method for genome editing (CRISPR)."
- https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/chemistry/2020/summary/
- https://www.nobelprize.org/uploads/2020/10/press-chemistryprize2020.pdf
2020-10-06 (TUE OCT 6, 2020)
THE 2020 NOBEL PRIZE IN PHYSICS
- The Nobel Prize in Physics 2020 was divided,
- one half awarded to
- Roger Penrose
- "for the discovery that black hole formation is a robust prediction of the general theory of relativity",
- the other half jointly to
- Reinhard Genzel and Andrea Ghez
- "for the discovery of a supermassive compact object at the centre of our galaxy."
- https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/2020/summary/
- https://www.nobelprize.org/uploads/2020/10/press-physicsprize2020.pdf
THE 2020 NOBEL PRIZE IN MEDICINE
- The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2020 was awarded jointly to
- Harvey J. Alter,
- Michael Houghton and
- Charles M. Rice
- "for the discovery of Hepatitis C virus."
- https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/2020/summary/
- https://www.nobelprize.org/uploads/2020/10/press-medicine2020.pdf
QPORIT XR DAILY NEWS
SEPTEMBER 2020
QPORIT XR DAILY NEWS
JANUARY - AUGUST 2020
