“As people realise it’s not going to end soon, this is when cracks begin appearing.”

While people may not be able to travel far, especially those in lockdown with travel limits, Scott says there are ways to find space close to home by going “somewhere you can see the horizon, you feel less crowded, less stressed and less pressure”.

“We know being cooped up in small spaces, especially in environments with lots of noise and activity, is not good for our mental health.”

She recommends going to the top of a hill, the beach, a forest and parks or, if you live in the inner city, even the middle of a football field. She says research shows even virtual reality, for example putting on a nature documentary, also works.

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“We call it zoning out instead of relaxing. You zone out on Netflix or a packet of chips, but even though you haven’t done anything, you haven’t relaxed. You wake up the next morning and you’re still tired.

The pandemic has shown how difficult it can be for the US to succeed with major technology projects. We asked leading thinkers what they would do to change that.

There are a number of reasons people are seeking a change, in what some economists have dubbed the ‘Great Resignation’. For some workers, the pandemic precipitated a shift in priorities, encouraging them to pursue a ‘dream job’, or transition to being a stay-at-home parent. But for many, many others, the decision to leave came as a result of the way their employer treated them during the pandemic.

Psychologists have now tested the influence of personality on people’s mental health during the pandemic – and their results suggest that introverts found it much harder to cope with the isolation than many had expected. Besides highlighting some common misconceptions about different personality types and their need to socialise, the insights from these studies can help us all to navigate life post-lockdown

But there are easy ways to avoid the intensity and minimise the inevitable lethargy, he says. These include reducing the size of the video chat window and not using full screen, and using an external keyboard to create greater distance between oneself and the grid of prying faces.

Crucially, Zoom users can also diverge from the default settings and use the hide self-view button, or even periodically turn their camera off altogether if feasible, “to give oneself a brief nonverbal rest”, Bailenson writes.

A new report in MIT Technology Review looks at why, almost a year into the pandemic, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention seemed totally unprepared for actually getting shots into people’s arms.

According to Technology Review, the agency knew it needed a robust, one-stop shop that could be used by patients, clinics, employers, and government officials. But instead, the CDC spent $44 million on something called the Vaccine Administration Management System —-VAMS— built by consulting firm Deloitte (via no-bid contracts) which was so inadequate that it has driven some states to try to patch together their own vaccine distribution systems instead.

Enjoy this amazing aerial flight through a future cyberpunk city. With calm ambient and rain sound in the background. This City gives you the vibes from the atmosphere of Blade Runner, or the Game Cyberpunk 2077, but also reminds of Mute City from the Game F-Zero or the City of Tron.

Covid-19 patients who recovered from the disease still have robust immunity from the coronavirus eight months after infection, according to a new study. The result is an encouraging sign that the authors interpret to mean immunity to the virus probably lasts for many years, and it should alleviate fears that the covid-19 vaccine would require repeated booster shots to protect against the disease and finally get the pandemic under control.

The study, published January 6 in Science, contrasts with earlier findings that suggested covid-19 immunity could be short-lived, putting millions who’ve already recovered at risk of reinfection. 

Police will be able to access data collected by Singapore’s covid-19 contact tracing system for use in criminal investigations, a senior official said on Monday. The announcement contradicts the privacy policy originally outlined when the government launched its TraceTogether app in March 2020 and is being criticized as a backpedal just after participation in contact tracing was made mandatory. 

Singapore ruled out using the Apple-Google system itself because officials there said they wanted more detailed infection information. Participation in contact tracing was once voluntary, but the government rolled that back late last year, and there are now mandatory check-ins at most places where people work, shop, and gather.

But most striking is her prediction that pandemic profiteering with seriously destabilize our society: "If America enters the next wave of coronavirus infections “with the wealthy having gotten somehow wealthier off this pandemic by hedging, by shorting…"

"And we come out of our rabbit holes and realize, ‘Oh, God, it’s not just that everyone I love is unemployed and can’t make mortgage payments or rent payments, but now all of those jerks that were flying around in private helicopters are now flying on private jets."

"…And they own an island that they go to and they don’t care whether or not our streets are safe,’ then I think we could have massive political disruption.”

Jeff Royder, Sr. Acct Mgr, is the Michael Scott character in this funny short and too-real series called Join Meeting about a group of employees having Zoom meetings. There are five episodes so far, directed by Benji Weinstein.

A forthcoming report from sanctions experts at the United Nations warns people not to attend a cryptocurrency conference in North Korea next month, since it might violate sanctions. The news: The confidential report will be submitted to the UN Security Council later this month, according to Reuters. It warns that previous presentations at the same…

Cyberattacks waged against cryptocurrency exchanges are now common, but the theft of just over $7 million from the Singapore-based exchange DragonEx last March stands out for at least three reasons.  First there is the extremely elaborate phishing scheme the attackers used to get in, which involved not only fake websites but also fake crypto-trading bots.…

 In at least 20 countries, the pandemic was cited as a reason to introduce sweeping new restrictions on speech and arrest online critics. In 28, governments blocked websites or forced outlets, users, or platforms to censor information in order to suppress critical reporting, unfavorable health statistics, or other content related to the coronavirus. In at least 45 of the countries studied, people were arrested as a result of their online posts about covid-19.
Many countries are also conducting increasingly sweeping surveillance of their populations, with contact tracing or quarantine compliance apps particularly ripe for abuse in places like Bahrain, India, and Russia. In China, the authorities used high- and low-tech tools not just to manage the outbreak of the coronavirus, but also to stop people from sharing information and challenge the official narrative. 

Global financial institutions use their own secure messaging system called SWIFT to exchange information about financial transactions and comply with money-laundering rules. Now cryptocurrency exchanges are under pressure from regulators to create a similar system, but it’s not at all clear how. The Travel Rule: In June, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the influential…

The Handshake Network, an ambitious public blockchain project whose developers want to reinvent how internet domain names are assigned, has  finally launched its main network after the project was revealed more than a year ago. Meet the DNS: When you enter a website name into your browser, you make a request of a network of…

The Riksbank, Sweden’s central bank, has announced the launch of a year-long pilot project of its proposed e-krona. The project will use distributed ledger technology inspired by the blockchains that run cryptocurrencies. Cashless in Sweden: Physical cash is headed toward obsolescence in Sweden. Nearly everyone uses a mobile payment application called Swish, and it’s been…

With almost 6,300 cases and more than 40 reported deaths, South Korea has become home to the world’s largest coronavirus outbreak outside China. As a result, the government in Seoul has taken what it calls “maximum” action to contain the spread of the disease—including sending thousands of people into mandatory home quarantine. Now it is…

Coronavirus in Köln: Hier finden Sie die wichtigsten Informationen zu den Auswirkungen des Virus in Köln.

Cryptocurrency scammers raked in $4.3 billion worth of digital money in 2019, more than triple 2018’s haul. That’s according to the latest in a series of recent data drops by blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis, all of which it has included in a lengthy report it published Wednesday entitled “The 2020 State of Crypto Crime.” You’ve…