Scientists Build a Nuclear-Diamond Battery That Could Power Devices for Thousands of Years
The world’s first nuclear-powered battery — a diamond with an embedded radioactive isotope — could power small devices for thousands of years, according to scientists at the UK’s University of Bristol.

Long-time Slashdot reader fahrbot-bot shared this report from LiveScience:

The diamond b … ⌘ Read more

Months After Its 20th Anniversary, OpenStreetMap Suffers an Extended Outage
Monday long-time Slashdot reader denelson83 wrote: The crowdsourced, widely-used map database OpenStreetMap has had a hardware failure at its upstream ISP in Amsterdam and has been put into a protective read-only mode to avoid loss or corruption of data. .

The outage had started Sunday December 15 at 4:00AM (GMT/UTC), but by … ⌘ Read more

Luigi Mangione’s Ghost Gun Was Only Partially 3D-Printed
“More than a decade after the advent of the 3D-printed gun as an icon of libertarianism and a gun control nightmare, police say one of those homemade plastic weapons has now been found in the hands of perhaps the world’s most high-profile alleged killer,” Wired wrote this month:

For the community of DIY gunsmiths who have spent years honing those printable firear … ⌘ Read more

US Life Expectancy Rose to 78.4 years in 2023 - Highest Level Since Pandemic
An anonymous reader shared this report from NBC News:

U.S. life expectancy rose last year, hitting its highest level since the beginning of the Covid pandemic, according to a report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The report, released Thursday, found that life expectancy at birth was 78.4 years in 202 … ⌘ Read more

T2 Linux SDE 24.12 ‘Sky’s the Limit!’ Released With 37 ISOs For 25 CPU ISAs
Berlin-based T2 Linux developer René Rebe is also long-time Slashdot reader ReneR — and popped by with a special announcement for the holidays:

The T2 Linux team has unveiled T2 Linux SDE 24.12, codenamed “Sky’s the Limit!”, delivering a massive update for this highly portable source-based Linux distribution… With 3,280 packa … ⌘ Read more

Voyager 1 Signals from Interstellar Space Detected by Amateur Astronomers on 1950s Telescope
“Voyager 1 is currently exploring interstellar space at a distance of 15.5 billion miles (24.9 billion kilometers) away from Earth,” writes Gizmodo.

And yet a team of amateur astronomers in the Netherlands was able to receive Voyager’s signals on a 1950s telescope designed to detect weak … ⌘ Read more

US Drone Sightings Provoke Reactions From New Jersey Legislature, Federal Government
On Thursday New Jersey lawmakers passed a resolution “calling on the federal government to conduct a ‘rigorous and ongoing’ investigation into the drone sightings in the state,” reports the Associated Press:

Meanwhile, federal and local authorities are warning against pointing lasers at suspected drones, be … ⌘ Read more

Hydroxychloroquine-Promoting COVID Study Retracted After 4 Years
Nature magazine reports that “A study that stoked enthusiasm for the now-disproven idea that a cheap malaria drug can treat COVID-19 has been retracted — more than four-and-a-half years after it was published.”

Researchers had critiqued the controversial paper many times, raising concerns about its data quality and an unclear ethics-approval p … ⌘ Read more

Microsoft Integrates a Free Version of Its ‘Copilot’ Coding AI Into GitHub, VS Code
An anonymous reader shared this report from TechCrunch:

Microsoft-owned GitHub announced on Wednesday a free version of its popular Copilot code completion/AI pair programming tool, which will also now ship by default with Microsoft’s popular VS Code editor. Until now, most developers had to pay a monthly … ⌘ Read more

California’s Population Jumps Back to Near Pre-Pandemic Levels
“California’s population grew this year by nearly a quarter of a million residents,” reports the Los Angeles Daily News, “closing in on record-high population levels the Golden State reached before the pandemic, the U.S. Census Bureau reported Thursday.”
Although “Data showed the state is growing more slowly than the country as a whole and other large … ⌘ Read more

‘Open Source Software Funding Report’ Finds 86% of Corporate Contributions are Employees’ Time
The Linux Foundation partnered with GitHub and Harvard’s Laboratory for Innovation Science to research organization-driven investments in open source software — the how and the why — surveying over 500 organizations around the world.
So what are the highlights from the published report?

The … ⌘ Read more

AI Writing Is Improving, But It Still Can’t Match Human Creativity
sciencehabit shares a report from Science Magazine: With a few keystrokes, anyone can ask an artificial intelligence (AI) program such as ChatGPT to write them a term paper, a rap song, or a play. But don’t expect William Shakespeare’s originality. A new study finds such output remains derivative – at least for now. […] [O]bjectively test … ⌘ Read more

Startup Set To Brick $800 Kids Robot Is Trying To Open Source It First
Last week, startup Embodied announced it was closing down, and its product, an $800 robot for kids ages 5 to 10, would soon be bricked. Now, in a blog post published on Friday, CEO Paolo Pirjanian shared that Embodied’s technical team is working on a way to open-source the robot, ensuring it can continue operating indefinitely. Ars … ⌘ Read more

Axiom’s Private Space Station Could Arrive As Early As 2028
Axiom Space has revised its plan for assembling its commercial space station by launching the Payload, Power, and Thermal module first, enabling it to operate as a free-flying platform as early as 2028 – two years ahead of the original timeline. Space.com reports: NASA awarded Axiom Space a contract in 2020 to attach one or more modules to the Internati … ⌘ Read more

10 Years Later: Malaysia To Resume Hunt For Flight MH370
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Malaysia has agreed to resume the search for the wreckage of missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, its transport minister said on Friday, more than 10 years after it disappeared in one of the world’s greatest aviation mysteries. Flight MH370, a Boeing 777 carrying 227 passengers and 12 crew, vanished en route fr … ⌘ Read more

Cory Doctorow’s Prescient Novella About Health Insurance and Murder
Five years ago, journalist and sci-fi author Cory Doctorow published a short story that explored the radicalization of individuals denied healthcare coverage. As The Guardian notes in a recent article, the story “might seem eerily similar” to the recent shooting of UnitedHealthcare’s CEO. While it appears that the alleged shooter never read … ⌘ Read more

‘Yes, I am a Human’: Bot Detection Is No Longer Working
The rise of AI has rendered traditional CAPTCHA tests increasingly ineffective, as bots can now “[solve] these puzzles in milliseconds using artificial intelligence (AI),” reports The Conversation. “How ironic. The tools designed to prove we’re human are now obstructing us more than the machines they’re supposed to be keeping at bay.” The report warns that the imminen … ⌘ Read more

EU Wants Apple To Open AirDrop and AirPlay To Android
The EU is pushing Apple to make iOS more interoperable with other platforms, requiring features like AirDrop and AirPlay to work seamlessly with Android and third-party devices, while also enabling background app functionality and cross-platform notifications. 9to5Google reports: A new document released (PDF) by the European Commission this week reveals a number of w … ⌘ Read more

10,000 Amazon Workers Go On Strike Ahead of Holiday Rush
An anonymous reader quotes a report from PCMag: Amazon employees are striking after the online retail giant missed a deadline to begin negotiations for a union contract. Roughly 10,000 employees have gone on strike as of Dec. 19. Workers are forming picket lines in New York City, Atlanta, Southern California, San Francisco, and Skokie, IL. Per a press release fro … ⌘ Read more

Justice Department Unveils Charges Against Alleged LockBit Developer
The U.S. Department of Justice has charged Russian-Israeli national, Rostislav Panev, for his alleged role as a developer in the LockBit ransomware group, accused of designing malware and maintaining infrastructure for attacks that extorted over $500 million and caused billions in global damages. CyberScoop reports: The arrest is part of a … ⌘ Read more

Qualcomm Processors Properly Licensed From Arm, US Jury Finds
Jurors delivered a mixed verdict on Friday, ruling that Qualcomm had properly licensed its central processor chips from Arm. This decision effectively concludes Arm’s lawsuit against Qualcomm, which had the potential to disrupt the global smartphone and PC chip markets.

The dispute stemmed from Qualcomm’s $1.4 billion acquisition of chip startup Nuvia i … ⌘ Read more

Arizona’s Getting an Online Charter School Taught Entirely By AI
An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: The newest online-only school greenlighted (PDF) by the Arizona State Board for Charter Schools comes with a twist: The academic curriculum will be taught entirely by AI. Charter schools – independently operated but publicly funded – typically get greater autonomy compared to traditional publi … ⌘ Read more

CFPB Sues America’s Largest Banks For ‘Allowing Fraud To Fester’ on Zelle
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is suing America’s three largest banks, accusing the institutions of failing to protect customers from fraud on Zelle, the payment platform they co-own. From a report: According to the suit, which also targets Early Warning Services LLC, Zelle’s official operator, Zelle users have lost more than … ⌘ Read more

Apple Pulls Lightning-Equipped iPhones From Swiss Stores Ahead of EU USB-C Mandate
Apple has started pulling its iPhone SE and iPhone 14 models from sale in Switzerland, signaling broader discontinuation across the European Union ahead of new USB-C charging requirements taking effect December 28.

The devices, which use Apple’s proprietary Lightning port, disappeared from Swiss online stores … ⌘ Read more

Michael Dell Says Adoption of AI PCs is ‘Definitely Delayed’
Dell CEO Michael Dell has acknowledged delays in corporate adoption of AI-enabled PCs but remains confident in their eventual widespread uptake, citing his four decades of industry experience with technology transitions.

The PC maker’s chief executive told Fortune that while the current refresh cycle is “definitely delayed,” adoption is inevitable once suf … ⌘ Read more

We’re About To Fly a Spacecraft Into the Sun For the First Time
NASA’s Parker Solar Probe will make its closest approach yet to the Sun on Christmas Eve, flying within 3.8 million miles of the solar surface and entering its atmosphere for the first time.

The spacecraft, which travels at speeds up to 430,000 miles per hour, aims to study the origins of solar wind – the stream of charged particles emanating f … ⌘ Read more

Why Online Returns Are a Hassle Now
U.S. retailers are cracking down on free returns as costs spiral out of control, The Atlantic reports. Return rates have more than doubled since 2019, with shoppers expected to send back nearly $900 billion in merchandise this year.

Major chains like REI and JCPenney are now charging fees or requiring in-store drop-offs, abandoning years of customer-friendly policies. With each $100 return costing stores up … ⌘ Read more

OpenAI Unveils o3, a Smarter AI Model With Improved Reasoning Skills
OpenAI has unveiled a new AI model that it says takes longer to solve problems but gets better results, following Google’s similar announcement a day earlier. The model, called o3, replaces o1 from September and spends extra time working through questions that need step-by-step reasoning.

It scores three times higher than o1 on ARC-AGI, a test … ⌘ Read more

US Data-Center Power Use Could Nearly Triple By 2028, DOE-Backed Report Says
U.S. data center power demand could nearly triple in the next three years, and consume as much as 12% of the country’s electricity, as the industry undergoes an AI transformation, according to an unpublished Department of Energy-backed report seen by Reuters. The publication adds: The Lawrence Berkeley National Laborato … ⌘ Read more

FDA Sets Stricter Rules for ‘Healthy’ Food Labels
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has unveiled stricter criteria for food manufacturers to label their products as “healthy,” marking the first major update to the definition in 30 years.

The new rule requires products to meet specific thresholds for nutrients while limiting sodium, saturated fat and added sugars. Under the guidelines, foods must contain minimum amounts of … ⌘ Read more

Academic Writing is Getting Harder To Read
Academic writing has become significantly less readable over the past 80 years, particularly in humanities and social sciences, according to an analysis of 347,000 PhD abstracts by The Economist. Using the Flesch reading-ease test, researchers found that readability scores in humanities and social sciences plunged from 37 in the 1940s to 18 in the 2020s. The decline was observed across all … ⌘ Read more

Japanese Firm’s USB-C Cable Rotates 360 Degrees
Japanese electronics manufacturer Sanwa Supply has launched a rotating USB-C cable capable of 240W power delivery but sadly USB 2.0 transfer speeds, Tom’sHardware reports. The $16 cable features a 360-degree rotating connector and is available in 1-meter and 1.8-meter lengths, with both USB-C to USB-C and USB-A to USB-C options, the report adds.

[![](https://a.fsdn.com/sd/twitter_i … ⌘ Read more

Steam Gamers Spend Just 15% of Time on New Releases
Steam users spent only 15% of their total gaming time on new releases in 2024, according to the platform’s year-end review, an increase from 9% in 2023 but below 2022’s 17%.

Legacy titles dominated playtime, with 47% spent on games released in the past seven years and 37% on titles older than eight years. New online games like Helldivers 2 and Black Myth: Wukong helped dr … ⌘ Read more

Google Cuts Managers and VPs in Efficiency Drive
Google has reduced its senior management positions by 10% as part of an ongoing efficiency initiative, CEO Sundar Pichai announced during a company-wide meeting earlier this week.

The restructuring affected managers, directors, and vice presidents, with some roles eliminated and others converted to non-management positions, a Google spokesperson told BusinessInsider. The move … ⌘ Read more

Senators Rip Into Automakers For Selling Customer Data and Blocking Right To Repair
A bipartisan group of senators is calling out the auto industry for its “hypocritical, profit-driven” opposition to national right-to-repair legislation, while also selling customer data to insurance companies and other third-party interests. From a report: In a letter sent to the CEOs of the top automakers, t … ⌘ Read more

This VPN Lets Anyone Use Your Internet Connection. What Could Go Wrong?
Teenagers using Meta’s virtual reality headsets to cheat at the popular game Gorilla Tag are unknowingly selling access to their home internet connections to potential cybercriminals, cybersecurity researchers found. The players have been side-loading Big Mama VPN, a free Android app, onto their VR headsets to create lag that makes it … ⌘ Read more

China’s TCL Overtakes Samsung in Premium Market For Ultra-Large TVs
Chinese TVs, once dismissed as “cheap and low-quality,” are making strides in the premium market, overtaking Samsung, the world’s top TV manufacturer. From a report: TCL, a leading Chinese TV brand, surpassed Samsung in the 80-inch and larger TV market for the first time in the second quarter. Another Chinese electronics company, Hi … ⌘ Read more

Russia Space Chief Says Country Will Fly On Space Station Until 2030
Ars Technica’s Eric Berger reports: In a wide-ranging interview with a Russian television station, the chief executive of Russia’s main space corporation said the country is now planning to participate in the International Space Station project all the way to NASA’s desired goal of 2030. “In coordination with our American colleagues, we … ⌘ Read more

Is There a Brain Microbiome?
An anonymous reader quotes an opinion piece from The Guardian, written by Prof Mark Pallen and Dr Aimee Parker (Quadram Institute, Norwich), Prof Nick Loman (University of Birmingham), Prof Alan Walker (University of Aberdeen): Contrary to what is implied in [this article], the weight of expert opinion in medical microbiology rejects the existence of a “brain microbiome” in the sense of a resident microbial communi … ⌘ Read more

Waymo’s Driverless Cars Are Apparently an Insurance Company’s Dream
A study by reinsurer Swiss Re found that Waymo’s autonomous vehicles have demonstrated significantly fewer property damage and bodily injury claims compared to human-driven cars, with reductions of up to 92% in some metrics. Engadget reports: Swiss Re analyzed liability claims from collisions covering 25.3 million miles driven by Waymo’s auto … ⌘ Read more

Home Assistant’s New Voice Assistant Answers To ‘Hey Jarvis’
Home Assistant (not to be confused with the Google Assistant on Google Home) has launched the Voice Preview Edition (Voice PE), its first dedicated voice assistant hardware for $59. The device offers a privacy-focused, locally controlled solution that supports over 50 languages and integrates seamlessly with the open-source smart home platform. As The Verge n … ⌘ Read more

Google Releases Its Own ‘Reasoning’ AI Model
An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: Google has released what it’s calling a new “reasoning” AI model – but it’s in the experimental stages, and from our brief testing, there’s certainly room for improvement. The new model, called Gemini 2.0 Flash Thinking Experimental (a mouthful, to be sure), is available in AI Studio, Google’s AI prototyping platform. A model card des … ⌘ Read more

Craig Wright Convicted For Repeatedly Lying About Inventing Bitcoin
Craig Wright, an Australian computer scientist living in the UK, has been found guilty of contempt of court for persistently and falsely claiming to be Bitcoin’s creator, Satoshi Nakamoto, despite a High Court ruling against his claim. He has been sentenced to 12 months in prison, suspended for two years, and faces jail if he continues his a … ⌘ Read more

Starlink’s First Nationwide Satellite Texting Service Goes Live In New Zealand
SpaceX has partnered with telecommunications company One NZ to offer satellite-to-cell Starlink texting service to customers in New Zealand. It marks the first time a nationwide satellite text messaging service has been powered by Starlink. Engadget reports: Now onto the caveats, and there are a couple of big ones. Star … ⌘ Read more

Feds Warn SMS Authentication Is Unsafe
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Gizmodo: Hackers aligned with the Chinese government have infiltrated U.S. telecommunications infrastructure so deeply that it allowed the interception of unencrypted communications on a number of people, according to reports that first emerged in October. The operation, dubbed Salt Typhoon, apparently allowed hackers to listen to phone calls and nab text m … ⌘ Read more

Journal That Published Faulty Black Plastic Study Removed From Science Index
The publisher of a high-profile, now-corrected study on black plastics has been removed from a critical index of academic journals amid questions about quality criteria, according to a report by Retraction Watch. From a report: On December 16, Clarivate – a scholarly publication analytics company – removed the journal … ⌘ Read more

Microsoft Won’t Let Customers Opt Out of Passkey Push
Microsoft has lauded the success of its efforts to convince customers to use passkeys instead of passwords, without actually quantifying that success. From a report: The software megalith credits passkey adoption to its enrolment user experience, or UX, which owes its unspecified uptake to unavoidable passkey solicitations – sometimes referred to as “nudges.”

“We’re im … ⌘ Read more

FAA Bans Drone Flights Near ‘Critical Infrastructure’ in New Jersey
The Federal Aviation Administration has issued a monthlong ban on drone flights over a large swath of New Jersey, the first broad prohibition of its kind since the authorities began investigating a spate of sightings last month that set off fear and speculation. From a report:
The ban began late on Wednesday and will continue through Jan. 17 … ⌘ Read more

Biden Declares Tougher 2035 Emissions Targets Weeks Before Trump Return
Joe Biden has announced tougher targets on the US’s carbon dioxide emissions for the next decade, in a defiant final gesture intended as a “capstone” on his legacy on the climate. From a report: With just weeks to go before Donald Trump enters the White House, the Biden administration is formally filing new plans under the Paris agr … ⌘ Read more

UK Arts and Media Reject Plan To Let AI Firms Use Copyrighted Material
Writers, publishers, musicians, photographers, movie producers and newspapers have rejected the Labour government’s plan to create a copyright exemption to help AI companies train their algorithms. From a report: In a joint statement, bodies representing thousands of creatives dismissed the proposal made by ministers on Tuesday that wo … ⌘ Read more