Month: August 2016

(credit: Uber)

In April, it looked like a high-profile lawsuit against Uber was going to be resolved after the high-flying startup agreed to pay up to $100 million to settle allegations that its treatment of drivers violated labor laws.

Today, US District Judge Edward Chen said the deal "is not fair, adequate, and reasonable," and he won't countenance it. In a 35-page order (PDF) he slammed the deal, which would have required Uber to pay $84 million and up to an additional $16 million contingent on whether Uber's IPO hit certain price points.

After some complicated back-and-forth about Uber's arbitration agreements, Chen was overseeing a case with a class of more than 240,000 California drivers and just over 60,000 Massachusetts drivers. In addition to payments ranging from $12 to $1,950, drivers would have certain additional rights like explanations before being deactivated, more information about their star ratings, and an internal process for drivers to complain about payment of certain fares. It would also allow drivers in California and Massachusetts to ask for tips—although Uber made clear it would not add an in-app tipping function, and in fact the company dissuades riders from tipping.

(credit: Thomas Hawk)

Volkswagen isn’t the only company that's been caught in the US Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) crackdown on emissions.

On Thursday, motorcycle company Harley-Davidson reached an agreement with the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in which Harley will pay $12 million in fines for selling some 340,000 “super tuners” that allowed US bike owners to modify emissions control systems.

The company will also no longer sell the offending aftermarket tuners in the US, and units sold outside the US will be marked to say that customers should not install them on motorcycles to be driven in the US. Harley will have to buy back and destroy existing aftermarket tuners that don’t meet Clean Air Act requirements, and it will have to spend a separate $3 million on a mitigation project “to replace conventional woodstoves with cleaner-burning stoves in local communities,” according to an EPA press release.

Enlarge (credit: USAF/Wikimedia)

If there’s a possibility worse than a full-scale exchange of nuclear weapons, maybe it’s a full-scale exchange of nuclear weapons launched because of a simple misunderstanding. In 1967, we may have come close to that scenario, but you can thank some meteorologists for the fact that it didn't come to pass.

In late May of 1967, an active spot on the Sun threw a remarkable storm our way, and it continued over several days. The spot released charged particles and serious bursts of radiation in the radio portion of the electromagnetic spectrum (among other things), disturbing the Earth’s ionosphere and magnetic field. All this resulted in disruptions to radio communications and radar systems for a few days—as well as Northern Lights seen as far south as New Mexico.

Critically, the early disruptions included NORAD’s newly built Ballistic Missile Early Warning System. The three high-latitude radar stations (in Alaska, Greenland, and the UK) pretty much went dark in the afternoon of May 23. As the Sun sank lower in the sky, these radar systems were pointed right at the source of the radio emissions just as they arrived. To US military leaders, it seemed an awful lot like jamming—Russia blinding the eyes watching for incoming nuclear weapons. Did that mean there were missiles or aircraft en route?

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images)

The attorneys who moved the song Happy Birthday into the public domain will receive $4.62 million in fees, according to a judge's fee order (PDF) published Tuesday. The amount, which equals one-third of a $14 million settlement fund, was granted over objections by the defendant, Warner/Chappell.

After various billing deductions, US District Judge George King found that a "lodestar" payment of about $3.85 million was appropriate. King then added a multiplier.

"Given the unusually positive results achieved by the settlement, the highly complex nature of the action, the risk class counsel faced by taking this case on a contingency-fee basis, and the impressive skill and effort of counsel, we conclude that a 1.2 multiplier is warranted," wrote King.