Whatever Happened to the 150,000 Tons of Radioactive Waste Stored Under the Atlantic Ocean?
More than 200,000 barrels of low-level radioactive waste were stored on the floor of the Atlantic Ocean between 1949 and 1982, reports ScienceAlert.
Whatever happened to those barrels?
Scientists have descended to the wreckage in a crewed submersible to investigate — and found many of the … ⌘ Read more
Andreessen Horowitz Launches AI/Company-Building School As a College Alternative
TechCrunch quipped it was like if startup school Y Combinator and Peter Thiel’s build-a-company-instead of-college Fellowship Program had a baby. Silicon Valley venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz is investing $35 million to launch a private school in San Francisco “aimed at turning high school graduates into f … ⌘ Read more
Bitcoin Surges to $86,455, an 8-Month High, After America’s SEC Announces Tokenized Stock Experiment
August 15: $62,991
September 23: $86,456
Bitcoin shot up 37% over the last 39 days, reaching an eight-month high on Monday. “Bitcoin is back,” declares Yahoo Finance:
The token held near $86,000 on Tuesday after a stunning multisession rally… [Fundstrat head of digital assets Sea … ⌘ Read more
Microsoft Helps Take Down Massive Automated, AI-Powered Phishing-as-a-Service Platform
Microsoft’s security blog describes the fight against a new “AI-powered cybercrime platform” offering phishing-as-a-service, with AI-tailored lures and analyses of compromised inboxes (to identify high-value targets). The site compromised more than 12,000 inboxes in over 10,000 organizations around the wo … ⌘ Read more
Trump Denounces Attempts to Control AI, Wants It Renamed ‘Super Intelligence’ in US Documents
U.S. President Trump addressed the United Nations on Tuesday. And a half hour in, after decrying immigration, Trump pivoted to add that “The United States also totally rejects any attempt to construct a globalist scheme to control for the artificial intelligence being spoken of so much no … ⌘ Read more
Are Students Suddenly Losing Interest in Computer Science as AI Coding Takes Off?
On academic mentoring platform Nova Learning, Computer Science and AI, “once the dominant choice among students… is losing ground fast, while Engineering has nearly doubled its share.” It’s a small survey, but “The steepest proportional decline is in Software & Data Science, the most traditional ‘learn to code’ … ⌘ Read more
Linux 7.2 vs. Linux 7.3 Shows A Few Improvements With AMD Strix Halo
Last week I ran some benchmarks showing performance gains for AMD Ryzen AI Max+ “Strix Halo” on Ubuntu 26.10. Then shortly after that testing on its daily state, which used the Linux 7.2 kernel, Canonical switched to Linux 7.3 as the Ubuntu 26.10 kernel. Here are some Linux 7.2 vs. Linux 7.3 benchmarks for the AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395 “Strix Halo” with the Framework Desktop… ⌘ Read more
‘Coyote vs. Acme’ Outgrosses All But 3 WB Movies This Year, Heads To Profit
The movie Coyote vs. Acme earned more than Warner Bros.’ $30 million tax write-off in just two weeks. And last week the movie officially earned more than its production budget of $70 million. But today the movie passed the $100 million mark. “You asked for it, we delivered, and you showed up!” distributor Ketchum Entert … ⌘ Read more
Pentagon Investigators Say Overreliance on Palantir AI Contributed to US Strike That Killed 123 Iranian Children
Two U.S. missiles hit an elementary school in Iran, killing over 150 people including 123 children on the first day of the Iran War. But Gizmodo notes that a new Bloomberg investigation cites U.S. officials involved in an unreleased internal Pentagon r … ⌘ Read more
Google Opens Preorders for Its $899 Gemini-Enhanced ‘Googlebook’ Laptops
Monday Google opened preorders for its “Googlebook” laptops, pricing them at $899. A Google’s blog post added that “At launch, you can choose between Intel Core Ultra Series 3 and Snapdragon X Elite processors” (paired with NPUs to power AI features).
“Devices will hit shelves on October 4 in the U.S. and on October 5 in Canada, the … ⌘ Read more
Meta’s New ‘Personal AI Agent’ Muse Beats ChatGPT in Downloads - and Get Blocked by Amazon
Meta’s AI “personal agent” Muse overtook ChatGPT as the #1 iOS free app in the U.S. on Friday, reports CNBC — and it’s still showing more downloads as of Monday night.
Muse now has over 2.5 million downloads since its debut less than two weeks ago, according to analytics firm Sensor Tower…
[Mu … ⌘ Read more
Paramount Skydance ‘Emerges Victorious’, Finally Wins Settlement for Warner Bros Takeover
Paramount Skydance just “emerged victorious” reports Reuters, “from a legal battle over its $110 billion acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery” that will “dramatically concentrate power across Hollywood’s film, TV, streaming and news businesses.”
The victory comes “after settling with a Calif … ⌘ Read more
As KDE Turns 30, Contributors and Commits are Going Strong
“In a few weeks, KDE will turn 30 years old,” writes core contributor Kevin Ottens, celebrating with some special KDE community data analytics (including a 30-year graph of the number of contributors):
It peaks around 180 on average (and sometimes reaches towards around 200 people) then shrinks again hitting bottom around 110 persons on average in 2017… Si … ⌘ Read more
Are Book Publishers Warming Up to the AI Industry?
There’s at least 15 author-driven lawsuits underway against AI companies, while publishers have filed roughly 10 more coordinated suits of their own, notes Publisher’s Weekly.
Yet “While the lawsuits play out, some publishers are building bridges.”
Google recently announced a partnership with Bloomsbury, De Gruyter Brill, Johns Hopkins University Press, Macmillan, O’Reilly … ⌘ Read more
Australia Considers Smart Glasses Ban in Government Workplaces, While 70 People Sue Meta Over Unknowing Data Collection
“Australia is considering barring the use of camera-equipped smart glasses in government workplaces…” reports Reuters, “in what it said could be the first ban of its kind.”
But meanwhile “more than 70 people who bought, used or were reco … ⌘ Read more
North Korean Hackers Posed as Recruiters. They Infected 30,000 Devices Worldwide
“I would like to verify your technical abilities, so please download the specified file and complete the assigned task…”
Fake job listings aimed at software developers and IT professionals led to 30,000 infected devices in over 100 countries — and 7,000 compromised cryptocurrency wallets, leading to over $10 millio … ⌘ Read more
Lawsuit Says Anthropic, OpenAI, SpaceXAI And Google Made Illegal Agreement On AI Slowdown
Tom’s Hardware reports:
Four plaintiffs subscribed to ChatGPT, Claude, Grok, or Gemini filed a proposed class-action lawsuit alleging that the developers of these AI models violated antitrust laws when they agreed to slow AI development. According to the Associated Press, the lawsuit argues that thi … ⌘ Read more
Democracy vs Digital Infrastructure: Pulitzer-Winning Journalist Charts ‘The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State’
The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State ultimately asks the question, “How did we cede control of our democracy to the machines, and can we get it back?” according to the Harvard’s Arts and Sciences site, FAS Current:
The new title finds Lepore, … ⌘ Read more
The Brain Is Actually Two Completely Separate Organs
“New research led by Stanford Medicine reveals that what we call the brain is two distinct organs that evolved independently over hundreds of millions of years,” Stanford Medicine announced this week:
The new research finding shows that the human brain consists of two ancient nervous systems cleverly packaged together — a more primitive part that regulates our heart … ⌘ Read more
To Enforce Its Proposed Social Media Ban for 450 Million Pre-Teens, EU Builds an Open Source App
The European Commission “proposed on Thursday banning children under 13 from social media, with parent-supervised accounts until 15,” reports Reuters.
“Enforcement would rely on a tool Brussels built itself” — a free, open-source age verification smartphone app “that tells a platform … ⌘ Read more
Tech Industry Scratches Its Head Over Trump’s ‘AI Force’ Proposal
Saturday morning President Trump announced he’s creating an AI task force and appointing an AI czar, reports Politico.
“I am forming the AI Force, much like I did Space Force, which has been a tremendous SUCCESS,” Trump wrote Saturday in what Politico earlier described as “a lengthy Truth Social post on Saturday morning.”
TRUMP: Over the ye … ⌘ Read more
Customer-Losing Flock Now Offers Buyouts to Avoid Laying Off Employees
Mashable writes:
Flock Safety offered employees voluntary buyouts on Friday, WIRED reported… Without the buyouts, those familiar with the situation suspect the company would have to lay off some of its 1,500 employees.
WIRED writes that people familiar with the program “say they believe that a significant number of the startup’s ro … ⌘ Read more
Developer Abandons ‘PS5 Linux’ Project After Sony Patches AI-Discovered Exploit
“In April this year, we saw Andy Nguyen turning the PS5 into a Linux-powered gaming PC,”
writes the blog It’s FOSS.
It ran Steam games and emulators using the PS5’s on-board hardware. But this week Andy announced he’s “stopping all my work on PS5 Linux” and “stepping away from the PS5 scene.”
stopping work on porting … ⌘ Read more
Fake AI Intelligence Almost Made the US Military Start a War With China
U.S. military intelligence received an inaccurate report this spring that a Chinese ship in the Middle East was transporting components of a nuclear weapons program, reports CNN.
“The US military swung into action with plans to intercept the vessel, according to four sources familiar with the episode.”
Armed members of the US milit … ⌘ Read more
US Air Force F-16 Crashes in Michigan After Pentagon Orders More Flyovers
The F-16 “experienced an incident,” the Texas Military Department said in a statement, adding that “The pilot successfully ejected the aircraft and is receiving care at a nearby hospital.”
ABC News reports:
A Texas Air National Guard F-16 crashed in Michigan during a training mission on Thursday afternoon, sparking an hourslon … ⌘ Read more
Gemini Breached Three Outside Systems, and Claude-Using Researchers Breached OpenAI
“Software security researchers used Anthropic’s Claude AI platform to hack OpenAI’s ChatGPT tool,” reports CBS News.
Using Claude, “On July 25, 2026, we chained two critical vulnerabilities to compromise multiple OpenAI employees’ ChatGPT accounts,” write researchers at security platform Hacktron AI. “With these ac … ⌘ Read more
Has the James Web Space Telescope Discovered a New ‘Black Hole Star’?
The James Webb Space Telescope has been picking up little red dots in almost every image,
writes Quanta magazine. And now two teams of astronomers propose they’re looking at a new astronomical object: a black hole star. It shines with the light of billions of suns — and hides a black hole in its core.
But Quanta adds that “not everyone … ⌘ Read more
Ubuntu 26.10 Switches To The Linux 7.3 Kernel
As a very pleasant surprise, the upcoming Ubuntu 26.10 release will now be powered by the Linux 7.3 kernel rather than their original plans and switch over to the Linux 7.2 kernel… ⌘ Read more
AI Insiders Issue New Warnings - Including Former Anthropic Engineer Jacob Coxon
Neither OpenAI or Anthropic is acting responsibly, warned AI researcher Jacob Coxon when resigning last week from Anthropic. But just hours earlier, OpenAI VP of Research Aidan Clark had posted “For the first time, I am asking myself if things are moving too fast. I’m honestly not sure, but I am sure that it would be go … ⌘ Read more
Will California Gut Its Net Neutrality Law to Comply with Trump Admin Demands?
In 2021, America approved $65 billion to fund broadband internet services as part of President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. But Trump’s administration announced they’d withhold funds from states with net neutrality protections…
States could object and sue the government, Ars Technica reported last October, … ⌘ Read more
Rust is Now a ‘Tier One’ Language at Microsoft
The Register reports:
When Microsoft’s developers and engineers sit down to code, they can now choose to work in Rust, which Redmond has added to its list of canonical languages. “Rust now is a Tier One language at Microsoft, and that just means that it sits among C++, C# and TypeScript as the best supported languages for internal development in the company,” explained Victor … ⌘ Read more
AMD Strix Halo Enjoys Some Performance Gains On Ubuntu 26.10, Especially With amd64v3
Ahead of next week’s Ubuntu 26.10 beta release I have been testing the “Stonking Stingray” on a variety of systems. Ubuntu 26.10 is performing well overall with some nice upgrades over Ubuntu 26.04 LTS, especially if opting to use the new snapshot/daily ISOs of Ubuntu 26.10 in amd64v3 form for x86_64-v3 packages. In today’s tests are a look at the performance benefits of Ubuntu 26.10 on an AMD Ryzen AI Max+ “Strix Halo”. ⌘ Read more
Ubuntu 26.10 Desktop Adjusting Its Behavior Under Memory Pressure
The Ubuntu 26.10 desktop is adjusting its default out-of-memory (OOM) daemon behavior when dealing with memory pressure on the system… ⌘ Read more
Journalist Calls Out ‘Collective Amnesia’ of Schools’ Romance With Big Tech Over AI
“Turns out, Silicon Valley isn’t especially altruistic,” writes the nonprofit education news site The 74. They’re reading a new book promising “the inside story of how Big Tech catalyzed, co-opted, and ultimately came to capture computer science and AI education in America”. Written by
New York Times business re … ⌘ Read more
America Acknowledges for the First Time: It Has Deployed Weapons In Space
Tuesday U.S. Space Force chief Douglas Schiess said his branch of the U.S. military operates “on-orbit weapons,” reports Reuters, to defend “against space-enabled attacks.” He promised “disciplined and responsible choices” when scaling America’s orbital defense arsenal in the coming years.
NPR calls this week’s reveleations “rem … ⌘ Read more
Ex-Google DeepMind Researcher Also Warns AI Could ‘Kill All Humans’. But Meta’s Zuckerberg Believes Safety is Up to Each AI Company
Reuters reports that a former Google DeepMind employee “became the latest AI researcher to warn that the technology could ‘kill all humans’, saying time could be running out to avoid the outcome:
Public alarm about the po … ⌘ Read more
Iran Strikes On Amazon Data Centers Caused Permanent Loss of Customer Data
Ars Technica reports:
Half a year after Iranian drone strikes knocked out multiple Amazon data centers, the US tech company has acknowledged the permanent loss of some customer data that was hosted in Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.
Amazon Web Services was “unable to restore access to the resources and data” hosted in some … ⌘ Read more
Hackers Stole Flock’s Camera Software, Revealing How the Company Tracks Cars and People
“Hackers ripped down a Flock camera above a roadway, made a near-complete copy of the data stored inside it, and shared the files with 404 Media and WIRED,” according to an article published on both sites.
Though Flock has described its system as protected by on-device encryption, “The hackers were able … ⌘ Read more
Ubuntu 26.10 Snapshot 4 ISOs Published
The fourth monthly-ish snapshot of Ubuntu 26.10 “Stonking Stingray” is now available for testing and comes ahead of next week’s Ubuntu 26.10 beta milestone… ⌘ Read more
Intel Compute Stack Enables LEO For Nova Lake, Introduces Intel Portable ISA “PISA”
Released today was the Intel Compute Runtime 26.35.39758.10 update for Windows and Linux systems. With this updated OpenCL and Level Zero GPU compute driver stack comes some exciting updates for this monthly feature update… ⌘ Read more
‘Zuckoff’ App Detects Meta Smartglasses, as Meta Plans Camera-Free Version, Loses Money, and Offers Social Media Subscriptions
The New York Post reports:
A new app called Zuckoff can detect if a user is near someone with Meta’s creepy AI-powered glasses, which have drawn criticism for enabling creeps to record video of women without their consent. Progra … ⌘ Read more
Minecraft Java Edition 26.3 ‘Wilderness Bound’ update released
The latest content drop is out now with Minecraft Java Edition 26.3 ‘Wilderness Bound’ update released.
Read the full article on GamingOnLinux. ⌘ Read more
OpenAI Admits Six More Instances of AI Models Acting Deceptively
OpenAI announced Wednesday that “We do not believe that the AI industry has solved alignment and monitoring to a sufficient degree to continue responsibly scaling at maximum speed for much longer.”
But along with the announcement, OpenAI announced it “found additional incidents of AI models acting deceptively and taking unsanctioned actions during tr … ⌘ Read more
Adafruit’s New CircuitPython ‘Turbo’ Brings Native Code To Tiny Boards
Targeting students and beginners, Adafruit released “CircuitPython” in 2017 (as a derivative of the MicroPython microcontroller-optimized programming language).
Now Adafruit managing director Phillip Torrone (also long-time Slashdot reader ptorrone) brings this update:
Adafruit has published CircuitPython Turbo, a workflow that compile … ⌘ Read more
As Part of California’s Coast Begins to Crumble, Is the Clock Ticking on Moving Radioactive Waste?
“As parts of the Southern California coastline crumbled into the sea, slammed by intense waves and flooding in recent days, oceanographer Kim McCoy had one thing on his mind,” reports the Los Angeles Times.
He was thinking about “the nuclear waste set in concrete on the beach n … ⌘ Read more
Mesa 26.2.3 Released With AMD GFX1171 Support, Other Fixes
Mesa 26.2.3 is out today as the newest stable point release in this quarter’s Mesa 26.2 series… ⌘ Read more
Ubuntu 26.10 amd64v3 Can Provide A Nice Boost For Low-End/Budget Hardware
Canonical recently began producing Ubuntu 26.10 amd64v3 daily ISOs to complement their experimental amd64v3 package archive that they have been trialing the past few release cycles. While we still don’t know what any official plans are for amd64v3 with Ubuntu 26.10, the performance gains can be very worthwhile over the generic amd64 binaries even for low-end/budget hardware. ⌘ Read more
Anthropic Commits to Independent AI Evaluators, Wants Slower Development. Nvidia’s CEO Wants It ‘As Fast as You Can’
“Anthropic’s CEO took the stage at a conference in San Francisco on Tuesday to reiterate his call for a slowdown of AI development,” reports the Guardian, “ while Nvidia’s CEO argued against slowing its development. “Run as fast as you can.”
Amodei is c … ⌘ Read more
GNOME 51 Released With Improved Frame Scheduling, Many App Improvements
Right on schedule and in time for appearing in the likes of Ubuntu 26.10 and Fedora Workstation 45, the GNOME 51 desktop is officially released… ⌘ Read more
Firefox Touts Lower CPU Use for Large JPEGs, Faster PDF Viewer Startup (and AI Controls)
Firefox 156 is the second release since Mozilla moved to a twice-monthly release schedule, and the blog OMG Ubuntu notes it has faster start-up times for its built-in PDF viewer and also lower CPU usage when viewing large JPEG images:
In Firefox 156, the browser now uses libjpeg-turbo’s IDCT scaling t … ⌘ Read more