Lifeboat Foundation

Secure communications provider Wickr has announced that it will shutter its free encrypted messaging app, Wickr Me, next year.

Text messaging has been around since the dawn of cellular technology, and sparked its own unique language. But it’s time to put sending regular SMS messages out to pasture.

If you have an iPhone, you’re already on your way. iPhones (as well as iPads and Macs) use iMessage to send messages between Apple devices. It’s a data-based messaging system reliant on 3G, 4G, and Wi-Fi, rather than SMS messaging, which uses an old, outdated but universal 2G cellular network. iMessage has grown in popularity, but has left Android devices and other computers out in the dark.

Continue reading “Cybersecurity 101: How to choose and use an encrypted messaging app” »

It will be the sight of astronauts on the moon, their gaze drawn to the strange movements of planet Earth and its sun, something that is sure to be an amusing sight for future NASA astronauts at the moon’s south pole.

This visualization shows the unusual movements of the Earth and the Sun as seen from the South Pole of the Moon. The animation compresses three months (a little over three lunar days) into two minutes. The virtual camera is on the rim of the Shackleton crater, partially visible in the lower right, and is pointed at Earth. The mountain on the horizon, some 85 miles away, is unofficially known as Mons Malapert.

Here, the Sun glides across the horizon, never more than 1.5 degrees above or below it, while the Earth bobs up and down, never straying from 0° longitude. The Earth appears to be upside down and spinning backward. The Sun’s perpetually low angle casts extremely long swirling shadows over the rugged lunar terrain.

Continue reading “This is what the Earth looks like rotating from the Moon… This is how” »

While some might view the emergence of humanoids with apprehension, a future filled with robots is likely to be a positive development for most. But as with anything, policy and society must be ready if, and when, they arrive.

There is growing corporate interest in humanoid robots to replace human labor. Tesla’s recently unveiled Bumble C robot may mark a turning point in an industry that has thus far focused on specialized machines produced in limited quantities. Should Tesla succeed, what does a mass-produced humanoid robot mean for the future of humanity?

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Revolutionary improvements to automation and production may one day create machines able to produce almost anything, quickly and cheaply, and far faster and more varied than modern 3D Printers. Such devices are sometimes known as Santa Claus Machines, Cornucopia Devices, or Clanking Del-Replicators, and today we will examine how likely such technology is, how far off in the future they might be, and what impact they would have on society.

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Continue reading “The Santa Claus Machine” »

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Continue reading “Loop Quantum Gravity Explained” »

That is, just the eigenvalues of a linearized analysis!

High-Risk, High-Payoff Bio-Research For National Security Challenges — Dr. David A. Markowitz, Ph.D., IARPA

Dr. David A. Markowitz, Ph.D. (https://www.markowitz.bio/) is a Program Manager at the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA — https://www.iarpa.gov/) which is an organization that invests in high-risk, high-payoff research programs to tackle some of the most difficult challenges of the agencies and disciplines in the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC).

Continue reading “Dr. David Markowitz, PhD — IARPA — High-Risk, High-Payoff Research For National Security Challenges” »

Infectious diseases expert George Thompson has been studying and treating fungal diseases for over two decades. He monitors their spread, symptoms and relative risks. Lately, he has been more concerned about a rising threat: the spread of disease-causing fungi outside of their traditional hot spots.

In a commentary published in Annals of Internal Medicine, Thompson and his co-author from the Mycotic Diseases Branch at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Tom Chiller raised the alarm. They noted the expanding presence and emerging risks from three endemic fungal diseases: histoplasmosis, blastomycosis and coccidioidomycosis (Valley fever).

“These three fungal diseases usually inhabit specific U.S. regions conducive to their survival,” said Thompson. He is a professor at the UC Davis School of Medicine in the Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases, and the Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology. “Recently, we are finding more cases of these diseases outside their known areas, taking clinicians and patients by surprise.”