Gerardo Valerio had been looking for a bathroom in Los Angeles Little Tokyo neighborhood for 20 minutes when he stumbled across a blue and white trailer with FREE BATHROOM at the top. At first, he was hesitant to enter the bathroom, which had been installed by the Washington, D.C.-based portable toilet startup Throne. To get in, he had to scan a QR code which pre-loaded a text onto his phone. After sending the text, the door would automatically slide open.What do I text, I need to pee? he jokes.All in all, he says, it was a positive experience: It was pretty to look at but it definitely has a smell to it. It needs to be maintained a bit more. But overall, nice.In Little Tokyo, there are almost no public restroomsin most of the restaurants and shops, you have to buy something first. There should be more, Valerio says.After years of complaints from riders, LA Metro isrolling out more free public Throne bathroomsthis year at transit stations across L.A. County. The portable, touchless trailers are self-contained, requiring no water or electric hookup. This allows the company to rapidly deploy restrooms wherever neededlike a busy train station. The new location at Little Tokyo station has been particularly popular, with 120 to 150 uses per day during the weekend. Thrones have also been deployed in the D.C. area, Ann Arbor, Michigan; Beverly Hills; and in the Bay area at twoCaltrain stations. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Throne Bathrooms (@thronebathrooms)Built on accountabilityThrone says its smart bathrooms use accountability to solve the age-old problem of unwanted bathroom activity. Accessing a Throne requires a unique user ID, usually a cell phone number. For those without access to a phone, Throne also distributes key cards through local service providers.[Its] just behavioral science, explains Throne cofounder and COO Jessica Heinzelman. If somebody knows that theyve used their phone to get into a bathroom, theyre treating it a little bit nicer, kind of the same mentality of if you have somebody in line behind you in a regular bathroom.Every user is asked to rate the cleanliness of the Throne and can report any issues via text. Throne uses this feedback to optimize the cleaning schedule which relies on gig laborand rapidly respond to any issues. As of March 1, there have been 425,900 uses nationally, with 168,600 in L.A., and a rating of 4.07 out of five stars.The biggest issue facing public bathrooms in Metro stations has been preventing inappropriate behavior, says Stephen Tu, deputy executive officer of station experience at Metro.Throne bathrooms are cheaper to clean and maintain because problem users can be banned from the system. So far, only 375 people out of 37,144 unique users across the national Throne network have been access-restricted, according to Heinzelman.Last year, after a six-month pilot at four locations, Metro approved a $22 million four-year contract with Throne to provide up to 64 bathrooms. Currently, there are14 Thronesin the Metro system, with four more set to roll out in April. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Throne Bathrooms (@thronebathrooms)Tapping the gig workforceSome Throne features might be high-tech, but the bathrooms are still cleaned the old-fashioned way: by people, specifically gig workers who sign up to clean specific locations at specific times through an app.It allows us to respond really quickly, while also providing people flexible income opportunities, says Heinzelman. If we had a W-2 workforce, we would probably be able to accomplish a quarter of the cleans in twice the time.Correna T., a public transportation advocate with the L.A. chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, believes that the bathrooms should be staffed by unionized Metro employees, not gig workers.We would much rather see those jobs go to union employees who have protections and benefits and are staffed publicly, she says.In July of last year, DSA-LA successfullymobilizedto push LA Metro to conduct afeasibility studyon bringing cleaning staff in-house. Over seven months later, the report is still not out. Next City reached out to Metro for a status update on the report but did not receive a response.Throne declined to provide details about how much a member of the cleaning network is paid per clean, but according toThrones website, each clean is priced dynamically.There are all sorts of variables to how we are setting clean tasks including when we have two Thrones co-located next to each other (no transit time or transit cost) [plus] the ability to get bonuses for rapid response, says Heinzelman in an email.Workers can receivean extra $15for extra tough jobs after submitting before-and-after photos that are then confirmed by the company. Thrones top earners are making up to $1,800 per week, says Heinzelman.Having bathrooms is an enormous social service support and health and safety strategy that we wholeheartedly support, says Alfonso Directo, Jr., advocacy director for the Alliance for Community Transit, a coalition of transportation and housing organizations. But ACT-LA would rather see Metro provide stable employment for local residents.Metro, as a public agency with public dollars, could be using those dollars to develop the infrastructure themselves, he says.A temporary fix?Correna T. was initially excited about the Throne bathroom program, but thinks it doesnt go far enough in providing a permanent solution.The bathrooms are portable, not permanent, she points out. Metro doesnt own themThrone does. The contract only extends to 2028the year that L.A. is hosting the summer Olympic games. To DSA-LA, this shows that the Throne partnership is primarily meant to serve tourists during the Olympics.If they dont expand this program past the Olympics, Throne could literally just come in and take them away, and they would no longer be an amenity for the city, she adds.Tu doesnt see the restrooms as necessarily temporary and says the agency has the option to renew the contract at the end of four years.The beauty of its portability allows us to scale very quickly, because to be able to do this with a more traditional approach would take many years to be able to get this at up to 64 locations, he says.LA Metro riders have beenrequesting bathroomsfordecadeswith little success. The system has only three stations with permanent bathrooms in a system with107 rail stationsand about12,000 bus stops(the city of Los Angeles has four bathrooms at Metro stations that it maintains separately).Tu says that the challenge with building and maintaining public bathrooms has been not just the capital costs of adding new bathrooms, but also the amount of money needed to staff them and keep them clean.During the pilot, Metro saw a 50% reduction in public urination and defecation incidents at locations where Thrones were deployed.When Next City asked if Metro could use the money saved on maintenance to build permanent bathrooms, Tu repeated that the partnership with Throne allows the agency to roll out multiple bathrooms in a short period of time.He stresses the high rating that Throne has received from users as evidence of the programs success, though he states that Metro is not opposed to exploring other options in the future.The only solution we see in the market right now is the Throne solution, he says.This story was originally published byNext City, a nonprofit news outlet covering solutions for equitable cities. 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Handheld gaming devices seem to be all the rage these days, and they actually span quite a wide range as well. On the one hand, you have the super-powerful handheld PC like the Steam Deck or the Lenovo Legion Go, letting you play massive AAA titles at the expense of some heft and bulk. On the opposite end of the spectrum are the low-power DIY projects that can even fit on keyrings but are extremely limited in their use, not to mention their ergonomics.And then there are retro kids, handhelds like the new Retroid Pocket Classic that take inspiration from their ancestors in more ways than one. Embracing the old-school design of those old handhelds and consoles, this nostalgia trip tries to bring the past to the present, introducing younger generations to the aesthetics of the 80s and the 90s, all while keeping up with the demanding requirements of modern emulators and the games they run, both old and new.Designer: RetroidThe Nintendo Game Boy is an icon as far as gaming handhelds go. Despite being quite chunky and toy-like by todays design standards, it still possesses a particular charm that has endeared it to many retro designers. But while the likes of the Analogue try to apply modern aesthetic trends to its design language, the Retroid Pocket Classic goes all out on reproducing that same playful vibe, albeit with some upgrades, of course.The Retroid Pocket Classic isnt afraid to use curves and colors, more reminiscent of the psychedelic trends of decades past. Although it has no use for cartridges, the back of the device bulges a little to provide a slightly better ergonomic grip. Sitting on top are four trigger buttons, controls that werent even imaginable in the days of the Game Boy.This Game Boy homage unsurprisingly also embraces some of the colors that made the original an icon, including an accurate Retro palette as well as the translucent Atomic Purple. Amusingly, it also pays tribute to one of the titles that catapulted the gaming handheld to fame with PKM Yellow. The most curious color, however, is the Classic 6, which is actually a whole different model. Rather than the Game Boy, this variant adopts the six-button control layout of the Sega Saturn, another luminary in the video gaming industry.Despite the old-school looks, the Retroid Pocket Classic is clearly a modern device, one that runs on a Qualcomm Snapdragon G1 Gen2 processor and uses Android 14 for its software. The screen is a 3.92-inch AMOLED display with a squarish resolution of 12401080, perfect for retro titles. Admittedly, its going to be significantly less impressive than even the cheapest gaming smartphone, but you wont be buying this nostalgia trip for its performance anyway.The post Retroid Pocket Classic pays tribute to the granddaddies of gaming consoles first appeared on Yanko Design.

One of my (many) unfulfilled dreams is to own a vinyl player and to start collecting records of albums that I love. There are several reasons why that still hasnt happened but one of them is that Im worried on how to properly keep those vinyl records that Ill be buying (and probably at not cheap prices). When I used to collect CDs back in the day, keeping them preserved and fully working for a long time was a worry and so I know this can be a problem for those records as well.For the aspiring vinyl enthusiast, the thought of building a cherished record collection often comes with the practical consideration of preservation. Just like those beloved CDs of the past, vinyl records, despite their more robust nature, are susceptible to damage over time. Warping, in particular, is a common ailment that can significantly impact playback quality, leading to frustrating skips, annoying pops, and an overall distorted listening experience.Designer: Pro-JectFortunately, innovative tools like the Pro-Ject Flatten it machine offer a dedicated solution for audiophiles and serious collectors looking to maintain and even restore their precious discs to their original, flat condition. As its straightforward name suggests, the Flatten it is specifically engineered to gently coax warped records back into plane, all while aiming to preserve the delicate grooves that hold the music you love. By carefully addressing the physical imperfections of a warped record, this device promises to eliminate those unwelcome sonic artifacts, allowing you to fully appreciate the rich, unadulterated sound that vinyl is renowned for, even from older or less-than-perfectly-stored acquisitions. The device actually looks like a record player itself but has premium heated aluminum plates so that the heat is evenly distributed and you get consistent results. You can also control the temperature being used and has a low temperature hysteresis of just 2 degrees celsius. The machine itself is made from solid aluminum construction so it can last for a long time. Its also easy to use so even if youre not much of a machine person, you can still operate it on your own. So, while the dream of owning that vinyl player and a curated collection of beloved albums is still on your horizon, know that tools like Pro-Jects Flatten it exist to ease your worries about long-term record preservation. Its a reassuring thought for any budding collector: even if life (or less-than-ideal storage) throws a curveball at your cherished vinyl, theres a way to bring them back to their original glory and keep the music playing. Perhaps this knowledge will nudge that vinyl dream a little closer to reality.The post Flatten It will help preserve those precious vinyl records first appeared on Yanko Design.

Creative workers need websites that balance aesthetics with functionality. Squarespace or GoDaddy which is better?

CorelDRAW GO is a graphic design web app with a lot of interesting capabilities, especially for online design.

An unsecured database used by a generative AI app revealed prompts and tens of thousands of explicit imagessome of which are likely illegal. The company deleted its websites after WIRED reached out.

Elon Musk said he borrowed the name from a 1960s science fiction novel, but another AI startup applied to trademark it before xAI launched its chatbot.

CIOs should prepare for a 76.4% rise in global generative AI (genAI) spending this year, driven by improved foundational models and growing demand, according to a Gartner research report released today.Organizations are expected to spend $644 billion worldwide on genAI projects despite high failure rates among early projects, the lions share of which will be on services.GenAI services are expected to grow 162% this year after jumping 177% last year. GenAI software, which grew 255% in 2024, will only grow by 93% this year. Perhaps the biggest shift, however, is in genAI devices, which are predicted to rise 99.5% this year after soaring 845% last year.The percentage of spending on genAI in various markets is leveling off because the adoption rate has increased. But, the overall amount being spent is notable. For example, organizations and consumers are expected to spend nearly $400 billion this year on genAI devices (PCs, smartphones and IoT devices) and $180 billion on servers.Even as spending rises, expectations for the technology are dropping due to high failure rates in early tests and dissatisfaction with results, according to John-David Lovelock, distinguished vice president analyst at GartnerStill, model providers are investing billions to improve size, performance, and reliability; that paradox will continue through 2025 and 2026, Lovelock said.Gartner ResearchCIOs are expected to prioritize commercial genAI solutions over custom development, focusing on proven, off-the-shelf offerings for more reliable results and business value in 2025, Gartner said.Despite model improvements, CIOs will reduce proof-of-concept and self-development efforts, focusing instead on genAI features from existing software providers, Lovelock said.GenAI spending is poised for significant growth across all core markets and submarkets, including IT services, software, devices and servers. In fact, GenAI will have a transformative impact across all aspects of IT spending markets, suggesting a future where AI technologies become increasingly integral to business operations and consumer products.Consumer AI device spendingGenAI spending this year will be driven largely by the integration of AI capabilities into hardware, such as servers, smartphones and PCs, with 80% of genAI spending going towards hardware, Gartner said.The markets growth trajectory is heavily influenced by the increasing prevalence of AI-enabled devices, which are expected to comprise almost the entire consumer device market by 2028, said Lovelock. However, consumers are not chasing these features. As the manufacturers embed AI as a standard feature in consumer devices, consumers will be forced to purchase them.In fact, for organizations, AI PCs could solve key issues organizations face when using cloud and data center AI instances, including cost, security, and privacy concerns, according to a study released this month by IDC Research.This year is expected to be the year of the AI PC, according to Forrester Research. It defines an AI PC as one that has an embedded AI processor and algorithms specifically designed to improve the experience of AI workloads across the central processing unit (CPU), graphics processing unit (GPU), and neural processing unit, or NPU. (NPUs allow the PCs to run AI algorithms at lightning-fast speeds by offloading specific functions.)The percentage of AI PCs in use is expected to grow from just 5% in 2023 to 94% by 2028, IDC said. The research firm surveyed 670 IT decision-makers from large companies in the US, UK, France, Germany, and Japan to explore their views on AI PCs. The November survey found that 97% of respondents plan to deploy AI to more employees in the future.This reflects a broader trend toward democratizing AI capabilities, ensuring that teams across functions and levels can benefit from its transformative potential, said Tom Mainelli, IDCs group vice president for device and consumer research. As AI tools become more accessible and tailored to specific job functions, they will further enhance productivity, collaboration, and innovation across industries.Gartner Research projects PC shipments will grow by 7.7% in 2025. The biggest driver will be due, not the arrival of not AI PCs, but to the need by many companies and users to refresh their hardware and move toward Windows 11. (Windows 10 hits its end-of-support date this October.)Our assumption is that [AI PCs] will not drive shipment growth, meaning that most end users wont replace their PCs because they want to have the AI. They will happen to select [an AI PC] if they will replace their PCs for specific reasons e.g., OS upgrade, aging PCs, or a new school or job, and most importantly, the price is right for them, Gartner analyst Mika Kitagawa said in an earlier statement.For example, Windows 11 has several genAI features built in, and Apple has been slowly rolling out Apple Intelligence features for its hardware.Nvidia chips, particularly the companys GPUs, are already widely used in PCs. Theyre popular for gaming, graphic design, video editing, and machine learning applications. Its GeForce series is especially well-known among gamers, while the Quadro and Tesla series are often used in professional and scientific computing. Many PC builders and gamers choose Nvidia processors for their performance and advanced features such as ray tracing and AI-enhanced graphics.Nvidia isnt the only manufacturer trying to get into the AI PC game. Samsung Electronics has started mass production of its most powerful SSD for AI PCs the PM9E1. Intel earlier this yearannounced its line of Ultra chips, which are also aimed at genAI PC operations. AndLenovo just introduced its Smarter AIline of tools that include agents andAI assistantsacross a number of devices. Finally, AMD has touted new CPUs offering greater processing power tailored for AI operations.

While Rockstars Grand Theft Auto 6 is out this Fall (barring any slippage), the wait for the next trailer continues to build. Considering the first debuted in December 2023, and all last year passed without any significant updates, the pressure is on to deliver.However, its seemingly part of parent company Take-Two Interactives marketing strategy for the title. CEO Strauss Zelnick spoke to Bloomberg, and when asked about why the release date is such a carefully held secret, he responded, The anticipation for that title may be the greatest anticipation Ive ever seen for an entertainment property, and Ive been around the block a few times, and Ive been in every entertainment business there is. Andwe want to maintain the anticipation and the excitement. And we do have competitors who will describe their release schedule years in advance. We found that the better thing to do is to provide marketing materials relatively close to the release window in order to create that excitement on the one hand and balance the excitement with unmet anticipation. We dont always get it exactly right, but thats what were trying to do.Its not exactly out of the blue for big publishers today see PlayStation heavily promoting its biggest first-party exclusives two or three months in advance. However, relatively is the keyword for Grand Theft Auto 6 since its unclear when Take-Two will begin its marketing campaign.Stay tuned for more details and updates. Grand Theft Auto 6 is in development for Xbox Series X/S and PS5, with Zelnick believing it will lead to a meaningful uptick in console sales. Reports also indicate that major developers and publishers could delay their titles depending on the launch date. Head here for more details.

html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd"Chaos has released Chaos Arena, its real-time solution for in-camera visual effects (ICVFX) in virtual production.The technology is intended to enable studios using Chaoss V-Ray renderer for offline rendering to display the same assets on LED walls with full ray tracing, without any preprocessing.Chaos pitches it as a faster, simple alternative to game engines for virtual production.Re-use assets created for offline rendering in V-Ray in real time on a LED wallUnveiled last year, and originally codenamed Project Arena, Chaos Arena is intended to render assets created for V-Ray pipelines in real time for display on a LED wall, creating a virtual backdrop for previs or in-camera VFX.It enables multiple operators to make changes to a 3D scene in response to a director or DoP, with Arena co-ordinating the edits, and synchronizing rendering to the LED wall.It uses the same core tech as Chaos Vantage, Chaoss real-time ray tracing renderer for exploring large V-Ray scenes, but is designed for distributed rendering on curved screens.Chaos describes it as the first-ever path-tracing solution for virtual shoots.Uses a server/spawner architecture with multiple operator machines and render nodesArena uses a server/spawner architecture, with a central server application connected to multiple spawner instances.The spawner is used both for operator machines, which feed changes made to a 3D scene to the server; and for rendering, with the server feeding instructions to the render instances.Separate spawners control output to different regions of the LED wall.For real-time camera tracking, Arena is compatible with network client protocols for Vicon and OptiTrack mocap systems, stYpe and EZTrack camera tracking systems, and the FreeD protocol.A simpler, more streamlined alternative to workflows based around Unreal Engine?As with Chaos Vantage itself, Project Arena is Chaoss attempt to break into a part of the industry in which Unreal Engine has done a lot of the early running.The game engine is widely used in virtual production, for which it could initially be used for free, although Epic Games did eventually begin charging larger studios last year.Chaoss pitch for Project Arena is similar to that for Vantage: that users will be able to use their existing V-Ray assets in it, without the kind of time-consuming conversion process required to prepare offline assets for rendering in a game engine.According to Chaos, Arena eliminate[s] the need for scene stripping, asset conversion, or baking, making it possible to move V-Ray animations to LED walls in around 10 minutes.The workflow makes it possible for studios to use the same assets in pre- and post-production with no do-overs or drops in quality.Current restrictions and performance limitationsAlthough Chaos Arena works with standard .vrscene files exported from V-Ray, it doesnt support every feature of the .vrscene format, or those of V-Rays host applications.For example, Arena does not support all of the advanced properties of Maya lights or cameras, or all of the properties of the V-Ray Material in files exported from V-Ray for Maya. You can see a list of .vrscene features supported for each of the V-Ray host applications compatible with Arena in the online documentation.As well as Maya, the documentation currently covers V-Ray for 3ds Max, Cinema 4D, Revit, Rhino and SketchUp.There are also a number of known limitations when using Arena in production, including a limit of 10 material layers in blend materials, a single dome light and environment fog per scene, and a maximum texture resolution of 16,384 x 16,384px.Operations currently supported in live editing mode include moving, rotating, scaling and hiding/unhiding objects, and adjusting lights, environment properties, scene states, and rendering and post-processing settings.Price and system requirementsChaos Arena is compatible with Windows 10+. It requires a DXR-capable GPU, although it doesnt currently support mixed-GPU-vendor setups: the system requirements specify a NVIDIA RTX GPU, rather than AMD or Intel processors.The software is priced on demand.Read an overview of Chaos Arena on Chaoss websiteRead more about Chaos Arenas capabilities in the online documentationHave your say on this story by following CG Channel on Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter). As well as being able to comment on stories, followers of our social media accounts can see videos we dont post on the site itself, including making-ofs for the latest VFX movies, animations, games cinematics and motion graphics projects.