Just six days ago — and 30 minutes after a Disney-OpenAI meeting about a project with Sora — Disney’s team was “blindsided” with the news Sora was being discontinued, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters, describing OpenAI’s move as “a big rug-pull.” Even some Sora employees were surprised by the cancellation. It was just 14 weeks ago Disney announced a $1 billion investment in...

“Emergency out-of-band fixes issued by enterprise IT giants Microsoft and Oracle have shone a spotlight on issues around both update cycles and patching,” reports Computer Weekly:Microsoft’s emergency update, KB5085516, addresses an issue that arose after installing the mandatory cumulative updates pushed live on Patch Tuesday earlier this month. According to Microsoft, it has since emerged...

An anonymous Slashdot reader writes: ClickFix attacks are ramping up. These attacks have users copy and paste a string to something that can execute a command line — like the Windows Run dialog, or a shell prompt. But MacRumors reports that macOS 26.4 Tahoe (updated earlier this week) introduces a new feature to its Terminal app where it will detect ClickFix attempts and stop them by...

It’s FOSS interviewed a software engineer whose long-running open source contributions include Python code for the Arch Linux installer and maintaining packages for NixOS. But “a recent change he made to systemd has pushed him into the spotlight” after he’d added the optional birthDate field for systemd’s user database.Critics saw it not merely as a technical addition, but as a symbolic...

“IBM says its quantum computer can now simulate real magnetic materials and match actual lab experiment results,” writes Slashdot reader BrianFagioli, “which is something people have been waiting years to see.”Instead of just theoretical output, the system reproduced neutron scattering data from a known material, meaning it lines up with real world physics. It still relies on a mix of quantum...

Memory and storage shortages and price hikes have “steadily rippled outward across all kinds of consumer tech,” reports Ars Technica. “Today’s bad news comes from Sony, which is raising prices for PlayStation 5 consoles in the US just eight months after their last price hike.”The drive-less Digital Edition will increase from $500 to $600; the base PS5 with an optical drive will increase from...

In a new 4,000-word article, CNN tells the story of a retired appellate paralegal and grandmother in her early 70s who was treated for depression with psilocybin. CNN notes there’s now retreats featuring psilocybin in a few countries — and while psilocybin is illegal under United States federal law, “In Oregon, 5,935 clients received psilocybin services through Oregon’s state-regulated...

Linux kernel maintainer Greg Kroah-Hartman tells The Register that AI-driven code review has “really jumped” for Linux. “There must have been some inflection point somewhere with the tools…””Something happened a month ago, and the world switched. Now we have real reports.” It’s not just Linux, he continued. “All open source projects have real reports that are made with AI, but they’re good, and...

After decades of studying, this week NASA announced “a major step forward in bringing nuclear power and propulsion from the lab to space.”NASA will launch the Space Reactor-1 Freedom, the first nuclear powered interplanetary spacecraft, to Mars before the end of 2028, demonstrating advanced nuclear electric propulsion in deep space. Nuclear electric propulsion provides an extraordinary...

The Wall Street Journal reports:Walking into his kitchen, Tim Yoder recoiled at a message on his refrigerator door: “Shop Samsung water filters.” Yoder, a supply-chain manager in Chicago, owns a Samsung Electronics Family Hub fridge. He paid $1,400 for an appliance that came with a 32-inch screen on the door that allows him to control other Samsung gadgets, pull up recipes or stream music. But...

Long-time Slashdot reader Qbertino writes: … but the CERN Project “Antimatter in motion” just did it. For the first time in history researchers at CERN have transported 92 antiprotons on a truck in a specially designed magnetic enclosure. The test-drive went so well that the researchers spontaneously decided to go another round… The purpose of the experiment was to test the feasibility of...

A dog missing for two months was found at an animal shelter — and its owner received an email from an artificial intelligence service that identified it, according to the Washington Post. “As controversial as AI is right now, this is one of those areas where it’s a real win,” according to the chief executive at the nonprofit animal welfare organization Best Friends Animal Society. And while...

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: OpenAI’s ChatGPT ads pilot in the United States has crossed the $100 million annualized revenue mark within six weeks of launch, a company spokesperson said on Thursday, pointing to robust early demand for the AI startup’s nascent advertising business. […] While roughly 85% of users are currently eligible to see ads, fewer than 20% are shown ads...