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Joe Rogan Controversy Leads Rumble to Make Him a Public $100 Million Offer
On the same day it was reported that Spotify CEO Daniel Ek apologized to employees but maintained his commitment to keeping Joe Rogan’s podcast on the platform, video hosting website Rumble tweeted at Rogan, offering to match the $100 million deal the podcaster reportedly signed to host his podcast exclusively on Spotify.
“How about you bring all your shows to Rumble, both old and new, with no censorship, for 100 million bucks over four years?” read the statement signed by Rumble CEO Chris Pavlovski.
Rogan signed a deal that was reportedly “worth more than $100 million,” with Spotify in 2019 to be the exclusive host of his podcast, according to CNBC. That deal has come under fire in recent weeks as clips of old episodes have resurfaced containing Rogan’s use of racial slurs and spreading COVID misinformation.
Thousands Protest Vaccine Mandates in Canada, Further Fraying Nerves
Thousands of people demonstrated in Canadian cities, including the financial hub Toronto, on Saturday as mostly peaceful but noisy protests against vaccine mandates spread from Ottawa, the capital.
The “Freedom Convoy” began as a movement against a Canadian vaccine requirement for cross-border truckers, but has turned into a rallying point against public health measures and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government.
About 5,000 people demonstrated in Ottawa, police said, while hundreds more gathered in Toronto, Canada’s biggest city, and Quebec City, coinciding with the city’s annual winter carnival. Four people were injured in Manitoba after a pick-up truck drove into a crowd late Friday, police said.
Oklahoma National Guard Members Can’t Sue Anonymously Over COVID Vaccine Mandate, Judge Rules
A federal judge ruled this week that members of the Oklahoma National Guard cannot sue the Biden administration anonymously over the COVID-19 vaccine mandate, saying that the public interest overrides concerns about privacy or personal safety.
“A decision to be vaccinated, or not, against COVID-19 is certainly a personal matter, but it is not intrinsically sensitive, let alone highly sensitive,” Senior U.S. District Judge Stephen Friot wrote in an order issued Wednesday in the case.
Gov. Kevin Stitt and Oklahoma Attorney General John O’Connor, along with 16 unnamed members of the Oklahoma National Guard, filed a lawsuit in federal court in Oklahoma City in December seeking to block the vaccine mandate imposed by the Biden administration on military personnel.
New Jersey to Lift School Mask Mandate
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy on Monday will begin unraveling the state’s aggressive anti-COVID rules, starting with a school mask mandate for all students and kids in child care settings.
The move by the Democratic governor, whose state faced some of the worst COVID casualty rates of the pandemic, offers a clear sign that the steady decline in cases that have followed the Omicron variant could lead to a new stage of life under Covid. It follows a similar decision last month by Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf, also a Democrat.
A spokesperson for Murphy, Mahen Gunaratna, said New Jersey students in grades K-12 and those in a child care setting will not be required to mask up starting Mar. 7.
Canadian Truckers Protesting Vaccines Turned to a Christian Fundraising Site After GoFundMe Blocked Donations. They’ve Already Raised $4 Million.
Canadian truckers in Ottawa who are protesting COVID-19 vaccine mandates have turned to a Christian fundraising site after GoFundMe blocked donations to their campaign.
The group known as Freedom Convoy has since raised more than $4 million on the Christian fundraising site GiveSendGo.
The Freedom Convoy has been protesting in the country’s capital for 10 days, using their trucks to block streets while supporters bring them fuel on sleds. The protest caused the mayor of Ottawa to declare a state of emergency, Insider previously reported.
Alaska Truck Drivers Rally Against Vaccine Mandates
Anchorage Daily News reported:
More than a 100 Alaska truck drivers rallied from Anchorage to Eagle River on Sunday to support Canadian truck drivers opposed to COVID-19 vaccine mandates.
Anchorage Assembly member Jamie Allard organized the event to support the truckers who have rallied in Ottawa since last weekend to protest COVID-19 vaccine mandates.
Judge Temporarily Halts Youngkin Order Making Masks Optional in Virginia Schools After Lawsuit From School Boards
An Arlington judge on Friday barred enforcement of Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s mask-optional order for schools — a major victory for the seven school boards that sued to stop it, and a sharp rebuke for the new governor.
In her 10-page order, Arlington Circuit Court Judge Louise DiMatteo offered a check to Youngkin’s assertion of gubernatorial authority, writing that the Virginia Constitution gives authority to local school boards to make safety and health decisions — including masking — for their students.
She also wrote that a state law passed over the summer requiring school districts to comply with federal health guidance makes Youngkin’s mask-optional order impossible to carry out, because it, too, delegates authority over decisions such as masking to local school boards.
Costa Rica Mandated COVID Vaccines for Children. But Not Everyone’s on Board.
Last November, Costa Rica became the first country in the world to mandate COVID-19 vaccines for minors, with all children 5 and older required to get vaccinated, barring medical exemptions.
One study by the University of Costa Rica’s School of Statistics found that 75% of respondents said they supported the vaccination mandate for people 18 and older, with support dropping along with age groups; 69% of people agreed with a vaccine mandate for 12-17-year-olds, while 59% were supportive of the measure for children between 5-12.
Under the mandate, a child can get vaccinated even if their parents do not consent, however that process is not instantaneous, according to public health expert Roman Macaya Hayes, who heads the Costa Rican Social Security Institute.
Legal Challenges of Employer COVID Vaccine Mandates Largely Tossed out, Experts Say
Legal challenges of employer vaccine mandates and health measures are being tossed out as arbitrators in Canada largely side with the need to maintain safe workplaces during a pandemic, legal experts say.
Most of the cases with rulings so far involve employee grievances in unionized workplaces, which have an expedited decision-making process compared with the courts, they say. A scan of decisions issued in recent weeks shows arbitrators are largely erring on the side of caution and minimizing health risks to employees and the public, experts say.
A recent arbitration decision between Hydro One Inc. and the Power Workers’ Union dismissed the grievances of multiple workers placed on unpaid leave for failing to comply with the utility’s COVID-19 vaccination policy.
COVID: Bavaria Suspends Vaccine Mandate for Nursing Staff
The southern German state of Bavaria will not enforce compulsory vaccination against COVID-19 for nursing staff in institutions such as hospitals and care homes from mid-March as originally planned, the state’s premier, Markus Söder, said on Monday.
This comes as Bavaria plans to loosen more anti-pandemic measures. The state government says that the healthcare system was currently in no danger of being overwhelmed in the current wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, despite a high infection rate.
Although Söder said he was in favor of a universal vaccine mandate in Germany, he said that he was now skeptical about compulsory vaccination just for those working in the healthcare sector.
Australia to Reopen to Double-Vaccinated Travelers
Australia will reopen its borders from Feb. 21 to foreign travelers who have received two COVID-19 vaccine doses, Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced Monday.
Australia’s borders have been shut to most non-residents since March 2020. Its tough pandemic policies made headlines last month when world men’s tennis no. 1 Novak Djokovic was deported from the country for being unvaccinated.
The condition is you must be double-vaccinated to come to Australia,” Morrison said during a news conference on Monday. “That’s the rule. Everyone is expected to abide by it.”
Huge Government Agencies Clash Over Imposing Facial Recognition
Even as the Internal Revenue Service and other federal agencies are pushing to require Americans to consent to facial recognition to sign on to government websites, the government’s central management office has refused to use the technology on its own secure log-in service, Login.gov.
The General Services Administration, which oversees federal offices and technology, says the face-scanning technology has too many problems to justify its use as an identity-verification service.
Dave Zvenyach, director of the GSA’s Technology Transformation Services, told The Washington Post that the agency “is committed to not deploying facial recognition … or any other emerging technology for use with government benefits and services until rigorous review has given us confidence that we can do so equitably and without causing harm to vulnerable populations.”
The 5 Technologies That Will Change the Future of the Human Race
In my book, Tech Trends in Practice, I talk about a lot of technology trends that are already moving out of the R&D departments and into everyday life, but the following five I think will have the most profound impacts on our society and the human race as a whole.
Artificial intelligence, or AI, and machine learning refer to the ability of machines to learn and act intelligently, meaning they can make decisions, carry out tasks and even predict future outcomes based on what they learn from data.
AI and machine learning already play a bigger role in everyday life than you might imagine.
Meta May Be Forced to Shutter Facebook, Instagram in EU
Meta says it may have to abandon the European Union.
The note was buried in the company’s annual filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Meta said that if officials on both sides of the Atlantic can’t reach an agreement on data transfers and warehousing, the company may have to pull its Facebook and Instagram platforms from Europe.
At this point, the statement is probably less of a threat and more an acknowledgment of the regulatory headwinds that the American company faces in the European Union. The SEC requires publicly traded companies to disclose issues that may affect profits and losses, and few things are more profitable for Facebook than user data.
Price Comparison Site Sues Google for $2.4 Billion Over Alleged Antitrust Breach
A Swedish price comparison website is suing Google for 2.1 billion euros ($2.4 billion) over allegations that it manipulated search results in favor of its own competing shopping service.
PriceRunner said Monday that it plans to take Google to court in Stockholm. It’s seeking compensation for damages in relation to a 2017 ruling from the European Commission that Google breached antitrust laws by giving preference to its own shopping comparison product, Google Shopping, through its popular search engine.
