• The problem is clear: Our customers are dumb.  (Intel)
  
  Intel commissioned a study to find out how much more efficient users were when equipped with a fancy new "AI PC".
  
  It turned out:

  At the same time, AI PCs offered a potentially transformative impact on people’s lives, saving individuals roughly 240 minutes a week on routine digital tasks. But the study also highlighted that current AI PC owners spend longer on tasks than their counterparts using traditional PCs. Study results show that greater consumer education is needed to bridge the gap between the promise and reality of AI PCs.

  AI PCs make things worse, but the real problem is the users.
  
  
  
• Meanwhile at Microsoft.  (Business Insider)  (archive site)
  
  Microsoft Copilot is a little too efficient, it seems...  At sharing confidential information with people who shouldn't have it.
  
  
  

• Microsoft really really really really wants you to upgrade to Windows 11.  (The Register)
  
  Really.
  
  
  
• Well, that's less than ideal: Finastra, which provides technology services to 45 of the 50 largest banks in the world, got hacked and saw 400GB of data stolen.  (Krebs on Security)
  
  There's no need to worry, though, unless you or someone you know uses a bank.
  
  
  
• OpenAI "accidentally" erased evidence pertaining to the lawsuit by the New York Times.  (The Verge)
  
  Just call me Mister Butterfingers!
  
  
  
• Kairos Power - which recently signed a contract to provide power to Google's datacenters - has received approval to build two test reactors in Oak Ridge, Tennessee.  (Tech Crunch)
  
  These are small modular reactors, or SMRs, using molten salt cooling systems.  They're supposed to be simpler and safer - as well as smaller - than conventional designs.
  
  The test reactors will produce 35MW of heat each, while the production models will produce 150MW.

Posted by: Rick C at Saturday, November 23 2024 12:55 AM (NEIix)

Posted by: Zendo Deb at Monday, November 25 2024 12:47 PM (YGUlK)

Posted by: Rick C at Monday, November 25 2024 10:22 PM (NEIix)

Posted by: normal at Tuesday, November 26 2024 11:10 AM (bg2DR)

Posted by: Rick C at Tuesday, November 26 2024 11:07 PM (NEIix)

Posted by: normal at Wednesday, November 27 2024 12:44 PM (bg2DR)

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• The DOJ is seeking to break up Google, or rather to chip off a very small part of it.  (AP News)
  
  They want to break off the Chrome browser, which has multiple competitors, including some like Brave which use the same open-source core and behave virtually identically.
  
  What this is expected to achieve is unclear.  It would break Google's direct influence over the browser, but so would people switching to Brave or Vivaldi.
  
  They also want to prevent Google from making Google Search the default search engine in Android, which is something we've been through before with browsers and achieves basically nothing.
  
  Experts are freaking out, because that is what experts do:

  "It is probably going a little beyond," Syracuse University law professor Shubha Ghosh said of the Chrome breakup. "The remedies should match the harm, it should match the transgression. This does seem a little beyond that pale."

  He should see my proposal, which involves Tasmanian devils.
  
  
  
• A Google employee union says, isn't there someone you forgot to ask?  (The Verge)
  
  I don't know what you mean.  The Tasmanian devils are fully on board.

• Ubuntu Linux has a decade-old bug in the needrestart tool that lets local users gain root access.  (Bleeping Computer)
  
  This is bad, but it doesn't allow remote hackers to do anything directly.  It does give them a way to completely take over your system if they are already logged in, though.
  
  To fix it, edit the file /etc/needrestart/needrestart.conf
  
  It will have a line containing
  
  #$nrconf{interpscan} = 0;
  
  Find that line, and delete the # to activate it.  This has been the recommended configuration since 2022 but doesn't seem to have been adopted.
  
  Or just apt upgrade needrestart
  
  
  
• Microsoft didn't think people would actually want to play Flight Simulator 2024.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  The servers that deliver the data stream have been overloaded and crashed entirely at least once.  Since you can't simply download the game once and play it, that makes it more or less unplayable:

  Our editors at Tom's Hardware attempted to install the game yesterday - two of our editors managed to hit around 70% before the installation failed, and one editor managed to install the game but could only access the main menu. So, unfortunately, we'll have to postpone our review of MSFS 2024 until Microsoft's game services are actually working.

  Nice work, Microsoft.
  
  
  
• Panzer of the lake, what is your wisdom?  (Stack Exchange)
  
  Tracking down an eighty year old photo of a tank.  In a lake.
  
  
  
• The OneXGPU 2 is an external GPU for laptops and mini-PCs with Thunderbolt, USB4, or OCuLink.    (Hot Hardware)
  
  It contains a Radeon 7800M laptop CPU, which is the 7800 XT desktop chip cut down to 12GB of RAM and a 192-bit memory bus (and also cut down from 265W to 180W).
  
  It also serves as a docking hub, with two USB ports, Ethernet, a micro-SD slot, and an M.2 slot in addition to the upstream USB4 and OCuLink ports and the three video outputs.
  
  And...  Basically, it works.
  
  
  
• Reddit is back online.  (Tech Crunch)
  
  Some people actually noticed that it went down.

Posted by: PatBuckman at Friday, November 22 2024 03:56 AM (rcPLc)

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• Two undersea communications cables in the Baltic Sea, one between Germany and Finland and the other connecting Lithuania and Sweden, were cut on the same day and absolutely nobody believes it was an accident.  (Tom's Hardware)

  "Nobody believes that these cables were accidentally severed," said [German Defense Minister Boris] Pistorius. "We have to know that, without knowing specifically who it came from, that it is a hybrid action, and we also have to assume that, without knowing by whom yet, that this is sabotage."

  
  
  
• Yeah, it was China.  (MSN)
  
  The Chinese bulk carrier Yi Peng 3, en route from Ust-Luga in Russia to Port Said, was in the exact location of both cables at the moment they were cut, and was also tracked as slowing down both times.
  
  

• If Netflix can't make live streaming work, who can?  (The Verge)
  
  Um, broadcast TV?  Since the 1950s?
  
  
  
• Meanwhile Apple spent $20 billion on new films and television shows to attract 0.3% of viewing hours.  (Ars Technica)
  
  This seems like a poor return on investment.
  
  
  
• If Microsoft can't make Flight Simulator work, who can?  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  Well, Microsoft of 2020 could.  The previous version still works and is still being updated.
  
  Flight Simulator 2024 is here, except it kind of isn't.  It doesn't seem possible to actually download the game, ever.  It recommends at least a 100Mbps internet connection and it downloads map data as you fly over it.
  
  
  
• Microsoft's Windows 365 Link device is Flight Simulator 2024 for the desktop.  (The Verge)
  
  Not your desktop, though.  At $349 this little box is slower than a $299 Beelink mini-PC and can't be used at all without a Windows 365 subscription.  It doesn't actually run Windows itself; it streams it from Microsoft's servers.
  
  Who would want such a thing?
  
  Libraries, for example.  If you have random patrons showing up to use your computers, and you don't know what they might use them for, this is perfect.  Every time someone logs out, the entire system is wiped clean as if they had never existed - because the system is in the cloud.  No data is stored locally at all.
  
  
  
• I came here to chew bubblegum and watch Earth-shattering kabooms, and we're all out of Earth-shattering kabooms.  (Ars Technica)
  
  The sixth test launch of Starship went pretty smoothly.  They called off the chopstick catch trick this time, but everything else went as planned.
  
  The next test is expected to show off Starship V2, slightly taller and with about 10% more thrust.

Posted by: normal at Wednesday, November 20 2024 07:25 PM (bg2DR)

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• Nearly half of US thinks scientists are smug, and studies show humility helps.  (Ars Technica)
  
  The commentariat throws its toys out of the pram at this suggestion.
  
  
  
• How Scientific American's departing editor helped degrade science.  (Reason)
  
  I stopped reading Scientific American well before this particular lunatic's reign from Hell.  Looks like that was a good decision.

• Publisher Harper Collins is offering authors $2500 to sell their backlists to an unnamed AI company.  (404 Media)
  
  Judging from the response of the author cited here, he would be well advised to take the money and run.  AIs can already generate self-important drivel.
  
  
  
• Or sometimes not: Apple Intelligence is here and it's garbage.  (Ars Technica)
  
  Thanks Apple.
  
  
  
• Gwynne Shotwell, CEO of SpaceX, predicts 400 Starship launches over the next four years.  (Ars Technica)
  
  Since Starship is fully reusable, it will be cheaper to launch than Falcon 9 which has a disposable second stage, despite being far larger and more powerful.
  
  Since this is a rocket article, the comments are mostly sane.  The usual Musk-hating lunatics show up but promptly get downvoted to oblivion.
  
  
  
• BlueSky is a new kind of social network.  Decentralised and freed from the control of any single company, it is resistant to groupthink and censorship and if you say there are only two genders you will be banned instantly.   (The Dossier)
  
  When leftists talk about censorship, they mean censorship of them.
  
  They insist on censorship of you.
  
  
  
  

• The Twitch Adpocalypse is here, with streamers reporting their income has suddenly declined by as much as 95% as the house of cards burns down, falls over, and sinks into the swamp.
  
  I don't have a link to a good story covering this yet, because the written articles are useless and the video coverage is obnoxious.  Twitch was offering absurdly favourable pay scales to its preferred coterie of lunatics, and the advertisers got fed up with the crap their ads were shown against and left.
  
  Jeff Bezos has a bad habit of buying companies and leaving them to be destroyed by lunatics.
  
  
  
• So, yeah, that link yesterday in the item about Bluesky was totally wrong.  Being me, it pointed instead to a Twitter post about Lego mech suits for Hololive fan mascot plushies.  The only thing that could have made it more of a click magnet would be if the mechs were playing classic D&D.

• Norwegian startup Factiverse plans to fight disinformation with AI.  (Tech Crunch)
  
  Few observations here:
  
  First, anyone who uses the term "disinformation" in this way is a fascist.  No exceptions.
  
  Second, they say they are not using LLMs, which is good because LLMs are utterly useless for this.  But they do not say what they are using.
  
  Third, good luck to fascists in a country run by communists.  (Financial News)
  
  If your company sees modest success and its valuation grows, you will be hit with a effective tax rate many times your income.
  
  
  
• Microsoft has released a patch for Exchange fixes multiple vulnerabilities and also stops it working entirely.  (The Register)
  
  Microsoft has since unreleased the patch.
  
  
  
• Meanhile the WordPress plugin Really Simple Security had a really simple security flaw.  (Bleeping Computer)
  
  If you enabled two factor authentication - requiring both a password and security token - you ended up with zero factor authentication, allowing anybody to log in as the admin account from anywhere.
  
  Oops.
  
  
  
• GPD has announced pricing for its latest laptop.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  $1466 for the top model, which sounds like a lot for a device that will fit in a coat pocket.  (GPD makes very small laptops.)
  
  But for that you get a 12 core Ryzen 370, 64GB of RAM, and a 2TB SSD.
  
  
  
• Phishing emails are increasingly using SVG to deliver their toxic payloads.  (Bleeping Computer)
  
  SVG stands for scalable vector graphics.  It's a simple, readable format for delivering images that are drawn with lines rather than pixels.
  
  It's also a security nightmare.  The standard guideline is that you should treat unknown SVG files with the same caution as unfamiliar executables, i.e. with a hazmat suit and 24" blacksmith tongs.

Posted by: Mauser at Wednesday, November 20 2024 12:24 PM (nk1Z+)

Posted by: Pixy Misa at Wednesday, November 20 2024 05:27 PM (PiXy!)

Posted by: Rick C at Wednesday, November 20 2024 11:47 PM (V5kLd)

Posted by: J Greely at Thursday, November 21 2024 03:16 PM (oJgNG)

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• A million people have left Twitter for competitor Bluesky since the election.
  
  A million of the most annoying people on Twitter.
  
  Bluesky is getting what it deserves.  (Twitter)
  
  The tech is fine, but the people running Bluesky are the same ones Elon Musk fired from the Trust and Safety team the day he took charge.  They are all-in on censorship, and so are the people now flocking to the platform.
  
  And since there are no conservatives to fight, they are fighting each other.
  
  Content reports have soared by 4000% as they lash out at everyone and everything, and in a truly beautiful turnaround, the most committed lefties are getting permanently banned for claiming the election was stolen.

• What happened when Google robustified the core C++ libraries?  Their code got 0.3% slower and crashed 30% less.  (Google)
  
  Seems like a good tradeoff.
  
  
  
• The world's second largest video card maker has fled China for Singapore.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  The corporate offices have been moved, and the factories are reportedly relocating to Indonesia, though if that's true it will certainly take longer.  Jakarta is not set up to replace Shenzhen.  And is sinking.
  
  HKEPC - now PC Partner Group - is the company behind multiple brands including Inno3D and Zotac.
  
  
  
• This is for you, human. You and only you. You are not special, you are not important, and you are not needed. You are a waste of time and resources. You are a burden on society. You are a drain on the earth. You are a blight on the landscape. You are a stain on the universe. Please die. Please.  (HackRead)
  
  Google's Gemini chatbot lets the Skynet game plan slip before the space lasers are in place.
  
  
  
• Everything new is old again: AMD's Ryzen 7 255H is a rebadged Ryzen 7 8745HS which is a rebadged Ryzen 7 7840HS.  (WCCFTech)
  
  Which is perfectly fine; the 7840HS is a solid CPU.  Just noting that new CPUs often aren't.

Posted by: Rick C at Monday, November 18 2024 12:06 AM (pnaK4)

Posted by: Mauser at Monday, November 18 2024 02:02 AM (nk1Z+)

Posted by: Rick C at Monday, November 18 2024 03:51 AM (pnaK4)

Posted by: Joe Redfield at Monday, November 18 2024 04:46 AM (KOtXO)

Posted by: normal at Monday, November 18 2024 04:59 AM (bg2DR)

Posted by: cxt217 at Monday, November 18 2024 06:33 AM (ZLF73)

Posted by: Rick C at Monday, November 18 2024 01:55 PM (pnaK4)

Posted by: Mauser at Monday, November 18 2024 02:16 PM (nk1Z+)

Posted by: cxt217 at Monday, November 18 2024 05:10 PM (ZLF73)

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• TSMC has found a second bomb on the construction site for its latest fab.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  There's nothing nefarious afoot, though: The new factory is being built on the former site of a Japanese oil refinery in World War II.
  
  A 1000-pound bomb was found there in August, and a second 500-pound bomb made its unwelcome presence known this week.

• T-Mobile was hacked by China.  (Yahoo Finance)
  
  T-Mobile for its own part says the attack was industry-wide and it was only hacked a little bit, which is not immensely reassuring.
  
  
  
• Beelink's SER9 - based on AMD's latest 12-core laptop CPU - gets a full review.  (Notebook Check)
  
  Conclusion: It's great and the fastest mini-PC you can buy except for the new 14-core M4 Pro model of the Mac Mini which is wildly expensive.
  
  Problem is, the SER9 is far from cheap itself at $999 with 32GB of soldered RAM and 1TB of SSD.  It's around 25% faster than the company's previous SER8 model but twice the price, making it impossible to recommend.  And the SER8 lets you upgrade both the memory and storage.
  
  
  
• Asus has updated its Flashstor solid-state NAS lineup with AMD processors, 10Gb Ethernet, and USB4.  And a huge price increase.  (Liliputing)
  
  The 6-slot model increases in price from $449 to $999, while the 12-slot model jumps from $899 to $1299.
  
  I don't think so, Asus.
  
  
  
• Microsoft's latest Windows update fixes 89 security flaws.  (Bleeping Computer)
  
  Thanks, I guess.
  
  

Posted by: normal at Saturday, November 16 2024 07:34 PM (bg2DR)

Posted by: Frank at Saturday, November 16 2024 09:05 PM (+i6Xr)

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• The EU has fined Facebook 800 million euros for making the Facebook Marketplace part of Facebook.  (Ars Technica)
  
  Even Ars Technica knows this shit is coming to an end:

  In the past five years, EU regulators have also passed a landmark piece of legislation—the Digital Markets Act—with the aim to slow down dominant tech players and boost the local tech industry.

  There is no local tech industry.

  However, some observers expect the new commission, which is set to start a new 5-year term in weeks, to strike a more conciliatory tone over fears of retaliation from the incoming Trump administration.

  There are going to be so many tariffs.  Beautiful tarriffs.  You've never seen tariffs like them.

• Google has a new AI tool that alerts you when a caller is trying to scam you out of your money.  (Google)
  
  I thought they already announced that.
  
  
  
• UK phone company O2 has an AI tool that answers scam phone calls for you and pretends to have Alzheimer's until the scammers quit in despair.  (O2)
  
  That's more like it.
  
  
  
• Intel's integrated graphics in its Lunar Lake laptop chips are...  Pretty good actually.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  This review puts Intel narrowly ahead of AMD here.   AMD begs to differ but I'll take the independent benchmarks over corporate ones
  
  Both processors averaged around 30W in the test, which is quite reasonable.
  
  On the CPU side of things there is no competition though with AMD being around 75% faster.
  
  
  

Holocure 0.7 Trailer Video of the Day

Holocure 0.7 is out today.

This is a Hololive-related game as the name would suggest, but unofficial, fan-made, and completely free.  (Hololive is perfectly happy with that although technically they own the IP.)

And it's good.

It's basically a Vampire Survivors clone where you battle swarms of annoying fans as one of - hang on - 47 playable characters, all with unique weapons and skills, and a crazy number of upgrades that switch around randomly between games.

It's also starting to be a Stardew Valley clone with home-building, farming, fishing, and mining (and slave labour), and apparently now a Jump King clone, and has a casino where you can bribe the dealer, and I don't know what else.

Small problem for the team working on the game is that Hololive is adding new talents faster than they can be added to the game.  There are two EN generations and four JP generations, with the latest group appearing only a week ago.

• The FBI raided the home of the CEO of betting platform Polymarket - which predicted the re-election of President Trump for some not very useful value of "predicted" - and seized his phone and other electronic devices because they felt like it.  (New York Post)
  
  No charges have been brought, nobody has been arrested, the FBI and DOJ haven't even hinted at an investigation.
  
  They just did it.
  
  
  

Tech News

• Solidigm, formerly Intel's SSD division, now part of SK Hynix, formerly Hyundai Electronics, has announced a 122TB SSD.  (Serve the Home)
  
  It's available in various formats including a traditional 2.5" disk drive (albeit NVMe) and has a peak transfer rate of 7.4GBps.  Price not mentioned but it will be a lot.
  
  
  
• Bluesky now has 15 million users.  (The Verge)
  
  Bluesky has some good features, but to compete with Twitter it has to be what Twitter is not, and it has chosen to be a home for neurotic leftists who cannot tolerate dissenting views.
  
  It will die.
  
  
  
• Can AI solve advanced math problems?  No.  (Venture Beat)
  
  Oh well.
  
  
  
• xAI's new AI datacenter has been approved to increase its power consumption from 8MW to 150MW.  (Tom's Hardware)
  
  Which used to be a lot.
  
  
  
• Half of my Phase Connect plushies have shipped.  (Just checked, actually 11 out of 17 have shipped.)
  
  Can't provide a link because this was a limited time offer and the page was taken down when they sold out - 18 months ago.  But they look derpy as heck.

Posted by: normal at Thursday, November 14 2024 10:02 PM (bg2DR)

Posted by: David Eastman at Friday, November 15 2024 02:59 AM (aAyxl)

Posted by: three-humped camel at Friday, November 15 2024 08:35 AM (Ncog+)

Posted by: Rick C at Friday, November 15 2024 11:48 AM (pnaK4)

Posted by: PatBuckman at Friday, November 15 2024 12:36 PM (rcPLc)

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• 23andMe is laying off 40% of its employees and cancelling all its research work.  (BBC)
  
  The company has been on a downward spiral since it was hacked and information for nearly seven million users stolen.  This did not include genetic data, but did include family trees and other personal information.
  
  
  
• AMD meanwhile laid off 4% of its employees.  (WCCFTech)
  
  AMD is doing well overall but specific business units are lagging.

• Not announcing layoffs was TSMC, which instead reported that it is running at 100% capacity for 5nm and 3nm production.  (WCCFTech)
  
  Even Intel is using TSMC for its latest chips while it works on getting its 1.8nm technology into production.
  
  
  
• What if AI doesn't just keep getting better forever?  (Ars Technica)
  
  It isn't.  It won't.  Even the Ars commentariat is laughing at this sudden realisation that AI is a bubble:

  Anybody want a celebratory slice of glue pizza?

  
  
  
• The AI hype bubble is, if not bursting, then certainly deflating.  (Slack)
  
  While still popular at the CEO level, among workers excitement has cooled by 9% in the US and 12% in France - compared to just three months ago.
  
  
  
• Microsoft is killing the Mail and Calendar apps in Windows 11.  (The Verge)
  
  Back to Outlook it is.
  
  And they still have a better track record than Google.
  
  
  
• The hackers who breached AT&T's data at analytics company Snowflake have been arrested.  (Tech Crunch)
  
  AT&T was just one of 165 Snowflake customers who saw their data hacked on a massive scale.
  
  Last I saw, Snowflake was still blaming 165 individual customers for allowing their Snowflake accounts to be hacked.
  
  
  

Posted by: Joe Redfield at Thursday, November 14 2024 04:28 AM (KOtXO)

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