Enlarge / Google is looking pretty dilapidated these days. (credit: Aurich Lawson)

Chrome’s new adblock-limiting extension plan is still on. The company paused the rollout of the new “Manifest V3” extension format a year ago after an outcry over how much it would damage some of Chrome’s most popular extensions. A year later, Google is restarting the phase-out schedule, and while it has changed some things, Chrome will eventually be home to inferior filtering extensions.

Google’s blog post says the plan to kill Manifest V2, the current format for Chrome extensions, is back on starting June 2024. On that date (we’ll be on “Chrome 127” by then), Google will turn off Manifest V2 for the pre-stable versions of Chrome—that’s the Beta, Dev, and Canary channels. Google says, “Manifest V2 extensions [will be] automatically disabled in their browser and will no longer be able to install Manifest V2 extensions from the Chrome Web Store.”

The timeline around a stable channel rollout is worded kind of strangely. The company says: “We expect it will take at least a month to observe and stabilize the changes in pre-stable before expanding the rollout to stable channel Chrome, where it will also gradually roll out over time. The exact timing may vary depending on the data collected, and during this time, we will keep you informed about our progress.” It’s unclear what “data” Google is concerned with. It’s not the end of the world if an extension crashes—it turns off and stops working until the user reboots the extension. Maybe the company is concerned about how many people Google “Firefox” once their ad-blocker stops working.

Enlarge / Travelers walk through Union Station as they travel ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday in Washington, DC, November 21, 2023. (credit: Getty | Saul Loeb)

Flu is on the rise in most of the country, with six Southern states and the District of Columbia already seeing high levels of influenza-like illnesses (ILI) activity. Louisiana has reached “very high” ILI activity, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported in the latest flu surveillance update. The percentage of flu tests coming back positive is also increasing nationwide, with only one region, the Mid-Atlantic region, showing a stable week-over-week positivity rate. However, the CDC noted that its rate overall is trending upward.

Enlarge / Zork running on a Commodore 64 at the Computerspielemuseum in Berlin, Germany. (credit: Marcin Wichary (CC by 2.0 Deed))

The source code for many of Infocom’s foundational text-parsing adventure games, including Zork, has been available since 2019. But that code doesn’t do anything for modern computers, nor even computers of the era, when it comes to actually running the games.

Most of Infocom’s games were written in “Zork Implementation Language,” which was native to no particular platform or processor, but ready to be interpreted on all kinds of systems by versions of its Z-Machine. The Z-Machine could be considered the first real game development engine, so long as nobody fact-checks that statement too hard. Lots of work has been done in open source realms to create modern, and improved, versions of these interpreters for pretty much every device imaginable.

The source code for these Z-Machine implementations (virtual machines, in today’s parlance) appeared like a grue from the dark a few days ago in a GitHub repository owned by Andrew Plotkin. Plotkin, a major figure in modern and classic text adventure realms (and lots in between), details what they are and how he found them in a blog post on his site.

Enlarge (credit: Microsoft )

• Apple MacBook Air 15-inch Laptop (M2) for $1,049 (was $1,299) at Best Buy
• Apple MacBook Air 13-inch Laptop (M1) for $750 (was $1,000) at Best Buy
• Apple 2023 MacBook Pro Laptop (14-inch, M3) for $1,449 (was $1,599) at Amazon
• Apple 2023 MacBook Pro Laptop (14-inch, M3 Pro) for $1,849 (was $1,999) at Amazon
• Apple 2023 MacBook Pro Laptop (16-inch, M3 Pro) for $2,299 (was $2,499) at Amazon
• Apple 2023 MacBook Air Laptop (15-inch, M2) for $1,049 (was $1,299) at Amazon
• Apple 2020 MacBook Air Laptop (13-inch, M1) for $750 (was $999) at Amazon
• Apple iPad (10th Generation) for $349 (was $449) at Amazon
• Apple iPad Air (5th Generation) for $500 (was $599) at Amazon
• Apple iPad Pro 12.9-inch (6th Generation) for $999 (was $1,099) at Amazon
• Apple iPad Mini (6th Generation) for $400 (was $499) at Amazon
• Apple Magic Keyboard: iPad Keyboard case for iPad Pro 11-inch (1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th Generation) and iPad Air (4th, 5th Generation) for $200 (was $299) at Amazon
• Apple Magic Keyboard: iPad Keyboard and case for iPad Pro 12.9‑inch (3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th Generation) for $249 (was $349) at Amazon

Dell

• G15 Gaming Laptop (15-inch, Intel Core i5-13450HX and RTX 3050) for $700 (was $900) at Dell
• Alienware m16 Gaming Laptop (16-inch, Intel Core i7-13700HX and RTX 4060) for $1,250 (was $1,700) at Dell
• Alienware m16 Gaming Laptop (16-inch, Intel Core i7-13700HX and RTX 4070) for $1,400 (was $2,000) at Dell
• Alienware m18 Gaming Laptop (18-inch, Intel Core i7-13700HX and RTX 4060) for $1,600 (was $1,900) at Dell
• Alienware Aurora R16 Gaming Desktop (Intel Core i7-13700F and RTX 4060) for $1,100 (was $1,350) at Dell
• Alienware x16 Gaming Laptop (16-inch, Intel Core i7-13700H and RTX 4060) for $1,600 (was $2,100) at Dell
• Alienware Curved QD-OLED Gaming Monitor AW3423DWF (34-inch) for $800 (was $1,000) at Dell
• Inspiron 15 Laptop (15-inch, Intel Core i3-1215U) for $260 (was $330) at Dell
• Inspiron 15 Laptop (15-inch, Intel Core i3-1215U) for $330 (was $430) at Dell
• Inspiron 15 Laptop (15-inch, Intel Core i7-1255U) for $550 (was $700) at Dell
• Latitude 3540 Laptop (15-inch, Intel Core i5-1335U) for $679 (was $1,243) at Dell
• Inspiron 16 Laptop (16-inch, Intel Core i5-1335U) for $550 (was $850) at Dell
• Inspiron 27 All-in-One (27-inch, Intel Core i7-1355U and Nvidia MX550) for $1,450 (was $1,550) at Dell
• XPS 13 Laptop (13-inch, Intel Core i7-1250U) for $799 (was $1,099) at Dell
• XPS 15 Laptop (15-inch, Intel Core i7-13700H and RTX 4050) for $1,549 (was $1,999) at Dell
• XPS 15 Laptop (15-inch, Intel Core i7-13700H and Intel Arc A370M) for $1,199 (was $1,499) at Dell
• XPS 15 Laptop (15-inch, Intel Core i9-13900H and RTX 4060) for $1,999 (was $2,499) at Dell
• XPS 15 Laptop (15-inch, Intel Core i9-13900H and RTX 4070) for $2,399 (was $2,999) at Dell
• XPS 13 Plus Laptop (13-inch, Intel Core i7-1360P) for $1,499 (was $1,949) at Dell
• Inspiron 14 2-in-1 Laptop (14-inch, Intel Core i5-1335U) for $500 (was $730) at Dell
• Inspiron 14 2-in-1 Laptop (14-inch, Intel Core i7-1355U) for $700 (was $1,000) at Dell
• Inspiron 16 Laptop (16-inch, Intel Core i7-1360P) for $750 (was $1,150) at Dell
• Inspiron 16 2-in-1 Laptop (16-inch, Intel Core i7-1360P) for $800 (was $1,100) at Dell
• Inspiron 24 All-in-One (24-inch, AMD Ryzen 5 7530U) for $700 (was $950) at Dell
• XPS Desktop (Intel Core i7-13700 and RTX 4060 Ti) for $1,360 (was $1,890) at Dell

HP

• HP Envy Laptop 17t-cw000 (17-inch, Intel Core i7-13700H) for $800 (was $1,300) at HP
• HP Pavilion Laptop 15t-eg300 (15-inch, Intel Core i7-1355U) for $550 (was $1,010) at HP
• OMEN 45L Gaming Desktop GT22-1470se (Intel Core i7-13700K and RTX 4060 Ti) for $1,500 (was $2,050) at HP
• HP Pavilion Laptop 15t-eg300 (15-inch, Intel Core i5-1335U) for $430 (was $910) at HP
• HP Envy x360 2-in-1 Laptop 15t-fe000 (15-inch, Intel Core i7-1355U) for $700 (was $1,100) at HP
• HP Pavilion Desktop TP01-3055xt (Intel Core i7-12700) for $700 (was $1,000) at HP
• HP EliteBook x360 1040 G8 Notebook PC Wolf Pro Security Edition (14-inch, Intel Core i7-1185G7) for $999 (was $3,693) at HP
• HP Laptop -15t-fd000 (15-inch, Intel Core i5-1335U) for $400 (was $820) at HP
• HP Envy All-in-One 34-c1045t (34-inch, Intel Core i5-12400 and GTX1650) for $1,400 (was $2,000) at HP
• HP Laptop 17-cn3097nr (17-inch, Intel Core i7-1355U) for $600 (was $920) at HP
• OMEN by HP 31.5 inch QHD 165Hz Curved Gaming Monitor – OMEN 32c for $250 (was $380) at HP

Lenovo

• Lenovo ThinkPad L14 Gen 3 (14-inch, AMD Ryzen 5 Pro 5675U) for $629 (was $2,688) at Lenovo
• Lenovo ThinkPad T14 Gen 4 (14-inch, Intel Core i5-1345U) for $910 (was $2,529) at Lenovo
• Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Yoga Gen 8 (14-inch, Intel Core i7-1365U) for $1,655 (was $4,039) at Lenovo
• Lenovo Yoga C940 (14-inch, Intel Core i5-1035G4) for $615 (was $1,250) at Lenovo
• Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 2 (16-inch, Intel Core i7-13700HX and RTX A1000) for $1,749 (was $3,899) at Lenovo
• Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 11 (14-inch, Intel Core i7-1365U) for $1,393 (was $3,319) at Lenovo
• Lenovo ThinkPad P14s Gen 4 (14-inch, AMD Lyzeen 7 Pro 7840U) for $1,099 (was $2,199) at Lenovo
• Lenovo ThinkPad P16s Gen 2 (16-inch, Intel Core i7-1360P and RTX A500) for $1,629 (was $3,629) at Lenovo
• Lenovo Yoga 7i (14-inch, Intel Core i7-1355U) for $950 (was $1,350) at Lenovo
• Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 5i (16-inch, Intel Core i7-1355U) for $710 (was $1,130) at Lenovo
• Lenovo IdeaPad Flex 5i (14-inch, Intel Core i5-1335U) for $585 (was $900) at Lenovo
• Lenovo ThinkPad E16 Gen 1 (16-inch, Intel Core i5-1335U) for $797 (was $1,449) at Lenovo
• Lenovo ThinkPad P16v (16-inch, Intel Core i7-13700H and RTX A500) for $1,499 (was $3,339) at Lenovo
• Lenovo ThinkPad P1 Gen 6 (16-inch, Intel Core i7-13700H and RTX A2000) for $1,979 (was $4,389) at Lenovo
• Lenovo IdeaPad Flex 5i (16-inch, Intel Core i5-1335U) for $585 (was $860) at Lenovo
• Lenovo Legion Pro 5i Gen 8 (16-inch, Intel Core i5-13500HX and RTX 4050) at Lenovo
• Lenovo IdeaPad Flex 5 (14-inch, AMD Ryzen 7 7730U) for $605 (was $960) at Lenovo
• Lenovo ThinkPad E14 Gen 5 (14-inch, Intel Core i5-1335U) for $775 (was $1,409) at Lenovo
• Lenovo IdeaPad Flex 5i (16-inch, Intel Core i7-1355U) for $715 (was $1,140) at Lenovo
• Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Nano Gen 3 (13-inch, Intel Core i7-1360P) for $1,209 (was $2,159) at Lenovo
• Lenovo ThinkPad T14 Gen 4 (14-inch, AMD Ryzen 7 Pro 7840U) for $956 (was $1,739) at Lenovo
• Lenovo LOQ (15-inch, Intel Core i7-13700H and RTX 4050) for $1,030 (was $1,400) at Lenovo

Microsoft

• Microsoft Surface Pro 9 for $798 (was $1,100) at Amazon
• Microsoft Surface Laptop 5 for $1,200 (was $1,500) at Amazon
• Microsoft Surface Laptop 5 for $900 (was $1,300) at Amazon
• Microsoft Surface Pro 9 starting from $800 (save up to $800 on select configurations) at Microsoft
• Microsoft Surface Pro 9 and Pro Keyboard bundle from $1,000 (save up to $540 on select configurations) at Microsoft
• Microsoft Surface Laptop Studio 2 from $2,000 (save up to $400 on select configurations) at Microsoft
• Microsoft Surface Laptop 5 from $800 (save up to $650 on select configurations) at Microsoft

Asus

• Asus TUF Gaming A17 (17-inch, AMD Ryzen 7 7735HS and RTX 4060) for $1,200 (was $1,500) at Amazon
• Asus TUF Gaming A17 (17-inch, AMD Ryzen 5 4600H and GTX 1560) for $700 (was $800) at Amazon
• Asus ROG Strix G15 (15-inch, AMD Ryzen 7 6800H and RTX 3060) for $997 (was $1,200) at Amazon
• Asus Chromebook CM14 Laptop (14-inch, MediaTek Komanio 520) for $180 (was $280) at Amazon
• Asus Vivobook 16 Laptop (16-inch, AMD Ryzen 5 5625U) for $420 (was $550) at Amazon
• Asus ROG Strix G16 (16-inch, Intel Core i7-13650HX and RTX 4060) for $1,100 (was $1,400) at Amazon
• Asus TUF Dash 15 (15-inch, Intel Core i7-12650H and RTX 3050 Ti) for $1,140 (was $1,200) at Amazon
• Asus TUF F17 (17-inch, Intel Core i5-11400H and RTX 3050) for $700 (was $900) at Amazon
• Asus Vivobook 15 (15-inch, Intel Core i3-1215U) for $600 (was $650) at Amazon
• Asus TUF Gaming F15 (15-inch, Intel Core i5-12500H and RTX 4050) for $1,000 (was $1,100) at Amazon
• Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 Alan Walker Special Edition Gaming Laptop (14-inch, AMD Ryzen 9 5900HS and RTX 3050 Ti) for $1,099 (was $1,239) at Amazon
• Asus ROG Zephyrus Gaming Laptop (15-inch, AMD Ryzen 9 6900HS and RTX 3060) for $1,150 (was $1,250) at Amazon
• Asus Chromebook Vibe CX55 Flip (15-inch, Intel Core i5-1135G7) for $590 (was $700) at Amazon

Framework laptop

• Framework Laptop prices go as low as $639 thanks to refurbs and “factory seconds”

Laptop accessories

• Samsung Portable SSD T7 USB 3.2 1TB for $90 (was $110) at Samsung
• Samsung Portable SSD T7 USB 3.2 2TB for $135 (was $180) at Samsung
• Samsung USB Type-C Flash Drive 256GB for $25 (was $38) at Samsung
• Samsung USB Type-C Flash Drive 128GB for $15 (was $20) at Samsung
• Samsung BAR Plus USB 3.1 Flash Drive 256GB Titan Grey for $27 (was $35) at Samsung
• Samsung BAR Plus USB 3.1 Flash Drive 128GB Titan Grey for $15 (was $20) at Samsung
• Samsung BAR Plus USB 3.1 Flash Drive 256GB Champagne Silver for $27 (was $35) at Samsung
• Crucial X10 Pro 2TB Portable SSD for $130 (was $178) at Amazon
• SK hynix Beetle X31 1TB Portable SSD for $65 (was $93) at Amazon
• Samsung 990 PRO Series – 2TB for $120 (was $136) at Amazon
• Samsung T9 Portable SSD 1TB for $110 (was $140) at Amazon
• Samsung T9 Portable SSD 4TB for $250 (was $440) at Amazon
• Samsung T7 Portable External Solid State Drive 2TB for $100 (was $122) at Amazon

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Enlarge / Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei on Tuesday, July 25, 2023, during a hearing on AI held by the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology, and the Law. (credit: Getty Images | Bloomberg)

After firing CEO Sam Altman, OpenAI’s board of directors reached out to the CEO of its rival, Anthropic, to propose a merger, but the proposal was quickly rejected, according to news reports. The board approached Anthropic co-founder and CEO Dario Amodei “about a potential merger of the two companies” as “part of an effort by OpenAI to persuade Amodei to replace Altman as CEO,” The Information reported yesterday, citing “a person with direct knowledge” of the contact.

“It’s not clear whether the merger proposal led to any serious discussion. Amodei quickly turned down the CEO offer due to his position at Anthropic,” The Information wrote.

The report was subsequently confirmed by Reuters. “OpenAI’s board of directors approached rival Anthropic’s CEO about replacing chief Sam Altman and potentially merging the two AI startups, according to two people briefed on the matter,” Reuters wrote. “Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei declined on both fronts, the people said.”

Enlarge (credit: NurPhoto / Contributor | NurPhoto)

On Monday, Elon Musk followed through with his promise to sue Media Matters over reporting that helped spark the latest advertiser backlash against antisemitic content posted on Musk’s X (formerly Twitter).

Musk’s complaint—bizarrely filed in a Texas court despite X Corp. being based in California and Media Matters in the District of Columbia—accused Media Matters of interference with X Corp.’s contract with advertisers, business disparagement, and interference with a prospective economic advantage by allegedly disrupting X Corp.’s relationship with advertisers.

The lawsuit’s business disparagement claim marks the first time that Musk has sued a group monitoring hate speech on X for defaming the platform. Where individuals can sue for defamation, businesses can sue over disparagement. In this case, Musk must prove that Media Matters knowingly published false statements intended to harm X Corp.’s business to succeed in his lawsuit.

Enlarge / Hyundai’s latest factory eschews the production line for cells. (credit: Hyundai)

As HMG gears up for additional models in its lineup and falls for the allure of increased EV sales, it’s building additional facilities, including the Georgia Metaplant that Hyundai is rushing to start production in 2024. Once at peak production, Hyundai says it will spit out about half a million EVs a year.

Enlarge / A 50-light-years-wide portion of the Milky Way’s dense center. (credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, S. Crowe)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We’ll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we’re going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Enlarge / A Porsche 963, one of the four different kinds of hybrid prototype racing cars built to the LMDh rules, running in IMSA’s GTP class at the 2023 Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta in October. (credit: David J. Griffin/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

The crowd streamed onto the track before the race, seizing their last chance to see the brightly liveried cars up close. Daytona had been busy in January, but the crowd at Road Atlanta seemed even larger. To be honest, though, the race the fans were here to see would not be one for the ages. A 52-car grid packed into just 2.8 miles of race track promised potential trouble, and the 10-hour race saw 14 interruptions by the safety car, never getting into a rhythm. But I’m not sure that mattered much; the main draw for many in attendance that Saturday was simply seeing this new era of hybrid prototypes in person, and on that score, everyone left with smiles.

We’ve spilled plenty of pixels over the past 18 months or so delving into some of the minutiae of this new class of racing car, variously known as LMDh or GTP. Briefly, these are purpose-built racing cars, which start with a carbon-fiber spine from one of four racecar constructors and then add an engine, bodywork, and software from one of the four OEMs that participate, and then the same Xtrac gearbox, Williams Advanced Engineering lithium-ion battery, and Bosch electric motor as a way to keep development costs reasonable.

The rules purposely limit the amount of aerodynamic downforce a car can generate relative to the amount of drag it creates, and they positively encourage each car maker to give these race cars styling that calls out to their road-going products.

Enlarge / The Nothing Phone 2 all lit up. (credit: Ron Amadeo)

It turns out companies that stonewall the media’s security questions actually aren’t good at security. Last Tuesday, Nothing Chats—a chat app from Android manufacturer “Nothing” and upstart app company Sunbird—brazenly claimed to be able to hack into Apple’s iMessage protocol and give Android users blue bubbles. We immediately flagged Sunbird as a company that had been making empty promises for almost a year and seemed negligent about security. The app launched Friday anyway and was immediately ripped to shreds by the Internet for many security issues. It didn’t last 24 hours before Nothing pulled the app from the Play Store Saturday morning. The Sunbird app, which Nothing Chat is just a reskin of, has also been put “on pause.”

The initial sales pitch for this app—that it would log you into iMessage on Android if you handed over your Apple username and password—was a huge security red flag that meant Sunbird would need an ultra-secure infrastructure to avoid disaster. Instead, the app turned out to be about as unsecure as you could possibly be. Here’s Nothing’s statement:

Nothing Chat’s shut down post. (credit: Twitter)

How bad are the security issues? Both 9to5Google and Text.com (which is owned by Automattic, the company behind WordPress) uncovered shockingly bad security practices. Not only was the app not end-to-end encrypted, as claimed numerous times by Nothing and Sunbird, but Sunbird actually logged and stored messages in plain text on both the error reporting software Sentry and in a Firebase store. Authentication tokens were sent over unencrypted HTTP so this token could be intercepted and used to read your messages.

Enlarge / The Framework Laptop 13, with Framework’s gear logo on the lid. (credit: Andrew Cunningham)

Part of Framework’s sales pitch is that the company’s modular laptops are a (somewhat) more sustainable, responsible alternative to buying a hermetically sealed and non-upgradeable model from one of the big PC makers. The company has attempted to encourage reuse and recycling by offering refurbished models and 3D-printable cases for repurposing laptop motherboards as tiny desktop computers.

Earlier this month, the company took another step in that direction, opening up a Framework Outlet section in its online marketplace to sell refurbished products and things that have been returned by their original buyers. The company is also expanding its “factory seconds” offerings—it previously offered some 11th-gen Core i5 Framework Laptop motherboards this way, but that’s now expanded to Core i7 motherboards and some complete Framework Laptop models built with bodies and screens that have minor manufacturing defects.

“With the excess displays we received from the factory, we found a subtle cosmetic defect on some of them,” wrote Framework CEO Nirav Patel. “There is a wavy pattern and backlight non-uniformity that is visible from certain angles. Because of this, we’re calling these systems “B-Stock” and pricing them even lower than our 11th Gen refurbs. As always, you can upgrade any part of the system including the display using parts from the Framework Marketplace whenever you need to.”

Enlarge (credit: Penguin Random House)

Let me start with the TLDR for A City on Mars. It is, essentially, 400 pages of “well, actually…,” but without the condescension, quite a bit of humor, and many, oh so many, details. Kelly and Zach Weinersmith started from the position of being space settlement enthusiasts. They thought they were going to write a light cheerleading book about how everything was going to be just awesome on Mars or the Moon or on a space station. Unfortunately for the Weinersmiths, they actually asked questions like “how would that work, exactly?” Apart from rocketry (e.g., the getting to space part), the answers were mostly optimistic handwaving combined with a kind of neo-manifest destiny ideology that might have given Andrew Jackson pause.

The Weinersmiths start with human biology and psychology, pass through technology, the law, and population viability and end with a kind of call to action. Under each of these sections, the Weinersmiths pose questions like: Can we thrive in space? reproduce in space? create habitats in space? The tour through all the things that aren’t actually known is shocking. No one has been conceived in low gravity, no fetuses have developed in low gravity, so we simply don’t know if there is a problem. Astronauts experience bone and muscle loss and no one knows how that plays out long term. Most importantly, do we really want to find this out by sending a few thousand people to Mars and hope it all just works out?

Then there are the problems of building a habitation and doing all the recycling. I was shocked to learn that no one really knows how to construct a long-term habitable settlement for either the Moon or Mars. Yes, there are lots of hand-wavy ideas about lava tubes and regolith shielding. But the details are just… not there. It reminds me of Europe’s dark days of depositing colonies on other people’s land. The stories of how unprepared the settlers were are sad, hilarious, and repetitive. And, now we learn that we are planning for at least one more sequel.

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images | Bet_Noire)

Musk’s X Corp. in July asked a federal judge for “a protective order staying the notice of deposition of Elon Musk,” and an order to terminate or modify the company’s 2022 settlement with the Federal Trade Commission. US Magistrate Judge Thomas Hixson denied both requests in an order issued Thursday in US District Court for the Northern District of California.

The May 2022 settlement with the FTC came in response to Twitter targeting ads at users with phone numbers and email addresses collected from those users when they enabled two-factor authentication. US authorities are investigating whether the Musk-owned social network, now officially called X, is complying with the settlement’s privacy and security requirements.

Enlarge (credit: Leon Neal / Staff | Getty Images Europe)

Advertising industry insiders told the Financial Times and Forbes that Yaccarino got bombarded all weekend by industry friends advising her to resign, or else face a “credibility crisis” as major brands—including Apple, Disney, IBM, Lionsgate, Paramount Global, Sony, and Warner Bros.—have stopped advertising on X.

This latest X advertiser scare followed two Media Matters reports of ads appearing next to antisemitic content. But the backlash goes beyond stemming just from those reports and is also connected to an antisemitic X post from Musk. In the post, Musk explicitly endorses as “the actual truth” the great replacement theory. That theory, as The New York Times explained, claims that “Jews have organized nonwhite immigrants to replace the white race” and “was embraced by Robert Bowers, who killed 11 worshipers at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018.”

Enlarge / Red wine headache (RWH) might be caused by quercetin, which inhibits an enzyme that processes acetaldehyde in the blood. (credit: Mick Stephenson/CC BY-SA 3.0)

As the holiday season kicks off this week, many will be making a consequential choice at dinner: red wine or white wine? And if your choice is red, will you be risking a headache? The fact that red wine can sometimes cause headaches in certain individuals (especially those prone to migraines) is common knowledge—so much so that the phenomenon (“RWH”) even has its own Wikipedia page. The Roman encyclopedist Celsus wrote in his treatise De Medicina about the pain felt after drinking wine, while six centuries later, Paul of Aegina mentioned that drinking wine could trigger a headache.

But the science to date is largely unclear regarding which components of red wine are responsible, as well as the mechanisms behind the phenomenon. A team of California scientists has narrowed down the likely culprits to a flavonol called quercetin, according to a new paper published in the journal Scientific Reports, although they have yet to run experiments with participants prone to RWH to test their hypothesis.

It’s a knotty issue because of the complexities of both wine and human genetics/physiology. Wine is basically water and alcohol, along with acids, dissolved sugars, and other compounds that lend color and flavor. For instance, the tannins in wine are polyphenolic compounds responsible for much of the bitterness and astringency in a given wine; they’re derived from the skins and stems of the grapes, or as a result of aging in oak barrels.

Enlarge / Then-Cruise CEO Kyle Vogt speaks at TechCrunch Disrupt 2023 on September 20, 2023, in San Francisco. (credit: Getty Images | Kimberly White )

“Today I resigned from my position as CEO of Cruise,” co-founder Kyle Vogt wrote in a post on twitter.com. “The startup I launched in my garage has given over 250,000 driverless rides across several cities, with each ride inspiring people with a small taste of the future,” he also wrote.

Cruise is owned by General Motors, which bought the company in 2016. Vogt expressed optimism about Cruise’s future without him, saying the team is “executing on a solid, multi-year roadmap and an exciting product vision.”

Enlarge / The Steam Deck OLED (bottom) sunbathing with its older brother. (credit: Kyle Orland)

In our review of the Steam Deck OLED last week, we noted that the upgraded 90 Hz screen “has a pretty direct impact on how it feels to play reflex-heavy games.” Now, Digital Foundry has used input lag-testing hardware to quantify the precise size of that amorphous feeling, which it found is significant even in games running at 60 fps and below.

Digital Foundry’s testing used Nvidia’s Latency and Display Analysis Tools running on two reflex-heavy games: Doom Eternal and Crysis 3 Remastered. The tool measures the total time between a mouse click and the flash of an on-screen muzzle that indicates a shot being fired—the lower, the better for the game’s responsiveness.

Unsurprisingly, the best improvements in input lag were measured when the Steam Deck OLED was running at a full 90 fps. Compared to the 60 fps LCD Steam Deck, input lag was reduced by an average of 26.1 ms for Doom Eternal and 32.5 ms for Crysis 3. While some of that reduction can be attributed to the shorter time between frame refreshes on the OLED (11.11 ms on the OLED at 90 fps versus 16.66 ms on the LCD at 60 fps), the size of the reduction here amounts to multiple 90 fps frames.