Month: July 2023

Elon Musk tweeted on  Sunday that he plans to change the logo of Twitter to an “X” from the famous blue bird, posting a short video teasing what the new logo may look like. In a series of posts on his Twitter account starting just after 12 a.m. ET, Twitter’s owner said that he’s looking to make the change worldwide as soon as Monday, writing: “And soon we shall bid adieu to the twitter brand and, gradually, all the birds.”  Musk later tweeted: “Not sure what subtle clues gave it way, but I like the letter X”  and later posted: X.com now points to https://twitter.com/. Interim X logo goes live later today.”

The change isn’t surprising given Musk’s long history with the name “X.” Musk’s rocket company, Space Exploration Technologies Corp., is commonly known as ‘SpaceX.’ And in 1999, Musk founded a startup called X.com, an online financial services company now known as PayPal.  In fact, the billionaire Tesla CEO tweeted last October that “buying Twitter is an accelerant to creating X, the everything app.” 

Musk’s news is just the latest big change to Twitter since he bought the social media platform for $44 billion last year. The logo change on Twitter, however, was met with sharp criticism on the social media platform, who felt it would be confusing to a huge chunk of the Twitter’s audience.  Revenue has dropped sharply since Musk took over the company and laid off roughly three-fourths of the workforce to slash costs and avoid bankruptcy. He hired longtime NBC Universal executive Linda Yaccarino as Twitter’s CEO in May.

Musk’s latest move comes shorty after Twitter faced new competition from Meta’s new app, Threads, launched earlier this month.  Threads is being billed as a text-based version of Meta’s photo-sharing app Instagram that the company has said offers “a new, separate space for real-time updates and public conversations.” In the first five days of its launch, 100 million people had signed up for Threads.

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At least six people died and as many as 26 others were injured following a string of violent shootings across Chicago over the last 48 hours. Victims identified from the shootings ranged between the ages 13 and 64.

A 41-year-old man was fatally shot during an armed robbery and found inside of a vehicle in an alley in the Lower West Side of Chicago early Friday morning; later that day, a 16-year-old was discovered on the sidewalk around the 1200 block of W. 81st Street with gunshot wounds to the chest, and was later pronounced dead.

On Saturday, a 13-year-old riding his bicycle was shot after a car drove by, leaving him with a grazed gunshot wound to the knee.  Early Sunday morning, an unknown assailant fired shots from the west alley of the street, striking three individuals (two women and one man). Later on Sunday, police discovered a 29-year-old man with a gunshot wound to the head in a flipped vehicle near the 3000 block of W. 21st Street; he was later pronounced deceased.

Since Friday, Chicago police responded to at least nine separate shooting scenes. Over the weekend of July 14 forty people were shot, four fatally, across Chicago.

https://abc7chicago.com/chicago-weekend-shootings-violence-auburn-gresham-fatal-man-killed/13537306/

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Police in South Carolina are probing a link between accused Gilgo Beach serial killer Rex Heuermann and the disappearance of an 18-year-old woman who went missing in 2014. 18-year-old Aaliyah Bell disappeared two days before Thanksgiving 2014 after leaving her uncle’s home in Rock Hill, South Carolina.

Police in Rock Hill, South Carolina said on Thursday that they were investigating whether the Long Island murder suspect is connected to the disappearance of Bell, who vanished just 20 miles away from a property Heuermann owns. Property records show that Heuermann also owns a timeshare in Las Vegas and a property in Chester, South Carolina — a 30-minute drive from Rock Hill — that he purchased in 2021 for $154,000. The property is fenced off and marked with a sign reading, “No Warrant, No Entry.” Police in Las Vegas have also been scouring their missing person records for ties to Heuermann.

Rock Hill Police Lt. Michael Chavis said in a statement: “Our investigators have been reviewing any information to see if there is a correlation between the disappearance of Aaliyah Bell and Rex Heuermann. So far there is no indication that leads us to identify Heuermann as a suspect in this case. We will continue to investigate Bell’s disappearance and follow up on all tips and leads.” Chavis added the department was “doing its due diligence” in trying to tie the cases together.

The 59-year-old Heuermann, an architect from Massapequa Park, is charged with murder in the deaths of three women whose remains were found in Gilgo Beach in 2010, and is the main suspect in a fourth slaying.

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The Senate Judiciary Committee voted on Thursday to advance legislation that would require the Supreme Court to adopt an ethics code. Called the ‘Supreme Court Ethics, Recusal and Transparency Act,’ the bill from lead sponsor Democratic Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse cleared the committee along party lines, 11-10. It is not expected to get the 60 votes required to advance on the Senate floor, and if so, it is likely fail in the GOP-controlled House.

Democrats followed  through on their pledge for legislative action after a series of reports about Justice Clarence Thomas’ relationship with a Republican real estate magnate. A Pro Publica report revealed that Justice Clarence Thomas had accepted vacations and travel from a Republican mega donor; while Justice Samuel Alito has also faced criticism for alleged ethics violations.

Republicans introduced several amendments touching on the protests outside Supreme Court justices’ homes, the leak of the draft opinion overturning Roe v. Wade, Supreme Court expansion and imposing new rules on reporters who cover the high court.

The legislation has backing from more than two dozen Senate Democrats, and would require the Supreme Court to adopt a code of conduct for the justices and implement procedures to handle complaints of judicial misconduct. It would also require the high court to impose more rigorous rules for the disclosure of gifts, travel and income received by the justices and their law clerks.

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A federal judge on Wednesday rejected former President Donald Trump’s bid to move his hush-money payments case from New York state court to a federal venue. The ruling from U.S. District Court Judge Alvin Hellerstein means the case will stay in Manhattan criminal court, where District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office is prosecuting Trump on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. A spokesperson for Bragg said: “We are very pleased with the federal court’s decision and look forward to proceeding in New York State Supreme Court.”  The case will now go back to state criminal court in Manhattan, where it will be overseen by Judge Juan Merchan, and is scheduled to go to trial in March.

Pleading not guilty, Trump argued that the payments were connected to his duties as president and that the case should therefore be heard in federal court; Judge Hellerstein rejected that argument, writing in his 25-page ruling: “Trump has failed to show that the conduct charged by the Indictment is for or relating to any act performed by or for the President under color of the official acts of a President. Trump also has failed to show that he has a colorable federal defense to the Indictment.”  

Hellerstein said in his ruling: “The evidence overwhelmingly suggests that the matter was a purely a personal item of the President — a cover-up of an embarrassing event. Hush money paid to an adult film star is not related to a President’s official acts. Falsifying business records to hide such reimbursement, and to transform the reimbursement into a business expense for Trump and income to Cohen, likewise does not relate to a presidential duty.” The conduct Trump is accused of covering up includes a $130,000 payment his then-lawyer Michael Cohen made to adult film star Stormy Daniels near the end of the 2016 presidential campaign to keep quiet about an alleged affair with Trump. Trump has acknowledged repaying Cohen in a series of payments in 2017 but he maintains the payments were on the up-and-up, and that he never had an affair with Daniels.

A Trump campaign spokesperson said in a statement that “this case belongs in a federal court and we will continue to pursue all legal avenues to move it there.” Trump’s attorneys had argued the former president could claim additional defenses in a federal court setting, in part because they say he would not have hired Cohen as his personal lawyer had he not been elected president.

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On Wednesday, the president of Stanford University announced his resignation, citing an independent review that found flaws in some papers he authored, but cleared him of research misconduct. Tessier-Lavigne has been president for nearly seven years.

Marc Tessier-Lavigne said in a statement to students and staff that he would step down Aug. 31. Tessier-Lavigne, a neuroscientist, says he “never submitted a scientific paper without firmly believing that the data were correct and accurately presented,” but added that he should have been more diligent in seeking corrections regarding his work. Tessier-Lavigne says he’s stepping down because he expects continued debate about his ability to lead the university, but will remain on faculty as a biology professor. Tessier-Lavigne also said he will continue his research into brain development and neurodegeneration.

The resignation comes after the board of trustees launched a review in December following allegations Tessier-Lavigne engaged in fraud and other unethical conduct related to his research and papers. The review assessed 12 papers that Tessier-Lavigne worked on — which were published before Tessier-Lavigne became Stanford president — with five of them in which he was the principal author. Tessier-Lavigne said he was aware of issues with four of the five papers but acknowledged taking “insufficient” steps to deal with the issues. He said he’ll retract three of the papers and correct two.

The panel cleared him of the most serious allegations regarding a 2009 paper published in the scientific journal Nature, which was the subject of a fraud investigation and that fraud was found. The panel ruled there was no investigation and no fraud discovered. H. Holden Thorp, editor-in-chief of the Science family of journals, said:
“People tend to think of scientists as these individuals that they’ve heard of like Einstein and Marie Curie. The truth is that researchers run laboratories filled with people, and everything that happens in that laboratory is a product of many individuals there.” The report cleared Tessier-Lavigne of research misconduct, but Thorp said ultimately the boss is responsible for what happens in the lab – and shouldn’t be distracted by doing other jobs.

Board chair Jerry Yang said that they’ve named Richard Saller, a classics professor, as interim president starting Sept. 1. In a statement, Yang said Tessier-Lavigne was key to creating the university’s first new school in 70 years (Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability) and in 2019, he unveiled a strategic long-range plan that will continue to guide the university’s growth.

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