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Submission + - People Training OpenAI's AI Fired for Using AI to Train the AI (404media.co)

Submitted by joshuark
joshuark writes: 404 Media has found multiple contractors hired to improve OpenAI’s models have been fired for using AI to train the AI. That’s not great for the models themselves, but there is also obviously a great irony in AI training companies working for OpenAI firing people for using AI when OpenAI’s whole thing is to make people use AI at work.

“I did feel guilty about doing this kind of work at the start,” they said. “I either pay zero attention to the results and choose randomly or purposely choose the [worst] output. I’m not sure how much of a difference it actually makes since there are hundreds of other people also rating prompt results, but it does feel like I’m getting paid to make AI worse.”

OpenAI declined to comment on its contractors being fired for using AI.

“I’m not a bad person or worker. I just needed a little boost and turned to AI to help me which eventually led to my downfall,” the contractor told 404 Media. “I felt no joy in the work or that I was contributing to society in any way.”

Submission + - Students are suddenly losing interest in computer science as AI coding takes off (nerds.xyz)

Submitted by BrianFagioli
BrianFagioli writes: For years, students were told that learning to code was one of the safest paths into a lucrative technology career. New data suggests that message may be losing some of its pull. Nova Learning says the share of surveyed middle and high school students naming Computer Science and AI as their primary academic interest fell from 42.3 percent in 2025 to 27.9 percent in 2026, while Engineering rose from 11.9 percent to 23 percent. The biggest gains came from Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, while Software and Data Science saw a steep drop.

The survey is not nationally representative, but broader enrollment data points in the same direction. The National Student Clearinghouse Research Center reported declines in Computer and Information Science enrollment at four year institutions, even as Engineering grew. AI coding tools are not proven to be the cause, but as software development changes and AI handles more coding tasks, students may be starting to rethink what a future in technology should look like.

Submission + - New tin-based solar cells trap heat 1,000 times longer, could beat 33% limit. (interestingengineering.com)

Submitted by fahrbot-bot
fahrbot-bot writes: Interesting Engineering is reporting that researchers at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands found that tin-based perovskite solar cells can slow heat loss from high-energy “hot electrons” by a factor of 1,000 and could push solar cell efficiency beyond the theoretical 33 percent limit.

When sunlight strikes a panel, photons jump-start electrons into action. The most energetic photons create super-charged hot electrons. Theoretically, these high-voltage powerhouses should generate far more electricity, but, in practice, they are fleeting. In fractions of a trillionth of a second, these high-energy particles rapidly cool, dumping their bonus energy as waste heat before ever leaving the solar cell.

“This means that the energy is lost before the hot electron exits the solar cell material,” said Jan Anton Koster, Professor of Physics of Novel Semiconductors and Devices at the University of Groningen.

Using a specialized solar cell material called tin-based perovskite, Loi’s lab performed a feat many thought impossible: she slowed the heat loss down by a factor of 1,000. Suddenly, the extra energy lingered for nanoseconds instead of vanishing in picoseconds.

The study findings were published in the journal ACS Energy Letters.

Submission + - The brain is actually two completely separate organs (stanford.edu)

Submitted by Beeftopia
Beeftopia writes: From Stanford Medicine:

"For centuries, scientists have thought of the brain as a single, unified organ. But new research led by Stanford Medicine reveals that what we call the brain is two distinct organs that evolved independently over hundreds of millions of years."

The adult brain has three main regions: the forebrain, midbrain and hindbrain. Scientists could never create hindbrain neurons.

"Previous attempts to make hindbrain neurons likely tried to coax forebrain and midbrain progenitors into hindbrain cells, which our study shows is not possible,” said researcher Rayyan Jokhai.

"The researchers’ breakthrough came from studying the earliest moments of embryonic development, during a stage called gastrulation when the body first takes shape. Jokhai and Dundes discovered that the hindbrain follows a separate developmental path, running in parallel to — rather than branching off from — the pathway that creates the forebrain and midbrain."

With this knowledge, researchers were able to create hindbrain neurons.

Submission + - Why can't M$ get any UI/UX changes right? (pcmag.com) 1

Submitted by golem100
golem100 writes: A couple weeks ago PCMag, and others, wrote articles along the lines of: "Microsoft Finally Backs Down: The Windows 11 Taskbar Update You've Been Waiting For". This is currently implemented with CU KB5120998 and since M$ has elected to defer "activation" of this feature--some two weeks later for most users it still needs to be enabled by the ViVe tool: vivetool /enable /id:59213768,61090762

Um, No...

The fundamental set of [lost] attributes that this "We brought Movable TaskBar back" lacks:

You can not control the position of the TaskBar on each desktop monitor--example: I have four displays on my desktop, three Landscape & one of which is in a Portrait orientation for reading documents.

With Windows7/8/10 you could position the TaskBar so that it was "Out of the way" and each display--on the right side of the right-most Landscape, on the left for the left-most Landscape display, & on the top/bottom for the Portrait. [same as my desktop on my Linux workstation]
Now you still get the same Taskbar alignment on all desktops.

You can not "resize" the taskbar. (well, you can--it has three sizes: too big, too small, and really way too small) For the previous three generations of the OS you could "Drag-Select" and resize the TaskBar to be the correct size for your needs on your desktop. [...just as I can on my KDE Desktop!]
With this implementation, 1/3 of the Taskbar real estate is consumed with "TaskBar-Tray Notification Icons."

Nobody asked for a partial, broken, re-implementation. The ask was: "Put it Back as it was!"
Dealing with M$ is pretty much like getting your 15 year old to do their chores on garbage night.

Submission + - Hackers Stole Flockâ(TM)s Camera Software, Revealing How the Company Tracks (404media.co)

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: While much of the automatic license plate readerâ(TM)s (ALPR) most sensitive storage remained encrypted and inaccessible, the joint analysis of the recovered data shows that software running on the device explicitly detects people as well as vehicles, license plates, and bicycles. The camera can produce dozens of images of a single passing vehicle and, according to several weeks of recovered logs, generated more than a million images. Its computer-vision software also sometimes isolated bumper stickers and other graphics, including, in one case, an American flag patch on a motorcyclistâ(TM)s saddlebag.

Submission + - China's Top Spy Chief Warns AI Is a Threat to Party Rule (gvwire.com)

Submitted by fjo3
fjo3 writes: China’s top spy chief has warned that artificial intelligence could pose a direct threat to the Chinese Communist Party’s hold on power, in what is the highest-level and most detailed articulation yet of how Beijing sees the technology’s security risks.

The unusually blunt assessment by Chen Yixin, the head of China’s Ministry of State Security, is in contrast to the warnings dominating the AI debate in the United States, which have focused on the possibility that AI could slip out of human control or pose a threat to humanity itself.

In an article published Sunday in the state-run magazine China Cyberspace, Chen called for more party control over AI and stricter government oversight. This, he said, was necessary to protect political stability at home; to defend against increasingly sophisticated cyberattacks and misinformation campaigns from “hostile forces”; and to compete militarily with countries like the United States.

Submission + - European Cars Are Spying on Their Drivers. The Same Tech Could Be Coming to USA (reason.com) 3

Submitted by fjo3
fjo3 writes: As of July 7, all new passenger vehicles sold in the E.U. had to come equipped with "advanced driver distraction warning" systems that watch for signs of "distraction" and, upon detecting them, issue a visual and an audio or tactile warning. Cars will warn drivers whose gaze drifts for more than three to six seconds, depending on their speed.

To comply with this mandate, cars will have to fix cameras on drivers' faces at all times, turning private motor vehicles into efficient surveillance systems. The equipment is supposed to operate as a "closed-loop system," meaning it "shall only continuously record and retain data necessary for the system to function and operate." But it is not clear how that rule will be enforced.

Beyond privacy concerns, some critics worry that the system itself will become a dangerous distraction, issuing warnings every time a driver changes the radio station or glances at a passenger. Others have complained that the requirement will increase auto costs.

Submission + - CircuitPython Turbo brings native code to tiny boards (adafruit.com)

Submitted by ptorrone
ptorrone writes: Adafruit has published CircuitPython Turbo, a workflow that compiles selected Python functions into native machine code on a computer, then loads them onto compatible microcontroller boards. It builds on MicroPython's Native and Viper emitters. In a documented Metro RP2040 fixed-point Mandelbrot test, Viper cut computation time from 8.335 seconds to 0.423 seconds, a 19.71x speedup over bytecode. The rest of the application stays in Python. The guide includes benchmarks, source code and hardware demos. The speedup is for the measured computation, not the whole application.

Submission + - Independent review of NATS failure on Aug 28 2023

Submitted by Mirnotoriety
Mirnotoriety writes: Independent Review of NATS (En Route) Plc’s Flight Planning System Failure on 28 August 2023

A perfectly legitimate flight plan triggered a previously undiscovered software edge case. Both NATS's primary and backup flight-processing systems hit the same error and shut themselves down.

Once both systems were down, NATS's manual fallback could process only about 60 flight plans/hour, versus roughly 700–900/hour normally. That forced severe traffic restrictions.

What actually crashed? The failed component was FPRSA-R, NATS's flight-plan processing system at Swanwick. The flight was Los Angeles Paris Orly. Its flight plan contained a waypoint abbreviated DVL. DVL can refer to Deauville, France, but also Devil's Lake, North Dakota. Eurocontrol's processing had added additional waypoints to the flight plan.

FPRSA-R was trying to determine where the aircraft would leave UK airspace. It encountered the DVL abbreviation and interpreted the wrong DVL as the exit point. The result was logically impossible: the aircraft appeared to leave UK airspace before it had entered it. The software recognised this as an impossible situation and generated a critical exception. The primary system disconnected from the operational network and entered maintenance mode.

Submission + - Dark energy debunked? Cosmic acceleration may be an illusion (sciencedaily.com)

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: A new analysis of more than 1,700 supernovae is questioning whether the universe is really accelerating at all. After accounting for the ages of the stars that produce these explosions, researchers found signs that cosmic expansion may actually be slowing. They also argue that the apparent acceleration changes with direction, which would be difficult to explain with dark energy. Other cosmologists dispute the conclusion, setting up a major test for upcoming observatories.

Submission + - Parents Demanding Tech Opt Outs Take Their Fight to Federal Court (edtech.law)

Submitted by Hasaf
Hasaf writes: On August 26, 2026, seven families from Lower Merion School District outside Philadelphia, PA, sued the District, the Superintendent, and certain members of the board, asserting violations of their Constitutional rights.

Plaintiffs allege that District leaders have presided over a digital free-for-all, where students of all ages can and do access online pornography, violent videos, gambling sites, and video games, including one in which the player’s goal is to escape from sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein’s private island. Instead of paying attention in class, students consume an endless stream of short-form videos, browse social media, and shop. They chat with strangers and bully each other. They frequently interact with AI chatbots, which not only help them cheat on their assignments and diminish what they have already learned, but have also sent grown adults into delusional spirals and have coached other young people to take their own lives. Lower Merion students do this and more at all hours of the day: on the bus, in class, at lunch, and during breaks, and also at home, late into the night, when their parents think they are doing homework.

The complaint, with exhibits, can be found there https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fedtech.law%2Fwp-content%2F...

The link to the complaints is also at the bottom of the article

Submission + - Road trip comparison - EV, hybrid, and gas (caranddriver.com)

Submitted by sinij
sinij writes:

Each car mostly followed the same route, but different lunch breaks and bathroom stops resulted in slightly different distances traveled. The Tesla covered 752 miles and consumed 243 kWh with four DC charging stops and two AC visits. Its total electricity bill was $85.70, or 11 cents per mile.

The Jetta GLI stayed closest to the highway for stops, making its total distance the shortest at 737 miles. It consumed 24.1 gallons of premium at a rate of 31 mpg, resulting in a $129.98 tab.

I found it surprising that for 700 mile trip EV was only cheaper by 44 dollars.

Submission + - US Military Disables Ad Trackers on Devices to Protect Troops (reuters.com) 1

Submitted by DeanonymizedCoward
DeanonymizedCoward writes: Reuters reports that the US Military is disabling ad tracking on devices, to prevent adversaries from buying publicly-available tracking data to assist in targeting troops. Military officials say that they have disabled trackers on a variety of computers and mobile devices, according to letters released on Friday by Sen. Ron Wyden, and following reports that commercially-available tracking data has been used to target troops in the Middle East.

This effort comes amid attempts by the military to impose tighter restrictions on use of personal devices in the field, and after it was reported that videos posted publicly by troops abroad have also been used by adversaries to target military facilities.

Wyden said in a statement that it was clear that the military's efforts "have not been effective at neutralizing this threat." U.S. Representative Pat Harrigan, a North Carolina Republican, said that U.S. enemies "should not be able to pull out a credit card and buy information that helps them track American troops."

Rep. Harrigan remains silent as to the larger question of whether the general public should be able to pull out a credit card and buy information that helps them track anyone they please.

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