Month: March 2021

(via Boing Boing)

Wait, you mean being inside with unmasked people increases your chances of catching covid?

But here’s one more study, published by the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on March 5, to add to the growing pile of evidence out there. Examining county-level data from March 1 to December 31, researchers found mask mandates were linked to decreases in daily infections and death growth rates within 20 days. The data also showed that reopening restaurants for on-premises dining was followed by a rise in infections and deaths six to 11 weeks later, especially when mask mandates weren’t in place.

Filmmaker and artist, Jonna Jinton, has a whole series of videos about living in the north of Sweden.

NEW: President Biden announces we will now have enough vaccine supply for 300 million Americans by the end of May.

This is an acceleration of 2 months over our prior outlook.

— Andy Slavitt (@aslavitt46) March 2, 2021

Absolute insanity.

AUSTIN, Texas — Texas is lifting its mask mandate, Gov. Greg Abbott said Tuesday, making it the largest state to end an order intended to prevent the spread of the coronavirus that has killed more than 42,000 Texans.

The Republican governor has faced sharp criticism from his party over the mandate, which was imposed eight months ago, and other COVID-19 restrictions. It was only ever lightly enforced, even during the worst outbreaks of the pandemic.

We have ramped up vaccinations to an astounding level, and with the Johnson and Johnson/Merck agreement, will be ahead of schedule. But the GOP is doing everything in its power to get as many citizens sick or killed as humanly possible. Opening up 100% is crazy, but removing mask mandates is just plain homicidal.

Greg Abbott is endangering the health of Texas and beyond, the Editorial Board writes https://t.co/12a5V4Cziw

— Washington Post Opinions (@PostOpinions) March 2, 2021

With our new Deep Nostalgia™, you can see how a person from an old photo could have moved and looked if they were captured on video! Read more: https://t.co/ZwUwzJRQ26 #RootsTech #RootsTechConnect pic.twitter.com/LERXhrqiut

— MyHeritage (@MyHeritage) February 25, 2021

I’m torn between amazed and creeped out:

To turn old static pictures into short videos, MyHeritage partners with D-ID, “a company specializing in video reenactment using deep learning.” First, the pictures must be upgraded to high-definition. Then deepfake technology is used to animate them with realistic human gestures. (And yes, more than one face can be animated in a single photo.) The company explains how it works:

Frederick Douglass, the mighty abolitionist, was the single most photographed person in the United States during the nineteenth century. Here's how he might've looked in motion. Brace yourself and press play. pic.twitter.com/HOxDK7jGyh

— La Marr Jurelle Bruce (@Afromanticist) February 28, 2021