Light pollution extends the active hours of birds worldwide by nearly an hour, fundamentally altering the natural rhythms of over 500 species across multiple continents. Analysis of 60 million bird call recordings reveals that artificial lighting causes birds to begin vocalizing 20 minutes earlier each morning and continue 30 minutes later each evening. The effect varies significantly by species anatomy and behavior.

Birds with proportionally larger eyes experience the strongest responses, with American Robins in highly illuminated areas beginning their songs up to two hours before sunrise. Species nesting in tree cavities or enclosed spaces show minimal changes, as opaque barriers shield them from artificial light. The research, drawing from BirdWeather devices deployed globally by birdwatchers, is the largest analysis of light pollution's biological impacts to date.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://science.slashdot.org/story/25/08/21/1949240/artificial-light-has-essentially-lengthened-birds-day?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Google is rolling out AI Mode in Search to 180 countries, expanding beyond the US, UK, and India, with even more countries being added soon. The search giant is also expanding its AI Mode's agentic capabilities, so you can now use natural language to find restaurant reservations. Engadget reports: Google says you can ask about getting a dinner reservation with conditions such as group size, date, location and your preference of cuisine, all of which be taken into consideration when AI Mode pulls in its results from across the web. Suggestions will be presented in list form with the available reservation slots. It'll also provide a link to the booking page you need. Google also plans to add local service appointments and event ticketing capabilities soon, with Ticketmaster and StubHub among its partners.

AI Mode leverages Google's web-browsing AI agent Project Mariner' its direct partners on Search and resources like Knowledge Graph and Google Maps when prompted to find you somewhere to eat. It has partnered with the likes of OpenTable, Resy and Tock to incorporate as many restaurants as possible and streamline the booking process. Right now, this feature is exclusive to those subscribed to the wildly expensive Google AI Ultra plan in the US, and can be accessed through its Labs platform. If you opt into the AI Mode experiment it can also remember your previous conversations and searches to give you results that more closely match your preferences.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/21/1952214/google-ai-mode-is-expanding-to-180-countries-adding-an-agentic-restaurant-finder?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the New York Times: Jay Blahnik was a fitness superstar with a book and nearly two decades of work with Nike before he was hired in 2013 to work on the Apple Watch. He became known inside Apple as the creator of the watch's signature fitness feature: three circular bands that people could complete through the day by exercising, standing and burning calories. Marketed with the tagline "Close Your Rings," the concept helped galvanize sales of Apple's first breakout product after Steve Jobs's death. But along the way, Mr. Blahnik created a toxic work environment (Warning: source may be paywalled; alternative source), said nine current and former employees who worked with or for Mr. Blahnik and spoke about personnel issues on the condition of anonymity. They said Mr. Blahnik, 57, who leads a roughly 100-person division as vice president for fitness technologies, could be verbally abusive, manipulative and inappropriate. His behavior contributed to decisions by more than 10 workers to seek extended mental health or medical leaves of absence since 2022, about 10 percent of the team, these people said.

When confronted with Mr. Blahnik's behavior, Apple moved to protect him after an internal investigation. The company settled one complaint alleging sexual harassment by Mr. Blahnik and is fighting a lawsuit by an employee, Mandana Mofidi, who said he had bullied her. Mr. Blahnik stayed in his job after company officials said their investigation had found no evidence of wrongdoing, according to interviews and Ms. Mofidi's lawsuit, which she filed against Mr. Blahnik and Apple last year in Los Angeles County Superior Court. The tension inside Mr. Blahnik's division speaks to workplace dysfunction at the heart of one of Apple's signature health initiatives. These employees said the company was more willing to protect a star executive than address the concerns of rank-and-file workers.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://apple.slashdot.org/story/25/08/21/202225/apple-fitness-chief-accused-of-toxic-workplace-culture-and-harassment?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Google's Android 16 QPR2 beta 1 is rolling out with new customization features, including the ability to force dark mode and icon themes on apps that don't support them. The update also adds enhanced parental controls, better data migration, PDF editing, and Bluetooth audio sharing, with a full release expected in December. The Verge reports: The beta includes a new dark theme option that will "intelligently invert the UI of apps that appear light despite users having selected the dark theme" when enabled, according to Google's announcement, forcibly making apps that don't natively support the feature to appear darker. Google says this is "largely intended as an accessibility feature" for users with low vision or photosensitivity, and will also automatically darken app splash screens and adjust status bar colors to match the darker theming.

Another feature will allow users to forcibly apply themed icon colors to apps that don't natively support them. Android's icon theming currently only works if app developers have provided a monochrome version of their app icon that can be adjusted, which is annoying for users who want to apply a consistent aesthetic across their entire home page. Auto-themed app icons spare developers from adding this capability manually, removing the hassle for users to customize their phone's theme. The full list of features in the QPR2 beta 1 update can be found on the Android developers' blog.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/21/209213/googles-next-big-android-update-can-force-dark-mode-and-icon-themes?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Reviewers are more likely to approve a manuscript if their own work is cited in subsequent versions than are reviewers who are not cited, according to an analysis of 18,400 articles from four open-access publications. From a report: The study, which is yet to be peer reviewed, was posted online as a preprint earlier this month. The study was inspired by anecdotes from authors who cited articles only because reviewers asked them to, says study author Adrian Barnett, who researches peer review and meta-research at Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane, Australia. Sometimes, these requests are fine, he says. But if reviewers ask for too many citations or the reason to cite their work is not justified, the peer-review process can become transactional, says Barnett. Citations increase a researcher's h-index, a metric reflecting the impact of their publications.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://science.slashdot.org/story/25/08/21/2015236/peer-reviewers-more-likely-to-approve-articles-that-cite-their-own-work?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Starting September 1st, Russia will require all smartphones and tablets sold in the country to come with MAX, a state-backed messaging app seen as a rival to WhatsApp and Telegram. Critics say the app could be used to track users. Reuters reports: The Russian government said in a statement that MAX, which will be integrated with government services, would be on a list of mandatory pre-installed apps on all "gadgets," including mobile phones and tablets, sold in Russia from September 1. State media says accusations from Kremlin critics that MAX is a spying app are false and that it has fewer permissions to access user data than rivals WhatsApp and Telegram. It will also be mandatory that from September 1, Russia's domestic app store, RuStore, which is pre-installed on all Android devices, will be pre-installed on Apple devices.

A Russian-language TV app called LIME HD TV, which allows people to watch state TV channels for free, will be pre-installed on all smart TVs sold in Russia from January 1, the government added. [...] MAX said this week that 18 million users had downloaded its app, parts of which are still in a testing phase. Russia's interior ministry said on Wednesday that MAX was safer than foreign rivals, but that it had arrested a suspect in the first fraud case using the new messenger.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/21/2015241/russia-orders-state-backed-whatsapp-rival-pre-installed-on-phones-and-tablets?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

LinkedIn's engagement-driven algorithm systematically elevates shallow, meaningless content over substantive professional discourse, according to a new analysis that highlights how major platforms prioritize user retention metrics over content quality. Entrepreneur and product executive Elliot Smith describes encountering a "seemingly endless stream of posts that are over fluffed, over produced and ultimately say nothing" that he categorizes as "toxic mediocrity."

Smith argues the platform's reward system creates a destructive cycle where "comments, likes and other engagement" signal user activity to LinkedIn's algorithm, which then promotes similar vapid content. "LinkedIn wants you on LinkedIn," Smith writes, noting the Microsoft-owned platform correlates engagement with ad clicks and premium conversions. Smith recommends professionals focus on substantive work rather than platform gaming, arguing "nothing you post there is going to change your career."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/21/2045209/why-linkedin-rewards-mediocrity?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

alternative_right shares a report from Phys.org: Now, for the first time, quantum scientists at the Quantum Control Laboratory at the University of Sydney Nano Institute have demonstrated a type of quantum logic gate that drastically reduces the number of physical qubits needed for its operation. To do this, they built an entangling logic gate on a single atom using an error-correcting code nicknamed the "Rosetta stone" of quantum computing. It earns that name because it translates smooth, continuous quantum oscillations into clean, digital-like discrete states, making errors easier to spot and fix, and importantly, allowing a highly compact way to encode logical qubits.
The curiously named Gottesman-Kitaev-Preskill (GKP) code has for many years offered a theoretical possibility for significantly reducing the physical number of qubits needed to produce a functioning "logical qubit." Albeit by trading efficiency for complexity, making the codes very difficult to control. Research published in Nature Physics demonstrates this as a physical reality, tapping into the natural oscillations of a trapped ion (a charged atom of ytterbium) to store GKP codes and, for the first time, realizing quantum entangling gates between them.

Led by Sydney Horizon Fellow Dr. Tingrei Tan at the University of Sydney Nano Institute, scientists have used their exquisite control over the harmonic motion of a trapped ion to bridge the coding complexity of GKP qubits, allowing a demonstration of their entanglement. "Our experiments have shown the first realization of a universal logical gate set for GKP qubits," Dr. Tan said. "We did this by precisely controlling the natural vibrations, or harmonic oscillations, of a trapped ion in such a way that we can manipulate individual GKP qubits or entangle them as a pair." [...] Across three experiments described in the paper, Dr. Tan's team used a single ytterbium ion contained in what is known as a Paul trap. This uses a complex array of lasers at room temperature to hold the single atom in the trap, allowing its natural vibrations to be controlled and utilized to produce the complex GKP codes. This research represents an important demonstration that quantum logic gates can be developed with a reduced physical number of qubits, increasing their efficiency.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://science.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/009241/rosetta-stone-of-code-shrinks-quantum-computer-hardware-needs?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Time and again, surveys and studies show that fears and concerns about charging are the main barriers standing in the way of someone switching from gas to EV. A new market research study by Telemetry Vice President Sam Abuelsamid confirms this, as it analyzes the charging infrastructure needs over the next decade. And one of the biggest hurdles -- one that has gone mostly unmentioned across the decade-plus we've been covering this topic -- is all the junk clogging up Americans' garages. lThat's because, while DC fast-charging garners all the headlines and much of the funding, the overwhelming majority of EV charging is AC charging, usually at home -- 80 percent of it, in fact. People who own and live in a single family home are overrepresented among EV owners, and data (PDF) from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory from a few years ago found that 42 percent of homeowners park near an electrical outlet capable of level 2 (240 V) AC charging.

But that could grow by more than half (to 68 percent of homeowners) if those homeowners changed their parking behavior, "most likely by clearing a space in their garage," the report finds. "90 percent of all houses can add a 240 V outlet near where cars could be parked," said Abuelsamid. "Parking behavior, namely whether homeowners use a private garage for parking or storage, will likely become a key factor in EV adoption. Today, garage-use intent is potentially a greater factor for in-house charging ability than the house's capacity to add 240 V outlets." Creating garage space would increase the number of homes capable of EV charging from 31 million to more than 50 million. And when we include houses where the owner thinks it's feasible to add wiring, that grows to more than 72 million homes. And that's far more than Telemetry's most optimistic estimate of U.S. EV penetration for 2035, which ranges from 33 million to 57 million EVs on the road 10 years from now.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/0020202/americans-junk-filled-garages-are-hurting-ev-adoption-study-says?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

alternative_right shares a report from ScienceDaily: Southwest Research Institute led a James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) survey, discovering a previously unknown tiny moon orbiting Uranus. A team led by SwRI's Dr. Maryame El Moutamid discovered the small object in a series of images taken on Feb. 2, 2025, bringing Uranus' total moon count to 29. "As part of JWST's guest observer program, we found a previously unknown satellite of the ice giant, which has been provisionally designated S/2025 U 1," said El Moutamid, a lead scientist in SwRI's Solar System Science and Exploration Division in Boulder, Colorado. "This object, by far the smallest object discovered to date, was detected in a series of 10 long exposures obtained by the Near-Infrared Camera."

Located in the outer solar system, Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun. Known as "the sideways planet" for its extreme axial tilt, the cyan-colored ice giant has a deep atmosphere composed of hydrogen, helium and methane. Scientists think Uranus' larger moons are roughly equal parts water ice and silicate rock. "Assuming that the new moon has an albedo comparable to other nearby satellites, this object is probably around six miles (10 km) in diameter," El Moutamid said. "It is well below the detection threshold for the Voyager 2 cameras."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://science.slashdot.org/story/25/08/21/2356259/astronomers-discover-hidden-moon-orbiting-uranus?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Davis Lu, a former Eaton Corporation developer, has been sentenced to four years in prison for sabotaging his ex-employer's Windows network with malware and a custom kill switch that locked out thousands of employees once his account was disabled. The attack caused significant operational disruption and financial losses, with Lu also attempting to cover his tracks by deleting data and researching privilege escalation techniques. BleepingComputer reports: After a corporate restructuring and subsequent demotion in 2018, the DOJ says that Lu retaliated by embedding malicious code throughout the company's Windows production environment. The malicious code included an infinite Java thread loop designed to overwhelm servers and crash production systems. Lu also created a kill switch named "IsDLEnabledinAD" ("Is Davis Lu enabled in Active Directory") that would automatically lock all users out of their accounts if his account was disabled in Active Directory. When his employment was terminated on September 9, 2019, and his account disabled, the kill switch activated, causing thousands of users to be locked out of their systems.

"The defendant breached his employer's trust by using his access and technical knowledge to sabotage company networks, wreaking havoc and causing hundreds of thousands of dollars in losses for a U.S. company," said Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew R. Galeotti. When he was instructed to return his laptop, Lu reportedly deleted encrypted data from his device. Investigators later discovered search queries on the device researching how to elevate privileges, hide processes, and quickly delete files. Lu was found guilty earlier this year of intentionally causing damage to protected computers. After his four-year sentence, Lu will also serve three years of supervised release following his prison term.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://yro.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/0039200/dev-gets-4-years-for-creating-kill-switch-on-ex-employers-systems?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Denmark is to stop charging VAT on books in an attempt to get more people reading. At 25%, the country's tax rate on books is the highest in the world, a policy the government believes is contributing to a growing "reading crisis." The culture minister, Jakob Engel-Schmidt, announced on Wednesday that the government would propose in its budget bill that the tax on books be removed. The move is expected to cost 330 million kroner ($51 million) a year.

"This is something that I, as minister of culture, have worked for, because I believe that we must put everything at stake if we are to end the reading crisis that has unfortunately been spreading in recent years," Engel-Schmidt told the Ritzau news agency . "I am incredibly proud. It is not every day that one succeeds in convincing colleagues that such massive money should be spent on investing in the consumption and culture of the Danes." [...]

"It is also about getting literature out there," said Engel-Schmidt. "That is why we have already allocated money for strengthened cooperation between the country's public libraries and schools, so that more children can be introduced to good literature." [...] If prices do not fall as a result of the measure, Engel-Schmidt said he would reconsider whether it was the right course of action. "I will of course monitor how prices develop. If it turns out that abolishing VAT only means that publishers' profits grow and prices do not fall, then we must consider whether it was the right thing to do," he said. Further reading: Denmark Ending Letter Deliveries Is a Sign of the Digital Times

[ Read more of this story ]( https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/0031247/denmark-to-abolish-vat-on-books-to-get-more-people-reading?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Professional services firms are engineering AI agents through massive prompt documents to automate complex knowledge work. KPMG Australia developed a 100-page prompt that transforms tax legislation and partner expertise into an agent producing comprehensive tax advice within 24 hours rather than the traditional two-week timeline.

The TaxBot searches distributed internal documents and Australian tax code to generate 25-page draft reports after collecting four to five inputs from tax agents. Chief Digital Officer John Munnelly said the system operates on KPMG Workbench, a global platform combining retrieval-augmented generation with models from OpenAI, Microsoft, Google, Anthropic, and Meta.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/1110257/kpmg-wrote-100-page-prompt-to-build-agentic-taxbot?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader shares a report: As it tries to unseat Google, OpenAI is relying on search data from an unlikely source: Google. OpenAI has been using Google search results scraped from the web to help power ChatGPT responses, according to two people with knowledge of it.

The Google search data helps answer ChatGPT queries on current events, such as news, sports and equity markets, one of the people said. OpenAI is getting the data from SerpApi, an eight-year-old web-scraping firm, which listed OpenAI as a customer on its website as recently as May last year. It removed the reference for reasons that couldn't be learned.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/1442208/openai-is-challenging-google---while-using-its-search-data?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Remote work policies designed to attract top talent are becoming security vulnerabilities as state-sponsored hackers seek employment at cryptocurrency firms. Coinbase has implemented mandatory in-person orientation and US citizenship requirements for sensitive roles after detecting North Korean IT workers attempting to infiltrate the company through remote positions.

CEO Brian Armstrong revealed on Stripe cofounder John Collison's podcast that the exchange now requires fingerprinting and live video interviews after discovering coordinated efforts involving US-based facilitators who reship laptops and attend virtual interviews on behalf of foreign operatives.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/1515238/coinbase-reverses-remote-first-policy-after-north-korean-infiltration-attempts?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader shares a report: The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is narrowing the capabilities and reducing the number of next-generation weather and climate satellites it plans to build and launch in the coming decades, two people familiar with the plans told CNN.

This move -- which comes as hurricane season ramps up with Erin lashing the East Coast -- fits a pattern in which the Trump administration is seeking to not only slash climate pollution rules, but also reduce the information collected about the pollution in the first place. Critics of the plan also say it's a short-sighted attempt to save money at the expense of understanding the oceans and atmosphere better.

Two planned instruments, one that would measure air quality, including pollution and wildfire smoke, and another that would observe ocean conditions in unprecedented detail, are no longer part of the project, the sources said.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/1612250/us-strips-ocean-and-air-pollution-monitoring-from-next-gen-weather-satellites?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

BrianFagioli writes: Google is preparing to bring its television platforms in line with the rest of Android. Starting August 1, 2026, both Google TV and Android TV will require app updates that include native code to provide 64-bit support. The move follows similar requirements for phones and tablets, and it paves the way for upcoming 64-bit TV devices.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/1624208/google-tv-and-android-tv-apps-must-support-64-bit-starting-august-2026?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Apple is in early discussions about using Google Gemini to power a revamped version of the Siri voice assistant, marking a key potential step toward outsourcing more of its artificial intelligence technology. From a report: The iPhone maker recently approached Alphabet's Google to explore building a custom AI model that would serve as the foundation of the new Siri next year, according to people familiar with he matter. Google has started training a model that could run on Apple's servers, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the discussions are private.

The work is part of an effort to catch up in generative AI, a field where the company arrived late and then struggled to gain traction. Earlier this year, Apple also explored partnerships with Anthropic and OpenAI, weighing whether Claude or ChatGPT could serve as Siri's new brain. Apple is still several weeks away from making a decision on whether to continue using internal models for Siri or move to a partner. And it hasn't yet determined who that partner may be.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://apple.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/1733230/apple-explores-using-google-gemini-ai-to-power-revamped-siri?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Organizations still using default Microsoft 365 email domains face severe throttling starting this October. The restrictions target the onmicrosoft.com domain that Microsoft 365 automatically assigns to new tenants, limiting external messages to 100 recipients per day starting October 15. Microsoft blames spammers who exploit new tenants for quick spam bursts before detection. Affected organizations must acquire custom domains and update primary SMTP addresses across all mailboxes -- a process that requires credential updates across devices and applications.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://it.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/1814219/default-microsoft-365-domains-face-100-email-daily-limit-starting-october?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

President Donald Trump said on Friday the U.S. would take a 10% stake in Intel under a deal with the struggling chipmaker and is planning more such moves, the latest extraordinary intervention by the White House in corporate America. Reuters: The development follows a meeting between CEO Lip-Bu Tan and Trump earlier this month that was sparked by Trump's demand for the Intel chief's resignation over his ties to Chinese firms.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/1849210/intel-has-agreed-to-a-deal-for-us-to-take-10-equity-stake-trump-says?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Europe's share of global economic output has fallen from 33% to 23% since 2005 while its space launch capacity has nearly collapsed, launching just four rockets this year compared to over 100 for the United States and 40 for China. The continent's economic stagnation spans 15 years -- likely the longest streak since the Industrial Revolution according to Deutsche Bank calculations -- with Germany's economy growing just 1% since late 2017 versus 19% US growth.

Per capita GDP gaps have widened dramatically: $86,000 annually in the US versus $56,000 in Germany and $53,000 in the UK. Industrial electricity costs have become prohibitive, running three times higher in Germany and four times higher in the UK than American rates. "America innovates, China imitates, Europe regulates," Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni observed. The continent's largest company by market value, SAP, now ranks just 28th globally.

Further reading: The Technology Revolution is Leaving Europe Behind.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/1925255/europe-is-losing?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Expect record-breaking temperatures to change the workplace, the World Health Organization (WHO) and World Meteorological Organization (WMO) warned today in a new report. When workers don't have adequate protections from heat stress, their health and productivity suffer.

It's a risk employers and lawmakers have to take more seriously if they want to keep workers safe and businesses prosperous, the agencies say. That means finding ways to adapt in a warming world, and paying close attention to groups that might be more vulnerable than others.

[...] More than 2.4 billion people around the world -- 71 percent of the working population -- experience workplace heat stress, according to estimates from the ILO. Each year, 22.85 million occupational injuries and 18,970 fatalities are linked to excessive heat at work. The report also says that worker productivity falls 2-3 percent with every degree increase above 20 degrees Celsius in wet-bulb globe temperature, a measure that takes humidity and other environmental factors into account.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/2020223/workers-need-better-protections-from-the-heat?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: A lawyer representing the online message board 4chan says it won't pay a proposed fine by the UK's media regulator as it enforces the Online Safety Act. According to Preston Byrne, managing partner of law firm Byrne & Storm, Ofcom has provisionally decided to impose a 20,000-pound fine "with daily penalties thereafter" for as long as the site fails to comply with its request. "Ofcom's notices create no legal obligations in the United States," he told the BBC, adding he believed the regulator's investigation was part of an "illegal campaign of harassment" against US tech firms.

"4chan has broken no laws in the United States -- my client will not pay any penalty," Mr Byrne said. Ofcom began investigating 4chan over whether it was complying with its obligations under the UK's Online Safety Act. Then in August, it said it had issued 4chan with "a provisional notice of contravention" for failing to comply with two requests for information. Ofcom said its investigation would examine whether the message board was complying with the act, including requirements to protect its users from illegal content. "American businesses do not surrender their First Amendment rights because a foreign bureaucrat sends them an email," law firms Byrne & Storm and Coleman Law wrote. "Under settled principles of US law, American courts will not enforce foreign penal fines or censorship codes. If necessary, we will seek appropriate relief in US federal court to confirm these principles."

The statement calls on the Trump administration to intervene and protect American businesses from "extraterritorial censorship mandates."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/2029253/4chan-refuses-to-pay-uk-online-safety-act-fines?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Clean-energy growth helped China's carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions fall by 1% year-on-year in the first half of 2025, extending a declining trend that started in March 2024. From a report: The CO2 output of the nation's power sector -- its dominant source of emissions -- fell by 3% in the first half of the year, as growth in solar power alone matched the rise in electricity demand. The new analysis for Carbon Brief shows that record solar capacity additions are putting China's CO2 emissions on track to fall across 2025 as a whole.

Other key findings include:

The growth in clean power generation, some 270 terawatt hours (TWh) excluding hydro, significantly outpaced demand growth of 170TWh in the first half of the year.
Solar capacity additions set new records due to a rush before a June policy change, with 212 gigawatts (GW) added in the first half of the year.
This rush means solar is likely to set an annual record for growth in 2025, becoming China's single-largest source of clean power generation in the process.
Coal-power capacity could surge by as much as 80-100GW this year, potentially setting a new annual record, even as coal-fired electricity generation declines.
The use of coal to make synthetic fuels and chemicals is growing rapidly, climbing 20% in the first half of the year and helping add 3% to China's CO2 since 2020.
The coal-chemical industry is planning further expansion, which could add another 2% to China's CO2 by 2029, making the 2030 deadline for peaking harder to meet.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/2036256/record-solar-growth-keeps-chinas-co2-falling-in-first-half-of-2025?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Google has signed a six-year cloud computing deal with Meta worth over $10 billion, making it the second major partnership after a recent agreement with OpenAI. The deal will see Meta rely on Google Cloud's infrastructure to support its massive AI data center buildout, as the company ramps up capital spending into the tens of billions. The Information (paywalled) first reported the deal.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://meta.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/2043255/meta-signs-10-billion-cloud-deal-with-google?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Waymo has received its first permit from the New York City Department of Transportation to begin testing autonomous vehicles in Manhattan and Downtown Brooklyn, marking the city's first official rollout of self-driving car trials. The program will initially deploy up to eight vehicles with safety drivers through late September, with the potential to extend and expand into other boroughs. CNBC reports: New York state law requires the company to have a driver behind the wheel to operate. "We're a tech-friendly administration and we're always looking for innovative ways to safely move our city forward," [Mayor Eric Adams] said in a release. "New York City is proud to welcome Waymo to test this new technology in Manhattan and Brooklyn, as we know this testing is only the first step in moving our city further into the 21st century."

The news comes just two months after the company said it filed permits to test its cars in the city with a trained specialist behind the wheel. [...] As part of the permit, Waymo must regularly meet and report data to DOT and work closely with law enforcement and emergency services.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/2036239/waymo-granted-first-permit-to-being-testing-autonomous-vehicles-in-nyc?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Register: Microsoft has reportedly stopped giving Chinese companies proof-of-concept exploit code for soon-to-be-disclosed vulnerabilities following last month's SharePoint zero-day attacks, which appear to be related to a leak in Redmond's early-bug-notification program. The software behemoth gives some software vendors early bug disclosures under its Microsoft Active Protections Program (MAPP), which typically delivers info two weeks before Patch Tuesday. MAPP participants sign a non-disclosure agreement, and in exchange get vulnerability details so that they can provide updated protections to customers more quickly.

According to Microsoft spokesperson David Cuddy, who spoke with Bloomberg about changes to the program, MAPP has begun limiting access to companies in "countries where they're required to report vulnerabilities to their governments," including China. Companies in these countries will no longer receive "proof of concept" exploit code, but instead will see "a more general written description" that Microsoft sends at the same time as patches, Cuddy told the news outlet. "A leak happened here somewhere," Dustin Childs, head of threat awareness at Trend Micro's Zero Day Initiative (ZDI), told The Register in July. "And now you've got a zero-day exploit in the wild, and worse than that, you've got a zero-day exploit in the wild that bypasses the patch, which came out the next day."

Childs said the MAPP change "is a positive change, if a bit late. Anything Microsoft can do to help prevent leaks while still offering MAPP guidance is welcome."

"In the past, MAPP leaks were associated with companies out of China, so restricting information from flowing to these companies should help," Childs said. "The MAPP program remains a valuable resource for network defenders. Hopefully, Microsoft can squelch the leaks while sending out the needed information to companies that have proven their ability (and desire) to protect end users."

[ Read more of this story ]( https://it.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/2059255/microsoft-reportedly-cuts-chinas-early-access-to-bug-disclosures-poc-exploit-code?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

At its upcoming Connect conference next month, Meta is rumored to unveil its first consumer-ready smart glasses with a built-in display, alongside a neural wristband controller. The $800 device, codenamed Hypernova, will be able to show simple visual content like texts and support AI assistant interactions. CNBC reports: Connect is a two-day conference for developers focused on virtual reality, AR and the metaverse. It was originally called Oculus Connect and obtained its current moniker after Facebook changed its parent company name to Meta in 2021. The glasses are internally codenamed Hypernova and will include a small digital display in the right lens of the device, said the people, who asked not to be named because the details are confidential. The device is expected to cost about $800 and will be sold in partnership with EssilorLuxottica, the people said. CNBC reported in October that Meta was working with Luxottica on consumer glasses with a display. [...]

With Hypernova, Meta will finally be offering glasses with a display to consumers, but the company is setting low expectations for sales, some of the sources said. That's because the device requires more components than its voice-only predecessors, and will be slightly heavier and thicker, the people said. [...] Although Hypernova will feature a display, those visual features are expected to be limited, people familiar with the matter said. They said the color display will offer about a 20 degree field of view -- meaning it will appear in a small window in a fixed position -- and will be used primarily to relay simple bits of information, such as incoming text messages.

The Hypernova glasses will also come paired with a wristband that will use technology built by Meta's CTRL Labs, said people familiar with the matter. CTRL Labs, which Meta acquired in 2019, specializes in building neural technology that could allow users to control computing devices using gestures in their arms. [...] In addition to Hypernova and the wristband, Meta will also announce a third-generation of its voice-only smart glasses with Luxottica at Connect, one person said.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/217232/meta-set-to-unveil-first-consumer-ready-smart-glasses-with-a-display-wristband?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Bluesky has blocked access to its service in Mississippi rather than comply with a new state law requiring age verification for all social media users. TechCrunch reports: In a blog post published on Friday, the company explains that, as a small team, it doesn't have the resources to make the substantial technical changes this type of law would require, and it raised concerns about the law's broad scope and privacy implications. Mississippi's HB 1126 requires platforms to introduce age verification for all users before they can access social networks like Bluesky. On Thursday, U.S. Supreme Court justices decided to block an emergency appeal that would have prevented the law from going into effect as the legal challenges it faces played out in the courts. As a result, Bluesky had to decide what it would do about compliance.

Instead of requiring age verification before users could access age-restricted content, this law requires age verification of all users. That means Bluesky would have to verify every user's age and obtain parental consent for anyone under 18. The company notes that the potential penalties for noncompliance are hefty, too -- up to $10,000 per user. Bluesky also stresses that the law goes beyond child safety, as intended, and would create "significant barriers that limit free speech and disproportionately harm smaller platforms and emerging technologies." To comply, Bluesky would have to collect and store sensitive information from all its users, in addition to the detailed tracking of minors. This is different from how it's expected to comply with other age verification laws, like the U.K.'s Online Safety Act (OSA), which only requires age checks for certain content and features.

Mississippi's law blocks anyone from using the site unless they provide their personal and sensitive information. The company notes that its decision only applies to the Bluesky app built on the AT Protocol. Other apps may approach the decision differently.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/2327213/bluesky-blocks-service-in-mississippi-over-age-assurance-law?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

Google has released (PDF) a new analysis of its AI's environmental impact, showing that it has cut the energy use of AI text queries by a factor of 33 over the past year. Each prompt now consumes about 0.24 watt-hours -- the equivalent of watching nine seconds of TV. An anonymous reader shares an excerpt from an Ars Technica article: "We estimate the median Gemini Apps text prompt uses 0.24 watt-hours of energy, emits 0.03 grams of carbon dioxide equivalent (gCO2e), and consumes 0.26 milliliters (or about five drops) of water," they conclude. To put that in context, they estimate that the energy use is similar to about nine seconds of TV viewing. The bad news is that the volume of requests is undoubtedly very high. The company has chosen to execute an AI operation with every single search request, a compute demand that simply didn't exist a couple of years ago. So, while the individual impact is small, the cumulative cost is likely to be considerable.

The good news? Just a year ago, it would have been far, far worse. Some of this is just down to circumstances. With the boom in solar power in the US and elsewhere, it has gotten easier for Google to arrange for renewable power. As a result, the carbon emissions per unit of energy consumed saw a 1.4x reduction over the past year. But the biggest wins have been on the software side, where different approaches have led to a 33x reduction in energy consumed per prompt.

The Google team describes a number of optimizations the company has made that contribute to this. One is an approach termed Mixture-of-Experts, which involves figuring out how to only activate the portion of an AI model needed to handle specific requests, which can drop computational needs by a factor of 10 to 100. They've developed a number of compact versions of their main model, which also reduce the computational load. Data center management also plays a role, as the company can make sure that any active hardware is fully utilized, while allowing the rest to stay in a low-power state.

The other thing is that Google designs its own custom AI accelerators, and it architects the software that runs on them, allowing it to optimize both sides of the hardware/software divide to operate well with each other. That's especially critical given that activity on the AI accelerators accounts for over half of the total energy use of a query. Google also has lots of experience running efficient data centers that carries over to the experience with AI. The result of all this is that it estimates that the energy consumption of a typical text query has gone down by 33x in the last year alone.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/2118234/google-says-it-dropped-the-energy-cost-of-ai-queries-by-33x-in-one-year?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

alternative_right shares a report from Phys.org: All the critical minerals the U.S. needs annually for energy, defense and technology applications are already being mined at existing U.S. facilities, according to a new analysis published in the journal Science. The catch? These minerals, such as cobalt, lithium, gallium and rare earth elements like neodymium and yttrium, are currently being discarded as tailings of other mineral streams like gold and zinc, said Elizabeth Holley, associate professor of mining engineering at Colorado School of Mines and lead author of the new paper.

To conduct the analysis, Holley and her team built a database of annual production from federally permitted metal mines in the U.S. They used a statistical resampling technique to pair these data with the geochemical concentrations of critical minerals in ores, recently compiled by the U.S. Geological Survey, Geoscience Australia and the Geologic Survey of Canada. Using this approach, Holley's team was able to estimate the quantities of critical minerals being mined and processed every year at U.S. metal mines but not being recovered. Instead, these valuable minerals are ending up as discarded tailings that must be stored and monitored to prevent environmental contamination.

The analysis looks at a total of 70 elements used in applications ranging from consumer electronics like cell phones to medical devices to satellites to renewable energy to fighter jets and shows that unrecovered byproducts from other U.S. mines could meet the demand for all but two -- platinum and palladium. Among the elements included in the analysis are:
- Cobalt (Co): The lustrous bluish-gray metal, a key component in electric car batteries, is a byproduct of nickel and copper mining. Recovering less than 10% of the cobalt currently being mined and processed but not recovered would be more than enough to fuel the entire U.S. battery market.
- Germanium (Ge): The brittle silvery-white semi-metal used for electronics and infrared optics, including sensors on missiles and defense satellites, is present in zinc and molybdenum mines. If the U.S. recovered less than 1% of the germanium currently mined and processed but not recovered from U.S. mines, it would not have to import any germanium to meet industry needs.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/08/23/0120237/us-is-throwing-away-the-critical-minerals-it-needs-analysis-shows?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

BrianFagioli shares a report from NERDS.xyz: LibreOffice 25.8 has landed, and while it packs in new features and speed improvements, the biggest headline is who just got left behind. If you are still running Windows 7 or Windows 8/8.1, this is the end of the road. LibreOffice will not run on those systems anymore, and there are no workarounds. The suite has slammed the door shut.

For years, LibreOffice kept older Windows users afloat while Microsoft and other developers moved on. That lifeline is gone. Anyone stubbornly clinging to Windows 7 or 8 now has two choices: upgrade or stay stuck on outdated software. LibreOffice has made it clear that it will not carry dead platforms any further. And the cuts do not stop there. 32-bit Windows builds are on their way out, with deprecation already in place. On the Mac side, 25.8 is the last release that runs on macOS 10.15. Starting with LibreOffice 26.2, only macOS 11 and newer will be supported. In other words, if your computer is too old to run modern systems, LibreOffice is walking away.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/23/0124202/libreoffice-258-slams-the-door-on-windows-7-and-8x?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the New York Times: There's an overwhelming sense of deja vu at multiplexes these days. In August alone, "Black Swan" (2010) is returning to theaters, along with the Tim Burton "Batman" movies from 1989 and 1992. Audiences will be able to revisit the oceanic terror of "Jaws" (1975), as well as the comic mystery (and multiple endings) of "Clue" (1985). Or they could groove to Prince's "Sign o' the Times" concert film from 1987. And it doesn't look like the rerelease trend is slowing down. In September, "The Breakfast Club" (1985) is returning, Pixar is bringing back "Toy Story" (1995), and "Apollo 13" (1995) is blasting off again. "Casper" (1995) will haunt screens for nearly the entire month of October, while "Avatar: The Way of Water" (2022) will run for about five days, teeing up the forthcoming "Avatar: Fire and Ash." And there are still more to come before the end of the year.

Rereleases have long been part of the theatrical ecosystem. After all, "Star Wars" movies have been heading back to multiplexes routinely since 1981 -- before "Return of the Jedi" even debuted. But recently, studios have been digging deeper into their archives for a variety of reasons -- only some of which have to do with nostalgia. "Black Swan," from Searchlight, which is now owned by Disney, took over around 200 IMAX screens to commemorate its 15th anniversary. Universal's specialty arm, Focus Features, rereleased both "Pride & Prejudice" (2005) and "Brokeback Mountain" (2005) earlier this year. "Pride & Prejudice" ultimately grossed more than $6 million domestically this time around, about 16 percent of its original U.S. box office haul.

In total, Universal has 12 rereleases on its 2025 slate -- not including a partnership with another distribution company -- compared with just four in 2024 and two in 2023. "We very much pay a lot of attention to our repertory business," the studio's president of domestic theatrical distribution, Jim Orr, said by phone, explaining, "We just think it's not only great fun for audiences, but a great business to be in as well." Orr explained that the size of Universal's rerelease slate this year was "more coincidental" than anything else, with all the films hitting anniversaries in 2025. Still, there is a strong business motivation: The rereleases help studios and exhibitors pad out relatively thin slates. "The truth of the matter is studios don't have enough product right now to give theaters, so that's why you're seeing an influx of these nostalgia plays," said Jeff Bock, senior media analyst at Exhibitor Relations. He added, "It doesn't cost a lot for them to do an anniversary edition or a 4K edition." There are several other reasons why Hollywood is rereleasing old movies, according to Orr. Rereleases are far cheaper to put out than launching a brand-new title. Studios also target films that already have strong, enduring audiences, "whether that's 'Pride & Prejudice,' with its meme-able depiction of yearning, or 'Casper,'" which he said had elicited 'decent' interest every year.

Then there's what Orr calls "opportunistic dating." "There might be a window where something goes thematically or holiday-wise, whatever kind of fits in, or there might be some more screens available in specific formats," he said. Specialty format releases like IMAX, Dolby, or 3D also help bring moviegoers to the theaters.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://entertainment.slashdot.org/story/25/08/23/0134245/hollywoods-newest-formula-for-success-rereleasing-old-movies?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

British telecommunications service provider Colt Telecom "has offices in over 30 countries across North America, Europe, and Asia, reports CPO magazine. "It manages nearly 1,000 data centers and roughly 75,000 km of fiber infrastructure."

But now "a cyber attack has caused widespread multi-day service disruption..."

On August 14, 2025, the telecom giant said it had detected a cyber attack that began two days earlier, on August 12. Upon learning of the cyber intrusion, the telecommunications service provider responded by proactively taking some systems offline to contain the cyber attack. Although Colt Telecom's cyber incident response team was working around the clock to mitigate the impacts of the cyber attack, service disruption has persisted for days. However, the service disruption did not affect the company's core network infrastructure, suggesting that Colt customers could still access its network services... The company also did not provide a clear timeline for resolving the service disruption. A week after the apparent ransomware attack, Colt Online and the Voice API platform remained unavailable.
And now Colt Technology Services "confirms that customer documentation was stolen," reports the tech news site BleepingComputer:

"A criminal group has accessed certain files from our systems that may contain information related to our customers and posted the document titles on the dark web," reads an updated security incident advisory on Colt's site.
"We understand that this is concerning for you."
"Customers are able to request a list of filenames posted on the dark web from the dedicated call centre."

As first spotted by cybersecurity expert Kevin Beaumont, Colt added the no-index HTML meta tag to the web page, making it so it won't be indexed by search engines.
This statement comes after the Warlock Group began selling on the Ramp cybercrime forum what they claim is 1 million documents stolen from Colt. The documents are being sold for $200,000 and allegedly contain financial information, network architecture data, and customer information... The Warlock Group (aka Storm-2603) is a ransomware gang attributed to Chinese threat actors who utilize the leaked LockBit Windows and Babuk VMware ESXi encryptors in attacks... Last month, Microsoft reported that the threat actors were exploiting a SharePoint vulnerability to breach corporate networks and deploy ransomware.

"Colt is not the only telecom firm that has been named by WarLock on its leak website in recent days," SecurityWeek points out. "The cybercriminals claim to have also stolen data from France-based Orange."

Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader Z00L00K for sharing the news.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://it.slashdot.org/story/25/08/23/0910226/amid-service-disruption-colt-telecom-confirms-criminal-group-accessed-their-data-as-ransomware-gang-threatens-to-sell-it?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

The Washington Post looks at the rise of low-effort, high-volume "AI slop" videos:

The major social media platforms, scared of driving viewers away, have tried to crack down on slop accounts, using AI tools of their own to detect and flag videos they believe were synthetically made. YouTube last month said it would demonetize creators for "inauthentic" and "mass-produced" content. But the systems are imperfect, and the creators can easily spin up new accounts — or just push their AI tools to pump out videos similar to the banned ones, dodging attempts to snuff them out.

One place where they're coming from...

Jiaru Tang, a researcher at the Queensland University of Technology who recently interviewed creators in China, said AI video has become one of the hottest new income opportunities there for workers in the internet's underbelly, who previously made money writing fake news articles or running spam accounts. Many university students, stay-at-home moms and the recently unemployed now see AI video as a kind of gig work, like driving an Uber. The average small creator she interviewed did their day jobs and then, at night, "spent two to three hours making AI-slop money," she said. A few she spoke with made $2,000 to $3,000 a month at it.

But the article provides other examples of the "wild cottage industry of AI-video makers, enticed by the possibility of infinite creation for minimal work"

A 31-year-old loan officer in eastern Idaho first went viral in June "with an AI-generated video on TikTok in which a fake but lifelike old man talked about soiling himself. Within two weeks, he had used AI to pump out 91 more, mostly showing fake street interviews and jokes about fat people to an audience that has surged past 180,000 followers..." (He told the Post the videos earn him about $5,000 a month through TikTok's creator program.)
"To stand out, some creators have built AI-generated influencers with lives a viewer can follow along. 'Why does everybody think I'm AI? ... I'm a human being, just like you guys,' says the AI woman in one since-removed TikTok video, which was watched more than 1 million times."
One AI-generated video a dog biting a woman's face off (revealing a salad) received a quarter of a billion views.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/23/022223/making-cash-off-ai-slop-the-surreal-video-business-taking-over-the-web?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

"Some joyless ne'er-do-well has loosed a botnet on the community-driven Arch Linux distro," reports the Register, with a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack that apparently started a week ago.

Arch maintainer Cristian Heusel announced Thursday on the project's web site that the attack "primarily impacts our main webpage, the Arch User Repository (AUR), and the Forums."

We are aware of the problems that this creates for our end users and will continue to actively work with our hosting provider to mitigate the attack. We are also evaluating DDoS protection providers while carefully considering factors including cost, security, and ethical standards... As a volunteer-driven project, we appreciate the community's patience as our DevOps team works to resolve these issues.

A status update Friday acknowledged "we are suffering from partial outages." The Register reports:
The attack comes as the project has been enjoying a boost in mainstream success. The distro was picked by Valve to underpin the SteamOS software running on its Steam Deck handheld gaming gadget, with the company providing the project with funding for further development. Late last year, a new version of the archinstall tool was released, with a view to making the system more friendly to newcomers...

For now, the Arch team is working to mitigate the attack's impact, which highlights a bootstrapping issue. Tools designed to shift traffic to mirrors in the event the main infrastructure is unavailable rely on a mirror list obtained from that same main infrastructure, with Heusel advising that users should "default to the mirrors listed in the pacman-mirrorlist package" if tools like reflector fail. Installation media can be downloaded from a range of mirrors, too, but should be checked against the project's official signing key before being trusted.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://linux.slashdot.org/story/25/08/23/0513229/arch-linux-faces-ongoing-ddos-attack?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.