Non-IT News Thread
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China warns Hong Kong protesters not to 'play with fire'
China has issued a strong warning to Hong Kong's protesters, saying their attempts "to play with fire will only backfire".
A spokesman for China's top policy office on Hong Kong told protesters not to "underestimate the firm resolve [of] the central government".
Hong Kong has seen nine consecutive weeks of anti-government protests.
On Monday, a call for a general strike caused severe disruption, and more than 200 flights were cancelled.
Protesters want an independent inquiry into alleged police brutality, the complete withdrawal of a controversial extradition bill, and the resignation of Hong Kong's leader Carrie Lam. -
US imposes sweeping sanctions on Venezuelan government
President Donald Trump has imposed sweeping sanctions on the Venezuelan government, freezing its assets in the US and barring transactions with it.
This measure is expected to be far more damaging for Venezuela's socialist government than previous sanctions. The move is the latest aimed at increasing pressure on President Nicolás Maduro to step down. The US is one of more than 50 nations that do not recognise Mr Maduro as Venezuela's legitimate president. It has instead given its backing to the head of the National Assembly, Juan Guaidó, who declared himself president in January. -
Brexit: EU 'refusing to negotiate', says Gove
Cabinet minister Michael Gove says the EU "seem to be refusing to negotiate with the UK" over a new Brexit deal.
Mr Gove, who is responsible for no-deal planning, said he was "deeply saddened" that Brussels was, in his words, saying "no, we don't want to talk". It comes after the EU said UK demands to remove the Irish backstop from Theresa May's deal were unacceptable. Irish PM Leo Varadkar has reiterated that the withdrawal deal, including the backstop, cannot be renegotiated.The European Commission said it was willing to hold further talks, "should the UK wish to clarify its position". Meanwhile, a group of politicians has started a legal action aimed at preventing Boris Johnson shutting down Parliament to force through a no-deal Brexit. -
@mlnews lol, as if the EU hadn't stated outright that the negotiations were over and absolutely no way would electing a new PM re-open negotiations. Gove is a moron.
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https://app.stardust.co/news/5898ee02-9429-43eb-9ad4-908c43c025b0
Disney announces Disney+, Hulu & ESPN+ bundle for $12.99 per-month
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@black3dynamite said in Non-IT News Thread:
https://app.stardust.co/news/5898ee02-9429-43eb-9ad4-908c43c025b0
Disney announces Disney+, Hulu & ESPN+ bundle for $12.99 per-month
ESPN+ in that is going to make it a huge upsell.
Hulu basic sucks big ass donkey balls. Wonder what the upcharge will be to have no ads.
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@JaredBusch said in Non-IT News Thread:
@black3dynamite said in Non-IT News Thread:
https://app.stardust.co/news/5898ee02-9429-43eb-9ad4-908c43c025b0
Disney announces Disney+, Hulu & ESPN+ bundle for $12.99 per-month
ESPN+ in that is going to make it a huge upsell.
Hulu basic sucks big ass donkey balls. Wonder what the upcharge will be to have no ads.
Yup.
We'll be getting Disney+ as soon as it's available in the US. VPN ftw.
Between Disney and Netflix, we'll be set. Buy a year up front and it's basically nothing. ESPN would be nice, but no time for sports, so no loss there I guess.
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British Airways passengers facing delays after IT failures
Holidaymakers travelling with British Airways are facing delays and problems checking in online after an IT glitch.At least 81 flights have been cancelled at Heathrow Airport, with 10 cancelled at Gatwick Airport. More than 200 other flights have been delayed.
BA said it is reverting to manual systems for check-in at airports.
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@hobbit666 said in Non-IT News Thread:
British Airways passengers facing delays after IT failures
Holidaymakers travelling with British Airways are facing delays and problems checking in online after an IT glitch.At least 81 flights have been cancelled at Heathrow Airport, with 10 cancelled at Gatwick Airport. More than 200 other flights have been delayed.
BA said it is reverting to manual systems for check-in at airports.
Didn't they just have a major failure like this, too?
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@JaredBusch said in Non-IT News Thread:
@black3dynamite said in Non-IT News Thread:
https://app.stardust.co/news/5898ee02-9429-43eb-9ad4-908c43c025b0
Disney announces Disney+, Hulu & ESPN+ bundle for $12.99 per-month
ESPN+ in that is going to make it a huge upsell.
Hulu basic sucks big ass donkey balls. Wonder what the upcharge will be to have no ads.
I'm guessing the normal upcharge you see on Hulu now from $5.99 to $12.99, so the new bundle price will likely be $19.99.
Toss in Neflix for $15.99 (4K plan)
Plex $5total - $40.98, compared to cable at $100+, not bad
I could toss Amazon Prime in here as well, but I have it more for shipping than for TV.
Amazon Prime - $10new total $50.98
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@Dashrender said in Non-IT News Thread:
@JaredBusch said in Non-IT News Thread:
@black3dynamite said in Non-IT News Thread:
https://app.stardust.co/news/5898ee02-9429-43eb-9ad4-908c43c025b0
Disney announces Disney+, Hulu & ESPN+ bundle for $12.99 per-month
ESPN+ in that is going to make it a huge upsell.
Hulu basic sucks big ass donkey balls. Wonder what the upcharge will be to have no ads.
I'm guessing the normal upcharge you see on Hulu now from $5.99 to $12.99, so the new bundle price will likely be $19.99.
Toss in Neflix for $15.99 (4K plan)
Plex $5total - $40.98, compared to cable at $100+, not bad
I could toss Amazon Prime in here as well, but I have it more for shipping than for TV.
Amazon Prime - $10new total $50.98
And that's for way more content and paying to not have ads, which for $100 on cable has ads. So half the price, for much more. If you are like me and put up with the ads, and actively find it more valuable to not have some things like sports, it's more like $20 and way better value.
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Cisco Webex Gains Voice Assistant Tech Through Voicea Acquisition
Voicea's smart meeting and conferencing assistant "EVA" will soon be a part of Cisco's Webex offerings, bringing real-time voice transcription and voice analytics to your meetings.
Cisco Webex yesterday announced its intent to acquire Voicea, the company that created the Enterprise Voice Assistant (EVA). Designed for meetings and conferences, EVA can listen in on a meeting or call, take notes, and set reminders so that participants can spend less energy on note taking and more on concentrating on the discussion. EVA can also track meeting assignments and produce actionable results from spoken meeting notes. The acquisition is expected to close in the first quarter of Cisco's fiscal year 2020, subject to customary closing conditions and required regulatory approvals.
Bringing Voicea's artificial intelligence (AI), real-time transcription, and advanced automatic speech recognition (ASR) to Cisco Webex will mark one the biggest adoptions of voice assistant technology in the enterprise space. According to Cisco Webex, more than 150 million people use Webex each month, with more than 360 million meetings happening on Webex yearly. -
@mlnews said in Non-IT News Thread:
Cisco Webex Gains Voice Assistant Tech Through Voicea Acquisition
But still requires 20 digits to dial in, and has zero options to work on Linux or MacOS. Least professional conferencing crap ever.
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Ancient parrot in New Zealand was 1m tall, study says
A giant parrot that roamed New Zealand about 19 million years ago had a height of 1m (3ft 2in) - roughly half the average height of a human, a new study has found.
The remains of the parrot were found near St Bathans in New Zealand's southern Otago region. Given its size, the parrot is believed to have been flightless and carnivorous, unlike most birds today. A study of the bird was published on Tuesday in the journal Biology Letters. Weighing just over one stone (7kg), the bird would have been two times heavier than the kākāpo, previously the largest known parrot. "There are no other giant parrots in the world," Professor Trevor Worthy, a palaeontologist at Flinders University in Australia and lead author of the study, told the BBC. "Finding one is very significant." -
@mlnews when that parrots asks for a cracker, you give it the damn cracker.
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@scottalanmiller said in Non-IT News Thread:
@Dashrender said in Non-IT News Thread:
@JaredBusch said in Non-IT News Thread:
@black3dynamite said in Non-IT News Thread:
https://app.stardust.co/news/5898ee02-9429-43eb-9ad4-908c43c025b0
Disney announces Disney+, Hulu & ESPN+ bundle for $12.99 per-month
ESPN+ in that is going to make it a huge upsell.
Hulu basic sucks big ass donkey balls. Wonder what the upcharge will be to have no ads.
I'm guessing the normal upcharge you see on Hulu now from $5.99 to $12.99, so the new bundle price will likely be $19.99.
Toss in Neflix for $15.99 (4K plan)
Plex $5total - $40.98, compared to cable at $100+, not bad
I could toss Amazon Prime in here as well, but I have it more for shipping than for TV.
Amazon Prime - $10new total $50.98
And that's for way more content and paying to not have ads, which for $100 on cable has ads. So half the price, for much more. If you are like me and put up with the ads, and actively find it more valuable to not have some things like sports, it's more like $20 and way better value.
Ditching ESPN and bringing back ads would lower the cost by $12.99, not $30
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@scottalanmiller Well maybe a whole package of crackers.
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Pakistan downgrades ties with India in Kashmir row
The row between India and Pakistan over the disputed territory of Kashmir has deepened, after Pakistan said it was expelling India's top diplomat and suspending trade.
Indian-administered Kashmir has been on lockdown since the Indian government decided on Monday to strip the region of its special constitutional status. Telephone networks and the internet were cut off on Sunday evening. Tens of thousands of troops have been patrolling the streets. The Himalayan region of Kashmir is claimed in its entirety by both India and Pakistan, but they each control only parts of it. Instances of protest and stone-throwing have been reported despite the communications blackout and a curfew. Local leaders have also been detained. -
President Trump visits mass shooting sites amid criticism
US President Donald Trump has visited Dayton, Ohio, at the start of a trip to the sites of two mass shootings at the weekend which left 31 people dead.
He is now on his way to El Paso, Texas, where Hispanic people were targeted in an apparent hate crime. Earlier, Mr Trump said he was concerned about "the rise of any group of hate... whether it's white supremacy" or any "other kind of supremacy". But he himself has been accused of stoking hatred against Hispanic people. The Democratic congresswoman who represents El Paso, Veronica Escobar, is refusing to meet him, saying his "racist and hateful words & actions" had caused pain to her community and her country. -
