Telly, a company that accepts advertising data instead of cash for its TVs, has reportedly had a hard time getting its “free” TVs into people’s homes. Telly debuted in May 2023. Its dual-screen design can show ads, even when people aren’t watching. Although the smaller, secondary screen can be used for more helpful applications, like showing the weather or sports scores, its primary purpose is to serve as a billboard…

The project developer for one of the Internet’s most popular networking tools is scrapping its vulnerability reward program after being overrun by a spike in the submission of low-quality reports, much of it AI-generated slop. “We are just a small single open source project with a small number of active maintainers,” Daniel Stenberg, the founder and lead developer of the open source app cURL, said Thursday. “It is not in…

On Tuesday, eBay updated its User Agreement to explicitly ban third-party “buy for me” agents and AI chatbots from interacting with its platform without permission, first spotted by Value Added Resource. On its face, a one-line terms of service update doesn’t seem like major news, but what it implies is more significant: The change reflects the rapid emergence of what some are calling “agentic commerce,” a new category of AI…

Websites that authenticate users through links and codes sent in text messages are imperiling the privacy of millions of people, leaving them vulnerable to scams, identity theft, and other crimes, recently published research has found. The links are sent to people seeking a range of services, including those offering insurance quotes, job listings, and referrals for pet sitters and tutors. To eliminate the hassle of collecting usernames and passwords—and for…

The companies that make RAM and flash memory chips are enjoying record profits because of the AI-induced memory crunch—and they’re also indicating that they don’t expect conditions to improve much if at all in 2026. And while RAM kits have been hit the fastest and hardest by shortages and price increases, we shouldn’t expect SSD pricing to improve any time soon, either. That’s the message from Shunsuke Nakato (via PC…

On Saturday, tech entrepreneur Siqi Chen released an open source plugin for Anthropic’s Claude Code AI assistant that instructs the AI model to stop writing like an AI model. Called “Humanizer,” the simple prompt plugin feeds Claude a list of 24 language and formatting patterns that Wikipedia editors have listed as chatbot giveaways. Chen published the plugin on GitHub, where it has picked up over 1,600 stars as of Monday….

YouTubers have been increasingly frustrated with Google’s management of the platform, with disinformation welcomed back and an aggressive push for more AI (except where Google doesn’t like it). So it’s no surprise that creators have been up in arms over the suspicious removal of YouTube’s advanced SRV3 caption format. You don’t have to worry too much just yet—Google says this is only temporary, and it’s working on a fix for…

TCL is taking majority ownership of Sony’s Bravia series of TVs, the two companies announced today. The two firms said they have signed a memorandum of understanding and aim to sign binding agreements by the end of March. Pending “relevant regulatory approvals and other conditions,” the joint venture is expected to launch in April 2027. Under a new joint venture, Huizhou, China-headquartered TCL will own 51 percent of Tokyo, Japan-headquartered…

Mac power users waiting on new high-end MacBook Pro models may have been disappointed last fall, when Apple released an M5 upgrade for the low-end 14-inch MacBook Pro without touching the M4 Pro or Max versions of the laptop. But the wait for M5 Pro and M5 Max models may be nearing its end. The tea-leaf readers at MacRumors noticed that shipping times for a handful of high-end MacBook Pro…

An unconfirmed report early this month suggested Asus was pulling back on its smartphone plans, but the company declined to comment at the time. Asus chairman Jonney Shih has now confirmed the wind-down of its smartphone business during an event in Taiwan. Instead, Asus will focus on AI products like robots and smart glasses. Shih addressed the company’s future plans during a 2026 kick-off event in Taiwan, as reported by…