"Disney cancels 'The Acolyte' after one season." 

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Russ Roberts (https://hawaiisciencejournal.blogspot.com).

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Disney cancels The Acolyte after one season

The Acolyte cancelled after season one

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500+by Jennifer Ouellette / 1d

Enlarge / We have doubts that any amount of Force powers will bring the show back. (credit: YouTube/Disney+) In news that will delight some and disappoint others, Disney has canceled Star Wars series The Acolyte after just one season, Deadline Hollywood reports . The eight-episode series got off to a fairly strong start, with mostly positive reviews and solid ratings, albeit lower than prior Star

From coal plant to data center: Old power stations are being repurposed

by Financial Times / 22min

Enlarge (credit: Robert Nickelsberg/Getty Images ) Booming demand for artificial intelligence is encouraging big tech companies and their suppliers to explore converting old power stations and industrial sites into data centers. Microsoft, Google, and Amazon are pouring billions of dollars into building data centers to power cloud computing and AI services, but it has become increasingly challeng

With 145 sickened, 2 dead, microdosing candy poisonings are still a mystery

by Beth Mole / 22min

Enlarge (credit: Diamond Shruumz ) The number of poisonings connected to Diamond Shruumz-brand microdosing candies has reached 145 cases across 29 states. Since the illnesses first came to light in early June, 59 of those sickened have required hospitalization, and health officials have reported people having seizures, needing intubation, and being admitted to intensive care units. Two deaths are

Yesterday

NASA wants clarity on Orion heat shield issue before stacking Artemis II rocket

25by Stephen Clark / 15h

Enlarge / The Orion spacecraft for the Artemis II mission, comprising its crew and service modules, was lifted into a vacuum test chamber at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida on April 4, 2024. (credit: NASA/Amanda Stevenson ) NASA would like to start stacking the Space Launch System rocket for the Artemis II mission—the first human flight around the Moon since 1972—sometime next month, but t

“We run a business”—why Microsoft’s Indiana Jones will be on PS5

Indiana Jones coming to PS5

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by Kyle Orland / 15h

Enlarge / So I'm not stuck on Xbox, eh? (credit: Bethesda) Bethesda's Indiana Jones and The Great Circle is the latest game from a Microsoft subsidiary that will make its way to the PlayStation 5. The game will hit Sony's console in the spring of 2025, Microsoft announced yesterday , months after a planned December launch on Xbox Series S/X and Windows. In an interview with YouTube channel Xbox O

Chick-fil-A plans to launch streaming service with original shows

Susannah Frost named Chick-fil-A president

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79by Scharon Harding / 15h

Enlarge / Would you like a streaming subscription with that? (credit: Getty ) Look out, Peacock. There's reportedly a new video streaming service that's avian-themed. The fast-food chain Chick-fil-A plans to launch a video-streaming service, Deadline reported today, citing anonymous sources. The streaming service is expected to focus on “family-friendly” content and include original TV shows, the

Telco fined $1M for transmitting Biden deepfake without verifying Caller ID

Telecom company fined 1M for deepfake

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by Jon Brodkin / 17h

Enlarge / President Joe Biden leaving the White House on August 16, 2024, in Washington, DC. (credit: Getty Images | Anna Moneymaker ) A phone company agreed to pay a $1 million fine for transmitting spoofed robocalls in which a deepfake of President Joe Biden's voice urged New Hampshire residents not to vote. Lingo Telecom, which is based in Texas, agreed to a settlement with the Federal Communi

German warship floats down Thames while playing Darth Vader’s theme

German Navy plays Star Wars theme

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100+by Nate Anderson / 17h

The German navy going "full Empire" down the Thames. The FGS Braunschweig is a German naval corvette made for stealthy littoral (shoreline) operations, but the Braunschweig ditched the stealth completely while transiting up the Thames this week on a training mission to London. Instead, the ship turned out its enlisted men to stand on deck in light blue shirts and dark pants while the boat blasted

Novel technique allows malicious apps to escape iOS and Android guardrails

Hackers exploit PWA apps for theft

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by Dan Goodin / 17h

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images) Phishers are using a novel technique to trick iOS and Android users into installing malicious apps that bypass safety guardrails built by both Apple and Google to prevent unauthorized apps. Both mobile operating systems employ mechanisms designed to help users steer clear of apps that steal their personal information, passwords, or other sensitive data. iOS bars the

Astronomers think they’ve found a plausible explanation of the Wow! signal

Wow Signal may have natural origin

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by Jennifer Ouellette / 17h

Enlarge / The Wow! signal, represented as "6EQUJ5," was discovered in 1977 by astronomer Jerry Ehman. (credit: Public domain) An unusually bright burst of radio waves—dubbed the Wow! signal —discovered in the 1970s has baffled astronomers ever since, given the tantalizing possibility that it just might be from an alien civilization trying to communicate with us. A team of astronomers think they m

Microsoft will try the data-scraping Windows Recall feature again in October

Windows Recall testing starts October

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26by Andrew Cunningham / 17h

Enlarge / The Recall feature provides a timeline of screenshots and a searchable database of text, thoroughly tracking everything about a person's PC usage. (credit: Microsoft) Microsoft will begin sending a revised version of its controversial Recall feature to Windows Insider PCs beginning in October, according to an update published today to the company's original blog post about the Recall co

Google can’t defend shady Chrome data hoarding as “browser agnostic,” court says

Google faces revived privacy lawsuit

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by Ashley Belanger / 19h

Enlarge (credit: Thomas Trutschel / Contributor | Photothek ) Chrome users who declined to sync their Google accounts with their browsing data secured a big privacy win this week after previously losing a proposed class action claiming that Google secretly collected personal data without consent from over 100 million Chrome users who opted out of syncing. On Tuesday, the 9th US Circuit Court of A

Ars Technica content is now available in OpenAI services

Condé Nast partners with OpenAI

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by Benj Edwards / 19h

Enlarge (credit: Ars Technica) On Tuesday, OpenAI announced a partnership with Ars Technica parent company Condé Nast to display content from prominent publications within its AI products, including ChatGPT and a new SearchGPT prototype. It also allows OpenAI to use Condé content to train future AI language models. The deal covers well-known Condé brands such as Vogue, The New Yorker, GQ, Wired,

Pixel 9 phones: The Gemini AI stuff, reviewed

Google Pixel 9 Pro impresses AI

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by Kevin Purdy / 20h

Enlarge / I asked Gemini to "reimagine" the background of this Pixel 9 group shot (originally on beige paper) as "science fiction moonscape," and then used "Auto frame" to expand the initially tight shot. Maybe that explains why this moon surface has another moon visible? (credit: Kevin Purdy / Gemini AI) Google made its AI assistant, Gemini, central to its pitch to reviewers and the public—it's

Pixel 9 family: The “just hardware” review (no AI)

Google Pixel 9 Pro impresses AI

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by Kevin Purdy / 20h

Enlarge / For this "neutral" hardware-focused review of the Pixel 9 phones, I asked the Pixel to "reimagine" a "neutral white background." (credit: Kevin Purdy / Gemini AI) I asked Google's Gemini Live chatbot, running on a new Pixel 9 Pro, how easy it was to use the Pixel 9 without all the Gemini AI features. "It's definitely possible to use a Pixel 9 without Gemini," the bot responded in a rema

“Disappointing”: Sonos CEO says old, user-preferred app can’t be re-released

Sonos layoffs amid app issues

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300+by Scharon Harding / 21h

Enlarge / Sonos' updated app was reportedly rushed out before the release of Sonos' Ace headphones (pictured). (credit: Sonos) Sonos' new app was launched and reviewed so poorly that the company is expecting to spend $20 million to $30 million on remediation. The Verge reported last week that high-level Sonos executives were considering relaunching the old app so users can have the functionality

Federal judge in Texas strikes down FTC’s ban on noncompete agreements

Judge blocks FTC noncompete ban

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39by Jon Brodkin / 21h

Enlarge / Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan arrives to testify before the House Appropriations Subcommittee at the Rayburn House Office Building on May 15, 2024 in Washington, DC. (credit: Getty Images | Kevin Dietsch ) A federal judge in Texas yesterday blocked the Federal Trade Commission's attempt to ban noncompete agreements that make it difficult for workers to change jobs or start ne

Ford rethinks EV strategy again—ditching 3-row SUVs, adding vans

Ford unveils new electric vehicles

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42by Jonathan M. Gitlin / 21h

Enlarge / Ford hoped to build 600,000 EVs a year by now, a mix of Mustang Mach-E crossovers, E-Transit vans, and F-150 Lightning pickups. This year, sales are up 71 percent so far; by the end of June, Ford had sold almost 45,000 EVs. (credit: Ford) Ford has scrapped plans to build some big three-row electric SUVs and is revising its North American electrification roadmap, the company announced th

CrowdStrike unhappy with “shady commentary” from competitors after outage

CrowdStrike update causes global chaos

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by Financial Times / 23h

Enlarge / Shares in SentinelOne and Palo Alto Networks have risen since July’s IT outage, while CrowdStrike has shed almost a quarter of its market value. (credit: Getty Images) CrowdStrike’s president hit out at “shady” efforts by its cyber security rivals to scare its customers and steal market share in the month since its botched software update sparked a global IT outage. Michael Sentonas tol

VW has finally announced ID. Buzz pricing—it’s better than we expected

Volkswagen ID Buzz priced from $59995

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100+by Jonathan M. Gitlin / 1d

Enlarge / Eight years after the concept first wowed crowds, the Volkswagen ID. Buzz is ready to go on sale in the US. (credit: James Lipman/VW) If it feels like many years since you first saw Volkswagen's retro electric microbus, the ID. Buzz, you're not wrong. It's surprisingly aptly named; I can't think of another car during the past decade that has aroused so much interest among people who don

Aug 20, 2024

“Something has gone seriously wrong,” dual-boot systems warn after Microsoft update

3 TTPs

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300+by Dan Goodin / 1d

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images) Last Tuesday, loads of Linux users—many running packages released as early as this year—started reporting their devices were failing to boot. Instead, they received a cryptic error message that included the phrase: “Something has gone seriously wrong.” The cause: an update Microsoft issued as part of its monthly patch release. It was intended to close a 2-year-old v

CEO of failing hospital chain got $250M amid patient deaths, layoffs, bankruptcy

100+by Beth Mole / 1d

Enlarge / Hospital staff and community members held a protest in front of Carney Hospital in Boston on August 5 as Steward has announced it will close the hospital. "Ralph" refers to Steward's CEO, Ralph de la Torre, who owns a yacht. (credit: Getty | Suzanne Kreiter ) As the more than 30 hospitals in the Steward Health Care System scrounged for cash to cover supplies, shuttered pediatric and neo

Civilization VII hands-on: This strategy sequel rethinks the long game

Civilization 7 set for release

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52by Samuel Axon / 1d

Enlarge / Firaxis has upped the ante on presentation for the cities. It's still a bit abstract and removed, but they have more vibrancy, detail, and movement than before. (credit: 2K Games) 2K Games provided a flight from Chicago to Baltimore and accommodation for two nights so that Ars could participate in the preview opportunity for Civilization VII. Ars does not accept paid editorial content.

Peter Molyneux is back with yet another new take on the “god game”

Peter Molyneux announces Masters of Albion

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by Kyle Orland / 1d

Welcome back to Albion. [credit: 22cans ] If you're a gamer of a certain age, you probably have fond memories of Peter Molyneux as the mind behind ambitious games like Populous , Dungeon Keeper , and the Fable series. If you're of a slightly younger age, you probably remember him as the serial overpromiser behind Project Godus and a recent NFT game that somehow attracted $54 million in player pre

The Great Circle is Indiana Jones for a post-Uncharted world

Indiana Jones game reveals release date

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by Kyle Orland / 1d

Enlarge / A time traveler with a flashlight would blow Indiana Jones' mind. At first glance, Wolfenstein: The New Order developer MachineGames might seem like an awkward fit for the first (non-Lego) Indiana Jones video game since the Wii era . While there's some overlap in the over-the-top Nazi villain department, the "shoot your way through every obstacle" nature of the new Wolfenstein games doe

Nvidia is ditching dedicated G-Sync modules to push back against FreeSync’s ubiquity

Nvidia partners with MediaTek for G-Sync

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by Andrew Cunningham / 1d

Enlarge (credit: Nvidia) Back in 2013, Nvidia introduced a new technology called G-Sync to eliminate screen tearing and stuttering effects and reduce input lag when playing PC games. The company accomplished this by tying your display's refresh rate to the actual frame rate of the game you were playing, and similar variable refresh-rate (VRR) technology has become a mainstay even in budget monito

How accurate are wearable fitness trackers? Less than you might think

by The Conversation / 1d

Enlarge (credit: Corey Gaskin) Back in 2010, Gary Wolf, then the editor of Wired magazine, delivered a TED talk in Cannes called “the quantified self.” It was about what he termed a “new fad” among tech enthusiasts. These early adopters were using gadgets to monitor everything from their physiological data to their mood and even the number of nappies their children used. Wolf acknowledged that th

Disney abandons Disney+ arbitration defense in restaurant allergy death case

Disney seeks dismissal of lawsuit

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47by Jon Brodkin / 1d

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images | Gary Hershorn ) Disney said it is abandoning its motion to compel arbitration in a case filed by a man who alleges his wife died from anaphylaxis after a restaurant at a Disney complex failed to honor requests for allergen-free food. Disney's motion to compel arbitration controversially cited the Disney+ streaming service's subscriber agreement, which includes a bi

Procreate defies AI trend, pledges “no generative AI” in its illustration app

Procreate CEO rejects generative AI

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1Kby Benj Edwards / 1d

Enlarge / Still of Procreate CEO James Cuda from a video posted to X. (credit: Procreate ) On Sunday, Procreate announced that it will not incorporate generative AI into its popular iPad illustration app . The decision comes in response to an ongoing backlash from some parts of the art community, which has raised concerns about the ethical implications and potential consequences of AI use in crea

Against all odds, an asteroid mining company appears to be making headway

100+by Eric Berger / 1d

Enlarge / The Odin spacecraft passed vibration testing. (credit: Astro Forge) When I first spoke with space entrepreneurs Jose Acain and Matt Gialich a little more than two years ago, I wondered whether I would ever talk to them again. That is not meant to be offensive; rather, it is a reflection of the fact that the business they entered into—mining asteroids for platinum and other precious meta

Russian pensioners urge Vladimir Putin to rescue Starliner astronauts

47by Eric Berger / 1d

Enlarge / Screenshot from Putin's squad video on bringing Starliner's astronauts home. (credit: Putin's Squads Z Soc Sprav ) One of the odder propaganda phenomena in Russia, of late, is seemingly spontaneous groups of elderly Russian pensioners gathering outdoors and espousing some random bit of agitprop. From a Western perspective, these are obviously staged and hilarious to behold. For example,

A frontrunner in Europe’s private launch industry just lost its first rocket

Rocket engine explodes at Shetland spaceport

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35by Stephen Clark / 1d

Enlarge / RFA's first stage during a four-engine test-firing in May. (credit: Rocket Factory Augsburg ) The first stage of Rocket Factory Augsburg's first orbital launcher was destroyed in a fireball during a test-firing Monday evening at a spaceport in Scotland, the company said. The German l