Southern California wildfires burn homes and ski resort | Fast Company

September 12, 2024September 11, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Two Southern California wildfires torched dozens of mountain homes, tore through a ski resort, and forced thousands to evacuate in towns and cities east of Los Angeles on Wednesday.

Around 40 homes and cabins burned in the villages of Mount Baldy and Wrightwood, and flames swept through the nearby Mountain High ski resort in San Bernardino County, the Los Angeles Fire Department reported.

The blaze, named the Bridge Fire, exploded to more than 48,000 acres, becoming the largest in the state and one of four burning within sight of each other. The Southern California fires have blackened 105,000-plus acres of scrub, brush, and forest, an area a third the size of Los Angeles.

NFIB Jobs Report: Small Business Job Growth Stalls in August | Small Business Trends

September 10, 2024September 9, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

According to the latest NFIB Jobs Report, small business job openings remained high in August, with 40% of business owners reporting positions they could not fill, up two points from July. Labor quality concerns also grew, with 21% of owners citing it as their top issue, the highest level reported since January 2024.

“Job openings on Main Street remain historically high as small business owners continue to lament the lack of qualified applicants for their open positions,” said NFIB Chief Economist Bill Dunkelberg.

In August, 62% of small business owners reported hiring or trying to hire, an increase of five points from July. However, 56% of those hiring reported few or no qualified applicants for open positions, with 31% seeing few qualified candidates and 25% seeing none.

Windows 11 24H2: the big update that’s coming soon | Digital Trends

September 9, 2024September 8, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Windows 11 is more than a few years old and it is getting feature drops called “moments” every so often, as well as yearly updates. But what about the whole new Windows release that will come after Windows 11?

Earlier leaks from Intel and Qualcomm made mention of Windows 12, leading some to believe that Windows 12 might be in development at Microsoft and could come in 2024.

Whether or not it’s called Windows 12 or Windows 11 24H2, a big update is coming. Here’s what we know so far.

Microsoft is turning to AI to make its workplace more inclusive | BBC News

September 5, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Microsoft’s chief diversity officer says diversity and investment in the workforce can help fix AI’s bias problems.

At the beginning of 2023, Microsoft found itself in a PR firestorm. The company was working to demonstrate its progress in artificial intelligence following a multi-billion dollar investment in OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT. It added an AI powered chatbot into its Bing search engine, which placed it among the first legacy tech companies to fold AI into its flagship products, but almost as soon as people started using it, things went sideways.

A New York Times journalist sparked international intrigue over a conversation he had with Bing that left him “deeply unsettled”. Soon, users began sharing screenshots that appeared to show the tool using racial slurs and announcing plans for world domination. Microsoft quickly announced a fix, limiting the AI’s responses and capabilities. In the following months, the company replaced its Bing chatbot with Copilot, which is now available as part of its Microsoft 365 software and Windows operating system.

Father of boy held in Georgia school shooting is arrested |BBC News

September 5, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

The father of a 14-year-old boy accused of killing four people at his high school in the US state of Georgia has been arrested.

Colin Gray, 54, is facing four charges of involuntary manslaughter, two counts of second-degree murder and eight of cruelty to children, said the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI).

Authorities have charged his son, Colt Gray, with four counts of murder and said they plan to prosecute him as an adult. His first court appearance is due on Friday morning.

The shooting on Wednesday at Apalachee High School in the city of Winder, near Atlanta, left two teachers and two students dead, and nine others injured.

Bitcoin ATMs are a hotbed for scams, FTC says | TechCrunch

September 4, 2024September 3, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) published a report about increasing fraud at Bitcoin ATMs. These ATMs allow people to turn their cash into crypto, but they’ve become a tool for scammers to perpetrate fraud. Since 2020, the FTC says, fraud at Bitcoin ATMs has ballooned nearly tenfold, and just in the first half of 2024, consumers have lost over $66 million to these scams.

Scammers use tactics like fake phone calls, messages, and security alerts to convince people that they’re in danger, and that they should deposit cash into a Bitcoin ATM to protect it. Then, the scammer may share a QR code to scan at the Bitcoin ATM, which deposits the cash into the scammer’s wallet.

America’s massive hotel strike just got even bigger | CNN Business

September 2, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Baltimore hotel workers are joining a massive nationwide strike against three major hotel chains during one of the biggest travel holidays of the year.

Unite Here, the union representing hotel workers, said approximately 200 hotel workers walked off the job in Baltimore at the Hilton Inner Harbor this morning.

Hotel union workers are now on strike across 25 US cities. More than 10,200 hotel workers at dozens of hotels stretching from Boston to the West Coast to Hawaii went on strike early Sunday morning.

“I walked out today because we just cannot keep working paycheck to paycheck, not able to pay our bills,” Jerome Roberts, a dishwasher at the Hilton Baltimore Inner Harbor said in a statement. “Going on strike is hard, but not nearly as hard as trying to get by on what we are getting paid. We told the bosses in our negotiations how much we are struggling right now but they didn’t care. We are on strike to make them pay.”

‘A very serious situation’: Volkswagen could close plants in Germany for the first time in history | CNN Business

September 2, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Volkswagen is weighing whether to close factories in Germany for the first time in its 87-year history as it moves to deepen cost cuts amid rising competition from China’s electric vehicle makers.

In a statement Monday, the German automaker, one of the world’s biggest car companies, said that it could not rule out plant closures its home country. Other measures to “future-proof” the company include trying to terminate an employment protection agreement with labor unions, which has been in place since 1994.

“The European automotive industry is in a very demanding and serious situation,” said Volkswagen Group CEO Oliver Blume. “The economic environment became even tougher, and new competitors are entering the European market. Germany in particular as a manufacturing location is falling further behind in terms of competitiveness.

SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket grounded for 2nd time in 2 months following explosive landing failure | Live Science

August 30, 2024August 29, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) grounded SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket on Wednesday (Aug 28), following a failed landing attempt that left the spacecraft toppled over in flames.

The reusable rocket booster had just completed its record-breaking 23rd mission, successfully launching 21 Starlink satellites into low Earth orbit before touching down on a drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean roughly nine minutes later, according to Live Science’s sister site Space.com. However, immediately upon landing, the rocket tipped over, bursting into flames.

No injuries or public property damage were reported in connection with the failed landing.