"Researchers say that a person's intelligence plays a bigger role in their computer proficiency than previously believed," writes SciTechDaily, "so much so that practice alone may not be enough to ensure ease of use." A new study has found that general cognitive abilities, such as perception, reasoning, and memory, are more important than previously believed in determining a person's ability to perform everyday tasks on a computer... "It is clear that differences between individuals cannot be eliminated simply by means of training," says Antti Oulasvirta [a professor at Finland's Aalto University who conducted extensive human-computer interaction research with his team and the University of Helsinki Department of Psychology]. "In the future, user interfaces need to be streamlined for simpler use. This age-old goal has been forgotten at some point, and awkwardly designed interfaces have become a driver for the digital divide. "We cannot promote a deeper and more equal use of computers in society unless we solve this basic problem," Oulasvirta says... This is the first-ever study to measure users' actual ability to perform daily tasks on a PC, as previous studies have relied on participants self-assessing their abilities via questionnaires... "The study revealed that, in particular, working memory, attention, and executive functions stand out as the key abilities. When using a computer, you must determine the order in which things are done and keep in mind what has already been done. A purely mathematical or logical ability does not help in the same way," says university lecturer Viljami Salmela [from the University of Helsinki]. "Our results suggest that contemporary user interfaces are getting so complex that their design is starting to affect inclusivity," their paper concludes, saying that it ultimately raises a question. "How can we design user interfaces to decrease the role of cognitive abilities."

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Celebrating Git's 20th anniversary, GitHub hosted a Q&A with Linus Torvalds, writes Its FOSS News. Among the other revelations: He says his college-age daughter sent a texting saying he's better known at her CS lab for Git than for Linux, "because they actually use Git for everything there." Which he describes as "ridiculous" because he maintained it for just four months before handing it off to Junio Hamano who's been heading up development for more than 19 years now. "When it did what I needed," Torvalds says, "I lost interest." Linus then goes on to share how Git was never a big thing for him, but a means to an end that prevented the Linux kernel from descending into chaos over the absence of a version control system. You see, before Git, Linux used BitKeeper for version control, but its proprietary licensing didn't sit too well with other Linux contributors, and Linus Torvalds had to look for alternatives. As it turned out, existing tools like CVS and Subversion were too slow for the job at hand, prompting him to build a new tool from scratch, with the coding part just taking 10 days for an early self-hostable version of Git. In its initial days, there were some teething issues, where users would complain about Git to Linus, even finding it too difficult to use, but things got calmer as the tool developed further. Torvalds thinks some early adopters had trouble because they were coming from a background that was more like CVS. "The Git mindset, I came at it from a file system person's standpoint, where I had this disdain and almost hatred of most source control management projects, so I was not at all interested in maintaining the status quo."

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"A modern free society has an obligation to offer electronic tax filing that respects user freedom," says a Free Software Foundation blog post, "and the United States is not excluded from this responsibility." "Governments, and/or the companies that they partner with, are responsible for providing free as in freedom software for necessary operations, and tax filing is no exception." For many years now, a large portion of [U.S.] taxpayers have filed their taxes electronically through proprietary programs like TurboTax. Millions of taxpayers are led to believe that they have no other option than to use nonfree software or Service as a Software Substitute (SaaSS), giving up their freedom as well as their most private financial information to a third-party company, in order to file their taxes... While the options for taxpayers have improved slightly with the IRS's implementation of the IRS Direct File program [in 25 states], this program unfortunately does require users to hand over their freedom when filing taxes.... Taxpayers shouldn't have to use a program that violates their individual freedoms to file legally required taxes. While Direct File is a step in the right direction as the program isn't in the hands of a third-party entity, it is still nonfree software. Because Direct File is a US government-operated program, and ongoing in the process of being deployed to twenty-five states, it's not too late to call on the IRS to make Direct File free software. In the meantime, if you need to file US taxes and are yet to file, we suggest filing your taxes in a way that respects your user freedom as much as possible, such as through mailing tax forms. Like with other government interactions that snatch away user freedom, choose the path that most respects your freedom. Free-as-in-freedom software would decrease the chance of user lock-in, the FSF points out. But they list several other advantages, including: Repairability: With free software, there is no uncertain wait period or reliance on a proprietary provider to make any needed bug or security fixes. Transparency: Unless you can check what a program really does (or ask someone in the free software community to check for you), there is no way to know that the program isn't doing things you don't consent to it doing. Cybersecurity: While free software isn't inherently more secure than nonfree software, it does have a tendency to be more secure because many developers can continuously improve the program and search for errors that can be exploited. With proprietary programs like TurboTax, taxpayers and the U.S. government are dependent on TurboTax to protect the sensitive financial and personal information of millions with few (if any) outside checks and balances... Taxpayer dollars spent should actually benefit the taxpayers: Taxpayer dollars should not be used to fund third-party programs that seek to control users and force them to use their programs through lobbying.... "We don't have to accept this unjust reality: we can work for a better future, together," the blog post concludes (offering a "sample message" U.S. taxpayers could send to IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel). "Take action today and help make electronic tax filing free as in freedom for everyone."

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Here's an update from the Wall Street Journal about a "widespread series of alarming cyberattacks on U.S. infrastructure." China was behind it, "Chinese officials acknowledged in a secret December meeting... according to people familiar with the matter..." The Chinese delegation linked years of intrusions into computer networks at U.S. ports, water utilities, airports and other targets, to increasing U.S. policy support for Taiwan, the people, who declined to be named, said... U.S. officials went public last year with unusually dire warnings about the uncovered Volt Typhoon effort. They publicly attributed it to Beijing trying to get a foothold in U.S. computer networks so its army could quickly detonate damaging cyberattacks during a future conflict. [American officials at the meeting perceived the remarks as "intended to scare the U.S. from involving itself if a conflict erupts in the Taiwan Strait."] The Chinese official's remarks at the December meeting were indirect and somewhat ambiguous, but most of the American delegation in the room interpreted it as a tacit admission and a warning to the U.S. about Taiwan, a former U.S. official familiar with the meeting said... In a statement, the State Department didn't comment on the meeting but said the U.S. had made clear to Beijing it will "take actions in response to Chinese malicious cyber activity," describing the hacking as "some of the gravest and most persistent threats to U.S. national security...." A Chinese official would likely only acknowledge the intrusions even in a private setting if instructed to do so by the top levels of Xi's government, said Dakota Cary, a China expert at the cybersecurity firm SentinelOne. The tacit admission is significant, he said, because it may reflect a view in Beijing that the likeliest military conflict with the U.S. would be over Taiwan and that a more direct signal about the stakes of involvement needed to be sent to the Trump administration. "China wants U.S. officials to know that, yes, they do have this capability, and they are willing to use it," Cary said. The article notes that top U.S. officials have said America's Defense Department "will pursue more offensive cyber strikes against China." But it adds that the administration "also plans to dismiss hundreds of cybersecurity workers in sweeping job cuts and last week fired the director of the National Security Agency and his deputy, fanning concerns from some intelligence officials and lawmakers that the government would be weakened in defending against the attacks."

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Long-time Slashdot reader sandbagger brings news that in June "a rare screening of the original 1977 Star Wars movie — complete with Han shooting first — will be shown at a theater in London..." Petapixel reports: Subsequent alterations made to the film are well-documented: Han Solo being shot at by the bounty hunter Greedo first, rather than the original in which anti-hero Han killed Greedo without being shot at. Then there is the addition of a CGI Jabba the Hutt who was only mentioned by name in the 1977 release. Fans have also complained about the color grading painted on re-releases. But for those attending the British Film Institute (BFI)'s Film on Film festival in London, they are in for a treat. Star Wars will play not once but twice on the opening night on June 12... BFI says the print is "unfaded" and "ready to transport us to a long time ago, and a galaxy far, far away, back to the moment in 1977 when George Lucas's vision cast a spell on cinema audiences." Lucas has little sympathy for those who want to see his first version of the film, telling the Associated Press in 2004, "I'm sorry you saw half a completed film and fell in love with it. But I want it to be the way I want it to be." The film festival promises "a glorious dye-transfer" of Star Wars — and will also show "a pristine 35mm print of the original US pilot episode of Twin Peaks, screening for the first time ever in the UK" — followed by a Q&A with the 1990 show's original star Kyle MacLachlan. On display to coincide with the opening night screening there is also a rare opportunity to view material from the original continuity script for Star Wars, which includes rare on-set Polaroids, annotations and deleted scenes. The script is from the collection of Ann Skinner, script editor on the original film, and is now cared for by the BFI National Archive.

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Slashdot reader king*jojo shared this article from The Register: A 23-year-old side-channel attack for spying on people's web browsing histories will get shut down in the forthcoming Chrome 136, released last Thursday to the Chrome beta channel. At least that's the hope. The privacy attack, referred to as browser history sniffing, involves reading the color values of web links on a page to see if the linked pages have been visited previously... Web publishers and third parties capable of running scripts, have used this technique to present links on a web page to a visitor and then check how the visitor's browser set the color for those links on the rendered web page... The attack was mitigated about 15 years ago, though not effectively. Other ways to check link color information beyond the getComputedStyle method were developed... Chrome 136, due to see stable channel release on April 23, 2025, "is the first major browser to render these attacks obsolete," explained Kyra Seevers, Google software engineer in a blog post. This is something of a turnabout for the Chrome team, which twice marked Chromium bug reports for the issue as "won't fix." David Baron, presently a Google software engineer who worked for Mozilla at the time, filed a Firefox bug report about the issue back on May 28, 2002... On March 9, 2010, Baron published a blog post outlining the issue and proposing some mitigations...

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America's Justice Department "has shut down its unit that investigates cryptocurrency fraud," reports USA Today. A Monday night memo from U.S. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the shut down was "effective immediately." Blanche directed the closure of the National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team and ordered prosecutors to pivot to investigating transnational criminal organizations and terrorist groups that use crypto to engage in illicit transactions... In his four-page memo, Blanche said the new order was meant to bring the Justice Department in line with Trump's own Executive Order 14178, which decreed that clarity and certainty regarding enforcement policy "are essential to supporting a vibrant and inclusive digital economy and innovation in digital assets." Blanche, one of several Trump criminal defense lawyers at the top ranks of DOJ, said the president "has also made clear that '[w]e are going to end the regulatory weaponization against digital assets'..." Consistent with that narrowing of its cryptocurrency enforcement policy, the DOJ Market Integrity and Major Frauds Unit will also cease cryptocurrency enforcement to focus on other administration priorities, including immigration and procurement fraud, Blanche said. The Washington Post got this assessment from Yesha Yadav, a Vanderbilt University law professor who closely follows cryptocurrency and financial markets. "It's hard to underestimate the importance this task force has had ... in pursuing some really huge crypto hacks and cases." More from USA Today: Public corruption and transnational crime experts warned that shutting down the unit could divert critical resources from efforts to stop criminals and corrupt regimes from using cryptocurrency for illicit gain, even as Trump claims he wants to crack down on them. "Dangerous US adversaries rely on cryptocurrencies to launder money and evade sanctions," said Nate Sibley, an anti-corruption expert and director of the Kleptocracy Initiative at the conservative Hudson Institute think tank in Washington, D.C., in a post on X. "If this is accurate, hard to see how it squares with — for example-cracking down on cartel finances or maximum pressure sanctions on Iran...." Trump's so-called "memecoin" surged from less than $10 on the Saturday before his inauguration to as high as $74.59 before eventually giving up some of its gains. The token, branded $TRUMP, has been criticized by ethics experts as a conflict of interest for the president since the company could likely benefit from his pro-crypto policies... Last month, Trump signed an order to create a federal Strategic Bitcoin Reserve, signaling new federal support for cryptocurrency in general and Bitcoin in particular. Since the first-ever White House crypto summit in March, America's Securities and Exchange Commission "has dropped more than a dozen cases against crypto firms," notes the Washington Post: Last month, both the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency pledged to stop evaluating banks based on "reputational risk" — a practice that some venture capitalists have claimed unfairly "de-banked" founders of cryptocurrency start-ups. In other news, executives from cryptocurrency exchange Binance "met with Treasury Department officials last month," reports the Wall Street Journal, asking them to remove a U.S. monitor overseeing their compliance with anti-money-laundering laws, according to people familiar with the talks. The article adds that Binance is also concurrently "exploring" a deal with the Trump family to list its new dollar-pegged stablecoin which "could catapult it into a huge market and potentially bring in billions in profit for the family. "

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Black holes "often exhibit long periods of dormancy," writes Popular Science, adding that astronomers had never witnessed a black hole "wake up" in real time. "Until now..." In February of 2024 X-ray bursts were spotted coming out of a black hole named Ansky by Lorena Hernández-García at Chile's Valparaiso University, according to the article. And what astronomers have now seen "challenges prevailing theories about black hole lifecycles." Hernández-García and collaborators then determined the black hole was displaying a phenomenon known as a quasiperiodic eruption, or QPE [a short-lived flaring event...] While a black hole inevitably destroys everything it captures, objects behave differently during their impending demise. A star, for example, generally stretches apart into a bright, hot, fast-spinning disc known as an accretion disc. Most astronomers have theorized that black holes generate QPEs when a comparatively small object like a star or even a smaller black hole collides with an accretion disc. In the case of Ansky, however, there isn't any evidence linking it to the death of a star. "The bursts of X-rays from Ansky are ten times longer and ten times more luminous than what we see from a typical QPE," said MIT PhD student and study co-author Joheen Chakraborty. "Each of these eruptions is releasing a hundred times more energy than we have seen elsewhere. Ansky's eruptions also show the longest cadence ever observed, of about 4.5 days." Astronomers must now consider other explanations for Ansky's remarkable behavior. One theory posits that the accretion disc could come from nearby galactic gas pulled in by the black hole instead of a star. If true, then the X-rays may originate from high energy shocks to the disc caused by a small cosmic object repeatedly passing through and disrupting orbital matter. It's detailed in a study published on April 11 in Nature Astronomy.... Meanwhile, scientists "have uncovered the strongest evidence yet for the existence of elusive intermediate-mass black holes," reports SciTechDaily. And there's more black hole news from RockDoctor (Slashdot reader #15,477): Given the recent work on galaxy-centre Super-Massive Black Holes (SMBHs), you may be surprised to learn that the only Stellar-Mass Black Holes (SMBHs ... uh, "BHs") identified to-date have been by their gravitational waves, as they merge with another BH or a neutron star. But the long-running OGLE (Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment) project (1992 — present) has recently confirmed that it has detected an isolated BH not orbiting another bright object, or "swallowing" much of anything... In this case, 16 other telescopes performed sensitive astrometry (position measurement) over 11 years including the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). These multiple measurements plot an ellipse on the sky, mirroring the movement of the Earth around it's orbit — parallax. Which means this is a relatively close object (1520 parsecs / ~5000 light years).... And there is no sign of a third light emitting body nearby, which means this is an isolated black hole, not orbiting any other body (or, indeed, with any other [small] star orbiting it).

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People "are likely to continue working full-time even if they receive no-strings-attached universal basic income payments," reports CNN, citing results from a recent experiment in Germany (discussed on Slashdot in 2020): Mein Grundeinkommen (My Basic Income), the Berlin-based non-profit that ran the German study, followed 122 people for three years. From June 2021 to May 2024, this group received an unconditional sum of €1,200 ($1,365) per month. The study focused on people aged between 21 and 40 who lived alone and already earned between 1,100 euros (around $1,250) and 2,600 euros ($2,950) a month. They were free to use the extra money from the study on anything they wanted. Over the course of three years, the only condition was that they had to fill out a questionnaire every six months that asked about different areas of their lives, including their financial situation, work patterns, mental well-being and social engagement. One concern voiced by critics is that receiving a basic income could make people less inclined to work. But the Grundeinkommen study suggests that may not be the case at all. It found that receiving a basic income was not a reason for people to quit their jobs. On average, study participants worked 40 hours a week and stayed in employment — identical to the study's control group, which received no payment. "We find no evidence that people love doing nothing," Susann Fiedler, a professor at the Vienna University of Economics and Business who was involved with the study, said on the study's website. Unlike the control group, those receiving a basic income were more likely to change jobs or enroll in further education. They reported greater satisfaction in their working life — and were "significantly" more satisfied with their income... And can more money buy happiness? According to the study, the recipients of a basic income reported feeling that their lives were "more valuable and meaningful" and felt a clear improvement in their mental health.

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The Washington Post reports: The United States urgently needs more energy to fuel an artificial intelligence race with China that the country can't afford to lose, industry leaders told lawmakers at a House hearing on Wednesday. "We need energy in all forms," said Eric Schmidt, former CEO of Google, who now leads the Special Competitive Studies Project, a think tank focused on technology and security. "Renewable, nonrenewable, whatever. It needs to be there, and it needs to be there quickly." It was a nearly unanimous sentiment at the four-hour-plus hearing of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which revealed bipartisan support for ramping up U.S. energy production to meet skyrocketing demand for energy-thirsty AI data centers. The hearing showed how the country's AI policy priorities have changed under President Donald Trump. President Joe Biden's wide-ranging 2023 executive order on AI had sought to balance the technology's potential rewards with the risks it poses to workers, civil rights and national security. Trump rescinded that order within days of taking office, saying its "onerous" requirements would "threaten American technological leadership...." [Data center power consumption] is already straining power grids, as residential consumers compete with data centers that can use as much electricity as an entire city. And those energy demands are projected to grow dramatically in the coming years... [Former Google CEO Eric] Schmidt, whom the committee's Republicans called as a witness on Wednesday, told [committee chairman Brett] Guthrie that winning the AI race is too important to let environmental considerations get in the way... Once the United States beats China to develop superintelligence, Schmidt said, AI will solve the climate crisis. And if it doesn't, he went on, China will become the world's sole superpower. (Schmidt's view that AI will become superintelligent within a decade is controversial among experts, some of whom predict the technology will remain limited by fundamental shortcomings in its ability to plan and reason.) The industry's wish list also included "light touch" federal regulation, high-skill immigration and continued subsidies for chip development. Alexandr Wang, the young billionaire CEO of San Francisco-based Scale AI, said a growing patchwork of state privacy laws is hampering AI companies' access to the data needed to train their models. He called for a federal privacy law that would preempt state regulations and prioritize innovation. Some committee Democrats argued that cuts to scientific research and renewable energy will actually hamper America's AI competitiveness, according to the article. " But few questioned the premise that the U.S. is locked in an existential struggle with China for AI supremacy. "That stark outlook has nearly coalesced into a consensus on Capitol Hill since China's DeepSeek chatbot stunned the AI industry with its reasoning skills earlier this year."

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Skype is shutting down after two decades on May 5th, notes the Washington Post. But the bigger problem for retired attorney Karen Griffin is that Microsoft won't refund the money they paid into a Skype account for cheap international phone calls: "They're no longer offering this service that I prepaid for, and now they're not giving me my money back," Griffin said. "There's a lot of people out there who are going to lose money...." To its credit, Microsoft gave Skype users a couple months' warning about the shutdown coming May 5. People can transfer Skype contacts and chat history to the company's Microsoft Teams chat-and-calling app or to other companies' services. (While Microsoft sells Teams to organizations, there's a free version for personal use.) But Microsoft didn't explain well what will happen to money that people like Griffin have parked in Skype accounts, in some cases for years.... Unless you bought Skype credits very recently, Microsoft said it won't refund money in Skype accounts. The company says it will add an option for Skype account holders to keep using their funds for phone calls online or in Teams. Griffin doesn't love what Microsoft is doing. She prefers a cash refund or a credit applied to her Microsoft Office subscription, for which she pays about $110 a year. Amit Fulay, vice president of product for Skype and Teams, said it's not possible to shift funds from a Skype account to Office subscriptions. And he nixed refunds because Microsoft will still offer basic call services for former Skype customers. "Refunds make more sense if you took away something," Fulay said. "We're not." Microsoft declined to say how much money Skype users collectively have sitting in accounts that they might never use. Stacey Higginbotham, a policy specialist with Consumer Reports' technology advocacy team, said Griffin is making a reasonable request for a rich company like Microsoft that's shutting down an internet service. "The best way: Give people their money back. The second-best way, give people a credit to all of your services," Higginbotham said.

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Smartphones, computer monitors, semiconductors, and various other electronics will be exempt from U.S. President Trump's tariffs, reports CNN, "according to a US Customs and Border Protection notice posted late Friday." And several other products also received an exemption which "applies to products entering the United States or removed from warehouses as early as April 5, according to the notice." Roughly 90% of Apple's iPhone production and assembly is based in China, according to Wedbush Securities' estimates. Counterpoint Research, a firm that monitors global smartphone shipments, estimated Apple has up to six weeks of inventory in the United States. Once that supply runs out, prices would have been expected to go up... Semiconductors and microchips are among the products heavily outsourced to factories in Asia due to lower costs. Those electronic parts are now exempt, according to the Friday notice. That could help Asian chipmakers, such as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), South Korea's Samsung and SK Hynix. The exemptions also include solar cells, memory cards, and computers, according to the BBC. "It was not clear whether technology imports from China would still be hit by a 20% tariff that was not part of the reciprocal tariffs announced on 2 April..." Thanks to Slashdot readers Alain Williams and Mr. Dollar Ton for sharing the news.

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A former Facebook employee/whistleblower alleges Meta's AI model Lllama was used to help DeepSeek. The whistleblower — former Facebook director of global policy Sarah Wynn-Williams — testified before U.S. Senators on Wednesday. CBS News found this earlier response from Meta: In a statement last year on Llama, Meta spokesperson Andy Stone wrote, "The alleged role of a single and outdated version of an American open-source model is irrelevant when we know China is already investing over 1T to surpass the US technologically, and Chinese tech companies are releasing their own open AI models as fast, or faster, than US ones." Wynn-Williams encouraged senators to continue investigating Meta's role in the development of artificial intelligence in China, as they continue their probe into the social media company founded by Zuckerberg. "The greatest trick Mark Zuckerberg ever pulled was wrapping the American flag around himself and calling himself a patriot and saying he didn't offer services in China, while he spent the last decade building an $18 billion business there," she said. The testimony also left some of the lawmakers skeptical of Zuckerberg's commitment to free speech after the whistleblower also alleged Facebook worked "hand in glove" with the Chinese government to censor its platforms: In her almost seven years with the company, Wynn-Williams told the panel she witnessed the company provide "custom built censorship tools" for the Chinese Communist Party. She said a Chinese dissident living in the United States was removed from Facebook in 2017 after pressure from Chinese officials. Facebook said at the time it took action against the regime critic, Guo Wengui, for sharing someone else's personal information. Wynn-Williams described the use of a "virality counter" that flagged posts with over 10,000 views for review by a "chief editor," which Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut called "an Orwellian censor." These "virality counters" were used not only in Mainland China, but also in Hong Kong and Taiwan, according to Wynn-Williams's testimony. Wynn-Williams also told senators Chinese officials could "potentially access" the data of American users.

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Scientists "demonstrated a promising step toward using a person's own immune cells to fight gastrointestinal cancers" at America's National Institutes of Health (or NIH), reports the Washington Post. But the results were published in Nature Medicine on Tuesday — "the same day the agency was hit with devastating layoffs..." The treatment approach is still early in its development; the personalized immunotherapy regimen shrank tumors in only about a quarter of the patients with colon, rectal and other GI cancers enrolled in a clinical trial. But a researcher who was not involved in the study called the results "remarkable" because they highlight a path to a frustratingly elusive goal in medicine — harnessing a person's own immune defenses to target common solid tumor cancers. Until now, cell-based immunotherapy has worked mainly on blood cancers, such as leukemia, but not the solid cancers that seed tumors in the breast, brain, lungs, pancreas and GI tract... But the progress arrives at a sad time for science — and for patients, said the leader of the work, NIH immunotherapy pioneer Steven Rosenberg. Two patients' treatments using the experimental therapy had to be delayed because NIH's capacity to make personalized cell therapies has been slowed by the firing of highly skilled staff and by purchasing slowdowns. Those occurred even before major layoffs took place Tuesday... The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) responded to an email asking about clinical trial delays with a statement: "NIH and HHS are complying with President Trump's executive order." It's "a very exciting study," said Patrick Hwu, president of the Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa. Finding ways to tailor this cell-based immunotherapy approach to common solid tumors that cause the vast majority of cancer deaths has remained a major scientific challenge... Rosenberg and colleagues first tried to create tumor infiltrating lymphocytes [or "TILs"] using the method that worked in melanoma for 18 patients with GI cancers that had spread. It failed completely. In a second iteration, his team sequenced the mutations present in each patient's tumor and used that information to sift out and expand the TILs that could home in on that patient's specific tumor cells. The results were far from a triumph, but provided a clue — this time, three of 39 patients' tumors shrank. In the last stage of the trial, the scientists added a drug called pembrolizumab that takes the brakes off immune cells. This time, eight of the 34 patients responded. "Right now, only a few labs in the country can do what they just did," Hwu said. While Rosenberg is already working "to refine and improve upon the results," he told the Post that two scientists involved in the specialized process of preparing the cells to treat patients were fired in the probationary purge. "We've had to slow down our work and delay the treatment of some patients...." And there's also dramatically fewer people now who can purchase research materials, which the Post says it "making it slower and more difficult to obtain supplies."

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Brain rot — the inability to think deeply after too much scrolling on a phone — afflicts "plenty of people," writes the New York Times' lead consumer technology writer. [Alternate URL here.] He's suffering from it too — "These days, it's tough to even finish a book." But is the answer just avoiding distractions with a stripped-down $600 phone "that barely does anything"? For a week he tested the Light Phone III... The newest version, which began shipping in March and is set for a broader release in July, can place calls, send texts, take photos, show map directions, play music and podcasts and not do much else. There is no web browser. There is also no app store, meaning there's no Uber to hail a ride, no Slack and no social media. There isn't even email... There were moments I enjoyed it. While waiting for a train, resting at the gym or eating alone, I was not tempted to stare at the phone screen, and I felt more mindful of my surroundings. Phone calls sounded nice and clear. The maps app did a fine job navigating me around town. It reminded me of simpler times when we used phones primarily to converse before putting them away to focus on other tasks. But over the week, the downsides of a dumber phone chipped away at my enjoyment, and overall I felt more stressed and less capable. I suddenly found myself unable to get into a train station, look up the name of a new restaurant or control my garage door. Some of that has less to do with the Light Phone itself, which is a so-so product, and more to do with how society as a whole has become dependent on advanced smartphone features. For example, his old smartphone supported virtual phone-based passes for mass transit and speedy access to his gym. (And his friends made phone of the Light Phone's photos.) But at least never felt tempted to check his email when out to dinner. "While I admire the goal of the Light Phone, my experience demonstrates there's nothing we can realistically do or buy to bring us back to simpler times. So many aspects of our lives, including getting around town, working, paying for things and controlling home appliances, revolve around our highly capable smartphones. "This Light Phone experiment reminded me of glamping: paying a lot to have an artificially crummier experience."

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"Gen Z is rediscovering Tumblr — a chaotic, cozy corner of the internet untouched by algorithmic gloss and influencer overload..." writes Fast Company, "embracing the platform as a refuge from an internet saturated with influencers and algorithm fatigue." Thanks to Gen Z, the site has found new life. As of 2025, Gen Z makes up 50% of Tumblr's active monthly users and accounts for 60% of new sign-ups, according to data shared with Business Insider's Amanda Hoover, who recently reported on the platform's resurgence. User numbers spiked in January during the near-ban of TikTok and jumped again last year when Brazil temporarily banned X. In response, Tumblr users launched dedicated communities to archive and share their favorite TikToks... To keep up with the momentum, Tumblr introduced Reddit-style Communities in December, letting users connect over shared interests like photography and video games. In January, it debuted Tumblr TV — a TikTok-like feature that serves as both a GIF search engine and a short-form video platform. But perhaps Tumblr's greatest strength is that it isn't TikTok or Facebook. Currently the 10th most popular social platform in the U.S., according to analytics firm Similarweb, Tumblr is dwarfed by giants like Instagram and X. For its users, though, that's part of the appeal. First launched in 2007, Tumblr peaked at over 100 million users in 2014, according to the article. Trends like Occupy Wall Street had been born on Tumblr, notes Business Insider, calling the blogging platform "Gen Z's safe space... as the rest of the social internet has become increasingly commodified, polarized, and dominated by lifestyle influencers." Tumblr was also "one of the most hyped startups in the world before fading into obsolescence — bought by Yahoo for $1.1 billion in 2013... then acquired by Verizon, and later offloaded for fractions of pennies on the dollar in a distressed sale. "That same Tumblr, a relic of many millennials' formative years, has been having a moment among Gen Z..." "Gen Z has this romanticism of the early-2000s internet," says Amanda Brennan, an internet librarian who worked at Tumblr for seven years, leaving her role as head of content in 2021... Part of the reason young people are hanging out on old social platforms is that there's nowhere new to go. The tech industry is evolving at a slower pace than it was in the 2000s, and there's less room for disruption. Big Tech has a stranglehold on how we socialize. That leaves Gen Z to pick up the scraps left by the early online millennials and attempt to craft them into something relevant. They love Pinterest (founded in 2010) and Snapchat (2011), and they're trying out digital point-and-shoot cameras and flip phones for an early-2000s aesthetic — and learning the valuable lesson that sometimes we look better when blurrier. More Gen Zers and millennials are signing up for Yahoo. Napster, surprising many people with its continued existence, just sold for $207 million. The trend is fueled by nostalgia for Y2K aesthetics and a longing for a time when people could make mistakes on the internet and move past them. The pandemic also brought more Gen Z users to Tumblr... And Tumblr still works much like an older internet, where people have more control over what they see and rely less on algorithms. "You curate your own stuff; it takes a little bit of work to put everything in place, but when it's working, you see the content you want to see," Fjodor Everaerts, a 26-year-old in Belgium who has made some 250,000 posts since he joined Tumblr when he was 14... Under Automattic, Tumblr is finally in the home that serves it, [says Ari Levine, the head of brand partnerships at Tumblr]. "We've had ups and downs along the way, but we're in the most interesting position and place that we've been in 18 years," he says... And following media companies (including Business Insider) and social platforms like Reddit, Automattic in 2024 was making a deal with OpenAI and Midjourney to allow the systems to train on Tumblr posts. "The social internet is fractured," the article argues. ("Millennials are running Reddit. Gen Xers and Baby Boomers have a home on Facebook. Bluesky, one of the new X alternatives, has a tangible elder-millennial/Gen X vibe. Gen Zers have created social apps like BeReal and the Myspace-inspired Noplace, but they've so far generated more hype than influence....") But in a world where megaplatforms "flatten our online experiences and reward content that fits a mold," the article suggests, "smaller communities can enrich them."

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"U.S. stock market futures plunged on Sunday evening," reports Yahoo Finance, "after the new U.S. tariff policy began collecting duties over the weekend..." The EU will vote on $28 billion in retaliatory tariffs Wednesday, Reuters reports. (And those tariffs will be approved unless "a qualified majority of 15 EU members representing 65% of the EU's population oppose it. They would enter force in two stages, a smaller part on April 15 and the rest a month later.") But France's Economy and Finance Minister has an idea: more strictly regulating how data is used by America's Big Tech companies. Politico EU reports/A>: "We may strengthen certain administrative requirements or regulate the use of data," Lombard said in an interview with Le Journal Du Dimanche. He added that another option could be to "tax certain activities," without being more specific. A French government spokesperson already said last week that the EU's retaliation against U.S. tariffs could include "digital services that are currently not taxed." That suggestion was fiercely rejected by Ireland, which hosts the European headquarters of several U.S. Big Tech firms... Technology is seen as a possible area for Europe to retaliate. The European Union has a €157 billion trade surplus in goods, which means it exports more than it imports, but it runs a deficit of €109 billion in services, including digital services. Big Tech giants like Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Google and Meta dominate many parts of the market in Europe. Amid the market turmoil, what about cryptocurrencies, often seen as a "proxy" for the level of risk felt by investors? In the 10 weeks after October 6, the price of Bitcoin skyrocketed 67% to $106,490 by December 10th. But by January 30th it had started dropping again, and now sits at $77,831 — still up 22% for the last six months, but down nearly 27% over the last 10 weeks. Yet even after all that volatility, Bitcoin suddenly fell again more than 6% on Sunday, reports Reuters, "as markets plunged amid tariff tensions. Ether, the second largest cryptocurrency, fell more than 10% on Sunday."

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"Three Microsoft CEOs walk into a room..." Satya Nadella posted on X.com, "and are interviewed by Copilot!" As part of Microsoft's 50th anniversary celebration, Microsoft CEO Nadella joined former Microsoft CEOs Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer in a funny two-minute video (also available on YouTube) in which Nadella asks Copilot for an AI-powered roast of each of them. "All right Satya," Copilot answers. "Let's spice it up..." Copilot: Steve, we'll start with you. Your enthusiasm is legendary. But do you ever worry that your energy might short-circuit the AI? I mean, even robots need a coffee break after your pep talks. Steve Ballmer: Come on dude! If you can't handle me, you can't handle a huge percentage of the world's population! We're counting on you! Copilot: Ha ha, fair point Steve. Now Bill, you've got that signature thoughtful gaze. But do you ever think the AI might feel intimidated by your intense thinking face? I mean, it's like it's waiting for a blue screen moment. Bill Gates: I hope so. I mean, it's all I've got left as the AIs get so damn intelligent. It's just that gaze and my willingness to criticize that differentiates me. Copilot: And it's a formidable gaze indeed, Bill. Steve Ballmer: Copilot, would you ever be willing to criticize him? Copilot: Absolutely. Criticism is where growth happens. Now Satya, AI seems to be your best buddy — but ever worry that your deep passion for AI could one day have it running the show, leaving you to just enjoy the ride? Satya Nadella: Well, the day AI can play like the best cricket player that I enjoy, that's the day it can run the show, as far as I'm concerned. Copilot: Touche, Satya. Let's see if it can hit a century in cricket and then we'll talk. This has been a blast, gentlemen. Here's to another 50 years of innovation and adventure. Cheers. Ballmer, Nadella, and Gates: Cheers. Bill Gates: Whatever that means to an AI. Does it drink?

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Nuclear fusion — which releases four times the energy of fission — could theoretically happen sooner in space than on earth, reports CNN. "And it could help spacecraft achieve speeds of up to 500,000 miles (805,000 kilometers) per hour — more than the fastest object ever built..." With funding from the UK Space Agency, British startup Pulsar Fusion has unveiled Sunbird, a space rocket concept designed to meet spacecraft in orbit, attach to them, and carry them to their destination at breakneck speed using nuclear fusion... For now, Sunbird is in the very early stages of construction and it has exceptional engineering challenges to overcome, but Pulsar says it hopes to achieve fusion in orbit for the first time in 2027. [Pulsar's founder/CEO says the first functional Sunbird would be ready four to five years later.] If the rocket ever becomes operational, it could one day cut the journey time of a potential mission to Mars in half. CNN says the proposed Sunbird process would use helium-3 — which may be abundant on the Moon — to generate protons which "can be used as a 'nuclear exhaust' to provide propulsion". (And without generating any dangerous radioactive material.) "It's very unnatural to do fusion on Earth," says Richard Dinan, founder and CEO of Pulsar. "Fusion doesn't want to work in an atmosphere. Space is a far more logical, sensible place to do fusion, because that's where it wants to happen anyway...." Sunbirds would operate similarly to city bikes at docking stations, according to Dinan: "We launch them into space, and we would have a charging station where they could sit and then meet your ship," he says. "You turn off your inefficient combustion engines, and use nuclear fusion for the greater part of your journey. Ideally, you'd have a station somewhere near Mars, and you'd have a station on low Earth orbit, and the (Sunbirds) would just go back and forth...." Initially, the Sunbirds will be offered for shuttling satellites in orbit, but their true potential would come into play with interplanetary missions. The company illustrates a few examples of the missions that Sunbird could unlock, such as delivering up to 2,000 kilograms (4,400 pounds) of cargo to Mars in under six months, deploying probes to Jupiter or Saturn in two to four years (NASA's Europa Clipper, launched in 2024 towards one of Jupiter's moons, will arrive after 5.5 years), and an asteroid mining mission that would complete a round trip to a near-Earth asteroid in one to two years instead of three. Other companies are working on nuclear fusion engines for space propulsion, including Pasadena-based Helicity Space, which received investment from aerospace giant Lockheed Martin in 2024. San Diego-based General Atomics and NASA are working on another type of nuclear reactor — based on fission rather than fusion — which they plan to test in space in 2027.

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It was already the best-selling videogame of all time, notes the Hollywood Reporter. And A Minecraft Movie just had the biggest opening ever for a video game movie adaptation. WIth a production budget of $150 million, it earned in $157 million in just its first weekend in the U.S., with a worldwide total of $301 million. A Warner Bros. executive called the movie "lightning in a bottle," while the head of co-producer Legendary Pictures acknowledged the game is a global phenomon, according to the article. (About the movie's performance, the executive "said the opening is a both a reflection of the mandate to celebrate the world of Minecraft in a joyful way, and the singular experience that only theatrical can offer." But an unfinished version leaked online before the movie was even released, reports Variety Screenshots and footage from the fantasy adventure were being shared widely on social media platforms this week, and were also available on file sharing sites. The images and scenes have uncompleted visual effects. Most of the footage was quickly taken down by the rights holders. Although pirated footage is a common problem for major film releases, it's rare to have a working print leak online in this way, raising questions about how such an early version of the movie was accessed, stolen and then shared.

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