'Veronika' Is the First Cow Known to Use a Tool This is the first recorded instance of a bovine using tools from her environment to relieve an itch--leaving scientists astonished. Justice for cartoonist Gary Larson: A team of scientists has observed, for the first time, a cow using a tool in a flexible manner. The ingenuity of "Veronika," as the animal is called, shows that cattle possess enough intelligence to manipulate elements of their environment and solve challenges they would otherwise be unable to overcome. Veronika is a pet cow in Austria. Nor was she trained to do tricks; on the contrary, for the past 10 years she has developed the ability to find branches in the grass, choose one, hold it with her mouth, and scratch herself with it to relieve skin irritation. Until now, only chimpanzees had convincingly demonstrated the ability to employ tools to improve their living conditions.

The latest Epstein Files release appears to contain hundreds of photographs along with court records and other materials. Over the weekend, the Justice Department released three new data sets comprising files related to Jeffrey Epstein . The DOJ had previously released nearly 4,000 documents prior to the Friday midnight deadline required by the Epstein Files Transparency Act . As with Friday's release, the new tranche appears to contain hundreds of photographs, along with various court records pertaining to Epstein. There are around 1,200 pages in all, including images WIRED is currently going through the materials and will update with more detail.

The three years since the release of ChatGPT, OpenAI's generative AI chatbot, have seen huge changes in every part of our lives. Social media is dead - here's what comes next The most high-profile case was filed by Disney and Universal in June, both of whom alleged in a lawsuit that AI image generator Midjourney had been trained on their intellectual property, allowing users to create images that "blatantly incorporate and copy Disney's and Universal's famous characters". The latest on what's new in science and why it matters each day. In October, the Japanese government formally asked OpenAI, the company behind the Sora 2 AI video generator, to respect the intellectual property rights of its culture, including manga and popular video games such as those published by Nintendo. Sora 2 has faced further controversy due to its ability to create lifelike footage of real people.

What we enjoy about generative A.I. may also be its ultimate limitation: we want to see ourselves. During the past few weeks, I've seen a proliferation of A.I.-generated video in my social-media feeds and group texts. The more impressive--or, at least, more personalized--of these have been the work of Sora 2, the updated version of OpenAI's video-generation platform, which the company released on an invitation-only basis at the end of September. This iteration of Sora comes with a socially networked app, and it appears to be much better at integrating you and your friends, say, into a stock scene. What this means is that, when you open up Sora 2, you'll likely see a video of someone you know winning a Nobel Prize, getting drafted into the N.B.A., or flying a bomber plane in the Second World War.

Bryan Cranston pictured speaking at a Sag-Aftra strike rally in 2023 in New York. The Breaking Bad actor went to the union with concerns after users of OpenAI's generative video platform Sora 2 were able to generate his likeness without his consent. Bryan Cranston pictured speaking at a Sag-Aftra strike rally in 2023 in New York. The Breaking Bad actor went to the union with concerns after users of OpenAI's generative video platform Sora 2 were able to generate his likeness without his consent. Users of generative AI video app were able to recreate the Breaking Bad actor's likeness without his consent, which OpenAI called'unintentional' Bryan Cranston has said he is "grateful" to OpenAI for cracking down on deepfakes of himself on the company's generative AI video platform Sora 2, after users were able to generate his voice and likeness without his consent.

T he prompts read like tiny, abstract poems. The scenes come to life before my eyes in the form of AI-generated video. The videos pop up instantly--before my brain has had time to picture the prompts using my own imagination, as if the act of dreaming has been rendered obsolete, inefficient. I am experiencing Vibes, a new social network nested within the Meta AI app--except it's devoid of any actual people. This is a place where users can create an account and ask the company's large language model to illustrate their ideas. The resulting videos are then presented, seemingly at random, to others in a TikTok-style feed.

When Everything Is Fake, What's the Point of Social Media? Earlier this week, a heartwarming post about a girl, a puppy, and a police officer went viral across social media platforms. The post consisted of two dashcam images of a distraught 12-year-old who, desperate to heal her sick puppy, got behind the wheel for the first time and tried to drive to the vet. She was pulled over, but commended by a police officer for being "amazing, strong, compassionate, and smart," and the puppy was saved. Comments flooded in celebrating the bond between a girl and her furry best friend.

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Open AI's new video-generation app is both shocking and terrifying. The new technology can create an AI-generated video that can be up to a minute long.

OpenAI has rolled out a social app powered by Sora 2, its artificial intelligence video generator, which was quickly flooded with videos featuring iconic Japanese intellectual property. In a short video widely shared online, Pokemon frolic through a lush green field while OpenAI CEO Sam Altman watches from the sidelines. He then turns to the camera and says, "I hope Nintendo doesn't sue us." Named for the Japanese word for "sky" due to the product's "limitless potential," according to company lore, the platform was released to a handful of users last week and was quickly flooded with videos featuring iconic Japanese intellectual property (IP), including Pokemon, One Piece and Dragon Ball Z. Such videos, which are only possible to generate because of OpenAI "training" Sora 2 on the work of human creators, have been widely branded "AI slop" by critics.