YouTube channel Gamers Nexus worked with Level1Techs, a technology-focused YouTube channel, and security researchers to analyze LG TVs’ tracking capabilities. They shared packet captures that pointed to the TVs, including LG’s pricey G5 OLED TV, scanning the LAN for other devices.

“The [G5] crawled our entire network and found dozens of unrelated devices, including smartwatches and phones of our staff who didn't even know we were working on this,” Steve Burke, Gamers Nexus' editor-in-chief, said.

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Thus far, the "Printable Big Box" collection on GOG is limited to just five games: Armikrog, Descent, Hitman: Codename 47, Myst, and Star Trek: 25th Anniversary. Players browsing those games on the GOG store will now see "3D Boxes" listed among the included "Goodies" before purchase. Owners of those games on GOG can download a ZIP file containing a version of the box art as an animated 3D object file (in an easy-to-open GLB format) and a "flat printable template" in PDF, SVG, and Adobe Illustrator formats. Those downloads allow for what GOG calls "a proper papercraft project for anyone who misses shelves full of PC game boxes."

"Physical media doesn’t survive the way software can—boxes get lost, crushed, thrown out," GOG writes in today's announcement. "Scanning them, and letting you print your own, is preservation in a different shape: the same mission that keeps these games running on modern PCs, applied to the objects they used to come in."

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It was only two months ago that Microsoft patched a then-record 570 vulnerabilities. Then, last month, Microsoft patched some 620 of them. Google and other companies have also published record numbers of vulnerabilities in recent months. Two weeks ago, OpenAI, Anthropic, Amazon Web Services, Google, Microsoft, and 100 companies and organizations published an open letter warning of a narrowing window for patching vulnerabilities ahead of an expected tsunami of AI-enabled attacks that actively exploit them first. The industry is taking the threat seriously by pumping out unprecedented numbers of patches in their software.

Welcome to the new normal

Dustin Childs, a researcher at the Zero Day Initiative, calls the spikes the “new normal” and also cautions that despite them, the damage that’s likely to result from AI-assisted attacks could eventually be substantial.

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Expedition 75 flight engineer Sophie Adenot with European Space Agency (ESA) donned the Delta badge originally worn by actor Anson Mount for a video recorded from aboard the space station. Mount portrays Christoper Pike in the Paramount+ streaming series Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. Paramount and ESA both released the clip on their Instagram feeds.

"For 60 years, Star Trek has brought us stories of friendship and exploration. I'm wearing Captain Pike's badge aboard the ISS in celebration of continuing the real world work of science and exploration," said Adenot. "For me, exploration and science are about curiosity and cooperation daring to go a little farther together, learning from what we discover and build, and turning that knowledge into a better future for everyone."

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The agreement itself sets up a system where the NIH would transfer money to the Department of Defense to fund staff and projects that would "support the advanced development of medical countermeasures against pandemic influenza, chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) threats, and emerging infectious diseases." The money would come out of the budget for the NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, or NIAID, to which Congress has allocated $6.6 billion in 2026. The agreement is set to run for a decade.

Left unspecified is just how much of the NIAID budget will be spent on Defense projects. Reporting by Nature suggests that the Department of Defense was looking for up to a third of its total budget but was being told to settle for about 10 percent. There's obviously an enormous disparity between the budgets of these two agencies, given that the 2026 Defense budget is roughly $1 trillion. That budget is under considerable strain, however, due to the open-ended nature of the conflict with Iran. The deal has also been announced at a time when the NIH has been struggling to issue sufficient grants to use the money that Congress allocated to it.

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The Supreme Court order was issued just in time for the start of a 60-day period before the election, in which broadcasters are required by US law to offer ad discounts to individual candidates. Because of the top court's order, TV stations must also give their lowest ad rates to political parties and joint fundraising committees, which face fewer limits on how much money they can raise and spend.

The legally required discount is known as the “lowest unit charge,” or LUC. A US law that applies to any licensed station that airs election ads requires that the lowest price be charged for “the use of any broadcasting station by any person who is a legally qualified candidate for any public office in connection with his campaign.” The main legal question is whether “use… by” a candidate can refer to ad time purchased on a candidate’s behalf by parties and joint fundraising committees.

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This signifies the semiconductor industry’s broader embrace of high NA EUV photolithography technology that can cost up to $400 million per machine and is only provided by the Dutch technology company ASML, Bloomberg reports. The technology would allow chip designers to implement even smaller features in potentially more powerful and efficient next-generation chips produced for AI data centers and consumer electronics such as smartphones, tablets, and laptops.

ASML’s EUV (extreme ultraviolet) lithography machines enable chipmakers to use powerful laser light to imprint patterns in silicon wafers, layer by layer, and gradually form the computer circuitry that makes silicon chips work. Compared to older deep ultraviolet lithography, EUV technology harnesses a more powerful source of light with a shorter wavelength to create even smaller features on silicon wafers.

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One of the cinematic highlights of 2023 was director Takashi Yamazaki's gloriously grounded kaiju epic, Godzilla Minus One, which became a major international hit and snagged an Oscar for best visual effects. Yamazaki is back this fall with the hotly anticipated sequel, Godzilla Minus Zero. Toho just dropped the full IMAX trailer, featuring not just our beloved Godzilla, but also a distinctive roar that teases the appearance of none other than the three-headed King Ghidorah.

(Spoilers for the 2023 film below.)

Godzilla Minus One focused on kamikaze pilot Kōichi Shikishima, who struggled with survivor's guilt after he failed to take action when Godzilla attacked the Japanese base on Odo Island in 1945. Knocked unconscious, Kōichi woke to find he was one of only two survivors—and the other, a mechanic named Tachibana, was furious about it. His parents and many others were killed in the World War II bombing of Tokyo. Kōichi rebuilt a life with a woman named Noriko and the orphaned baby she rescued, Akiko. But then Godzilla re-emerged, and Kōichi resolved to die fighting the monster to atone for Odo Island.

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In an investigation published Tuesday, the Tech Transparency Project (TTP) reported that Meta failed to detect 332 ads containing CSAM this year. The “vast majority” of ads promoted AI apps made in China, while many ads promoted so-called “nudify” apps that make it easy for bad actors to use AI and digitally alter images of children.

TTP matched “multiple CSAM ads to photos of real children that appeared online.” These ads seem to violate federal child pornography laws, since the Justice Department has clarified that AI CSAM is just as harmful as CSAM. The young royal’s image was “animated into a video of her performing a graphic sex act,” TTP found. Other ads animated a photo of a 14-year-old Instagram influencer “showing off her new sports club uniform” into “a video of her performing oral sex.” A third “preteen” victim “posing in a pink athletic outfit with pigtails” in a series of stock photos was morphed into a video where she looks frightened as she’s molested by an adult male, TTP reported.

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Google recently released version 3 of its WeatherNext model, with the biggest change being that it now ingests some satellite weather data, shortening the lag time between current weather conditions and generating a new forecast. The update is detailed in a white paper.

Reanalysis

Many weather models make use of what’s called a “reanalysis,” which is a sort of model of its own. Reanalyses take in all kinds of weather data and combine them into a single, consistent global snapshot of the atmosphere. That requires that they provide estimates for conditions over locations without real-world measurements, because weather forecast models need to work with a global picture.

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If you don't live in Europe and perform a search for, say, hotels, Google will helpfully provide myriad sponsored links, booking recommendations, and price-comparison tools in its results. The problem is that this content isn't organic—Google includes links and offers contingent on its business interests. To get to the regular search results for these types of lucrative searches, you have to scroll way down the page. Companies that partner with Google can get more exposure, but the European Commission says this creates an unlevel playing field.

"To comply with DMA requirements, we're making significant changes to Search in Europe," Google's Nick Fox told Reuters. "These changes ​degrade the user experience for ​Europeans, boosting online intermediaries ⁠at the expense of local businesses and removing helpful features people rely on every day."

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The White House's "Build the Wall" game asked players to stop a "Zombie Border siege" by stacking Tetris-styled bricks in an attempt to "hold the line." Unlike in Tetris, though, the blocks in "Build the Wall" don't disappear when you complete a line, meaning each brick contributes to an impassable barrier for the pixel-art "zombies" marching in from the "Southern Border." That change makes the gameplay pretty uninteresting for anything but cheap propaganda, and it also means that every game quickly and ironically ends with a "Border Breached" message when the blocks inevitably fill up the well.

Amerika Garcia Grewal, co-director of Texas migrant rights group Frontera Federation, told AFP last week that the makers of the game "have lost touch with what it means to be human and care for others."

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Eggshells have long fascinated scientists because of their mechanical properties. For instance, it's well known that cracking an egg requires applying just enough force to the center to achieve a clean break without completely shattering the shell. In 2012, MIT mechanical engineer Pedro Reis co-authored a paper demonstrating the link between an egg's ovoid geometry and its rigidity, a major factor when predicting how much force an object can endure before cracking. (As I wrote for Slate at the time, rigidity is related to, but distinct from, strength. If one eggshell has tiny cracks and the other doesn't, both shells have different strengths—the cracked one will break more easily—but the same rigidity.)

Reis started studying eggshells after participating in a popular physics demonstration: walking on cartons of eggs without breaking them. The key, he learned, was to align the eggs with their narrow tip (the most crack-resistant part) pointing up, and then carefully place one's feet to distribute one's weight over the entire surface area. This ensures that no single egg is overloaded. While it takes around 5.5 pounds of force to crack an egg, that depends on the direction in which the force is applied, as well as its distribution over the shell's surface.

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I have to present this news with a big disclaimer, though, because I've been part of the Children of Infinity writing team since 2021, working as a volunteer with the Pistol Shrimp Games crew and contributing NPC dialogue and some story bits. As a huge fan of the original games, it's been a dream opportunity. (Because I've been volunteering my time, I'm not financially involved and receive no compensation if you download the demo or, when it's eventually released, buy the full game.)

What's in the demo

Children of Infinity is a space adventure RPG, just like The Ur-Quan Masters (and its direct spiritual predecessors, Starflight and Starflight 2). What's been released today is just one part of the game—the arcade-style "melee" portion, which lets players jump into one-versus-one combat against another player or against a computer-controlled opponent. Each of the ships you can pick has its own maneuvering characteristics, weapons, and special abilities.

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Despite a surge in global EV sales on the back of rising fuel prices, long-term battery durability continues to be one of the key concerns for drivers when they consider switching from a petrol model to an electric car.

EV battery warranties typically cover eight years or 100,000 miles (160,000 km) with car manufacturers required under the warranty to provide a replacement battery if capacity falls below 70 percent.

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With the Series E funding round, co-led by Point72 Ventures and Spark Capital, Stoke Space brought its total amount of capital raised to $2.3 billion, a staggering amount for a company that has yet to attempt an orbital launch.

The quantity of new funding will enable the company to accelerate work on a larger "Block 2" version of the Nova rocket, capable of lifting 15 metric tons to low-Earth orbit in a fully reusable configuration, said Stoke co-founder and Chief Executive Andy Lapsa.

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Steve Matisz, chief of the Barker Fire Department, said his crew went into the building “kind of blind,” facing heavy black smoke from chemicals they couldn’t identify because the safety sheets meant to inform them had apparently burned up. “It’s been a difficult situation,” Matisz said. He wasn't sure what to think about the claim that the safety sheets had burned in the fire.

The site is a former coal mine on Lake Ontario. The $3.2 billion campus is one of the largest AI data center buildouts in New York, and it has many stakeholders. A company called TeraWulf owns and operates the data center on land it leases from a company owned by its own CEO; Fluidstack, a UK-based AI company, will run the center; Google holds warrants for a future 14 percent equity stake and has agreed to guarantee Fluidstack’s lease payments; and Anthropic is among the AI companies whose compute demand the facility exists to serve.

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The two-stage rocket, named Spectrum, became the first fully commercial launch vehicle in Europe to reach orbit. With Saturday's success, Isar is the clear leader among a pack of several European launch startups vying to inject some competition into Europe's stagnant launch market.

Isar's 92-foot-tall (28-meter) Spectrum rocket lifted off at 4:12 pm EST (20:12 UTC) Saturday from Andøya Spaceport in northern Norway, where it was 10:12 pm local time and the final bluish hues of daylight faded from the late summer sky. Seven minutes later, the rocket was in orbit.

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That dietary advice has changed the way the world consumes salmon, pushing consumer demand ever upward and production to higher and higher levels. Most of that demand is being met with farmed salmon: Today, nearly 70 percent of the salmon consumed on the planet are raised in pens and cages.

The US Department of Agriculture’s Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommend eating at least 8 ounces of fish a week and urges people to choose salmon or other species that are similarly high in “heart-healthy” Omega-3 fatty acids. But new research led by USDA scientists finds that levels of these fatty acids in farmed salmon have dropped considerably, potentially making the agency’s own advice, and similar recommendations, including from the American Heart Association, outdated and insufficient.

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The investigation comes just hours after the electric automaker welcomed hundreds of fans to downtown Austin to ride in the driverless Cybercabs. Tesla plans to deploy the vehicles on its Robotaxi ride-hail network, which is currently operating in a handful of cities in Texas and Florida.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is updating vehicle standards to make it easier and faster for driverless cars to deploy on public roads. It’s currently tweaking eight rules, including those requiring car parts that driverless cars don’t really need: brake pedals, windshield wipers, and rearview mirrors. But for now, years-old standards remain in place.

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