EDIT: It's a problem or webpage design and not an issue with Firefox. My bad.

I recently have been trying to switch from Chrome to Firefox, based upon encouragement from this sub. There have been a few minor bumps along the way.

One interruption arises when I tried to save an image. In chrome I was accustomed to right-clicking on the image and choosing "Save Image As..." But this does not show up as an option for me in the context menu with Firefox.

It's strange, because web searches trying to solve the problem suggest that it used to appear as a context menu option.

Right now I'm forced to take a multistep option of opening the image in another tab, and then saving it.

Is there some kind of setting I can change, so that I can get the option to right-click and save an image?

Thanks so much.

July 26, 2023

Dear Editors:

On March 17, 2020, Nature Medicine published a Correspondence entitled “The proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2” (1). The paper assessed the genome sequence of SARS-CoV-2 and concluded, “Our analyses clearly show that SARS-CoV-2 is not a laboratory construct or a purposefully manipulated virus” and “we do not believe that any type of laboratory-based scenario is plausible.”

The paper played an influential role—indeed, the central role—in communicating the false narrative that science established that SARS-CoV-2 entered humans through natural spillover, and not through research-related spillover (2-7). The paper was promoted by Joao Monteiro the chief editor of Nature Medicine, as an exceptionally important and definitive research study (“great work”; “will put conspiracy theories about the origin of #SARSCoV2 to rest “; 8). The paper has been cited more than 5,800 times, making it the 68th most cited publication in all fields in 2020, the 16th most cited publication in biology in 2020, and the 8th most cited publication on the subject of COVID-19 in the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Email messages and Slack direct messages among authors of the paper obtained under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) process or by the U.S. Congress and publicly released in full in or before July 2023 (2-7), show that the authors did not believe the core conclusions of the paper at the time it was written, at the time it was submitted for publication, and at the time it was published. The authors’ statements show that the paper was, and is, a product of scientific misconduct.

It is imperative that this misleading and damaging product of scientific misconduct be removed from the scientific literature.

We, as STEM and STEM-policy professionals, call upon Nature Medicine to publish an expression of editorial concern for the paper and to begin a process of withdrawal or retraction of the paper.

Signers (in alphabetical order)

Amir Attaran, University of Ottawa Paul Babitzke, Pennsylvania State University Alina Chan, Broad Institute Richard H. Ebright, Rutgers University Mohamed E. El Zowalaty, Higher Colleges of Technology David Fisman, University of Toronto Andrew Goffinet, University of Louvain Richard N. Goldstein, Harvard University Elisa D. Harris, Center for International and Security Studies at Maryland Neil L. Harrison, Columbia University Laura Kahn, One Health Initiative Hideki Kakeya, University of Tsukuba Justin B. Kinney, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Tatsu Kobayakawa, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology Yanna Lambrinidou,Virginia Tech Milton Leitenberg, University of Maryland Allen A. Lenoir, Bioterrorism/Pediatrics Infectious Disease Center Jamie Metzl, Atlantic Council David L. Nelson, Baylor College of Medicine Bryce E. Nickels, Rutgers University Takeshi Nitta, University of Tokyo Andrew Noymer, University of California, Irvine Roger Pielke Jr., University of Colorado, Boulder Harish Seshadri, Indian Institute of Science Rick Sheridan, Emske Phytochem Eric S. Starbuck, Save the Children Tyler Stepke, Johns Hopkins University Atsushi Tanaka, Osaka Medical and Pharmaceutical University Hiroshi Tauchi, Ibaraki University Anton van Der Merwe, University of Oxford Alex Washburne, Selva Analytics Andre Watson, Ligandal Roland Wiesendanger, University of Hamburg Susan Wright, University of Michigan

References

(1) Kristian G. Andersen, Andrew Rambaut, W. Ian Lipkin, Edward C. Holmes & Robert F. Garry, The proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2, Nature Medicine, volume 26, pages 450–452 (2020)

(2) Interim Majority Staff Report – The Proximal Origin of a Cover-Up: Did the “Bethesda Boys” Downplay a Lab Leak?, July 12, 2023

(3) Amid Partisan Politicking, Revelations on a Covid Origins Article, The Nation, July 12, 2023

(4) House Republicans Accidentally Released a Trove of Damning Covid Documents, The Intercept, July 12, 2023

(5) Top Scientists Misled Congress About Covid Origins, Newly Released Emails And Messages Show, Public, July 18, 2023

(6) “So Friggin’ Likely”: New Covid Documents Reveal Unparalleled Media Deception, Racket News, July 18, 2023

(7) Covid Origins Scientist Denounces Reporting On His Messages As A “Conspiracy Theory, Public, July 20, 2023

(8) https://twitter.com/JMinImmunoland/status/1239966983279366145

Sicily - which has already been brought to its knees by a prolonged heatwave - is battling wildfires that are threatening towns and cities across the island. Temperatures of more than 47.5C (117F) were recorded in Catania on Monday.

Several resorts and tourist hotspots around the island have begun evacuating their guests.

Palermo Airport was temporarily closed to air traffic on Tuesday morning after wildfires in the hills around it reached the airport perimeter.

The fires are causing deaths across southern Italy. Local media reported that two bodies were found charred in a house near Palermo airport.

In Sicily, an 88-year-old woman died after falling ill, as the fires prevented emergency services reaching her.

A 98-year-old man in the region of Calabria died when the flames from a wildfire reached his home where he was bedbound.

In Sardinia, a firefighter died of a stroke after spending hours battling a blaze.

A firefighter was seriously injured near Palermo while trying to tackle one of the blazes, which are being fuelled by high winds, local media reported.

More than 200 people in Palermo have already sought medical attention for smoke inhalation. Two hospitals have suspended routine appointments to ensure people suffering from smoke inhalation or other illnesses related to the extreme heat can be looked after.

Half of the bus network in Palermo has been suspended as the vehicles are overheating and cannot cool down because of consistently high temperatures.

Hospital Cervello, in the north of the city, is being threatened by the flames, while some wards have been evacuated, Italian media said.

The farmers' association, Coldiretti, said Sicily was facing an "unprecedented catastrophe and incalculable environmental damage".

The minister for civil protection, Nello Musumeci, wrote on Facebook: "This is one of the hardest days in Italy's history for 10 years. Climate change has hit our nation and demands that we all change our ways. There are no excuses." "We knew that today would be the hardest day," Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni told Italian radio RTL 102.5. "We have a situation where very high temperatures are combined with wind, which makes using Canadair [firefighting aircraft] impossible."

"We are following the situation, which is very delicate, minute by minute.".

I just stumbled onto the server. What is wingspan? Looks cool.

Did somebody say we had the hottest day in world history 2x this week? Did I get that right?

Reddit just became a lot more friendly to bots, and a lot less friendly to humans. Their block list covered 144,926 bot accounts. All those and more are going to get unleashed.

I was just trying to access Feddit.UK via a popular VPN. It looked like the site didn't even exist. Just a gray error page.

I'm not sure this is a good policy.

EDIT: I have clarification from ProtonVPN about what the problem is with accessing Feddit.uk. They have a service called NetShield which blocks IP addresses associated with malware and trackers. There is a false positive for Feddit.uk. Their team is aware of it, and will hopefully fix it. In the meantime, people can access Feddit.uk using ProtonVPN by turning NetShield off. It works for me.

1. Someone (Reddit administrators?) was caught using chatGPT bots to flood the site with pro-admin comments.

2. After /r/Programming exposed this, the subReddit was closed down.

3. Rumor: the admins were the ones who close down the sub. Regardless, the astroturfing is evident.

SOURCES

1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36361247

2. https://web.archive.org/web/20230611210834/https://old.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/146wn9s/meta_who_is_astroturfing_rprogramming_and_why/

3. https://web.archive.org/web/20230612080526/https://i.imgur.com/4e9jO7P.jpg