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☕️ Google tiendra son évènement Pixel le 13 août

En 2024, Google organise son évènement Pixel beaucoup plus tôt que d’habitude. L’entreprise donne généralement rendez-vous à la rentrée ou au début de l’automne, peu de temps après l’évènement d’Apple.

9to5Google dit ainsi avoir reçu son invitation pour l’évènement Made by Google. Le texte est court, renvoyant simplement à la démonstration de ses dernières nouveautés en matière d’IA, d’Android et d’appareils Pixel.

Google présentera son Pixel 9, dont la déclinaison Pro pourrait cette année est disponible en deux tailles, dont une XL. Peut-être en écho à la gamme Pro Max des iPhone, les plus grandes tailles se vendant davantage. Une page officielle pour le téléphone avec un petit teaser vient d’ailleurs d’être mise en ligne.

Selon nos confrères, une variante Fold (pliable) du smartphone est attendue, de même qu’une montre Pixel Watch 3 et des écouteurs Pixel Buds Pro 2.

☕️ Le sulfureux site de rencontre français Coco.gg a été saisi, son créateur arrêté en Bulgarie

Sur Twitter (X), le Parquet de Paris explique que le site coco.gg a été fermé par la Direction Générale des Douanes et Droits Indirects et la Gendarmerie Nationale, sous l’autorité de la JUNALCO (Juridiction nationale chargée de la lutte contre la criminalité organisée) du Parquet de Paris.

Le communiqué de presse du Parquet ne mentionne pas la douane, mais précise que l’enquête avait été effectuée par l’Unité Nationale Cyber (UNCyber) de la Gendarmerie et l’Office national anti-fraude (ONAF), et bénéficié de l’appui du commandement du ministère de l’Intérieur dans le cyberespace (COMCYBER-MI).

Les opérations ont en outre été coordonnées avec Eurojust. Les autorités françaises ont bénéficié de la coopération de cinq pays européens : la Bulgarie (où avait été relocalisée l’entreprise française responsable du site), l’Allemagne (où se trouvait un temps au moins des serveurs), la Lituanie, les Pays-Bas et la Hongrie, rapporte Le Parisien.

L’enquête avait été ouverte en décembre dernier pour des soupçons de :

  • fourniture d’une plateforme en ligne pour permettre une transaction illicite en bande organisée (passible de 10 ans d’emprisonnement en 500 000 euros d’amende),
  • intermédiation ou séquestre, au moyen d’une plateforme en ligne, ayant pour objet de mettre en œuvre, dissimuler ou faciliter une transaction illicite en bande organisée (idem),
  • infractions relatives à la pédocriminalité, au proxénétisme aggravé, au blanchiment aggravé, et à l’association de malfaiteurs en vue de commettre ces infractions.

Le communiqué rappelle que coco.gg était connu depuis de nombreuses années comme étant un « facilitateur de commission de diverses infractions, notamment des actes de pédocriminalité, de proxénétisme, de prostitution, de viols, de vente de stupéfiants, de guet-apens, voire d’homicides », ciblant notamment des homosexuels, ou émanant de chasseurs autoproclamés de pédocriminels :

« Entre le 1ᵉʳ janvier 2021 et le 7 mai 2024, il ressort de l’exploitation des fichiers de police que pas moins de 23 051 procédures judiciaires en lien avec la plateforme coco ont été ouvertes. 70 parquets sur l’ensemble du territoire national, ont transmis des procédures dont ils ont eu à connaître impliquant la plateforme coco.fr [qui s’était délocalisé en 2022 sur coco.gg, ndlr], au préjudice de 480 victimes. »

Or, souligne le Parquet de Paris, « dans l’ensemble des procédures recensées, la plateforme coco a été utilisée spécifiquement pour sa notoire absence de modération ».

Quatre personnes ont été arrêtées, précise Le Parisien, dont son créateur, Isaac Steidl, dont notre confrère avait tiré le portrait fin mai. On y apprenait que cet ingénieur informaticien varois de 44 ans, qui avait lancé le site il y a une vingtaine d’années, s’était relocalisé en Bulgarie en 2023.

Il avait également obtenu, cette même année, d’être déchu de sa nationalité française, quand bien même, précise la documentation du ministère de l’Intérieur, « Si l’examen d’un dossier d’une personne résidant en France fait apparaître que la demande vise à soustraire l’intéressé à des sanctions ou à des obligations fiscales, ce dernier verra sa demande rejetée ».

Sa femme était en garde à vue mardi dans le Var, rapporte l’AFP, qui ne donne pas plus de précisions sur les deux autres personnes interpellées.

☕️ Google tiendra son évènement Pixel le 13 août

En 2024, Google organise son évènement Pixel beaucoup plus tôt que d’habitude. L’entreprise donne généralement rendez-vous à la rentrée ou au début de l’automne, peu de temps après l’évènement d’Apple.

9to5Google dit ainsi avoir reçu son invitation pour l’évènement Made by Google. Le texte est court, renvoyant simplement à la démonstration de ses dernières nouveautés en matière d’IA, d’Android et d’appareils Pixel.

Google présentera son Pixel 9, dont la déclinaison Pro pourrait cette année est disponible en deux tailles, dont une XL. Peut-être en écho à la gamme Pro Max des iPhone, les plus grandes tailles se vendant davantage. Une page officielle pour le téléphone avec un petit teaser vient d’ailleurs d’être mise en ligne.

Selon nos confrères, une variante Fold (pliable) du smartphone est attendue, de même qu’une montre Pixel Watch 3 et des écouteurs Pixel Buds Pro 2.

☕️ Le sulfureux site de rencontre français Coco.gg a été saisi, son créateur arrêté en Bulgarie

Sur Twitter (X), le Parquet de Paris explique que le site coco.gg a été fermé par la Direction Générale des Douanes et Droits Indirects et la Gendarmerie Nationale, sous l’autorité de la JUNALCO (Juridiction nationale chargée de la lutte contre la criminalité organisée) du Parquet de Paris.

Le communiqué de presse du Parquet ne mentionne pas la douane, mais précise que l’enquête avait été effectuée par l’Unité Nationale Cyber (UNCyber) de la Gendarmerie et l’Office national anti-fraude (ONAF), et bénéficié de l’appui du commandement du ministère de l’Intérieur dans le cyberespace (COMCYBER-MI).

Les opérations ont en outre été coordonnées avec Eurojust. Les autorités françaises ont bénéficié de la coopération de cinq pays européens : la Bulgarie (où avait été relocalisée l’entreprise française responsable du site), l’Allemagne (où se trouvait un temps au moins des serveurs), la Lituanie, les Pays-Bas et la Hongrie, rapporte Le Parisien.

L’enquête avait été ouverte en décembre dernier pour des soupçons de :

  • fourniture d’une plateforme en ligne pour permettre une transaction illicite en bande organisée (passible de 10 ans d’emprisonnement en 500 000 euros d’amende),
  • intermédiation ou séquestre, au moyen d’une plateforme en ligne, ayant pour objet de mettre en œuvre, dissimuler ou faciliter une transaction illicite en bande organisée (idem),
  • infractions relatives à la pédocriminalité, au proxénétisme aggravé, au blanchiment aggravé, et à l’association de malfaiteurs en vue de commettre ces infractions.

Le communiqué rappelle que coco.gg était connu depuis de nombreuses années comme étant un « facilitateur de commission de diverses infractions, notamment des actes de pédocriminalité, de proxénétisme, de prostitution, de viols, de vente de stupéfiants, de guet-apens, voire d’homicides », ciblant notamment des homosexuels, ou émanant de chasseurs autoproclamés de pédocriminels :

« Entre le 1ᵉʳ janvier 2021 et le 7 mai 2024, il ressort de l’exploitation des fichiers de police que pas moins de 23 051 procédures judiciaires en lien avec la plateforme coco ont été ouvertes. 70 parquets sur l’ensemble du territoire national, ont transmis des procédures dont ils ont eu à connaître impliquant la plateforme coco.fr [qui s’était délocalisé en 2022 sur coco.gg, ndlr], au préjudice de 480 victimes. »

Or, souligne le Parquet de Paris, « dans l’ensemble des procédures recensées, la plateforme coco a été utilisée spécifiquement pour sa notoire absence de modération ».

Quatre personnes ont été arrêtées, précise Le Parisien, dont son créateur, Isaac Steidl, dont notre confrère avait tiré le portrait fin mai. On y apprenait que cet ingénieur informaticien varois de 44 ans, qui avait lancé le site il y a une vingtaine d’années, s’était relocalisé en Bulgarie en 2023.

Il avait également obtenu, cette même année, d’être déchu de sa nationalité française, quand bien même, précise la documentation du ministère de l’Intérieur, « Si l’examen d’un dossier d’une personne résidant en France fait apparaître que la demande vise à soustraire l’intéressé à des sanctions ou à des obligations fiscales, ce dernier verra sa demande rejetée ».

Sa femme était en garde à vue mardi dans le Var, rapporte l’AFP, qui ne donne pas plus de précisions sur les deux autres personnes interpellées.

Toujours plus complet, Farming Simulator 25 arrivera le 12 novembre prochain

Il était très attendu après plusieurs mois de silence, et nous avons enfin plus d'informations ! Farming Simulator 25 se dévoile partiellement avec une vidéo de présentation qui tient du film d'action et une date de lancement : le 12 novembre prochain sur PC, PS5 et Xbox Series. Les autres consoles ? Pas assez puissantes pour le moteur GIANTS Engine 10 qui nous promet des effets visuels toujours plus riches. Mais surtout, GIANTS Software semble vouloir faire voyager les joueurs et nous proposera de nouvelles possibilités inédites, comme la possibilité de cultiver du riz avec tout ce que cela implique, comme l'inondation de la rizière. De quoi renouveler le gameplay de la série, en espérant qu'il reste toujours aussi riche et profond. […]

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PHILIPS lance le 32M2N8800, un écran QD-OLED montant jusqu'à 240 Hz

PHILIPS lance le EVNIA 32M2N8800, un écran QD-OLED capable de monter jusqu'à 240 Hz sur une définition UHD (3840 x 2160) avec un temps de réponse de 0,03 ms. Il affiche 1,07 milliard de couleurs, capables de couvrir 99 % de l'espace colorimétrique DCI-P3, 100 % du NTSC et 97 % de l'Adobe RGB. Comme toujours avec l'OLED, nous avons droit à un taux de contraste de 1 500 000:1. Il propose une luminance maximale de 250 cd/m² en SDR et 450 cd/m² en HDR et se voit certifié HDR 400 True Black et ClearMR 13000. L'écran est également calibré en usine afin de proposer un deltaE inférieur à 2. […]

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Philips dévoile le nouveau moniteur 49B2U6903CH, doté d'une multitude de fonctionnalités au service des professionnels

Ce nouveau moniteur Philips permet de combiner productivité et connectivité, faisant de lui un atout idéal pour les professionnels. Avec le lancement du moniteur Philips 49B2U6903CH, de nouvelles fonctionnalités viennent faciliter la collaboration dans les environnements de travail numériques modernes : un écran de 48,8 pouces, une résolution DQHD de 5120 x 1440, une webcam haute performance, et bien d'autres atouts. […]

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Newly Identified Tipping Point For Ice Sheets Could Mean Greater Sea Level Rise

In a new study published in the journal Nature Geoscience, scientists have identified a new Antarctic ice sheet "tipping point" where slight increases in the temperature of seawater infiltrating coastal ice sheets can lead to significant ice loss due to feedback loops that expand underwater cavities and accelerate ice collapse into the ocean. This mechanism could potentially cause future sea level rise to far exceed current predictions, impacting major global cities and billions of people. The Guardian reports: The researchers used computer models to show that a "very small increase" in the temperature of the intruding water could lead to a "very big increase" in the loss of ice -- ie, tipping point behavior. It is unknown how close the tipping point is, or whether it has even been crossed already. But the researchers said it could be triggered by temperature rises of just tenths of a degree, and very likely by the rises expected in the coming decades. [...] The new research [...] found that some Antarctic ice sheets were more vulnerable to seawater intrusion than others. The Pine Island glacier, currently Antarctica's largest contributor to sea level rise, is especially vulnerable, as the base of the glacier slopes down inland, meaning gravity helps the seawater penetrate. The large Larsen ice sheet is similarly at risk. The so-called "Doomsday" glacier, Thwaites, was found to be among the least vulnerable to seawater intrusion. This is because the ice is flowing into the sea so fast already that any cavities in the ice melted by seawater intrusion are quickly filled with new ice.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Man Flies To Florida To Attack Another Player Over an Online Gaming Dispute

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Associated Press: An online gaming dispute made its way to the real world when a New Jersey man flew to Florida to attack another player with a hammer, authorities said. Edward Kang, 20, is charged with attempted second-degree murder and armed burglary with a mask, according to Nassau County court records. He was arrested early Sunday morning. Kang and the victim, another young man around the same age as Kang, had never met in real life, but they both played ArcheAge, a medieval fantasy massively multiplayer online role-playing game. The game's publisher announced in April that it would be shutting down servers in Europe and North America on June 27, citing a declining number of active players. Kang flew from Newark, New Jersey, to Jacksonville, Florida, last Thursday after telling his mother that he was going to visit a friend that he had met while playing a video game, officials said. Officials didn't say how Kang learned where the victim lives. Upon arrival, Kang took an Uber to a hotel in Fernandina Beach, about 35 miles north of Jacksonville, and then bought a hammer at a local hardware store, deputies said. Kang went to the victim's Fernandina Beach home, which was unlocked, around 2 a.m. Sunday, authorities said. The victim was walking out of his bedroom when he was confronted by Kang, who hit him on the head with the hammer, officials said. The two struggled as the victim called for help. His stepfather responded and helped to restrain Kang until police arrived. The victim suffered several head wounds that were not considered life-threatening, officials said. Online court records didn't list an attorney for Kang. He was being held without bond.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Researchers Upend AI Status Quo By Eliminating Matrix Multiplication In LLMs

Researchers from UC Santa Cruz, UC Davis, LuxiTech, and Soochow University have developed a new method to run AI language models more efficiently by eliminating matrix multiplication, potentially reducing the environmental impact and operational costs of AI systems. Ars Technica's Benj Edwards reports: Matrix multiplication (often abbreviated to "MatMul") is at the center of most neural network computational tasks today, and GPUs are particularly good at executing the math quickly because they can perform large numbers of multiplication operations in parallel. [...] In the new paper, titled "Scalable MatMul-free Language Modeling," the researchers describe creating a custom 2.7 billion parameter model without using MatMul that features similar performance to conventional large language models (LLMs). They also demonstrate running a 1.3 billion parameter model at 23.8 tokens per second on a GPU that was accelerated by a custom-programmed FPGA chip that uses about 13 watts of power (not counting the GPU's power draw). The implication is that a more efficient FPGA "paves the way for the development of more efficient and hardware-friendly architectures," they write. The paper doesn't provide power estimates for conventional LLMs, but this post from UC Santa Cruz estimates about 700 watts for a conventional model. However, in our experience, you can run a 2.7B parameter version of Llama 2 competently on a home PC with an RTX 3060 (that uses about 200 watts peak) powered by a 500-watt power supply. So, if you could theoretically completely run an LLM in only 13 watts on an FPGA (without a GPU), that would be a 38-fold decrease in power usage. The technique has not yet been peer-reviewed, but the researchers -- Rui-Jie Zhu, Yu Zhang, Ethan Sifferman, Tyler Sheaves, Yiqiao Wang, Dustin Richmond, Peng Zhou, and Jason Eshraghian -- claim that their work challenges the prevailing paradigm that matrix multiplication operations are indispensable for building high-performing language models. They argue that their approach could make large language models more accessible, efficient, and sustainable, particularly for deployment on resource-constrained hardware like smartphones. [...] The researchers say that scaling laws observed in their experiments suggest that the MatMul-free LM may also outperform traditional LLMs at very large scales. The researchers project that their approach could theoretically intersect with and surpass the performance of standard LLMs at scales around 10^23 FLOPS, which is roughly equivalent to the training compute required for models like Meta's Llama-3 8B or Llama-2 70B. However, the authors note that their work has limitations. The MatMul-free LM has not been tested on extremely large-scale models (e.g., 100 billion-plus parameters) due to computational constraints. They call for institutions with larger resources to invest in scaling up and further developing this lightweight approach to language modeling.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

MTV News Website Goes Dark, Archives Pulled Offline

MTVNews.com has been shut down, with more than two decades' worth of content no longer available. "Content on its sister site, CMT.com, seems to have met a similar fate," adds Variety. From the report: In 2023, MTV News was shuttered amid the financial woes of parent company Paramount Global. As of Monday, trying to access MTV News articles on mtvnews.com or mtv.com/news resulted in visitors being redirected to the main MTV website. The now-unavailable content includes decades of music journalism comprising thousands of articles and interviews with countless major artists, dating back to the site's launch in 1996. Perhaps the most significant loss is MTV News' vast hip-hop-related archives, particularly its weekly "Mixtape Monday" column, which ran for nearly a decade in the 2000s and 2010s and featured interviews, reviews and more with many artists, producers and others early in their careers. "So, mtvnews.com no longer exists. Eight years of my life are gone without a trace," Patrick Hosken, former music editor for MTV News, wrote on X. "All because it didn't fit some executives' bottom lines. Infuriating is too small a word." "sickening (derogatory) to see the entire @mtvnews archive wiped from the internet," Crystal Bell, culture editor at Mashable and one-time entertainment director of MTV News, posted on X."decades of music history gone... including some very early k-pop stories." "This is disgraceful. They've completely wiped the MTV News archive," longtime Rolling Stone senior writer Brian Hiatt commented. "Decades of pop culture history research material gone, and why?" The report notes that some MTV News articles may be available via internet archiving services like the Wayback Machine. However, older articles aren't available.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Waymo's Autonomous Ride-Hailing Service Now Available To All In San Francisco

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Alphabet's Waymo said on Tuesday its autonomous ride-hailing service, Waymo One, is now available to everyone in San Francisco, nearly four years after a similar move in Phoenix, Arizona. Driverless vehicles are expected to drive commercial success for automakers even as regulatory scrutiny remains tight amid concerns of investors about growing investments in the nascent technology. Waymo had started a test service with its research-focused program in San Francisco in 2021, which included an autonomous specialist on board for all rides at that time, as it looked to commercialize the technology. The company said that about 300,000 people had signed up to ride with Waymo since it first opened a waitlist in the city, signaling strong demand. Now with open access, anyone can request a ride on its app. The company had opened access to everyone in Phoenix, Arizona without a waitlist in 2020. Mountain View, California-based Waymo is a self-driving technology pioneer, which started its first U.S. driverless taxi service in 2020 over a decade after it was born in 2009 as a project inside Google. In March, the company received approval from the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) to start its Waymo One in Los Angeles and some cities near San Francisco.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Seattle's Living Computers Museum Logs Off For Good

Kurt Schlosser reports via GeekWire: Living Computers Museum + Labs, the Seattle institution created by the late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen as a hands-on showcase for rare computing technology and interactive displays, will not reopen, more than four years after closing just ahead of the pandemic. Allen's estate, which has been managing and winding down his vast array of holdings since his death in 2018, confirmed to GeekWire that the 12-year-old museum is closed for good. The estate also announced Tuesday that some key pieces from Allen's personal collection of computer artifacts, displayed over the years at Living Computers, will be auctioned by Christie's as part of a broader sale of various Allen items later this year. As directed by Allen's wishes, proceeds from the sale of any items will go to charitable causes. Allen's sister Jody Allen is the executor of his estate and for several years has been selling pieces of it, ranging from Seattle's Cinerama movie theater, the Everett, Wash.-based Flying Heritage and Combat Armor Museum, Vulcan Productions, Stratolaunch, the superyacht Octopus, and more. The estate previously teamed up with Christie's for a November 2022 auction of 155 masterpieces from Allen's extensive art collection. It was the world's most successful single-owner fine art auction ever, raising a record $1.62 billion. The new auction, titled "Gen One: Innovations from the Paul G. Allen Collection," is billed as "a celebration of first-generation technologies and the pioneering minds behind them." The event will feature more than 150 items in three separate auctions, including "Firsts: The History of Computing," an online sale closing Sept. 12. This auction pays homage to Allen's role shaping the modern computing landscape. A highlight of the sale is a computer that Allen helped restore and on which he worked, a DEC PDP-10: KI-10. Built in 1971, it's the first computer that both Allen and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates ever used prior to founding Microsoft. It's estimated to fetch $30,000 to $50,000. Christie's said details about other computers and related items from Allen's collection will be shared this summer. The other two auctions of Allen property include "Pushing Boundaries: Ingenuity," a live auction on Sept. 10 that will feature items intended to tell the story of scientific and technological achievements spanning centuries. The top item is a 1939 signed letter from Albert Einstein to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt credited as the impetus behind the establishment of the Manhattan Project. It's estimated to fetch $4 million to $6 million. The third auction is "Over the Horizon: Art of the Future," an online auction closing Sept. 12, showcasing art devoted to interplanetary travel. A sale highlight is Chelsey Bonestell's "Saturn as Seen from Titan," circa 1952, and estimated to fetch $30,000 to $50,000.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

South Korean ISP 'Infected' 600,000 Torrenting Subscribers With Malware

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TorrentFreak: Last week, an in-depth investigative report from JBTC revealed that Korean Internet provider KT, formerly known as Korea Telecom, distributed malware onto subscribers' computers to interfere with and block torrent traffic. File-sharing continues to be very popular in South Korea, but operates differently than in most other countries. "Webhard" services, short for Web Hard Drive, are particularly popular. These are paid BitTorrent-assisted services, which also offer dedicated web seeds, to ensure that files remain available. Webhard services rely on the BitTorrent-enabled 'Grid System', which became so popular in Korea that ISPs started to notice it. Since these torrent transfers use a lot of bandwidth, which is very costly in the country, providers would rather not have this file-sharing activity on their networks. KT, one of South Korea's largest ISPs with over 16 million subscribers, was previously caught meddling with the Grid System. In 2020, their throttling activities resulted in a court case, where the ISP cited 'network management' costs as the prime reason to interfere. The Court eventually sided with KT, ending the case in its favor, but that wasn't the end of the matter. An investigation launched by the police at the time remains ongoing. New reports now show that the raid on KT's datacenter found that dozens of devices were used in the 'throttling process' and they were doing more than just limiting bandwidth. When Webhard users started reporting problems four years ago, they didn't simply complain about slow downloads. In fact, the main concern was that several Grid-based Webhard services went offline or reported seemingly unexplainable errors. Since all complaining users were KT subscribers, fingers were pointed in that direction. According to an investigation by Korean news outlet JBTC, the Internet provider actively installed malware on computers of Webhard services. This activity was widespread and effected an estimated 600,000 KT subscribers. The Gyeonggi Southern Police Agency, which carried out the raid and investigation, believes this was an organized hacking attempt. A dedicated KT team allegedly planted malware to eavesdrop on subscribers and interfere with their private file transfers. [...] Why KT allegedly distributed the malware and what it precisely intended to do is unclear. The police believe there were internal KT discussions about network-related costs, suggesting that financial reasons played a role.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

GM's Cruise Names Former Amazon, Microsoft Xbox Executive As New CEO

Cruise, the autonomous vehicle unit from General Motors, named Amazon and Microsoft executive Marc Whitten as its new CEO, replacing former CEO and co-founder Kyle Vogt. CNBC reports: Whitten was a founding engineer at Microsoft's Xbox before leaving the company after more than 17 years to become chief product officer of audio company Sonos in 2014, according to his LinkedIn profile. He then worked at Amazon as vice president of entertainment devices and services before his most recent role as chief product and technology officer for software development company Unity's Create. His appointment comes at a crucial time for Cruise, which is testing and relaunching its autonomous vehicles on public roadways. It ceased operations weeks after an Oct. 2 accident in which a pedestrian in San Francisco was dragged 20 feet by a Cruise robotaxi. A third-party probe into the October incident ordered by GM and Cruise found that culture issues, ineptitude and poor leadership fueled regulatory oversights that led to the accident. The probe also investigated allegations of a cover-up by Cruise leadership, but investigators did not find evidence to support those claims. During that time, San Francisco-based Cruise was attempting to expand its operations into a revenue-generating business for GM, which has been a majority owner of the company since acquiring it in 2016. Other investors now include Honda Motor, Microsoft, T. Rowe Price, and Walmart. As of this month, Cruise has resumed supervised driving in Phoenix, Houston and Dallas, in addition to its ongoing testing in Dubai. It has not relaunched in San Francisco, where it remains under investigation related to the accident.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

VW To Invest Up To $5 Billion In EV Maker Rivian

Volkswagen today announced it will invest up to $5 billion in U.S. electric-vehicle maker Rivian as part of a new, equally controlled joint venture to share EV architecture and software. Shares surged 40% in extended Nasdaq trading after the announcement. Reuters reports: The investment will provide Rivian - known for its flagship R1S SUVs and R1T pickups - the funding it needs to develop its less-expensive and smaller R2 SUVs that are set to roll out in 2026, CEO RJ Scaringe told Reuters. Volkswagen will initially invest $1 billion in Rivian and a further $4 billion in investments later, the companies said. The partnership will help Volkswagen accelerate its plans to develop software-defined vehicles (SDV), with Rivian licensing its existing intellectual property rights to the joint venture.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

OpenAI To Pull Plug on 'Unsupported' Nations Like China From July 9

ChatGPT developer OpenAI has sent out emails to users based in countries it considers "unsupported," saying it will block their access for good starting July 9. From a report: The email, reproduced on the OpenAI community forum here, includes a brief statement. "Our data shows that your organization has API traffic from a region that OpenAI does not currently support," it reads. "We will be taking additional measures to block API traffic from regions that are not on our supported countries and territories list starting on July 9." "To continue using OpenAI's services, you will need to access the service in a supported region," it concludes. Much of the world has access to OpenAI including virtually the entire West, most of Eastern Europe, South Asia, and about half of Africa. However, there are some notable absences on the list such as Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and mainland China.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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