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Company closes transformative year with record F2022 revenue of $197.3 million, with accelerated Enterprise and Government ARR growth of 17%, up from 11% in prior year Achieves second consecutive year of Rule of 40 Vancouver, BC, August 26, 2022--(T-Net)--Absolute Software Corporation (Nasdaq: ABST) (TSX: ABST), a provider of self-healing, intelligent security solutions, today announced its financial results for its fourth quarter and full-year fiscal 2022 ended June 30, 2022. All dollar figures are stated in U.S. dollars, unless otherwise indicated. "This year was the strongest in recent history - driven by the strong customer demand and our team's continued focus and execution, we are ending the year with our successful integration of NetMotion almost complete and very well-positioned for success in fiscal 2023," said Christy Wyatt, President and CEO of Absolute Software. "Security and IT teams are increasingly acknowledging the need for both cyber defense as well as cyber resilience and, as a result, the industry is increasingly aware of the value in our unique intelligent, self-healing security solutions. We intend to continue investing in growth through F2023, while maintaining focus on meeting the Rule of 40 for the year." Fourth Quarter ("Q4") and Full-Year Fiscal 2022 ("F2022") Financial Highlights Revenue was $52.5 million for Q4 F2022 and $197.3 million for F2022, an increase of 65% and 63% respectively, compared to the same period of the previous fiscal year. Adjusted Revenue(1) was $54.0 million for Q4 F2022 and $210.4 million for F2022, an increase of 70% and 74% respectively, compared to the same period of the previous fiscal year. Adjusted Revenue(1) for Q4 F2022 and F2022 increased by 13% and 15% respectively, compared to Q4 F2021 and F2021 revenue on an as-if combined basis without factoring in acquisition related adjustments(2). Net loss was $5.3 million for Q4 F2022 and $24.5 million for F2022, compared to net loss of $3.0 million for Q4 F2021 and net income of $3.7 million for F2021. Adjusted EBITDA(1) for Q4 F2022 was $15.4 million or 29% of Adjusted Revenue(1), compared to $8.0 million or 25% of Adjusted Revenue for Q4 F2021. Adjusted EBITDA(1) for F2022 was $55.8 million or 27% of Adjusted Revenue(1), compared to $31.9 million or 26% of Adjusted Revenue for F2021. Total ARR(4) as of June 30, 2022 was $209.5 million, representing an increase of 70% over the prior year reported ARR, and an increase of 16% compared to an as-if combined basis for June 30, 2021(3). The Enterprise & Government portions of Total ARR increased by 99% year over year, and by 17% compared to an as-if combined basis for June 30, 2021(3). The Enterprise & Government portion represented 78% of Total ARR as of June 30, 2022. The Education sector portion of Total ARR increased by 12% year over year, and by 12% compared to an as-if combined basis for June 30, 2021(3). The Education sector portion represented 22% of Total ARR as of June 30, 2022. Net Dollar Retention(4) was 108% for Q4 F2022, an increase from 106% for Q4 F2021. Cash from operating activities was $8.7 million for Q4 F2022 and $39.8 million for F2022, a decrease of 24% and 15% respectively from $11.4 million for Q4 F2021 and $46.8 million for F2021. Cash was negatively impacted as a result of one of our largest partners having a one-time migration of their payment system, which caused a delay in payment and pushed it into the following quarter. This payment has been subsequently received. Had it not been for that, our cash balance would have been approximately $72 million. A quarterly dividend of CAD$0.08 per outstanding common share was paid in Q4 F2022. Q4 F2022 Business Highlights Business and organizational developments: In April, we launched operations in Australia and New Zealand, as well as expanded operations across Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA), as a result of continued demand for our intelligent, self-healing security solutions. In May, we were named the winner of a Bronze Stevie Award, part of the 20th Annual American Business Awards®, in the category of Company of the Year - Computer Software. In June, we were named the winner of two Global InfoSec Awards by Cyber Defense Magazine (CDM) for 'Most Comprehensive Endpoint Security' and 'Market Leader - Zero Trust at RSAC.' In June, Absolute completed a reorganization to consolidate and integrate NetMotion Software, Inc. ("NetMotion") into Absolute creating a more efficient operating structure going forward. Product and service highlights: In Q4, we reached13.6 million active endpoints across our global customer base - an increase of 18% year over year. In Q4, we added 11 mission-critical applications to our Application Persistence™ ecosystem, including BlackBerry CylancePROTECT® and Ivanti Neurons for Unified Endpoint Management (UEM), enabling joint Absolute Resilience™ customers to ensure they remain healthy and undeletable. In April, we delivered enhancements to our Secure Access product portfolio, including self-healing Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA); a resilient deployment architecture; and expanded network and ZTNA policy intelligence. In April, we launched Absolute Ransomware Response, enabling customers with the capabilities and services needed to strengthen ransomware preparedness and accelerate endpoint recovery. Partner and other highlights: In Q4, we partnered with Lenovo to launch Lenovo Smart Lock Services, powered by Absolute, and the Lenovo Commercial Vantage Program. In April, we named Orca Tech as Australia and New Zealand distributor, as well as appointed new sales leadership, to accelerate growth and awareness in the region. In June, we announced Ericom, Utopic, and WinMagic® as new partners leveraging Absolute Application Persistence-as-a-Service (APaaS) to strengthen resiliency of their endpoint applications. In June, we published 'The Value of Zero Trust in a Work-from-Anywhere World' report, revealing the increased risk exposure organizations face amid the shift to distributed and hybrid work. F2022 Business Highlights Business and organizational developments: In July 2021, we completed the acquisition of NetMotion. In F2022, we made key executive appointments, including Ron Fior as Interim Chief Financial Officer (CFO), Peter Chess as General Counsel and John Herrema as Executive Vice President of Product and Strategy. In addition, Andre Mintz joined our Board of Directors. In F2022, we were featured as a Representative Vendor in the Gartner "Market Guide for Zero Trust Network Access" (ZTNA) report. In F2022, we were recognized as a winner or finalist in 13 award programs - including BC Tech's 'Technology Impact Awards,' G2's 2022 Best Software Awards, the CRN® 2022 Partner Program Guide, and the Gartner Peer Insights Customer Choice Awards - and were named a Leader in the G2 Summer 2022 Grid® Report for Endpoint Management for the 10th consecutive quarter. Product and service highlights: In F2022, we grew the total number of mission-critical applications in our Application Resilience library to more than 60. In F2022, we launched Application Persistence-as-a-Service (APaaS) - empowering ISVs and system manufacturers to leverage Absolute's firmware-embedded, self-healing device connection to strengthen the resiliency of their mission-critical applications. We also announced APaaS partnerships with leading ISVs including Plurilock, Smart Eye Technology, Ericom, WinMagic, and Utopic Software. In F2022, we continued to deliver a steady cadence of product innovations, including: The first combined product milestone following our acquisition of NetMotion, with the launch of the industry's first self-healing Zero Trust platform. Absolute Insights™ for Endpoints and Networks, enabling customers to analyze critical performance metrics spanning endpoints, users, applications, and network connections. Enhancements to our Secure Endpoint product portfolio, including the Absolute DataExplorer™ tool and enhanced geolocation capabilities. Critical certifications for our Secure Access product line, including Common Criteria Evaluation Assurance Level (EAL) 4+ - the highest certification level recognized under the Common Criteria program for software products - and the completion of a System and Organizational Controls (SOC 2) Type I audit. A new K-12 offering, Absolute Resilience for Student Devices, enabling education IT teams with critical capabilities to better manage and secure 1:1 device programs. Partner and other highlights: In F2022, Absolute continued to be included as a key component in the global security portfolios of Dell, Lenovo, and HP. Named as a strategic security partner by Lenovo in the launch of their global 'Everything-as-a-Service' strategy and Lenovo Smart Lock Services. Partnered with HP to launch a successful retail bundle on QVC in North America and turn on factory activation for consumer devices in EMEA. In F2022, we continued to scale our business in international markets, appointing the Nuvias Group as distributor in the DACH region, expanding on the previous distribution agreements in the UK and Benelux. In F2022, AT&T named our Secure Access platform as a key solution helping to power FirstNet®, the only nationwide network built for America's first responders. F2023 Financial Outlook The Company's financial outlook for its 2023 fiscal year (July 1, 2022 - June 30, 2023) is as follows(1): Full-year F2023 adjusted revenue(2) is expected to be in the range of $241.5 million to $246.5 million; this equates to a full-year F2023 adjusted revenue growth of approximately 14.8% to 17.1% (3). Full-year F2023 Adjusted EBITDA(2) margin, calculated on adjusted revenue, is expected to be in the range of 21.0% to 24.0%. https://www.bctechnology.com/news/2022/8/26/Absolute-Software-Reports-Fourth-Quarter-and-Full-Year-Fiscal-2022-Financial-Results-Revenue-up-63-65-YoY-But-Net-Loss-Rises-Sharply.cfm

Nottingham-based computer hardware supplier, PLM Global, has been bought in an MBO, in a deal backed by SME Capital. Shane Watson will take on the role of CEO supported by Wayne Swallows as chairman who has been acting in an advisory capacity for PLM for two years. PLM Global was formed in 2014 as a hardware solution provider. The company supplies hardware and applications solutions to multiple sectors including retail, manufacturing, transport and logistics. The new executive team will be made up of Rob Alcock, who has been promoted to sales director, Leroy Stratford, whose role is head of finance, and Matt Leary, operations Manager. Watson said: “I am absolutely delighted with this outcome; we have worked tirelessly to get PLM Global to the stage it is at today. With our experienced and strong-skilled board of directors, I have every faith that we will progress further.” SME Capital regional director, Timothy House, added “PLM have established a very successful business which is well placed in the current macroeconomic environment, Shane’s motivation and drive to grow the business was evident from the first meeting and Shane’s knowledge of the sector as well as strong relationships with key customers/suppliers should help drive the business forward. SME Capital provided a seven-figure funding solution which included a bullet repayment in order to soften the cash repayment profile. PLM Global was advised by HSKSG Corporate Finance Specialists. https://www.thebusinessdesk.com/eastmidlands/news/2062629-seven-figure-mbo-at-computer-hardware-firm

Conservative government accused of "hiding away" as millions prepare for "catastrophe". Not a single minister appeared on national TV or radio on Friday morning to defend the government, as the public learned their energy bills are set to rise by 80%. At 7am the energy regulator Ofgem announced a change in the price cap that will see the average household’s yearly bill rise from £1,971 to £3,549 from October. The hike has been described as a “catastrophe” amid warnings it will lead to people dying during the winter. On a typical weekday a minister tours TV and radio stations between 7am and 9am to promote and defend government policy, as well as to be grilled on the top stories of the day. The media round usually sees the minister appear on Sky News, BBC Breakfast, ITV’s GMB, BBC Radio 4′s Today programme, LBC and others. It is highly unusual for all the main broadcasters to not feature a representative from the government.BBC Breakfast said it had asked the government to provide a minister to interview but was told no one was “available”. The Today programme also noted that “no UK government ministers have been available for interview this morning by us or by other breakfast news programmes”. Labour shadow mental heath minister Rosena Allin-Khan said the lack of interviews was “shameful”. “On a day where people across Britain are facing unimaginable worry, not a single Conservative government minister did media interviews this morning,” she said. “Millions are worrying about bills, the government should be reassuring people - not hiding away.” Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, took part in morning broadcast interviews on behalf of labour. Boris Johnson, who will be replaced by Liz Truss or Rishi Sunak as prime minister on September 6, has been accused of presiding over a “zombie government” since the Conservative Party ousted him. The outgoing PM had two holidays in August despite growing fears about the cost of living crisis. Truss, the frontrunner in the contest, said this morning she would “ensure people get the support needed”, but did not offer specifics. Money expert Martin Lewis, who did appear on TV this morning, warned there needed to be “urgent further government intervention”. “I’ve been accused of catastrophizing this situation, and the reason I’ve done that is because this is a genuine, social and financial catastrophe that is putting lives at risk. It should have been done far earlier,” he told GMB. “I hope and I pray, whomever our new Prime Minister is, they have the will to do something because if they don’t, people will die this winter due to these energy price hikes.” Ofgem CEO Jonathan Brearley said it was “clear” that the new prime minister will need to “act further”. “We are working with ministers, consumer groups and industry on a set of options for the incoming prime minister that will require urgent action.” Simon Francis, co-ordinator of the End Fuel Poverty Coalition, said: “Today’s Ofgem price hike is like a dagger to the heart of millions of people up and down the country. “As a result of the decision, parents will be unable to feed their children, the sick and elderly will be condemned to worsening health, disabled people will go without vital medical equipment and households will be forced into poverty for the first time in generations. “All the solutions lie at the Westminster Government’s door, yet it is silent in the face of this looming disaster.” Energy UK, which represents suppliers, said the charges its members will be forced to pass on to households will be “simply unaffordable”. https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/ministers-not-available-for-interview-as-energy-bills-set-to-rise-by-80_uk_63087af2e4b065bfc4ada308

Beagles are in the news. Last fall, Republican politicians, including Rep. Madison Cawthorn (N.C.), attacked Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, by seeking to tie him to supposedly torturous experiments involving the breed. Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) posted a photo on Twitter of former president Donald Trump holding a beagle with the disconcerting caption, “Beagle Lives Matter.” Then, more recently, 4,000 beagle dogs were released from the facilities of contract research company Envigo after investigations found violations of federal animal welfare regulations. There is probably one available now at your local animal rescue, which will surely receive more attention now that Prince Harry and Meghan adopted one of them. Much of the recent attention has been driven by activist organizations seeking to make the cute little hounds into icons of animal experimentation, to undermine public support for federal spending on animal research. But, the beagle news also raises the question: Why are beagles used for experimentation? Humans and dogs, as any pet owner will tell you, are extremely alike. Many of our basic biological systems are similar: Dogs get cancers like ours and respond to some pharmaceuticals like we do. Beagles, a medium-sized and friendly breed, are easy to work with and cheap to feed, making them useful laboratory animals. But the full answer requires a longer historical view. In the first decades of the 20th century, scientists began to worry about the reliability of their laboratory animals. Dogs had long been used for experiments, especially in cardiology and physiology, because their circulatory systems are parallel to ours. But the dogs that researchers had access to were neither consistent nor even always healthy. Strays were often picked up in fields or purchased from city pounds, and scientists rarely knew exactly what they were getting. What was needed, they argued, was a “standard” or “normal” dog. There were a number of candidates. Researchers at Columbia University proposed the Irish terrier in the 1930s, and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration briefly bred the dogs for toxicity testing. But terriers didn’t stick their small beards required tiresome maintenance, and advocates failed to assemble funding for a centralized terrier colony. Others proposed airedales or beagles, yet there were few decisive arguments favoring one above the rest. Scientists typically recommended breeds they knew best, generating a stew of competing personal preferences. Outside of the walls of the laboratory, however, American dog culture was changing and altering the fates of many breeds. Beagles were always common dogs, ever since their importation from England in the late 19th century, but they experienced a steady climb in po[CENSORED]rity as dog ownership exploded in the 1930s and ’40s. In 1950, Americans fell in love with Snoopy, a new beagle character in the Peanuts comic. Four years later, the American Kennel Club listed it as the most po[CENSORED]r breed in the country. Such po[CENSORED]rity extended into science as well. In 1950, the Atomic Energy Commission launched the most expansive beagle study ever conducted in a multi-sited investigation into radiation and longevity, occasioned by the U.S. detonation of atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Short-term radiation effects were clear and horrific, but long-term consequences from lower doses were less obvious. Because rats tended to die of pneumonia before they developed cancers, a bigger and longer-living test animal was needed. America’s nuclear scientists settled on the dog and chose beagles, which were bred in most states and thus easy to purchase. From 1950 until the early 1980s, large-scale beagle radiobiology studies were conducted across the country: at the University of California at Davis, the University of Utah, the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, the Argonne National Laboratory, the University of Rochester and more. The foundations of much of what we know about the health effects of radiation lie in this work. But so does much of what we know about beagles and dogs more broadly. As it turned out, little basic data about canine health even existed in 1950. American veterinarians were only just starting to focus on domestic pets, rather than agricultural animals. The majority of privately owned dogs died young hit by cars or felled by undiagnosed health issues. So along with studying radiation, researchers such as Allen C. Andersen, at Davis, set out to answer key questions, such as: How long can a beagle live? (More than 17 years.) How many dogs should live together in cages? (Two seemed to be the sweet spot.) What were their nutritional requirements? Their psychological needs? Supported by the new Research Laboratory for the Diseases of Dogs at Cornell University, these researchers generated huge quantities of information about beagles, culminating in the publication of Andersen’s “The Beagle as an Experimental Dog” in 1970. But radiobiologists weren’t alone. Pharmaceutical researchers and the FDA also began prominently favoring beagles. The FDA’s toxicity testing guidelines from 1955 noted that the agency used beagles for internal appraisals but stopped short of formally endorsing the breed. That changed in the early 1960s after researchers realized that thalidomide, a po[CENSORED]r morning sickness medication used by pregnant women, could cause serious birth defects in their children. These revelations convinced legislators and regulators of the need for stronger drug testing standards. The result was the 1962 Kefauver-Harris Amendment to the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, which required demonstrations of drug efficacy and established the framework for today’s “gold standard” of random clinical trials. It also forced the FDA to explicitly advise companies on how to test drugs, including using dogs (or monkeys) as the step between rodent tests and human trials. Arnold Lehman, director of the FDA’s Division of Pharmacology, clarified in 1963 that when the FDA said “dog,” it basically meant “beagle.” Because the large American market was increasingly key to the success of drugs anywhere, regulators around the world mirrored the FDA’s beagle recommendation, and pharmaceutical companies from Germany to Japan established their own colonies of charming little black and tan hounds. Today, there are for-profit scientific beagle breeders in the United States, England, Japan, China and more. This history reminds us how much we owe to these dogs, countless thousands who have lived, howled and often suffered for science. Their sacrifices helped unveil secrets of the atom, demonstrate that cigarettes cause cancer, reveal new techniques for periodontal surgery and much more. We also know more about dogs and how to care for them. Many vaccines, including for rabies, parvo and canine hepatitis, relied on beagle research. So too did modern canine nutritional guidelines and medications such as Anipryl, which treats Alzheimer’s-like conditions in dogs. Our understanding of how dogs live was fundamentally transformed thanks to beagles. But today, a science without beagles appears increasingly likely. Many I spoke with during the course of my research for a book on the history of the use of beagles in scientific research, especially within activist communities, predict an end to their use within one or two decades. Whether they are correct remains to be seen, but understanding our debt to beagles and their role in over a century of scientific discovery is as vital as ever. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/opinions-beagles-are-in-the-news-after-decades-as-key-players-in-medical-research/ar-AA117xl8

U.S. oil futures fluctuated between losses and gains on Friday, but held onto a climb for the week, after remarks Federal Reserve Chairman indicated that more interest-rate hikes are on tap as the central bank continues its efforts to combat rising inflation.Speculation surrounding a possible production cut by major oil producers helped provide some support for the oil sector, but traders also kept an eye out for more news about a potential nuclear deal with Iran that could eventually lead to more oil on the global market. Price action West Texas Intermediate crude for October delivery fell 49 cents, or 0.5%, to $92.03 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, with prices fluctuating between losses and gains for the session. Front-month contract prices traded 1.8% higher for the week, FactSet data show. The front-month October Brent crude oil contract traded flat at $99.34 a barrel on ICE Futures Europe, with prices up by 2.7% for the week. Back on Nymex, September gasoline lost 6.8 cents, or 2.4%, to $2.7446 per gallon, while September heating oil gained 3.8 cents, or 1%, to $3.9867 per gallon. Natural gas for September delivery traded nearly flat at $9.373 per million British thermal units, with prices up around 0.4% for the week. What analysts are saying “Bullish sentiments” arising from talk of potential production cuts by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and their allies also known as OPEC+ was offset by an “unenthusiastic mood” painted by Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, said Manish Raj, chief financial officer at Velandera Energy Partners. Powell delivered a blunt message that the Fed will keep at the job of bringing inflation down until it is done and that the fight will be costly in terms of jobs and economic growth. In his speech, he drove home the point that the Fed has an “overarching focus right now to bring inflation back down to our 2% goal.” he left the door open for a 0.75 percentage point interest hike in September. “High interest rates will certainly lower economic activity and oil consumption is no exception,” Raj told MarketWatch. Economic data released Friday showed a key gauge of U.S. inflation fell 0.1% in July on the heels of declines in gasoline prices. For the week, oil prices have risen as hopes for a nuclear deal with Iran were offset by comments about potential production cuts out of Saudi Arabia. The comments from Saudi Arabia’s energy minister suggest international oil benchmarks won’t be allowed to trade below $90 per barrel without at least some verbal intervention from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies, according to analysts at Commerzbank. “Admittedly, sources close to OPEC stressed shortly afterwards that a production cut would probably only happen if Iran were to return to the oil market as a result of a new nuclear agreement. Nonetheless, the impression remains that Saudi Arabia is not willing to tolerate any price slide below $90,” Commerzbank team wrote. https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/oil-prices-rise-as-traders-await-news-about-iran-deal-opec-production-cuts/ar-AA117QF4?fromMaestro=true

Video Game Fables deconstructs the typical RPG tropes in a way that brings a good sense of humor and levity to the game. While it can’t completely escape some of the tropes that it brings up, you will have a good time playing along with a game that doesn’t take itself too seriously. Have you ever wondered what it would be like when video game characters point out what’s wrong with their world? What if someone took the time to point out the absurdity that NPCs and players experience on a regular basis? That is what Video Game Fables sets out to do, and it does a fantastic job deconstructing the typical RPG tropes for players, NPCs, and game design. The game doesn’t take itself seriously, which results in a light-hearted humorous adventure that never fails to put a smile on your face. While the deconstruction itself doesn’t allow you to magically bypass some in-game annoyances, Video Game Fables is still a fun RPG for those looking for a good mix of laughs and adventure. Video Game Fables is currently available on PC for USD 19.99. STORY – GOING OFF SCRIPT TOO MANY TIMES Video Game Fables starts with a princess named Aru, who is supposed to be captured by a Gator King and imprisoned in a castle. A Hero gets a task from the King to rescue Aru from the jaws of evil. Before the Hero even sets out on their quest, Aru decides the situation is ridiculous and escapes herself. With the help of a random villager named Nate who just happens to pass by, Aru brings herself back to her kingdom. This enrages the Hero, who was actually looking forward to the adventure. With the pre-established script no longer possible, the Hero allies with a Witch to destroy the King’s castle. He takes the King and the Gator King hostage before flying away with the witch. Aru will have to recruit Nate and the Gator King’s son Tator to try and fix the situation. Along the way, Aru will speak with Nate and Tator about their adventures, commenting on how silly or inane something might be. Nate happens to be an expert in heroic knowledge, while Tator really just wants things to go back to normal. This is your typical RPG adventure where the protagonists defeat the villains after a hero’s journey. What makes it special is that Aru is playing the only sane man, commenting on how silly the journey is because of the tropes they have to go through. Nate seems to enjoy the whole journey, while Tator is just a budding villain who really wants to go home. It’s an absurd set of circumstances that the characters frequently reference, which brings most of the humor and light-heartedness. Unlike most RPGs that need a serious tone, Video Game Fables succeeds because it doesn’t take itself seriously. Aru is aware most of their challenges are absurd, dungeons are weird, and NPCs act strange. Having the characters dig their heels in or fail to see the absurdity provides great comedic effect. The script manages to balance this light-hearted humor with the constant reminder of the rescue mission. The result is a deconstruction story that never fails to make you smile and makes you want to see what’s next. https://www.keengamer.com/articles/reviews/pc-reviews/video-game-fables-review-silly-deconstruction-fun-pc/

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Top Tech News, and today we are talking about Apple’s new program, Microsoft pushing ads for users and a quick tech tip. Apple is now extending its self-repair service to MacBook users. The company started this unique program with iPhones earlier this year, and now you have MacBook users getting the option to repair their machines at home using original Apple tools. Apple will start selling genuine parts and service tools from August 23. The company is starting the self-repair program for the MacBook Air and the MacBook Pro with the M1 chipset. Apple will offer the tools that can be bought to or rented for one-time use by paying $49 (Rs 3,920 approx). Microsoft Bringing Ads To Outlook App On Mobile Microsoft wants to push more ads on the Outlook mobile app for Android and iOS users. The company is doing this so that more people sign up for the Outlook service with a nominal fee. So, if you have been enjoying the Outlook app for free, chances are you are going to see a lot more ads pasted on the UI of the mailing app. Till date, Outlook was mostly showing ads in the Others tab where you have all the mails listed in the same list, while the Focused tab was left alone. But from now, even the personalised list will show ads for Outlook users, as reported by The Verge. Microsoft has a core range of plans for its Microsoft 365 subscription that also includes Outlook, and the company wants to give users the choice of seeing ads, or paying to use the service. https://www.msn.com/en-in/money/technology/top-tech-news-august-23-apple-macbook-self-repair-microsoft-ads-and-more/ar-AA10ZBYN

GrubMarket today announced it has completed the acquisitions of New York-based Frantoni Corporation (“Frantoni”) and Kansas-based Granite State Software (“GSS”), highly reputable enterprise software providers that specialize in building advanced food supply chain software solutions, with a focus on the Eastern and Midwest regions of the U.S. Both companies are led by software veterans with decades of industry experience in the fresh produce space. Founded nearly 40 years ago by experienced computer professional Peter Kimball, GSS is now managed by seasoned software engineer Glenn Sherman, who joined GSS in 1990 and took over ownership of the company in 2014. Frantoni is still run by original owner Frank Gemeinhardt, accomplished tech sales executive and software engineer who built Frantoni into industry-leading software used by many prominent produce wholesalers in New York City. In addition to offering specialized produce ERP software systems, both GSS and Frantoni seamlessly integrate with Orders IO, GrubMarket’s innovative, custom-branded eCommerce mobile app for customer ordering and communications. Known for their commitment to customer satisfaction, both Frantoni and GSS have loyal and dedicated customers who have grown with the companies for decades. After the acquisition, GSS and Frantoni will continue to be managed by Glenn Sherman and Frank Gemeinhardt, respectively, and GSS and Frantoni customers will have the opportunity to add on additional modules offered by GrubMarket’s Orders IO and WholesaleWare products. “We are thrilled to join GrubMarket and continue our legacy by working with the team here to improve the archaic and old-school food supply chain industry. Our deep technical expertise from 39+ years of produce wholesale software development experience, combined with our strong customer relationships across the Northeast, Midwest, and Southeast U.S., puts us in a unique position to help further GrubMarket’s mission to digitally transform this under-digitized sector,” said Glenn Sherman, owner of GSS. Frank Gemeinhardt, owner of Frantoni, adds: “We are excited to join the GrubMarket team to provide our customers with the opportunity to adopt additional modules offered by the visionary WholesaleWare ERP software. GrubMarket’s tech team is among the best in the industry, and we can’t wait to collaborate as a greater team to solidify our status as the most impactful technology enabler in the food space.” According to Mike Xu, CEO of GrubMarket: “Both Frantoni and GSS have strong reputations in the software development space for fresh food supply chain players. Both companies have a customer-first philosophy that matches our own here at GrubMarket. They’ve been in business for decades, have proven track records of high customer satisfaction, and offer strong synergies with our flagship product, WholesaleWare. We’re excited to bring Glenn and Frank’s considerable expertise to GrubMarket, to help us continue building a best-in-class software and eCommerce experience for our software customers. This acquisition enables us to further strengthen our ability to accelerate digital transformation in this traditional food supply chain space.” GSS and Frantoni’s software offerings will become an addition to GrubMarket’s eCommerce and software product family, which already includes the innovative and proprietary WholesaleWare software suite, the company’s software-as-a-service platform that provides food industry wholesalers and distributors with seamless financial management, powerful sales, and online ordering features, precise inventory management, lot traceability, grower accounting, and automated routing and logistics, as well as Orders IO, GrubMarket’s custom branded mobile eCommerce solution. https://enterprisetalk.com/news/grubmarket-buys-produce-software-providers-frantoni-and-granite-state-software/

Imagine building some of the most sophisticated hardware-driven technologies in the world spacecraft, drones or autonomous vehicles. Then imagine being unable to easily share your data to different teams, having to use clunky user interfaces and relying on a single person manually inputting data in an Excel spreadsheet to bottom-line your project. “You’d be shocked at how archaic the tools are,” Lucy Hoag, co-founder of Violet Labs, said. She wasn’t referring to the sophistication of the tools, but the way in which the hardware production toolset is balkanized across both teams and tasks. It’s a problem, common across the industry, that she and her co-founder Caitlin Curtis say leads to major inefficiencies. To solve this problem, Violet Labs is developing a cloud-based platform that can act as a single source of truth, collecting the data from all the tools and making them easily accessible across teams. Hoag likened the product to Zapier, which uses APIs to talk to different tools. The Violet platform would function similarly, generating API requests and collating the data into a single powerful database. The company is also developing a no-code user interface that can act as an all-in-one toolkit for hardware engineers. Hoag, who has a background in astronautical engineering, cut her teeth building a tool called Spider to automate the satellite design process. That led her into a career working for some of the biggest companies in the world: Google, Waymo, Lyft and most recently Amazon, for its broadband satellite initiative Project Kuiper. When she returned to aerospace at Amazon, after years mostly working on self-driving cars, she said she was shocked at how little the tool set had developed. “We’re really still doing things the exact same way,” she said. “At Kuiper is where I met Caitlin and we both really bonded over that frustration. That brings us here.” “Here” is quitting their jobs to work on the Violet platform full-time. The duo is now eight months deep into building the company to develop that tool. Violet Labs just closed a $4 million seed round to accelerate product development as Hoag and Caitlin race to market later this year. The round was led by Space Capital, with participation from MaC Venture Capital, Felicis, V1.VC and technologists. A multitude of software tools are used through the lifecycle of hardware product development, from more generalized tools to the very specialized. The tools themselves are very sophisticated but, as Hoag put it, “the problem is they really don’t talk to each other.” To work around this problem, teams will usually hire a system engineer or a technical program manager to manually maintain a source of truth between the different tools. Let’s make it concrete. Say a mechanical engineer is working on building a spacecraft. She has the physical model of the satellite in a CAD design software, like Solidworks, and she needs to get parameters related to the spacecraft’s Guidance, Naviagtion and Control (GNC) system to another team. Today, she might manually extract those parameters, insert them in a Google Sheets document, email that to the system engineer or post it to a workspace like Confluence, and then the GNC team would manually take those values and hard-code them into GitHub or Bitbucket. “It’s just incredibly slow,” Hoag explained. “As you can imagine, it’s error-prone because there are so many humans in the loop and so many steps in the process. It’s needlessly inefficient, and that’s what Violet is trying to solve.” She added that teams could go from spending months or many months to get something built in prototype to as little or days or weeks with Violet’s platform. In the worst cases, the legacy way of doing things isn’t just inefficient a problem on its own, for companies that want to aggressively get products out to market but it can be disastrous. One notorious example is the Mars Climate Orbiter, a space probe launched in December 1998. The mission resulted in failure due to a navigation error specifically, a failure of translating units from metric to Imperial. It resulted in a complete loss of payload. The Violet platform, Hoag says, would help teams avoid errors like that one. The company is still just Hoag and Curtis, who’ve been working on a prototype and chatting with customers in the aerospace, autonomous vehicles and robotics fields. Heartened by the feedback they received, the duo decided to raise funds back in May to bring the product to market faster. Their pitch obviously resonated. Ryan Isono, VP at Felicis, said he heard echoes of these pain points from others in the hardware and robotics space. Violet Labs has already landed a few agreements with some of the applications they plan to integrate with, including the product lifecycle management tool Duro and the requirements management software Jama. The company plans to use the funding to accelerate product development and hire more full-stack software developers. Hoag said that while there’s been massive innovation for software development, hardware engineers are noticing the lack of innovation on their side of things. “We’re at this inflection point where there’s all these different companies and startups and people being empowered to build these systems,” she said. “We feel that this next generation of engineers won’t tolerate this outdated toolset. They will demand something that’s more streamlined or data-driven or frictionless, and we want to be the ones to enable that.” https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/22/meet-the-ex-project-kuiper-engineers-wanting-to-disrupt-hardware-workflow/

Britain’s factories are bearing the brunt of the slowdown in the economy as higher costs, weaker demand and supply bottlenecks combine to send output plunging. Two separate snapshots of industrial activity showed a decline in manufacturing activity – part of a Europe-wide trend exacerbated by the economic fallout from the war in Ukraine. The monthly purchasing managers’ index from S&P/Cips found manufacturing output at its weakest level since the early stages of the pandemic in the spring of 2020. Other than the fall suffered during the Covid lockdown, the decline from 48.9 to 42.4 between July and August was the quickest since the global financial crisis in 2009. A reading below 50 indicates contraction rather than expansion. Modest growth in the UK’s much bigger service sector prevented the overall measure of private-sector activity dipping below 50, but the drop from 52.1 to 50.9 left the composite index at its weakest in 18 months. The eurozone’s overall PMI fell from 49.9 to 49.2 in August, also the lowest in 18 months. Annabel Fiddes, economics associate director at S&P Global Market Intelligence, said: “The UK private sector moved closer to stagnation in August, as mild growth of activity across the service sector only just offset a deepening downturn at manufacturers. “Waning customer demand amid the weaker economic outlook, and shortages of both staff and inputs, were reported to have hit goods producers hard, with firms registering the quickest drops in output and new work since May 2020. Excluding the initial phase of the pandemic in early 2020, the reduction in manufacturing output was the quickest seen since the start of 2009. Meanwhile, the service sector registered the weakest increase in activity since the recovery began in early 2021.” The CBI’s industrial trends survey showed that in the latest three months manufacturers’ order books shrank and output fell for the first time since February 2021. Alpesh Paleja, a CBI economist, said: “From rising prices to bottlenecks in supply chains, manufacturers continue to operate against a background of high input costs and significant operational delays. When coupled with an oncoming economic downturn, it is not surprising to see orders and activity ebb away as we move through the year.” In addition to rising energy bills, manufacturers are also braced for further increases in interest rates from the Bank of England. The City expects official borrowing costs, currently 1.75%, to reach 4% by next spring. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/aug/23/factories-bearing-the-brunt-of-uk-economic-slowdown?amp;amp;amp

Vermont Fish and Wildlife says a Strafford woman was attacked by a bear on her property, and one of her dogs lured the animal away from her. Game wardens say Susan Lee, 61, was walking on her property Saturday with her two dogs when she heard a loud noise and realized a bear was charging her. Lee tripped and fell and felt pain in her upper left leg, and realized the bear was on top of her and had bitten her. That’s when her Jack Russell terrier intervened by barking at the bear and drawing its attention away from Lee. The bear got off her and focused on the dog. Lee was able to return home with her dogs without seeing the bear again. She was treated at the hospital for a bite wound on her upper left leg and multiple scratches between 2- and 9-inches long on both her sides. Her wounds were not life-threatening. Fish and Wildlife biologists investigated the attack site but did not find the bear. They believe the bear was a female with cubs, and the attack was likely provoked when Lee and her dogs surprised them. “Bear attacks are extremely rare in Vermont,” Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department Bear Biologist Jaclyn Comeau said in a statement, adding that the department has records of only three prior bear attacks in the state. “However, at this time of year black bears are moving in family units and mothers will be protective of their cubs. If confronted by a bear it is essential to remain calm and back away slowly, and to fight back immediately if attacked.” https://www.wcax.com/2022/08/23/vermont-woman-attacked-by-bear-barking-dog-lures-animal-away/

The Russian government tightened its grip on the internet on Tuesday, as a state-controlled company with close links to President Vladimir Putin agreed to buy the news feed and homepage of the country's most po[CENSORED]r website. Yandex, often referred to as Russia's Google, said it was selling its news aggregator, content platform Zen and yandex.ru homepage to VK to focus on other business areas, such as food delivery and ride-hailing. In exchange, Yandex will acquire food delivery company Delivery Club from VK. Values for the assets were not disclosed. VK runs Russia's largest social network, VKontakte, and an overhaul last year saw state-controlled gas exporter Gazprom and banker Yuri Kovalchuk, whom Putin has publicly called a personal friend, assume greater control over the company. Vladimir Kiriyenko, the son of Putin's first deputy chief of staff Sergei Kiriyenko, is its CEO. Russia's years-long suppression of independent media intensified after Moscow sent troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24. It passed a law banning what it calls "false information" about the armed forces and quashing many organisations' ability to broadcast freely. It has blocked access to some foreign platforms, including Meta Platforms' Facebook and Instagram. "The board and management of Yandex have concluded that the interests of the company's stakeholders ... are best served by pursuing the strategic exit from its media businesses and shifting to a focus on other technologies and services," Yandex said in a statement. Yandex has, like many Russian companies, had a turbulent few months. It plunged to a first-quarter loss and its shares tumbled to six-year lows before trading was suspended in late February. Revenues and profits recovered in the second quarter, and while its Nasdaq-listed shares remain suspended, trading in its Moscow shares resumed after about a month. Yandex has in recent years complied with Moscow's demands, under threat of fines, over which publications' stories can feature on its news aggregator, drawing criticism from free-speech advocates. Moscow has not blocked access to most foreign-language media, which remain freely available in Russia and on Yandex, but search results do restrict access to any sites that communications regulator Roskomnadzor has banned, many of which are Russian-language independent media. In February, Yandex started warning Russian users seeking information about events in Ukraine of unreliable information online. A former head of Yandex News, Lev Gershenzon, on March 1 described Yandex as a key element in hiding information about the conflict in Ukraine. Yandex has denied being complicit in censorship. "We are buying our freedom," a source close to Yandex said. "This business had been such a weight on our feet. "This will enable us to do our business significantly depoliticised, practically completely depoliticised." ONLINE SEARCH Yandex dominates Russia's online search market with a share of around 62%, according to its analytics tool Yandex Radar. Google accounts for about 36%, with VK's mail.ru at less than 1%. That stronghold over the online search market will likely continue. Yandex.ru displays a bundle of news stories below its search bar, followed by a rolling stream of content. The company's entry point for search will now become ya.ru, a site that resembles Google's homepage and is already po[CENSORED]r with those who prefer uncluttered searches. Yandex.ru, its News feed and Zen, will be renamed dzen.ru, Yandex said, with VK to take over development and control over "content, look and feel". The asset swaps require anti-monopoly approval and are expected to close in the coming months, Yandex said. E-COMMERCE SHAKE-UP Search, advertising and ride-hailing are among Yandex's strongest revenue-generating businesses, but it has several other units, such as cloud services and self-driving cars. It is expanding services in Africa and Latin America, but pulling back from e-grocery in Europe. The terms of the deal look broadly neutral, said BCS Express in a note. The profitable Zen and News divisions are positive for VK, while Yandex strengthens its position in foodtech with the likely loss-making Delivery Club, analysts said. Yandex's Moscow-listed shares rose 2.7%, while VK's depositary receipts were up 2.9%, both outperforming the wider market. Dmitry Masyuk, head of Yandex's foodtech division, said Delivery Club would improve speed and choice on its food delivery offering. Yandex estimated the size of the market at 650 billion roubles ($11 billion) in 2021 and sees annual growth of 20%, he said. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/russia-tightens-grip-media-landscape-072051773.html

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Every Wednesday and Friday, The Verge publishes our flagship podcast, The Vergecast, where our editors make sense of the week’s most important technology news. On Fridays, Verge editor-in-chief Nilay Patel, editor-at-large David Pierce, and managing editor Alex Cranz discuss the week in tech news with the reporters and editors covering the biggest stories. On today’s episode, the crew discusses the Android 13 update, the battle between the vertical video apps, and a lightning round of tech news. Android 13 is here, and newer Pixel phones are able to upgrade to it (my Pixel 3A did not make the cut). The Vergecast discusses why this is Android’s “Snow Leopard” release, how it affects the greater Android phone world, and whether an update like this will convince iOS users to switch. Later in the show, the topic shifts to social video apps. Instagram Reels, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts are all trying to shame you or prevent you from posting your content made in other video apps. The crew discusses creation tools and distribution being tied or locked together and how people may react to this increasing limitation. There’s a whole lot more discussed in the show like a fake exhaust sound from an electric vehicle or weird computer monitors so listen here or in your preferred podcast player for the full discussion. https://www.msn.com/en-us/lifestyle/shopping/vergecast-android-13-arrives-galaxy-watch-5-review-and-instagram-gets-competitive/ar-AA10Qu07

Modern DevOps turned back the clock on agile software development. Them’s fighting words, but they’re words Cory O’Daniel, the CEO of Massdriver, stands by. From his point of view, engineers today are often stuck waiting on other teams so that they can write code, creating frustrating bottlenecks. “DevOps was supposed to be practices,” O’Daniel told TechCrunch via email. “[It’s] not agile, it’s ‘waterfall.’ Modern DevOps is waterfall in agile clothing.” Some surveys show that DevOps is indeed hampered by challenges with infrastructure. According to CloudBolt, 11% of developers responding to a 2021 poll found their CI/CD infrastructure reliable while over half (55%) had difficulty creating consistent pipeline environments. That’s why O’Daniel, together with Chris Hill and Dave Williams, co-founded Massdriver in 2021. Massdriver’s platform is designed to assist with managing infrastructure and apps at enterprises, allowing engineers to deploy infrastructure without cloud expertise. “Williams and I were working on a side project and we got into an argument about who was going to do the operations work. Here we were, two seasoned ops engineers with more than 15 years experience each in cloud operations, arguing over who was going to have to do the grunt work,” O’Daniel said. O’Daniel was previously principal software architect at The RealReal and a cloud solutions architect at Container Heroes, an IT consultancy. “We both just wanted to write value-producing software for the business. This is where the idea of Massdriver was born.” Using Massdriver, customers choose from prebuilt infrastructure “bundles” that they can connect to create systems across regions or cloud providers with a visual tool. Postdeployment, the systems can be monitored from Massdriver’s admin dashboard, which also helps orchestrate features like cloud outage detection and automated status pages. O’Daniel emphasized that Massdriver’s alert notifications take users to a diagram of their infrastructure and highlight the impacted components, rather than forcing them to hop between tools like PagerDuty, Datadog, and Terraform. This month will see the release of continuous deployment support, complementing the existing support for container registries and DNS management. “ “We are taking a different approach to building out internal developer platforms … We give engineers a diagramming interface. It’s their source of truth. It’s their documentation when onboarding new teammates. It’s how they managed and monitor their infrastructure,” O’Daniel said. “We want to meet companies where they are at and let them pick the best tool for the job.” Since soft launching in March, O’Daniel says that Massdriver has reached “well into” six-figure annual recurring revenue and “mid-80%” gross margin. (Gross margin is the difference between revenue and cost of goods sold, divided by revenue; a figure above 75% is considered healthy.) Despite competition from Upbound and Humanitec, the company has around 100 developers across 35 organizations managing over 80 compute environments, and plans to expand its 11-person workforce within the next month. Recently, Massdriver which is backed by Y Combinator raised $4 million in seed funding. O’Daniel says that the funds will be used to exit the minimum viable product phase and “continue to make the product simpler for all caliber of engineers to deploy production-ready infrastructure.” “Massdriver enables engineers and IT staff to deliver secure infrastructure faster with guardrails less worrying about infrastructure, more confident delivery … Anyone in the org can open the tool and get insights into infrastructure, data services, and applications at a glance,” O’Daniel said. “At Massdriver, we want to let engineers engineer so they can focus on delivering business value, not toiling over configuring commodity infrastructure and that’s what the C-suite wants, too.” https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/19/massdriver-wants-to-abstract-away-infrastructure-to-let-devs-focus-on-coding/?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuYmluZy5jb20v&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAFrXWKEah2u7g7ma3qZ8GeB7HPVTGXFNLvSFpcRryqRq1unDjIGJlxtoDutyh3VWRZ279PC3sgjSKLDhE3tECEW2Jov9urRgkcwNmHuw1s8GJ_7Zv-NqKkfbcVnYqNUVYbGMjOim6zJcT55Zl2JJjOnbPcHhn8uz4OX2oKkdZxE3

Vladimir Putin has warned of a 'large-scale catastrophe' at Ukraine's largest nuclear power plant which is being occupied by his own forces. The Russian leader claims the Zaporizhzhia plant is being constantly shelled by Ukrainian forces, but Kyiv argues it is Kremlin forces carrying out the attacks themselves as a false flag pretext for the feared 'provocation'. To add to the safety concerns, shocking video that appears to have been taken from inside the plant has revealed Russia military hardware being stored inside a turbine hall - just feet away from one of the reactors. Meanwhile, Ukrainian nuclear company Enerhoatom said Russian troops are planning to cut off Zaporizhzhia from the lines that feed power into the Ukrainian energy system. The firm said on Telegram that Putin's men are looking for fuel suppliers for the 'diesel generators, which are expected to switch on after the power units are shut down'. The generators would be necessary to keep the power supplied to the cooling systems for spent nuclear fuel, Enerhoatom said. Footage emerged overnight showing the inside of what looks like a turbogenerator hall, with at least five Russian military trucks parked inside next to a stack of crates. While it is not clear from the footage exactly what the trucks are doing there, they have 'Z' war markings on the hoods and are painted camouflage green - almost certainly meaning they are being used by the Russian armed forces. The video is the clearest evidence that has yet emerged to back Ukrainian assertions that Russia is storing explosives and other military hardware in and around the nuclear reactors, risking a disaster which could blanket Europe in radioactive ash. If the video was indeed taken in a turbogenerator hall - as seems likely from machinery visible in the footage - then it would mean the trucks are just 100ft from a reactor, putting it at risk in the event of an explosion. Ukraine warned overnight that Russia could be preparing a 'major provocation' at Zaporizhzhia today after ordering its staff not to come to work today, as a terrifying graphic revealed how far the fallout would spread in the event of a disaster. Putin and French President Emmanuel Macron discussed the situation at the plant in a phone call today, the Kremlin said. According to the Kremlin readout of the call, Putin said shelling of Zaporizhzhia, which he blamed on Kyiv, created the risk of 'large-scale catastrophe'. Both presidents agree on the need to send a team from the International Atomic Energy Agency to the plant. Data from the Ukrainian hydrometeorological institute shows the worst of the fallout would be concentrated within Ukraine itself, particularly its central regions. But dangerous particles would also be swept across Europe, blanketing Poland, the Baltics, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Moldova, all of whom are NATO members. Significant radiation would also drift across the border into Russia itself, and fall across close ally Belarus. The warnings came as UN chief Antonio Guterres and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan met with Volodymyr Zelensky in the western city of Lviv to discuss issues, including the safety of the Zaporizhzhia plant. President Erdogan, on his first visit to Ukraine since the war broke out, said he is 'worried' about the situation there and added: 'We don't want another Chernobyl.' Guterres, who has been calling for independent UN inspectors to be given access to the plant to ensure its safety, said any attack on it would be akin to 'suicide'. 'We must tell it like it is - any potential damage to Zaporizhzhia is suicide,' he said. Ukraine's military intelligence said: 'Considering the number of weapons that are currently located on the territory of the nuclear plant, as well as repeated provocative shelling, there is a high probability of a large-scale terrorist attack at the nuclear facility.' Zaporizhzhia, which houses six nuclear reactors, is Europe's largest nuclear plant and accounts for about a fifth of Ukraine's annual energy use. It is located close to Crimea, on the eastern side of the Dnipro River that divides Ukraine in two. Russia has occupied the site since early in the war when troops took control after a brief but alarming firefight that set an administrative building on fire. The situation there has been tense but stable for the last several months, though has ramped up in recent weeks as Ukraine attempts to push Russia out of the south. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11126467/Russia-tells-staff-Zaporizhzhia-nuclear-power-plant-not-come-work.html

First Read is your briefing from “Meet the Press” and the NBC Political Unit on the day’s most important political stories and why they matter. If it’s Friday ... A Judge says he’s inclined to unseal parts of Mar-a-Lago search affidavit. ...Fox News polls show Democrats up in Arizona Senate and Wisconsin Senate. ... Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell admits GOP might not flip the Senate, citing candidate quality. ... NBC’s Antonia Hylton interviews Democrat Cheri Beasley in North Carolina Senate. ... And 73% of second year college Democrats don’t want Biden to run in 2024, poll finds. The Sunshine State has dropped from the top spot of America’s most consequential battleground states, due in large part to the GOP’s continued statewide success in the state since Barack Obama’s victory there in 2012. But Florida returns to the spotlight when it and New York hold primaries on Tuesday. You have Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis along with his 2024 possibilities running for re-election. And we’ll find out which Democrat (either Charlie Crist or Nikki Fried) will take him on in November. So far, DeSantis has found success wading in the Trump Era waters, picking social fights that energize the Republican base, but also touting his economic stewardship during Covid (see this TV ad, for example). You also have Sen. Marco Rubio’s, R-Fla., Senate showdown with Democrat Val Demings, though there’s not really any primary action in that race. And you have controversial Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., getting a primary challenge; you have several open congressional seats (due to redistricting and retirements); and you have Democrats trying to make a comeback in South Florida’s 27th District. One of the conundrums of Florida politics over the last 10 years is how both Republicans and Democrats have been treating it more and more like a ruby-red state when, in fact, the races there are almost always close. (And we have a strong feeling that both the state's gubernatorial and senate races will be within 5 points in November.) The other thing to watch: Do national Democrats and especially the folks over at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. begin paying more attention to Florida’s gubernatorial race in the fall, given the potential 2024 implications? Data Download: The number of the day is … $28 million That’s how much the McConnell-aligned Senate Leadership Fund is booking in TV and radio ad time for the fall to help boost Republican author J.D. Vance in Ohio’s Senate race. It’s a signal the calvary is coming to help Vance, who made it through his primary thanks to the help of an endorsement from former President Donald Trump and major financial backing from venture capitalist Peter Thiel. But since then, he’s been outspent by an overwhelming figure Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan has spent $18.6 million on ads since the primary, compared to just $382,000 from Vance and another $1.6 million spent on coordinated ads from Vance and the National Republican Senatorial Committee. The combined Democratic effort has regularly hit $700,000 or more a week, while the combined GOP spend didn’t eclipse $20,000 per week until August. https://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/first-read/desantis-key-primaries-florida-returns-political-spotlight-tuesday-rcna43879

In a major win for animal welfare groups “one of the worst" animal welfare issues in Australia will be phased out by 2036 - with battery cages for egg-laying hens to be banned within 14 years. Australia will phase out battery cages for hens by 2036 following a lengthy battle between the egg industry and animal welfare groups. The Australian Animal Welfare Standards and Guidelines was released on Thursday, after being under review for nearly seven years, requiring conventional layer hen cages to be phased out over the next 10 to 14 years. If a cage system was installed before the end of 2011, it must be updated by July 1, 2032. Those installed after 2014 must meet the new requirements by 2036. Under the new rules, all hens that are caged with other birds must have at least 750cm sq of usable space per bird. If the hen is caged alone, it must have 1m sq of usable space. RSPCA Australia chief executive Richard Mussell has praised the move, calling it a “significant win for animal welfare”. “This is a win for animal advocates and for the community who have been calling for an end to these barren, wire cages for over 40 years,” he said. “But most importantly, it will eventually be a win for the millions of layer hens confined to battery cages." The guidelines once implemented, will bring Australia into line with over 75% of OECD countries who have already moved to phase out battery cages. RSPCA Australia Chief Science Officer, Dr Suzie Fowler, said that the animal welfare science was clear - that hens suffer in barren battery cages. “This is one of the worst animal welfare issues in Australia right now,” she said. “Good welfare simply can’t be achieved in a battery cage because the animal welfare issues are inherent to the system itself – restricted movement, constantly standing on a wire floor, and no ability for a hen to perform natural behaviours like perching, nesting and stretching and flapping her wings. "So to finally see a phase out date put in place is very significant and we welcome today’s news.” Egg Farmers of Australia, CEO Melinda Hashimoto slammed the new guidelines, labelling them a ‘slap in the face’ for our nation's cage egg farmers. “Unfortunately, the review totally ignored evidence on why conventional cages should continue until 2046,” Ms Hashimoto said "It’s 10 years too early and could drive many family egg farmers to the wall. "This is because bank loans can spread over 30 years for existing cages and equipment. Farmers now don’t have time to pay-off that debt before they must dump their cages.” https://www.skynews.com.au/australia-news/animal-welfare-groups-major-win-battery-caged-hens-banned-by-2036-after-lengthy-battle-between-egg-industry-and-animal-welfare-groups/news-story/10da3d885001ecf00be5d8e412fb1548

It was Thursday afternoon, and, not for the first time, Fox News host Jessica Tarlov was pursuing a line of reasoning not often heard on her network. “If this was actually an illegal search, which is what he’s saying it was, you could bring that to court,” Ms Tarlov said during a discussion of the FBI’s serach of former president Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence on the programme The Five. “And his lawyers are not doing that. They’ve had ten days now to do that and they’ve done nothing.” That’s as far as Ms Tarlov made it before she was interrupted by a fellow panelist. “This is nothing but process,” Greg Gutfeld said moments later. “We have to start thinking about people instead of boxes of paper, and I’m going to go back to my original point: I wish Merrick Garland was agonising for weeks over riots, or over smash-and-grab, or over the ten percent rise in rape in New York City. Instead, they are so focused on Trump that that’s the only criminal they see.” Mr Gutfeld concluded his remarks by looking into the camera and announcing that Mr Garland, and, persumably, liberals at large believe that Trump supporters are “worse than Hitler.” This is not the first time that Ms Tarlov has incurred the wrath of her colleagues on the right wing network. Last week, shortly after the FBI executed its search, Ms Tarlov challenged former judge Jeanine Pirro on an assertion that the FBI could have planted evidence on Mr Trump’s property during the search. “[FBI Director] Christopher Wray is a Trump appointee,” Ms Tarlov said. “Christopher Wray is as much a part of the Deep State as the rest of them,” Pirro shouted in response. Ms Tarlov also wound up her conservative co-hosts by asserting that Mr Trump clearly had not been fully cooperating with law enforcement over the course of a tense segment that at several points saw Ms Tarlov’s colleagues shout her down. Ms Tarlov’s presence and willingness to challenge Mr Trump during Fox News’ daytime programming has boosted her profile while showing the lengths to which Fox News personalities will go to defend Mr Trump even as other po[CENSORED]r Republicans like Florida Gov Ron DeSantis prepare to challenge him for the Republican nomination in 2024. In addition to her Fox News duties, Ms Tarlov is a political strategist who also serves as head of research at the women’s magazine Bustle. Ms Tarlov and her Fox colleagues may have plenty more to discuss soon: a judge is reportedly considering releasing a partial version of the affidavit connected to the search warrant that allowed the FBI to search Mar-a-Lago. https://www.yahoo.com/now/fox-news-pundit-driving-colleagues-042243329.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuYmluZy5jb20v&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAGEwNmXm71S0C4cQXr4t_CzA9c8mpjPEvKlAxKQavk3xJI6u8_7DE2EZJpK2XgI1DfswVy4BFRwaUqknGlXehPJfZlb-l_9TmxriSZGduyBdsIDvfaXAKngzdC3Bj2A-PRk4C7gRUgyhewmxd8uGM0zb3s2TgN8dNiRRHWXa-MQf

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