America's generally pro-Trump media site Fox News felt compelled to report today that "Some poison control centers reported a spike in calls following President Trump's suggestion that injecting disinfectant might help people infected with coronavirus." The comment alarmed medical professionals around the world. The president subsequently claimed on Friday that he was being "sacrastic," although at the press conference he was soberly addressing health experts on the coronavirus task force, urging them to launch a study. Lysol parent company Reckitt Benckiser issued a statement Friday reminding people that "under no circumstance should our disinfectant products be administered into the human body (through injection, ingestion or any other route)." In Maryland, the Emergency Management Agency received over 100 calls inquiring about the president's suggestion, forcing the service to issue an alert to remind citizens that "under no circumstances should any disinfectant product be administered into the body through injection, ingestion or any other route." Washington State's Emergency Management Division similarly issued a public statement to remind people to not "drink bleach" or "inject disinfectant." More concerning, though, is the number of people who actually went ahead with the suggestion. In New York City, the Daily News reported that the Poison Control Center saw 30 cases of "exposure to Lysol, bleach and other cleaners in 18 hours after Trump's suggestion" that cleaning products might be used to treat coronavirus. NYC Poison Control saw only 13 such cases in a similar period last year. Anna Sanders, who wrote the Daily News article, reported that no one died or was hospitalized as a result. "After raising the idea of putting disinfectant inside people's bodies, Trump cautioned Thursday that he's not a medical expert," reports one New York-based news site. " 'Maybe you can. Maybe you can't. I'm not a doctor. I'm, like, a person who has a good you-know-what,' Trump said, pointing to his head."

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"With the pandemic having shut down production, companies are asking ad agencies to create commercials made up of digitally altered footage," reports the New York Times, citing a State Farm commercial that aired during an ESPN documentary starring the anchor of "SportsCenter," Kenny Mayne: The producers made the commercial by layering video of Mr. Mayne's 60-year-old mouth onto footage of his 38-year-old face. To many viewers, the stunt provided a welcome moment of levity in depressing times. Others were made uneasy by the smoothness of the patch, describing it as a type of deepfake. "We tried to make the joke clear enough so that we weren't tricking anyone," said Carrie Brzezinski-Hsu, the head of ESPN CreativeWorks, which created the commercial with the ad agencies Optimum Sports and Translation. Ms. Brzezinski-Hsu said manipulated footage was likely to appear in future ESPN ads. And executives at several major advertising agencies said they had discussed making similar commercials with their clients in recent weeks. "We're so restricted in how we can generate content," said Kerry Hill, the production director for the ad agency FCB in North America. "Anything that can be computer generated is something we're going to explore." Husani Oakley, the chief technology officer of the ad firm Deutsch, said digitally altered ads should somehow clue viewers into the fact that what they are seeing is not completely real. "The technology is here, and it's only going to get better and better, and we have to get used to it," he added. "We're exploring ways to have fun with it."

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This week Python's core developer blog announced the very last production release of Python 2.7. Hackaday reports: The intention was for it to coincide with PyCon 2020, but just like so many of the events planned for the first half of the year, the in-person conference had to be canceled in favor of a virtual one due to the COVID-19 epidemic. That might have stymied the celebration somewhat, but the release of Python 2.7.18 will still be looked on as a special moment for everyone involved. "Thank you @gutworth for being the 2.7 release manager during 11 long years," Guido van Rossum announced on Twitter. "It's time for the CPython community to say a fond but firm farewell to Python 2," reads the announcement on the core developer's blog. Python 2.7 has been under active development since the release of Python 2.6, more than 11 years ago. Over all those years, CPython's core developers and contributors sedulously applied bug fixes to the 2.7 branch, no small task as the Python 2 and 3 branches diverged. There were large changes midway through Python 2.7's life such as PEP 466's feature backports to the ssl module and hash randomization. Traditionally, these features would never have been added to a branch in maintenance mode, but exceptions were made to keep Python 2 users secure. Thank you to CPython's community for such dedication. Python 2.7 was lucky to have the services of two generations of binary builders and operating system experts, Martin von Löwis and Steve Dower for Windows, and Ronald Oussoren and Ned Deily for macOS. The reason we provided binary Python 2.7 releases for macOS 10.9, an operating system obsoleted by Apple 4 years ago, or why the "Microsoft Visual C++ Compiler for Python 2.7" exists is the dedication of these individuals. Python 3 would be nowhere without the dedication of the wider community. Library maintainers followed CPython by maintaining Python 2 support for many years butalso threw their weight behind the Python 3 statement. Linux distributors chased Python 2 out of their archives. Users migrated hundreds of millions of lines of code, developed porting guides, and kept Python 2 in their brain while Python 3 gained 10 years of improvements. Finally, thank you to GvR for creating Python 0.9, 1, 2, and 3. Long live Python 3+!

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Biden should pick Elizabeth Warren for VP.

She'd put Repubs on notice. Biden is a nice guy but Warren knows you suck. Good cop bad cop.

A black woman? The best candidate, Maxine Waters, isn't in contention.

Let's win, not just the election but the politcal war that will follow.

BTW, I supported Biden over Warren after Klobuchar dropped out. I want a president that is uncontentious, for everyone. A unifier. It's the only way out of the paralysis imho.

But I want everyone to understand the unity has as its foundation care for the American people. That's what Warren is for. No one can misunderstand what that choice means.

CNET reports on new research from a threat-intelligence company into the more than 540 domain names registered this month with the word "reopen" in their URL. While hundreds of them are "designed to lend credibility to anti-lockdown protests," and 98 more were purchased to thwart that effort, there's still many other domains that "come from suspicious sources or resellers looking to make money... Researchers at DomainTools have found hundreds of 'reopen' URLs that were bought specifically to be resold and others that resemble malware campaigns." These are "reopen" websites targeted toward restaurants, movie theaters and sports, and all are set up for sale... "Domainers are a particular type of people who spot any chance they can to hop on a quick buck," said Chad Anderson, senior security researcher at DomainTools. "In any of these instances, there's going to be people who try and pick domains they are able to sell for $5,000 that they bought for $10 because someone wants to start a movement." DomainTools' researchers also found a batch of links registered in bulk specifically with typos for the phrase "Reopen American Business." All of these domains were registered in China and have misspellings, indicating they're set up to be phishing pages... The idea is to trick visitors who make typos into entering their sensitive credentials on these fraudulent pages. These domains all have servers registered with Bodis, an advertising service that monetizes domain names and has links to a previous malware campaign from the advanced persistent threat (APT) group DarkHotel. APTs are known groups behind cyberattacks. DarkHotel APT is a hacking group that primarily affects victims in Japan, Taiwan, China, Russia and South Korea. "It looks like it's going to be used for phishing campaigns," Anderson said. "It hasn't been fully activated yet, but it has characteristics of a DarkHotel APT group." There's also an interesting detail about the first seven "reopen" pages created, which looked like they represented independent groups but were all registered under the name of pro-gun activist Aaron Dorr from Iowa, and redirected visitors to the gun rights groups that were organizing protests to "liberate" their locked down cities. That activist's family also created "reopen" Facebook groups with hundreds of thousands of followers -- which then directed people to the websites. "NBC News found that many of the websites hosted by Dorr were designed to harvest visitors' data, including emails and home addresses." NBC adds that the group's usual method "is to attack established conservative groups from the right, including the National Rifle Association, and then make money by selling memberships in their groups or selling mailing lists of those who sign up, according to some conservative politicians and activists who have labeled the efforts as scams."

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sciencehabit writes: Although tales of people being killed by meteorite impacts date back to biblical times, few have been documented until the past decade or so. Now, Turkish researchers have uncovered the earliest evidence that a meteorite killed one man and paralyzed another when it slammed into a hilltop in what is now Iraq in August 1888. Documents chronicling the event were found in Turkish state archives, the team reports online today in Meteoritics & Planetary Science. According to one of three letters written by local authorities in the region shortly after the event, the killer meteorite was one of several that fell during a 10-minute interval. Reports of a fireball seen in a city nearby suggest the object approached the area from the southeast before it blew up high in the atmosphere.

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Here's a splash of cold water.

We've been sort of assuming that there will be immunity and eventually a vaccine for Covid-19.

But it may be that neither will happen.

There isn't a vaccine for HIV, for example.

It first appeared in 1984.

"Confirmed coronavirus cases world-wide Friday exceeded 2.7 million, with more than 190,000 dead," reports the Wall Street Journal, citing data from Johns Hopkins University. While America has just 4.3% of the world's population, "The U.S. accounted for nearly a third of the cases, exceeding 869,000, and more than a quarter of the deaths, at 49,963." The Miami Herald reports: The coronavirus has killed more than 50,000 people in the United States, just four days after passing 40,000 U.S. deaths on Sunday, Johns Hopkins University reports. The total as of early Friday afternoon was more than 50,370, up about 400 deaths since Thursday night, the data shows... More than 25,000 people have died in Italy, and more than 22,000 in Spain... Most of the U.S. deaths have occurred in New York City: 16,388, the university says. Two weeks ago America had just 20% of the world's confirmed fatalities.

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Facebook is challenging Zoom with the introduction of "Messenger Rooms," a group messaging service that allows Facebook users to host group calls of up to 50 people that anyone can join. Engadget reports: Instead of inviting people individually, Facebook users can post links in their News Feed or in Groups or event pages. And unlike Messenger's existing video chat features, participants don't need to have the Messenger app or even a Facebook account to join a room. When a room is created, anyone can join via their browser, though hosts can opt to "lock" rooms to new guests to prevent party crashers. There are other Zoom-like features, too. Messenger Rooms will have "immersive 360-degree backgrounds that transport you to beautiful and iconic spaces, from the beach to a luxe apartment on the water," along with "14 new camera filters that offer ambient lighting to brighten your space and your face." Facebook also notes that there are no time limits for video chat sessions, which can be scheduled in advance. Messenger Rooms is starting to roll out now, and will be live in the U.S. "in the coming weeks." Facebook also announced that it's integrating Messenger's video calling into Facebook Dating, so users can participate in "virtual dates" while they can't plan IRL get-togethers. The update will be available "in the coming months."

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Biden should pick Elizabeth Warren for VP.

She'd put Repubs on notice. Biden is a nice guy but Warren knows you suck. Good cop bad cop.

A black woman? The best candidate, Maxine Waters, isn't in contention.

Let's win, not just the election but the politcal war that will follow.

Intel CEO Bob Swan cited a quote from former CEO Andy Grove as particularly apt during the pandemic. In a call with analysts, Swan noted that Grove once said, "Bad companies are destroyed by crises; good companies survive them; great companies are improved by them." From a report: Swan made the remarks after reporting what he said were "outstanding" results for both earnings and revenues in the "incredibly challenging" first quarter. But investors were spooked and drove the stock down 5% in after-hours trading, in part because Intel decided not to offer full financial guidance for all of 2020, due to uncertainties in the market. Intel also said its gross profit margins, or the money it makes on the sale of its products, would likely be lower in the second quarter. That is in part because the company is recording higher expenses as it prequalifies the manufacturing of its second generation of 10-nanometer products -- which is considered a normal expense in a process technology transition.

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Facebook has accused the Israeli surveillance technology company NSO Group of using servers located in the U.S. to infect hundreds of smartphones with spyware. From a report: The allegation comes as part of a lawsuit that Facebook initiated last year accusing the NSO Group of using WhatsApp accounts to hack into the phones. Facebook owns the popular messaging app. In a filing released on Thursday in federal court in Oakland, California, lawyers representing the social media giant alleged that NSO Group had used a network of remote servers in California to hack into phones and devices that were used by attorneys, journalists, human rights activists, government officials and others. NSO Group has argued that Facebook's case against it should be thrown out on the grounds that the court has no jurisdiction over its operations. In a 13 May legal document, lawyers representing NSO Group said that the company had no offices or employees in California and "do no business of any kind there." NSO has also argued that it has no role in operating the spyware and is limited to "providing advice and technical support to assist customers in setting up" the technology.

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Downing Street confirms the PM's chief adviser attended Sage meetings but denies he is a member.

The strategy devised by scientists was to keep large parts of society open but not everyone is convinced.

Public transport usage won't recover to pre-Covid19 levels once the lockdown ends, a survey suggests.