1771
Bring back hydrogen lifting gas
According to one estimate, there are around 25 blimps worldwide. What will it take to bring back these majestic beasts of the sky?
New
The latest blog posts to take off on Hacker News. 4,917 posts.
Society, Policy & Culture
Any year
1772
1773
Captcha Patent Is an All-American Nightmare
A newly formed patent troll is looking for big money from small business websites, just for using free, off-the-shelf login verification tools. Defenders of the American Dream, LLC (DAD ), is sending out its demand letters to websites that use Google’s reCAPTCHA system, accusing them of infringing...
1774
Apple's plan to “think different” about encryption opens a backdoor to your life
Apple has announced impending changes to its operating systems that include new “protections for children” features in iCloud and iMessage. If you’ve spent any time following the Crypto Wars, you know what this means: Apple is planning to build a backdoor into its data storage system and its messaging system.
1775
Mirror, Mirror 2021: Reflecting Poorly
The United States trails far behind other high-income countries on measures of health care affordability, administrative efficiency, equity, and outcomes.
1776
Mozilla Common Voice Adds 16 New Languages and 4,600 New Hours of Speech
The Mozilla Common Voice initiative has released a new, expanded data set featuring 16 new languages — like Basaa and Kazakh — and 4,622 new hours of sp…
1777
Facebook’s claims about the Ad Observer are wrong
Recently the Surgeon General of the United States weighed in on the spread of disinformation on major platforms and its effects on people and society. He e
1778
1779
1780
1781
1782
Vaccines and our return to office plans
An update on Google’s return to office plans, including vaccine requirements and extending voluntary work from home.
1783
A critique of Safari's influence on the web
There's been a lot of discussion recently about how "Safari is the new IE" (1, 2, 3, 4, 5). I don't want to rehash the basics of that, but I have seen some...
1784
It’s not a self-driving car unless you can sleep in it
GROUND TRUTH is an inside look at the development and deployment of self-driving technology, from the simulation labs to city streets.
1785
United States - CO₂ and Greenhouse Gas Emissions Country Profile
Data on the United States’ greenhouse gas emissions
1786
Strengthening our workplace with neurodiverse talent
Google Cloud launches a career program for people with autism designed to hire and support more talented people with autism in the rapidly growing cloud industry.
1787
Americans' life ratings reach record high
An estimated 59.2% of U.S. adults rate their lives well enough to be categorized as "thriving" exceeding the previous record-high estimate of 57.3% from 2017.
1788
Are Recipes and Cookbooks Protected by Copyright
Are Recipes and Cookbooks Protected by Copyright? Our experts at Copyright Alliance answer this frequently asked question in this week's blog post.
1789
Latest Data on COVID-19 Vaccinations by Race/Ethnicity
KFF is collecting and analyzing data on COVID-19 vaccinations by race/ethnicity to gain increased insight who is receiving the vaccine and whether some groups are facing disparities in vaccination.
1790
Reflections as the Internet Archive turns 25
A Library of Everything As a young man, I wanted to help make a new medium that would be a step forward from Gutenberg's invention hundreds of years before. By building a Library of Everything in the digital age, I thought the opportunity was not just to make it available to everybody in the world,
1791
1792
MAPS Celebrates California Senate Passage of Psychedelic Reform Bill
Fifty years after the War on Drugs was officially declared and psychedelic substance prohibition began in contravention of evidence supporting therapeutic use, the California State Senate has taken the first Legislative step to dismantle psychedelic prohibition with a 21-16 vote on June 1, 2021, in favor of Senate…
1793
Baltimore Museum of Art will host an exhibition curated by the museum's guards
In March 2022, the Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) will present Guarding the Art, an exhibition curated entirely by 17 members of the museum’s security team.
1794
Word gap: When money’s tight, parents talk less to kids
Tackling income inequality could boost low-income children's vocabulary, study suggests
1795
Right or left, you should be worried about big tech censorship
Claiming that “right-wing voices are being censored,” Republican-led legislatures in Florida and Texas have introduced legislation to “end Big Tech censorship.” They’re right. Conservatives are being censored. But it’s not just conservatives who have their political speech blocked by social media giants.
1796
Don’t Let Police Arm Autonomous or Remote-Controlled Robots and Drones
Whether controlled by an artificial intelligence or a remote human operator, armed police robots and drones pose an unacceptable threat to civilians. The ongoing revolution in the field of robotics requires us to act now to prevent a new era of police violence.
1797
Deforestation and Forest Loss
Explore long-term changes in deforestation and deforestation rates across the world today.
1798
A Solarpunk Manifesto
Solarpunk, Permaculture, Sociocracy
1799
Hooking Candiru: Another mercenary spyware vendor comes into focus
Candiru is a secretive Israel-based company that sells spyware exclusively to governments. Using Internet scanning, we identified more than 750 websites linked to Candiru’s spyware infrastructure. We found many domains masquerading as advocacy organizations such as Amnesty International, the Black Lives Matter…
1800
Status, Wealth, & Power: Network Effects Demand a New Social Contract
We are the ones creating these massive network effect businesses. So it's up to us to write new social contracts for the people who use them.