Comparing genomes of intestinal bacteria in various primates and human populations begins to pinpoint the possibly helpful microbes that have gone missing from our guts. From a report: Deep in the human gut, myriad “good” bacteria and other microbes help us digest our food, as well as keep us healthy by affecting our immune, metabolic, and nervous systems. Some of these humble microbial assistants have been in our guts since before humans became human — certain gut microbes are found in almost all primates, suggesting they first colonized a common ancestor. But humans have also lost many of these helpers found in other primates and may be losing even more as people around the world continue to flock to cities, a researcher reported last week at a microbiology meeting in Washington, D.C. Those absent gut microbes could affect human health, he says.
“This work helps us develop a new understanding of the course of human biological and cultural development,” says Lev Tsypin, a microbiology graduate student at the California Institute of Technology who was not involved in the new study. The microbiome comprises all the bacteria, fungi, viruses, and other microscopic life that inhabit an individual, be it a person, a plant, or a planaria. For humans and many other species, the best characterized microbiome centers on the bacteria in the gut. The more microbiologists study these gut microbes, the more they link the bacteria to functions of their hosts. In humans, for example, gut bacteria influence how the immune system responds to pathogens and allergens, or interact with the brain, affecting mood.
Andrew Moeller, an evolutionary biologist at Cornell University, was one of the first to show that gut bacteria and humans have built these relationships over a very long time. Six years ago, he and colleagues reported the work showing human gut microbes are very similar to those in other primates, suggesting their intestinal presence predates the evolution of humans. But his follow-up studies, and work by others, also indicate the human gut microbiome has, in a general sense, become less diverse than the gut microbes in our current primate cousins. One study found 85 microbial genera, such as Bacteroides and Bifidobacterium, in the guts of wild apes, but just 55 in people in U.S. cities. Splitting the difference, people in less developed parts of the world have between 60 and 65 of those bacterial groups, an observation that ties the decrease in microbial diversity to urbanization.
For years, my kids have been following me into my garage gym. (Even before we had a proper home gym, they would steal stray dumbbells or yoga balls that I thought I had bought for myself.) I would encourage their interest, but I wondered: How can I encourage them to make exercise a habit? It took a while, but I think…
A cybersecurity report published last month revealed the passwords most commonly used by business owners and executives, and topping this list were “123456” and “password.” The commonality of such remarkably weak passwords among not just ordinary users, but high-ranking executives of large corporations is almost laughable, if not for the fact
The status of legal access to abortion is now prohibited, restricted, or uncertain in more than half of the US. However, abortion pills are still deemed safe by the Food and Drug Administration, and it’s still legal for consulted certified prescribers to mail abortion pills to patients in any state. Thousands took to social media to post and raise awareness of options for mail-ordering abortion pills, only to have their posts deleted within minutes, sparking user protests of censorship.
Facebook and Instagram confirmed in an Associated Press report that posts offering to mail abortion pills to people in states suddenly without access would continue to be removed.
These posts violate company policies that prohibit the gift or sale of pharmaceuticals or drugs on the platforms, a Meta spokesperson told AP.
Both the su and the sudo commands allow users to perform system administration tasks that are not permitted for non-privileged users—that is, everyone but the root user. Some people prefer the sudo command: For example, Seth Kenlon recently published “5 reasons to use sudo on Linux”, in which he extols its many virtues. I, on the other hand, am partial to the su command and prefer it to sudo for most of the system administration work I do. In this article, I compare the two commands and explain why I prefer su over sudo but still use both.
Version 9.0 of the Vim text
editor has been released. The biggest change would appear to be the
addition of the “Vim9 Script” language for editor customization:
The main goal of Vim9 script is to drastically improve
performance. This is accomplished by compiling commands into
instructions that can be efficiently executed. An increase in
execution speed of 10 to 100 times can be expected.
A secondary goal is to avoid Vim-specific constructs and get closer
to commonly used programming languages, such as JavaScript,
TypeScript and Java.
Sony has announced the launch of Inzone, a new brand of PC gaming displays and headsets. They’ll be coming out of the company’s Electronics division (not to be confused with its Interactive Entertainment unit) and its flagship product will be the Inzone M9, a 27-inch 4K monitor. The M9 boasts an IPS panel with full-array local dimming, a 144Hz refresh rate and a claimed 1-millisecond gray to gray response time.
Sony says the panel is also DisplayHDR 600-certified and covers 95 percent of the DCI-P3 color gamut. Additionally, the monitor is G-Sync compatible and features support for variable refresh rate (VRR) gaming thanks to the inclusion of an HDMI 2.1 port. If you connect the M9 to a PS5 through that port, you’ll get access to a feature that will automatically switch the monitor between its included low-latency and picture processing modes when it detects you’re about to play a game or watch a movie. Sony has also optimized the PS5’s HDR output for the M9, and you’ll see the benefits of that tuning automatically as well. Sony’s M9 will hit shelves this summer and retail for $899.
Alongside a 4K display, Sony will also offer a 240Hz Full HD monitor. Like the company’s new flagship, the M3 will boast a 1-millisecond gray to gray response time, PlayStation 5-specific features and compatibility for both G-Sync and VRR. As you might expect, high dynamic range performance won’t be as good as the 4K variant, with the monitor only earning VESA’s DisplayHDR 400 certification. Sony plans to begin selling the M3 sometime this winter for $529.
If you’re looking for a new gaming headset, Sony has you covered there too. For those who want it all, there’s the $299 H9. It features active noise cancellation, Bluetooth and 2.4GHz wireless connectivity, support for spatial audio and the same synthetic leather found on Sony’s recently announced WH-1000XM5 headphones. For a more affordable option, there’s the H7. It omits the H9’s ANC and “soft fit” leather features for a $229 price tag. The H7 will also come with better battery life. Sony claims you can get 40 hours of use from its new mid-tier headphones compared to 32 hours from the H9. Lastly, there’s the $99 H3, which you can connect to your PC or PS5 through a 3.5mm headphone jack or wired USB adapter. Sony will release all three models this summer.
Enlarge/ Streamlined aircraft of the 1930s and 1940s were an inspiration for the Hyundai Ioniq 6. (credit: Hyundai)
The physical unveiling of the Hyundai Prophecy concept car was an early casualty of COVID, originally scheduled for the hastily canceled 2020 Geneva auto show. That didn’t stop it from blowing my socks off once Hyundai sent some images over the Internet, however. At the time, I didn’t think the Korean automaker would put the concept—which I described as the result of “a transporter accident involving a Mercedes CLS and a Tesla Model 3″—into production.
Obviously, I was being a fool because just as the Hyundai 45 concept morphed into the excellent Ioniq 5 crossover, the Prophecy has been translated into production as the Ioniq 6 sedan. Like the Ioniq 5, the Ioniq 6 uses Hyundai’s new E-GMP platform for 800 V vehicles, but importantly, it’s actually smaller (with a 2-inch/50-mm shorter wheelbase) and will be cheaper than the angular Ioniq 5. (Yes, this still confuses me, because 6 is more than 5, so one expects a bigger, more expensive car, plus the Ioniq 7 is going to be a large seven-seater electric SUV, due next year.)
The most notable change from the concept is the Ioniq 6’s extra height, an unavoidable consequence of having to package a 6-inch (150 mm) slab of lithium-ion batteries under the cabin’s floor. I asked Hyundai design chief Sangyup Lee if he had been tempted to stretch the production car’s wheelbase to maintain the concept’s proportions.
I’ve always wondered why aside from a handful of peripherals like the Pulse 3D headset and that weird 3D display, Sony never really tried to expand the PlayStation brand outside of consoles. And while you won’t find any PS logos on its new line of headsets and monitors, with Inzone it really feels like Sony is finally bringing its wider tech expertise to gaming.
Now the reason we haven’t seen a ton of PlayStation-branded peripherals before is because the Sony most people think about is actually a conglomerate of several companies that make everything from medical diagnostic tools to camera sensors. And in the case of Inzone, its new gaming gear isn’t being made by the same Sony that produces its iconic consoles (Sony Interactive Entertainment) but instead by the Sony that makes everyday consumer gadgets (Sony Corp/Sony Electronics) like TVs and headphones including the excellent WH-1000XM5.
Sam Rutherford/Engadget
That’s important because, while these devices have design cues borrowed from the PS5, including their black and white color scheme and sleek sci-fi lines, much of the tech inside has trickled down from a range of Sony Electronics’ devices. And after using a handful of Inzone’s new peripherals for about a week, it really feels like you’re getting a great mix of tech from two different branches of Sony.
Let’s start with Inzone’s headphones which consist of three different models: the entry-level $99 H3, the mid-range $229 H7 and the high-end $299 H9. As the cheapest of the three, the H3 are incredibly simple and straightforward. Unlike their more expensive siblings, they don’t support wireless audio and instead rely on either a 3.5mm cord or a USB cable for connecting to your console or PC. On the bright side, the thick padded headband and cloth earcups make the H3 a joy to wear, even during marathon gaming sessions.
Sam Rutherford/Engadget
Another bonus is that due to cooperation between two arms of Sony, all Inzone headsets, including the H3, support the PS5’s Tempest 3D audio engine just like you get on the official Pulse 3D headphones. That means you get spatial audio and customizable sound profiles that make it easier to hear things like the footsteps of someone trying to sneak up behind you. That said, with the Pulse 3D also costing just $99 for wireless headphones that are just as comfortable as the H3, I think they’re probably the better buy for anyone on a budget.
Where things get really interesting though is when you move up to the H7 and H9, which feature dual-mode wireless connectivity (Bluetooth and a dedicated 2.4GHz wireless dongle), a slightly more streamlined design and strong battery life. On top of that, the H9 also feature digital noise canceling using the same tech as Sony’s 1000X line, and it shows.
Unlike the cloth earcups you get on the H3 and H7 headsets, the flagship H9 features soft fit leather earcups just like you get on Sony’s WH-1000XM5 headphones.
Sam Rutherford/Engadget
Now I should mention Sony was only able to send out the H3 and H9 for testing, so I’ve been using those for my comparisons. But the H7 and H9 are fairly close in terms of specs, with the main difference being the H7’s lack of exterior RGB lighting, no support for digital noise canceling and the use of cloth earcups instead of the soft fit leather padding you get on the H9 (which is the same material Sony uses on the WH-100XM5). In return, because they don’t have built-in noise canceling, the H7 offer slightly longer battery life (around 40 hours) compared to the H9 (around 32 hours).
Regardless, my time with the H9 so far has been great, and in a lot of ways, they feel like a pair of WH-1000XM5 that have been tuned for gaming. The noise cancellation works wonders for drowning out background sounds, and the super supple leather makes wearing them feel like putting a cloud around your head.
Sam Rutherford/Engadget
I also really appreciate some of the small details Sony added to the H9. On a lot of headphones that offer two modes of wireless connectivity, you can typically only use one type at a time. But with the H7 and H9s, you can connect to two different devices simultaneously. This means you can use the wireless dongle to connect to your PlayStation or PC, and then use Bluetooth to get audio from your phone. And because the PS5 doesn’t have native support for chat apps like Discord, this makes it much easier to talk to your friends regardless of what platform you’re on at the moment.
Additionally, the H7 and H9 are the only other headphones besides the Pulse 3Ds that can use the PS5’s on-screen status notifications, which means you can see stuff like volume levels, battery status, mic mute, and game/chat balance all at glance. So while they aren’t the PS5’s official headphones, they behave like they are, while also offering even more features and better audio quality. And just like the WH-1000XM5, you can even use your phone to take a picture of your ear, to tune their sound even further.
Sam Rutherford/Engadget
As for Inzone’s new monitors, there’s the $529 M3 and the $899 M9. However, since the M3 won’t be available until sometime this winter, I’m going to focus on my time with the M9. Featuring a 27-inch 4K IPS panel with a 144Hz refresh rate, the M9 isn’t the biggest or fastest gaming monitor around. But for the money, it packs a ton of features compared to similarly-priced rivals. Not only does it support VRR and NVIDIA G-Sync, it also sports a strong one millisecond gray-to-gray time, DisplayHDR 600 certification and a gamut that covers more than 95 percent of the DCI-P3 spectrum. In short, colors are bright, rich and vivid while also being largely immune from the ghosting you often see on less sophisticated displays.
However, the M9’s biggest advantage is its full-array local dimming (FALD) which is made up of 96 different lighting zones compared to just eight or 16 on competitors like the LG 27GP950 or the Samsung S28AG700. And after seeing the results side-by-side, I was kind of shocked at how much of a difference the M9’s FALD makes. A lot of gamers can spot bloom in games when something bright moves quickly across a dark background, which often produces ring of light around the object. But not only does the M9 almost completely eliminate halos, the ability to adjust lighting zones with greater precision also gives the monitor improved dynamic range. So in games like Elden Ring, I saw backgrounds that were much darker and atmospheric compared to the washed-out gray tones I saw on other monitors. This allows you to get much better contrast and black levels without needing to upgrade to more expensive QD-OLED displays like Alienware’s $1,300 AW3423DW.
Sam Rutherford/Engadget
And just like its headphones, Inzone’s first monitor has a lot of really thoughtful smaller features. It has a built-in KVM switch, which is extremely useful if you have multiple PCs connected to the same display. It also has a native FPS counter so you can easily keep tabs on performance, while the monitor’s Auto Genre Picture Mode can switch between settings like Cinema Mode and Gaming Mode depending on the content coming from your PS5. And in addition to being height and tilt adjustable, Sony even designed the M9’s stand so that its feet stick out towards the back, which means PC gamers who need to place their keyboard as close as possible to their monitor like Dafran totally can.
But perhaps my favorite little touch, is the software that allows you to navigate the monitor’s on-screen display with your mouse, instead of having to fumble around with the joystick on the back of the panel. The M9 even comes with built-in stereo speakers, so you can plug in your PS5 and get straight to gaming without worrying about audio. And thanks to two HDMI 2.1 ports, one DisplayPort 1.4 jack, support for video over USB-C (DP Alt mode) and a built-in USB Hub, there’s a wealth of connectivity.
All of Inzone’s new headsets and monitors will be available this summer except the M3 display, which will go on sale sometime this winter.
Sam Rutherford/Engadget
So aside from the H3 which is somewhat basic, I’ve come away quite impressed with Inzone’s first batch of PC and console gaming peripherals. That said, looking at the pedigree of these two faces of Sony, that probably shouldn’t be a surprise. It might not say so on the box, but in a lot of ways, this feels like the marriage between PlayStation and the tech from some of Sony’s best gadgets. But what might be the most promising part is that while Inzone hasn’t shared any future plans just yet, after talking to some of its reps, it’s clear Sony has big plans for its new gaming brand going into 2023 and beyond.
Sony is expanding its gaming footprint beyond the console with a family of monitors and headphones debuting under a new brand called “Inzone.” To be clear, these are not Playstation products. They are meant for both console and PC gamers, unlike Sony’s “Pulse” headset, which was made exclusively for the PS5. Since…
Sony’s Inzone H series headsets are out, and their arrival marks the company’s first proper attempt at making PC gaming peripherals. (You might be able to find odd PC gaming one-offs like the Sony DR-GA500 headset if you squint at the company’s past hard enough, but it’s clear that Inzone indicates new dedication to…
Proprietary space-grade cameras are expensive, limited, and a pain to develop. Smallsat manufacturer NanoAvionics recently sidestepped any development issues and opted for something off the shelf instead. The company used a GoPro Hero 7 mounted to a custom-built selfie stick to take a selfie that’s truly out of this…
Today, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment released a new Robin-centric Gotham Knights trailer showing the caped crusader bam! pow! and kerpslatting goons while (checks notes) teleporting.
Last week, Epic finally added a user review system to its PC Game Store, nearly 3.5 years after the service’s initial launch. The first set of public ratings produced by that system is now live for hundreds of titles on the Epic Games Store (skip to the end of this article for a handy breakdown of some of the best-reviewed EGS games thus far).
After sifting through those ratings a bit, some pros and cons of Epic’s unique user review approach come to the forefront. While EGS’s user review system brings some interesting ideas to online game stores, it still feels a little half-baked, even after years of apparent work on Epic’s part.
Anti-bomb technology
The main difference in the Epic Games Store rating system is that it’s not just open to any player with an opinion. On platforms like Steam, anyone who has “recorded playtime” on a title can submit a user review. On EGS, by contrast, Epic explains that the “ratings system will ask random players, who have played a game for more than two hours, to give a rating on a five point scale.”
williamyf writes: Today, Mozilla released Firefox 102. New features include:* Tired of too many windows crowding your screen? You can now disable automatic opening of the download panel every time a new download starts. Read more.* Firefox now mitigates query parameter tracking when navigating sites in ETP strict mode.* Subtitles and captions for Picture-in-Picture (PiP) are now available at HBO Max, Funimation, Dailymotion, Tubi, Disney+ Hotstar, and SonyLIV. This allows you to view video in a small window pinned to a corner of the screen while navigating between apps or browsing content on the main screen.
But do not get fooled, the most important feature is that this release is an ESR, this is super-important of a host of reasons: * Firefox ESR is the basis for KaiOS (an evolution of BootToGecko), an OS for Semi-Smart Phones very popular in India (100milion+), SE Asia + Africa (~60Milion), so, whatever made the cut in 102 will define the base capabilities for KaiOS for the next year. * Firefox ESR is the basis for Thunderbird, so, if you use Thunderbird or a derivative, whatever made the cut in 102 will underpin Thunderbird for the next year. * Many popular Linux distros (like Debian or Kali) use Firefox ESR as the default browser. * Many companies and organizations use Firefox ESR as their default browser, and many SW development companies certify Firefox ESR as an alowed browser for their SW. So, 102 is a very important release, becuase it brings a year of advances to ESR.
At an all-hands meeting on Thursday, Xbox addressed the growing employee concerns about labor conditions at Bethesda Game Studios and its parent company, ZeniMax. Matt Booty, head of Xbox Game Studios, said he was “confident” that the studio was not crunching, and that it was “unfair” to attribute crunch culture to…
Taking a page from on-track rival Mercedes, Red Bull plans to produce its own hypercar. On Tuesday, the company took to Twitter to announce the RB17, which is slated to be a two-seater with a hybrid V8 engine and 1,100 horsepower. Production will start in 2025, with Red Bull planning to only make 50 cars at a price of £5 million ($6.1 million) per vehicle.
If just so happen to be a millionaire, buying the F1-inspired RB17 will net you access to Red Bull’s team simulators and on-track training. The company will also service and maintain the car for you at the Milton Keynes factory in England where it plans to produce the RB17.
— Oracle Red Bull Racing (@redbullracing) June 28, 2022
“The RB17 marks the first time that a car wearing the Red Bull brand has been available to collectors,” Red Bull Racing CEO Christian Horner said. “The RB17 distills everything we know about creating championship-winning Formula 1 cars into a package that delivers extreme levels of performance in a two-seat track car.”
Red Bull chief technical officer Adrian Newey is designing the vehicle. His resume includes the Aston Martin Valkyrie and all four of Red Bull’s F1 championship-winning cars. Red Bull said the RB17 would be built around a carbon-composite tub and a body designed to take advantage of ground effect like modern F1 cars.
HTC is somehow still making smartphones. The latest from the company is the HTC Desire 22 Pro, a 399 British pound (~$486) mid-ranger that represents the company’s first smartphone of 2022.
HTC says this phone will somehow help you “enter the metaverse,” as “the phone to carry you into the future.” The metaverse is the latest tech buzzword companies have been hyping up. It’s roughly used to mean “VR-related.” The phone itself does not seem to have any actual VR features. HTC’s latest VR goggles, the Vive Flow, use an Android phone as the controller and can show the phone screen inside the VR environment. This phone comes with that Vive Flow controller app, but you can install it on any Android phone that supports miracast and get the same features.
Presumably the buzzword gimmicks are meant as a distraction from the fact that the HTC Desire 22 Pro is a generic-looking mid-range phone. It has a Snapdragon 695, a 120 Hz, 6.6-inch, 2412×1080 LCD, 8GB of RAM, 128GB of storage, and a 4520 mAh battery. It has Android 12, a fingerprint reader, wireless charging, a microSD slot, and an IP67 water-resistance rating, which HTC only describes as “splash proof.” For cameras, you have a 65 MP main camera, a 13 MP ultrawide, 5 MP depth sensor, and 32 MP front camera. HTC’s spec sheet curiously also lists “Face ID” as a feature, which is an Apple trademark. HTC probably means generic face recognition.
There’s been a bit of a strange recurrence in Star Wars recently: more often than not, people just don’t die. The Rise of Skywalker, infamously perhaps, is predicated on the return of the Emperor with little explanation as to how he got out of a one-way trip down an exploding reactor shaft. Obi-Wan Kenobi just gave us…
