An anonymous reader quotes a report from Phys.org: In a first-of-its-kind experiment, engineers at the University of Pennsylvania brought quantum networking out of the lab and onto commercial fiber-optic cables using the same Internet Protocol (IP) that powers today's web. Reported in Science, the work shows that fragile quantum signals can run on the same infrastructure that carries everyday online traffic. The team tested their approach on Verizon's campus fiber-optic network. The Penn team's tiny "Q-chip" coordinates quantum and classical data and, crucially, speaks the same language as the modern web. That approach could pave the way for a future "quantum internet," which scientists believe may one day be as transformative as the dawn of the online era.

Quantum signals rely on pairs of "entangled" particles, so closely linked that changing one instantly affects the other. Harnessing that property could allow quantum computers to link up and pool their processing power, enabling advances like faster, more energy-efficient AI or designing new drugs and materials beyond the reach of today's supercomputers. Penn's work shows, for the first time on live commercial fiber, that a chip can not only send quantum signals but also automatically correct for noise, bundle quantum and classical data into standard internet-style packets, and route them using the same addressing system and management tools that connect everyday devices online. "By showing an integrated chip can manage quantum signals on a live commercial network like Verizon's, and do so using the same protocols that run the classical internet, we've taken a key step toward larger-scale experiments and a practical quantum internet," says Liang Feng, Professor in Materials Science and Engineering (MSE) and in Electrical and Systems Engineering (ESE), and the Science paper's senior author.

"This feels like the early days of the classical internet in the 1990s, when universities first connected their networks," added Robert Broberg, a doctoral student in ESE and co-author of the paper. "That opened the door to transformations no one could have predicted. A quantum internet has the same potential."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/29/0043214/engineers-send-quantum-signals-with-standard-internet-protocol?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Состоялся открытый релиз документального фильма « [ Python: The Documentary ]( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfH4QL4VqJ0 ) » про историю развития популярного языка программирования, созданный CultRepo.

«Это история самого любимого в мире языка программирования: Python. То, что начиналось как сторонний проект в Амстердаме в 1990-х годах, превратилось в программное обеспечение, лежащее в основе искусственного интеллекта, науки о данных и некоторых крупнейших компаний мира. Но будущее Python было неопределённым. В какой‑то момент он едва не исчез. В этом 90-минутном документальном фильме с Гвидо ван Россумом, Трэвисом Олифантом, Барри Варшавой и многими другими основные участники проекта рассказывают историю становления Python, его развития под влиянием сообщества, конфликтов, которые едва не разрушили его, и влияния языка на... ну... всё», — пояснили в CultRepo.

Также в сети доступна видеозапись [ ключевого доклада ]( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sf2AqQ5a38Y ) по этому событию и ответов на вопросы на EuroPython.

Ранее авторы индекса TIOBE [ опубликовали ]( https://habr.com/ru/news/937856/ ) августовский рейтинг популярных языков программирования.

«В [ прошлом месяце ]( https://habr.com/ru/news/927392/ ) Python достиг наивысшего рейтинга среди языков программирования за всю историю индекса TIOBE. Мы думали, что Python уже не сможет расти дальше, но ИИ‑помощники по программированию позволили Python сделать ещё один шаг вперёд. Согласно недавним исследованиям Стэнфордского университета, ИИ‑помощники по программированию, такие как Microsoft Copilot, Cursor или Google Gemini Code Assist, на 20% эффективнее при использовании для популярных языков программирования. Причина очевидна: для этих языков доступно больше кода для обучения базовых моделей. Эта тенденция прослеживается и в индексе TIOBE, где мы видим консолидацию языков в верхних строках. Зачем начинать изучать новый малоизвестный язык, для которого недоступен ИИ‑помощник? Это современный способ сказать, что вы не хотите изучать новый язык, который плохо документирован и/или имеет слишком мало библиотек, которые могут вам помочь», — [ пояснил ]( https://www.techrepublic.com/article/news-tiobe-commentary-august/ ) генеральный директор Tiobe Пол Янсен.

22 июля 2025 года состоялся выпуск Python 3.14 RC1 (release candidate 1) с официальной поддержкой Free-threaded Python. Выпуск Python 3.14 RC2 ожидается в конце августа. Стабильный релиз языка программирования Python 3.14 намечен на 7 октября 2025 года. Выпуск Python 3.13 случился 7 октября 2024 года.

https://www.linux.org.ru/news/opensource/18064172

Опубликованы новые сборки FreedomBox Trixie, переведённые на пакетную базу Debian 13. Проектом развивается система для простого развёртывания персональных серверов, обеспечивающих защиту персональных данных пользователей и позволяющих быстро запустить на своём оборудовании типовые сервисы, которые могут применяться для личного использования. Все развиваемые проектом наработки доступны через репозитории Debian. Установочный образ сформирован для архитектуры x86_64 (формирование сборок i386 прекращено). При желании можно создать собственный образ при помощи специального инсталлятора Freedom-Maker и конфигуратора freedombox-setup.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=63794

Taco Bell's rollout of AI-powered drive-thru assistants has run into problems, with glitches and trolls gaming the system by making absurd orders like thousands of water cups. It's so bad that the company is reconsidering where and how to deploy the tech, admitting it may not work well in "super busy" restaurants. "We're learning a lot, I'm going to be honest with you," Dane Mathews, Taco Bell's chief digital and technology officer, told the WSJ. "I think like everybody, sometimes it lets me down, but sometimes it really surprises me." The Verge reports: Since announcing plans to put AI in the drive-thru last year, Taco Bell has deployed the tech in over 500 locations across the US, according to the WSJ. Other fast-food chains are experimenting with AI, too, including McDonald's, Wendy's, and White Castle. Mathews tells the outlet that while the company still plans on pushing ahead with AI voice technology and evaluating the data, he's discovered that using AI exclusively in certain situations, like a drive-thru for "super busy restaurants with long lines," might not be such a great idea after all.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://slashdot.org/story/25/08/29/0037244/taco-bells-ai-drive-thru-plan-gets-caught-up-on-trolls-and-glitches?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Опубликован выпуск дистрибутива MODICIA 6.12.41, основанного на пакетной базе Debian и предлагающего подборку приложений для музыкантов, дизайнеров и создателей видео. Пользовательское окружение построено с использованием среды рабочего стола Cinnamon. Проектом поддерживается каталог приложений, насчитывающий около 1000 пакетов. Размер iso-образа, способного запускаться в live-режиме, - 4.7 ГБ (x86_64).

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=63793

Longtime Slashdot reader cristiroma shares a report from New Atlas: Wouldn't it be great if the plants in your home could do more than just sit there looking pretty? Researchers at South China Agricultural University in the city of Guangzhou have found a way to upgrade them into soft glowing night lights in a range of hues, with the use of nanoparticles. The team developed a light-emitting phosphor compound that enabled succulents with fleshy leaves to charge in sunlight or indoor LED light in just a couple of minutes, and then emit a soft uniform glow that lasts up to two hours. The afterglow phosphor compound -- which is similar to those found in glow-in-the-dark toys -- is inexpensive, biocompatible, and negates the need for more complex methods of infusing bioluminescence in plants, like genetic modification. It simply gets injected into the leaves.

[...] Beyond modifying a commercial compound for this project, the team also had to figure out the right size for the phosphor particles so they'd work as intended inside plants. Shuting Liu, first author on the study that appeared in Matter this week, noted, "Smaller, nano-sized particles move easily within the plant but are dimmer. Larger particles glowed brighter but couldn't travel far inside the plant." Through extensive testing, the researchers arrived at an optimal size of around 7 micrometers, about the width of a red blood cell. They also determined through experimentation that the particles worked best in succulents, rather than plants with thinner leaves like bok choy.

Once they'd landed on the right particle size, loading concentration, and plant type, the team found that the phosphor material diffused into succulent leaves almost instantly, and uniformly lit up entire leaves -- enough to illuminate nearby objects. The scientists were also able to create modified phosphors that glowed in colors like green, red, and blue. That could make for novel indoor or garden decor, as well as pathway lighting. These luminous plants also don't cost much -- according to Liu, "Each plant takes about 10 minutes to prepare and costs a little over 10 yuan (about $1.4), not including labor." Over the course of 10 days, the injected plants didn't show any signs of damage, yellowing, structural integrity, or even reduced levels of chlorophyll.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://science.slashdot.org/story/25/08/29/0030247/nanoparticles-turn-houseplants-into-night-lights?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

TOP10 VISITORS:

[1] 37.252.14.x point=144 web=0 up=24.9MB (48%) <--- ake (6/hr)
[2] Google point=1 web=740 up=7.2MB (14%) <--- Google
[3] PetalBot point=2 web=1024 up=6.0MB (11%) <--- PetalBot
[4] 65.21.113.x point=0 web=67 up=3.3MB (6%)
[5] 216.73.216.x point=0 web=209 up=2.9MB (5%)
[6] 144.76.33.x point=0 web=41 up=2.0MB (3%)
[7] Amazon point=0 web=85 up=1.4MB (2%)
[8] Facebook point=0 web=102 up=1.0MB (1%)
[9] 217.114.158.x point=25 web=0 up=0.9MB (1%) <--- fox (1/hr)
[10] 105.159.149.x point=0 web=9 up=0.1MB (<1%)

TOTAL TRAFFIC: 50MB

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CBS News: They look, move and even smell like the kind of furry Everglades marsh rabbit a Burmese python would love to eat. But these bunnies are robots meant to lure the giant invasive snakes out of their hiding spots. It's the latest effort by the South Florida Water Management District to eliminate as many pythons as possible from the Everglades, where they are decimating native species with their voracious appetites. In Everglades National Park, officials say the snakes have eliminated 95% of small mammals as well as thousands of birds. "Removing them is fairly simple. It's detection. We're having a really hard time finding them," said Mike Kirkland, lead invasive animal biologist for the water district. "They're so well camouflaged in the field."

The water district and University of Florida researchers deployed 120 robot rabbits this summer as an experiment. Previously, there was an effort to use live rabbits as snake lures but that became too expensive and time-consuming, Kirkland said. The robots are simple toy rabbits, but retrofitted to emit heat, a smell and to make natural movements to appear like any other regular rabbit. "They look like a real rabbit," Kirkland said. They are solar powered and can be switched on and off remotely. They are placed in small pens monitored by a video camera that sends out a signal when a python is nearby. "Then I can deploy one of our many contractors to go out and remove the python," Kirkland said. The total cost per robot rabbit is about $4,000, financed by the water district, he added.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/217230/florida-deploys-robot-rabbits-to-control-invasive-burmese-python-population?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Amtrak's new 160 mph tilting Acela trains have debuted on the Northeast Corridor, offering smoother rides, upgraded interiors, faster Wi-Fi, and 27% more seating capacity. However, "they don't complete the journey any faster than the old trains," reports The Independent. From the report: Acela runs from Washington, DC's Union Station to Boston via Philadelphia, New York Penn Station, New Haven, and Providence. It's a total distance of 457 miles, with the fastest next-gen Acela journey being six hours and 43 minutes, five minutes slower than the quickest end-to-end time offered by the old Acela trains, introduced in 2000. However, this may be because, as is common practice with new trains the world over, Amtrak is scheduling longer dwell times at stations so staff and passengers can adjust to them. The next-gen sets have a top service speed that's 10mph faster -- though this can only be achieved on certain sections of the mostly 110mph route -- and an enhanced "anticipative" tilting system that allows for higher speeds through curves.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/2128257/amtraks-new-160mph-acela-trains-take-just-as-long-as-the-old-ones?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Today, Microsoft unveiled two in-house AI models: MAI-Voice-1, a high-speed speech-generation system now live in Copilot, and MAI-1-Preview, its first end-to-end foundation model trained on 15,000 H100 GPUs. Neowin reports: MAI-Voice-1 is a speech generation model and is already available in Copilot Daily and Podcasts. To preview the full capabilities of this voice model, Microsoft has created a new Copilot Labs experience that anyone can try today. With the Copilot Audio Expressions experience, users can just paste text content and select the voice, style, and mode to generate high-fidelity, expressive audio. They can also download the generated audio if required. Microsoft also highlighted that this MAI-Voice-1 model is very fast and efficient. In fact, it can generate a full minute of audio in under a second on a single GPU.

Second, Microsoft has begun public testing of MAI-1-preview on LMArena, a popular platform for community model evaluation. This represents MAI's first foundation model trained end-to-end and offers a glimpse of future offerings inside Copilot. They are actively spinning the flywheel to deliver improved models and will have much more to share in the coming months. MAI-1-preview is an MoE (mixture-of-experts) model, pre-trained and post-trained on nearly 15,000 NVIDIA H100 GPUs. Notably, MAI-1-preview is Microsoft's first foundation model trained end-to-end in-house. Microsoft claims that this model is better at following instructions and can offer helpful responses to everyday user questions. Microsoft will be rolling out this new model to certain text use cases within Copilot over the coming weeks.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/2058255/microsoft-reveals-two-in-house-ai-models?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Microsoft is testing new Xbox Game Pass features with Insiders, letting Core and Standard subscribers stream cloud-enabled titles they own or access via subscription across more devices, including supported TVs and browsers. These tiers will also gain access to select PC game versions for the first time. From a Xbox blog post: We're always exploring more ways to make your Xbox experience centered around you -- your content, benefits, and playstyle. That's why we're making it easier to enjoy the games you love, wherever you are, and on any device. Starting today, Xbox Insiders are invited to try out new updates in Xbox Game Pass that make it easier to stream and play across more devices.

Xbox Insiders subscribed to Xbox Game Pass Core or Standard now have even more freedom to play wherever they are with Xbox Cloud Gaming (Beta). As part of this Insider experience, Xbox Game Pass Core and Standard subscribers will be able to stream cloud playable games included with their subscription or select cloud playable games they own, making it easier to jump in from any supported device. [...] We're expanding the ways players can experience PC gaming through Xbox Game Pass. As part of testing, Xbox Insiders subscribed to Game Pass Core or Standard will for the first time gain access to PC versions of select titles, giving you even more flexibility and the choice to play on a PC or Windows handheld."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://games.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/1827215/microsoft-expands-xbox-cloud-gaming-to-cheaper-game-pass-tiers?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Stellantis has put its fully developed Level 3 driver-assistance system on hold due to high costs, technical hurdles, and weak consumer demand. Reuters reports: As recently as February, Stellantis said its in-house system, which is part of the AutoDrive program, was ready for deployment and a key pillar of its strategy. The company said the system, which enables drivers to have their hands off the wheel and eyes off the road under certain conditions, would allow them to temporarily watch movies, catch up on emails, or read books. That Level 3 software was never launched, the company confirmed to Reuters. But it stopped short of saying that the program was canceled.

"What was unveiled in February 2025 was L3 technology for which there is currently limited market demand, so this has not been launched, but the technology is available and ready to be deployed," a Stellantis spokesperson said. The three sources, however, said that the program was put on ice and is not expected to be deployed. When asked how much time and money was lost on the initiative, Stellantis declined to say, responding that the work done on AutoDrive will help support its future versions. [...] Stellantis said it is leaning on aiMotive, a tech startup it acquired in 2022, to deliver the next generation of the AutoDrive program. Stellantis declined to say when that program would be ready for market or if it would include Level 3 capability.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/2052249/stellantis-shelves-level-3-driver-assistance-program?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

FFmpeg 8.0 brings GPU-accelerated video encoding via Vulkan -- and can now subtitle your videos automatically using integrated speech recognition. From a report: At the start of the week, the FFmpeg project released its eighth major version. It's codenamed "Huffman" after the Huffman code algorithm, which was invented in 1952, making it one of the oldest lossless compression algorithms.

[...] The changelog lists 30 significant changes, of which the top new feature is integrating Whisper. This means whisper.cpp, which is Georgi Gerganov's entirely local and offline version of OpenAI's Whisper automatic speech recognition model. The bottom line is that FFmpeg can now automatically subtitle videos for you.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/1844210/ffmpeg-8-can-now-subtitle-your-videos-on-the-fly?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Microsoft's Copilot AI assistant is officially coming to TVs, starting with Samsung's 2025 lineup of TVs and smart monitors. With the integration, you can call upon Copilot and ask for movie suggestions, spoiler-free episode recaps, and other general questions.

On TV, Copilot takes on a "friendly, animated presence" that resembles the opalescent Copilot Appearance Microsoft showed off last month, though in a color that makes it look more like a personified chickpea. The beige blob will float and bounce around your screen, while its mouth moves in line with its responses.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/1823233/microsofts-copilot-ai-is-now-inside-samsung-tvs-and-monitors?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Police Scotland and the Scottish Police Authority (SPA) are pressing ahead with a Microsoft Office 365 rollout despite Microsoft refusing to disclose where sensitive law enforcement data will be processed. Freedom of Information documents reveal that Microsoft cannot guarantee data sovereignty, may process data in "hostile" jurisdictions, retains encryption key control, and blocks vetting of overseas staff -- all leaving the force unable to comply with strict Part 3 data protection rules. Slashdot reader Mirnotoriety shares an excerpt from a Computer Weekly article: "MS is unable to specify what data originating from SPA will be processed outside the UK for support functions," said the SPA in a detailed data protection impact assessment (DPIA) created for its use of O365. "To try and mitigate this risk, SPA asked to see ... [the transfer risk assessments] for the countries used by MS where there is no [data] adequacy. MS declined to provide the assessments." The SPA DPIA also confirms that, on top of refusing to provide key information, Microsoft itself has told the police watchdog it is unable to guarantee the sovereignty of policing data held and processed within its O365 infrastructure.

"Microsoft states in their own risk factors that O365 is not designed for processing the data that will be ingested by SPA," said the DPIA, adding that while the system can be configured in ways that would allow the processing of "high-value" policing data, "that bar is high." It further added that while Microsoft previously agreed to make a number of changes to the data processing addendum (DPAdd) being used for Police Scotland's Azure-based Digital Evidence Sharing Capability (DESC) -- the nature of which is still unclear -- Microsoft has advised that "O365 operates in a completely different manner and there is currently no way to guarantee data sovereignty." It further noted that while a similar "ancillary document, like that provided ... via the DESC project" could afford "some level of assurance" for international transfers generally, it would still fall short of Part 3 requirements to set out exactly which types of data are processed and how.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/1815208/microsoft-refuses-to-divulge-data-flows-to-police-scotland?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Imgur users have flooded the image-hosting site's front page with pictures of John Oliver giving the middle finger to parent company MediaLab AI. The revolt follows staff layoffs that eliminated human moderators and the breakdown of core site functions including video playback for non-logged-in users and failed image uploads.

A former employee confirmed MediaLab AI laid off Imgur's moderation team without notice and reassigned remaining staff to other projects. The company acquired Imgur in 2021 after founder Alan Schaaf departed. MediaLab AI faces lawsuits from Schaaf and other former site owners over allegedly withheld acquisition payments.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/1816210/imgurs-community-is-in-full-revolt-against-its-owner?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

A central Japanese town wants to limit smartphone use for all its 69,000 residents to two hours a day, in a move that has sparked intense debate on device addiction. From a report: The proposal, believed to be the first of its kind in Japan, is currently being debated by lawmakers after being submitted by Toyoake municipal government in Aichi earlier this week. Toyoake's mayor said the proposal -- which only applies outside of work and study -- would not be strictly enforced, but rather was meant to "encourage" residents to better manage their screen time.

There will be no penalties for breaking the rule, which will be passed in October if approved by lawmakers. "The two hour limit... is merely a guideline... to encourage citizens," Toyoake Mayor Masafumi Koki said in a statement. "This does not mean the city will limit its residents' rights or impose duties," he said.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/186258/japanese-town-proposes-two-hour-daily-limit-on-smartphones?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick announced that the Department of Commerce will begin publishing GDP statistics on the blockchain, touting it as part of President Trump's push to make America a "crypto government." CoinTelegraph reports: Lutnick made the announcement during a White House cabinet meeting on Tuesday, describing the effort as a move to expand blockchain-based data distribution across government agencies. Speaking to US President Donald Trump and other government officials, he said: "The Department of Commerce is going to start issuing its statistics on the blockchain, because you are the crypto president, and we are going to put our GDP on the blockchain so people can use it for data and distribution." Lutnick said the initiative will begin with GDP figures and could expand across federal departments after the Commerce Department finishes "ironing out all of the details" for the implementation.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://yro.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/182244/us-to-publish-economic-data-on-blockchain-commerce-chief-says?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: Credit reporting giant TransUnion has disclosed a data breach affecting more than 4.4 million customers' personal information. In a filing with Maine's attorney general's office on Thursday, TransUnion attributed the July 28 breach to unauthorized access of a third-party application storing customers' personal data for its U.S. consumer support operations.

TransUnion claimed "no credit information was accessed," but provided no immediate evidence for its claim. The data breach notice did not specify what specific types of personal data were stolen. In a separate data breach disclosure filed later on Thursday with Texas' attorney general's office, TransUnion confirmed that the stolen personal information includes customers' names, dates of birth, and Social Security numbers. [...] It's not clear who is behind the breach at TransUnion, or if the hackers made any demands to the company.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://it.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/1758241/transunion-says-hackers-stole-44-million-customers-personal-information?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Anthropic will start training its AI models on user data, including new chat transcripts and coding sessions, unless users choose to opt out. The Verge: It's also extending its data retention policy to five years -- again, for users that don't choose to opt out. All users will have to make a decision by September 28th. For users that click "Accept" now, Anthropic will immediately begin training its models on their data and keeping said data for up to five years, according to a blog post published by Anthropic on Thursday.

The setting applies to "new or resumed chats and coding sessions." Even if you do agree to Anthropic training its AI models on your data, it won't do so with previous chats or coding sessions that you haven't resumed. But if you do continue an old chat or coding session, all bets are off.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://yro.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/1643241/anthropic-will-start-training-its-ai-models-on-chat-transcripts?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Every breath people take in their homes or car probably contains significant amounts of microplastics small enough to burrow deep into lungs, new peer-reviewed research finds, bringing into focus a little understood route of exposure and health threat. The Guardian: The study, published in the journal Plos One, estimates humans can inhale as much as 68,000 tiny plastic particles daily. Previous studies have identified larger pieces of airborne microplastics, but those are not as much of a health threat because they do not hang in the air as long, or move as deep into the pulmonary system.

The smaller bits measure between 1 and 10 micrometers, or about one-seventh the thickness of a human hair, and present more of a health threat because they can more easily be distributed throughout the body. The findings "suggest that the health impacts of microplastic inhalation may be more substantial than we realize," the authors wrote.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://science.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/1316211/humans-inhale-as-much-as-68000-microplastic-particles-daily-study-finds?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Solo entrepreneurs now launch 35% of all startups, double the rate from a decade ago, yet venture capital funding patterns remain virtually unchanged, according to an analysis by venture capitalist Sajith Pai. Carta's equity management data reveals that while solo-founded companies grew from 17% of 2,600 startups in 2015 to 35% of 3,800 startups in 2024, their share of VC funding barely moved from 15 to 17%.

"Valley VCs don't like solo founders," Pai, who is a partner at India-based venture firm Blume, writes in his analysis. Y Combinator CEO Garry Tan confirmed the accelerator's practice of persuading solo founders to find partners after acceptance.The bias persists despite prominent solo-founded successes including Amazon, SpaceX, and Zoom. Pai notes that "most unicorn startups have cofounders" but questions whether this reflects genuine risk differences or simply that cofounded startups receive five times more funding opportunities. "The bias against solo founders is so strong," Pai observes, that it appears repeatedly in founder complaints and venture capitalist commentary, even as other Silicon Valley biases against women and non-elite universities gradually ease.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/1540255/solo-founders-are-battling-silicon-valleys-biggest-bias?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Typepad, which launched in 2003 to make it easier for the masses to start their blogging journey, is shutting down. From a blog post: We have made the difficult decision to discontinue Typepad, effective September 30, 2025. After September 30, 2025, access to Typepad -- including account management, blogs, and all associated content -- will no longer be available. Your account and all related services will be permanently deactivated. Please note that after this date, you will no longer be able to access or export any blog content.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/122253/typepad-is-shutting-down?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Компания VK опубликовала версию мессенджера MAX для платформы Linux. Сборки доступны в пакетах RPM (79 МБ) и DEB (92 МБ), а также в форме самодостаточного образа в формате AppImage (114 МБ), который можно запустить без установки в систему. Версия для Linux построена на основе платформы Electron, использующий браузерный движок Chromium.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=63791

An anonymous reader shares a report: Over half of the British public are worried about the impact of AI on their jobs, according to employment unions, which want the UK government to adopt a "worker first" strategy rather than simply allowing corporations to ditch employees for algorithms. The Trades Union Congress (TUC), a federation of trade unions in England and Wales, says it found that people are concerned about the way AI is being adopted by businesses and want a say in how the technology is used at their workplace and the wider economy.

It warns that without such a "worker-first plan," use of "intelligent" algorithms could lead to even greater social inequality in the country, plus the kind of civil unrest that goes along with that. The TUC says it wants conditions attached to the tens of billions in public money being spent on AI research and development to ensure that workers are supported and retrained rather than deskilled or replaced. It also wants guardrails in place so that workers are protected from "AI harms" at work, rules to ensure workers are involved in deciding how machine learning is used, and for the government to provide support for those who euphemistically "experience job transitions" as a result of AI disruption.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/1156233/uk-unions-want-worker-first-plan-for-ai-as-people-fear-for-their-jobs?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Apple has warned that "EU-style rules" proposed by the UK competition watchdog "are bad for users and bad for developers." From a report: It says EU laws -- which have sought to make it easier for smaller firms to compete with big tech -- have resulted in some Apple features and enhancements being delayed for European users. It argues the UK risks similar hold-ups if the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) pushes ahead with plans designed to open up markets the regulator says is too dominated by Apple and Google.

[...] The CMA wants UK app makers to be able to use and exchange data with Apple's mobile technology -- something called "interoperability." Without it, app makers cannot create the full range of innovative products and services, it argues. Apple claims under EU interoperability rules it has received over 100 requests -- some from big tech rivals -- demanding access to sensitive user data, including sensitive information Apple itself cannot access. It argues the rules are effectively allowing other firms to demand its data and intellectual property for free.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://apple.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/1149224/apple-warns-uk-against-introducing-tougher-tech-regulation?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

The Sixteen Thirty Fund, a liberal dark money organization, is paying Democratic influencers up to $8,000 monthly through its Chorus Creator Incubator Program, Wired reports. Contracts prohibit participants from disclosing their payments or identifying funders, the publication added. The program launched last month includes over 90 creators with a collective audience exceeding 40 million followers. Influencers must attend advocacy trainings and messaging check-ins while Chorus retains approval rights over political content made with program resources. The Sixteen Thirty Fund distributed over $400 million to left-leaning causes in 2020.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://politics.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/1135244/a-dark-money-group-is-secretly-funding-high-profile-democratic-influencers?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Apple has removed the iPhone torrenting client, iTorrent, from AltStore PAL's alternative iOS marketplace in the EU, showing that it can still exert control over apps that aren't listed on the official App Store. iTorrent developer Daniil Vinogradov told TorrentFreak that Apple has revoked his distribution rights to publish apps in any alternative iOS stores, so the issue isn't tied to AltStore PAL itself.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://apple.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/1125221/apple-pulls-iphone-torrent-app-from-altstore-pal-in-europe?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Разработчики проекта openSUSE представили инсталлятор Agama 17, разрабатываемый для замены классического интерфейса установки SUSE и openSUSE, и примечательный отделением пользовательского интерфейса от внутренних компонентов YaST. Agama поддерживает использование различных фронтэндов, например, фронтэнда для управления установкой через web-интерфейс. Код компонентов инсталлятора распространяется под лицензией GPLv2 и написан на языках Ruby, Rust и JavaScript/TypeScript.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=63790

alternative_right shares a report from ScienceAlert: When's the last time you settled down with a good book, just because you enjoyed it? A new survey shows reading as a pastime is becoming dramatically less popular in the U.S., which correlates with an increased consumption of other digital media, like social media and streaming services. The survey was carried out by researchers from the University of Florida and the University of London, and charts a 40 percent decrease in daily reading for pleasure across the years 2003-2023, based on responses from 236,270 US adults.

"This is not just a small dip -- it's a sustained, steady decline of about 3 percent per year," says Jill Sonke, director for the Center for the Arts in Medicine at the University of Florida. "It's significant, and it's deeply concerning." The number of US people reading for pleasure every day peaked in 2004 at 28 percent, the researchers found, but by 2023 this was down to 16 percent. There was a silver lining though: those people who are still reading are reading for slightly longer on average.

Reading habits aren't changing across the board. The drops in reading for pleasure were higher in Black Americans, especially those with lower income, education levels, and who lived outside of cities. That speaks to problems beyond the rise of smartphones, tablets, and other screens, according to the researchers. Different life situations are leading to disparities in accessibility that don't help promote reading as a pastime. "Our digital culture is certainly part of the story," says Sonke. "But there are also structural issues -- limited access to reading materials, economic insecurity and a national decline in leisure time. If you're working multiple jobs or dealing with transportation barriers in a rural area, a trip to the library may just not be feasible." The findings have been published in the journal iScience.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/08/27/233214/reading-for-fun-is-plummeting-in-the-us-and-experts-are-concerned?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader shares a report: German banks blocked PayPal payments totalling more than 10 billion euros ($11.7 billion) over fraud concerns, the Sueddeutsche Zeitung newspaper reported on Wednesday, without specifying its sources. The payments were halted on Monday after lenders flagged millions of suspicious direct debits from PayPal that appeared last week, the newspaper said. Asked to comment on the report, a PayPal spokesperson said a temporary service interruption had affected "certain transactions from our banking partners and potentially their customers", but that the issue had now been resolved.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://it.slashdot.org/story/25/08/28/0331245/german-banks-halted-10-billion-euros-in-paypal-payments-on-fraud-concerns-says-newspaper?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

20 августа [ состоялся ]( https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2025/08/20/libreoffice-25-8/ ) выпуск 25.8 кроссплатформенного набора офисных приложений [ LibreOffice ]( https://www.libreoffice.org ) .

Это стабильная версия с улучшением пользовательского интерфейса, новыми функциями электронных таблиц и более быстрой загрузкой файлов.

( [ читать дальше... ]( https://www.linux.org.ru/news/office/18063157#cut ) )

A U.S.-China research team has developed the world's first one-step process to convert mixed plastic waste into gasoline and hydrochloric acid with up to 95-99% efficiency, all at room temperature and ambient pressure. InterestingEngineering reports: As the authors put it, "The method supports a circular economy by converting diverse plastic waste into valuable products in a single step." To carry out the conversion, the team combines plastic waste with light isoalkanes, hydrocarbon byproducts available from refinery processes. According to the paper, the process yields "gasoline range" hydrocarbons, mainly molecules with six to 12 carbons, which are the primary component of gasoline. The recovered hydrochloric acid can be safely neutralized and reused as a raw material, potentially displacing several high-temperature, energy-intensive production routes described in the paper. "We present here a strategy for upgrading discarded PVC into chlorine-free fuel range hydrocarbons and [hydrochloric acid] in a single-stage process," the researchers said. Reported conversion efficiencies underscore the potential for real-world use. At 86 degrees Fahrenheit (30 degrees Celsius), the process reached 95 percent conversion for soft PVC pipes and 99 percent for rigid PVC pipes and PVC wires.

In tests that mixed PVC materials with polyolefin waste, the method achieved a 96 percent solid conversion efficiency at 80 degrees Celsius (176 degrees Fahrenheit). The team describes the approach as applicable beyond laboratory-clean samples. "The process is suitable for handling real-world mixed and contaminated PVC and polyolefin waste streams," the paper states. SCMP points to an ECNU social media post citing the study, which characterized the achievement as a first, efficiently converting difficult-to-degrade mixed plastic waste into premium petrol at ambient temperature and pressure in a single step.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://science.slashdot.org/story/25/08/27/2258214/worlds-first-1-step-method-turns-plastic-into-fuel-at-95-efficiency?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

После года разработки опубликован релиз композитного сервера Wayfire 0.10, использующего Wayland и позволяющего формировать нетребовательные к ресурсам интерфейсы пользователя c 3D-эффектами в стиле 3D-плагинов к Compiz (переключение экранов через 3D-куб, пространственная раскладка окон, морфинг при работе с окнами и т.п.). Wayfire поддерживает расширение функциональности через плагины и предоставляет гибкую систему настройки. Код проекта написан на языке C++ и распространяется под лицензией MIT.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=63788

Japan has launched its first entirely homegrown quantum computer, built with domestic superconducting qubits and components, and running on the country's own open-source software toolchain, OQTOPUS. "The system is now ready to take on workloads from its base at the University of Osaka's Center for Quantum Information and Quantum Biology (QIQB)," reports LiveScience. From the report: The system uses a quantum chip with superconducting qubits -- quantum bits derived from metals that exhibit zero electrical resistance when cooled to temperatures close to absolute zero (minus 459.67 degrees Fahrenheit, or minus 273.15 degrees Celsius). The quantum processing unit (QPU) was developed at the Japanese research institute RIKEN. Other components that make up the "chandelier" -- the main body of the quantum computer -- include the chip package, delivered by Seiken, the magnetic shield, infrared filters, bandpass filters, a low-noise amplifier and various cables.

These are all housed in a dilution refrigerator (a specialized cryogenic device that cools the quantum computing components) to allow for those extremely low temperatures. It also comes alongside a pulse tube refrigerator (which again cools various components in use), controllers and a low-noise power source. OQTOPUS, meanwhile, is a collection of open-source tools that include everything required to run quantum programs. It includes the core engine and cloud module, as well as graphical user interface (GUI) elements, and is designed to be built on top of a QPU and quantum control hardware.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/25/08/27/2241254/japan-launches-its-first-homegrown-quantum-computer?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

TOP10 VISITORS:

[1] 37.252.14.x point=144 web=0 up=24.9MB (36%) <--- ake (6/hr)
[2] 185.39.19.x point=2 web=18 up=12.3MB (18%) <--- 185.39.19.x
[3] 144.76.33.x point=0 web=323 up=11.4MB (16%)
[4] PetalBot point=3 web=985 up=5.8MB (8%) <--- PetalBot
[5] 65.21.113.x point=0 web=48 up=3.6MB (5%)
[6] 216.73.216.x point=0 web=216 up=2.8MB (4%)
[7] Amazon point=0 web=79 up=1.6MB (2%)
[8] Google point=2 web=172 up=1.3MB (1%) <--- Google
[9] 217.114.158.x point=25 web=0 up=0.9MB (1%) <--- fox (1/hr)
[10] TikTok point=1 web=58 up=0.8MB (1%) <--- TikTok

TOTAL TRAFFIC: 67MB

Компания Red Hat опубликовала второй бета-выпуск пакетного менеджера RPM 6.0, который будет задействован в осеннем выпуске дистрибутива Fedora Linux 43. Проект используется в таких дистрибутивах, как RHEL, Fedora, SUSE, openSUSE, ALT Linux, Rosa Linux, OpenMandriva, Mageia, PCLinuxOS и Tizen. Код RPM распространяется под лицензиями GPLv2 и LGPLv2. Версии RPM 5 пропущена для исключения пересечений с проектом RPM5, который не связан с RPM от Red Hat и развивался независимыми разработчиками.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=63787

Состоялся выпуск официального настольного клиента мессенджера MAX для операционных систем Linux. Это долгожданное обновление закрывает один из главных пробелов в экосистеме мессенджера и предоставляет миллионам пользователей Linux полноценный доступ к сервису прямо с их компьютеров.

( [ читать дальше... ]( https://www.linux.org.ru/news/proprietary/18062581#cut ) )

Разработчики библиотеки GNU MP (GMP), предоставляющей функции для выполнения арифметических операций с произвольной точностью, предупредили пользователей об инциденте с повторным выходом из строя процессоров серии AMD Ryzen 9000 на базе микроархитектуры Zen 5 в ходе тестирования работы библиотеки. Предполагается, что повреждение процессоров было вызвано перегревом, возникающим при интенсивном выполнении функций GMP. До завершения полного анализа проблемы пользователям не рекомендовано активно использовать GMP на системах с CPU AMD Zen 5.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=63786

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: SpaceX has long marketed Starship as a fully and rapidly reusable rocket that's designed to deliver thousands of pounds of cargo to Mars and make life multiplanetary. But reusability at scale means a space vehicle that can tolerate mishaps and faults, so that a single failure doesn't spell a mission-ending catastrophe. The 10th test flight on Tuesday evening demonstrated SpaceX's focus on fault tolerance. In a post-flight update, SpaceX said the test stressed "the limits of vehicle capabilities." Understanding these edges will be critical for the company's plans to eventually use Starship to launch Starlink satellites, commercial payloads, and eventually astronauts.

When the massive Starship rocket lifted off on its 10th test flight Tuesday evening, SpaceX did more than achieve new milestones. It purposefully introduced several faults to test the heat shield, propulsion redundancy, and the relighting of its Raptor engine. The heat shield is among the toughest engineering challenges facing SpaceX. As Elon Musk acknowledged on X in May 2024, a reusable orbital return heat shield is the "biggest remaining problem" to 100% rocket reusability. The belly of the upper stage, also called Starship, is covered in thousands of hexagonal ceramic and metallic tiles, which make up the heat shield. Flight 10 was all about learning how much damage the ship can accept and survive when it goes through atmospheric heating. During the tenth test, engineers intentionally removed tiles from some sections of the ship, and experimented with a new type of actively cooled tile, to gather real-world data and refine designs. [...]

Propulsion redundancy was also put to the test. The Super Heavy booster's landing burn configuration appeared to be a rehearsal for engine failure. Engineers intentionally disabled one of the three center Raptor engines during the final phase of the burn and used a backup engine in its place. That was a successful rehearsal for an engine-out event. Finally, SpaceX reported the in-space relight of a Raptor engine, described on the launch broadcast as the second time SpaceX has pulled this off. Reliable engine restarts will be necessary for deep-space missions, propellant transfers, and possibly some payload deployment missions. [...] The next step is translating Flight 10 data into future hardware upgrades to move closer to routine operations and days when, as Musk envisioned, "Starship launches more than 24 times in 24 hours."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://science.slashdot.org/story/25/08/27/2153208/with-starship-flight-10-spacex-prioritized-resilience-over-perfection?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

samleecole shares a report from 404 Media: An app developer has jailbroken Echelon exercise bikes to restore functionality that the company put behind a paywall last month, but copyright laws prevent him from being allowed to legally release it. Last month, Peloton competitor Echelon pushed a firmware update to its exercise equipment that forces its machines to connect to the company's servers in order to work properly. Echelon was popular in part because it was possible to connect Echelon bikes, treadmills, and rowing machines to free or cheap third-party apps and collect information like pedaling power, distance traveled, and other basic functionality that one might want from a piece of exercise equipment. With the new firmware update, the machines work only with constant internet access and getting anything beyond extremely basic functionality requires an Echelon subscription, which can cost hundreds of dollars a year.

App engineer Ricky Witherspoon, who makes an app called SyncSpin that used to work with Echelon bikes, told 404 Media that he successfully restored offline functionality to Echelon equipment and won the Fulu Foundation bounty. But he and the foundation said that he cannot open source or release it because doing so would run afoul of Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the wide-ranging copyright law that in part governs reverse engineering. There are various exemptions to Section 1201, but most of them allow for jailbreaks like the one Witherspoon developed to only be used for personal use. [...] "I don't feel like going down a legal rabbit hole, so for now it's just about spreading awareness that this is possible, and that there's another example of egregious behavior from a company like this [...] if one day releasing this was made legal, I would absolutely open source this. I can legally talk about how I did this to a certain degree, and if someone else wants to do this, they can open source it if they want to."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/27/2131210/developer-unlocks-newly-enshittified-echelon-exercise-bikes-but-cant-legally-release-software?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Nevada has been crippled by a cyberattack that began on August 24, taking down state websites, intermittently disabling phone lines, and forcing offices like the DMV to close. The Register reports: The Office of Governor Joseph Lombardo announced the attack via social media on Monday, saying that a "network security incident" took hold in the early hours of August 24. Official state websites remain unavailable, and Lombardo's office warned that phone lines will be intermittently down, although emergency services lines remain operational. State offices are also closed until further notice, including Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) buildings. The state said any missed appointments will be honored on a walk-in basis.

"The Office of the Governor and Governor's Technology Office (GTO) are working continuously with state, local, tribal, and federal partners to restore services safely," the announcement read. "GTO is using temporary routing and operational workarounds to maintain public access where it is feasible. Additionally, GTO is validating systems before returning them to normal operation and sharing updates as needed." Local media outlets are reporting that, further to the original announcement, state offices will remain closed on Tuesday after officials previously expected them to reopen. The state's new cybersecurity office says there is currently no evidence to suggest that any Nevadans' personal information was compromised during the attack.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://it.slashdot.org/story/25/08/27/2143210/silver-state-goes-dark-as-cyberattack-knocks-nevada-websites-offline?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

A widely used Node.js utility called fast-glob, relied on by thousands of projectsâ"including over 30 U.S. Department of Defense systems -- is maintained solely by a Russian developer linked to Yandex. While there's no evidence of malicious activity, cybersecurity experts warn that the lack of oversight in such critical open-source projects leaves them vulnerable to potential exploitation by state-backed actors. The Register reports: US cybersecurity firm Hunted Labs reported the revelations on Wednesday. The utility in question is fast-glob, which is used to find files and folders that match specific patterns. Its maintainer goes by the handle "mrmlnc", and the Github profile associated with that handle identifies its owner as a Yandex developer named Denis Malinochkin living in a suburb of Moscow. A website associated with that handle also identifies its owner as the same person, as Hunted Labs pointed out.

Hunted Labs told us that it didn't speak to Malinochkin prior to publication of its report today, and that it found no ties between him and any threat actor. According to Hunted Labs, fast-glob is downloaded more than 79 million times a week and is currently used by more than 5,000 public projects in addition to the DoD systems and Node.js container images that include it. That's not to mention private projects that might use it, meaning that the actual number of at-risk projects could be far greater.

While fast-glob has no known CVEs, the utility has deep access to systems that use it, potentially giving Russia a number of attack vectors to exploit. Fast-glob could attack filesystems directly to expose and steal info, launch a DoS or glob-injection attack, include a kill switch to stop downstream software from functioning properly, or inject additional malware, a list Hunted Labs said is hardly exhaustive. [...] Hunted Labs cofounder Haden Smith told The Register that the ties are cause for concern. "Every piece of code written by Russians isn't automatically suspect, but popular packages with no external oversight are ripe for the taking by state or state-backed actors looking to further their aims," Smith told us in an email. "As a whole, the open source community should be paying more attention to this risk and mitigating it." [...]

Hunted Labs said that the simplest solution for the thousands of projects using fast-glob would be for Malinochkin to add additional maintainers and enhance project oversight, as the only other alternative would be for anyone using it to find a suitable replacement. "Open source software doesn't need a CVE to be dangerous," Hunted Labs said of the matter. "It only needs access, obscurity, and complacency," something we've noted before is an ongoing problem for open source projects. This serves as another powerful reminder that knowing who writes your code is just as critical as understanding what the code does," Hunted Labs concluded.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/27/2026245/defense-department-reportedly-relies-on-utility-written-by-russian-dev?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from 404 Media: 4chan and Kiwi Farms sued the United Kingdom's Office of Communications (Ofcom) over its age verification law in U.S. federal court Wednesday, fulfilling a promise it announced on August 23. In the lawsuit, 4chan and Kiwi Farms claim that threats and fines they have received from Ofcom "constitute foreign judgments that would restrict speech under U.S. law." Both entities say in the lawsuit that they are wholly based in the U.S. and that they do not have any operations in the United Kingdom and are therefore not subject to local laws. Ofcom's attempts to fine and block 4chan and Kiwi Farms, and the lawsuit against Ofcom, highlight the messiness involved with trying to restrict access to specific websites or to force companies to comply with age verification laws.

The lawsuit calls Ofcom an "industry-funded global censorship bureau." "Ofcom's ambitions are to regulate Internet communications for the entire world, regardless of where these websites are based or whether they have any connection to the UK," the lawsuit states. "On its website, Ofcom states that 'over 100,000 online services are likely to be in scope of the Online Safety Act -- from the largest social media platforms to the smallest community forum.'" [...] Ofcom began investigating 4chan over alleged violations of the Online Safety Act in June. On August 13, it announced a provisional decision and stated that 4chan had "contravened its duties" and then began to charge the site a penalty of [roughly $26,000] a day. Kiwi Farms has also been threatened with fines, the lawsuit states. "American citizens do not surrender our constitutional rights just because Ofcom sends us an e-mail. In the face of these foreign demands, our clients have bravely chosen to assert their constitutional rights," said Preston Byrne, one of the lawyers representing 4chan and Kiwi Farms.

"We are aware of the lawsuit," an Ofcom spokesperson told 404 Media. "Under the Online Safety Act, any service that has links with the UK now has duties to protect UK users, no matter where in the world it is based. The Act does not, however, require them to protect users based anywhere else in the world."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://yro.slashdot.org/story/25/08/27/205230/4chan-and-kiwi-farms-sue-the-uk-over-its-age-verification-law?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Starting with Word for Windows version 2509, Microsoft is making cloud saving the default behavior. New documents will automatically save to OneDrive (or another cloud destination), with dated filenames, unless users manually revert to local saving in the settings. From the report: "Anything new you create will be saved automatically to OneDrive or your preferred cloud destination", writes Raul Munoz, product manager at Microsoft on the Office Shared Services and Experiences team. Munoz backs up the decision with half a dozen advantages for saving documents to the cloud. From never losing progress and access anywhere to easy collaboration and increased security and compliance. While cloud saving is without doubt beneficial in some cases, Munoz fails to address the elephant in the room. Some users may not want that their documents are stored in the cloud. There are good reasons for that, including privacy.

Summed up:
- If you do not mind that Word documents are stored in the cloud, you do not need to become active.
- If you mind that Word documents are stored in the cloud by default, you need to modify the default setting.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://slashdot.org/story/25/08/27/1955256/word-documents-will-now-be-saved-to-the-cloud-automatically-on-windows?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Google has eliminated more than one-third of its managers overseeing small teams, an executive told employees last week, as the company continues its focus on efficiencies across the organization. From a report: "Right now, we have 35% fewer managers, with fewer direct reports" than at this time a year ago, said Brian Welle, vice president of people analytics and performance, according to audio of an all-hands meeting reviewed by CNBC. "So a lot of fast progress there."

At the meeting, employees asked Welle and other executives about job security, "internal barriers" and Google's culture after several recent rounds of layoffs, buyouts and reorganizations. Welle said the idea is to reduce bureaucracy and run the company more efficiently. "When we look across our entire leadership population, that['s mangers, directors and VPs, we want them to be a smaller percentage of our overall workforce over time," he said.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/27/1955230/google-has-eliminated-35-of-managers-overseeing-small-teams-in-past-year-exec-says?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

yesterlink вернулся:

https://ii.yester.link/list.txt

(напомню у него нету веб-лица)

Доступен корректирующий выпуск Firefox 142.0.1, в котором устранено несколько проблем.

https://www.opennet.ru/opennews/art.shtml?num=63785

After losing his job in 2024, Eric Thompson spearheaded a working group to push for federal legislation banning "ghost jobs" -- openings posted with no intent to hire. The proposed Truth in Job Advertising and Accountability Act would require transparency around job postings, set limits on how long ads can remain up, and fine companies that violate the rules. CNBC reports: "There's nothing illegal about posting a job, currently, and never filling it," says Thompson, a network engineering leader in Warrenton, Virginia. Not to mention, it's "really hard to prove, and so that's one of the reasons that legally, it's been kind of this gray area." As Thompson researched more into the phenomenon, he connected with former colleagues and professional connections across the country experiencing the same thing. Together, the eight of them decided to form the TJAAA working group to spearhead efforts for federal legislation to officially ban businesses from posting ghost jobs.

In May, the group drafted its first proposal: The TJAAA aims to require that all public job listings include information such as:
- The intended hire and start dates
- Whether it's a new role or backfill
- If it's being offered internally with preference to current employees
- The number of times the position has been posted in the last two years, and other factors, according to the draft language.

It also sets guidelines for how long a post is required to be up (no more than 90 calendar days) and how long the submission period can be (at least four calendar days) before applications can be reviewed. The proposed legislation applies to businesses with more than 50 employees, and violators can be fined a minimum of $2,500 for each infraction. The proposal provides a framework at the federal level, Thompson says, because state-level policies won't apply to employers who post listings across multiple states, or who use third-party platforms that operate beyond state borders.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://politics.slashdot.org/story/25/08/27/1938243/a-proposal-to-ban-ghost-jobs?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Hill: Republicans on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee opened a probe into alleged organized efforts to inject bias into Wikipedia entries and the organization's responses. Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) and Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), chair of the panel's subcommittee on cybersecurity, information technology, and government innovation, on Wednesday sent an information request on the matter to Maryana Iskander, chief executive officer of the Wikimedia Foundation, the nonprofit that hosts Wikipedia. The request, the lawmakers said in the letter (PDF), is part of an investigation into "foreign operations and individuals at academic institutions subsidized by U.S. taxpayer dollars to influence U.S. public opinion."

The panel is seeking documents and communications about Wikipedia volunteer editors who violated the platform's policies, as well as the Wikimedia Foundation's efforts to "thwart intentional, organized efforts to inject bias into important and sensitive topics." "Multiple studies and reports have highlighted efforts to manipulate information on the Wikipedia platform for propaganda aimed at Western audiences," Comer and Mace wrote in the letter. They referenced a report from the Anti-Defamation League about anti-Israel bias on Wikipedia that detailed a coordinated campaign to manipulate content related to the Israel-Palestine conflict and similar issues, as well as an Atlantic Council report on pro-Russia actors using Wikipedia to push pro-Kremlin and anti-Ukrainian messaging, which can influence how artificial intelligence chatbots are trained.

"[The Wikimedia] foundation, which hosts the Wikipedia platform, has acknowledged taking actions responding to misconduct by volunteer editors who effectively create Wikipedia's encyclopedic articles. The Committee recognizes that virtually all web-based information platforms must contend with bad actors and their efforts to manipulate. Our inquiry seeks information to help our examination of how Wikipedia responds to such threats and how frequently it creates accountability when intentional, egregious, or highly suspicious patterns of conduct on topics of sensitive public interest are brought to attention," Comer and Mace wrote. The lawmakers requested information about "the tools and methods Wikipedia utilizes to identify and stop malicious conduct online that injects bias and undermines neutral points of view on its platform," including documents and records about possible coordination of state actors in editing, the kind of accounts that have been subject to review, and and of the panel's analysis of data manipulation or bias. "We welcome the opportunity to respond to the Committee's questions and to discuss the importance of safeguarding the integrity of information on our platform," a Wikimedia Foundation spokesperson said.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://politics.slashdot.org/story/25/08/27/1923235/republicans-investigate-wikipedia-over-allegations-of-organized-bias?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.