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Submission + - Elon Musk claims of SSN fraud shows his ignorance of data (usatoday.com)

Submitted by UnknowingFool
UnknowingFool writes: Elon Musk, the self-proclaimed top Path of Exile player, has tweeted his claims of fraud with the Social Security Administration records. Among his claims "cursory examination of Social Security showed people in there that are about 150 years old" and "just learned that the social security database is not de-duplicated, meaning you can have the same SSN many times over". His first claim is regarding the fact that there are 18.9M individuals in the database who were born before 1920 but not marked as dead. These are "vampires" according to Musk who are receiving benefits. The actual explanation is that the SSA has never received proof of death to flag these individual as dead. Especially who died before the digital age, these individuals' death records may not exist. Being marked as alive in the database; however, does not mean that these individuals are receiving benefits.

An audit in 2015 found that exactly 266 individuals over the age of 112 were receiving benefits. Of those 253 were found to be not actually over 112 with only 13 individuals recorded with the correct age. Social Security benefits however terminate at age 115.

As for his second claim of duplicate SSNs, without further context, it is difficult to assert that duplicate SSNs in a database is even a problem. For some types of data like contribution and payment records, duplicate SSNs is normal as one should expect multiple records can exist for one unique SSN.

Submission + - Musk to "fix" Community Notes for contradicting Trump (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by smooth wombat
smooth wombat writes: The man who espouses "free speech" has announced he will be "fixing" Community Notes on Twitter because they repeatedly contradict what Trump says. He claims a cabal of governments and media are using Notes to game the system.

Musk's attack on Community Notes is somewhat surprising. Although he has always maintained that Community Notes aren't "perfect," he has defended Community Notes through multiple European Union probes challenging their effectiveness and declared that the goal of the crowdsourcing effort was to make X "by far the best source of truth on Earth." At CES 2025, X CEO Linda Yaccarino bragged that Community Notes are "good for the world."

Yaccarino invited audience members to "think about it as this global collective consciousness keeping each other accountable at global scale in real time," but just one month later, Musk is suddenly casting doubts on that characterization while the European Union continues to probe X.

Perhaps most significantly, Musk previously insisted as recently as last year that Community Notes could not be manipulated, even by Musk. He strongly disputed a 2024 report from the Center for Countering Digital Hate that claimed that toxic X users were downranking accurate notes that they personally disagreed with, claiming any attempt at gaming Community Notes would stick out like a "neon sore thumb."

Comment designed to draw recurring revenue from players (Score 1) 27

by Morpeth (#65097881) Attached to: Sony Cancels Two More PlayStation Projects in Broader Retreat

THAT is all the more reason I'm glad whatever those games were are dead.

I like games "designed to..." be fun, interesting, engaging, entertaining, thought-provoking, etc. When the design centers around monetization and that kind of mindset, I say a big 'fuck you', glad the projects are dead. There enough of that shit already.

I think a lot the supposed 'crash' in the industry can be blamed on whoever is making the design decisions, be they 'leadership', bean counters, or the programmers -- because many of us gamers remember when nerds were the ones who designed games they thought would be fun and want to play themselves -- not execs who want to just to suck every fucking penny they can out of people.

Comment Re:What's the point of boxed again? (Score 2) 32

by Morpeth (#65073295) Attached to: Boxed Video Game Sales Collapse in UK as Digital Revenues Flatten

Agreed. I remember when Neverwinter Nights came out, there was substantial and well made manual, and a really nice cloth map of the game region. I loved those kind of extras, but without them, 'meh'. That said, I'm old school and sometimes I still like having a hard copy of game so that I can play when company X goes under or pulls their servers, etc.

I like how GOG.com handles digital distrubution -- not just the DRM-free part, but you can usually download the actual install file(s) and keep a copy to reinstall anytime if needed -- and they often have digital downloads of the manuals, wallpapers, maps, music, etc. which I appreciate.

Comment Re:Live services are killing the game industry (Score 1) 123

by Morpeth (#65037107) Attached to: '2024 Was the Year the Bottom Fell Out of the Games Industry'

I also avoid games that overly monetize with game passes, season passes, micro-transactions up the wazoo. I like playing many games and as you mentioned the live service model tends to want to monopolize a players times. The games I play most have the concessional DLC or expansion that I am willing to buy, but no subs, micros, etc. I may be in the minority but I shy away from the live service model since it feels like bean counters designing games and not gamers/programmers.

Comment Or it could be some of them suck/lost the audience (Score 5, Interesting) 123

by Morpeth (#65037093) Attached to: '2024 Was the Year the Bottom Fell Out of the Games Industry'

"online harassment campaigns targeting developers over diversity initiatives,..." OR it could be this kind of shit doesn't belong in a fantasy RPG.

https://youtu.be/tz5oehDRhbU?t.... (pushups for 'misgendering' someone?)
https://youtu.be/1JkPHdlJc20 (randomly interjection of "I am non-binary" into a dinner conversation)

I am left-leaning, but this kind of stuff keeps me from buying a game like this. I played the original Dragon Age Origins, totally loved it... THIS game is something totally different. I don't need someone lecturing and working out their own stuff in a game where I just want some escapism. NO ONE talks like this, especially in your classic fantasy/medieval setting. Not to mention this game is a disney-eque santitized version of Dragon Age when it comes to other dialog, storyline and violence. DA:O had some grim and dark stuff and difficult and ugly choices, this game is rainbows and unicorns

Submission + - Is AI making you less creative? (techxplore.com)

Submitted by Big Hairy Gorilla
Big Hairy Gorilla writes: Researchers at the University of Toronto, explore the impact of LLMs on Human Creativity. The use of LLMs in particular, but automation in general, leads to a conundrum. "The smarter the tool the dumber the operator" is how I put it. Observationally, it's clear that we in technology use tools extensively. At what point do we lose skills because the tools do "too much" for you?

Submission + - Code.org-Tied Investors Back AI-Assisted Gigification of Entry-Level Dev Jobs

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: Run by the tech-backed nonprofit Code.org, the nation's 2024 Hour of Code for K-12 students kicks off Monday as part of Computer Science Education Week. As in years past, the Hour of Code seeks to make tech careers enticing to young students, but this year's pitch comes as the once-booming tech job market has contracted sharply amid an AI investment frenzy. It's a marked change from the original Hour of Code in 2013, when Mark Zuckerberg helped pitch tech careers by saying, "Our policy at Facebook is literally to hire as many talented engineers as we can find." Ten years later, Zuckerberg was laying off as many talented engineers as he could find.

Particularly disrupted by AI and outsourcing, explained UC Berkeley CS professor James Brown, are entry-level tech positions. "In tech," Brown writes, "programming positions that aren't that demanding are disappearing. You can now use a programming assistant that's based on a large language model to basically write a lot of code for you. So, where a company would have had to hire one or two people before, they no longer need to. There are still entry-level jobs that involve basically babysitting the AI — but these systems are getting better very quickly."

Interestingly, as O'Brien frets that universal basic income may soon be needed since "a person starting their [CS] degree today may find themself graduating four years from now into a world with very limited employment options," GitStart — a Y Combinator startup backed by a Who's Who of tech leaders, is aiming to cash in on the gigification of software engineering by "redistributing [CS] work to [AI-assisted] junior engineers worldwide." According to Bonfire Ventures, which led a recent investment round, GitStart customers have reported substantial cost savings, with one CEO noting, "Every ticket that GitStart handles costs me one-sixth of what it costs in-house, and it gets done faster."

GitStart's $5M seed financing was led by Code.org co-founder Ali Partovi's Neo, together with tech leaders that included Microsoft CTO and AI EVP Kevin Scott (also a Code.org Board member), Google VP Parisa Tabriz (also a Code.org Board member), Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi (a Code.org donor/advisor), and others, including OpenAI Board member Adam D'Angelo (Code.org co-founder Hadi Partovi — Ali's twin — participated in a recent investment round). Individuals who have invested in Neo include tech giant leaders and Code.org boosters Bill Gates, Satya Nadella, Reid Hoffman, Jeff Wilke (a Code.org Board member), Sheryl Sandberg, and Eric Schmidt.

Submission + - FDA may outlaw food dyes 'within weeks': Bombshell move would affect candy, soda (nbcnews.com) 1

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: The Food and Drug Administration will decide on a ban of certain food dyes in the coming weeks after receiving a petition to review the safety of Red 3, NBC News reports.

“With Red 3, we have a petition in front of us to revoke the authorization board, and we’re hopeful that in the next few weeks we’ll be acting on that petition,” Jim Jones, the deputy commissioner for human foods at the FDA, said during a Senate meeting this week, per NBC.

According to the FDA, the agency has reviewed the safety of Red 3 —which is derived from petroleum and found snacks, beverages, candy and more — in food and drugs “multiple times” since it was first approved in 1969, but the petition has requested for the additive to be reviewed once more.

While the FDA has stated that food dyes are safe and do not pose health risks, the dye was banned from topical drugs and cosmetics in 1990.

Comment JavaScript != Java (Score 4, Interesting) 26

by Morpeth (#64973919) Attached to: USPTO Petitioned To Cancel Oracle's JavaScript Trademark

I'm confused by this, how the hell did Oracle get the TM for his? Aside from the naming confusion, they are two different languages -- I get that Oracle got the rights to Java when they bought Sun back in the day, but JavaScript was developed by Eich and then it became the EMCAScript standard -- two different beasts. Or is this just some BS moneygrab / marketing shit from Oracle?

Submission + - Google CEO Forbids Political Talk After Firing 28 Over Israeli Contract Protest (yahoo.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Google CEO Sundar Pichai has weighed in on the debate over the relative values of political expression and workplace coexistence by ordering employees to leave their political opinions at home. A day after firing 28 workers for participating in a sit-in protest of the tech giant’s cloud contract with Israel, Pichai warned staff that the office is not a place “to fight over disruptive issues or debate politics” in a company blog post.

Although Pichai didn’t specifically mention the protests or the Israel–Hamas war, he concluded that the $1.92 trillion company “is a business, and not a place to act in a way that disrupts coworkers or makes them feel unsafe, to attempt to use the company as a personal platform.” “We have a duty to be an objective and trusted provider of information that serves all of our users globally,” Pichai continued. “When we come to work, our goal is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful. That supersedes everything else and I expect us to act with a focus that reflects that.”

Submission + - Romans made 'self-healing' concrete, and now we know how (sciencealert.com) 2

Submitted by Rick Schumann
Rick Schumann writes: The method used by ancient Romans to make their concrete has apparently been misunderstood, but now modern researchers have unraveled the mystery of how structures, like the Pantheon, for instance, has survived all these centuries without collapsing: the method they used to mix their 'pozzolanic' concrete yielded a 'self-healing' type, in which, if cracks developed and later got water in them, would through an inherent chemical process fill and seal the cracks.
The researchers are currently exploring ways to commercially produce this type of concrete as a more environmentally-friendly type for modern use.

Submission + - Perplexity CEO Offers To Replace Striking NYT Staff With AI (techcrunch.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The CEO of AI search company Perplexity, Aravind Srinivas, has offered to cross picket lines and provide services to mitigate the effect of a strike by New York Times tech workers. The NYT Tech Guild announced its strike Monday, after setting November 4 as its deadline months earlier. The workers represented provide software support and data analysis for the Times, on the business side of the outlet. They have been asking for an annual 2.5% wage increase and to cement a current two days per week in-office expectation, among other things. [...] Picketers demonstrated in front of the NYT building in New York as negotiations continued. Meanwhile, on X, formerly known as Twitter, Perplexity’s CEO offered to step in for the striking workers.

Replying to Semafor media editor Max Tani quoting the publisher, Srinivas wrote: “Hey AG Sulzberger @nytimes sorry to see this. Perplexity is on standby to help ensure your essential coverage is available to all through the election. DM me anytime here.” Many on X immediately castigated Srinivas for acting as a scab — a derogatory term for people willing to perform the jobs of striking workers. It is widely considered a disreputable behavior in matters of labor and equity. By undercutting collective action, scabs limit the ability of workers to bargain with those in positions of power. Srinivas may simply be trying to make sure people have the information they need on election day. The company has lately unveiled its own elections info hub and map. But to offer its services explicitly as a replacement for striking workers was bound to be an unpopular move.

Though TechCrunch asked Perplexity for comment, Srinivas responded to TechCrunch’s post on X saying that “the offer was *not* to ‘replace’ journalists or engineers with AI but to provide technical infra support on a high-traffic day.” The striking workers in question, however, are the ones who provide that service to the NYT. It’s not really clear what services other than AI tools Perplexity could offer, or why they would not amount to replacing the workers in question.

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