For Asian American and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander heritage month, Kelly Marie Tran (Raya and the Last Dragon) sat down with StarWars.com to discuss her experience being a part of the Star Wars universe as a first generation Asian-American when she was cast as Rose Tico in Star Wars: The Last Jedi. In the open…
As a result of the injury, Biniam Girmay had to withdraw from the Giro d’Italia cycling competition.
Bentley's First Electric Car Will Be Sickeningly Fast – And Shockingly Expensive
Posted in: Today's ChiliBentley’s CEO has revealed some key specs for the luxury automaker’s upcoming first electric vehicle, including blistering speeds and a price to match.
New York State AG investigates Discord, Twitch roles in Buffalo mass shooting
Posted in: Today's ChiliNew York State wants to understand the part internet services may have played in the deadly Buffalo mass shooting. Attorney General Letitia James is launching investigations into Discord, Twitch, 4chan and 8chan over concerns they let the attacker “discuss and amplify” his plans. It was “chilling and unfathomable” that the shooter could post his intentions months in advance without facing consequences, James said.
The perpetrator reportedly talked about his plans for racism-fuelled violence on Discord, 4chan and 8chan. He tried to livestream the entire attack on Twitch. The service took down the shooter’s channel within two minutes and has clamped down on attempts to reshare the video, but that didn’t stop others from trying to distribute the video on Facebook, Twitter and other platforms. On Discord, meanwhile, the culprit invited others to review his plans half an hour in advance. Both 4chan and 8chan have long focused on an anything-goes approach to content and have been accused of harboring hate speech.
A Discord spokesperson told Engadget the company would cooperate with the investigation. We’ve also asked Twitch for comment. Discord has a long history of banning extremist chat servers. Likewise, Twitch has previously pulled violent streams and curbed efforts to share the associated clips.
The investigations won’t necessarily lead to action against the involved sites. Whether or not they do, the move underscores the pressure on internet services to proactively remove hate and threatening speech, rather than reacting to incidents.
Netflix Kneecapped Its Own Efforts to Champion Diverse Shows, Axed Writers Say
Posted in: Today's ChiliAlongside 150 full time employees Netflix axed Tuesday, dozens of contract writers were shown the door. Bitter tweets flooded in after the job cuts were announced. Many of those writers were part of Netflix’s large-scale diversity communications initiatives, and they said that the struggling streaming giant had left…
On April 27, the Department of Homeland Security announced the new Disinformation Governance Board, a group within the federal agency focused on researching the best ways to fight rampant online lies and misleading content seen as a danger to national security. Less than a month later, though, and the board has…
A Ton of Star Wars Celebration 2022 Exclusives, Including Apparel, Collectibles, and Much More
Posted in: Today's ChiliIf you managed to score tickets to this year’s Star Wars Celebration in Anaheim, California, next week, I sincerely hope you also managed to save up some galactic credits. Besides actual Star Wars news, the amount of exclusive merchandise that will be available to you there, and there alone, is simply staggering—so…
Don Gorske has eaten a Big Mac almost every day for 50 years ― more than 32,000 as of last August.
How To Back Up Your Mac To iCloud
Posted in: Today's ChiliIn addition to its Time Machine system backup feature, Apple also makes it possible for Mac users to backup files and data to their iCloud accounts.
A pregnant worker and labor activist says Amazon made her pick up trash alone
Posted in: Today's ChiliTwo Amazon employees have accused the company of retaliating against them for their efforts to organize workers at a warehouse in Liverpool, New York. Ashley Mercer and Jason Main filed an unfair labor practice complaint with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) on May 17th.
According to Vice News, Amazon tasked Mercer last week with picking up cigarette butts, broken glass and other discarded trash in the parking lot of its SYR1 warehouse in Liverpool. Mercer told the outlet her manager sent her out alone and without water or sunscreen on a day when the temperature went above 80 degrees Fahrenheit. Making the optics of the situation worse, Mercer is about six months pregnant, putting her at the end of her second trimester. “Approved for 10 hours parking lot clean-up,” an accommodation report obtained by Vice states.
On the same day, the company suspended Mercer’s partner, Jason Main, who is also named in the NLRB complaint. Amazon later fired him for reportedly not using a step stool for moving merchandise. Mercer and Main have both been involved in agitating on behalf of the Amazon Labor Union (ALU) at a variety of warehouses in New York. Additionally, the two have come to work at the Liverpool facility wearing ALU-branded shirts and masks, while Mercer has also done the same at two warehouses in nearby Syracuse, and passed out leaflets at JFK8, the Staten Island facility that became the first unionized Amazon warehouse in the US last month.
“It wasn’t until I started mentioning that I am part of Amazon Labor Union that they pulled me out of my position and put me outside the building,” Mercer told Vice. “I think it’s retaliation because I’m a big part of [the ALU] and it feels like as soon as you bring up the union, they treat you differently.”
We’ve reached out to Amazon for comment.
Amazon has yet to recognize the ALU. In April, the company challenged the result of the JFK8 vote, accusing the organization of threatening employees unless they voted to unionize. It also recently fired two employees who were involved in organizing that facility, and ALU itself was born out of the company’s termination of founder Christian Smalls, a former worker at the JFK8 facility.