Futurology Today

Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20250416121141/https://nysfocus.com/2025/04/14/wrongful-conviction-integrity-unit-new-york-prosecutorial-misconduct

This opinion piece argues that Europe should "shut down recommender algorithms" of the big US social media platforms - Facebook, X, Instagram, etc. - because the author believes that these algorithms are undermining European democracy.

The most obvious example of such an algorithm is on X, where Musk can manipulate the algorithm to boost European far-right parties, like AfD. But the author argues that other social media CEOs, like Zuck, are beholden to Trump's anti-liberal agenda - for example, Trump "openly threatened to throw Mark Zuckerberg in jail for the rest of his life". Therefore: "It is reasonable to assume that tech oligarchs will do what [Trump] tells them", which may include the Trump administration pressuring US social media companies to recommend more right-wing content.

So the author says: "The EU must immediately switch off the tech companies’ algorithms on its soil, at least until they are proven safe for democracy". Do you agree with that?

Malaysia stands with China on trade, Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim has said as the Southeast Asian nation hosts Chinese President Xi Jinping.

“We stand with the Chinese government, for the well-being of our people and for our national economic interests, as well as the overall development and stability of our country,” Anwar told state-run Chinese broadcaster CGTN on Wednesday.

Xi, who is on a week-long three-nation tour of Southeast Asia, was greeted by a 21-gun salute as he arrived at the national palace on Wednesday morning for an audience with Malaysia’s King Sultan Ibrahim Iskandar, accompanied by Prime Minister Anwar.

Later, the countries are expected to sign deals aimed at opening up more trade for key Malaysian exports such as palm oil and durian, increasing the influx of Chinese tourists and students to Southeast Asia and sharing Chinese know-how in sectors such as renewable energy.

In return, analysts warn that China is likely to expect Malaysia and its Southeast Asian neighbours to back it as the region’s leading power – an alignment that could provoke a reaction from Washington, leading to unpredictable consequences.

Anwar, however, refuted this argument. “We should not and do not need to be constrained by any side. So far, we refuse to succumb to such pressure,” he said.

“Our attitude is that we cooperate with those who treat us well. I must emphasise that although China is a major power with a strong economy and formidable military strength, we have never felt any sense of trouble or pressure from it.”

The visit is timely as Malaysia and its neighbours face having their decades of growth stunted by Donald Trump’s tariffs.

The US president has threatened to impose a blanket 24 per cent tariff on Malaysian exports, affecting everything from electric heaters and lamps to furniture.

Xi’s visit, which was planned months in advance, comes as China assumes the role of the defender of global free trade after Trump’s tariffs threatened to cut access to the US market.

China’s giant economy has become a potential lifeline for Southeast Asian economies now fearing the gut punch of US tariffs.

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Uchuujin Muumuu, episode 2

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After calling out his own party for how it was handing the investigation into multimillion-dollar health contracts, Peter Guthrie has been kicked out of the UCP caucus.

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The original was posted on /r/worldnews by /u/BreakfastTop6899 on 2025-04-16 17:26:10+00:00.

In January, I returned to Damascus after 14 years in exile. The last time I had stood in the city’s streets, towering statues of Hafez al-Asad and Bashar al-Asad loomed over the squares. Following the collapse of Bashar Al-Asad’s rule in December of 2024, those statues now lay in fragments—some torn down, others left to decay.

Well I feel like a real idiot right now, I've played stalker anomaly for a long time now. And because I like a stutter free, high refresh rate experience. I hadn't used the graphics upgrade mod. Well my dumb ass didn't fully read through the description, and it turns out it actually increases your performance..

Sure enough I booted up stalker anomaly with the screen space shaders mod, and the game runs a little better than it did. and looks like an AAA game from 2018.

I dunno if any of you play stalker anomaly, but don't skip over this mod.

Please share your success stories :)

A number of suspects have been arrested and charged in connection with a homicide late last month on Wellington Avenue, Winnipeg police say.

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The 186 meter long warship Marshal Ustinov is shooting artillery on targets at the Rybachii Peninsula as part of an ongoing exercise.

Archived version: https://archive.is/newest/https://www.thebarentsobserver.com/security/russian-cruiser-fires-artillery-few-kilometres-from-border-to-norway/428280

Disclaimer: The article linked is from a single source with a single perspective. Make sure to cross-check information against multiple sources to get a comprehensive view on the situation.

X’s revenues and profits collapsed in the UK in the year after Elon Musk took over the social media platform, the company has admitted.

A decline in advertising spending amid concerns about “brand safety and/or content moderation” were cited as the reason for the fall, according to accounts filed this week to Companies House.

Twitter UK Ltd also narrowly averted being struck off last month for failing to file the accounts on time, according to other recent filings to Companies House. It only filed full accounts on Monday for 2023, the year in which it was rebranded as X after Musk’s takeover.

...

Its overall revenue totalled £69.1m, down from £205.3m in 2022, a decrease of 66.3% year-on-year. The profit for 2023 dropped from £5.6m the previous year to £1.2m. Pre-tax profits were 74% lower at £2.25 million. This was a “significant decrease in the performance of the company”, it said.

Musk’s takeover also led to a wave of sackings, with the billionaire telling the BBC in 2023 that only 1,500 of about 8,000 Twitter employees were still employed at the company in that year.

In the UK, the accounts show that the number of the company’s employees fell to 114, from 399 the previous year. This included a cut of 173 to the number employed in “research and development”.

...

Musk set up a new company in the UK at the end of last year amid speculation that he was planning to make a large donation to Nigel Farage’s Reform UK party.

The company, called X.AI London, was incorporated on 12 December. It was recorded as being engaged in “business and domestic software development” and is based at the same London offices as X.

Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20250416120140/https://www.nprillinois.org/government-politics/2025-04-14/legislature-kills-bill-that-would-have-expanded-resentencing-for-youth-offenders

It’s August in Tokyo—hot and muggy, as usual. So I’ve scheduled my daily walk to be early and close to where I’m staying with a friend in the western part of the city. I walk to Tama-Reien, Tokyo’s largest municipal cemetery. Headstone and funerary shops line the street near the entrance. Once inside, I sense the order of a well-run place: a map laying out the grid, toilets and water taps well-marked, and row upon row of family headstones.

Yet, just as mosquitoes break the stillness of the air, a degree of neglect punctuates the place. While many plots are well-tended—gravestones washed, greenery neatly clipped, remnants of flowers and incense—others are overgrown, a jumble of weeds, with headstones broken or missing altogether. These are “abandoned graves” (akihaka) that no one cares for due to the family dying out or moving away.

Walking through Tama Reien, I also discover another category of dead: those who enter the ground abandoned already. When someone dies kinless and unclaimed, the municipality assumes responsibility and buries them in the zone for the “disconnected dead” (muenbo). A single marker designates the collective, anonymous remains gathered here. Devoid of the tenderness of flowers and care, the plot feels lonely. While saddened, I’m nonetheless drawn to it.

Later I ask my friend Yoshiko Kuga about it. She tells me that more and more Japanese are worried about meeting this undesirable fate.

Sociality, or the relations humans have with other humans, has long interested me. As an anthropologist, I’ve researched social hierarchies, gender, and capitalism in urban Japan for several decades. Yoshiko, who I became fast friends with during an earlier fieldwork project, is the one who first pointed me in the direction of my recent research on how the practices surrounding care for the dead, once dependent on family relations, have radically changed due to demographic and socioeconomic shifts in the population.