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Contents contributed and discussions participated by runlai_jiang

runlai_jiang

U.S. Stocks Surge After China's Xi Eases Trade Fears - WSJ - 0 views

  • Major U.S. stock indexes climbed Tuesday, with the Dow adding more than 400 points, as remarks from Chinese President Xi Jinping soothed concerns about a trade war that had rattled markets in recent weeks
  • Speaking at the Boao Forum, an annual economic summit, Mr. Xi pledged Beijing’s commitment to further economic liberalization as well as promising greater intellectual property protection and increased access to China’s financial and manufacturing sectors for foreign companies.
  • his conciliatory tone was taken well by the market
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  • In Asia, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index rallied 1.7%, as did Shanghai’s composite index, with Chinese banks among the sharpest risers.
runlai_jiang

Alien atmospheres recreated on Earth - BBC News - 0 views

  • Researchers have recreated the chemistry of atmospheres on distant planets for the first time in the lab, according to two new papers.
runlai_jiang

Trump told to mute Twitter critics, not block them, by New York judge - BBC News - 0 views

  • A judge has advised US President Donald Trump to mute rather than block his Twitter critics after users of the service filed a lawsuit against him.
runlai_jiang

The craft beer firm with a thirst for global growth - BBC News - 0 views

  • Walking into a bar in India, it is hard to miss the bottles of Bira 91 beer. Featuring a cartoon monkey with a punk hairdo and one eye smaller than the other, the labels read: "Imagined in India".Despite only launching in 2015, Bira 91 is now immensely popular across a country dominated by ubiquitous Kingfisher.Entrepreneur Ankur Jain started the brand when he moved back to his native New Delhi after 10 years living in New York.
  • By the end of last year, annual production had increased 30-fold to 300,000 barrels of five different beers, and the company's annual revenues had reached $30m.At the same time Bira 91 had secured $35m of external investment, including from US venture capital firm Sequoia Capital.
  • To do this Mr Jain decided to flatten the organisational structure of the business. His fellow directors saw their senior job titles and assigned seats in offices taken away, and now employees at Bira 91 sit around the same dinner tables, allowing junior and senior employees to freely exchange ideas.
runlai_jiang

Elon Musk: Mars ship test flights 'next year' - BBC News - 0 views

  • Elon Musk, a man prone to ludicrous deadlines, has birthed another: test flights of his Mars spaceship next year."I think we’ll be able to do short flights, up and down flights, some time in the first half of next year," he told an audience at the South by South West (SXSW) festival in Austin, Texas.
  • Elon Musk is unquestionably the most interesting businessman in Silicon Valley - arguably the world - thanks to his almost single-handed reignition of the space race.After a string of failed rockets - and near bankruptcy - SpaceX wowed the world with its latest flight, Falcon Heavy, in February.
  • "This is a situation where you have a very serious danger to the public. There needs to be a public body that has insight and oversight so that everyone is delivering AI safely. This is extremely important.
runlai_jiang

Trump-North Korea meeting: US 'knows the risks', says spy chief - BBC News - 0 views

  • CIA director Mike Pompeo has defended Donald Trump's decision to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, saying the president understands the risks.
  • No sitting US president has ever met a North Korean leader. Mr Trump reportedly accepted the offer to do so on the spot when it was relayed by South Korean envoys on Thursday, taking his own administration by surprise.
  • Speaking to the same channel, Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren raised fears that what she called the "decimated" US State Department lacked officials familiar with Pyongyang's methods.
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  • Trump: North Korea 'wants peace'At a political rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday, Mr Trump told supporters he believed North Korea wanted to "make peace". But he said he might leave the talks quickly if it didn't look like progress for nuclear disarmament could be made.
runlai_jiang

New Life for Steel Plant Perks Up Depressed Illinois Town, Workforce - WSJ - 0 views

  • GRANITE CITY, Ill.—Ever since the layoffs a few years ago, many residents here had wondered when the local steel plant would again fire up its furnaces—or close forever.
  • Not only were hundreds of steelworkers left jobless when United States Steel Corp. X -1.49% scaled down its operations in Granite City, Ill., in 2015, but lunch deliveries to the plant vanished for a local diner while a shoe store’s work-boot sales plummeted. At least 26 businesses closed within a year, according to an area chamber of commerce.
  • The Granite City steel plant didn’t entirely close. Before the layoffs started, the plant employed 2,200, making it the town’s biggest employer, according to a securities filing. After layoffs of approximately 1,500 employees, some were eventually brought back, but the furnaces remained off.
runlai_jiang

Why Blockchain Will Survive, Even If Bitcoin Doesn't - WSJ - 0 views

  • We’re now awash in “crypto” hype—cryptocurrencies like bitcoin and fundraising efforts like initial coin offerings. For every venture capitalist or technical expert, there’s a half-dozen hype men and fly-by-night startups making the entire space look like a 21st-century version of the Amsterdam tulip mania.
  • These applications can’t be found on a coin exchange, and they aren’t going to turn anyone into an overnight billionaire. But they could bring much-needed change to some of the world’s most critical, if unsexy, industries. This means new ways of transferring real estate titles, managing cargo on shipping vessels, mapping the origins of conflict materials, guaranteeing the safety of the food we eat and more. Using blockchain, you could prove that a particular diamond on sale in a Milan boutique came from a particular mine in Russia.
  • The third reason is that hype I mentioned. The current excitement around cryptocurrency gives blockchain the visibility to attract developers and encourage adoption.
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  • In this way, blockchain resembles another buzzword, “the cloud.” While detractors argued that the cloud was just “someone else’s computer,”
runlai_jiang

Union urges Ford to make electric move - BBC News - 0 views

  • The Unite union has urged Ford to convert its UK engine plants to making electric cars and battery technology.Currently Ford makes engines for the Ford Fiesta and Jaguar Land Rover vehicles at Bridgend in South Wales and diesel engines in Dagenham in Essex.
  • Production of engines for Jaguar Land Rover at the Ford Engine plant in Bridgend will end in September 2020.Half of the workforce of 1,930 at Bridgend works on that engine.At the moment Ford Bridgend makes half a million engines a year for Ford's own models and a quarter of a million for JLR.After 2020 the number of engines being made on the site will be just a quarter of present production levels.
  • Figures from industry body the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders showed sales of new diesel cars fell 17.1% last year as higher taxes and pollution fears hit demand.
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  • A recent study by Aston University forecast a further 10% drop in sales this year and estimated that diesel cars will account for less than a third of the market by 2020.
runlai_jiang

Would you buy a flying car that costs nearly £300,000? - BBC News - 0 views

  • As Dutch company Pal-V unveils its flying car gyrocopter at the Geneva motor show, we ask if the dream of flying cars for all could ever become a reality. Or will they remain toys for the rich, superseded by sky taxis that can fly autonomously?
runlai_jiang

Trump holds games violence meeting - BBC News - 0 views

  • US President Donald Trump has met video games company representatives to discuss violent content.
  • The meeting came in the wake of last month's shooting at a school in Florida in which 17 people died.The president has in the past expressed the view that violent games were "shaping young people's thoughts".
  • On several occasions, President Trump has pointed to video game violence as being a problem potentially affecting American youths."Video game violence & glorification must be stopped," he wrote on Twitter in December 2012.
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  • Critics of the industry included Brent Bozell from the Media Research Center. He has frequently called for a reduction of violence in games.
  • “Video games are enjoyed around the world and numerous authorities and reputable scientific studies have found no connection between games and real-life violence," the ESA said in a statement.
  • In 2013, following the death of 20 pre-school children and six staff members at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, the vice-president at the time, Joe Biden, met games representatives from firms such as Electronic Arts and Epic.Mr Biden said games companies were not being "singled out" and there was no "silver bullet" when it came to solving the issue. He said there was no good data either way to support or disprove claims that games violence provoked real actions.
runlai_jiang

Tech Tent: The woes of the world wide web - BBC News - 0 views

  • Sir Tim Berners-Lee tells Tech Tent that he has become less optimistic about the beneficial effects of his creation - but the web's founder is up for a fight about what he regards as a vital principle, net neutrality.
  • Both he and other web pioneers were hugely optimistic about its potential to foster collaboration and an open exchange of views. "Humanity once connected by technology would do wonderful things," he says.
  • In the United States the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has moved to scrap the net neutrality regulation brought in by the Obama administration.
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  • He had told the FCC boss that advances in computer processing power had made it easier for internet service providers to discriminate against certain web users for commercial or political reasons, perhaps slowing down traffic to one political party's website or making it harder for a rival company to process payments.
  • For Johnny Hornby of the advertising firm The&Partnership, the worry is the lack of control that the internet giants appear to have over the content that appears on their platforms.
  • The internet once seemed to promise perfectly targeted advertising that pleased both consumers and the companies trying to reach them: - another utopian vision that is now looking a bit frayed around the edges.
runlai_jiang

Elon Musk: SpaceX and Tesla alive 'by skin of their teeth' - BBC News - 0 views

  • Elon Musk says his companies SpaceX and Tesla are both still alive only "by the skin of their teeth".The entrepreneur told an audience at the South by South West (SXSW) conference that both companies almost went bankrupt in 2008.
  • He said 2008 was an incredibly difficult year - SpaceX's Falcon 1 rocket failed for the third time, and Tesla almost went bankrupt two days before Christmas.
  • Mr Musk also got divorced, and he said he had to borrow money from his friends to pay his rent.
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  • "SpaceX is alive by the skin of its teeth, and so is Tesla - if things had just gone a little differently, both companies would be dead," he said.
  • Mr Musk remains convinced that life on Mars is both possible and necessary. He fears another "dark age" should a third world war occur, and feels that Mars will be integral to helping the human race survive and regenerate.He also feels there are plentiful business opportunities there.
runlai_jiang

'Pharma Bro' Martin Shkreli sentenced to seven years - BBC News - 0 views

  • Martin Shkreli, the former drug firm executive found guilty of defrauding investors, has been sentenced to seven years in prison.
  • He first became notorious in 2015 for hiking the price of a lifesaving drug.His lawyers had asked the judge to impose a sentence of 12 to 18 months, while prosecutors were seeking at least 15 years.
  • In 2015 the youthful executive made headlines after he founded Turing Pharmaceuticals, bought the anti-parasitic drug Daraprim and raised its price by 5,000% to $750 (£540) per pill.
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  • "There are times when I want to hug him and hold him and comfort him and there are times when I want to punch him in the face," said Mr Brafman.
  • The medication is used to treat Aids patients, the pregnant and elderly. Price gouging is not illegal or even unusual in the US pharmaceutical industry.
  • Before his sentencing, Mr Brafman told the judge that Shkreli is a "somewhat broken" person who suffered from depression and an anxiety disorder.
  • But a month later he offered social media followers $5,000 if they could bring him hair from former US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, who repeatedly criticised him during her campaign.
runlai_jiang

BBC - Capital - The dirty secret about success - 0 views

  • e’re often reluctant to credit our good fortune purely to luck. We’d much rather put a material gain or positive outcome down to our brilliant intelligence, smarts, skills or hard work.But if success is directly correlated to our ability, why do there seem to be so many rich people with mediocre talent? And why aren’t the smartest people in the world also the wealthiest?A new paper authored by a team of Italian researchers, physicists Alessandro Pluchino and Andrea Raspisarda and economist Alessio Biondo, used a computer simulation of success defined by financial wealth to show that the most successful people in the world aren’t necessarily the most talented. They are the luckiest.
  • “It’s hard to get people to think about external forces and events,” says Frank. “But we find that if you prompt them to think about it – by asking about a time when they were lucky, rather than telling them they were lucky – the more generous people become and more willing to contribute to the common good.”
runlai_jiang

BBC - Travel - The most ambitious country in the world? - 0 views

  • This ostensible lack of consideration hadn’t been my experience of Singapore thus far. Previously, construction workers had stopped their jackhammers as I walked past so as not to wake my sleeping baby. I’d had umbrellas offered to me when getting off the bus in the teeming rain. So why did getting into a lift seem like survival of the fittest?
  • Kiasu is a Hokkien (Chinese dialect) word that comes from ‘kia’, which means afraid, and ‘su’, which means to lose: fear of losing out. In 2007, the word was included in the Oxford English Dictionary, where it’s described as ‘…a grasping, selfish attitude’.
  • In practical terms, this means Singaporeans hate missing out and love a bargain.
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  • To his surprise, despite there being a mix of ethnicities and languages in Singapore’s multicultural army camps, the young officers managed to find common ground through military slang.
runlai_jiang

BBC - Travel - The secrets hiding in Warsaw, the Paris of the East - 0 views

  • Once known as ‘The Paris of the East’ for its Baroque beauty, Warsaw saw more than 85% of its buildings destroyed amid the ravages of World War II. Despite its past hardships, Poland’s capital city continues to rise from the ashes – and its once-famous elegance can still be found by those who look beyond the surface.
  • Poland’s capital is full of surprises in unexpected places. “I discovered a skiing station in the middle of the city, a tropical beach on the Vistula River and a deer freely living in the Łazienki Park,” said French-Russian Sasha Naslin, who moved here from Belgium three years ago and blogs at The Alternative Travel Guide. “I was lucky to see him only the once!”
runlai_jiang

A New Antidote for Noisy Airports: Slower Planes - WSJ - 0 views

  • Urban airports like Boston’s Logan thought they had silenced noise issues with quieter planes. Now complaints pour in from suburbs 10 to 15 miles away because new navigation routes have created relentless noise for some homeowners. Photo: Alamy By Scott McCartney Scott McCartney The Wall Street Journal BiographyScott McCartney @MiddleSeat Scott.McCartney@wsj.com March 7, 2018 8:39 a.m. ET 146 COMMENTS saveSB107507240220
  • It turns out engines aren’t the major culprit anymore. New airplanes are much quieter. It’s the “whoosh” that big airplanes make racing through the air.
  • Computer models suggest slowing departures by 30 knots—about 35 miles an hour—would reduce noise on the ground significantly.
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  • The FAA says it’s impressed and is moving forward with recommendations Boston has made.
  • . A working group is forming to evaluate the main recommendation to slow departing jets to a speed limit of 220 knots during the climb to 10,000 feet, down from 250 knots.
  • New routes put planes over quiet communities. Complaints soared. Phoenix neighborhoods sued the FAA; Chicago neighborhoods are pushing for rotating runway use. Neighborhoods from California to Washington, D.C., are fighting the new procedures that airlines and the FAA insist are vital to future travel.
  • “It’s a concentration problem. It’s a frequency problem. It’s not really a noise problem.”
  • “The flights wake you up. We get a lot of complaints from young families with children,” says Mr. Wright, a data analyst who works from home for a major health-care company.
  • In Boston, an analysis suggested only 54% of the complaints Massport received resulted from noise louder than 45 decibels—about the level of background noise. When it’s relentless, you notice it more.
  • With a 30-knot reduction, noise directly under the flight track would decrease by between 1.5 and 5 decibels and the footprint on the ground would get a lot skinnier, sharply reducing the number of people affected, Mr. Hansman says.
  • The industry trade association Airlines for America has offered cautious support of the Boston recommendations. In a statement, the group said the changes must be safe, work with a variety of aircraft and not reduce the airport’s capacity for takeoffs and landings.
  • Air-traffic controllers will need to delay a departure a bit to put more room between a slower plane and a faster one, or modify its course slightly.
runlai_jiang

Airbus Sees 3,700 Jobs at Risk at Troubled Plane Programs - WSJ - 0 views

  • European plane maker Airbus EADSY -0.02% SE said Wednesday it plans to cut production of its flagship A380 superjumbo and A400M military transport aircraft, threatening thousands of jobs, though overall strong demand for airliners may mitigate staff cuts.
  • But Airbus’s A380 has missed out on the boom. Airlines worry that they won’t be able to fill an aircraft that seats more than 500 passengers. Plus, the superjumbo carries a price tag of $445.6 million before typical discounts,
  • Emirates Airline, the world’s largest by international traffic, in February signed an order for 20 A380s with an option for 16 more.
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  • The deal allows Airbus to sustain annual production at six planes, which it described as the minimum at which losses are manageable.
  • The bleak outlook for the A380 was punctuated late last year when the first of the jets put into operation was placed in long-term storage after Singapore Airlines opted not to extend an initial lease period. The carrier is the second biggest A380 customer, having ordered 24.
  • Boeing also has struggled to win orders for its biggest plane, the 747-8, leading to production cuts. For Airbus, the A400M cutback comes after years during which the company struggled to get the military transport out the door and develop some of the promised technical features. Airbus said it would build 15 of the planes this year, after delivering 19 last year. It plans to build 11 of the planes in 2019, and eight annually thereafter.
  • Airbus Chief Financial Officer Harald Wilhelm said last month said that lowering build rates for the A400M and the A380 would keep them in production and buy time to secure further deals.
runlai_jiang

How Cellphone Chips Became a National-Security Concern - WSJ - 0 views

  • The U.S. made clear this week that containing China’s growing clout in wireless technology is now a national-security priority. Telecommunications-industry leaders say such fears are justified—but question whether the government’s extraordinary intervention in a corporate takeover battle that doesn’t even involve a Chinese company will make a difference.
  • Those worries are rooted in how modern communication works. Cellular-tower radios, internet routers and related electronics use increasingly complex hardware and software, with millions of lines of code
  • Hackers can potentially control the equipment through intentional or inadvertent security flaws, such as the recently disclosed “Meltdown” and “Spectre” flaws that could have affected most of the world’s computer chips.
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  • Qualcomm is one of the few American leaders in developing standards and patents for 5G, the next generation of wireless technology that should be fast enough to enable self-driving cars and other innovations. The CFIUS letter said a weakened Qualcomm could strengthen Chinese rivals, specifically Huawei Technologies Co., the world’s top cellular-equipment maker and a leading smartphone brand.
  • Washington has taken unusual steps to hinder Huawei’s business in the U.S., concerned that Beijing could force the company to exploit its understanding of the equipment to spy or disable telecom networks.
  • Many European wireless carriers, including British-based Vodafone Group PLC, praise Huawei’s equipment, saying it is often cheaper and more advanced that those of its competitors. That is another big worry for Washington.
  • board and senior management team are American. “It’s barely a foreign company now, but politics and logic aren’t often friends,” said Stacy Rasgon, a Bernstein Research analyst. “I’m just not convinced that Qualcomm’s going to slash and burn the 5G roadmap and leave it open to Huawei” if Broadcom buys it.
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