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COVID news for the day
Mar. 14th, 2020 09:26 amThis is an amazing one, and I'll actually use his name for it, because on occasion he does good things: (stopped clock accurate twice a day?) TRUMP ELIMINATES INTEREST ON STUDENT LOANS UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE! Details have yet to be finalized, but I'll bet the loan companies are screaming.
****
To the best of my knowledge, it is not Tom Hanks that tested positive for COVID, it is his wife, Rita Wilson, that did. They are both in isolation in Australia.
It's possible that he has subsequently tested positive and I missed the news, but originally it was Rita, not Tom.
EDIT: Apparently Tom Hanks has tested positive, I hadn't seen the news until after I posted this and was ready to get on the road, I didn't have time to correct it until I got home. Hopefully they'll both be among the number who have mild symptoms and don't require extreme measures.
****
Our Beloved Leader had a brush with the virus at CPAC last week but probably wasn't exposed. But then he was literally next to a person who was definitely shedding virus, and he isn't concerned in the least and isn't going to get tested because "he isn't showing symptoms".
In the words of The Immortal Rabbit, "What a maroon." But we knew that.
Meanwhile, an Australian cabinet minister has tested positive and is in isolation. Who was he in contact with just before? Trumpie's little snookywookums, Ivanka.
And an American Congressman for Florida, Matt Getz, was photographed wearing a full gas mask, mocking people who were concerned about COVID. Apparently he actually wore it on the floor of the House. Someone in his district died of the virus. Care to guess which party to which he pledges his allegiance?
****
A Faux Newts host said they were more concerned with stepping on a used heroin needle than getting COVID. Personally, for me the needle would probably be the better choice. There's known good drugs for treating HIV/AIDS. It might cause some problems, interacting with my immunodeficiency, but it's better than dying of pneumonia. Fuck that person.
****
Italy's internet is getting clobbered. With all the schools shut down, kids are home doing marathon Fortnite sessions and just saturating bandwidth. Shape of things to come around the world? How long before ISPs start throttling?
Here's a little primer on how Massively-Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games (MMORPG) like Lord of the Rings Online or World of Warcraft work in terms of networking. Everything you do online is converted into a data segment called a packet before its sent onto the internet and it goes to a remote server. There's two types of packets (broadly speaking): TCP and UDP. TCP is guaranteed delivery: it will pretty much always get to where it's going to go. You don't send just one packet, you're sending a stream, and the packets are numbered, so if one packet doesn't arrive, the remote server says "Hey, Bob! #17 didn't make it, send me another copy!" When the new copy of #17 arrives, it assembles all of the packets into the full message and passes it up the chain for the computer to process.
See, computers are easy! ;-)
UDP is similar, packets go across the network, but they're not lossless. They're a firehose. If a packet gets lost, it's lost. No retransmission.
When it comes to online games, here's how it works. There's two layers of information. There's critical information, which is what I The Player am doing on my computer. I'm moving around, fighting a beastie, crafting things, using a potion, whatever. That MUST get to the game server, so that's sent TCP. It WILL be received and update my character information in their database.
The second layer is non-critical. I'm fighting the beastie, it takes a swing at me. That swing consists of many packets of information that tells the program running on my computer how to animate that swing, showing me the combat visualization on my computer. When the network is running smooth, I see frames 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,etc. But these are UDP packets, and sometimes they get lost. And they're lossy - they don't get sent again if they go astray. When there's some congestion, I might see 1,2,4,5,6,8,9,11,etc. and the animation might not be quite as smooth as I'd like.
And that's just the way it is.
So my critical info always gets to the LOTRO (or WoW or SW:KOTR or whatever) servers, but sometimes things are not quite as smooth on my end.
I don't know for certain that Fortnite uses this model of information outbound from my computer is TCP, inbound is UDP, but it's probably something like that. If the ISPs start to throttle, they could choose to slow down all traffic, or just UDP, or block Fortnite altogether. ISPs don't have unlimited bandwidth: they're going to have to do something because they have business users who have contracts guaranteeing them certain amounts of bandwidth to be available, and they have to honor those contracts. If they don't, there can be penalties involved.
Could be interesting times.
****
The UK government is effectively doing nothing to control the COVID outbreak? They think they can moderate the flow to keep the NHS from breaking? I think they're doomed. To me, that smacks of child abuse and their willingness to try to keep children from getting infected with a known infectious disease: could it possibly be a crime or violation of human rights? We don't know what the long-term ramifications of this disease are. For example, having the mumps has serious consequences. What if having COVID has some consequences that we don't know about yet, that don't become visible for a couple of years? The UK government is willing to experiment on the nation's children?!
Time to invest in hemp and learn how to tie knots. One specific type comes to mind.
****
This week in New Mexico, the number of cases went from one, to four, and now ten. The web site hasn't been updated for March 14th, so no idea if more cases were documented yesterday.
On the good news side, our Governor declared a public health state of emergency on the 11th and issued a ruling that health insurers cannot charge for COVID testing, and also includes influenza and pneumonia testing. Now the curious thing about this is it says it prohibits cost sharing including copays, coinsurance, and deductibles, for testing and health care services related to COVID-19. That "health care services" I find curious. Does that mean if I'm hospitalized, I pay nothing? While it would be quite dire if I did require hospitalization, it'd be nice to know.
****
Nothing new at NMSU, which I didn't expect to change yesterday. Still a two-week Spring Break. Teachers are still preparing to teach online, I expect at the end of the month the campuses will remain closed to students and live courses will be online. My wife brought up the point that things like freshman science lectures could be well over 100 students. I don't know, I've seen lecture halls like that in movies, but I've never seen classrooms like that at main campus, the classes that I've taken there were much smaller.
****
Cruise lines are being incredible jerks. They're flat-out lying to customers, trying to get them not to cancel reservations. They're telling them that COVID only happens in colder regions, that their ships are clean, yadda yadda yadda. Pure bullshit. Yet the JoCo Cruise sailed last week with Jonathan Colton, John Scalzi, and I don't know how many others, for the Caribbean. I hope no one gets sick!
In some cases, the cruise lines are refusing to let people cancel and are keeping multi-thousand dollar fees paid. I expect to see law suits over this. They are going to haemorrhage a lot of money, and possibly some may fold and get gobbled up by Princess. Time will tell.
Myself, I would be very reluctant to go on a big ship cruise anyway, COVID-aside. Just too many people, too many little kids. The biggest source of illness on those cruises is handling cash and gambling: chips and cards. Those things are never sufficiently clean. Avoid those, and you'll greatly reduce your chances of Cruise Plague.
As I've said often, my wife and I did a river cruise on the Elbe from Prague to Berlin. Small ship, fewer than 100 passengers. Absolutely lovely, highly recommended.
****
AT&T has announced it will suspend data caps for cellular users during the virus pandemic. No details as to how long this will last. An article on Slashdot today speculates whether this will force all cellular carriers to abandon cell data caps forever!
I've been hit with an overage fee once, when Russet and I were in Phoenix. The WiFi at my parents house doesn't hit the bedroom we stay in, she might have been playing LOTRO via her phone. I don't remember the exact circumstances, but it wasn't a huge fee.
****
It's possible that he has subsequently tested positive and I missed the news, but originally it was Rita, not Tom.
EDIT: Apparently Tom Hanks has tested positive, I hadn't seen the news until after I posted this and was ready to get on the road, I didn't have time to correct it until I got home. Hopefully they'll both be among the number who have mild symptoms and don't require extreme measures.
****
Our Beloved Leader had a brush with the virus at CPAC last week but probably wasn't exposed. But then he was literally next to a person who was definitely shedding virus, and he isn't concerned in the least and isn't going to get tested because "he isn't showing symptoms".
In the words of The Immortal Rabbit, "What a maroon." But we knew that.
Meanwhile, an Australian cabinet minister has tested positive and is in isolation. Who was he in contact with just before? Trumpie's little snookywookums, Ivanka.
And an American Congressman for Florida, Matt Getz, was photographed wearing a full gas mask, mocking people who were concerned about COVID. Apparently he actually wore it on the floor of the House. Someone in his district died of the virus. Care to guess which party to which he pledges his allegiance?
****
A Faux Newts host said they were more concerned with stepping on a used heroin needle than getting COVID. Personally, for me the needle would probably be the better choice. There's known good drugs for treating HIV/AIDS. It might cause some problems, interacting with my immunodeficiency, but it's better than dying of pneumonia. Fuck that person.
****
Italy's internet is getting clobbered. With all the schools shut down, kids are home doing marathon Fortnite sessions and just saturating bandwidth. Shape of things to come around the world? How long before ISPs start throttling?
Here's a little primer on how Massively-Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games (MMORPG) like Lord of the Rings Online or World of Warcraft work in terms of networking. Everything you do online is converted into a data segment called a packet before its sent onto the internet and it goes to a remote server. There's two types of packets (broadly speaking): TCP and UDP. TCP is guaranteed delivery: it will pretty much always get to where it's going to go. You don't send just one packet, you're sending a stream, and the packets are numbered, so if one packet doesn't arrive, the remote server says "Hey, Bob! #17 didn't make it, send me another copy!" When the new copy of #17 arrives, it assembles all of the packets into the full message and passes it up the chain for the computer to process.
See, computers are easy! ;-)
UDP is similar, packets go across the network, but they're not lossless. They're a firehose. If a packet gets lost, it's lost. No retransmission.
When it comes to online games, here's how it works. There's two layers of information. There's critical information, which is what I The Player am doing on my computer. I'm moving around, fighting a beastie, crafting things, using a potion, whatever. That MUST get to the game server, so that's sent TCP. It WILL be received and update my character information in their database.
The second layer is non-critical. I'm fighting the beastie, it takes a swing at me. That swing consists of many packets of information that tells the program running on my computer how to animate that swing, showing me the combat visualization on my computer. When the network is running smooth, I see frames 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,etc. But these are UDP packets, and sometimes they get lost. And they're lossy - they don't get sent again if they go astray. When there's some congestion, I might see 1,2,4,5,6,8,9,11,etc. and the animation might not be quite as smooth as I'd like.
And that's just the way it is.
So my critical info always gets to the LOTRO (or WoW or SW:KOTR or whatever) servers, but sometimes things are not quite as smooth on my end.
I don't know for certain that Fortnite uses this model of information outbound from my computer is TCP, inbound is UDP, but it's probably something like that. If the ISPs start to throttle, they could choose to slow down all traffic, or just UDP, or block Fortnite altogether. ISPs don't have unlimited bandwidth: they're going to have to do something because they have business users who have contracts guaranteeing them certain amounts of bandwidth to be available, and they have to honor those contracts. If they don't, there can be penalties involved.
Could be interesting times.
****
The UK government is effectively doing nothing to control the COVID outbreak? They think they can moderate the flow to keep the NHS from breaking? I think they're doomed. To me, that smacks of child abuse and their willingness to try to keep children from getting infected with a known infectious disease: could it possibly be a crime or violation of human rights? We don't know what the long-term ramifications of this disease are. For example, having the mumps has serious consequences. What if having COVID has some consequences that we don't know about yet, that don't become visible for a couple of years? The UK government is willing to experiment on the nation's children?!
Time to invest in hemp and learn how to tie knots. One specific type comes to mind.
****
This week in New Mexico, the number of cases went from one, to four, and now ten. The web site hasn't been updated for March 14th, so no idea if more cases were documented yesterday.
On the good news side, our Governor declared a public health state of emergency on the 11th and issued a ruling that health insurers cannot charge for COVID testing, and also includes influenza and pneumonia testing. Now the curious thing about this is it says it prohibits cost sharing including copays, coinsurance, and deductibles, for testing and health care services related to COVID-19. That "health care services" I find curious. Does that mean if I'm hospitalized, I pay nothing? While it would be quite dire if I did require hospitalization, it'd be nice to know.
****
Nothing new at NMSU, which I didn't expect to change yesterday. Still a two-week Spring Break. Teachers are still preparing to teach online, I expect at the end of the month the campuses will remain closed to students and live courses will be online. My wife brought up the point that things like freshman science lectures could be well over 100 students. I don't know, I've seen lecture halls like that in movies, but I've never seen classrooms like that at main campus, the classes that I've taken there were much smaller.
****
Cruise lines are being incredible jerks. They're flat-out lying to customers, trying to get them not to cancel reservations. They're telling them that COVID only happens in colder regions, that their ships are clean, yadda yadda yadda. Pure bullshit. Yet the JoCo Cruise sailed last week with Jonathan Colton, John Scalzi, and I don't know how many others, for the Caribbean. I hope no one gets sick!
In some cases, the cruise lines are refusing to let people cancel and are keeping multi-thousand dollar fees paid. I expect to see law suits over this. They are going to haemorrhage a lot of money, and possibly some may fold and get gobbled up by Princess. Time will tell.
Myself, I would be very reluctant to go on a big ship cruise anyway, COVID-aside. Just too many people, too many little kids. The biggest source of illness on those cruises is handling cash and gambling: chips and cards. Those things are never sufficiently clean. Avoid those, and you'll greatly reduce your chances of Cruise Plague.
As I've said often, my wife and I did a river cruise on the Elbe from Prague to Berlin. Small ship, fewer than 100 passengers. Absolutely lovely, highly recommended.
****
AT&T has announced it will suspend data caps for cellular users during the virus pandemic. No details as to how long this will last. An article on Slashdot today speculates whether this will force all cellular carriers to abandon cell data caps forever!
I've been hit with an overage fee once, when Russet and I were in Phoenix. The WiFi at my parents house doesn't hit the bedroom we stay in, she might have been playing LOTRO via her phone. I don't remember the exact circumstances, but it wasn't a huge fee.
