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Nokia and SURF reach 800Gb/s transmission on existing fiber to prepare for massive upgrade to CERN’s Large Hadron Collider
April 15, 2024
Espoo, Finland – April 15, 2024 – Nokia and SURF, the collaborative organisation for IT in Dutch education and research, have successfully reached a single carrier 800Gb/s optical transmission over SURF’s existing cross border, multi-vendor research and education network infrastructure. The transmission, based on Nokia’s photonic service engine technology, will help accelerate the massive data exchange between the CERN particle accelerator and the NL Tier-1 (NL T1) research IT facilities at SURF and Nikhef, the Dutch National Institute for Subatomic Physics. By reaching 800Gb/s per channel on older fiber varieties, Nokia and SURF prove that existing infrastructure still has tremendous potential, and that legacy optical fibers can be used to meet future capacity demands of the huge data streams generated by international scientific research instruments.
The trial was conducted over a 1648 km point-to-point fiber link connecting Amsterdam and Geneva, crossing Belgium and France. The fiber link is part of the SURF-network, which connects national research and education institutes in the Netherlands, such as Nikhef. Additionally, the SURF-network is also well connected to other research networks and experiments worldwide, including the LHC Optical Private Network (LHCOPN). The LHCOPN provides access to data at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, the world’s largest and most powerful particle accelerator. For this trial, CERN, Nikhef, SURF and the ATLAS LHC experiment have collaborated to include real production workflows that are expected when the High-Luminosity Large Hadron Collider (HL-LHC) is operational.
SURF is preparing its network for CERN’s LHC upgrade to the HL-LHC that will become operational in 2029. The discovery of the Higgs boson by the LHC has already revolutionized the world’s understanding of the universe. Expectations are that the future HL-LHC will reveal even deeper insights into the fundamental building blocks of the cosmos. This upgrade will not only provide more insightful research results and improve the potential for groundbreaking discoveries, but it will also produce enormous amounts of scientific data. The HL-LHC is expected to generate data at a rate of five times the speed of its predecessor. Therefore, it depends on advances in SURF’s high-performance network, as demonstrated in this trial, to enable fast and reliable data transfer to the NL T1 for further scientific exploration.
Nokia’s sixth-generation super-coherent Photonic Service Engine (PSE-6s) was deployed on the Amsterdam-Geneva link, in combination with SURF’s line system with equipment from a third-party on an older fiber link. It showed that the partners were able to achieve 800Gb/s transmission using 16QAM-shaped PCS modulation. Together, Nokia and SURF demonstrated the capacity and performance of their solutions, as well as the potential for SURF to increase the capacity and efficiency of its existing network. By focusing on the testing of new technologies with various suppliers, and through the adoption of advanced technology in its network, SURF ensures optimal service and support for the innovative, data-intensive projects of its research partners.
https://telecomreseller.com/2024/04/15/nokia-and-surf-reach-800gb-s-transmission-on-existing-fiber-to-prepare-for-massive-upgrade-to-cerns-large-hadron-collider/
Major games studio abruptly shuts down, blaming leaks to video game journalist
15 April, 2024
A studio founded by the creator of State of Decay has closed, with its founder blaming leaks to the gaming press as the reason for its shuttering.
Jeff Strain, who started Possibility Space in 2021, told all staff last week that the studio was shutting down immediately. That is per an email obtained by Polygon labor reporter Nicole Carpenter, confirming an April 12 LinkedIn post from a studio employee saying it had been abruptly shuttered.
In his email to staff, Strain specifically named an inquiry from Ethan Gach, an investigative writer for Kotaku, as the first domino setting in motion the studio’s demise. Gach, says Strain, had reached out to talk about the end of Crop Circle Games, a sister studio to Possibility Space under the Prytania Media label that Strain founded with his wife, Annie Delisi Strain, also in 2021.
“I was stunned to see non-public information about Project Vonnegut,” Strain wrote, referencing the code name for a work in development, “disclosure of our publishing partner with details of our business and financial relationship, and details of internal [profit and loss] discussions and confidential all company meetings.” Gach, said Strain, said he received those documents from someone inside Possibility Space.
“To see internal team members under a confidentiality agreement engage in this was shocking,” Strain said. He flew to meet with Possibility Space’s publishing partners in person, during which he was told they would be unwilling “to invest the additional resources needed to complete the game, so we mutually agreed to cancel [project] Vonnegut.”
All Possibility Space employees were then fired, pursuant to labor laws in their jurisdictions. Strain said he had hired a law firm to “oversee the wind-down of the studio,” and whose representatives would be contacting workers to discuss Possibility Space’s remaining obligations to them.
Whatever Kotaku was working on, it has not published that story. Crop Circle Games was closed in February and its employees furloughed. The Verge reported that Annie Delisi Strain, in a statement posted to that studio’s website (since deleted) also referenced Gach’s reporting. “I stepped down as CEO this winter on a medical leave,” she said, “and while I don’t know the content of Mr. Gach’s article, I have no assurances that my personal health struggles as a rare female game industry CEO will not be covered in his article.”
In the email shutting down Possibility Space, Jeff Strain says he is “stepping away from the game industry to focus on my family and care for Annie.”
Some former employees pushed back against the Strains’ rapidly escalating version of events surrounding both Crop Circle and Possibility Space. In a LinkedIn post, Jennifer Klasing, formerly a content designer for that studio, called Jeff Strain a “grifter” and said the studio’s leadership “has failed us, morally, ethically, and financially.”
What was Possibility Space working on?
Possibility Space’s “Project Vonnegut” was never announced, so it’s hard to say. As Strain said in his email, it had a publishing arrangement in place, or at least some understanding with a publisher that was worth a drop-everything airline flight to try to repair a relationship. It is strange, however, that a studio executive would run out the door to perform damage control for a story that might describe that relationship and hadn’t yet published.
Jeff Strain co-founded ArenaNet, the maker of GuildWars, in 2000. He started Undead Labs in 2009, and that studio launched the zombie apocalypse survival adventure State of Decay in 2013. Undead Labs was acquired by Microsoft in 2018, about four months after State of Decay 2 launched. It has since become one of several design houses in the Xbox family, developing first-party titles to launch same-day on the console’s Xbox Game Pass service.
https://readwrite.com/possibility-space-studio-shuts-down-press-leaks-kotaku-ethan-gach/
Guatemala is investigating U.S. NGOs for child trafficking, seeks Texas AG collaboration
April 14, 2024
Guatemala’s Attorney General is investigating ongoing criminal claims that a number of American tax payer funded non-governmental organizations (NGOs) operating both inside and outside the United States are complicit in the ongoing trafficking, abuse and disappearance of children from its nation, according to an official Guatemalan letter obtained by this investigative columnist.
The Guatemalan government is seeking full cooperation from the State of Texas, where the accusations of abuse have been reported, government officials told SaraACarter.com.
A letter from Guatemalan Attorney General MarĂa Consuelo Porras was sent to Attorney General Ken Paxton on Saturday. Porras asked Paxton for immediate assistance with investigations into recent criminal reports filed with Guatemala’s Public Ministry alleging that unaccompanied minor children and adolescents being trafficked into the U.S. from Guatemala have allegedly suffered sexual and physical abuse at facilities operated by U.S. tax payer funded NGOs.
The Biden Administration has granted tens of billions of dollars in U.S. tax payer money in the form of grants to NGOs working to house, feed, educate and provide resources to illegal migrants entering the country. The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think-tank in Washington D.C. documented the astonishing cost of an open border to American taxpayers.
Guatemalan Secretary General Angel Pineda with the Public Ministry spoke with SaraACarter.com Sunday night. He said he is seeking collaboration from Paxton and the state of Texas in this ongoing criminal investigation.
“As a Prosecutor’s Office, Ministerio Publico of Guatemala, have received a criminal complaint that states some criminal actions, which we see with great concern,” Pineda told this investigative columnist. “Due to the situation that is happening in Texas, regarding different forms of abuses of some Guatemalan children and adolescents, when the institution received that criminal complaint, the institution has started investigations, so it is necessary to work on this matter in an integral way.”
He added “that is why, I have been authorized to ask for the collaboration of prosecutor Paxton so we can work together and protect Guatemalan children, and have sent a letter in that matter. “
Texas Attorney General Paxton could not be reached immediately for comment.
According to sources, the allegations of abuse are currently under investigation and are focused on facilities contracted by NGOs that have been poorly managed, and or have allowed for the sexual assault and physical abuse of children from Guatemala. In other cases, the Guatemalan government is investigating NGOs, some of which are operating in Central America, that are aiding and abetting the child trafficking organizations by supplying the necessary resources to move the unaccompanied children to the United States border without guardians or parental supervision.
“These Guatemalan children have reportedly been placed in shelters and organizations throughout Texas under the guise of providing them with a family environment,” Porras states in the letter. “Disturbingly, there have been reports and documented situations of sexual abuse in these shelters, which is a huge violation of the rights and dignity of these children.”
“The State of Texas bears much of the responsibility for these lost children, who have been transferred to the border and processed migratory (through migration procedures) in Texas apparently fully aware of this situation,” the translated letter from Spanish to English states.
cont.
https://saraacarter.com/guatemala-is-investigating-u-s-ngos-for-child-trafficking-seeks-texas-ag-collaboration/