An anonymous reader shares a report: Starting with those builds, Windows 11 will show a Game Pass recommendation / ad within the Settings app. The advertisement will appear on both Windows 11 Home and Windows 11 Pro if you actively play games on your PC. Microsoft lists this feature first under the "Highlights" section of its blog post about the update. Some users aren't pleased. "Microsoft has gone too far," news blog TechRadar wrote.

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T-Mobile is facing customer outrage after announcing a $5-per-line price increase on plans that were marketed with a "lifetime" price guarantee. The move has sparked over 1,600 complaints to the Federal Communications Commission, ArsTechnica reports Kathleen Odean, 70, of Rhode Island, is among the affected customers. "The promise was absolutely clear," she told Ars. "It's right there in writing: 'T-Mobile will never change the price you pay for your T-Mobile One plan.'" T-Mobile claims an FAQ page allows for price changes, but customers argue this caveat was never prominently disclosed. The company's 2017 press release touted the guarantee without mentioning exceptions.

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Bill Gates has defended the rapid rise in energy use caused by AI systems, arguing the technology would ultimately offset its heavy consumption of electricity. Speaking in London, Gates urged environmentalists and governments to "not go overboard" on concerns about the huge amounts of power required to run new generative AI systems, as Big Tech companies such as Microsoft race to invest tens of billions of dollars in vast new data centres. Data centres will drive a rise in global electricity usage of between 2-6 per cent, the billionaire said. "The question is, will AI accelerate a more than 6 per cent reduction? And the answer is: certainly," said Gates, the Microsoft co-founder who has been a prolific investor in companies developing sustainable energy and carbon- reduction technologies. In May, Microsoft admitted that its greenhouse gas emissions had risen by almost a third since 2020, in large part due to the construction of data centres. Gates, who left Microsoft's board in 2020 but remains an adviser to chief executive Satya Nadella, said tech companies would pay a "green premium" -- or higher price -- for clean energy as they seek new sources of power, which was helping to drive its development and deployment. "The tech companies are the people willing to pay a premium and to help bootstrap green energy capacity," he said at the Breakthrough Energy Summit in London on Thursday.

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Google is severing its trust in Entrust after what it describes as a protracted period of failures around compliance and general improvements. From a report: Entrust is one of the many certificate authorities (CA) used by Chrome to verify that the websites end users visit are trustworthy. From November 1 in Chrome 127, which recently entered beta, TLS server authentication certificates validating to Entrust or AffirmTrust roots won't be trusted by default. Google pointed to a series of incident reports over the past few years concerning Entrust, saying they "highlighted a pattern of concerning behaviors" that have ultimately seen the security company fall down in Google's estimations. The incidents have "eroded confidence in [Entrust's] competence, reliability, and integrity as a publicly trusted CA owner," Google stated in a blog. The move follows a May publication by Mozilla, which compiled a sprawling list of Entrust's certificate issues between March and May this year. Entrust -- after an initial PR disaster -- acknowledged its procedural failures and said it was treating the feedback as a learning opportunity.

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For the first two decades of the social internet, lurkers ruled. Among Gen Z, they're in the minority, according to survey data from YouTube. From a report: Tech industry insiders used to cite a rule of thumb stating that only one in ten of an online community's users generally post new content, with the masses logging on only to consume images, video or other updates. Now younger generations are flipping that divide, a survey by the video platform said. YouTube found that 65 percent of Gen Z, which it defined as people between the ages of 14 and 24, describe themselves as video content creators -- making lurkers a minority. The finding came from responses from 350 members of Gen Z in the U.S., out of a wider survey that asked thousands of people about how they spend time online, including whether they consider themselves video creators. YouTube did the survey in partnership with research firm SmithGeiger, as part of its annual report on trends on the platform. YouTube's report says that after watching videos online, many members of Gen Z respond with videos of their own, uploading their own commentary, reaction videos, deep dives into content posted by others and more. This kind of interaction often develops in response to videos on pop culture topics such as "RuPaul's Drag Race" or the Fallout video game series. Fan-created content can win more watch time than the original source material, the report says.

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The Supreme Court on Friday overturned a long-standing legal doctrine in the US, making a transformative ruling that could hamper federal agencies' ability to regulate all kinds of industry. The Verge adds: Six Republican-appointed justices voted to overturn the doctrine, called Chevron deference, a decision that could affect everything from pollution limits to consumer protections in the US. Chevron deference allows courts to defer to federal agencies when there are disputes over how to interpret ambiguous language in legislation passed by Congress. That's supposed to lead to more informed decisions by leaning on expertise within those agencies. By overturning the Chevron doctrine, the conservative-dominated SCOTUS decided that judges ought to make the call instead of agency experts.

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The SEC sued Ethereum software provider ConsenSys over its MetaMask service on Friday, alleging the wallet product was an unregistered broker that "engaged in the offer and sale of securities." From a report: MetaMask also offered an unregistered securities program through its staking service, the SEC alleged in a filing in the courthouse in the Eastern District of New York. The SEC alleged in its lawsuit that it offered staking services for Lido and Rocket Pool as investment contracts, meaning they are also unregistered securities. "Consensys has collected over $250 million in fees," the SEC alleged. You can read the full lawsuit here [PDF].

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Indonesian President Joko Widodo ordered on Friday an audit of government data centres after officials said the bulk of data affected by a recent ransomware cyberattack was not backed up, exposing the country's vulnerability to such attacks. From a report: Last week's cyberattack, the worst in Indonesia in recent years, has disrupted multiple government services including immigration and operations at major airports. The government has said more than 230 public agencies, including ministries, had been affected, but has refused to pay an $8 million ransom demanded to retrieve the encrypted data. Responding to the cyberattack, Indonesia's state auditor said the president instructed it to examine the country's data centres. The audit would cover "governance and the financial aspect", said Muhammad Yusuf Ateh, who heads Indonesia's Development and Finance Controller, after attending a cabinet meeting led by Widodo on Friday. Hinsa Siburian, an official who chairs Indonesia's cyber security agency known by its acronym BSSN, has said 98% of the government data stored in one of the two compromised data centres had not been backed up.

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Fujifilm's X100 digital camera, once a niche product, has become an unexpected cash cow, driven by surging demand from young social media users. The retro-styled $1,599 camera has boosted Fujifilm's imaging division to its biggest profit contributor, accounting for 37% of operating profit in fiscal 2023, up from 27% the previous year. Despite doubling production in China for the latest model, Fujifilm struggles to meet demand. The camera's popularity on platforms like TikTok has transformed it into a coveted accessory. The surge marks an unexpected reversal for Fujifilm, which had pivoted towards healthcare after the decline of traditional film photography.

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Amazon's cloud arm is investigating Perplexity AI for potential violations of its web services rules, the e-commerce giant told Wired. The startup, backed by Jeff Bezos' family fund and Nvidia, allegedly scraped websites that had explicitly forbidden such access. Earlier this month, WIRED uncovered evidence of Perplexity using an unmarked IP address to bypass restrictions on major news sites. The company's CEO, Aravind Srinivas, claimed a third-party contractor was responsible but declined to name them.

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Russian hackers who broke into Microsoft's systems and spied on staff inboxes earlier this year also stole emails from its customers, the tech giant said on Thursday, around six months after it first disclosed the intrusion. Reuters: The disclosure underscores the breadth of the breach as Microsoft faces increasing regulatory scrutiny over the security of its software and systems against foreign threats. An allegedly Chinese hacking group that separately breached Microsoft last year stole thousands of U.S. government emails. Microsoft said it was also sharing the compromised emails with its customers, but did not say how many customers had been impacted, nor how many emails may have been stolen.

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TeamViewer, the company that makes widely used remote access tools for companies, has confirmed an ongoing cyberattack on its corporate network. TechCrunch: In a statement Friday, the company attributed the compromise to government-backed hackers working for Russian intelligence, known as APT29 (and Midnight Blizzard). The Germany-based company said its investigation so far points to an initial intrusion on June 26 "tied to credentials of a standard employee account within our corporate IT environment." TeamViewer said that the cyberattack "was contained" to its corporate network and that the company keeps its internal network and customer systems separate. The company added that it has "no evidence that the threat actor gained access to our product environment or customer data." Martina Dier, a spokesperson for TeamViewer, declined to answer a series of questions from TechCrunch, including whether the company has the technical ability, such as logs, to determine what, if any, data was accessed or exfiltrated from its network.

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An anonymous reader shares a report: A top executive at McDonald's says the chain does not have plans to bring back plant-based options after a test of its McPlant burger in San Francisco and Dallas failed. "It was not successful in either market," Joe Erlinger, McDonald's U.S. president, said during the Wall Street Journal Global Food Forum in Chicago on Wednesday. American consumers are not coming to McDonald's looking for a McPlant burger or other plant-based proteins, Erlinger added. The chain had previously partnered with Beyond Meat to make McPlant burgers and nuggets. Plant-based items are off the menu for now, but Erlinger didn't rule out the possibility that salads could one day make a return. That'll depend on whether customer demand is there. "If people really want salads from McDonald's, we will gladly relaunch salads," Erlinger said. "But what our experience has proven is that's not what the consumer is looking for from McDonald's." Instead, consumers are looking for french fries, $5 meal deals, and hot, fresh sandwiches, he added.

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Mark Zuckerberg has criticized the notion of a singular, dominant AI in a new interview. He argued against the idea of AI technology being "hoarded" by one company, taking aim at unnamed competitors who he suggested view themselves as "creating God." Zuckerberg advocated for open-source AI development, emphasizing the need for diverse AI systems reflecting varied interests. He likened the future AI landscape to the current ecosystem of phone apps, content creators, and businesses, where no single entity dominates. Meta announced early U.S. tests of AI Studio, software enabling creators to build AI avatars for Instagram messaging. These AIs will be clearly labeled to avoid confusion. Zuckerberg stressed the importance of empowering many to experiment with AI, stating, "That's what culture is, right? It's not one group of people getting to dictate everything for people."

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A former Boeing contractor has filed complaints with federal agencies, alleging safety issues in 787 Dreamliner production and wrongful termination. Richard Cuevas, a veteran mechanic, claims he observed improper drilling of fastener holes in forward pressure bulkheads during his work with Spirit AeroSystems, Boeing's main supplier. Cuevas warned that these defects could compromise aircraft safety. After reporting concerns to the FAA and his superiors, Cuevas says he was fired. His lawyers have urged investigations into Dreamliner bulkheads and claim unlawful retaliation. Boeing stated they investigated the concerns thoroughly and determined no safety risk.

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Alibaba's Qwen models dominated Hugging Face's latest LLM leaderboard, securing three top-ten spots. The new benchmark, launched Thursday, tests open-source models on tougher criteria including long-context reasoning and complex math. Meta's Llama3-70B also ranked highly, but several Chinese models outperformed Western counterparts. (Closed-source AIs like ChatGPT were excluded.) The leaderboard replaces an earlier version deemed too easy to game.

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Scientists have uncovered a new gene-editing tool with potential to rival CRISPR, according to studies published in Nature on Wednesday. The system, based on a bacterial DNA parasite called IS110, uses RNA guides to target specific genomic locations. While showing promise for precise DNA cutting, the method currently lacks the accuracy needed for human applications. At best, it achieved 94% accuracy in lab tests. The team also revealed the molecular structure of IS110's DNA-cutting enzyme, shedding light on its unique four-step editing mechanism. Nature, 2024. DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-07552-4, 10.1038/s41586-024-07570-2.

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The FCC wants to make it significantly easier for consumers to unlock their phones from their carriers, proposing that all devices must be unlockable just 60 days after purchase. From a report: How this will mesh with current plans and phone buying trends, however, is something the agency is hoping to learn before putting such a rule into effect. Mobile phones purchased from a carrier are generally locked to that carrier until either the contract is up or the phone is paid off. But despite improvements to the process over the years (unlocking was flat-out illegal not long ago), it still isn't quite clear to all consumers when and how they can unlock their phone and take it to the carrier (or country) of their choice. FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel announced the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, or NPRM, in a press release today. "When you buy a phone, you should have the freedom to decide when to change service to the carrier you want and not have the device you own stuck by practices that prevent you from making that choice," she wrote. "That is why we are proposing clear, nationwide mobile phone unlocking rules." Specifically, the release says, carriers would simply have to provide unlocking services 60 days after activation. A welcome standard, but it may run afoul of today's phone and wireless markets.

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Intel has introduced an advanced optical input/output chiplet, marking what it claims to be a significant leap in data center technology. The optical compute interconnect (OCI) chiplet, unveiled at the Optical Fiber Communication Conference 2024, is designed for integration with CPUs and GPUs and boasts 64 PCIe 5.0 channels transmitting 4 Tbps over 100 meters using fiber optics. Tom's Hardware adds: The chiplet uses dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) wavelengths and consumes only five pico-Joules per bit, significantly more energy-efficient than pluggable optical transceiver modules, which consume about 15 pico-Joules per bit, according to Intel. This device is crucial for next-generation data centers and AI/HPC applications. It will enable high-performance connections for CPU and GPU clusters, coherent memory expansion, and resource disaggregation. These features will be handy for operating supercomputers for large-scale AI models and machine learning tasks that require tremendous data bandwidth.

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The number of climate lawsuits filed against companies around the world is rising swiftly, a report has found, and a majority of cases that have concluded have been successful. From a report: About 230 climate-aligned lawsuits have been filed against corporations and trade associations since 2015, two-thirds of which have been initiated since 2020, according to the analysis published on Thursday by the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment. One of the most rapidly growing forms of litigation is over "climate-washing" -- when companies are accused of misrepresenting their progress towards environmental targets -- and the analysis found that 47 such cases were filed against companies and governments in 2023. As climate communications are increasingly scrutinised, there has been arise in climate-washing litigation, often with positive outcomes for those bringing the cases. Of the 140 climate-washing cases reviewed between 2016 and 2023, 77 have officially concluded, 54 of which ended with a ruling in favour of the claimant. More than 30 cases in 2023 concerned the "polluter pays" principle, whereby companies are held accountable for climate damage caused by high greenhouse gas emissions. The authors also highlighted six "turning off the taps" cases, which challenge the flow of finance to areas which hinder climate goals.

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Google has unveiled its largest-ever expansion of Translate, adding 110 new languages powered by its PaLM 2 AI model. The update spans major world languages and endangered tongues, covering an additional 614 million speakers globally. Highlights include Cantonese, long-requested by users, and a quarter of the new offerings from Africa. Some additions, like Manx from the Isle of Man, showcase dramatic revival stories. The expansion reflects Google's ambitious "1,000 Languages Initiative" and follows its 2022 addition of 24 languages using zero-shot machine translation. Challenges in implementation included navigating regional varieties and non-standardized forms, the company wrote in a blog post.

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The Supreme Court decided to press pause on the Environmental Protection Agency's plan to prevent smog-forming pollutants from drifting across state borders. From a report: Ohio, Indiana, West Virginia, and various trade organizations including fossil fuel industry groups asked the Supreme Court to issue a stay on the plan while they contest the EPA's actions in lower courts. SCOTUS agreed to put the plan on hold today in its opinion on Ohio v. Environmental Protection Agency. Five justices voted in favor of halting implementation for now, while the remaining justices dissented. "If anything, we see one reason for caution after another," Justice Neil Gorsuch writes in his opinion. While the stay is temporary, the decision signals that the conservative-leaning Supreme Court is likely to rule in favor of states opposing the EPA's plan if the issue makes it to the nation's highest court again for a final decision on the plan's legal merit. That could make it harder to improve air quality across the nation since air pollutants typically don't stay in one place.

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Publicly traded crypto exchange Coinbase, in connection with History Associates Incorporated, has filed two civil lawsuits against the Securities and Exchange Commission and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation for their failure to comply with FOIA requests. From a report: The Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA, grants the full or partial disclosure of previously unreleased information that's controlled by the U.S. government. Generally speaking, agencies have 20 days to respond -- not necessarily satisfy -- these requests. And even when government agencies do furnish documents, they can redact anything that falls under certain exemptions: Information related to national security, internal personnel, trade secrets, law enforcement, or financial institution records. Late last year, Coinbase hired History Associates Incorporated, a private historical research firm, to submit a FOIA request on its behalf. The San Francisco crypto exchange was seeking copies of "Pause Letters" sent to financial institutions asking them to indefinitely cease all "crypto-related activities," according to the complaint. The letters were described in a report from the FDIC's Office of Inspector General (OIG), but never shared publicly. The OIG said the letters presented a "risk that the FDIC would inadvertently limit financial institution innovation and growth in the crypto space." The FDIC refused to provide History Associates or Coinbase with the letters.

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Exam submissions generated by AI can not only evade detection but also earn higher grades than those submitted by university students, a real-world test has shown. From a report: The findings come as concerns mount about students submitting AI-generated work as their own, with questions being raised about the academic integrity of universities and other higher education institutions. It also shows even experienced markers could struggle to spot answers generated by AI, the University of Reading academics said. Peter Scarfe, an associate professor at Reading's School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences said the findings should serve as a "wake-up call" for educational institutions as AI tools such as ChatGPT become more advanced and widespread. He said: "The data in our study shows it is very difficult to detect AI-generated answers. There has been quite a lot of talk about the use of so-called AI detectors, which are also another form of AI but (the scope here) is limited." For the study, published in the journal Plos One, Prof Scarfe and his team generated answers to exam questions using GPT-4 and submitted these on behalf of 33 fake students. Exam markers at Reading's School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences were unaware of the study. Answers submitted for many undergraduate psychology modules went undetected in 94% of cases and, on average, got higher grades than real student submissions, Prof Scarfe said.

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Air freight operators have increased their greenhouse gas emissions by 25% compared to 2019, according to a report [PDF] by campaign group Stand.earth. The analysis found that operators ran about 300,000 more flights in 2023 than in 2019, a 30% increase in volume. The United States accounted for over 40% of global air freight emissions. The Guardian adds: FedEx and UPS were responsible for 24.7% of the industry's carbon emissions in 2023. It is estimated that 99.8% of aviation fuel is produced from fossil fuels, with the scaling of low carbon replacements a distant prospect. Research published last year forecast that global annual parcel volume could increase to 800bn parcels a year by 2030 [PDF], compared with 315bn in 2022.

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The US Conference of Mayors, which speaks for the administrations of more than 1,400 cities with a population of at least 30,000 people, adopted a resolution over the weekend at its annual meeting that voiced an objection to HR 3557, a draft law known as the American Broadband Deployment Act of 2023. From a report: The bill, which was introduced by House Rep Earl Carter (R-GA) last May and is awaiting further consideration by Congress, is ostensibly designed to make it easier for telcos to build infrastructure and run additional cables on state and locally managed land, ideally allowing fast broadband connectivity to reach more and more folks. Rep Carter went as far as saying his proposals will ensure "more Americans have access to internet and the United States can maintain its competitive edge against China." Meanwhile, the mayors say HR 3557 strips local governments of authority to oppose bad projects. What raises particular ire are provisions in the draft law that would provide a very short window for opposition. What we have here, basically, is a classic example of one side trying to strip away what is perceived to be bureaucracy and red tape, and the other side insisting that checks and balances are sorely needed.

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Since the James Webb Space Telescope began operating two years ago, astronomers have been using it to leapfrog one another millions of years into the past, back toward the moment they call cosmic dawn, when the first stars and galaxies were formed. Last month, an international team doing research as the JWST Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey, or JADES, said it had identified the earliest, most distant galaxy yet found -- a banana-shaped blob of color measuring 1,600 light-years across. It was already shining with intense starlight when the universe was in its relative infancy, at only 290 million years old, the astronomers said. The new galaxy, known as JADES-GS-z14-0, is one of a string of Webb discoveries, including early galaxies and black holes, that challenge conventional models of how the first stars and galaxies formed. "This discovery proves that luminous galaxies were already in place 300 million years after the Big Bang and are more common than what was expected," the researchers wrote in a paper posted to an online physics archive. "Galaxy formation models will need to address the existence of such large and luminous galaxies so early in cosmic history," said the authors, who were led by Stefano Carniani, a professor at the university Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa, Italy. The galaxy was first spotted during a deep space survey with the Webb's Near Infrared Camera, one of the telescope's workhorse instruments. Within a patch of southern sky known as the Jades Origin Field, which is about a quarter of the size of a full moon, scientists found 11 galaxies that seemed to date from when the universe was less than 400 million years old -- far more than they had expected. Subsequent studies by Dr. Carniani and his colleagues with the telescope's infrared spectrograph revealed that the wavelength of light from JADES-GS-z14-0 had been stretched more than 15-fold by the expansion of the universe (a redshift of 14 to use astronomical jargon), similar to the way a siren's pitch becomes lower as it speeds away. That means light has been coming toward us for 13.5 billion years, since shortly after the universe began. (The universe is about 13.8 billion years old, according to cosmological calculations.) The light from the galaxy is spread over a diffuse region, which indicates that the glow was coming from stars, not the gullet of a black hole. Its brightness corresponded to the output of hundreds of millions of suns, an astonishing number to have formed and assembled in only 290 million years.

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Security researchers claim to have discovered exposed API keys in the code of Rabbit's R1 AI device, potentially allowing access to all user responses and company services. The group, known as Rabbitude, says they could send emails from internal Rabbit addresses to demonstrate the vulnerability. 404 Media adds: In a statement, Rabbit said, "Today we were made aware of an alleged data breach. Our security team immediately began investigating it. As of right now, we are not aware of any customer data being leaked or any compromise to our systems. If we learn of any other relevant information, we will provide an update once we have more details."

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An anonymous reader shares a report: If you've been mindlessly scrolling through streaming services and have been feeling even less enthused than usual, you may not be entirely to blame: almost all major US streamers have been cutting their original TV output this year, according to new analysis (paywalled) from Variety. From content monolith Netflix, which released 203 original shows in the first half of 2023 compared with 174 in H1 '24, to Disney+, which has halved its already-slim original TV library as it continues an apparent shift to quality over quantity, shrinkage has hit the streaming world hard. Indeed, of the 8 major streamers Variety studied from Luminate data, only Max and Peacock maintained their output level year over year. All told, the number of original seasons fell 19% at the 8 streamers tracked.

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Chinese undersea cable manufacturers are experiencing growth despite U.S. trade restrictions, as Beijing pushes for self-sufficiency in critical communications infrastructure, Nikkei is reporting. FiberHome International Technologies, blacklisted by the U.S. in 2020, reports increased business due to China's drive for domestic production. "We don't need foreign technologies," a FiberHome executive told Nikkei. China is challenging U.S. dominance in the global undersea cable network, which spans 1.4 million kilometers and carries over 95% of the world's data. Chinese companies are expected to contribute 45% of new cable installations from 2023 to 2028, according to industry estimates. The Asia-Pacific region leads in subsea cable investment, with China spearheading multiple projects connecting to Southeast Asian nations. This aligns with President Xi Jinping's "Digital Silk Road" initiative, part of the broader Belt and Road strategy. However, geopolitical tensions have led to project delays and increased costs. Some cables are being rerouted to avoid contentious areas like the South China Sea, potentially creating parallel networks divided along geopolitical lines.

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BrianFagioli writes: Canonical has introduced a new service enabling the creation of custom distroless Docker images under its "Everything LTS" program. This initiative allows customers to include any open-source software in their Docker images, regardless of whether it is packaged in Ubuntu, with a security maintenance commitment of up to 12 years. [...] This expansion of the Ubuntu Pro offering incorporates numerous new open-source components, especially current AI/ML tools, maintained directly from the source rather than as traditional 'deb' packages. This approach aims to minimize the attack surface of containers, thereby enhancing security and aiding compliance with various regulatory standards such as FIPS, FedRAMP, EU Cyber Resilience Act, FCC U.S. Cyber Trust Mark, and DISA-STIG.

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The U.S. government last week announced an unprecedented ban on selling Russian cybersecurity firm Kaspersky's software, citing national security concerns. The move, effective July 20, has left American resellers confused and worried about its impact. Kaspersky can provide updates to existing customers until September 29, after which the software's effectiveness will diminish. From a report: Avi Fleischer, the founder of Technical Difficulties, told TechCrunch that not only does he sell Kaspersky to his customers, he also uses its products on his phone and personal computer. He added that the ban is "annoying, to say the least," because he will now have to find another antivirus company and migrate all his customers to the new product, which will cost him time and money. "It's just a lot of time lost for nothing. And I don't see how I can even really charge end users for this," Fleischer said in a phone call. "It was my suggestion that they use Kaspersky and now Kaspersky is being banned by the United States government. What am I supposed to do?"

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YouTube is negotiating with major record labels to license songs for AI tools that clone popular artists' music, according to Financial Times. The Google-owned platform is offering upfront payments to Sony, Warner, and Universal to secure rights for training AI software, aiming to launch new features this year. But there are roadblocks to the deal, the story adds: However, many artists remain fiercely opposed to AI music generation, fearing it could undermine the value of their work. Any move by a label to force their stars into such a scheme would be hugely controversial. [...] YouTube last year began testing a generative AI tool that lets people create short music clips by entering a text prompt. The product, initially named "Dream Track," was designed to imitate the sound and lyrics of well-known singers. But only 10 artists agreed to participate in the test phase, including Charli XCX, Troye Sivan and John Legend, and Dream Track was made available to a just small group of creators.

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The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected to impose limits on the way President Joe Biden's administration may communicate with social media platforms, overturning a lower court decision in a case brought by Missouri, Louisiana, and five individuals. In a 6-3 ruling, the court found plaintiffs lacked legal standing to sue, unable to show a "concrete link" between officials' conduct and harm suffered. The case centered on whether the administration coerced platforms to censor disfavored speech when alerting them to content violating their policies, particularly regarding elections and COVID-19. The administration argued it sought to mitigate online misinformation hazards. Plaintiffs claimed platforms suppressed conservative-leaning speech under government pressure. The Justice Department contended that government officials have long used their platform to express views on public matters.

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Apple has extended its self-service repair diagnostics tool to 32 European countries, including the UK, France, and Germany. The software, previously limited to technicians, allows customers to perform system configuration after self-repairs on iPhones, Macs, and Studio Displays. Launched in the U.S. last year, the tool is part of Apple's Self Service Repair program, which provides access to genuine parts, tools, and manuals for select models. The expansion supports 42 Apple products in 33 countries and 24 languages, furthering the company's efforts to extend product lifespan.

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ChatGPT developer OpenAI has sent out emails to users based in countries it considers "unsupported," saying it will block their access for good starting July 9. From a report: The email, reproduced on the OpenAI community forum here, includes a brief statement. "Our data shows that your organization has API traffic from a region that OpenAI does not currently support," it reads. "We will be taking additional measures to block API traffic from regions that are not on our supported countries and territories list starting on July 9." "To continue using OpenAI's services, you will need to access the service in a supported region," it concludes. Much of the world has access to OpenAI including virtually the entire West, most of Eastern Europe, South Asia, and about half of Africa. However, there are some notable absences on the list such as Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and mainland China.

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Slack announced a significant change to its platform, saying it will "begin deleting messages and files more than one year old from free workspaces on a rolling basis." Slack's prior policy involved keeping messages and files for the lifetime of a free workspace, although accessing that full history required switching to a paid account. Under the new policy, Slack reserves the right to delete content from free workspaces after one year.

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Google is switching back to pagination for its search results, abandoning the continuous scroll feature introduced in 2022 for desktop and 2021 for mobile. The change, effective immediately for desktop users, aims to improve search result loading speeds, Google said, adding that infinite scrolling did not significantly enhance user satisfaction. Mobile users will see the change in coming months.

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Federal regulators have given Amazon key permission that will allow it to expand its drone delivery program, the company announced Thursday. From a report: In a blog post published on its website, Seattle-based Amazon said that the Federal Aviation Administration has given its Prime Air delivery service the OK to operate drones "beyond visual line of sight," removing a barrier that has prevented its drones from traveling longer distances. With the approval, Amazon pilots can now operate drones remotely without seeing it with their own eyes. An FAA spokesperson said the approval applies to College Station, Texas, where the company launched drone deliveries in late 2022. Amazon said its planning to immediately scale its operations in that city in an effort to reach customers in more densely populated areas. It says the approval from regulators also "lays the foundation" to scale its operations to more locations around the country. Businesses have wanted simpler rules that could open neighborhood skies to new commercial applications of drones, but privacy advocates and some airplane and balloon pilots remain wary.

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China brought a capsule full of lunar soil [non-paywalled link] from the far side of the moon down to Earth on Tuesday, achieving the latest success in an ambitious schedule to explore the moon and other parts of the solar system. From a report: The sample, retrieved by the China National Space Administration's Chang'e-6 lander after a 53-day mission, highlights China's growing capabilities in space and notches another win in a series of lunar missions that started in 2007 and have so far been executed almost without flaw. "Chang'e-6 is the first mission in human history to return samples from the far side of the moon," Long Xiao, a planetary geologist at China University of Geosciences, wrote in an email. "This is a major event for scientists worldwide," he added, and "a cause for celebration for all humanity." Such sentiments and the prospects of international lunar sample exchanges highlighted the hope that China's robotic missions to the moon and Mars will serve to advance scientific understanding of the solar system. Those possibilities are contrasted by views in Washington and elsewhere that Tuesday's achievement is the latest milestone in a 21st-century space race with geopolitical overtones. In February, a privately operated American spacecraft landed on the moon. NASA is also pursuing the Artemis campaign to return Americans to the lunar surface, although its next mission, a flight by astronauts around the moon, has been delayed because of technical issues. China, too, is looking to expand its presence on the moon, landing more robots there, and eventually human astronauts, in the years to come.

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India is set to embark on an ambitious $168 billion project to link its major rivers, aiming to address water scarcity and boost agriculture in the world's most populous nation. The National River Linking Project, conceived over a century ago, plans to construct 30 canals to transfer an estimated 7 trillion cubic feet of water annually across the country. While government officials tout the project's potential to irrigate farmland and generate hydroelectric power, scientists and environmental experts have raised concerns about its ecological impact. Recent research suggests the project could disrupt monsoon patterns, potentially exacerbating water stress in some regions.

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Birth rates in the world's rich economies have more than halved since 1960 to hit a record low, according to a study that urged countries to prepare for a "lower fertility future." From a report: The average number of children per woman across the 38 most industrialised countries has fallen from 3.3 in 1960 to 1.5 in 2022, according to a study by the OECD published on Thursday. The fertility rate is now well below the "replacement level" of 2.1 children per woman -- at which a country's population is considered to be stable without immigration -- in all the group's member countries except for Israel. "This decline will change the face of societies, communities and families and potentially have large effects on economic growth and prosperity," warned the Paris-based organisation. Faltering population growth acts as a drag on economic expansion. Across the EU, the rise in overall labour force participation will soon not be enough to compensate for its falling working-age population, exacerbating labour shortages, according to the IMF and European Commission's 2024 ageing report. Coupled with rising life expectancy, low births also put pressure on public finances as they leave fewer people contributing the tax revenues needed to pay for the rising costs of an ageing population. A lack of pupils is also driving an increase in school closures across Europe, Japan and South Korea.

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Boozt, an online Nordic department store, has banned thousands of customers for returning an excessive number of purchased items. From a report: The retailer has blocked about 60,000 of a total 3.5 million customers, in a bid to reduce the significant costs associated with "serial returners," the company said in a statement. "Their behavior is too expensive for both the company and the environment," it added. Returns are costly for retailers both in lost revenue and in the cost of trying to turn around an item to be sold again. In some instances items returned aren't fit to be sold again, leading to waste.

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Over the weekend, a clip from a recent interview with Telegram's founder Pavel Durov went semi-viral on X (previously Twitter). In the video, Durov tells right-wing personality Tucker Carlson that he is the only product manager at the company, and that he only employs "about 30 engineers." Security experts say that while Durov was bragging about his Dubai-based company being "super efficient," what he said was actually a red flag for users. "Without end-to-end encryption, huge numbers of vulnerable targets, and servers located in the UAE? Seems like that would be a security nightmare," Matthew Green, a cryptography expert at Johns Hopkins University, told TechCrunch. (Telegram spokesperson Remi Vaughn disputed this, saying it has no data centers in the UAE.) Green was referring to the fact that -- by default -- chats on Telegram are not end-to-end encrypted like they are on Signal or WhatsApp. A Telegram user has to start a "Secret Chat" to switch on end-to-end encryption, making the messages unreadable to Telegram or anyone other than the intended recipient. Also, over the years, many people have cast doubt over the quality of Telegram's encryption, given that the company uses its own proprietary encryption algorithm, created by Durov's brother, as he said in an extended version of the Carlson interview. Eva Galperin, the director of cybersecurity at the Electronic Frontier Foundation and a longtime expert in the security of at-risk users, said that it's important to remember that Telegram, unlike Signal, is a lot more than just a messaging app.

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The Biden administration is investigating China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom over concerns the firms could exploit access to American data through their U.S. cloud and internet businesses by providing it to Beijing, Reuters reported Tuesday, citing sources familiar with the matter. From the report: The companies still have a small presence in the United States, for example, providing cloud services and routing wholesale U.S. internet traffic. That gives them access to Americans' data even after telecom regulators barred them from providing telephone and retail internet services in the United States. Reuters found no evidence the companies intentionally provided sensitive U.S. data to the Chinese government or committed any other type of wrongdoing. The investigation is the latest effort by Washington to prevent Beijing from exploiting Chinese firms' access to U.S. data to harm companies, Americans or national security, as part of a deepening tech war between the geopolitical rivals. It shows the administration is trying to shut down all remaining avenues for Chinese companies already targeted by Washington to obtain U.S. data.

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The European Union on Tuesday accused Microsoft of breaching antitrust rules with the "abusive" bundling of its Teams and Office products. From a report: "The European Commission has informed Microsoft of its preliminary view that Microsoft has breached EU antitrust rules by tying its communication and collaboration product Teams to its popular productivity applications included in its suites for businesses Office 365 and Microsoft 365," the European Commission -- the EU's executive arm -- said in a Statement of Objections, which is sent to inform companies of concerns raised against them. If the commission decides that an infringement has taken place once companies have responded, it can ban the conduct and fine the charged company up to 10% of its global revenue. Microsoft this year took the preemptive step to unbundle Teams from Microsoft 365 in an effort to quash antitrust concerns by the EU. However, the commission said in its Tuesday statement that the changes were "insufficient to address its concerns and that more changes to Microsoft's conduct are necessary to restore competition." Microsoft said it would work to find solutions to address the commission's additional concerns.

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Apple rejected overtures by Meta Platforms to integrate the social networking company's AI chatbot into the iPhone months ago, according to people with knowledge of the matter. The two companies aren't in discussions about using Meta's Llama chatbot in an AI partnership and only held brief talks in March, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the situation is private. The dialogue about a partnership didn't reach any formal stage, and Apple has no active plans to integrate Llama. [...] Apple decided not to move forward with formal Meta discussions in part because it doesn't see that company's privacy practices as stringent enough, according to the people. Apple has spent years criticizing Meta's technology, and integrating Llama into the iPhone would have been a stark about-face.

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Microsoft has made OneDrive slightly more annoying for Windows 11 users. Quietly and without any announcement, the company changed Windows 11's initial setup so that it could turn on the automatic folder backup without asking for it. Now, those setting up a new Windows computer the way Microsoft wants them to (in other words, connected to the internet and signed into a Microsoft account) will get to their desktops with OneDrive already syncing stuff from folders like Desktop Pictures, Documents, Music, and Videos. Depending on how much is stored there, you might end up with a desktop and other folders filled to the brim with shortcuts to various stuff right after finishing a clean Windows installation. Automatic folder backup in OneDrive is a very useful feature when used properly and when the user deliberately enables it. However, Microsoft decided that sending a few notification prompts to enable folder backup was not enough, so it just turned the feature on without asking anybody or even letting users know about it, resulting in a flood of Reddit posts about users complaining about what the hell are those green checkmarks next to files and shortcuts on their desktops.

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Uber has begun locking New York City drivers out of its app during periods of low demand in an attempt to fight a minimum wage rule, and Lyft is threatening to do the same. As a result, some drivers say their wages have fallen by as much as 50%. At the heart of the move, say the two companies, is a six-year-old pay rule in New York that, among other things, requires firms like Uber and Lyft to pay drivers for the idle time they rack up between rides. The lockouts, which began last month, are aimed at limiting how much non-passenger time drivers are able to log and be paid for. Drivers, meanwhile, say they need to work longer hours to earn the same amount as before.

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