Apple Faces Case Alleging Discrimination Against South Asian Engineer

Apple is facing a discrimination lawsuit brought by an Indian female engineer. She alleges that her two managers, one of whom was from India, the other from Pakistan, discriminated against her, Bloomberg News reported. It comes at a time of increasing focus on how Silicon Valley firms treat South Asian employees.

The woman’s case in California state court is the latest to allege workplace bias in Silicon Valley that focuses on cultural prejudices of some tech workers from South Asia. Cisco Systems Inc. is fighting a suit brought by California’s civil rights agency alleging bias against a member of India’s so-called lower castes, known as Dalits. Anita Nariani Schulze is part of the Sindhi minority — she is Hindu, with ancestry in the Sindh region of what is now Pakistan. Her complaint alleges that her senior and direct managers, both male, consistently excluded her from meetings while inviting her male counterparts, criticized her, micromanaged her work, and deprived her of bonuses, despite positive performance evaluations and significant team contributions. Schulze claims the managers’ animus reflects sexism, racism, religious bias and discrimination on the basis of national origin. The Sindhi Hindu nationality is “known for its technical acumen” and its gender equality, she says, which “exacerbated the managers’ discriminatory treatment.”

That Container Ship Blocking the Suez Canal Will Affect ‘Anything You See in Stores’

One of the world’s biggest container ships has blocked the Suez Canal, a vital shipping route. Delays could mean higher prices for gas and other items.

The extent depends on how quickly the massive vessel, the Ever Given, which holds upward of 20,000 shipping containers and is as long as the Eiffel Tower is tall, can be moved out of the way. Everything from food, furniture, clothes, shoes, exercise equipment, electronics, car parts and carpets could be affected, logistics experts say. “Basically anything you see in the stores,” said Lars Jensen, an independent container shipping expert based in Denmark.

iPad Helps Australian Primary School Drive Innovation And Creativity, Navigate COVID-19 Pandemic

Apple has revealed the story of an Australian primary school that put technology, particularly iPad, at the heart of its work to keep students engaged during the COVID-19 pandemic. St Therese Catholic Primary School in Sadleir Miller has students from 50 different cultures, 73 percent of whom are from non-English-speaking backgrounds and three-quarters of whom have English as their second language. Principal Michelle McKinnon explained how years of integrating technology helped drive innovation and creativity amongst her students, as well as guide them through the pandemic.

“The creativity of our students really hit us — they were so clever at sharing what they’d learned,” says McKinnon. “Students shared their own passions and interests more freely in the remote setting, revealing previously undiscovered talents and strengths.” A self-directed learning program invited children to showcase their talents by selecting their own research topics while they studied at home. Using Keynote, iMovie, Pages, Text to Speech, and stop-motion animation, students shared their findings on subjects as wide-ranging as the Great Barrier Reef, painter Vincent van Gogh, and disease prevention in horses. During lockdown, students used the Seesaw app to create digital schoolwork portfolios and share them with teachers. These proved so popular with students, teachers, and families that they are now standard practice at St Therese.

Surfshark VPN 3-Year Subscription: $83.99

We have a deal on a subscription to Surfshark VPN, a service that offers Military-grade AES-256-GCM encryption, support for IKEv2 and OpenVPN protocols, and unlimited simultaneous connections. A 3 year subscription is $83.99 through our deal, and the deal listing has 2 and 4 year options, too.

You Can Now Use Orchid VPN Starting at a Dollar

Orchid VPN now costs as little as US$1 to get started with the service, the company announced on Thursday.

With Orchid’s iOS and macOS app, users simply buy VPN credits for $1, $5 or $20, which is then turned into a XDAI-backed account. Once the user’s VPN is active, users are only charged for the bandwidth run through the VPN, with no recurring monthly or annual subscription fee, in stark contrast to other VPN offerings. The current market rate for Orchid service is only $0.06 per GB.

A pay-as-you-go blockchain-based VPN is an interesting service.

Disney+ Price Will Increase to $7.99 This Friday

Streaming service Disney+ is increasing its price to US$7.99 this Friday, March 26.

As previously announced back in September, Disney+ subscriptions and its bundle package with ESPN+ and ad-supported Hulu are getting a price hike. Beginning March 26, subscriptions for the service will jump from $7 to $8 per month, while the annual subscription option will jump from $70 to $80 per year. The Disney+ bundle will increase from $13 to $14 a month.

Cred.ai Offers a Unicorn Credit Card Powered by AI

Cred.ai is a new fintech company that wants to help you improve your credit score with its special credit card powered by AI.

As you buy items on your credit card, Cred will automatically pay them off from your bank account—not instantly (that way, you can still build credit) and not necessarily at the end of the month (that way you don’t float too much debt at any given time, which can also hurt your credit). Even if you autopay your credit card monthly, Cred’s AI can, in theory, do better.

This is old news, but I’m sharing it because the Cred.ai app is now available in the App Store to apply. I applied for the card last night to hopefully review in the future. There is a waiting list unless you have an invite code.

Back Up Your Shortcuts Using iCloud Links With This Shortcut

Apple had some kind of issue on their end that caused iCloud links for shortcuts to stop working. Since shortcuts no longer rely on files within the Shortcuts folder in iCloud, the only way to back up your shortcuts is by generating an iCloud link. The links are working again but only for new iCloud links. Old links don’t work anymore. I’ve been using two shortcuts that I created as a backup. The first one will generate a link for every shortcut you have and create a note in Apple Notes with the links. The second one can back up a single shortcut at a time and appends it to that same note as well as a text file. They can, and should, be modified to fit your own needs and file system. Update: Multiple reports on Friday suggest that old links are working again.

Music and Videos Designed to Aid Rest, Sleep, Stress, and Anxiety: $29.99

We have a deal on Restflix, a streaming service designed to help users fall asleep faster and rest better. It features more than 20 personalized channels full of sleep meditations, bedtime stories, calming visuals, and binaural beats to harness the brain’s responsiveness to sound and help create a meditative, restful state. It also has apps for Apple TV, iOS, Roku, Android, and Fire TV. 1 year is $29.99 through our deal, and there are longer subscriptions in the deal listing, too.

Brother-Sister Duo Charged With Stealing MacBooks From Stanford

Two people pleaded guilty to federal charges this week in a scheme to steal and re-sell hundreds of MacBooks from Stanford.

Castaneda was charged with thefts totaling around $4 million, while $2.3 million in stolen goods were attributed to her brother. Authorities say the computers were sold on Craigslist to an uncharged co-conspirator, a Folsom man, who resold them to people living in other states.

The article mentions approximately 800 MacBooks.

Reasons Why Developers Prefer Testing on iOS

There are a variety of reasons why many developers prefer to launch and test their apps on iOS instead of Android. Screenrant broke down some of them, including the benefits of the greater control and uniformity found in Apple’s system.

There are many reasons why developers tend to prefer iOS over Android with a commonly suggested one being that iOS users are more likely to spend on apps than Android users. However, the locked down user base is a far more basic and important reason from the developer perspective. With iOS, developers gain access to a significant number of users and on a limited number of devices. This combination lends itself very well to apps that are still in an early and beta testing state. Essentially, the level of control developers have over the iOS experience is far greater than with Android, and that’s likely to make a significant difference when deciding which operating system to launch on first.