TLDR 2020-07-09

Tinder has introduced a new video call feature called Face to Face in 13 countries, including several regions in the US, Australia, Brazil, and France. Only a select group of members will have access to the feature as the team continues to develop the service. Both users will have to opt into the service before they can make video calls to each other. Users will have to agree to behave during calls and they will be given the opportunity to report someone after the call if they did something inappropriate. The call will be in split-screen so that users will see exactly what the other person sees on their device. There will be a moderation process but Tinder says that it has no intention of recording calls. The team will lean heavily towards trusting user reports.

Google has abandoned plans for a cloud computing product designed for the Chinese market and other politically controversial countries. The project, codenamed 'Isolated Region', was intended for countries that required control over the flow of data within their borders. It was created so that governments and companies in restricted regions could move data on servers separate to Google's central cloud computing systems and network infrastructure. The project was shut down after conversations and input from government stakeholders.

Sony has released a wearable, pocket-sized air conditioner. The Reon Pocket can cool the wearer's body by 13 degrees Celsius and raise body temperature by around 8 degrees Celsius. It is around the size of a card-holding wallet and is designed to be worn inside a special undershirt with a feature pocket at the base of the neck. Users control the device using an app. The device has a battery life of around 90 minutes, with a 2-hour charge time. It will sell for around $130 online on various Japanese sites.

While humans haven't needed surgery in space yet, the time is coming near when it will be necessary as spaceflight is becoming more accessible. Current procedures on the ISS are to stabilize patients enough to transport them back to Earth for surgery. However, that procedure won't work for longer missions, such as trips to Mars. Space travel changes many aspects of how the body works due to changed physics. Experimental surgeries have already been performed on rats in microgravity, resulting in innovations such as magnetic surgical tools. A specialized surgical enclosure could help solve many of the issues associated with the lack of gravity. 3D printing will be an important technology when it comes to equipping space surgeons. Robotic surgery is also another option, but the lag in communications in space is an issue.

mailgo is a JavaScript package that transforms mailto and tel links into a menu that allows users to open the links directly in an app. A GIF demo is available.

Sweetvis is a Python library that generates visualizations for exploratory data analysis with a single line of code. It outputs a fully self-contained HTML application. An example report from the Titanic dataset is available.

People purchasing decommissioned police body cameras online have discovered unencrypted video data still on the devices. While there was an attempt to remove the data from the devices before selling them, the data was easily recoverable using existing data forensics tools. Used body cameras are commonly for sale online. Some hackers have bought up stocks of used cameras to investigate the footage.

Online dating has risen significantly in popularity in the last couple of decades and has resulted in a ton of data regarding dating patterns in the modern age. An analysis of online dating patterns using the Stable Marriage Problem resulted in some insights about why dating can be difficult and why certain tropes exist. Being the initiator tends to result in more success. Women tend to have higher standards for men than men have for women, which may influence how people perceive others' relationships. The analysis showed that as a community grows, it becomes exponentially harder to match with people.