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TechCrunch is reporting that GraphQL, the Facebook-incubated data query language, is moving into its own open-source foundation. "Like so many other similar open-source foundations, the aptly named GraphQL Foundation will be hosted by the Linux Foundation." From the report: Facebook announced GraphQL back in 2012 and open sourced it in 2015. Today, it's being used by companies that range from Airbnb to Audi, GitHub, Netflix, Shopify, Twitter and The New York Times . At Facebook itself, the GraphQL API powers billions of API calls every day. At its core, GraphQL is basically a language for querying databases from client-side applications and a set of specifications for how the API on the backend should present this data to the client. It presents an alternative to REST-based APIs and promises to offer developers more flexibility and the ability to write faster and more secure applications. Virtually every major programming language now supports it through a variety of libraries.
"GraphQL has redefined how developers work with APIs and client-server interactions. We look forward to working with the GraphQL community to become an independent foundation, draft their governance and continue to foster the growth and adoption of GraphQL," said Chris Aniszczyk, vice president of Developer Relations at the Linux Foundation. As Aniszczyk noted, the new foundation will have an open governance model, similar to that of other Linux Foundation projects. The exact details are still a work in progress, though. The list of founding members is also still in flux, but for now, it includes Airbnb, Apollo, Coursera, Elementl, Facebook, GitHub, Hasura, Prisma, Shopify and Twitter.
Microsoft is using Minecraft to help employees get acquainted with a refresh of the company's campus in Redmond, Washington. CNBC reports: Earlier this year, Microsoft enlisted Blockworks, a company that uses Minecraft's digital building blocks for designing real-world projects, to create a miniature rendering of the campus facelift, which is scheduled for completion in 2022. They're using graphics that are far more immersive than two-dimensional photos and videos. While Minecraft was designed for gamers, its immersive nature and the ability to quickly move around and construct edifices makes it easy to see how new buildings will look when inserted into an existing landscape. [James Delaney, a managing director at Blockworks] said Minecraft forces designers to sacrifice some accuracy because structures in real life don't always have the game's squared-off look, but the speed and ease of use more than made up for those deficiencies. It might take just 10 minutes to wrap up a single building, he said. Microsoft employees -- and anyone else with the education edition of Minecraft -- can now take a digital tour of the new campus and see how plans are developing. Outside of Microsoft, that access requires a subscription to Office 365 Education.
Corporate Vice President of Cortana Javier Soltero is leaving the company after being in charge of Cortana for less than a year. "Soltero joined Microsoft when it bought at the end of 2014 Acompli, a mobile mail startup in San Francisco which he co-founded and led," reports ZDNet. "After joining Microsoft four years ago, Soltero spearheaded Outlook Mobile, then all of Outlook." Before being appointed to run Cortana in March of this year, he was the head of strategy for Office. From the report: Last month, Microsoft officials confirmed that Cortana was one of the technologies that management was moving from AI + Research to the Experiences & Devices team, which is under Executive Vice President Rajesh Jha. Microsoft is in the midst of trying to reposition Cortana from a standalone digital assistant to more of an assistance aide. Given the strong focus on home and work productivity by the Microsoft 365 and Office teams, officials seemingly decided it made sense for Cortana to be situated in that group. I've heard Soltero is going to go back to doing entrepreneurial activities once he leaves by year-end. Perry Clarke is going to be working with Soltero on transition plans in the next couple of months, sources are telling me. Clarke has been with Microsoft engineering since 1996, when he led Exchange. He also has been a Microsoft Distinguished Engineer for the past several years. I've heard talk that Microsoft ultimately is looking to bring Cortana and Search together into a single engineering team.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: If you talk to experts on election security (I studied with several of them in graduate school) they'll tell you that we're nowhere close to being ready for online voting. "Mobile voting is a horrific idea," said election security expert Joe Hall when I asked him about a West Virginia experiment with blockchain-based mobile voting back in August. But on Tuesday, The New York Times published an opinion piece claiming the opposite. "Building a workable, scalable, and inclusive online voting system is now possible, thanks to blockchain technologies," writes Alex Tapscott, whom the Times describes as co-founder of the Blockchain Research Institute. Tapscott is wrong -- and dangerously so. Online voting would be a huge threat to the integrity of our elections -- and to public faith in election outcomes.
Tapscott focuses on the idea that blockchain technology would allow people to vote anonymously while still being able to verify that their vote was included in the final total. Even assuming this is mathematically possible -- and I think it probably is -- this idea ignores the many, many ways that foreign governments could compromise an online vote without breaking the core cryptographic algorithms. For example, foreign governments could hack into the computer systems that governments use to generate and distribute cryptographic credentials to voters. They could bribe election officials to supply them with copies of voters' credentials. They could hack into the PCs or smartphones voters use to cast their votes. They could send voters phishing emails to trick them into revealing their voting credentials -- or simply trick them into thinking they've cast a vote when they haven't.
A Wall Street Journal article published this morning reported that Foxconn is looking to transfer some of its Chinese workers to Wisconsin in time for its new factory opening in Racine. The article says that these workers would likely be engineers and would fill a gap in prospective talent due to a tight labor market. Foxconn has since denied these claims. The Verge reports: In a comment to Gizmodo, Foxconn denied that it was recruiting Chinese workers. The company said: "We can categorically state that the assertion that we are recruiting Chinese personnel to staff our Wisconsin project is untrue. Our recruitment priority remains Wisconsin first and we continue to focus on hiring and training workers from throughout Wisconsin. We will supplement that recruitment from other U.S. locations as required."
In November 2017, Wisconsin pledged $3 billion in subsidies for the Taiwan-based company if it opted to open the factory in Wisconsin. In return, Foxconn said it would create 13,000 jobs and invest $10 billion. (The state subsidy came out to $230,000 per job.) The Wall Street Journal report suggests that the company is struggling to find qualified engineers in the area, though, as the unemployment rate in the state reached a record low at 3 percent, along with a recent national low at 3.7 percent.
The cybercrime wing of Pakistan's Federal Investigation Agency has said data from "almost all" Pakistani banks was stolen in a recent security breach. FIA Cybercrimes Director retired Capt Mohammad Shoaib told Geo News that hackers based outside the country had breached the security systems of several local banks. "The hackers have stolen large amounts of money from people's accounts," he added. From a report: He said the FIA has written to all banks, and a meeting of the banks' heads and security managements is being called. The meeting will look into ways the security infrastructure of banks can be bolstered. "Banks are the custodians of the money people have stored in them," Shoaib said. "They are also responsible if their security features are so weak that they result in pilferage." It wasn't immediately clear when exactly the security breach took place. According to Shoaib, more than 100 cases are being investigated by the agency in connection with the breach.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire's efforts to rally his European Union colleagues around a new tax on tech giants fell short, as countries skeptical of the plan doubled down on their opposition, and others, including Italy, said they'll push ahead with their own plans. Ministers from Denmark, Ireland and Sweden said they couldn't support the tax in its current form, casting doubt on the proposal's future, since unanimity is required to pass taxes in the EU. The plan on the table would impose a 3 percent levy on the European sales of the likes of Amazon and Facebook. A number of countries are already imposing taxes of their own, increasing the risk of fragmentation in the single market. Finance Minister Giovanni Tria said an Italian tax will kick in next year if there's no broader agreement by then. Spain and the U.K. have already announced their own levies.
AT&T will alert a little more than a dozen customers within the next week or so that their service will be terminated due to copyright infringement, news outlet Axios reported, citing sources familiar with its plans. From the report: It's the first time AT&T has discontinued customer service over piracy allegations since having shaped its own piracy policies last year, which is significant given it just became one of America's major media companies. AT&T owns a content network after its purchase of Time Warner earlier this year, an entity now called WarnerMedia. Content networks are typically responsible for issuing these types of allegations to internet service providers (ISPs) for them to address with their customers.
Oracle's Internet Intelligence division has confirmed today the findings of a recently published academic paper that accused China of "hijacking the vital internet backbone of western countries." From a report: The research paper was authored by researchers from the US Naval War College and Tel Aviv University and it made quite a few waves online after it was published. Researchers accused China Telecom, one of China's biggest state-owned internet service providers, of hijacking and detouring internet traffic through its normally-closed internet infrastructure. Some security experts contested the research paper's findings because it didn't come from an authoritative voice in the world of internet BGP hijacks, but also because the paper touched on many politically sensitive topics, such as China's cyber-espionage activities and how China used BGP hijacks as a way to circumvent the China-US cyber pact of 2015. But today, Doug Madory, Director of Oracle's Internet Analysis division (formerly Dyn), confirmed that China Telecom has, indeed, engaged in internet traffic "misdirection." "I don't intend to address the paper's claims around the motivations of these actions," said Madori. "However, there is truth to the assertion that China Telecom (whether intentionally or not) has misdirected internet traffic (including out of the United States) in recent years."
A lump of metal in a building near Paris has long served as the global standard for the kilogram. That's about to change. From a report: Later this month, at the international General Conference on Weights and Measures, to be held in France, delegates are expected to vote to get rid of this single physical specimen and instead plump to use a fundamental measurement -- to be defined in terms of an electric current -- in order to define the mass of an object. The king of kilograms is about to be dethroned. And crucially much of the key work that has led to the toppling of the Paris kilogram has been carried out at the National Physical Laboratory where the late Bryan Kibble invented the basic concepts of the device that will replace that ingot in the Pavillon de Breteuil. The Kibble balance works by measuring the electric current that is required to produce an electromagnetic force equal to the gravitational force acting on a mass. A second stage allows the electromagnetic force to be determined in terms of a fundamental constant known as the Planck constant which will, in future, be used to define a kilogram. These machines will provide the standard for weighing objects -- and that means no more dusting of old lumps of alloy to ensure they stay pure and accurate. [...] "One key reason for doing this work is to provide international security," says Robinson. "If the Pavillon de Breteuil burned down tomorrow and the kilogram in its vaults melted, we would have no reference left for the world's metric weights system. There would be chaos. The current definition of the kilogram is the weight of that cylinder in Paris, after all." [...] Another major motivation for the replacement of le grand K is the need to be able to carry out increasingly more and more precise measurements. "Pharmaceutical companies will soon be wanting to use ingredients that will have to be measured in terms of a few millionths or even billionths of a gram," says Prior. "We need to be prepared to weigh substances with that kind of accuracy." Suggested reading: A thread on Twitter which discusses SI units and the redefinition of the kilogram.
If extraterrestrial intelligence exists somewhere in our galaxy, a new MIT study proposes that laser technology on Earth could, in principle, be fashioned into something of a planetary porch light -- a beacon strong enough to attract attention from as far as 20,000 light years away. From a report: The research, which author James Clark calls a "feasibility study," appears today in The Astrophysical Journal. The findings suggest that if a high-powered 1- to 2-megawatt laser were focused through a massive 30- to 45-meter telescope and aimed out into space, the combination would produce a beam of infrared radiation strong enough to stand out from the sun's energy. Such a signal could be detectable by alien astronomers performing a cursory survey of our section of the Milky Way -- especially if those astronomers live in nearby systems, such as around Proxima Centauri, the nearest star to Earth, or TRAPPIST-1, a star about 40 light-years away that hosts seven exoplanets, three of which are potentially habitable. If the signal is spotted from either of these nearby systems, the study finds, the same megawatt laser could be used to send a brief message in the form of pulses similar to Morse code.
AMD on Monday revealed the Zen 2 architecture for the family of processors that it will launch in the coming years, starting with 2019. The move is a follow-up to the competitive Zen designs that AMD launched in March 2017, and it promises two-times improvement in performance throughput. From a report: AMD hopes the Zen 2 processors will keep it ahead of or at parity with Intel, the world's biggest maker of PC processors. The earlier Zen designs enabled chips that could process 52 percent more instructions per clock cycle than the previous generation. Zen has spawned AMD's most competitive chips in a decade, including Ryzen for the desktop, Threadripper (with up to 32 cores) for gamers, Ryzen Mobile for laptops, and Epyc for servers. In the future, you can expect to see Zen 2 cores in future models of those families of chips. AMD's focus is on making central processing units (CPUs), graphics processing units (GPUs), and accelerated processing units (APUs) that put the two other units together on the same chip.
Machine learning algorithms don't yet understand things the way humans do -- with sometimes disastrous consequences. Melanie Mitchell, a professor of Computer Science at Portland State University, writes: As someone who has worked in A.I. for decades, I've witnessed the failure of similar predictions of imminent human-level A.I., and I'm certain these latest forecasts will fall short as well. The challenge of creating humanlike intelligence in machines remains greatly underestimated. Today's A.I. systems sorely lack the essence of human intelligence: understanding the situations we experience, being able to grasp their meaning. The mathematician and philosopher Gian-Carlo Rota famously asked, "I wonder whether or when A.I. will ever crash the barrier of meaning." To me, this is still the most important question. The lack of humanlike understanding in machines is underscored by recent cracks that have appeared in the foundations of modern A.I. While today's programs are much more impressive than the systems we had 20 or 30 years ago, a series of research studies have shown that deep-learning systems can be unreliable in decidedly unhumanlike ways. I'll give a few examples. "The bareheaded man needed a hat" is transcribed by my phone's speech-recognition program as "The bear headed man needed a hat." Google Translate renders "I put the pig in the pen" into French as "Je mets le cochon dans le stylo" (mistranslating "pen" in the sense of a writing instrument). Programs that "read" documents and answer questions about them can easily be fooled into giving wrong answers when short, irrelevant snippets of text are appended to the document. Similarly, programs that recognize faces and objects, lauded as a major triumph of deep learning, can fail dramatically when their input is modified even in modest ways by certain types of lighting, image filtering and other alterations that do not affect humans' recognition abilities in the slightest. One recent study showed that adding small amounts of "noise" to a face image can seriously harm the performance of state-of-the-art face-recognition programs. Another study, humorously called "The Elephant in the Room," showed that inserting a small image of an out-of-place object, such as an elephant, in the corner of a living-room image strangely caused deep-learning vision programs to suddenly misclassify other objects in the image.
A look at VoteWithMe and OutVote, two new political apps that are trying to use peer pressure to get people to vote. From a story: The apps are to elections what Zillow is to real estate -- services that pull public information from government records, repackage it for consumer viewing and make it available at the touch of a smartphone button. But instead of giving you a peek at house prices, VoteWithMe and OutVote let you snoop on which of your friends voted in past elections and their party affiliations -- and then prod them to go to the polls by sending them scripted messages like "You gonna vote?" "I don't want this to come off like we're shaming our friends into voting," said Naseem Makiya, the chief executive of OutVote, a start-up in Boston. But, he said, "I think a lot of people might vote just because they're frankly worried that their friends will find out if they didn't." Whom Americans vote for is private. But other information in their state voter files is public information; depending on the state, it can include details like their name, address, phone number and party affiliation and when they voted. The apps try to match the people in a smartphone's contacts to their voter files, then display some of those details. The data's increasing availability may surprise people receiving messages nudging them to vote -- or even trouble them, by exposing personal politics they might have preferred to keep to themselves. Political campaigns have for years purchased voter files from states or bought national voter databases from data brokers, but the information has otherwise had little public exposure outside of campaign use. Now any app user can easily harness such data to make inferences about, and try to influence, their contacts' voting behavior.
An anonymous reader shares a report: In Idaho, Nebraska, and Utah, voters will directly decide whether their states should expand their Medicaid programs. In Wisconsin, they could elect a candidate for governor who has pledged to sharply curtail drug prices. And across the country, Democratic congressional candidates are running on platforms highlighting their support for protecting insurance coverage for those with pre-existing conditions and lowering drug prices. Health care is on the ballot across the country, with issues ranging from medical marijuana to abortion rights to insurance coverage dominating the conversation.
Digitization promises to make medical care easier and more efficient. But are screens coming between doctors and patients? Here's an excerpt by Atul Gawande of The New Yorker, which talks about the deployment of Epic, a new medical software which cost Partners HealthCare a staggering $1.6 billion, panned out: On May 30, 2015, the Phase One Go-Live began. My hospital and clinics reduced the number of admissions and appointment slots for two weeks while the staff navigated the new system. For another two weeks, my department doubled the time allocated for appointments and procedures in order to accommodate our learning curve. This, I discovered, was the real reason the upgrade cost $1.6 billion. The software costs were under a hundred million dollars. The bulk of the expenses came from lost patient revenues and all the tech-support personnel and other people needed during the implementation phase. In the first five weeks, the I.T. folks logged twenty-seven thousand help-desk tickets -- three for every two users. Most were basic how-to questions; a few involved major technical glitches. Printing problems abounded. Many patient medications and instructions hadn't transferred accurately from our old system. My hospital had to hire hundreds of moonlighting residents and pharmacists to double-check the medication list for every patient while technicians worked to fix the data-transfer problem. Many of the angriest complaints, however, were due to problems rooted in what Sumit Rana, a senior vice-president at Epic, called "the Revenge of the Ancillaries." In building a given function -- say, an order form for a brain MRI -- the design choices were more political than technical: administrative staff and doctors had different views about what should be included. The doctors were used to having all the votes. But Epic had arranged meetings to try to adjudicate these differences. Now the staff had a say (and sometimes the doctors didn't even show), and they added questions that made their jobs easier but other jobs more time-consuming. Questions that doctors had routinely skipped now stopped them short, with "field required" alerts. A simple request might now involve filling out a detailed form that took away precious minutes of time with patients.
Ask Slashdot: How To Fix an Outdated College Tech Curriculum?
An anonymous reader writes: As a student, what's the best way to bring change to an outdated college tech curriculum? The background on this is that I have 15 years of experience in the field and a very healthy amount of industry-recognized training and certifications. I'm merely finishing up my degree to flesh out my resume -- I haven't learned much from the program that I don't already know. However, the program would have benefited me greatly 15 years ago. It's a great program, except for a biometrics class that is absolutely behind the curve. The newest publication on the syllabus is from 2009. This is simply teaching the students outdated and often wrong information. Additionally, a lot of the material seems like it was stretched to make a full semester class in biometrics in the first place -- most of the material, honestly, could be compressed to about two hours of lecture and still be delivered at a reasonable rate. What's the best way for a student in my situation to get this fixed so the school stops wasting student's time with outdated and wrong information?
A new proof from the Australian science fiction writer Greg Egan and a 2011 proof anonymously posted online are now being hailed as significant advances on a puzzle mathematicians have been studying for at least 25 years. Erica Klarreich, writing for Quanta Magazine: On September 16, 2011, an anime fan posted a math question to the online bulletin board 4chan about the cult classic television series The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya . Season one of the show, which involves time travel, had originally aired in nonchronological order, and a re-broadcast and a DVD version had each further rearranged the episodes. Fans were arguing online about the best order to watch the episodes, and the 4chan poster wondered: If viewers wanted to see the series in every possible order, what is the shortest list of episodes they'd have to watch? In less than an hour, an anonymous person offered an answer -- not a complete solution, but a lower bound on the number of episodes required. The argument, which covered series with any number of episodes, showed that for the 14-episode first season of Haruhi, viewers would have to watch at least 93,884,313,611 episodes to see all possible orderings. "Please look over [the proof] for any loopholes I might have missed," the anonymous poster wrote. The proof slipped under the radar of the mathematics community for seven years -- apparently only one professional mathematician spotted it at the time, and he didn't check it carefully. But in a plot twist last month, the Australian science fiction novelist Greg Egan proved a new upper bound on the number of episodes required. Egan's discovery renewed interest in the problem and drew attention to the lower bound posted anonymously in 2011. Both proofs are now being hailed as significant advances on a puzzle mathematicians have been studying for at least 25 years. Mathematicians quickly verified Egan's upper bound, which, like the lower bound, applies to series of any length. Then Robin Houston, a mathematician at the data visualization firm Kiln, and Jay Pantone of Marquette University in Milwaukee independently verified the work of the anonymous 4chan poster. Now, Houston and Pantone, joined by Vince Vatter of the University of Florida in Gainesville, have written up the formal argument. In their paper, they list the first author as "Anonymous 4chan Poster."
A strange interstellar object that invaded our solar system and passed close to Earth in the fall of 2017 could have been an artificial object, a piece of a spacecraft from an alien civilization, Harvard researchers are suggesting in a new paper [PDF]. From a report: "There is data on the orbit of this object for which there is no other explanation. So we wrote this paper suggesting this explanation," said Professor Avi Loeb, chairman of the Harvard astronomy department. "The approach I take to the subject is purely scientific and evidence-based. As far as I know, there is no other explanation. You can rule it out or in, based on additional data." He said the study had been accepted for publication in the The Astrophysical Journal Letters on Nov. 12. The paper, written by Loeb and postdoctoral researcher Shmuel Bialy, suggests the object might be a light sail, or solar sail -- a proposed method of powering spacecraft that uses a sail to catch radiation pressure and propel the spacecraft, just as a normal sail uses the wind to propel a boat. The object 'Oumuamua -- Hawaiian for "messenger from afar arriving first" -- is the first ever observed intruding in the orbits of our planets. It was picked up by telescopes in October 2017 at the University of Hawaii's Haleakala Observatory, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration said. It is on its way out of the solar system and expected to never return. Scientists say other "interstellar" objects may have sailed by in the past, undetected. The object raised eyebrows. It was monitored for signs of radio signals as weak as one-tenth of a cellphone-strength signal, but nothing was detected. Researchers said in December 2017 that it appeared to be a naturally formed, icy object covered with a dry crust. Further reading: Interstellar Visitor 'Oumuamua Is a Comet After All (June 2018), Scientists say mysterious 'Oumuamua' object could be an alien spacecraft, and Cigar-shaped interstellar object may have been an alien probe, Harvard paper claims.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: The amount of energy required to "mine" one dollar's worth of bitcoin is more than twice that required to mine the same value of copper, gold or platinum, according to a new paper, suggesting that the virtual work that underpins bitcoin, ethereum and similar projects is more similar to real mining than anyone intended. One dollar's worth of bitcoin takes about 17 megajoules of energy to mine, according to researchers from the Oak Ridge Institute in Cincinnati, Ohio, compared with four, five and seven megajoules for copper, gold and platinum.
Other cryptocurrencies also fair poorly in comparison, the researchers write in the journal Nature Sustainability, ascribing a cost-per-dollar of 7MJ for ethereum and 14MJ for the privacy focused cryptocurrency monero. But all the cryptocurrencies examined come off well compared with aluminium, which takes an astonishing 122MJ to mine one dollar's worth of ore. [...] To account for the wild fluctuations in cryptocurrency price, and therefore effort expended by miners, the researchers used a median of all the values between January 1, 2016 and June 30, 2018, and attempted to account for the geographic dispersal of bitcoin miners. "Any cryptocurrency mined in China would generate four times the amount of CO2 compared to the amount generated in Canada," they write, highlighting the importance of such country-dependent accounting.

tokenized:
TechCrunch is reporting that GraphQL , the Facebook - incubated data query language , is moving into its own open - source foundation . " Like so many other similar open - source foundations , the aptly named GraphQL Foundation will be hosted by the Linux Foundation . " From the report : Facebook announced GraphQL back in 2012 and open sourced it in 2015 . Today , it 's being used by companies that range from Airbnb to Audi , GitHub , Netflix , Shopify , Twitter and The New York Times . At Facebook itself , the GraphQL API powers billions of API calls every day . At its core , GraphQL is basically a language for querying databases from client - side applications and a set of specifications for how the API on the backend should present this data to the client . It presents an alternative to REST - based APIs and promises to offer developers more flexibility and the ability to write faster and more secure applications . Virtually every major programming language now supports it through a variety of libraries .
 " GraphQL has redefined how developers work with APIs and client - server interactions . We look forward to working with the GraphQL community to become an independent foundation , draft their governance and continue to foster the growth and adoption of GraphQL , " said Chris Aniszczyk , vice president of Developer Relations at the Linux Foundation . As Aniszczyk noted , the new foundation will have an open governance model , similar to that of other Linux Foundation projects . The exact details are still a work in progress , though . The list of founding members is also still in flux , but for now , it includes Airbnb , Apollo , Coursera , Elementl , Facebook , GitHub , Hasura , Prisma , Shopify and Twitter .
 Microsoft is using Minecraft to help employees get acquainted with a refresh of the company 's campus in Redmond , Washington . CNBC reports : Earlier this year , Microsoft enlisted Blockworks , a company that uses Minecraft 's digital building blocks for designing real - world projects , to create a miniature rendering of the campus facelift , which is scheduled for completion in 2022 . They 're using graphics that are far more immersive than two - dimensional photos and videos . While Minecraft was designed for gamers , its immersive nature and the ability to quickly move around and construct edifices makes it easy to see how new buildings will look when inserted into an existing landscape . [ James Delaney , a managing director at Blockworks ] said Minecraft forces designers to sacrifice some accuracy because structures in real life do n't always have the game 's squared - off look , but the speed and ease of use more than made up for those deficiencies . It might take just 10 minutes to wrap up a single building , he said . Microsoft employees -- and anyone else with the education edition of Minecraft -- can now take a digital tour of the new campus and see how plans are developing . Outside of Microsoft , that access requires a subscription to Office 365 Education .
 Corporate Vice President of Cortana Javier Soltero is leaving the company after being in charge of Cortana for less than a year . " Soltero joined Microsoft when it bought at the end of 2014 Acompli , a mobile mail startup in San Francisco which he co - founded and led , " reports ZDNet . " After joining Microsoft four years ago , Soltero spearheaded Outlook Mobile , then all of Outlook . " Before being appointed to run Cortana in March of this year , he was the head of strategy for Office . From the report : Last month , Microsoft officials confirmed that Cortana was one of the technologies that management was moving from AI + Research to the Experiences & Devices team , which is under Executive Vice President Rajesh Jha . Microsoft is in the midst of trying to reposition Cortana from a standalone digital assistant to more of an assistance aide . Given the strong focus on home and work productivity by the Microsoft 365 and Office teams , officials seemingly decided it made sense for Cortana to be situated in that group . I 've heard Soltero is going to go back to doing entrepreneurial activities once he leaves by year - end . Perry Clarke is going to be working with Soltero on transition plans in the next couple of months , sources are telling me . Clarke has been with Microsoft engineering since 1996 , when he led Exchange . He also has been a Microsoft Distinguished Engineer for the past several years . I 've heard talk that Microsoft ultimately is looking to bring Cortana and Search together into a single engineering team .
 An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica : If you talk to experts on election security ( I studied with several of them in graduate school ) they 'll tell you that we 're nowhere close to being ready for online voting . " Mobile voting is a horrific idea , " said election security expert Joe Hall when I asked him about a West Virginia experiment with blockchain - based mobile voting back in August . But on Tuesday , The New York Times published an opinion piece claiming the opposite . " Building a workable , scalable , and inclusive online voting system is now possible , thanks to blockchain technologies , " writes Alex Tapscott , whom the Times describes as co - founder of the Blockchain Research Institute . Tapscott is wrong -- and dangerously so . Online voting would be a huge threat to the integrity of our elections -- and to public faith in election outcomes .
 Tapscott focuses on the idea that blockchain technology would allow people to vote anonymously while still being able to verify that their vote was included in the final total . Even assuming this is mathematically possible -- and I think it probably is -- this idea ignores the many , many ways that foreign governments could compromise an online vote without breaking the core cryptographic algorithms . For example , foreign governments could hack into the computer systems that governments use to generate and distribute cryptographic credentials to voters . They could bribe election officials to supply them with copies of voters ' credentials . They could hack into the PCs or smartphones voters use to cast their votes . They could send voters phishing emails to trick them into revealing their voting credentials -- or simply trick them into thinking they 've cast a vote when they have n't .
 A Wall Street Journal article published this morning reported that Foxconn is looking to transfer some of its Chinese workers to Wisconsin in time for its new factory opening in Racine . The article says that these workers would likely be engineers and would fill a gap in prospective talent due to a tight labor market . Foxconn has since denied these claims . The Verge reports : In a comment to Gizmodo , Foxconn denied that it was recruiting Chinese workers . The company said : " We can categorically state that the assertion that we are recruiting Chinese personnel to staff our Wisconsin project is untrue . Our recruitment priority remains Wisconsin first and we continue to focus on hiring and training workers from throughout Wisconsin . We will supplement that recruitment from other U.S. locations as required . "
 In November 2017 , Wisconsin pledged $ 3 billion in subsidies for the Taiwan - based company if it opted to open the factory in Wisconsin . In return , Foxconn said it would create 13,000 jobs and invest $ 10 billion . ( The state subsidy came out to $ 230,000 per job . ) The Wall Street Journal report suggests that the company is struggling to find qualified engineers in the area , though , as the unemployment rate in the state reached a record low at 3 percent , along with a recent national low at 3.7 percent .
 The cybercrime wing of Pakistan 's Federal Investigation Agency has said data from " almost all " Pakistani banks was stolen in a recent security breach . FIA Cybercrimes Director retired Capt Mohammad Shoaib told Geo News that hackers based outside the country had breached the security systems of several local banks . " The hackers have stolen large amounts of money from people 's accounts , " he added . From a report : He said the FIA has written to all banks , and a meeting of the banks ' heads and security managements is being called . The meeting will look into ways the security infrastructure of banks can be bolstered . " Banks are the custodians of the money people have stored in them , " Shoaib said . " They are also responsible if their security features are so weak that they result in pilferage . " It was n't immediately clear when exactly the security breach took place . According to Shoaib , more than 100 cases are being investigated by the agency in connection with the breach .
 An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg : French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire 's efforts to rally his European Union colleagues around a new tax on tech giants fell short , as countries skeptical of the plan doubled down on their opposition , and others , including Italy , said they 'll push ahead with their own plans . Ministers from Denmark , Ireland and Sweden said they could n't support the tax in its current form , casting doubt on the proposal 's future , since unanimity is required to pass taxes in the EU . The plan on the table would impose a 3 percent levy on the European sales of the likes of Amazon and Facebook . A number of countries are already imposing taxes of their own , increasing the risk of fragmentation in the single market . Finance Minister Giovanni Tria said an Italian tax will kick in next year if there 's no broader agreement by then . Spain and the U.K. have already announced their own levies .
 AT&T will alert a little more than a dozen customers within the next week or so that their service will be terminated due to copyright infringement , news outlet Axios reported , citing sources familiar with its plans . From the report : It 's the first time AT&T has discontinued customer service over piracy allegations since having shaped its own piracy policies last year , which is significant given it just became one of America 's major media companies . AT&T owns a content network after its purchase of Time Warner earlier this year , an entity now called WarnerMedia . Content networks are typically responsible for issuing these types of allegations to internet service providers ( ISPs ) for them to address with their customers .
 Oracle 's Internet Intelligence division has confirmed today the findings of a recently published academic paper that accused China of " hijacking the vital internet backbone of western countries . " From a report : The research paper was authored by researchers from the US Naval War College and Tel Aviv University and it made quite a few waves online after it was published . Researchers accused China Telecom , one of China 's biggest state - owned internet service providers , of hijacking and detouring internet traffic through its normally - closed internet infrastructure . Some security experts contested the research paper 's findings because it did n't come from an authoritative voice in the world of internet BGP hijacks , but also because the paper touched on many politically sensitive topics , such as China 's cyber - espionage activities and how China used BGP hijacks as a way to circumvent the China - US cyber pact of 2015 . But today , Doug Madory , Director of Oracle 's Internet Analysis division ( formerly Dyn ) , confirmed that China Telecom has , indeed , engaged in internet traffic " misdirection . " " I do n't intend to address the paper 's claims around the motivations of these actions , " said Madori . " However , there is truth to the assertion that China Telecom ( whether intentionally or not ) has misdirected internet traffic ( including out of the United States ) in recent years . "
 A lump of metal in a building near Paris has long served as the global standard for the kilogram . That 's about to change . From a report : Later this month , at the international General Conference on Weights and Measures , to be held in France , delegates are expected to vote to get rid of this single physical specimen and instead plump to use a fundamental measurement -- to be defined in terms of an electric current -- in order to define the mass of an object . The king of kilograms is about to be dethroned . And crucially much of the key work that has led to the toppling of the Paris kilogram has been carried out at the National Physical Laboratory where the late Bryan Kibble invented the basic concepts of the device that will replace that ingot in the Pavillon de Breteuil . The Kibble balance works by measuring the electric current that is required to produce an electromagnetic force equal to the gravitational force acting on a mass . A second stage allows the electromagnetic force to be determined in terms of a fundamental constant known as the Planck constant which will , in future , be used to define a kilogram . These machines will provide the standard for weighing objects -- and that means no more dusting of old lumps of alloy to ensure they stay pure and accurate . [ ... ] " One key reason for doing this work is to provide international security , " says Robinson . " If the Pavillon de Breteuil burned down tomorrow and the kilogram in its vaults melted , we would have no reference left for the world 's metric weights system . There would be chaos . The current definition of the kilogram is the weight of that cylinder in Paris , after all . " [ ... ] Another major motivation for the replacement of le grand K is the need to be able to carry out increasingly more and more precise measurements . " Pharmaceutical companies will soon be wanting to use ingredients that will have to be measured in terms of a few millionths or even billionths of a gram , " says Prior . " We need to be prepared to weigh substances with that kind of accuracy . " Suggested reading : A thread on Twitter which discusses SI units and the redefinition of the kilogram .
 If extraterrestrial intelligence exists somewhere in our galaxy , a new MIT study proposes that laser technology on Earth could , in principle , be fashioned into something of a planetary porch light -- a beacon strong enough to attract attention from as far as 20,000 light years away . From a report : The research , which author James Clark calls a " feasibility study , " appears today in The Astrophysical Journal . The findings suggest that if a high - powered 1- to 2 - megawatt laser were focused through a massive 30- to 45 - meter telescope and aimed out into space , the combination would produce a beam of infrared radiation strong enough to stand out from the sun 's energy . Such a signal could be detectable by alien astronomers performing a cursory survey of our section of the Milky Way -- especially if those astronomers live in nearby systems , such as around Proxima Centauri , the nearest star to Earth , or TRAPPIST-1 , a star about 40 light - years away that hosts seven exoplanets , three of which are potentially habitable . If the signal is spotted from either of these nearby systems , the study finds , the same megawatt laser could be used to send a brief message in the form of pulses similar to Morse code .
 AMD on Monday revealed the Zen 2 architecture for the family of processors that it will launch in the coming years , starting with 2019 . The move is a follow - up to the competitive Zen designs that AMD launched in March 2017 , and it promises two - times improvement in performance throughput . From a report : AMD hopes the Zen 2 processors will keep it ahead of or at parity with Intel , the world 's biggest maker of PC processors . The earlier Zen designs enabled chips that could process 52 percent more instructions per clock cycle than the previous generation . Zen has spawned AMD 's most competitive chips in a decade , including Ryzen for the desktop , Threadripper ( with up to 32 cores ) for gamers , Ryzen Mobile for laptops , and Epyc for servers . In the future , you can expect to see Zen 2 cores in future models of those families of chips . AMD 's focus is on making central processing units ( CPUs ) , graphics processing units ( GPUs ) , and accelerated processing units ( APUs ) that put the two other units together on the same chip .
 Machine learning algorithms do n't yet understand things the way humans do -- with sometimes disastrous consequences . Melanie Mitchell , a professor of Computer Science at Portland State University , writes : As someone who has worked in A.I. for decades , I 've witnessed the failure of similar predictions of imminent human - level A.I. , and I 'm certain these latest forecasts will fall short as well . The challenge of creating humanlike intelligence in machines remains greatly underestimated . Today 's A.I. systems sorely lack the essence of human intelligence : understanding the situations we experience , being able to grasp their meaning . The mathematician and philosopher Gian - Carlo Rota famously asked , " I wonder whether or when A.I. will ever crash the barrier of meaning . " To me , this is still the most important question . The lack of humanlike understanding in machines is underscored by recent cracks that have appeared in the foundations of modern A.I. While today 's programs are much more impressive than the systems we had 20 or 30 years ago , a series of research studies have shown that deep - learning systems can be unreliable in decidedly unhumanlike ways . I 'll give a few examples . " The bareheaded man needed a hat " is transcribed by my phone 's speech - recognition program as " The bear headed man needed a hat . " Google Translate renders " I put the pig in the pen " into French as " Je mets le cochon dans le stylo " ( mistranslating " pen " in the sense of a writing instrument ) . Programs that " read " documents and answer questions about them can easily be fooled into giving wrong answers when short , irrelevant snippets of text are appended to the document . Similarly , programs that recognize faces and objects , lauded as a major triumph of deep learning , can fail dramatically when their input is modified even in modest ways by certain types of lighting , image filtering and other alterations that do not affect humans ' recognition abilities in the slightest . One recent study showed that adding small amounts of " noise " to a face image can seriously harm the performance of state - of - the - art face - recognition programs . Another study , humorously called " The Elephant in the Room , " showed that inserting a small image of an out - of - place object , such as an elephant , in the corner of a living - room image strangely caused deep - learning vision programs to suddenly misclassify other objects in the image .
 A look at VoteWithMe and OutVote , two new political apps that are trying to use peer pressure to get people to vote . From a story : The apps are to elections what Zillow is to real estate -- services that pull public information from government records , repackage it for consumer viewing and make it available at the touch of a smartphone button . But instead of giving you a peek at house prices , VoteWithMe and OutVote let you snoop on which of your friends voted in past elections and their party affiliations -- and then prod them to go to the polls by sending them scripted messages like " You gon na vote ? " " I do n't want this to come off like we 're shaming our friends into voting , " said Naseem Makiya , the chief executive of OutVote , a start - up in Boston . But , he said , " I think a lot of people might vote just because they 're frankly worried that their friends will find out if they did n't . " Whom Americans vote for is private . But other information in their state voter files is public information ; depending on the state , it can include details like their name , address , phone number and party affiliation and when they voted . The apps try to match the people in a smartphone 's contacts to their voter files , then display some of those details . The data 's increasing availability may surprise people receiving messages nudging them to vote -- or even trouble them , by exposing personal politics they might have preferred to keep to themselves . Political campaigns have for years purchased voter files from states or bought national voter databases from data brokers , but the information has otherwise had little public exposure outside of campaign use . Now any app user can easily harness such data to make inferences about , and try to influence , their contacts ' voting behavior .
 An anonymous reader shares a report : In Idaho , Nebraska , and Utah , voters will directly decide whether their states should expand their Medicaid programs . In Wisconsin , they could elect a candidate for governor who has pledged to sharply curtail drug prices . And across the country , Democratic congressional candidates are running on platforms highlighting their support for protecting insurance coverage for those with pre - existing conditions and lowering drug prices . Health care is on the ballot across the country , with issues ranging from medical marijuana to abortion rights to insurance coverage dominating the conversation .
 Digitization promises to make medical care easier and more efficient . But are screens coming between doctors and patients ? Here 's an excerpt by Atul Gawande of The New Yorker , which talks about the deployment of Epic , a new medical software which cost Partners HealthCare a staggering $ 1.6 billion , panned out : On May 30 , 2015 , the Phase One Go - Live began . My hospital and clinics reduced the number of admissions and appointment slots for two weeks while the staff navigated the new system . For another two weeks , my department doubled the time allocated for appointments and procedures in order to accommodate our learning curve . This , I discovered , was the real reason the upgrade cost $ 1.6 billion . The software costs were under a hundred million dollars . The bulk of the expenses came from lost patient revenues and all the tech - support personnel and other people needed during the implementation phase . In the first five weeks , the I.T. folks logged twenty - seven thousand help - desk tickets -- three for every two users . Most were basic how - to questions ; a few involved major technical glitches . Printing problems abounded . Many patient medications and instructions had n't transferred accurately from our old system . My hospital had to hire hundreds of moonlighting residents and pharmacists to double - check the medication list for every patient while technicians worked to fix the data - transfer problem . Many of the angriest complaints , however , were due to problems rooted in what Sumit Rana , a senior vice - president at Epic , called " the Revenge of the Ancillaries . " In building a given function -- say , an order form for a brain MRI -- the design choices were more political than technical : administrative staff and doctors had different views about what should be included . The doctors were used to having all the votes . But Epic had arranged meetings to try to adjudicate these differences . Now the staff had a say ( and sometimes the doctors did n't even show ) , and they added questions that made their jobs easier but other jobs more time - consuming . Questions that doctors had routinely skipped now stopped them short , with " field required " alerts . A simple request might now involve filling out a detailed form that took away precious minutes of time with patients .
 Ask Slashdot : How To Fix an Outdated College Tech Curriculum ?
 An anonymous reader writes : As a student , what 's the best way to bring change to an outdated college tech curriculum ? The background on this is that I have 15 years of experience in the field and a very healthy amount of industry - recognized training and certifications . I 'm merely finishing up my degree to flesh out my resume -- I have n't learned much from the program that I do n't already know . However , the program would have benefited me greatly 15 years ago . It 's a great program , except for a biometrics class that is absolutely behind the curve . The newest publication on the syllabus is from 2009 . This is simply teaching the students outdated and often wrong information . Additionally , a lot of the material seems like it was stretched to make a full semester class in biometrics in the first place -- most of the material , honestly , could be compressed to about two hours of lecture and still be delivered at a reasonable rate . What 's the best way for a student in my situation to get this fixed so the school stops wasting student 's time with outdated and wrong information ?
 A new proof from the Australian science fiction writer Greg Egan and a 2011 proof anonymously posted online are now being hailed as significant advances on a puzzle mathematicians have been studying for at least 25 years . Erica Klarreich , writing for Quanta Magazine : On September 16 , 2011 , an anime fan posted a math question to the online bulletin board 4chan about the cult classic television series The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya . Season one of the show , which involves time travel , had originally aired in nonchronological order , and a re - broadcast and a DVD version had each further rearranged the episodes . Fans were arguing online about the best order to watch the episodes , and the 4chan poster wondered : If viewers wanted to see the series in every possible order , what is the shortest list of episodes they 'd have to watch ? In less than an hour , an anonymous person offered an answer -- not a complete solution , but a lower bound on the number of episodes required . The argument , which covered series with any number of episodes , showed that for the 14 - episode first season of Haruhi , viewers would have to watch at least 93,884,313,611 episodes to see all possible orderings . " Please look over [ the proof ] for any loopholes I might have missed , " the anonymous poster wrote . The proof slipped under the radar of the mathematics community for seven years -- apparently only one professional mathematician spotted it at the time , and he did n't check it carefully . But in a plot twist last month , the Australian science fiction novelist Greg Egan proved a new upper bound on the number of episodes required . Egan 's discovery renewed interest in the problem and drew attention to the lower bound posted anonymously in 2011 . Both proofs are now being hailed as significant advances on a puzzle mathematicians have been studying for at least 25 years . Mathematicians quickly verified Egan 's upper bound , which , like the lower bound , applies to series of any length . Then Robin Houston , a mathematician at the data visualization firm Kiln , and Jay Pantone of Marquette University in Milwaukee independently verified the work of the anonymous 4chan poster . Now , Houston and Pantone , joined by Vince Vatter of the University of Florida in Gainesville , have written up the formal argument . In their paper , they list the first author as " Anonymous 4chan Poster . "
 A strange interstellar object that invaded our solar system and passed close to Earth in the fall of 2017 could have been an artificial object , a piece of a spacecraft from an alien civilization , Harvard researchers are suggesting in a new paper [ PDF ] . From a report : " There is data on the orbit of this object for which there is no other explanation . So we wrote this paper suggesting this explanation , " said Professor Avi Loeb , chairman of the Harvard astronomy department . " The approach I take to the subject is purely scientific and evidence - based . As far as I know , there is no other explanation . You can rule it out or in , based on additional data . " He said the study had been accepted for publication in the The Astrophysical Journal Letters on Nov. 12 . The paper , written by Loeb and postdoctoral researcher Shmuel Bialy , suggests the object might be a light sail , or solar sail -- a proposed method of powering spacecraft that uses a sail to catch radiation pressure and propel the spacecraft , just as a normal sail uses the wind to propel a boat . The object ' Oumuamua -- Hawaiian for " messenger from afar arriving first " -- is the first ever observed intruding in the orbits of our planets . It was picked up by telescopes in October 2017 at the University of Hawaii 's Haleakala Observatory , the National Aeronautics and Space Administration said . It is on its way out of the solar system and expected to never return . Scientists say other " interstellar " objects may have sailed by in the past , undetected . The object raised eyebrows . It was monitored for signs of radio signals as weak as one - tenth of a cellphone - strength signal , but nothing was detected . Researchers said in December 2017 that it appeared to be a naturally formed , icy object covered with a dry crust . Further reading : Interstellar Visitor ' Oumuamua Is a Comet After All ( June 2018 ) , Scientists say mysterious ' Oumuamua ' object could be an alien spacecraft , and Cigar - shaped interstellar object may have been an alien probe , Harvard paper claims .
 An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian : The amount of energy required to " mine " one dollar 's worth of bitcoin is more than twice that required to mine the same value of copper , gold or platinum , according to a new paper , suggesting that the virtual work that underpins bitcoin , ethereum and similar projects is more similar to real mining than anyone intended . One dollar 's worth of bitcoin takes about 17 megajoules of energy to mine , according to researchers from the Oak Ridge Institute in Cincinnati , Ohio , compared with four , five and seven megajoules for copper , gold and platinum .
 Other cryptocurrencies also fair poorly in comparison , the researchers write in the journal Nature Sustainability , ascribing a cost - per - dollar of 7MJ for ethereum and 14MJ for the privacy focused cryptocurrency monero . But all the cryptocurrencies examined come off well compared with aluminium , which takes an astonishing 122MJ to mine one dollar 's worth of ore . [ ... ] To account for the wild fluctuations in cryptocurrency price , and therefore effort expended by miners , the researchers used a median of all the values between January 1 , 2016 and June 30 , 2018 , and attempted to account for the geographic dispersal of bitcoin miners . " Any cryptocurrency mined in China would generate four times the amount of CO2 compared to the amount generated in Canada , " they write , highlighting the importance of such country - dependent accounting .


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Braemore Sales & Lettings have announced the immediate availability of a virtual reality property tour for all property sale listings, enabling prospective property purchasers and house hunters the opportunity to easily and seamlessly view properties from the comfort of their own home via their computers, tablets or smartphones, regardless of where they are located geographically in the world. Powered by MiDigs 360|VR, the virtual reality property tour will be taken for each property sale listed with Braemore Sales & Lettings, as well as to promote featured districts throughout Edinburgh to provide additional information from property buyers who maybe are not as familiar with Edinburgh. Braemore have even created tours of their three City Centre office locations in Edinburgh and use this to encourage clients to stop by and discuss all things property.
“Here at Braemore, we are always looking for cutting edge tools to help market our client’s properties and, with that in mind, we are now adding high definition a 360 Virtual Reality Property Tour to our property marketing package for all property sale listings. This tour allows you to view the property as if you were there in person, from your place of work or from the comfort of your own home. An ideal solution for buyers with busy schedules or live-away investors. This is just one of the many reasons why Braemore offer one of the best sales packages available in the market today” said Scott Webster, Director of Estate Agency at Braemore Sales & Lettings.
Being the first estate agent in Edinburgh to offer a 360 Virtual Reality Property Tour for residential property sales, many Braemore sellers and buyers have already seen the benefits. Listed on the market for sale, 2 (2F3) Springwell Place is a spacious two-bedroom second floor flat in the popular area of Dalry. This property received an acceptable offer just 48 hours after the virtual reality property tour went live.
Having a virtual reality property tour for all property sales listings with Braemore is an update driven by customer feedback received from clients, specifically, for the Off-Market Sales & Purchase product that Braemore have available where there is not always the traditional marketing photographs and floor plans available. This is part of Braemore Sales & Lettings’ commitment to deliver the latest technology to help property sellers and buyers.
With over 25 years’ experience in the Edinburgh property market, Braemore Sales & Lettings is the premiere sales and lettings agent in Edinburgh. The company offers a fully-managed estate agency service complete with property dressing and staging services, as well as accompanied viewings 7 days a week at no additional cost to property sellers.
Click HERE to view all of the 360 Virtual Reality Property Tour with Braemore Sales & Lettings.

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Braemore Sales & Lettings have announced the immediate availability of a virtual reality property tour for all property sale listings , enabling prospective property purchasers and house hunters the opportunity to easily and seamlessly view properties from the comfort of their own home via their computers , tablets or smartphones , regardless of where they are located geographically in the world . Powered by MiDigs 360|VR , the virtual reality property tour will be taken for each property sale listed with Braemore Sales & Lettings , as well as to promote featured districts throughout Edinburgh to provide additional information from property buyers who maybe are not as familiar with Edinburgh . Braemore have even created tours of their three City Centre office locations in Edinburgh and use this to encourage clients to stop by and discuss all things property .
 “ Here at Braemore , we are always looking for cutting edge tools to help market our client ’s properties and , with that in mind , we are now adding high definition a 360 Virtual Reality Property Tour to our property marketing package for all property sale listings . This tour allows you to view the property as if you were there in person , from your place of work or from the comfort of your own home . An ideal solution for buyers with busy schedules or live - away investors . This is just one of the many reasons why Braemore offer one of the best sales packages available in the market today ” said Scott Webster , Director of Estate Agency at Braemore Sales & Lettings .
 Being the first estate agent in Edinburgh to offer a 360 Virtual Reality Property Tour for residential property sales , many Braemore sellers and buyers have already seen the benefits . Listed on the market for sale , 2 ( 2F3 ) Springwell Place is a spacious two - bedroom second floor flat in the popular area of Dalry . This property received an acceptable offer just 48 hours after the virtual reality property tour went live .
 Having a virtual reality property tour for all property sales listings with Braemore is an update driven by customer feedback received from clients , specifically , for the Off - Market Sales & Purchase product that Braemore have available where there is not always the traditional marketing photographs and floor plans available . This is part of Braemore Sales & Lettings ’ commitment to deliver the latest technology to help property sellers and buyers .
 With over 25 years ’ experience in the Edinburgh property market , Braemore Sales & Lettings is the premiere sales and lettings agent in Edinburgh . The company offers a fully - managed estate agency service complete with property dressing and staging services , as well as accompanied viewings 7 days a week at no additional cost to property sellers .
 Click HERE to view all of the 360 Virtual Reality Property Tour with Braemore Sales & Lettings .


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RU? Instant Reaction Review Podcast Ep. 121 - Fury Review - Are You Screening?
Fury left us in such a strange place that I ultimately called it a kind of anti-movie. Despite agreeing with most of my problems with the film, Shane ended up rating it quite a bit higher, and actually, I didn’t rate it that low myself.
If you listen to us regularly, you probably know that we are becoming famous for spending a lot of our time talking about the negatives of movies we rate highly, and the positives of movies we give very low scores, but with Fury, the movie was so odd that I don’t think we knew where to go with our dissection of it.
We both agreed that Brad Pitt did an impressive job with the role, though we disagreed on some of the other actors, but some of the steps along this character’s path didn’t make a lot of sense.
In the end, it becomes odd heaped upon odd, and that didn’t work for me as a final product. When it starts to seem like you’re being odd just for the sake of being odd, I lose interest.
It’s odd for a war film. It’s odd for a character study (because it’s hard to like anyone). It’s odd for… having laser fire… or whatever. It’s odd for sticking so many cliches in. It’s just odd.
Give us a listen below, and please remember to share, subscribe, rate us on iTunes, etc., etc.

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RU ? Instant Reaction Review Podcast Ep . 121 - Fury Review - Are You Screening ?
 Fury left us in such a strange place that I ultimately called it a kind of anti - movie . Despite agreeing with most of my problems with the film , Shane ended up rating it quite a bit higher , and actually , I did n’t rate it that low myself .
 If you listen to us regularly , you probably know that we are becoming famous for spending a lot of our time talking about the negatives of movies we rate highly , and the positives of movies we give very low scores , but with Fury , the movie was so odd that I do n’t think we knew where to go with our dissection of it .
 We both agreed that Brad Pitt did an impressive job with the role , though we disagreed on some of the other actors , but some of the steps along this character ’s path did n’t make a lot of sense .
 In the end , it becomes odd heaped upon odd , and that did n’t work for me as a final product . When it starts to seem like you ’re being odd just for the sake of being odd , I lose interest .
 It ’s odd for a war film . It ’s odd for a character study ( because it ’s hard to like anyone ) . It ’s odd for … having laser fire … or whatever . It ’s odd for sticking so many cliches in . It ’s just odd .
 Give us a listen below , and please remember to share , subscribe , rate us on iTunes , etc . , etc .


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"Nature may reach the same result in many ways."
" Nature may reach the same result in many ways. "
" A point of great importance would be first to know: what is the capacity of the earth? And... "
" Let the future tell the truth and evaluate each one according to his work and accomplishme... "
" To conquer by sheer force is becoming harder and harder every day. Defensive is getting co... "
" Fights between individuals, as well as governments and nations, invariably result from mis... "
" For a while I gave myself up entirely to the intense enjoyment of picturing machines and d... "
" We crave for new sensations but soon become indifferent to them. The wonders of yesterday ... "

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" Nature may reach the same result in many ways . "
 " Nature may reach the same result in many ways . "
 " A point of great importance would be first to know : what is the capacity of the earth ? And ... "
 " Let the future tell the truth and evaluate each one according to his work and accomplishme ... "
 " To conquer by sheer force is becoming harder and harder every day . Defensive is getting co ... "
 " Fights between individuals , as well as governments and nations , invariably result from mis ... "
 " For a while I gave myself up entirely to the intense enjoyment of picturing machines and d ... "
 " We crave for new sensations but soon become indifferent to them . The wonders of yesterday ... "


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* If you can't find what you are after please call the store on 9545 0700 to double check or to see if we can order it for you.
* Not all titles listed may be available at all times, if you find something you'd like to hire please call the store on 9545 0700 to confirm it's availability.
* We do not count "the" or "a" at the beginning of a title, search by the first letter of the second word in the title. Example; if you're looking for "The Shawshank Redemption" search under "S".
* The lists are accurate at the time of posting, however they are subject to change.

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* If you ca n't find what you are after please call the store on 9545 0700 to double check or to see if we can order it for you .
 * Not all titles listed may be available at all times , if you find something you 'd like to hire please call the store on 9545 0700 to confirm it 's availability .
 * We do not count " the " or " a " at the beginning of a title , search by the first letter of the second word in the title . Example ; if you 're looking for " The Shawshank Redemption " search under " S " .
 * The lists are accurate at the time of posting , however they are subject to change .


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This collection is brightly coloured and will delight even the very youngest of Thomas fans. Bertie is the perfect size and weight for little hands to hold and requires no batteries to operate. The wheels are free-moving and require no tracks which means kids are free to play just about anywhere they like.
Also available: Thomas, Percy, Diesel, Harold and Sir Topham Hatt (each sold separately).

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This collection is brightly coloured and will delight even the very youngest of Thomas fans . Bertie is the perfect size and weight for little hands to hold and requires no batteries to operate . The wheels are free - moving and require no tracks which means kids are free to play just about anywhere they like .
 Also available : Thomas , Percy , Diesel , Harold and Sir Topham Hatt ( each sold separately ) .


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The participation fee covers local housing during the project, three vegetarian meals a day, ground transportation to and from the airport and project site, local excursions, short-term travel insurance, a Maranatha t-shirt, and luggage tags. Flights, passports, and vaccinations are not included in the participation fee.
Volunteers on this project will continue the masonry construction at the Beryl Adventist Church. This project was started earlier this year.
ARRIVALVolunteers will arrive in Dominica (DOM) on Thursday, November 1, 2018.Please wait for confirmation from Maranatha before purchasing your airfare to ensure there is still space on the project.
DEPARTUREVolunteers will depart from Dominica (DOM) on Sunday, November 11, 2018.
Volunteers on this project will experience perhaps one of the most unique accommodations for a Maranatha project in the last few years! The group will stay at a UNESCO World Heritage Center called Fort Shirley. The old fort has been converted into a lodge that has several well-kept up dorms, bathrooms, and a kitchen and dining room.
The group will be divided into two dorm rooms, one for males and one for females. There are stairs down to the shared bathrooms from the respective dorms. The bathrooms have hot water and individual stalls for showers. Mattresses are provided, but volunteers will need to bring their own bedding (pillow, sheets, and blanket) as well as towels and washcloths. The rooms do not have air conditioning, so you may also consider bringing a battery- operated fan to help keep your bunk cooler. WiFi is not available at the fort.
Couples and families are welcome on this project. There are a few more- private rooms in the upstairs of the fort. We will put two couples together in a room or one family. If we end up with a large group of volunteers, some couples might have to divide into the dorm rooms.
The fort is located on a bluff overlooking the ocean and about 30 minutes from the construction site. The group will meet together at the hotel for meals and worships. Each day, the group will travel by small bus to the construction.
Volunteers will purchase their own plane tickets to and from the Douglas-Charles Airport (DOM) in Dominica. The dates posted are the arrival and departure dates from the project, but due to travel time, you may need to leave a day or two before the arrival date. You may have an overnight layover on another Caribbean island due to the connections available. Maranatha representatives will meet volunteers upon arrival. Please wait for confirmation before purchasing your airfare to ensure that there is enough space on the project. More information is available in an information packet available for download above. Booking outside these windows could result in additional fees and missed portions of the project.
During the project, the group will take a day to tour some sites in Dominica. We’ll head to the capital city of Roseau for some souvenir shopping. We’ll also be able to go on hikes to visit the island’s once beautiful natural landscape, including waterfalls and mountains. There are also several beaches that the group can enjoy during the trip. Volunteers will also have the option to scuba dive or snorkel for an additional cost.

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The participation fee covers local housing during the project , three vegetarian meals a day , ground transportation to and from the airport and project site , local excursions , short - term travel insurance , a Maranatha t - shirt , and luggage tags . Flights , passports , and vaccinations are not included in the participation fee .
 Volunteers on this project will continue the masonry construction at the Beryl Adventist Church . This project was started earlier this year .
 ARRIVALVolunteers will arrive in Dominica ( DOM ) on Thursday , November 1 , 2018.Please wait for confirmation from Maranatha before purchasing your airfare to ensure there is still space on the project .
 DEPARTUREVolunteers will depart from Dominica ( DOM ) on Sunday , November 11 , 2018 .
 Volunteers on this project will experience perhaps one of the most unique accommodations for a Maranatha project in the last few years ! The group will stay at a UNESCO World Heritage Center called Fort Shirley . The old fort has been converted into a lodge that has several well - kept up dorms , bathrooms , and a kitchen and dining room .
 The group will be divided into two dorm rooms , one for males and one for females . There are stairs down to the shared bathrooms from the respective dorms . The bathrooms have hot water and individual stalls for showers . Mattresses are provided , but volunteers will need to bring their own bedding ( pillow , sheets , and blanket ) as well as towels and washcloths . The rooms do not have air conditioning , so you may also consider bringing a battery- operated fan to help keep your bunk cooler . WiFi is not available at the fort .
 Couples and families are welcome on this project . There are a few more- private rooms in the upstairs of the fort . We will put two couples together in a room or one family . If we end up with a large group of volunteers , some couples might have to divide into the dorm rooms .
 The fort is located on a bluff overlooking the ocean and about 30 minutes from the construction site . The group will meet together at the hotel for meals and worships . Each day , the group will travel by small bus to the construction .
 Volunteers will purchase their own plane tickets to and from the Douglas - Charles Airport ( DOM ) in Dominica . The dates posted are the arrival and departure dates from the project , but due to travel time , you may need to leave a day or two before the arrival date . You may have an overnight layover on another Caribbean island due to the connections available . Maranatha representatives will meet volunteers upon arrival . Please wait for confirmation before purchasing your airfare to ensure that there is enough space on the project . More information is available in an information packet available for download above . Booking outside these windows could result in additional fees and missed portions of the project .
 During the project , the group will take a day to tour some sites in Dominica . We ’ll head to the capital city of Roseau for some souvenir shopping . We ’ll also be able to go on hikes to visit the island ’s once beautiful natural landscape , including waterfalls and mountains . There are also several beaches that the group can enjoy during the trip . Volunteers will also have the option to scuba dive or snorkel for an additional cost .


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Payments Fraud is Occurring in Record Numbers. Why?
Magnus Carlsson, Manager of Treasury and Payments at the Association for Financial Professionals, discusses the results of the 2017 AFP Payments Fraud & Control Survey, underwritten by J.P. Morgan. Nearly three quarters of corporate treasury and finance professionals said their companies were victims of payments fraud last year, the highest percentage since the survey debuted in 2005.

tokenized:
Payments Fraud is Occurring in Record Numbers . Why ?
 Magnus Carlsson , Manager of Treasury and Payments at the Association for Financial Professionals , discusses the results of the 2017 AFP Payments Fraud & Control Survey , underwritten by J.P. Morgan . Nearly three quarters of corporate treasury and finance professionals said their companies were victims of payments fraud last year , the highest percentage since the survey debuted in 2005 .


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The photo was shot using a NIKON COOLPIX AW120 camera at an aperture of f/9.1, 1/500 sec. shutter speed and ISO 200. Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode. The original image file has a resolution of 4608 x 3456 pixels, or in other words 15.9 megapixels.The photo has a resolution of 300 DPI and occupies a disk space of 7.22 megabytes.
According to the image metadata, the photo was shot on Wednesday 18th of November 2015. The local time was 13:08:18. The timezone was America / Cancun, which is GMT -06:00. Please note that timezone was guessed using the GPS coordinates and may not be accurate. The EXIF timestamp may also be wrong if the date and time weren't set correctly in the digital camera.
NIKON COOLPIX AW120 camera has a built-in GPS receiver and allows geotagging on image files. The coordinates and location where the photo was taken is stored in the EXIF. According to GPS data analysis, the photo was taken at coordinates 20° 26' 2.05" N , 87° 0' 13.69" W. Using reverse geocoding, the address associated with the coordinates is guessed as Carretera Costera Sur, Quintana Roo, Mexico. Depending on the GPS receiver and the reception conditions the accuracy may vary and the address should not be regarded as exact location.

tokenized:
The photo was shot using a NIKON COOLPIX AW120 camera at an aperture of f/9.1 , 1/500 sec . shutter speed and ISO 200 . Flash did not fire , compulsory flash mode . The original image file has a resolution of 4608 x 3456 pixels , or in other words 15.9 megapixels . The photo has a resolution of 300 DPI and occupies a disk space of 7.22 megabytes .
 According to the image metadata , the photo was shot on Wednesday 18th of November 2015 . The local time was 13:08:18 . The timezone was America / Cancun , which is GMT -06:00 . Please note that timezone was guessed using the GPS coordinates and may not be accurate . The EXIF timestamp may also be wrong if the date and time were n't set correctly in the digital camera .
 NIKON COOLPIX AW120 camera has a built - in GPS receiver and allows geotagging on image files . The coordinates and location where the photo was taken is stored in the EXIF . According to GPS data analysis , the photo was taken at coordinates 20 ° 26 ' 2.05 " N , 87 ° 0 ' 13.69 " W. Using reverse geocoding , the address associated with the coordinates is guessed as Carretera Costera Sur , Quintana Roo , Mexico . Depending on the GPS receiver and the reception conditions the accuracy may vary and the address should not be regarded as exact location .


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Everyone experiences swelling and inflammation throughout their lifetime. Often, it is due to an infection or injury and only lasts a couple of days to a week. In these specific cases, inflammation is important because it is our body’s way of protecting and healing itself. Unfortunately, if you have chronic inflammation—that which persists over a long period of time—despite its best intentions, the inflammation ends up causing more harm than good.
Swelling and inflammation are simply the immune system’s response to any type of harmful stimulus. Such stimuli can range from damaged tissue as a result of rolling your ankle to a bacterial infection to the common cold. When there is danger somewhere in the body, the immune system springs into action and increases blood flow to the affected area. The blood carries various nutrients necessary for healing.
Sometimes swelling and inflammation are visible to the naked eye, like when you get stung by a bee and you get a big red bump at the site of the sting. Other times, inflammation and swelling occur deep within the body and are only evidenced by the pain associated with them.
Swelling is the enlargement of a part of the body—organ, skin, or other tissue—and is usually caused by inflammation. Depending on the cause of swelling, it is accompanied by various other sensations including itchiness, nausea, vomiting, pain, dizziness, fever, and fatigue.
There are two types of inflammation: acute and chronic. Acute inflammation typically has a rapid onset, meaning it happens quickly and severely in a specific part of the body. Eventually, acute inflammation will die down and everything returns to normal. If you get hit by a baseball, you will likely have acute inflammation where the ball made contact, but after a few days or weeks you will return to normal.
Chronic inflammation, on the other hand, lasts a long time—many weeks, months, or even years. If chronic inflammation is left untreated, it can shift from just a symptom to the trigger point of many other maladies.
Either way, acute or chronic, inflammation is typically associated with pain, swelling, stiffness or decreased mobility, redness of the skin, and warmth.
The immune system is a series of cells, tissues, and organs that work together to defend the body against infection. An immune response is a series of biological and chemical reactions which occur in response to a stimulus or irritant. When tissues of the body are damaged because of this irritant, the damaged cells release three types of chemicals: histamines, bradykinin, and prostaglandins. When the surrounding blood vessels come in contact with these chemicals, they release fluid into the tissue, also known as swelling. The idea is that the fluid isolates any type of foreign substance (the irritant) from contacting any other tissues. Then white blood cells are attracted to the area to “clean up” or remove waste. They essentially eat the germs and damaged cells. The cleanup is characteristic of inflammation as opposed to simple swelling.
Acute inflammation and swelling is typically due to either trauma that damages the tissues in the form of an injury or infection (bacterial or viral). While acute inflammation is important for maintaining a long, healthy life, chronic inflammation can contribute to a number of different diseases.
Chronic inflammation and swelling is usually due to a pre-existing disease or condition, or an imbalance somewhere in the body. In order to conquer inflammation, you must start at the source.
Inflammation like you experience with, say, arthritis, is typically due to an imbalance of the musculoskeletal system. The body is designed with a specific alignment such that when you are in proper alignment, there is just the right amount of space in each joint so the muscles, bones, ligaments, tendons, blood vessels, and nerves that pass through the joint have room to function efficiently. When you have poor alignment, some joints get compressed, and the space in the joint decreases. Decreased space in the joints compresses the nerves, muscles, and tendons and causes friction between bones. Where there is friction, there is inflammation. The body triggers an inflammatory response to repair damaged cells and remove dead ones. In order to cut down on the inflammation, you must first address the alignment issue.
Additionally, certain types of food or drink are considered inflammatory, meaning they exacerbate inflammation.
Equalize your weight. Notice your sit bones, those protruding bones in the middle of your buttocks, and how you distribute weight on them while seated. Sit in your office, kitchen, or living room chair, and ask yourself, “Is there more weight on my right sit bone than my left, or more weight on my left sit bone than my right?” If the answer to either question is yes, take time to fidget until the weight is evenly distributed. Memorize that feeling of equalizing your weight on your sit bones, and remind yourself to find that equalization each time you sit. By equalizing your weight, you decrease stress on the joints and prevent unnecessary inflammation.
Avoid inflammatory foods. Eating highly processed, inflammation-inducing foods may contribute to worsening inflammation in the body. Fried foods, sugary foods, and refined carbohydrates are just a few of the foods to avoid. Make whole foods 95 percent of your daily diet, leaving junk food for special occasions. Focus on eating and cooking more anti-inflammatory foods to decrease unnecessary inflammation and swelling.
Don’t smoke. Smoking leads to a high white blood cell count, indicating that the body is working on overdrive to keep the body free from infection, while also depleting nutrients from your blood. This means your immune system is constantly triggering inflammatory responses, but the healing is slowed as the blood cannot deliver the nutrients your body needs. Add to that the inflammation in the lungs caused by the smoke itself! By not smoking, you eliminate a huge source of inflammation in the body.
1. Ground the feet. Press the bases of all ten toes and the heels into the floor, and equalize the weight distribution between the bases of toes and heels. Now, equalize the weight between the right foot and the left foot. Feel the earth supporting you. The feet are the base for support of the entire body.
2. Soften the jaw. Move the mandible—the jawbone—from side to side, open and close the mouth, or gently massage the hinge of the jaw to release jaw tension. By routinely practicing softening, the jaw tension in the face decreases, which can alleviate conditions and maladies such as headaches, TMD, and teeth grinding. Consciously softening the jaw throughout the day encourages the jaw and the overall face to be more relaxed.
3. Nourish the spine. Lubricate the vertebrae by bringing the spine into flexion and extension. Sounds complicated? It’s not! Come to hands and knees, with wrists under shoulders and knees under hips, in All 4s. Round spine and set gaze to navel. This is spinal flexion. Arch spine and set gaze high. This is spinal extension. You’re nourishing your spine by enhancing the flow of spinal fluid to the spine, effectively increasing your range of motion and ease of overall movement.
One of the best strategies for dealing with inflammation is the age-old RICE method: Rest, Ice, Compress, and Elevate. Ice, compression, and elevation all help to minimize inflammation to the affected area, while resting gives the immune system the time and space to do its job.
Additionally, take a bath with Epsom salt and lavender oil. Epsom salts soaked in water releases magnesium sulfate. During a bath, the magnesium sulfate is absorbed through the skin to help reduce inflammation. Lavender oil promotes the relaxation of muscles. Together, the two are a powerful tonic to aid in healing. Simply add a cup of Epsom salts and two or three drops of lavender oil to a warm—not hot—bath, and enjoy!

tokenized:
Everyone experiences swelling and inflammation throughout their lifetime . Often , it is due to an infection or injury and only lasts a couple of days to a week . In these specific cases , inflammation is important because it is our body ’s way of protecting and healing itself . Unfortunately , if you have chronic inflammation — that which persists over a long period of time — despite its best intentions , the inflammation ends up causing more harm than good .
 Swelling and inflammation are simply the immune system ’s response to any type of harmful stimulus . Such stimuli can range from damaged tissue as a result of rolling your ankle to a bacterial infection to the common cold . When there is danger somewhere in the body , the immune system springs into action and increases blood flow to the affected area . The blood carries various nutrients necessary for healing .
 Sometimes swelling and inflammation are visible to the naked eye , like when you get stung by a bee and you get a big red bump at the site of the sting . Other times , inflammation and swelling occur deep within the body and are only evidenced by the pain associated with them .
 Swelling is the enlargement of a part of the body — organ , skin , or other tissue — and is usually caused by inflammation . Depending on the cause of swelling , it is accompanied by various other sensations including itchiness , nausea , vomiting , pain , dizziness , fever , and fatigue .
 There are two types of inflammation : acute and chronic . Acute inflammation typically has a rapid onset , meaning it happens quickly and severely in a specific part of the body . Eventually , acute inflammation will die down and everything returns to normal . If you get hit by a baseball , you will likely have acute inflammation where the ball made contact , but after a few days or weeks you will return to normal .
 Chronic inflammation , on the other hand , lasts a long time — many weeks , months , or even years . If chronic inflammation is left untreated , it can shift from just a symptom to the trigger point of many other maladies .
 Either way , acute or chronic , inflammation is typically associated with pain , swelling , stiffness or decreased mobility , redness of the skin , and warmth .
 The immune system is a series of cells , tissues , and organs that work together to defend the body against infection . An immune response is a series of biological and chemical reactions which occur in response to a stimulus or irritant . When tissues of the body are damaged because of this irritant , the damaged cells release three types of chemicals : histamines , bradykinin , and prostaglandins . When the surrounding blood vessels come in contact with these chemicals , they release fluid into the tissue , also known as swelling . The idea is that the fluid isolates any type of foreign substance ( the irritant ) from contacting any other tissues . Then white blood cells are attracted to the area to “ clean up ” or remove waste . They essentially eat the germs and damaged cells . The cleanup is characteristic of inflammation as opposed to simple swelling .
 Acute inflammation and swelling is typically due to either trauma that damages the tissues in the form of an injury or infection ( bacterial or viral ) . While acute inflammation is important for maintaining a long , healthy life , chronic inflammation can contribute to a number of different diseases .
 Chronic inflammation and swelling is usually due to a pre - existing disease or condition , or an imbalance somewhere in the body . In order to conquer inflammation , you must start at the source .
 Inflammation like you experience with , say , arthritis , is typically due to an imbalance of the musculoskeletal system . The body is designed with a specific alignment such that when you are in proper alignment , there is just the right amount of space in each joint so the muscles , bones , ligaments , tendons , blood vessels , and nerves that pass through the joint have room to function efficiently . When you have poor alignment , some joints get compressed , and the space in the joint decreases . Decreased space in the joints compresses the nerves , muscles , and tendons and causes friction between bones . Where there is friction , there is inflammation . The body triggers an inflammatory response to repair damaged cells and remove dead ones . In order to cut down on the inflammation , you must first address the alignment issue .
 Additionally , certain types of food or drink are considered inflammatory , meaning they exacerbate inflammation .
 Equalize your weight . Notice your sit bones , those protruding bones in the middle of your buttocks , and how you distribute weight on them while seated . Sit in your office , kitchen , or living room chair , and ask yourself , “ Is there more weight on my right sit bone than my left , or more weight on my left sit bone than my right ? ” If the answer to either question is yes , take time to fidget until the weight is evenly distributed . Memorize that feeling of equalizing your weight on your sit bones , and remind yourself to find that equalization each time you sit . By equalizing your weight , you decrease stress on the joints and prevent unnecessary inflammation .
 Avoid inflammatory foods . Eating highly processed , inflammation - inducing foods may contribute to worsening inflammation in the body . Fried foods , sugary foods , and refined carbohydrates are just a few of the foods to avoid . Make whole foods 95 percent of your daily diet , leaving junk food for special occasions . Focus on eating and cooking more anti - inflammatory foods to decrease unnecessary inflammation and swelling .
 Do n’t smoke . Smoking leads to a high white blood cell count , indicating that the body is working on overdrive to keep the body free from infection , while also depleting nutrients from your blood . This means your immune system is constantly triggering inflammatory responses , but the healing is slowed as the blood can not deliver the nutrients your body needs . Add to that the inflammation in the lungs caused by the smoke itself ! By not smoking , you eliminate a huge source of inflammation in the body .
 1 . Ground the feet . Press the bases of all ten toes and the heels into the floor , and equalize the weight distribution between the bases of toes and heels . Now , equalize the weight between the right foot and the left foot . Feel the earth supporting you . The feet are the base for support of the entire body .
 2 . Soften the jaw . Move the mandible — the jawbone — from side to side , open and close the mouth , or gently massage the hinge of the jaw to release jaw tension . By routinely practicing softening , the jaw tension in the face decreases , which can alleviate conditions and maladies such as headaches , TMD , and teeth grinding . Consciously softening the jaw throughout the day encourages the jaw and the overall face to be more relaxed .
 3 . Nourish the spine . Lubricate the vertebrae by bringing the spine into flexion and extension . Sounds complicated ? It ’s not ! Come to hands and knees , with wrists under shoulders and knees under hips , in All 4s . Round spine and set gaze to navel . This is spinal flexion . Arch spine and set gaze high . This is spinal extension . You ’re nourishing your spine by enhancing the flow of spinal fluid to the spine , effectively increasing your range of motion and ease of overall movement .
 One of the best strategies for dealing with inflammation is the age - old RICE method : Rest , Ice , Compress , and Elevate . Ice , compression , and elevation all help to minimize inflammation to the affected area , while resting gives the immune system the time and space to do its job .
 Additionally , take a bath with Epsom salt and lavender oil . Epsom salts soaked in water releases magnesium sulfate . During a bath , the magnesium sulfate is absorbed through the skin to help reduce inflammation . Lavender oil promotes the relaxation of muscles . Together , the two are a powerful tonic to aid in healing . Simply add a cup of Epsom salts and two or three drops of lavender oil to a warm — not hot — bath , and enjoy !