Don’t let an AI bot potentially crash your TV.

Speaking with an AI chatbot can be a little awkward, but companies like Google and OpenAI are working on fixing that.

Speaking with an AI chatbot can be a little awkward, but companies like Google and OpenAI are working on fixing that.

If you’re not going to put it on your desk, at least do these things.

If you’re not going to put it on your desk, at least do these things.

Humanoid robots have improved emotional mimicry to the point of being able to cry during an emotional conversation.

Humanoid robots have improved emotional mimicry to the point of being able to cry during an emotional conversation.

There’s no need to manually type text into your iPhone that you see in the real world. Use Live Text to copy it, call phone numbers and much more.

There’s no need to manually type text into your iPhone that you see in the real world. Use Live Text to copy it, call phone numbers and much more.

A brief history of “Duo” foldables.

A brief history of “Duo” foldables.

With the right software, you can run Android apps on your Windows PC. Here’s why you may want to and how to get it set up on your own computer.

With the right software, you can run Android apps on your Windows PC. Here’s why you may want to and how to get it set up on your own computer.

In November 2021, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History opened an exhibit called “The Electric Dr. Franklin,” describing “Benjamin Franklin’s pioneering contributions to electrical science.” The exhibit explained that, prior to becoming an abolitionist, he had enslaved people in his household. “Benjamin Franklin’s remarkable scientific accomplishments were, in part, enabled by slavery,” it declared.

The exhibit speculated that Franklin may have used enslaved people in his electrical research. “Franklin wrote about experiments in which he took shocks and used family and friends in these ways, although he seldom identified who in particular assisted him,” stated the exhibit, which closed in 2025 but can still be found online. “Indentured servants and enslaved people in his household could also have been used, although we may never know for certain.”

It was an eye-catching conjecture: one of the most revered of the Founding Fathers subjecting people held against their will to possibly painful shocks. And it was one of many details singled out for criticism in a blistering 162-page White House report released in July that argued that the museum had fallen victim to an “ideological capture” that “moved the Museum’s mission away from straightforward historical education and scholarship toward an extreme political activism that seeks to transform our country.”

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Could this push solar cell efficiency beyond the theoretical 33% limit? Interesting Engineering reports:

Researchers at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands found that tin-based perovskite solar cells can slow heat loss from high-energy “hot electrons…”

When sunlight strikes a panel, photons jump-start electrons into action. The most energetic photons create super-charged hot electrons… [but] in fractions of a trillionth of a second, these high-energy particles rapidly cool, dumping their bonus energy as waste heat before ever leaving the solar cell… In collaboration with Maria Antonietta Loi, professor of Photophysics and Optoelectronics, the team created an experimental setup. Using a specialized solar cell material called tin-based perovskite, Loi’s lab performed a feat many thought impossible: she slowed the heat loss down by a factor of 1,000.

Suddenly, the extra energy lingered for nanoseconds instead of vanishing in picoseconds… To solve the puzzle, Koster and PhD student Tim Faber built digital simulations to peel back the quantum layers. And discovered a surprising double-action mechanism at work… The simulations matched the exact nanosecond delay observed in the lab… These specialized materials could be used to build a new generation of super-efficient solar cells.

Tin-based metal halide perovskites are non-toxic, eco-friendly crystalline materials for high-performance solar energy conversion… The material possesses an unusually low electron mass. As a result, electric charges move quickly and retain extra thermal energy for extended periods. This combination of broad light absorption, efficient charge movement, and prolonged energy retention makes these materials prime candidates for next-generation solar panels.

“There are many other questions that still need answers,” the team said in their announcement, “but in theory, this discovery could allow the creation of more efficient solar cells, beyond the theoretical limit of 33 percent.”
Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader fahrbot-bot for sharing the article.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The United States and China have agreed to “launch a dialogue” on AI, reports Reuters.

On artificial intelligence, the two sides agreed to hold a dialogue on the technology’s risks and benefits, with the next round of discussions set for November, and to set up a communication channel for AI-related incidents, the Chinese Foreign Ministry and the White House said.

The White House said that the leaders had agreed to use the term “super intelligence” in place of “artificial intelligence.” In a separate statement, the Chinese ministry said that Beijing valued Washington’s use of the new term. As AI technology continues to advance, the two sides should step up exchanges and work toward consensus in line with new developments, it said.

But CNN argues that “Despite growing calls to prevent AI development from spiraling out of control, the Trump-Xi summit has produced little substance, as many experts expected.”

The right thing to do on AI, [China’s leader] Xi said during talks with Trump, is to “draw on each other’s strengths, not guard against each other” — a reference to Beijing’s concern about US containment, from existing tech export controls to potential AI restrictions. “The two sides can continue their dialogue on AI, exchange views on its risks and benefits, and jointly prevent the misuse and abuse of AI,” he added. But the summit has yielded little progress on AI beyond a formal dialogue and a bilateral communication channel, proposals discussed before the two leaders’ summit — underscoring the entrenched mutual mistrust amid contrasting visions on AI… Because of low levels of trust, cooperation between the two superpowers remains limited, said George Chen, chair of digital practice at The Asia Group consultancy. “Beijing continues to believe Washington seeks to contain China’s rise in AI and other emerging technologies, a perception that will shape the pace and scope of future engagement for the two countries on AI,” he said.

CNN also points out that while China trails the US in frontier AI models, “it’s rapidly narrowing the technology gap while championing a more open ecosystem centered on accessibility and lower cost.”

In July, Chinese leader Xi Jinping launched the World Artificial Intelligence Cooperation Organization — a rival grouping to the Pax Silica alliance that Trump formed last year to reduce reliance on China for AI supply chains. While over two dozen countries and the European Union signed up to Trump’s Pax Silica, Xi has recruited 29 countries, including Russia, Indonesia and Pakistan, to his alternative vision of open models, which allow users to freely download, customize and run without paying hefty fees to American firms like Anthropic and OpenAI. For developers in the Global South, an inexpensive Chinese model from DeepSeek or Moonshot may be more useful than a slightly more capable system requiring an expensive subscription and access to a foreign cloud provider, said Eric Olander, editor in chief of The China-Global South Project, a research agency….

China’s embrace of open systems has not always been a top-down strategy by Beijing. Restrictions on access to the most advanced chips because of US export controls, coupled with smaller capital markets, have pushed Chinese developers toward open models as a way to compete with leading US proprietary systems. That shift has proved effective. In a year, Chinese models’ global usage skyrocketed from less than 15% to over 54% last week, led by DeepSeek, according to AI leaderboard data by OpenRouter, a marketplace for models. Even American firms, from Airbnb and DoorDash to Shopify, have embraced Chinese models, tapping into the advantages of open systems, including lower costs and greater flexibility for customization.

CNN adds this insight from Alex Colville, an analyst focusing on tech and security at the government-backed Australian Strategic Policy Institute. “The more capable Chinese models become, the less likely it is Beijing may leave them unrestricted.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Last weekend KDE’s annual Akademy conference included a presentation proposing
an AI-native KDE,” writes The Register. This led KDE developer Nate Graham to open a discussion about proposed restrictions on LLM-assisted contributions which “rapidly became heated. Moderators issued warnings, restricted further comments, and eventually removed the thread.”

But as Graham writes on his blog, “A bunch of people mostly outside of KDE who disapprove of LLM usage derailed KDE’s attempt to add restrictions to LLM usage.”

Two people unknown to any KDE contributors appeared and began fighting with one another about the broader topic of the morality of AI, not the proposed guidelines… Someone else outside of KDE set up kdeforpeople.com in an attempt to… pressure KDE into banning LLMs. A bunch of people signed onto it, almost none of whom are known KDE contributors.
The topic was picked up on social media and the press with… varying levels of accuracy. The draft proposal was removed and the whole topic hidden… Yep, that’s where we’re at in the state of online discourse around AI…

The “lovable, sovereign, AI-native KDE” idea was presented by two people important to KDE in decades past, but who had not made any contributions recently besides this Akademy talk. Their idea does not reflect the overall direction of KDE or Plasma, and I don’t think it ever will. If “a lovable, sovereign, AI-native KDE” freaks you out, I believe it is completely reasonable and safe to ignore…

I completely understand why a lot of people have problems with LLMs. I have these concerns as well.

He concluded by asking people not to derail any future process to set usage guidelines, fighting over “the broader topic of AI in general.”

“The discussion is gone, but the argument continues,” adds The Register:

GNOME developer Jordan Petridis has also published The GNOME LLM Policy That I Want, proposing that LLMs be barred from creating or modifying anything submitted to GNOME or hosted on its infrastructure.

“You might be asked to prove your code meets this requirement,” Petridis writes, arguing for proposals that target the norms around developer behavior. His rationale? “The GNOME Project prioritizes the social and human aspects of collective software creation,”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

AirPrint is the easiest path to printing on iPhone; other apps enable this, but printing with a cable isn’t supported.