Errant reference in macOS 15.2 seems to confirm M4 MacBook Airs for 2025

The macOS 15.2 update that was released earlier today came with a handful of new features, plus something unexpected: an apparently accidental reference to the upcoming M4 MacBook Airs. MacRumors reports that the “Mac16,12” and “Mac16,13” model identifiers reference 13- and 15-inch models of the M4 Air and that both are coming in 2025. That a MacBook Air refresh is planned for next year isn’t much of a surprise at…

December 11, 2024
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TCL TVs will use films made with generative AI to push targeted ads

Advertising has become a focal point of TV software. We’re seeing companies that sell TV sets be increasingly interested in leveraging TV operating systems (OSes) for ads and tracking. This has led to bold new strategies, like an adtech firm launching a TV OS and ads on TV screensavers. With new short films set to debut on its free streaming service tomorrow, TV-maker TCL is positing a new approach to…

December 11, 2024
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Google goes “agentic” with Gemini 2.0’s ambitious AI agent features

On Wednesday, Google unveiled Gemini 2.0, the next generation of its AI-model family, starting with an experimental release called Gemini 2.0 Flash. The model family can generate text, images, and speech while processing multiple types of input including text, images, audio, and video. It’s similar to multimodal AI models like GPT-4o, which powers OpenAI’s ChatGPT. “Gemini 2.0 Flash builds on the success of 1.5 Flash, our most popular model yet…

December 11, 2024
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Startup will brick $800 emotional support robot for kids without refunds

Startup Embodied is closing down, and its product, an $800 robot for kids ages 5 to 10, will soon be bricked. Embodied blamed its closure on a failed “critical funding round.” On its website, it explained: We had secured a lead investor who was prepared to close the round. However, at the last minute, they withdrew, leaving us with no viable options to continue operations. Despite our best efforts to…

December 10, 2024
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AI company trolls San Francisco with billboards saying “stop hiring humans”

Since the dawn of the generative AI era a few years ago, the march of technology—toward what tech companies hope will replace human intellectual labor—has continuously sparked angst about the future role humans will play in the job market. Will we all be replaced by machines? A Y-Combinator-backed company called Artisan, which sells customer service and sales workflow software, recently launched a provocative billboard campaign in San Francisco playing on…

December 10, 2024
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AMD’s trusted execution environment blown wide open by new BadRAM attack

One of the oldest maxims in hacking is that once an attacker has physical access to a device, it’s game over for its security. The basis is sound. It doesn’t matter how locked down a phone, computer, or other machine is; if someone intent on hacking it gains the ability to physically manipulate it, the chances of success are all but guaranteed. In the age of cloud computing, this widely…

December 10, 2024
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The iPhone accessories that let me ditch my laptop while traveling

There’s something liberating about traveling without your computer. Your load is lighter, your battery needs are fewer, and you don’t have to risk damaging or losing one of your most important and expensive devices. Besides, most of us are already carrying around a pretty powerful and conveniently compact computer 24/7: our smartphones. My problem, though, is that I prefer doing most things on a laptop rather than on a phone….

December 10, 2024
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Reddit debuts AI-powered discussion search—but will users like it?

On Monday, Reddit announced it would test an AI-powered search feature called “Reddit Answers” that uses an AI model to create summaries from existing Reddit posts to respond to user questions, reports Reuters. The feature generates responses by searching through Reddit’s vast collection of community discussions and comments. When users ask questions, Reddit Answers provides summaries of relevant conversations and includes links to related communities and posts. The move potentially…

December 9, 2024
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Ten months after first tease, OpenAI launches Sora video generation publicly

On Monday, OpenAI released Sora Turbo, a new version of its text-to-video generation model, making it available to ChatGPT Plus and Pro subscribers through a dedicated website. The model generates videos up to 20 seconds long at resolutions reaching 1080 p from a text or image prompt. Open AI announced that Sora would be available today for ChatGPT Plus and Pro subscribers in the US and many parts of the…

December 9, 2024
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Raspberry Pi 500 makes an 8GB Pi 5 into a compact, inexpensive desktop PC

One of the selling points of the Raspberry Pi 5 (released in October 2023) is that it was fast enough and had enough memory to be a credible general-purpose desktop PC, if not an especially fast one. For Pi-as-desktop enthusiasts, the company has a couple of new pre-holiday announcements. The biggest is the Raspberry Pi 500, which fits the components of an 8GB Pi 5 into a small keyboard-shaped case for…

December 9, 2024
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