#[1]alternate [2]News for nerds, stuff that matters [3]Search Slashdot [4]Slashdot RSS [5]Slashdot * [6]Stories * + Firehose + [7]All + [8]Popular * [9]Polls * [10]Software * [11]Apparel * [12]Newsletter * [13]Jobs [14]Submit Search Slashdot ____________________ (BUTTON) * [15]Login * or * [16]Sign up * Topics: * [17]Devices * [18]Build * [19]Entertainment * [20]Technology * [21]Open Source * [22]Science * [23]YRO * Follow us: * [24]RSS * [25]Facebook * [26]LinkedIn * [27]Twitter * [28]Youtube * [29]Mastodon * [30]Newsletter Follow Slashdot stories on [31]Twitter Nickname: ____________________ Password: ____________________ [ ] Public Terminal __________________________________________________________________ Log In [32]Forgot your password? [33]Close binspamdupenotthebestofftopicslownewsdaystalestupid freshfunnyinsightfulinterestingmaybe offtopicflamebaittrollredundantoverrated insightfulinterestinginformativefunnyunderrated descriptive typodupeerror Do you develop on GitHub? You can keep using GitHub but automatically [34]sync your GitHub releases to SourceForge quickly and easily with [35]this tool so your projects have a backup location, and get your project in front of SourceForge's nearly 30 million monthly users. It takes less than a minute. Get new users downloading your project releases today! [36]Sign up for the Slashdot newsletter! or [37]check out the new Slashdot job board to browse remote jobs or jobs in your area [38]× 171167678 story [39]Government [40]Texas Bans Kids From Social Media Without Parental Consent [41](theverge.com) [42]38 Posted by [43]BeauHD on Thursday June 15, 2023 @06:00AM from the get-ready-for-more-checkboxes dept. Texas Governor Greg Abbott has signed a bill [44]prohibiting children under 18 from joining various social media platforms without parental consent. Similar legislation has been passed in [45]Utah and [46]Louisiana. The Verge reports: The bill, [47]HB 18, requires social media companies to receive explicit consent from a minor's parent or guardian before they'd be allowed to create their own accounts starting in September of next year. It also forces these companies to prevent children from seeing "harmful" content -- like content related to eating disorders, substance abuse, or "grooming" -- by creating new filtering systems. Texas' definition of a "digital service" is extremely broad. Under the law, parental consent would be necessary for kids trying to access nearly any site that collects identifying information, like an email address. There are some exceptions, including sites that primarily deliver educational or news content and email services. The Texas attorney general could sue companies found to have violated this law. The law's requirements to filter loosely defined "harmful material" and provide parents with control over their child's accounts mirror language in some federal legislation that has [48]spooked civil and digital rights groups. Like HB 18, the US Senate-led Kids Online Safety Act orders platforms to prevent minors from being exposed to content related to disordered eating and other destructive behaviors. But critics fear this language could encourage companies like Instagram or TikTok to overmoderate non-harmful content to avoid legal challenges. Overly strict parental controls could also harm kids in abusive households, allowing parents to spy on marginalized children searching for helpful resources online. apply tags__________ 171167632 story [49]Space [50]Saturn's Icy Moon Enceladus Harbors Essential Elements For Life [51](reuters.com) [52]3 Posted by [53]BeauHD on Thursday June 15, 2023 @03:00AM from the hide-and-seek dept. Researchers have [54]discovered high concentrations of phosphorus in ice crystals emitted from Saturn's moon Enceladus, enhancing its potential to support life. The findings, based on data from NASA's Cassini spacecraft, suggest that Enceladus may possess the necessary elements for life. Reuters reports: The discovery was based on data collected by NASA's Cassini spacecraft, the first to orbit Saturn, during its 13-year landmark exploration of the gaseous giant planet, its rings and its moons from 2004 to 2017. The same team previously confirmed that Enceladus' ice grains contain a rich assortment of minerals and complex organic compounds, [55]including the ingredients for amino acids, associated with life as scientists know it. But phosphorus, the least abundant of six chemical elements considered necessary to all living things -- the others are carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen and sulphur -- was still missing from the equation until now. "It's the first time this essential element has been discovered in an ocean beyond Earth," the study's lead author, Frank Postberg, a planetary scientist at the Free University in Berlin, said in a JPL press release. [...] One notable aspect of the latest Enceladus discovery was geochemical modeling by the study's co-authors in Europe and Japan showing that phosphorus exists in concentrations at least 100 times that of Earth's oceans, bound water-soluble forms of phosphate compounds. "This key ingredient could be abundant enough to potentially support life in Enceladus' ocean," said co-investigator Christopher Glein, a planetary scientist at Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas. "This is a stunning discovery for astrobiology." "Whether life could have originated in Enceladus' ocean remains an open question," Glein said. apply tags__________ 171165626 story [56]Science [57]Synthetic Human Embryos Created In Groundbreaking Device [58](theguardian.com) [59]48 Posted by [60]BeauHD on Wednesday June 14, 2023 @11:30PM from the science-outpacing-the-law dept. An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Scientists have [61]created synthetic human embryos using stem cells, in a groundbreaking advance that sidesteps the need for eggs or sperm. Scientists say these model embryos, which resemble those in the earliest stages of human development, could provide a crucial window on the impact of genetic disorders and the biological causes of recurrent miscarriage. However, the work also raises serious ethical and legal issues as the lab-grown entities fall outside current legislation in the UK and most other countries. The structures do not have a beating heart or the beginnings of a brain, but include cells that would typically go on to form the placenta, yolk sac and the embryo itself. There is no near-term prospect of the synthetic embryos being used clinically. It would be illegal to implant them into a patient's womb, and it is not yet clear whether these structures have the potential to continue maturing beyond the earliest stages of development. The motivation for the work is for scientists to understand the "black box" period of development that is so called because scientists are only allowed to cultivate embryos in the lab up to a legal limit of 14 days. They then pick up the course of development much further along by looking at pregnancy scans and embryos donated for research. The full details of the latest work, from the Cambridge-Caltech lab, are yet to be published in a journal paper. But, speaking at the conference, Zernicka-Goetz described cultivating the embryos to a stage just beyond the equivalent of 14 days of development for a natural embryo. The model structures, each grown from a single embryonic stem cell, reached the beginning of a developmental milestone known as gastrulation, when the embryo transforms from being a continuous sheet of cells to forming distinct cell lines and setting up the basic axes of the body. At this stage, the embryo does not yet have a beating heart, gut or beginnings of a brain, but the model showed the presence of primordial cells that are the precursor cells of egg and sperm. "Our human model is the first three-lineage human embryo model that specifies amnion and germ cells, precursor cells of egg and sperm," Zernicka-Goetz told the Guardian before the talk. "It's beautiful and created entirely from embryonic stem cells." apply tags__________ 171166578 story [62]Security [63]JPL Creates World's Largest PDF Archive to Aid Malware Research [64]14 Posted by [65]BeauHD on Wednesday June 14, 2023 @10:02PM from the size-matters dept. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) has [66]created the largest open-source archive of PDFs as part of [67]DARPA's Safe Documents program, with the aim of improving internet security. The corpus consists of approximately 8 million PDFs collected from the internet. From a press release: "PDFs are used everywhere and are important for contracts, legal documents, 3D engineering designs, and many other purposes. Unfortunately, they are complex and can be compromised to hide malicious code or render different information for different users in a malicious way," said Tim Allison, a data scientist at JPL in Southern California. "To confront these and other challenges from PDFs, a large sample of real-world PDFs needs to be collected from the internet to create a shared, freely available resource for software experts." Building the corpus was no easy task. As a starting point, Allison's team used Common Crawl, an open-source public repository of web-crawl data, to identify a wide variety of PDFs to be included in the corpus -- files that are publicly available and not behind firewalls or in private networks. Conducted between July and August 2021, the crawl identified roughly 8 million PDFs. Common Crawl limits downloaded data to 1 megabyte per file, meaning larger files were incomplete. But researchers need the entire PDF, not a truncated version, in order to conduct meaningful research on them. The file-size limit reduced the number of complete, untruncated files extracted directly from Common Crawl to 6 million. To get the other 2 million PDFs and ensure the corpus was complete, the JPL team re-fetched the truncated files using specialized software that downloaded the whole files from the incomplete PDFs' web addresses. Various metadata, such as the software used to create each PDF, was extracted and is included with the corpus. The JPL team also relied on free, publicly available geolocation software to identify the server location of the source website for each PDF. The complete data set totals about 8 terabytes, making it the largest publicly available corpus of its kind. The corpus will do more than help researchers identify threats. Privacy researchers, for example, could study these files to determine how file-creation and editing software can be improved to better protect personal information. Software developers could use the files to find bugs in their code and to check if old versions of software are still compatible with newer versions of PDFs. The Digital Corpora project hosts the huge data archive as part of Amazon Web Services' Open Data Sponsorship Program, and the files have been packaged in easily downloadable zip files. apply tags__________ 171165600 story [68]Microsoft [69]Microsoft Launched Bing Chatbot Despite OpenAI Warning It Wasn't Ready [70]16 Posted by [71]BeauHD on Wednesday June 14, 2023 @09:25PM from the both-going-after-the-same-thing dept. According to [72]a report from the Wall Street Journal, the partnership between Microsoft and OpenAI has [73]become "awkward" due to tension and confusion. Ars Technica reports: Not only has this tension and confusion extended to Microsoft's internal AI team -- which apparently is dealing with budget cuts and limited access to OpenAI technology -- but sources said it also clouded Microsoft's controversial rollout of AI-powered Bing search last February. At that time, Bing was found to be vulnerable to prompt injection attacks revealing company secrets and providing sometimes inaccurate and truly unhinged responses to user prompts. According to WSJ, OpenAI warned Microsoft "about the perils of rushing to integrate OpenAI's technology without training it more" and "suggested Microsoft move slower on integrating its AI technology with Bing." A top concern for OpenAI was that Bing's chatbot, Sydney, might give inaccurate or unhinged responses, but this early warning seemingly was easily ignored by Microsoft. In a [74]Wired interview published today, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella suggested that any hiccups with Sydney at first were just part of Microsoft's plan for training the chatbot to respond to real-world prompts that couldn't be tested in a lab. "We did not launch Sydney with GPT-4 the first day I saw it, because we had to do a lot of work to build a safety harness," Nadella told Wired. "But we also knew we couldn't do all the alignment in the lab. To align an AI model with the world, you have to align it in the world and not in some simulation." So that's partly why Microsoft rushed ahead anyway, but sources told WSJ that the rush was also partly due to Microsoft executives who had "misgivings about the timing of ChatGPT's launch last fall." Because OpenAI started ChatGPT's public testing while Microsoft was still working on integrating OpenAI tech into Bing, tension seemingly spiked between the partners, who also stood as rivals in an AI race to capture the world's attention. As ChatGPT's success grew, some Microsoft employees raised concerns that ChatGPT was stealing Bing's "thunder," WSJ reported. Others sensibly posited that Microsoft could learn valuable lessons ahead of Bing's rollout from ChatGPT's early public testing. [...] Of course, ChatGPT ultimately won the AI race, instantly attracting the fastest-growing user base in history. Meanwhile, "the new Bing," released a month later, "has yet to come close to the breakout success of ChatGPT," WSJ reported. Citing data from analytics firm YipitData, WSJ reported that ChatGPT "has nearly double the average number of daily search sessions as Bing search does." Further tension and confusion has brewed within Microsoft's in-house AI team, which has "complained about diminished spending." Most employees are set back by a lack of "access to the inner workings" of OpenAI's technology, which is particularly painful for employees attempting to integrate that tech into various Microsoft products. There's also the awkward reality that OpenAI's and Microsoft's sales teams "sometimes pitch the same customers." Much of this "drama" amounts to typical infighting that happens any time two companies pair up, WSJ reported, but there's no ignoring the conflict inherent to both sides attempting to maintain independence while reaping maximum profits by selling access to the same technology. Despite these tensions, Nadella told Wired that OpenAI "bet on" Microsoft, and Microsoft "bet on" OpenAI. He still envisions "a good commercial partnership" between the independent companies and considered Microsoft's investment in OpenAI as "a long-term stable deal." Increasingly, it looks like one way to assuage tension is to bring the companies even closer together in partnership. WSJ noted that Nadella announced last month that the Bing search engine would soon be integrated into ChatGPT, which he said was "just the start of what we plan to do with our partners in OpenAI to bring the best of Bing to the ChatGPT experience." apply tags__________ 171165516 story [75]Medicine [76]Google Lens Can Now Search For Skin Conditions [77]8 Posted by [78]BeauHD on Wednesday June 14, 2023 @08:45PM from the computer-vision dept. Google Lens, the company's computer vision-powered app that scans objects and brings up relevant information, is now [79]able to search for skin conditions, like moles and rashes. "Uploading a picture or photo through Lens will kick off a search for visual matches, which will also work for other physical maladies that you might not be sure how to describe with words (like a bump on the lip, a line on nails or hair loss)," reports TechCrunch. From the report: It's a step short of the AI-driven app Google launched in 2021 to diagnose skin, hair and nail conditions. That app, which debuted first in the E.U., faced barriers to entry in the U.S., where it would have had to have been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. (Google declined to seek approval.) Still, the Lens feature might be useful for folks deciding whether to seek medical attention or over-the-counter treatments. Lens integration with Google Bard is also coming soon. "Users will be able to include images in their Bard prompts and Lens will work behind the scenes to help Bard make sense of what's being shown," reports TechCrunch. apply tags__________ 171165482 story [80]The Internet [81]Bay Area Woman Is On a Crusade To Prove Yelp Reviews Can't Be Trusted [82](sfgate.com) [83]39 Posted by [84]BeauHD on Wednesday June 14, 2023 @08:02PM from the she-might-be-on-to-something dept. An anonymous reader quotes a report from SFGATE: A strange letter showed up on Kay Dean's doorstep. It was 2017, and the San Jose resident had left a one-star review on the Yelp page of a psychiatry office in Los Altos. Then the letter arrived: It seemed the clinic had hired a local lawyer to demand that Dean remove her negative review or face a lawsuit. The envelope included a $50 check. Dean, who once worked as a criminal investigator in the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Inspector General, smelled something fishy. She decided to look into the clinic, part of a small California chain called SavantCare. By the time her work was done, she'd found a higher calling -- and SavantCare's ex-CEO was fighting felony charges. Since then, Dean, 60, has [85]mounted a yearslong crusade against Yelp and the broader online review ecosystem from a home office in San Jose. Yelp, founded in San Francisco in 2004, is deeply entrenched in American consumer habits, and has burrowed itself into the larger consciousness through partnerships with the likes of Apple Maps. The company's crowdsourced reviews undergird the internet's web of recommendations and can send businesses droves of customers -- or act as an insurmountable black mark. Dean follows fake reviews from their origins in social media groups to when they hit the review sites, methodically documenting hours of research in spreadsheets and little-watched YouTube videos. Targets accuse her of an unreasonable fixation. Yelp claims it aggressively and effectively weeds out fakes. But Dean disagrees, and she's out to convince America that Yelp, Google and other purveyors of reviews cannot be trusted. "This is an issue that affects millions of consumers, and thousands of honest businesses," she said in her YouTube page's introductory post on April 30, 2020, facing the camera dead-on. "I'm creating these videos to expose this massive fraud against the American public and shine a light on Big Tech's culpability." "I don't do it lightly. If I put a video up, it's serious," she told SFGATE in May. "I'm putting myself out there." Dean is particularly motivated by the types of small businesses that she's found gaming Yelp's recommendation algorithm. She has spotted seemingly paid-for reviews on the pages of lawyers, home contractors, and doctors' offices -- high-ticket companies for which she says she'd "rather have no information than fake information." apply tags__________ 171165440 story [86]AI [87]McKinsey Report Finds Generative AI Could Add Up To $4.4 Trillion a Year To the Global Economy [88](venturebeat.com) [89]27 Posted by [90]BeauHD on Wednesday June 14, 2023 @07:20PM from the but-at-what-cost? dept. According to global consulting leader [91]McKinsey and Company, Generative AI [92]could add "2.6 trillion to $4.4 trillion annually" to the global economy. That's almost the "economic equivalent of adding an entire new country the size and productivity of the United Kingdom to the Earth ($3.1 trillion GDP in 2021)," notes VentureBeat. From the report: The $2.6 trillion to $4.4 trillion economic impact figure marks a huge increase over McKinsey's previous estimates of the AI field's impact on the economy from 2017, up 15 to 40% from before. This upward revision is due to the incredibly fast embrace and potential use cases of GenAI tools by large and small enterprises. Furthermore, McKinsey finds "current generative AI and other technologies have the potential to automate work activities that absorb 60 to 70% of employees' time today." Does this mean massive job loss is inevitable? No, according to Alex Sukharevsky, senior partner and global leader of QuantumBlack, McKinsey's in-house AI division and report co-author. "You basically could make it significantly faster to perform these jobs and do so much more precisely than they are performed today," Sukharevsky told VentureBeat. What that translates to is an addition of "0.2 to 3.3 percentage points annually to productivity growth" to the entire global economy, he said. However, as the report notes, "workers will need support in learning new skills, and some will change occupations. If worker transitions and other risks can be managed, generative AI could contribute substantively to economic growth and support a more sustainable, inclusive world." Also, the advent of accessible GenAI has pushed up McKinsey's previous estimates for workplace automation: "Half of today's work activities could be automated between 2030 and 2060, with a midpoint in 2045, or roughly a decade earlier than in our previous estimates." Specifically, McKinsey's report found that four types of tasks -- customer operations, marketing and sales, software engineering and R&D -- were likely to account for 75% of the value add of GenAI in particular. "Examples include generative AI's ability to support interactions with customers, generate creative content for marketing and sales and draft computer code based on natural-language prompts, among many other tasks." [...] Overall, McKinsey views GenAI as a "technology catalyst," pushing industries further along toward automation journeys, but also freeing up the creative potential of employees. "I do believe that if anything, we are getting into the age of creativity and the age of creator," Sukharevsky said. apply tags__________ 171165392 story [93]The Internet [94]A San Francisco Library Is Turning Off Wi-Fi At Night To Keep People Without Housing From Using It [95](theverge.com) [96]152 Posted by [97]BeauHD on Wednesday June 14, 2023 @06:40PM from the food-water-shelter-internet dept. In San Francisco's District 8, a public library has [98]turned off its Wi-Fi outside of business hours in response to complaints from neighbors and the city supervisor's office about open drug use and disturbances caused by unhoused individuals. The Verge reports: In San Francisco's District 8, a public library has been shutting down Wi-Fi outside business hours for nearly a year. The measure, quietly implemented in mid-2022, was made at the request of neighbors and the office of city supervisor Rafael Mandelman. It's an attempt to keep city dwellers who are currently unhoused away from the area by locking down access to one of the library's most valuable public services. A local activist known as HDizz revealed details behind the move last month, [99]tweeting public records of a [100]July 2022 email exchange between local residents and the city supervisor's office. In the emails, residents complained about open drug use and sidewalks blocked by residents who are unhoused. One relayed a secondhand story about a library worker who had been followed to her car. And by way of response, they demanded the library limit the hours Wi-Fi was available. "Why are the vagrants and drug addicts so attracted to the library?" one person asked rhetorically. "It's the free 24/7 wi-fi." San Francisco's libraries have been historically progressive when it comes to providing resources to people who are unhoused, even hiring specialists to offer assistance. But on August 1st, [101]reports San Francisco publication Mission Local, city librarian Michael Lambert met with Mandelman's office to discuss the issue. The next day, District 8's Eureka Valley/Harvey Milk Memorial branch began turning its Wi-Fi off after hours -- a policy that San Francisco Public Library (SFPL) spokesperson Jaime Wong told The Verge via email remains in place today. In the initial months after the decision, the library apparently received no complaints. But in March, a little over seven months following the change, it [102]got a request to reverse the policy. "I'm worried about my friend," the email reads, "whom I am trying to get into long term residential treatment." San Francisco has shelters, but the requester said their friend had trouble communicating with the staff and has a hard time being around people who used drugs, among other issues. Because this friend has no regular cell service, "free wifi is his only lifeline to me [or] for that matter any services for crisis or whatever else." The resident said some of the neighborhood's residents "do not understand what they do to us poor folks nor the homeless by some of the things they do here." Jennifer Friedenbach of San Francisco's Coalition on Homelessness told The Verge in a phone interview that "folks are not out there on the streets by choice. They're destitute and don't have other options. These kinds of efforts, like turning off the Wi-Fi, just exacerbate homelessness and have the opposite effect. Putting that energy into fighting for housing for unhoused neighbors would be a lot more effective." apply tags__________ 171165314 story [103]Transportation [104]Feds Tell Automakers Not To Comply With Massachusetts 'Right To Repair' Law [105](arstechnica.com) [106]71 Posted by [107]BeauHD on Wednesday June 14, 2023 @06:02PM from the federal-law-preempts-state-law dept. An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: In 2020, voters in Massachusetts chose to extend that state's automotive "right to repair" law to [108]include telematics and connected car services. But this week, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration told automakers that some of the law's requirements [109]create a real safety problem and that they should be ignored since federal law preempts state law when the two conflict. Almost all new cars in 2023 contain embedded modems and offer some form of telematics or connected car services. And the [110]ballot language that passed in Massachusetts requires "manufacturers that sell vehicles with telematics systems in Massachusetts to equip them with a standardized open data platform beginning with model year 2022 that vehicle owners and independent repair facilities may access to retrieve mechanical data and run diagnostics through a mobile-based application." There have been attempts by state lawmakers, the auto industry, and NHTSA to tweak the law to create a more reasonable timeline for implementation, but to no avail. Now, [111]according to Reuters, NHTSA has written to automakers to advise them not to comply with the Massachusetts law. Among its problems are the fact that someone "could utilize such open access to remotely command vehicles to operate dangerously, including attacking multiple vehicles concurrently," and that "open access to vehicle manufacturers' telematics offerings with the ability to remotely send commands allows for manipulation of systems on a vehicle, including safety-critical functions such as steering, acceleration, or braking." Faced with this dilemma, it's quite possible the automakers will respond by simply disabling telematics and connected services for customers in the state. Subaru already took that step when it introduced its model year 2022 vehicles, and NHTSA says other OEMs may do the same. apply tags__________ 171165082 story [112]AI [113]Bipartisan Bill Denies Section 230 Protection for AI [114](axios.com) [115]25 Posted by msmash on Wednesday June 14, 2023 @05:20PM from the shape-of-things-to-come dept. Sens. Josh Hawley and Richard Blumenthal want to clarify that the internet's bedrock liability law [116]does not apply to generative AI, per a new bill introduced Wednesday. From a report: Legal experts and lawmakers have questioned whether AI-created works would qualify for legal immunity under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, the law that largely shields platforms from lawsuits over third-party content. It's a newly urgent issue thanks to the explosive of generative AI. The new bipartisan bill bolsters the argument that Section 230 doesn't cover AI-generated work. It also gives lawmakers an opening to go after Section 230 after vowing to amend it, without much success, for years. Section 230 is often credited as the law that allowed the internet to flourish and for social media to take off, as well as websites hosting travel listings and restaurant reviews. To its detractors, it goes too far and is not fit for today's web, allowing social media companies to leave too much harmful content up online. Hawley and Blumenthal's "No Section 230 Immunity for AI Act" would amend Section 230 "by adding a clause that strips immunity from AI companies in civil claims or criminal prosecutions involving the use or provision of generative AI," per a description of the bill from Hawley's office. apply tags__________ 171165052 story [117]Businesses [118]Logitech CEO Bracken Darrell Resigns [119](betanews.com) [120]11 Posted by msmash on Wednesday June 14, 2023 @04:40PM from the how-about-that dept. Logitech made a major announcement this week, revealing that Bracken Darrell, the company's president and CEO, [121]will be leaving to pursue a new opportunity. From a report: Darrell's resignation from his positions as president, CEO, and board member is effective immediately. However, he will stay with the company for the next month to ensure a smooth transition. As part of their succession planning process, Logitech has appointed board member Guy Gecht as the interim CEO while they conduct a global search for potential candidates from both within and outside the company. Regarding Guy Gecht, it's important to note that he has been a non-executive member of Logitech's board since September 2019. Prior to taking on the interim CEO role, Gecht served on Logitech's Audit Committee and chaired the Technology and Innovation Committee. The move comes at a time when Logitech is struggling with revenues as people return to schools and offices. apply tags__________ 171164974 story [122]Google [123]Google Is Weaving Generative AI Into Online Shopping Features [124](bloomberg.com) [125]10 Posted by msmash on Wednesday June 14, 2023 @04:00PM from the closer-look dept. Google is [126]bringing generative AI technology to shopping, aiming to get a jump on e-commerce sites like Amazon. From a report: The Alphabet-owned company announced features Wednesday aimed at helping people understand how apparel will fit on them, no matter their body size, and added capabilities for finding products using its search and image-recognition technology. Additionally, Google introduced new ways to research travel destinations and map routes using generative AI -- technology that can craft text, images or even video from simple prompts. "We want to make Google the place for consumers to come shop, as well as the place for merchants to connect with consumers," Maria Renz, Google's vice president of commerce, said in an interview ahead of the announcement. "We've always been committed to an open ecosystem and a healthy web, and this is one way where we're bringing this technology to bear across merchants." Google is the world's dominant search engine, but 46% of respondents in a survey of US shoppers conducted last year said they still started their product searches and research on Amazon, according to the research firm CivicScience. TikTok, too, is making inroads, CivicScience's research found -- 18% of Gen Z online shoppers turn to the platform first. Google is taking note, with some of its new, AI-powered shopping exploration features aimed at capturing younger audiences. A new virtual "try-on" feature, launching on Wednesday, will let people see how clothes fit across a range of body types, from XXS to 4XL sizes. Apparel will be overlaid on top of images of diverse models that the company photographed while developing the capability. Google said it was able to launch such a service because of a new image-based AI model that it developed internally, and the company is releasing a new research paper detailing its work alongside the announcement. apply tags__________ 171164654 story [127]Microsoft [128]Microsoft Now Sells Surface Replacement Parts, Including Displays, Batteries, and SSDs [129](theverge.com) [130]16 Posted by msmash on Wednesday June 14, 2023 @03:22PM from the moving-forward dept. Microsoft is starting to [131]sell replacement components for its Surface devices. The software giant now supplies replacement parts in the Microsoft Store, allowing Surface owners to replace their displays, batteries, SSDs, and more. From a report: "We are excited to offer replacement components to technically inclined consumers for out-of-warranty, self repair," says Tim McGuiggan, VP of devices services and product engineering at Microsoft. "When purchasing a replacement component, you will receive the part and relevant collateral components (such as screws if applicable)." Tools to help you repair a Microsoft Surface device are sold separately by iFixit, which Microsoft partnered with in 2021 to sell official Surface repair tools. iFixit supplies tools like battery covers to protect against punctures during repair, debonding cradles to help cut the adhesive that holds screen glass in place, and a tool to properly replace a screen. apply tags__________ 171164454 story [132]Businesses [133]Comcast Complains To FCC That Listing All of Its Monthly Fees is Too Hard [134](arstechnica.com) [135]95 Posted by msmash on Wednesday June 14, 2023 @02:45PM from the how-about-that dept. [136]mschaffer [137]shares a report: Comcast and other ISPs have annoyed customers for many years by advertising low prices and then charging much bigger monthly bills by tacking on a variety of fees. While some of these fees are related to government-issued requirements and others are not, poorly trained customer service reps have been known to falsely tell customers that fees created by Comcast are mandated by the government. The FCC rules will force ISPs to accurately describe fees in labels given to customers, but Comcast said it wants the FCC to rescind a requirement related to "fees that ISPs may, but are not obligated to, pass through to customers." These include state Universal Service fees and other local fees. As Comcast makes clear, it isn't required to pass these costs on to customers in the form of separate fees. Comcast could stop charging the fees and raise its advertised prices by the corresponding amount to more accurately convey its actual prices to customers. Instead, Comcast wants the FCC to change the rule so that it can continue charging the fees without itemizing them.. I suppose it's just easier to grab people's money than it is to make up names for the fees, Mschaffer adds. apply tags__________ [138]« Newer [139]Older » Slashdot Top Deals Slashdot Top Deals [140]Slashdot Deals Slashdot Poll Recently, an open letter signed by tech leaders, researchers proposes delaying AI development. Do you agree that AI development should be temporarily halted? (*) Yes ( ) No (BUTTON) vote now [141]Read the 60 comments | 19557 votes Looks like someone has already voted from this IP. If you would like to vote please login and try again. Recently, an open letter signed by tech leaders, researchers proposes delaying AI development. Do you agree that AI development should be temporarily halted? 0 Percentage of others that also voted for: * [142]view results * Or * * [143]view more [144]Read the 60 comments | 19557 voted Most Discussed * 290 comments [145]Hotel Owners Start To Write Off San Francisco as Business Nosedives * 290 comments [146]Reddit CEO Tells Employees That Subreddit Blackout 'Will Pass' * 211 comments [147]Reddit Communities With Millions of Followers Plan To Extend the Blackout Indefinitely * 193 comments [148]Ocean Temperatures Are Off the Charts * 151 comments [149]A San Francisco Library Is Turning Off Wi-Fi At Night To Keep People Without Housing From Using It [150]Firehose * [151]Windows 11 June 2023 Update Breaks Chrome for some users * [152]Comcast says it's too gosh darn difficult to list all of their monthly fees * [153]Tesla is about to pull the plug on its main EV charging rival * [154]Amazon Locks a Man Out of His Smart Home Over Racism Allegations * [155]Reddit Communities Plan To Extend the Blackout Indefinitely [156]This Day on Slashdot 2013 [157]Transgendered Folks Encountering Document/Database ID Hassles 814 comments 2007 [158]Is Scientific Consensus a Threat to Democracy? 836 comments 2006 [159]Pope Advised Hawking Not to Study Origin of Universe 864 comments 2004 [160]Java Faster Than C++? 1270 comments 2003 [161]12/7 and Overtime on a Salary? 932 comments [162]Sourceforge Top Downloads * [163]TrueType core fonts 2.2B downloads * [164]Notepad++ Plugin Mgr 1.5B downloads * [165]VLC media player 899M downloads * [166]eMule 686M downloads * [167]MinGW 631M downloads Powered By [168]sf [169]Slashdot * [170]Today * [171]Wednesday * [172]Tuesday * [173]Monday * [174]Sunday * [175]Saturday * [176]Friday * [177]Thursday * [178]Submit Story Stinginess with privileges is kindness in disguise. -- Guide to VAX/VMS Security, Sep. 1984 * [179]FAQ * [180]Story Archive * [181]Hall of Fame * [182]Advertising * [183]Terms * [184]Privacy Statement * [185]About * [186]Feedback * [187]Mobile View * [188]Blog * * (BUTTON) Icon Do Not Sell My Personal Information Trademarks property of their respective owners. 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