Comment Obligitory (Score 2) 65
Futurama warned us about this twenty-five years ago: Don't Date Robots!
See the episode "I Dated a Robot".
Comment Samsung Samsung (Score 1) 41
I was hoping this was recursively odd like Samsung not selling RAM to Samsung.
Nope, just an uncaught typo.
Comment Video (Score 1) 181
Here is a video of an incident where hidden handles nearly killed most of a family.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Abrup...
Everyone gets out alive in this case. It looks like everyone panicked a little bit, which should be expected in the midst of the adrenaline rush of a car accident! The features of a vehicle should work well even when people are not thinking clearly.
Comment RAM Shortage (Score 3, Insightful) 29
Will the RAM shortage impact the price?
There have already been reports that chip shortages will impact the availability of chips for home computers, phones, and automobiles. Maybe Microsoft put in a huge order for its requirements and is ahead of the curve.
Comment Higher Costs (Score 4, Informative) 98
Would you rather pay a tariff's cost or pay more for products produced domestically? We will see how every company deals with this.
Tariffs are often presented as a shield for domestic industries, but economically they are counterintuitive: by limiting foreign competition, they reduce the pressure on local companies to innovate, improve efficiency, or lower costs. Without that competitive drive, businesses can stagnate, producing inferior goods and services while charging higher prices. The irony is that the domestic consumers tariffs are meant to protect end up paying more for worse products, while the broader economy loses out on the dynamism and progress that open competition usually sparks.
Suddenly reshaping supply chains to respond to tariffs carries significant risks that ripple across the economy. Companies may be forced to abandon established, efficient networks in favor of hastily arranged alternatives, which often means higher costs, logistical bottlenecks, and reduced reliability. These abrupt shifts can disrupt production schedules, strain relationships with long-term suppliers, and erode quality control. Worse, the uncertainty discourages investment in long-term innovation, as firms divert resources to short-term survival.
When unemployment is already low, suddenly finding enough workers to reconfigure supply chains in response to tariffs becomes nearly impossible without driving up labor costs. Firms must compete for scarce talent, often retraining or relocating employees, which adds further expense and delays. At the same time, the abrupt shift discards sunk costs. Prior investments in established supplier relationships, infrastructure, and logistics are thrown out before they would have been depreciated. These wasted resources are replaced by new costs for recruitment, training, and building fresh networks, all of which inevitably flow into higher prices for consumers. In effect, tariffs don’t just disrupt trade; they force companies to burn past investments while layering on new inefficiencies that must show up in the prices of goods.
Submission + - U.S. Will Restart Testing Nuclear Bombs (npr.org)
Mr_Blank writes: President Donald Trump appeared to suggest the U.S. will resume testing nuclear weapons for the first time in three decades, saying it would be on an "equal basis" with Russia and China.
The U.S. conducts some of its most sensitive nuclear weapons research in a laboratory deep beneath Nevada. NPR was recently given a tour. There was no indication the U.S. would start detonating warheads, but the president offered few details about what seemed to be a significant shift in U.S. policy.
The U.S. military already regularly tests its missiles that are capable of delivering a nuclear warhead, but it has not detonated the weapons since 1992 because of a test ban.
But the president suggested that changes were necessary because other countries were testing weapons. It was unclear what he was referring to, but it evoked Cold War-era escalations.
"Because of other countries testing programs, I have instructed the Department of War to start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis," he said in a post on Truth Social. "That process will begin immediately."
Trump made the announcement only an hour before he was scheduled to sit down with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The U.S. conducts some of its most sensitive nuclear weapons research in a laboratory deep beneath Nevada. NPR was recently given a tour. There was no indication the U.S. would start detonating warheads, but the president offered few details about what seemed to be a significant shift in U.S. policy.
The U.S. military already regularly tests its missiles that are capable of delivering a nuclear warhead, but it has not detonated the weapons since 1992 because of a test ban.
But the president suggested that changes were necessary because other countries were testing weapons. It was unclear what he was referring to, but it evoked Cold War-era escalations.
"Because of other countries testing programs, I have instructed the Department of War to start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis," he said in a post on Truth Social. "That process will begin immediately."
Trump made the announcement only an hour before he was scheduled to sit down with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Comment Last Version of Windows (Score 4, Interesting) 68
Who can I sue? I thought Microsoft said that Windows 10 would be "the last version of windows"
Should I spend all the money to upgrade to a new computer just so I can run Windows 11 for a few years?
Should I stay on defunct Windows 10 until Windows 12 is available? I would surely be upset if I bought a Win11 capable computer only to learn Win12 has all new incompatible requirements.
Has anyone reviewed the environmental impact of making all of the Win10 hardware go to the landfills?
I guess I will have to look up the best Linux option and make the move. The year of Linux has arrived for me. Thanks Microsoft!
Submission + - Skipping Over-The-Air Car Updates Could Be Costly (autoblog.com)
Mr_Blank writes: Once a new OTA update becomes available, owners of GM vehicles have 45 days to install the update. After this date, the company will not cover any damages or issues that are caused by ignoring the update. “Damage resulting from failure to install over-the-air software updates is not covered,” states the warranty booklet for 2025 and 2026 models. This same rule applies to all GM’s brands in the USA: Chevrolet, Buick, Cadillac, and GMC. However, if the software update itself causes any component damage, that will be covered by the warranty. Owners coming from older GM vehicles will have to adapt as the company continues to implement its Global B electronic architecture on newer models, which relies heavily on OTA updates. Similar policies appear in the owner's manual for Tesla. Software-defined vehicles are here to stay, even if some of them have far more tech glitches than they should—just ask Volvo.
Comment We Called It (Score 5, Interesting) 57
When this change was made many Slashdotters said it was ridiculous.
Cayenne8 said: "Yeah, my first thought was WTF would they ditch the very popular and VERY well known company name "HBO" for just Max? Seems like the latest round of marketing folks coming to businesses these days haven't a clue about the job they are trying to do, and how it all works."
Then we piled on from there...
An American dream for the very privileged: Getting paid generational wealth despite messing up so badly.
Comment The Difference? (Score 0) 14
Will the typical person be able to tell the difference between a human and AI voice reading the stories?
Certainly the best-sellers will retain humans, even famous humans, to read their books. But for the rest, AI could save them a lot of time and money.
Hopefully this technology will spread fast and then every book will be available with narration on many platforms. That would lead to price competition and competition for quality. Let the free market decide if this is a good idea or not.
Comment One ID to rule them all (Score 1) 21
What prevents one or a handful of IDs from being used by millions of people?
An obvious solution for that problem would be for every ID verification to be cross-checked against governmental registries.
This is also very convenient for the government to 'protect the children' and 'fight terrorists' by knowing every 'sensitive' thing that your ID has been registered to have had accessed. Your personal liberty will certainly be secured by this enlightened system, and no dragnet will ever ruin your reputation and good standing.
Oh, and if things you have already accessed are later deemed to be 'sensitive' then could that blemish be added to your permanent record after the fact - long after you had a chance to decided to click the link?
Bring a sled! This slope looks slippery.
Submission + - Tesla Sued for Algorithmic Odometer Manipulation (jalopnik.com)
Mr_Blank writes: A multiple-Tesla owner in Northern California is suing the automaker, claiming the odometers incorrectly measures mileage using a faulty algorithm which ups the supposed miles driven from 15% to 117%. The lawsuit alleges Tesla does this to close out warranties early on their products. The lawsuit, however, stands on a filed patent which may or may not be in use in Tesla vehicles.In the instance of their Model Y,Hinton says they drove 6,086 miles but the Tesla recorded 13,228 miles. The lawsuit is based on a patent that Tesla filed for a seemingly tricky form of recording mileage. The patent calls for a "miles-to-electrical energy conversion factor" that would take in factors like charging behavior and road conditions into the calculation of miles traveled instead of a direct recording of miles traveled.The lawsuit alleges Tesla is using this technology instead of mechanical or electrical systems that faithfully record miles traveled, in order to shorten warranties based on miles-driven in the cars.
Comment Insured (Score 4, Interesting) 192
This seems like a distraction for the driver. Distractions cause accidents. Accidents cost money.
The lucky drivers of these vehicles will pay again in higher insurance rates.
Will this be a 'feature' in rental cars too? I do not want this feature.
Comment Use it or lose it (Score 1) 90
Use AI to maximize productivity &out compete your peers: Get a job!
Use AI and lose your ability to handle irregular situations: Lose a job!
Everything will be fine as long as nothing goes wrong in a novel way.
Submission + - A chilling AI warning (axios.com)
Mr_Blank writes: Jake Sullivan — with three days left as White House national security adviser, with wide access to the world's secrets — delivered a chilling, "catastrophic" warning for America and the incoming administration: The next few years will determine whether artificial intelligence leads to catastrophe — and whether China or America prevails in the AI arms race.
America must quickly perfect a technology that many believe will be smarter and more capable than humans. We need to do this without decimating U.S. jobs, and inadvertently unleashing something with capabilities we didn't anticipate or prepare for. We need to both beat China on the technology and in shaping and setting global usage and monitoring of it, so bad actors don't use it catastrophically. Oh, and it can only be done with unprecedented government-private sector collaboration — and probably difficult, but vital, cooperation with China.
This is beyond uncharted waters. It's an unexplored galaxy — "a new frontier," in his words. And one, he warns, where progress routinely exceeds projections in advancement. Progress is now pulsing in months, not years.
There won't be one winner in this AI race. Both China and the U.S. are going to have very advanced AI. There'll be tons of open-source AI that many other nations will build on, too. Once one country has made a huge advance, others will match it soon after. What they can't get from their own research or work, they'll get from hacking and spying. (It didn't take long for Russia to match the A-bomb and then the H-bomb.)
Steve Bannon and other MAGA originals believe AI is evil at scale — a job-killer for the very people who elected Trump. But for now, Bannon is a fairly lonely voice shouting against AI velocity. Trump and the AI gods hold the stage.
America must quickly perfect a technology that many believe will be smarter and more capable than humans. We need to do this without decimating U.S. jobs, and inadvertently unleashing something with capabilities we didn't anticipate or prepare for. We need to both beat China on the technology and in shaping and setting global usage and monitoring of it, so bad actors don't use it catastrophically. Oh, and it can only be done with unprecedented government-private sector collaboration — and probably difficult, but vital, cooperation with China.
This is beyond uncharted waters. It's an unexplored galaxy — "a new frontier," in his words. And one, he warns, where progress routinely exceeds projections in advancement. Progress is now pulsing in months, not years.
There won't be one winner in this AI race. Both China and the U.S. are going to have very advanced AI. There'll be tons of open-source AI that many other nations will build on, too. Once one country has made a huge advance, others will match it soon after. What they can't get from their own research or work, they'll get from hacking and spying. (It didn't take long for Russia to match the A-bomb and then the H-bomb.)
Steve Bannon and other MAGA originals believe AI is evil at scale — a job-killer for the very people who elected Trump. But for now, Bannon is a fairly lonely voice shouting against AI velocity. Trump and the AI gods hold the stage.
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