An anonymous reader shares a report: Yet another busy hurricane season is likely across the Atlantic this year -- but some of the conditions that supercharged storms like Hurricanes Helene and Milton in 2024 have waned, according to a key forecast issued Thursday.

A warm -- yet no longer record-hot -- strip of waters across the Atlantic Ocean is forecast to help fuel development of 17 named tropical cyclones during the season that runs from June 1 through Nov. 30, according to Colorado State University researchers. Of those tropical cyclones, nine are forecast to become hurricanes, with four of those expected to reach "major" hurricane strength. ... [ Read it >> ]

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A new study shows bonobos can combine vocal calls in ways that mirror human language, producing phrases with meanings beyond the sum of individual sounds. "Human language is not as unique as we thought," said Dr Melissa Berthet, the first author of the research from the University of Zurich. Another author, Dr Simon Townsend, said: "The cognitive building blocks that facilitate this capacity is at least 7m years old. And I think that is a really cool finding."... [ Read it >> ]

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SpaceX's Fram2 mission returned safely after becoming the first crewed spaceflight to orbit directly over Earth's poles. From a report: Led by cryptocurrency billionaire Chun Wang, who is the financier of this mission, the Fram2 crew has been free-flying through orbit since Monday. The group splashed down at 9:19 a.m. PT, or 12:19 p.m. ET, off the coast of California -- the first West Coast landing in SpaceX's five-year history of human spaceflight missions. The company livestreamed the splashdown and recovery of the capsule on its website.... [ Read it >> ]

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Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto's ambitious plan to create 1 million hectares of new rice farms in eastern Merauke Regency faces strong criticism from scientists who have warned it will fail due to unsuitable soils and climate. Military "food brigades" are currently guarding bulldozers clearing swampy forests in Indonesian New Guinea for the project, which aims to boost food self-sufficiency for the nation's 281 million people. ... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: In a world filled with "vibe coding," Zach Yadegari, teen founder of Cal AI, stands in ironic, old-fashioned contrast. Ironic because Yadegari and his co-founder, Henry Langmack, are both just 18 years old and still in high school. Yet their story, so far, is a classic. Launched in May, Cal AI has generated over 5 million downloads in eight months, Yadegari says. Better still, he tells TechCrunch that the customer retention rate is over 30% and that the app generated over $2 million in revenue last month. [...]... [ Read it >> ]

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Web crawlers collecting training data for AI models are overwhelming Wikipedia's infrastructure, with bot traffic growing exponentially since early 2024, according to the Wikimedia Foundation. According to data released April 1, bandwidth for multimedia content has surged 50% since January, primarily from automated programs scraping Wikimedia Commons' 144 million openly licensed media files. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Software engineer and longtime Slashdot reader, Dmitry Grinberg (dmitrygr), shares a recent project they've been working on: "an interactive-speed Linux on a tiny board you can easily build with only 3 8-pin chips": There was a time when one could order a kit and assemble a computer at home. It would do just about what a contemporary store-bought computer could do. That time is long gone. Modern computers are made of hundreds of huge complex chips with no public datasheets and many hundreds of watts of power supplied to them over complex power delivery topologies. It does not help that modern operating systems require gigabytes of RAM, terabytes of storage, and always-on internet connectivity to properly spy on you. But what if one tried to fit a modern computer into a kit that could be easily assembled at home? What if the kit only had three chips, each with only 8 pins? Can it be done? Yes. The system runs a custom MIPS emulator written in ARMv6 assembly and includes a custom bootloader that supports firmware updates via FAT16-formatted SD cards. Clever pin-sharing hacks allow all components (RAM, SD, serial I/O) to work despite the 6 usable I/O pins. Overclocked to up to 150MHz, the board boots into a full Linux shell in about a minute and performs at ~1.65MHz MIPS-equivalent speed.... [ Read it >> ]

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Longtime Slashdot reader CyberSlugGump shares a support article from AT&T, writing: On June 17th, AT&T will stop supporting email-to-text messages. That means you won't be able to send a text message to an AT&T customer from an email address. You can still get in touch with AT&T customers using SMS (text), MMS, and standard email services.... [ Read it >> ]

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Midjourney's new V7 image model features a revamped architecture with smarter text prompt handling, higher image quality, and default personalization based on user-rated images. While some features like upscaling aren't yet available, it does come with a faster, cheaper Draft Mode. TechCrunch reports: To use it, you'll first have to rate around 200 images to build a Midjourney "personalization" profile, if you haven't already. This profile tunes the model to your individual visual preferences; V7 is Midjourney's first model to have personalization switched on by default. Once you've done that, you'll be able to turn V7 on or off on Midjourney's website and, if you're a member of Midjourney's Discord server, on its Discord chatbot. In the web app, you can quickly select the model from the drop-down menu next to the "Version" label.... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: A technique that hostile nation-states and financially motivated ransomware groups are using to hide their operations poses a threat to critical infrastructure and national security, the National Security Agency has warned. The technique is known as fast flux. It allows decentralized networks operated by threat actors to hide their infrastructure and survive takedown attempts that would otherwise succeed. Fast flux works by cycling through a range of IP addresses and domain names that these botnets use to connect to the Internet. In some cases, IPs and domain names change every day or two; in other cases, they change almost hourly. The constant flux complicates the task of isolating the true origin of the infrastructure. It also provides redundancy. By the time defenders block one address or domain, new ones have already been assigned.... [ Read it >> ]

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Google has introduced Sec-Gemini v1, an experimental AI model built on its Gemini platform and tailored for cybersecurity. BetaNews reports: Sec-Gemini v1 is built on top of Gemini, but it's not just some repackaged chatbot. Actually, it has been tailored with security in mind, pulling in fresh data from sources like Google Threat Intelligence, the OSV vulnerability database, and Mandiant's threat reports. This gives it the ability to help with root cause analysis, threat identification, and vulnerability triage.... [ Read it >> ]

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For the second time, President Trump has extended the deadline for ByteDance to divest TikTok's U.S. operations by 75 days. The TikTok deal "requires more work to ensure all necessary approvals are signed," said Trump in a post on his Truth Social platform. The extension will "keep TikTok up and running for an additional 75 days."... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Associated Press: It took only seconds for the judges on a New York appeals court to realize that the man addressing them from a video screen -- a person about to present an argument in a lawsuit -- not only had no law degree, but didn't exist at all. The latest bizarre chapter in the awkward arrival of artificial intelligence in the legal world unfolded March 26 under the stained-glass dome of New York State Supreme Court Appellate Division's First Judicial Department, where a panel of judges was set to hear from Jerome Dewald, a plaintiff in an employment dispute. "The appellant has submitted a video for his argument," said Justice Sallie Manzanet-Daniels. "Ok. We will hear that video now."... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader shares a report: A Microsoft employee disrupted the company's 50th anniversary event to protest its use of AI. "Shame on you," said Microsoft employee Ibtihal Aboussad, speaking directly to Microsoft AI CEO Mustafa Suleyman. "You are a war profiteer. Stop using AI for genocide. Stop using AI for genocide in our region. You have blood on your hands. All of Microsoft has blood on its hands. How dare you all celebrate when Microsoft is killing children. Shame on you all."... [ Read it >> ]

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Hackers targeting Australia's major pension funds in a series of coordinated attacks have stolen savings from some members at the biggest fund, Reuters is reporting, citing a source, and compromised more than 20,000 accounts. From the report: National Cyber Security Coordinator Michelle McGuinness said in a statement she was aware of "cyber criminals" targeting accounts in the country's A$4.2 trillion ($2.63 trillion) retirement savings sector and was organising a response across the government, regulators and industry. The Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia, the industry body, said "a number" of funds were impacted over the weekend. While the full scale of the incident remains unclear, AustralianSuper, Australian Retirement Trust, Rest, Insignia and Hostplus on Friday all confirmed they suffered breaches.... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader shares a report: The gap between Windows 10 and Windows 11 continues to narrow, and Microsoft's flagship operating system is on track to finally surpass its predecessor by summer. The latest figures from Statcounter show the increase in Windows 11's market share accelerating, while Windows 10 declines. ... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader shares a report: AI is projected to reach $4.8 trillion in market value by 2033, but the technology's benefits remain highly concentrated, according to the U.N. Trade and Development agency. In a report released on Thursday, UNCTAD said the AI market cap would roughly equate to the size of Germany's economy, with the technology offering productivity gains and driving digital transformation. However, the agency also raised concerns about automation and job displacement, warning that AI could affect 40% of jobs worldwide. On top of that, AI is not inherently inclusive, meaning the economic gains from the tech remain "highly concentrated," the report added. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Camera manufacturers continue to use different proprietary RAW file formats despite the 20-year existence of Adobe's open-source DNG (Digital Negative) format, creating ongoing compatibility challenges for photographers and software developers.

Major manufacturers including Sony, Canon, and Panasonic defended their proprietary formats as necessary for maintaining control over image processing. Sony's product team told The Verge their ARW format allows them "to maximize performance based on device characteristics such as the image sensor and image processing engine." Canon similarly claims proprietary formats enable "optimum processing during image development." ... [ Read it >> ]

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China said Friday that it will impose reciprocal 34% tariffs on all imports from the United States from April 10, making good on a promise to strike back after US President Donald Trump escalated a global trade war. CNN: On Wednesday, Trump unveiled an additional 34% tariff on all Chinese goods imported into the US, in a move poised to cause a major reset of relations and worsen trade tensions between the world's two largest economies. ... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Visa has offered Apple roughly $100 million to take over the tech giant's credit card partnership from Mastercard, the Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday, citing sources familiar with the matter. Visa has made a bold push to secure the Apple Card, offering an upfront payment typically reserved for the largest card programs, WSJ reported. American Express is also trying to unseat Mastercard to win the Apple card. Amex is looking to become the card's issuer as well as the network, the report said, citing the sources. Goldman Sachs ended its partnership with Apple in late 2023 as the Wall Street bank retreated from consumer lending.... [ Read it >> ]

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Coreboot 25.03 has been released with support for 22 new motherboards and several other significant updates, including enhanced display handling, USB debugging, RISC-V support, and RAM initialization for older Intel platforms. Phoronix reports: Coreboot 25.03 delivers display handling improvements, a better USB debugging experience, CPU topology updates, various improvements to the open-source RAM initialization for aging Intel Haswell platforms, improved USB Type-C and Thunderbolt handling, various embedded controller (EC) improvements, better RISC-V architecture support, DDR5-7500 support, and many bug fixes across the sprawling Coreboot codebase. More details, including a full list of the supported boards, can be found here.... [ Read it >> ]

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The M.T.A. has unveiled on Wednesday a revamped New York City subway map -- the first major redesign in nearly 50 years. As reported by the New York Times, the map draws inspiration from the modernist but controversial 1972 Unimark version, prioritizing clarity over geographic precision. It's also a part of a broader effort to refresh the system's image amid calls for infrastructure upgrades and political tensions over transit funding and congestion pricing. From the report: The updated version blends elements of the Unimark design with a successor known to some as the Tauranac map, after John Tauranac, a well-regarded New York mapmaker. That design was led by the firm Michael Hertz Associates. The new map is already being displayed on digital monitors, and will be posted in subway cars and platforms over the next several weeks, the M.T.A. said.... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: [...] The study, led by researchers at Brown University, found that the wealthiest Americans lived shorter lives than the wealthiest Europeans. In fact, wealthy Northern and Western Europeans had death rates 35 percent lower than the wealthiest Americans, whose lifespans were more like the poorest in Northern and Western Europe -- which includes countries such as France, the Netherlands, and Switzerland. "The findings are a stark reminder that even the wealthiest Americans are not shielded from the systemic issues in the US contributing to lower life expectancy, such as economic inequality or risk factors like stress, diet or environmental hazards," lead study author Irene Papanicolas, a professor of health services, policy and practice at Brown, said in a news release.... [ Read it >> ]

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Microsoft is testing a new Windows 11 feature that resizes taskbar icons dynamically like on macOS, with options to shrink icons when the taskbar is full or keep them small at all times. The Verge reports: If you're on the beta, under Taskbar settings - Taskbar behaviors, you can now select options under Show smaller taskbar buttons: Always, Never, or When taskbar is full. The third option will scale down icons so that they all can fit and not get hidden away in a second menu. The behavior appears to be similar to macOS where icons on the dock get smaller as more applications or minimized windows are added. Microsoft is also testing an update to the Start menu. "Now, it has a larger layout that includes the ability to hide the recommended recent apps and can show all of your apps on the page," reports The Verge.... [ Read it >> ]

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Google's NotebookLM has added a new "Discover sources" feature that allows users to describe a topic and have the AI find and curate relevant sources from the web -- eliminating the need to upload documents manually. "When you tap the Discover button in NotebookLM, you can describe the topic you're interested in, and NotebookLM will bring back a curated collection of relevant sources from the web," says Google software engineer Adam Bignell. Click to add those sources to your notebook; "it's a fast and easy way to quickly grasp a new concept or gather essential reading on a topic." PCMag reports: You can still add your files. NotebookLM can ingest PDFs, websites, YouTube videos, audio files, Google Docs, or Google Slides and summarize, transcribe, narrate, or convert into FAQs and study guides. "Discover sources" helps incorporate information you may not have saved. [...] The imported sources stay within the notebook you created. You can read the entire original document, ask questions about it via chat, or apply other NotebookLM features to it.... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from Techdirt: Walled Culture has been following closely Italy's poorly designed Piracy Shield system. Back in December we reported how copyright companies used their access to the Piracy Shield system to order Italian Internet service providers (ISPs) to block access to all of Google Drive for the entire country, and how malicious actors could similarly use that unchecked power to shut down critical national infrastructure. Since then, the Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA), an international, not-for-profit association representing computer, communications, and Internet industry firms, has added its voice to the chorus of disapproval. In a letter (PDF) to the European Commission, it warned about the dangers of the Piracy Shield system to the EU economy [...]. It also raised an important new issue: the fact that Italy brought in this extreme legislation without notifying the European Commission under the so-called "TRIS" procedure, which allows others to comment on possible problems [...].... [ Read it >> ]

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The Louvre Museum will discontinue its use of Nintendo 3DS XL consoles as audio guides by September 2025, replacing them with a new system. NintendoSoup reports: For several years the Louvre has been using specially dedicated New Nintendo 3DS XL consoles to give visitors an audio guided tour of the famous museum. According to the museum's official website however, it seems that the program will be discontinued in September 2025, to be replaced by a new system.... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica, written by Ryan Whitwam: Researchers at DeepMind have ... released a new technical paper (PDF) that explains how to develop AGI safely, which you can download at your convenience. It contains a huge amount of detail, clocking in at 108 pages before references. While some in the AI field believe AGI is a pipe dream, the authors of the DeepMind paper project that it could happen by 2030. With that in mind, they aimed to understand the risks of a human-like synthetic intelligence, which they acknowledge could lead to "severe harm." This work has identified four possible types of AGI risk, along with suggestions on how we might ameliorate said risks. The DeepMind team, led by company co-founder Shane Legg, categorized the negative AGI outcomes as misuse, misalignment, mistakes, and structural risks.... [ Read it >> ]

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Air conditioning will contribute more to rising global energy demand than data centers through 2030, according to an International Energy Agency. While attention has focused on computing power consumption, the IEA projects data centers will account for less than 10% of increased energy demand by 2030, significantly less than space cooling requirements. Global cooling degree days, a measure of air conditioning need, were 6% higher in 2024 than 2023 and 20% above the long-term average for the first two decades of the century. ... [ Read it >> ]

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U.S. stock markets suffered their worst day since the Covid pandemic after Donald Trump announced sweeping new tariffs, triggering a global selloff and wiping out $470 billion in value from tech giants Apple and Nvidia. From a report: The tech-heavy Nasdaq fell 6%, while the S&P 500 and the Dow dropped 4.8% and 3.9%, respectively. [...] Meanwhile, the US dollar hit a six-month low, going down at least 2.2% on Thursday morning compared with other major currencies and oil prices sank on fears of a global slowdown. Though the US stock market has been used to tumultuous mornings over the last few weeks, US stock futures -- an indication of the market's likely direction -- had plummeted after the announcement. Hours later, Japan's Nikkei index slumped to an eight-month low and was followed by falls in stock markets in London and across Europe.... [ Read it >> ]

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Intel and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. have reached a preliminary agreement to form a joint venture operating Intel's chipmaking facilities, with TSMC taking a 20% stake, The Information reports [non-paywalled source]. Intel and other U.S. semiconductor companies would hold the majority of shares in the proposed venture. Instead of capital investment, TSMC has discussed sharing chipmaking methods and training Intel personnel. ... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Microsoft's business-oriented "Link" mini-desktop PC, which connects directly to the company's Windows 365 cloud service, is now available to buy for $349.99 in the US and in several other countries. Windows 365 Link, which was announced last November, is a device that is more easily manageable by IT departments than a typical computer while also reducing the needs of hands on support.... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Oracle has told customers that a hacker broke into a computer system and stole old client log-in credentials, according to two people familiar with the matter. It's the second cybersecurity breach that the software company has acknowledged to clients in the last month. ... [ Read it >> ]

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The climate crisis is on track to destroy capitalism, a top insurer has warned, with the vast cost of extreme weather impacts leaving the financial sector unable to operate. From a report: The world is fast approaching temperature levels where insurers will no longer be able to offer cover for many climate risks, said Günther Thallinger, on the board of Allianz SE, one of the world's biggest insurance companies. He said that without insurance, which is already being pulled in some places, many other financial services become unviable, from mortgages to investments. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Climate startup Aspiration, which boasted a roster of celebrity backers and arranged carbon credits for Meta Platforms, Microsoft and other large companies, filed bankruptcy weeks after its co-founder was arrested on fraud charges. From a report: CTN Holdings, as the company is now known, has about $170 million in debt. The goal of the bankruptcy is to sell its assets as quickly as possible in order to repay creditors, chief restructuring officer Miles Staglik said in a court filing. The pool of potential bidders is small and the nature of the CTN's ventures will likely require more cash and "long term horizons before any potential value could be realized for creditors," Staglik said. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Intel has unveiled a refresh of its iconic brand identity, introducing the slogan "That's the power of Intel Inside" to reconnect with consumers and highlight the chipmaker's role in modern computing. The new campaign resurrects the familiar "Intel Inside" theme that helped transform the company into a household name in the 1990s, when Intel's marketing strategy directly targeted consumers rather than system designers. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Despite promises of more efficient streaming, the AV1 video codec hasn't achieved widespread adoption seven years after its 2018 debut, even with backing from tech giants Netflix, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, and Meta. The Alliance for Open Media (AOMedia) claims AV1 is 30% more efficient than standards like HEVC, delivering higher-quality video at lower bandwidth while remaining royalty-free. ... [ Read it >> ]

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databasecowgirl writes: Commenting in The Times on the absurdity of Meta's copyright infringement claims, Caitlin Moran defines Schrodinger's economics: where a company is both [one of] the most valuable on the planet yet also too poor to pay for the materials it profits from.
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Microsoft has pulled back on data center projects around the world, suggesting the company is taking a harder look at its plans to build the server farms powering artificial intelligence and the cloud. From a report: The software company has recently halted talks for, or delayed development of, sites in Indonesia, the UK, Australia, Illinois, North Dakota and Wisconsin, according to people familiar with the situation. Microsoft is widely seen as a leader in commercializing AI services, largely thanks to its close partnership with OpenAI. Investors closely track Microsoft's spending plans to get a sense of long-term customer demand for cloud and AI services. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Longtime Slashdot reader theodp writes: A coalition of Washington state business leaders -- which includes Microsoft President Brad Smith and Amazon Chief Legal Officer David Zapolsky -- released a letter Wednesday urging state lawmakers to reconsider recently proposed tax and budget measures. "I actually think it's an almost unprecedented outpouring of support from across the business community," said Microsoft's Smith in an interview. In their letter, which reads in part like it could have been penned by a GenAI Marie Antoinette, the WA business leaders question whether any more spending is warranted given how poorly Washington's 4th and 8th graders compare to children in the rest of the nation on test scores. The letter also laments the increase in WA's homeless population as it celebrates WA Governor Bob Ferguson's announcement that he would not sign a proposed wealth tax.... [ Read it >> ]

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The European Space Agency's short film Space Debris: Is it a Crisis? highlights the growing danger of orbital clutter, warning that "70% of the 20,000 satellites ever launched remain in space today, orbiting alongside hundreds of millions of fragments left behind by collisions, explosions and intentional destruction." Inkl reports: The approximately eight-minute-long film "Space Debris: Is it a Crisis?" attempts to answer its conjecture with supportive statistics and orbital projections. [...] The film also mentions that the kind of Earth orbit matters when discussing whether we're in a space junk "crisis" -- though unfortunately, orbits at risk appear to be those with satellites that help with communication and navigation, as well as our fight against another primarily human-driven crisis: global warming. Still, the film emphasizes that solutions ought to be thought of carefully: "True sustainability is complex, and rushed solutions risk creating the problem of burden-shifting." You can watch the film on ESA's website.... [ Read it >> ]

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Amazon and United Launch Alliance will launch 27 full-scale satellites on April 9 as part of Amazon's Project Kuiper, marking the company's first major step toward building a global satellite internet network to rival SpaceX's Starlink. GeekWire reports: ULA said the three-hour window for the Atlas V rocket's liftoff from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station's Space Launch Complex 41 in Florida is scheduled to open at noon ET (9 a.m. PT) that day. ULA is planning a live stream of launch coverage via its website starting about 20 minutes ahead of liftoff. Amazon said next week's mission -- known as Kuiper-1 or KA-1 (for Kuiper Atlas 1) -- will put 27 Kuiper satellites into orbit at an altitude of 280 miles (450 kilometers).... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from 404 Media: A "vibe coded" AI app developed by entrepreneur and Y Combinator group partner Tom Blomfield has generated recipes that gave users instruction on how to make "Cyanide Ice Cream," "Thick White Cum Soup," and "Uranium Bomb," using those actual substances as ingredients. Vibe coding, in case you are unfamiliar, is the new practice where people, some with limited coding experience, rapidly develop software with AI assisted coding tools without overthinking how efficient the code is as long as it's functional. This is how Blomfield said he made RecipeNinja.AI. [...] The recipe for Cyanide Ice Cream was still live on RecipeNinja.AI at the time of writing, as are recipes for Platypus Milk Cream Soup, Werewolf Cream Glazing, Cholera-Inspired Chocolate Cake, and other nonsense. Other recipes for things people shouldn't eat have been removed.... [ Read it >> ]

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Robotics and machine learning engineer Naveen Kul developed WattWise, a lightweight open-source CLI tool that monitors power usage via smart plugs and throttles system performance based on electricity pricing and peak hours. Tom's Hardware reports: The simple program, called WattWise, came about when Naveen built a dual-socket EPYC workstation with plans to add four GPUs. It's a power-intensive setup, so he wanted a way to monitor its power consumption using a Kasa smart plug. The enthusiast has released the monitoring portion of the project to the public now, but the portion that manages clocks and power will be released later. Unfortunately, the Kasa Smart app and the Home Assistant dashboard was inconvenient and couldn't do everything he desired. He already had a terminal window running monitoring tools like htop, nvtop, and nload, and decided to take matters into his own hands rather than dealing with yet another app.... [ Read it >> ]

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NaNoWriMo, the nonprofit behind the annual novel-writing challenge, is shutting down after 20 years but will keep its websites online temporarily so users can retrieve their content. The Guardian reports: A 27-minute YouTube video posted the same day by the organization's interim executive director Kilby Blades explained that it had to close due to ongoing financial problems, which were compounded by reputational damage. In November 2023, several community members complained to the nonprofit's board, Blades said. They believed that staff had mishandled accusations made in May 2023 that a NaNoWriMo forum moderator was grooming children on a different website. The moderator was eventually removed, though this was for unrelated code of conduct violations and occurred "many weeks" after the initial complaints. In the wake of this, community members came forward with other complaints related to child safety on the NaNoWriMo sites.... [ Read it >> ]

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A joint investigation found that at least five popular VPN apps on the App Store and Google Play have ties to Qihoo 360, a Chinese company with military links. Apple has since removed two of the apps but has not confirmed the status of the remaining three, which 9to5Mac notes have "racked up more than a million downloads." The five apps in question are Turbo VPN, VPN Proxy Master, Thunder VPN, Snap VPN, and Signal Secure VPN (not associated with the Signal messaging app). The Financial Times reports: At least five free virtual private networks (VPNs) available through the US tech groups' app stores have links to Shanghai-listed Qihoo 360, according to a new report by research group Tech Transparency Project, as well as additional findings by the Financial Times. Qihoo, formally known as 360 Security Technology, was sanctioned by the US in 2020 for alleged Chinese military links. The US Department of Defense later added Qihoo to a list of Chinese military-affiliated companies [...] In recent recruitment listings, Guangzhou Lianchuang says its apps operate in more than 220 countries and that it has 10mn daily users. It is currently hiring for a position whose responsibilities include "monitoring and analyzing platform data." The right candidate will be "well-versed in American culture," the posting says.... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: Anthropic announced on Wednesday that it's launching a new Claude for Education tier, an answer to OpenAI's ChatGPT Edu plan. The new tier is aimed at higher education, and gives students, faculty, and other staff access to Anthropic's AI chatbot, Claude, with a few additional capabilities. One piece of Claude for Education is "Learning Mode," a new feature within Claude Projects to help students develop their own critical thinking skills, rather than simply obtain answers to questions. With Learning Mode enabled, Claude will ask questions to test understanding, highlight fundamental principles behind specific problems, and provide potentially useful templates for research papers, outlines, and study guides.... [ Read it >> ]

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According to Bloomberg, India is set for a surge in tech startup IPOs valued at around $100 billion by 2027, with major players like Flipkart, PhonePe, and Oyo preparing to go public. From a report: A report from Indian investment bank The Rainmaker Group suggests that the new wave of IPO hopefuls is in a stronger financial position than their predecessors. Many of the startups that were listed during the 2021-2022 boom struggled post-IPO, with fintech firm Paytm losing roughly 63% of its value and beauty retailer Nykaa slipping 4% since going public.... [ Read it >> ]

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To mark Microsoft's 50th anniversary, Bill Gates has released the original Altair BASIC source code he co-wrote with Paul Allen, calling it the "coolest code" he's ever written and a symbol of the company's humble beginnings. Thurrott reports: "Before there was Office or Windows 95 or Xbox or AI, there was Altair BASIC," Bill Gates writes on his Gates Notes website. "In 1975, Paul Allen and I created Microsoft because we believed in our vision of a computer on every desk and in every home. Five decades later, Microsoft continues to innovate new ways to make life easier and work more productive. Making it 50 years is a huge accomplishment, and we couldn't have done it without incredible leaders like Steve Ballmer and Satya Nadella, along with the many people who have worked at Microsoft over the years."... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Europol has shut down one of the largest dark web pedophile networks in the world, prompting dozens of arrests worldwide and threatening that more are to follow. Launched in 2021, KidFlix allowed users to join for free to preview low-quality videos depicting child sex abuse materials (CSAM). To see higher-resolution videos, users had to earn credits by sending cryptocurrency payments, uploading CSAM, or "verifying video titles and descriptions and assigning categories to videos."... [ Read it >> ]

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