![]() ![]() The other fragments will likely soon meet the same fate as they continue northward toward the equator. If the berg gets too small, the NIC can no longer track it. According to a press release, a large fracture runs down its center, and smaller pieces are breaking from the edges. Though the ice chunk is currently 11.5 miles long and just under six miles wide, it's showing signs of breaking down. Last month, astronauts on the International Space Station captured an image of B-15Z, one of the largest remaining fragments. But now, only four remaining pieces meet the minimum size requirement (20 square nautical miles) to be tracked by the National Ice Center. By 2015, the original iceberg had broken into eight major fragments. When it first broke away from Antarctica, B-15 stretched 170 miles long and 25 miles wide, with a surface area of 4,250 square miles. Now, reports Brandon Specktor at LiveScience, B-15 has drifted close to South Georgia Island and a new image suggest its wild ride is almost over. Over the last 18 years, researchers have tracked iceberg B-15 as it drifted around the continent and eventually northward. “We need to ensure that it exists, that it is autonomous, independent and empowered to monitor, supervise and sanction, if necessary.In late March, 2000, an iceberg larger than Jamaica, the largest ever recorded, broke off Antarctica’s Ross Ice Shelf. ![]() She added that even as the vote is delayed it was important that legislators come back with a viable solution. “Without this bill there is no body that has the power to monitor social media companies, hold them accountable for their actions, and ensure that they don’t cause public harm,” said Laura Moraes, campaign director for the human rights non-profit Avaaz. Internet freedom advocates have endorsed the bill as a much-needed stopgap for tech’s massive power. Silva said the original draft of the bill included the creation of a state agency to watch out for illegal content, but this was dropped due to resistance in congress. It was fast-tracked in the lower house after a series of fatal attacks in schools which social media allegedly encouraged, and new articles added to the bill have not been debated in congressional committees before going to the vote. The Brazilian proposal is comparable to the European Union’s Digital Services Act enacted last year. “Such conduct could configure, in theory, abuse of economic power on the eve of voting on the bill by trying to illegally and immorally impact public opinion and the vote in congress,” Justice Alexandre de Moraes said in his decision.īrazil’s antitrust regulator Cade said it would investigate Google and Meta’s campaigns against the bill. Its critics say the bill needs wider debate because it was too hastily drawn up, allows censorship and will have the opposite result of rewarding those who post disinformation since the bill proposes that companies would have to pay content providers and copyrights on material posted on their sites.īrazil’s speaker of the house, Arthur Lira, on Tuesday moved to delay the vote on the bill after the rapporteur Orlando Silva requested more time to improve the draft and incorporate changes.Īlso on Tuesday, the supreme court asked the chief executives in Brazil for Google, Meta and Spotify to testify within five days explaining their conduct regarding the bill. The proposed law to penalize firms for not reporting fake news was due to be voted on in the lower house of congress on Tuesday but it is facing opposition from conservative and evangelical lawmakers. All Brazilians have the right to be part of this conversation, and as such, we are committed to communicating our concerns about Bill 2630 publicly and transparently,” it said in a statement. “We support discussions on measures to combat the phenomenon of misinformation. The US company promptly pulled the link, though Google defended its right to communicate its concerns through “marketing campaigns” on its platforms and denied altering search results to favor material contrary to the bill. “What is this? An editorial? This is not a media or an advertising company,” the minister told a news conference, calling Google’s link disguised and misleading advertising for the company’s stance against the law. The justice minister, Flávio Dino, ordered Google to change the link on its homepage on Tuesday, saying the company had two hours after notification or would face fines of 1m reais ($198,000) per hour. It also took out a full-page advertisement in the local paper Folha de S Paulo to sway public opinion.īrazil’s government and judiciary has accused the company of undue interference in the debate in congress over its public campaigning. US companies including Alphabet have been aggressively campaigning against the new bill, with the Google parent company placing an advertisement on its search homepage in Brazil as well as YouTube there.
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