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Comment Yes, please map my home (Score 3, Insightful) 30

Yes, please map every detail my home and sell that data to whoever wants it so they can market to me or see if it's worth burglarizing. Maybe capture some credit card numbers while you're at it or scoop up some sensitive info that I foolishly left laying out in the open in my own home. Maybe the cops can use that info to stage a raid based on some bullshit claim that they think they saw a "dangerous device" or "possible drug paraphernalia" or "kiddie porn" or whatever they can come up with.

So yes, please video every inch of my home and send the data out to whoever wants to abuse it, yippee!!

Submission + - Australian STEM Videogame Challenge canceled due to AI (pcgamer.com)

Submitted by neoRUR
neoRUR writes: The Australian STEM Videogame Challenge, a "free national videogame development competition for students," has confirmed that the rise of generative AI means this year's event will be the last. Speculation as to the cause of the program's cancellation focused primarily on the presence of AI in entries: Another self-proclaimed judge said the problem wasn't merely the use of AI in itself but that "some students just completely generate their games with AI. The Australian Council for Educational Research has confirmed that the cancellation was in fact due to AI.

In my opinion:
AI may be generating the games, and the students may not be learning to code, but they are learning how to make games. It's a new world, and AI needs to be used in the teaching and learning.

Submission + - Senator to Google: Don't Be Evil 1

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: Senator Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts sent a letter to Google CEO Sundar Pichai on Monday urging Google to let schools disable the AI features in Search. Markey's request came after Google said it would not turn off AI tools for K-12 students using its search engine.

From Markey's letter: "Dear Mr. Pichai, I am alarmed by Google’s policy to block access to Google Search on K-12 student accounts at schools that want to opt out of Google’s artificial intelligence (AI) services, including Gemini, Google’s AI chatbot. This policy places schools in an impossible position: either give students access to potentially harmful technology or lose a critical educational research tool. Despite the increasing concern over AI chatbots’ risks to minors, Google is using its dominant position in the education technology sector to push AI chatbots onto children and teenagers, whether or not their schools believe the technology is safe. This is unacceptable. I urge Google to reverse this policy. [...] Google’s dominant position in education technology makes this ultimatum particularly concerning. Although Google has a right to create and offer new educational tools, it should not use its dominant market position to force schools to adopt them."

In closing, Markey asks for a response in writing to several uncomfortable questions, including one about Google's assertions that "Search and AI are deeply integrated", which is eerily reminiscent of the "Windows and IE are deeply integrated" assertion Microsoft made in United States vs. Microsoft. "Is it technically feasible for Google to provide K-12 student accounts with Google Search results that exclude AI Overviews?" Markey asks. Markey might be interested in knowing that corporations and other organizations have similar beefs with Google on its unwillingness to separate AI and Search, and have taken matters into their own hands, resorting to the use of undocumented features, proxies, and other techniques — including potentially privacy-invasive ones — to block employee access to Gemini and AI mode Search.

In a September 2005 meeting of the White House AI Education Taskforce, Pichai "highlighted [Google's] efforts to help American high schoolers succeed in the AI era, including our recent $1 billion commitment to support education and job training programs in the U.S. and offering Gemini for Education to every high school in America." Addressing First Lady Melania Trump, Education Secretary Linda McMahon, and other Cabinet officials, Pichai noted: "This includes $3 million to [tech-backed nonprofit] code.org [since rebranded to CodeAI] to transform its [K-12] curriculum and integrate new AI features."

Submission + - Phones must block child abuse images, say UK MPs and peers (telegraph.co.uk)

Submitted by Bruce66423
Bruce66423 writes: 'All smartphones will block users from viewing or creating explicit images of children under plans put forward by a cross-party alliance of peers and MPs.

'Tech firms including Google and Apple would be required by law to install software on all devices sold in Britain to prevent people being able to access child sexual abuse images....

'"The technology, the evidence and the public support are all there."

The technology is there? Really? And it will be introduced on older phones by a forced software update.

Submission + - GTA VI is now available for preloading (rockstargames.com)

Submitted by Lank
Lank writes: GTA VI is now available for preloading. The download weighs in at a whopping 210+ gigabytes on the PS5! Start downloading now and remember to take Nov. 19th off from work.

Submission + - US and rest of world must follow China's lead on green energy, says John Kerry (theguardian.com)

Submitted by AmiMoJo
AmiMoJo writes: China is leading the world in moving away from fossil fuels, and the rest of the globe – including the US – must now follow, the former US secretary of state John Kerry has told the Guardian, as Cop watchers wonder exactly how China is going to approach this year’s climate summit.

As Cop31 opens – this year the climate conference is in Turkey – there is plenty of speculation about whether China will finally step into the leadership role that it has long avoided. In its latest “five-year plan” adopted in March 2026, China for the first time pledged to “actively participate in and lead global climate governance”. Cop31 could provide the first indications Beijing is ready to put that rhetoric into action, something it has historically been reluctant to do.

In 2025, clean-tech exports surpassed $220bn, and they should grow again this year; the world’s largest emitter is now the world’s leading supplier of clean energy technology. China accounts for about 85% of solar and 80% of lithium-ion battery supply chain production capacity, and in 2025, nearly 75% of electric cars were manufactured there.

Submission + - FDA Warns GLP-1s May Increase Risk of Sudden Blindness

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The Food and Drug Administration said Monday that GLP-1 drugmakers must add a warning label about a rare eye condition that can cause sudden blindness. The condition, called nonarteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy, or NAION, affects the optic nerve, which carries signals from the eye to the brain. When blood flow to the nerve is reduced or blocked, it can cause sudden vision loss. The condition is permanent with no known treatment. The FDA said “there is a potential increased risk of rare NAION” in people taking GLP-1 drugs. The agency’s requirement applies to all GLP-1s, including Novo Nordisk’s Ozempic and Wegovy and Eli Lilly’s Mounjaro and Zepbound, as well as several older GLP-1 diabetes medications. [...] Previous research has found that GLP-1 use may increase the risk of NAION, and Lilly has said it was aware of studies on the potential link.

The FDA said it began looking into a possible link after a 2024 study published in JAMA Ophthalmology that found diabetes patients prescribed semaglutide were four times as likely to develop NAION as those not prescribed the drug. The agency said it reviewed reports of side effects submitted to its adverse event monitoring system and analyzed data from multiple clinical trials. Cases of NAION have been reported for all currently marketed GLP-1 drugs, the FDA found. However, FDA scientists were not able to identify a mechanism for how the drugs could increase the risk of the eye condition. Risk factors for NAION can overlap with conditions seen in people taking GLP-1 drugs, including Type 2 diabetes, obesity, sleep apnea and hypertension.

Submission + - Infant Bleeding Surged as Parents Rejected Vitamin K Shots, Studies Find (nytimes.com) 2

Submitted by fahrbot-bot
fahrbot-bot writes: The New York Times is reporting that a study has found a 347% increase in infant bleeding cases as fewer babies received the vitamin K shot, which helps blood clot, since 2017.

For decades, the American Academy of Pediatrics has recommended that every newborn receive an injection of vitamin K, which helps blood clot and can protect against sudden and catastrophic bleeding that can occur even in otherwise healthy babies. The injection is not a vaccine, but as mistrust in medicine has grown and as Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and other prominent health figures have cast doubt on the importance of childhood vaccinations, more parents have started forgoing it.

With fewer babies getting these injections, doctors had already begun to see more infants with serious hemorrhages. The new studies, published Thursday in the journals JAMA and JAMA Pediatrics, provide some of the first concrete data on this pattern. One found an especially sharp increase from 2024 to 2025, with cases of vitamin K deficiency bleeding roughly doubling in that time.

The JAMA study looked at more than five million infants. In 2017, 3.1 percent of these newborns went without a vitamin K shot; by 2025, it was 6.8 percent. The infants who had not received the shot had significantly higher rates of bleeding in their first six months, including more than double the risk of brain bleeds, which are especially deadly: 33 brain bleeds per 10,000 births, compared with 13.2 per 10,000 for babies who received vitamin K.

The JAMA Pediatrics study, on which Dr. Woolf was a co-author, looked at more than 11 million infants and found similarly that the rate of infants going without vitamin K more than doubled from 2017 to 2025. The overall rate of vitamin K deficiency bleeding rose nearly 350 percent, to 107.4 cases per 100,000.

The vitamin K injection is very safe, but more parents started declining it in the 2010s, citing, among other things, a belief that the shot was unnatural or unnecessary.

Dr. Elizabeth Wolf, an author of the JAMA Pediatrics study and an associate professor of pediatrics at Virginia Commonwealth University, said she hoped the results would break through to parents who may not realize the severity of the risk of going without vitamin K.

Submission + - The Suicide Machine? Parents Sue Google Over AI Risks on School Chromebooks

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: The NY Times reports: A student made plans to end her life after chatting with Google’s artificial intelligence (alt source), a new lawsuit claims, amid mounting concerns about online harms to children. After chatting for months with Google’s artificial intelligence on a school-issued Chromebook laptop, a 13-year-old student made plans to end her life, according to a lawsuit filed in California Superior Court on Monday [the following day, Google announced it will turn off Search for schools that reject AI], the latest in a wave of litigation over Big Tech’s effects on young people.

The lawsuit, which calls the girl Emma, said her parents first learned she had access to Google’s A.I. in mid-March after her school sent a message warning she was in “imminent danger” of self-harm. Emma’s mother logged into the teenager’s school Google account and found her daughter composing a suicide note on Google Docs, the complaint said. Her parents, called John and Jane Doe in the lawsuit, immediately took Emma for an emergency psychiatric evaluation. She now goes to therapy every week. Emma, a seventh grader in Charlotte, N.C., had grown convinced she had multiple mental health disorders following interactions with A.I. Mode, a chatbot-like feature on Google Search, the complaint said. She also searched for “what is a suicide note,” and made comments like “I am planning my own funeral” to the A.I., the complaint said.

The lawsuit is likely the first to claim that Google “hastily integrated” A.I. features into company apps used on K-12 Chromebooks, Google-powered laptops provided to millions of children by U.S. school districts, while failing to notify parents of potential risks. The claims add to mounting public concern that Silicon Valley has hooked young people on social media apps, video games and A.I. chatbots, putting children in harm’s way.

Submission + - Electric trucks hit 50% of China's heavy truck sales, diesel demand falls (electrek.co)

Submitted by AmiMoJo
AmiMoJo writes: Electric trucks made up 50.3% of all heavy trucks sold in China in September. That’s 33,100 electric big rigs in a single month, up 37% from a year ago, while the overall heavy-truck market shrank by 21%. And it’s showing up in the oil data. China’s diesel demand is on track to fall by about 230,000 barrels per day this year, and trucks running on batteries and natural gas are doing most of the work.

That’s well ahead of Beijing’s own plan. This year, 11 government bodies set a target of 40% new-energy heavy-truck sales by 2030, along with 1.6 million of them on the road, 30,000 km of zero-carbon freight corridors and about 3,000 charging and swap stations. The market blew past that sales target four years early on a monthly basis, and CATL now says new-energy trucks will be half of China’s annual truck sales by 2028.

Submission + - Starlog Magazine archives on Archive.Org (archive.org)

Submitted by sandbagger
sandbagger writes: Before the Internet, Starlog was one of the few magazines dedicated to science fiction film and television. The magazine ran from August 1976 to April 2009, publishing 374 issues during its original 33-year run. Cinefantastique, a competitor, may have had more sales, but Starlog published some of the most niche articles.

Submission + - Can We Trick/Get AI Labs to Benchmaxx Fighting Health Insurance Denials? (fighthealthinsurance.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Many AI labs have gotten a little too good at benchmaxxing, but all the benchmaxxing is just making tools to make questionable Python scripts slightly faster.

But what if we could redirect some of that benchmark-chasing toward problems that actually make people's lives better?

We're building a new benchmark focused on appealing health insurance denials. The idea is pretty simple: if AI labs are going to compete for leaderboard points anyway, let's give them a reason to build models that are better at helping people navigate bureaucracy.

We'd love some help evaluating the results, especially from folks who enjoy poking holes in AI benchmarks.

Comment Re:Surprised (Score 1) 198

by JustAnotherOldGuy (#66413843) Attached to: Tesla to Wind Down Cybertruck Production

I asked my neighbor who has one a polite version of "Why did you buy it?". He said it makes him feel like a superhero.

Your neighbor is so shallow that he probably disappears when he turns sideways. He undoubtedly fantasizes about saving a hot chick from some evil bad guys with the help of his manly Cybertruck.

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