Technology
- Apple backs out of investment in OpenAIarstechnica.com Apple backs out of backing OpenAI, report claims
Apple dropped out of the $6.5 billion investment round at the 11th hour.
- Don’t believe the hype: AGI is far from inevitablewww.ru.nl Don’t believe the hype: AGI is far from inevitable | Radboud University
Will AI soon surpass the human brain? If you ask employees at OpenAI, Google DeepMind and other large tech companies, it is inevitable. However, researchers at Radboud University and other institutes show new proof that those claims are overblown.
Will AI soon surpass the human brain? If you ask employees at OpenAI, Google DeepMind and other large tech companies, it is inevitable. However, researchers at Radboud University and other institutes show new proof that those claims are overblown and unlikely to ever come to fruition. Their findings are published in Computational Brain & Behavior today.
- This little gadget to find out which type of USB-C cable you have
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USB was supposed to rule them all but it's now a mess of standards sharing the same connector. Different speeds, voltage, charging protocols, alt modes, even the number of pins used is variable.... For those asking, the thing is available on Kickstarter
- Illuminating the Future: Developments in PRC Photonic Chip Productionjamestown.org Illuminating the Future: Developments in PRC Photonic Chip Production
Executive Summary: In June, the first pilot production line for photonics microchips in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) was launched at Shanghai Jiao Tong University’s Chip Hub for Integrated Photonics Xplore (CHIPX), as the country explores new approaches to chip design. The PRC sees photonic ...
- New cooling system works on gravity instead of electricitytechxplore.com New cooling system works on gravity instead of electricity
Its abundance of sunlight and heavy investment in solar cell technology has positioned Saudi Arabia well in its transition to becoming a leading exporter of renewable energy. Indeed, solar energy currently makes up more than 80% of the Kingdom's green energy capacity. However, these cells bring a tw...
- Beyond technical features: why we need to talk about the values of the Fediverse (part 1)blog.elenarossini.com Beyond technical features: why we need to talk about the values of the Fediverse (part 1)
The Fediverse has a different value system than commercial social media: striving for genuine connections, protecting privacy and championing accessibility
The Fediverse has been teaching me how to be a better digital citizen. Actually, let me rephrase that: without the shadow of a doubt, the Fediverse has made me a better digital citizen.
You may have heard in passing how Fediverse networks are considered to be “ethical social media” – but this description has rarely been followed up by an explanation of how and why. I’d like to give it a shot, through the prism of my personal experience.
- BYD recalling 97,000 top-selling EVs on steering component fault, regulator sayswww.reuters.com /business/autos-transportation/byd-recalling-97000-top-selling-evs-steering-component-fault-regulator-says-2024-09-30/
BYD has informed the Chinese regulator it is recalling nearly 97,000 electric vehicles (EVs) for a manufacturing fault involving a steering control unit that could lead to fire risks, the market regulator said on Sunday.
The Chinese automaker is recalling Dolphin and Yuan Plus EVs manufactured in China between November 2022 and December 2023, according to a statement from the State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR).
BYD did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The company would ask its dealers to install a physical fix in the recalled cars, the SAMR statement added.
The recall is a rare one by BYD of its pure electric and plug-in hybrid cars as the Chinese company grew rapidly to become the world's biggest seller of such vehicles.
It recalled a small batch of Tang plug-in hybrids in 2022 due to a defect in the battery pack that could cause fires.
- Huawei is sending samples of its new AI chip meant to rival Nvidiawww.scmp.com Huawei is sending samples of its new AI chip meant to rival Nvidia
Huawei is sending out samples of its Ascend 910C processor for testing as the tech giant races to fill a void left by Nvidia.
https://archive.ph/Y7MVs
- Australia’s 3G Shutdown - Telcos to Block Working 4G/5G Phones!medium.com Australia’s 3G Shutdown - Telcos to Block Working 4G/5G Phones!
Silent Policy Change: Telcos to disconnect “Unsupported” Phones
- HP ink cartridge DRM bypass demonstrated using physical man-in-the-middle-attackwww.tomshardware.com HP ink cartridge DRM bypass demonstrated using physical man-in-the-middle-attack
Super-thin PCB stops the cartridge from counting how many pages you've printed.
- Google Was Set to Host An Israeli Military Conference. When We Asked About It, The Event Disappeared.theintercept.com Google Was Set to Host An Israeli Military Conference. When We Asked About It, The Event Disappeared.
Google's Tel Aviv office was to host a military tech conference in Israel, but scrubbed any internet record of it after being asked.
The Israeli Defense Tech Conference, aimed at tech companies working with the Israeli military, was scheduled for November at the Google for Startups campus in Tel Aviv.
The event, according to a listing posted on the event RSVP app Luma, was pitched at “founders, investors and innovators” looking to network and learn more about the defense tech space. It was co-sponsored by Google, Fusion Venture Capital, Genesis, a startup accelerator, and the Israeli military’s research and development arm, known as the Directorate of Defense Research and Development (DDR&D, or Ma’fat).
When The Intercept contacted Google, the event page disappeared.
Google was not only listed as the physical host of the event and one of its sponsors, but the event listing also included a notice that attendees “approve of sharing [their] details with the organizers (Fusion & Google)” as part of signing up.
When The Intercept contacted Google, as well as the other companies and venture capital firms on the event page, the event page disappeared.
- If your AI seems smarter, it's thanks to smarter human trainers
In the early years, getting AI models like ChatGPT or its rival Cohere to spit out human-like responses required vast teams of low-cost workers helping models distinguish basic facts such as if an image was of a car or a carrot.
But more sophisticated updates to AI models in the fiercely competitive arena are now demanding a rapidly expanding network of human trainers who have specialized knowledge -- from historians to scientists, some with doctorate degrees.
"A year ago, we could get away with hiring undergraduates, to just generally teach AI on how to improve," said Cohere co-founder Ivan Zhang, talking about its internal human trainers.
"Now we have licensed physicians teaching the models how to behave in medical environments, or financial analysts or accountants."
- Dog poop drone cleans up the yard so you don't have tohackaday.com How to Turn Off Smart TV Snooping Features - Consumer Reports
Smart TVs collect viewing data. Here's what you need to know to reduce the data collection for all the major brands of smart TVs. These TV privacy settings limit what manufacturers learn about you.
Finally, a good use for drone and AI/ML technology!
From the maker of the poop-shooting laser turret and the AI/ML poop image detector.
- Stem cells reverse woman’s diabetes — a world firstwww.nature.com Stem cells reverse woman’s diabetes — a world first
She is the first person with type 1 diabetes to receive this kind of transplant.
- The Mozilla Graveyardwww.spacebar.news The Mozilla Graveyard
A look back at 20 dead Mozilla and Firefox products, from smartphones to VR games.
- EU to vote on Oct 4 to finalize tariffs for China-made EVs, Bloomberg News reports
Sept 28 (Reuters) - The European Union is planning to vote on whether to introduce tariffs as high as 45% on imported electric vehicles made in China on Oct. 4, Bloomberg News reported on Saturday, citing people familiar with the matter.
Member states have received a draft of the regulation for the proposed measures, the report said, adding that the new date could still change.
According to the report, the vote among the bloc's member states was slightly delayed amid last-minute negotiations with Beijing to try to find a resolution that would avoid the new levies.
The European Commission is on the verge of proposing final tariffs of up to 35.3% on EVs built in China, on top of the EU's standard 10% car import duty.
- Musk’s X blocks links to JD Vance dossier and suspends journalist who posted itarstechnica.com Musk’s X blocks links to JD Vance dossier and suspends journalist who posted it
X says it suspended reporter for "posting unredacted personal information."
Elon Musk's X is blocking links to the JD Vance "dossier" containing the Trump campaign's research on the vice presidential nominee. X also suspended Ken Klippenstein, the journalist who published the dossier that apparently comes from an Iranian hack of the Trump campaign.
- Valve removes arbitration from its Steam agreements — here’s what that means for youwww.polygon.com Valve removes arbitration from its Steam agreements — here’s what that means for you
Steam users can now sue Valve, thanks to changes to its Steam Subscriber Agreement.
- Mozilla hit with privacy complaint over Firefox user trackingwww.reuters.com /technology/mozilla-hit-with-privacy-complaint-over-firefox-user-tracking-2024-09-25/
STOCKHOLM, Sept 25 (Reuters) - Vienna-based advocacy group NOYB on Wednesday said it has filed a complaint with the Austrian data protection authority against Mozilla accusing the Firefox browser maker of tracking user behaviour on websites without consent.
NOYB (None Of Your Business), the digital rights group founded by privacy activist Max Schrems, said Mozilla has enabled a so-called “privacy preserving attribution” feature that turned the browser into a tracking tool for websites without directly telling its users.
Mozilla had defended the feature, saying it wanted to help websites understand how their ads perform without collecting data about individual people. By offering what it called a non-invasive alternative to cross-site tracking, it hoped to significantly reduce collecting individual information.
- “Railway Miracle” Only Seen in China?! I Went Deep into China’s Super High-Speed Rail and Found This
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- There is no Black Friday - Brett Scott on cultural malwarewww.asomo.co There is no Black Friday
And the overlords of the global village spam us with cultural malware
- Intel is releasing another microcode update to protect crashing Raptor Lake CPUswww.theverge.com Intel is releasing another microcode update to protect crashing Raptor Lake CPUs
0x12B might help reduce instability after you get it.
- Top EU Court’s Advisor Explains Why Video Game Cheats Are Not Copyright Infringementwww.techdirt.com Top EU Court’s Advisor Explains Why Video Game Cheats Are Not Copyright Infringement
One of the reasons that today’s copyright is such a bad fit for the modern digital world is that its roots lie deep in 18th-century law and analogue objects like books. This fact has created a kind…
- As the open social web grows, a new nonprofit looks to expand the 'fediverse'techcrunch.com As the open social web grows, a new nonprofit looks to expand the 'fediverse' | TechCrunch
A new project launching today aims to capitalize on the momentum seen within the fediverse, also known as the open social web, which describes
A new project launching today aims to capitalize on the momentum seen within the fediverse, also known as the open social web, which describes interconnected social networking services powered by the ActivityPub protocol. Co-founded by the co-author and current editor of ActivityPub, Evan Prodromou, a new nonprofit organization called the Social Web Foundation will focus on expanding the fediverse, improving ActivityPub and the user experience, informing policymakers, and educating people about the fediverse and how they can participate.
- Amazon, Tesla and Meta among world’s top companies undermining democracy – reportwww.theguardian.com Amazon, Tesla and Meta among world’s top companies undermining democracy – report
Corporations such as ExxonMobil and Blackstone also big funders of climate crisis, new trade union report finds
Some of the world’s largest companies have been accused of undermining democracy across the world by financially backing far-right political movements, funding and exacerbating the climate crisis, and violating trade union rights and human rights in a report published on Monday by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC).
Amazon, Tesla, Meta, ExxonMobil, Blackstone, Vanguard and Glencore are the corporations included in the report. The companies’ lobbying arms are attempting to shape global policy at the United Nations Summit of the Future in New York City on 22 and 23 September.
- An Abridged History of Safari Showstoppers - Webventureswebventures.rejh.nl An Abridged History of Safari Showstoppers - Webventures
TL;DR: iOS Safari is more than an inconvenience for developers, it's the fundamental reason interoperability has been stymied in...
TL;DR: iOS Safari is more than an inconvenience for developers, it's the fundamental reason interoperability has been stymied in...
- Why office workers could soon be filmed all day at their desksmetro.co.uk Why office workers could soon be filmed all day at their desks
BT is researching 'continuous authentication via facial recognition' with software that can also analyse if employees look tired or stressed.
- Cloudflare's new marketplace will let websites charge AI bots for scrapingtechcrunch.com Cloudflare's new marketplace will let websites charge AI bots for scraping | TechCrunch
Cloudflare announced plans on Monday to launch a marketplace in the next year where website owners can sell AI model providers access to scrape their
- Israel's pager attack in Lebanon will blow back: Western tech can't be trusted anymore
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- China’s AI firms are cleverly innovating around chip banswww.economist.com China’s AI firms are cleverly innovating around chip bans
Tweaks to software blunt the shortage of powerful hardware
https://archive.is/fR7RB
- Meta unveils $299 Quest 3S VR headset, Orion AR glasses prototypewww.cnbc.com Meta unveils $299 Quest 3S VR headset, Orion AR glasses prototype
Meta announced the Quest 3S, the latest virtual-reality headset to come out of the company's Reality Labs division and a cheaper offering than its predecessor.
Meta announced the Quest 3S, the latest virtual reality headset to come out of the company’s Reality Labs division and a cheaper offering than its predecessor.
The device will go on sale on Oct. 15, and it’ll retail starting at $299, down from the $499 starting price for 2023′s Quest 3. The device can be used to watch movies, as well as run VR fitness apps and gaming, Meta said Wednesday at its Connect event in Menlo Park, California. The company positioned the headset as a multitasking computer, putting it in competition with Apple’s $3,499 Vision Pro headset that launched in February.
In addition to the Quest 3S, Meta on Wednesday also showcased its latest prototype of augmented-reality smart glasses and announced a flurry of new features for its Meta AI chatbot.
- How we redesigned the ProleWiki homepage and what anyone can learn from itcriticalresist.substack.com How we redesigned the ProleWiki homepage and what anyone can learn from it
You don't need to be a designer to understand design -- promise.
cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/5770703
> My own article as a companion to the new ProleWiki homepage we are releasing very very soon, explaining how we started from nothing and got the final full page.
- These Images Of An F-22 Raptor's Crumbling Radar Absorbent Skin Are Fascinatingwww.twz.com These Images Of An F-22 Raptor's Crumbling Radar Absorbent Skin Are Fascinating
The photos are a reminder of just how much work goes into keeping the F-22's skin ready for combat and the amazing science behind its stealthy design.
- Delete America, GPS, and BeiDou: the Great Power Competition in satellite navigation systems
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- China Is Rapidly Becoming a Leading Innovator in Advanced Industriesitif.org China Is Rapidly Becoming a Leading Innovator in Advanced Industries
There may be no more important question for the West’s competitive position in advanced industries than whether China is becoming a rival innovator. While the evidence suggests it hasn’t yet taken the overall lead, it has pulled ahead in certain areas, and in many others Chinese firms will likely eq...
cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/43060836
- DEF CON 32 - Disenshittify or die! How hackers can seize the means of computation - Cory Doctorow
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cross-posted from: https://jlai.lu/post/10771034
> Personal review: > > A good recap of his previous writings and talks on the subject for the first third, but a bit long. Having paid attention to them for the past year or two, my attention started drifting a few times. I ended up being more impressed with how much he's managed to condense explaining "enshittification" from 45+ minutes down to around 15. > > As soon as he starts building off of that to work towards the core of his message for this talk, I was more-or-less glued to the screen. At first because it's not exactly clear where he's going, and there are (what felt like) many specific court rulings to keep up with. Thankfully, once he has laid enough groundwork he gets straight his point. I don't want to spoil or otherwise lessen the performance he gives, so I won't directly comment on what his point is in the body of this post - I think the comments are better suited for that anyways. > > I found the rest to be pretty compelling. He rides the fine line between directionless discontent and overenthusiastic activist-with-a-plan as he doubles down on his narrative by calling back to the various bits of groundwork he laid before - now that we're "in" on the idea, what felt like stumbling around in the dark turns into an illuminating path through some of the specifics of the last twenty to forty years of the dynamics of power between tech bosses and their employees. The rousing call to action was also great way to end and wrap it all up. > > I've become very biased towards Cory Doctorow's ideas, in part because they line up with a lot of the impressions I have from my few years working as a dev in a big-ish multinational tech company. This talk has done nothing to diminish that bias - on the contrary.
- Exclusive: US to propose ban on Chinese software, hardware in connected vehicles, sources saywww.reuters.com /business/autos-transportation/us-propose-barring-chinese-software-hardware-connected-vehicles-sources-say-2024-09-21/
WASHINGTON, Sept 21 (Reuters) - The U.S. Commerce Department is expected on Monday to propose prohibiting Chinese software and hardware in connected and autonomous vehicles on American roads due to national security concerns, two sources told Reuters.
The Biden administration has raised serious concerns about the collection of data by Chinese companies on U.S. drivers and infrastructure as well as the potential foreign manipulation of vehicles connected to the internet and navigation systems.
The proposed regulation would ban the import and sale of vehicles from China with key communications or automated driving system software or hardware, said the two sources, who declined to be identified because the decision had not been publicly disclosed.
The move is a significant escalation in the United States' ongoing restrictions on Chinese vehicles, software and components. Last week, the Biden administration locked in steep tariff hikes on Chinese imports, including a 100% duty on electric vehicles as well as new hikes on EV batteries and key minerals.
- Tech giants push to dilute Europe's AI Act
LONDON, Sept 20 (Reuters) - The world's biggest technology companies have embarked on a final push to persuade the European Union to take a light-touch approach to regulating artificial intelligence as they seek to fend off the risk of billions of dollars in fines.
EU lawmakers in May agreed the AI Act, the world's first comprehensive set of rules governing the technology, following months of intense negotiations between different political groups.
- OceanGate’s ill-fated Titan sub relied on a hand-typed Excel spreadsheetwww.theverge.com OceanGate’s ill-fated Titan sub relied on a hand-typed Excel spreadsheet
‘This is an idiotic way to do navigation.’