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From the life-after-death department: An anonymous reader quotes a report from Popular Mechanics: American composer Alvin Lucier was well-known for his experimental works that tested the boundaries of music and art. A longtime professor at Wesleyan University (before retiring in 2011), Alvin passed away in 2021 at the age of 90. However, that wasn't the end of his lifelong musical odyssey. Earlier this month, at the Art Gallery of Western Australia, a new art installation titled Revivification used Lucier's "brain matter" -- hooked up to an electrode mesh connected to twenty large brass plates -- to create electrical signals that triggered a mallet to strike the varying plates, creating a kind of post-mortem musical piece. Conceptualized in collaboration with Lucier himself before his death, the artists solicited the help of researchers from Harvard Medical School, who grew a mini-brain from Lucier's white blood cells. The team created stem cells from these white blood cells, and due to their pluripotency, the cells developed into cerebral organoids somewhat similar to developing human brains. "At a time when generative AI is calling into question human agency, this project explores the challenges of locating creativity and artistic originality," the team behind Revivification told The Art Newspaper. "Revivification is an attempt to shine light on the sometimes dark possibilities of extending a person's presence beyond the seemed finality of death."
"The central question we want people to ask is: could there be a filament of memory that persists through this biological transformation? Can Lucier's creative essence persist beyond his death?" the team said.
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From the good-ol'-days department: With macOS now 24 years old and Apple officially designating all Intel-based Mac minis as "vintage" or "obsolete," The Register takes a look at new internet tools that help keep vintage Macs online and surprisingly relevant: Cameron Kaiser of Floodgap Systems is a valuable ally. His retro computing interests are broad, and we've mentioned him a few times on The Register, such as his deep dive into the revolutionary Canon Cat computer, and his evaluation of RISC-V hardware performance. Back in 2020, he revived the native Classic Mac OS port of the Lynx web browser, MacLynx. Earlier this month, he came back to it and has updated it again, including adding native Mac OS dialog boxes. His account is -- as usual -- long and detailed but it's an interesting read. He also maintains some other web browsers for elderly Macs, including TenFourFox for Mac OS X 10.4 and Classilla for Mac OS 8.6 and 9.x.
If you're not up to git pull commands and elderly Mac OS X build tools, then there is a fork of TenFourFox that may be worth a look, InterWebPPC. It's not current with the new batch of patches, but we can still hope for another build. In other "Classic on the internet" news, although it's not a huge amount of use on its own, there's also a newly released Classic Mac OS version of Mbed-TLS on GitHub. This ports the SSL library -- also used in the super-lightweight Dillo browser -- to the older C89/C90 standard, so that it can build in CodeWarrior and run with OpenTransport from Mac OS 9 right back to later versions of Mac OS 7.
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From the tell-us-how-you-really-feel department: Bluesky is testing a new verification system featuring blue checks issued by "Trusted Verifiers" like news organizations, rather than a centralized authority or pay-to-play model like X (formerly Twitter). "Looking at the comments on the pull request, it's clear this idea has sparked a lot of discussion and a lot of concern among the community who follow the platform's development closely," reports Neowin. "Many users voiced strong opposition to the change, arguing that the existing domain name verification is sufficient and more aligned with the decentralized ethos that Bluesky aims for." From the report: There's a general worry that adding a visual badge, especially one controlled in part by Bluesky, feels too much like the centralized systems they were trying to escape from by joining Bluesky: "Do not want. BSky is not Twitter 2.0. Do not become like Elon Musk. We came here to get AWAY from that bs." Several commenters also expressed that the current domain name system, while not perfect, is an elegant and decentralized way to build trust, and that adding this new layer feels redundant and gives too much power to centralized entities, including Bluesky itself: "Let's please not do this. Domain names as user IDs is an elegant solution as a system of trust that builds off the infrastructure of an open web."
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From the record-profits department: Netflix's Q1 revenue rose to $10.5 billion, a 13% increase from last year, while net income grew to $2.9 billion. The company says it expects more growth in the coming months when it sees "the full quarter benefit from recent price changes and continued growth in membership and advertising revenue." The Verge reports: Netflix raised the prices across most of its plans in January, with its premium plan hitting $24.99 per month. It also increased the price of its Extra Member option -- its solution to password sharing -- to $8.99 per month. Though Netflix already rolled out the increase in the US, UK, and Argentina, the streamer now plans to do the same in France. This is the first quarter that Netflix didn't reveal how many subscribers it gained or lost. It decided to only report "major subscriber milestones" last year, as other streams of revenue continue to grow, like advertising, continue to grow. Netflix last reported having 300 million global subscribers in January.
During an earnings call on Thursday, Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters said the company expects to "roughly double" advertising revenue in 2025. The company launched its own advertising technology platform earlier this month. There are some changes coming to Netflix, too, as Peters confirmed that its homepage redesign for its TV app will roll out "later this year." He also hinted at adding an "interactive" search feature using "generative technologies," which sounds a lot like the AI feature Bloomberg reported on last week. Further reading: Netflix CEO Counters Cameron's AI Cost-Cutting Vision: 'Make Movies 10% Better'
Posted by from MMO Champion
WoW Weekly: Patch 11.1.5, Beetriz Pet, Noblegarden Updates & Animated Azeroth
Originally Posted by Blizzard
(
Blue Tracker /
Official Forums)
Everything Coming in 11.1.5 Featuring Naguura and Update Notes
The 11.1.5 content update ushers in a host of new activities rolling out, beginning with the update's launch and continuing in the weeks following.
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.
Follow along as Naguura outlines everything coming in 11.1.5.
Read through our update notes for even more details about these upcoming features:
THE WINDS OF MYSTERIOUS FORTUNE ARE IN YOUR FAVOR DEFEND THE ARATHI IN THE NIGHTFALL SCENARIO
NEW COOLDOWN MANAGER HORRIFIC VISIONS REVISITED
DASTARDLY DUOS CLASSES
REPUTATION AND RENOWN USER INTERFACE AND ACCESSIBILITY
Twitch Drop: Get the Beetriz Pet April 22
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From the tools-of-the-trade department: An anonymous reader quotes a report from SecurityWeek: An October 2024 study by Software AG suggests that half of all employees are Shadow AI users, and most of them wouldn't stop even if it was banned. The problem is the ease of access to AI tools, and a work environment that increasingly advocates the use of AI to improve corporate efficiency. It is little wonder that employees seek their own AI tools to improve their personal efficiency and maximize the potential for promotion. It is frictionless, says Michael Marriott, VP of marketing at Harmonic Security. 'Using AI at work feels like second nature for many knowledge workers now. Whether it's summarizing meeting notes, drafting customer emails, exploring code, or creating content, employees are moving fast.' If the official tools aren't easy to access or if they feel too locked down, they'll use whatever's available which is often via an open tab on their browser.
There is almost also never any malicious intent (absent, perhaps, the mistaken employment of rogue North Korean IT workers); merely a desire to do and be better. If this involves using unsanctioned AI tools, employees will likely not disclose their actions. The reasons may be complex but combine elements of a reluctance to admit that their efficiency is AI assisted rather than natural, and knowledge that use of personal shadow AI might be discouraged. The result is that enterprises often have little knowledge of the extent of Shadow IT, nor the risks it may present. According to an analysis from Harmonic, ChatGPT is the dominant gen-AI model used by employees, with 45% of data prompts originating from personal accounts (such as Gmail). Image files accounted for 68.3%. The report also notes that 7% of empmloyees were using Chinese AI models like DeepSeek, Baidu Chat and Qwen.
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From the was-it-worth-it department: Some actors who sold their likenesses to AI video companies like Synthesia now regret the decision, after finding their digital avatars used in misleading, embarrassing, or politically charged content. Ars Technica reports: Among them is a 29-year-old New York-based actor, Adam Coy, who licensed rights to his face and voice to a company called MCM for one year for $1,000 without thinking, "am I crossing a line by doing this?" His partner's mother later found videos where he appeared as a doomsayer predicting disasters, he told the AFP. South Korean actor Simon Lee's AI likeness was similarly used to spook naive Internet users but in a potentially more harmful way. He told the AFP that he was "stunned" to find his AI avatar promoting "questionable health cures on TikTok and Instagram," feeling ashamed to have his face linked to obvious scams. [...]
Even a company publicly committed to ethically developing AI avatars and preventing their use in harmful content like Synthesia can't guarantee that its content moderation will catch everything. A British actor, Connor Yeates, told the AFP that his video was "used to promote Ibrahim Traore, the president of Burkina Faso who took power in a coup in 2022" in violation of Synthesia's terms. [...] Yeates was paid about $5,000 for a three-year contract with Synthesia that he signed simply because he doesn't "have rich parents and needed the money." But he likely couldn't have foreseen his face being used for propaganda, as even Synthesia didn't anticipate that outcome.
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From the return-to-client department: IBM is mandating that U.S. sales and Cloud employees return to the office at least three days a week, with work required at designated client sites, flagship offices, or sales hubs. According to The Register, some IBM employees argue that these policies "represent stealth layoffs because older (and presumably more highly compensated) employees tend to be less willing to uproot their lives, and families where applicable, than the 'early professional hires' IBM has been courting at some legal risk." From the report: In a staff memo seen by The Register, Adam Lawrence, general manager for IBM Americas, billed the return-to-office for most stateside sales personnel as a "return to client initiative."Citing how "remarkable it is when our teams work side by side" at IBM's swanky Manhattan flagship office, unveiled in September 2024, Lawrence added IBM is investing in an Austin, Texas, office to be occupied in 2026.
Whether US sales staff end up working in NYC, Austin, or some other authorized location, Lawrence told them to brace for -- deep breath -- IBM's "new model" of "effective talent acquisition, deployment, and career progression." We're told that model is "centered on client proximity for those dedicated to specific clients, and anchored on core IBM locations for those dedicated to territories or those in above-market leadership roles." The program requires most IBM US sales staff "to work at least three days a week from the client location where their assigned territory decision-makers work, a flagship office, or a sales hub." Those residing more than 50 miles from their assigned location will be offered relocation benefits to move. Sales hubs are an option only for those with more than one dedicated account.
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From the cease-and-desist department: An anonymous reader quotes a report from 404 Media: A judge in Nevada has ruled that "tower dumps" -- the law enforcement practice of grabbing vast troves of private personal data from cell towers -- is unconstitutional. The judge also ruled that the cops could, this one time, still use the evidence they obtained through this unconstitutional search. Cell towers record the location of phones near them about every seven seconds. When the cops request a tower dump, they ask a telecom for the numbers and personal information of every single phone connected to a tower during a set time period. Depending on the area, these tower dumps can return tens of thousands of numbers. Cops have been able to sift through this data to solve crimes. But tower dumps are also a massive privacy violation that flies in the face of the Fourth Amendment, which protects people from unlawful search and seizure. When the cops get a tower dump they're not just searching and seizing the data of a suspected criminal, they're sifting through the information of everyone who was in the location. The ruling stems from a court case involving Cory Spurlock, a Nevada man charged with drug offenses and a murder-for-hire plot. He was implicated through a cellphone tower dump that law enforcement used to place his device near the scenes of the alleged crimes.
A federal judge ruled that the tower dump constituted an unconstitutional general search under the Fourth Amendment but declined to suppress the evidence, citing officers' good faith in obtaining a warrant. It marks the first time a court in the Ninth Circuit has ruled on the constitutionality of tower dumps, which in Spurlock's case captured location data from over 1,600 users -- many of whom had no way to opt out.
Posted by msmash from Slashdot
From the tussle-continues department: Netflix Co-CEO Ted Sarandos pushed back on director James Cameron's recent assertion that AI could slash film production costs by half, arguing instead for quality improvements over cost reduction during Netflix's first-quarter earnings call Thursday. "I read the article too about what Jim Cameron said about making movies 50% cheaper," Sarandos said. "I remain convinced that there's an even bigger opportunity to make movies 10% better."
Sarandos pointed to Netflix's current AI implementations in set references, pre-visualization, VFX sequence preparation, and shot planning. He said AI-powered tools have democratized high-end visual effects that were once exclusive to big-budget productions. The executive cited 2019's "The Irishman" as a benchmark, noting its "very cutting-edge, very expensive de-aging technology that still had massive limitations." In contrast, he referenced cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto's directorial debut "Pedro Paramo," which employed AI-powered de-aging at "a fraction" of The Irishman's cost. "The entire budget of the film was about what the VFX cost on The Irishman," Sarandos explained. "Same creator using new tools, better tools, to do what was impossible five years ago."
The biggest expense was installing the mantle ducts to keep the carbonate-silicate cycle operating. 
Ryan Coogler and Michael B. Jordan have reunited once again, and the internet can’t get enough! Their newest project, “Sinners,” is a genre-fluid horror-thriller that blends together themes of religion, freedom, music, mysticism, and vampires— but with that unmistakable Coogler-edge.
Marvel announced that “soon” swimsuit-themed skins will be appearing in popular free-to-play shooter Marvel Rivals. Do you hear that loud noise? That’s the sound of Marvel Rivals developer NetEase installing new vaults to hold all the money they are about to make.
The Nintendo Switch 2 uses MicroSD Express cards—a faster and better version of the old MicroSD cards used on the Switch and other devices—to store downloaded games. But it might be tricky to buy one of these tiny storage chips, as they have started selling out since the Switch 2's reveal.
Though I can already see people clamoring to unlock the HDR from the Battle Pass to camp in the most mundane of spots, the return of the Kilo 141 probably excites me the most. This high-powered assault rifle is immensely accurate straight out of the gate, but with the right attachments, it’s virtually unstoppable. I…
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