Four Generations Art

maintains, presents, and exhibits the work of Paul D. Ortlip and four generations of Ortlip family artists.

Virtual idols are the future of false religion. With 3 billion users and zero sense of sacred boundaries, Facebook is poised to lead this revolution. //

The Church of Facebook is set to capture the human soul in silicon. On July 25, the New York Times reported that since 2017 the social media giant has quietly cultivated exclusive partnerships with select religious communities. As always, money is involved.

While Facebook’s ultimate goals remain sealed behind non-disclosure agreements, the Times article does hint at things to come: “The company aims to become the virtual home for religious community, and wants churches, mosques, synagogues and others to embed their religious life into its platform, from hosting worship services and socializing more casually to soliciting money.”

“The partnerships reveal how Big Tech and religion are converging,” the Times continues. “Facebook is shaping the future of religious experience itself, as it has done for political and social life.”

In other words, ultra-mod spiritual centers will be blessed by mass data extraction, algorithmic polarization, and censorship of theological “misinformation.”

If Facebook’s history is any guide, every digital prayer will be scooped up and turned into a data point. Livestreamed preachers who deny the sanctity of LGBT lifestyles will be flagged and punished as “extremists.” Best of all, smartphone-addicted congregants can donate their last widow’s mite with the touch of a virtual button. Sounds like a little slice of heaven, doesn’t it?

Don’t have an SSL Certificate? Google is going to flag your website this year!

We turn to the internet for everything. From selling to buying,

With this dominating trend, online security has become a necessity.

Undoubtedly, Google loves its users and therefore, is coming up with every possible way to make us feel secure here on the internet.

With its recent announcement, earlier this year, Google will flag all the unencrypted internet by the end of 2017.

What?

This website is for when you try to open Facebook, Google, Amazon, etc on a wifi network, and nothing happens. Type "http://neverssl.com" into your browser's url bar, and you'll be able to log on.

Why?

Normally, that's a bad idea. You should always use SSL and secure encryption when possible. In fact, it's such a bad idea that most websites are now using https by default.

And that's great, but it also means that if you're relying on poorly-behaved wifi networks, it can be hard to get online. Secure browsers and websites using https make it impossible for those wifi networks to send you to a login or payment page. Basically, those networks can't tap into your connection just like attackers can't. Modern browsers are so good that they can remember when a website supports encryption and even if you type in the website name, they'll use https.

And if the network never redirects you to this page, well as you can see, you're not missing much.

It’s summer, and that means a fresh wave of stories about COVID-19 in Florida.

Last year, the press fixated on the state’s rising case and hospitalization rates, blaming them on Gov. Ron DeSantis’ decisions to eschew government mask mandates and allow businesses to reopen, children to attend school, and residents to recreate without excessive restraints.

DeSantis was often unfavorably compared with New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, whose iron-fisted restrictions were considered the epitome of enlightened governance.

Enthusiasm for Cuomo has waned, but heaping scorn on DeSantis is still in vogue. Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson has dubbed DeSantis “public enemy number one,” first in line among “cynical and irresponsible Republican politicians [who] have created an environment that is killing Americans.”

So what’s really going on in Florida? Is DeSantis a cynical and irresponsible killer? Here are the facts.

Anyone who tells you that they expected the first promotional image for the LOTR on Prime series to reveal an iconic panorama of Valinor — the land of angelic beings of Middle-earth — is either a liar or is inside the production. //

At first, you think: “Well, it’s another Middle-earth city. But, hey, it’s pretty cool.” You’re expecting, perhaps, Armenelos or Rómenna on the island of Númenór. After all, we know the series is supposed to encompass the rise and fall of the island kingdom and there does seem to be a glittering body of water even if it’s a bit small to be a bay, much less the ocean.

Then your eye is drawn inexorably to the background glow and it dawns that what you thought was merely the sun nearly (and neatly) conceals a pair of colossal trees.

And in an instant your whole worldview of the series just … changes.

Because, you know — if you’ve tried your hand at reading The Silmarillion or have delved into the pre-history of The Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit — that these aren’t just any pair of trees.

It’s the Two Trees.

The tree of silver and the tree of gold that are the source of all light in Valinor. That provide the light for Fëanor’s Silmarils, and ultimately for the Phial of Galadriel. And whose destruction triggers a cascade of events that stretches all the way to the end of the Third Age.

If anything can be, this is the heart of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth mythmaking.

LOTR on Prime has enormous ambitions and it’s not afraid to declare as much.

While scouring the bowels of the Internet, I came across some videos by a personality named Hotep God Drelly. A new face for me among individuals I follow, who identify with the Conscious Black Conservative movement. //

All you ngg@s who hate the Republican Party so much, the Republican Party, without bloodshed, is gone be the only way you get out of this sht my n*gg@s! It’s the only way! Conservatives, Libertarians, these are the only people that’s gone save yo’ Black ass!

“You keep on voting Democrat if you want to! I’m telling you—either yo’ ass need to f#ckin’ move, or get that Democrat government out yo’ damn state. Because soon you will not be able to do anything without getting vaccinated.” //

Vaccine passports are a modern-day version of the “freedom papers” that Blacks had to carry around with them pre-civil war in order to have the freedom to travel from the North to the South unmolested. If you saw the movie 12 Years A Slave, you see how well that worked.

What is the difference between “freedom papers” and carrying around proof to prove you have been vaccinated and are not going to infect anyone? Especially since the public and private sector are attempting to attach who is and is not allowed freedoms based on that fact. We already have a black market for fake vaccine passports. Where else will this lead?

This is beyond Orwellian; it’s positively Stalinesque. //

To a greater degree, if you know the history of Black Americans and the government via the medical establishment, from the Tuskegee Experiment to Henrietta Lacks to the CDC study on MMR Vaccines, you would think that if this vaccine is truly in our self-interest, they would be more measured and serious in their approach, as well as acknowledge what has been done wrong in the past, and give us evidence on how this time it will be different.

The vaccine lottery, music ditty, fatty food perks and giveaways tomfoolery is what you do with something that is not that urgent or serious. So, that leads me, and probably other Blacks to believe, that if this vaccine and COVID-19 was as serious as they claim it is, the dissemination of information and access to the vaccines would also be done in a more consequential manner.

No matter what your race, we all know that the COVID-19 response and the vaccine distribution have not been handled seriously, consequentially, or even competently. From the shifting standards, the lies, and the gaslighting done by the Biden administration and the CDC, to the well-paid state health officials and their sleight of hand with testing, actual cases, and actual deaths, they have killed all credibility and all trust. Then there is the fact that the so-called Black leaders in the Democrat Party, from 44th President Barack Obama and his 60th birthday bash with 700 of his closest friends to D.C. Mayor Marxist Muriel Bowser attending a maskless wedding after instituting the mask mandates back into that city, have shown that they are not taking it seriously.

So, why should we?

Recent studies suggest that over half of millennials do not see themselves as 'emotionally and behaviourally' connected to their job and company. Exhausted from high-pressure jobs and with a growing sense of burnout, some millennials are following a personal finance strategy that allows them to quit the day job and retire decades early. //

FIRE = Financial Independence, Retire Early

• 25x annual spending is enough to retire early?

A new study has found that individuals that have previously contracted COVID-19 show a more potent antibody response than those who were solely vaccinated for the respiratory virus.

https://www.news-medical.net/news/20210801/Antibody-responses-following-SARS-CoV-2-infection-more-potent-than-vaccine-elicited-ones.aspx

Conducted by a research team at Rockefeller University in New York, the analysis found “that between a first (prime) and second (booster) shot of either the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccine, the memory B cells of infection-naïve individuals produced antibodies that evolved increased neutralizing activity against SARS-CoV-2,” but also that “no additional increase in the potency or breadth of this activity was observed thereafter.”

Meanwhile, researchers determined that not only do recovered COVID-19 patients possess neutralizing antibodies up to a year after infection, but that such infection simultaneously assists in offering protection against developing variants.

“Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection produces B-cell responses that continue to evolve for at least one year,” the study read. “During that time, memory B cells express increasingly broad and potent antibodies that are resistant to mutations found in variants of concern.”

The analysis later goes on to conclude, “Memory antibodies selected over time by natural infection have greater potency and breadth than antibodies elicited by vaccination.”

Moreover, the results suggest that “boosting vaccinated individuals with currently available mRNA vaccines would produce a quantitative increase in plasma neutralizing activity but not the qualitative advantage against variants obtained by vaccinating convalescent individuals.”

HTTPS is now free, easy and increasingly ubiquitous. It's also now required if you don't want Google Chrome flagging the site as "Not secure". Yet still, many of the world's largest websites continue to serve content over unencrypted connections, putting users at risk even when no sensitive data is involved.

For the past several years, we’ve moved toward a more secure web by strongly advocating that sites adopt HTTPS encryption. And within the last year, we’ve also helped users understand that HTTP sites are not secure by gradually marking a larger subset of HTTP pages as “not secure”. Beginning in July 2018 with the release of Chrome 68, Chrome will mark all HTTP sites as “not secure”.

Peter Doocy asked White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki a great question: in regard to Gov. DeSantis defending parents’ rights to decide for their own children whether to have them in masks or not, does Joe Biden think that parents should have that kind of power, to opt out of mask policies?

Psaki didn’t actually answer the question. She said she thought public health experts should be making the decision instead of politicians. //

Her non-answer was basically an answer in itself. While she says public health experts should be making the decision, she refuses to say that parents should have that right for their own children. So in her mind that public health experts hold more weight than the parents, on the matter. //

The choice isn’t between masks or no school. That’s a false dichotomy. The choice is between a sane approach, giving the parents power over their own children vs. operating under unnecessary and/or even unwise state dictates. //

emptypockets
an hour ago edited
"That’s a false dichotomy."

That is one of their first go-to tactics, the false dichotomy or as Gutfeld terms it, "the prison of two ideas". Set it up as though there is ONLY this--what they say--or an extreme evil with nothing between the two, no other choices. That's when they don't just insult and try delegitimizing you with "racist" or whatever. That and setting up of false dichotomies and strawmen is their only effort at "persuasion" and yeah, they really suck at that, too. //

Robal
an hour ago
When democrats claim they care about the health and safety of our children, remember: its the same democrats who prefer we abort our children instead of giving birth to them.

Sometimes, locking down a laptop with the latest defenses isn't enough. ///

Typing in a password is still better than relying entirely on credentials stored in TPM.

Trends in Number of COVID-19 Cases and Deaths in the US Reported to CDC, by State/Territory
Reported to the CDC by State or Territory; Maps, charts, and data provided by CDC, updates Mon-Sat by 8 pm ET

“What is your response to Gov. DeSantis, who is using your words about ‘don’t be in the way’ and he’s saying ‘I am in the way, to block too much interference from the federal government.’ Your response, Mr. President?” O’Donnell inquired.

“Governor who?” Biden responded as people, presumably other reporters, could be heard laughing. “That’s my response.” //

DESANTIS: Well, I guess I’m not surprised that Biden doesn’t remember me, I guess the question is what else has he forgotten? Biden’s forgotten about the crisis at our southern border. I can tell you that biden has forgotten about the inflation that’s biting the budgets of families all throughout our country. Biden has forgotten about the demonstrators who are fighting for freedom down in Cuba and Biden’s even forgotten about the Constitution itself as we saw with what he did with this moratorium. And I can just tell you I’m the governor who protects parents in their ability to make the right choices for their kids’ education. I’m the governor who protects the jobs and education and businesses in Florida by not letting the federal government lock us down. I’m the governor who answers to the people of Florida not to bureaucrats in Washington. //

greginfla
44 minutes ago
The best thing the media could do for the leftist cause is to ignore DeSantis. They are giving DeSantis nationwide exposure, and as someone said, making him a peer with POTUS. This is similar to how Trump got tons of free marketing from the media. //

DeeInFL
....
I don’t know where you’re getting your data from but Florida is not out pacing Covid deaths from the delta variant. According to the CDC Covid tracker the 7 day average per 100,000 is the highest in Arkansas followed by Louisiana. Even looking at total Covid deaths prior to the delta variant Florida ranked 26th out of all deaths in Covid deaths per capita.

A record-breaking bat that flew more than 1,200 miles (2,018 km) from London to Russia died after being attacked by a cat.

The female Nathusius' pipistrelle bat, the size of a human thumb, was discovered in Russia's Pskov region.

The bat, whose wing had a "London Zoo" marking, was rescued by a bat rehabilitation group but later died.

It is the furthest recorded journey by a bat from Britain across Europe, beating all known British records.

The pipistrelle bat, which weighed 8g (0.3 oz), was discovered by Russian resident Svetlana Lapina in the small village of Molgino and the finding was reported to the Bat Conservation Trust in the UK.

Joe Biden certainly isn’t the first president to violate his oath of office, but he might be the first in memory to openly brag about doing it.

As Biden announced a new “eviction moratorium,” he informed Americans that the “bulk of constitutional scholars” would say the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention eviction moratorium is “not likely to pass constitutional muster.”

Not likely? It already failed.

In June, Justice Brett Kavanaugh agreed with the majority Supreme Court that the CDC “exceeded its existing statutory authority,” even though he allowed the order to sunset. The president admitted as much, noting that the new moratorium is meant to give the administration time to act on “rental assistance” before the court again shuts it down. What stops Biden from stalling and trying a third time? A 10th time?

Biden admitted to the media that he would be circumventing the courts, the law, and his oath of office, in which he promised, to the best of his ability, to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States,” not to infringe on the property rights of Americans to placate crackpot socialists in his party.

When asked today about the discrepancy, White House press secretary Jen Psaki promised, “This is also going to be a temporary solution.” Because, as Article 2, Section 5, apparently states, the executive can make laws irrespective of Supreme Court rulings, as long as he also crosses his heart and promises it’s only going to be temporary.

When pushed further on the matter, Psaki could not recall the moment when Biden was convinced there was solid legal ground to move forward. Probably because no such moment exists.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., was far more honest, noting that this was “a huge victory for the power of direct action and not taking no for an answer.”

Not taking no for an answer—in this case, not taking no for an answer from the Supreme Court—is lawlessness. The process—the sacred norms that Democrats pretended to care about over the past five years—is irrelevant to engaging in “direct action” within government. It’s been clear from their efforts to delegitimize the Supreme Court to their effort to undermine faith in federalism and countermajoritarian institutions.

China is working aggressively to spread its influence and promote its interests throughout the globe, exploiting nations and flaunting individual rights and sovereignty as it does so. And it’s doing a pretty good job.

China invests huge amounts of capital into developing countries, with overseas investment and construction exceeding $2 trillion since 2005. Many of these projects fail to meet international standards and use illegal funds, according to The Heritage Foundation’s 2021 China Transparency Report. (The Daily Signal is the news and commentary platform of The Heritage Foundation.)

China uses these investments to influence voting at the United Nations. One William and Mary AidData research study found that “if African countries voted with China in the U.N. General Assembly an extra 10% of the time, they would get an 86% bump in official development assistance on average.” //

Despite its seeming successes, China lacks the most important ingredient for a thriving country, what the interim National Security Strategic Guidance calls “our most fundamental advantage”: democracy.

China lacks the basic freedoms that enable society and people to flourish. According to the Index of Economic Freedom, China remains a mostly unfree country with weak property rights and a protectionist financial system. New reports appear regularly about government interference stifling human expression in China. //

It is time to hold China accountable for such abuses. It is vital, however, that the U.S. and other Western nations not fall into the trap of countering the growth of Chinese influence by replicating authoritarian Chinese actions. It is the responsibility of democracies to work together to expose the corruption and authoritativeness of the Chinese Communist Party while emphasizing and staying true to their own values of democracy, respect for human rights, and economic freedom.

China isn’t invincible. Its regime lacks freedoms that people inherently desire. It is imperative that the U.S. makes it clear to other countries that cooperating with China means cooperating with a “regime that systematically violates the human rights of its citizens.”

• Sprint 3G network shutdown date: January 1, 2022

• Sprint 4G LTE network sunset date: June 30, 2022

• T-Mobile 3G network shutdown date: April 1, 2022 (formerly October 1st, 2021)

• T-Mobile 2G network shutdown date: January 1, 2023

• Verizon 3G network sunset: January 1, 2023

After December 31st, 2022, says Verizon, if you are a Big Red customer still using a device that is 3G (CDMA) or 4G that does not support HD Voice (Non-VoLTE), the device will no longer make/receive calls, send/receive text messages, or use data services.

• AT&T 3G network sunset: February 1, 2022
• Free phone: AT&T RADIANT Core

It's taller than NASA's Saturn V moon rocket.

SpaceX's newest Starship prototype was briefly placed atop of its massive booster for the first time on Friday (Aug. 6), setting a new record for the world's tallest rocket ahead of a planned orbital test flight this year.

Engineers performed the stacking test at the SpaceX Starbase facility in South Texas, near the village of Boca Chica, in view of livestreams from NASA Spaceflight and Spadre.com. SpaceX has not commented on the stacking procedure yet on Twitter, although founder Elon Musk sent an update suggesting the company actually wanted to complete the stacking Thursday (Aug. 5), a few hours after Starship completed its rollout to the launch pad, but winds were too high. //

Super Heavy alone stands 230 feet (70 meters) tall and Starship SN4 added another 165 feet (50 m) of height. Together they stood a whopping 395 feet tall (120 m), taller than NASA's massive Saturn V moon rocket, which was 363 feet tall (110 m).

Communication should travel via the shortest path necessary to get the job done, not through the "chain of command." Any manager who attempts to enforce chain of command communication will soon find themselves working elsewhere.

Musk adds, "If, in order to get something done between departments, an individual contributor has to talk to their manager, who talks to a director, who talks to a VP, who talks to another VP, who talks to a director, who talks to a manager, who talks to someone doing the actual work, then super dumb things will happen. It must be OK for people to talk directly and just make the right thing happen." //

Set your people free

In a knowledge economy, top-down hierarchical management styles that direct traffic one-way -- up the chain -- will collapse, especially since knowledge workers typically know more than their managers about their own areas of specialization.

The right approach here is to give smart people the keys to solving problems on their own. You'll find that in high-performing organizations that empower their knowledge workers, information is shared openly across fewer reporting levels, and people are able to use it to make the right decisions quickly.

The starting point is to empower workers by giving them autonomy to make decisions in the moment. Workers need the right data, insights, and technology to make high-quality decisions. Putting this trust and power in the hands of workers is seen as critical to agility and success.

It starts with leadership

Arming workers with the power of making decisions and acting with the data they have requires big changes in both process and culture, and senior leaders must drive this change from the top by providing their full support and leading by example.