185255588
submission
alternative_right writes:
The X Safety team probed suspected Chinese accounts involved in influence operations and identified 200,000 accounts, including 200 accounts "posting in a manner that could manipulate a legitimate debate about American AI and energy policy," the team said in a tweet.
The posts included content on how AI strains the electricity grid and increases utility prices and "cartoons that depicted data-center operators enriching themselves at the public's expense."
It's unclear what, if any, action X will take to suspend or delete accounts from the bot farm.
X, owned by Elon Musk, whose billions rely on data centers to boost his AI enterprises, did not respond to Axios' request for comment.
185194510
submission
alternative_right writes:
At first what they were telling people is that it was for Kindles, but I just didn't believe that. I instantly was like, I don't think that's how they do it because of publication rights and stuff, copyright and everything. Then I saw it was for AI. I don't like it only because I wish I could take these books. There's so much knowledge and so much stuff in them and some of them look like they might be rare, and I've heard that they order rare books, and that's why I say some of these are so obscure. I definitely don't like the idea that they can't be reused or anything like that afterwards. They're reducing the amount of available copies for other people.
185194240
submission
alternative_right writes:
Every single model tested could be manipulated into producing harmful content, including models equipped with defenses meant to resist exactly that kind of tampering.
185130660
submission
alternative_right writes:
Researchers have created a tiny chip that produces a stable âoerainbowâ of light capable of generating multiple high-frequency signals at once, potentially boosting the speed and capacity of future 6G networks. Its extreme precision could also make it valuable for quantum timing, navigation, radar, and even space-based technologies.
185114114
submission
alternative_right writes:
A shadowy polling firm confessed this week to faking survey results in two marquee races â" then claimed the entire operation was a "short-term social experiment" on misinformation.
Why it matters: An AI-enabled flood of synthetic and outright fabricated content is wreaking havoc on reality, poisoning the signals people rely on to understand politics, business and culture.
185101072
submission
alternative_right writes:
Brands have completely taken over the modern world, from established corporate trademarks to the proliferation of online influencers. But the allure of brands is nothing new, according to a study about an ancient style of pottery called Qurayyah Painted Ware that was a progenitor of branding some 3,200 years ago.
This brand of pottery was popular in what is now Saudi Arabia during the Bronze Age. The tradition is distinguished by distinctive black-and-red geometric designs and stylized animal and human figures. These unique visual properties, along with a consistent production technique and quality, suggest that it was an early branded commodity that was made to be recognizable to the wider community.
âoeIt is now understood that brands and proto-brands existed well before modern economies,â said researchers led by Marta Luciani of the University of Vienna. âoeIn this contribution we analyze the process by which the commodity itselfâ"decorated pottery vesselsâ"was developed into a brand not by added symbols but on the virtue of its visual identity, material consistency, technological continuity, centralized production, export circulation, local imitation, intentional commercial scope, and cultural reputation.â
185077770
submission
alternative_right writes:
"When it went into the pool, I was shocked," the customer said. "I donâ(TM)t think Iâ(TM)ll be wanting any more drone deliveries."
185060082
submission
alternative_right writes:
Our brains comprise 86 billion neurons and the trillions of connections between them, whipping up an orchestrated storm of electricity and chemicals that pulse within a 3-pound lump of jellified fat, protein, and water.
The intricate biological machine that defines us humans requires about 20 years to mature, a much lengthier developmental period than in most other species.
This, along with the added inconvenience that it's locked within our craniums, makes our developing brains experimentally inaccessible.
So, scientists are building brains in the lab, no big deal.
In a breakthrough described in the journal Nature, researchers have created miniature brains, called organoids, that can 'sense' the passage of time and retain a cellular 'memory' of how long they have already spent developing.
185046254
submission
alternative_right writes:
Metaâ(TM)s Facebook and Instagram platforms have begun displaying targeted warning messages to users searching for news or information related to mass immigration, including terms such as âoeCeuta.â
The prompts caution users to âoebe careful when searching for migration infoâ and include a prominent link or button offering âoehelp with moving to a new country.â
Clicking through takes users to a Meta Help Center page titled âoeHelp is available if you want to move to a new country.â That page, created in consultation with experts from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), provides tips and guidance to help migrants enter Europe and other states.
185046086
submission
alternative_right writes:
Xâ(TM)s algorithm learns what you hate and shows you more of it, according to a new study just published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The paper, titled Value misalignment of Xâ(TM)s feed algorithm is a reflection of value tensions in engagement, found that the siteâ(TM)s algorithm prioritized engagement above all else when it generated a userâ(TM)s For You Page. It also showed that X serves more ragebait to people who say they are Democrats, although the exact reason for that is unclear.
âoeIn 2026 thatâ(TM)s maybe not the most surprising headline ever,â Ziv Epstein, a postdoctoral researcher at Stanford University, and co-author of the paper, told 404 Media. âoeSo we actually dug in a little deeper to figure out why this is actually happening, and it turns out that X's feed algorithm, like a lot of these social media algorithms, is optimized for engagement [but] it turns out that not all types of engagement are considered equally.â
185045664
submission
alternative_right writes:
Optical fibers are already the backbone of global communication systems. Recently, however, physicists have started to explore how their functionality could be boosted further by conveying information via entangled quantum particlesâ"potentially enabling instantaneous exchanges of information across vast distances. Such a system could eventually be the basis of a future 'quantum internet,' offering a level of security and computing power beyond anything possible today.
185045650
submission
alternative_right writes:
Quantum computers harness the power of quantum mechanics, the laws that govern physics at atomic and subatomic scales. Among various designs for such machines, Helios is a trapped-ion quantum computer, which means it uses charged atoms suspended in free space using electromagnetic fields.
It operates using 98 qubitsâ"the units of information that a quantum computer uses to process data. This number of qubits makes it the largest trapped-ion quantum computer built so far. Quantinuum, the company behind the device, is based in Cambridge, U.K., and Broomfield, Colorado. It demonstrated earlier machines operating on 32 qubits in 2023 and 56 qubits in 2025.
Helios and its predecessors use an architecture (or operational structure) with separate regions for storing and processing quantum information. The architecture is called a QCCD (quantum charge-coupled device) and was invented in 2002. This is akin to the architecture of classical computers that have memory for storage (hard disk drives, solid-state drives) and a separate processor (CPU, GPU).
The specific geometry of Helios resembles a rosette, with a ring for storage and two streamers for processing. The crucial element is the four-way X junction where they meet. A QCCD physically transports the charged objects (the ions) electrically from the storage to the processing regions.
The processing is done using laser pulses. This requires a quantum algorithm to be broken up into ion transport and quantum processing. This differs substantially from other quantum computing architectures, such as superconducting qubits, where the qubits are fixed in space and processing is executed by electrical signals switched on and off in time.
185045534
submission
alternative_right writes:
Google quietly changed Gmail this week to make it easier for political campaigns and PACs to bypass spam folders and pump endless fundraising emails into the inboxes of millions of users.
The move could help qualifying political groups keep fundraising pleas out of the email graveyard and boost donations ahead of the midterm elections. The change follows years of complaints from Republicans that Gmailâ(TM)s spam filters disproportionately blocked their emails more often than Democrats.
The companyâ(TM)s new policy, first reported by the New York Times, came through an opaque policy announcement on its Help Center on Monday.
185021788
submission
alternative_right writes:
Quarks are fundamental subatomic particles that combine in trios to make up familiar baryons such as protons and neutrons, and gluons are the quantum 'Gorilla Glue' that binds their quark structure together.
For nearly 50 years, physicists have hunted for "glueballs", exotic particles predicted by this theory of the strong interaction.
Now, a collaboration working at a collider in Beijing says it has the clearest evidence yet that a known particle called X(2370) is dominated by one of these elusive states.
Physicists sifted through the wreckage of high-energy particle collisions to find strong evidence of this glueball, made predominantly of gluons â" massless force carriers of the strong interaction between quarks.
The same underlying physics also gives rise to the residual strong force that binds protons and neutrons into an atomic nucleus, much as photons carry the electromagnetic force.
185021676
submission
alternative_right writes:
AI companies are seeking access to data beyond the chat window.
OpenAI last week announced an optional Computer History feature that lets ChatGPT retain a record of the apps and websites a person uses.
Google, meanwhile, said last month it will use photos and other material people upload through Search to train its AI systems by default, though users can opt out.
The upside is the potential for more useful, personalized AI. The tradeoff is giving companies a broader and more continuous view of users' lives.
