Amazon has delayed some commitments around new data center leases, Wells Fargo analysts said Monday, the latest sign that economic concerns may be affecting tech companies’ spending plans. From a report: A week ago, a Microsoft executive said the software company was slowing down or temporarily holding off on advancing early build-outs. Amazon Web Services and Microsoft are the leading providers of cloud infrastructure, and both have ramped up their capital expenditures in recent quarters to meet the demands of the generative artificial intelligence boom.

“Over the weekend, we heard from several industry sources that AWS has paused a portion of its leasing discussions on the colocation side (particularly international ones),” Wells Fargo analysts wrote in a note. They added that “the positioning is similar to what we’ve heard recently from MSFT,” in that both companies are reeling in some new projects but not canceling signed deals.

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The Fyre Festival saga is getting an unexpected new chapter. Shawn Rech, who co-founded the TruBlu streaming network for crime and investigative content, is planning to leverage the Fyre Festival name for a new music streaming platform. He’s acquired select intellectual property trademarks for the famously failed music event whose co-founder Billy McFarland went to jail for fraud. However, Rech will not play a role in Fyre Festival’s hypothetical live events. According to him, he’s just trying to capitalize on the name’s familiarity for his own project.

“It has nothing to do with music,” Rech told Deadline in a surprisingly candid statement. “I needed a big name that people would remember, even if it’s attached to infamy, so that’s why I bought these [trademarks] to start the streaming network.”

Deadline reports that the Fyre Music Streaming will have a subscription video-on-demand platform and free ad-supported television channels. Rech claims it will launch at Thanksgiving. “We’re building something authentic and lasting,” he said.

It takes an impressive amount of hubris to use the name of a comically ridiculous music festival fraud and expect people to give you money for it. But considering Rech did manage to get TruBlu off the ground, maybe his music platform will actually exist. If the fact that the second Fyre Festival has already been indefinitely postponed is any sign of what’s to come, though, it will be a hilarious exercise in schadenfreude.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/music/fyre-festival-is-becoming-a-music-streaming-service-that-might-not-be-a-scam-this-time-221058381.html?src=rss

Anbernic, a popular retro handheld maker, has announced that its suspending shipments of its devices from China to the US because of tariffs. The company, which makes a variety of emulation-focused consoles and has appeared in Engadget’s “Best gaming handhelds” list, is still selling devices it’s already shipped to the US while supplies last.

“Due to changes in U.S. tariff policies, we will be suspending all orders shipping from China to the United States starting today,” Anbernic writes. “We strongly recommend prioritizing products shipped from our U.S. warehouse, which are currently not affected by import duties and can be purchased with confidence.” 

Anbernic has long offered the option to choose which warehouse your device is shipped from as a way to avoid additional customs fees or a model being out of stock in specific region. Because of this policy change, though, US customers will no longer be able to order directly from China and could miss out on the company’s future hardware launches.

The decision to stop shipping to the US is understandable given the current chaos around tariffs. President Donald Trump announced a 90-day pause on most tariffs on April 9, but increased the tariffs companies would pay to import goods from China. Specific exemptions were carved out for certain electronics, but then the Trump administration later clarified that electronics would get their own separate semiconductor tariffs at some point, too. 

All of this flip-flopping over trade policies was also paired with the removal of the “de minimis exemption” which allows packages shipped to the US under $800 to be duty-free, a key ingredient in cheap Amazon-alternatives like Temu and the budget products Anbernic sells. Given how messy the current approach to trade is, it’s possible Anbernic might be able to ship to the US again in the future. For now, though, not everyone is able to eat the costs of tariffs like Nintendo is.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/retro-handheld-maker-anbernic-stops-us-shipments-due-to-tariffs-220217833.html?src=rss

Cursor AI users recently encountered an ironic AI failure when the platform’s support bot falsely claimed a non-existent login restriction policy. Co-founder Michael Truell apologized for the issue, clarified that no such policy exists, and attributed the mishap to AI hallucination and a session management bug. The Register reports: Users of the Cursor editor, designed to generate and fix source code in response to user prompts, have sometimes been booted from the software when trying to use the app in multiple sessions on different machines. Some folks who inquired about the inability to maintain multiple logins for the subscription service across different machines received a reply from the company’s support email indicating this was expected behavior. But the person on the other end of that email wasn’t a person at all, but an AI support bot. And it evidently made that policy up.

In an effort to placate annoyed users this week, Michael Truell co-founder of Cursor creator Anysphere, published a note to Reddit to apologize for the snafu. “Hey! We have no such policy,” he wrote. “You’re of course free to use Cursor on multiple machines. Unfortunately, this is an incorrect response from a front-line AI support bot. We did roll out a change to improve the security of sessions, and we’re investigating to see if it caused any problems with session invalidation.” Truell added that Cursor provides an interface for viewing active sessions in its settings and apologized for the confusion.

In a post to the Hacker News discussion of the SNAFU, Truell again apologized and acknowledged that something had gone wrong. “We’ve already begun investigating, and some very early results: Any AI responses used for email support are now clearly labeled as such. We use AI-assisted responses as the first filter for email support.” He said the developer who raised this issue had been refunded. The session logout issue, now fixed, appears to have been the result of a race condition that arises on slow connections and spawns unwanted sessions.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Max’s May lineup brings the return of two of the streamer’s original comedy series. First up is the second installment of Conan O’Brien Must Go (May 8), an unscripted travel series in which Conan reconnects with fans he previously met on his podcast, Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend. This season’s three episodes will debut weekly.

At the end of the month, Sex and the City spinoff And Just Like That… (May 29) returns for its third season, following original SATC characters—plus a few additions—navigating life in New York City in their 50s.

On the film side, Max will debut HBO original Mountainhead (May 31), starring Steve Carrell, Jason Schwartzman, Cory Michael Smith, and Ramy Youssef as billionaire friends navigating a financial crisis. Mountainhead was written and directed by Succession creator Jesse Armstrong. Also landing on Max in May is A24’s Oscar-winning drama The Brutalist (May 16).

Finally, the new two-part documentary Pee-wee As Himself (May 23) tells the personal and professional story of Paul Reubens, who played the iconic Pee-wee Herman. The docu-series 100 Foot Wave (May 1) also returns for a third season, with five episodes debuting weekly.

Max subscribers will also get a variety of live sports, including NHL and NBA playoff games as well as a handful of MLB matchups.

Here’s everything else coming to Max in May.

What’s coming to Max in May 2025

Available May 1

• 100 Foot Wave, Season 3 (HBO Original)

• A Haunted House (2013)

• A Haunted House 2 (2014)

• A Private War (2018)

• Badman’s Country (1958)

• Barricade (1950)

• Broadway Melody of 1940 (1940)

• Carson City (1952)

• Chronicle (2012)

• Chronicle: Director’s Cut (2012)

• Dallas (1950)

• Dylan’s Playtime Adventures, Season 1B (Max Original)

• Enter The Dragon (1973)

• Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

• Fort Dobbs (1958)

• Fort Worth (1951)

• Funny People (2009)

• Hannibal (2001)

• In the Fade (2017)

• Inception (2010)

• Legend of the Guardians The Owls of Ga’Hoole (2010)

• Lone Star (1952)

• Lost River (2015)

• Madagascar (2005)

• Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted (2012)

• Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa (2008)

• Megan Leavey (2017)

• Notting Hill (1999)

• Pee-wee’s Big Adventure (1985)

• Rachel and the Stranger (1948)

• Rancho Notorious (1952)

• Red Tails (2012)

• Ride, Vaquero! (1953)

• Riding Shotgun (1954)

• Rocky Mountain (1950)

• Royal Wedding (1951)

• San Antonio (1945)

• Santa Fe Trail (1940)

• Shoot-Out at Medicine Bend (1957)

• Son of Belle Starr (1953)

• Son of the Mask (2005)

• Springfield Rifle (1952)

• Stars in My Crown (1950)

• Tall in the Saddle (1944)

• Tall Man Riding (1955)

• The Band Wagon (1953)

• The Bounty Hunter (1954)

• The First Texan (1956)

• The Goonies (1985)

• The Kissing Bandit (1948)

• The Left-Handed Gun (1958)

• The Man Behind the Gun (1953)

• The Mortal Storm (1940)

• The Naked Spur (1953)

• The Oklahoma Kid (1939)

• The Oklahoman (1957)

• The Painted Hills (1951)

• The Princess Bride (1987)

• The Shining (1980)

• The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

• The Young Guns (1956)

• They Died with Their Boots On (1941)

• This Means War (2012)

• This Means War: Extended Edition (2012)

• Thunder Over the Plains (1953)

• Trail Street (1947)

• Vengeance Valley (1951)

• Vivacious Lady (1938)

• We Bought a Zoo (2011)

• Westbound (1959)

• Westward the Women (1951)

• Wichita (1955)

• Ziegfeld Girl (1941)

Available May 2

• Adult Best Friends (2024)

• Malditos, Season 1 (Max Original)

• Teen Titans Go!, Season 9A (Cartoon Network)

Available May 3

• Ready Player One (2018)

Available May 6

• Fareed Zakaria: The War on Government (CNN)

• Talking Pictures Podcast – Special Video Episode with Eli Roth Recorded At TCM Classic Film Festival

• The Playboy Murders, Season 3 (ID)

• Toxic, Season 1 (ID)

Available May 8

• Conan O’Brien Must Go, Season 2 (Max Original)

Available May 9

• Bloody Trophy (Krwawe Trofeum) (Max Original)

• The Whale (A24, 2022)

Available May 11

• Delicious Miss Brown, Season 10 (Food Network)

• The Bakersfield 3: A Tale of Murder and Motherhood, Season 1 (ID)

Available May 12

• Where the Crawdads Sing (2022)

Available May 13

• Betting on Paradise, Season 1 (HGTV)

• Contraband: Seized at the Border, Season 6 (Discovery)

• Dream Destination: A Surprise Trip, Season 1 (discovery+)

Available May 14

• Cutthroat Kitchen: Knives Out, Season 1 (Food Network)

• Mini Reni, Season 1 (Magnolia Network)

Available May 15

• Duster, Season 1 (Max Original)

• Mermicorno: Starfall, Season 2 (Max Original)

• United States of Scandal with Jake Tapper, Season 2 (CNN Original)

Available May 16

• The Brutalist (A24)

Available May 17

• Bugs Bunny Builders, Season 2E (Cartoon Network)

Available May 18

• Love & Marriage: Detroit, Season 2 (OWN)

• Say Yes to the Dress, Season 21 (TLC)

Available May 19

• American Monster: Abuse of Power, Season 1 (ID)

Available May 20

• Kong: Skull Island (2017)

Available May 21

• Homicide Hunter: American Detective, Season 5 (ID)

Available May 22

• Expedition Files, Season 2 (Discovery)

Available May 23

• Pee-wee as Himself (HBO Original)

• Restoring Galveston, Season 7 (Magnolia Network)

• Silly Sundays, Season 1B (Cartoon Network)

Available May 25

• Say Yes To The Dress With Tan France, Season 1 (TLC)

Available May 28

• Down Home Fab, Season 3 (HGTV)

Available May 29

• And Just Like That…, Season 3 (Max Original)

Available May 31

• Mountainhead (HBO Original)

Dark mode has saved many of us from eye pain when using our smartphones at night. The difference between a black display with white text and a blinding white screen with black text is immeasurable when your phone is the only light source in the room—especially when you’re opening your eyes for the first time in a while.

While many Android users prefer to use dark mode all the time, others prefer it exclusively in the evening and night. That’s where the “sunset to sunrise” schedule comes into play: On many devices, such as Google’s Pixel phones, you can choose to schedule dark mode from sunset to sunrise. After the sun rises, your phone stays in light mode, so your content is bright alongside the light outside. But after sunset, when the light starts to dim, your phone conveniently switches dark mode. It’s the best of both worlds—when it works.

As reported by 9to5Google, users are experiencing issues with scheduled themes on Pixel devices. The problems seem to have begun with the March 2025 Pixel update, and remains unpatched following the April update. It can be frustrating, especially when you’re expecting your phone to look a certain way at a certain time of day. There are a few workarounds, but they’re not a permanent solution.

Workarounds for the dark mode bug on Pixel

Back in March, when the issue first popped up on Pixel devices, users discovered a quirk that appears to trigger the glitch: manually enabling dark mode.

Typically, when you have this schedule enabled, you’re still free to toggle between themes whenever you want. Android would simply override that decision during the next schedule change. For example, if light mode kicks in after sunrise, but you still want dark mode, you can manually enable it, and Android will preserve that setting until the following day’s sunrise. Then, it switches back to light mode.

It appears that part of the bug has to do with this practice. If you manually toggle dark mode on in this situation, Android won’t switch to light mode during the following sunrise. The same goes the opposite way: If you enable light mode after sunset, dark mode won’t kick in the following sunset.

For now, one of the best workarounds is to simply not touch the toggle if you want to keep your theme schedule active and automatic. That’s not a great workaround, by any means, but it seems to be the one with the most success.

Some users saw success in setting up a custom time for dark mode (Settings > Display > Dark theme > Schedule) then switching back to the “sunset to sunrise” option after the fact. However, others say the bug returns in time—indicating there is something broken in this particular schedule function. You could also try setting up a Bedtime mode rather than relying on this schedule, though that would affect more of your phone’s function than usual.

Wine 10.6 has been released, featuring a new lexer within its Command Processor (CMD), support for the PBKDF2 algorithm to its Bcrypt implementation, and improved metadata handling in WindowsCodecs. According to Phoronix, the update also includes 27 known bug fixes that address issues with Unity games, Alan Wake, GDI+, and various other games and applications.

You can see all the changes and download the relesae via WineHQ.org GitLab.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has decide that its official stance towards AI-use in films is to take no stance at all, according to a statement the organization shared outlining changes to voting for the 98th Oscars. The issue of award-nominated films using AI was first raised in 2024 when the productions behind Best Picture nominees The Brutalist and Emilia Pérez admitted to using the tech to alter performances.

“With regard to Generative Artificial Intelligence and other digital tools used in the making of the film, the tools neither help nor harm the chances of achieving a nomination, ” AMPAS writes. “The Academy and each branch will judge the achievement, taking into account the degree to which a human was at the heart of the creative authorship when choosing which movie to award.”

While the organization at least reaffirms that human involvement is their primary concern, they also don’t seem to believe that using AI — potentially trained on the ill-gotten work of their membership — is an existential problem. Hollywood labor unions have historically felt differently: One of several issues raised during the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes in 2023 was that AI could be used to replace the work of real people. The Brutalist and Emilia Pérez used it to modify vocal performances, but you don’t have to connect too many dots to see generative AI playing an even more substantial role in the future.

The Academy is more flexible than it’s been in years, expanding membership, adding new award categories and alongside this AI statement, improving awards voting for the better. But it still seems like most industries are waiting for a decisive legal victory against an AI company to set a new standard before they change their tune towards the tech.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/tv-movies/using-generative-ai-will-neither-help-nor-harm-the-chances-of-achieving-oscar-nominations-201719890.html?src=rss

The American Civil Liberties Union is suing to find out exactly what information the so-called Department of Government Efficiency has accessed from federal agencies. The civil rights organization submitted a Freedom of Information Act request to several goverment departments in February; it is now suing to get responses from the Social Security Administration and the Department of Veterans Affairs. The SSA denied the group’s request for expedited processing and has not responded to the ACLU’s appeal, while the VA did not act on the FOIA request, according to the press release announcing the lawsuit.

The ACLU requested any records that would show whether DOGE members have accessed databases that contain personally identifying information about citizens. The request also seeks information about whether AI is being used to analyze government data.

“The federal government cannot dodge accountability by ignoring our lawful demands for transparency,” said Nathan Freed Wessler, deputy director of the Speech, Privacy and Technology Project within the ACLU. “The American people have an urgent need to know if their private financial, medical and personal records are being illegally accessed, analyzed or weaponized by Trump’s unaccountable team of unvetted outsiders. This is doubly true for our seniors and veterans, who are at particular risk if their data has been accessed illegally.”

DOGE, a group headed by Elon Musk, has been leading the move to cut jobs across federal agencies, including those that oversee Musk’s business endeavors. Although there have been other lawsuits trying to prevent people who are not civil servants from accessing sensitive government data, other reports claim DOGE members have been trying to circumvent court orders that limit their reach.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/cybersecurity/aclu-sues-two-federal-agencies-for-transparency-around-doge-activity-195916390.html?src=rss

Ultra HDR is a cool image format. Like traditional HDR, this format packs more image data into each media file, which translates into brighter highlights, darker shadows, and more vibrant colors. However, Ultra HDR files also contain the standard dynamic range (SDR) version of the image as well. That way, you can share Ultra HDR files with friends who don’t have HDR-compatible displays, and the image will show up just fine.

But there’s a difference between being able to display an Ultra HDR image on a non-HDR display and converting an SDR image to HDR (or Ultra HDR, for that matter). Traditionally, the latter has been a more complicated endeavor, and not something offered through easy means to consumers. If you wanted your images to have a high dynamic range, you needed to shoot in HDR from the start.

As it happens, Google Photos is changing those rules. Android Authority reported that Google is now rolling out an option to its default photo app to let users upgrade their SDR images to Ultra HDR. Here’s how it works.

How to convert images to Ultra HDR in Google Photos

There are two things that need to happen before you can try out the new option. First, you need to be running Google Photos version 7.24.0.747539053 or newer. Second, Google needs to update your app with the feature itself. This is what’s known as a server-side update, as the feature isn’t something necessarily contained in a specific software version. If you’re running the right version, Google can then update your app on its end, and include the option for you to use. In other words, if your Google Photos app is fully updated and you still don’t see the new option, wait a bit for the update to roll out.

Once the feature does land on your version of Google Photos, open an image, then tap Edit launch the editor. Here, scroll left on the tools along the bottom of the display, then tap Adjust. You’ll find the new “Ultra HDR” option in this menu, replacing the “HDR Effect” option that was previously available in the editor.

In Android Authority’s testing, the image is clearly labeled as “Ultra HDR,” which you can find adjacent to the photo’s resolution and size information. Speaking of file size, Ultra HDR images may end up smaller than the original image you were working with, since the gain map (very simply, the HDR data of the image) is smaller than the original photo. If you want to make sure you preserve the full information of the image, it might be a good idea to save the original photo after applying the effect—even if it does cost you a bit of storage.

The Federal Trade Commission has decided to take formal action against ride-hailing service Uber over what it describes as “deceptive billing and cancellation practices.” The FTC’s lawsuit, filed on Monday, specifically takes issue with the Uber One service, which lets subscribers earn cash back on rides, get free deliveries and avoid cancellation fees.

According to the FTC, Uber made it easy for subscribers to join Uber One, but much harder to cancel. “Users can be forced to navigate as many as 23 screens and take as many as 32 actions to cancel,” the commission claims. The company also reportedly charged some users before their bill their free trial was up, and misrepresented the savings Uber One offered by not taking its subscription fee into account.

The lawsuit says that Uber’s actions violated the FTC Act and the Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act, which “requires online retailers to clearly disclose the terms of the service they are selling, obtain consumers’ consent before charging them for a service and provide a simple way to cancel a recurring subscription.” 

Uber intends to fight the lawsuit and believes that the FTC has misrepresented the facts in some key ways. The company says that it “does not sign up or charge consumers without their consent” and that subscription cancellations can happen in-app, at any point. Uber does acknowledge that subscriptions previously had to be cancelled 48 hours before a charge through the company’s support team, but that’s apparently no longer the case.

Despite the best efforts of tech executives, the Trump administration has maintained a level of animosity towards tech companies. New FTC chair Andrew Ferguson suggested that censorship would be a major concern for the FTC under President Donald Trump, but the commission is still moving forward with an antitrust case against Meta, for example. The possibility for the (technically) independent organization to be wielded as a weapon by Trump feels a lot more likely without any Democrat members.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/ftc-sues-uber-over-claims-the-company-makes-subscriptions-hard-to-cancel-191552906.html?src=rss