Almere-Digest

June 4, 2019

France: Experiments with medical cannabis to be launched by France in coming weeks

France to launch medical cannabis experiment in coming weeks As a nearly unanimous French Senate gave medical marijuana the green light on May 28,

France will start experimenting the use of medical marijuana for “about two years”, pending the approval of the health ministry.

June 3, 2019

Car Industry - Electric Cars : Aiways could be first Chinese-brand EV sold in Europe - by Echo Huang

China’s automakers have long wanted to expand beyond their home market. While they’ve made a little progress in Southeast Asia and Africa, they’ve had scant success in developed markets like the US and Europe.

That isn’t stopping Aiways, an electric-vehicle startup based in Shanghai, from trying. The four-year-old company recently told Quartz it plans to offer its flagship car, the U5, in Germany, France, Switzerland, Norway, and the Netherlands next spring. If all goes to plan, Aiways will become the first Chinese-brand electric car offered in Europe.

The company’s strategy involves skipping dealerships and offering consumers direct online sales and leasing. That will help it reduce costs and compete with traditional gas guzzlers, Alexander Klose, vice president for overseas operation, told the Financial Times (paywall). The U5, he added, will be priced at less than €40,000 ($44,700).

June 2, 2019

Robotics: If robots do everything, then what will we do? Will people marry robots in future?

As a journalist, I always try to ask smart questions. But I could not beat the questions that a group of five-year-olds posed to China’s top artificial intelligence (AI) guru, like the ones in the headline of this article.

People pay attention to what Dr Lee Kai-Fu says – lotsof people. Fifty million people in China follow him on social media, which means he has more fans than American talk show host Oprah Winfrey.

What worries Dr Lee is not human-robot marriages, because while a tiny minority of people might want to treat robots as humans, most of us – even children – know the difference between a toy or a pet and a human relationship.

Click here if you want to read more about Robots and sex

For the original report of this story: If robots do everything, then what will we do? Will people marry robots in future? - CNA

June 1, 2019

The Netherlands: becomes the first country to show Amber alerts on ATMs - by Catalin Cimpanu

he Netherlands has become the first country in the world that has expanded its national Amber Alert system to automated teller machines (ATMs).

Starting last week, over 300 ATMs from ATM manufacturer In2Retail have begun showing photos of missing children on their screensavers.

For now, the Amber Alert-compatible ATMs are onlyinstalled in selected locations, such as international airports (in Amsterdam and Rotterdam), some national airports, but also in large shopping malls and near popular tourist attractions.

Authorities say they have plans to blanket the entire country and expand the system to the ATMs of other ATM vendors.

Read more at: The Netherlands becomes the first country to show Amber alerts on ATMs | ZDNet

May 30, 2019

The Netherlands: Dutch King invites Donald Trump tto visit the Netherlands

May 29, 2019

The Netherlands: No buses, few trains: public transport strike causes long jams - DutchNews.nl

A strike by public
transport workers on Tuesday has led to long traffic jams as commuters
turn to cars and taxis instead to get to work.

By 8 am there were 520 kilometres of slow-moving vehicles on the Dutch
roads, and traffic had ground to halt around Alkmaar and Rotterdam,
motoring organisation ANWB said.

Hashtags such as #meerijden and #liftaangeboden have become popular as
people seek to share rides. And in Amsterdam officials have opened the
IJ tunnel to bikes and mopeds, because there are no ferries over the IJ.

Read more at DutchNews.nl:

A strike by public transport workers on Tuesday has led to long traffic jams as commuters turn to cars and taxis instead to get to work.

By 8 am there were 520 kilometres of slow-moving vehicles on the Dutch roads, and traffic had ground to halt around Alkmaar and Rotterdam, motoring organisation ANWB said.

Hashtags such as #meerijden and #liftaangeboden have become popular as people seek to share rides. And in Amsterdam officials have opened the IJ tunnel to bikes and mopeds, because there are no ferries over the IJ.

Read more at: No buses, few trains: public transport strike causes long jams - DutchNews.nl

May 28, 2019

The Netherlands: Nationalists and populists issues lose favorability in the Netherlands

There was faltering support for the Netherlands to withdraw from the European Union, according to a survey of voters and non-voters in the Netherlands during the 2019European Parliamentary elections.

The poll, conducted by Ipsos for broadcaster NOS, also showed several nationalist issues falling out of favor with the Dutch public. Just 15 percent of people agreed with a mandate saying the Netherlands should leave the EU. That is down from 24 percent of respondents five years ago. About 65 percent disagreed with the sentiment, with the rest saying they either did not know or did not care.

Interestingly, about 60 percent of voters said the Netherlands is better as part of the European Union, while fewer than 40 percent of non-voters said the same. Still, about 69 percent want to see the EU grow even stronger because of international tensions, while only 7 percent disagreed.