Can Trump turn promises into policy?
Donald Trump becomes the 47th President of the United States in just over a month.Throughout his campaign, Trump laid out a list. Things he plans to accomplish in a second term — some on day one. They include: closing the border...imposing tariffs... and ending the war between Russia and Ukraine.Trump also campaigned on bringing down food prices...in fact, he told NBC's Kristen Welker, it's the reason he won.President-elect Trump has a long to-do list for his first days in office. How much of it can he actually get done? A lot says senior Trump advisor Jason Miller.For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.Email us at considerthis@npr.org.
fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻") wrote:
Hey hi hello! Guess what? I launched my new freelance website today. Very happy and excited and happy.
You can now schedule a DM on Instagram
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
Instagram will now let you schedule direct messages, as first reported by TechCrunch. With this feature, you can long-press on the “send” button and then choose a date and time that you’d like to send your message.
As noted on Instagram’s support page, you can schedule messages containing only text, meaning you can still only send photos, videos, or GIFs to friends or family members in real-time. When you click on a chat with a scheduled message, Instagram will display a notice that shows how many messages you have scheduled.
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Screenshot: The Verge
Tapping into the notice and long-pressing your message also gives you the option to delete it or send it right away. Right now, it looks like you can only schedule a message as far out as 29 days.
The company has added several features as part of its efforts to build out its DMs, including a way to edit messages, draw on photos, and share your live locations with friends, similar to Snapchat.
18 Neat Games Releasing In December You Should Be Keeping Tabs On
December is here and 2024 is almost over, but not before some of the year’s biggest games launch just in time for the winter doldrums. My console SSDs are already groaning under the weight of all those downloads. How will I find room for another 350GB of games?
Will Sectarian Groups Get Along in a New Syria?
As the future of Syria begins to emerge, one minority group is particularly fearful about how they'll be treated. The Alawites feel like they were mistreated by now-deposed dictator Bashar al-Assad, but because he was a member of that sect, they are also unfairly tied to him in the minds of other Syrians. We go to an Alawite neighborhood of Damascus to hear their concerns.
TikTok asks the Supreme Court for an emergency order to block a US ban unless it's sold
A similar plea was filed by content creators who rely on the platform for income and some of TikTok's more than 170 million users in the U.S.
need a remaster of the Lain DVD release that doesn't change anything except every episode has text scrolling along the top talking about how 9/11 just happened https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5xt5WG7tt0
jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:
ahhhhhhhh
“Mexican Home (Live)” by John Prine
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Blackmagic’s Vision Pro immersive camera can be yours for only $29,995
Blackmagic has announced that its URSA Cine Immersive commercial camera for shooting high-quality 3D immersive video is now available to preorder “direct from Blackmagic Design Offices,” with the first deliveries going out in early 2025. The camera, which could enable more immersive content for the Vision Pro, costs $29,995 — or a mere 8.6 Vision Pros.
First revealed in June, the Cine Immersive will let cinematographers shoot 90fps video in stereoscopic 3D at 8160 x 7200 resolution per eye — or more than twice the estimated per-eye resolution of the Vision Pro’s screens. They’ll be able to edit the footage using the proprietary Apple Immersive Video format in DaVinci Resolve Studio, which Blackmagic plans to add support for early next year.
Blackmagic Design CEO Grant Petty said the DaVinci update will enable “a true end-to-end workflow for Apple Immersive Video.” He added that the company is “looking forward to working closely with filmmakers” on immersive videos ahead of the camera’s wider release later in 2025.
Blackmagic included images of the camera in its email to The Verge. It looks cool, so I’ve included them for your perusal:
The Vision Pro has some immersive content outside of Apple’s videos — in apps like Amplium or Explore POV — but none of them quite have the quality of Apple’s videos. Until now, Apple has been the only company producing content with its format, and only a handful of such videos are available at this point. That could change, eventually, if studios take advantage of Blackmagic’s new camera and DaVinci update.
Trump Sounds Down to Pardon Eric Adams
On Monday, President-elect Donald Trump said that he would consider pardoning Eric Adams if the New York City mayor is convicted on charges related to accepting bribes and soliciting illegal foreign campaign donations. “I think that he was treated pretty unfairly,” Trump told reporters from his Florida resort, Mar-a-Lago. Despite admitting to not knowing “the […]
Dune: Prophecy's Sister Francesca Is Stronger Than You Think
There’s only one more episode left in Dune: Prophecy’s first season, and the show is still adding more Bene Gesserits with the power to shake everything up to the Dune universe. Although we’ve seen her younger self briefly in flashback scenes, the arrival of adult Sister Francesca (Tabu) to House Corrino in the…
Serbian authorities are reportedly hacking and installing spyware on activists’ phones
Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos from Getty Images
Police in Serbia are using mobile device hacking tools to break into the phones of activists and journalists and then installing spyware to track them, Amnesty International warns in a report. The organization says the state uses tools built by Israeli company Cellebrite, which are intended to help law enforcement unlock devices for forensic purposes.
Amnesty International calls for the Serbian government to end these surveillance practices:
Serbian authorities muststop using highly invasive spyware and provide effective remedy to victims of unlawful targeted surveillance and hold those responsible for the violations to account. Cellebrite and other digital forensic companies also must conduct adequate due diligence to ensure that their products are not used in a way which contributes to human rights abuses.
Amnesty International gathered various accounts of Serbian authorities processing the phones of civil society members, who were detained under various premises, with additional procedures (such as drug testing and psych evaluations) that added extra time to the length of detention, and therefore the total amount of time the authorities had access to their phones. During this time, police would plant “Novispy” — a spyware program that is likely state-developed — on their phones. Some devices were broken into using a (since-patched) Qualcomm vulnerability, Amnesty International explains in the document.
One case reported by 404 Media mentions Serbian news outlet FAR’s deputy editor, Slaviša Milanov, and the editor-in-chief were driving together when they were stopped by Serbian authorities, who detained them and confiscated their phones. When the phones were returned, they noticedchanges, like data and Wi-Fi being toggled off and apps using a lot of energy.
Milanov says his Android device, a Xiaomi Redmi Note 10S, was running extra software when he got it back and that the police had extracted 1.6GB of data even though he had not given up his password.
Cellebrite senior director Victor Cooper responded to questions from Amnesty International, saying the company’s products “are licensed strictly for lawful use” that requires a warrant or a legally-sanctioned investigation per the end user agreement. Cooper also told 404 Media that Cellebrite is investigating the “alleged misuse” of their technology and is “prepared to impose appropriate sanctions” with any relevant agencies.
YouTube is letting creators opt into allowing third-party AI training
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
YouTube is rolling out a way for creators to let third-party companies use their videos to train AI models. To be clear, the default setting for this is off, meaning that if you don’t want to let third-party companies scrape your videos for AI training, you don’t have to do anything. But if, for some reason, you do want to allow that — Google says that “some creators and rights holders” may want to — it’s going to be an option.
“We see this as an important first step in supporting creators and helping them realize new value for their YouTube content in the AI era,” a TeamYouTube staffer named Rob says in a support post. “As we gather feedback, we’ll continue to explore features that facilitate new forms of collaboration between creators and third-party companies, including options for authorized methods to access content.”
YouTube will be rolling out the setting in YouTube Studio “over the next few days,” and unauthorized scraping “remains prohibited,” Rob writes.
Another support page says that you’ll be able to pick and choosefrom a list of third-party companies that can train on your videos or you can simplyallow all third-party companies to train on them. The initial list of companies includes the following, according to TechCrunch:
AI21 Labs, Adobe, Amazon, Anthropic, Apple, ByteDance, Cohere, IBM, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia, OpenAI, Perplexity, Pika Labs, Runway, Stability AI, and xAI.
YouTube spokesperson Jack Malon tells The Verge that TechCrunch’s list is accurate. “These companies were chosen because they’re building generative AI models and are likely sensible choices for a potential partnership with creators,” Malon says.
This announcement follows reports of AI models from big companies — including OpenAI, Apple, and Anthropic — being trained on content and datasets scraped from YouTube. Google itself already uses YouTube data to help train its AI tools. “As we have for many years, we use content uploaded to YouTube to improve the product experience for creators and viewers across YouTube and Google, including through machine learning and AI applications,” the company said in September, when it announced this feature was in the works. “We do this consistent with the terms that creators agree to.”
Sotheby's to auction off ancient Ten Commandments tablet
One of the earliest tablets inscribed with the Ten Commandments (dating to A.D. 300-800) is scheduled to go up for auction at Sotheby's on Wednesday.
Reblogged by fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻"):
stefan@stefanbohacek.online ("Stefan Bohacek") wrote:
The @internetarchive team is inviting artists of all skill levels to celebrate the upcoming Public Domain Day by creating 2–3 minute short films!
"This contest offers a chance to explore and reimagine the creative treasures entering the public domain."
via https://mastodon.archive.org/@brewsterkahle/113660053665523755
#PublicDomain #PublicDomainDay #copyright #InternetArchive #film #filmmakers #artists
isagalaev ("Ivan Sagalaev :flag_wbw:") wrote:
Just did a very red blooded, manly and completely non-toxic thing, split some logs lying in my garage for firewood. Properly with an axe.
Glad to be able to do that after struggling with lower back pains for some time. Feel elated :-)
Attachments:
simontatham@hachyderm.io ("Simon Tatham") wrote:
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED BUT REPULSIVE", "WRONG BUT WROMANTIC", "FREQUENTLY MISUNDERSTOOD", "NOBODY BOTHERS WITH THIS BIT", "SHOULDN'T REALLY BUT WE WON'T JUDGE", "REQUIRED IN ORDER TO WORK AROUND EVERYONE ELSE'S BUGS", "YOU DO YOU", and "OBVIOUSLY ABSURD BUT VERY COMMON FOR SOME REASON" in this document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119.
ChatGPT’s AI search engine is rolling out to everyone
Image: The Verge
ChatGPT’s AI search engine is rolling out to all users starting today. OpenAI announced the news as part of its newest 12 days of ship-mas livestream, while also revealing an “optimized” version of the feature on mobile and the ability to search with advanced voice mode.
ChatGPT’s search engine first rolled out to paid subscribers in October. It will now be available at the free tier, though you have to have an account and be logged in.
One of the improvements for search on mobile makes ChatGPT look more like a traditional search engine. When looking for a particular location, like restaurants or local attractions, ChatGPT will display a list of results with accompanying images, ratings, and hours. Clicking on a location will pull up more information about the spot, and you can also view a map with directions from directly within the app.
Another feature aims to make ChatGPT search faster when you’re looking for certain kinds of sites, such as “hotel booking websites.” Instead of generating a response right away, ChatGPT will surface links to websites before taking the time to provide more information about each option. Additionally, ChatGPT can also automatically provide up-to-date information from the web when using Advanced Voice Mode, though that’sonly available to paid users.
In earlier livestreams, OpenAI also announced the launch of its text-to-image model Sora and rolled out a $200 per month ChatGPT Pro subscription.
Reblogged by andreu@andreubotella.com ("Andreu Botella :verified_enby:"):
algorights ("Algorights") wrote:
«Who Is Tech Really For? As Silicon Valley chases military tech and funding, it’s losing sight of what inspires its workers».
@timnitGebru
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/05/special-series/tech-protest-gaza-artificial-intelligence.html?unlocked_article_code=1.fE4.OXrP.4Edbt-DeY0P3&smid=url-share
Amazon manipulated injury data to make warehouses appear safer, a Senate probe finds
A Senate committee investigation, led by Sen. Bernie Sanders, accused Amazon of risking worker safety for speed while manipulating injury data to make its warehouses seem safer than they are.
fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻") wrote:
New Crisis Hotline for CEOs? - Ken Klippenstein
"New York state is considering creating a special hotline just for CEOs to report perceived threats, CNN reported this morning. What a nice reminder of just how responsive government can be when it comes to corporate executives."
Incredible. https://www.kenklippenstein.com/p/new-crisis-hotline-for-ceos
Four people are dead and several more are hospitalized in Wisconsin school shooting
Four victims and the suspected shooter are dead after a shooting at a Wisconsin grade school.
Reblogged by cstanhope@social.coop ("Your friendly 'net denizen"):
cwebber@social.coop ("Christine Lemmer-Webber") wrote:
A nice article about @lispwitch's incredible guile-emacs project on LWN https://lwn.net/SubscriberLink/1001645/a8f6f33c9e1e40ca/
Here's a screenshot of guile-emacs working on my computer with my config and theme in 2015! It worked even then, though it was slow, but this was because it had stopped before focusing on optimizations which were known and could be done.
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pzmyers@octodon.social ("pzmyers 🦑") wrote:
Great. Another pointless school shooting that will inspire us to do nothing.
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2024/12/16/theres-no-point-in-even-mentioning-this/
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Steve Bannon Teases A Third Trump Term
After being released from prison in October, Steve Bannon seemingly did everything in his power to get Donald Trump back in the White House. Now he appears interested in helping the president-elect remain in the Oval Office—even beyond what is constitutionally allowed. At an event hosted by the New York Young Republican Club on Sunday, […]
Marvel Rivals' New Winter Update Is Adding An Oops All Jeff Mode
Later this week, popular character shooter Marvel Rivals will launch its first big holiday-themed event. The new winter update will add new costumes for multiple characters, as well as a new Splatoon-like mode featuring only Jeff the Landshark.
Everything We've Learned About Intergalactic, Naughty Dog’s New Sci-Fi Adventure
Naughty Dog, the developer behind The Last of Us, Uncharted, Jak & Daxter, and the original Crash Bandicoot games, finally revealed what it’s been working on since The Last of Us Part II launched in 2020. The game is called Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet and it’s coming to a PlayStation 5 near you. We saw the first…
pzmyers@octodon.social ("pzmyers 🦑") wrote:
It has been a peculiarly purplish semester for me. But it's over.
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2024/12/16/its-a-wrap-2/
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The Witcher 4 Gives Ciri A New Voice
Aspiring monster slayer Ciri isn’t just returning for The Witcher 4, she’s the star this time around. But while Geralt of Rivia’s surrogate daughter will step into his shoes to lead her own grizzled adventures, the character won’t sound the same as she did in The Witcher 3.
Google’s Whisk AI generator will ‘remix’ the pictures you plug in
An AI-generated image I made in Whisk using Google’s suggested images as prompts. | Image: Google via Whisk
Google has announced a new AI tool called Whisk that lets you generate images using other images as prompts instead of requiring a long text prompt.
With Whisk, you can offer images to suggest what you’d like as the subject, the scene, and the style of your AI-generated image, and you can prompt Whisk with multiple images for each of those three things. (If you want, you can fill in text prompts, too.) If you don’t have images on hand, you can click a dice icon to have Google fill in some images for the prompts (though those images alsoappear to be AI-generated). You can also enter some text into a text box at the end of the process if you want to add extra detail about the image you’re looking for, but it’s not required.
Whisk will then generate images and a text prompt for each image. You can favorite or download the image if you’re happy with the results, or you can refine an image by entering more text into the text box or clicking the image and editing the text prompt.
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Screenshot by Jay Peters / The Verge
A screenshot of Whisk. I clicked the dice to generate a subject, scene, and style. I swapped out the auto-generated scene by entering a text prompt. Whisk created the first two images, which I iterated on by asking Whisk to add some steam around the subject (because it’s a fire being in water), resulting in the next two images.
In a blog post, Google stresses that Whisk is designed to be for “rapid visual exploration, not pixel-perfect edits.” The company also says that Whisk may “miss the mark,” which is why it lets you edit the underlying prompts.
In the few minutes I’ve used the tool while writing this story, it’s been entertaining to tinker with. Images take a few seconds to generate, which is annoying, and while the images have been a little strange, everything I’ve generated has been fun to iterate on.
Google says Whisk uses the “latest” iteration of its Imagen 3 image generation model, which it announced today. Google also introduced Veo 2, the next version of its video generation model, which the company says has an understanding of “the unique language of cinematography” and hallucinates things like extra fingers “less frequently” than other models (one of those other models is probably OpenAI’s Sora). Veo 2 is coming first to Google’s VideoFX, which you can get on the Google Labs waitlist for, and it will be expanded to YouTube Shorts “other products” sometime next year.
Meta rolls out live AI, live translations, and Shazam to its smart glasses
More AI features are rolling out to the Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge
Meta just announced three new features are rolling out to its Ray-Ban smart glasses: live AI, live translations, and Shazam. Both live AI and live translation are limited to members of Meta’s Early Access Program, while Shazam support is available for all users in the US and Canada.
Both live AI and live translation were first teased at Meta Connect 2024 earlier this year. Live AI allows you to naturally converse with Meta’s AI assistant while it continuously views your surroundings. For example, if you’re perusing the produce section at a grocery store, you’ll theoretically be able to ask Meta’s AI to suggest some recipes based on the ingredients you’re looking at. Meta says users will be able to use the live AI feature for roughly 30 minutes at a time on a full charge.
Meanwhile, live translation allows the glasses to translate speech in real-time between English and Spanish, French, or Italian. You can choose to either hear translations through the glasses themselves, or view transcripts on your phone. You do have to download language pairs beforehand, as well as specify what language you speak versus what your conversation partner speaks.
Shazam support is a bit more straightforward. All you have to do is to prompt the Meta AI when you hear a song, and it should be able to tell you what you’re listening to. You can watch Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg demo it in this Instagram reel.
If you don’t see the features yet, check to make sure your glasses are running the v11 software and that you’re also running v196 of the Meta View app. If you’re not already in the Early Access Program, you can apply via this website.
The updates come just as Big Tech is pushing AI assistants as the raison d’etre for smart glasses. Just last week, Google announced Android XR, a new OS for smart glasses, and specifically positioned its Gemini AI assistant as the killer app. Meanwhile, Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth just posted a blog opining that “2024 was the year AI glasses hit their stride.” In it, Bosworth also asserts that smart glasses may be the best possible form factor for a “truly AI-native device” and the first hardware category to be “completely defined by AI from the beginning.”
The FAA Head’s Resignation is Another Massive Gift to Elon Musk
In his litany of complaints about the federal government, Elon Musk has reserved special ire for the Federal Aviation Administration, which regulates SpaceX, one of his companies. With Donald Trump on the way back into the White House, FAA head Michael Whitaker announced on Thursday that he’ll step down in January, despite having years left […]
Capcom Planning To Revive More Of Its 'Dormant' Franchises
Capcom has confirmed that the publisher plans to revive more old, dormant video game franchises after recently announcing a new Okami and Onimusha. That sound you just heard was thousands of Dino Crisis fans around the world gasping at once.
There's One Excellent Sci-Fi Show You Can Be Sure Won't Be Cancelled
2024 really was the year that people became horribly aware of the perils of getting into a streaming TV show. With viewing figures obfuscated or entirely hidden, and streamers’ mercurial decisions rarely explained, a new favorite show—that seems to be unanimously popular—can just get canceled out of the blue. But…
cstanhope@social.coop ("Your friendly 'net denizen") wrote:
I've got a new song for my Christmas playlist. I stumbled across "Electronic Santa Claus" on my drive to work.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pf5QR6cOTAE
It's by "Blazer Force", which is apparently an alias for a Bret McKenzie, who I am not familiar with.
Instagram will let you recap 2024 with a collage for your story
Illustration by Kristen Radtke / The Verge
Instagram will now let you showcase your favorite moments from 2024 by adding a collage to your story. The new feature, which is only available through the first week of January, lets you combine a bunch of pictures from throughout the year and share them with friends.
You can currently only create collage-like stories by adding a photo to your story, resizing it, moving it around the screen, and then adding more images as stickers. Instagram’s layout feature also lets you add multiple photos to a story, but they only appear in a grid format.
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Image: Instagram
Instagram is rolling out some other temporary features as well, including end-of-year-themed “Add Yours” templates, allowing your friends to reply to your story with one of their own. There are also new “New Year” and “Countdown” text effects, holiday chat themes for DMs, as well as secret phrases, such as “happy New Year,” in notes and DMs that trigger special effects.
YouTube is testing creator voice replies
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
The next time you comment on a YouTube video, you could hear its creator’s voice respond to you. YouTube says it’s testing out a feature with a “small number” of creators that lets them record an audio reply to comments on their videos.
YouTube says it hopes this experiment “enables more meaningful relationships between creators and their audiences.” YouTubers in the test group can use it by tapping the sound wave icon when replying to a comment, tapping “record a voice reply,” and then posting it as normal. However, anyone else can interact with these replies just like ordinary text comments.
Here’s one of the creators in YouTube’s test group.
For now, creators in the test group can only create voice replies in the iOS app, and only on their own videos. Where you can hear the replies seems to be limited, too; I didn’t have the option to listen to the above voice reply from YouTuber ThioJoe in a web browser on my Mac, but I could play it in the YouTube app on my iPhone 15 Pro and Pixel 6 phones.
Stalker 2, As Told By Steam Reviews
Despite a war in Ukraine forcing S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2’s developers to abandon its offices and countless setbacks throughout the game’s lifespan, Stalker 2 finally launched in an impressive, though somewhat buggy, manner.
Sony’s noise-canceling WF-1000XM5 are cheaper than they were on Black Friday
Sony’s XM5 deliver impressive noise cancellation, sound, and comfort. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
The holiday season is a time of celebration, but it can also be chaotic. With all the parties, travel, and family obligations, it’s difficult to carve out time to recharge. That’s why noise-canceling earbuds like Sony’s WF-1000XM5 are so helpful, as they can help you enjoy some peace and quiet even in the busiest of environments. Thankfully, they’re currently on sale at Amazon, Best Buy, and Target for around $198 ($102 off), their best price to date.
Sony’s WF-1000XM5 are our favorite pair of wireless earbuds on the market. Along with drowning out background noise well, they offer exceptional, detailed sound and clear voice quality. They’re also relatively small and lightweight, and come with four foam-style ear tips so you can comfortably wear them on long flights. Battery life is good, too, so you won’t need to worry about them dying midway through a flight. They should last eight hours with noise cancellation turned on, and when you do need to charge, they do so extremely quickly.
Additionally, Sony’s flagship pair of earbuds offer a handful of other conveniences that make them a great investment. They include support for multipoint Bluetooth connectivity, for one thing, so you can pair them with multiple devices simultaneously. They also boast IPX4 water resistance, so they’ll even be able to withstand some light rain.
Read our Sony WF-1000XM5 review.
Some more ways to save today
- Amazon’s Smart Plug is on sale for $14.99 ($10 off) at Amazon and Best Buy, which is just $2 shy of its lowest price to date. You can use the smart plug to easily add smarts to various traditional gadgets, including Christmas lights, lamps, coffee makers, fans, and kettles. You don’t need a smart home hub either, though bear in mind that the plugs are only compatible with Alexa, so you might want to steer clear if you’re embedded in another smart home ecosystem.
- You can buy Google’s 128GB Pixel Tablet (and speaker dock) for $399 ($65 off) at Amazon and Best Buy, which is $20 shy of its best price to date. The 11-inch Android tablet is a great entertainment device with stellar performance, but it’s the included speaker dock that really makes the Pixel Tablet stand out. The latter lets you turn the tablet into a smart display with Google Assistant support akin to the Nest Hub Max, so you can use it to set alarms, display photos, and even control smart home devices with your voice. Read our review.
- The latest Beats Pill has returned to its Black Friday low of $99.99 ($50 off) at Amazon, Best Buy, and Target, which is just $2 shy of its lowest price to date. The pill-shaped Bluetooth speaker delivers good sound for its size but also comes with some handy perks, including support for lossless audio over USB-C and native support for both Android and iOS. It also features IP67 water and dust protection and a built-in lanyard, so you can easily carry it on the go. Read our review.
Chuck Schumer wants answers after another weekend of drone chaos
Sen. Chuck Schumer during a December 15th press conference. | Screenshot: NBC News
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has asked the Department of Homeland Security to provide New York and New Jersey authorities with an advanced drone detection system to help “determine what the heck is going on” with continued sightings in the Northeast.
“We’ve seen lots of recent sightings in New York, New Jersey, Long Island, Staten Island.” Schumer said during a December 15th press conference. “With all these sightings over the last while, why do we have more questions than answers?”
Over the weekend, parts of Stewart International Airport were temporarily shut down due to the drone sightings, prompting New York Governor Kathy Hochul to say, “this has gone too far.” Drone activity also shut down airspace over the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio for over four hours.
President-elect Donald Trump said on Monday that he’s canceling a trip to Bedminster, New Jersey due to drone sightings in the area. He said, “the government knows what is happening” and “they’d be better off saying what it is.”
During a press conference on Sunday, Schumer requested a “360-degree” detection system like the one built by Robin Radar Systems. The European company sells micro-doppler radars that it claims can distinguish between birds and drones moving up to 60 miles per hour in 3D space. Its website features case studies of its radars being used for security at airports, during the G7 Summit, and to study bird migration in the Netherlands.
Schumer also urged Congress to pass the “Safeguarding the Homeland from the Threats Posed by Unmanned Aircraft Systems Act,” which could give local law enforcement and federal authorities the power to detect drones.
I’m pushing for answers amid these drone sightings.
I’m calling for @SecMayorkas to deploy special drone-detection tech across NY and NJ.
And I’m working to pass a bill in the Senate to give local law enforcement more tools for drone detection.
— Chuck Schumer (@SenSchumer) December 15, 2024
bcantrill ("Bryan Cantrill") wrote:
Stoked for today's Oxide and Friends: @ahl and I will be joined by @pfrazee.com to talk about the wild ride that @bsky.app has been on -- and get into the technical underpinnings in the AT Protocol. Join us, 5p Pacific!
Reblogged by fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻"):
timnitGebru@dair-community.social ("Timnit Gebru (she/her)") wrote:
We discuss the many ways in which people, ranging from journalists to civil society to all sorts of disciplines outside of computer vision, have uncovered various harms that arise from it, and proposed many mitigation strategies. We cover everything from research from those within computer vision to the labor movement.
Believe it or not, I signed up to do this either when I was still at Google or right after I was fired. Started working on it with Remi who was in our team at the time.
The 12 Movies You Need to Watch Before Nosferatu Scares You Senseless
Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu may boast a 132-minute runtime and nearly a decade of time spent in development, but it represents the culmination of a century of horror influences. Drawing on everything from the German Expressionist techniques of the 1922 classic Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror to the grotesque…
First public comments attributed to Assad claim he never planned to leave Syria
Former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad issued his first remarks since opposition forces took over the capital over a week ago in a Telegram post from Moscow.
You can now buy this nostalgic Game Boy Advance clone
The Anbernic RG34XX is now available in four colors, including transparent red and green options. | Image: Anbernic
Anbernic’s latest handheld, which upgrades the design of Nintendo’s Game Boy Advance with a larger screen, extra buttons, and the ability to play games through emulation, is now available. The RG34XX can be ordered through Anbernic’s website for $69.99, but is discounted to $63.99 until December 18th. It comes in four colors, including the GBA’s original purple and black, as well as transparent green and red options.
Although it looks nearly identical to the original GBA’s hardware, the RG34XX adds a pair of additional action buttons, two more shoulder buttons, microSD card slots, an HDMI port, and a larger 3.4-inch display with a 720x480 resolution and a 3:2 aspect ratio. The handheld also appears to carry over the GBA’s volume dial, but it’s actually a two-way toggle switch allowing the volume to be adjusted up and down in small increments.
The RG34XX only became available for sale starting today, but Anbernic sent units to reviewers last week so we already have our first impressions of the new handheld. Russ Crandall, who runs the YouTube channel Retro Game Corps, found the emulator to be a “nearly perfect” recreation of Nintendo’s hardware. That can be either a good or bad thing, depending on how you remember the GBA’s ergonomics.
The RG34XX is powered by the Allwinner H700 chipset that Anbernic has already used in eight other devices. It won’t be able to play all the games released for 3D consoles like the Nintendo 64, Sega Dreamcast, and Sony PSP, but the handheld will handle 16-bit games with ease, and excels at emulating the Game Boy Advance given the matching screen ratio.
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Image: Keep Retro
The secondary set of shoulder buttons on the RG34XX are smaller and positioned in a way that larger hands may struggle to comfortably reach.
Retro Handhelds, a site that focuses on portable devices for playing classic games, also found the RG34XX to be an accurate recreation of the GBA, but found it a little cramped for larger hands to play. The RG34XX’s primary shoulder buttons, located in the same position as the GBA’s felt good. However, the secondary set, which are smaller and positioned closer to where the GBA’s cartridge slot was located, were not very comfortable to use.
Germany's Scholz loses a confidence vote, triggering new elections
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz had hoped for this outcome when he called for the confidence vote, analysts say. His aim: to win fresh elections in February and come back with a stronger mandate.
Stand Out From The Crowd With These Free Marvel Rivals Skins
Marvel Rivals is quite a generous game. Not only are all future heroes confirmed to be free, but every battle pass can be enjoyed permanently as long as you’ve purchased them. You’ll mostly be tempted to put your money toward skins, but there are many you can acquire for free.
T-Mobile is looking for Starlink satellite-to-cell beta testers
Image: The Verge
T-Mobile is letting customers sign up to be the first to test its upcoming Starlink satellite direct-cell service, which promises to fill in 500,000 square miles of terrestrial cell tower dead zones in the US. The company created a new registration page where people can sign up for free, and testing will begin “early next year.”
The T-Mobile Starlink beta program is open to all post-paid customers with “compatible” satellite phones, although the company hasn’t shared a complete list of which devices will work. To start, registered beta testers will only get to try out satellite texting, with voice calls and data coming later.
The FCC handed T-Mobile and satellite partner SpaceX approval last month to allow satellite-to-service for customers, although not with the higher radio emission power needed for real-time voice and video calls. In August, Verizon and AT&T raised concerns that a fully realized T-Mobile service could interfere with their competing satellite services.
T-Mobile tested direct-to-cell emergency alerts in September, and in October, SpaceX turned on satellite text messaging to T-Mobile customers in areas affected by Hurricane Helene and Milton.
Amazon Teamsters in NYC have voted to authorize a strike
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
Workers at a Staten Island, New York Amazon warehouse voted on Friday to authorize a strike if the company doesn’t agree to set dates for contract negotiations. The workers are asking Amazon to recognize the union and bargain for safer working conditions and better wages, threatening the possibility of a strike during one of Amazon’s busiest times of the year.
Teamsters general president Sean O’Brien says in a press release that Amazon must agree to bargaining dates by December 15th, which passed yesterday. If Amazon hasn’t agreed, it risks facing a strike by the more than 5,500 workers at its Staten Island (JFK8) fulfillment center. Delivery drivers at a Queens (DBK4) last-mile delivery station also voted to authorize a strike.
“This is my third holiday I’m giving to Amazon,” a worker named James said in a video published Friday by labor nonprofit More Perfect Union. “I haven’t been around for Thanksgiving or Christmas. It’s constant speed-up for the holidays. It’s like twice as dangerous, I would say.”
A newly published US Senate Committee report says that, based on an investigation of Amazon’s records, the company’s warehouse injury rates were “more than 1.8 times that of other companies in each of the past seven years,” according to The New York Times. Senator Bernie Sanders, who chairs the committee, said “Amazon’s executives repeatedly chose to put profits ahead of the health and safety of its workers by ignoring recommendations that would substantially reduce injuries.”
In a statement emailed to The Verge, Amazon spokesperson Eileen Hards accused the Teamsters union of “intentionally” misleading claims that it represents thousands of Amazon employees and drivers.
They don’t, and this is another attempt to push a false narrative. The truth is that the Teamsters have actively threatened, intimidated, and attempted to coerce Amazon employees and third-party drivers to join them, which is illegal and is the subject of multiple pending unfair labor practice charges against the union.
Hards didn’t immediately respond when we asked which charges she was referring to. Conversely, in 2022, the National Labor Relations Board alleged that Amazon itself “repeatedly broke the law by threatening, surveilling, and interrogating” Staten Island workers who were attempting to unionize.
Workers at the Staten Island warehouse voted to unionize in 2022 and joined Teamsters, one of the largest US labor unions, in June, followed by drivers working out of the Queens facility in September. Amazon hasn’t recognized those unions. As of this writing, the Teamsters hasn’t announced an active strike on its X account, its Facebook page, or its site.
Star Wars' Rey Is Here To Explain What Monster Hunter Is All About
Monster Hunter Wilds is just a couple of months away. The action-RPG looks great so far and is poised to be the biggest game yet in the long-running series. It also probably looks completely overwhelming and hard to parse for newcomers to the franchise. Fortunately, actor Daisy Ridley is here to explain it to you in…
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, a longtime theater lover, makes her Broadway debut
Jackson made a cameo in the romantic comedy musical & Juliet on Saturday night. She told NPR: "I got a call, and someone said, 'We heard that this was your lifelong dream.' And it is."
Gargron ("Eugen Rochko") wrote:
I'm taking some time off for the holidays. I am very, very tired. Maybe coding during the weekends because you're too busy running the company during the work week is not a very sustainable strategy? I've been stuck indoors since September...
This Is The Best Class To Start Out With In Path Of Exile 2
When starting an RPG, before you even consider a character creator (which Path of Exile 2 does not offer), there’s a choice—the ultimate choice for a beginner. What is the best starting class for a new player? Is it the tried-and-tested Warrior? Perhaps the ever-vigilant Ranger?
These global stories were very, very, very popular in 2024
Our blog published hundreds of stories in 2024. These are the 11 that captured the most pageviews. If you look at the headlines, you'll understand why.
As robotaxi companies stumble in the US, China’s fleet is growing
Photo by Jia Tianyong / China News Service / VCG via Getty Images
The same day that General Motors announced that it would stop funding its beleaguered robotaxi company Cruise, one of China’s leading autonomous vehicle operators made a different sort of announcement.
Pony.ai said it would expand its robotaxi fleet from about 250 to at least 1,000 vehicles in 2025, thanks to a partnership with GAC Aion, a division of one of China’s biggest automakers. With a larger fleet, the company says it plans on growing its service areas in the so-called first-tier cities of Beijing, Guangzhou, Shanghai, and Shenzhen. Pony’s current fleet averages 15 rides per vehicle per day, which translates to over 26,000 trips every week.
China is winning the race
It was another example of how access to cheap, plentiful electric vehicles as well as a lax regulatory environment and other state-fueled incentives are fueling China’s aggressive approach to autonomous vehicles. Baidu, another major Chinese AV operator, recently detailed its own efforts to bring the cost per vehicle down to around $30,000. Baidu also has a joint venture with automaker Geely to make driverless cars.
In the US, the tie-ups between automakers and driverless vehicle operators have faltered. In addition to GM’s decision to back away from Cruise, Ford shut down its Argo AI robotaxi project that it had been funding with Volkswagen. Both Ford and GM say they plan to redirect their efforts toward advanced driver-assist technology for personally owned vehicles.
The US is on high alert about China’s growing dominance in the field of autonomous vehicles. Earlier this year, the Biden administration proposed new rules to block the “sale or import” of connected vehicle software originating from China, arguing that vehicles with hardware and software from the country pose an “acute” threat to US national security. This followed an earlier move by the administration to lock in new tariffs on Chinese imports, including a 100 percent duty on EVs and new hikes on batteries and key minerals. And President-elect Donald Trump, who has been stacking his cabinet with China hawks, has promised even harsher tariffs.
These protectionist trade policies could also slow the development of driverless cars in the US. Waymo, the leading robotaxi company, has said it would use a Chinese EV as its next-generation vehicle. The Zeekr-made vehicle was supposed to be a lower-cost option for the company, which has racked up billions of dollars in expenses over the years.
Robotaxis could flounder without access to cheaply made EVs. Indeed, the public markets haven’t necessarily openly embraced Pony.ai and other Chinese firms, despite their aggressive expansion plans. The company’s initial public offering on Nasdaq valued it at $5.25 billion, or about 40 percent less than the $8.5 billion it was worth two years ago, according to the Financial Times.
No AV operator in the world is currently profitable. The fleets are still too small, the companies are mostly cautious about growing too quickly, and the technology is still more expensive than the meager revenues being brought in.
Pony.ai and others are hoping that China’s government will soon allow their vehicles to expand into suburban areas. Meanwhile, Trump’s transition team is weighing whether to create a federal framework for self-driving cars, which could enable a wider deployment of vehicles without traditional controls, like steering wheels and pedals.
No AV operator in the world is currently profitable
But the threat of China outpacing the US in robotaxi development hasn’t spurred Congress to break the logjam that has stalled AV legislation in Congress for over six years. Disagreements range from increasing the number of AVs on the road to prohibiting states from setting their own performance standards for AVs to liability concerns.
Cities may also object to companies trying to push out more driverless vehicles. Officials in San Francisco, for example, have raised a host of complaints, including blocked buses and emergency vehicles, and local residents have logged protests over new rules allowing robotaxis to roam more freely.
Those concerns are likely to remain a sticking point. Meanwhile, China has already surpassed the US in robotaxi deployment. The question is how much further ahead they can get.
Arm CEO Rene Haas on the AI chip race, Intel, and what Trump means for tech
Image: The Verge; Photo: Hollie Adams / Bloomberg via Getty Images
The head of the ubiquitous chip design firm on the ‘breathtaking’ pace of AI.
100+ Hour FFVII: Rebirth Adds A Fast-Forward Option For Cutscenes
Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth is a remake that manages to blow up the middle-act of the original 1997 PlayStation game into a game twice as long. Take your time, see the sites, wrap your head around every little nook and wrinkle of its sprawling world, and you’ll be saving the planet for well over 100 hours. A new update…
Look Out: Sonic The Hedgehog 3’s Post-Credits Scene Is Spreading Online
Sonic the Hedgehog 3 is finally coming to theaters this week on December 20. However, there have been some early screenings for press and fan events, which means spoilers are bound to sprout up ahead of time. Unfortunately, it also means that phone recordings of the film’s post-credits scene are starting to appear…
Eufy’s new $70 security cam captures color footage at night
Eufy’s new Indoor Cam E30 can sit on a table or be mounted to walls and ceilings, but you’ll need to run a power cable. | Image: Eufy
Eufy has announced a new security camera, the Indoor Cam E30. The camera updates an older model released in 2020 with 4K video recording capabilities and an added spotlight that adds color capture to its typical night vision options. It’s available now for $69.99.
The Indoor Cam E30 can rotate 360 degrees horizontally and pan 75 degrees vertically, allowing it to monitor an entire room. It uses on-device AI to detect the presence of humans and pets and can also recognize and alert you to audio cues such as an infant crying. The camera can automatically track subjects in motion to keep them in frame. Its position can also be manually controlled, but only available through the Eufy mobile app, not Apple Home.
The device is compatible with HomeKit — including Apple’s HomeKit Secure Video — allowing you to save recordings to iCloud. But that requires an iCloud Plus subscription and it limits the streaming resolution to 1080P. If you’d prefer to go subscription free, the Indoor Cam E30 includes a microSD card slot for storing local footage, which can be streamed to the Eufy mobile app at 4K. If you need additional storage, the camera can also be connected to Eufy’s $149.99 HomeBase S380, which can be expanded to up to 16TB. (Eufy has promised it’s fixed the privacy issues we caught in 2022.)
Two-way audio allows you to communicate through the camera remotely, which is ideal for telling the dog or cat to get off the couch while you’re at work. (Editor’s note: has a cat ever listened?) And while the added spotlight allows the Indoor Cam E30 to capture nighttime footage in color, it reduces how far the camera see in the dark to 16.4-feet. Using its infrared lights limits the camera to only seeing in black and white, but it boosts its visual range to a little over 32-feet.
fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻") wrote:
Damn, do you think the reason why Siri hasn't progressed in a decade is because of Google paying Apple? Like, is there an unspoken agreement there?
The best entertainment of 2024
Arcane. | Image: Netflix
Finding something to watch or play can sometimes feel like work — there’s just so much out there vying for your free time. That’s true whether you’re heading to a theater, browsing the many streaming platforms, or looking for a new video game. It’s easy to get overwhelmed with choice.
So, as we’ve done in years past, we’re collecting all of our favorite releases from 2024 in one place. The goal is to make your decision-making a little easier. That could mean highlighting anything from an anticipated movie that actually lives up to the hype to a surprise indie game that takes the world by storm.
And we’ll be updating this page all year long as we continue to check out the latest in film, television, and gaming — so stay tuned.
Everyone's Having A Totally Normal One About Black Myth: Wukong Not Winning GOTY
Award ceremonies are very silly. One film, or book, or game, isn’t objectively better than all the others, because that’s not a thing. But the notion that it is nonetheless serves as the bizarre basis for such events, and it’s one that it seems the developers and players of Black Myth: Wukong are really not coping…
Silo will end with season 4 on Apple TV Plus
Image: Apple
The end of the end of the world is now in sight. Apple just announced that its post-apocalyptic series Silo, which is in the midst of its second season, has been renewed for two more seasons. That means that season 4 will be the show’s last.
Silo first debuted in 2023, and it tells the story of the remnants of humanity, who live in an underground silo where they’re largely safe from the ruined landscape outside. However, things get much more complex very quickly, and the show is laden with mysteries. The series is based on a trilogy of sci-fi novels from Hugh Howey, and Apple says that the final two seasons will tell “the complete story” of the books. (So far, the first book has been split across the first two seasons of the show.)
“With the final two chapters of Silo, we can’t wait to give fans of the show an incredibly satisfying conclusion to the many mysteries and unanswered questions contained within the walls of these silos,” showrunner Graham Yost said in a statement. Rebecca Ferguson, who stars in the show and serves as an executive producer, added that “I have always felt passionately about telling the entire story contained within Hugh Howey’s books, so I couldn’t be happier that audiences around the world have enthusiastically embraced the show.”
The second season of Silo wraps up on January 17th. That’s the same day that another sci-fi series returns to Apple TV Plus, with season 2 of the workplace thriller Severance.
fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻") wrote:
Pet peeves around word pronunciation always feels vaguely classist because it’s never about how rich people pronounce things.
Oh you hate how people say “Axe” instead of ask? Well I hate how you say “vase” like you’re a 18th century British art dealer. Grow up.
You Don't Want To Miss This Holiday-Themed Astro Bot Level
Game of the Year winner Astro Bot is one hell of a platformer with plenty of creative and thrilling levels to complete throughout its campaign. And since launch, developer Team ASOBI has continued to release new levels to keep players interested even after completing everything the base game has to offer. Such is the…
NPR wants to know: What is a key lesson you learned this year?
The year is coming to a close, which can bring a lot of reflection. What went great and what might have gone sideways? Every year we learn lessons on what to improve, what are some of yours?
Life Kit's most-read stories of 2024: Sleep myths, tipping etiquette, home design tricks
Comics, social etiquette and myth-busting stories ruled Life Kit in 2024. That includes guidance on what to do if a partner cheats — and how to tip at fast food joints.
Snapchat is overhauling how influencers earn money on the platform
Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge
Snapchat is tweaking how people earn money on the platform by introducing a new, unified monetization program. The new program will cover content posted to Stories as well as Spotlight, the platform’s TikTok-like discovery feed filled with recommended video content. Under the program, influencers earn revenue for ads placed within eligible Stories and Spotlight posts.
Previously, monetization of these formats was splintered off from one another: Stories earnings were in one bucket, and Spotlight earnings were handled through a different program.
The new program is currently in testing with a small group of users, and will roll out widely on February 1st, 2025. To participate, users need to hit a set of benchmarks to be invited: 50,000 followers and either 10 million Snap views, 1 million Spotlight views, or 12,000 hours of watch time in the last 28 days.
They also need to post consistently, with at least 25 times per month to saved Stories or Spotlight and posting to Spotlight or public Stories on at least 10 of the last 28 days. Some of those eligibility requirements are significantly higher than they were under the old structure. To be eligible to earn money through Spotlight, for example, creators previously needed things like a public profile, 1,000 followers, and 10,000 video views.
Other video platforms have also streamlined or changed the original creator funds. TikTok, for example, now has one creator program that requires videos longer than 1-minute. On YouTube, Shorts creators earn money via ad revenue — a move by the company to meaningfully compete with TikTok.
pzmyers@octodon.social ("pzmyers 🦑") wrote:
Would you trust this man with your nation's science policy?
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2024/12/16/scientists-as-scoundrels/
Attachments:
A 50 thousand year-old love story between humans and Neanderthals
Tens of thousands of years ago, modern humans mated with Neanderthals. But exactly how and when that happened, and who those groups of humans were, was less known. New research adds some clues.
pzmyers@octodon.social ("pzmyers 🦑") wrote:
No duh.
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2024/12/16/surprise-the-earth-is-a-globe/
ABC News' $15M settlement with Trump. And, renewed hope for an Israel-Hamas ceasefire
ABC News agreed to a $15M settlement in a defamation lawsuit with President-elect Donald Trump. Here's a look at why. And, multiple factors have led to renewed hope for an Israel-Hamas ceasefire deal.
Europe’s Starlink competitor is go
A Starlink terminal in the wild. | Photo by Thomas Ricker / The Verge
The EU has signed a deal for its IRIS² constellation of 290 communication satellites that will operate in both medium and low-earth orbit. The Starlink rival will provide secure connectivity to governmental users as well as private companies and European citizens, and bring high-speed internet to dead-zones. The public-private deal valued at €10.6 billion (about $11 billion), according to The Financial Times, is expected to come online by 2030.
SpaceRISE — a consortium led by European satellite network operators SES, Eutelsat, and Hispasat, and supported by European satcom subcontractors like Airbus and Deutsche Telekom — has been given a 12-year concession contract to develop, deploy, and operate the IRIS² constellation. IRIS² is an acronym for Infrastructure for Resilience, Interconnectivity and Security by Satellite.
“This cutting-edge constellation will protect our critical infrastructures, connect our most remote areas and increase Europe’s strategic autonomy. By partnering with the SpaceRISE consortium, we are demonstrating the power of public-private collaboration to drive innovation and deliver tangible benefits to all Europeans,” said Henna Virkkunen, Executive Vice-President for Tech Sovereignty, Security and Democracy.
In September, FCC chair Jessica Rosenworcel said she wanted to see more competition to Elon Musk’s Starlink, which has already launched some 7,000 satellites since 2018.
pzmyers@octodon.social ("pzmyers 🦑") wrote:
I was not entertained by GLADIIATOR.
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2024/12/16/gladiiator/
Attachments:
The Biden overtime rule was struck down. Now, some workers are losing pay raises
The overtime rule would have made more than 4 million workers newly eligible to earn overtime on Jan. 1. Then a federal judge in Texas said the Biden administration had gone too far.
As a kid, I hated playing sports. As an adult, I fell in love with them
Want to start a new fitness activity? These older athletes have ideas.
A desert festival where robots are the headliner
Scientists are using the Mojave Desert to test robots for the next space age.
“I Can’t Afford My Oxygen”: The Human Toll of For-Profit Insurance
Amid the frenzied coverage of UnitedHealth CEO Brian Thompson‘s assassination and the public’s troubling reaction to it were references to various polls, including one conducted in 2016 by the Kaiser Family Foundation, whose results suggested that Americans were content with their private health plans. Similar stats had crept into the debate over Medicare for All—a […]
Los Angeles County Shows Why Democrats Lost
Two weeks after the election, I met Dianela Rosario in Huntington Park, California—an almost entirely Latino city that swung hard to the right this year. A 51-year-old Dominican American shopkeeper, Rosario told me that before this year she had never voted for a Republican presidential candidate. But, in 2024, inflation and the prices of groceries […]
The federal EV tax credit has an uncertain fate. What car shoppers should know
Currently, drivers can get a tax credit worth up to $7,500 for buying or leasing an EV. But the incoming administration promised to roll back those credits, which they consider wasteful spending.
Trump claims a 'massive' mandate, but presidents often overread their victories
There's a long history of presidents claiming that their win means the will of the people is behind their agendas. But elections are rarely full-throated endorsements of a candidate's every policy.
How are states spending their opioid settlement cash? Look yours up in this database
From addiction treatment to toy robot ambulances, here's how state and local governments used billions in opioid settlement funds in 2022 and 2023. Explore this database to find our how officials are using the payouts where you live.
France rushes help to Mayotte, where hundreds are feared dead from Cyclone Chido
France was rushing help by ship and military aircraft to its poor overseas territory of Mayotte in the Indian Ocean on Monday after the island was shattered by its worst storm in nearly a century.
fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻") wrote:
God, I needed a new Phantogram album (AM). Their first single It Wasn’t Meant to Be is so good. https://music.apple.com/us/album/it-wasnt-meant-to-be/1763684613?i=1763684723
Attachments:
2 men were arrested in Boston for allegedly flying a drone near the airport
Two men were arrested in Boston on Saturday for allegedly operating a drone "dangerously close" to Logan International Airport, police said.
Israel will close its Ireland embassy over Gaza tensions
Israel said Sunday it will close its embassy in Ireland as relations deteriorated over the war in Gaza, where Palestinian medical officials said new Israeli airstrikes killed over 46 people including several children.
fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻") wrote:
I miss the old web. Bring back pop-up ads. Forward me an email with an ancient curse. I want my computer to scream in horror whenever it connects to the internet.
fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻") wrote:
I'm closing in on a point, you guys. Maybe I'll publish tonight 🎉🎉🎉
Reblogged by pzmyers@octodon.social ("pzmyers 🦑"):
Axomamma@mastodon.online wrote:
@Cherizilla Is @pzmyers watching?
As drone sightings spread across East Coast, federal officials still don't know much
Clusters of drones have been reported flying over at least six states. The Biden administration is pushing Congress to pass legislation that would expand counter-drone authorities.
fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻") wrote:
2025 Public Domain Day Remix Contest: The Internet Archive is Looking For Creative Short Films Made By You! | Internet Archive Blogs:
"We invite filmmakers and artists of all skill levels to celebrate Public Domain Day on January 24, 2024, by creating and uploading 2–3 minute short films to the Internet Archive!" https://blog.archive.org/2024/12/16/2025-public-domain-day-remix-contest-the-internet-archive-is-looking-for-creative-short-films-made-by-you/
Zakir Hussain, legendary tabla virtuoso who defied genres, dies at 73
Hussain's career spanned over five decades, during which he was revered as both a national treasure in India and admired worldwide.
November project goals update
The Rust project is currently working towards a slate of 26 project goals, with 3 of them designed as Flagship Goals. This post provides selected updates on our progress towards these goals (or, in some cases, lack thereof). The full details for any particular goal are available in its associated tracking issue on the rust-project-goals repository.
Flagship goals
Bring the Async Rust experience closer to parity with sync Rust
Async closure stabilization has been approved, though the stabilization has not yet landed! The lang team ultimately opted to stabilize the trait name AsyncFn rather than the keyword-based async Fn syntax that was originally proposed. This decision came after discussion on the Flavors RFC which made it clear we were not at a consensus about whether the async Trait keyword would be used more generally or not. Given that, the team felt that the AsyncFn synta was a fine "next step". If we do ultimately adopt some form of async Trait keyword syntax, then AsyncFn can become a trait alias.
Regarding return-type notation, an extension of return-type notation to cover Self::foo(..): Send landed and we landed #132047 which fixes a known ICE. Stabilization PR is now unblocked.
No major progress towards async drop reviews or team reorganization.
Resolve the biggest blockers to Linux building on stable Rust
This month saw steady progress on our checklist. dingxiangfei2009's PR renaming derive(SmartPointer) to derive(CoercePointee) was merged and he began the work to port the RFL codebase to use the new name. Alice Ryhl opened RFC #3716 proposing a way to manage compiler flags that alter the ABI and discussion (and some implementation work) has ensued. Finally, we landed PR #119364 making target blocks in asm-goto safe by default; this was based directly on experience from RFL which showed that [safe would be more useful]. We are still working to finalize another extension to asm-goto that arose from RFL requirements, allowing const to support embedded pointers. Finally we prepared reference PR #1610 describing the change to permit Pointers to Statics in Constants that was stabilized last month.
Rust 2024 has now entered the nightly beta and is expected to stabilize as part of Rust 1.85 on 2025-02-20. It has a great many improvements that make the language more consistent and ergonomic, that further upon our relentless commitment to safety, and that will open the door to long-awaited features such as gen blocks, let chains, and the never type !. For more on the changes, see the nightly Edition Guide. The call for testing blog post contains more information and instructions on how you can try it yourself.
Goals with updates
"Stabilizable" prototype for expanded const generics
min_generic_const_argsnow exists as a feature gate, though without any functionality, only some gated refactorings, but shouldn't be long before it has actual functionality behind it.- The refactoring to remove all the
eval_xmethods onty::Consthas been completed, making it possible to correctly implement normalization for constants.
- Posted the October update.
- Created more automated infrastructure to prepare the October update, making use of an LLM to summarize updates into one or two sentences for a concise table.
Begin resolving `cargo-semver-checks` blockers for merging into cargo
- Support for cargo manifest linting is now merged, making it possible to catch breakage caused by manifest (
Cargo.toml) changes, not just source code changes. An example of such breakage is the removal of a package feature: any crates that enabled the removed feature will no longer build. - Partial schema design and implementation of type information in lints, enabling the creation of breaking-change lints and improving diagnostic quality for a subset of type-related breaking changes.
- Resolved multi-team questions that were blocking cross-crate checking, with the compiler team MCP merged and rustdoc improvements discussed and agreed upon.
- The way const traits are desugared was completely restructured, making the design easier to understand and more robust against current unit tests.
- Significant development and cleanup for the feature has been done, with several pull requests merged and two still open, bringing the feature closer to being able to dogfood on the standard library and closer to stabilization.
- @joshtriplett opened https://github.com/rust-lang/rfcs/pull/3680. The @rust-lang/lang team has not yet truly discussed or reached a decision on that RFC.
- @spastorino began implementation work on a prototype.
Explore sandboxed build scripts
- The sandboxed build scripts exploration is complete. We are unlikely to continue this work in next year but the research may be useful in other areas, such as the possible addition of POSIX process support to WASI or a declarative system dependency configuration in Cargo.
Expose experimental LLVM features for automatic differentiation and GPU offloading
- The re-design of the autodiff middle/backend was implemented, reducing the remaining LoC to be upstreamed from 2.5k to 1.1k, split into two PRs (1 and 2), which received initial feedback and are expected to land in early December.
- The preprint of the first paper utilizing
std::autodiffis available on Arxiv, with code available at ChemAI-Lab/molpipx, showcasing significantly faster compilation times in Rust compared to JAX.
Extend pubgrub to match cargo's dependency resolution
- The core data structures of PubGrub have been published as a separate
version-rangescrate, enabling multiple projects to share this core abstraction and benefit from improvements without waiting for the rest of the project. - This is one of many steps required to publish a new
0.3.0version of the PubGrub crate.
Make Rustdoc Search easier to learn
- Rustdoc will now show type signatures in the search results page, and the boxing transform behaves more like Hoogle's does.
- Improvements to matching behavior have been made to fit user expectations.
- We stabilized
-Znext-solver=coherenceagain in https://github.com/rust-lang/rust/pull/130654. It's looking like the stabilization will actually go through this time. - We're currently refactoring the way the current "typing mode" is tracked, working to fix trait-system-refactoring#106. An FCP was started to clean up the way we merge candidates when proving trait goals.
- rust-lang/rust#125116 has been merged, marking half of the goal as formally completed.
- Discussions on using cargo cache on CI are beginning to take form.
- rust-lang/rust#125116 may be contested in results. The impact may not be as large as expected, even on Clippy.
- We've been experimenting with Clippy using
rustc_driveras a static library, instead of dynamic linking. This would be us both a way to check the performance impact ofrustc_driveras a shared library, and a way to profile Clippy without filtering betweendl_*calls.
- The never patterns RFC was posted.
- Feedback on the RFC suggests that the question of "which arms can be omitted" isn't as orthogonal as hoped, so the focus will switch to that.
Provided reasons for yanked crates
- The PR https://github.com/rust-lang/crates.io/pull/9423 has been merged.
- Work is ongoing on the frontend feature.
Scalable Polonius support on nightly
- Amanda's EuroRust talk on polonius from last month is also now available on YouTube.
- Implementation work continues, mostly on a branch. Major developments include a new debugger which has accelerated progress. There are about 70 test failures left to be analyzed.
- rust-lang/cargo#14670 and rust-lang/cargo#14749 have been posted and merged.
- rust-lang/cargo#14792 has been posted.
- Still in the process of determining the cause of the deadlock through local testing and compiler code analysis.
- Help wanted: Try to reproduce deadlocks described in the issue list.
Survey tools suitability for Std safety verification
- A new partnership between the Rust Foundation and AWS will help fund this effort. The verification challenges in the verify-rust-std fork now have financial rewards for those completing them.
- Help wanted: Help needed to write more contracts, to integrate new tools, to review pull requests or to participate in the repository discussions.
Testing infra + contributors for a-mir-formality
- We decided to close this goal as we have not been making steady progress. We are evaluating what to propose the 2025h1 round of goals.
Goals without updates
The following goals have not received updates in the last month:
Associated type position impl trait
Implement "merged doctests" to save doctest time
Meta’s Instagram boss: who posted something matters more in the AI age
Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge
In a series of Threads posts this afternoon, Instagram head Adam Mosseri says users shouldn’t trust images they see online because AI is “clearly producing” content that’s easily mistaken for reality. Because of that, he says users should consider the source, and social platforms should help with that.
“Our role as internet platforms is to label content generated as AI as best we can,” Mosseri writes, but he admits “some content” will be missed by those labels. Because of that, platforms “must also provide context about who is sharing” so users can decide how much to trust their content.
Just as it’s good to remember that chatbots will confidently lie to you before you trust an AI-powered search engine, checking whether posted claims or images come from a reputable account can help you consider their veracity. At the moment, Meta’s platforms don’t offer much of the sort of context Mosseri posted about today, although the company recently hinted at big coming changes to its content rules.
What Mosseri describes sounds closer to user-led moderation like Community Notes on X and YouTube or Bluesky’s custom moderation filters. Whether Meta plans to introduce anything like those isn’t known, but then again, it has been known to take pages from Bluesky’s book.
fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻") wrote:
I don’t like writing so much as I like having written. You get what I mean? It’s like hiking in the heat for the relief of walking into an air conditioned room.
Reblogged by slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell"):
cwilcox808@c.im ("Curtis Wilcox") wrote:
@Meyerweb
`paint-order` also works on HTML text if `-webkit-text-stroke` is used to add a stroke.Both properties work in all major browsers (despite one being prefixed); Chrome was the last to add support for `paint-order` on HTML text, in release 123 earlier this year.
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/paint-order
This mod turns the PSP into a tiny PS2 with Bluetooth controller support
The PS Placeable makes the PSP into a tiny PS2. | Image: Retro Mod Works
What if you could turn a PSP with a broken screen into a miniature PS2, connect a Bluetooth controller to it, and play PSP games on your TV? That’s the idea behind Retro Mod Works’ PS Placeable, a mod that “consolizes” the PSP and was featured yesterday in a video from the YouTube channel Macho Nacho Productions.
Retro Mod Works charges $274.99 for a prebuilt PS Placeable. Those are waitlisted at the moment, though — a message on the site says the project is a “one man show” and that the demand for the Placeable was higher than anticipated.
Retro also offers to mod customer-provided PSPs for $100 less, and there’s an option preorder DIY parts and do the conversion work yourself. The mod requires either a PSP-2000 or PSP-3000 revision, as the first PSP didn’t have a video output. It’s not clear when the DIY parts will ship — we’ve asked Retro Mod Works and will update if we get a reply.
/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/25791254/PS_Placeable_stack.png)
Image: Retro Mod Works
A stack of PS Placeables.
The primary person behind the project, named Dan, told Macho Nacho host Tito Perez that he “hated the idea of buying digital games” for which he has physical copies, and wanted a way to add Bluetooth controller support while preserving the UMD drive. He’s also mentioned in replies on Reddit that his goal is to help people revive broken PSPs with the mod, which doesn’t need the console’s screen.
But buying one of these mod kits can be pricey or require skills most people don’t have. If you just want to play PSP games on your TV and don’t care about having a UMD drive, the PSP Go — which lacked Sony’s oddball optical drive but supported Bluetooth controllers and also had a way to output video — is still pretty easy to come by.
Why the ABC News Settlement With Trump Is Complicated
ABC News will pay $15 million to settle a defamation lawsuit that president-elect Donald Trump brought against the network, centered on incorrect comments that anchor George Stephanopoulos made about the civil lawsuit against Trump brought by writer E. Jean Carroll. The details of the settlement are concerning for anyone who cares about press freedom in […]