Space Photonics Opportunities Abound As NASA Renews Moon And Planetary Exploration Market to Witness over XX% Growth ‘in Revenue During the COVID-19…

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Report Highlights

The recent ramp-up by NASA as it revitalizes its commitment to the Moon, Mars and other planetary exploration is providing new opportunities for companies involved in optics and photonics. This report examines the new technical challenges in space photonics and optics, and the spillover to manufactured products, which is both exciting and well recognized.

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Reports Includes:

An overview ofspace photonics opportunities at NASAfor revitalizing Moon, Mars and other planetary exploration initiatives Coverage of pre-Artemis Moon scientific missions and photonics Comparative study on space-made vs. earth-made optical fibres Knowledge about Lunar Crater Observing and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS), the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) and the Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE).

Summary

The recent ramp-up by NASA as it revitalizes its commitment to the Moon, Mars and other planetary exploration initiatives is providing new opportunities for companies involved in optics and photonics. Astronomy and optics go all the way back to Galileos telescope, and instruments including the spectrometer date back to the first days of the NASA space program.

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The potential spin-off effects of these activities are the stuff of marketing dreams. Who among us is not delighted by the transition from room-sized valve driven mainframe computers to semiconductors? Or memory foam mattresses, infrared thermometers, freeze dried ice cream, solar cells, Bowflex exercising and water filtration recycling systems? In optics, the tracking system for LASIK eye surgery owes a debt to velocity and range imaging LADAR first used for docking spacecraft.

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Unlike the outcomes of the programs leading to the first Moon mission, Mercury-Gemini-Apollo, the program here is far longer lasting and the scope is far greater. NASAs intent is not just to land on the Moon, but to develop the Moon as a launching pad where water and rocket fuelamong other things can be mined indigenously, and space exploration to Mars and beyond can occur.

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Space Photonics Opportunities Abound As NASA Renews Moon And Planetary Exploration Market to Witness over XX% Growth 'in Revenue During the COVID-19...

EAEU countries mull over joint space project – Kazinform

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MOSCOW. KAZINFORM The Council of the Eurasian Economic Commission (EEC) has approved the first cooperation project of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) countries in the provision of space and geoinformation services based on remote sensing data - an interstate program, which will be a pilot one for the EAEU member states, BelTA learned from the press service of the EEC.

The implementation of the program will begin after its approval by the Eurasian Intergovernmental Council, which meeting is scheduled for 17 July, BelTA reports.

After the EAEU presidents gave the relevant instructions, representatives of space agencies and leading manufacturers of space technology embarked on the joint work to develop the interstate program. A high-quality documents with great prospects has been developed, said Artak Kamalyan, Member of the Board Minister in charge of Industry and Agriculture of the Eurasian Economic Commission.

Earth remote sensing technologies from space are a highly precise and operational tool for studying our planet, which helps to effectively manage its resources. Today's technologies offer unique solutions to improve the efficiency of exploration and production of mineral resources, to introduce the latest best practices in agriculture, to prevent and mitigate emergency situations, to protect the environment and control climate change. Approximately 80% of the information used to make weather forecasts comes from space. A total of about 500 remote sensing satellites are in Earth orbit. Very soon they may be joined by the Eurasian ones, representatives of the EEC said.

The interstate program is set to be implemented in 2021-2025. For this purpose, the EAEU countries and the EEC will have to go through three stages together. The first stage is to unite the existing and prospective satellite constellations of the EAEU countries. As a result, the coverage area of the observed zone will be significantly increased, and the necessary information will be transmitted to users more quickly. Accordingly, the competitiveness of the united satellite resources in the global space market will increase.

At the second stage the EAEU countries will develop a unified information portal - a database of united space imagery data. They will also upgrade national ground-based data reception and processing complexes. This will considerably improve the quality of geo-information services provided to users in various sectors of the EAEU economy.

The final stage of the interstate program will be the development of a promising joint space system for remote sensing of the allied countries on the basis of medium- and high-resolution spacecraft, the development and production of which will be carried out in cooperation with enterprises of the member states. The characteristics of the prospective joint spacecraft will correspond to the quality of the best world models, and will exceed them in some respects.

The interstate program will help effectively use the advantages of the common economic space, to unite industrial, scientific, technical and marketing capabilities of the EAEU countries, to involve all the EAEU states, including Armenia and Kyrgyzstan that do not possess spacecrafts, in the work on the project and as a result to get a much bigger overall result, available to all the participants of the interstate program, the EEC said.

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EAEU countries mull over joint space project - Kazinform

NASA Perseverance rover’s search for life on Mars: What you need to know – CNET

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The Perseverance rover on Mars as imagined by an artist.

NASA's Perseverance rover hopes to answer our biggest burning question about Mars history: Did the red planet once host life?

The dry, dusty Mars we know today was very different in the deep past. Humanity's latest rover is making a beeline for an area of Mars that was once home to a lake, a perfect place to look for signs of ancient microbes.

Since Sojourner in 1997, NASA has sent a succession of increasingly sophisticated wheeled explorers to Mars. Perseverance is the latest and greatest and in July 2020, it launches on an epic journey across space.

From the cosmos to your inbox. Get the latest space stories from CNET every week.

Perseverance will do much more than snap amazing images of Mars. These are some of the key mission objectives:

The mission is planned to last for at least one Mars year, which works out to about 687 days on Earth (it takes longer for Mars to go around the sun). However, NASA has a good track record with extending its robotic Mars missions. We can look to the long-lived Opportunity and Curiosity rovers as role models for this.

Now playing: Watch this: Meet the Mars 2020 rover launching this year

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After a series of delays, Perseverance is now targeted to launch no earlier than July 30. NASA has nudged the event back several times from the original July 17 date. The delays are not yet an issue since the open period for launch stretches until Aug. 15. NASA will livestream the rover's sendoff.

When: July 30Where: Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, FloridaRocket: United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V

The window is important. "Owing to the relative positions of Earth and Mars to each other, launch opportunities come up only every 26 months," said NASA in a June 2020 release. Missing this window would mean NASA would have to wait until September 2022 for its next shot. The space agency will do everything possible to make sure Perseverance takes off on time.

NASA performed extensive tests of the parachute system that will lower Perseverance to Mars.

As long as the rover launches sometime within the designated time period, it will have the same arrival date: Feb. 18, 2021. The landing process will include some of the most harrowing minutes of the entire mission.

Perseverance will get to try out a new method that NASA hopes will deliver it as close to its targeted landing site as possible. NASA calls this the "Range Trigger" technique and it's all about deploying the parachutes at exactly the right time.

"If the spacecraft were going to overshoot the landing target, the parachute would be deployed earlier," said NASA. "If it were going to fall short of the target, the parachute would be deployed later, after the spacecraft flew a little closer to its target."

Earth observers can look forward to an unprecedented view of the entry, descent and landing process. The mission is equipped with cameras and a microphone to capture all of the excitement and stress as NASA attempts to land Perseverance gently onto the surface of Mars.

This Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter image shows the Jezero Crater delta region.

Jezero Crater is located just north of Mars' equator and was once home to a river delta. That history of water makes it a prime spot to look for signs of past microbial life. Sounds like the perfect landing site for a science laboratory on wheels.

"The landing site in Jezero Crater offers geologically rich terrain, with landforms reaching as far back as 3.6 billion-years-old, that could potentially answer important questions in planetary evolution and astrobiology,"said NASA's Thomas Zurbuchenwhen the site was announced in 2018.

The car-sized Perseverance rover looks fairly similar to its predecessor, Curiosity, but also represents quite a few technology advances since Curiosity was designed. Here are the numbers:

Length: 10 feet (3 meters)Weight: 2,260 pounds (1,025 kilograms)Wheels: Six aluminum wheels with titanium spokesTop speed: Just under 0.1-miles per hour (152 meters per hour)

The Perseverance rover is stocked with instruments that it will use to investigate the Jezero Crater on Mars.

Perseverance is loaded with seven instruments chosen to help it achieve its mission objectives. You can get the full rundown from NASA, but here are some highlights:

Mastcam-Z: The camera system mounted on the rover's mast is equivalent to eyes on a head. According to NASA, its main job is "to take high-definition video, panoramic color and 3D images of the Martian surface and features in the atmosphere with a zoom lens to magnify distant targets." The mastcam will be our main viewing window onto the Jezero Crater.

MOXIE: The Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment is one of the ways Perseverance is helping to prepare humans to go to Mars. This instrument is designed to make oxygen from the carbon-dioxide atmosphere. This capability will be necessary to help future human explorers breathe, but it would also help us make propellant for rockets right on site. That's a necessary step for bringing our Mars astronauts back to Earth after their missions.

SuperCam: When you put a camera, laser and spectrometers together, you get SuperCam, an instrument that will help look for organic compounds, a key part of the quest for signs of past microbial life. "It can identify the chemical and mineral makeup of targets as small as a pencil point from a distance of more than 20 feet (7 meters)," said NASA.

Sherloc: The "Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals" or Sherloc, as the instrument is affectionately known, will search for signs of life on the red planet. The instrument and its companion camera (nicknamed Watson) are capable of taking microscopic images of Mars and analyzing them. Equipped with a laser it can fire at the surface, Sherloc is able to measure chemicals present in the soil and rock using a technique known as spectroscopy.

The NASA Mars helicopter team attaches a piece to the flight model in early 2019.

"Let's send a helicopter to Mars" might sound a little far-fetched, but NASA is doing it anyway. Ingenuity, a small helicopter designed to work in the challenging conditions on the red planet, is all tucked into the rover's belly where it will ride out the journey.

Ingenuity is a high-risk, high-reward technology demonstration. It will hang out under the rover for a few months until NASA finds a suitable spot to deploy it. Perseverance will drop it onto the Martian surface and then move away.

The helicopter will make the first attempt at powered flight on another planet. NASA hopes Ingenuity soars and becomes a model for a new way to investigate other worlds.

Check out this video for more on how this little chopper could change the way we approach space exploration.

Now playing: Watch this: How NASA's Mars helicopter could change the future of...

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NASA currently has two machines operating on the surface of Mars, the stationary InSight lander and the Mars rover Curiosity. InSight is located in a region called Elysium Planitia, a large plains area. Curiosity is cruising around Gale Crater, a giant ditch with a massive mountain inside it. Perseverance will be scoping out a very different part of the planet as it continues NASA's legacy of Mars exploration.

The last time we had two functioning rovers on Mars was in 2018 when the Opportunity rover lost contact with home due to the impact of a global dust storm. Perseverance won't have the same issues as Opportunity. Like Curiosity, it uses a nuclear power source that doesn't require sunlight to keep it going.

This plate holds the names of nearly 11 million people and carries a coded message.

Perseverance will be a long way from Earth, but it will carry poignant remembrances of its home planet. Over 10.9 million people signed up to have their names travel with the rover through NASA's Send Your Name to Mars public outreach program. The names are etched on small silicon chips that NASA installed on the rover on an aluminum plate underneath a protective shield.

The plate also bears an illustration of the Earth, our sun and Mars. Hidden in the sun's rays is the message "explore as one," written in Morse code.

A separate aluminum plate pays tribute to health care workers and their efforts to aid humanity during the coronavirus pandemic. This plate carries an illustration of a serpent wrapped around a rod with the Earth at the top.

These names and messages are a reminder that NASA's robotic explorers never truly travel alone. Perseverance is the culmination of years of effort from NASA, but it's also an emissary for humanity, an extension of our curiosity and sense of wonder and a little bit of Earth on Mars.

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Space Robotics – Market Research | Recent Trends and Growth Forecast 2025 – CueReport

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Latest updates on Space Robotics market, a comprehensive study enumerating the latest price trends and pivotal drivers rendering a positive impact on the industry landscape. Further, the report is inclusive of the competitive terrain of this vertical in addition to the market share analysis and the contribution of the prominent contenders toward the overall industry.

In the space robotics market, products including rovers, probes, and arms are increasingly used in both deep and near space-related projects. Robotic arms are capable of cleaning litter and debris produces in space due to lost equipment and old satellites orbiting around the planet. The increasing need to clean the debris, which is a threat to existing satellites, spaceships, and astronauts is increasing the demand for probes and arms. Governmental organizations are developing efficient robotic arms for various projects, which will aid in performing maintenance & research related tasks to astronauts. For instance, in March 2019, Canada announced an investment of USD 1.4 billion in NASA?s Lunar Gateway Program and offered a robot arm that will aid the continuous functioning of the lunar-orbiting base.

Government applications in the space robotics market are rapidly developing due to several R&D activities and satellite launches for defense & security purposes in countries including the U.S., China, Israel, etc., contributing to industry growth. Moreover, the growing awareness related to space exploration and satellite launch programs that will aid defense & military activities is creating the demand for robotic technology. In the UK, the government is offering huge funding for R&D and demonstrating projects under its Innovate UK programs, such as the FAIR-SPACE hub and other projects, creating growth prospects the space robotics market.

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Space Robotics Market is expected to exceed USD 3.5 billion by 2025. Increasing government investments and projects related to space research and exploration in several countries is driving the industry demand. The launch of several satellites and spaceships working in deep and near spaces require timely maintenance and repairing, creating the need for highly efficient robotic systems. National organizations such as NASA, CSA, JAXA, etc., are introducing humanoid robots to perform the maintenance, servicing, and transportation operations to gain high efficiency, further developing the space robotics market. The rising trends of autonomous features and AI technology in robotic products will drive rapid industry expansion.

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Key companies in the space robotics market are SpaceX, Northrop Grumman, Honeybee Robotics, Maxar Technologies, Orbital ATK, Altius Space Machines, Motiv Space Systems, etc. Companies are investing highly in R&D capabilities to develop efficient & technically advanced robot technologies applicable in exploration & servicing operations. These players are witnessing several partnerships and contracts with government agencies for technical advancements in the space robotics market. For instance, in December 2018, MDA announced that the company has signed four contracts with Canada under its Defence Innovation Research Program.

The Asia Pacific space robotics market is expected to grow over the forecast time span owing to many space exploration & research projects in countries including China, Japan, and India, majorly driving the industry growth. For instance, in January 2019, the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) announced that the country?s first unmanned space mission will include a humanoid robot, which is in the development stage and has multilingual features. China is also involved with several projects for space & moon exploration, which will add up to industry development prospects.

Major Highlights from Table of contents are listed below for quick lookup into Space Robotics Market report

Chapter 1. Methodology and Scope

Chapter 2. Executive Summary

Chapter 3. Space Robotics Industry Insights

Chapter 4. Company Profiles

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Space Robotics - Market Research | Recent Trends and Growth Forecast 2025 - CueReport

Russia Actively Developing Nuclear Propulsion System for Space Exploration – Roscosmos – UrduPoint News

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MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 14th July, 2020) Russia is rapidly developing a new nuclear propulsion system that will be used to power large spacecraft during exploration missions to the outer reaches of the Solar System and beyond, Dmitry Rogozin, the head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, said on Monday.

"Only this kind of powerful system, which makes it possible for ion thrusters to work, will allow for spacecraft to reach the planets of the Solar System, and maybe in the future, go beyond the Solar System itself," Rogozin said during an interview with the Komsomolskaya Pravda radio broadcaster.

The Roscosmos head noted that traditional chemical rockets, which either use hydrogen or a mix of oxygen and kerosene, cannot travel to the far reaches of the Solar System.

"We are on the path to the development of nuclear space energy," Rogozin commented.

At present, Roscosmos scientists are developing a new transport and energy module (TEM) that will utilize a nuclear propulsion system.

The space agency intends on launching a new space tug equipped with a nuclear propulsion system into orbit in 2030, Roscosmos First Deputy Director General Yury Urlichich said this past January.

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Russia Actively Developing Nuclear Propulsion System for Space Exploration - Roscosmos - UrduPoint News

Trump says feds in Portland have done a great job on protests – OregonLive

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Two days after a demonstrator was critically wounded by a federal law enforcement official who fired an impact munition at the mans head, President Donald Trump praised federal authorities here for doing a great job.

Portland was totally out of control, and they went in, and I guess we have many people right now in jail and we very much quelled it, and if it starts again, well quell it again very easily, said Trump during a public appearance Monday at the White House. Its not hard to do, if you know what youre doing.

The incident Saturday left Donavan La Bella, 26, with skull and facial fractures, his mother said. She said her son underwent facial reconstructive surgery early Sunday.

Though the president said many people have been jailed here as a result of protests, U.S. Attorney for Oregon Billy J. Williams on Monday estimated that a dozen people have been arrested on federal charges, including arson and assaulting a federal officer.

Trump did not address how federal authorities plan to approach Portland protests as they continue.

Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler on Monday said he remains deeply concerned about the actions of federal law enforcement officials and said La Bellas injuries at the hands of a federal officer were unacceptable.

Wheeler said that while he doesnt want federal law enforcement officials to complicate already tense nightly protests, he lacks the authority to tell them to stay away.

They report to the federal government and they have jurisdiction throughout the United States, he said.

The incident places new scrutiny on federal involvement in policing protests in downtown Portland, where courts have restricted local police but not federal agents from using crowd control munitions against nonviolent protesters.

The U.S. Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General will investigate what led Marshals Service deputies to shoot impact munitions at La Bella, said Williams.

That investigation needs to be thorough, and it will be, said Williams, Oregons top federal law enforcement official.

Like Williams office, the U.S. Marshal Service in Oregon is part of the U.S. Department of Justice.

The agency, which serves as the enforcement arm of the federal courts, provides protection for judges and other court officials, arrests federal fugitives and operates the federal witness protection program.

The Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse in downtown Portland sits next to the Multnomah County Justice Center, the heart of nightly protests since late May. The courthouse was fenced off from protesters for weeks. Protesters tore down the chain link fence several times in June. Federal officers did not pour out of the courthouse and use force during those incidents.

In recent days, federal officers have staged inside the courthouse and emerged from it to deploy stun grenades or shoot impact munitions.

Videos posted to social media over the weekend appear to show a federal officer shooting a protester in the head with an impact munition outside of the courthouse.

One video shows La Bella holding a speaker while standing across the street from the courthouse between two parked cars. Federal officers throw a canister that lands at his feet, which he lightly tosses away from him back in the direction it came. It lands partway across the street.

A few seconds later, a firing sound can be heard, and La Bella collapses to the ground, dropping the speaker. The video shows no sign of aggressive provocation on the part of the protester, who appeared to be standing alone.

Another video shows La Bella bleeding on the sidewalk and apparently unconscious after being struck in the face. Several protesters rush to check on him and carry him away, revealing the splatters of blood on the sidewalk. The officers are shown standing across the street and are not reacting.

The top U.S. Marshals official in Oregon is Russell Burger. Burger was appointed in 2011 and was retained in 2017 for another four years by President Donald Trump. He previously served as Lane County sheriff.

Burger answers to the director of the U.S. Marshals Service, Donald W. Washington, a former U.S. attorney in Louisiana who was appointed by Trump to lead the service three years ago.

The U.S. Marshals Service in Washington, D.C., on Monday referred questions about the incident to the agencys Portland office. Burger on Monday did not respond to an email from The Oregonian/OregonLive. The news organization sent questions to a spokeswoman for the agency but did not get an immediate response.

In addition to the U.S. Marshals Service, law enforcement from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security have also been present at the protests.

The Department of Homeland Security has not responded to multiple requests about the role of its officers at the protests.

Wheeler on Monday said he doesnt have a problem with federal law enforcement policing federal buildings from inside.

What I have a problem with them is leaving the facilities, going onto the streets of this community and then escalating an already tense situation like they did the other night, Wheeler said.

Impact munitions, like the foam-tipped and plastic projectiles used by Portland police, are generally intended to be fired at arms and legs to prevent serious injury. Portland police directives restrict officers from using impact munitions to target a persons head, neck or throat unless deadly force is authorized. Additionally, police cant use impact munitions to control crowds without supervisor permission or the threat of death or serious injury.

And under a temporary court order, Portland police may not use less-lethal impact weapons unless officers believe lives or safety are at risk. Theyre specifically barred from using the munitions against people engaged in passive resistance.

Those restrictions do not, however, apply to federal law enforcement.

During an appearance in Portland on Monday, U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, a Democrat, accused Trump of dispatching federal authorities into cities as if they are enemy stronghold requiring an occupying army to suppress.

Wyden said he plans to press Trump and federal authorities to answer the question about why he sent federal law enforcement in the first place to our community and we are going to insist on answers as to what their orders were and who they answer to.

On Monday, Williams in general defended the federal response to the protests, calling it a very conservative approach. He said that response had been largely limited to keeping tabs on federal buildings to ensure no one tried to enter them. He said the approach, however, shifted more than a week ago when someone broke the courthouse doors.

We cant have people entering the federal courthouse hellbent on destruction, he said. That is not going to happen.

Williams said a teen who aimed a laser at a federal law enforcement official was apprehended and was turned over to the Multnomah County juvenile court for prosecution.

Early Saturday morning, a 23-year-old man allegedly assaulted a U.S. Marshals Service deputy with a hammer. According to court records, Jacob M. Gaines used the tool to damage the entrance of the courthouse and struck U.S. Marshals Service deputy when confronted. Gaines, who told authorities he is homeless, is accused of assaulting a federal officer.

Williams on Monday said he told Wheeler that city and civic leaders need to make a concerted effort to end violent aspects to nightly protests in Portland. He characterized the actions of some demonstrators as mindless lawlessness.

They are agitators, he said. They are anarchists, they are people engaged in unlawful behavior and violent, unlawful behavior toward Portland police officers, toward federal agents, towards buildings of all kinds public and privately owned.

Oregonian reporter K. Rambo contributed to this report.

-- Noelle Crombie; ncrombie@oregonian.com; 503-276-7184; @noellecrombie

Subscribe to Oregonian/OregonLive newsletters and podcasts for the latest news and top stories.

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Trump says feds in Portland have done a great job on protests - OregonLive

Trump and McConnell are the twin tribunes of America’s ruin vote them out – The Guardian

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Fate has been unkind to the United States. The nation is grappling simultaneously with a pandemic that has claimed the lives of more than 130,000; the most severe economic downturn since the Great Depression; and mind-numbing police brutality, which has generated the largest outpouring of grief and anger against systemic racism in memory.

Perhaps Americas greatest misfortune is that these crises have emerged at a time when its leadership is too incompetent to respond to them, if not maliciously dedicated to worsening them.

Donald Trump has not only refused to contain Covid-19 but is actively pushing Americans into harms way, demanding the nation reopen while cases and deaths continue to rise. Meanwhile, hes siphoning federal money intended to dampen the economic crisis into the pockets of his cronies and family. And he is deliberately stoking racial tensions to energize his base for the upcoming election.

As if this werent enough, Trump continues to attack the rule of law, on which a democracy depends in order to deal with these and all other challenges.

But he could not accomplish these abhorrent feats alone. Senate Republicans are either cheering him on or maintaining a shameful silence. Trumps biggest enabler is the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell.

Senate Republicans either cheer Trump on or maintain a shameful silence

McConnells response to Trumps overt appeals to racism? He is not a racist, says McConnell. His reaction to Trumps failure to contain Covid-19? President Obama should have kept his mouth shut rather than criticize Trump. McConnells take on Trumps multiple attacks on the rule of law, including Fridays commutation of former Trump campaign aide Roger Stones prison sentence? Utter silence.

But McConnell has been a vocal opponent of the Heroes Act passed by the House in early May to help Americans survive the pandemic and fortify the upcoming election calling it a liberal wishlist. In fact, its a necessary list.

McConnell and his fellow Senate Republicans dont want to extend the bills extra-$600-a-week unemployment benefits, enacted in March but due to expire on 31 July. They argue the benefits are higher than what low-income workers are likely to earn on the job, so the money is a disincentive to work.

Baloney. Few jobs are available to low-income workers, and most are in so-called essential work rife with Covid-19. Besides, the US economy cant be revived unless people have extra money in their pockets to buy goods and services. Even before the pandemic, nearly 80% of Americans lived paycheck to paycheck. Now many are desperate, as revealed by lengthening food lines and growing delinquencies in rent payments.

Yet McConnell and his ilk are happy to give away trillions of dollars in bailouts to Wall Street bankers and corporate executives, on the dubious premise that the rich will work harder if they receive more money while people of modest means work harder if they receive less. In reality, the rich contribute more to Republican campaigns when they get bailed out.

McConnell and Senate Republicans quietly inserted into the last Covid relief bill a $170bn windfall to Jared Kushner and other real estate moguls. Another $454bn went to backing up a Federal Reserve program that benefits big business by buying up debt.

And although that bill was also intended to help small businesses, lobbyists connected to Trump including current donors and fundraisers for his re-election helped their clients rake in more than $10bn, while an estimated 90% of small businesses owned by people of color and women got nothing.

McConnells response? Hes willing to consider more aid to small business.

But McConnell urges lawmakers to be cautious, warning that the amount of debt that were adding up is a matter of genuine concern. He seems to forget the $1.9tn tax cut he engineered in December 2017 for big corporations and the super rich. Is he willing to roll it back to provide more funding for Americans in need?

The inept and overwhelmingly corrupt reign of Trump and McConnell will come to an end next January if enough Americans vote this November. Trumps polls are plummeting and Senate Republicans seem likely to lose at least four seats, thereby flipping the Senate to Democrats and consigning McConnell to the dustbin of Capitol Hill.

But will enough people vote during a pandemic? The Heroes Act provides $3.6bn for states to expand mail-in and early voting but McConnell isnt interested. Hes well aware that more voters increase the likelihood Republicans will be booted out. (Which is also why Trump is claiming, with no evidence, that voting by mail will cause widespread voter fraud.)

If there is another coronavirus bill, differences between McConnell and the House will have to be resolved within two weeks after Congress returns from recess on 20 July. McConnell says his priority will be to shield businesses from Covid-related lawsuits by customers and employees who have contracted the virus.

If he had an ounce of concern for the nation, his priority would be to shield Americans from the ravages of Covid and American democracy from the ravages of Trump.

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Trump and McConnell are the twin tribunes of America's ruin vote them out - The Guardian

New Hampshire rally shows how the Trump campaign is adjusting to 2020 realities – CNN

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It's made planning more difficult, but the campaign found a location that met all those metrics in New Hampshire, where President Donald Trump will appear on Saturday.

"You have to go to a place where the state guidelines allow you to put on the rally that works," Trump communications director Tim Murtaugh said. "New Hampshire and Gov. (Chris) Sununu have done a great job dealing with the coronavirus and that is part of what allows the President to be there this weekend."

According to Johns Hopkins University, New Hampshire's seven-day moving average of new cases has dropped consistently since early May. In general, the state's numbers have been low. It has just under 6,000 reported cases total, and fewer than 400 people have died of the virus there.

"I'm probably not going to go to the rally itself because frankly that's just a lot of people," Sununu told a group Tuesday night. "I don't go in big crowds anymore for the Covid thing. I just have to be very careful of that."

Still, Sununu defended the idea of Trump holding the rally, pointing to the campaign's plans to ask rally goers to wear masks, dole out hand sanitizer and encourage social distancing. New Hampshire Republicans are embracing the President's visit. Matt Mowers, a former Trump administration official who is a candidate for the GOP nomination in the state's 1st Congressional District, argued the Granite State is prepared to handle an event like this.

"People understand the threat and there are going to be precautions," Mowers said.

He argued that safely reopening the economy is a big part of the GOP message to voters: "New Hampshire wants to get back to work. The largest percentage of workers come from small businesses and you can't keep them closed forever."

New Hampshire could serve as the perfect backdrop to make that argument. While many key swing states, like Florida and Arizona, are seeing an uptick in cases, New Hampshire seemingly has things under control -- and also happens to be a state the Trump team feels they can put back into their win column after losing there narrowly in 2016. Hillary Clinton carried the state and its four electoral votes by less than 3,000 votes, a winning margin of less than a half of a percentage point.

"From the beginning, our plan has been to retain the states that President Trump won in 2016 and then pick off a few states where he was close," Murtaugh said. "We've been high on our chances in New Hampshire from the very beginning."

But Democrats argue that choosing New Hampshire is much more about convenience than strategy. A state with a friendly Republican governor and dropping cases provides the Trump campaign with the chance to put on a much more successful show than they were able to pull off in Tulsa, Oklahoma, last month. The Tulsa rally fell far short of expectations, as the campaign failed to fill the 20,000 seat area where Trump spoke and were forced to cancel a planned outdoor event when the predicted large, overflow crowd failed to materialize.

"It's about him doing whatever he can to turn the page. He's not very good at much, but he does understand the power of the shiny symbol and how some folks' attention can be distracted immediately," said Ray Buckley, chairman of the New Hampshire Democratic Party. "He needed to find the area that he could put together a show which is what his entire presidency is about and that's why he picked New Hampshire."

This rally will also show the adjustments the campaign plans to make in the wake of the problems they dealt with in Tulsa. The venue will be predominately outside on the tarmac of an airport with an airplane hangar nearby. The event in Tulsa was completely indoors, with seats in very close proximity together and very little opportunity for rally goers to practice social distancing. The set-up also made it impossible to mask the thousands of seats that went empty as the crowd count fell well below expectations.

"We've identified a very vast space that we believe we can adequately accommodate a high amount of people and they will be urging people to social distance at the event and also wear face masks," said Paul Brean, the executive director of Pease Development Authority, which owns and operates the Portsmouth International Airport.

It will also be a much smaller space than the arena the President hoped to pack in Tulsa. Brean said the space the campaign is using can accommodate well over 10,000 people, which is roughly half the size of the arena in Oklahoma.

New Hampshire could be the test case for the campaign's new approach to rallies. If it works, it could be a sign of what is to come for the Trump team as they push to take advantage of what they view as one of the President's strongest assets. His team has, for much of 2020, been denied this weapon in their arsenal. But they firmly believe they have the time to get the practice right.

"We have four months to go before Election Day and plenty of time for plenty of rallies," Murtaugh said. "Hillary Clinton made the mistake of spiking the ball on the two yard line four years ago. Now Joe Biden and Democrats are getting ready to spike the ball on the 40 yard line. Declaring victory now is a big mistake."

CNN's Donald Judd contributed to this story.

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New Hampshire rally shows how the Trump campaign is adjusting to 2020 realities - CNN

Choppy waters: On the Italian marines decision – Observer Research Foundation

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The Enrica Lexie case involving the fatal shooting of two Indian fishermen by two Italian marines appears to have come to a close. This incident not only raised tough questions for maritime law, but also resulted in political and diplomatic confrontation between India and Italy. Upon Romes request in 2015, the dispute was brought before an international tribunal constituted under the 1982 UN Convention for the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which released its final award (or decision) on 2 July 2020.

The tribunal said that though both countries have concurrent jurisdiction over the case, India must immediately cease the exercise of its criminal jurisdiction since the marines are entitled to immunity. The award also holds that Italy interfered with Indias freedom of navigation and must pay compensation for physical harm, material damage to property and moral harm caused to the captain and crew members of the fishing vessel. New Delhi, in a recent statement, has said that it will abide by the award.

The dispute is a complex one, and raises legal questions that have seldom been raised before. The incident took place on 15 February 2012, 20.5 nautical miles (nm) off the coast of Kerala. Two marines Sergeant Latorre and Sergeant Girone aboard a commercial Italian oil tanker, MV Enrica Lexie, shot and killed two Indian nationals, Valentine Jelastine and Ajeesh Pink, on an Indian fishing vessel (St. Antony). The Italian side argues that the marines sensed that St. Antony constituted a pirate attack, thus compelling them to respond with firearms. The Indian side refutes this and says that the crew aboard St. Antony was simply exercising its sovereign fishing rights in the Arabian Sea (extending up to 200 nm from the shore). Criminal proceedings against the marines first began in India in 2012, until the international arbitral tribunal was seized of the matter in 2015.

Two contentious legal questions were raised in this case: the first is whether the marines were entitled to immunity for their acts, and the second, whether India could exercise its criminal jurisdiction, when the incident took place beyond its territorial waters.

International law confers immunity to state officials for acts performed in official capacity (known as functional immunity). Italy argued that the marines were entitled to functional immunity; they were members of the Italian navy and part of a Vessel Protection Detachment (VPD) deployed according to government directives (Law No. 130/2011) and international commitments to protect the vessel from piracy. The mechanism for VPDs was operationalised through a memorandum of understanding (MoU) between the Italian Ministry of Defence and the Italian ship-owners association. The MoU specifically defines VPD as a military unit composed of military personnel, preferentially from the Navy, embarked on trading vessels. The military personnel on VPD duty must comply with rules of engagement and guidelines issued by the Italian Ministry of Defence.

International Law Commission reports (here and here) on functional immunity identifies criteria for who are officials: that the official should have connection with the state (constitutional, statutory or contractual); the official acts internationally as a representative of the State; and that the official exercises elements of governmental authority, acting on behalf of the State. At this stage, the connection of VPD to the Italian state is fairly straightforward: they are members of the Italian Navy, were deployed according to government laws, and functioned under a framework of rules established by the Italian Ministry of Defence.

Elsewhere, it has been argued (here and here) that UNCLOS has its own provisions for sovereign immunity, which only extends it to warships, naval auxiliary and other vessels owned and operated by the state. Since there is no provision for immunity for state officials here, the same cannot and should not be given to the marines. However, nothing in the convention suggests the exclusion of customary rules of international law such as sovereign immunity for officials in matters of law of the sea. What this does indicate is that there is a need for greater clarity on the application of multiple legal frameworks to complex cases.

Another counter-argument is that Italian ship owners who placed VPDs on their vessels had to cover costs for such an attachment. This creates a clear financial link between the VPDs and ship owners, raising questions if they indeed performed government functions or commercial ones. However, it is unclear if this is sufficient to erase the sovereign nature of their duties and sever their ties from the state. Further, Italys laws also draw a distinction between VPDs and private armed security guards, where the latter who are not military personnel and operate entirely on private payroll would not be entitled to immunity.

A more difficult contention is the grant of immunity when the Indian position believes that the use of firearms against St. Antony a mere fishing vessel was disproportionate and excessive. Scholars acknowledge that actions that are careless, reckless, involved excessive force, or was contrary to instructions, do not negate the application of sovereign immunity. As a result, the tribunal award has decided that the marines are entitled to immunity. However, by acknowledging that Italy violated Indias freedom of navigation and by directing payment of compensation to New Delhi, it ascribed responsibility to Rome for the marines actions.

The second question raised in this dispute was whether India could exercise its criminal jurisdiction, given that the incident took place beyond its territorial waters (which extends to 12 nm from the shore). Exercise of criminal jurisdiction in territorial waters is mentioned explicitly in the UNCLOS (Article 27). The place where the incident took place at 20.5 nm is what the convention terms as the contiguous zone.Here, a state can only exercise necessary control for violation of customs, fiscal, immigration and sanitary laws. The convention is silent if criminal laws can be extended to the contiguous zone. For India, the 1976 Maritime Zones Act and a 1981 Home Ministry notification extends Indias criminal jurisdiction all the way up to 200 nm. When the matter was raised before the tribunal, Italy argued that Indias laws were contrary to the provisions of the UNCLOS.

Because of the ambiguity of the UNCLOS on criminal jurisdiction, a reading of the Lotus case, a seminal judgment of the Permanent Court of International Justice (the precursor to the International Court of Justice) becomes essential. Its findings can be described as follows: an offence commenced on a vessel of flag State A which has fatal consequences aboard the vessel of flag State B can be subject to the criminal law of both A and B. This gives both India and Italy concurrent jurisdiction. The UNCLOS did carve an exception to such exercise of dual jurisdiction for matters of collision or any other incident of navigation; in these specific circumstances, only the flag state (Italy, in this case) could exercise jurisdiction. Rome relied on this very provision to assert that because of this, the matter should be handed over to its courts. Analysts refuted that a fatal shooting could simply be considered as any other incident of navigation. It appears that the tribunal must have adopted this reasoning as well, and thereby relied on the Lotus case to find that both Italy and India had concurrent jurisdiction over the matter. However, given that the marines were entitled to immunity, India was directed to cease its criminal jurisdiction over the matter.

This development was deemed as a loss for India and has enraged fishermen. However, there is one positive aspect to the award. The tribunal did not adjudge the legitimacy of Indias extension of its criminal laws up to 200 nm (the exclusive economic zone), and has not disturbed our legal framework in this regard. It has in a way acknowledged the concurrent jurisdiction of both India and Italy, which indicates that if the shooting had been carried out by private personnel, India may have retained jurisdiction. Currently, only excerpts of the award have been released for advance publication and the full award is not available yet. A reading of the entire decision can perhaps support a more nuanced analysis of the legal and political questions at hand.

In practice, exercise of foreign criminal jurisdiction over state officials as India attempted to do so is successful in very few cases, and depends on the consent of the other state for it to proceed. Without such consent, attempts to exercise jurisdiction can worsen relations between states. The extensive media reporting of the case and its high profile nature resulted in posturing of both the Indian and the Italian government.

In India, Keralas political leadership and the fishing community closely followed the case, while Kerala MPs protested when the marines were allowed to return to vote in Italys general elections. At the national level, efforts to engage in diplomacy did not yield positive results. Both the Manmohan Singh government and the Modi government continued to have differences with their Italian counterparts. On two occasions Italy recalled its envoy to India, while in 2013 India restrained Italys then Ambassador Daniele Mancini from leaving the country. A 2016 visit to Rome by then External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj provided some course correction and reset ties between the two countries.

These developments not only affected diplomatic relations with Italy, but with the European Union as well. Indias decision to invoke a 2002 Act for this case which contained a death penalty provision was explicitly condemned by the EU. Later in 2015, the India-EU summit was called off, while Italy also blocked Indias entry to the Missile Technology Control Regime.

The fallout of this dispute has shown that apart from sound diplomatic strategy, multilateral efforts also need to be taken to interpret and clarify contentious provisions in international legal instruments. This is particularly important for largely unregulated areas, such as the placement of state officials on commercial shipping vessels. As an aftermath of this incident, in March 2015, Italy announced that it would end the employment of VPDs aboard Italian merchant vessels. For now, New Delhi must negotiate an appropriate compensation package from Italy, closely follow developments in Italian courts and ensure that justice is secured for the death of its two nationals.

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Choppy waters: On the Italian marines decision - Observer Research Foundation

Japan supercomputer finds ways to nix airborne virus at work and on trains – The Japan Times

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Supercomputer-driven models simulated in Japan have suggested that operating commuter trains with windows open and limiting the number of passengers may help reduce the risk of novel coronavirus infection, as scientists warn the virus may spread in the air.

In an open letter published Monday, 239 scientists in 32 countries outlined evidence they say shows floating virus particles can infect people who breathe them in.

The World Health Organization (WHO) acknowledged evidence emerging of airborne transmission, but said it was not definitive.

Even if the coronavirus is airborne, questions remain about how many infections occur through that route. How concentrated the virus is in the air may also decide contagion risks, said Professor Yuki Furuse of Kyoto University.

In the open letter, scientists urged for improvements to ventilation and the avoidance of crowded, enclosed environments recommendations Japan broadly adopted months ago, according to Shin-ichi Tanabe, one of the co-authors of the letter.

In Japan, the committee for COVID-19 countermeasures insisted on the 3Cs at an early stage, said Tanabe, a professor at Waseda University in Tokyo, referring to Japans public campaign to avoid closed spaces, crowded places and close-contact settings. This was ahead of the world.

As the nation tamed the pandemic, with over 19,000 confirmed cases and 977 deaths so far, economy minister Yasutoshi Nishimura credited its success to the 3Cs and its cluster-tracing strategy.

The recent study by Japanese research giant Riken using the worlds fastest supercomputer, the Fugaku, to simulate how the virus travels in the air in various environments recommended several ways to lower infection risks in public settings.

Makoto Tsubokura, the studys lead researcher, said that opening windows on commuter trains can increase ventilation two- to threefold, lowering the concentration of ambient microbes.

But to achieve adequate ventilation, there needs to be space between passengers, the simulations showed, representing a drastic change from the custom of packing commuter trains tightly, for which the nation is notorious.

Other findings advised the installation of partitions in offices and classrooms, while hospital beds should be surrounded by curtains that touch the ceiling.

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Japan supercomputer finds ways to nix airborne virus at work and on trains - The Japan Times

New supercomputer at the University of Aberdeen supports genomics research – Scientific Computing World

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Researchers at the University of Aberdeen will now benefit from a new supercomputer named 'Maxwell' which is supporting ground research at the Universitys CentreforGenome-Enabled Biology andMedicine(CGEBM). The system also provides a centralised HPC system for the whole University with applications in medicine, biological sciences, engineering, chemistry, maths and computing science.

Dean Phillips, assistant director, digital and information services of the University of Aberdeen says: 'Aberdeen is a research-intensive university and weve already seen an increase of 50 per cent in registered usersof our Maxwell HPC cluster. Having our own HPC system helps the University to attract new researchers, research funding and expand on existing programmes of research and teaching. It is highly beneficial for our researchers to have on-site access to HPC infrastructure, particularly when securing start-up funds.OCFs Remote Admin Service is an extension of our team and really helps to ensure the smooth day to day running of our HPC cluster and dealing with support issues, user requests and keeping on top of software and security updates.'

University researchers will use Maxwell to rapidly analyse complex genomics datasets from known and novel organisms and help researchers to revolutionise the study of the Earths biodiversity and complex ecosystems important to health and disease, agriculture or the environment. It is estimated that only around 1 per cent of the Earths biodiversity is easily culturable in a laboratory, and there is little knowledge on most living organisms on the planet.

Dr Elaina Collie-Duguid, Manager, Centre for Genome Enabled Biology & Medicine at the University of Aberdeen comments: 'Genomicsis a dynamic discipline that rapidly evolves into new applications and approaches to interrogate complex systems. The new HPC cluster, with its expanded capacity and advanced GPU capabilities, enables us to use new analysis methods and work at a much quicker rate than before. It really is an exciting time for genomics, which is revolutionising the study of organisms and complex ecosystems to address issues of global importance, and HPC is a critical tool for analysis of these data.'

With the use of HPC, researchers can analyse microbiomes associated with a diverse array of ecosystems, such as the human gut, fish important to Scottish aquaculture, glaciers, deep-sea sediments, soil and bioreactors for the production of sustainable and environmentally friendly biofuels. These studies could provide a new understanding of important and diverse biological processes such as antimicrobial drug resistance; pathogen detection, evolution and virulence; mechanisms of drug efficacy and toxicity; development; inflammation; tumorigenesis; nutrition and satiety; and degradation of hydrocarbons.

Scotia Biologics is working with the Universitys CGEBM, using Maxwells capacity to speed up its existing pipeline and generating a more comprehensive dataset using genomics compared to traditional methods typically used in its field.

The new HPC system is also being used to teach graduates and post-graduate students in specialist subjects such as AI and bioinformatics, fields important to modern research and STEM careers, providing them with a unique opportunity to access HPC capacity. With 300 users, the cluster is providing a centralised HPC system to support all researchers and post-graduate students across the University.

The new HPC system is designed, integrated and managed by high performance compute, storage, cloud and AI integrator OCF.Russell Slack, managing Director of OCF comments: 'The new HPC cluster helps the University remain ahead of a fiercely competitive market. It attracts researchers, students and grants to its facility. Aberdeens investment in its HPC is a credit to its foresight in the importance of HPC in research that impacts people and everyday lives.'

Keith Charlton, CEO of Scotia Biologics states: 'As part of our drive to introduce new services to offer to the life sciences sector, Scotia is developing phage display library capabilities based around a growing number of animal species. With access to Maxwell, weve been able to quickly generate a large volume of data relatively inexpensively whilst significantly advancing our R&D programme.'

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New supercomputer at the University of Aberdeen supports genomics research - Scientific Computing World

Changing System Architectures And The Complexities Of Apple’s Butterfly Approach To ISAs – Hackaday

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Apple computers will be moving away from Intel chips to its own ARM-based design. An interesting thing about Apple as a company is that it has never felt the need to tie itself to a particular system architecture or ISA. Whereas a company like Microsoft mostly tied its fortunes to Intels x86 architecture, and IBM, Sun, HP and other giants preferred vertical integration, Apple is currently moving towards its fifth system architecture for its computers since the company was formed.

What makes this latest change possibly unique, however, is that instead of Apple relying on an external supplier for CPUs and peripheral ICs, they are now targeting a vertical integration approach. Although the ARM ISA is licensed to Apple by Arm Holdings, the Apple Silicon design that is used in Apples ARM processors is their own, produced by Apples own engineers and produced by foundries at the behest of Apple.

In this article I would like to take a look back at Apples architectural decisions over the decades and how they made Apples move towards vertical integration practically a certainty.

The 1970s was definitely the era when computing was brought to living rooms around the USA, with the Commodore PET, Tandy TRS-80 and the Apple II microcomputers defining the late 1970s. Only about a year before the Apple IIs release, the newly formed partnership between Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs had produced the Apple I computer. The latter was sold as a bare, assembled PCB for $666.66 ($2,995 in 2019), with about 200 units sold.

Like the Apple I, the Apple II and the Commodore PET were all based on the MOS 6502 MPU (microprocessor unit), which was essentially a cheaper and faster version of Motorolas 6800 MPU, with the Zilog Z80 being the other popular MPU option. What made the Apple II different was Wozniaks engineering shortcuts to reduce hardware costs, using various tricks to save separate DRAM refresh circuitry and remove the need for separate video RAM. According to Wozniak in a May 1977 Byte interview, [..] a personal computer should be small, reliable, convenient to use, and inexpensive.

With the Apple III, Apple saw the need to provide backward compatibility with the Apple II, which was made easy because the former maintained the same 6502 MPU and a compatible hardware architecture. Apples engineers did however put in limitations that prevented the emulated Apple II system to access more than a fraction of the Apple IIIs RAM and other hardware.

With the ill-fated Apple Lisa (1983) and much more successful Apple Macintosh (1984), Apple transitioned to the Motorola 68000 (m68k) architecture. The Macintosh was the first system to feature what would become the classic Mac OS series of operating systems, at the time imaginatively titled System 1. As the first step into the brave new world of 32-bit, GUI-based, mouse-driven desktops, it did not have any focus on backward compatibility. It also cost well over $6,000 when adjusted for inflation.

The reign of m68k-based Macintosh systems lasted until the release of the Macintosh LC 580, in 1995. That system featured a Motorola 68LC040 running at 33 MHz. That particular CPU in the LC 580 featured a bug that caused incorrect operation when used with a software FPU emulator. Although a fixed version of the 68LC040 was introduced in mid-1995, this was too late to prevent many LC 580s from shipping with the flawed CPU.

The year before the LC 580 was released, the first Power Macintosh system had been already released after a few years of Apple working together with IBM on the PowerPC range of chips. The reason for this shift could be found mostly in the anemic performance of the CISC m68k architecture, with Apple worried that the industrys move to the much better performing RISC architectures from IBM (POWER), MIPS, Sun (Sparc) and HP (PA-RISC). This left Apple no choice but to seek an alternative to the m68k platform.

The development of what came to be known as the Power Macintosh series of systems began in 1988, with Apple briefly flirting with the idea of making its own RISC CPU, to the point where they bought a Cray-1 super computer to assist in the design efforts. Ultimately they were forced to cancel this project due to a lack of expertise in this area, requiring a look at possible partners.

Apple would look at the available RISC offerings from Sun, MIPS, Intel (i860) and ARM, as well as Motorolas 88110 (88000 RISC architecture). All but Motorolas offering were initially rejected: Sun lacked the capacity to produce enough CPUs, MIPS had ties with Microsoft, Intels i860 was too complex, and IBM might not want to license its POWER1 core to third parties. Along the way, Apple did take a 43% stake in ARM, and would use an ARM processor in its Newton personal digital assistant.

Under the Jaguar project moniker, a system was developed that used the Motorola 88110, but the project was canceled when Apples product division president (Jean-Louis Gasse) left the company. Renewed doubt in the 88110 led to a meeting being arranged between Apple and IBM representatives, with the idea being to merge the POWER1s seven chips into a single chip solution. With Motorola also present at this meeting, it was agreed to set up an alliance that would result in the PowerPC 601 chip.

Apples System 7 OS was rewritten to use PowerPC instructions instead of m68k ones, allowing it to be used with what would become the first PowerPC-based Macintosh, the Power Macintosh 6100. Because of the higher performance of PowerPC relative to m68k at the time, the Mac 68k emulator utility that came with all PowerPC Macs was sufficient to provide backward compatibility. Later versions used dynamic recompilation to provide even more performance.

The PowerPC era is perhaps the most distinct of all Apple designs, with the colorful all-in-one iMac G3 and Power Macintosh G3 and Power Mac G4 along with the Power Mac G5 still being easily recognized computers that distinguished Apple systems from PCs. Unfortunately, by the time of the G4 and G5 series of PowerPC CPUs, their performance had fallen behind that of Intels and AMDs x86-based offerings. Although Intel made a costly mistake with their Netburst (Pentium 4) architecture during the so-called MHz wars, this didnt prevent PowerPC from falling further and further behind.

The Power Mac G5, with its water-cooled G5 CPUs, struggled to keep up with the competition and had poor performance-per-watt numbers. Frustrations between IBM and Apple about whether to focus on PowerPC or IBMs evolution of server CPUs called Power did not help here. This led Apple to the obvious conclusion: the future was CISC, with Intel x86. With the introduction of the Intel-based Mac Pro in 2006, Apples fourth architectural transition had commenced.

As with the transition from m68k to PPC back in the early 90s, a similar utility was used to the Mac 68k emulator, called Rosetta. This dynamic binary translator supports the translating of G3, G4 and AltiVec instructions, but not G5 ones. It also comes with a host of other compromises and performance limitations. For example, it does not support applications for Mac OS 9 and older (Classic Mac OS), nor Java applications.

The main difference between the Mac 68k emulator and Rosetta is that the former ran in kernel space, and the latter in user space, meaning that Rosetta is both much less effective and less efficient due to the overhead from task switching. These compromises led to Apple also introducing the universal binary format, also known as a fat binary and multi-architectural binary. This means that the same executable can have binary code in it for more than one architecture, such as PowerPC and x86.

A rare few of us may have missed the recent WWDC announcement where Apple made it official that it will be switching to the ARM system architecture, abandoning Intel after fourteen years. What the real reasons are behind this change will have to wait, for obvious reasons, but it was telling when Apple acquired P.A. Semi, a fabless semiconductor company, in 2009. Ever since Apple began to produce ARM SoCs for its iPhones instead of getting them from other companies, rumors have spread.

As the performance of this Apple Silicon began to match and exceed that of desktop Intel systems in benchmarks with the Apple iPhones and iPads, many felt that it was only a matter of time before Apple would make an announcement like this. There has also the lingering issue of Intel not having had a significant processor product refresh since introducing Skylake in 2015.

So there we are, then. It is 1994 and Apple has just announced that it will transition from m68k CISC to its own (ARM-based?) RISC architecture. Only it is 26 years later and Apple is transitioning from x86 CISC to its own ARM-based RISC architecture, seemingly completing a process that started back in the late 1980s at Apple.

As for the user experience during this transition, its effectively a repeat of the PowerPC to Intel transition during 2006 and onward, with Rosetta 2 (Rosetta Harder?) handling (some) binary translation tasks for applications that do not have a native ARM port yet and universal binaries (v2.0) for the other applications. Over the next decade or so Apple will find its straddling the divide between x86 and ARM before it can presumably settle into its new, vertically integrated home after nearly half a decade of flittering between foreign system architectures.

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Changing System Architectures And The Complexities Of Apple's Butterfly Approach To ISAs - Hackaday

Commercial flights to be welcomed to Seychelles in August 2020 – Travel Daily News International

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The new lift in air travel restrictions on the destination comes an indication of the successful progression of the implementation of the first phase of movement restrictions effective as of June 1, 2020.

As the destination tops holidays searches in the region, the availability of flights comes at an opportune time for visitors planning to find a peaceful and picturesque vacation.

It is with the aim of ensuring the safety of visitors travelling to Seychelles for a holiday and the local population that a new series of guidelines has been issued by the Public Health Authority in Seychelles and the Tourism Stakeholders.

The guidelines, which has been meticulously discussed by all the different parties within the Seychelles tourism industry, encompasses various information relating to travelling to Seychelles and the requirements for same to happen under the new normal.

The document, which also includes the list of countries, has been made available on the department of tourism website since Friday July 3, 2020.

Prominent points of the documents are highlighted below:

The following information emphasized Testing

Reservation and Stay

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Commercial flights to be welcomed to Seychelles in August 2020 - Travel Daily News International

Tourism as an Agent of Recovery in Post-COVID-19 Southern Africa – Future Directions International

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Key Points

Summary

The Southern African Development Community region comprises 16 mainland and insular countries: Angola, Botswana, Comoros, Democratic Republic of Congo, Eswatini (Swaziland), Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. As of July 2020, the estimated total population of the SADC region is just fewer than 370-million people.[1] Among the various regional bodies that exist across Africa, the SADC ranks among the largest, in terms of the number of member states, and their population and gross domestic product (GDP).

In common with the rest of the world, the SADC countries are suffering from the economic damage inflicted by the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the viruss relatively late arrival on the continent, its public health and economic consequences have been felt just as acutely in Africa as elsewhere. As has been the case elsewhere, governments have taken different approaches to managing its effects, with varying degrees of success. Southern African standouts in that regard include Mauritius, Seychelles, Namibia and Botswana. As much of the world cautiously begins opening up again, finding ways to keep or return people to employment and rejuvenate local economies is vital. Given the wealth of attractions across the SADC region, the travel and tourism industry can play a key role in doing that. The time is now advantageous for the countries of the region to work together and actively promote their regions open spaces and diverse attractions.

Analysis

Good News and then Bad News

At the start of 2020, the tourism industry across Africa looked to be in for another good year, and was coming off another year of solid growth in which international arrivals increased by four per cent. According to World Tourism Organisation figures, in January and February, the number of international passengers arriving in Africa grew by an average of 2.5%. Importantly for a number of SADC countries, outbound tourist numbers from the key source markets of France, Germany and the UK continued to show solid growth.

In April alone, however, as lockdowns became the new normal, the number of arrivals fell by 94 per cent. Across all of sub-Saharan Africa, international tourist arrivals over the first quarter were down by 35.2%. Unfortunately for local tourism operators, their industry is confronted by the combination of relatively limited numbers of domestic and intra-regional travellers and a high dependence on wealthy international visitors, many of whom are no longer willing or able to travel. In some SADC countries, governments have been able to provide assistance to those struggling with lost livelihoods. That is by no means the case everywhere and, in any event, the fiscal demands placed on often already cash-strapped governments mean that such support cannot be indefinite.

The World Bank predicts that global GDP will contract by 5.2 per cent in 2020 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, with emerging and developing economies among the hardest to be hit. For many of the SADC countries, the news is even worse. Apart from South Africa (forecast to experience a 7.1% contraction) and Zimbabwe (-10.0%), with economies that were already experiencing substantial difficulties of their own making, the hardest-hit are expected to be those countries with highly-developed tourism and services sectors, including Seychelles (-11.1%), Botswana (-9.1%), Mauritius (-6.8%) and Namibia (-4.8%). Angola, with its nascent tourism industry and continuing dependence on falling oil export revenues, is predicted to experience a four per cent fall in GDP. The estimates produced by the International Monetary Fund are a little less bleak, but the overall pattern is very much the same.

Growth is forecast to return to the region in 2021 in some cases, quite significantly, yet still not enough to offset the damage done in 2020 but that is still a long way off. Until that time, the trick will be to find ways to minimise the harm to economies and increasingly precarious livelihoods. The tourism sector will not be the sole path to recovery, but it can offer hope to at least one sector of the economy.

Tourism as an Agent of Recovery

Ranging from the wineries, safaris, cuisine and culture of South Africa to the little-visited equatorial jungles that are home to the mountain and lowland gorillas of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the continental SADC countries alone are home to large numbers of remarkable sights, stunning landscapes and moving experiences. Offshore, the French-influenced island countries of Mauritius, Seychelles, Comoros and Madagascar bask in the warm blue waters of the Indian Ocean, with Madagascar also famously offering the chance to view lemurs in their natural habitats.

The SADC countries are clearly blessed with a range of visitor attractions and, prior to the pandemic, many had long-standing, successful tourism industries. As a source of jobs, foreign exchange and contribution to GDP, tourism has the potential to be a catalyst for recovery across much of the region.

In almost all of the SADC countries, prior to the pandemic, the travel and tourism sector made a significant contribution to national GDP (see Figure 1, below). Not surprisingly, perhaps, that was greatest in Seychelles (40.5 per cent of GDP, or US$657.5 million) and Mauritius (18.8 per cent, or US$2.67 billion). In common with Namibia (14.7 per cent of GDP; US$1.98 billion) and Botswana (12.6 per cent; US$2.32 billion), these countries have earned praise (particularly Mauritius), for their good governance, social cohesion and sound economic management, all of which are essential underpinnings for a successful tourism industry. Less expected perhaps may be the industrys contribution to the GDP of Lesotho (12.3 per cent; largely driven by South African business travellers) and Madagascar (11.8 per cent; in this case, French leisure travellers are the single largest source market).

As might be expected from such figures, the industry is a significant provider of employment in many of the SADC countries. Once again, the leaders are Seychelles, Mauritius and Namibia, with the industry also accounting for a large number of jobs in the safari destinations of Botswana and Tanzania.

Of equal importance to local economies are foreign exchange earnings and the amount spent by international visitors. According to the United Nations World Tourism Organisation, on average, each international tourist spends US$1,030 in overseas destinations. Among the SADC countries, the amount spent varies widely, from US$10 per visitor in the DRC, to US$2,500 in Angola, US$2,400 in Madagascar and US$2,120 in Comoros.[2] Putting aside the oil-inflated costs of Angola, the figures from Madagascar and Comoros seem to confirm the worth of having a unique, high-value (if not always easy or accessible), offering.

SADC as the Driver of a Tourism Revival

The SADC began life as the Southern African Development Co-ordination Conference (SADCC) in April 1980. With the objective of increasing the level of economic development in member states, the SADCC membership consisted of the independent, majority-ruled states of Southern Africa at that time: Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

In 1992, in the wake of a changing world order, the independence of Namibia in 1990 and the sense of an approaching end to apartheid in South Africa, the SADCC heads of state and government accepted that, while the organisation had done much to foster a greater sense of regional identity, it had fallen short in its goal of economic development. Recognising that greater levels of regional integration and a more formalised organisation to help achieve that were now required, the SADCC and the Memorandum of Understanding that governed it were replaced by the Declaration and Treaty Establishing the Southern African Development Community. The broad objectives of the SADC, as expressed in the Declaration and Treaty, are:

To achieve economic development; peace and security; growth; alleviate poverty; enhance the standard and quality of life of the peoples of Southern Africa; and support the socially disadvantaged through Regional Integration.

Also listed in the Declaration and Treaty are specific areas of co-operation, including food security, land and agriculture; infrastructure and services; industry, trade, investment and finance; human resources development, science and technology; natural resources and environment; social welfare, information and culture; politics, diplomacy and international relations.

It is an ambitious and worthy agenda. Over the intervening decades, the SADCs membership has expanded and, along with it, the number of official languages, from just the original English and Portuguese to also include French and, from 2019, Kiswahili.

In terms of reviving a post-COVID tourism industry, a valuable component of many regional economies, SADC Common Agenda policy number six seems particularly relevant: Promote and maximise productive employment. Of even greater relevance is the 1998 Protocol on the Development of Tourism, which sets out to:

build upon the regions potential as a tourist destination. SADC intends to ensure even distribution of tourism development throughout the region and to create a favourable environment for tourism, thereby using tourism as a vehicle for socio-economic development. As well, the Protocol establishes systems for facilitating travel to Southern Africa, training for industry workers, and marketing the region as a tourist destination.

The SADC thus has a clear mandate to drive the recovery of the regional tourism industry, in partnership with governments and the private sector. As is the case elsewhere, multinational hotel and tour operators, for instance, are better placed to ride out the COVID-19 storm than the many small- and medium-sized enterprises working in local tourism sectors. Keeping such small, local businesses alive must be a priority.

As much of the world cautiously opens up again, one way to do that could be for the SADC to revive its own, largely defunct, tourism marketing body, the Regional Tourism Organisation of Southern Africa (RETOSA). During the period when it was adequately funded, RETOSA was charged with encouraging tourism among SADC states and promoting the region to overseas travellers as a unique and varied destination. With funding restored, either RETOSA or the SADC Secretariats Tourism Unit could be an ideal vehicle for working with member governments, airlines, accommodation providers, tour operators and local industry representatives to craft marketing strategies for visitors from suitably low-risk countries to individual SADC countries, or one or more sub-regional groupings; for instance, a South African or Botswanan safari in combination with a visit to Victoria Falls, the deserts of Namibia, or further afield to one or more of the Indian Ocean islands.

In fact, as the country with the largest and most developed tourism industry, which is also home to the largest source market of intra-regional travellers, as well as the regions main airport hub at Johannesburg and a lesser hub at Cape Town, together with the greatest number of international road connections and the favourable exchange rate of the rand, South Africa is well-placed to act as the lead attraction in any co-ordinated campaign to showcase the appeal of the more southerly SADC countries in particular. Attractions worthy of promotion would include its safari, cultural, historical, culinary, viticultural, trekking and adventure offerings, all of which could be used to entice travellers to explore just a little further afield in, say, the wilderness and wildlife of Eswatini, Lesotho, Zambia or Zimbabwe, not to mention the beaches and islands of Mozambique.

Possible Challenges

The need to fund any such campaigns, including the need to restore funding to RETOSA, if it is to be the lead agency, may present a challenge. A possible solution may be the imposition of a small levy on accommodation bookings for non-SADC nationals.

With appropriate planning, the amount involved need not be large, perhaps ranging from between US$1 and US$2 per person per night, depending upon the type and location of the accommodation. Extra charges are never ideal, but, since the days of cheap, mass travel are unlikely to return for some time, the effect of a small additional sum on the majority of those making the journey to Southern Africa in this new era, be it for business or leisure, should still be quite manageable.

Possibly more challenging is a hurdle that has always been present across much of Africa: poor infrastructure. The region has enjoyed significant infrastructural improvements over the last decade, often funded (and largely constructed) by China, or, like the Kazungula Bridge over the Zambezi River to link Zambia and Botswana, funded by Japan. For the tourism sector, such new roads, railways and bridges have great value in making travel and border crossings speedier and easier. Beyond South Africa, the quality of transport infrastructure is generally lower; in places such as Malawi, the DRC and Madagascar, for instance, the quality of the road network can be abysmal. In such circumstances, COVID-safe air travel can often be the only option.

The health of the global civil aviation industry in the immediate post-COVID environment may be another potential impediment to a tourism-led recovery. With their high cost overheads and often thin profit margins, airlines have been hard hit by COVID-19. Around the world, a number of long-established airlines have already folded and the viability of those that remain has been seriously affected, such that further insolvencies are probably inevitable. In Southern Africa, as elsewhere, a reduced number of airlines offering fewer flights and charging higher fares may crimp the demand for travel.

It will, therefore, be more important than ever for the region that, in addition to being served by large, foreign airlines, its own carriers, with their extensive domestic and regional networks, remain viable. In the case of many of the smaller flag carriers, their continued survival, despite a frequent lack of profitability, hinges largely on being majority or entirely owned by their respective governments. The pressures on such airlines have only been magnified by the shutdowns, travel bans and unprecedented demands on the public purse of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Leading regional carriers South African Airways (SAA) and Air Mauritius are among the larger airlines in the SADC area most affected. Both were grappling with pre-existing profitability issues when the pandemic struck. Air Mauritius went into voluntary administration on 22 April, with a view to being restructured and restarted. The future of SAA, previously hanging in the balance, may now be looking a little brighter after Pretoria indicated that it would consider giving the airline a 21-billion rand ($1.8 billion) rescue package to pay off debts and ready itself for the post-COVID future. Given SAAs position as the regions main carrier (and one of Africas largest), if the airline were to fold, it and its feeder services would be sorely missed. Air connectivity across the region would certainly be poorer in its absence.

Also needing to be addressed in any regional tourism promotion campaign is the health aspect of travel. Airlines are at pains to reassure passengers that air travel in the COVID-19 era is safe and that their hospital-standard aircraft filtration systems do not spread the virus. Once a traveller has made peace with again being in aeroplane and airport environments, there remains the possibility of contracting COVID-19 while in Southern Africa. Although the relatively low incidence of cases across the region is, in most countries, largely due to low rates of testing, the likes of Mauritius, Seychelles, Botswana and Namibia have thus far contained the spread of the virus quite successfully. The favourable geography of those countries, as far-flung islands or sparsely populated, wide-open spaces, could certainly be used as a selling feature.

If done well, the potential is there for the SADC, via RETOSA, to reaffirm its value by leading a concerted regional effort to utilise the tourism sector as an agent of economic recovery. The travel and tourism industry cannot offer an across-the-board panacea but, with suitable marketing and measures taken to address potential challenges, it can offer the hope of an economic lifeline.

*****

[1] Based on estimates compiled by the US Bureau of the Census using statistics from national population censuses and other data sources.

[2] From World Tourism Organisation using most recent full-year data (2018), except: Botswana (2017), Zimbabwe (2017), DR Congo (2016), Lesotho (2013).

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Tourism as an Agent of Recovery in Post-COVID-19 Southern Africa - Future Directions International

Adventure Time: Distant Lands Premiere BMO the Hero – Show Snob

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Adventure Times: Distant Lands "BMO" - Courtesy of HBO Max

Despite all evidence of the world around them falling apart, most characters in Adventure Time: Distant Lands maintain a contagious enthusiasm. Perhaps more than any does BMO.

The first episode of the four-part HBO Max limited series Adventure Time: Distant Lands centers on the brave little robot. BMOs adventure begins with him on a ship destined to terraforming Mars. And it isnt long before BMO laughs in the face of danger, happily fixing the hole in his ship by welding a Band-Aid over it.

Soon after, he meets another robot in space, one that looks like Plankton from SpongeBob SquarePants condensed into a little ball. BMO names his new friend Olive. Olive, much to BMOs chagrin, zips the ship past its original destination and takes BMO through trippy space travel akin to 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Eventually, BMO crashes on a troubled planet. And even though he loses an arm, he is ecstatic to meet a young rabbit scientist, whom he encourages to think up her own name. She settles on Y5.

Much like Finn the Humans parents in the original series, Y5s parents are dismissive and demeaning. They look down on Y5, and tell her to scrap BMO for parts. But BMOs contagious heroicness leads Y5 to her own coming-of-age story.

Its too simple to characterize BMO as childlike. Throughout Adventure Time, and especially in Adventure Time: Distant Lands, BMO is sanguine in the trials and tribulations of his maturity.

But BMO always makes the adult decision to heed the cry of dangers. So often does he rush into action that it takes the sound of an alarm for Y5 to realize she misses BMO.

With the help of his new friends Y5 and Olive, who plays the Jake the Dog role to BMOs Finn, BMO helps save the planet on numerous occasions. He also has incredible one-liners that make him a 21st century Adam West Batman.

He died as he lived, sucking big time, BMO says, as a villain is sucked into outer space.

And even when BMO is at the depths of despair, with his systems shut off and his hardware scattered and littered in the dangerous jungle pod, he calmly and patiently awaits the good he knows will arrive.

Adventure Times: Distant Lands BMO Courtesy of HBO Max

After helping Y5 stand up to her parents, BMO is saved by his new rabbit friend. They save the day together, and BMO only leaves the planet after the young scientist decrees that all the citizens have to learn how to get along and share the limited remaining resources after the villains took most for themselves.

BMO ponders on his ship how Y5 will probably become Mayor of the planet.

BMO ends the episode on a new, strange planet. He looks to the horizon and finds a young Finn and Jake playing outside their treehouse. Ever the optimist, BMO is excited about this new adventure.

Theres much to admire about Adventure Time: Distant Lands. Obviously, having new Adventure Time content is great. Each episode is an hour-long, even better. But retaining the story, humor, and humanity of the characters is the best.

Which Adventure Time character do you wish had their own special as part of Adventure Time: Distant Lands? Let us know in the comments below!

Adventure Time: Distant Lands Episode 1 is available now on HBO MAX.

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Adventure Time: Distant Lands Premiere BMO the Hero - Show Snob

Investigating the funding mechanisms behind ANTIFA | Columns – Port Lavaca Wave

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Dear Attorney General Barr,

June 16, 2020

I write to thank you for the Department of Justices (DOJ) dedication to investigating ANTIFA, your work to declare ANTIFA a terrorist group, and for your efforts to ensure that proper actions will be taken against the violent agitators who have abused federal law. Additionally, I want to commend you for using the Joint Terrorism Task Force network to identify the organizers of the recent destructive protests. However, I also write to urge you to investigate the funding mechanisms behind ANTIFA and other associated groups, which have threatened the wellbeing of our society.

As you may know, ANTIFA groups have had a long history of violent protests, under which they have caused direct harm to anyone critical of their beliefs. For example, last summer, a photojournalist, who was a harsh critic of ANTIFA groups, was beaten by an ANTIFA mob on a public street. The photojournalist posed no physical threat to the group and was simply capturing footage during a Portland ANTIFA demonstration against right-wing groups.

Furthermore, ANTIFA groups executed in violent attacks at the University of California, Berkeley, in response to a planned speech on campus by a right-wing commentator. During these riots, masked ANTIFA protestors hurled fireworks, rocks, and alcoholic beverages at law enforcement officials and caused nearly $100,000 worth of damage to the campus.

More recently, in 2019, during an ANTIFA protest outside the Tacoma Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma, Washington, an armed 68-year-old man attacked a police officer. The armed man placed his arms around the officer in an attempt to choke him, so that another protester would be freed. Later, police found explosives and weapons in his bag.

The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution guarantees the right to speak freely and to petition the government through peaceful gatherings and protests. However, the ANTIFA protests directly undermine these freedoms, as they use terror and violence to silence the voices of opposition groups and to suppress their ability to assemble. This group continued to utilize these methods over the past week, which led to inflictions of brutal injuries on law enforcement officials and civilians and severe damages to infrastructure, small businesses, and historical sites. These attacks by radical, left-wing protesters are the antithesis to the safe and effective manner in

which our founding fathers intended First Amendment rights to be utilized, as they only create a further divide and exacerbate inequality in vulnerable populations.

ANTIFA groups who use violence as a tool to advocate for their beliefs and their radical-leftist agenda can carry out these vicious and well-organized attacks due to their ability to

obtain adequate funding. In an effort to subdue these attacks, I urge you to investigate the funding mechanisms behind these volatile groups bringing such reprehensible and destructive behavior amongst our society. Going forward, we must hold ANTIFAs financial supporters accountable, guarantee that taxpayer dollars are not wasted on the prevention of these violent attacks and ensure that future demonstrations work to honor our First Amendment freedom to peacefully protest.

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Investigating the funding mechanisms behind ANTIFA | Columns - Port Lavaca Wave

FBI monitors threats against Seattle-area protests – KUOW News and Information

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Since the nationwide protests against police violence began six weeks ago, there have been numerous acts of violence against peaceful protesters.

In Seattle, one person was killed, and another person seriously injured when a man drove into a crowd of peaceful protesters on I-5. In June, a protester was shot on Capitol Hill by a man who drove into the protest zone.

This interview has been edited for clarity.

Raymond Duda is the Special Agent in charge of Seattle's FBI field office. He says the FBI has not been involved in investigating those incidents. But in other parts of the country, the FBI has arrested members of right-wing hate groups who were planning to use violence against protesters.

Paige Browning: Special Agent Duda, is the FBI is tracking similar types of threats here in Seattle?

Duda: We are. There's constantly intelligence out there regarding individuals across the spectrum, whether it's on the far right or the far left. We track that intelligence. You have to understand the intelligence itself is a spectrum. Rarely do you have intelligence that you have 100% confidence in. It falls somewhere on that spectrum.

We look at it closely. We've got some of the best intelligence professionals in the country that work for us. We constantly assess that, and determine whether or not it warrants further investigative activity.

How would you assess the threat level in Seattle from these sort of groups?

Leading up to the Fourth of July holiday, there was a fair amount of concern that there could be additional violence associated with the Capitol Hill Organized Protest, as it's called. The actions taken by the city in the week leading up to the holiday weekend changed that dynamic significantly.

We continued to monitor the threat over the weekend, but it subsided substantially. I don't believe there were any acts of violence associated with either side of the spectrum of domestic extremist groups.

President Trump and Attorney General William Barr have blamed violence that's taken place during demonstrations on so called Antifa members. Last month, Attorney General Barr said: We have evidence that Antifa and other similar extremist groups, as well as actors of a variety of different political persuasions, have been involved in instigating and participating in the violent activity.

Have you seen any evidence of some sort of organized Antifa activity here in Seattle?

Here in Seattle, no, we haven't seen evidence of organized activity. We have seen individuals -- and again, we view Antifa as an ideology, as opposed to an organization -- we have seen individuals here that align with that ideology, but "organized," I would say no.

I know that the FBI assisted with the clearing of Seattle's protest site, the CHOP. Why was the FBI brought in?

We had a limited role. We had specialty capabilities. There were reports of potential explosives, and weapons, and things like that. We have the capability to work with the Seattle Police Department and provide some expertise in the event that those sorts of objects are uncovered.

Has that operation led to any investigations?

No, that did not lead to any specific investigations. We do have investigations that have been initiated based on the totality of circumstances that have occurred in Seattle over the last few weeks, but that particular operation did not lead to the opening of anything.

As you told us, your agency did have some involvement in the clearing out of the CHOP protest area. What would you say to someone who is concerned about the federal government being involved?

At the FBI, we absolutely support the exercise of individuals First Amendment rights. We think that is a sign of a healthy democracy, and we want to encourage that activity. Where we get involved is with those individuals who are bent on hijacking that activity to commit acts of violence in furtherance of whatever ideology they may have.

Those violent acts make the lawful protesters less safe, and they make the public less safe. So that's our focus, on those individuals that would hijack that lawful, constitutionally protected activity to further their own extremist agendas, and typically involving violence.

Listen to the interview by clicking the play button above.

This post has been updated.

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FBI monitors threats against Seattle-area protests - KUOW News and Information

9 great reads from CNET this week – CNET

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For the most up-to-date news and information about the coronavirus pandemic, visit the WHO website.

This week saw mounting evidence that COVID-19 can spread through the air, a form of transmission the World Health Organization had earlier considered very rare. The agency also made a stronger statementthat the virus can be spread by people who are asymptomatic. Meanwhile, the United States has been setting single-day records for coronavirus cases -- it reported almost 60,000 on Thursday alone, according to The New York Times.

On the tech front, President Donald Trump iseyeing a ban on TikTok, Uber has gone all-in on grocery delivery, Apple made iOS betas available for public testing, and CNET kicked off a series on how China aims to dominate everything from 5G to AI.

Subscribe to the CNET Now newsletter for our editors' picks of the most important stories of the day.

Here are week's stories you don't want to miss.

It's the stuff of science fiction: chilling your body inside a stainless steel chamber for years on end. But is cryonics a way to reverse death? Or is it just a pipe dream?

China isn't the only country jockeying for control. The US dominated 4G's expansion and expects to do the same with 5G.

The coronavirus pandemic hasn't slowed China's adoption of 5G.

Exclusive: Several emergency services in the US and Canada are embracing the What3words service. One tap on a text message lets you tell them exactly where you are.

In a massive warehouse in New Jersey, Bowery Farming is trying to change the future of agriculture (all while using 90% less water).

The reality is that US and China efforts to develop AI are entwined, even if the tensions of coronavirus and trade disagreements may spur a separation.

Wars aren't fought only on battlefields. Here's the little-known story of the gang of Americans who searched for black gold in the heart of besieged Britain.

Kevin Valdez draws on personal experience to play a neurodiverse character on a new Apple TV Plus show.

Commentary: Today's services are primed to help you figure out where you come from.

Old phones and Star Wars toys aren't the only valuable items people will pay for on eBay, Facebook Marketplace and more.

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9 great reads from CNET this week - CNET

Documentary review: ‘Aswang’ captures the horror that is the war on drugs – ABS-CBN News

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During this COVID-19 quarantine, three controversial, internationally-acclaimed documentaries about Philippine politics had been shared by their filmmakers online for Filipinos to watch for the first time.

Last May, Lauren Greenfield's "The Kingmaker" was streamed, laying bare Madame Imelda Marcos' enduring belief from the Martial Law days up to the present time -- that "perception is real, truth is not" -- straight from her own mouth. In June, on Independence Day, Ramona Diaz's "A Thousand Cuts" was streamed for free on YouTube for 24 hours, two days before a local court found its embattled subject, Rappler founder Maria Ressa, guilty of cyber-libel.

This weekend, a third hard-hitting political documentary by an intrepid female filmmaker is being shared online. "Aswang" by Alyx Ayn G. Arumpac had its world premiere at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam last November 2019 where it won a major award. Since then, it had also been screened in a couple of big human rights film festivals, and won the Amnesty International award at the Thessaloniki Documentary Festival held virtually last May.

"Aswang" is about the aggressively heated war on drugs launched in 2016 in fulfillment of presidential campaign promises. Various tragic stories during this drug war among the urban poor had been tackled by several filmmakers like Brillante Mendoza, Erik Matti and Lav Diaz in the past couple of years. The most recent one was Ben Rekhi's gritty "Watch List" released in cinemas just a month before the quarantine.

In contrast to these works of fiction, Arumpac brought her camera directly to the scenes of actual crimes to tell the grim aftermath among the families left behind. We see the real people and their emotions, not mere actors. We hear their own words, not lines penned by a scriptwriter. We may have seen these families in short clips on the evening news, but here, they are given a little more time to tell their grievances.

Children who live in these grim slum conditions were highlighted by Arumpac. Her narrative began with the death of teenager Kian Lloyd de los Santos allegedly at the hands of cops. From there, Arumpac picked one of Kian's much younger friend Jomari to serve as a focal point of her film. Left to fend for himself while his parents were both incarcerated, the precocious, street-smart urchin Jomari had prematurely jaded pronouncements, which were in stark contrast with his innocent glee in shopping for superhero slippers and basketball jerseys to wear.

In between stories of the drug war, the director and her editors also factored in some side stories to further drive home her point against the dire conditions suffered by the urban poor. There were scenes from a fiery street protest against the leadership, with the presidential visage used as the basis of a satanic effigy. There was also a detour to describe the case of how human rights officials freed a number of male and female inmates who were kept sealed in a dark, humid, putrid cell hidden behind a filing cabinet.

We may say we have heard all of these things already from the news, perhaps ad nauseam for some. However, when these painful scenes are compiled together in a documentary like this, the tragic human drama is amplified a hundredfold. It aimed to jolt us out of our privileged seats of comfort and direct our eyes to these "invisible" socio-political tragedies happening right under our line of sight.

How coincidental that it would be streamed to the Filipino public just days after the anti-terror bill was signed into law, and the day after a one-sided congressional vote took down a mass media giant. The timing could not have been more uncanny.

This review was originally published in the author's blog, "Fred Said."

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Documentary review: 'Aswang' captures the horror that is the war on drugs - ABS-CBN News

How Authoritarianism Fuels the War on Drugs – Open Society Foundations

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As the world has been gripped by the COVID-19 pandemic, the global war on drugs has continued in ways that are both surprising and tragically familiar. Indeed, as recent examples from across the globe have shown, the drug war is already often used as an excuse for authoritarian measures with ulterior motives.

Recently, in a live stream moderated by the Open Society Global Drug Policy Programs Matt Wilson, three essential voices on this topicSheila Coronel, the director of the Toni Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism at the Columbia University School of Journalism; Geoff Ramsey, director for Venezuela at the Washington Office on Latin America; and Aqeela Sherrills, director of the Newark Community Street Teamdiscussed the link between the drug war and authoritarianism, as well as the lessons reformers and civil society actors can use to promote justice instead.

Watch the video above to learn more.

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How Authoritarianism Fuels the War on Drugs - Open Society Foundations