Apple has acquired Israel-based startup Q.ai, a move that could provide a much-needed boost to the tech giant’s capabilities in artificial intelligence. Although Apple has not disclosed terms of the deal, sources told Financial Times that the arrangement is reportedly valued at nearly $2 billion. If that figure is accurate, the Q.ai acquisition marks Apple’s second largest acquisition to date, followed by its purchase of Beats for $3 billion back in 2014.

Johny Srouji, Apple’s senior vice president of hardware technologies, said in a statement that Q.ai “is a remarkable company that is pioneering new and creative ways to use imaging and machine learning.” Apple hasn’t shared any specifics about how it plans to leverage the startup, but its past work indicates the possibility of Apple moving deeper into AI-powered wearables. “Patents filed by Q.ai show its technology being used in headphones or glasses, using ‘facial skin micro movements’ to communicate without talking,” the Times reported. 

The startup’s founding team, including CEO Aviad Maizels, will join Apple as part of the deal. This acquisition marks Maizels’ second sale to Apple; he previously founded a three-dimensional hearing business called PrimeSense that Apple bought back in 2013.

For several months, many tech insiders have speculated that an acquisition might be Apple’s best path forward to catching up in the AI race. In the company’s Q3 earnings call in July 2025, CEO Tim Cook acknowledged that “We’re open to M&A that accelerates our roadmap.” A deal like this one could eventually lead to Apple developing its own fully in-house AI chatbot rather than relying on a competitor like Google to power artificial intelligence in its Siri assistant.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/apple-acquires-qai-for-a-reported-2-billion-190017949.html?src=rss

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When the cold weather arrives, there’s a tendency among homeowners to focus on the interior—namely, our personal comfort and the utility bills. That’s perfectly sensible—no one wants to shiver in their own house, and no one wants to be slammed with an enormous utility bill, either. But the exterior of your house is just as important.

Heavy snow and icy buildup during extended periods of severe cold can really take a toll on your house. Snow and ice combined with melt/freeze cycles during sunny periods can do some serious (and often completely silent) damage to your home in a variety of ways, from water intrusion through your roof to ice-heavy tree branches crashing into the house. If you live somewhere where you can expect to be buried in snow and ice at some point this winter, here are the products you need to protect your house.

Clear snow with a roof rake

Snow is heavy, and your roof is designed to handle only so much of it. The chances that your roof is going to collapse are probably pretty minimal, but that doesn’t mean letting a ton of snow and ice sit on it for weeks at a time is good for your roof or the structure under it. At the same time, climbing up onto your roof to shovel or sweep snow off is not the safest thing to do. Instead, keep a snow rake on hand. Designed to be used from the ground, a snow rake is a simple tool that lets you scrape a lot of snow off your roof safely, easing the snow load and minimizing the chances that water will infiltrate the house. Just keep in mind that if you install roof cable to prevent ice dams (see below), you’ll need to be super careful using a roof rake, as you can easily snag the cable and yank it loose.

Use a sewer skewer to melt snow and ice in vents

One often-overlooked problem caused by cold, snowy weather is ice buildup in roof and furnace vents. Sewer vents on the roof and furnace vents that draw in clean air and expel exhaust from your heating system can get clogged with ice, which can cause your heat to malfunction and pose a severe health hazard if fumes build up inside the home. A sewer skewer is a simple solution. It’s just a hunk of copper, really, but copper is an excellent conductor, so it absorbs heat from the sun (and your home’s own gases as they rise up) and radiates that heat back out, melting any snow and ice that form in the vent. It’s shaped to move the melting water away from the vent so it doesn’t just drip down and re-freeze. It’s incredibly simple to install (be careful on your roof, though) and can save you from disaster.

Install heated roof cables

Ice dams are layers of ice that form at the edge of your roof, preventing proper drainage. Unchecked, ice dams can really do a number on your roof and even the structure of your house. Preventing ice dams can be relatively easy, however—just install some heated roof cables. Attached to the edge of your roof in a zig-zag pattern, roof cables ensure that ice dams can’t form, and melting snow and ice can drain properly into your gutters.

RADIANT SOLUTIONS HeatTapePro – Intelligent Commercial Grade Self-Regulating Heat Cable with GlowCap™ – 10 YR warranty – Ice Dam & Pipe Freeze Protection – 112 ft cable + 10 Ft Cord, 120V, 6 watts/Ft

$428.95
at Amazon

$428.95
at Amazon

Use covers on exterior faucets

A common way ice and freezing temperatures can damage your house is through exterior faucets and spigots. Because they extend outside the insulated interior of the house, they’re very susceptible to freezing, and that ice can make its way into the pipe behind it, leading to a burst pipe and a very expensive problem. The solution, though, is not expensive—for about $11, a faucet cover will keep your exterior faucets ice-free and water safely inside your pipes where it belongs. Affix one to every exposed faucet or spigot around the house and you’ll have one less thing to worry about.

Cut back problem tree branches with a mini chainsaw

If you have trees near your home, heavy ice and snow can snap off branches, which then smack into your roof or walls—and those ice-laden branches will be heavy when they hit your house. Being a little proactive and trimming back branches—especially old, dead ones—is the best way to prevent that from happening. If you don’t want to call a professional to trim back a few branches, pick up a mini-chainsaw to get the job done. If your branches are a little more than a mini can handle, a full-size chainsaw might be needed—but be sure you know how to handle it, especially if you’re going to be climbing a ladder to use it.

Prevent ice clogs with gutter heaters

Like ice dams on your roof, your gutters can become clogged with snow and ice, preventing proper drainage and leading to rot and water intrusion. Gutter heaters are an easy solution that prevents ice and snow buildup, ensuring everything drains away from your roof and your house as intended.

H&G lifestyles 24ft Electric Gutter Heater for Roof,Prevent Ice Dams for Roofs and Gutters, Aluminum Panels with Self-Regulating Heating Cable, Freeze Protection for Gutter Valley,12pcs

$119.99
at Amazon

$119.99
at Amazon

Use a filler sealer on hardscapes

The freeze/melt cycle can be particularly hard on your hardscapes, including driveways and patios. Meltwater gets into small cracks and then freezes, expanding and widening those cracks. After a while, your pavement or asphalt is chewed up and needs replacing. You can do a few things to prevent (or at least slow down) this destruction. Filling cracks in asphalt or concrete as they form with a filler sealer means water can’t get into them in the first place. And sealing your asphalt or concrete surfaces will protect them during those weeks when ice is sitting there, melting and freezing over and over again as temperatures fluctuate.

A group of music publishers led by Concord Music Group and Universal Music Group are suing Anthropic, according to a report by Reuters. The suit accuses the AI company of illegally downloading more than 20,000 copyrighted songs, including sheet music, lyrics and compositions.

These songs were then allegedly fed into the chatbot Claude for training purposes. There are some iconic tunes named by Universal in the suit, including tracks by The Rolling Stones, Neil Diamond and Elton John, among many others. Concord is an independent publisher that handles artists like Common, Killer Mike and Korn.

The publishers issued a statement saying that the damages could amount to more than $3 billion. This would make it one of the largest non-class action copyright cases in US history.

“While Anthropic misleadingly claims to be an AI ‘safety and research’ company, its record of illegal torrenting of copyrighted works makes clear that its multibillion-dollar business empire has in fact been built on piracy,” the lawsuit says.

The suit was filed by the same legal team as last year’s Bartz v. Anthropic case. The music publishers say they found that Anthropic had been illegally downloading thousands of songs during the discovery process of that suit.

For the unfamiliar, the Bartz v. Anthropic case ended with an award of $1.5 billion to impacted writers after it was found that the company had illegally downloaded their published works for similar training purposes. The terms of that agreement dictated that the 500,000 authors involved in the case would get $3,000 per work. The $1.5 billion looks like a big number, but not so much when broken down like that. Also, Anthropic is worth around $350 billion.

In the Bartz case, Judge William Alsup ruled that it was legal for Anthropic to train its models on copyrighted content but not legal to acquire that content via piracy. We’ll have to wait and see how this new suit shakes out. The legal precedent here seems to suggest that if Anthropic would have just spent a buck on each copyrighted song, then they’d be in the clear. That’s an odd distinction when it comes to building an entire company around snatching up copyrighted content, but whatever.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/music-publishers-sue-anthropic-for-3-billion-over-flagrant-piracy-185459358.html?src=rss

The private equity industry is experiencing a quiet reckoning as hundreds of midsize firms find themselves trapped between investors who have lost patience and portfolios of companies they cannot sell at acceptable prices.

“There is existential risk for a number [of funds] because of the fundraising environment,” said Sunaina Sinha Haldea, global head of private capital advisory at Raymond James. “If existing investors don’t come and support them, new investors are highly unlikely to.”

According to data from Preqin, the average buyout fund that closed in 2025 spent 23 months fundraising, up from 16 months in 2021, and the total number of funds raised fell to 1,191 from 2,679 over the same period. New York’s Vestar Capital scrapped plans for its eighth fund in late 2024 and has not invested in a new portfolio company since 2023. The firm’s assets under management dropped from $7 billion fifteen years ago to $3.3 billion in 2024.

Three-year annualized returns through June 2025 for the Cambridge Associates U.S. Private Equity Index stand at 7.4%, trailing the MSCI World stock index by 11 percentage points annually. The average holding period for buyout deals has stretched to 6.3 years from 5.1 years in 2020. Blue-chip megafunds continue raising capital normally, but smaller firms face existential pressure.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

This past summer, Google DeepMind debuted Genie 3. It’s what’s known as a world world, an AI system capable of generating images and reacting as the user moves through the environment the software is simulating. At the time, DeepMind positioned Genie 3 as a tool for training AI agents. Now, it’s making the model available to people outside of Google to try with Project Genie.

To start, you’ll need Google’s $250 per month AI Ultra plan to check out Project Genie. You’ll also need to live in the US and be 18 years or older. At launch, Project Genie offers three different modes of interaction: World Sketching, exploration and remixing. The first sees Google’s Nano Banana Pro model generating the source image Genie 3 will use to create the world you will later explore. At this stage, you can describe your character, define the camera perspective — be it first-person, third-person or isometric — and how you want to explore the world Genie 3 is about to generate. Before you can jump into the model’s creation, Nano Banana Pro will “sketch” what you’re about to see so you can make tweaks. It’s also possible to write your own prompts for worlds others have used Genie to generate.

One thing to keep in mind is that Genie 3 is not a game engine. While its outputs can look game-like, and it can simulate physical interactions, there aren’t traditional game mechanics here. Generations are also limited to 60 seconds, as is the presentation, which is capped at 24 frames per second and 720p. Still, if you’re an AI Ultra subscriber, this is a cool opportunity to see the bleeding edge of what DeepMind has been working over the past couple of years.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/googles-project-genie-lets-you-generate-your-own-interactive-worlds-183646186.html?src=rss

Two security professionals who were arrested in 2019 after performing an authorized security assessment of a county courthouse in Iowa will receive $600,000 to settle a lawsuit they brought alleging wrongful arrest and defamation.

The case was brought by Gary DeMercurio and Justin Wynn, two penetration testers who at the time were employed by Colorado-based security firm Coalfire Labs. The men had written authorization from the Iowa Judicial Branch to conduct “red-team” exercises, meaning attempted security breaches that mimic techniques used by criminal hackers or burglars.

The objective of such exercises is to test the resilience of existing defenses using the types of real-world attacks the defenses are designed to repel. The rules of engagement for this exercise explicitly permitted “physical attacks,” including “lockpicking,” against judicial branch buildings so long as they didn’t cause significant damage.

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Zendaya is busy. Euphoria, which she produces in addition to starring in, is finally set to return for its third season on April 12, four years after our last visit to East Highland, and nearly seven since it premiered.

As frustrating as these between-season breaks can be, they leave plenty of time to explore other tales of the wild lives of high schoolers. It’s all relative, though: While growing up in never a picnic, there’s drama, and then there’s drama. These 15 streamalikes vary widely in tone and style, but they all make clear that being a young person in the 21st century is not f*cking easy. Stream the first two seasons of Euphoria on HBO Max.

The Sex Lives of College Girls (2021 – 2025)

Kimberly (Pauline Chalamet) is an endlessly naïve scholarship student; Bela (Amrit Kaur) is an aspiring comedy writer on the make for the hottest guys; Whitney (Alyah Chanelle Scott) is an overachieving athlete and senator’s daughter;and Leighton (Reneé Rapp) is a closeted sorority girl. They’re all randomly assigned to room together as freshmen at the fictional Essex College in Vermont. Created by Mindy Kaling and Justin Noble, this comedy-drama isn’t nearly as salacious as its title suggests. There’s sex for sure, but like Sex and the City before it, the funny, queer-friendly show is more about female friendship. Stream The Sex Lives of College Girls on HBO Max.

The Sex Lives of College Girls

at HBO Max

at HBO Max

My Mad Fat Diary (2013 – 2015)

Period drama is having a moment, and this one goes way, way back…to the 1990s. This British comedy-drama stars the brilliant Sharon Rooney (you might know her as Lawyer Barbie) as Rae Earl, a 16-year-old who just spent several months in a psychiatric hospital for a cocktail of mental health issues, poor body image being near the top of that list. Heading back to school, she tries to conceal the truth of her absence and ongoing challenges—with expectedly mixed results. Despite the show’s comedy elements, it’s about as good a narrative about growing up with serious mental health issues as you’re likely to find. Rooney won a well-deserved Best Actress BAFTA for her performance. Stream My Mad Fat Diary on Prime Video, Hulu, and Tubi.

My Mad Fat Diary

at Prime Video

at Prime Video

Boarders (2024 – )

This British import feels a bit like a latter-day Skins, featuring a scholastic setting and a talented cast of young stars-in-waiting (including leads Josh Tedeku and Jodie Campbell). At the (fictional) prestigious boarding school St. Gilbert’s, five Black teens are newly attending on scholarships, but their integration into the existing cliques is less than smooth. The blend of coming-of-age drama with a willingness to take the piss when it comes to the whole “rich private school thing” makes this Tubi original a smashing good time. Stream Boarders on Tubi.

Boarders (2024 – )

at Tubi

at Tubi

Gossip Girl (2007 – 2012)

Teen drama at its finest and most bitchy, Gossip Girl follows the many scandals of a group of young Upper East Side socialites and hangers-on. The tangled teenage lives of Serena van der Woodsen (Blake Lively), her best frenemy Blair Waldorf (Leighton Meester), scholarship kid Dan Humphrey (Penn Badgley), and plenty more pretty young boys and girls are chronicled in meticulous detail by the title’s mysterious, omnipresent Gossip Girl (voiced by Kristen Bell). This one shares with Emily an impeccable sense of style, as its leads never miss a fashion beat. It all seems a bit tame when help up to Euphoria, but the show carved a path nonetheless, scandalizing parents in the mid-aughts. (The two-season 2021 follow-up is also available on HBO Max.) Stream Gossip Girl on HBO Max and Netflix.

Gossip Girl

at HBO Max

at HBO Max

Prisma (2022 – 2024)

Andrea and Marco are twin brothers (both played by Mattia Carrano) with a broad circle of friends living in modern day Italy. Marco has a history of self-harm that impacted his burgeoning swimming career, while Andrea has a secret social media life,messaging men while presenting as a woman. Sexual and gender exploration is the prime mover here, but the show also deals realistically with issues like drugs and bullying and any number of other coming-of-age trials. A bit of a hidden gem. Stream Prisma on Prime Video.

Prisma (2022 – 2024)

Elite (2018 – 2024)

With a bit of Gossip Girl’s juicy style, Elite follows a group of working-class friends who wind up with scholarships to Las Encinas, a fictional private school that is, in the show’s universe, the most exclusive in Spain. What they find there is snobbery, for sure, but also mystery, murder, and lots and lots of sex (between and among characters of various sexual orientations and numerical groupings). The smart, wonderfully trashy show ran for an almost shocking (in our modern streaming era) eight seasons, with a couple of regional remakes. Stream Elite on Netflix.

Elite (2018 – 2024)

at Netflix

at Netflix

Blood & Water (2020 – )

This top-tier teen drama stars Ama Qamata as Puleng Khumalo, a teenage girl who’s lived her entire life in the shadow of a sister who was taken as a baby by human traffickers (Puleng’s parents still hold a birthday celebration for the sister each year). When invited to a party by popular Fikile Bhele (Khosi Ngema), a student at an elite school in Cape Town, Puleng can’t help noticing their similarities. Steeped in the story of her sister, Puleng transfers to the school to get to the bottom of things. There’s plenty of juicy high school drama and family secrets in the mix, but the show is elevated by its unexpected dramatic heft and a multitude of queer characters and storylines. (This is ostensibly a South Africa remake of Elite, but its flavor and sense of identity are so unique that you’d hardly notice.) Stream Blood & Water on Netflix.

Blood & Water (2020 – )

at Netflix

at Netflix

Overcompensating (2025 – )

Comedian Benito Skinner plays himself, sort of, in this buzzy comedy that sees a former high school jock facing his freshman year in college while desperately trying to convince himself and everyone else that he’s as straight as they come (relatable, except for the jock part). Much of the appeal is in its deft blending of tones: It’s a frequently raunchy college comedy and simultaneously a sweet coming-of-age story about accepting yourself without worrying about what everyone else thinks. The cast includes Adam DiMarco (The White Lotus) and Rish Shah (Ms. Marvel) and while it definitely doesn’t go as hard as Euphoria, there are moments of real drama and heartbreak. Stream Overcompensating on Prime Video.

Overcompensating (2025 – )

at Prime Video

at Prime Video

Sex Education (2019 – 2023)

Many of us come from families with philosophies that could be described as less than sex positive. Which is not great. This popular British series imagines the life of a teenager with a parent on the opposite end of that spectrum: Mom (Gillian Anderson) is a sex therapist who’s not particularly good at romantic relationships. As a result, Asa Butterfield’s Otis Milburn grew up with an ambivalence toward the topic—a lack of interest that held until he realized that his inside knowledge of doing the deed could earn him friends (and paying customers) at school. Alongside some classmates, he establishes his own clinic to help his fellow students with their sexual concerns. In the process, Otis, and the show, address a wide range of issues, from birth control and abortion, to masturbation, sexually transmitted diseases, and developing sexual identities. Emma Mackey and Ncuti Gatwa (Doctor Who) also star. Stream Sex Education on Netflix.

Sex Education

at Netflix

at Netflix

Industry (2020 – )

Industry isn’t concerned with a power struggle among people at the top of the ladder; instead, its focus is the fight to climb said ladder. The young wannabe investment bankers it follows would all love to be the terrible rich people from that other show. The main characters come from a variety of backgrounds, but they’re all competing for a limited number of permanent positions at the fictional Pierpoint & Co., a London bank, and they’ll do anything it takes to earn their shot at the big prize. The setting here is seemingly very different from Euphoria‘s vague greater Los Angeles, and the whole investment banking thing hardly doesn’t line up with the trials of high school, but there’s a a definite vibe match, as young people face high pressure situations and fight to stay above water in a world rife with traps and temptations. Stream Industry on HBO Max.

Industry (2020 – )

at HBO Max

at HBO Max

We Are Who We Are (2020)

Director Luca Guadagnino (Challengers, Queer) created this series about two American teenagers, Fraser (Jack Dylan Grazer) and Caitlin (Jordan Kristine Seamón), living with their families on a U.S. military base in Chioggia, Italy. Fraser’s two moms are both in the army, but he’s new to base life. Caitlin, on the other hand, has lived in Chioggia for years with her conservative father. Over the course of a summer, the two gradually bond over their mutual feelings of isolation, as well as their explorations of gender and sexuality. Stream We Are Who We Are on HBO Max.

We Are Who We Are

at HBO Max

at HBO Max

Baby (2018 – 2020)

As with many teen dramas, Baby kicks off at an elite boarding school (poor kids come of age too, ya know), but this one has a fairly wild spin: It’s based (quite loosely) on a real-life Italian scandal involving teen sex workers. Benedetta Porcaroli (Immaculate) stars as Chiara, a rich kid who makes a new bestie in Ludovica (Alice Pagani), who needs money and happens to know a very sketchy guy who might be able to help her earn it. The tone is somehow less lascivious than the premise suggests, although the sex-work-as-teenage-rebellion angle is not for every taste. Stream Baby on Netflix.

Baby (2018 – 2020)

at Netflix

at Netflix

Heartbreak High (2022 – )

There’s a lot of backstory here that you don’t really need to know to enjoy the show, but in brief, Heartbreak High is a sorta soft-reboot of a popular and long-running 1990s show in Australia, which was itself a spin-off from a 1993 movie. There’s a solid blend of teen drama (sealing with issues related to gender identity, race, and teen sexuality) and comedy (the main characters corralled into the Sexual Literacy Tutorial, with the unfortunate acronym SLT). It all starts with Amelie and Harper, two students at a diverse Sydney high school, who set off a firestorm when they create a detailed map of the sexual exploits of the student body. Stream Heartbreak High on Netflix.

Heartbreak High (2022 – )

at Netflix

at Netflix

Riverdale (2017 – 2023)

“What the hell is this doing here?” you’re probably asking yourself. And, fair. But hear me out: This reimagining of the once entirely wholesome Archie comics universe is generally way over-the-top, but it tackles the trials and tribulations of growing up (including recurring storylines involving substance abuse) in a similarly…let’s say “operatic” fashion. It veers wildly between genres, starting out by blending several coming-of-age storylines with a hot-for-teacher whodunnit: The dour, elderly Miss Grundy of the comics is younged up and is having an affair with Archie in the series opener, leading in to a bloody murder mystery. Before long, we’re folding in supernatural horror and alternate universes, things made all the weirder by the way the show seems to take itself absolutely seriously in the face of one bonkers plot twist after another. It’s the whackadoo comic-book version of Euphoria. Steam Riverdale on Netflix.

Riverdale (2017 – 2023)

at Netflix

at Netflix

Skins (2007 – 2013)

The popular and controversial British series launched names like Nicholas Hoult, Daniel Kaluuya, and Dev Patel while dealing with hot-button issues like mental illness, substance abuse, and bullying. The show also never forgets—not even for one episode—that it’s about teenagers, and doesn’t shy away from the sex lives of its large (and ever-changing) cast of characters. There’s a pretty straight line to be drawn between the success of Skins and that of Euphoria. Stream Skins on Hulu.

Skins (2007 – 2013)

at Hulu

at Hulu

Apple has acquired Q.AI, a secretive Israeli startup whose technology can analyze facial skin micro-movements to interpret “silent speech,” in a deal valued at close to $2 billion that marks the iPhone maker’s second-largest acquisition ever, according to backer GV (formerly Google Ventures).

The four-year-old company was founded in Tel Aviv in 2022 by Aviad Maizels, Yonatan Wexler and Avi Barliya. Patents filed by Q.AI show its technology being deployed in headphones or smart glasses to enable non-verbal communication with an AI assistant. The acquisition comes as Meta’s Ray-Ban smart glasses already let wearers talk to its AI, and Google and Snap are preparing to launch competing devices later this year.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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If you need a pair of basic, true wireless earbuds at a low price and don’t need features like noise cancellation, the Sony WF-C510 earbuds are worth considering. Known for their comfort and balanced sound, these affordable buds check most of the everyday features people are looking for (like Ambient Sound Mode and multipoint Bluetooth) at a fraction of the cost—and right now, Grade A refurbished Sony WF-C510 wireless earbuds is available on Woot for $34.99, which is less expensive than their lowest recorded price on Amazon, according to price-trackers.

Grade A Refurbished Sony WF-C510 Wireless Earbuds

$34.99
at Woot

$69.99
Save $35.00

$34.99
at Woot

$69.99
Save $35.00

The WF-C510 earphones are Sony’s most affordable option, combining comfort for long listening sessions with a functional design and solid sound. They have a compact, lightweight charging case and work with Sony’s companion app. With a small, stemless design, on-bud physical buttons, and swappable ear tips, they closely resemble the brand’s more expensive earbuds. 

According to this PCMag review, the earbuds deliver “deep bass and high-end clarity without distortion” and perform similarly to pricier buds. While they don’t have noise cancellation, they do have Ambient Mode, which lets you hear your surroundings naturally while they’re on. Battery life lasts up to 11 hours with Ambient Mode off, and the case holds an additional 11 hours. While the earbuds are generally comfortable thanks to customizable tips and a snug fit, pressing the buttons can push them slightly into your ear, which may cause discomfort for sensitive users. That said, others may prefer physical controls over touch controls, which can be overly sensitive and lead to accidental activations.

They have an IPX4 rating, which protects against splashing and light rain, but shouldn’t be submerged in water. They have 6mm drivers that produce frequencies between 20Hz and 20kHz and support. While they have limited codec support (they only use AAC and SBC rather than LDAC), they support Bluetooth multipoint connections with up to two devices. Despite the low price, these refurbished Sony WF-C510 wireless earbuds deliver respectable audio performance, a comfortable build, and a compact case with an extra charge. If you don’t need high-resolution Bluetooth codecs, touch controls, or noise-cancelling features, they’re a dependable option, especially at just $34.99. 

Woot only ships to the 48 contiguous states in the U.S, and if you have Amazon Prime, you get free shipping; otherwise, it’ll be $6 to ship. The earbuds may come with signs of wear, but with a Grade A rating, these will be very limited. If you do run into any issues, they come with a  1 Year eReplacements Limited Warranty.

On Tuesday, OpenAI released a free AI-powered workspace for scientists. It’s called Prism, and it has drawn immediate skepticism from researchers who fear the tool will accelerate the already overwhelming flood of low-quality papers into scientific journals. The launch coincides with growing alarm among publishers about what many are calling “AI slop” in academic publishing.

To be clear, Prism is a writing and formatting tool, not a system for conducting research itself, though OpenAI’s broader pitch blurs that line.

Prism integrates OpenAI’s GPT-5.2 model into a LaTeX-based text editor (a standard used for typesetting documents), allowing researchers to draft papers, generate citations, create diagrams from whiteboard sketches, and collaborate with co-authors in real time. The tool is free for anyone with a ChatGPT account.

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Maingear is back with another nostalgia-fueled gaming PC. The Retro98 may look like it’s made for playing Quake while you wait for The Phantom Menace trailer to drop. But on the inside, the beige box is powerful enough to slay today’s most demanding AAA games. “You’re not going to find this PC at your local Radio Shack,” Maingear promises.

If you’re at least middle-aged, the Retro98’s exterior is instantly familiar. The hand-built tower includes an LED fan-speed display, a working turbo button and a power-lockout key. Sticking with the nostalgic motif, its front I/O is hidden behind the Maingear logo. I can already hear The Beastie Boys’ “Intergalactic” playing in the background.

Fortunately, you won’t be limited to 1998 games. (Dope as they are.) It has up to a Ryzen 9 9950X3D processor, GeForce RTX 5090 graphics, 64GB Kingston Fury RAM and 4TB Kingston FURY Renegade NVMe Gen5 SSD. The maxed-out version (described by Maingear as “unapologetically overkill”) even includes open-loop liquid cooling.

Maingear

Now for the bad news. As you might expect from a retro novelty PC like this, you’ll have to pay a pretty penny. The base model (Intel Core Ultra 7 265K / NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070) costs $2,499. There are two other standard tiers, priced at $3,499 and $4,999. Finally, the open-loop-cooled “Alpha” build is a whopping $9,799. Hey, those aren’t 1998 prices!

The Retro98 also has an extremely limited run. Maingear is producing only 32 standard units and six alpha units. The company says it won’t bring this build back once those sell out. However, there is a workaround for tinkerers: Since it’s based on the SilverStone FLP02 tower PC case, you could grab one of those and build your own.

Those wealthy and nostalgic enough to take the plunge can order the Retro98 today from Maingear’s website.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/pc/maingears-latest-retro-gaming-desktop-takes-you-back-to-the-quake-era-174958445.html?src=rss

An anonymous reader shares a report: Chat & Ask AI, one of the most popular AI apps on the Google Play and Apple App stores that claims more than 50 million users, left hundreds of millions of those users’ private messages with the app’s chatbot exposed, according to an independent security researcher and emails viewed by 404 Media. The exposed chats showed users asked the app “How do I painlessly kill myself,” to write suicide notes, “how to make meth,” and how to hack various apps.

The exposed data was discovered by an independent security researcher who goes by Harry. The issue is a misconfiguration in the app’s usage of the mobile app development platform Google Firebase, which by default makes it easy for anyone to make themselves an “authenticated” user who can access the app’s backend storage where in many instances user data is stored.

Harry said that he had access to 300 million messages from more than 25 million users in the exposed database, and that he extracted and analyzed a sample of 60,000 users and a million messages. The database contained user files with a complete history of their chats with the AI, timestamps of those chats, the name they gave the app’s chatbot, how they configured the model, and which specific model they used. Chat & Ask AI is a “wrapper” that plugs into various large language models from bigger companies users can choose from, Including OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Anthropic’s Claude, and Google’s Gemini.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Spotify is adding group chats to the messaging service it premiered last year. In an addendum to the original blog post introducing Messages, the company announced that users can initiate chats with up to 10 of their friends to share the podcasts, playlists and songs they are listening to.

The in-app messaging feature, which was released last August, works to keep users on the app instead of navigating to another platform to share content with friends. Since its introduction, Spotify has added functionality bit by bit. Earlier this month, the company added the ability to share what you’re listening to in real-time. Users can also invite chat participants to join a Jam, the app’s collaborative listening tool.

Spotify isn’t the only content platform trying to make in-app messaging a thing. Late last year, YouTube said it would be testing DMs, after originally adding the feature in 2017 before removing it in 2019.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/streaming/spotify-has-a-group-messaging-feature-now-173734450.html?src=rss