Last minute geek

1. No US-France digital tax war for now, as Trump and Macron call a truce
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... in France and 750 million euros worldwide. Washington has threatened to impose taxes on French products in response. French authorities have repeatedly said that any international agreement on digital ...

2. Bee thief nabs 92 hives from California almond orchard
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... shortage of bees,” he said. “Luckily, I have enough to cover what I did, or what we lost. But it affects the farmer, and it affects the farmers all the way in Oregon and Washington because of the loss ...

3. BLS to remove computers from data 'lockups,' chief denies it's aimed at Michael Bloomberg
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

The U.S. Labor Department Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) today announced changes to BLS economic data “lockup” procedures that involve removing a number of legacy computers from its Washington newsroom, ...

4. The DEA seized a 79-year-old man's life savings at airport and won't give it back
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... her father, 79-year-old Terry Rolin, accumulated the money over a lifetime of saving and that he gave her the cash to open a joint bank account. From The Washington Post (via Seattle Times): Rebecca Brown ...

5. Christian school expels student over rainbow birthday cake
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

...  Alford says neither the cake nor Kenney's jumper were a statement on sexuality. The school didn't respond to the Washington Post's inquiries, but told a local news channel Kenney had committed other "lifesyle ...

6. Security expert offers hacking advice to students whose campuses have implemented pervasive wireless surveillance
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

After a late-December Washington Post story revealed a nationwide epidemic of colleges quietly installing pervasive wireless location-tracking systems on campus, which gathered data on students without ...

7. Take this Washington Post post to find out which of these 2020 Democrats agrees with you most
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

Take this Washington Post multiple-choice questionnaire to see which Democrat candidate shares your opinions the most. Read the rest Read all  ...

8. America's most popular governor: the lavishly corrupt Larry Hogan [R-MD]
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... Washington Monthly's Eric Cortellessa reports, that was a fiction, and Hogan has continued to oversee his company even as he made public policy that made his governorship the most profitable in Maryland ...

9. Iran War: As U.S. sends 3,500 more troops to mideast, the vibe in Baghdad is bad
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... was killed yesterday in U.S. airstrike on the Baghdad airport in Iraq. As the U.S. sends some 3,500 additional troops to the mideast, Washington Post reporter Mustafa Salim [@Mustafa_salimb on Twitter] ...

10. Former Google exec says he was pushed out after he lobbied for human rights program
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... to China, in a stark reversal of its 2010 move that made its search engine unavailable there,” reports Nitasha Tiku in the Washington Post: Now, the 50-year-old is alleging that Google pushed him out for ...

11. Massive sea lions commandeer small boat
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

Two big sea lions kicked back aboard a small, empty anchored boat in Eld Inlet at the southern end of Washington's Puget Sound. Josh Phillips of Spawn Fly Fish captured this delightful moment two weeks ...

12. YouTube's burnout generation
(English/engadget)

Jacques Slade is a 43-year-old father of two who lives an hour north of LA. He has worked in real estate, taught at a charter school and written music; he also spent nine years at Washington Mutual bank ...

13. Microtransactions overwhelmed the Disney cinematic universe
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

Writing for the Washington Post, Gene Park argues that Star Wars has been at its best in recent years the closer the product has been to a video game. He praises the narrative in the game Fallen Order, ...

14. Homeland Security labelled a group of volunteer doctors as "radical political activists"
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... DHS Press Secretary (@SpoxDHS) December 10, 2019 The Washington Examiner article linked to in the tweet is hardly objective, but even it still holds back from this kind of labelling. Left-wing organizations ...

15. Political journalist Omoyele Sowore arrested and tortured under Nigeria's overbroad "cyberstalking" law
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... to criminalize political speech. In fact, earlier this year we celebrated a federal court decision in Washington State in the United States that tossed out an overbroad cyberstalking law. In the case, ...

16. A poor, Trump-voting Florida town opened a government grocery store to end its food desert, but it's "not socialism"
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... Sean Lynch, a retired Navy vet, told The Washington Post: "We take the water out of the ground, and we pump it to your house and charge you. So what’s the difference with a grocery store?" Not a thing, ...

17. Former CIA officer Jerry Lee sentenced to 19 years for handing U.S. info to China
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... classified info to Chinese for $800K; he maintains he never did https://t.co/4lSLY04w8N — Rachel Weiner (@rachelweinerwp) November 22, 2019 And from the backstory by Washington Post reporter Rachel ...

18. Human composting is now legal in Washington, and offered by a Seattle business
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

A startup based in Seattle says they plan to offer an alternative to human burial and cremation in Washington state, now that it's finally legal. Yep, human composting. Won't take it personally if you ...

19. Washington, DC sues DoorDash for allegedly misleading users about tips
(English/engadget)

DoorDash's change in tipping policy has come too late to avoid legal repercussions. The District of Columbia Attorney General has sued DoorDash over claims it not only stiffed couriers (aka Dashers) ...

20. You will fail.
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

CNN political correspondent Abby Phillip was among the first to share a provocative tidbit of Washington gossip on Twitter today. Earlier today, Phillip (who is wonderful, you should follow her on Twitter) ...

21. Trump advisor Roger Stone convicted for obstruction of justice
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... did release the emails during the campaign, which became a major talking point of the election that Donald Trump went on to win. Washington Post: In arguments and testimony over the past two weeks, prosecutors ...

22. Amazon unhappy Microsoft won $10 billion 'war cloud' Pentagon contract
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

Donald Trump has long made a sport of mocking Amazon founder and Washington Post newspaper owner Jeff Bezos, and Jeff Bezos is well aware of this. Microsoft just won a $10 billion so-called “war cloud” ...

23. China has 500+ Uighur camps and prisons and is holding far more than one million, activists say
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... cited figure of one million people. From AFP via Yahoo News: The East Turkistan National Awakening Movement, a Washington-based group that seeks independence for the mostly Muslim region known to China ...

24. Facial recognition tools shared by 'Massive, secretive network of police departments'
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... requests in Washington state were made through a previously undisclosed email listserv known as FITlist. FITlist — with FIT standing for “Fraud and Identity Theft” — includes officers from at least a dozen ...

25. Trump says something stupid: 'They shouldn’t be having public hearings'
(English/BoingBoing ibag)

... this spectacle live in Washington. After weeks of Republicans demanding that Schiff open up the doors and allow the public to see the impeachment proceedings, Trump says this morning: “They shouldn’t ...