Gaming Site Editor Jailbreaks an Amazon Echo Show
“A few developers found a way, for now, to turn a few of these increasingly mediocre Amazon Show devices into friendly, useful, open computers,” writes the co-founder of the gaming/tech news site Aftermath. For under $50 each, he bought some used versions of the devices and tested their instructions, partly to escape the full-screen ads Amazon began showing late last year, an … ⌘ Read more

Should Keycaps Use Text or Glyphs for Delete, Return, Tab, Caps Lock, and Shift?
“The new MacBook Air and MacBook Pro models feature a keyboard change,” reports MacRumors:

On the U.S. English version of the new MacBook Air and MacBook Pro keyboards, the tab, caps lock, shift, return, and delete keycaps now have glyphs on them. On previous-generation models, these keys are labeled with text instead … ⌘ Read more

System76 CEO Sees ‘Real Possibility’ Colorado’s Age-Verification Bill Excludes Open-Source
Last week System76 CEO Carl Richell criticized age-verification laws for operating systems — but he now sees a “real possibility” Colorado’s law might exclude open-source.

Phoronix reports that the System76 CEO met with the state Senator who co-authored Colorado’s bill, and then posted on X.com t … ⌘ Read more

US Set To Receive $10 Billion Fee For Brokering TikTok Deal
The deal to take control of TikTok’s U.S. business came with an unusual condition, according to people familiar with the matter. The investors — which include Oracle, Abu Dhabi investor MGX, and private-equity firm Silver Lake — “paid the Treasury Department about $2.5 billion when the deal closed in January,” reports the Wall Street Journal, “and are set t … ⌘ Read more

How a Species Evolved Fast Enough to Save Itself from Extinction
California saw its worst drought in 10,000 years between 2012 and 2015, remembers the Washington Post. And yet genetic analyses of California’s scarlet monkeyflower “found that many rapidly evolved… allowing them to cope with water scarcity and rebound from decline.”

“The fact that certain organisms are able to adapt just because of genetics t … ⌘ Read more

AI’s Productivity Boost? Just 16 Minutes Per Week, Claims Study
“A new study suggests the productivity boost from AI may be far smaller than executives claim,” writes Slashdot reader BrianFagioli:

According to research cited in Foxit’s State of Document Intelligence report, while 89% of executives and 79% of end users say AI tools make them feel more productive, the actual time savings shrink dramatically once peo … ⌘ Read more

U.S. State Bans on Lab-Grown Meats Challenged in Court
Last June Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller said in a statement that Texans “have a God-given right to know what’s on their plate, and for millions of Texans, it better come from a pasture, not a lab. It’s plain cowboy logic that we must safeguard our real, authentic meat industry from synthetic alternatives.”

But California company Wildtype sells lab-grown … ⌘ Read more

Meta Plans Sweeping Layoffs As AI Costs Mount
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Meta is planning sweeping layoffs that could affect 20% or more of the company, three sources familiar with the matter told Reuters, as Meta seeks to offset costly artificial intelligence infrastructure bets and prepare for greater efficiency brought about by AI-assisted workers. No date has been set for the cuts and the magnitude has … ⌘ Read more

Two Long-Lost Episodes of ‘Doctor Who’ Found
Longtime Slashdot reader tsuliga writes: Two new episodes of Doctor Who that were previously lost have been found. The original Doctor Who episodes were wiped or deleted by the BBC because they were not aware of the future use of re-runs of these shows. Ninety-five of the 253 episodes from the program’s first six years are currently missing. How many more episodes are out there … ⌘ Read more

ChatGPT, Other Chatbots Approved For Official Use In the Senate
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the New York Times: A top Senate administrator on Monday gave aides the green light to use three artificial intelligence chatbots for official work, a reflection of how widespread the use of the products has become in workplaces around the globe. The chief information officer for the Senate sergeant-at-arms, w … ⌘ Read more

Instagram Discontinues End-To-End Encryption For DMs
Meta plans to remove end-to-end encryption (E2EE) from Instagram direct messages by May 8, 2026. “Very few people were opting in to end-to-end encrypted messaging in DMs, so we’re removing this option from Instagram in the coming months,” says Meta. “Anyone who wants to keep messaging with end-to-end encryption can easily do that on WhatsApp.” The Hacker News reports: The … ⌘ Read more

Qatar Helium Shutdown Puts Chip Supply Chain On a Two-Week Clock
Iranian drone strikes shut down a major helium facility in Qatar, removing about 30% of global helium supply and raising concerns for the semiconductor industry, which relies on the gas for chip fabrication. “QatarEnergy declared force majeure on existing contracts on March 4, freeing it from supply obligations to customers,” reports Tom’s Hardwar … ⌘ Read more

Don’t Get Used To Cheap AI
AI services may not stay cheap for long, as companies like OpenAI and Anthropic are currently subsidizing usage to rapidly grow market share. As these companies move toward profitability and potential IPOs, Axios reports that investors will likely push them to increase prices and improve margins. An anonymous reader shares an excerpt from the report: Flashback: Silicon Valley has seen this movie before. The so-called “mil … ⌘ Read more

Digg Relaunch Fails
sdinfoserv writes: After running a Reddit clone for a couple of months, the Digg beta shut down again. The website is a splash memo from CEO Justin Mezzell, blaming the latest “Hard Reset” on bots. “Building on the internet in 2026 is different,” writes Mezzell. “We learned that the hard way. Today we’re sharing difficult news: we’ve made the decision to significantly downsize the Digg team…”

The decision was made after struggling … ⌘ Read more

Backblaze Hosts 314 Trillion Digits of Pi Online
BrianFagioli shares a report from NERDS.xyz: Cloud storage company Backblaze has partnered with StorageReview to make a massive dataset containing 314 trillion digits of Pi publicly accessible. The digits were calculated by StorageReview in December 2025 after months of heavy computation designed to stress modern hardware. The dataset now hosted in the cloud weighs in at over … ⌘ Read more

Meta Delays Rollout of New AI Model After Performance Concerns
Meta has delayed the release of its next major AI model after internal tests showed it lagging behind competing systems from Google, OpenAI, and Anthropic. The New York Times reports: The model, code-named Avocado, outperformed Meta’s previous A.I. model and did better than Google’s Gemini 2.5 model from March, two of the people said. But it has not … ⌘ Read more

Live Nation Execs Brag About ‘Robbing’ Ticket Buyers In Slack DMs
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Pitchfork: Earlier this week, the U.S. Department of Justice and Live Nation reached a settlement in the DOJ’s antitrust lawsuit against the concert giant. During the trial, which lasted only a week, representatives for Live Nation had moved to exclude a collection of Slack direct messages from 2022 between … ⌘ Read more

Apple’s App Store In China Gets Lower 25% Commission To Appease Regulators
Apple will cut its App Store commission in China from 30% to 25% starting March 15, with small-business and mini-app rates dropping from 15% to 12%. AppleInsider reports: Chinese regulators have been back and forth with Apple in recent years over the 30% App Store commission. The latest publicly known pressure occurred after Pre … ⌘ Read more

Facial Recognition Error Jails Innocent Grandmother For Months
Mr. Dollar Ton shares a report from the Guardian: Angela Lipps, 50, spent nearly six months in jail after Fargo police identified her as a suspect in an organized bank fraud case using facial recognition software, according to south-east North Dakota news outlet InForum. Lipps told the outlet she had never been to North Dakota and did not commit the c … ⌘ Read more

Italian Prosecutors Seek Trial For Amazon, Four Execs Over Alleged $1.4 Billion Tax Evasion
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Milan prosecutors have requested trial for Amazon’s European unit and four of its managers over alleged tax evasion worth around $1.38 billion, two sources with direct knowledge of the matter said on Thursday. The move is unprecedented for a case o … ⌘ Read more

Apple MacBook Neo Beats Ever Single x86 PC CPU For Single-Core Performance
Early benchmarks show the A18 Pro-powered MacBook Neo beating every current x86 CPU in single-core Cinebench performance, including chips from Intel and AMD. Notebookcheck reports: We have performed a couple of benchmarks and were particularly impressed by the single-core performance. Not in the short Geekbench test, but in … ⌘ Read more

London Man Wore Smart Glasses For High Court ‘Coaching’
A witness in a London High Court case was caught using smart glasses connected to his phone to receive real-time coaching while giving evidence during cross-examination. “In my judgement, from what occurred in court, it is clear that call was made, connected to his smart glasses, and continued during his evidence until his mobile phone was removed from him,” said Judg … ⌘ Read more

Microsoft Backs Anthropic To Halt US DOD’s ‘Supply-Chain Risk’ Designation
joshuark shares a report from Reuters: Microsoft has filed an amicus brief on Tuesday in support of Anthropic’s lawsuit asking the court to temporarily block the U.S. Department of Defense designation of the AI startup as a supply-chain risk. In an amicus brief filing in a federal court in San Francisco, Microsoft backed Anthropic’s r … ⌘ Read more

Google Chrome Is Finally Coming To ARM64 Linux
BrianFagioli writes: Google says it will finally release Chrome for ARM64 Linux in the second quarter of 2026, bringing the company’s full browser to a platform that has existed for years without official support. Until now, Linux users running Arm hardware have largely relied on Chromium builds or unofficial packages if they wanted something close to Chrome. Google says the new b … ⌘ Read more

Adobe CEO to Step Down After 18 Years
Shantanu Narayen announced he will step down as CEO of Adobe once a successor is appointed, ending an 18-year tenure during which he transformed the company from boxed software to the Creative Cloud subscription model. Narayen said he will remain board chair as Adobe continues pushing into generative AI products. CNBC reports: Narayen joined Adobe in 1988 as a vice president and general manager, and he be … ⌘ Read more

Apple’s MacBook Neo Makes Repairs Easier, Cheaper Than Other MacBooks
Apple’s new MacBook Neo is “easier to repair than other modern MacBooks,” according to Ars Technica’s Andrew Cunningham. It introduces a more repairable internal design that makes components like the battery and keyboard easier and cheaper to replace. An anonymous reader quotes an excerpt from the report: Replacements for pretty much any … ⌘ Read more

Perplexity’s ‘Personal Computer’ Lets AI Agents Access Your Local Files
Perplexity AI has introduced a “Personal Computer” agent system that can run on a local machine such as a Mac mini, giving its AI agents access to a user’s files and applications to automate tasks. According to CEO Aravind Srinivas, the heavy AI processing runs on Perplexity’s “secure servers” but sensitive actions will require user approval … ⌘ Read more

Honda Cancels All Three EVs That It Planned To Build In the US
sinij shares a report from Car and Driver: Honda is making a monumental shift in its business plans. The automaker is canceling the development and launch of the 0 Series SUV, the 0 Series saloon, and the Acura RSX, and as a result, expects to take a significant financial hit in 2026 [of up to $15.8 billion]. The automaker was blunt in its announce … ⌘ Read more

Anthropic’s Claude AI Can Respond With Charts, Diagrams, and Other Visualschat
Anthropic updated Claude so it can automatically generate charts, diagrams, and other interactive visualizations directly inside conversations, rather than only in a side panel. The new visualizations are rolling out now to all users. The Verge reports: As an example, Anthropic says a conversation about the periodic t … ⌘ Read more

Google Maps Gets Its Biggest Navigation Redesign In a Decade, Plus More AI
Google Maps is rolling out its biggest update in more than a decade, introducing a Gemini-powered chatbot and a new “Immersive Navigation” interface. “Ask Maps” lets users plan trips, ask questions, and refine travel suggestions conversationally within the app. “The new chatbot will be accessible via a button up near the search … ⌘ Read more

Atlassian CEO Cites AI Shift When Announcing Plan To Shed 1,600 Jobs
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: Atlassian plans to cut 1,600 jobs or a 10th of its global workforce, joining rivals in slashing staffing to cope with the advent of AI and a broader post-Covid industry slowdown. Australian billionaire founder Mike Cannon-Brookes explained the reductions in a staff memo, while also announcing … ⌘ Read more

Strait of Hormuz Closure Triggers Work From Home, 4-Day Weeks In Asia
Asian governments are implementing emergency measures like four-day workweeks and work-from-home mandates to cope with a fuel shortage triggered by the Iran conflict and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. “Asia is particularly dependent on oil exports from the Middle East; Japan and South Korea respectively source 90% and 70% of their … ⌘ Read more

Reducing Europe’s Nuclear Energy Sector Was ‘Strategic Mistake’, EU Chief Says
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Reducing Europe’s nuclear energy sector was a “strategic mistake,” European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said on Tuesday, as governments grapple with an energy crunch from the Iran war. Europe produced around a third of electricity from nuclear power in 1990 bu … ⌘ Read more

Only Half of Americans Went To a Movie Theater In 2025, Study Finds
A Pew Research Center survey found that only 53% of U.S. adults went to a movie theater in the past year, while 7% said they’ve never seen a movie in a theater at all. “The findings reflected a domestic box office still fighting to regain its footing since the COVID-19 pandemic, when ticket sales collapsed 81% in 2020 due to theater … ⌘ Read more

GFiber and Astound Broadband To Join Forces
GFiber (a.k.a. Google Fiber) and Astound Broadband announced that they plan to merge into a deal backed by infrastructure investor Stonepeak Infrastructure Partners. The resulting company will be majority owned by Stonepeak, with Alphabet becoming a “significant minority shareholder.” Light Reading reports: Stonepeak Infrastructure Partners teamed with Patriot Media to acquire Astound in … ⌘ Read more

Why Falling Cats Always Seem To Land On Their Feet
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the New York Times: In a paper, published last month in the journal The Anatomical Record, researchers offered a novel take on falling felines. Their evidence suggests new insights into the so-called falling cat problem, particularly that cats have a very flexible segment of their spines that allows them to correct their orientati … ⌘ Read more

Researchers Discover 14,000 Routers Wrangled Into Never-Before-Seen Botnet
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Researchers say they have uncovered a takedown-resistant botnet of 14,000 routers and other network devices – primarily made by Asus – that have been conscripted into a proxy network that anonymously carries traffic used for cybercrime. The malware – dubbed KadNap – takes … ⌘ Read more

Microsoft’s ‘Xbox Mode’ Is Coming To Every Windows 11 PC
In April, Microsoft will be rolling out a full-screen “Xbox mode” to all Windows 11 PCs, including laptops, desktops, and tablets. The move follows last week’s confirmation of its next-generation Xbox console, known internally as Project Helix, which will be capable of running both Xbox titles and PC games. The Verge reports: Technically, you’ve been able to try t … ⌘ Read more

Grammarly Disables Tool Offering Generative-AI Feedback Credited To Real Writers
Grammarly has disabled its Expert Review feature after backlash from writers whose names were used to present AI-generated feedback without their permission. Superhuman (formerly Grammarly) CEO Shishir Mehrotra wrote in a LinkedIn post that the company will disable Expert Review while they “reimagine” the feature: Back … ⌘ Read more

Swiss E-Voting Pilot Can’t Count 2,048 Ballots After USB Keys Fail To Decrypt Them
A Swiss e-voting pilot was suspended after officials couldn’t decrypt 2,048 ballots because the USB keys needed to unlock them failed. “Three USB sticks were used, all with the correct code, but none of them worked,” spokesperson Marco Greiner told the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation’s Swissinfo service. The canton … ⌘ Read more

Binance Sues WSJ, Panicked By Gov’t Probes Into Sanctioned Crypto Transfers
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Binance is hoping that suing (PDF) The Wall Street Journal for defamation might help shake off a fresh round of government probes into how the cryptocurrency exchange failed to detect $1.7 billion in transfers to a network that was funding Iran-backed terror groups. The laws … ⌘ Read more

Nvidia Is Planning to Launch Its Own Open-Source OpenClaw Competitor
Nvidia is preparing to launch an open-source AI agent platform called NemoClaw, designed to compete with the likes of OpenClaw. According to Wired, the platform will allow enterprise software companies to dispatch AI agents to perform tasks for their own workforces. “Companies will be able to access the platform regardless of whether their prod … ⌘ Read more

YouTube Expands AI Deepfake Detection To Politicians, Government Officials, and Journalists
YouTube is expanding its AI deepfake detection tools to a pilot group of politicians, government officials, and journalists, allowing them to identify and request removal of unauthorized AI-generated videos impersonating them. TechCrunch reports: The technology itself launched last year to rough … ⌘ Read more

China Moves To Curb OpenClaw AI Use At Banks, State Agencies
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: Chinese authorities moved to restrict state-run enterprises and government agencies from running OpenClaw AI apps on office computers, acting swiftly to defuse potential security risks after companies and consumers across China began experimenting with the agentic AI phenomenon. Government agencies and state- … ⌘ Read more

ASUS Executive Says MacBook Neo is ‘Shock’ to PC Industry
ASUS says the MacBook Neo is a “shock” to the Windows PC ecosystem. “In the past, Apple’s pricing situation has always been high, so for them to release a very budget-friendly product, this is obviously a shock to the entire industry,” said ASUS co-CEO S.Y. Hsu in a Tuesday earnings call. While he expects PC makers to respond, rising AI-driven memory shortag … ⌘ Read more

Meta To Charge Advertisers a Fee To Offset Europe’s Digital Taxes
Meta will begin charging advertisers a 2-5% “location fee” to offset digital services taxes imposed by several European countries, including the UK, France, Italy, Spain, Austria, and Turkey. Reuters reports: The fee, for image or video ads delivered on Meta platforms including WhatsApp click-to-message campaigns and marketing messages together w … ⌘ Read more

Yann LeCun Raises $1 Billion To Build AI That Understands the Physical World
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Wired: Advanced Machine Intelligence (AMI), a new Paris-based startup cofounded by Meta’s former chief AI scientist Yann LeCun, announced Monday it has raised more than $1 billion to develop AI world models. LeCun argues that most human reasoning is grounded in the physical world, not lan … ⌘ Read more

Valve Faces Second, Class-Action Lawsuit Over Loot Boxes
Valve is facing a new consumer class-action lawsuit two weeks after New York sued the video game company for “letting children and adults illegally gamble” with loot boxes. The new lawsuit is similar, alleging that loot boxes in games like Counter-Strike 2, Dota 2, and Team Fortress 2 are “carefully engineered to extract money from consumers, including children, t … ⌘ Read more

A 1,300-Pound NASA Spacecraft To Re-Enter Earth’s Atmosphere
Van Allen Probe A, a 1,300-pound (600 kg) NASA satellite launched in 2012 to study Earth’s radiation belts, is expected to re-enter Earth’s atmosphere this week. While most of it is expected to burn up during descent, “some components may survive,” reports the BBC. “The space agency said there is a one in 4,200 chance of being harmed by a piece of the p … ⌘ Read more

After Outages, Amazon To Make Senior Engineers Sign Off On AI-Assisted Changes
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Financial Times: Amazon’s ecommerce business has summoned a large group of engineers to a meeting on Tuesday for a “deep dive” into a spate of outages, including incidents tied to the use of AI coding tools. The online retail giant said there had been a “trend of incidents” in rece … ⌘ Read more