Even more oddities spotted in the news

[Bob Schroeck]

The last thread hit 300 posts, so here's a third installment.

Sadly I don't have an oddity to share, but I wanted to make sure there was a thread present when someone did.

[Bob Schroeck]

Sailor Moon Director Wins Harassment Lawsuit Against Crazed Fan

[robkelk]

Keith Richards turns 80

Raise a hand, anybody - anyone at all - who expected him to last this long.

[Dartz]

Must've been a boring Rabbi

[robkelk]

Congratulations to Elton John for winning an Emmy, making him the nineteenth member of the EGOT club (or the twenty-fifth if you count honorary Emmys, Oscars, Grammys, and Tonys).

[robkelk]

Today is the International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust

[Bob Schroeck]

Sailor Moon manhole covers to be installed in Tokyo at sites linked to the anime/manga series.

[robkelk]

Quebec greenlights X gender markers for driver's licences, health cards

Only an oddity because of how long it took to happen - they're the last province in Canada to allow this.

No word on whether Elon Musk had anything to do with his favourite letter.

[classicdrogn]

Sadly, even if he did he's not the type to take away the worst offenders' Xitter licenses.

[Labster]

German man got 217 COVID shots over 29 months—here’s how it went

To save you the click, he has slightly higher immune response to the corona, but not enough to justify doing that. The patient seems to have suffered no ill effects from the hypervaccination.

[classicdrogn]

Le gasp! It didn't infect him with autism, male pattern baldness, or 5G!? Unimaginable!

[robkelk]

Ban on same-sex marriage unconstitutional, Sapporo High Court rules

The only oddity here is how long this has taken -- Japan is the only G7 nation that still bans same-sex marriage.

[hazard]

Nothing odd about that, to be honest.

Anime may make you think otherwise, but Japan is deeply socially conservative.

[Labster]

Posted here, rather than politics, because I think it will be entirely uncontroversial here:

SBF repeatedly lied to get out of “supervillain” prison term, new FTX CEO alleges

Sam Bankman-Fried being a liar is hardly news. But I wanted to draw your attention to this bit:

According to Ray, "Bankman-Fried continues to live a life of delusion." While Ray's team continues to work to recover funds lost, which has been estimated around $10 billion, the total amount of stakeholder claims filed is $23.6 quintillion dollars.

"One quintillion is one billion billions," Ray told Kaplan. "It is the number 1 followed by 18 zeros. The task of addressing filed claims and reducing them to their proper and 'allowed' amount is monumental. Mr. Bankman-Fried assumes this is a breeze. He is wrong, very wrong."

$23 quintillion? Those crypto bros are throwing around Magrathea money. Easily enough money to buy Earth outright.

[robkelk]

...

According to Ray, "Bankman-Fried continues to live a life of delusion." While Ray's team continues to work to recover funds lost, which has been estimated around $10 billion, the total amount of stakeholder claims filed is $23.6 quintillion dollars.
...

Looks like Bankman-Fried isn't the only one living a life of delusion.

[Dartz]

Someone slipped a bit of a mickey into XFZ library to allow remote access

Oh dear.

Fortunately this was caught soon enough to only affect Fedora Rawhide, Kali and a Debian release. Or - basically - nothing that's actually (or should be) in production.

[Labster]

Someone slipped a bit of a mickey into XFZ library to allow remote access

Oh dear.

Fortunately this was caught soon enough to only affect Fedora Rawhide, Kali and a Debian release. Or - basically - nothing that's actually (or should be) in production.

Yeah it was one month from making it into an Ubuntu LTS from that Debian release.  We all got very lucky, since this was a long-term attack.  Either the guy was planted by a government, or co-opted by a government.  The attack needed a secret key to work, too.

Cue the hand-wringing about how open-source development doesn't give individuals enough support; just like the thoughts and prayers we offer school shootings, it should have the same effect.

[robkelk]

The bus came back...

After a quarter century, the actual (not a replica) bus used in The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert has been found.

It's currently being restored.

[robkelk]

Who likes loud cars? Ontario study suggests they skew young, male and score high on psychopathy and sadism

Actually reading the article reveals at least one flaw in the methodology, though, so this needs to be re-done with a larger sample.

[classicdrogn]

Exactly no one should be surprised if said larger study confirms the results, however.

[robkelk]

What goes up might not be allowed to come back down

The Register: FAA now requires reentry vehicles to get licensed before launch

Last year, Varda's W-1, based on a Rocket Lab Photon satellite bus, was launched into orbit. While the FAA gave permission for the launch, it did not give authorization for the capsule to return to the US.

[robkelk]

Remember Apple's "1984" ad? Of course you do.

Remember Apple's "Lemmings" ad from 1985? The one that forced Steve Jobs to leave the company? Maybe you don't, but you should. Apple's ad company didn't.

Apple crushes creativity and its reputation in new iPad ad

[classicdrogn]

That seems like quite the overreaction, but the Xitterati excel at that.

[robkelk]

From what I've seen, the reaction is about as strong as the reaction back in '85.

You'd think Apple would have learned not to talk down to their customers in the last four decades...

[classicdrogn]

Yes.

Overreaction.

"We've squeezed all these tools of creativity into one little gadget!" What's the problem with that?