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Submission + - A Talking Robot Guide Dog Could Change How Visually Impaired People Navigate (studyfinds.com) 1

Submitted by fjo3
fjo3 writes: What if you could ask your guide dog where the nearest water fountain is and hear it answer back, complete with directions and an estimated walk time? Researchers at the State University of New York at Binghamton have built a robotic guide dog that can do something close to that, holding simple back-and-forth conversations about navigation with its handler, describing the surrounding environment, and talking through route options as it leads the way.

Real guide dogs are incredible companions, but they can only respond to a handful of short commands like “forward” or “left.” They can’t tell a person what’s around them or explain that reaching the kitchen means passing through two doors. And the supply problem is staggering: only about 2% of visually impaired people in the United States use guide dogs, partly because breeding and training takes years and fewer than half the dogs in training actually graduate. In China, the gap is even wider, with roughly 400 guide dogs serving more than 10 million visually impaired people.

Submission + - The secret, never-before-used CIA tool that helped find airman downed in Iran (nypost.com)

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: The CIA used a futuristic new tool called âoeGhost Murmurâ to find and rescue the second American airman who was shot down in southern Iran, The Post has learned.

The secret technology uses long-range quantum magnetometry to find the electromagnetic fingerprint of a human heartbeat and pairs the data with artificial intelligence software to isolate the signature from background noise, two sources close to the breakthrough said.

Submission + - Google tells Wear OS developers to go 64-bit or get blocked from the Play Store (nerds.xyz)

Submitted by BrianFagioli
BrianFagioli writes: Google is pushing the smartwatch ecosystem further toward 64-bit. Starting September 15, 2026, Wear OS apps that include native code will need to ship both 32-bit and 64-bit versions or updates will be blocked from the Play Console. Existing 32-bit watches will still get compatible apps, so this mostly affects developers submitting new builds. For many apps written in Kotlin or Java the change may not require code updates, but developers still need to check their APKs since third party SDKs can quietly introduce native libraries. In other words, if you build for Wear OS, it is time to double check those binaries before the deadline hits.

Submission + - Why It's Good to [Masturbate] Frequently, According to Science (404media.co) 1

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: Regular ejaculation — for example, by masturbation — produces higher quality sperm, a finding that has implications for fertility science and assisted reproductive technologies, according to a comprehensive new study published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

It’s well-established that sperm quality in many animals can deteriorate as males age, but less is known about how the age of sperm cells independently impacts reproductive outcomes. To fill in this gap, scientists co-led by Krish Sanghvi and Rebecca Dean of the University of Oxford conducted a meta-analysis of more than 115 studies about human sperm storage that cumulatively involved nearly 55,000 men, as well as 56 studies of 30 non-human species.

Submission + - grandma put in jail because of "AI" hallucinations "trying to rebuild her life" (theguardian.com)

Submitted by Mr. Dollar Ton
Mr. Dollar Ton writes: Angela Lipps, 50, spent nearly six months in jail after Fargo police identified her as a suspect in an organized bank fraud case using facial recognition software, according to south-east North Dakota news outlet InForum. Lipps told the outlet she had never been to North Dakota and did not commit the crimes.

Lipps is now back home but says the experience has had lasting consequences. While jailed and unable to pay bills, Lipps lost her home, her car and her dog, she said. She also told WDAY News no one from the Fargo police department had apologized.

This isn't the first time "AI" and lazy police together have put innocent people away, concludes the article.

Submission + - Has Slashdot Become More Ads Than "News for Nerds, Stuff That Matters"? 2

Submitted by FictionPimp
FictionPimp writes: Load Slashdot's front page today without an ad blocker and count what you see before scrolling.

Above the fold, there are 6 distinct ad placements: a full-width Retool banner just below the navigation, a MongoDB Atlas inline banner styled to look like a site notice sitting directly above the first story, two sidebar ad units (one for a game dev course bundle, one for business software comparison), a "Sponsored Content" slot beginning to appear at the bottom edge, and a sticky MongoDB footer bar fixed to the bottom of the screen. MongoDB alone holds two simultaneous placements on the same page load. The ratio is 6 ads to 2 stories before you even scroll.

Slashdot has carried the tagline "News for nerds, stuff that matters" since Rob Malda was running the site out of a college dorm in 1997. It is now owned by Slashdot Media, the same parent as SourceForge, and the nav bar includes a "Thought Leadership" section, which is industry parlance for paid editorial content.

None of this is unique to Slashdot. Display advertising is how independent tech publications survive. But there is a meaningful difference between ads that share a page with content and ads that outnumber and surround the content, with some of them actively designed to look like part of the editorial feed.

The question for the Slashdot community: at what point does the original promise of the site, a curated community-moderated signal in a noisy web, get buried under the noise it was supposed to filter? Should the site be rebranded: "Ads for Nerds, News if we can fit it in"?

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