Posted by BeauHD from Slashdot
From the PSA department: samleecole shares a report from 404 Media: American police departments near the United States-Mexico border are paying hundreds of thousands of dollars for an unproven and secretive technology that uses AI-generated online personas designed to interact with and collect intelligence on "college protesters," "radicalized" political activists, and suspected drug and human traffickers, according to internal documents, contracts, and communications 404 Media obtained via public records requests. Massive Blue, the New York-based company that is selling police departments this technology, calls its product Overwatch, which it markets as an "AI-powered force multiplier for public safety" that "deploys lifelike virtual agents, which infiltrate and engage criminal networks across various channels." According to a presentation obtained by 404 Media, Massive Blue is offering cops these virtual personas that can be deployed across the internet with the express purpose of interacting with suspects over text messages and social media. [...]
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Posted by BeauHD from Slashdot
From the false-advertising department: HP has agreed to a $4 million settlement over allegations of deceptive pricing practices on its website, including falsely inflating original prices for computers and accessories to create the illusion of steep discounts. Ars Technica reports: Earlier this month, Judge P. Casey Pitts for the US District Court of the San Jose Division of the Northern District of California granted preliminary approval [PDF] of a settlement agreement regarding a class-action complaint first filed against HP on October 13, 2021. The complaint accused HP's website of showing "misleading" original pricing for various computers, mice, and keyboards that was higher than how the products were recently and typically priced.
Per the settlement agreement [PDF], HP will contribute $4 million to a "non-reversionary common fund, which shall be used to pay the (i) Settlement Class members' claims; (ii) court-approved Notice and Settlement Administration Costs; (iii) court-approved Settlement Class Representatives' Service Award; and (iv) court-approved Settlement Class Counsel Attorneys' Fees and Costs Award. All residual funds will be distributed pro rata to Settlement Class members who submitted valid claims and cashed checks."
The two plaintiffs who filed the initial complaint may also file a motion to receive a settlement class representative service award for up to $5,000 each, which would come out of the $4 million pool. People who purchased a discounted HP desktop, laptop, mouse, or keyboard that was on sale for "more than 75 percent of the time the products were offered for sale" from June 5, 2021, to October 28, 2024, are eligible for compensation. The full list of eligible products is available here [PDF] and includes HP Spectre, Chromebook Envy, and Pavilion laptops, HP Envy and Omen desktops, and some mechanical keyboards and wireless mice. Depending on the product, class members can receive $10 to $100 per eligible product purchased.
Posted by BeauHD from Slashdot
From the resource-constrained department: Microsoft has introduced BitNet b1.58 2B4T, the largest-scale 1-bit AI model to date with 2 billion parameters and the ability to run efficiently on CPUs. It's openly available under an MIT license. TechCrunch reports: The Microsoft researchers say that BitNet b1.58 2B4T is the first bitnet with 2 billion parameters, "parameters" being largely synonymous with "weights." Trained on a dataset of 4 trillion tokens -- equivalent to about 33 million books, by one estimate -- BitNet b1.58 2B4T outperforms traditional models of similar sizes, the researchers claim.
BitNet b1.58 2B4T doesn't sweep the floor with rival 2 billion-parameter models, to be clear, but it seemingly holds its own. According to the researchers' testing, the model surpasses Meta's Llama 3.2 1B, Google's Gemma 3 1B, and Alibaba's Qwen 2.5 1.5B on benchmarks including GSM8K (a collection of grade-school-level math problems) and PIQA (which tests physical commonsense reasoning skills). Perhaps more impressively, BitNet b1.58 2B4T is speedier than other models of its size -- in some cases, twice the speed -- while using a fraction of the memory.
There is a catch, however. Achieving that performance requires using Microsoft's custom framework, bitnet.cpp, which only works with certain hardware at the moment. Absent from the list of supported chips are GPUs, which dominate the AI infrastructure landscape.
Posted by from MMO Champion
WoW Classic 20th Anniversary Edition Phase 4 Arrives the Week of May 1
Originally Posted by Blizzard
(
Blue Tracker /
Official Forums)
Release Timetable
Week of May 1: Zul'Gurub raid, Dragons of Nightmare, Stranglethorn Fishing Extravaganza, Stirring of the Silithid, and the Tier 0.5 (Dungeon Set 2) Class Armor Sets
Prepare to Enter the Perilous Zul’Gurub
Deep within the jungles of Stranglethorn, distant drums beat in an ancient ritual, calling forth the Blood God, Hakkar, to the ancient troll city of Zul’Gurub. Assemble a band of hardy explorers and make your way to this max-level, 20-player raid instance filled with rare and epic items to procure from its verdant tree-lined avenues and lost temples..
Raid Bosses: 13
Level: 60
Location: East of Lake Nazferiti in Stranglethorn Vale
Reputation: Zandalar Tribe
Thirteen bosses await you within Zul’Gurub, with four available on a rotating basis as part of the Edge of Madness encounter, allowing access to one of these bosses per reset.
Before you face Hakkar, you’ll first want to defeat his five priests to improve your odds of success. They’ll lend their powers to the Blood God if left alive, making him near unstoppable. Defeat them in any order— each has a chance to drop rewards your party may find helpful on your journey through Zul’Gurub.
High Priest Arlokk
High Priest Jek’lik
High Priest Mar’li
High Priest Thekal
High Priest Venoxis
Bloodlord Mandokir
Jin’do the Hexer
Gahz’ranka
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Posted by BeauHD from Slashdot
From the PSA department: Google is offering all U.S. college students a free year of its Gemini Advanced AI tools through its Google One AI Premium plan, as part of a push to expand Gemini's user base and compete with ChatGPT. It includes access to the company's Pro models, Veo 2 video generation, NotebookLM, Gemini Live and 2TB of Drive storage. Ars Technica reports: Google has a new landing page for the deal, allowing eligible students to sign up for their free Google One AI Premium plan. The offer is valid from now until June 30. Anyone who takes Google up on it will enjoy the free plan through spring 2026. The company hasn't specified an end date, but we would wager it will be June of next year. Google's intention is to give students an entire school year of Gemini Advanced from now through finals next year. At the end of the term, you can bet Google will try to convert students to paying subscribers.
As for who qualifies as a "student" in this promotion, Google isn't bothering with a particularly narrow definition. As long as you have a valid .edu email address, you can sign up for the offer. That's something that plenty of people who are not actively taking classes still have. You probably won't even be taking undue advantage of Google if you pretend to be a student -- the company really, really wants people to use Gemini, and it's willing to lose money in the short term to make that happen.
Posted by msmash from Slashdot
From the my-way-or-highway department: Synology's upcoming Plus Series NAS systems will restrict full functionality to users who install the company's self-branded hard drives, Tom's Hardware is reporting, marking a significant shift in the consumer NAS market. While third-party drives will still work for basic storage, critical features including drive health monitoring, volume-wide deduplication, lifespan analysis, and automatic firmware updates will be disabled, the publication said.
The restriction doesn't apply to Synology's 2024 and older models, only affecting new Plus Series devices targeted at SMBs and advanced home users. Synology itself doesn't manufacture drives but rebrands HDDs from major manufacturers like Seagate, Western Digital, and Toshiba, often with custom firmware that functions as DRM. According to Synology, the change follows successful implementation in their enterprise solutions and will deliver "higher performance, increased reliability, and more efficient support." A workaround exists: users can initialize a non-Synology drive in an older Synology NAS and then migrate it to a new Plus model without restrictions.
Posted by BeauHD from Slashdot
From the would-you-look-at-that department: An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: There's a somewhat concerning new trend going viral: People are using ChatGPT to figure out the location shown in pictures. This week, OpenAI released its newest AI models, o3 and o4-mini, both of which can uniquely "reason" through uploaded images. In practice, the models can crop, rotate, and zoom in on photos -- even blurry and distorted ones -- to thoroughly analyze them. These image-analyzing capabilities, paired with the models' ability to search the web, make for a potent location-finding tool. Users on X quickly discovered that o3, in particular, is quite good at deducing cities, landmarks, and even restaurants and bars from subtle visual clues.
In many cases, the models don't appear to be drawing on "memories" of past ChatGPT conversations, or EXIF data, which is the metadata attached to photos that reveal details such as where the photo was taken. X is filled with examples of users giving ChatGPT restaurant menus, neighborhood snaps, facades, and self-portraits, and instructing o3 to imagine it's playing "GeoGuessr," an online game that challenges players to guess locations from Google Street View images. It's an obvious potential privacy issue. There's nothing preventing a bad actor from screenshotting, say, a person's Instagram Story and using ChatGPT to try to doxx them.
Posted by from MMO Champion
Patch 11.1.5 Content Update Notes
Originally Posted by Blizzard
(
Blue Tracker /
Official Forums)
The 11.1.5 content update ushers in a host of new activities rolling out beginning with the launch of the update with more to come in the weeks that follow. It all begins with the Nightfall Scenario, UI updates with the new Cooldown Manager, and the Winds of Mysterious Fortune bringing with it an in-game experience boost and reputation boost for characters levels 10 through 79.
THE WINDS OF MYSTERIOUS FORTUNE ARE IN YOUR FAVOR
Beginning on April 22, 2025, through May 20, 2025, players can take advantage of the Winds of Mysterious Fortune 20% experience buff to get up to speed with their new or alternate characters levels 10 through 79. This buff will also provide +200% major faction renown in Dragonflight zones and +100% select major faction renown in The War Within zones.
DRAGONFLIGHT FACTIONS INCLUDED:
Dragonscale Expedition
Maruuk Centaur
Iskaara Tuskarr
Valdrakken Accord
Loamm Niffen
Dream Wardens
Sabellian
Wrathion
Cobalt Assembly
THE WAR WITHIN FACTIONS INCLUDED:
Council of Dornogal
Hallowfall Arathi
The Assembly of the Deeps
The General
The Vizier
The Weaver
Undermine factions are excluded from benefitting from this buff.
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After letting us process the first season’s half-naked murder clowns and sinister dollfaced thugs for two years, Peacock’s Twisted Metal series is returning with a deeper connection to the source material. On July 31, Anthony Mackie and the rest of the Divided States of America will be back for the show’s second…
Sony has increased the price of PlayStation Plus, the company’s multi-tiered online subscription service, in over 20 countries including Canada, Australia, and Mexico. This comes after some of these same countries saw a price hike on PS5 consoles.
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