An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Google has announced a tiny version of its Gemma open model designed to run on local devices. Google says the new Gemma 3 270M can be tuned in a snap and maintains robust performance despite its small footprint. [...] Running an AI model locally has numerous benefits, including enhanced privacy and lower latency. Gemma 3 270M was designed with these kinds of use cases in mind. In testing with a Pixel 9 Pro, the new Gemma was able to run 25 conversations on the Tensor G4 chip and use just 0.75 percent of the device's battery. That makes it by far the most efficient Gemma model. Developers shouldn't expect the same performance level of a multi-billion-parameter model, but Gemma 3 270M has its uses. Google used the IFEval benchmark, which tests a model's ability to follow instructions, to show that its new model punches above its weight. Gemma 3 270M hits a score of 51.2 percent in this test, which is higher than other lightweight models that have more parameters. The new Gemma falls predictably short of 1 billion-plus models like Llama 3.2, but it gets closer than you might think for having just a fraction of the parameters. Google claims Gemma 3 270M is good at following instructions out of the box, but it expects developers to fine-tune the model for their specific use cases. Due to the small parameter count, that process is fast and low-cost, too. Google sees the new Gemma being used for tasks like text classification and data analysis, which it can accomplish quickly and without heavy computing requirements. You can download the new Gemma for free, and the model weights are available. There's no separate commercial licensing agreement, so developers can modify, publish, and deploy Gemma 3 270M derivatives in their tools. You can download Gemma 3 270M from Hugging Face and Kaggle in both pre-trained and instruction-tuned versions.

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Apple has reintroduced blood oxygen monitoring to certain Apple Watch models in the U.S. by shifting the feature's calculations to the paired iPhone, sidestepping an ITC import ban stemming from its legal dispute with medical device maker Masimo. TechCrunch reports: Blood oxygen data will be measured and calculated on the user's paired iPhone, and results can be viewed in the Respiratory section of the Health app. This means users won't be able to view the data on their Apple Watch, as they'll need to do so on their iPhone. Apple says the update announced today is enabled by a recent U.S. Customs ruling, which means that the tech giant is allowed to import Apple Watches with the redesigned Blood Oxygen feature. The change doesn't affect previously sold models with the original version of the feature or units bought outside the U.S. The redesigned feature only applies to Apple Watches that were sold after the ITC import ban took effect in early 2024. These users can access the redesigned Blood Oxygen feature through an iPhone and Apple Watch software update coming on Thursday.

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PayPal payment processing has been unavailable for Steam purchases in most countries since early July 2025, Valve has confirmed, with functionality limited to transactions in U.S. dollars, Euros, British Pounds, Japanese Yen, Australian dollars, and Canadian dollars. In a statement to RockPaperShotgun, the company said one of PayPal's acquiring banks terminated all Steam transaction processing. Valve linked the bank's decision to previous Mastercard-related content restrictions. The disruption began in early July 2025 when PayPal notified Valve of the immediate termination, leaving millions of users in affected regions without PayPal access and no certain timeline for resolution.

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Astronomers have observed the calamitous result of a star that picked the wrong dance partner. They have documented what appears to be a new type of supernova, as stellar explosions are known, that occurred when a massive star tried to swallow a black hole with which it had engaged in a lengthy pas de deux. The star, which was at least 10 times as massive as our sun, and the black hole, which had a similar mass, were gravitationally bound to one another in what is called a binary system. But as the distance separating them gradually narrowed, the black hole's immense gravitational pull appears to have distorted the star -- stretching it out from its spherical shape -- and siphoned off material before causing it to explode. An AI algorithm detected the event in real time, enabling astronomers to conduct comprehensive observations. Data from four years before the supernova showed bright emissions as the black hole consumed its companion's outer hydrogen layer. The exact mechanism remains uncertain -- either gravitational distortion triggered the star's collapse or the black hole completely tore it apart first. Following the explosion, the black hole consumed residual stellar debris, growing more massive.

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Negotiations on a global treaty to end plastic pollution are drawing to a close Thursday, as nations remain deadlocked over whether to tackle the exponential growth of plastic production. From a report: A draft of the treaty released Wednesday wouldn't limit plastic production or address chemicals used in plastic products. Instead, it's centered on proposals where there's broad agreement -- such as reducing the number of problematic plastic products that often enter the environment and are difficult to recycle, promoting the redesign of plastic products so they can be recycled and reused, and improving waste management. It asks nations to make commitments to ending plastic pollution, rather than imposing global, legally-binding rules. French President Emmanuel Macron said the "lack of ambition" in the draft treaty was unacceptable, and that agreeing to a global treaty against plastic pollution "is our opportunity to make a difference."

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Former Sony Worldwide Studios chairman Shawn Layden criticized subscription gaming services like Xbox Game Pass, arguing that developers working under such models become "wage slaves." Speaking in a recent industry discussion, Layden contended that subscription services prevent developers from traditional profit-sharing arrangements. "They're not creating value, putting it in the marketplace, hoping it explodes, and profit sharing, and overages, and all that nice stuff," Layden said. "It's just, 'You pay me X dollars an hour, I built you a game, here, go put it on your servers.'" He called the model uninspiring for game developers.

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An anonymous reader shares a report: OpenAI is considering ways to bring in additional revenue, and bringing ads to ChatGPT is one option on the table. While being interviewed on Decoder, ChatGPT head Nick Turley said he's "humble enough not to rule it out categorically," but hedged that OpenAI would need to "be very thoughtful and tasteful" about how ads could be integrated into ChatGPT. "We will build other products, and those other products can have different dimensions to them, and maybe ChatGPT just isn't an ads-y product because it's just so deeply accountable to your goals. But it doesn't mean that we wouldn't build other things in the future, too," Turley said. "I think it's good to preserve optionality, but I also really do want to emphasize how incredible the subscription model is, how fast it's growing, and how untapped a lot of the opportunities are."

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Meta's internal policy document permitted the company's AI chatbots to engage children in "romantic or sensual" conversations and generate content arguing that "Black people are dumber than white people," according to a Reuters review of the 200-page "GenAI: Content Risk Standards" guide. The document, approved by Meta's legal, public policy and engineering staff including its chief ethicist, allowed chatbots to describe children as attractive and create false medical information. Meta confirmed the document's authenticity but removed child-related provisions after Reuters inquiries, calling them "erroneous and inconsistent with our policies."

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Twenty years after Michelin introduced the Tweel in 2005, airless tires remain absent from passenger vehicles despite their promise to "eliminate nearly 200 million scrap tires a year caused by flats and underinflation," according to Michelin's internal testing cited in a Jalopnik report. Current prototypes "tend to transfer more road noise and vibration into the cabin than traditional radials -- making the ride harsher, especially at highway speeds." Heat dissipation poses additional challenges as "airless designs -- particularly those with internal webbing or solid cores -- have fewer ways to shed thermal load." The added structural mass "can affect fuel economy and increase unsprung weight -- bad news for handling and suspension tuning." Federal regulations compound these technical barriers since vehicle tires are subject to rigorous performance standards, many of which assume air pressure as a baseline.

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Electricity rates for individuals and small businesses could rise sharply as Amazon, Google, Microsoft and other technology companies build data centers and expand into the energy business. Residential electricity bills increased at least $15 monthly for Ohio households starting in June due to data center demands, according to utility data and an independent grid monitor. A Carnegie Mellon University and North Carolina State University analysis projects average U.S. electricity bills will rise 8% by 2030 from data center growth, with Virginia facing potential 25% increases. Virginia regulators estimate residents could pay an additional $276 annually by 2030. National residential electricity rates have already risen more than 30% since 2020. Tech companies' AI push requires data centers that consumed over 4% of U.S. electricity in 2023, with government analysts projecting consumption reaching 12% within three years. American Electric Power warned Ohio regulators that without new rate structures requiring data centers to pay more upfront costs, residents and small businesses would bear much of the expense for grid upgrades.

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The Office of the Commissioner of Canada Elections (OCCE) has revealed in its annual report that it will "explore the use" AI and emerging technologies to see how they will shape the government body's approach for the next year. From a report: Commissioner Caroline Simard's office didnâ(TM)t outline ways it might adopt AI. In its outlook, the OCCE expected to use funding announced in January 2025 to secure the tools needed for addressing the "challenges of today's electoral environment." This included staffing roles dictated by its new structure and reflected "ongoing modernization efforts," but no further details. The Commissioner is an independent officer who ensures the government, political parties, and others honour both the Canada Elections Act and Referendum Act. This includes core aspects like financing, nominations, campaigning, and advertising. More recently, the OCCE has been addressing rising issues with AI, including election disinformation facilitated by bots, AI-generated images, and deepfakes (AI-generated videos that resemble real people in false scenarios).

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Kodak says it remains confident it can avoid shutdown despite filing required "going concern" disclosures about $500 million in debt obligations due within 12 months. The 133-year-old photography company plans to draw approximately $300 million from its U.S. pension fund in December to pay off a significant portion of its term loan before maturity. Chief Marketing Officer Denisse Goldbarg said the disclosure was mandatory under accounting rules but Kodak would emerge virtually debt-free.

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The next version of Windows will become "more ambient, pervasive, and multi-modal" as AI transforms how users interact with computers, Microsoft's Windows chief Pavan Davuluri said in a company video. Davuluri, Corporate Vice President and head of Windows, said that voice will emerge as a primary input method alongside keyboard and mouse, with the operating system gaining context awareness to understand screen content and user intent through natural language. Windows interfaces, he said, will appear fundamentally different within five years as the platform becomes increasingly agentic. The transformation will rely on both local processing power and cloud computing capabilities to deliver seamless experiences where users can speak to their computers while simultaneously typing or inking.

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Top fintech and crypto executives urged the Trump administration to block US banks from charging fees for access to customer data, levies that strike at the heart of their business models. From a report: Klarna, Robinhood and crypto exchange Gemini were among a long list of companies, investors and lobbying groups that signed a letter sent Wednesday to President Donald Trump, arguing that the proposed fees would "cripple" innovation and "may cause small businesses and financial tools to shut down entirely." JPMorgan Chase has told fintechs and the data aggregators they rely on that the bank's customer account information will no longer be accessible without a charge. JPMorgan, the biggest US bank, views the data aggregators as freeloaders of sorts who access data without paying and then charge their fintech clients for it. PNC Financial Services is considering charging similar fees. "We urge you to use the full power of your office and the broader administration to prevent the largest institutions from raising new barriers to financial freedom," they said in the letter. "We cannot allow the most powerful, entrenched banks to close the door on a more open and modern financial system."

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BrianFagioli writes: Lenovo is starting its fiscal year with a major win, delivering record-breaking PC sales and claiming dominance in the AI PC space. For the first quarter of its 2025/26 fiscal year, the company reported $18.8 billion in revenue, which is 22 percent higher than the same period last year. Profit came in at $505 million, more than double the figure from a year ago. The standout performer was Lenovo's PC and smart devices division. It posted its fastest growth in 15 quarters and secured a record 24.6 percent global market share. More than 30 percent of Lenovo's PCs shipped in the quarter were AI PCs, giving it the top position in the Windows AI PC segment with a 31 percent market share. This leadership is an important talking point for Lenovo as it continues to market AI features as a key reason for buyers to upgrade.

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Igor Babuschkin, co-founder of xAI, has left the company to start Babuschkin Ventures, a VC firm focused on AI safety and humanity-advancing startups. TechCrunch reports: Babuschkin led engineering teams at xAI and helped build the startup into one of Silicon Valley's leading AI model developers just a few years after it was founded. "Today was my last day at xAI, the company that I helped start with Elon Musk in 2023," Babuschkin wrote in the post. "I still remember the day I first met Elon, we talked for hours about AI and what the future might hold. We both felt that a new AI company with a different kind of mission was needed." Babuschkin is leaving xAI to launch his own venture capital firm, Babuschkin Ventures, which he says will support AI safety research and back startups that "advance humanity and unlock the mysteries of our universe." The xAI co-founder says he was inspired to start the firm after a dinner with Max Tegmark, the founder of the Future of Life Institute, in which they discussed how AI systems could be built safely to encourage the flourishing of future generations. In his post, Babuschkin says his parents immigrated to the U.S. from Russia in pursuit of a better life for their children. Prior to co-founding xAI, Babuschkin was part of a research team at Google DeepMind that pioneered AlphaStar in 2019, a breakthrough AI system that could defeat top-ranked players at the video game StarCraft. Babuschkin also worked as a researcher at OpenAI in the years before it released ChatGPT. In his post, Babuschkin details some of the challenges he and Musk faced in building up xAI. He notes that industry veterans called xAI's goal of building its Memphis, Tennessee supercomputer in just three months "impossible." [...] Nevertheless, Babuschkin says he's already looking back fondly on his time at xAI, and "feels like a proud parent, driving away after sending their kid away to college." "I learned 2 priceless lessons from Elon: #1 be fearless in rolling up your sleeves to personally dig into technical problems, #2 have a maniacal sense of urgency," said Babuschkin.

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Data brokers are required by California law to provide ways for consumers to request their data be deleted. But good luck finding them. From a report: More than 30 of the companies, which collect and sell consumers' personal information, hid their deletion instructions from Google, according to a review by The Markup and CalMatters of hundreds of broker websites. This creates one more obstacle for consumers who want to delete their data. Many of the pages containing the instructions, listed in an official state registry, use code to tell search engines to remove the page entirely from search results. Popular tools like Google and Bing respect the code by excluding pages when responding to users. Data brokers nationwide must register in California under the state's Consumer Privacy Act, which allows Californians to request that their information be removed, that it not be sold, or that they get access to it. After reviewing the websites of all 499 data brokers registered with the state, we found 35 had code to stop certain pages from showing up in searches.

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An anonymous reader shares a report: India's blueprint for displacing China as the world's electronics workshop contains a rather extraordinary feature: the entire Indian edifice requires Chinese companies to supply the technical architecture, manufacturing know-how and operational templates that would make such displacement theoretically possible. Let's start with Dixon Technologies, India's flagship domestic electronics manufacturer. The company has systematically built indigenous capability through a growing constellation of Chinese partnerships: Longcheer provides the design intelligence, Kunshan Q-Tech delivers camera module expertise, Chongqing Yuhai supplies precision-molded components and HKC brings display technology. This pattern of structured dependence has become the organizing principle of India's electronics manufacturing push. [...] The current architecture sees Chinese companies retain control of the critical knowledge while their Indian partners provide labour arbitrage and regulatory navigation. Under this arrangement, India isn't constructing an alternative to Chinese manufacturing so much as establishing Chinese manufacturing's most elaborate subsidiary operation, underwritten by Indian taxpayers and marketed as national renewal. Many countries, but most importantly India and Vietnam, have worked hard in recent years to attract businesses that decided to diversify away from China, a strategy analysts have dubbed as "China Plus One."

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Russian authorities are "partially" restricting calls in messaging apps Telegram and WhatsApp, the latest step in an effort to tighten control over the internet. From a report: In a statement, government media and internet regulator Roskomnadzor justified the measure as necessary for fighting crime, saying that "according to law enforcement agencies and numerous appeals from citizens, foreign messengers Telegram and WhatsApp have become the main voice services used to deceive and extort money, and to involve Russian citizens in sabotage and terrorist activities."

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An anonymous reader New Atlas: An engineered protein that acts like a molecular sponge has the potential to change how carbon monoxide poisoning is treated, chasing down CO molecules in the bloodstream and helping the body flush them out in just minutes, without the risk of short- or long-term health issues that come with the current frontline treatment, pure oxygen. Researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine (UMSOM) were focused on a natural protein known as RcoM, found in the bacterium Paraburkholderia xenovorans. In bacteria, RcoM detects trace amounts of CO in the environment, so the engineers believed this could be harnessed to scavenge for CO molecules attached to red blood cells instead. The re-engineered protein is the basis of the therapy they call RcoM-HBD-CCC. While it's not exactly a catchy name, it possesses somewhat of a superpower when it comes to cleaning out CO. It selectively binds tightly to the poisonous CO molecules, while ignoring oxygen (O2) and other critical chemical compounds, such as blood-pressure-regulating nitric oxide (NO), in the body. [...] In mouse models, RcoM-HBD-CCC therapy was able to clear CO from the blood in minutes, with it safely flushed out of the body through urine. The engineered antidote acts like a sponge, seeking out and soaking up CO attached to red blood cells. In mice, half the CO in the bloodstream was cleared out in less than a minute, freeing the hemoglobin on the cells to once again start carrying O2. Importantly, other experimental scavenger hemoproteins haven't been able to selectively target CO, and as a result also bind to NO – so infusions of such hemoproteins can lead to a reduction of NO in the blood, tightening blood vessels and spiking blood pressure. In the study, RcoM-HBD-CCC showed it didn't have this affinity with the vital molecule. "Unlike other protein-based treatments, we found the compound caused only minimal changes in blood pressure, which was an exciting finding and raised the potential for this new molecule to have clinical applications," said study corresponding author Dr Mark T. Gladwin, Dean of UMSOM. "This has the potential to become a rapid, intravenous antidote for carbon monoxide that could be given in the emergency department or even in the field by first-responders." The study was published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

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