New invention: the phone booth!

T-Mobile installs phone-charging purple booths on city streets
by Linda Hardesty | Mar 29, 2019 12:41pm

Every Phone BoothE comes with power for smartphone charging along with a compatible cord. And the booth features a large vertical screen that connects to the customer’s T-Mobile smartphone to use with video calls or just to enjoy a big screen for better internet browsing. The large screen can also be set as a background for customers to take selfies.

The booth offers a quiet, temperature-controlled space complete with walls and windows. If they could fit a couch in the booth, people may never leave.

Phone BoothE is reserved just for T-Mobile customers, who can unlock the booths with a smartphone app. They can download the T-Mobile Phone BoothE App from the App Store or Google Play (coming soon). They can also use the app to find and reserve a BoothE nearest them.

It's about time. Ever since the demise of public phone booths, we've needed a way to make a private call without renting office space.

Of course, now T-Mobile is going to have to deal with the problems that AT&T had with the classic phone booths - of homeless people living in them, drug addicts shooting up in them, etc. But maybe they have a solution in place for all this.

Update: It appears that the "Phone BoothE" was an April 1st joke, even though they announced it on March 29th. It still sounds like a good idea, though.

Dry Bones: No big deal

DryBonesBlog. March 27, 2019

Hamas Rockets From Gaza Hit Israel ...again!!

Sadly, this seems to be the absolute truth. Terrorists can bomb Israel and nobody cares, but if Israel fires even one bullet in retaliation, then they are condemned by the entire world.

You would think that after 60 years of this, Israel would stop caring what the world thinks. If everything you do makes the world hate you, then why should you even listen to them?

The Verge: An exclusive look at an original iPhone prototype

An exclusive look at an original iPhone prototype
Apple's red iPhone M68 in all its glory
By Tom Warren | @tomwarren | Mar 19, 2019, 9:00am EDT

Apple had developed the iPhone in secret over those two and a half years, and for many inside the company, the device had only been known by the codenames “M68” and “Purple 2.” Apple was focused on surprising everyone with the iPhone, and that meant that many of the engineers working on the original handset didn’t even know what it would eventually look like.

To achieve that level of secrecy, Apple created special prototype development boards that contained nearly all of the iPhone’s parts, spread out across a large circuit board. The Verge has obtained exclusive access to the original iPhone M68 prototype board from 2006 / 2007, thanks to Red M Sixty, a source that asked to remain anonymous. It’s the first time this board has been pictured publicly, and it provides a rare historical look at an important part of computing history, showing how Apple developed the original iPhone.

Awesome bit of history.

Get well soon, Yaakov Kirschen

Yaakov Kirschen, author of the famous Dry Bones comic has been sick with pneumonia for over a week. Please include him in your prayers for a speedy recovery.

Washington Free Beacon: California Gov. to Go Against Voters, Institute Death Penalty Moratorium

California Gov. to Go Against Voters, Institute Death Penalty Moratorium
By: Charles Fain Lehman, March 13, 2019 11:37 am

California Governor Gavin Newsom (D., Calif.) will on Wednesday announce a moratorium on his state's death penalty, placing an indefinite pause on executions on the largest death row in the United States.

... "The intentional killing of another person is wrong. And as governor, I will not oversee the execution of any individual," Newsom is expected to say.

... In 2016, California voters approved a ballot measure to fix the state's death penalty system, limiting the length of death penalty appeals to five years after conviction. That same year, they voted by a wider margin against a ballot measure to abolish the death penalty in the state altogether. Newsom's moratorium will therefore fly in the face of the most recent expression of the views of the people of California.

Come and see the Democrats' total lack of principles. In addition to flat-out defying the wishes of his constituency, Newsom shows a total disregard for humanity.

He says that it is wrong to kill another person. But he clearly doesn't believe what he said.

He and his party have no problem killing the unborn (abortion), the just-born (late-term abortions and children who survive botched abortions), the elderly and the terminally ill (demanding only palliative care and by supporting assisted suicide).

It would seem that the only class of person Newsom and the Democrats don't want to see killed are convicted serial killers.

There's an old saying: If you are kind to the cruel, then you are being cruel to the kind. And Mr. Newsom is a perfect example.

Gizmodo: Goodbye Big Five

Goodbye Big Five
Kashmir Hill

Reporter Kashmir Hill spent six weeks blocking Amazon, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, and Apple from getting her money, data, and attention, using a custom-built VPN. Here’s what happened.

A great series of articles illustrating very succinctly why it is pretty much impossible to completely avoid the "big five" Internet companies unless you want to disconnect from civilization altogether.

Washington Free Beacon: Study: Crackdown on Prescriptions Drove up Hep. C Infections

Study: Crackdown on Prescriptions Drove up Hep. C Infections
BY: Charles Fain Lehman. February 21, 2019 5:00 am

A key decision made to curb the opioid crisis not only made that situation worse, but also caused a surge in deadly hepatitis C infections, a new paper argues.
...
Prior to reformulation, OxyContin was extremely popular in illicit markets because its timed release mechanism meant that it contained large quantities of oxycodone—substantially more than "all-at-once" pills. Users would crush the pill and extract the oxy within, getting a longer lasting and more potent high.

Amid a nationwide crackdown on prescription opioids under the Obama administration, the Food and Drug Administration gave Purdue permission to reformulate its flagship drug. The new version gelled up on crushing, leaving it useless. This, regulators thought, would help slow the increase in deaths then attributed to OxyContin.

Instead, users began switching from pills to injected heroin, with all of the dangers that entails. That includes infection with hepatitis C, which can be transferred by sharing improperly sanitized needles.

Never underestimate the law of unintended consequences.

And don't assume that an addict is going to quit just because you made his favorite drug impossible to get. They're quite likely to switch to something else, and in this case, that something else was more dangerous than what they were forced off of.

AppleInsider: Huawei cloning Apple parts, rewarding employees for tech theft

Huawei cloning Apple parts, rewarding employees for tech theft
By Roger Fingas. Monday, February 18, 2019, 07:27 am PT (10:27 am ET)

In November, a Huawei engineer heading up smartwatch development tracked down a supplier that helps build the Apple Watch's heart rate sensor, The Information said. The person arranged a meeting with the claim he could offer a manufacturing contract, but instead probed for details about the Apple Watch, an anonymous executive at the supplier said.

The engineer was accompanied by four researchers, and together the group is said to have spent an hour and a half asking about the Watch. With nothing given Huawei went silent.

Huawei has reportedly used similar tactics against companies like Cisco, Motorola, and Akhan Semiconductor. The U.S. Justice Department in fact claims that Huawei has a program that rewards employees for stealing data, with better bonuses based on how confidential information is.

This should come as no surprise, given the fact that the Chinese government has been stealing military and technology secrets for decades. And an important reason why nobody should buy Huawei equipment. Getting something for a low price should not be enough justification to reward theft.

YouTube: Imam Tawhidi speaks from Auschwitz

Imam Tawhidi speaks from Auschwitz
Australian Jewish Association, Feb 3, 2019

Have you ever seen an Imam condemn antisemitism from Auschwitz?

WATCH 2 min video.

He also has a message for America where Democrats have recently elected two highly anti-Israel and antisemitic Islamist representatives.

"The US Congress should be focusing on serving US citizens. It should not be a platform for Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar to promote hatred against the Jewish people. My message from Auschwitz!"

I wonder if any mainstream media outlet will run this video.

A transcript of the video, in case it should become unavailable in the future:

Can't Unsee: UI design game

Can't Unsee is a game where you are presented with two different sample screens from iOS-like applications and must choose which one is correct and which one has design flaws.

Things like alignment of objects, shapes, colors, layout, etc. They start out simple, but get much harder as you go on.

h/t to Daring Fireball.