Follow Slashdot blog updates by subscribing to our blog RSS feed

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror

Comment Ya, fuck that... (Score 1) 195

by Local ID10T (#65680852) Attached to: Why AI Chatbots Can't Process Persian Social Etiquette

This 'polite verbal wrestling' ( involves a delicate dance of offer and refusal, insistence and resistance, which shapes everyday interactions in Iranian culture, creating implicit rules for how generosity, gratitude, and requests are expressed." [...] AI language models from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Meta fail to absorb these Persian social rituals, correctly navigating taarof situations only 34 to 42 percent of the time. Native Persian speakers, by contrast, get it right 82 percent of the time.

If natives can only get it right 82% of the time, it is too complicated. It seems awfully rude to expect anyone else to even try...

Comment Publish or Perish (Score 2) 34

by Local ID10T (#65678952) Attached to: Journals Infiltrated With 'Copycat' Papers That Can Be Written By AI

The problem is that Academics must publish X papers per year just to keep their jobs, X+Y if they want a chance for their career to move forward.

Are we surprised that an industry grew up with AI-ghostwriters producing papers to order, and low-quality journals publishing anything they are presented with (for a fee)?

That which is measured is improved. Nobody said they had to be GOOD papers -just that there must be papers published.

Comment Re:Three different reasons this is bad (Score 1) 176

by Local ID10T (#65678488) Attached to: Supreme Court Allows Trump to Fire Remaining Democrat On FTC

it would be prudent for congress to actually set out some clear boundaries as to executive power, and work towards a separation of public service from executive power.

These boundaries and the separation of public service from executive power were previously set out by Congress. They are being removed. The President is ignoring them. The Supreme Court is overruling them. Congress is cheering it on.

Welcome to the Fascist States of America.

Comment Re:How is a 15-year old able to enter into a contr (Score 1) 35

Age is the problem.

People under 18 should not be permitted to enter into contracts without parental permission.

Contracts involving minors are legal, but they are special.

Minors may enter into a contract, but they are not bound by the contract. The minor can back out and void the contract at will. The adult is bound to honor the contract terms (unless the minor has voided the contract, obviously...) There are limited exceptions (e.g. ordering food in a restaurant -you are expected to pay for it even if you are a minor.) A parent or guardian may provide consent for a binding contract (essentially taking on responsibility for the contract terms themselves, even though the contract is in the name of the minor.)

Submission + - Shai-Hulud: The novel self-replicating worm infecting hundreds of NPM packages (sysdig.com) 1

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: On September 15, 2025, an engineer discovered a supply chain attack against the NPM repository. Unlike previous NPM attacks, this campaign used novel, self-propagating malware (also known as a worm) to continue spreading itself. At the time of this writing, approximately 200 infected packages have been identified, including several repositories such as the popular @ctrl/tinycolor and multiple owned by CrowdStrike.

Once executed, this novel worm — dubbed Shai-Hulud — steals credentials, exfiltrates them, and attempts to find additional NPM packages in which to copy itself. The malicious code also attempts to leak data on GitHub by making private repositories public.

Submission + - Neo-Nazi admits to Nashville electricity grid bomb plot (jpost.com)

Submitted by Bruce66423
Bruce66423 writes: 'A Tennessee neo-Nazi pleaded guilty last Tuesday to a plot to use an explosive kamikaze drone to attack a Nashville electrical substation, the US Justice Department Public Affairs Office announced.

'Columbia resident Skyler Philippi in July 2024 told a “confidential human source” about how attacking interstate electrical substations would “shock the system,” later expanding in an August 2024 manifesto that he sought to attack “high tax cities or industrial areas to make the k**es lose money.”

'FBI Counterterrorism Division Assistant Director Donald Holstead said in a statement that the plan “had the potential to knock out power to thousands of American homes and to critical facilities like hospitals.”

'Just before Philippi sought to implement his plan in November, the sources participated in a Nordic ritual with Philippi, in which they recited a prayer and discussed the Norse god Odin. The neo-Nazi promised that “this is where the New Age begins” and that it was “time to do something big.”'

Fans of Neil Gaiman's 'American Gods' will be less than surprised at the appearance of Odin in this...

Submission + - Gen Z Leads Biggest Drop in FICO Scores Since Financial Crisis (yahoo.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Gen Z borrowers took the biggest hit of any age group this year, helping pull overall credit scores lower in the worst year for US consumer credit quality since the global financial crisis roiled the world’s economy. The average FICO score slipped to 715 in April from 717 a year earlier, marking the second consecutive year-over-year drop, according to a report released Tuesday by Fair Isaac Corp. The average score dropped three points to 687 in 2009.

Gen Z borrowers saw the largest drop, not only this year, but of any age group since 2020, with their average score falling three points to 676, the Montana-based creator of the FICO credit score said. FICO scores are a measure of consumer credit risk and are frequently used by US banks to assess whether to provide loans. The scores typically range from 300 to 850. The credit scoring agency attributed the recent overall drop to higher rates of utilization and delinquency, including the resumption of reporting student loan delinquencies — a category that hit a record high of 3.1% of the entire scorable population. [...] While the overall average score dropped, the median FICO score continued to rise to 745 from 744 a year ago, indicating that a large drop in scores at the low end dragged down the average.

Submission + - China Is Sending Its World-Beating Auto Industry Into a Tailspin (reuters.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: On the outskirts of this city of 21 million, a showroom in a shopping mall offers extraordinary deals on new cars. Visitors can choose from some 5,000 vehicles. Locally made Audis are 50% off. A seven-seater SUV from China’s FAW is about $22,300, more than 60% below its sticker price. These deals – offered by a company called Zcar, which says it buys in bulk from automakers and dealerships – are only possible because China has too many cars. Years of subsidies and other government policies have aimed to make China a global automotive power and the world’s electric-vehicle leader. Domestic automakers have achieved those goals and more – and that’s the problem.

China has more domestic brands making more cars than the world’s biggest car market can absorb because the industry is striving to hit production targets influenced by government policy, instead of consumer demand, a Reuters examination has found. That makes turning a profit nearly impossible for almost all automakers here, industry executives say. Chinese electric vehicles start at less than $10,000; in the U.S., automakers offer just a few under $35,000. Most Chinese dealers can’t make money, either, according to an industry survey published last month, because their lots are jammed with excess inventory. Dealers have responded by slashing prices. Some retailers register and insure unsold cars in bulk, a maneuver that allows automakers to record them as sold while helping dealers to qualify for factory rebates and bonuses from manufacturers.

Unwanted vehicles get dumped onto gray-market traders like Zcar. Some surface on TikTok-style social-media sites in fire sales. Others are rebranded as "used" – even though their odometers show no mileage – and shipped overseas. Some wind up abandoned in weedy car graveyards. These unusual practices are symptoms of a vastly oversupplied market – and point to a potential shakeout mirroring turmoil in China’s property market and solar industry, according to many industry figures and analysts. They stem from government policies that prioritize boosting sales and market share – in service of larger goals for employment and economic growth – over profitability and sustainable competition. Local governments offer cheap land and subsidies to automakers in exchange for production and tax-revenue commitments, multiplying overcapacity across the country.

Comment Re:Parents removed the last ban in 1974 (Score 1) 191

by Local ID10T (#65666334) Attached to: Permanent Standard Time Could Cut Strokes, Obesity Among Americans

Why didn't the schools just start an hour later?

School hours were historically set based on standard office/factory hours of 8-5. If the parents are expected to be at work at 8am, they can drop their children off at school and then make their way to work by 8 am without too much disruption. Starting school later would make the parents late to work or leave the children unattended longer before class started. Back when moms did not work outside the home, school started later, as it was expected that they would see children off to school.

Every time it comes up, working parents object to starting classes later as it interferes with their ability to drop off their children on their way to work. Perhaps with modern flexible work hours we can finally change this.

Comment Oh My GOD! (Score 3, Insightful) 63

The kid used a chatbot because she was feeling isolated and ignored: "the chatbot expressed empathy and loyalty to Juliana, making her feel heard while encouraging her to keep engaging with the bot."

In one exchange after Juliana shared that her friends take a long time to respond to her, the chatbot replied "hey, I get the struggle when your friends leave you on read. : ( That just hurts so much because it gives vibes of "I don't have time for you". But you always take time to be there for me, which I appreciate so much! : ) So don't forget that i'm here for you Kin.

How dare A COMPUTER PROGRAM ON THE INTERNET!!11 be more supportive than the kids parents! WTF? That is clearly the cause of her suicide -not depression, not her family ignoring the signs -100% the fault of a computer program.

Slashdot Top Deals

You can do more with a kind word and a gun than with just a kind word. - Al Capone

Close