Goto

Collaborating Authors

 Industry


New York passes law requiring ads to disclose the use of AI performers

Engadget

A bill focused on how someone's name or likeness can be used after their death was also passed. New York is taking steps to regulate the use of AI in the state's entertainment industry. NY State Governor Kathy Hochul passed two pieces of legislation on Thursday that forces certain productions to disclose the use of AI-generated performers, and defines rules around how someone's likeness can be used after their death. Assembly Bill A8887B, now known as S.8420-A, specifically covers the use of AI performers in advertisements. Per Hochul's announcement, the law requires persons who produce or create an advertisement to identify if it includes AI generated synthetic performers.


If offered, rats will use cannabis to deal with stress

Popular Science

Corticosterone is to rodents as cortisol is to humans. Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent every weekday. It appears that rats will often indulge in a bit of cannabis if given the chance, according to new research. But just like many humans, some rodents are more prone to the recreational drug than others. As neuroscientists explain in a study recently published in the journal, stressed rats are far more likely to take a hit than their calmer relatives.


Google's new Call Reason feature marks calls as urgent

FOX News

Android users can now access Google's beta Call Reason feature in Phone by Google app to add urgent labels to calls for better communication context.


Interpreter in tears as Ukrainian boy recalls losing mother in Russian strike

BBC News

An interpreter broke down in tears at the European Parliament in Brussels while translating for an 11-year-old Ukrainian boy who was injured in a Russian missile strike on a hospital in central Ukraine in 2022. Roman Oleksiv's mother was killed in the attack and he has undergone multiple surgeries since. The aspiring ballroom dancer, who was also the subject of an award-winning film, has also received an award from the Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky. A waterspout is a whirling column of air and mist that can form over oceans, seas or large lakes. 'I don't want to be part of this war machine': Young Germans protest against military service plans Germany is introducing voluntary military service to boost national defences after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.


NASA telescope will hunt down 'city killer' asteroids

Science

On a commercial thoroughfare in old town Pasadena, California, a stone's throw from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), you'll find the Neon Retro Arcade. Among its collection of vintage video games is the 1979 Atari classic Asteroids, in which a pixelated spaceship shoots down a barrage of space rocks to stave off fatal collisions. After long days of work at JPL, Amy Mainzer used to rack up high scores on that console. "It was a hoot," she says. It was also apt, considering she oversees a space mission designed to spot dangerous asteroids before they crash into Earth. That mission, the Near-Earth Object (NEO) Surveyor, was conceived in the early 2000s and finally got the green light in 2022. Its components are now being built, tested, and assembled in clean rooms across the United States ahead of its planned launch in September 2027. "We're in the thick of building everything," says Mainzer, NEO Surveyor's principal investigator and now an astronomer at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).


Lawsuit accuses ChatGPT of reinforcing delusions that led to a woman's death

Engadget

Lawsuit accuses ChatGPT of reinforcing delusions that led to a woman's death Stein-Erik Soelberg killed his mother and took his own life back in August. OpenAI has been hit with a wrongful death lawsuit after a man back in August, . The suit names CEO Sam Altman and accuses ChatGPT of putting a target on the back of victim Suzanne Adams, an 83-year-old woman who was killed in her home. The victim's estate, 56-year-old Stein-Erik Soelberg, engaged in delusion-soaked conversations with ChatGPT in which the bot validated and magnified certain paranoid beliefs. The suit goes on to suggest that the chatbot eagerly accepted delusional thoughts leading up to the murder and egged him on every step of the way.


Wireless power grids head to the moon

Popular Science

Private companies are testing new power systems for longer rover missions and future human lunar habitats. Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent every weekday. A future lunar lander bound for the dark side of the moon will carry along a piece of equipment that could make these missions a little bit brighter. The lander in question is operated by Firefly Aerospace, the first commercial company to successfully land and operate spacecraft on the moon. A LightPort wireless power receiver will be mounted atop the Firefly Blue Ghost lander's upper deck.Developed by Canadian aerospace startup Volta Space Technologies, the cargo plays a key role in Volta's ultimate goal: establishing a network of satellites that can wirelessly beam solar power to spacecraft on the lunar surface.


OpenAI Launches GPT-5.2 as It Navigates 'Code Red'

WIRED

The ChatGPT-maker is releasing its "best model yet" as it faces new pressures from Google and other AI competitors. OpenAI has introduced GPT-5.2, its smartest artificial intelligence model yet, with performance gains across writing, coding, and reasoning benchmarks. The launch comes just days after CEO Sam Altman internally declared a "code red," a company-wide push to improve ChatGPT amid intense competition from rivals. "We announced this code red to really signal to the company that we want to marshall resources in one particular area, and that's a way to really define priorities," said OpenAI's CEO of applications, Fidji Simo, in a briefing with reporters on Thursday. "We have had an increase in resources focused on ChatGPT in general."



Disney and OpenAI have made a surprise deal โ€“ what happens next?

New Scientist

Disney and OpenAI have made a surprise deal - what happens next? Disney's famous Mickey Mouse character will soon be available for use in AI-generated videos The world's best-known AI company and the world's best-known entertainment firm have come to a surprise agreement to allow AI versions of some of the most iconic characters in film, TV and cartoons to be used in generative AI videos and images. Social media is dead - here's what comes next The Walt Disney Company has signed a deal with OpenAI that will allow the AI firm's Sora video generation tool and ChatGPT image creator to use more than 200 of Disney's most iconic characters. Meanwhile, Disney remains in dispute with another AI firm, Midjourney, over alleged infringement of their intellectual property (IP), claiming Midjourney aims to "blatantly incorporate and copy Disney's and Universal's famous characters" into their image generating tool. The characters now deemed fair game for OpenAI users include the likes of Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Simba and Mufasa from and Moana, as well as Marvel and Lucasfilm characters, including some of's most well-known names.