Asus has introduced the Fragrance Mouse, a hybrid wireless mouse that features a removable container for fragrance oils. Despite not being a gaming mouse, it includes premium features like PTFE pads, low-noise clicks rated for up to 10 million presses, and three fixed DPI settings (1200, 1600, 2400). Tom's Hardware reports: The selling point of the new mouse is its fragrance-producing capabilities. Under the mouse (right behind the AA battery housing) is a small semi-translucent container designed to house oils that give the mouse a pleasing aroma. There's no limit to what scents can be used; the container can be washed and refilled with different scents. Last year, the peripheral maker debuted an aroma-dispensing laptop that featured a fragrance dispenser at the center of the lid.

WinRAR 7.10 now lets users remove potentially sensitive metadata from downloaded files while preserving core Windows security features. The file compression tool's latest release introduces a "Zone value only" setting that strips download locations and IP addresses from Windows' Mark-of-the-Web security flags during file extraction.

The new privacy control, enabled by default, maintains only the basic security zone identifier that triggers Windows' safety prompts for downloaded files. This change prevents recipients of shared archives from accessing metadata that could reveal where files originated. The update from win.rar GmbH, whose compression software claims 500 million users worldwide, also adds performance improvements through larger memory page support and introduces a dark mode interface.

Apple has launched the iPhone 16E, featuring a 6.1-inch OLED display, Face ID, an A18 chipset, USB-C, 48MP camera, and support for Apple Intelligence. Gone but not forgotten: the home button, Touch ID and 64GB of base storage. The Verge reports: The 16E includes the customizable Action Button, but not the new Camera Control you'll find on the 16 series. It does swap its Lightning port for USB-C, now a requirement for the phone to be sold in the EU. On the inside, there's an A18 chipset, the same chip as the iPhone 16. That makes the 16E powerful enough to run Apple Intelligence, the suite of AI tools that includes notification summaries. Even the non-Pro iPhone 15 can't do that, so the 16E is one of the most capable iPhones out there. Apple has previously confirmed that 8GB RAM was the minimum to get Apple Intelligence support in the iPhone 16 series, so it's likely that the 16E also boasts at least that much memory. It's also been bumped to a baseline of 128GB of storage, meaning there's no longer a 64GB iPhone.

There's only a single 48-megapixel rear camera; the lack of additional cameras is the biggest downgrade compared to the company's other handsets. With support for wireless charging and a water-resistant IP rating, there's little you have to give up elsewhere. The iPhone 16E is also the first iPhone to include a modem developed by Apple itself. The company has spent years trying to move away from modems developed by Qualcomm, and we're finally seeing the fruits of that labor. The big questions now are how well the new modem performs and whether Apple is ready to roll out its own connectivity components in the iPhone 17 line later this year. It's available for Friday starting at $599 with 128GB of storage.

Microsoft is reminding IT administrators that WSUS driver synchronization will be deprecated on April 18, 2025, urging them to transition to cloud-based update solutions like Windows Autopatch, Azure Update Manager, and Microsoft Intune. "For on-premises contexts, drivers will be available on the Microsoft Update catalog, but you won't be able to import them into WSUS," the company said in a Windows message center update on Tuesday. "You'll need to use any of the available alternative solutions, such as Device Driver Packages, or transition to cloud-based driver services for your organization, such as Microsoft Intune and Windows Autopatch." BleepingComputer reports: This reminder follows two other warnings issued since June 2024, announcing the deprecation of WSUS driver synchronization and encouraging customers to adopt Redmond's newer cloud-based driver services. The company also revealed in September 2024 that WSUS had been deprecated, but Microsoft added that it plans to keep publishing updates through the channel and maintain all existing capabilities. This announcement came after WSUS was listed on August 13 as one of the "features removed or no longer developed starting with Windows Server 2025."

"Specifically, this means that we are no longer investing in new capabilities, nor are we accepting new feature requests for WSUS," Microsoft's Nir Froimovici said at the time. "However, we are preserving current functionality and will continue to publish updates through the WSUS channel. We will also support any content already published through the WSUS channel."

Former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati has launched Thinking Machines Lab with several leaders from OpenAI on board, including John Schulman, Barrett Zoph, and Jonathan Lachman. Their mission is "to make AI systems more widely understood, customizable, and generally capable," with a commitment to publishing technical research and code. The Verge reports: In a press release shared with The Verge, the company suggests that it's building products that help humans work with AI, rather than fully autonomous systems. "We're building a future where everyone has access to the knowledge and tools to make AI work for their unique needs and goals," says the press release.

PAjamian writes: Two years ago Red Hat announced an end to its public source code availability. This caused a great deal of outcry from the Enterprise Linux community at large. Since then many have waited for a statement from the Free Software Foundation concerning their stance on the matter. Now, nearly two years later the FSF has finally responded to questions regarding their stance on the issue with the following statement:

When asked if the FSF would be willing to intervene on behalf of the community they had this to say:

Following is the full text of my original email to them and their response:

Subject: Statement about recent changes in source code distribution for Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Date: 2023-07-16 00:39:51

> Hi,
>
> I'm a user of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Rocky Linux and other Linux
> distributions in the RHEL ecosystem. I am also involved in the EL
> (Enterprise Linux) community which is being affected by the statements
> and changes in policy made by Red Hat at
> https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/furthering-evolution-centos-stream and
> https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/red-hats-commitment-open-source-
> response-gitcentosorg-changes
> (note there are many many more links and posts about this issue which
> I
> believe you are likely already aware of). While a few of these
> questions are answered more directly by the license FAQ some of them
> are
> not and there are a not insignificant number of people who would very
> much appreciate a public statement from the FSF that answers these
> questions directly.
>
> Can you please comment or release a statement about the Free Software
> Foundation's position on this issue? Specifically:
>

Thank you for writing in with your questions. My apologies for the delay, but we are a small team with limited resources and can be challenging keeping up with all the emails we receive.

Generally, we don't agree with what Red Hat is doing. Whether it constitutes a violation of the GPL would require legal analysis and the FSF does not give legal advice. However, as the stewards of the GNU GPL we can speak how it is intended to be applied and Red Hat's approach is certainly contrary to the spirit of the GPL. This is unfortunate, because we would expect such flagship organizations to drive the movement forward.

> Is Red Hat's removal of sources from git.centos.org a violation of the
> GPL and various other Free Software licenses for the various programs
> distributed under RHEL?
>
> Is Red Hat's distribution of source RPMs to their customers under
> their
> subscriber agreement sufficient to satisfy the above mentioned
> licenses?
>
> Is it a violation if Red Hat terminates a subscription early because
> their customer exercised their rights under the GPL and other Free
> Software licenses to redistribute the RHEL sources or create
> derivative
> works from them?
>
> Is it a violation if Red Hat refuses to renew a subscription that has
> expired because a customer exercised their rights to redistribute or
> create derivative works?
>
> A number of the programs distributed with RHEL are copyrighted by the
> FSF, some examples being bash, emacs, GNU core utilities, gcc, gnupg
> and
> glibc. Given that the FSF has standing to act in this matter would
> the
> FSF be willing to intervene on behalf of the community in order to get
> Red Hat to correct any of the above issues?
>

As of today, we are not aware of any issue with Red Hat's new policy that we could pursue on legal grounds. However, if you do find a violation, please [follow these instructions][0] and send a report to <license-violation@gnu.org>.

[0]: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-violation.html

If you are interested in something more specific on this, the Software Freedom Conservancy [published an article about the RHEL][1] situation and hosted a [panel at their conference in 2023][2]. These cover the situation fairly thoroughly.

[1]: https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2023/jun/23/rhel-gpl-analysis/
[2]: https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2023/jul/19/rhel-panel-fossy-2023/

xAI has launched Grok 3, the latest iteration of its large language model, alongside new capabilities for its iOS and web applications. The model has been trained on approximately 200,000 GPUs in a Memphis data center, representing what CEO Elon Musk claims is a tenfold increase in computing power compared to its predecessor.

The new release introduces two specialized variants: Grok 3 Reasoning and Grok 3 mini Reasoning, designed to methodically analyze problems similar to OpenAI's o3-mini and DeepSeek's R1 models. According to xAI's benchmarks, Grok 3 outperforms GPT-4o on several technical evaluations, including AIME for mathematical reasoning and GPQA for PhD-level science problems.

A notable addition is the DeepSearch feature, which combs through web content and X posts to generate research summaries. The platform will be available through X's Premium+ subscription and a new SuperGrok tier ($30/month or $300/year), with the latter offering enhanced reasoning capabilities and unlimited image generation. To prevent knowledge extraction through model distillation -- a technique recently attributed to DeepSeek's alleged copying of OpenAI's models -- xAI has implemented measures to obscure the reasoning models' thought processes in the Grok app. The company plans to release the Grok 2 model as open source once Grok 3 achieves stability.

SanDisk aims to produce petabyte-scale SSDs through its new UltraQLC platform, though the company has not specified a release timeline. The technology, it said, combines SanDisk's BICS 8 QLC 3D NAND with a proprietary 64-channel controller featuring hardware accelerators that offload storage functions from firmware to reduce latency and improve reliability.

The initial UltraQLC drives will use 2Tb NAND chips to reach 128TB capacities, with future iterations targeting 256TB, 512TB, and eventually 1PB as higher-density NAND becomes available. The controller dynamically adjusts power based on workload and employs an advanced bus multiplexer to handle increased data loads from high-density QLC stacks, the company said.

Bloomberg reports that Apple's long-promised overhaul for Siri "is facing engineering problems and software bugs, threatening to postpone or limit its release, according to people with knowledge of the matter...." Last June, Apple touted three major enhancements coming to Siri:

- the ability to tap into a customer's data to better answer queries and take actions.
- a new system that would let the assistant more precisely control apps.
- the capability to see what's currently on a device's screen and use that context to better serve users....

The goal is to ultimately offer a more versatile Siri that can seamlessly tap into customers' information and communication. For instance, users will be able to ask for a file or song that they discussed with a friend over text. Siri would then automatically retrieve that item. Apple also has demonstrated the ability for Siri to quickly locate someone's driver's license number by reviewing their photos... Inside Apple, many employees testing the new Siri have found that these features don't yet work consistently...

The control enhancements — an upgraded version of something called App Intents — are central to the operation of the company's upcoming smart home hub. That product, an AI device for controlling smart home appliances and FaceTime, is slated for release later this year.
And Amazon is also struggling with an AI upgrade for its digital assistant, reports the Washington Post: The "smarter and more conversational" version of Alexa will not be available until March 31 or later, the employee said, at least a year and a half after it was initially announced in response to competition from OpenAI's ChatGPT. Internal messages seen by The Post confirmed the launch was originally scheduled for this month but was subsequently moved to the end of March... According to internal documents seen by The Post, new features of the subscriber-only, AI-powered Alexa could include the ability to adopt a personality, recall conversations, order takeout or call a taxi. Some of the new Alexa features are similar to Alexa abilities that were previously available free through partnerships with companies like Grubhub and Uber...

The AI-enhanced version of Alexa in development has been repeatedly delayed due to problems with incorrect answers, the employee working on the launch told The Post. As a popular product that is a decade old, the Alexa brand is valuable, and the company is hesitant to risk customer trust by launching a product that is not reliable, the person said.

"Security researchers say the Chinese government-linked hacking group, Salt Typhoon, is continuing to compromise telecommunications providers," reports TechCrunch, "despite the recent sanctions imposed by the U.S. government on the group."

TechRadar reports that the Chinese state-sponsored threat actor is "hitting not just American organizations, but also those from the UK, South Africa, and elsewhere around the world." The latest intrusions were spotted by cybersecurity researchers from Recorded Future, which said the group is targeting internet-exposed web interfaces of Cisco's IOS software that powers different routers and switches. These devices have known vulnerabilities that the threat actors are actively exploiting to gain initial access, root privileges, and more. More than 12,000 Cisco devices were found connected to the wider internet, and exposed to risk, Recorded Future further explained. However, Salt Typhoon is focusing on a "smaller subset" of telecoms and university networks.
"The hackers attempted to exploit vulnerabilities in at least 1,000 Cisco devices," reports NextGov, "allowing them to access higher-level privileges of the hardware and change their configuration settings to allow for persistent access to the networks they're connected on... Over half of the Cisco appliances targeted by Salt Typhoon were located in the U.S., South America and India, with the rest spread across more than 100 countries." Between December and January, the unit, widely known as Salt Typhoon, "possibly targeted" — based on devices that were accessed — offices in the University of California, Los Angeles, California State University, Loyola Marymount University and Utah Tech University, according to a report from cyber threat intelligence firm Recorded Future... The Cisco devices were mainly associated with telecommunications firms, but 13 of them were linked to the universities in the U.S. and some in other nations... "Often involved in cutting-edge research, universities are prime targets for Chinese state-sponsored threat activity groups to acquire valuable research data and intellectual property," said the report, led by the company's Insikt Group, which oversees its threat research.

The cyberspies also compromised Cisco platforms at a U.S.-based affiliate of a prominent United Kingdom telecom operator and a South African provider, both unnamed, the findings added. The hackers also "carried out a reconnaissance of multiple IP addresses" owned by Mytel, a telecom operator based in Myanmar...

"In 2023, Cisco published a security advisory disclosing multiple vulnerabilities in the web UI feature in Cisco IOS XE software," a Cisco spokesperson said in a statement. "We continue to strongly urge customers to follow recommendations outlined in the advisory and upgrade to the available fixed software release."

Last June two NASA astronauts flew to the International Space Station on the first crewed test flight of Boeing's Starliner. But they aren't stranded there, and they weren't abandoned, the astronauts reminded CNN this week in a rare space-to-earth interview: "That's been the rhetoric. That's been the narrative from day one: stranded, abandoned, stuck — and I get it. We both get it," [NASA astronaut Butch] Wilmore said. "But that is, again, not what our human spaceflight program is about. We don't feel abandoned, we don't feel stuck, we don't feel stranded." Wilmore added a request: "If you'll help us change the rhetoric, help us change the narrative. Let's change it to 'prepared and committed.'

"That's what we prefer," he said...

[NASA astronaut Suni] Williams also reiterated a sentiment she has expressed on several occasions, including in interviews conducted before she left Earth. "Butch and I knew this was a test flight," she told CNN's Cooper, acknowledging the pair has been prepared for contingencies and understood that the stay in space might be extended. "We knew that we would probably find some things (wrong with Starliner) and we found some stuff, and so that was not a surprise," she said.
When Cooper opened the interview by asking the astronauts how they're doing, Williams answers "We're doing pretty darn good, actually," pointing out they had plenty of food and great crew members. And Wilmore added that crews come to the space station on a careful cycle, and "to alter that cycle sends ripple effects all the way down the chain. We would never expect to come back just special for us or anyone unless it was a medical issue or something really out of the circumstances along those lines. So we need to come back and keep the normal cycle going..."

CNN's article notes a new announcement from NASA Tuesday that the astronauts might return a couple weeks early "after opting to change the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule it will use." That mission's targeted launch date is now March 12.

In the meantime, Williams says in the interview, "We do have some internet connection up here, so we can get some internet live. We've gotten football. It's been this crew's go-to this past fall. Also YouTube or something like that. It's not continuous — it has chunks of time that we get it. And we use that same system also to make phone calls home, so we can talk to our families, and do videoconferences even on the weekends as well. This place is a pretty nice place to live, for the most part."

And they're also "working on with folks on the ground" to test the NASA's cube-shaped, free-flying robotic Astrobees.

Elon Musk said Thursday his AI startup xAI will release Grok 3, a new chatbot he claims surpasses existing AI models, within two weeks. Speaking at Dubai's World Governments Summit, Musk cited internal testing showing superior reasoning capabilities compared to current AI systems.

The announcement comes days after a Musk-led investor group offered $97.4 billion to acquire OpenAI's nonprofit assets. Musk, who co-founded OpenAI before starting rival xAI, is suing to block the AI company's planned transition to a for-profit structure, arguing it contradicts its original mission. "I think the evidence is there in that OpenAI has gotten this far while having at least a sort of dual profit, non-profit role. What they're trying to do now is to completely delete the non-profit, and that seems really going too far," he added.

Convicted Theranos founder, Elizabeth Holmes, had her first interview since being reported to prison in 2023, telling People magazine that she is still working on "research and inventions" in the healthcare space. Here's an excerpt from the article: Scheduled for release on April 3, 2032, Holmes says she hopes to travel with her family and to fight for reform of criminal justice system. She recently drafted an American Freedom Act bill -- a seven-page handwritten document -- to bolster the presumption of innocence and change criminal procedure. "This will be my life's work," says Holmes, adding that she is speaking out now as part of her mission to advocate on behalf of incarcerated persons and those ripped away from their children.

And, despite her global reputation as a biotech con artist who put lives at risk, she says she's continuing to write patents for new inventions and plans to resume her career in healthcare technology after her release. "There is not a day I have not continued to work on my research and inventions," she says. "I remain completely committed to my dream of making affordable healthcare solutions available to everyone."

For now, however, she is sustained by weekend visits from her family, when she can cuddle Invicta, watch William gather acorns in the prison yard and hold Evans's hand and briefly hug and kiss. (Conjugal visits are not allowed.) "It kills me to put my family through pain the way I do," she says. "But when I look back on my life, and these angels that have come into it, I can get through anything. It makes me want to fight for all of it."

Longtime Slashdot reader BrendaEM writes: Command-line aside, Cinnamon is the most effective keeper of the Linux desktop flame -- by not abandoning desktop and laptop computers. Yes, there are other desktop GUIs, such as MATE, and the lightweight Xfce, which are valuable options when low overhead is important, such as in LinuxCNC. However, among the general public lies a great expanse of office workers who need a full-featured Linux desktop.

The programmers who work on GNOME and its family of supporting applications enrich many other desktops do their more than their share. These faithful developers deserve better user-interface leadership. GNOME has tried to steer itself into tablet waters, which is admirable, but GNOME 3.x diminished the desktop experience for both laptop and desktop users. For instance, the moment you design what should be a graphical user interface with words such as "Activities," you ask people to change horses midstream. That is not to say that the command line and GUI cannot coexist -- because they can, as they do in many CAD programs.

I remember a time when GNOME ruled the Linux desktop -- and I can remember when GNOME left those users behind. Perhaps in a future, GNOME could return to the Linux desktop and join forces with Cinnamon -- so that we may once again have the year of the Linux desktop.

Longtime Slashdot reader theodp writes: Monday brought chilling news reports of the all-count trial convictions of three individuals for a conspiracy to rob and drug people outside of LGBTQ+ nightclubs in Manhattan's Hell's Kitchen neighborhood, which led to the deaths of two of their victims. The defendants were found guilty on all 24 counts, which included murder, robbery, burglary, and conspiracy. "As proven at trial," explained the Manhattan District Attorney's Office in a press release, "the defendants lurked outside of nightclubs to exploit intoxicated individuals. They would give them drugs, laced with fentanyl, to incapacitate their victims so they could take the victims' phones and drain their online financial accounts [including unauthorized charges and transfers using Cash App, Apple Cash, Apple Pay]." District Attorney Alvin L. Bragg, Jr. added, "My Office will continue to take every measure possible to protect New Yorkers from this type of criminal conduct. That includes ensuring accountability for those who commit this harm, while also working with financial companies to enhance security measures on their phone apps."

In 2024, D.A. Bragg called on financial companies to better protect consumers from fraud, including: adding a second and separate password for accessing the app on a smartphone as a default security option; imposing lower default limits on the monetary amount of total daily transfers; requiring wait times of up to a day and secondary verification for large monetary transactions; better monitoring of accounts for unusual transfer activities; and asking for confirmation when suspicious transactions occur. "No longer is the smartphone itself the most lucrative target for scammers and robbers -- it's the financial apps contained within," said Bragg as he released letters (PDF) sent to the companies that own Venmo, Zelle, and Cash App. "Thousands or even tens of thousands can be drained from financial accounts in a matter of seconds with just a few taps. Without additional protections, customers' financial and physical safety is being put at risk. I hope these companies accept our request to discuss commonsense solutions to deter scammers and protect New Yorkers' hard-earned money."

"Our cellphones aren't safe," warned the EFF's Cooper Quintin in a 2018 New York Times op-ed. "So why aren't we fixing them?" Any thoughts on what can and should be done with software, hardware, and procedures to stop "bank jackings"?

OpenAI has canceled the release of o3 in favor of a "simplified" product lineup. CEO Sam Altman said in a post on X that, in the coming months, OpenAI will release a model called GPT-5 that "integrates a lot of [OpenAI's] technology," including o3. TechCrunch reports: The company originally said in December that it planned to launch o3 sometime early this year. Just a few weeks ago, Kevin Weil, OpenAI's chief product officer, said in an interview that o3 was on track for a "February-March" launch. "We want to do a better job of sharing our intended roadmap, and a much better job simplifying our product offerings," Altman wrote in the post. "We want AI to 'just work' for you; we realize how complicated our model and product offerings have gotten. We hate the model picker [in ChatGPT] as much as you do and want to return to magic unified intelligence."

Altman also announced that OpenAI plans to offer unlimited chat access to GPT-5 at the "standard intelligence setting," subject to "abuse thresholds," once the model is generally available. (Altman declined to provide more detail on what this setting -- and these abuse thresholds -- entail.) Subscribers to ChatGPT Plus will be able to run GPT-5 at a "higher level of intelligence," Altman said, while ChatGPT Pro subscribers will be able to run GPT-5 at an "even higher level of intelligence."

"These models will incorporate voice, canvas, search, deep research, and more," Altman said, referring to a range of features OpenAI has launched in ChatGPT over the past few months. "[A] top goal for us is to unify [our] models by creating systems that can use all our tools, know when to think for a long time or not, and generally be useful for a very wide range of tasks." Before GPT-5 launches, OpenAI plans to release its GPT-4.5 model, code-named "Orion," in the next several weeks, according to Altman's post on X. Altman says this will be the company's last "non-chain-of-thought model." Unlike o3 and OpenAI's other so-called reasoning models, non-chain-of-thought models tend to be less reliable in domains like math and physics.

Chinese animated film Ne Zha 2 has broken multiple box office records, becoming China's highest-grossing film of all time and the first non-Hollywood movie to surpass $1 billion in a single market. From a report: Helmed by Yang Yu, known as Jiaozi, the film hit the big screen during the lucrative Chinese New Year frame on Jan. 29, surpassing 2017's "Wolf Warrior 2" to become China's most-watched film. Meanwhile, its total revenue (including presales) hit 8 billion yuan (about 1.12 billion U.S. dollars) by Sunday. In just eight days and five hours after its release, "Ne Zha 2" became China's highest-grossing film of all time on Thursday, exceeding the 5.77 billion yuan record set by "The Battle at Lake Changjin." A day later, it overtook "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" to become the highest-grossing film ever in a single market, reaching over 6.79 billion yuan (including presales) in China on Friday.

A follow-up to the animated sensation "Ne Zha," which grossed 5 billion yuan and topped the country's box office charts in 2019, the sequel has captivated audiences with its breathtaking visuals, rich storytelling and deep cultural resonance. The record-breaking run makes "Ne Zha 2" not just a box office titan but a cultural phenomenon, further underscoring China's ability to produce homegrown blockbusters that strike a chord with domestic audiences. You can watch the international trailer on YouTube.

Alan W. Filion, an 18-year-old from Lancaster, Calif., was sentenced to four years in prison for making nearly 400 false bomb threats and threats of violence (source may be paywalled; alternative source) to religious institutions, schools, universities and homes across the country. The New York Times reports: The threatening calls Mr. Filion made would often cause large deployments of police officers to a targeted location, the Justice Department said in a news release. In some cases, officers would enter people's homes with their weapons drawn and detain those inside. In January 2023, Mr. Filion wrote on social media that his swats had often led the police to "drag the victim and their families out of the house cuff them and search the house for dead bodies."

Investigators linked Mr. Filion to over 375 swatting calls made in several states, including one that he made to the police in Sanford, Fla., saying that he would commit a mass shooting at the Masjid Al Hayy Mosque. During the call, he played audio of gunfire in the background. Mr. Filion was arrested in California in January 2024, and was then extradited to Florida to face state charges for making that threat. Mr. Filion began swatting for recreation in August 2022 before making it into a business, the Justice Department said. The teenager became a "serial swatter" and would make social media posts about his "swatting-for-a-fee" services, according to prosecutors.

In addition to pleading guilty to the false threat against the mosque in Florida, Mr. Filion pleaded guilty in three other swatting cases: a mass shooting threat to a public school in Washington State in October 2022; a bomb threat call to a historically Black college or university in Florida in May 2023; and a July 2023 call in which he claimed to be a federal law enforcement officer in Texas and told dispatchers that he had killed his mother and would kill any responding officers.

Today, the KDE Project announced the release of KDE Plasma 6.3, featuring improved fractional scaling, enhanced Night Light color accuracy, better CPU usage monitoring, and various UI and security refinements.

Some of the key features of Plasma 6.3 include:
- Improved fractional scaling with KWin to lead to an all-around better desktop experience with fractional scaling as well as when making use of KWin's zoom effect.
- Screen colors are more accurate with the KDE Night Light feature.
- CPU usage monitoring within the KDE System Monitor is now more accurate and consuming fewer CPU resources.
- KDE will now present a notification when the kernel terminated an app because the system ran out of memory.
- Various improvements to the Discover app, including a security enhancement around sandboxed apps.
- The drawing tablet area of KDE System Settings has been overhauled with new features and refinements.
- Many other enhancements and fixes throughout KDE Plasma 6.3.

You can read the announcement here.

The European Union pledged to mobilize 200 billion euros ($206.15 billion) to invest in AI as the bloc seeks to catch up with the U.S. and China in the race to train the most complex models. From a report: European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that the bloc wants to supercharge its ability to compete with the U.S. and China in AI. The plan -- dubbed InvestAI -- includes a new 20 billion-euro fund for so-called AI gigafactories, facilities that rely on powerful chips to train the most complex AI models. "We want Europe to be one of the leading AI continents, and this means embracing a life where AI is everywhere," von der Leyen said at the AI Action Summit in Paris.

The announcement underscores efforts from the EU to position itself as a key player in the AI race. The bloc has been lagging behind the U.S. and China since OpenAI's 2022 release of ChatGPT ushered in a spending bonanza. [...] The EU is aiming to establish gigafactories to train the most complex and large AI models. Those facilities will be equipped with roughly 100,000 last-generation AI chips, around four times more than the number installed in the AI factories being set up right now.