Tootfinder

Myanmar shut down a major online scam center on October 21 as part of operations starting in September to curb cross-border online scams and illegal gambling (Associated Press)
https://apnews.com/article/myanmar-scam-centers-cybercr…

Stragglers from Myanmar scam center raided by army cross into Thailand as buildings are blown up
A Thai regional army commander say that the number of people fleeing from Myanmar to Thailand after Myanmar’s military shut down a major online scam center has slowed to a trickle. The news on Tuesday came after more than 1,500 people had left in the past week. The KK Park site was identified by Thai officials and independent experts as housing a major cybercrime operation. It was raided by Myanmar’s army in mid-October as part of operations starting in early September to suppress cross-bor…

"Moldova heads to the polls in tense vote that could steer country closer to EU or Russia"
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/sep/28/moldova-heads-to-the-polls-in-tense-vote-that-could-steer-country-close…

Optimal Control of ODE Car-Following Models: Applications to Mixed-Autonomy Platoon Control via Coupled Autonomous Vehicles
Arwa Alanqary, Alexandre M. Bayen, Xiaoqian Gong, Anish Gollakota, Alexander Keimer, Ashish Pandian
https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.19417

Optimal Control of ODE Car-Following Models: Applications to Mixed-Autonomy Platoon Control via Coupled Autonomous Vehicles
In this paper, we study the optimal control of a mixed-autonomy platoon driving on a single lane to smooth traffic flow. The platoon consists of autonomous vehicles, whose acceleration is controlled, and human-driven vehicles, whose behavior is described using a microscopic car-following model. We formulate the optimal control problem where the dynamics of the platoon are describing through a system of non-linear ODEs, with explicit constraints on both the state and the control variables. Theor…

Ah, good thing Ireland didn’t bet a major chunk of its economy on US Big Tech creating jobs or anything.
*phew!*
#BigTech #USA #AI

The pitcher wound up and he flang the ball at the batter. The batter
swang and missed. The pitcher flang the ball again and this time the
batter connected. He hit a high fly right to the center fielder. The
center fielder was all set to catch the ball, but at the last minute his
eyes were blound by the sun and he dropped it.
-- Dizzy Dean

Vladimir Putin will expand his war in Ukraine
by attacking another European country,
Volodymyr Zelenskyy has predicted,
and accused Russia of recent drone incursions
that he said were an attempt to test Nato’s defences.
Speaking in Kyiv after his meeting with Donald Trump at the UN in New York,
the Ukrainian president said Russia was preparing for a bigger conflict.
“Putin will not wait to finish his war in Ukraine.
He will open up some other …

A test of seven AI chatbots' abilities to identify news photos' location, date, and photographer showed all failed to consistently identify photos' provenance (Columbia Journalism Review)
https://www.cjr.org/tow_center/why-ai-models-are-bad-at-verifyi…

Why AI models are bad at verifying photos
Many of the latest large language models, including OpenAI’s recently released GPT-5, tout an impressive capability: reasoning about images. We have seen viral trends of AI models geolocating obscure vacation pictures, impressive demos of LLMs correctly analyzing blurry or cropped photos, and promising results on benchmark tests. These seem to be fueling punditry on whether […]

Electromagnetic Formation Flying Using Alternating Magnetic Field Forces and Control Barrier Functions for State and Input Constraints
Sumit S. Kamat, T. Michael Seigler, Jesse B. Hoagg
https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.18501

Electromagnetic Formation Flying Using Alternating Magnetic Field Forces and Control Barrier Functions for State and Input Constraints
This article presents a feedback control algorithm for electromagnetic formation flying with constraints on the satellites' states and control inputs. The algorithm combines several key techniques. First, we use alternating magnetic field forces to decouple the electromagnetic forces between each pair of satellites in the formation. Each satellite's electromagnetic actuation system is driven by a sum of amplitude-modulated sinusoids, where amplitudes are controlled in order to prescribe the tim…

FYI, here’s the exact language of 50 U.S.C. § 1702(b) which spells out how media mail is exempt:
https://kind.social/@wbwolf/115103183358864928

Sources: AI contractor marketplace Mercor is finalizing $350M in funding led by Felicis at a $10B valuation; founded in 2023, Mercor manages 30K contractors (Angel Au-Yeung/Wall Street Journal)
https://www.wsj.com/te…