After years of requests, Instagram is finally releasing a dedicated iPad app on September 3rd... "But it will be slightly different than the mobile app users are accustomed to," reports The Verge. From the report: Most significantly, the iPad app will open directly to a feed of Reels, the company's TikTok competitor -- perhaps a sign of the short-form-video times. [...] Other features will be available on iPad: Stories will still line the top of the homepage, and users will be able to switch to a "Following" tab where they'll be able to swipe between feeds that more resemble the mobile Instagram experience (including a chronological option). The bigger screen means more space and fewer clicks: comments on Reels will appear next to full-size videos, and the DMs page will have your inbox alongside chats, similar to what Messenger looks like on desktop.... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from ZDNet: Over the Labor Day weekend, Cloudflare says it successfully stopped a record-breaking distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack that peaked at 11.5 terabits per second (Tbps). This came only a few months after Cloudflare blocked a then all-time high DDoS attack of 7.3 Tbps. This latest attack was almost 60% larger.... [ Read it >> ]

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U.S. workers are becoming more stressed about their rising personal debts and financial health, a Bank of America survey showed. From a report: Of the respondents polled by BofA, 47% of employed people said they had a sense of financial well-being, dropping from 52% at the start of the year. Nearly 85% of consumers carried some type of personal debt, while 26% of the workforce was seeking help in areas such as emergency savings, paying down debt, and overall financial wellness, compared with 13% in 2023, according to the May survey of more than 1,000 people working full-time.... [ Read it >> ]

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Dolby Vision 2 addresses two widespread TV viewing problems in ways that will likely divide viewers and creators. The format's Content Intelligence feature uses AI and ambient light sensors to brighten notoriously dark content like Game of Thrones' Battle of Winterfell and Apple TV+'s Silo based on room brightness. ... [ Read it >> ]

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The latest status report from the FreeBSD Project says no thanks to code generated by LLM-based assistants. From a report: The FreeBSD Project's Status Report for the second quarter of 2025 contains updates from various sub-teams that are working on improving the FreeBSD OS, including separate sub-projects such as enabling FreeBSD apps to run on Linux, Chinese translation efforts, support for Solaris-style Extended Attributes, and for Apple's legacy HFS+ file system. ... [ Read it >> ]

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The SAT is billed as "a great way to find out how prepared students are for college." If that's true, recent changes to its format offer an unflattering assessment of the country's aspiring scholars, Bloomberg's editorial board wrote Wednesday. From the piece: [...] Then the pandemic hit. As in-person exams became impractical, hundreds of schools dropped their testing requirements. The SAT and its main competitor, the ACT, lost millions of dollars in revenue. Although both recently started offering digital options, schools have been slow to reinstate their requirements. Today, more than 80% of schools remain test-optional. ... [ Read it >> ]

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For the first time in more than four years, there are fewer open jobs in the U.S. than there are job seekers. CNN: "This is a turning point for the labor market," Heather Long, chief economist at Navy Federal Credit Union, wrote Wednesday. "It's yet another crack."

The number of job openings fell to an estimated 7.18 million at the end of July, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data released Wednesday. Job openings not only are at their lowest level in 10 months, but they're also below the number of unemployed workers (at 7.2 million) for the first time since April 2021.... [ Read it >> ]

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Streameast -- the world's largest illegal sports streaming platform -- has been shut down after a year long investigation, according to a leading United States-based anti-piracy organisation. From a report: The network of 80 unauthorised domains generated 1.6billion combined visits over the past year, providing free access to global sports fixtures, including Europe's top football leagues and competitions, such as the Premier League and Champions League, as well as the NFL, NBA and MLB. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Critics are denouncing Tuesday's antitrust remedies ruling against Google, calling them inadequate to restore search market competition. DuckDuckGo said the court's decision allows Google to continue using its monopoly to hold back competitors in AI search.

The Open Markets Institute called it "pure judicial cowardice" that leaves Google's power "almost fully intact." Senator Amy Klobuchar said the limited remedies demonstrate why Congress needs to pass legislation stopping dominant platforms from preferencing their own products. The News/Media Alliance criticized Judge Amit Mehta for failing to address Google forcing publishers to provide content for AI offerings to remain in search results.... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Amazon.com must face a class action on behalf of hundreds of millions of U.S. consumers over claims that the online retail giant overcharged for products sold by third-party sellers, a federal judge in Seattle has ruled. U.S. District Judge John Chun in an order (PDF) unsealed on Friday certified a nationwide class involving 288 million customers and billions of transactions, marking one of the largest-ever in the United States.... [ Read it >> ]

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alternative_right shares a report from ScienceAlert: The insecticide chlorpyrifos is a powerful tool for controlling various pests, making it one of the most widely used pesticides during the latter half of the 20th century. Like many pesticides, however, chlorpyrifos lacks precision. In addition to harming non-target insects like bees, it has also been linked to health risks for much larger animals -- including us. Now, a new US study suggests those risks may begin before birth. Humans exposed to chlorpyrifos prenatally are more likely to exhibit structural brain abnormalities and reduced motor functions in childhood and adolescence.... [ Read it >> ]

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The world's largest iceberg is now breaking apart rapidly in warmer waters after nearly 40 years adrift. "Earlier this year, the 'megaberg' known as A23a weighed a little under a trillion tons and was more than twice the size of Greater London," reports The Guardian. "It is now less than half its original size, but still a hefty 1,770 sq km (683 sq miles) and 60km (37 miles) at its widest point..." Scientists expect it to completely disintegrate within weeks. From the report: A23a calved from the Antarctic shelf in 1986 but quickly grounded in the Weddell Sea, remaining stuck on the ocean floor for over 30 years. It finally escaped in 2020 and, like other giants before it, was carried along "iceberg alley" into the South Atlantic Ocean by the powerful Antarctic Circumpolar Current. Around March, it ran aground in shallow waters off distant South Georgia island, raising fears it could disrupt large colonies of adult penguins and seals there from feeding their young. But it dislodged in late May, and moved on. [...] Iceberg calving is a natural process. But scientists say the rate at which they were being lost from Antarctica is increasing, probably because of human induced climate change.... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Wall Street Journal: On a recent evening, a trio of Ukrainian drones flew under the cover of darkness to a Russian position and decided among themselves exactly when to strike. The assault was an example of how Ukraine is using artificial intelligence to allow groups of drones to coordinate with each other to attack Russian positions, an innovative technology that heralds the future of battle. Military experts say the so-called swarm technology represents the next frontier for drone warfare because of its potential to allow tens or even thousands of drones -- or swarms -- to be deployed at once to overwhelm the defenses of a target, be that a city or an individual military asset.... [ Read it >> ]

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A group of more than 85 scientists have issued a joint rebuttal to a recent U.S. Department of Energy report about climate change, finding it full of errors and misrepresenting climate science. NPR: The group of climate scientists found several examples where the DOE authors cherry-picked or misrepresented climate science in the agency's report. For instance, in the DOE report the authors claim that rising carbon dioxide can be a "net benefit" to U.S. agriculture, neglecting to mention the negative impacts of more heat and climate-change fueled extreme weather events on crops. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Waymo is expanding its U.S. robotaxi footprint by bringing its Jaguar I-Pace SUVs and Zeekr vans to Denver and Seattle. Testing is set to begin this week, with commercial rides expected as early as 2026. TechCrunch reports: The vehicles will be manually driven to start, before the company starts testing its autonomous tech in both cities. Waymo told TechCrunch that it hopes to start offering robotaxi trips in Denver next year and the Seattle metropolitan area "as soon as we're permitted to do so." Denver and Seattle will be two of the most extreme-weather cities that Waymo is feeling out, giving it a chance to test out its tech in snow, wind, and rain that is harder to come by in places like Phoenix. The report notes that Waymo currently operates more than 2,000 robotaxis in the U.S., concentrated in cities like San Francisco, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Austin, and Atlanta. The self-driving car company is expanding to Dallas, Miami, Washington D.C., and New York, while also "dipping its toes" in additional markets such as Philadelphia, Las Vegas, and Houston.... [ Read it >> ]

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Paramount and Activision are teaming up to produce a live-action Call of Duty movie, with Paramount promising the same blockbuster treatment it gave Top Gun: Maverick.

David Ellison, Chairman and CEO of Paramount, said in a statement: "As a lifelong fan of Call of Duty this is truly a dream come true. From the first Allied campaigns in the original Call of Duty, through Modern Warfare and Black Ops, I've spent countless hours playing this franchise that I absolutely love. Being entrusted by Activision and players worldwide to bring this extraordinary storytelling universe to the big screen is both an honor and a responsibility that we don't take lightly. We're approaching this film with the same disciplined, uncompromising commitment to excellence that guided our work on Top Gun: Maverick, ensuring it meets the exceptionally high standards this franchise and its fans deserve. I can promise that we are resolute in our mission to deliver a cinematic experience that honors the legacy of this one-in-a-million brand -- thrilling longtime fans of Call of Duty while captivating a whole new generation."... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Register: Ten vulnerabilities in Copeland controllers, which are found in thousands of devices used by the world's largest supermarket chains and cold storage companies, could have allowed miscreants to manipulate temperatures and spoil food and medicine, leading to massive supply-chain disruptions. The flaws, collectively called Frostbyte10, affect Copeland E2 and E3 controllers, used to manage critical building and refrigeration systems, such as compressor groups, condensers, walk-in units, HVAC, and lighting systems. Three received critical-severity ratings. Operational technology security firm Armis found and reported the 10 bugs to Copeland, which has since issued firmware updates that fix the flaws in both the E3 and the E2 controllers. The E2s reached their official end-of-life in October, and affected customers are encouraged to move to the newer E3 platform. Upgrading to Copeland firmware version 2.31F01 mitigates all the security issues detailed here, and the vendor recommends patching promptly.... [ Read it >> ]

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Chrome has extended its dominance in the browser wars, surpassing 70% market share on desktops while Edge, Safari, Firefox, and Opera trail far behind. Neowin reports: According to [Statcounter], in August 2025, Chrome kept on increasing its overwhelming market share, which is now above the 70% mark (70.25%, to be precise) in the desktop browser market. The gap between Chrome and its closest competitor, Microsoft Edge, is immense, with Edge holding just 11.8% (+0.01 points over the previous month). Apple's Safari is third with 6.34% (+1.04 points); Firefox has 4.94% (-0.36 points); and Opera is fifth with a modest 2.06% market share (-0.13 points).... [ Read it >> ]

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SAP will invest over 20 billion euros ($23 billion) in European sovereign cloud infrastructure over the next decade. "Innovation and sovereignty cannot be two separate things -- it needs to come together," said Thomas Saueressig, SAP's board member tasked with leading customer services and delivery. CNBC reports: The company said it was expanding its sovereign cloud offerings to include an infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) platform enabling companies to access various computing services via its data center network. IaaS is a market dominated by players like Microsoft and Amazon. It will also roll out a new on-site option that allows customers to use SAP-operated infrastructure within their own data centers. The aim of the initiative is to ensure that customer data is stored within the European Union to maintain compliance with regional data protection regulations such as the General Data Protection Regulation, or GDPR.... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: OpenAI said on Tuesday it will acquire Statsig in an all-stock deal valuing the product testing startup at about $1.1 billion based on OpenAI's current valuation of $300 billion. The ChatGPT maker will also appoint Statsig's chief executive officer, Vijaye Raji, as OpenAI's tech chief of applications, in a push to build on its artificial intelligence products amid strong competition from rivals.... [ Read it >> ]

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A federal judge spared Google from the harshest penalties in its antitrust case. The search giant can keep Chrome and avoid breaking up Android, but it has been barred from exclusive contracts and ordered to limit data sharing with rivals. CNBC reports: U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta ruled against the most severe consequences that were proposed by the U.S. Department of Justice, including selling off its Chrome browser, which provides data that helps its advertising business deliver targeted ads. "Google will not be required to divest Chrome; nor will the court include a contingent divestiture of the Android operating system in the final judgment," the decision stated. "Plaintiffs overreached in seeking forced divesture of these key assets, which Google did not use to effect any illegal restraints."... [ Read it >> ]

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An old school ransomware attack has a new twist: threatening to feed data to AI companies so it'll be added to LLM datasets. 404 Media reports: Artists&Clients is a website that connects independent artists with interested clients. Around August 30, a message appeared on Artists&Clients attributed to the ransomware group LunaLock. "We have breached the website Artists&Clients to steal and encrypt all its data," the message on the site said, according to screenshots taken before the site went down on Tuesday. "If you are a user of this website, you are urged to contact the owners and insist that they pay our ransom. If this ransom is not paid, we will release all data publicly on this Tor site, including source code and personal data of users. Additionally, we will submit all artwork to AI companies to be added to training datasets." ... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader shares a report: It's broadly understood that electric vehicles are more environmentally friendly than their counterparts that burn only gasoline. And yes -- that includes the impact of manufacturing batteries and generating power to charge them. But even then, such generalizations gloss over specifics, like which EVs are especially eco-friendly, not to mention where. The efficiency of an electric car varies greatly depending on ambient temperature, which is less compromising for gas-burning vehicles. ... [ Read it >> ]

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UK weather agency Met Office, in a blog post: Provisional Met Office statistics confirm that summer 2025 is officially the warmest summer on record for the UK. Analysis by Met Office climate scientists has also shown that a summer as hot or hotter than 2025 is now 70 times more likely than it would be in a 'natural' climate with no human caused greenhouse gas emissions. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Taylor Otwell, inventor and maintainer of popular PHP framework Laravel, is warning against overly complex code and the risks of bypassing the framework. From a report: Developers are sometimes drawn to building "cathedrals of complexity that aren't so easy to change," he said, speaking in a podcast for maintainable.fm, a series produced by Ruby on Rails consultancy Planet Argon. ... [ Read it >> ]

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For decades, the dry season in the Amazon rainforest has been getting drier. A new study, published on Tuesday, found that about 75% of the decrease in rainfall is directly linked to deforestation. From a report: The study, in Nature Communications, also found that tree loss was partly responsible for increased heat across the Amazon. Since 1985, the hottest days in the Amazon have warmed by about 2 degrees Celsius. About 16% of that increase, the researchers found, was because of deforestation. ... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader shares a report: If you're sharing an ad-free YouTube Premium or YouTube Music account with friends or family who live outside of your home, you could lose your premium privileges. Customers who lose these can still watch YouTube or listen to music with ads -- but let's be real, it's not the same. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Steam's August 2025 hardware survey shows 32GB RAM configurations reached 35.42% of users while 16GB systems fell to 41.67%, continuing a six-month trend that positions 32GB to become the dominant memory configuration among PC gamers before year's end.

Windows 11 crossed 60% adoption among Steam users. The RTX 4060 continues gaining market share despite newer RTX 5060 availability. Display resolutions at 2560x1600 pixels saw the largest growth, primarily from gaming laptops.... [ Read it >> ]

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America is becoming a nation of economic pessimists. WSJ reports: A new Wall Street Journal-NORC poll [PDF] finds that the share of people who say they have a good chance of improving their standard of living fell to 25%, a record low in surveys dating to 1987. More than three-quarters said they lack confidence that life for the next generation will be better than their own, the poll found. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Speaking of Amazon Prime, Amazon is axing the program that lets Prime members share their free shipping perk with people outside their household. The Verge: In an update to its support page, Amazon says it will cut off Prime benefit sharing on October 1st, 2025, prompting invitees who don't live with the account holder to sign up for their own subscription at a discounted $14.99 rate for an entire year (and then $14.99 per month after that). ... [ Read it >> ]

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Developer Hugo Tunius, writing in a blog post: Sideloading has been a hot topic for the last decade. Most recently, Google has announced further restrictions on the practice in Android. Many hundreds of comment threads have discussed these changes over the years. One point in particular is always made: "I should be able to run whatever code I want on hardware I own." I agree entirely with this point, but within the context of this discussion it's moot. ... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader shares a report: The United States is on the precipice of a historic, if dubious, achievement. If current trends hold, 2025 could be the first year on record in which the US population actually shrinks.

The math is straightforward. Population growth has two sources: natural increase (births minus deaths) and net immigration (arrivals minus departures). Last year, births outnumbered deaths by 519,000 people. That means any decline in net immigration in excess of half a million could push the U.S. into population decline. A recent analysis of Census data by the Pew Research Center found that between January and June, the US foreign-born population fell for the first time in decades by more than one million. While some economists have questioned the report, a separate analysis by the American Enterprise Institute predicted that net migration in 2025 could be as low as negative 525,000. In either case, annual population growth this year could easily turn negative.... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Amazon doubled its Prime Day discount sales to four days this year and touted blowout numbers days after the event. But by one critical metric, it missed the mark. Sign-ups in the U.S. failed to meet last year's total and even the company's own target, according to internal company data reviewed by Reuters. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Shenzhen-Hong Kong-Guangzhou has overtaken Tokyo-Yokohama to become the world's top cluster for innovation, the United Nations said Monday. From a report: The UN's World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) said the Chinese cluster had leapfrogged its Japanese rival in its 2025 Global Innovation Index. The change at the top of the world's 100 leading innovation clusters was down to WIPO broadening the criteria to include venture capital investments to formulate the annual rankings. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Premium bottled water is emerging as restaurants' answer to declining alcohol consumption as establishments offer curated water menus featuring bottles priced up to $25.70. La Popote in Cheshire has introduced a seven-water selection ranging from $6.75 Peak District spring water to $25.70 Portuguese Vidago, served in wine glasses at room temperature. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Google denied claims Monday that it had issued a security warning to Gmail users about a major vulnerability. The company stated that recent reports claiming a broad Gmail security alert were "entirely false." Google said its email service blocks more than 99.9% of phishing and malware attempts from reaching users' inboxes.... [ Read it >> ]

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College students have integrated generative AI into their academic routines at an unprecedented scale as 85% report usage for coursework in the past year, according to new Inside Higher Ed survey data. The majority employ AI tools for brainstorming ideas, seeking tutoring assistance, and exam preparation rather than wholesale academic outsourcing. Only 25% admitted using AI to complete assignments entirely, while 19% generated full essays. ... [ Read it >> ]

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International tourism to the United States faces an unprecedented 8.2% decline in 2025, with the World Travel and Tourism Council projecting a $12.5 billion loss in visitor spending -- the only decline among 184 economies analyzed. Canadian visitors, traditionally comprising 28% of international arrivals, have dropped by approximately 25% through July. ... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Speaking to The Logan Bartlett Show on Friday, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said the use of AI agents had enabled him to "rebalance" his headcount in the customer support division by trimming 4,000 jobs. "I've reduced it from 9,000 head to about 5,000 because I need less heads," Benioff said. Benioff called the first eight months of 2025, during which an estimated 10,000 jobs have been lost to AI, "eight of the most exciting months of my career." ... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader shares a report: The European Union will deploy additional satellites in low Earth orbit to strengthen resilience against GPS interferences and will improve capabilities to detect it, EU Defence Commissioner Andrius Kubilius said on Monday. His remarks followed an incident on Sunday in which the GPS system aboard European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen's aircraft was jammed en route to Bulgaria. Bulgarian authorities suspect the jamming was due to due to interference by Russia, an EU spokesperson said.... [ Read it >> ]

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The century-old duty-free import exemption that transformed American online shopping has ended, The Atlantic argues, closing a loophole that allowed packages valued under $800 to enter the United States without tariffs. The de minimis threshold, raised from $200 in 2016, processed millions of daily shipments directly from overseas sellers to American consumers. ... [ Read it >> ]

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Some Microsoft Azure customers have had a worrying few days after a problematic account migration caused forecast costs for the cloud service to skyrocket, triggering budget alerts.

An alarmed Register reader got in touch after receiving warnings from Azure's automated systems that they had significantly exceeded their budgets, and a glance at Microsoft's support forums indicates their issue was not isolated. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Americans are having a record low amount of sex -- even less than they did during the Covid-19 pandemic -- according to a new study led by researchers at the Institute for Family Studies. WSJ: This continues the downward shift in sexual activity that has been worrying sociologists and psychologists for decades. For the report, called "The Sex Recession," researchers at the IFS analyzed the data on sex and intimacy in the latest General Social Survey produced by NORC at the University of Chicago, which was collected in 2024 and released in May. They found that just 37% of people age 18-64 reported having sex at least once a week, down from 55% in 1990. The decline is even more striking for young adults: Almost a quarter of people age 18-29, or 24%, said they had not had sex in the past year; this is twice as many as in 2010. ... [ Read it >> ]

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Waymo robotaxis are repeatedly selecting identical parking spots in front of specific Los Angeles and Arizona homes between rides, puzzling residents who document the same vehicles returning to precise locations daily. The company states its vehicles choose parking based on local regulations, existing vehicle distribution, and proximity to high-demand areas but cannot explain the algorithmic specificity. ... [ Read it >> ]

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A review of published meta-analyses examining protein supplementation found no evidence supporting intake beyond 1.6 grams per kilogram of body weight daily, according to an analysis by cardiologist Eric Topol. The review examined multiple randomized controlled trials encompassing thousands of participants. The most widely cited Morton study, which included 1,863 participants across 49 trials, showed no statistically significant benefit at higher protein levels, with a p-value of 0.079. ... [ Read it >> ]

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PC Gamer reports:

The Diablo team is the next in line to unionize at Blizzard. Over 450 developers across multiple disciplines have voted to form a union under the Communications Workers of America (CWA), and they're now the fourth major Blizzard team to do so... A wave of unions have formed at Blizzard in the last year, including the World of Warcraft, Overwatch, and Story and Franchise Development teams. Elsewhere at Microsoft, Bethesda, ZeniMax Online Studios and ZeniMax QA testers have also unionized... ... [ Read it >> ]

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"Typically when something is available to "buy," ownership of that good or access to that service is offered in exchange for money," writes Ars Technica.
"That's not really the case, though, when it comes to digital content."

Often, streaming services like Amazon Prime Video offer customers the options to "rent" digital content for a few days or to "buy" it. Some might think that picking "buy" means that they can view the content indefinitely. But these purchases are really just long-term licenses to watch the content for as long as the streaming service has the right to distribute it — which could be for years, months, or days after the transaction. A lawsuit recently filed against Prime Video challenges this practice and accuses the streaming service of misleading customers by labeling long-term rentals as purchases. The conclusion of the case could have implications for how streaming services frame digital content... ... [ Read it >> ]

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"I have no musical talent at all," says Oliver McCann. "I can't sing, I can't play instruments, and I have no musical background at all!"

But the Associated Press describes 37-year-old McCann as a British "AI music creator" — and last month McCann signed with an independent record label "after one of his tracks racked up 3 million streams, in what's billed as the first time a music label has inked a contract with an AI music creator."... [ Read it >> ]

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"Nearly 400 students, many of them entrepreneurs, have so far made the journey to Forest City to study everything from coding to unconventional theories on statehood," reports Bloomberg.

"They're building crypto projects, fine-tuning their physiques and testing whether a shared ideology — rather than just shared territory — can bind a community."... [ Read it >> ]

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Futurism reports:

Earlier this week, buried in the middle of a lengthy blog post addressing ChatGPT's propensity for severe mental health harms, OpenAI admitted that it's scanning users' conversations and reporting to police any interactions that a human reviewer deems sufficiently threatening. ... [ Read it >> ]

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