Bull market or fool’s market? Investors say the latter | CNN Business

June 20, 2023June 18, 2023 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

The stock market has made incredible strides since its downturn last year – so much so, it’s difficult to believe the economy could be on the verge of recession.

At the market’s close on June 16, 2022, the S&P 500 index was at about 3,666.77, beaten down by persistent inflation, the Federal Reserve’s interest rate hikes and geopolitical tensions.

The broad-based index is at 4,409.59 as of the close on June 16, 2023 – marking a roughly 20% gain from a year earlier despite collapses of regional banks, an only narrowly avoided debt default and the Fed’s continued battle against inflation.

An online gambling site is taking bets on the future of Reddit | Fast Company

June 14, 2023June 13, 2023 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

With more than 8,400 subreddits going dark to protest Reddit’s decision to start charging some third-party apps for access to the company’s application programming interface (API), the “front page of the internet” is looking pretty threadbare this week.

That may improve, in some cases, late Tuesday and early Wednesday as the 48-hour protest draws to a close, but many popular subreddits—including r/music, with over 30 million subscribers—say they will stop operating “indefinitely” until the situation is resolved, noting that their moderators are unable to do their work with the tools on Reddit’s official app.

So now, an online gambling site is laying odds and taking wagers about what happens next. And according to the oddsmakers, at least, it doesn’t look good for Reddit.

How Phoenix’s water crisis could slash development | Fast Company

June 14, 2023June 13, 2023 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Phoenix is facing not one but two water crises. Around a third of the desert city’s water comes from the beleaguered Colorado River. Thanks to a decades-long mega-drought fueled by climate change, the city stands to lose much of that supply in coming years as the river dries up and the state faces water cuts.

Another third of the metro’s water comes from underground aquifers—and that water is running out too. Earlier this month, Arizona’s water department published a new report assessing how much water remains in the aquifers below Phoenix. The data was alarming: The state found that it has allocated more groundwater to cities and farms over the next 100 years than is actually present in the aquifers. If the Phoenix area keeps pumping water at its current rate, those aquifers will tap out over the next century, according to the department. The total shortfall amounts to almost 5 million acre-feet, or around 1.6 trillion gallons, that were permitted for use over the next 100 years but may not exist at all.

Ukraine dam: Thousands flee floods after dam collapse near Nova Kakhovka| BBC News

June 7, 2023June 6, 2023 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Thousands of people are being evacuated downstream of a major dam which has collapsed in Russian-held Ukraine.

President Volodymyr Zelensky said 80 towns and villages may be flooded after the destruction of the dam at Nova Kakhovka, which he blamed on Russia.

Water is surging down the Dnipro river, and is said to pose a catastrophic flooding risk to the city of Kherson.

Russia has denied destroying the dam – which it controls – instead blaming Ukrainian shelling.

Microsoft to pay $20m for child privacy violations | BBC News

June 7, 2023June 5, 2023 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Microsoft will pay $20m (£16m) to US federal regulators after it was found to have illegally collected data on children who had started Xbox accounts.

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) reached a settlement with the company on Monday, which also includes increased protections for child gamers.

Among other violations, the FTC found that Microsoft failed to inform parents about its data collection policies.

It follows a similar action against Amazon last week over its Echo devices.

The FTC said Microsoft violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act by not properly getting parental consent and by retaining personal data on children under 13 for longer than necessary for accounts created before 2021.

Oklahoma approves first US taxpayer-funded religious charter school | BBC News

June 6, 2023June 5, 2023 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

An Oklahoma school board has approved what will be the first publicly funded religious charter school in the US.

The Oklahoma State Virtual Charter School Board approved the Catholic charter school by 3-2 in a vote on Monday.

The charter school would be run by the Catholic Archdiocese of Oklahoma City and the Diocese of Tulsa.

The state attorney general called the approval “unconstitutional” and warned it could lead to costly legal action.

A charter school is funded by taxpayers but independently managed. Charter schools are a small fraction of the US school system.

The S&P 500 broke out above a key level. Now what? | CNN Business

June 5, 2023 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

The S&P 500 index on Friday closed at its highest level in almost a year. But that doesn’t mean that stocks are poised for a bull run just yet.

The broad-based index on May 26 closed above the 4,200 level for the first time since August 2022, when the market began to sell off and fell sharply to last year’s low of about 3,577 in October.

The S&P 500 ended last week up 1.8% at about 4,282, marking its best weekly gain since late March.

So, what caused the broad-based index to finally breach its level of resistance? The gains were powered by three key updates that investors cheered:

There may be hundreds of millions of habitable planets in the Milky Way, new study suggests | Live Science

June 2, 2023June 1, 2023 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

The sun is an ordinary star, but it’s not the only kind of star out there. Most stars in our galaxy are M dwarfs (sometimes called red dwarfs), which are significantly smaller and redder than the sun — and many of them may have the potential to host life, new research shows.

A new reanalysis of data from the planet-hunting Kepler mission shows that one-third of planets around M dwarfs may be suitable for life — meaning there are likely hundreds of millions of habitable planets in the Milky Way alone.

For the analysis, astronomers at the University of Florida incorporated new information from the European Space Agency’s Gaia satellite, which precisely measures the distances and motions of stars, to fine-tune measurements of exoplanets’ orbits. The researchers wanted to pin down a parameter of each orbit known as eccentricity, a measure of how stretched out the planet’s path around its star is.

Tips for Wage Transparency Law | Business

May 23, 2023May 22, 2023 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Here’s how to stay compliant with new job posting requirements while avoiding workplace drama.

In the U.S., salary discussions have long remained a taboo subject. Now, not talking about it could cost you hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines.

On Nov. 1, 2022, New York City’s salary transparency law took effect. Other states, including California, are following suit with similar regulations. And while these laws might not yet affect you, it pays to prepare for changes as the pay transparency trend gathers steam across the country.