For web publishers, stopping AI bots from scraping their best content while consuming valuable bandwidth must feel somewhere between futile and nigh impossible. It’s like throwing a cup of water at a forest fire. No matter what you try, the new generation of bots keeps advancing, insatiably consuming data to train AI models that are currently in the grip of competitive hyper-growth. But with traditional approaches for limiting bot behavior, such as a robots.txt file, looking increasingly long in the tooth, a solution of sorts might be on the horizon through work being carried out by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) AI Preferences Working Group (AIPREF). The AIPREF Working Group is meeting this week in Brussels, where it hopes to continue its work to lay the groundwork for a new robots.txt-like system for websites that will signal to AI systems what is and isn’t off limits. The group will try to define two mechanisms to contain AI scrapers, starting with “a common vocabulary to express authors’ and publishers’ preferences regarding use of their content for AI training and related tasks.” Second, it will develop a “means of attaching that vocabulary to content on the internet, either by embedding it in the content or by formats similar to robots.txt, and a standard mechanism to reconcile multiple expressions of preferences.” AIPREF Working Group Co-chairs Mark Nottingham and Suresh Krishnan described the need for change in a blog post: “Right now, AI vendors use a confusing array of non-standard signals in the robots.txt file and elsewhere to guide their crawling and training decisions,” they wrote. “As a result, authors and publishers lose confidence that their preferences will be adhered to, and resort to measures like blocking their IP addresses.” The AIPREF Working Group has promised to turn its ideas around the biggest change to the way websites signal their preferences since robots.txt was first used in 1994 into something concrete by mid-year. Parasitic AI The initiative comes at a time when concern over AI scraping is growing across the publishing industry. This is playing out differently across countries, but governments keen to encourage local AI development haven’t always been quick to defend content creators. In 2023, Google was hit by a lawsuit, later dismissed, alleging that its AI had scraped copyrighted material. In 2025, UK Channel 4 TV executive Alex Mahon told British MPs that the British government’s proposed scheme to allow AI companies to train models on content unless publishers opted out would result in the “scraping of value from our creative industries.” At issue in these cases is the principle of taking copyrighted content to train AI models, rather than the mechanism through which this is achieved, but the two are, arguably, interconnected. Meanwhile, in a separate complaint thread, the Wikimedia Foundation, which oversees Wikipedia, said last week that AI bots had caused a 50% increase in the bandwidth consumed since January 2024 by downloading multimedia content such as videos: “This increase is not coming from human readers, but largely from automated programs that scrape the Wikimedia Commons image catalog of openly licensed images to feed images to AI models,” the Foundation explained. “This high usage is also causing constant disruption for our Site Reliability team, who has to block overwhelming traffic from such crawlers before it causes issues for our readers,” Wikimedia added. AI crawler defenses The underlying problem is that established methods for stopping AI bots have downsides, assuming they work at all. Using robots.txt files to express preferences can simply be ignored, as it has been by traditional non-AI scrapers for years. The alternatives — IP or user-agent string blocking through content delivery networks (CDNs) such as Cloudflare, CAPTCHAS, rate limiting, and web application firewalls — also have disadvantages. Even lateral approaches such as ‘tarpits’ — confusing crawlers with resource-consuming mazes of files with no exit links — can be beaten by OpenAI’s sophisticated AI crawler. But even when they work, tarpits also risk consuming host processor resources. The big question is whether AIPREF will make any difference. It could come down to the ethical stance of the companies doing the scraping; some will play ball with AIPREF, many others won’t. Cahyo Subroto, the developer behind the MrScraper ‘’ethical” web scraping tool, is skeptical: “Could AIPREF help clarify expectations between sites and developers? Yes, for those who already care about doing the right thing. But for those scraping aggressively or operating in gray areas, a new tag or header won’t be enough. They’ll ignore it just like they ignore everything else, because right now, nothing’s stopping them,” he said. According to Mindaugas Caplinskas, co-founder of ethical proxy service IPRoyal, rate limiting through a proxy service was always likely to be more effective than a new way of simply asking people to behave. “While [AIPREF] is a step forward in the right direction, if there are no legal grounds for enforcement, it is unlikely that it will make a real dent in AI crawler issues,” said Caplinskas. “Ultimately, the responsibility for curbing the negative impacts of AI crawlers lies with two key players: the crawlers themselves and the proxy service providers. While AI crawlers can voluntarily limit their activity, proxy providers can impose rate limits on their services, directly controlling how frequently and extensively websites are crawled,” he said. However. Nathan Brunner, CEO of AI interview preparation tool Boterview, pointed out that blocking AI scrapers might create a new set of problems. “The current situation is tricky for publishers who want their pages to be indexed by search engines to get traffic, but don’t want their pages used to train their AI,” he said. This leaves publishers with a delicate balancing act, wanting to keep out the AI scrapers without impeding necessary bots such as Google’s indexing crawler. “The problem is that robots.txt was designed for search, not AI crawlers. So, a universal standard would be most welcome.”

Apple is shutting down its Northbrook Court store on April 26, and this time, it's not relocating — it's leaving for good.Apple's Northbrook Court storeThe company has confirmed that its Northbrook location in suburban Chicago will permanently close at 7 p.m. on April 26, 2025. While Apple often shutters stores to move to larger or more modern locations, this is one of the rare cases where it's not being replaced.The company thanked customers on its store page and encouraged them to visit nearby locations or shop online. The closure reflects broader changes at Northbrook Court. Continue Reading on AppleInsider | Discuss on our Forums

Unshakeable confidence does newly blossomed Montpelier-headquartered studio Sandfall Interactive exhibit in their first project. Barely half a decade old, the company – led by CEO and creative director Guillaume Broche, a passionate gamer formerly employed at another game developer – has amassed a thirty-strong team, and their upcoming RPG-adjacent adventure Clair Obscur: Expedition’s presentation is bracing, intriguing, and damn-near faultless. Graphical prowess isn’t the source of the studio’s confidence though. Sure, Clair Obscur looks incredible, but Broche and his team – wearing influence from Soulslikes, out of FromSoftware’s oeuvre like Sekiro – are certain they’ve crafted a distinct combat experience. Narrative, character-driven action is Expedition’s beating heart, but it’s battling is its body’s nourishment: vibrant, free-flowing, energising. It was during Broche’s previous experience when he conjured up the ideas comprising Clair Obscur’s narrative framework. Expedition focuses on a populace desperate to halt their eradication by enemies whose cruelty looms oppressively in view of prosperous citadel Lumiere. The stage is set for some bitter skirmishes, experienced through the eyes of oppressed protagonists. Once you get into it, you’ll quickly discover there’s an RPG heritage imbuing Clair Obscur’s combat. It’s turn-based in nature, so anyone who’s dabbled in RPGs will be rightly familiar in the ebb and flow of Expedition’s fighting. There are, however, extra elements which reframe Clair Obscur’s combat with asymmetrical lightness of touch. Real-time actions which add distinct flavour. Amongst these are defence minded dodges, parries, and jumps to evade enemy attacks, each executed via time-based button presses. Especially precise dodges and parries result in perfect variations, gifting chance to unload potentially damaging counterattacks. Better still, if you successfully parry an attack aimed at your entire party, the whole squad will retaliate with an awe-striking, choreographed counter. Visual spectacle and ultra-high damage. There is risk versus reward in parrying versus dodging, of course, with the risk heightened by numerous tough enemies who manoeuvre unpredictably to attack in off-kilter patterns. You’ll have to study their moves, ala FromSoft, in order to successfully deflect or evade every landing blow. Even on normal difficulty, the window for precise response is tight, so it’ll take some practice to truly get into the groove. The combat’s real-time swagger continues with a free-aim ability which can be used not unlike Horizon’s Aloy to shoot enemy weak points, wipe off chunks of their health, or immobilise or eradicate opponents altogether. There’s depth to the combat’s turn based flipside too, with each character in your party capable of melee attacks in addition to the free-aimed range attacks. However, crucially, your characters need to amass Action Points if they’re to use their ranged ability, and landing blows is the best way to do this. Action Points themselves, according to Sandfall Interactive co-founder François Meurisse in conversation with GamesRadar at Games Developer Conference, are a further point of differentiation between Clair Obscur: Expedition and other RPGs. Meurisse explains that the idea is that the players accumulate points to put towards skills rather than more established magic or mana points in other games of the genre. These skills are distinct to each character’s arsenal too and rely on building a specific attribute (also unique to each character). Grizzled expedition leader Gustave uses his skills to fill an Overcharge meter which he can spend to unleash a devastatingly powerful attack. Mage-like Lune wields elemental attacks which leave Stains upon her enemies, the effects of these consumed by subsequent attacks to boost damage alongside other effects. From these two characters alone and this brief explanation of their skillset we can see already the kind of over-powered synergies players can concoct between party members. Lune leaves a stain; Gustave unloads an overcharged attack. We haven’t even mentioned the youngest of the trio Maelle, who joins the party later. Her skillset – when built over subsequent turns – seems especially potent. See, she has three stances which she can freely switch between: an offensive stance to boost damage at the cost of defence, a mirror image defensive stance to increase resilience for a reduction in attacking power. Her piece-de-resistance however is her Virtuose stance which, should an opponent’s defences be whittled down enough or should one of Lune’s stains leave them elementally weakened, can eliminate them in a spectacular attack dealing 200% more damage. There will be plenty of unlockable abilities for each character too which should provide a host of imaginative, and thoroughly gratifying, ways to take down enemies the deeper the expedition goes. The characters you’ll command throughout Expedition are complex, emotionally nuanced, damaged, yet relatable. They exist in a world where their population is slowly being whittled down to zero. Gustave, for one, has had to suffer the recent trauma of seeing his 34-year-old love interest die. In fact, during Clair Obscur’s demo Gustave happens upon the bodies of his fellow expeditioners, with his anguish bubbling just beneath the surface spilling into an act of desperation and desire for suicide. It’s Lune who stops him, her being the more pragmatic of the pair, essentially making clear that their mission will likely see them both dead before its culmination and that should either one of them die, they’re duty bound to continue regardless. The pair spend much of their time together quarrelling, both unable to see each other’s point of view, equally valid they both are. However, within the emotionally charged script are lighter moments. Shared laughter, banal conversation, that sort of thing, the more laidback moments examples that these characters deeply care about each other’s survival, alongside providing the perfect counterpoint to heavier moments of desperation and fear, emotions that make up the bulk of the character’s journey. It’s another refreshing distinction in Clair Obscur’s favour in that these characters are written and performed with emotional gravitas. Too often in JRPGs characters act like foolish people and often make silly mistakes that are not to be expected from them. Expedition’s participants are adults’ scorn by generations of loss, dwindling hope, and trauma, and this is reflected in their actions and behaviours. So, we’re assuming Clair Obscur will deliver mature characters and will avoid the one dimensional route that so many games follow these days. Topping off the superb action and wonderfully composed characters is a vibrant, thoroughly imaginative world in which the game takes place. Levels here meld high-art fantasy with the phantasmagorical, a highlight in the gameplay shared thus far being a realm seemingly underwater, with fish swimming through the air and seaweed waving in invisible currents. Also of significance is Clair Obscur: Expedition is not open world. Instead, these levels are linear in design, with secret routes and hidden areas sure, but these biomes are curated experiences. From gameplay shared thus far, the game seems like it’ll be for the better than players aren’t free to take in the narrative, action, and exploration at their own pace. There’s an important purpose driving the motives behind each character, and Sandfall Interactive have opted to portray their odyssey at a pace they feel is most suitable. Sandfall Interactive are right to be confident. Clair Obscur: Expedition looks fantastic and should end the year as one of the biggest games released. It’ll be nothing short of a Lumiere-sized tragedy should it fail to find an audience. Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.

Astronomers Discover a Rare White Dwarf Pair Doomed to Explode in a Brilliant Supernova The event will be ten times brighter than our Moon in the night sky, but never fear, it won’t happen for another 23 billion years An artistic rendering of the moment when the first white dwarf explodes and spews material at the second white dwarf, which itself is about to explode.  Credit University of Warwick/Mark Garlick Astronomers have discovered a rare pair of white dwarfs destined to explode in a spectacular supernova in Earth’s cosmic neighborhood. The discovery is detailed in a study published Friday in the journal Nature Astronomy. White dwarfs are the dense remnant cores of dying stars that have run out of fuel; when they gather too much mass for its gravity, they can explode in what's called a “1a supernova.” Astronomers have theorized that supernovas such as these are caused by two white dwarfs orbiting each other in a binary star system, when one of them consumes the other. The astronomers' discovery marks the first such 1a supernova-causing binary system ever identified, and just about 150 light-years away from Earth—which on the scale of the universe, is actually quite close. This proximity “gives the impression that plenty more of these systems should be hiding in plain sight and we have the ability to identify these systems much farther away,” James Munday, lead author of the study and a researcher at the University of Warwick, tells ScienceAlert's Michelle Starr. “For years, a local and massive double white dwarf binary has been anticipated, so when I first spotted this system with a very high total mass on our galactic doorstep, I was immediately excited,” Munday adds in a statement. Munday adds that he realized the significance of the discovery when the team's analysis revealed that the two white dwarfs were separated by just 1/60th of the distance between the Earth and the Sun. Further research also demonstrated that the binary system is the heaviest of its kind confirmed by scientists with a total mass 1.56 times that of our sun's. If the small distance between the white dwarfs wasn't evidence enough of their doomed destiny, their combined mass certainly sealed their fate. The type Ia supernova explosion of WDJ181058.67+311940.94 Watch on “[The dwarfs] are both about as big as the Earth. One has a diameter about 20 percent larger and the other about 50 percent larger. That gives you an idea of how dense they are. It's the Sun compressed onto the size of Earth. Their masses when they were regular stars were probably around three to four times the mass of the Sun,” study co-author and University of Warwick astrophysicist Ingrid Pelisoli tells Reuters' Will Dunham. The white dwarfs are currently orbiting around each other, with each orbit lasting over 14 hours. In time, they will spiral closer and closer, eventually completing an orbit in just 30 to 40 seconds. One white dwarf will siphon matter off the other, triggering a rare “1a” supernova with four separate explosions. The growing white dwarf will first explode at the point where it is gathering mass, followed by an explosion in its core. This detonation will spew material at the other white dwarf, triggering the same devastating sequence. Overall, the supernova's power will be “a thousand trillion trillion times“ that of the world's most powerful nuclear bomb, and will last around four seconds, per the statement. “We predict that the binary will explode dynamically by means of a double detonation that will destroy both stars just before they merge," the researchers explain in the study, adding in the statement that the supernova will appear ten times brighter than how our Moon appears in the night sky. Type 1a supernovas' consistent brightnesses are deeply relevant to scientists, who use them as “standard candles" to measure other distances in the universe. Despite the system's proximity to Earth, the researchers explain that the event won't endanger our planet. Given that they estimate that the explosion will take place in around 23 billion years, however, we won't be around to see it. For comparison, Earth is 4.5 billion years old, and the entire universe is 13.7 billion years old. In fact, Earth itself might not even be around to witness it and the Sun itself might already be a white dwarf. “Still,” says writer Stephen Luntz for IFL Science, “perhaps some aliens on another world will enjoy the sight.” Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday. More about: Astronomy New Research Outer Space telescope

Eyeball Games will soon launch its 8-ball mobile pool game, Pool Masters, and also unveiled a new collaboration with How to Train Your Dragon.Read More

Adobe is building AI agents for Photoshop and Premiere Pro that can suggest ways to edit your photos or videos and then carry out the tasks for you, according to a blog written today by Ely Greenfield, Adobe’s CTO of digital media.Adobe Photoshop’s agentic AI, or what the company calls its “creative agent,” will be presented in a new floating Actions panel that will recommend context-aware edits after analyzing your photo. For instance, it will be able to suggest removing people standing in the background or creating a greater depth of field by blurring everything behind the subject. All you need to do is click the suggestion and it will be carried out automatically.Long-time Photoshop users are used to manually manipulating photos by tediously masking people and objects and then creating layers so changes can be made to only certain parts of the image. Adobe has already added AI features that let you extend and fill photos across a larger canvas, or delete unwanted objects or people from the background using Distraction Removal.Photoshop’s Actions panel. GIF: AdobeAdobe’s vision is that Photoshop users will be able to prompt agents with natural language, making it easier to learn the steps needed to perform a task (although the agent will still be able to do it for you). And you can continue prompting the agent to make more changes, or manually make adjustments in the layers. In one example video, someone asks the agent to clean up an image and add a text box behind a person, and the agent then lists out steps including: remove background people, auto brighten, remove distracting objects, create “subject” layer, create text layer, and organize layers.GIF: AdobeFor Premiere Pro, Adobe will build on the new Media Intelligence feature introduced last week, which analyzes videos for objects and composition so you can find the footage you need. A future agent will let you direct the agent to make a rough video cut.“While AI can’t replace human creative inspiration, with your input it can make some educated guesses to help you get your project off the ground,” Greenfield wrote in the blog. “It can also help you learn how to perform complex tasks with a few simple keystrokes, helping you grow as an editor.” Premiere Pro’s creative agent will eventually help editors refine shot choices, adjust color, mix audio, and more. Adobe also just launched Generative Extend, which uses AI to add seconds to your clips to help fit a transition.Adobe will introduce the technology behind the first AI agent, which will be for Photoshop, at its Max event in London on April 24th.See More:

Google has released the Agent Development Kit (ADK), an open-source framework aimed at making it easier for developers to build, manage, and deploy multi-agent systems. ADK is written in Python and focuses on modularity and flexibility, making it suitable for both simple and more complex use cases involving multiple interacting agents. Summary Set up a basic multi-agent system with under 100 lines of Python. Customize agents and tools using a flexible API. Currently Python-based, with plans to support other languages in the future. What is ADK? ADK is a developer-oriented framework for creating multi-agent systems. It provides a set of components like agents, tools, orchestrators, and memory modules, all of which can be extended or replaced. The idea is to give developers control over how agents interact and manage their internal state, while also providing a structure that’s easy to understand and work with. Core Features Code-first approach: You write plain Python to define behavior. Multi-agent support: Run and coordinate multiple agents. Custom tools and memory: Extend with your own logic and state management. Streaming support: Agents can exchange information in real time. Example: A Basic Multi-Agent Setup Here’s a short script that shows how to define and run a multi-agent system using ADK: from adk import Agent, Orchestrator, Tool class EchoTool(Tool): def run(self, input: str) -> str: return f"Echo: {input}" echo_agent = Agent(name="EchoAgent", tools=[EchoTool()]) relay_agent = Agent(name="RelayAgent") orchestrator = Orchestrator(agents=[echo_agent, relay_agent]) if __name__ == "__main__": input_text = "Hello from ADK!" result = orchestrator.run(input_text) print(result) This script creates two agents and a simple custom tool. One agent uses the tool to process input, and the orchestrator manages the interaction between them. Development Workflow ADK is designed to fit into standard development workflows. You can: Log and debug agent behavior. Manage short- and long-term memory. Extend agents with custom tools and APIs. Adding a Custom Tool You can define your own tools to let agents call APIs or execute logic. For example: class SearchTool(Tool): def run(self, query: str) -> str: # Placeholder for API logic return f"Results for '{query}'" Attach the tool to an agent and include it in the orchestrator to let your system perform searches or external tasks. Integrations and Tooling ADK integrates well with Google’s broader AI ecosystem. It supports Gemini models and connects to Vertex AI, allowing access to models from providers like Anthropic, Meta, Mistral, and others. Developers can choose the best models for their application needs. Google also introduced Agent Engine, a managed runtime for deploying agents into production. It handles context management, scaling, security, evaluation, and monitoring. Though it complements ADK, Agent Engine is also compatible with other agent frameworks such as LangGraph and CrewAI. To help developers get started, Google provides Agent Garden, a collection of pre-built agents and tools. This library allows teams to prototype faster by reusing existing components rather than starting from scratch. Security and Governance For enterprise-grade applications, ADK and its supporting tools offer several built-in safeguards: Output control to moderate agent responses. Identity permissions to restrict what agents can access or perform. Input screening to catch problematic inputs. Behavior monitoring to log and audit agent actions. These features help teams deploy AI agents with more confidence in secure or sensitive environments. What’s Next Right now, ADK supports Python, and the team behind it has shared plans to support other languages over time. Since the project is open-source, contributions and extensions are encouraged, and the framework may evolve based on how developers use it in real-world settings. Conclusion ADK offers a structured but flexible way to build multi-agent systems. It’s especially useful if you want to experiment with agent workflows without having to build everything from scratch. With integration options, prebuilt libraries, and production-grade tooling, ADK can be a practical starting point for teams developing AI-driven applications. Whether you’re experimenting with small agent workflows or exploring more involved systems, ADK is a practical tool to consider. Check out the GitHub Page and Documentation. All credit for this research goes to the researchers of this project. Also, feel free to follow us on Twitter and don’t forget to join our 85k+ ML SubReddit. NikhilNikhil is an intern consultant at Marktechpost. He is pursuing an integrated dual degree in Materials at the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur. Nikhil is an AI/ML enthusiast who is always researching applications in fields like biomaterials and biomedical science. With a strong background in Material Science, he is exploring new advancements and creating opportunities to contribute.Nikhilhttps://www.marktechpost.com/author/nikhil0980/This AI Paper from ByteDance Introduces MegaScale-Infer: A Disaggregated Expert Parallelism System for Efficient and Scalable MoE-Based LLM ServingNikhilhttps://www.marktechpost.com/author/nikhil0980/This AI Paper Introduces an LLM+FOON Framework: A Graph-Validated Approach for Robotic Cooking Task Planning from Video InstructionsNikhilhttps://www.marktechpost.com/author/nikhil0980/This AI Paper Introduces Inference-Time Scaling Techniques: Microsoft’s Deep Evaluation of Reasoning Models on Complex TasksNikhilhttps://www.marktechpost.com/author/nikhil0980/This AI Paper from Anthropic Introduces Attribution Graphs: A New Interpretability Method to Trace Internal Reasoning in Claude 3.5 Haiku

Barnes & Noble is one of the best places to buy books, but it's also become a surprisingly great place to find LEGO sets and Blu-rays as well. As the desire for physical media experiences has started to become popular again, the bookstore has risen to the occasion. And while actual Barnes & Noble store locations are a great place to shop in person, the online store has started offering some great discounts lately.Right now, Barnes & Noble is having a ton of spring sales on a lot of great stuff. Popular LEGO sets are marked down 25%, books are on sale, and even Blu-rays and DVDs are getting discounts. To see the full sale, you can browse the Barnes & Noble promotions page, or take a look at some of the breakout deals we've found below.LEGO Sets Are 25% OffLowest Price EverLEGO Icons Dune Atreides Royal OrnithopterThe biggest surprise from the Barnes & Noble sale is that the only LEGO Dune set, the Atreides Royal Ornithopter, is at its lowest price ever. Amazon also dropped the price of this set, but still didn't go as low as Barnes & Noble has with the 25% discount here. Alongside the Dune set, quite a few other deals on Disney and Star Wars sets are worth noting. Some of these will be retired soon, and LEGO sets can become hard to find after they've been officially retired. This LEGO promotion is set to end on April 21, the day after Easter.LEGO Super Mario - Adventures with Luigi Starter CourseRetiring SoonLEGO Disney Classic The Enchanted TreehouseLEGO Star Wars BARC Speeder EscapeRetiring SoonLEGO Star Wars New Republic E-Wing vs. Shin Hati's StarfighterUp to 25% Off Popular PaperbacksUp to 25% Off Popular BooksSee it at Barnes & NobleIt wouldn't be a Barnes & Noble sale without some good discounts on popular novels. The company is dropping prices on some of the best-selling fiction series like Fourth Wing, A Court of Thorns and Roses, Harry Potter books, and even the Hunger Games novels. The 25% discount also applies to select non-fiction and kids books. If you're looking more specifically for board books on sale, though, Amazon is your best bet right now.Fourth WingThe Hunger Games (Deluxe Edition)QuicksilverHarry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Stenciled Edges)50% Off British TV Blu-rays and DVDs50% Off British TV Blu-rays and DVDsSee it at Barnes & NobleLast but not least, Barnes & Noble is having a very specific sale on releases of British TV shows. There are some overall great deals in here on some classics, though. A ton of Doctor Who DVDs are included in the sale, including the David Tenant years, plus discounts on popular series like Downton Abby, Poldark, and Sherlock. If you like all of these things I've just listed, this sale is right up your alley. This specific promotion lasts through May 11 or for as long as stock remains.Does Barnes & Noble Have Free Shipping?Barnes & Noble does have free shipping, but according to the help page, it is only for orders of $40 or more as long as the item isn't "unusually sized or overweight." You also have to make sure you choose "standard shipping" as the option when checking out. Alternatively, you can choose to order online and pick up in-store if you have a location near you. You can take advantage of the online Barnes & Noble store finder to see your closest option.

It’s been a wild day for the global economy. Amid US tariff turmoil and reversals, the stock market went on quite the ride. After nearly a week of big losses, Apple stock rebounded significantly with more than 15% in gains—a result not only of the current tariff pause, but likely also exemption optimism thanks to new comments from President Trump. Rebounding Apple stock likely buoyed by exemption possibility Apple’s stock started the day at $171.95, a recent low in light of looming tariffs and an escalating trade war between the US and China. But following word that the most severe global tariffs were on a 90-day pause, the stock soared and closed at $198.85. This represents more than a 15% increase, though it’s still down from pre-tariff numbers that hovered above $200. The temporary de-escalation is undoubtedly a big part of today’s increases. So too, I suspect, is Trump’s indication that certain US companies may be getting tariff exemptions. Annie Linskey writes for The Wall Street Journal: President Trump said Wednesday that he’s considering granting some U.S. companies an exemption from his tariff program. “There are some that have been hard,” Trump told reporters when asked about companies requesting exemptions. “There are some that, by the nature of the company, get hit a little bit harder. We’ll take a look at that.” 9to5Mac’s Take Apple received tariff exemptions during Trump’s first administration, and at least some analysts seemed to believe the same would happen this time around. Though nothing is confirmed, it wouldn’t be too surprising for Apple to be singled out as one of the companies that could “get hit a little bit harder” by tariffs. The company’s supply chain is heavily based in China, the one place US tariffs are still escalating. In fact, Trump name-dropped Apple when discussing tariffs this afternoon: “Look at Apple, Apple is going to spend $500 billion building a plant. They wouldn’t be doing that if I didn’t do this. They’d just keep building them in China, and that’s unsustainable.” Yes, I’d say exemptions for Apple seem very likely at this point. Best iPhone accessories Add 9to5Mac to your Google News feed.  FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.You’re reading 9to5Mac — experts who break news about Apple and its surrounding ecosystem, day after day. Be sure to check out our homepage for all the latest news, and follow 9to5Mac on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn to stay in the loop. Don’t know where to start? Check out our exclusive stories, reviews, how-tos, and subscribe to our YouTube channel

It seems like president Donald Trump's secretary of education Linda McMahon needs a primer on artificial intelligence.During an education summit organized by Silicon Valley venture capitalists, the 76-year-old Trump appointee and former professional wrestling promoter repeatedly pronounced "AI" as "A1," the name of a popular steak sauce produced by Kraft Heinz.The baffling appearance suggested that McMahon somehow doesn't know how to pronounce one of the most ubiquitous acronyms in modern society. "I wish I could remember the source, but there's a school system that's going to start making sure that first graders or even pre-Ks have A1 teaching every year starting that far down in the grades," she told the audience.McMahon was speaking at a roundtable discussion that was also attended by Julia Stiglitz, the CEO of Uplimit, a company that claims to harness AI to drive enterprise learning, and Vijay Karunamurthy, the CTO of Scale AI,  a San Francisco-based AI data annotation company.In other words, the rest of the convened panel had a pretty good idea of what AI is, unlike McMahon."Kids are sponges, they just absorb everything, and so it wasn't all that long ago that we're going to have internet in our schools," McMahon said. "Now, okay, let's see A1, and how can that be helpful in one-on-one instruction."The Internet was introduced in US public schools in the mid to late 1990s, well over two decades ago.Trump's secretary of education appears to be woefully unqualified for the job, as she has no experience in education. She's most prominently known for having founded the corporate entity that eventually turned into World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc., alongside her husband Vince McMahon, in the 1980s.She also served as the administrator of the Small Business Administration during the first Trump administration.McMahon's embarrassing moment is especially troubling because the use of AI in the classroom has proven highly controversial.Students across the globe have embraced generative AI tools like OpenAI's ChatGPT with open arms. That's despite persistent technical challenges, like widespread hallucinations, raising concerns that impressionable young students could be taking inherently flawed and potentially misleading outputs of these AI tools at face value.Early efforts to introduce AI in the classroom have equally been met with skepticism. Critics argue that human educators can never be genuinely replaced, while proponents say that AI tools could free up their time to focus on more pressing matters.Teachers are already massively overworked and underpaid, the argument goes, and AI could take some of that load off.Even more troublingly, a recent study by the educational resource organization Twinkl found that 62 percent of US educators regularly incorporated AI into their work. However, 69 percent of US teachers reported that they had received no formal AI training from their schools, indicating they're woefully unprepared.While it remains unclear which initiative McMahon was referring to during her recent appearance, a number of companies have tried to introduce AI tools that allow young elementary, and Pre-K children to generate short stories, or create interactive presentations.However, relying on AI this early on in a child's education could have some serious side effects."The big question becomes whether children can benefit from those AI interactions in a way that is similar to how they benefit from interacting with other people," said Harvard Graduate School of Education assistant professor Ying Xu in an episode of the school's podcast last year."There is the excitement that AI has the potential for personalized learning and to help students develop skills for this AI-driven society," she added. "But like many of you, I share the same concerns about the outlook of this, what we call the 'AI generation.'"According to Xu, using AI tools this early runs the risk of children becoming "more attached to AI than to the people around them."In short, considering Trump's secretary of education appears to be uninformed on how to pronounce the acronym "AI," the government's ability to shape the role of AI in education in an informed and justified way remains unclear as ever.Besides, Trump announced plans to dismantle the US education department last month, so these are questions individual states will need to grapple with.More on AI in education: High Schools Training Students for Manual Labor as AI Looms Over College and JobsShare This Article