Obviously, there are gaps in our knowledge of Roman construction techniques and tools because we lack either written or physical evidence of these. Non-permanent materials have eroded away over two millennia and their characteristics elude us. Great structures like Hadrian’s Wall survive because of the use of stone or concrete.
There is, however, one clear example of a non-permanent structure which we know a lot about – Caesar’s first bridge over the Rhine. We know the story because Caesar tells us in volume four of The Conquest of Gaul. But construction techniques are only part of the story. Caesar built this bridge to show the Germans they were never safe from him because he had the skills to cross the river and attack them.
Agency, willfulness, and determination will likely be extremely valuable. Correctly deciding what to do and figuring out how to navigate an ever-changing world will have huge value; resilience and adaptability will be helpful skills to cultivate. AGI will be the biggest lever ever on human willfulness, and enable individual people to have more impact than ever before, not less.
We expect the impact of AGI to be uneven. Although some industries will change very little, scientific progress will likely be much faster than it is today; this impact of AGI may surpass everything else.
The price of many goods will eventually fall dramatically (right now, the cost of intelligence and the cost of energy constrain a lot of things), and the price of luxury goods and a few inherently limited resources like land may rise even more dramatically.
Downstream from Koblenz, there are two small towns named Andernach and Neuwied. Historical scholarship suggests Caesar planned to cross the Rhine in between these two locations. The distance between the shorelines in this area is 800 to 1000 feet. The average depth of the river is 16 feet.
Before we talk about the construction of the bridge, it will be useful to show a photograph of the model that sits in The Museo Della Civilta Romana in Rome.
Before starting construction, the Romans built a crane on a raft and floated it out into the river. You can see the framework of this apparatus on the left of the picture. The piers supporting the bridge were constructed of one and a half foot thick logs. These tigna bina were tied together in pairs with a two foot gap between them. They were then driven into the river bed at an oblique angle using a pile driver. This was apparently a large stone, attached to block and tackle on poles, that could be swung at the posts once they were tied into position. Once two sets of these posts were secure a large log (fibulae) was placed between them in the slot formed by the two foot gap. Angled supporting posts were tied to the tigna bina to provide additional support.
Caesar says the piles were positioned forty feet apart before they were driven into the riverbed.
Surprise playoff runs are no rarity in MLB, and someday there will be one more shocking than the 2024 Mets. What separates them from some of the others, however, is what they did to follow up their miracle finish. For comparison, look at the 2015 Mets, a team widely considered to be a fringe playoff contender entering the year who ultimately had a legitimate shot at a World Series ring. That group fell short, but the wide assumption in baseball was that they would be back and be led by their young pitching.
The winter of 2015 going into 2016, the Mets remained mostly quiet during the offseason. The team retained Yoenis Céspedes, which was their true major move. They also traded left-handed pitcher Jon Niese to the Pittsburgh Pirates for second baseman Neil Walker, and signed Asdrúbal Cabrera to play shortstop.
Across baseball, the Cleveland Guardians have failed to build off of multiple ALCS appearances as well as their 2016 AL Pennant, the Dodgers made the playoffs ten times in a row without winning a title during a full season before 2024, and teams like the Toronto Blue Jays and Milwaukee Brewers have failed to capitalize on consistent playoff appearances at different points. The common denominator between all of these examples is a lack of championship-level moves in the offseason, whether it be via free agency or trade.
The one exception? Last year’s Dodgers. The team went out and acquired Shohei Ohtani, Tyler Glasnow, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Teoscar Hernández, all of whom played major roles in their championship season.
In total, the Mets have spent over $1 billion in total contract value this winter. Soto’s $765 million led the way by a significant margin, but the Mets did not shy away from spending afterwards either. The Mets had every excuse to ride the tail of their 2024 campaign, touting their success, fan interest, media attention and simple all-around fun they had. However, as teams have shown before, hoping those factors extend into a new season and are enough to help repeat and grow upon prior success rarely works.
20 years fits with Kurzweils prognosis of a singularity, but it’s conservative as it extrapolates past progress into the future, which was based on humans using technology to built better technology. In other words it’s an extrapolation that assumes static human intellect as driving force with the exponential being based on the feedback loop of tools being used to built better tools. Once AGI arrives and thus recursive self improved, it’s likely that the exponent gets a lot larger, as at least one additional order of exponential growing starts that interacts with the already existing one. It’s not just increases in absolute intelligence in AGI, and the use of surrogate models like alphafold to shift the heavy lifting of experimentation from physical to digital space.
It’s also that AGI (even only at human levels) is faster (e.g. a human mathematician equivalent in AGI thinking faster by 1000x should achieve 1000years of progress in just one year). Plus scalability, we have a couple of millions of scientists and engineers in the world, once AGI at that level is scalable, agentic and has perhaps also physical embodiment if needed, we could could have billions and trillions (again limited by the rate of recursive self improvement), all communicating and transferring gained knowledge at electronic speeds. Humans as the current drivers of progress are not subject to recusive self improvement outside of tool usage and specialization. Thus Kurzweils estimate for 2045 is likely far to conservative, also we might get AGI/ASI prior to his 2029 expectation (which he himself acknowledged recently).
Instead of hoping to build off of their achievements last year, some of which can be left up to random chance, the Mets took steps to make sure that they will be a better team entering 2025 than they were entering 2024. This does not guarantee year-over-year growth or a deeper playoff run for the Mets, but the team enacted the correct process. Every now and again, an inspiring one-off will win a ring while on a Cinderella run. Far more often, however, teams that utilize strong practices, implement good processes and make the playoffs routinely win championships.
Since 2015, only three teams have made the playoffs at least eight times: the New York Yankees, Houston Astros and Dodgers. The Yankees are the only club among that group not to win a ring, let alone two, and only have one pennant to show for their work.
With the word "debanking," crypto execs and investors have found immediate allies among top Republicans in both houses of Congress and in the White House, who are ready and willing to investigate any potential malfeasance that occurred when Democrats were in charge.
President Donald Trump has coopted the agenda for political gain. At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last month, he accused JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America of politically motivated debanking, claiming major financial institutions have shut out conservatives under pressure from regulators. The banks denied the claim and Trump hasn't provided any evidence to back it up.
Once the support structure was in place, logs were laid across the piers and then boards were used to form the roadway.
I estimate that the piers were about twenty feet apart so a thousand foot river span would have required 50 piers. The bridge was built in ten days which meant workers would have placed five piers per day assuming the roadway was built as a parallel process over piers already completed.
The Romans had a variety of familiar tools at their disposal, including adzes, hammers, saws for cutting boards, and block and tackle. They used 9 inch nails to fasten boards together.
Once the bridge was complete, the army crossed over the Rhine. They spent 18 days in the land of the Sugambri, burning abandoned villages because the enemy had fled their homeland in fear of the Roman juggernaut. After treating with the Ubii, Caesar crossed back over the Rhine and destroyed the bridge behind him. Ten days in the making, Caesar’s Rhine bridge lived for eighteen days.
This diagram shows the principal landmarks. The camp was formed by intersecting roads, with gates at the end of each. The main building of the camp was the Principia, located at the intersection of the two main roads.
The walls of the camp were designed to neutralize an attack. The first step in building them was to dig a trench six feet deep. When the trench was complete its sides were graded into a “V” to prevent an attacker from jumping across. The soil from the trench hole was then piled into a rampart frame of logs, making the total thickness of the rampart 3-5 meters. The top of the rampart was covered with palisades to produce a fence. Each legionnaire carried two 6 foot palisades in his kit which were tied together when placed.
Crypto exchange Coinbase was one of the top corporate donors in the 2024 election cycle, giving more than $75 million to a group called Fairshake and its affiliate PACs, including a fresh pledge of $25 million to support the pro-crypto super PAC in the 2026 midterms. Ripple doled out around around $50 million.
Coinbase and Ripple were both involved in protracted legal battles with the SEC under former Chairman Gary Gensler.
Coinbase Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal testified before the House Financial Services Committee on Feb. 6, along with Fred Thiel, CEO of bitcoin miner MARA Holdings. In a hearing titled "Operation Choke Point 2.0: The Biden Administration's Efforts to Put Crypto in the Crosshairs," they described aggressive pressure from U.S. regulators to effectively push banks to cut ties with crypto firms.
"No one wants to see anyone denied basic banking services on the basis of their political views or whether they happen to work in an industry that might be out of favor with the current administration," Grewal told CNBC. "There are concerns across the political aisle and across the Congress that banking services have in the past been weaponized in order to run roughshod over those who may be out of favor."
As part of its probe, the House committee is investigating claims that bank executives and financial regulators secretly blacklisted crypto firms.
Thiel, in his testimony, said that the "discriminatory banking and financial policies threaten the digital asset ecosystem" and that "banks and payment processors are effectively deciding which industries can exist and grow within the U.S. economy."
Camp gates were designed to prevent the rush of an attack force. Techniques to prevent this usually involved a ditch in front of the gate or an angling the wall at the gate formed into a curve. Roads in the camp were 18 meters wide which was also the distance from the rampart to the first tent line.
Camp structures were sized according to importance of the occupant. The commander occupied the Praetorium (part of the principia), while the tribunes had their own barracks. The legionnaires slept in leather (calf or goat) tents designed to be waterproof. Each tent was ten feet square and housed eight men. Each century had eight tents for eighty men since sixteen were always on guard duty. Centurions had their own larger tent.
Silivergate attributed its insolvency to "increased supervisory pressure on Silvergate and other banks focused on servicing crypto-asset businesses."
Signature Bank was seized by regulators in March 2023. Former Democratic Congressman Barney Frank, a Signature board member, claimed that the FDIC shut it down specifically "to send a very strong anti-crypto message." The FDIC arranged a sale of Signature's assets, excluding $4 billion in crypto-related deposits.
Mike Lempres, who was chairman of Silvergate and previously spent two years as Coinbase's legal chief, wrote in an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal this week that the "federal government is finally changing course after four years of vilifying cryptocurrencies and using legally dubious policies to force companies to bend to its will."
While the crypto industry at large is rallying around that message, many in Congress are focused on making the case that banks were targeting conservatives for their political views. Carter said lawmakers are trying to reach a wider audience because "most regular folks don't care about crypto."
Formed in the 50s A.D, Sicarii was a fringe sect of Zionist fanatics known for carrying concealed daggers (Sicae) and using them against their enemies and Jews they considered enemy sympathizers. Their lives were dedicated to the expulsion of the Romans from the promised land by terror or whatever means they could employ. When the Roman general Titus captured Jerusalem in 70 A.D, the stage was set to retake Masada, destroy the Sicarii and return the fortress to Roman control. Flavius Silva was given command of the assault in 72 A.D. and immediately set to his task.
It is estimated that the fortress held approximately 1,000 people including women and children. Of these there were about 500 warriors.
Silva’s approach, like all Roman generals, was methodical in the extreme. He knew Rome could not afford to have any of the Sicarii survive the attack so he put together a plan to deploy a series of forts and built a circumvallation around the rock.
The focus of the assault was a 90 foot siege tower, built with a battering ram, ballastas and scorpiones. As the Roman soldiers pushed it along, it was protected by ballistas located on the sides of the spur. Once the tower reached the fortress wall the ram was put to work attacking the gate and blazing torches were sent over the wall. The next morning the Romans threw gangways from the tower to the top of the walls and entered the fortress. All inside were dead. The Jews had arranged a mass murder to avoid the taboo of suicide. Each Jew was assigned someone to kill in progression until only one was left and he committed suicide. Two women were found alive hiding in a basement and revealed what happened.
We know that the final assault took place in May of 73 A.D, but the rest of the timetable is obscure. If Silva took command at the end of 72, he would have put his plans together before beginning construction, perhaps in early 73 A.D. This was not a classic siege where the goal is starving out the enemy. The Sicarii were small in number and had an adequate food supply. The timetable for victory was determined by the availability of the siege tower and its ramp. Once the tower had been pushed to the walls of Masada, Roman forces were able to enter the fortress and the assault came to an end.
Trump Media reports $400 million in 2024 losses
Trump Media & Technology Group is worth almost $7 billion, but the company generated less than $4 million in revenue in 2024, according to a new filing.
Trump Media & Technology Group shares were down about 1% in extended trading on Friday after the operator of Truth Social released its 2024 results.
Here's how the company performed:
Earnings: Loss of $2.36 per share
Revenue: $3.6 million
The company's revenue declined 12% year over year, according to its annual report. The company saw its net loss widen to $400.9 million from $58.2 million in 2023.
In 2024, Trump Media incurred merger-related legal fees because of obstruction from former President Biden's Securities and Exchange Commission, according to a statement. A change to a revenue-sharing agreement with an advertising partner resulted in lower sales. "Additionally, revenue has varied as we selectively test a nascent advertising initiative on our Truth Social platform," the company said in the annual report.
"We will continue to explore opportunities to partner, merge with, and acquire other entities that are able to function effectively if TMTG evolves into a holding company with subsidiaries spanning several industries," Chairman and CEO Devin Nunes, a former Republican Congressman was quoted as saying in the statement.
Amazon 'anti-union propaganda,' employee surveillance loom over labor vote at North Carolina warehouse
Amazon workers at a facility near Raleigh, North Carolina, are wrapping up a vote this weekend over whether to unionize.
Italo Medelius-Marsano was a law student at North Carolina Central University in 2022, when he took a job at an Amazon warehouse near the city of Raleigh to earn some extra cash.
The past month has been unlike any other during his three-year tenure at the company. Now, when he shows up for his shift at the shipping dock, Medelius-Marsano says he's met with flyers and mounted TVs urging him to "vote no," as well as QR codes on workstations that lead to an anti-union website. During meetings, managers discourage unionization.
Workers at RDU1 and other facilities told CNBC that Amazon is increasingly using digital tools to deter employees from unionizing. That includes messaging through the company's app and workstation computers. There's also automated software and handheld package scanners used to track employee performance inside the warehouse, so the company knows when staffers are working or doing something else.
Amazon said it doesn't require employees to meet specific productivity speeds or targets.
Amazon, the nation's second-largest private employer, has long sought to keep unions out of its ranks. The strategy succeeded in the U.S. until 2022, when workers at a Staten Island warehouse voted to join the Amazon Labor Union. Last month, workers at a Whole Foods store in Philadelphia voted to join the United Food and Commercial Workers union.
In December, Amazon delivery and warehouse workers at nine facilities went on strike, organized by the Teamsters, during the height of the holiday shopping season to push the company to the bargaining table. The strike ended on Christmas Eve. Amazon said it had no impact on the company's operations.
The hugest driving force behind the tragedy of the commons phenomenon, in my opinion, isn't necessarily the greed of humans. While that obvious does play a factor, I would suggest that it's actually the fear of other's greed. The niggling thought that "Everyone else is going to be selfish and take as much as they possible can, so I'd better do it too so I don't get left behind." Whether it's true or not that the rest of the community will actually do this, we each of us believe it is true, driving us to found our own fears. Which is why when regulation is proposed, and introduced, all but the greediest people will gladly work to make it happen... because then we know we're not going to lose our share to everyone else.
"We believe that both decisions should be equally protected which is why we talk openly, candidly and respectfully about these topics, actively sharing facts with employees so they can use that information to make an informed decision," Hards said in a statement.
Hards said the company doesn't retaliate against employees for union activities, and called claims that its employee monitoring discourages them from unionizing "odd." She also disputed Medelius-Marsano's claim that the company tracks employees by scanning their badges.
The trireme was developed during the early fifth century B.C. in Greece probably from designs the Phoenicians were using. The “tri” in trireme refers to the three types of oarsmen in the ship - thalamites, zygites, and thranites. Why these types existed and how they functioned is a mystery.
There are four principle ways to configure oarsmen in a trireme: in a single line on each side of the boat; vertically, one group above another; assigning multiple rowers per oar; or placing rowers next to each other on a common bench. The following discussion will attempt to determine which of these options was in use.
Greek triremes had a length of approximately 120 feet, as verified from available dry-dock ruins. One hundred twenty feet is also the engineering maximum because, even with internal support cabling, it can be shown that wave action will break a longer wooden ship in half. Because of the limit on the number of oarsmen who could be placed on each side of the ship, designers had to come up with other ways to arrange them.
John Logan, a professor and director of labor and employment studies at San Francisco State University, told CNBC in an email that Amazon has "perfected the weaponization" of technology, workplace surveillance and algorithmic management during anti-union campaigns "more than any other company."
While Amazon may be more sophisticated than others, "the use of data analytics is becoming far more common in anti-union campaigns across the country," Logan said. He added that it's "extremely common" for companies to try to improve working conditions or sweeten employee perks during a union drive.
The absence of historical writing on the configuration of the rowers leaves us in the dark – but we have other sources. The poets, philosophers, and playwrights of Athens have come to the rescue with tidbits of information.
From the standpoint of pictorial evidence (pottery and the like), we come up empty. The most widely analyzed artifact showing a trireme is called the Lenomant of the Acropolis believed to have been carved in 400 B.C.
Obviously, there are gaps in our knowledge of Roman construction techniques and tools because we lack either written or physical evidence of these. Non-permanent materials have eroded away over two millennia and their characteristics elude us. Great structures like Hadrian’s Wall survive because of the use of stone or concrete.
There is, however, one clear example of a non-permanent structure which we know a lot about – Caesar’s first bridge over the Rhine. We know the story because Caesar tells us in volume four of The Conquest of Gaul. But construction techniques are only part of the story. Caesar built this bridge to show the Germans they were never safe from him because he had the skills to cross the river and attack them.
!summarize #tesla #robots #humanoid #optimus
Agency, willfulness, and determination will likely be extremely valuable. Correctly deciding what to do and figuring out how to navigate an ever-changing world will have huge value; resilience and adaptability will be helpful skills to cultivate. AGI will be the biggest lever ever on human willfulness, and enable individual people to have more impact than ever before, not less.
We expect the impact of AGI to be uneven. Although some industries will change very little, scientific progress will likely be much faster than it is today; this impact of AGI may surpass everything else.
The price of many goods will eventually fall dramatically (right now, the cost of intelligence and the cost of energy constrain a lot of things), and the price of luxury goods and a few inherently limited resources like land may rise even more dramatically.
Downstream from Koblenz, there are two small towns named Andernach and Neuwied. Historical scholarship suggests Caesar planned to cross the Rhine in between these two locations. The distance between the shorelines in this area is 800 to 1000 feet. The average depth of the river is 16 feet.
Before we talk about the construction of the bridge, it will be useful to show a photograph of the model that sits in The Museo Della Civilta Romana in Rome.
Before starting construction, the Romans built a crane on a raft and floated it out into the river. You can see the framework of this apparatus on the left of the picture. The piers supporting the bridge were constructed of one and a half foot thick logs. These tigna bina were tied together in pairs with a two foot gap between them. They were then driven into the river bed at an oblique angle using a pile driver. This was apparently a large stone, attached to block and tackle on poles, that could be swung at the posts once they were tied into position. Once two sets of these posts were secure a large log (fibulae) was placed between them in the slot formed by the two foot gap. Angled supporting posts were tied to the tigna bina to provide additional support.
Caesar says the piles were positioned forty feet apart before they were driven into the riverbed.
Surprise playoff runs are no rarity in MLB, and someday there will be one more shocking than the 2024 Mets. What separates them from some of the others, however, is what they did to follow up their miracle finish. For comparison, look at the 2015 Mets, a team widely considered to be a fringe playoff contender entering the year who ultimately had a legitimate shot at a World Series ring. That group fell short, but the wide assumption in baseball was that they would be back and be led by their young pitching.
The winter of 2015 going into 2016, the Mets remained mostly quiet during the offseason. The team retained Yoenis Céspedes, which was their true major move. They also traded left-handed pitcher Jon Niese to the Pittsburgh Pirates for second baseman Neil Walker, and signed Asdrúbal Cabrera to play shortstop.
Across baseball, the Cleveland Guardians have failed to build off of multiple ALCS appearances as well as their 2016 AL Pennant, the Dodgers made the playoffs ten times in a row without winning a title during a full season before 2024, and teams like the Toronto Blue Jays and Milwaukee Brewers have failed to capitalize on consistent playoff appearances at different points. The common denominator between all of these examples is a lack of championship-level moves in the offseason, whether it be via free agency or trade.
The one exception? Last year’s Dodgers. The team went out and acquired Shohei Ohtani, Tyler Glasnow, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Teoscar Hernández, all of whom played major roles in their championship season.
In total, the Mets have spent over $1 billion in total contract value this winter. Soto’s $765 million led the way by a significant margin, but the Mets did not shy away from spending afterwards either. The Mets had every excuse to ride the tail of their 2024 campaign, touting their success, fan interest, media attention and simple all-around fun they had. However, as teams have shown before, hoping those factors extend into a new season and are enough to help repeat and grow upon prior success rarely works.
20 years fits with Kurzweils prognosis of a singularity, but it’s conservative as it extrapolates past progress into the future, which was based on humans using technology to built better technology. In other words it’s an extrapolation that assumes static human intellect as driving force with the exponential being based on the feedback loop of tools being used to built better tools. Once AGI arrives and thus recursive self improved, it’s likely that the exponent gets a lot larger, as at least one additional order of exponential growing starts that interacts with the already existing one. It’s not just increases in absolute intelligence in AGI, and the use of surrogate models like alphafold to shift the heavy lifting of experimentation from physical to digital space.
It’s also that AGI (even only at human levels) is faster (e.g. a human mathematician equivalent in AGI thinking faster by 1000x should achieve 1000years of progress in just one year). Plus scalability, we have a couple of millions of scientists and engineers in the world, once AGI at that level is scalable, agentic and has perhaps also physical embodiment if needed, we could could have billions and trillions (again limited by the rate of recursive self improvement), all communicating and transferring gained knowledge at electronic speeds. Humans as the current drivers of progress are not subject to recusive self improvement outside of tool usage and specialization. Thus Kurzweils estimate for 2045 is likely far to conservative, also we might get AGI/ASI prior to his 2029 expectation (which he himself acknowledged recently).
Instead of hoping to build off of their achievements last year, some of which can be left up to random chance, the Mets took steps to make sure that they will be a better team entering 2025 than they were entering 2024. This does not guarantee year-over-year growth or a deeper playoff run for the Mets, but the team enacted the correct process. Every now and again, an inspiring one-off will win a ring while on a Cinderella run. Far more often, however, teams that utilize strong practices, implement good processes and make the playoffs routinely win championships.
Since 2015, only three teams have made the playoffs at least eight times: the New York Yankees, Houston Astros and Dodgers. The Yankees are the only club among that group not to win a ring, let alone two, and only have one pennant to show for their work.
With the word "debanking," crypto execs and investors have found immediate allies among top Republicans in both houses of Congress and in the White House, who are ready and willing to investigate any potential malfeasance that occurred when Democrats were in charge.
President Donald Trump has coopted the agenda for political gain. At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last month, he accused JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America of politically motivated debanking, claiming major financial institutions have shut out conservatives under pressure from regulators. The banks denied the claim and Trump hasn't provided any evidence to back it up.
!summarize #perplexity #deepresearch #agents #chatgpt
Once the support structure was in place, logs were laid across the piers and then boards were used to form the roadway.
I estimate that the piers were about twenty feet apart so a thousand foot river span would have required 50 piers. The bridge was built in ten days which meant workers would have placed five piers per day assuming the roadway was built as a parallel process over piers already completed.
The Romans had a variety of familiar tools at their disposal, including adzes, hammers, saws for cutting boards, and block and tackle. They used 9 inch nails to fasten boards together.
Once the bridge was complete, the army crossed over the Rhine. They spent 18 days in the land of the Sugambri, burning abandoned villages because the enemy had fled their homeland in fear of the Roman juggernaut. After treating with the Ubii, Caesar crossed back over the Rhine and destroyed the bridge behind him. Ten days in the making, Caesar’s Rhine bridge lived for eighteen days.
!summarize #billoreilly #ideology #npr #pbs
!summarize #doge #elonmusk #government
This diagram shows the principal landmarks. The camp was formed by intersecting roads, with gates at the end of each. The main building of the camp was the Principia, located at the intersection of the two main roads.
The walls of the camp were designed to neutralize an attack. The first step in building them was to dig a trench six feet deep. When the trench was complete its sides were graded into a “V” to prevent an attacker from jumping across. The soil from the trench hole was then piled into a rampart frame of logs, making the total thickness of the rampart 3-5 meters. The top of the rampart was covered with palisades to produce a fence. Each legionnaire carried two 6 foot palisades in his kit which were tied together when placed.
Crypto exchange Coinbase was one of the top corporate donors in the 2024 election cycle, giving more than $75 million to a group called Fairshake and its affiliate PACs, including a fresh pledge of $25 million to support the pro-crypto super PAC in the 2026 midterms. Ripple doled out around around $50 million.
Coinbase and Ripple were both involved in protracted legal battles with the SEC under former Chairman Gary Gensler.
Coinbase Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal testified before the House Financial Services Committee on Feb. 6, along with Fred Thiel, CEO of bitcoin miner MARA Holdings. In a hearing titled "Operation Choke Point 2.0: The Biden Administration's Efforts to Put Crypto in the Crosshairs," they described aggressive pressure from U.S. regulators to effectively push banks to cut ties with crypto firms.
"No one wants to see anyone denied basic banking services on the basis of their political views or whether they happen to work in an industry that might be out of favor with the current administration," Grewal told CNBC. "There are concerns across the political aisle and across the Congress that banking services have in the past been weaponized in order to run roughshod over those who may be out of favor."
As part of its probe, the House committee is investigating claims that bank executives and financial regulators secretly blacklisted crypto firms.
Thiel, in his testimony, said that the "discriminatory banking and financial policies threaten the digital asset ecosystem" and that "banks and payment processors are effectively deciding which industries can exist and grow within the U.S. economy."
!summarize #eu #ukraine #kajakallas
Camp gates were designed to prevent the rush of an attack force. Techniques to prevent this usually involved a ditch in front of the gate or an angling the wall at the gate formed into a curve. Roads in the camp were 18 meters wide which was also the distance from the rampart to the first tent line.
Camp structures were sized according to importance of the occupant. The commander occupied the Praetorium (part of the principia), while the tribunes had their own barracks. The legionnaires slept in leather (calf or goat) tents designed to be waterproof. Each tent was ten feet square and housed eight men. Each century had eight tents for eighty men since sixteen were always on guard duty. Centurions had their own larger tent.
!summarize #elonmusk #hhs #layoffs #probationary #employees
!summarize #aaronboone #marcusstroman #starter #pitching #nyyankees
Silivergate attributed its insolvency to "increased supervisory pressure on Silvergate and other banks focused on servicing crypto-asset businesses."
Signature Bank was seized by regulators in March 2023. Former Democratic Congressman Barney Frank, a Signature board member, claimed that the FDIC shut it down specifically "to send a very strong anti-crypto message." The FDIC arranged a sale of Signature's assets, excluding $4 billion in crypto-related deposits.
Mike Lempres, who was chairman of Silvergate and previously spent two years as Coinbase's legal chief, wrote in an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal this week that the "federal government is finally changing course after four years of vilifying cryptocurrencies and using legally dubious policies to force companies to bend to its will."
While the crypto industry at large is rallying around that message, many in Congress are focused on making the case that banks were targeting conservatives for their political views. Carter said lawmakers are trying to reach a wider audience because "most regular folks don't care about crypto."
!summarize #troyaikman #jimmyjohnson #jerryjones #dallas #cowboys #nfl
!summarize #chiefs #kansascity #traviskelce #nfl
Formed in the 50s A.D, Sicarii was a fringe sect of Zionist fanatics known for carrying concealed daggers (Sicae) and using them against their enemies and Jews they considered enemy sympathizers. Their lives were dedicated to the expulsion of the Romans from the promised land by terror or whatever means they could employ. When the Roman general Titus captured Jerusalem in 70 A.D, the stage was set to retake Masada, destroy the Sicarii and return the fortress to Roman control. Flavius Silva was given command of the assault in 72 A.D. and immediately set to his task.
It is estimated that the fortress held approximately 1,000 people including women and children. Of these there were about 500 warriors.
!summarize #trump #nasa #artemis #boeing #space #layoffs
Silva’s approach, like all Roman generals, was methodical in the extreme. He knew Rome could not afford to have any of the Sicarii survive the attack so he put together a plan to deploy a series of forts and built a circumvallation around the rock.
!summarize #economics #prostitution #money #hooker #profession
The focus of the assault was a 90 foot siege tower, built with a battering ram, ballastas and scorpiones. As the Roman soldiers pushed it along, it was protected by ballistas located on the sides of the spur. Once the tower reached the fortress wall the ram was put to work attacking the gate and blazing torches were sent over the wall. The next morning the Romans threw gangways from the tower to the top of the walls and entered the fortress. All inside were dead. The Jews had arranged a mass murder to avoid the taboo of suicide. Each Jew was assigned someone to kill in progression until only one was left and he committed suicide. Two women were found alive hiding in a basement and revealed what happened.
We know that the final assault took place in May of 73 A.D, but the rest of the timetable is obscure. If Silva took command at the end of 72, he would have put his plans together before beginning construction, perhaps in early 73 A.D. This was not a classic siege where the goal is starving out the enemy. The Sicarii were small in number and had an adequate food supply. The timetable for victory was determined by the availability of the siege tower and its ramp. Once the tower had been pushed to the walls of Masada, Roman forces were able to enter the fortress and the assault came to an end.
Trump Media reports $400 million in 2024 losses
Trump Media & Technology Group is worth almost $7 billion, but the company generated less than $4 million in revenue in 2024, according to a new filing.
Trump Media & Technology Group shares were down about 1% in extended trading on Friday after the operator of Truth Social released its 2024 results.
Here's how the company performed:
Earnings: Loss of $2.36 per share
Revenue: $3.6 million
The company's revenue declined 12% year over year, according to its annual report. The company saw its net loss widen to $400.9 million from $58.2 million in 2023.
In 2024, Trump Media incurred merger-related legal fees because of obstruction from former President Biden's Securities and Exchange Commission, according to a statement. A change to a revenue-sharing agreement with an advertising partner resulted in lower sales. "Additionally, revenue has varied as we selectively test a nascent advertising initiative on our Truth Social platform," the company said in the annual report.
"We will continue to explore opportunities to partner, merge with, and acquire other entities that are able to function effectively if TMTG evolves into a holding company with subsidiaries spanning several industries," Chairman and CEO Devin Nunes, a former Republican Congressman was quoted as saying in the statement.
Amazon 'anti-union propaganda,' employee surveillance loom over labor vote at North Carolina warehouse
Amazon workers at a facility near Raleigh, North Carolina, are wrapping up a vote this weekend over whether to unionize.
Italo Medelius-Marsano was a law student at North Carolina Central University in 2022, when he took a job at an Amazon warehouse near the city of Raleigh to earn some extra cash.
The past month has been unlike any other during his three-year tenure at the company. Now, when he shows up for his shift at the shipping dock, Medelius-Marsano says he's met with flyers and mounted TVs urging him to "vote no," as well as QR codes on workstations that lead to an anti-union website. During meetings, managers discourage unionization.
Workers at RDU1 and other facilities told CNBC that Amazon is increasingly using digital tools to deter employees from unionizing. That includes messaging through the company's app and workstation computers. There's also automated software and handheld package scanners used to track employee performance inside the warehouse, so the company knows when staffers are working or doing something else.
Amazon said it doesn't require employees to meet specific productivity speeds or targets.
!summarize #alexbregman #boston #redsox #Mlb
Amazon, the nation's second-largest private employer, has long sought to keep unions out of its ranks. The strategy succeeded in the U.S. until 2022, when workers at a Staten Island warehouse voted to join the Amazon Labor Union. Last month, workers at a Whole Foods store in Philadelphia voted to join the United Food and Commercial Workers union.
In December, Amazon delivery and warehouse workers at nine facilities went on strike, organized by the Teamsters, during the height of the holiday shopping season to push the company to the bargaining table. The strike ended on Christmas Eve. Amazon said it had no impact on the company's operations.
!summarize #party #politics #democrats #trump #republicans
!summarize #antiaging #youth #longevity #supplement
The hugest driving force behind the tragedy of the commons phenomenon, in my opinion, isn't necessarily the greed of humans. While that obvious does play a factor, I would suggest that it's actually the fear of other's greed. The niggling thought that "Everyone else is going to be selfish and take as much as they possible can, so I'd better do it too so I don't get left behind." Whether it's true or not that the rest of the community will actually do this, we each of us believe it is true, driving us to found our own fears. Which is why when regulation is proposed, and introduced, all but the greediest people will gladly work to make it happen... because then we know we're not going to lose our share to everyone else.
"We believe that both decisions should be equally protected which is why we talk openly, candidly and respectfully about these topics, actively sharing facts with employees so they can use that information to make an informed decision," Hards said in a statement.
Hards said the company doesn't retaliate against employees for union activities, and called claims that its employee monitoring discourages them from unionizing "odd." She also disputed Medelius-Marsano's claim that the company tracks employees by scanning their badges.
The trireme was developed during the early fifth century B.C. in Greece probably from designs the Phoenicians were using. The “tri” in trireme refers to the three types of oarsmen in the ship - thalamites, zygites, and thranites. Why these types existed and how they functioned is a mystery.
There are four principle ways to configure oarsmen in a trireme: in a single line on each side of the boat; vertically, one group above another; assigning multiple rowers per oar; or placing rowers next to each other on a common bench. The following discussion will attempt to determine which of these options was in use.
Greek triremes had a length of approximately 120 feet, as verified from available dry-dock ruins. One hundred twenty feet is also the engineering maximum because, even with internal support cabling, it can be shown that wave action will break a longer wooden ship in half. Because of the limit on the number of oarsmen who could be placed on each side of the ship, designers had to come up with other ways to arrange them.
John Logan, a professor and director of labor and employment studies at San Francisco State University, told CNBC in an email that Amazon has "perfected the weaponization" of technology, workplace surveillance and algorithmic management during anti-union campaigns "more than any other company."
While Amazon may be more sophisticated than others, "the use of data analytics is becoming far more common in anti-union campaigns across the country," Logan said. He added that it's "extremely common" for companies to try to improve working conditions or sweeten employee perks during a union drive.
The absence of historical writing on the configuration of the rowers leaves us in the dark – but we have other sources. The poets, philosophers, and playwrights of Athens have come to the rescue with tidbits of information.
From the standpoint of pictorial evidence (pottery and the like), we come up empty. The most widely analyzed artifact showing a trireme is called the Lenomant of the Acropolis believed to have been carved in 400 B.C.