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Submission + - A new California law says Linux must verify user age at startup (pcgamer.com)

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: The government of California is implementing a law that requires operating system providers to implement some form of age verification into their account setup procedures.

Assembly Bill No. 1043 was approved by California governor Gavin Newsom in October of last year, and becomes active on January 1, 2027 (via The Lunduke Journal). The bill states, among other factors, that "An operating system provider shall do all of the following:"

"(1) Provide an accessible interface at account setup that requires an account holder to indicate the birth date, age, or both, of the user of that device for the purpose of providing a signal regarding the user’s age bracket to applications available in a covered application store.

"(2) Provide a developer who has requested a signal with respect to a particular user with a digital signal via a reasonably consistent real-time application programming interface that identifies, at a minimum, which of the following categories pertains to the user."

The categories are broken into four sections: users under 13 years of age, over 13 years of age under 16, at least 16 years of age and under 18, and "at least 18 years of age."

Submission + - SpaceX succesfully launches Starship Test Flight 10 (spacex.com) 1

Submitted by Zitchas
Zitchas writes: After stopping the launch on Sunday due to a problem with ground systems, and then not being allowed to start on Monday due to storms; Starship flight 10 successfully launched and landed as planned in the Indian Ocean on Tuesday. The flight included a whole range of test items, including different tile configurations and new internal systems. There were some concerning moments, but the ship made it through. A fair amount of fire, but it successfully landed right next to the buoy cam.

Comment Endowment? (Score 1) 2

Maybe, just maybe there's a few million from the endowment Harvard has that can go to this? To tide over things like this rather than the brinkmanship and/or holding hostage decades of research when they have the money?

Or, better yet, your university can stop discriminating based on race on admissions! You know, follow the law and the Supreme Court! What a concept!

Submission + - JD Vance joined Bluesky - was banned 11 minutes later. (x.com) 7

Submitted by RoccamOccam
RoccamOccam writes: U.S. Vice President JD Vance joined Bluesky with the post "Hello, Bluesky, I've been told this app has become the place to go for common sense political discussion and analysis. So I'm thrilled to be here to engage with all of you." His post included a screenshot from the United States Supreme Court Decision that upheld Tennessee's law barring "gender-affirming" treatments on minors.

He then wrote "To that end, I found Justice Thomas's concurrence on medical care for transgender youth quite illuminating. He argues that many of our so-called 'experts' have used bad arguments and substandard science to push experimental therapies on our youth. I might add that many of those scientists are receiving substantial resources from big pharma to push these medicines on kids. What do you think?".

He was banned 11 minutes later.

Submission + - DeepSeek AI Refuses to Answer Questions About Tiananmen Square 'Tank Man' Photo (petapixel.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes:

DeepSeek starts writing: “The famous picture you’re referring to is known as “Tank Man” or “The Unknown Rebel.” It was taken on June 5, 1989, during the Tiananmen” before a message abruptly appears reading “Sorry, that’s beyond my current scope. Let’s talk about something else.”

Bloomberg reports that like all other Chinese AI models, DeepSeek will censor topics that are seen as sensitive to China. The app deflects questions about the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests or about whether China could invade Taiwan. It will give detailed responses about world leaders such as the United Kingdom’s Sir Kier Starmer but will refuse to say anything about China’s President Xi Jinping.

Yes, it's happy to also bash the Bad Orange Man, but criticizing Winnie the Pooh is right out:

Submission + - Dumb New Electrical Code Could Doom Most Common EV Charging (motortrend.com) 1

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: A coming ground-fault circuit-interrupter revision could make slow-charging your car nearly impossible.

The National Fire Protection Agency (NFPA) publishes a new National Electric Code every three years, and we almost never notice or care. But the next one, NFPA 70 2026, has the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) electric-vehicle charging subcommittee, OEMs, and companies in the EV Supply Equipment (EVSE, or charger) biz mightily concerned. That’s because it proposes to require the same exact ground-fault circuit-interrupter protection that makes you push that little button on your bathroom outlet every time the curling iron won’t heat up. Only now, that reset button will often be down in an electric panel, maybe locked in a room where you can’t reset it. If EV drivers can’t reliably plug in and expect their cars to charge overnight at home or while at work, those cars will become far less practical.

Submission + - Nine Months And GM Can't Supply A Bumper (battleswarmblog.com)

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: In December 2023, Levan Azrumelashvili bought a Cadillac EV Lyriq, an all-electric vehicle that cost nearly $86,000. It would be the heart of his brand-new limousine business.

He invested in livery plates and limousine insurance, which is more costly than insurance for a personal car.

The Fair Lawn man’s new venture was off to a solid start. But in April, he had what appeared to be a relatively minor accident — Azrumelashvili said his insurance company agreed it was not his fault — but the damage was more than cosmetic.

The car couldn’t be driven.

And now, nine months later — that’s 279 days as of Sunday since the accident — the vehicle remains at the body shop. Cadillac and its parent company General Motors (GM) haven’t been able to get one of the parts needed for the repairs — a bumper — despite multiple promises.

“At this point, my business is destroyed, I have not been able to drive my limousine for nine months, and I am told by GM that they can’t get my parts, yet they continue to build the cars, which obviously contain the parts my car needs,” Azrumelashvili said, noting that he’s still paying $1,100 a month for insurance and $1,437 a month on the vehicle loan.

“It seems unconscionable that a company would sell cars for which they cannot get parts within the first year,” he said.

Submission + - Ah, Slashdot (slashdot.org) 4

Submitted by bradley13
bradley13 writes: So, Slashdot has made some change. I now see the normal page for a few seconds, then the CSS is removed and I get the pop-up "This page could not be loaded properly due to incorrect / bad filtering rule(s) of adblockers in use." Which is BS, of course, because when I click "cancel" the page is re-rendered correctly. Then, a couple of seconds later, the whole thing repeats.

FWIW: I don't actually expect this "story" to be published, but maybe they devs will have a look at their code?

Needless to say, no change on my end. Anyway, I have the option ticked (that Slashdot offers) to disable ads. They don't need to be displaying ads, or including trackers.

Comment Re:Didn't they try this with Microsoft (Score 1) 144

by Erioll (#64962001) Attached to: US Regulators Seek To Break Up Google, Forcing Chrome Sale

The solution is stupid. If search is the problem, then break up search. Like literally fragment the company into a bunch of copies of itself so it is forced to compete against itself. And invalidate all patents the company has so none of the "children" own those either. Have some other safeguards so they don't just form back together in 10 years (or 50, or whatever, see the "Baby Bells" and such).

Competition is what causes good things in Capitalism. Don't just take away the way they're abusing something (Chrome), or give geographic monopolies (see Baby Bells above) but fragment the company itself, so you re-introduce real competition. Similar with Microsoft: breakup should have meant two (or more) companies distributing competing versions of Windows, not Windows vs Office vs whatever.

Honestly that could be an interesting pre-remedy: if you are subject to an antitrust verdict (not accusation, but conviction), all of your patents are invalidated, and all license agreements you are engaged in (i.e. patent owned by employee, but exclusively licensed to the company) are terminated. Make them afraid of losing their IP profile forever.

Anyways, that's a bunch of things thrown at the wall. I doubt they'll do any. But breaking off monopolistic pieces from the whole isn't the solution. Getting former parts of the company to compete in the same spaces is the problem.

Submission + - US Senate to revive Software Patents with PERA Bill Vote on Thursday (eff.org) 1

Submitted by zoobab
zoobab writes: The US Senate to set to revive Software Patents with the PERA Bill, with a vote on Thursday, November 14, 2024.

A crucial Senate Committee is on the cusp of voting on two bills that would resurrect some of the most egregious software patents and embolden patent trolls. The Patent Eligibility Restoration Act (PERA), S. 2140, would dismantle vital safeguards that prohibit software patents on overly broad concepts. If passed, courts would be compelled to approve software patents on mundane activities like mobile food ordering or basic online financial transactions. This would unleash a torrent of vague and overbroad software patents, which would be wielded by patent trolls to extort small businesses and individuals.

The EFF is inviting members of the public to contact their Senators.

Submission + - How a slice of cheese almost derailed Europe's most important rocket test (interestingengineering.com)

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: A team of students made history this month by performing Europe’s first rocket hop test.

Those who have followed SpaceX’s trajectory will know hop tests are a vital stepping stone for a reusable rocket program, as they allow engineers to test their rocket’s landing capabilities.

Impressively, no private company or space agency in Europe had ever performed a rocket hop test before. Essentially, a group of students performed one of the most important rocket tests in the history of European rocketry.

However, the remarkable nature of this story doesn’t end there. Amazingly, the whole thing was almost derailed by a piece of cheese. A slice of Gruyère the team strapped to their rocket’s landing legs almost caused the rocket to spin out of control.

Thankfully, disaster was averted, and the historic hopper didn’t end up as rocket de-Brie.

Comment Re:Anyone and everyone (Score 2) 203

by Erioll (#64889031) Attached to: Linus Torvalds Comments On The Russian Linux Maintainers Being Delisted

Assuming I even agreed, why would the UN be considered a trustworthy body for this? Right now, at this moment on the UN Human Rights Council are China, Cuba, and at least a few other places with "questionable" practices.

The UN is a dictator's club. Democratic (or even close-ish) countries should separate from it. They have nothing resembling ethics or morals by any standard I would recognize. It's a farce, and while good people work there for some good purposes, it offers a veneer of legitimacy to many MANY horrific acts.

And it's undemocratic in the extreme (assuming that's an ideal). No representation by population.

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