QPORIT

RAIL STRIKE

The Biden Administration worked very hard to bring both sides together and avert a rail strike. A rail strike would have been devastating to the economy. It appears the strike has been averted.

HATE FUELED VIOLENCE HAS NO PLACE IN AMERICA

Also, in a separate event today, President Biden spoke eloquently, passionately, and from his heart, in assessing the danger to our democracy from hate crimes, white supremacists, and violent domestic terror. He announced a number of significant measures to oppose extreme radicalization and promote unity and compromise.

Dealing with hate crimes and domestic terror is of tremendous importance; stoking violent extremists to attack the Capitol to prevent or delay the peaceful transition of power in 2021 resulted in several deaths, and almost upended our constitutional system of democratic, republican government. (Shockingly, ABC World News tonight devoted most of its attention to the changing of Royalty in Britain, and did not even mention the initiatives to preserve democracy in the USA, or even Biden's speech.).

PRESIDENT BIDEN

https://youtu.be/R56-jO3q46I?t=375

UNITED WE STAND INITIATIVES

https://unitedwestand.gov/

NEW PLURALISTS

https://newpluralists.org/

Labels: domestic terrorism, hate, President Biden, rail strike, violence

# posted by QPORIT @ 11:04 PM 0 comments

Ethereum, the second most important cryptocurrency after Bitcoin, has completed a merge of new software technology, designed to reduce the environmental impact of "mining", and improve the scaling of transactions using Ethereum.  

Since blockchain smart contracts -- including NFT's -- and crypto transactions at large scale are a fundamental part of Ethereum's usage and business model, efficiency, accuracy, and speed of transactions are essential to its success.

Shipped!

The Merge was executed on September 15, 2022. This completed Ethereum's transition to proof-of-stake consensus, officially deprecating proof-of-work and reducing energy consumption by ~99.95%.

https://ethereum.org/en/upgrades/merge/

Labels: bitcoin, blockchain, cryptocurrency, Ethereum, proof-of stake, proof-of-work, smart contracts, The Merge

# posted by QPORIT @ 9:52 PM 0 comments

The Gadsden Flag, 1775

# posted by QPORIT @ 4:07 PM 0 comments

Solid improvements. Nothing exciting, unless you are an outdoor adventurer.

The most interesting new feature is the ability to directly contact a satellite for emergency help, even if you are in the wilderness, off the Cellular and WiFi grid.  As this technology advances it may have some fascinating applications.

Also for adventurers, there is a new Apple Watch Ultra, with several special features for those people who need them.  For example, there is a scuba diving app that puts, they say, everything you need to know about your dive on your wrist.

For kids (and grownups) on trips in the woods, there's a feature for people who get lost.  The GPS tracking of your wanderings is saved and can show you how to retrace your steps.

For people who drive too fast, or drive where other people drive too fast, both the watches and the phones have crash detection, and can notify authorities if you cannot.

The still and video cameras are better, both with hardware improvements and continuing development of computational imaging (aka XRography - my term, not Apple's).

Air pods are getting personalized spatial audio.

The iPhone Pro models get a new, more powerful A16 (4 nanometer!) chip. It seems that the Pro models still have Lidar, and the others still do not.

Everything has more computation, longer battery life, improved still and video imaging, and some cosmetic changes. 

iPhone14 & iPhonePro 14 are 6.1"; the Plus models are 6.7". Prices (at least in dollars) are about the same as last year for the model 13's. Some trade-ins are possible. Orders begin 9/9; availability for different products varies, starting on 9/16/2022.

Nothing was said about the long rumored VR/AR Apple glasses. 

Labels: Air Pods, Apple, Apple Watch 8, iPhone 14, spatial audio

# posted by QPORIT @ 3:14 PM 0 comments

At the Keynote Event for the IFA Tech Conference, Meta and Qualcomm announced a multi-year partnership to design and develop custom chips to power XR devices.

The agreement does not appear to require the chips to be exclusive to Meta.  This is very wise, and good news. Unlike Apple's attempts to completely silo their products (which negatively impacts competition and interoperability, and allows them to overcharge for their successful products), an open agreement will support the entire XR industry, result in lower costs, and allow wide-ranging innovation. 

As this is a multi-year agreement, it will support continuing improvement in XR technology.  It also provides important encouragement at a moment when fears of a recession are acting to discourage new investments in XR innovation.

QUALCOMM ANNOUNCEMENT

https://www.qualcomm.com/news/releases/2022/09/qualcomm-and-meta-partner-to-deliver-multi-generation-metaverse-

Labels: Apple, chips, eXte3nded Reality, Meta, Qualcomm, Virtual Reality, VR, XR

# posted by QPORIT @ 5:33 PM 0 comments

 What is going on at CNN?

Labels: Chris Licht, CNN, John Harwood

# posted by QPORIT @ 5:32 PM 0 comments