Author: Robin Edgar

Organisational Structures | Technology and Science | Military, IT and Lifestyle consultancy | Social, Broadcast & Cross Media | Flying aircraft

Our Inability To Recognize That Remixing Art Is Transformative Is Now Leading To Today’s AI/Copyright Mess

Posted on by Robin Edgar

If you’ve never watched it, Kirby Ferguson’s “Everything is a Remix” series (which was recently updated from the original version that came out years ago) is an excellent look at how stupid our copyright laws are, and how they have really warped our view of creativity. As the series makes clear, creativity is all about Read more about Our Inability To Recognize That Remixing Art Is Transformative Is Now Leading To Today’s AI/Copyright Mess[…]

Liberté, égalité, Fraternité: France Loses Its Marbles On Internet Censorship – wants to control content you see by owning your browser

Posted on by Robin Edgar

Over the years we’ve covered a lot of attempts by relatively clueless governments and politicians to enact think-of-the-children internet censorship or surveillance legislation, but there’s a law from France in the works which we think has the potential to be one of the most sinister we’ve seen yet. It flew under our radar so we’re Read more about Liberté, égalité, Fraternité: France Loses Its Marbles On Internet Censorship – wants to control content you see by owning your browser[…]

AI-generated art cannot be copyrighted, judge rules – Only humans can be creative, apparently

Posted on by Robin Edgar

Copyright issues have dogged AI since chatbot tech gained mass appeal, whether it’s accusations of entire novels being scraped to train ChatGPT or allegations that Microsoft and GitHub’s Copilot is pilfering code. But one thing is for sure after a ruling [PDF] by the United States District Court for the District of Columbia – AI-created Read more about AI-generated art cannot be copyrighted, judge rules – Only humans can be creative, apparently[…]

Scientists design novel nonlinear circuit to harvest clean power using graphene

Posted on by Robin Edgar

Obtaining useful work from random fluctuations in a system at thermal equilibrium has long been considered impossible. In fact, in the 1960s eminent American physicist Richard Feynman effectively shut down further inquiry after he argued in a series of lectures that Brownian motion, or the thermal motion of atoms, cannot perform useful work.   Now, Read more about Scientists design novel nonlinear circuit to harvest clean power using graphene[…]

Visualizing the mysterious dance: Quantum entanglement of photons captured in real-time

Posted on by Robin Edgar

[…] Knowing the wave function of such a quantum system is a challenging task—this is also known as quantum state tomography or quantum tomography in short. With the standard approaches (based on the so-called projective operations), a full tomography requires large number of measurements that rapidly increases with the system’s complexity (dimensionality). Previous experiments conducted Read more about Visualizing the mysterious dance: Quantum entanglement of photons captured in real-time[…]

SanDisk Extreme SSDs Are ‘Worthless,’ Multiple Lawsuits Against WD Say – wipe your data

Posted on by Robin Edgar

Last week we wrote about a lawsuit against Western Digital that alleged that the firm’s solid state drive didn’t live up to its marketing promises. More lawsuits have been filed against the company since. ArsTechnica: On Thursday, two more lawsuits were filed against Western Digital over its SanDisk Extreme series and My Passport portable SSDs. Read more about SanDisk Extreme SSDs Are ‘Worthless,’ Multiple Lawsuits Against WD Say – wipe your data[…]

One Fan Ports Abandoned PS1 Classic ‘WipeOut’, Tells Sony To either let it be or make it available for the world again. Sony will because copyright and assholes.

Posted on by Robin Edgar

More and more, as the video game industry matures, we find ourselves talking about game preservation and the disappearing culture of some older games as the original publishers abandon them. Often times leaving the public with no actual legit method for purchasing these old games, copyright law conspires with the situation to also prevent the Read more about One Fan Ports Abandoned PS1 Classic ‘WipeOut’, Tells Sony To either let it be or make it available for the world again. Sony will because copyright and assholes.[…]

Mozilla Foundation Warns France’s Proposed Web Blocking Law ‘Could Threaten the Free Internet’

Posted on by Robin Edgar

The Mozilla Foundation has started a petition to stop the French government from forcing browsers like Mozilla’s Firefox to censor websites. “It would set a dangerous precedent, providing a playbook for other governments to also turn browsers like Firefox into censorship tools,” says the organization. “The government introduced the bill to parliament shortly before the Read more about Mozilla Foundation Warns France’s Proposed Web Blocking Law ‘Could Threaten the Free Internet’[…]

RIAA Attempts To Kill The World’s Greatest Library whilst it is down: Sues Internet Archive For Making It Possible To Hear Old 78s

Posted on by Robin Edgar

On Friday, the Internet Archive put up a blog post noting that its digital book lending program was likely to change as it continues to fight the book publishers’ efforts to kill the Internet Archive. As you’ll recall, all the big book publishers teamed up to sue the Internet Archive over its Open Library project, Read more about RIAA Attempts To Kill The World’s Greatest Library whilst it is down: Sues Internet Archive For Making It Possible To Hear Old 78s[…]

South Korea ‘puts the brakes’ on Google app store dominance

Posted on by Robin Edgar

A Wednesday statement from the Commission brought news that in late July it wrote to Google to inform it of the ₩42.1 billion ($31.5 million) fine announced, and reported by The Register, in April 2023. The Commission has also commenced monitoring activities to ensure that Google complies with requirements to allow competition with its Play Read more about South Korea ‘puts the brakes’ on Google app store dominance[…]

HP in class action for bricking scanners and print functions when ink runs low, using less than 50% of ink for actual printing

Posted on by Robin Edgar

HP has failed to shunt aside class-action legal claims that it disables the scanners on its multifunction printers when their ink runs low. Though not for lack of trying. On Aug. 10, a federal judge ruled that HP Inc. must face a class-action lawsuit claiming that the company designs its “all-in-one” inkjet printers to disable Read more about HP in class action for bricking scanners and print functions when ink runs low, using less than 50% of ink for actual printing[…]

Windows feature that resets system clocks based on random data is wreaking havoc

Posted on by Robin Edgar

A few months ago, an engineer in a data center in Norway encountered some perplexing errors that caused a Windows server to suddenly reset its system clock to 55 days in the future. The engineer relied on the server to maintain a routing table that tracked cell phone numbers in real time as they moved Read more about Windows feature that resets system clocks based on random data is wreaking havoc[…]

Amazon Now Punishes Merchants Who Ship Their Own Products – flexing monopoly!

Posted on by Robin Edgar

Third-party merchants on Amazon who ship their own packages will see an additional fee for each product sold starting on Oct. 1st. Sellers could previously choose to ship their products without contributing to Amazon, but the new fee means members of Amazon’s Seller Fulfilled Prime program will be required to pay the company 2% on each Read more about Amazon Now Punishes Merchants Who Ship Their Own Products – flexing monopoly![…]

Scientists Recreate Pink Floyd Song By Reading Brain Signals of Listeners

Posted on by Robin Edgar

Scientists have trained a computer to analyze the brain activity of someone listening to music and, based only on those neuronal patterns, recreate the song. The research, published on Tuesday, produced a recognizable, if muffled version of Pink Floyd’s 1979 song, “Another Brick in the Wall (Part 1).” […] To collect the data for the Read more about Scientists Recreate Pink Floyd Song By Reading Brain Signals of Listeners[…]

Snapchat’s My AI Goes Rogue, Posts To Stories

Posted on by Robin Edgar

On Tuesday, Snapchat’s My AI in-app chatbot posted its own Story to the app that appeared to be a photo of a wall and ceiling. It then stopped responding to users’ messages, which some Snapchat users found disconcerting. TechCrunch reports: Though the incident made for some great tweets (er, posts), we regret to inform you Read more about Snapchat’s My AI Goes Rogue, Posts To Stories[…]

Tesla’s New Range-Limited Model S, X Can Go Further, but are software locked

Posted on by Robin Edgar

Tesla has added a new Standard Range trim for both its aging Model S and Model X luxury cars this week, effectively slashing the barrier to entry for the automaker’s flagship sedan and SUV by a staggering $10,000 each. The Model S SR now comes in at $78,490, and the Model X SR at $88,490—both Read more about Tesla’s New Range-Limited Model S, X Can Go Further, but are software locked[…]

Blended Wing Body Demonstrator Jet Contract Awarded By Air Force

Posted on by Robin Edgar

The U.S. Air Force says it has picked aviation startup JetZero to design and build a full-size demonstrator aircraft with a blended wing body, or BWB, configuration. The goal is for the aircraft, which has already received the informal moniker XBW-1, to be flying by 2027. Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall made the Read more about Blended Wing Body Demonstrator Jet Contract Awarded By Air Force[…]

‘Flying Aliens’ Harassing Peruvian Village Are Actually Illegal Miners With Jetpacks

Posted on by Robin Edgar

The mysterious attacks began on July 11. “Strange beings,” locals said, visiting an isolated Indigenous community in rural Peru at night, harassing its inhabitants and attempting to kidnap a 15-year-old girl. […] News of the alleged extraterrestrial attackers quickly spread online as believers, skeptics, and internet sleuths around the world analyzed grainy videos posted by Read more about ‘Flying Aliens’ Harassing Peruvian Village Are Actually Illegal Miners With Jetpacks[…]

Study gets monkeys drunk for 12 months and doing 9 drinks a day. Injects dopamine inhibitors and discovers they don’t want to do much of anything any more.

Posted on by Robin Edgar

[…] a new study published on Monday in the journal Nature Medicine. The gene therapy was tested on macaque monkeys over 12 months, revealing promising results. […] At the beginning of the study, the monkeys were gradually given alcohol until an addiction was established. Then, they began self-regulating their own intake at an amount equating Read more about Study gets monkeys drunk for 12 months and doing 9 drinks a day. Injects dopamine inhibitors and discovers they don’t want to do much of anything any more.[…]

Apple 2017 Batterygate finally leads to $500m payout, no more courts (in the US, in the UK – tbc)

Posted on by Robin Edgar

Apple’s “Batterygate” legal saga is finally swinging shut – in the US, at least – with a final appeal being voluntarily dismissed, clearing the way for payouts to class members. The US lawsuit, which combined 66 separate class actions into one big legal proceeding in California, was decided in 2020, with the outcome requiring Apple Read more about Apple 2017 Batterygate finally leads to $500m payout, no more courts (in the US, in the UK – tbc)[…]

Virgin Galactic successfully flies tourists to space for first time

Posted on by Robin Edgar

Virgin Galactic’s VSS Unity, the reusable rocket-powered space plane carrying the company’s first crew of tourists to space, successfully launched and landed on Thursday. The mission, known as Galactic 02, took off shortly after 11am ET from Spaceport America in New Mexico. Aboard the spacecraft were six individuals total – the space plane’s commander and Read more about Virgin Galactic successfully flies tourists to space for first time[…]

Canon is getting away with printers that won’t scan without ink — but HP might pay

Posted on by Robin Edgar

Were you hoping Canon might be held accountable for its all-in-one printers that mysteriously can’t scan when they’re low on ink, forcing you to buy more? Tough: the lawsuit we told you about last year quietly ended in a private settlement rather than becoming a big class-action. I just checked, and a judge already dismissed Read more about Canon is getting away with printers that won’t scan without ink — but HP might pay[…]

CNET Deletes Thousands of Old Articles to Game Google Search

Posted on by Robin Edgar

Tech news website CNET has deleted thousands of old articles over the past few months in a bid to improve its performance in Google Search results, Gizmodo has learned. Archived copies of CNET’s author pages show the company deleted small batches of articles prior to the second half of July, but then the pace increased. Read more about CNET Deletes Thousands of Old Articles to Game Google Search[…]

Nearly every AMD CPU since 2017 vulnerable to Inception bug

Posted on by Robin Edgar

AMD processor users, you have another data-leaking vulnerability to deal with: like Zenbleed, this latest hole can be to steal sensitive data from a running vulnerable machine. The flaw (CVE-2023-20569), dubbed Inception in reference to the Christopher Nolan flick about manipulating a person’s dreams to achieve a desired outcome in the real world, was disclosed Read more about Nearly every AMD CPU since 2017 vulnerable to Inception bug[…]

‘We’re changing the clouds.’ An unintended test of geoengineering is fueling record ocean warmth

Posted on by Robin Edgar

[…] researchers are now waking up to another factor, one that could be filed under the category of unintended consequences: disappearing clouds known as ship tracks. Regulations imposed in 2020 by the United Nations’s International Maritime Organization (IMO) have cut ships’ sulfur pollution by more than 80% and improved air quality worldwide. The reduction has Read more about ‘We’re changing the clouds.’ An unintended test of geoengineering is fueling record ocean warmth[…]