Twitch wants everyone to have nicer, more family-friendly usernames. The video streaming website has updated its policy to prohibit usernames that have hate speech, threats of violence and personally identifiable information in them. It will now also ban usernames with references to "sexual acts, arousal, fluids or genitalia," as well as references to hard drugs. Those with some kind of reference to weed, alcohol or tobacco don't have to worry about a thing, though — those three are A-OK and don't fall under the new "hard drugs" rule.
"Although we’ve removed many reported, offensive usernames under our current policy, we believe establishing a stronger standard is needed to cultivate a diverse, inclusive global community on Twitch," the Amazon-owned streaming platform said in its announcement.
Twitch is giving all users until March 1st, 2022 before it starts enforcing its new guidelines. That way, creators will have time to think of a new handle and fix their branding without their disrupting their streaming activities. After the deadline passes, Twitch will suspend users if their names are clearly "hateful, harassing, violent or typically representative of malicious behavior."
It will, however, give people with references to sex and hard drugs in their names a chance and will only require them to reset their handles. Same goes for instances wherein it's not clear if a handle violates the new policy. The website built a tool that allows people to reset their names without losing their account history, subs, follows and bits, and people can continue their activities as usual after they use it. While Twitch is giving users the freedom to make changes on their own, it said a machine learning feature will keep an eye on any new handle people try to create to make sure it doesn't violate its policy, as well.
The Joint European Torus (JET) fusion reactor in the UK has generated the highest level of sustained energy ever from atom fusion. On December 21st, 2021, the "tokamak" reactor produced 59 megajoules of energy during a five-second fusion pulse. That’s double what it created back in 1997. (Yes, I know energy is not created or destroyed, but you get what I mean!)
The JET reactor is the flagship experimental device of the European Fusion Program, funded by the EU. It's mainly designed to prove scientists’ modeling efforts, with an eye on future, bigger experiments with a much larger ITER reactor in France, set to start fusion testing in 2025.
JET hit a Q value of 0.33, meaning it produced about a third of the energy put in. The highest Q value achieved so far is 0.7 by the US Department of Energy's National Ignition Facility, but it only hit that figure for 4 billionths of a second. The goal with ITER is to reach a Q factor of 10 or greater. Fun fact: ITER isn’t an acronym but means “the path” in Latin. And now you know.
Maybe you’ve got a glorious new 4K TV. But maybe you’re still using sub-par built-in speakers. Thankfully, it's never been easier to bring the surround sound experience home without investing thousands of dollars in Hi-Fi components. Senior Editor Devindra Hardawar guides you through your options.
The Boombox feature risked overpowering safety alerts.
Tesla is recalling hundreds of thousands of cars over a technical issue. It has recalled 578,607 Model 3, S, X and Y vehicles over concerns the Boombox feature can overpower Pedestrian Warning System sounds. The ability to play external audio while the car is in motion violates a federal safety rule requiring a clearly audible sound when EVs and hybrids are moving at speeds below 18.6MPH. As with some of its previous recalls, the company will address the issue with a free over-the-air update. The patch will disable Boombox while cars aren't parked, Tesla said.
Tesla called the lawsuit "unfair and unproductive."
More bad news for Tesla. A California civil rights agency has filed a lawsuit against the company for alleged racial discrimination and harassment at its Fremont factory, according to The Wall Street Journal. "After receiving hundreds of complaints from workers, DFEH found evidence that Tesla’s Fremont factory is a racially segregated workplace," said California Department of Fair Employment and Housing director Kevin Kish in a statement.
MoviePass is making a comeback. Co-founder Stacy Spikes, who is back at the helm, says MoviePass 2.0 is being built on a Web3 framework and will have a kind of virtual currency. It will have tiered plans, but he didn’t mention pricing. Spikes said there'll be ways for people to earn credits through the app via a "preshow experience." That’s watching ads. To make sure you're actually watching them, the app will employ facial recognition and eye-tracking. Wonderful.
Google is unveiling the first Android 13 developer preview today, and it's clear the company is not going to avoid the "unlucky" number. Developers (and risk takers) can test their apps using the Android emulator or flashing a system image to the Pixel 4 or newer Pixel phones. Based on today's announcement, it looks like we can expect finer privacy controls and more of Android 12's Material You design licks throughout.
States can apply for the funds to create an Alternative Fuel Corridor on US highways.
The Biden administration has announced a $5 billion plan to help states build half a million EV charging stations by 2030 — five times the current number. The goal is to allow EV owners to find a charging port anywhere within 50 miles of their location across all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. A total of $615 million will be distributed this year alone.
The UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has accepted Google's latest plan to replace third-party cookies from the Chrome Browser. The regulator said that Google made legally binding commitments to address its concerns that the "Privacy Sandbox" would weaken competition and harm consumers.
Early in 2021, the CMA announced that it would investigate Google's plan to replace third party cookies with "trust tokens." It said that Google's plan "could undermine the ability of publishers to generate revenue and undermine competition in digital advertising, entrenching Google’s market power." It added that it received complaints from publishers and tech companies which alleged that Google may be "abusing its dominant position."
While this is an important step, we are under no illusions that our work is done. We now move into a new phase where we will keep a close eye on Google as it continues to develop these proposals.
The CMA said that Google has promised to use a "more transparent process than initially proposed." It will now engage with third parties and publish test results, and must address any issues raised by the CMA or third parties. It will also not remove third-party cookies "until the CMA is satisfied that its competition concerns have been addressed."
In its own blog post on the matter, Google said it would "design, develop and implement Privacy Sandbox with regulatory oversight and input from the CMA and the ICO." It promised to apply the commitments globally, not just in the UK, as "we believe that they provide a roadmap for how to address both privacy and competition concerns in this evolving sector," Google wrote.
Last year, Google delayed the rollout of third-party cookies until mid-2023, rather than the 2022 timeline it originally set. It admitted at the time that it "needs more time across the ecosystem to get this right." Google had originally proposed a cookie alternative called "FLoC" (Federated Learning of Cohorts) but announced last month that it was testing a replacement called Topics API.
The CIA has been conducting a secret mass surveillance program that affects Americans' privacy, according to a newly declassified letter (PDF) by US Senators Ron Wyden (D-Ore) and Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.). In the letter dated April of 2021, the members of the Senate Intelligence Committee urged the agency to tell the public the kind of records it collected, the amount of American records' maintained and the nature of the CIA's relationship with its sources.
The Senators also asked the Director of National Intelligence to declassify the studies conducted by a watchdog called the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB), which prompted the letter in the first place. PCLOB did in-depth examinations of two CIA counterterrorism-related programs back in 2015 as part of a larger oversight review of Executive Order 12333, a Reagan-era EO that extends the powers of US intelligence agencies.
According to The Wall Street Journal, surveillance activities conducted under EO 12333 — like the CIA's bulk program — aren't subject to the same oversight as those under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The publication also notes that that the CIA isn't legally allowed to conduct domestic spying, but some Americans' information get scooped up in certain instances. One example is if they're communicating with an overseas target via phone or the internet. Intelligence agencies are required to protect any information from the US, as well, such as redacting Americans' names unless they're pertinent to the investigation. According to the Senators, PCLOB noted problems with how the CIA handled and searched Americans' information under the program.
The Senators said the existence of the program was hidden not just to the public, but also to the Congress. An intelligence official told The New York Times, though, the the Intelligence Committee already knew about the data collection. It's the program's tools for storying and querying that collected data, which are discussed in PCLOB's reports, that it may not know the details of.
While both the Senators' letter and one of PCLOB's studies have now been released, they've both been heavily redacted. It's impossible to tell, based on the documents that came out, what kind of information was collected and what the nature of the program was. Or is — it's also unclear whether the program is still ongoing or if the CIA has already ended it. The CIA said in a statement:
"CIA has kept, and continues to keep, the Senate Select Committee for Intelligence (SSCI) and House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) fully and currently apprised of its intelligence programs, to include the activities reviewed by PCLOB. Moreover, all CIA officers have a solemn obligation to protect the privacy and civil liberties of Americans. CIA will continue to seek opportunities to provide better transparency into the rules and procedures governing our collection authorities to both Congress and the American public."
Best Buy restricted sales of several NVIDIA RTX 3000-series GPUs, including the RTX 3080 and 3090 models, to members of its $199 per year subscription program, PC Mag has reported. It made the graphics cards available for an "Exclusive Access Event," but anyone attempting to buy one was greeted with a popup saying that access was limited to Totaltech members.
The retailer launched Totaltech into beta last April with the promise of perks like free shipping, unlimited Geek Squad tech support, two-year warranty protection and free installation on most products. Another listed perk was "exclusive member sale pricing" on products, but yesterday's restock was reportedly the first time it was needed to purchase GPUs, stock checker @CameranRitz told PC Mag.
As usual, Best Buy had a limited number of cards, so even being a member was no guarantee of getting one. However, the sale reportedly last several hours before they were gone, which is longer than usual when NVIDIA cards get restocked.
Best Buy isn't the first retailer to put high-demand items behind a paywall, with Walmart and others also requiring memberships to buy certain items. However, Best Buy forces you to pay the $200 annual membership in one shot, where Walmart Plus is $15 per month and can be cancelled at any time.
Best Buy is also the exclusive retailer of NVIDIA Founder's Edition cards in the US, which it does usually sell at MSRP. So even with the Totaltech membership, purchasing one may still be cheaper compared to the outrageous markups from scalpers or other retailers. At the same time, the membership also blocks any bots. Still, the situation upset some potential buyers. "Disappointed but not surprised," said Twitter user @Michael_gg_Inc.
Universal remotes are a handy tool to have around if you have many devices that would all otherwise have their own remote controls. Merging them all into a single device leads to less clutter and less frustration, but they are often not truly “universal” as some of them may not support every infrared device that has ever been built. If you’re in a situation like that it’s possible to build a truly universal remote instead, provided you have a microcontroller and a few infrared LEDs on hand.
This was the situation that [Matt] found himself in when his Amazon Fire TV equipment control feature didn’t support his model of speakers. To get around this he programmed an Arduino to essentially translate the IR codes from the remote and output a compatible set of codes to the speakers.This requires both an IR photodiode and an IR LED but little else other than the codes for the remote and the equipment in question. With that all set up and programmed into the Aruino, [Matt]’s remote is one step closer to being truly “universal”.
While [Matt] was able to make use of existing codes in the Arduino library, it is also possible to capture the codes required manually by pointing a remote at a photodiode and programming a microcontroller to capture the codes that you need. [Matt] used a Raspberry Pi to do this when debugging this project, but we’ve also seen this method used with a similar build which uses an ESP8266 to control an air conditioner via its infrared remote control capabilities.
Elon Musk has given SpaceX's first huge Starship update in years, and during his presentation, the company showed off what a launch with the massive launch system would look like. The Starship system is composed of the Starship spacecraft itself on top of a Super Heavy booster. SpaceX is working towards making it rapidly and fully reusable so as to make launches to the Moon and to Mars feasible. After making its way outside our planet, the booster will break off and return to its launch tower, where it will ideally be caught by the tower arms. As for the spacecraft, it will proceed to its destination before making its way back to Earth.
Musk said the booster will spend six minutes in the air over all, two upon ascent and four for its return trip. In the future, the system could be reused every six to eight hours for three launches a day. SpaceX says achieving a fully and rapidly reusable system is "key to a future in which humanity is out exploring the stars." Musk also talked about how in-orbit refilling — not "refueling," since the vehicle's Raptor engines use more liquid oxygen than fuel — is essential for long-duration flights.
The Super Heavy booster, Musk said, has more than twice the thrust of a Saturn V, the largest rocket to ever head to space so far. In its current iteration, it has 29 Raptor engines, but it could eventually have 33. Speaking of those engines, Raptor version 2 is a complete redesign of the first, costs half as much and needs fewer parts. The company is capable of manufacturing five to six a week at the moment, but it could apparently be capable of producing as many as seven by next month.
Aside from being able to carry hundreds of tons, the Starship could revolutionize space travel if SpaceX can truly make launches as affordable as Musk said it could. He revealed during the event that a Starship launch could cost les than $10 million per flight, all in, within two to three years. That's significantly less than a Falcon 9 launch that costs around $60 million.
SpaceX wants to launch the Starship from its Boca Chica, Texas facility called Starbase, where it's been building the rocket's prototype. It has yet to secure approval from the Federal Aviation Administration to do so, and Musk said the company doesn't know where things stand with the agency exactly. However, there's apparently a rough indication that the FAA will be come with its environmental assessment in March. SpaceX also expects the rocket to be ready by then, which means Starship's first orbital test flight could be on the horizon.
We knew this day would come, but it still feels strange to say goodbye: the original website hosting Wordle — https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/ — now points to its new forever home of https://www.nytimes.com/games/wordle/index.html.
Other than some small UI changes to better mesh with the clean, spacious design language of NYT's Games section, Wordle is effectively identical. In fact, if you've already played today's puzzle, you'll find the solution unchanged on the Grey Lady's domain — and if you've been a desktop solver this whole time, streaks should be retained. Strangely though, the Wordle does not yet appear on the Games landing page.
The original Wordle page does not yet redirect on mobile though, if you're hoping for one last spin.
Wordle launched last October as a once-a-day word game in part inspired by the Times' Spelling Bee game. After obtaining massive popularity, its creator — Josh Wardle — sold his game to its spiritual progenitors for an undisclosed sum in the "low-seven figures." It's believed the game will remain free-to-play despite the change in ownership.
Space startup Astra's effective commercial debut didn't quite go according to plan. As SpaceNewsreports, the company's first practical mission for NASA failed when the Rocket 3.3 vehicle's upper stage flew out of control shortly after detaching from the first stage. While the launch itself went smoothly, footage suggests the payload fairing separation went awry.
The rocket was carrying NASA's ELaNa 41 (Educational Launch of Nanosatellites) mission. Three of the four cubesats aboard the flight were from universities hoping to conduct experiments for drag sails, space weather modelling and quantum gyroscopes. The fourth, from NASA itself, was meant to test quick and low-cost methods to build and inspect cubesats.
In a statement, Astra said it was "deeply sorry" for losing the payloads and would shed more light on the incident after a "data review." The launch had already been delayed several days, in part due to a range problem.
No private space firm wants an incident like this, but it might have been more damaging to Astra than for others. This was Astra's fifth attempt at orbit, and all but one of them have ended in failure. The setback could hurt Astra's chances at competing with companies like Rocket Lab and SpaceX, both of which have better (if still imperfect) track records.
This also underscores the challenges involved with private spaceflight. While it's playing an increasingly important role in commercial and scientific programs, the companies and their technology are still relatively young — even heavyweights like Boeing are struggling. It may take some time before there's a wide range of providers that can reliably ferry cargo.
A US federal court has sentenced Canadian hacker Doug Bowser to 40 months in prison for his involvement in Switch hacking group Team Xecuter, the Department of Justice announced on Thursday. Not to be confused with Nintendo of America president Doug Bowser (or Mario’s nemesis, for that matter), Bowser was part of a collective that developed and sold devices people could use to play pirated games on their consoles.
The FBI arrested Bowser in 2020. One year later, he agreed to pay $10 million to Nintendo to settle a civil privacy lawsuit and another $4.5 million in restitution to the company. Leading up to today’s sentencing announcement, Bowser faced up to 10 years in prison. According to the Justice Department, video game publishers have lost more than $65 million thanks to Team Xecuter’s exploits. Homeland Security Investigations and the FBI are still working to apprehend Bowser’s accomplices.
