Anthropic Endorses California AI Transparency Bill; Google-‘Open’ Web in Rapid Decline; Nintendo Wins Suit Against Switch Modder; Signal Bows Free & Paid Backup Plans

Posted: September 8, 2025 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , | Leave a comment

A programming note— we will post a little later tomorrow, in order to report on the new iPhones and other devices revealed at the Apple event. The event is scheduled to start at 10 AM Pacific time. 

In a win for actual open artificial intelligence, Anthropic, makers of the Claude AI large language model, have endorsed SB 53, the so-called AI Transparency bill. Theverge.com reports that the bill would require leading AI companies to publish safety frameworks with details about how they manage “catastrophic risks,” as well as provide certain whistleblower protections. Anthropic’s support comes after weeks of negotiations with the AI industry on the bill’s specifics.

Google has continued to claim for months that the web is ‘thriving,’ and that AI isn’t hosing traffic, and that its search engine is sending people to a wide variety of websites…wider than ever. Well, that’s what they are saying publicly. According to theverge.com, Google admitted in a court filing last week that “the open web is already in rapid decline.” Keep in mind that Google wants to appear weaker and less monopolistic in court, but a number of  digital publishers and independent website owners have reported experiencing a decline in traffic following changes to Google Search’s algorithm and the rise of AI chatbots. The net net is, that people are ‘less likely’ to click on links when presented with Google’s AI Overview. Google still insists that it continues to ‘send billions of clicks to websites every day.’ 

Nintendo has just won a big battle in court, scoring $2 million in a lawsuit against Modded Hardware. Engadget.com notes that the site was known for selling devices that allowed users to get around Nintendo’s piracy protections, including the popular MIG Switch flashcart that lets buyers play official Nintendo games without the need for a physical cartridge. The court win also requires Ryan Daly to shut down the website and forfeit the domain to Nintendo. Nintendo had previously settled a similar suit against the makers of the Yazu emulator. They extracted $2.4 million from them. 

Signal, the messaging app that claims to give you serious privacy is ruling out a feature for storage. One of the selling points of the app has been that it didn’t let users store any type of backup of conversations on the platform. Well, that was then and this is now. TechCrunch.com reports that Signal will now give users a free tier of 100 MB of storage for text messages and the last 45 days worth of media. They store the messages after compression, so that amount of storage will handle quite a number of messages. For users that want to store more than the last 45 days worth of media, there is a $1.99 a month paid plan, which gives up to 100 Gigs of storage. Signal is using zero-knowledge technology to secure its backups, so they’re not linked to a particular user or a specific payment method. Users will receive a 64-character recovery key that is generated on the device to unlock their backups. Amid Signal rivals, WhatsApp offers end-to-end backup through an optional feature that users have to enable. Still…you are trusting your supposedly secret messages to their cloud storage, so buyer beware. There is probably already software out there or will be soon that can tie you to your messages.

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now.

Apple Bows New M4 iMac; Google Working on Tensor Chip for Pixel Watch; Meta Developing AI Search Engine; Police Shut Down Big Info Theft Operation

Posted: October 28, 2024 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , | Leave a comment

Last week, Apple teased an ‘exciting week of announcements,’ and they didn’t mess around…a new M4 iMac was unveiled this morning. 9to5mac.com reports that the freshened iMac not only runs the more powerful M4 chip, but it has new color choices, as well as a nano-texture display option. The base model has 16 gigs of ram, doubling the former model. It can have up to 4 Thunderbolt ports, and comes in new colors…new shades of green, yellow, orange, pink, purple, and blue…and of course, silver. With the M4 chip, and the 16 gigs of ram, the all-in-one Mac will have no problem running Apple Intelligence. The base model starts at $1299 with 16 gigs of unified memory. Preorders are open now, with availability starting Friday, November 8th.  

Google is working on a new custom Tensor chip for the Pixel Watch. The present Watch has been running on off-the-shelf chips from Samsung and Qualcomm. According to 9to5google.com, the Watch 2 and Watch 3 have both been running Snapdragon W5+ chipsets. This chipset from Qualcomm has dramatically improved battery life over the outdated Exynos chip that ran the original Pixel Watch. The Tensor powered Watches could come in 2026. 

Meta is reportedly working on an AI search engine to cut reliance on Google and Microsoft. Theinformation.com says that Meta is designing the search engine and web crawler to return conversational answers about current events to folks using its Meta AI chatbot. Meta currently supplies news, sports and stock info to users that is provided by Google Search and Microsoft’s Bing. Meta may be concerned that either Google or Microsoft may want to pull out of these arrangements, and hopes the AI search engine/chatbot will be able to take their place. 

A coalition of international law enforcement agencies have managed to disrupt two very prolific information thieves that have stolen data from thousands. Techcrunch.com reports that the Dutch National Police, the lead agency, gained full access to the servers used by the Redline and Meta info stealers. Infostealers are a kind of malware designed to extract sensitive information, such as passwords, credit card data, search histories, and the contents of cryptocurrency wallets, from an infected system. Redline has been widely used by crooks, while Meta is a relatively new info stealer (not to be confused with the company of the same name that owns Facebook, Instagram, Threads, and WhatsApp. 

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now.

Meta Scraped Every Australian Account to Train AI; Sony PS5 Pro…Cha-Ching; Google Will Give Search Context Via Link to Internet Archive; Proposed Data Center UNDER San Francisco Bay

Posted: September 11, 2024 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , | Leave a comment

If you use Meta’s AI on Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, or Threads, you may get more of a  ‘shrimp on the barbie’ flavor in your replies. Engadget.com reports that Meta scraped data on every one of their Australian users to train its AI! After initially denying this, Meta’s global privacy director Melinda Claybaugh had to cop to it…apparently they scraped every photo and text back to 2007 from every user…unless the user had set their posts to private. Right now, Meta isn’t offering Australians an opt-out option like it does for European Union users. Meta did say they didn’t and won’t scrape the accounts of those under 18, but it will use the info the kids post on their parents’ or guardians’ accounts.

Sony did make its brief announcement about the PS5 Pro yesterday. There wasn’t really much new to report except the price…Sony surprised analysts with a $699.99 price…making the Pro their most expensive console ever. The PS3 adjusted for inflation would be $779 with added disk drive, by the way. According to theverge.com, the Pro still may be the ticket if you aren’t up to building your own PC gaming machine. In addition,  the easy plug-and-play model, simplified UI, and hassle-free warranty process are all big benefits over having to build or find a good prebuilt PC and then deal with Windows and driver updates. Consoles sell in their millions because they’re far more consumer-friendly than PCs. If you can’t see that price point, look into rolling your own…or see if you don’t have a friend who can do it for you on the cheap. 

In an effort to add more context to search results, Google will now link results directly to The Internet Archive to help add historical context to the links in your results. 9to5google.com says the new feature is live as of today. In order to access The Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine links through Google Search you will need to click the three dots menu button that shows up by all search results, then click in ‘More about this page.’ The Internet Archive is a nonprofit research library that stores and preserves giant chunks of the web for easy reference later. 

A data center at the bottom of San Francisco Bay? That’s what a couple of entrepreneurs are thinking, and their company NetworkOcean plans to submerge a small capsule filled with GPU servers into the Bay within a month. Arstechnica.com reports that they think this will help solve the thirst of data centers for water and electricity. The founders contend that moving data centers off land would slow ocean temperature rise by drawing less power and letting seawater cool the capsule’s shell, supplementing its internal cooling system. A couple flies in the ointment: scientists who study the hundreds of square miles of brackish water say even the slightest heat or disturbance from NetworkOcean’s submersible could trigger toxic algae blooms and harm wildlife.There is also the issue that no agencies that oversee the bay have heard of this plan, let alone issued the needed permits. Of course NetworkOcean is crying ‘over regulation.’

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now.