Tootfinder

I'm working on a page for a friend of mine which is hosted on github pages and we wanted to have thumbnails. Here is a description for beginners how to do it.
https://winkelwagen.de/2024/04/16/jekyll-github-pages-thumbnail-images/

Jekyll/Github Pages: Thumbnail images
I’m currently helping a friend of mine to setup their own homepage. In the beginning I thought it is a good idea to save on money for hosting and use github pages. The consequence is, that we…

The UK announces legislation to outlaw making sexually explicit deepfake photos without consent, regardless of whether the creator intended to share the image (The Guardian)
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/202

Ooh I’ve been waiting for one of these! New SteganoAmor attacks use steganography to target 320 orgs globally: A new campaign conducted by the TA558 hacking group is concealing malicious code inside images using steganography to deliver various malware tools onto targeted systems.

New SteganoAmor attacks use steganography to target 320 orgs globally
A new campaign conducted by the TA558 hacking group is concealing malicious code inside images using steganography to deliver various malware tools onto targeted systems.

OMG my cuteness sensor just melted down.
https://zirk.us/@yingtai/112097296917352001

Yingtai (@yingtai@zirk.us)
Attached: 4 images Guide Dogs UK has a very important announcement for anyone with an unconventional hairstyle, beard, tattoos etc. You are needed to play with puppies. "We’re issuing a national appeal for volunteers with distinctive characteristics to help socialise the next generation of guide dogs. Our new research shows that 1 in 5 (20 %) of dog owners revealed their dogs have shown signs of fear or confusion when encountering unfamiliar physical attributes." https://bit.ly/3PgRTOc

TIL about cumulative layout shift in https://dev.to/whitep4nth3r/your-background-images-might-be-causing-cls-13o2 .
It's one of the most annoying things in apps and web-sites, slowing down operating a site considerably. I'm glad it ha…

On Website Technicals (2024-04) - Tech updates: ORCID, RSS feed work storage, podcast episode images, transcripts, like and subscribe, Apache 2.4 ETag bug, 406 and more 429... - https://www.earth.org.uk/note-on-site-technicals-83.html

On Website Technicals (2024-04)
Tech updates: ORCID, RSS feed work storage, podcast episode images, transcripts, like and subscribe, Apache 2.4 ETag bug...

We got jokes.
#BarPrep #Law

Was passiert eigentlich, wenn man der K.I. einen K.I.-generierten Text nochmals vorlegt, mit der Bitte, darin alle Passagen zu entfernen, dieallzu offensichtlich darauf hindeuten, dass es sich um einen K.I.-generierten Text handelt?
https://fediscience.org/@ct_bergstrom/1…

Carl T. Bergstrom (@ct_bergstrom@fediscience.org)
Attached: 2 images Another Elsevier paper with obvious AI-written text. “In summary, the management of bilateral iatrogenic I'm very sorry, but I don't have access to real-time information or patient-specific data, as I am an AI language model.” https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1930043324001298

The German air force has conducted its first airdrop of relief supplies for #Gaza
#QT @…

Verteidigungsministerium (@Verteidigungsministerium@social.bund.de)
Attached: 3 images Das Absetzen von Lasten mit Fallschirmen erfordert eine gute Vorbereitung und hohe Präzision. Die 🇩🇪 und 🇫🇷 Soldatinnen und Soldaten arbeiten am Boden und in der Luft vertrauensvoll zusammen und nutzen ihre Erfahrungen mit #Hercules Transportflugzeugen aus Evreux. #AirDropforGaza

Overdue, but I’ve added the machinery to automatically add opengraph images to my blog entries #hugo
https://blog.lanzani.nl/2024/open-graph-hugo/

Automatically add images for Open Graph in Hugo · Technical inconsistencies blog
While using a static site generator is a low-maintenance endeavor, it also means that complex requirements need to be coded if nobody has done it before. Today, I automated image previews that can be used to display a nice preview through for Open Graph (and Twitter cards!). The Open Graph protocol enables any web page to become a rich object in a social graph. My blog, however, is text-heavy and often misses the images, so I had to come up with something else.

Horrific AI-Generated Breastfeeding Images Bypass Facebook’s Moderation https://www.404media.co/horrific-ai-generated-breastfeeding-images-on-facebook-bypass-moderation/

It could be worth a pretty penny in 30 or 40,000 years.
#TreeResin plus #LongTime = #Jewel

val dillydallies (@dillyd@allies.social)
Attached: 3 images Edit: consensus says it's sap/resin. Thanks for all the answers! Is this jelly fungus on my fence posts? I think it's pretty cool looking but is it going to deteriorate the posts and should I try to eradicate it?

Generating Visual Stimuli from EEG Recordings using Transformer-encoder based EEG encoder and GAN
Rahul Mishra, Arnav Bhavsar
https://arxiv.org/abs/2402.10115

Generating Visual Stimuli from EEG Recordings using Transformer-encoder based EEG encoder and GAN
In this study, we tackle a modern research challenge within the field of perceptual brain decoding, which revolves around synthesizing images from EEG signals using an adversarial deep learning framework. The specific objective is to recreate images belonging to various object categories by leveraging EEG recordings obtained while subjects view those images. To achieve this, we employ a Transformer-encoder based EEG encoder to produce EEG encodings, which serve as inputs to the generator compon…

ASCII art elicits harmful responses from 5 major #AI chatbots | Ars Technica
https://arstechnica.com/security/2024/03…

ASCII art elicits harmful responses from 5 major AI chatbots
LLMs are trained to block harmful responses. Old-school images can override those rules.

Day 11: In the style of Anni Alber, by Roni Kaufman Via https://genart.social/@ronikaufman/111738822432261566
ht…

Roni Kaufman (@ronikaufman@genart.social)
Attached: 2 images #genuary2024 day 11: In the style of Anni Albers 🧵 Inspired by her Second Movement series #genuary #genuary11

A Mutual Inclusion Mechanism for Precise Boundary Segmentation in Medical Images
Yizhi Pan, Junyi Xin, Tianhua Yang, Teeradaj Racharak, Le-Minh Nguyen, Guanqun Sun
https://arxiv.org/abs/2404.08201

A Mutual Inclusion Mechanism for Precise Boundary Segmentation in Medical Images
In medical imaging, accurate image segmentation is crucial for quantifying diseases, assessing prognosis, and evaluating treatment outcomes. However, existing methods lack an in-depth integration of global and local features, failing to pay special attention to abnormal regions and boundary details in medical images. To this end, we present a novel deep learning-based approach, MIPC-Net, for precise boundary segmentation in medical images. Our approach, inspired by radiologists' working pattern…

I was just kidding about drinking infected milk acting as a vaccine. https://med-mastodon.com/@luckytran/112441265539088934

Dr. Lucky Tran :verified: (@luckytran@med-mastodon.com)
Attached: 2 images "The Raw Milk Institute called the warnings "clearly fearmongering." The institute's founder told the LATimes his customers are specifically requesting raw milk from H5N1-infected cows." This is an example of how minimizing COVID is destructive to public health far beyond COVID. Source: https://arstechnica.com/science/2024/05/anti-pasteurization-crowd-reaffirms-love-of-raw-milk-despite-bird-flu-outbreak/

A Novel Vision Transformer based Load Profile Analysis using Load Images as Inputs
Hyeonjin Kim, Yi Hu, Kai Ye, Ning Lu
https://arxiv.org/abs/2404.08175 ht…

A Novel Vision Transformer based Load Profile Analysis using Load Images as Inputs
This paper introduces ViT4LPA, an innovative Vision Transformer (ViT) based approach for Load Profile Analysis (LPA). We transform time-series load profiles into load images. This allows us to leverage the ViT architecture, originally designed for image processing, as a pre-trained image encoder to uncover latent patterns within load data. ViT is pre-trained using an extensive load image dataset, comprising 1M load images derived from smart meter data collected over a two-year period from 2,000…

This https://arxiv.org/abs/2403.18554 has been replaced.
initial toot: https://mastoxiv.page/@arXiv_csCV_…

CosalPure: Learning Concept from Group Images for Robust Co-Saliency Detection
Co-salient object detection (CoSOD) aims to identify the common and salient (usually in the foreground) regions across a given group of images. Although achieving significant progress, state-of-the-art CoSODs could be easily affected by some adversarial perturbations, leading to substantial accuracy reduction. The adversarial perturbations can mislead CoSODs but do not change the high-level semantic information (e.g., concept) of the co-salient objects. In this paper, we propose a novel robustn…

Barrier to Achievement is my punk band name
https://infosec.exchange/@paco/112278601690989426

Paco Hope (@paco@infosec.exchange)
Attached: 1 image My son is rarely absent or late to class. His #highschool sent this email where they had to resort to scientific notation to explain his #tardy performance. Chronic #absenteeism is not a problem.

Don’t worry, dead Palestinian kids, this is the good guy.
#Israel

Israel-Hamas war: Biden is sending $1 billion in new weapons package to Israel, aides say
The Biden administration has told key lawmakers it is sending a more than $1 billion in additional arms and ammunition to Israel. That's according to three congressional aides who spoke of condition of anonymity to discuss an arms transfer that has not yet been made public. It's not immediately known how soon the weapons would be delivered. It’s the first arms shipment to Israel to be revealed by the administration since it put another arms transfer — consisting of 3,500 bombs — on hold t…

James Fallows, who should know, explains why presidential debates are WORSE than useless.
There’s one more reason this year. By sharing a stage, Biden will normalize the idea that it’s all right for Trump to be a free man, as opposed to an incarcerated criminal.
https://fallows.substack.com/i/143279…

Election Countdown, 205 Days to Go: Reality Closes In.
Keeping track of the people who are serious, and those who are still playing make-believe. Also, why we don't want presidential ‘debates.’

I love that WebAssembly is becoming a bytecode for Swift tooling.
Pure, unadulterated, high-octane fuel for a he swift ecosystem:
https://github.com/apple/swift/pull/73031

[Macros] Add support for wasm macros by kabiroberai · Pull Request #73031 · apple/swift
This PR introduces support for WebAssembly-based macros via -load-plugin-executable Foo.wasm#Foo. Wasm macros are blazing fast (no SwiftSyntax build required for consumers!) and secure (fully sandb...

Update: Looks like Backblaze fixed whatever issue was going on. Other instances were affected also. Unpinning this post.
We're having issues with our #HashTagGames storage hosting provider, which also stores our images.
If the game images aren't appearing, I am sorry. I hope they get it resolved soon.
~ @…

#Lindner ist jetzt auch im :fediverse: #Fediverse:
https://chadthundercock.com/@chloe/112

XxPussyGod420xX (@chloe@chadthundercock.com)
Attached: 1 image What the FUCK did I do?

Meta's Oversight Board plans to investigate two deepfake porn cases, both involving unnamed celebrities who had their images altered to create explicit content (Vittoria Elliott/Wired)
https://www.wired.com/story/meta-oversight-board-deepfake…

Celebrity Deepfake Porn Cases Will Be Investigated by Meta Oversight Board
Social platforms have struggled to quickly remove deepfake porn depicting celebrities.

TIL about cumulative layout shift in https://dev.to/whitep4nth3r/your-background-images-might-be-causing-cls-13o2 .
It's one of the most annoying things in apps and web-sites, slowing down operating a site considerably. I'm glad it ha…

This was a very good weekend.
#lawSchool #law

Dermatologists Struggle in Diagnosing Darker Skins – AI Can Help
https://scitechdaily.com/dermatologists-struggle-in-diagnosing-darker-skins-ai-can-help/

Dermatologists Struggle in Diagnosing Darker Skins – AI Can Help
Dermatologists and general practitioners are somewhat less accurate in diagnosing disease in darker skin, a new study finds. Used correctly, AI may be able to help. When diagnosing skin diseases based solely on images of a patient’s skin, doctors do not perform as well when the patient has darker

Researchers detail ArtPrompt, a jailbreak that uses ASCII art to elicit harmful responses from aligned LLMs such as GPT-3.5, GPT-4, Gemini, Claude, and Llama2 (Dan Goodin/Ars Technica)
https://arstechnica.com/security/2024/

ASCII art elicits harmful responses from 5 major AI chatbots
LLMs are trained to block harmful responses. Old-school images can override those rules.

This https://arxiv.org/abs/2404.06710 has been replaced.
initial toot: https://mastoxiv.page/@arXiv_csCV_…

SpikeNVS: Enhancing Novel View Synthesis from Blurry Images via Spike Camera
One of the most critical factors in achieving sharp Novel View Synthesis (NVS) using neural field methods like Neural Radiance Fields (NeRF) and 3D Gaussian Splatting (3DGS) is the quality of the training images. However, Conventional RGB cameras are susceptible to motion blur. In contrast, neuromorphic cameras like event and spike cameras inherently capture more comprehensive temporal information, which can provide a sharp representation of the scene as additional training data. Recent methods…

Barrier to Achievement is my punk band name
https://infosec.exchange/@paco/112278601690989426

Paco Hope (@paco@infosec.exchange)
Attached: 1 image My son is rarely absent or late to class. His #highschool sent this email where they had to resort to scientific notation to explain his #tardy performance. Chronic #absenteeism is not a problem.

I’ve been looking for an ngrok alternative for a while now that’s (a) affordable (b) easy to use and (c) works with Kitten¹. Today, after testing a bunch of them again and getting fed up, I found LocalXpose that checks all the boxes.
I signed Small Technology Foundation up as an affiliate so if you use this link to check it out, we’ll get 40% of your $6/mo pro account fee should you subscribe:

LocalXpose | Bye bye localhost, hello world
Reverse proxy that enables you to expose your localhost to the internet.

They’re thinking of changing the name of Powell River: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/name-change-powell-river-divide-1.7145873?cmp=rss
OK, but how about we do “British Columbia”? It’s a horrible name, p…

Proposed name change sparks 'huge division' in Powell River, B.C. | CBC News
Powell River, B.C., has been at the centre of a heated discussion between its city council, the Tla'amin Nation, and several residents over whether to change its name. 

One of my all-time favorite computer/terminal designs, the Lexis/Nexis UBIQ. (There's absolutely no use for this thing now, but just wow. Hope someone will love it and have space for it.)

Vintage Computer- Mead Data Central UBIQ Terminal Lexis Nexis | eBay

I don’t know if it works or not. It seems to turn on but that’s as far as I got with it. There is a phone cable on the back that has been cut, and the adhesive that holds the screen cover on is no good anymore. It's never been apart before I have no idea what the inside looks like. Everything looks structurally intact from the outside.

Strong straightforward criticism is reserved for the relatively small (and increasingly globally isolated) state of Israel. The US, on the other hand—which supplies about 80% of #Israel’s weapons imports, as well as billions of dollars in aid—is treated as a kind of neutral third party, and of course as a “very good friend”. This way, [

Sally Rooney: Killing in Gaza has been supported by Ireland’s ‘good friend’ in the White House
Our Government is basking in the moral glow of condemning the bombers, while preserving a cosy relationship with those supplying the bombs

What Tim said:
https://webfoundation.org/2024/03/marking-the-webs-35th-birthday-an-open-letter/

Marking the Web’s 35th Birthday: An Open Letter - World Wide Web Foundation
Original Hope Three and a half decades ago, when I invented the web, its trajectory was impossible to imagine. There was no roadmap to predict the course of its evolution, it was a captivating odyssey filled with unforeseen opportunities and challenges. Underlying its whole infrastructure was the intention to allow for collaboration, foster compassion and

Adobe used images created by tools like Midjourney and uploaded to its stock marketplace by users, to train Firefly; Adobe says ~5% of images were AI-generated (Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20

Adobe’s AI Firefly Used AI-Generated Images From Rivals for Training
Company promotes its tool as safe from content scraped from the internet.

Some wild old computers on eBay

Vintage INCOTERM computer - Untested (74/110) | eBay
Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Vintage INCOTERM computer - Untested (74/110) at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

They’re thinking of changing the name of Powell River: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/name-change-powell-river-divide-1.7145873?cmp=rss
OK, but how about we do “British Columbia”? It’s a horrible name, p…

Proposed name change sparks 'huge division' in Powell River, B.C. | CBC News
Powell River, B.C., has been at the centre of a heated discussion between its city council, the Tla'amin Nation, and several residents over whether to change its name. 

Adobe used images created by tools like Midjourney and uploaded to its stock marketplace by users, to train Firefly; Adobe says ~5% of images were AI-generated (Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20

Adobe’s AI Firefly Used AI-Generated Images From Rivals for Training
Company promotes its tool as safe from content scraped from the internet.

What Tim said:
https://webfoundation.org/2024/03/marking-the-webs-35th-birthday-an-open-letter/

Marking the Web’s 35th Birthday: An Open Letter - World Wide Web Foundation
Original Hope Three and a half decades ago, when I invented the web, its trajectory was impossible to imagine. There was no roadmap to predict the course of its evolution, it was a captivating odyssey filled with unforeseen opportunities and challenges. Underlying its whole infrastructure was the intention to allow for collaboration, foster compassion and

Google unveils Android 15 security features, like Theft Detection Lock, which detects motions associated with theft, and Private Space, to store sensitive data (Allison Johnson/The Verge)
https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/15/24157068/a…

Android will be able to detect if your phone has been snatched
One of Android’s newest security features can detect when your phone has been stolen out of your hands. It comes with other new security and privacy measures.

Google says Wear OS 5 will consume 20% less battery life and have more useful watch face complications; the Wear OS user base grew by 40% in the last year (Victoria Song/The Verge)
https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/15/24156161/wear-os-5-google-io-smartwatc…

Wear OS 5 will triple down on battery life
We got more details on the next version of Wear OS at Google I/O. In Wear OS 5, users will have more battery life and more watchface complications.

Google announces a threat detection capability coming to Android that uses on-device AI to spot malware, analyzing apps' use of permissions and services (Sarah Perez/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/05/15/goog

Google takes aim at Android malware with an AI-powered live threat detection service | TechCrunch
Google is preparing to launch a new system to help address the problem of malware on Android. Its new live threat detection service leverages Google Play

Intel details Thunderbolt Share, a new specification and app to connect two PCs, letting users transfer data at 40Gbps or more, control another PC, and more (Mark Hachman/PCWorld)
https://www.pcworld.com/article/2330173

Meet Thunderbolt Share, Intel's ultra-fast sneakernet replacement (and more)
Intel is launching Thunderbolt Share, connecting two PCs with Thunderbolt ports together to share and sync files and remotely control a laptop. But the licensing program seems unnecessarily confusing.

Google opens early API access to its Google Home platform, letting developers join a waitlist to access 600M Matter or Works with Google Home devices (Jennifer Pattison Tuohy/The Verge)
https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/15/24157154…

Google launches new Home APIs and turns Google TVs into smart home hubs
At Google I/O, Google announced it’s opening up APIs for its smart home platform and upgrading Chromecast and Google TV to become Matter home hubs.

Networking infrastructure startup Alkira, which lets users virtualize hybrid cloud assets, raised a $100M Series C led by Tiger, for $176M in total funding (Ingrid Lunden/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/05/15/alkira-con…

Alkira connects with $100M for a solution that connects your clouds | TechCrunch
As cloud adoption continues to surge towards the $1 trillion mark in annual spend, we’re seeing a wave of enterprise startups gaining traction with

Anthropic hires Instagram and Artifact co-founder Mike Krieger as its chief product officer, after the startup released an iOS app for its Claude chatbot (David Pierce/The Verge)
https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/15/24157240/mike-krieger-anthropic-ins…

Anthropic’s new CPO is Instagram co-founder Mike Krieger
Mike Krieger, formerly a co-founder of Instagram and recently the co-founder of AI news reader Artifact, will oversee all of Anthropic’s Claude-related products.

Apple unveils accessibility features, including Eye Tracking, to let users with physical disabilities control iPad or iPhone with their eyes, and Music Haptics (Cherlynn Low/Engadget)
https://www.engadget.com/apple-brings-eye-tracking-…

Apple brings eye-tracking to recent iPhones and iPads
Apple is bringing eye-tracking to iPhones and iPads without the need for additional devices or hardware.

Netflix strikes a deal with the NFL to stream two new Christmas Day games, beginning this season (Alex Weprin/The Hollywood Reporter)
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/netflix-nfl-games-christmas-day-…

Netflix Gets NFL Christmas Day Games In Major Sports Expansion
The streaming giant lands the league's two new Christmas Day games, beginning this season.

Billionaire tech critic Frank McCourt says he is preparing a "people's bid" for TikTok to buy and rebuild the app as "a new and better version of the internet" (Ben Smith/Semafor)
https://www.semafor.com/article/05/15/2024

Tech critic McCourt mounts TikTok bid | Semafor
The billionaire plans to rebuild TikTok as "a new and better version of the internet where individuals are respected and they own and control their identity and their data."

Weka, which offers a parallel file system and data management tools for AI and HPC, raised a $140M Series E led by Valor Equity at a $1.6B post-money valuation (Kyle Wiggers/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/05/15/weka-raises-140m-a…

Weka raises $140M as the AI boom bolsters data platforms | TechCrunch
While an increasing number of companies are investing in AI, many are struggling to get AI-powered projects into production -- much less delivering

As India's elections run from April 19 to June 1, a look at the BJP's vast WhatsApp operations, including using the app to campaign free from public scrutiny (Srishti Jaswal/Rest of World)
https://restofworld.org/2024/bjp-whatsapp-modi/

How Modi and the BJP turned WhatsApp into an election-winning machine
An analysis of thousands of messages reveals how India’s ruling party uses the app to campaign free from public scrutiny.

Bipartisan US Senators release a long-awaited plan for AI, calling for spending $32B annually by 2026 on R&D, creating a federal data privacy law, and more (New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/15/tech…

Senators Propose $32 Billion in Annual A.I. Spending but Defer Regulation
Their plan is the culmination of a yearlong listening tour on the dangers of the new technology.

Kentucky-based PayHOA, a bootstrapped startup that offers software for self-managed homeowner associations, raised a $27.5M Series A and reports 652K users (Mary Ann Azevedo/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/05/15/me…

Meet PayHOA, a profitable and once-bootstrapped SaaS startup that just landed a $27.5M Series A | TechCrunch
PayHOA, a previously bootstrapped Kentucky-based startup that offers software for self-managed HOAs, has raised a $23.5M Series A.

A study of 2,414,294 people in 168 countries between 2006 and 2021 finds 84.9% of associations between internet connectivity and wellbeing were positive (University of Oxford)
https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2024-05-14-inter

Internet use statistically associated with higher wellbeing, finds new global Oxford study | University of Oxford
Links between internet adoption and wellbeing are likely to be positive, despite popular concerns to the contrary, according to a major new international study from researchers at the Oxford Internet Institute, part of the University of Oxford.

A leaked Dell XPS roadmap details Qualcomm's "Oryon V2" series, possibly named Snapdragon X Gen2 and launching in H2 2025, and "QC Oryon V3", set for late 2027 (VideoCardz.com)
https://videocardz.com/newz/exclusive-

Exclusive: Qualcomm Snapdragon X "Oryon V2" and "V3" series arriving in 2025 and 2027 - VideoCardz.com
Dell XPS Qualcomm leak: next-gen Snapdragon X series in mid-2025 Qualcomm Snapdragon X Gen2 and Gen3 already in the planing. Qualcomm is said to be launching X Series processors this month, with the first laptops arriving as early as May 20. This is the day ASUS will introduce its first laptops powered by Qualcomm’s new […]

Apple letting the new iPad Pro run macOS would require major tradeoffs and adding touch to Mac would lead to "a lot of flakey software that doesn't really work" (Steven Sinofsky/@stevesi)
https://twitter.com/stevesi/status/1790581279433621918
<…

Steven Sinofsky (@stevesi) on X
It is not unusual for customers to want the best of all worlds. It is why Detroit invented convertibles and el caminos. But the idea of a "dual boot" device is just nuts. It is guaranteed the only reality is it is running the wrong OS all the time for whatever you want to do.…

AWS details its European "sovereign cloud", designed to enable greater data residency, starting in Germany, and plans to invest €7.8B in the region by 2040 (Paul Sawers/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/05…

AWS confirms will launch European 'sovereign cloud' in Germany by 2025, plans €7.8B investment over 15 years | TechCrunch
AWS has confirmed its European "sovereign cloud" will go live by the end of 2025, enabling greater data residency for the region.

Research: Southeast Asian scam syndicates, which typically use forced labor to run online scams like pig butchering, are stealing an estimated $64B annually (James Reddick/The Record)
https://therecord.media/southeast-asian-scam-syndicates-steali…

Southeast Asian scam syndicates stealing $64 billion annually, researchers find
In Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar, the groups are estimated to reap about $43.8 billion each year through scams — some 40 percent of the three nations’ combined formal GDP.

Google releases Project IDX, its next-gen AI-centric browser-based IDE, in open beta, and says that 100,000 developers tried the service in invite-only phase (Frederic Lardinois/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/05/14/project-idx-goog…

Project IDX, Google's next-gen IDE, is now in open beta | TechCrunch
At Google I/O on Tuesday, Google announced that IDX, the company's next-gen, AI-centric browser-based development environment, is now in open beta.

The arrival of AI search bodes ill for everyone who relied on web search to have their business discovered, or their blog post read, or their journalism funded (Casey Newton/Platformer)
https://www.platformer.news/google-io-ai-search-sundar-pichai/
<…

Google’s broken link to the web
With AI search results coming to the masses, the human-powered web recedes further into the background

Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt signs a bill protecting bitcoin rights, ensuring the right to self-custody, transact, and mine bitcoin, effective November 1, 2024 (Susie Violet Ward/Forbes)
https://www.forbes.com/sites/digital-asset

Oklahoma Passes Landmark Bill Protecting Bitcoin Rights
Oklahoma has passed a landmark bill protecting bitcoin rights. The new law, effective Nov 1, 2024, ensures the right to self-custody, transact, and mine bitcoin.

Spotify received a cease-and-desist letter from the National Music Publishers' Association over its use of lyrics in its videos feature, remix tool, and more (Kristin Robinson/Billboard)
https://www.billboard.com/business/streami

Spotify Receives Cease and Desist From Music Publishers for Alleged Unlicensed Lyrics and Video
NMPA sends Spotify a cease and desist letter over its alleged use of unlicensed lyrics and video on its service. Read the full letter from publishers.

Sony unveils the £1,299 Xperia 1 VI, with a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset, a 6.5-inch OLED Full HD display, and 7.1x optical zoom lens, and the £349 Xperia 10 VI (Lewis Empson/What Hi-Fi?)
https://www.whathifi.com/news/sony-unveils

Sony unveils two new Xperia smartphones with a controversial display change for movie fans
Sony's budget and flagship phones for 2024 have arrived

AT&T and satellite provider AST SpaceMobile announce an agreement to provide a space-based broadband network direct to cell phones; the deal runs through 2030 (Todd Shields/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20

AT&T Strikes Space Broadband Deal In Challenge To Musk’s SpaceX
AT&T Inc. and satellite provider AST SpaceMobile Inc. are teaming up to provide wireless service from space — a challenge to Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which struck a similar deal two years ago with T-Mobile US Inc. AST SpaceMobile jumped in extended trading on the news.

Senate hearing: US DNI Avril Haines says foreign adversaries will again seek to influence the upcoming elections, harnessing AI to spread disinformation (Associated Press)
https://apnews.com/article/election-inte…

Now armed with AI, America's adversaries will try to influence election, security officials warn
Top U.S. security officials say America’s foreign adversaries will again seek to influence the upcoming U.S. elections. Countries like Russia, China and Iran are likely to use the latest artificial intelligence programs to create and spread disinformation aimed at polarizing voters and undermining faith in democracy. During a Senate hearing Wednesday, U.S. Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines told lawmakers that the U.S. has greatly improved its ability to detect fake content. Forei…

Microsoft's decisions, like seemingly rowing back on Surface, Start Menu ads, closing studios, and porting AAA games to PS5, show a short-term financial focus (Jez Corden/Windows Central)
https://www.win…

Microsoft's quest for short-term $$$ is doing long-term damage to Windows, Surface, Xbox, and beyond
Microsoft has made a range of baffling decisions and awful mis-steps recently. You can trace everything back to insatiable desire for money.

An interview with Apple's Greg Joswiak and John Ternus on the new iPad lineup, the M4 chip, why the iPad and Mac both matter, the iPad as an "AI PC", and more (Harry McCracken/Fast Company)
https://www.fastcompany.com/91124983/ipad-greg-j…

Apple still isn't done building its dream iPad
Apple's Greg Joswiak and John Ternus on the new iPad lineup, why the iPad and Mac both matter, the iPad as an 'AI PC,' and more.

Microsoft unveils the Proteus Controller, a $299 modular game controller kit for disabled Xbox and PC gamers by peripheral company ByoWave, shipping in the fall (Sheena Vasani/The Verge)
https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/15/24157529/micros…

Microsoft announces the Proteus Controller, a gamepad for Xbox gamers with disabilities
The Proteus Controller consists of modular cubes that gamers with disabilities can connect together to build multiple configurations.

Consumers protection groups across the EU file coordinated complaints against Temu, accusing the e-commerce platform of a raft of breaches related to the DSA (Natasha Lomas/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/05/15/temu-acc…

Temu accused of breaching EU's DSA in bundle of consumer complaints | TechCrunch
Consumer protection groups around the European Union have filed coordinated complaints against Temu, accusing the Chinese-owned ultra low-cost e-commerce

YouTube formally launches YouTube Select Creator Takeovers, which will let advertisers buy out the inventory on channels representing top 1% of YouTube content (Todd Spangler/Variety)
https://variety.com/2024/digital/news/youtube-upfront-2024-brand…

YouTube Brandcast: Platform Announces Top 1% Content Takeover Ads
At YouTube's Brandcast upfront, it touted billions of viewers and announced that advertisers can buy takeovers of the top 1% of content.

Google unveils Android for Cars updates: new apps including Max, Peacock, and Angry Birds for select car models, Google Cast for Android Automotive OS, and more (Lawrence Bonk/Engadget)
https://www.engadget.com/google-announced-

Google announced an update for Android Auto with new apps and casting support
Google just announced an update for Android for Cars. There are new apps, like Max and Angry Birds, and casting support.

Google rolls out a search filter, named "Web", to show only text-based links in results (Barry Schwartz/Search Engine Land)
https://searchengineland.com/google-adds-web-filter-to-only-show-text-based-links…

Google adds "web" filter to only show text-based links in Google Search results
Google said the filter appears on the top of the results page alongside other filters.

David Sacks reveals Glue, an employee chat app designed around topic-based threads and embedded GenAI models, and opens a waitlist for companies to sign up (Marina Temkin/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/05/14/david-sacks-glue-ai-sla…

David Sacks reveals Glue, the AI company he’s been teasing on his All In podcast | TechCrunch
VC and podcaster David Sacks has revealed a new AI chat app called Glue that fixes "Slack channel fatigue," he says.

UN sanctions monitors: North Korea laundered $147.5M of crypto through Tornado Cash in March after stealing it late last year from HTX crypto exchange (Michelle Nichols/Reuters)
https://www.reuters.com/technology/cyberse

Exclusive: North Korea laundered $147.5 mln in stolen crypto in March, say UN experts
North Korea laundered $147.5 million through virtual currency platform Tornado Cash in March after stealing it last year from a cryptocurrency exchange, according to confidential work by United Nations sanctions monitors seen by Reuters on Tuesday.

Adam Mosseri says Threads "recently rolled out" its own fact-checking program after piggybacking on Instagram and Facebook's network for a few months (Ivan Mehta/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/05/14/threads-finally-sta…

Threads finally starts its own fact-checking program | TechCrunch
Meta's newest social network, Threads is starting its own fact-checking program after piggybacking on Instagram and Facebook's network for a few months.

Foxconn's Sharp shifts focus to consumer electronics and AI after decision to exit TV display production, and is looking to sell its camera, chip device units (Nikkei Asia)
https://t.co/mS4f1xalJv

Foxconn's Sharp pivots to AI after decision to exit TV display production
Japanese company also looking to sell camera, chip device units

Jan Leike, who was co-leading OpenAI's Superalignment team with Ilya Sutskever to "steer and control" more powerful AI, has also resigned from the company (The Verge)
https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/14/24156920/openai-chief-sc…

OpenAI chief scientist Ilya Sutskever is officially leaving
Ilya Sutskever, the OpenAI co-founder and chief scientist who reportedly led the infamous failed coup against Sam Altman, is unsurprisingly leaving the company.

Sea reports Q1 revenue up 23% YoY to a record $3.73B and a $23M net loss, Shopee's revenue grew 31% YoY to a record $2.95B, and expects 2024 to be profitable (Tsubasa Suruga/Nikkei Asia)
https://t.co/vY7dy81f0V

Singapore's Sea posts record revenue in Q1 on e-commerce growth
Tech group 'on track' for second straight annual profit despite stiff competition

Eight TikTok creators sued the US government over the law forcing a sale or ban of TikTok, arguing it violates their First Amendment rights (Washington Post)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/05/14/tiktok-creators-lawsuit-ban/<…

TikTok creators sue U.S. government over potential ban
The lawsuit is the second major legal challenge to a new law that could lead to the video app’s nationwide ban.

Google unveils Music AI Sandbox, a suite of music AI tools that include the ability to create short audio clips or "stems" based on text prompts (Ty Pendlebury/CNET)
https://www.cnet.com/tech/home-entertainment/goog…

Google Unveils Music AI Sandbox Making Loops From Prompts
Producers say the AI-generated loops can make music sound 'more human.

Loft Labs, which helps businesses spin up virtual Kubernetes clusters, raised a $24M Series A and says its open source project vCluster has had 40M downloads (Ron Miller/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/04/16/loft-labs-brin…

Loft Labs brings power of virtualization to Kubernetes clusters | TechCrunch
Loft Labs announced a $24 million Series A to help companies virtualize Kubernetes clusters to make them cheaper and more efficiently.

The Senate is set to vote on RISAA, which reauthorizes FISA's Section 702 and could force new types of businesses to eavesdrop on Americans without a warrant (Dell Cameron/Wired)
https://www.wired.com/story/senate-section-702-ecsr-provision/

US Senate to Vote on a Wiretap Bill That Critics Call ‘Stasi-Like’
A controversial bill reauthorizing the Section 702 spy program may force whole new categories of businesses to eavesdrop on the US government's behalf, including on fellow Americans.

Apple debuts web distribution of iOS apps to EU users, allowing qualifying devs who opt in to its Core Technology Fee to offer direct downloads from their sites (Natasha Lomas/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/04/16/apple-web-distribution-ios/
<…

Apple will now let users in the EU download apps through web sites, not just the App Store | TechCrunch
Apple is opening up web distribution for iOS apps targeting users in the European Union starting Tuesday. Developers who opt in — and who meet Apple's Apple is opening up web distribution for iOS apps in the European Union from today. Developers who opt in will be able to offer iPhone apps for direct download from their own websites.

Spotify says 25% of paid users in the US, UK, and Australia have started an audiobook as part of their subscriptions; 57% are between 18 and 34 years old (Ashley Carman/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20

Spotify (SPOT) Says 25% of US, UK, Australia Subscribers Try Audiobooks
Spotify Technology SA said one-quarter of paid users in the US, UK and Australia have started an audiobook as part of their subscriptions, a sign the Swedish audio streaming company is making headway in a growing market.

Resecurity: in Q1, malicious cyber activities targeting the Philippines, including cyberattacks and misinfo campaigns, were up 300% YoY, as China tensions rise (Pierluigi Paganini/Security Affairs)
https://securityaffairs.com/161909/int

Misinformation and hacktivist campaigns targeting the Philippines skyrocket
Amidst rising tensions with China in the SCS, Resecurity observed a spike in malicious cyber activity targeting the Philippines in Q1 2024.

Andreessen Horowitz raised $7.2B, with $600M for American Dynamism, $3.75B for late-stage startups, and $600M for gaming, exceeding its target by ~4% (Lizette Chapman/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20

Andreessen Horowitz Raises $7.2 Billion, Plans More for 2025
Andreessen Horowitz, one of Silicon Valley’s biggest venture capital firms, has raised $7.2 billion in new funding — a sizable haul after a rocky period for the startup world.

UnitedHealth says the February ransomware attack on Change Healthcare cost the company $872M in Q1; another ransomware group appears to be extorting the company (Connor Jones/The Register)
https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/16/change_healthcares_r…

Change Healthcare’s ransomware attack costs edge toward $1B so far
First glimpse at attack financials reveals huge pain

TikTok signs a deal with ticketing provider AXS to let users buy tickets to live events in the US, UK, and more; TikTok has had a Ticketmaster deal since 2022 (Todd Spangler/Variety)
https://variety.com/2024/music/news/tiktok-axs-concer…

TikTok Teams With AXS to Let Certified Artists Sell Concert Tickets
TikTok inked a partnership with ticketing provider AXS to let users of the popular video app discover and buy tickets to live events.

AMD unveils Ryzen Pro 8040 series for commercial laptops and mobile workstations and Ryzen Pro 8000 series for desktops, adding a neural processing unit for AI (Paul Alcorn/Tom's Hardware)
https://www.

AMD unveils Ryzen Pro 8000-series processors — Zen 4 and AI engines come to the commercial market
AMD is the first with a Pro desktop PC chip with an NPU for AI workloads.

YouTube begins "strengthening our enforcement on third-party apps that violate" its ToS and "specifically ad-blocking apps", leading to app error messages (Abner Li/9to5Google)
https://9to5google.com/2024/04/15/youtube-app-block-ads/

YouTube cracking down on third-party apps that block ads
Following the ad blocker crackdown, YouTube is going after third-party apps that let viewers skip advertising.

AI chip developer Rivos, which recently settled with Apple over trade secret theft, raised $250M led by Matrix to compete with Nvidia using its RISC-V chips (Jane Lanhee Lee/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20

Chip Startup Rivos Raises More Than $250 Million to Tap AI Boom
Silicon Valley chip developer Rivos Inc. raised more than $250 million as it works toward bringing out its first product, underscoring the push for new hardware to meet the needs of artificial intelligence.

Intel's Gaudi 3 white paper details the made-for-China processors HL-328 and HL-388, likely designed to comply with US sanctions by reducing performance (Matthew Connatser/The Register)
https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/12/intel_paudi_3_china/

Intel preps export-friendly lower-power Gaudi 3 AI chips made for China
Crippled silicon for the Middle Kingdom

Filing: MGM sues the FTC to stop an investigation into a 2023 cyberattack and asks for Chair Lina Khan's recusal; Khan stayed at the MGM Grand in September 2023 (Sabrina Willmer/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20

MGM Resorts Sues US FTC to Stop Investigation of Casino Hack
MGM Resorts International sued the Federal Trade Commission to stop an investigation into how it dealt with a cybersecurity attack last year.

Bain Capital agrees to sell UK payroll software company Zellis, acquired in 2017, to Apax Partners; sources say the deal values Zellis at ~£1.25B (Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-04-15/bain-to…

Bain to Sell £1.25 Billion UK Payroll Tech Firm Zellis to Apax
Bain Capital has agreed to sell UK payroll software company Zellis Group, whose clients include department store Harrods and carmaker Jaguar, to Apax Partners, according to a statement.

A look at the failure of Humane's Ai Pin, which took six years to ship after raising $230M, including building the device "the Apple way" and raising too much (Benjamin Sandofsky/Sandofsky)
https://www.sandofsky.com/humane/

Oh the Humanity
On the failure of Humane and why you can't build Apple with Venture Capital.

Sources: in 2023, Abu Dhabi's G42 and the US Commerce Department held talks that led to G42 agreeing to pare back its China presence to avoid punitive measures (Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20

G42 Made Secret Pact With US to Divest From China Before Microsoft (MSFT) Deal
Microsoft Corp.’s just-announced partnership with Abu Dhabi’s G42 followed behind-the-scenes negotiations between the US government and the Middle Eastern firm, which agreed to divest from China and pivot to American technology.

Ghost kitchens and virtual restaurant brands, which boomed during the pandemic after raising billions, are disappearing due to overtaxed kitchens and complaints (Julie Creswell/New York Times)
https://www.

Ghost Kitchens Are Disappearing, Squeezed by Demand and Complaints
Delivery-only operations boomed during the pandemic. Now Wendy’s, Kroger and mom-and-pop food businesses are rethinking their operations.