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Comment Re: We're in the group (Score 1) 153

by JustAnotherOldGuy (#65810731) Attached to: Homeschooling Hits Record Numbers

Therefore, someone choosing to homeschool their child isn't reducing the amount of school funding in the pool. No one is getting a tax credit for homeschooling.

Yeah, and I never said they weren't. I've no idea where you came up with that.

My point is that it costs real money to provide a quality education (public or private) and a lot of people aren't okay with that fact.

"Education is expensive but the cost pales in comparison to ignorance."

Anyway, better luck reading more carefully next time and have a wonderful day.

Comment Features? How about losing the bottom bar? (Score 1) 39

A Windows 11 VM that I manage went through an update cycle and, when it was finally finished, the bottom bar was missing.

Like just about all Windows issues, I had to spend a long time googling solutions and trying them, before I eventually landed on the correct solution. I tend to avoid those tiresome Youtube videos that take 10 minutes to tell you that: 1. Their solution is simple and will work, 2, don't forget to subscribe, while failing to acknowledge that there might be other causes for the failure that you have experienced.

Surprisingly, the solution came in an AI answer with the right set of search terms. In my experience, the hit rate for accuracy of AI searches is poor, but this time, it worked!

Comment Let's be honest (Score 1) 153

by JustAnotherOldGuy (#65810083) Attached to: Homeschooling Hits Record Numbers

Let's be honest- the vast, VAST majority of parents aren't remotely qualified to be a 'teacher'.

Teaching is a complex skill, which is why people go to COLLEGE and get a DEGREE to be able to do it professionally.

I know a LOT of parents, including some pretty smart ones, and most of them wouldn't be able to do a credible job of homeschooling a child. Again, teaching is a learned skill, not something you dabble in. It's not something anyone can just pick up and start doing.

Homeschooling has produced a lot of simpletons who don't know jack shit, but who've still managed to claw a GED out of the school system.

I would clamp down on homeschooling and test the parents comprehensively to make certain that they can actually teach, not just read out of a book or do some canned exercises.

But hey, if you want to raise a country full of dopes who don't know fuck all, homeschooling by the average parent is the way to go.

Submission + - Newest Starship booster is significantly damaged during testing early Friday (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: During the pre-dawn hours in South Texas on Friday morning, SpaceX’s next-generation Starship first stage suffered some sort of major damage during pre-launch testing.

The company had only rolled the massive rocket out of the factory a day earlier, noting the beginning of its test campaign said on the social media site X: “The first operations will test the booster’s redesigned propellant systems and its structural strength.”

That testing commenced on Thursday night at the Massey’s Test Site, a couple of miles down the road from the company’s main production site at Starbase Texas. However an independent video showed the rocket’s lower half undergo an explosive (or possibly implosive) event at 4:04 am CT (10:04 UTC) Friday.

Post-incident images showed significant damage, perhaps a crumpling of sorts, to the lower half of the booster where the vehicle’s large liquid oxygen tank is housed. Neither SpaceX, nor company founder Elon Musk, had commented on the failure within a couple of hours of its occurrence on Friday morning.

The likely loss of this vehicle, “Booster 18,” is significant for SpaceX. Although the company is hardware rich—indeed it has built a massive factory in South Texas to churn out such vehicles—it nonetheless had a lot riding on this rocket. This is the first Starship Version 3, which was intended to have many design fixes and upgrades from the previous iterations of Starship vehicles to improve the reliability and performance of the massive rocket.

Submission + - AI Caught in a Lie: a Corrective Conversation with Perplexity AI (wordpress.com)

Submitted by Mirnotoriety
Mirnotoriety writes: “Recently I uploaded a large data set to Perplexity AI, trying to find some commonalities across nearly 700 pieces of data. Perplexity AI replied that “syringes” was an important commonality, and provided one page of analysis on that point.”

‘My issue? The word “syringes” and anything related to medical terminology did not appear in my document.’

Submission + - Border Patrol monitors drivers, detains those with 'suspicious' travel patterns (apnews.com)

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: The U.S. Border Patrol is monitoring millions of American drivers nationwide in a secretive program to identify and detain people whose travel patterns it deems suspicious, The Associated Press has found.

The predictive intelligence program has resulted in people being stopped, searched and in some cases arrested. A network of cameras scans and records vehicle license plate information, and an algorithm flags vehicles deemed suspicious based on where they came from, where they were going and which route they took. Federal agents in turn may then flag local law enforcement.

Suddenly, drivers find themselves pulled over — often for reasons cited such as speeding, failure to signal, the wrong window tint or even a dangling air freshener blocking the view. They are then aggressively questioned and searched, with no inkling that the roads they drove put them on law enforcement’s radar.

Once limited to policing the nation’s boundaries, the Border Patrol has built a surveillance system stretching into the country’s interior that can monitor ordinary Americans’ daily actions and connections for anomalies instead of simply targeting wanted suspects. Started about a decade ago to fight illegal border-related activities and the trafficking of both drugs and people, it has expanded over the past five years.

Submission + - Nano Banana Pro Uses Gemini 3 Power To Generate More Realistic AI Images (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Google’s meme-friendly Nano Banana image-generation model is getting an upgrade. The new Nano Banana Pro is rolling out with improved reasoning and instruction following, giving users the ability to create more accurate images with legible text and make precise edits to existing images. It’s available to everyone in the Gemini app, but free users will find themselves up against the usage limits pretty quickly. Nano Banana Pro is part of the newly launched Gemini 3 Pro—it’s actually called Gemini 3 Pro Image in the same way the original is Gemini 2.5 Flash Image, but Google is sticking with the meme-y name. You can access it by selecting Gemini 3 Pro and then turning on the “Create images” option.

Google says the new model can follow complex prompts to create more accurate images. The model is apparently so capable that it can generate an entire usable infographic in a single shot with no weird AI squiggles in place of words. Nano Banana Pro is also better at maintaining consistency in images. You can blend up to 14 images with this tool, and it can maintain the appearance of up to five people in outputs. Google also promises better editing. You can refine your AI images or provide Nano Banana Pro with a photo and make localized edits without as many AI glitches. It can even change core elements of the image like camera angles, color grading, and lighting without altering other elements. Google is pushing the professional use angle with its new model, which has much-improved resolution options. Your creations in Nano Banana Pro can be rendered at up to 4K.

Submission + - U.S. employee well-being hit new low in 2024, survey reveals (phys.org)

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: The latest research confirms a decline in general employee well-being since 2020. In 2024, employees reported the lowest well-being scores on record, as opposed to 2020, when employees reported the highest well-being scores.

"In some cases, the lower scores represent a reduction in employee flexibility for either flexible hours or remote work," the latest research states. "In other cases, these scores could be related to challenges associated with greater economic shifts related to inflation or productivity needs."

"What we're seeing is a growing gap between how leaders and their teams experience the workplace," said Smith. "Managers may feel a return to normalcy, but that doesn't mean their employees do. Leaders must be cautious not to assume their own well-being reflects the broader workforce at their organization. The data shows a potential disconnect, and that's a signal for action."

Submission + - U.S. employee well-being hit new low in 2024, survey reveals (phys.org)

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: The latest research confirms a decline in general employee well-being since 2020. In 2024, employees reported the lowest well-being scores on record, as opposed to 2020, when employees reported the highest well-being scores.

"In some cases, the lower scores represent a reduction in employee flexibility for either flexible hours or remote work," the latest research states. "In other cases, these scores could be related to challenges associated with greater economic shifts related to inflation or productivity needs."

"What we're seeing is a growing gap between how leaders and their teams experience the workplace," said Smith. "Managers may feel a return to normalcy, but that doesn't mean their employees do. Leaders must be cautious not to assume their own well-being reflects the broader workforce at their organization. The data shows a potential disconnect, and that's a signal for action."

Submission + - OnlyFans Institutes Criminal Background Checks for US Creators (xbiz.com)

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: OnlyFans will screen creators in the United States for criminal convictions, CEO Keily Blair has announced in a post on LinkedIn.

“I am very proud to add our partnership with Checkr Trust to our onboarding process in the US,” Blair writes. “Checkr, Inc. helps OnlyFans to prevent people who have a criminal conviction that may impact our community's safety from signing up as a Creator on OnlyFans.”

Checkr is a screening service that bills itself as delivering “instant criminal and public record checks covering 99% of the U.S. population.” The company lists Uber, Instacart, DoorDash and Netflix among its clients.

Submission + - Moss spores survive 9 months outside International Space Station (phys.org)

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: To find out, Fujita's team subjected Physcomitrium patens, a well-studied moss commonly known as spreading earthmoss, to a simulated a space environment, including high levels of UV radiation, extreme high and low temperatures, and vacuum conditions.

They tested three different structures from the moss—protenemata, or juvenile moss; brood cells, or specialized stem cells that emerge under stress conditions; and sporophytes, or encapsulated spores—to find out which had the best chance of surviving in space.

The researchers found that UV radiation was the toughest element to survive, and the sporophytes were by far the most resilient of the three moss parts. None of the juvenile moss survived high UV levels or extreme temperatures. The brood cells had a higher rate of survival, but the encased spores exhibited ~1,000x more tolerance to UV radiation. The spores were also able to survive and germinate after being exposed to 196C for over a week, as well as after living in 55C heat for a month.

Submission + - Moss spores survive 9 months outside International Space Station (phys.org)

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: To find out, Fujita's team subjected Physcomitrium patens, a well-studied moss commonly known as spreading earthmoss, to a simulated a space environment, including high levels of UV radiation, extreme high and low temperatures, and vacuum conditions.

They tested three different structures from the moss—protenemata, or juvenile moss; brood cells, or specialized stem cells that emerge under stress conditions; and sporophytes, or encapsulated spores—to find out which had the best chance of surviving in space.

The researchers found that UV radiation was the toughest element to survive, and the sporophytes were by far the most resilient of the three moss parts. None of the juvenile moss survived high UV levels or extreme temperatures. The brood cells had a higher rate of survival, but the encased spores exhibited ~1,000x more tolerance to UV radiation. The spores were also able to survive and germinate after being exposed to 196C for over a week, as well as after living in 55C heat for a month.

Submission + - Misinformation investigation leads to a Google algorithm fix (pickr.com.au)

Submitted by Leighlo
Leighlo writes: Hey Slashdot team, thought you'd be interested in a piece I wrote following an investigation into misinformation and disinformation rising to the top of Google and its AI overviews in Australia. Essentially, someone is buying up old domains and running fake articles, which in turn is tricking and manipulating Google, and just about every search and AI engine.

I gave my findings to Google, and a good week or so later, it is applying fixes.

Submission + - White House Prepares Executive Order To Block State AI Laws (politico.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The White House is preparing to issue an executive order as soon as Friday that tells the Department of Justice and other federal agencies to prevent states from regulating artificial intelligence, according to four people familiar with the matter and a leaked draft of the order obtained by POLITICO. The draft document, confirmed as authentic by three people familiar with the matter, would create an “AI Litigation Task Force” at the DOJ whose “sole responsibility” would be to challenge state AI laws.

Government lawyers would be directed to challenge state laws on the grounds that they unconstitutionally regulate interstate commerce, are preempted by existing federal regulations or otherwise at the attorney general’s discretion. The task force would consult with administration officials, including the special adviser for AI and crypto — a role currently occupied by tech investor David Sacks.

The executive order, in the draft obtained by POLITICO, would also empower Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick to publish a review of “onerous” state AI laws within 90 days and restrict federal broadband funds to states whose AI laws are found to be objectionable. It would direct the Federal Trade Commission to investigate whether state AI laws that “require alterations to the truthful outputs of AI models” are blocked by the FTC Act. And it would order the Federal Communications Commission to begin work on a reporting and disclosure standard for AI models that would preempt conflicting state laws.

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