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Feature work on Plasma 6.5 this week includes "a major visual change that has been years in the wanting," according to the KDE blog: "rounded bottom corners for windows!" Neowin reports:This visual refresh, planned for the upcoming Plasma 6.5, is a feature that many users have been asking for over a long period, with a formal proposal even being submitted back in 2021.Its official arrival will mean less need for community-developed workarounds like kde-rounded-corners, a popular third-party script that has served this purpose for years. The feature will be enabled by default, but it includes an option for those who prefer the classic, sharp-cornered look.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Twitter co-founder/Block CEO Jack Dorsey isn't just vibe coding new apps like Bitchat and Sun Day. He's also "invested $10 million in an effort to fund experimental open source projects and other tools that could ultimately transform the social media landscape," reports TechCrunch," funding the projects through an online collective formed in May called "andOtherStuff:[T]he team at "andOtherStuff" is determined not to build a company but is instead operating like a "community of hackers," explains Evan Henshaw-Plath [who handles UX/onboarding and was also Twitter's first employee]. Together, they're working to create technologies that could include new consumer social apps as well as various experiments, like developer tools or libraries, that would allow others to build apps for themselves. For instance, the team is behind an app called Shakespeare, which is like the app-building platform Lovable, but specifically for building Nostr-based social apps with AI assistance. The group is also behind heynow, a voice note app built on Nostr; Cashu wallet; private messenger White Noise; and the Nostr-based social community +chorus, in addition to the apps Dorsey has already released. Developments in AI-based coding have made this type of experimentation possible, Henshaw-Plath points out, in the same way that technologies like Ruby on Rails, Django, and JSON helped to fuel an earlier version of the web, dubbed Web 2.0. Related to these efforts, Henshaw-Plath sat down with Dorsey for the debut episode of his new podcast, revolution.social with @rabble... Dorsey believes Bluesky faces the same challenges as traditional social media because of its structure - it's funded by VCs, like other startups. Already, it has had to bow to government requests and faced moderation challenges, he points out. "I think [Bluesky CEO] Jay [Graber] is great. I think the team is great," Dorsey told Henshaw-Plath, "but the structure is what I disagree with ... I want to push the energy in a different direction, which is more like Bitcoin, which is completely open and not owned by anyone from a protocol layer...." Dorsey's initial investment has gotten the new nonprofit up and running, and he worked on some of its initial iOS apps. Meanwhile, others are contributing their time to build Android versions, developer tools, and different social media experiments. More is still in the works, says Henshaw-Plath. "There are things that we're not ready to talk about yet that'll be very exciting," he teases.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

"Eight healthy babies were born in Britain," reports Phys.org, "with the help of an experimental technique that uses DNA from three people to help mothers avoid passing devastating rare diseases to their children, researchers reported Wednesday." Mutations in mitochondrial DNA "can cause a range of diseases in children that can lead to muscle weakness, seizures, developmental delays, major organ failure and death," and in rare cases even pre-IVF testing can't clearly detect their presence.Researchers have been developing a technique that tries to avoid the problem by using the healthy mitochondria from a donor egg. They reported in 2023 that the first babies had been born using this method... Using this method means the embryo has DNA from three people - from the mother's egg, the father's sperm and the donor's mitochondria - and it required a 2016 U.K. law change to approve it. It is also allowed in Australia but not in many other countries, including the U.S. Experts at Britain's Newcastle University and Monash University in Australia reported in the New England Journal of Medicine Wednesday that they performed the new technique in fertilized embryos from 22 patients, which resulted in eight babies that appear to be free of mitochondrial diseases. One woman is still pregnant... Robin Lovell-Badge [a stem cell and developmental genetics scientist at the Francis Crick Institute who was not involved in the research] said the amount of DNA from the donor is insignificant, noting that any resulting child would have no traits from the woman who donated the healthy mitochondria... In the U.K., every couple seeking a baby born through donated mitochondria must be approved by the country's fertility regulator. As of this month, 35 patients have been authorized to undergo the technique. Critics have previously raised concerns, warning that it's impossible to know the impact these sorts of novel techniques might have on future generations... But in countries where the technique is allowed, advocates say it could provide a promising alternative for some families.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

"I vibe coded a little game called Coldplay Canoodlers," reads the X.com post by gaming enthusiast/songwriter Jonathan Mann. "You're the camera operator and you have to find the CEO and HR lady canoodling. 10 points every time you find them." Mann's post includes a 30-second clip from the game, which is playable here. Forbes notes that the TikTok video of the couple's reaction has drawn more than 100 million views - and that the married-to-someone-else CEO has now tendered his resignation from his dataops company Astronomer (which was accepted). The company is now searching for a new chief executive, according to a statement posted on LinkedIn. ("Comments have been turned off on this post...") "Our leaders are expected to set the standard in both conduct and accountability, and recently, that standard was not met." But songwriter Mann saw a chance to have some fun, writes Forbes:Mann used ChatGPT to make the "Coldplay Canoodlers" game, inputting such prompts as: "Can you generate an 8-bit pixel image of a stadium concert viewed from the stage" and "there should be a large jumbotron somewhere up in the stadium seats." He also entered rough drawings of the visual style he envisioned... The response to the game, Mann said in an interview, has been unexpected. "I have gone viral many times with my songs," he said. It's "very strange to have it happen with a game I made in four hours." Songwriter Mann has been sharing an original song online every day for over 17 years. Last summer Slashdot also covered Mann's attempts to sell NFTs of his songs, and his concerns about SEC regulations. (This led him to file a real-world legal challenge - and to write a song titled "I'm Suing the SEC".) So with all the attention this weekend to his instant game, there was nothing to do but... write a new song about it. And minutes ago on X.com, Mann also posted a new update about his game. "I turned it into an NFT." "Took some time," Mann explained later. "But I vibe coded my own ERC-721 contract and minted the game as a playable NFT. (Plays great on OpenSea)."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

It's "a milestone for scalable quantum technologies," according to the announcement from Boston University. Scientists from Boston University, UC Berkeley, and Northwestern University "reported the world's first electronic-photonic-quantum system on a chip, according to a study published in Nature Electronics." Quantum computing is on "a decades-long path from concept to reality," says Milos PopoviA, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at BU and a senior author on the study. "This is a small step on that path - but an important one, because it shows we can build repeatable, controllable quantum systems in commercial semiconductor foundries."The system combines quantum light sources and stabilizing electronics using a standard 45-nanometer semiconductor manufacturing process to produce reliable streams of correlated photon pairs (particles of light) - a key resource for emerging quantum technologies. The advance paves the way for mass-producible "quantum light factory" chips and large-scale quantum systems built from many such chips working together... Just as electronic chips are powered by electric currents, and optical communication links by laser light, future quantum technologies will require a steady stream of quantum light resource units to perform their functions. To provide this, the researchers' work created an array of "quantum light factories" on a silicon chip, each less than a millimeter by a millimeter in dimension... "What excites me most is that we embedded the control directly on-chip - stabilizing a quantum process in real time," says Anirudh Ramesh, a PhD student at Northwestern who led the quantum measurements. "That's a critical step toward scalable quantum systems." Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader fahrbot-bot for sharing the news.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

"Nearly 2 million people protected their privacy by deleting their DNA from 23andMe after it declared bankruptcy in March," writes a Washington Post technology columnist. "Now it's back with the same person in charge - and I still don't trust it."As of this week, genetic data from the more than 10 million remaining 23andMe customers has been formally sold to an organization called TTAM Research Institute for $305 million. That nonprofit is run by the person who co-founded and ran 23andMe, Anne Wojcicki. In a recent email to customers, the new 23andMe said it "will be operating with the same employees and privacy protocols that have protected your data." Never mind that Wojcicki and her privacy protocols are what put your DNA at risk in the first place... The company is legally obligated to maintain and honor 23andMe's existing privacy policies, user consents and data protection measures. And as part of a settlement with states, TTAM also agreed to provide annual privacy reports to state regulators and set up a privacy board. But it hasn't agreed to take the fundamental step of asking for permission to acquire existing customers' genetic information. And it's leaving the door open to selling people's genes to the highest bidder again in the future... Existing 23andMe customers have the right to delete their data or opt out of TTAM's research. But the new company is not asking for opt-in permission before it takes ownership of customers' DNA... Why does that matter? Because people who handed over the DNA 15 years ago, often to learn about their genetic ancestry, never imagined it might be used in this way now. Asking for new permission might significantly shrink the size (and value) of 23andMe's DNA database - but it would be the right thing to do given the rocky history. Neil M. Richards [the Washington University professor who served as privacy ombudsman for the bankruptcy court], pointed out that about a third of 23andMe customers haven't logged in for at least three years, so they may have no idea what is going on. Some 23andMe users never even clicked "agree" on a legal agreement that allowed their data to be sold like this; the word "bankruptcy" wasn't added to the company's privacy policy until 2022. And then there is an unknown number of deceased users who most certainly can't consent, but whose DNA still has an impact on their living genetic relatives... [S]everal states have argued that their existing genetic privacy laws don't allow 23andMe to receive the information without getting permission from every single person. Virginia has an ongoing lawsuit over the issue, and the California attorney general's office told me it "will continue to fight to protect and vindicate the rights" of consumers.... Two more points of concern:"There is nothing in 23andMe's bankruptcy agreement or privacy statement to prevent TTAM from selling or transferring DNA to some other organization in the future."The article also notes a 2023 data breach affecting 6.9 million users, arguing "They haven't shown they can keep your data safe... 23andMe's financial struggles could make it hard to run a robust cybersecurity program."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader shared this report from the Washington Post:Ships trigger seafloor methane emissions while moving through shallow water, researchers report in Communications Earth & Environment. The scientists say the unexpected discovery has nothing to do with the type of fuel used by the ship. Instead, "ship-induced pressure changes and turbulent mixing" trigger the release of the gas from the seafloor. Bubbles and gas diffusion push the methane into the atmosphere, where it acts as a greenhouse gas... Container and cruise ships triggered the largest and most frequent methane emissions, but the study suggests that ships of all kinds, regardless of their type of engine or size, trigger methane emissions. Researchers said they observed emissions that were 20 times higher in the shipping lane than in undisturbed nearby areas. Given the number of ports in similarly shallow areas worldwide, it's important to learn more about emissions in shipping lanes and to better estimate their "hitherto unknown impact," study co-author Johan Mellqvist, a professor of optical remote sensing at Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden, said in a news release.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Electronic messages travel faster than seismic waves, Gizmodo points out - meaning some people near an earthquake receive an Android Earthquake Alert "before the seismic waves reach them - and even a few seconds could be just enough time to hide under a table or run outside." Richard Allen from the University of California in Berkeley's Seismological Laboratory, writes in a new study that "The global adoption of smartphone technology places sophisticated sensing and alerting capabilities in people's hands, in both the wealthy and less-wealthy portions of the planet." From Gizmodo:According to the study, 70% of the world's smartphones are Android phones, which by default come with the aforementioned sensing and alerting capabilities. From 2021 to 2024, the Android Earthquake Alert (AEA) system detected an average of 312 earthquakes per month across 98 countries. The earthquakes had a magnitude between 1.9 and 7.8, and the system alerted users of earthquakes at or over a magnitude of 4.5, averaging around 60 events and 18 million alerts per month. The AEA system also collected user feedback, revealing that 85% of users who received alerts experienced shaking, with 36% receiving the alert before, 28% during, and 23% after the shaking began... "AEA demonstrates that globally distributed smartphones can be used to detect earthquakes and issue warnings at scale with an effectiveness comparable to established national systems," the researchers wrote. The system detected 11,231 earthquakes between April of 2021 and March of 2024, according to the study, which notes that the length of the advanced warning "ranged from seconds up to a minute" for moderate shaking, and about 15 seconds for the strongest shaking.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Historian Garrett M. Graff describes his upcoming book, The Devil Reached Toward the Sky: An Oral History of the Making and Unleashing of the Atomic Bomb. "I assembled an oral history of the Manhattan Project, the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the end of World War II in the Pacific, told through the voices of around 500 participants and witnesses of the events - including luminaries like Albert Einstein and Oppenheimer and political figures like President Harry Truman." It was 80 years ago this week that physicists and 150 other leaders in the atomic bomb program "gathered in the desert outside Alamogordo, New Mexico, for the world's first test of a nuclear explosion." In an except from his upcoming book, Graff publishes quotes from eyewitness:Brig. Gen. Leslie Groves: I had become a bit annoyed with Fermi when he suddenly offered to take wagers from his fellow scientists on whether or not the bomb would ignite the atmosphere, and if so, whether it would merely destroy New Mexico or destroy the world. He had also said that after all it wouldn't make any difference whether the bomb went off or not because it would still have been a well worthwhile scientific experiment. For if it did fail to go off, we would have proved that an atomic explosion was not possible. Afterward, I realized that his talk had served to smooth down the frayed nerves and ease the tension of the people at the base camp, and I have always thought that this was his conscious purpose. Certainly, he himself showed no signs of tension that I could see... As the hour approached, we had to postpone the test - first for an hour and then later for 30 minutes more - so that the explosion was actually three- and one-half hours behind the original schedule... Our preparations were simple. Everyone was told to lie face down on the ground, with his feet toward the blast, to close his eyes and to cover his eyes with his hands as the countdown approached zero. As soon as they became aware of the flash they could turn over and sit or stand up, covering their eyes with the smoked glass with which each had been supplied... The quiet grew more intense. I, myself, was on the ground between Bush and Conant... Edward Teller: We all were lying on the ground, supposedly with our backs turned to the explosion. But I had decided to disobey that instruction and instead looked straight at the bomb. I was wearing the welder's glasses that we had been given so that the light from the bomb would not damage our eyes. But because I wanted to face the explosion, I had decided to add some extra protection. I put on dark glasses under the welder's glasses, rubbed some ointment on my face to prevent sunburn from the radiation, and pulled on thick gloves to press the welding glasses to my face to prevent light from entering at the sides... We all listened anxiously as the broadcast of the final countdown started; but, for whatever reason, the transmission ended at minus five seconds... Kenneth T. Bainbridge: My personal nightmare was knowing that if the bomb didn't go off or hang-fired, I, as head of the test, would have to go to the tower first and seek to find out what had gone wrong... Brig. Gen. Thomas F. Farrell: Dr. Oppenheimer held on to a post to steady himself. For the last few seconds, he stared directly ahead. A few examples of how they remembered the explosion: William L. Laurence: There rose from the bowels of the earth a light not of this world, the light of many suns in one. Kenneth T. Bainbridge: I felt the heat on the back of my neck, disturbingly warm. George B. Kistiakowsky: I am sure that at the end of the world - in the last millisecond of the earth's existence - the last man will see what we have just seen. Brig. Gen. Thomas F. Farrell: Oppenheimer's face relaxed into an expression of tremendous relief. J. Robert Oppenheimer: We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried. Norris Bradbury, physicist, Los Alamos Lab: Some people claim to have wondered at the time about the future of mankind. I didn't. We were at war, and the damned thing worked.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

ABC News reports:Dialogue heard on a cockpit voice recording indicates that the captain of the Air India flight that crashed in June, killing 260 people, may have turned off the fuel just after takeoff, prompting the first officer to panic, according to The Wall Street Journal, which cited sources familiar with U.S. official's early assessment... The president of the Federation of Indian Pilots condemned the Wall Street Journal report, saying, "The preliminary report nowhere states that the pilots have moved the fuel control switches, and this has been corroborated by the CVR [cockpit voice recorder] recording." But meanwhile "India on Monday ordered its airlines to examine fuel switches on several Boeing aircraft models," reports Reuters, "while South Korea ordered a similar measure on Tuesday, as scrutiny intensified of fuel switch locks at the centre of an investigation into a deadly Air India crash."The precautionary moves by the two countries and airlines in several others came despite the planemaker and the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration assuring airlines and regulators in recent days that the fuel switch locks on Boeing jets are safe... [The preliminary report] noted a 2018 advisory from the FAA, which recommended, but did not mandate, operators of several Boeing models, including the 787, to inspect the locking feature of fuel cutoff switches to ensure they could not be moved accidentally... Some airlines around the world told Reuters they had been checking relevant switches since 2018 in accordance with the FAA advisory, including Australia's Qantas Airways. Others said they had made additional or new checks since the release of the preliminary report into the Air India crash. The web site of India's Financial Express newspaper spoke to Mary Schiavo, who was Inspector General of America's Transportation Department from 1990 to 1996 (and is also a long-time critic of the FAA). The site notes Schiavo "rejected the claims of human error that a pilot downed the Ahmedabad to London flight by cutting off the fuel supply."Schiavo exclusively told FinancialExpress.com that this is not the first time fuel switch transitioned from "Run" to "Cutoff" on its own. It happened five years ago, too. "There was an All Nippon Airways (ANA) flight in 2019 in which the 787 aircraft did this itself, while the flight was on final approach. No pilot input cutting off the fuel whatsoever," Schiavo told FinancialExpress.com... "The investigation revealed the plane software made the 787 think it was on the ground and the Thrust Control Malfunction Accommodation System cut the fuel to the engines," she told FinancialExpress.com, before adding, "The pilots never touched the fuel cutoff..." Both engines flamed out immediately after the pilot deployed the thrust reversers for landing. The aircraft, which was also a Boeing 787 Dreamliner, was towed away from the runway by the authorities, and no injuries were reported. UK Civil Aviation Authority, four weeks before the crash, had warned about similar fuel system issues on Boeing aircraft [on May 15, 2025]. "The FAA has issued an Airworthiness Directive addressing a potential unsafe condition affecting fuel shutoff valves installed on Boeing aircraft," the UK regulator's notice read, listing the B737, B757, B767, B777 and B787... Thrust Control Malfunction Accommodation informs FADEC [a digital computer] about whether the aircraft is on the ground or in the air, and if it believes the aircraft is on the ground, it may automatically throttle back the engines, without the pilot's input. Reuters notes that the Air India crash preliminary report "said maintenance records showed that the throttle control module, which includes the fuel switches, was replaced in 2019 and 2023 on the plane involved in the crash." Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader wired_parrot for sharing the news.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

"The U.S. is absolutely facing the most serious Chinese hacking ever." That's what the Washington Post was told by a China-focused consultant at security company SentinelOne:Undeterred by recent indictments alleging widespread cyberespionage against American agencies, journalists and infrastructure targets, Chinese hackers are hitting a wider range of targets and battling harder to stay inside once detected, seven current and former U.S. officials said in interviews. Hacks from suspected Chinese government actors detected by the security firm CrowdStrike more than doubled from 2023 to more than 330 last year and continued to climb as the new administration took over, the company said... Although the various Chinese hacking campaigns seem to be led by different government agencies and have different goals, all benefit from new techniques and from Beijing's introduction of a less constrained system for cyber offense, the officials and outside researchers told The Washington Post... Chinese intelligence, military and security agencies previously selected targets and tasked their own employees with breaking in, they said. But the Chinese government decided to take a more aggressive approach by allowing private industry to conduct cyberattacks and hacking campaigns on their own, U.S. officials said. The companies are recruiting top hackers who discover previously unknown, or "zero-day," flaws in software widely used in the United States. Then the companies search for where the vulnerable programs are installed, hack a great many of them at once, and then sell access to multiple Chinese government customers and other security companies. That hacking-for-hire approach creates hundreds of U.S. victims instead of a few, making it hard to block attacks and to decide which were China's key targets and which were unintentionally caught in the hacks, an FBI official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to follow agency practices... "The result of that incentive structure is that there is significantly more hacking...." China has mastered the ability to move undetected through networks of compromised U.S. devices, so that the final connection to a target appears to be an ordinary domestic connection. That makes it easy to get around technology that blocks overseas links and puts it outside the purview of the National Security Agency, which by law must avoid scrutinizing most domestic transmissions. Beijing is increasingly focused on hacking software and security vendors that provide access to many customers at once, the FBI official said. Once access is obtained, the hackers typically add new email and collaboration accounts that look legitimate... Beyond the increased government collaboration with China's private security sector is occasional collaborating with criminal groups, said Ken Dunham, an analyst at the security firm Qualys. The article notes that China's penetration of U.S. telecom carriers "is still not fully contained, according to the current and former officials." But in addition, the group behind that attack "has more recently shown up inside core communications infrastructure in Europe, according to John Carlin, a former top national security official in the Justice Department who represents some U.S. victims of the group." And documents leaked last year from a security contractor that works with the Chinese military and other government groups "described contracts and targets in 20 countries, with booty including Indian immigration data, logs of calls in South Korea, and detailed information on roads in Taiwan. "It also detailed prices for some services, such as $25,000 for promised remote access to an iPhone, payment disputes with government customers and employee gripes about long hours..."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

"Commodore has returned from a parallel timeline where tech stayed optimistic, inviting, and human," explains the official web site for "the first real Commodore computer in over 30 years..." You can check out an ad for it here. "Not an emulator. Not a PC... Powered by a FPGA recreation of the original motherboard, wrapped in glowing game-reactive LEDs (or classic beige of course)." Fast Company calls it "a $299 device that its makers claim is compatible with over 10,000 retro games, cartridges, and peripherals." In a YouTube video posted last month, "Peri Fractic" said he'd purchased the company for "a low seven-figure sum," and said he'd recruited several former Commodore employees to help relaunch the brand.The new C64s are expected to begin shipping as early as October, though that date could slip... There are three models to choose from, all with the same internal components. If you were expecting a vastly outdated machine, however, you're in for a surprise. The Commodore 64 Ultimate will include 128 megabytes of RAM and 16 megabytes of flash memory. It connects to modern monitors via HDMI in high-definition 1080p resolution and features three USB-A ports and one USB-C port. Beyond the computer itself, the power source, and HDMI cable, your $299 also gets you a spiral-bound user guide, a 64-gigabyte USB drive featuring over 50 licensed games, a quick-start guide, and stickers. Aesthetically, the Commodore 64 Ultimate is available in the original beige or in premium variants: the Starlight Edition, with a clear case and LED lights ($249), or the Founder's Edition, which includes 24-karat gold-plated badges, satin gold keys, and a translucent amber case ($499). Just 6,400 units of the Founder's Edition will be produced, according to the company. The preorder setup resembles a Kickstarter campaign, though it doesn't use that platform. Commodore says all preorders come with a money-back guarantee, but it chose to skip the service's fees. Buyers should be aware that accounts are charged at the time of preorder... The product will come with a one-year limited warranty, and Commodore says most parts are already in production, including the updated motherboard, the case, and the keycaps that recreate the blocky keys that early users remember.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Ukrainian hacker group BO Team, with help from the Ukrainian Cyber Alliance and possibly Ukraine's military, claims to have wiped out one of Russia's largest military drone manufacturers, destroying 47TB of production data and even disabling the doors in the facility. "Or, as described by the hacking collective (per Google translate), they 'deeply penetrated' the drone manufacturer 'to the very tonsils of demilitarization and denazification,'" reports The Register. From the report: BO Team (also known as Black Owl) announced the breach on its Telegram channel, and claimed to have carried out the operation alongside fellow hackers the Ukrainian Cyber Alliance "and one very well-known organization, the mention of which makes Vanya's bottle receivers explode," according to a Google translation of the Russian text. While the "very well-known organization" isn't named, BO Team included a link to Ukraine's Ministry of Defence. The military intelligence agency, working alongside the attackers, "carried out large-scale work to capture the entire network and server infrastructure of Gaskar Group, collect valuable information about the UAVs being produced and prospective, and then destroy the information and disable this infrastructure," the Telegram post continued. This reportedly included 47TB of technical information about the production of Russian drones, and BO Team claims to have destroyed all of the information on Gaskar's servers, including 10TB of backup files. "By the way, from the information we received, China is providing assistance in the production and training of specialists of Gaskar Group," the hackers added via Telegram. BO Team also posted what they claim to be confidential employee questionnaires [PDF]. On their own Telegram channel, the Ukrainian Cyber Alliance said they also stole "all the source code" before destroying everything. "The network went down so thoroughly that the doors in the building were blocked," the pro-Ukraine crew wrote, per Google translate. "To open them, the administration had to turn on the fire alarm. Most likely, the defense order is on the verge of failure, and thousands of drones will not get to the front in the near future."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Dictionary.com abruptly deleted all user accounts and saved word lists from its premium apps without notice or refunds, leaving long-time logophiles "devastated." "The company deleted all accounts, as well as the only ways to use Dictionary.com without seeing ads -- even if you previously paid for an ad-free experience," reports Ars Technica. From the report: Dictionary.com offers a free dictionary through its website and free Android and iOS apps. It used to offer paid-for mobile apps, called Dictionary.com Pro, that let users set up accounts, use the app without ads, and enabled other features (like grammar tips and science and rhyming dictionaries) that are gone now. Dictionary.com's premium apps also let people download an offline dictionary (its free apps used to let you buy a downloadable dictionary as a one-time purchase), but offline the dictionaries aren't available anymore. About a year ago, claims of Dictionary.com's apps being buggy surfaced online. We also found at least one person claiming that they were unable to buy an ad-free upgrade at that time. Reports of Dictionary.com accounts being deleted and the apps not working as expected, and with much of its content removed, started appearing online about two months ago. Users reported being unable to log in and access premium features, like saved words. Soon after, Dictionary.com's premium apps were removed from Google Play and Apple's App Store. The premium version was available for download for $6 as recently as March 23, per the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The House passed a bipartisan bill regulating stablecoins which now heads to President Trump's desk as part of his push to make the U.S. the "crypto capital of the world." Two other crypto-related bills -- one defining digital asset market structure and another banning a U.S. central bank digital currency -- were also approved by the House but face uncertain futures in the Senate amid partisan tensions and concerns over Trump's personal financial ties to crypto ventures. CNBC reports: The stablecoin bill, passed on a 308-122 vote, sets initial guardrails and consumer protections for the cryptocurrency, which is tied to a stable asset, often the U.S. dollar, to reduce price volatility. It passed the Senate with bipartisan support in June. "Around the world, payment systems are undergoing a revolution," said House Financial Services Chair French Hill of Arkansas as lawmakers debated the stablecoin legislation Thursday morning. Hill said the bill will "ensure American competitiveness and strong guardrails for our consumers." After Trump declared it "crypto week," the bills were stalled for more than a day amid disagreements among House Republicans about how to combine the legislation. In the end, GOP leaders put the three bills for a separate votes, leaving the fate of the other two bills unclear in the Senate. The internal dissent could foreshadow challenges ahead for the more sweeping crypto legislation that Trump has demanded and the industry has poured millions into advancing. The stablecoin measure is seen by lawmakers and the industry as a step toward adding legitimacy and consumer trust to a rapidly growing sector. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in June that the legislation could help that currency "grow into a $3.7 trillion market by the end of the decade." The bill outlines requirements for stablecoin issuers, including compliance with U.S. anti-money laundering and sanctions laws, and mandates that issuers hold reserves backing the cryptocurrency. Without such a framework, Republicans on the Senate Banking Committee in a statement warned, "consumers face risks like unstable reserves or unclear operations from stablecoin issuers." After the votes, House Republicans strongly urged the Senate to take up the second bill, which would create a new market structure for cryptocurrency.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Record: Threat actors are stealing sensitive data from organizations by breaching end-of-life appliances made by cybersecurity company SonicWall. Incident responders from Google Threat Intelligence Group (GTIG) and Mandiant said on Wednesday that they have uncovered an ongoing campaign by an unidentified threat group that leverages credentials and one-time password (OTP) seeds stolen during previous intrusions -- allowing the hackers to regain access to organizations even after security updates are installed. [...] The campaign is targeting fully patched end-of-life SonicWall Secure Mobile Access (SMA) 100 series appliances. Google explained that the malware the hackers are using removes log entries, making it difficult to figure out how they initially gained access to a system. Google said the campaign extends beyond the incidents they investigated directly and added that SonicWall has "confirmed reports of other impacted organizations." The company noted that SonicWall updated an advisory for a bug tracked as CVE-2024-38475 in light of Google's findings. "As an added security measure, we strongly advise customers to reset the OTP (One-Time Password) binding for all users. This step ensures that any potentially compromised or stale OTP secrets are invalidated, thereby mitigating unauthorized access risks," SonicWall said in the update to the advisory.. One novel aspect of the campaign is the use of a backdoor called OVERSTEP, which modifies the SonicWall appliance's boot process to maintain persistent access, steal sensitive credentials and conceal the malware's own components. Incident responders struggled to track other activities by the hackers because OVERSTEP allowed them to delete logs and largely cover their tracks. OVERSTEP is specifically designed for SonicWall SMA 100 series appliances, according to Google. In addition to CVE-2024-38475, Google and Mandiant experts floated several potential vulnerabilities the hackers may have used to gain initial access, including CVE-2021-20038, CVE-2024-38475, CVE-2021-20035, CVE-2021-20039 and, CVE-2025-32819. Beyond those, Google theorized that the hackers may have used an unknown zero-day vulnerability to deploy the malware on targeted SonicWall SMA appliances.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Russian lawmakers passed sweeping new legislation allowing authorities to fine individuals simply for searching and accessing content labeled "extremist" via VPNs. The Washington Post reports: Russia defines "extremist materials" as content officially added by a court to a government-maintained registry, a running list of about 5,500 entries, or content produced by "extremist organizations" ranging from "the LGBT movement" to al-Qaeda. The new law also covers materials that promote alleged Nazi ideology or incite extremist actions. Until now, Russian law stopped short of punishing individuals for seeking information online; only creating or sharing such content is prohibited. The new amendments follow remarks by high-ranking officials that censorship is justified in wartime. Adoption of the measures would mark a significant tightening of Russia's already restrictive digital laws. The fine for searching for banned content in Russia would be about a $65, while the penalty for advertising circumvention tools such as VPN services would be steeper -- $2,500 for individuals and up to $12,800 for companies. Previously, the most significant expansion of Russia's restrictions on internet use and freedom of speech occurred shortly after the February 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, when sweeping laws criminalized the spread of "fake news" and "discrediting" the Russian military. The new amendment was introduced Tuesday and attached to a mundane bill on regulating freight companies, according to documents published by Russia's lower house of parliament, the State Duma.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Verge's Emma Roth reports: The News/Media Alliance, a trade association behind major news publishers, announced that it has "successfully secured" the removal of 12ft.io, a website that helped users bypass paywalls online. The trade association says 12ft.io's webhost took down the site on July 14th "following the News/Media Alliance's efforts." 12ft.io -- or 12 Foot Ladder -- also allowed users to view webpages without ads, trackers, or pop-ups by disguising a user's browser as a web crawler, giving them unfettered access to a webpage's contents. Software engineer Thomas Millar says he created the site when he realized "8 of the top 10 links on Google were paywalled" when doing research during the pandemic. [...] In its announcement, News/Media Alliance says 12ft.io "offered illegal circumvention technology" that allowed users to access copyrighted content without paying for it. The organization adds that it will take "similar actions" against other sites that let users get around paywalls. The News Media Alliance recently called Google's AI Mode "theft." (Like many chatbots, Google's AI Mode eliminates the need to visit a website, starving publishers of the pageviews they need to be compensated for their work.) "Publishers commit significant resources to creating the best and most informative content for consumers, and illegal tools like 12ft.io undermine their ability to financially support that work through subscriptions and ad revenue," News/Media Alliance president and CEO Danielle Coffey said in the press release. "Taking down paywall bypassers is an essential part of ensuring we have a healthy and sustainable information ecosystem."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from NBC News: Mark Zuckerberg and current and former directors and officers of Meta Platforms agreed on Thursday to settle claims seeking $8 billion for the damage they allegedly caused the company by allowing repeated violations of Facebook users' privacy, a lawyer for the shareholders told a Delaware judge on Thursday. The parties did not disclose details of the settlement and defense lawyers did not address the judge, Kathaleen McCormick of the Delaware Court of Chancery. McCormick adjourned the trial just as it was to enter its second day and she congratulated the parties. The plaintiffs' lawyer, Sam Closic, said the agreement just came together quickly. Billionaire venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, who is a defendant in the trial and a Meta director, was scheduled to testify on Thursday. Shareholders of Meta sued Zuckerberg, Andreessen and other former company officials including former Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg in hopes of holding them liable for billions of dollars in fines and legal costs the company paid in recent years. The Federal Trade Commission fined Facebook $5 billion in 2019 after finding that it failed to comply with a 2012 agreement with the regulator to protect users' data. The shareholders wanted the 11 defendants to use their personal wealth to reimburse the company. The defendants denied the allegations, which they called "extreme claims." "This settlement may bring relief to the parties involved, but it's a missed opportunity for public accountability," said Jason Kint, the head of Digital Content Next, a trade group for content providers. "Facebook has successfully remade the 'Cambridge Analytica' scandal about a few bad actors rather than an unraveling of its entire business model of surveillance capitalism and the reciprocal, unbridled sharing of personal data. That reckoning is now left unresolved."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev has said that the majority of his company's new code is written by AI, with "close to 100%" of engineers using AI code editors. Speaking on the 20VC podcast, Tenev estimated around 50% of new code at the trading platform is AI-generated. Tenev said the 50% figure is imprecise due to advanced "agentic" code editors that have made it difficult to distinguish human-written from AI-generated code. The company has progressed from GitHub Copilot to Cursor and now Windsurf, where "nearly all of the code is written by AI," he said. Tenev estimated only a "minority" of new code at Robinhood is written by humans.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Mozilla will ship WebGPU support in Firefox 141 when the browser launches July 22, bringing graphics processing capabilities that Chrome users have had since 2023. The initial release supports Windows only, with Mac, Linux, and Android planned for the coming months. WebGPU provides web content direct access to graphics processors for high-performance computation and rendering in games and complex 3D applications. Chrome gained WebGPU support with version 113 in 2023, while Safari 26 is expected to add the feature this fall. Firefox's implementation uses the WGPU Rust crate, which translates web requests into native commands for Direct3D 12, Metal, or Vulkan.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

British universities face mounting financial pressures with four in ten institutions running deficits, according to the Office for Students regulator. Half have closed courses to save money, while Durham and Newcastle each shed 200 staff members. Lancaster's cost-saving plan could eliminate one in five academic positions. The crisis, writes Economist, stems from frozen tuition fees for English students, which will rise by only a few percent in August for the first time in eight years.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

OpenAI launched ChatGPT agent Thursday, an AI tool that can complete multi-step tasks including online shopping, creating PowerPoint presentations, and generating spreadsheets. The agent combines capabilities from two existing OpenAI services: Operator, which can browse and interact with websites like a human, and Deep Research, which handles complex online research tasks. The tool runs on a new AI model developed specifically for agent capabilities and can perform tasks such as planning meals and ordering ingredients online, booking restaurant reservations, and creating slide decks based on competitor analysis. In demonstrations, the agent successfully browsed Etsy for vintage lamps under $200 with free shipping and automatically added items to a shopping cart. ChatGPT agent is immediately available to Pro, Plus, and Team subscribers, with Enterprise and Education users gaining access later this summer. The tool requires user permission before making purchases or performing "irreversible" actions like sending emails. The startup, however, has cautioned that the agent "is far from perfect" and can take several minutes to complete tasks.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Sony removed the tiltable screen from its new RX1R III full-frame compact camera to maintain similar dimensions to the previous model, despite adding numerous new features and charging $5,100 for the device, The Verge reports. The company increased the camera's size by only 2.5mm in height and 15.5mm in depth while incorporating the high-resolution sensor from the A7R V, Sony's latest autofocus tracking system, a longer-lasting battery, and a proper electronic viewfinder. Sony integrated the top dials and hot shoe into the body for a sleeker appearance. The camera's compact design prevents the inclusion of lens or sensor-based image stabilization. The Verge points out that Leica also added a tilt screen to its Q3 model after users requested the feature, despite the design compromise required.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A California federal judge has ruled that three authors suing Anthropic for copyright infringement can represent writers nationwide whose books the AI startup allegedly pirated to train its Claude chatbot. U.S. District Judge William Alsup said the authors can bring a class action on behalf of all U.S. writers whose works Anthropic allegedly downloaded from pirate libraries LibGen and PiLiMi to create a repository of millions of books in 2021 and 2022. Alsup said Anthropic may have illegally downloaded as many as 7 million books from the pirate websites, which could make it liable for billions of dollars in damages if the authors' case succeeds.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Cancer death rates in the U.S. have fallen by approximately one-third since the 1990s when adjusted for age, according to data cited in a new analysis of global cancer trends. The decline represents a steady, year-over-year reduction that began in the early 1990s and continues across developed countries. Prevention efforts have contributed substantially to the decline. Reduced smoking rates in wealthy nations prevented more than 3 million cancer deaths since 1975 in America alone. Britain's HPV vaccination program, launched in 2008 for teenage girls, produced a 90% reduction in cervical cancer rates among women in their 20s within 15 years. Treatment advances have transformed outcomes for specific cancers. Childhood leukemia, once virtually fatal, now has a five-year survival rate above 90%. Researchers have identified inexpensive drugs with cancer-prevention properties, including aspirin, which cuts bowel cancer risk in half for patients with Lynch syndrome. Future progress faces obstacles, however, including high treatment costs and planned cuts to the National Cancer Institute under the Trump administration. China overtook America as the primary source of cancer research in 2025.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Uber said Thursday it will partner with electric vehicle maker Lucid Group and autonomous driving startup Nuro to deploy robotaxis using Lucid Gravity SUVs equipped with Nuro Driver technology on its ride-sharing network. The companies plan to launch the first vehicles in late 2026 in an unidentified major US city and deploy at least 20,000 robotaxis over six years. Uber will make multi-hundred-million dollar investments in both partners, including $300 million for Lucid to upgrade its assembly line for integrating Nuro hardware into Gravity vehicles.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Perplexity has partnered with Indian telecoms giant Bharti Airtel to provide its premium Pro service to 360 million customers for free for an entire year, representing the largest distribution deal of its kind globally. The service normally costs $200 annually and provides access to advanced models including GPT-4.1 and Claude Sonnet and Opus 4. India is already ChatGPT's largest market by mobile usage.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Major US theater chains including Cinemark, Regal and Marcus have held preliminary talks about jointly marketing their big-screen theaters to compete with Imax, according to Bloomberg. The discussions have focused on setting shared standards for the chains' "premium large-format" theaters, with options including uniting around a new brand name or adding an industrywide designation that would serve as a stamp of approval for their locations. The chains are motivated by Imax's growing influence in the industry, as the company consistently generates more than 10% of the box office for blockbusters despite operating only 372 US locations. AMC Entertainment, the largest chain and biggest operator of Imax screens in the US, is not participating in the deliberations, the report added.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

VMware is overhauling its partner program again under Broadcom's direction, drastically reducing the number of authorized partners -- especially small and mid-size ones -- while ending the white label program by October 31, 2025. The Register reports: Australian IT service provider Interactive outlined the changes on Wednesday in a post that explained the changes with the following five points: - Partner Reduction: The new program significantly reduces the number of authorized partners, being a by-invitation-only program. As a result on July 15, 2025 VCSP partners who are not invited to participate in the new Program for VCSP partners will be sent a notice of non-renewal.- Transition Period Until 31 October, 2025: Non-invited partners can continue to transact until 31 October 2025. After that date, they may only service existing VCSP commitment contracts for the remainder of the current term. No new commitment contracts or renewals will be accepted for those partners.- White Label Program Ending: Broadcom is also sunsetting the White Label model on 31 October 2025. The same transitional commercial conditions apply to White Label contracts as stated above.- Immediate Impact: Departing partners are encouraged to work with authorized VCSP partners to ensure a smooth transition for customers who seek to renew a service at the end of their current term.- Shift Toward Hyperscale Private Compute: Broadcom is reshaping its vision for private compute, whereby VMware Cloud Foundation 9 underpins a small number [of] hyperscale private cloud platforms in each region. A future where customers buy managed infrastructure from partners like Interactive to support their compute requirements. Interactive also warned that customers whose partners are no longer part of the partner program could expect the change to effect: - Your ability to renew licenses through your existing partner- The support and service quality you've come to expect- Potential delays or confusion during upcoming renewals or service requests- Potential cost increases as partner consolidation may led additional costs for migration and re-onboarding, and reduced bundling options that previously allowed for greater cost efficiencies VMware also told The Register that "Non-renewing partners can continue to support their existing customers until the end of their current commit contract term including co-termed capacity orders. Non-renewing partners are encouraged to work with authorized VCSP partners to ensure a smooth transition for customers who seek to renew a service at the end of their current term." Making matters worse: VMware on Tuesday divulged three critical flaws in eights of its products rated 9.3/10.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

alternative_right shares a report from Phys.org: Monitoring changes in water temperature and pressure at the seafloor can improve understanding of ocean circulation, climate, and natural hazards such as tsunamis. In recent years, scientists have begun gathering submarine measurements via an existing infrastructure network that spans millions of kilometers around the planet: the undersea fiber-optic telecommunications cables that provide us with amenities like Internet and phone service. Without interfering with their original purpose, the cables can be used as sensors to measure small variations in the light signals that run through them so that scientists can learn more about the sea. Meichen Liu and colleagues recently developed a new instrument, consisting of a receiver and a microwave intensity modulator placed at a shore station, that facilitates the approach. Their work is published in Geophysical Research Letters. Transcontinental fiber-optic cables are divided into subsections by repeaters, instruments positioned every 50 to 100 kilometers that boost information-carrying light signals so that they remain strong on the journey to their destination. At each repeater, an instrument called a fiber Bragg grating reflects a small amount of light back to the previous repeater to monitor the integrity of the cable. By observing and timing these reflections, the new instrument measures the changes in the time it takes for the light to travel between repeaters. These changes convey information about how the surrounding water changes the shape of the cable, and the researchers used that information to infer properties such as daily and weekly water temperature and tide patterns.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: For some years now, detractors of battery electric vehicles have held up hydrogen as a clean fuel panacea. That sometimes refers to hydrogen combustion engines, but more often, it's hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles, or FCEVs. Both promise motoring with only water emitted from the vehicles' exhausts. It's just that hydrogen actually kinda sucks as a fuel, and automaker Stellantis announced today that it is ending the development of its light-, medium- and heavy-duty FCEVs, which were meant to go into production later this year. Hydrogen's main selling point is that it's faster to fill a tank with the stuff than it is to recharge a lithium-ion battery. So it's a seductive alternative that suggests a driver can keep all the convenience of their gasoline engine with none of the climate change-causing side effects. But in reality, that's pretty far from true. [...] Between the high development costs and the fact that FCEVs only sell with strong incentives, the decision was made to cancel the production of hydrogen vans in France and Poland. Stellantis says there will be no job losses at its factories and that R&D staff will be put to work on other projects. "In a context where the Company is mobilizing to respond to demanding CO2 regulations in Europe, Stellantis has decided to discontinue its hydrogen fuel cell technology development program," said Jean-Philippe Imparato, chief operating officer for Enlarged Europe. "The hydrogen market remains a niche segment, with no prospects of mid-term economic sustainability. We must make clear and responsible choices to ensure our competitiveness and meet the expectations of our customers with our electric and hybrid passenger and light commercial vehicles offensive."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Longtime Slashdot reader Qbertino writes: Heise, a German IT news publisher, reports (English version via Google Translate) that the German state of Brandenburg is getting the world's tallest wind turbine, with an overall height of 300 meters (approximately 365 meters including rotor blades), designed to capture so-called third-level winds at higher altitudes. The article also includes a short 3D animation illustrating the construction and its size relative to standard modern wind turbines. The wind turbine uses a dual-framework base instead of a traditional closed tower to access stronger high-altitude winds, aiming to match offshore energy output while keeping onshore operating costs. According to Heise, the prototype could lead to the installation of up to 1,000 units across Germany -- fitting seamlessly between existing wind farms without needing extra land.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Intel is laying off more than 5,000 employees across four states, according to updated Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification filings. From a report: Most of the cuts are happening in California and Oregon. Intel more than doubled its layoff estimates for Santa Clara and Folsom to a total of 1,935 affected employees, according to California WARN filings. The cuts began taking place in Folsom on July 11, and in Santa Clara on July 15.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Scale AI is laying off 14% of its workforce and 500 contractors as part of a major restructuring just weeks after Meta bought a 49% stake and absorbed its CEO into a new superintelligence lab. The Verge reports: Jason Droege, CEO of Scale AI, sent an email to all Scale employees today, which was viewed by The Verge. Droege said he plans to restructure several parts of Scale's generative AI business and organize it from 16 pods to "the five most impactful": code, languages, experts, experimental, and audio. The company will also reorganize its go-to-market team into a single "demand generation" team that will have four pods, each covering a specific set of customers. "The reasons for these changes are straightforward: we ramped up our GenAI capacity too quickly over the past year," Droege wrote. "While that felt like the right decision at the time, it's clear this approach created inefficiencies and redundancies. We created too many layers, excessive bureaucracy, and unhelpful confusion about the team's mission. Shifts in market demand also required us to re-examine our plans and refine our approach." Droege said that he believes the changes to the company will make it more able to adapt to market shifts, serve existing customers, and win back customers that have "slowed down" work with Scale. He also said that the company would deprioritize generative AI projects with less growth potential. "We remain a well-resourced, well-funded company," he wrote. Scale's generative AI business unit will have an all-hands meeting tomorrow, followed by a company-wide meeting on July 18th. Osborne said that Scale plans to increase investment and hire hundreds of new employees in areas like enterprise, public sector, and international public sector, in the second half of 2025 and that severance has been paid out to impacted roles. "We're streamlining our data business to help us move faster and deliver even better data solutions to our GenAI customers," he said.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Longtime Slashdot reader bobdevine shares a report from OSTechNix: For the first time, Linux has officially broken the 5% desktop market share barrier in the United States of America! It's a huge milestone for open-source and our fantastic Linux community. While many might think of Linux as a niche choice, this new data shows a significant shift is happening. According to the latest StatCounter Global Stats for June 2025, Linux now holds 5.03% of the desktop operating system market share in the United United States of America. This is fantastic news! [...] One truly satisfying detail for me? Linux has finally surpassed the "Unknown" category in the USA! It shows that our growth is clear and recognized. "It took eight years to go from 1% to 2% (by April 2021), then just 2.2 years to reach 3% (June 2023), and a mere 0.7 years to hit 4% (February 2024)," notes the report. "Now, here we are, at over 5% in the USA! This exponential growth suggests that we're on a promising upward trend."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: Security researchers say Chinese authorities are using a new type of malware to extract data from seized phones, allowing them to obtain text messages -- including from chat apps such as Signal -- images, location histories, audio recordings, contacts, and more. In a report shared exclusively with TechCrunch, mobile cybersecurity company Lookout detailed the hacking tool called Massistant, which the company said was developed by Chinese tech giant Xiamen Meiya Pico. Massistant, according to Lookout, is Android software used for the forensic extraction of data from mobile phones, meaning the authorities using it need to have physical access to those devices. While Lookout doesn't know for sure which Chinese police agencies are using the tool, its use is assumed widespread, which means Chinese residents, as well as travelers to China, should be aware of the tool's existence and the risks it poses. [...] The good news ... is that Massistant leaves evidence of its compromise on the seized device, meaning users can potentially identify and delete the malware, either because the hacking tool appears as an app, or can be found and deleted using more sophisticated tools such as the Android Debug Bridge, a command line tool that lets a user connect to a device through their computer. The bad news is that at the time of installing Massistant, the damage is done, and authorities already have the person's data. "It's a big concern. I think anybody who's traveling in the region needs to be aware that the device that they bring into the country could very well be confiscated and anything that's on it could be collected," said Kristina Balaam, a researcher at Lookout who analyzed the malware. "I think it's something everybody should be aware of if they're traveling in the region."Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Steam has begun banning games that violate the payment rules of banks and card networks, targeting adult content in particular -- especially titles with extreme or controversial themes. Engadget reports: The new clause states that "content that may violate the rules and standards set forth by Steam's payment processors and related card networks and banks, or internet network providers" is not allowed and could result in removal from the platform. In other words, if credit card companies get mad about something, they could actually have the power to ban a game. The clause goes on to say that this will affect "certain kinds of adult-only content." This has likely already resulted in many games being pulled off the platform. SteamDB doesn't give a reason for these removals, but the timing does match up.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

OpenAI has added Google Cloud as a provider for ChatGPT and its API, expanding beyond Microsoft to address growing demand for computing power. CNBC reports: OpenAI has added Google to a list of suppliers, specifying that ChatGPT and its application programming interface will use the Google Cloud Platform, as well as Microsoft, CoreWeave and Oracle. The announcement amounts to a win for Google, whose cloud unit is younger and smaller than Amazon's and Microsoft's. Google also has cloud business with Anthropic, which was established by former OpenAI executives. The Google infrastructure will run in the U.S., Japan, the Netherlands, Norway and the United Kingdom.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Android Authority: Italian YouTuber Once Were Nerd covers a variety of retro gaming topics, but his reviews of ANBERNIC devices appear to be the straw that broke the camel's back. According to the video [here], customs enforcement officers from the Guardia di Finanza showed up at his home and office on April 15 with a search warrant to investigate promotion of pirated copyrighted materials. They seized a variety of ANBERNIC, Powkiddy, and TrimUI gaming handhelds from his collection. In total, more than 30 consoles were taken. The creator, assuming he didn't do anything wrong, complied with demands, providing full transcripts of his conversations and chats with gaming handheld manufacturers. The officers also took his phone, promising to return it in a few days. It was returned two months later, on June 15. According to the video, officials are not required to disclose what exactly the charges are or who has brought them until the initial investigation is complete under Italian law. At that point, the case is either dismissed or goes to trial. The complaint specifically mentions reproduction of copyrighted material from Nintendo and Sony, but the case may originate from the agency itself. However, in the meantime officials have the option to shut down his channel, even before proving any wrongdoing. This is a scary prospect for any creator who has spent years building a channel, and unlike YouTube copyright strikes, there's likely no remedy. Currently, officials contest that his reviews of ANBERNIC devices like the RG Slide, which often, but not always, ship with microSD cards filled with copyrighted ROMs, are punishable under Article 171 ter of the Italian Copyright Law. This law, which was originally written in 1941, allows for a maximum punishment of 15,000 euros (or 30 million Italian Lira, since the law pre-dates the Euro) and three years of jail time.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The abstract of a paper featured on NBER: Most U.S. innovation output originates from firms that operate R&D facilities across multiple local markets. We study how this geographic structure influences aggregate innovation and growth, and whether it is socially optimal. First, we develop an endogenous growth model featuring multi-market innovative firms that generate knowledge spillovers to geographically proximate firms. In equilibrium, firms may operate in too few or too many local markets, depending on how sensitive are the local spillovers they generate to their local size. Second, to quantify these effects, we link the model to data on firms' R&D locations, patents, and citation networks. Using an event-study design, we show that firms' spatial expansion increases spillovers to other firms and estimate how these spillovers depend on a firm's local footprint. Our estimates imply that U.S. innovative firms operate in too few markets relative to the social optimum. Third, using quantitative counterfactuals, we find that policies promoting broader spatial scope yield larger welfare gains than standard R&D subsidies. Moreover, unlike R&D subsidies, such policies can also reduce regional inequality.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

VMware has notified partners that its current channel program will end, replacing it with an invitation-only system that significantly reduces the number of authorized partners. Partners not invited to the new VMware Cloud Service Provider program would have received non-renewal notices on July 15, 2025, and can continue transactions only until October 31, 2025, after which they may service existing contracts through their current terms. The company is also ending its White Label program on October 31, 2025. The changes mark the second major partner program overhaul in 18 months, following Broadcom's January 2024 decision to terminate partners operating VMware-powered clouds with fewer than 3,500 processor cores.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

BrianFagioli writes: Meta has partnered with Amrize and the University of Illinois to develop an "AI-optimized" concrete mix that cuts carbon by 35% for its new data center.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Google will now let everyone in the US call local businesses using AI. The feature, which is now available in Search, allows you to use AI for pricing or availability information without having to talk on the phone. Google first started testing this feature in January, and it's still only available for certain kinds of businesses, like pet groomers, dry cleaners, and auto shops. When you search for one of these services, like a pet groomer, Google will display a new "have AI check pricing" prompt beneath the business listing.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Amazon.com marked its 30th anniversary Wednesday, three decades after Jeff Bezos launched the company as an online bookstore promising "one million titles" from Seattle. The e-commerce giant began in 1995 with Bezos, his then-wife MacKenzie Scott, and seven employees. The company now employs 1.5 million people and carries a market capitalization exceeding $2 trillion. Amazon has expanded from books into groceries through its $13.7 billion Whole Foods acquisition, cloud computing via Amazon Web Services, and entertainment with Prime Video.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

WeTransfer has reversed controversial terms of service changes after users protested language suggesting uploaded files could be used to "improve machine learning models." The file-sharing service, popular among creative professionals and used by 80 million users across 190 countries, clarified that user content had never been used to train AI models and removed all references to machine learning from its updated terms. Creative users including voice actors, filmmakers, and journalists had threatened to cancel subscriptions over the changes.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Digital tokens designed to track popular stocks have suffered extreme price deviations since launching two weeks ago, with an Amazon-tracking token briefly spiking to more than 100 times the underlying stock's closing price. The token AMZNX hit $23,781.22 on crypto trading platform Jupiter on July 3, while Amazon shares had closed the previous day around $200. A similar Apple-tracking token jumped to $236.72 on July 3, representing a 12% premium to the actual stock price. Companies including Robinhood, Kraken, Gemini and Bybit launched these blockchain-based versions of U.S. stocks in late June for non-U.S. customers. Robinhood is facing scrutiny from Lithuania's central bank after launching tokens tied to OpenAI and SpaceX without permission from either company, prompting OpenAI to disavow the tokens on social media.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Seagate has released its first heat-assisted magnetic recording hard drives for individual buyers, marking the commercial debut of technology the company has developed for more than two decades. The 30TB IronWolf Pro and Exos M drives cost $600, while 28TB models are priced at $570. The drives use HAMR technology, which uses tiny lasers to heat and expand drive platter sections within nanoseconds to write data at higher densities. Seagate announced delivery of HAMR drives up to 36TB to datacenter customers in late 2024. The consumer models use conventional magnetic recording technology and are built on Seagate's Mosaic 3+ platform, achieving areal densities of 3TB per disk. Western Digital plans to release its first HAMR drives in 2027, though it has reached 32TB capacity using shingled magnetic recording. Toshiba will sample HAMR drives for testing in 2025 but has not announced public availability dates.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Airbus's Silicon Valley innovation center Acubed and Google spinout SandboxAQ have successfully tested a quantum-sensing navigation device as an alternative to GPS during 150 hours of flights across the continental United States. The toaster-sized MagNav device uses quantum physics to measure unique magnetic signatures in Earth's crust [non-paywalled, syndicated link], with an AI algorithm matching those signatures to exact locations. The technology achieved Federal Aviation Administration requirements by pinpointing aircraft location within two nautical miles 100% of the time and within 550 meters 64% of the time. SandboxAQ CEO Jack Hidary called it "the first novel absolute navigation system to our knowledge in the last 50 years." The analog system cannot be jammed or spoofed like GPS, which faces increasing tampering in the Middle East and around Ukraine and Russia.Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Chinese firms have begun rushing to order Nvidia's H20 AI chips as the company plans to resume sales to mainland China, Reuters reports. The chip giant expects to receive US government licenses soon so that it can restart shipments of the restricted processors just days after CEO Jensen Huang met with President Donald Trump, potentially generating $15 billion to $20 billion in additional revenue this year. Nvidia said in a statement that it is filing applications with the US government to resume H20 sales and that "the US government has assured Nvidia that licenses will be granted, and Nvidia hopes to start deliveries soon." [...] The H20 chips represent Nvidia's most capable AI processors legally available in China, though they contain less computing power than versions sold elsewhere due to export restrictions imposed in 2022. Nvidia is currently banned from selling its most powerful GPUs in China. Despite these limitations, Chinese tech giants, including ByteDance and Tencent, are reportedly scrambling to place orders for the lesser chip through what sources describe as an approved list managed by Nvidia. "The Chinese market is massive, dynamic, and highly innovative, and it's also home to many AI researchers," Reuters reports Huang telling Chinese state broadcaster CCTV during his visit to Beijing, where he is scheduled to speak at a supply chain expo on Wednesday. "Therefore, it is indeed crucial for American companies to establish roots in the Chinese market." The resumption of H20 sales marks a shift in US-China technology relations after the chips were effectively banned in April with an onerous export license requirement, forcing Nvidia to take a $4.5 billion write-off for excess inventory and purchase obligations. According to Reuters, Chinese sales generated $17 billion in revenue for Nvidia in the fiscal year ending January 26, representing 13 percent of total sales. Nvidia also announced it will introduce a new "RTX Pro" chip model specifically tailored to meet regulatory rules in the Chinese market, though the company provided no details about its specifications or capabilities.Read more of this story at Slashdot.