Imagine being a business that insurance companies contract with to issue medical denials to doctors, so insurance companies can save money. That's EviCore.
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How do these people sleep?EviCore markets itself to insurance companies by promising a 3-to-1 return on investment — that is, for every $1 spent on EviCore, the insurer would pay out $3 less on medical care and other costs. EviCore salespeople have boasted of a 15% increase in denials, according to the investigation, which is based on internal documents, corporate data and dozens of interviews with former employees, doctors, industry experts, health care regulators and insurance executives. Almost everybody interviewed spoke on condition of anonymity because they continue to work in the industry.
Why Was the Discovery of the Jet Stream Mostly Ignored? Because the Japanese discoverer published his findings in Esperanto. 🤦🏻♂️ This story is interesting because Japanese WW II balloons carrying bombs drifted to the Pacific NW, and started a fire in the Siskiyou National Forest.
Although most of the balloon bombs are thought to have gone down in the Pacific Ocean, a few remain in remote areas of the Pacific Northwest. Two forestry workers discovered one near Lumby, British Columbia, in 2014. A Canadian navy bomb disposal unit arrived and blew it to bits. Use caution when hiking.
The newest AI boom pitch: Host a mini data center at your home. Who knows? It might cut down on heating costs.
People Would Rather Have Nuclear Power Plants In Their Area Than AI Data Centers. Some day, they'll have both.
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The Chinese have got us by the short and curlies. The U.S. was supposed to shut down foreign-made routers by 2027 for security reasons. But doing that will shut down America's network security system. So it's been pushed back to 1 Jan 2029. At least.
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Just what America needs, huh. Cannabis Use Disorder Strongly Linked to Major Depression, New Review Finds.
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Bitcoin trader recovers $400,000 using Claude AI after getting 'stoned' and losing wallet password 11 years ago — bot tried 3.5 trillion passwords before decrypting an old wallet backup. Yeah he was ecstatic about it. Another reason not to get stoned.
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There's a reason why some people have a policy never to negotiate with terrorists. Instructure's payment to hackers will just keep them in business doing it again. This wasn't the first time Instructure was hacked. You think they'd learn at least. They should fire their IT people.
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The myelin sheath is not just the insulator nerves. It also regulates neuroplasticity. Myelin is what makes white matter in the brain look white.
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Yay, Portland State. Researchers at that unlikely university came up with an effective malarial agent that hits the parasite at multiple stages in its development. PSU – who would have thunk, huh?
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Diseases can spread between apartments via shared ventilation. Another reason why homeless shelters are just a bad idea.
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Governments Influence AI Chatbot Responses by Controlling Online Information Sources. This is much like how some pranksters made chatbots say that their CEO was the sexiest bald man alive. Chatbots are so malleable.
And here's a company that sells "authenticity" at a price. Here you can "buy" an influencer persona that will sell your product for you. Everything can be fake in the AI world.
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Browsers Treat Big Sites Differently. At first I thought this was something nefarious, but the reason for this is because websites cater to Chrome, and don't look as good on other browsers. So rather than wait for website developers to fix their websites, browsers just implement fixes quietly, and do it in a way you'd never notice, unless you were a browser nerd.
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No, CNN you are wrong. You cannot "reverse much of the damage alcohol has done to your body". Acute intoxication will fade, but damage to your brain and liver are irreversible. In fact, the attempts by the liver to regenerate are what cause cirrhotic nodularity and hepatocellular carcinoma.
I hate when opposition to the mRNA vax gets painted as opposition to ALL vaccines. Like this article by Derek Lowe, who should know better. Derek was and is a champion of the mRNA COVID vaccine. Yeah, there was efficacy data on the ancestral strain, but that efficacy rapidly petered out by the time the delta stain came on the scene, and that's what the coronavirus experts predicted what would happen all along. It's the reason why there has not been a successful vaccine against that type of virus. And Derek chooses to direct a blind eye to all the data highlighting the dangers of that vax preparation. Why there was so much censorship, as Alex Berenson experienced. And I can't believe Derek is convinced by Moderna's mRNA flu vaccine study, which Alex debunked so well. He thinks RFK Jr just doesn't people to have vaccines at all. What crap!
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Epic Pencil lets you annotate on your screen, like you can in apps. Could be handy during video conferencing.
And hush makes you realize how commoditized voice transcription is now. The app uses OpenAI's open source whisper API model, which they made public in 2022 under the MIT license. So there is no "dictionary" like there was in voice dictation apps of the olden days. It needs Apple's metal GPU API to make it run with reasonable latency, but it may still be long enough to be annoying (~6 sec). Everything stays on the machine. It's all local. And it doesn't have Apple 60 second time limit. It's push-to-talk once you install it and works everywhere. Whisper is said to be more accurate than Apple's dictation anyway.
Free-Scene solves a problem that I've had with AI videos, namely that they are too short. You can just capture a single short scene. Yeah, I could use iMovie to stitch videos together, but this app does it for you. Input the prompt and it will create a single video with all the individual videos stitched together.
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What happened to the car designed for women, by women? I thought this was going to be an article that would just ridicule "the car designed by women, for women". But actually some of the ideas are good and make sense. I don't like the plain, minimal design approach, though. The exchangeable seat covers makes sense, but it's much better to have seats that are just easier to clean. But this car sure gets its looks from Volvo than Jony Ive.
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If you're a web designer and want to capture the look that your target audience would expect to see, this website is for you. It's called who are you? It captures the look and feel of some many websites that cater to different interests.
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Oops. A major microplastics finding went out the window. Lesson: check controls first before publishing.
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Oregon enables students to skip state tests and it’s undermining improvement. Well, you can't improve what you can't measure.
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Laika's Wildwood teaser portrays a Portland that doesn't exist anymore. No homeless tents. Safe to drink from Benson Bubblers. Saturday Market and Burnside plaza is filled with nice things. You can't have this world if you don't want to come down hard on crime and drug use, and continue to endorse harm reduction and shunting your economy to supporting the criddler lifestyle.
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Even the Metro Chamber of Commerce opposes expanding the Arts Tax. People are saying it should just be eliminated completely. It's not 2012 anymore. Art isn't a priority. The people can spend the money more wisely.
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Propser Portland tells the city that they want their Old Town property back. Revitalization ain't going to happen.
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Portland is about to close nearly 450 shelter beds, as homelessness rises. It was a waste of money. Can you believe that there is a "sober section of the Reedway Safe Rest Village"? What's the rest – the wasted section? The fentanyl section? Good grief.
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