Month: August 2024
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String Theorists Accidentally Find a New Formula for Pi
[…] most recently in January 2024, when physicists Arnab Priya Saha and Aninda Sinha of the Indian Institute of Science presented a completely new formula for calculating it, which they later published in Physical Review Letters. Saha and Sinha are not mathematicians. They were not even looking for a novel pi equation. Rather, these two…
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These robots move through the magic of mushrooms
Researchers at Cornell University tapped into fungal mycelia to power a pair of proof-of-concept robots. Mycelia, the underground fungal network that can sprout mushrooms as its above-ground fruit, can sense light and chemical reactions and communicate through electrical signals. This makes it a novel component in hybrid robotics that could someday detect crop conditions otherwise…
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PLAUD NotePin: A Wearable AI Memory Capsule that just might work
So this is a pin a bit larger than an AA battery which does one thing: it transcribes your musings and makes notes. Where does the AI come in? Speech and speaker recognition, audio trimming, summarisation and mind-maps. You see a lot of doubtful reviews on this thing out there, mostly on the basis of…
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Appliance and Tractor Companies Lobby Against Giving the Military the Right to Repair, which apparently you can’t do to stuff that sees combat – well done capitalsim
Lobbying groups across most of the device manufacturing industry—from tractor manufacturers to companies that make fridges, consumer devices, motorcycles, and medical equipment—are lobbying against legislation that would require military contractors to make it easier for the U.S. military to fix the equipment they buy, according to a document obtained by 404 Media. The anti-repair lobbying…
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Mozilla removes telemetry service Adjust from mobile Firefox versions – it was spying on you secretly it turns out
Mozilla will soon remove its telemetry service Adjust from the Android and iOS versions of browsers Firefox and Firefox Focus. It appeared that the developer was collecting data on the effectiveness of Firefox ad campaigns without disclosing that. Mozilla, the developers of Firefox, until recently used the telemetry service Adjust to collect data from its…
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Synology Release DSM 7.2.2 Removes a LOT of features. Think hard about upgrading.
It’s not an update, it’s a destroyer of functionality Removal of Video Station Support: The update no longer supports Video Station, which has upset users who rely on this feature for media management and playback. Incompatibility with Plex: The DSM 7.2.2 update has caused issues with Plex, requiring users to update to a new version…
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Australian Regulators Decide To Write A Strongly Worded Letter About Clearview’s Privacy Law Violations, leave it at that
Clearview’s status as an international pariah really hasn’t changed much over the past few years. It may be generating fewer headlines, but nothing’s really changed about the way it does business. Clearview has spent years scraping the web, compiling as much personal info as possible to couple with the billions of photos it has collected.…
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Revolutionary Quantum Compass Could Soon Make GPS-Free Navigation a Reality
[…] researchers from Sandia National Laboratories have used silicon photonic microchip components to perform a quantum sensing technique called atom interferometry, an ultra-precise way of measuring acceleration. It is the latest milestone toward developing a kind of quantum compass for navigation when GPS signals are unavailable. Sandia National Laboratories scientist Jongmin Lee, left, prepares a…
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Dutch officials fine Uber €290M for GDPR violations
Privacy authorities in the Netherlands have imposed a €290 million ($324 million) fine on ride-share giant Uber for sending driver data to servers in the United States – “a serious violation” of the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). According to the Dutch Data Protection Authority (DPA), Uber spent years sending sensitive driver information from…
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Telegram CEO Pavel Durov’s Arrest Upends Kremlin Military Communications
Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov was arrested Saturday night by French authorities on allegations that his social media platform was being used for child pornography, drug trafficking and organized crime. The move sparked debate over free speech worldwide from prominent anti-censorship figures including Elon Musk, Robert F. Kennedy. Jr. and Edward Snowden. However, “the…
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Spike mutations make it even easier for SARS-CoV-2 infect the brain
Scientists have discovered a mutation in SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, that plays a key role in its ability to infect the central nervous system. The findings may help scientists understand its neurological symptoms and the mystery of “long COVID,” and they could one day even lead to specific treatments to protect and clear…
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‘Bees starving’ in disastrous year for French honey
Beekeepers across France say it has been a disastrous year for honey, with bees starving to death and production plummeting by up to 80 percent. Mickael Isambert, a beekeeper in Saint-Ours-les-Roches in central France, lost 70 percent of his honey and had to feed his colonies sugar to help them survive after a cold, rainy…
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Strength training activates cellular waste disposal
The elimination of damaged cell components is essential for the maintenance of the body’s tissues and organs. An international research team led by the University of Bonn has made significant findings on mechanisms for the clearing of cellular wastes, showing that strength training activates such mechanisms. The findings could form the basis for new therapies…
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WTF! Telegram messaging app CEO Durov arrested in France
PARIS, Aug 24 (Reuters) – Pavel Durov, the Russian-French billionaire founder and CEO of the Telegram messaging app, was arrested at Bourget airport outside Paris on Saturday evening, TF1 TV and BFM TV said, citing unidentified sources. Durov was travelling aboard his private jet, TF1 said on its website, adding he had been targeted by…
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Good sleep habits important for overweight adults, different effects for men and women
New research from Oregon Health & Science University reveals negative health consequences for people who are overweight and ignore their body’s signals to sleep at night, with specific differences between men and women. The study published this week in The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism. “This study builds support for the importance of good…
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SolarWinds left hardcoded credentials in helpdesk product
SolarWinds left hardcoded credentials in its Web Help Desk product that can be used by remote, unauthenticated attackers to log into vulnerable instances, access internal functionality, and modify sensitive data The software maker has now issued an update to address that critical oversight; its users are encouraged to install the fix, which presumably removes the…
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World-first lung mRNA cancer vaccine trials launched across seven countries
Doctors have begun trialling the world’s first mRNA lung cancer vaccine in patients, as experts hailed its “groundbreaking” potential to save thousands of lives. Lung cancer is the world’s leading cause of cancer death, accounting for about 1.8m deaths every year. Survival rates in those with advanced forms of the disease, where tumours have spread,…
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Google is shoving its apps onto new Windows laptops
Google is making a new desktop app called Essentials that packages a few Google services, like Messages and Photos, and includes links to download many others. The app will be included with many new Windows laptops, with the first ones coming from HP. […] The Essentials app lets you “discover and install many of our…
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Microplastics are infiltrating brain tissue, studies show
[…] The paper also found the quantity of microplastics in brain samples from 2024 was about 50% higher from the total in samples that date to 2016, suggesting the concentration of microplastics found in human brains is rising at a similar rate to that found in the environment. Most of the organs came from the…
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Peloton to charge $95 activation fee for used bikes
Peloton on Thursday said it will start charging new subscribers a one-time $95 activation fee if they bought their hardware on the secondary market as more consumers snag lightly used equipment for a fraction of the typical retail price. […] During its fiscal fourth quarter, which ended June 30, Peloton said it saw a “steady…
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Study of 18 million people finds increased mental illnesses incidence following severe COVID-19, especially in unvaccinated people
A new study that examined health data on 18 million people reveals higher incidence of mental illnesses for up to a year following severe COVID-19 in unvaccinated people. Vaccination appeared to mitigate the adverse effects of COVID-19 on mental illnesses. The University of Bristol-led study, published in JAMA Psychiatry today [21 August], investigated associations of…
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For first time, DNA tech offers both data storage and computing functions
Researchers from North Carolina State University and Johns Hopkins University have demonstrated a technology capable of a suite of data storage and computing functions—repeatedly storing, retrieving, computing, erasing or rewriting data—that uses DNA rather than conventional electronics. Previous DNA data storage and computing technologies could complete some but not all of these tasks. The paper,…
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Study explains why laws are written in an incomprehensible style
Legal documents are notoriously difficult to understand, even for lawyers. This raises the question: Why are these documents written in a style that makes them so impenetrable? MIT cognitive scientists believe they have uncovered the answer to that question. Just as “magic spells” use special rhymes and archaic terms to signal their power, the convoluted…
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Florida data broker NPD says it was ransacked by cyber-thieves
A Florida firm has all but confirmed that millions of people’s sensitive personal info was stolen from it by cybercriminals and publicly leaked. That information, totaling billions of records, includes the names, Social Security numbers, physical and email addresses, and phone numbers of folks in the United States, UK, and Canada. It’s the sort of…
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Bicycles Can Be Hacked Easily Now
[…] New research suggests that certain brands of bike parts have vulnerabilities that could allow them to be remotely compromised during competitions. The research was unveiled this week at the Usenix Workshop on Offensive Technologies by researchers from Northeastern University and UC San Diego. In their paper, researchers note that, much like modern cars, today’s…
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