Forgot your password?
typodupeerror

Submission + - Oregon School Cell Phone Ban: 'Engaged Students, Joyful Teachers' (portlandtribune.com)

An anonymous reader writes: There was plenty of uncertainty and debate about the effectiveness of a cell phone ban decreed (PDF) by executive order last summer. But at least in Estacada, the policy has earned two thumbs up, including approval from a “grumpy old teacher.” Jeff Mellema is a language arts teacher at Estacada High School. He has worked in the building for 24 years, and he said the new policy that prohibits students from using their phones during the day has been a breath of fresh air.

“There is so much better discourse in my classroom, be it personal or academic,” Mellema said. “Students can’t avoid those conversations anymore with their phones.” “This ban has brought joy back to this old, grumpy teacher,” he added with a smile. That is the kind of feedback Gov. Tina Kotek was hoping for as she visited Estacada High School on Wednesday afternoon, March 18. Her goal was to visit classrooms, speak with administrators, and meet with students one-on-one to hear about the effectiveness of her phone policy. [...] In the classrooms, she was able to take a straw poll around the cell phone ban and then get specific, direct feedback from the kids. Overall, it was positive.

The Rangers said they noticed changes in how they interact with teachers and peers. They don’t feel that “siren’s song” tug of their phones as often, and the changes are bleeding into everyday life as well — think less reminders to put phones away during family dinners. Phones also led to issues around bullying and online toxicity during the school day. There are some hiccups. The students spoke about difficulties in tracking busy schedules. Many athletes relied on their phones for practice times and locations. Some advanced placement kids said the overzealous programs monitoring school laptops blocked access to needed resources for studying/researching schoolwork. There is even a strange quirk with school-provided tech that prevents them from accessing their calculators. “Maybe the filters are too strong right now,” Gov. Kotek said. “That is why we are working with the districts to best implement the policy.”

The kids also weighed in on the debate around the extent of the ban. The two options bandied in Salem were a “bell-to-bell” policy or just inside classrooms. The latter would allow kids to use their phones during passing period and lunch. Several advocated for that change. That mirrored the debate within the Oregon legislature. It ultimately led to a stalemate and the need for Gov. Kotek’s executive ruling. “When you make a decision like this, you don’t know how it will ultimately work,” Kotek told the students. “I appreciate you adapting to the situation and making it work for you.” While things could change in the future, the governor is pleased with the early results. The phone ban is here to stay.

Submission + - Hyperscale DDoS over Last Year and DOJ Takedown (linkedin.com)

sturgeon writes: US Department of Justice announced major takedown of world's largest botnet last night — capable of generating hundreds of Tbps of DDoS traffic from millions of residential android devices (https://www.justice.gov/usao-ak/pr/authorities-disrupt-worlds-largest-iot-ddos-botnets-responsible-record-breaking-attacks). Security vendors now sharing more information, including dramatic graph of DDoS activity before and after

Submission + - China invents process that turns desert sand into fertile soil in just 10 months (earth.com)

AmiMoJo writes: Scientists have used lab-grown microbes to bind loose desert sand into a thin, stable layer that wind cannot easily blow away. That stronger surface gives restoration teams time to plant shrubs and grasses before harsh winds and heat wipe out young plants.

On straw checkerboards laid across northwest China, a dark film spread over treated sand and stayed after seasonal dust storms.

Tracking those plots through heat and frost, the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) documented how fast the film hardened. In trials near the Taklamakan Desert in Xinjiang in northwest China, CAS teams saw crusts stabilize sand within 10 to 16 months. Even with that speed, planners focused on building the soil base first, so later plants could survive without constant replanting.

Submission + - Co-founder of Supermicro allegedly smuggled $2.5B worth of GPUs to China (cnn.com)

AmiMoJo writes: The co-founder of Super Micro Computer and two others were charged with diverting $2.5 billion worth of servers with Nvidia’s artificial intelligence chips to China, in violation of US laws barring exports to that country without a license.

Yih-Shyan Liaw, known as Wally; Ruei-Tsang Chang, known as Steven; and Ting-Wei Sun, known as Willy, were charged with conspiring to violate export control laws, smuggling goods from the US and conspiring to defraud the US.

Liaw, who co-founded Super Micro Computer and served on its board of directors, was arrested Thursday in California and released on bail. Sun, a contractor, is held awaiting a detention hearing. Chang, who worked in the Taiwan office of Super Micro, remains at large.

Submission + - OpenAI to merge Atlas browser, ChatGPT, Codex into a single desktop super app (neowin.net)

joshuark writes: OpenAI is planning to combine its Atlas web browser, ChatGPT app, and Codex coding app into a singular desktop super app. CEO of Applications, Fidji Simo, said the company was doubling down on its successful products.

By taking this move, the AI company aims to streamline the user experience and reduce fragmentation. With that said, each of the apps currently do quite different things so it will be interesting to see how they put this all together. Simo said in an internal memo: “We realized we were spreading our efforts across too many apps and stacks, and that we need to simplify our efforts. That fragmentation has been slowing us down and making it harder to hit the quality bar we want.”

OpenAI is in a fierce battle with companies like Anthropic and Google to produce the best models and products. By unifying and speeding up the development of their desktop offering, it gives OpenAI a leg up in the race.

Atlas is probably the least known among the three products. It lets users browse the web with ChatGPT packed in. This browser is only available on macOS, so fewer people have had a chance to use it.

Submission + - Tech-Backed CS Teachers Association Pivots to AI Literacy, Scores $11M NSF Grant

theodp writes: On Thursday, the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) announced an $11 million award to the Computer Science Teachers Association (CSTA) in furtherance of the Trump administration's executive order on Advancing Artificial Intelligence Education for American Youth that directed federal agencies to promote AI literacy. The award will launch Artificial Intelligence Professional Development (PD) Weeks: CS Foundations for Creating with AI, a multistate initiative that will prepare thousands of K-12 educators to teach foundational computer science (CS) and AI at scale. "Artificial Intelligence is transforming every sector of our economy, and American students must be prepared not just to use AI, but to understand it and create with it," explained the NSF's Brian Stone. "We are thinking beyond AI towards what the White House calls the 'Future of Intelligence.'"

CSTA joined fellow tech-backed nonprofit Code.org last December to pivot the nation's K-12 schoolchildren from coding to AI literacy during CS Education Week. Replacing CSEdWeek's Hour of Code event was a new Hour of AI event, a move called for and backed by Microsoft — that featured AI literacy tutorials from Microsoft, Google, and Amazon, all of whom are Strategic CSTA Partners and Code.org Lifetime Supporters.

"Computer science teachers will continue to be leaders in preparing students for an AI-enabled future," said CSTA Executive Director Jake Baskin in a LinkedIn post. "Over the next two years, this initiative will allow us to equip thousands of K-12 educators nationwide with the knowledge and instructional strategies needed to teach foundational CS and AI at scale. On the heels of last year's announcement of the AI education Executive Order, Baskin (formerly Director of State Government Affairs at Code.org) joined the nation's tech leaders in signing a letter of support that appeared in a New York Times ad to kick off a new Code.org led campaign to make CS and AI a graduation requirement for all students.

Comment We're on the same path (Score 1) 74

My company (think large healthcare) is doing the same kind of "Get AI in to everything everywhere NOW!" program and I'm telling you here first, there's gonna be a major fuckup in the company sooner or later that'll be directly attributable to some un-tethered AI bullshit.

They're cramming it into everything and exhorting employees to use it "once a day" or more for something, anything, so they can make a slide that says, "Wow, lookit all the people in the company using AI!! Damn we're awesome!!"

Comment Re:Bam. Dead Internet theory no longer a theory (Score 2) 45

A site called botscout.com used to have graphs of bot vs human activity, and the numbers went up more and more and the graph line got steeper and steeper every month.

Eventually the graph just became a line going straight up, and a few months later they took the graphs offline. I guess there wasn't any point to them any more, eh? It's all fucking bots, all the way down.

We humans are paddling around aimlessly in an ocean of bots, drowning in their traffic.

Comment Honestly (Score 1) 2

I'm honestly not sure what the point of this project is.

I'm not against it, in fact I think it's fascinating, like resurrecting the Dodo bird. Resurrecting the Dodo bird would actually have a point, but faking a knock-off version of XP?

I just don't know who they think will run this or what anyone will do with it, assuming it ever sees the light of day (which I doubt I'll live to see).

So honestly, why do this? I understand the "what", but the whole bit about "why" escapes me.

Slashdot Top Deals

Veni, Vidi, VISA: I came, I saw, I did a little shopping.

Working...