Winding Down
An idiosyncratic look at, and comment on, the week's net, technology, science and other news
by Alan Lenton
10 July 2022
OK – we’ve got loads of stuff for you this week. Essays on the Russian oil industry, the January 6th attack on the US Capitol, then we take a look at Windows 11 (or lack of it), the downside of Right to Repair, anti-satellite weapons, and a billion police records leaked in China. A quick look at Elon Musk’s attempt to get out of Twitter free, and a great idea on the issue of pedestrians is under testing in London.
We have no less that three lots of pictures: Mardi Gras in 1898, astronomy, and rail freight wagons and engines.
The quote this week is from Oscar Wilde (a very quotable man!).
And the scanner section includes URLs pointing to material on WWII deception, Azure capacity issues, Marriot Hotels data breach (again), an interesting Apple security feature, a CERN Dashboard, the consequences of taking too much vitamin D, and finally a note for Londoners.
Enjoy!
Alan Lenton
Publishing schedule: Next issue 17 July
Credits: Thanks to Fi Craig for drawing my attention to material for Winding Down and for editing it for spelling, grammer, etc.
Essays:
Two essays for you to find something new.
The first is a fascinating essay on Russia’s oil industry and reserves. Starting from the two indisputable facts that oil prices have fallen from their March high, and Russian production is still much higher than the original forecasts at the time when sanctions started to be introduced. What is happening, in fact is that the slack is being taken up by countries like China and India, who weren’t previous using a lot of Russian oil.
Starting from this basis the essay looks at what the future is likely to hold for the Russian oil industry.
https://theconversation.com/russias-oil-is-in-long-term-decline-and-the-war-has-only-added-to-the-problem-186167
The second essay is a discussion of what ‘insurrection’ is, in the light of the January 6th assault on the US Capitol. The topic is generating a lot of arguments at the moment as the House select committee continues its hearings on the events.
The article is also a revelation about just how well tooled up the attackers were. It’s well worth a read.
https://www.lawfareblog.com/guns-insurrections-and-magnetometers-sidelight-cassidy-hutchinsons-testimony
Computing:
Ah! Yes! And the saga of Windows 11 continues. According to the figures reported by advertising company AdDuplex, Windows 11 is now at 23.1% of the PC market. Windows 10, on the other hand, now has 62.1% of the market. That’s not really very good – it seems like a lot of people are happy with Windows 10 – or at least prefer the beast they know to the one they don’t.
What I’d love to know is how many of those Windows 10 people, like me, have Windows 11 uploaded onto their PCs, but are refusing it permission to install itself? (No, I didn’t give it permission to upload itself to my machine – it snuck in one night while I wasn’t looking.)
Incidentally, this AdDuplex survey is the most favourable to Windows 11 – others put its use behind that of Windows 7!
https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/01/windows_11_adduplex/
Right to Repair:
The Right to Repair – it’s a great idea – or is it? Well, I thought it was, at least until I read an article about the right to repair medical equipment. I remember the one time I was in an MRI machine. It was freaky enough without having to wonder if it had recently been repaired by the local handyman.
It’s not as simple as it seems, and, just to make it even more complicated, the lawyers have now got their snouts into the trough. Take a look at the URL for a fuller briefing on the issue.
https://thehill.com/opinion/healthcare/560741-the-major-health-care-and-cybersecurity-risk-of-right-to-repair-laws/
Satellites:
Hmmm... We seem to have had a run on anti-satellite weapon news recently, for instance...
In May a paper surfaced at the Beijing Institute of Tracking and Telecommunications suggesting that China needed to start developing the military capacity to take out some, or all, of Musk’s 2,400 Starlink satellites (yes – that’s how many there are in orbit at the moment). Then in June a US think tank, the Secure World Foundation, produced a paper on how useful the Starlink satellites have, and are being, in the Russia-Ukraine war. From that it was but a short step to suggest that ‘counter-space’ facilities might well be in order for the US armed forces.
And finally, a few days ago, there was a report in space.com about a suspected Russian anti-satellite weapon in the country’s far south-west.
If this stuff, and similar elsewhere, ever gets used at least it will be a one-off situation, because low Earth orbit will be so chock full of debris that it will be unusable for years!
https://www.theregister.com/2022/05/25/beijing_starlink_takedown/
https://www.theregister.com/2022/06/02/anti_satellite_weapons/
https://www.space.com/russia-anti-satellite-laser-facility-satellite-photos
Security:
Well we now have a glimpse of what the future will be like if we don’t protect democratic rights over the coming years. There has been a leak of one billion (yes, billion) records from a Shanghai, China, police database. The database contains around a quarter of a million individual records from between 1995 and 2019, including names, addresses, phone numbers, identity numbers, sex, as well as the reason for why the police were called out.
Very frightening stuff – read the article, it’s an important lesson about what could happen here...
https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/07/china-leak-police-database/
Social Media:
Well after all the hoo-ha and shilly-shallying Elon Musk really does seem to be trying to bail out of his commitment to buy Twitter – something which I for one am happy about. I only started using it recently, and rather like it, even though I only read it at the moment.
Going back to Musk, I don’t think he is going to get out easily or cheaply. Too much is at stake.
https://www.theverge.com/2022/7/8/23200961/elon-musk-files-back-out-twitter-deal-breach-of-contract
and this is a copy of his court filing claiming Twitter is at fault.
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1418091/000110465922078413/tm2220599d1_ex99-p.htm
Transport:
Now this is one of the best ideas I’ve seen for a long time, though car owners might not agree! It’s the (at the moment testing the waters, so to speak) idea that traffic lights should prioritize humans over cars! YES! It is being tested out on 18 sets of lights throughout London. Basically, instead of the pedestrian light being red until a pedestrian pushes the button, it is green until a vehicle is detected.
A brilliant idea, and much safer because pedestrians won’t be so tempted to nip across the road while the pedestrian light is red, because they don’t think a vehicle is coming!
https://boingboing.net/2022/07/08/london-is-testing-out-traffic-lights-that-prioritize-humans-over-cars.html
Pictures:
Lots of pictures this week – and all from the Smithsonian Magazine.
First the oldest known picture of a New Orleans Mardi Gras parade – from 1898
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/oldest-footage-of-a-new-orleans-mardis-gras-has-been-found-180980308/
Next a very classy set of pictures from the Smithsonian’s Astronomy Photographer of the Year Contest
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/view-galaxies-and-beyond-in-the-astronomy-photographer-of-the-years-shortlisted-images-180980371/
And finally for the train spotters among my readers a selection of pictures of freight wagons and locomotives!
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/photographs-capture-indescribable-glory-trains-180980326/
Quotes:
I thought this quote was worth remembering this summer as we negotiate the politics of the world:
“The truth is rarely pure, and never simple.”
Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) – ‘The Importance of Being Earnest”
Scanner:
How the ghost army of WWII used art to deceive the Nazis
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/how-the-ghost-army-of-wwii-used-art-to-deceive-the-nazis-180980336/
If you liked the above story, you might like to get hold of the book ‘The War Magician’ by David Fisher
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1406189.The_War_Magician
Supply chain blamed amid claims of Azure capacity issues
https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/04/azure_capacity_issues/
Marriott Hotels admits to third data breach in 4 years
https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/06/marriott_hotels_suffer_yet_another/
Apple’s latest security feature could literally save lives
https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/06/apple_lockdown_mode/
CERN Large Hadron Collider Live Dashboard
*** Note that this is not an official CERN thing – but it is great! ***
http://meltronx.com/
Man Vomits For Months After Taking Vitamin D at Almost 400x Daily Recommended Dose
https://www.sciencealert.com/man-overdoses-vomits-for-months-after-taking-almost-400x-recommended-vitamin-d-dose
This one is mainly for Londoners given the aggro we are currently getting from the government...
Opinion: It’s time to stop arguing about funding London’s transport
https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/articles/opinion-its-time-to-stop-arguing-about-funding-londons-transport-55473/
Footnote:
Please send suggestions for stories to alan@ibgames.com and include the words Winding Down in the subject line, unless you want your deathless prose gobbled up by my voracious Thunderbird spam filter...
Alan Lenton
alan@ibgames.com
10 July 2022
Alan Lenton is a retired on-line games designer, programmer and sociologist (among other things), the order of which depends on what he is currently working on! His web site is at http://www.ibgames.net/alan/index.html.
Past issues of Winding Down can be found at http://www.ibgames.net/alan/winding/index.html.
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