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Submission + - AI: Many discussions, no underlying explanation. 1

Futurepower(R) writes: AI: There is a huge amount of AI news and comments, but apparently nothing that helps people understand how AI is developed, and functions.

We need a book, or other information, that explains how AI technology functions.

Comment Re:Which is it? (Score 0) 118

A few days ago there was a story about how an AI store was failing horribly. It can't do that, but at the same time will destroy us?

Not "at the same time". You're conflating what AI can do now with what it will likely be able to do in a year or five, or 20.

Amodei and others are worried about what AI that doesn't yet exist may do, not about what current-generation AI can do. AI is getting better, very quickly, and unless there's some blocking obstacle that no one has been able to identify will at some point become far, far smarter than humans, individually or collectively. So before that happens, we need to figure out how to make sure that superintelligent AI wants to help us, and wants to do it in the right way.

Submission + - Why can't M$ get any UI/UX changes right? (pcmag.com)

golem100 writes: A couple weeks ago PCMag, and others, wrote articles along the lines of: "Microsoft Finally Backs Down: The Windows 11 Taskbar Update You've Been Waiting For". This is currently implemented with CU KB5120998 and since M$ has elected to defer "activation" of this feature--some two weeks later for most users it still needs to be enabled by the ViVe tool: vivetool /enable /id:59213768,61090762

Um, No...

The fundamental set of [lost] attributes that this "We brought Movable TaskBar back" lacks:

You can not control the position of the TaskBar on each desktop monitor--example: I have four displays on my desktop, three Landscape & one of which is in a Portrait orientation for reading documents.

With Windows7/8/10 you could position the TaskBar so that it was "Out of the way" and each display--on the right side of the right-most Landscape, on the left for the left-most Landscape display, & on the top/bottom for the Portrait. [same as my desktop on my Linux workstation]
Now you still get the same Taskbar alignment on all desktops.

You can not "resize" the taskbar. (well, you can--it has three sizes: too big, too small, and really way too small) For the previous three generations of the OS you could "Drag-Select" and resize the TaskBar to be the correct size for your needs on your desktop. [...just as I can on my KDE Desktop!]
With this implementation, 1/3 of the Taskbar real estate is consumed with "TaskBar-Tray Notification Icons."

Nobody asked for a partial, broken, re-implementation. The ask was: "Put it Back as it was!"
Dealing with M$ is pretty much like getting your 15 year old to do their chores on garbage night.

Comment Re:TFA has no supporting data (Score 1) 198

The rebates on the batteries you earn over time, and to do so you must export some of your stored battery power back to the grid during peak hours.

Is this actually a substantial amount of energy? I'm in Utah (Rocky Mountain Power) and RMP also pays me to use my batteries... but the amount of energy they draw is tiny. 8-10 times per week they draw on my batteries, but it's like 4 kW peak draw (my batteries can sustain 20 kW), and generally for less than 30 seconds, so in any given week I'm only contributing like 0.2 kWh. As I understand it, this is because RMP uses my batteries not really to "serve loads", per se, but just as grid stabilization; brief backfill to keep the voltage from sagging.

Obviously my batteries do serve *my* loads, which reduces the load on the grid, but that's not what RMP pays me for.

Does CA make heavier use of residential batteries to feed the grid?

Submission + - The 'Anti-AI' Panic Is Led by...AI Companies (hotair.com)

schwit1 writes: What we are seeing is a massive, pretty obviously coordinated campaign by AI researchers, companies, NGOs, and politicians to strangle competition in an industry and, as I will show, save the financial bacon of the top AI companies that are vastly overextended financially because they have made contractual commitments that they simply have no prospect of paying for.

Comment Re:What a moron. (Score 1) 73

Most of his donations were to Democrats, so he has no chance for that. https://time.com/6241262/sam-b...

And JD Vance called him Hitler. Trump accepts changes of heart as long as they include sufficient groveling and self-humiliation. SBF's problem is he doesn't currently have any money, and doesn't have a lot of friends to put up cash for him either. If SCOTUS will overturn his fine on a technicality and he can get some or all of that money back, then he'll have the cash to buy a pardon. Obviously he needs to get it done in the next 2 years, four months.

Submission + - Amazon Vine Review Recasts 'Coding Kids' Exposé as Learn-to-Code Primer for 1

theodp writes: "Amazon Vine," the e-tailer explains, "is an invitation-only program which selects the most insightful reviewers in the Amazon store to serve as Vine Voices. Vine Voices have the unique opportunity to order items free of charge and share their product experiences with Amazon customers to help them make informed buying decisions. [...] When customers see a review with the special Vine badge, they can trust that they're getting an honest, unbiased opinion from a real customer just like them."

So, how well does the reality live up to the promise? In the case of the new book Coding Kids: Big Tech's Battle to Remake Public Schools, not so much. Described by the publisher as "the inside story of how Big Tech catalyzed, co-opted, and ultimately came to capture computer science and AI education in America" ("Fourth graders doing Google-branded coding lessons. Amazon schooling seventh graders on its warehouse robots. Advanced Placement computing courses from Microsoft and Apple."), the top review selected by Amazon informs customers that the book is a 'good introduction to coding.'

"I really enjoyed Coding Kids," writes the 'trusted' Amazon Vine reviewer. "What stood out to me most was how the book takes something that can sound complicated—computer coding—and makes it feel approachable and even fun. As I was reading it, I found myself thinking that this is exactly the kind of book that could help a child become interested in technology without feeling overwhelmed by it. I particularly liked the way it encourages kids to be curious, experiment, and solve problems on their own. That was probably my favorite part because it shows that coding isn’t just about computers—it’s also about creativity and learning how to think differently. I would definitely recommend Coding Kids to parents, grandparents, or teachers looking for a good introduction to coding. I came away from the book thinking that it could genuinely spark a child’s interest in technology and give them the confidence to explore something new."

While likely just another example of Hanlon's Razor ("Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."), the recasting of an investigative nonfiction book that casts a critical eye at Amazon's influence on K-12 education as a learn-to-code primer for children doesn't exactly instill trust in the Amazon Vine program or Amazon's 'Top Reviews' selection process. More on-point book reviews of Coding Kids can be found at the Washington Independent Review of Books ("Turns out, Silicon Valley isn’t especially altruistic.") and Science ("Big Tech’s crusade to get kids coding is more self-interested than it first appears").

Submission + - Welcome to the Security Singularity (safety.google) 4

shanen writes: Or should this be an AskSlashdot about how to avoid such problems? But mostly I think it's a funny story to build a rant around. Or it could be regarded as a kind of spinoff of the recent story about record numbers of patches from Microsoft. Is the AI fixing old bugs? Or have recent AI-driven patches created more bugs that need to be fixed in the next month's record-setting patch package?

But here's the background of my funny story. My smartphone contract has a price structure linked to data usage. The least expensive tier is for less data (of course) so I try to use Wi-Fi as much as possible. No recent problems on that front in terms of using too much data.

Often I wind up using municipal Wi-Fi systems, but they are divided up into fairly small regions here. The login procedures vary quite a bit. Yesterday I was in a memorial museum doing a bit of research and that particular municipality has a somewhat different login system for their Wi-Fi. One of the options was to use my google account... Usually a convenient and quick approach.

But this time something caused the google to go berserk. Leading to hours of password changes and account recoveries and battles between my various computers and my smartphone and I'm pert' shure there's still more to come. No idea what the google thinks it is protecting me from, but the "convenient and quick approach" led to a major nightmare. In the end it appears my SIM was my only salvation?

Slashdot wants a URL, so I linked to the google's page on the topic. Doubleplusungood on steroids.

Comment Re:Golly that kettle is dark! (Score 2) 90

The thing here is that there isn't "Apple". There is Apple-the-parent-company, and Apple UK. From the perspective of law, Apple-the-parent is a supplier to Apple UK. Apple UK will have been ordered not to disclose information, including its suppliers. Therefore nothing restricts Apple-the-parent other than its contract as a supplier to Apple UK.

Yes I'm aware that sounds odd, but I deal with these situations fairly regularly (although am not any form of lawyer, this is absolutely not legal advice etc.). Contracts between international entities are common, and Apple US would not be in breach of US law but would be in breach of contract and would place Apple UK in breach of UK law by doing so.

Am not taking the UK government's side on this - I personally think the order is nuts and yep, I'm British. I'm just trying to show why the relationship would be more complex. Legally Apple US could disclose of course. However I'll bet you it has a supplier contract with Apple UK, a legally distinct entity, that says something like "the terms of this agreement will be bound by UK law". Hence it would be in breach of contract, and that could place Apple UK at legal risk in the UK.

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