December 17, 202415 min readWe May Be on the Brink of Finding the Real Planet NineIf theres a hidden world in the solar system, a new telescope should find itBy Robin George Andrews Ron MillerMost astronomers would love to find a planet, but Mike Brown may be the only one proud of having killed one. Thanks to his research, Pluto, the solar systems ninth planet, was removed from the pantheonand the public cried foul. How can you revise our childhoods? How can you mess around with our planetariums?About 10 years ago Browns daughterthen around 10 years oldsuggested one way he could seek redemption: go find another planet. When she said that, I kind of laughed, Brown says. In my head, I was like, Thats never happening.Yet Brown may now be on the brink of fulfilling his daughters wish. Evidence he and others have gathered over the past decade suggests something strange is happening in the outer solar system: distant subplanetary objects are being found on orbits that look sculpted, arranged by an unseen gravitational force. According to Brown, that force is coming from a ninth planetone bigger than Earth but smaller than Neptune.On supporting science journalismIf you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.Nobody has found Planet Nine yet. If its really out there, its too far and too faint for almost any existing telescope to spot it. But thats about to change. A new telescope, the Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile, is about to open its mechanical eyes. When it does, it should catch millions of previously undetected celestial phenomena, from distant supernovae to near-Earth asteroidsand, crucially, tens of thousands of new objects around and beyond Pluto.If Browns hidden world is real, Rubin will almost certainly find it or strong indirect evidence that it exists. In the first year or two, were going to answer that question, says Megan Schwamb, a planetary astronomer at Queens University Belfast in Northern Irelandand, just maybe, the solar system will once again have a ninth planet.Pluto was discovered in 1930 and always seemed to be a lonely planet on the fringes of the solar system. But in the early 2000s skywatchers found out that Pluto had company: other rime-coated worlds much like it were popping up in surveys of that benighted frontier. And in 2005, using Californias Palomar Observatory, Brownan astronomer at the California Institute of Technologyand two of his colleagues spied a far-flung orb that would change the way we perceive the solar system.That orb was Eris. It was remarkably distant68 times as far from the sun as Earth. But at roughly 1,500 miles in diameter, it was just a little larger than Pluto. The day I found Eris and did the calculation about how big it might be, I was like, Okay, thats it. Games up, Brown says. Either Eris was going to become a new planet, or Pluto wasnt what we thought.Finding a ninth planet would be huge. Such a discovery could change what we know about our solar systems past.In 2006 officials at the International Astronomical Union decided that to qualify as a planet, a body must orbit a star, must be sufficiently massive for gravity to squish it into a sphere and must have a clear orbit. Pluto, which shares its orbital neighborhood with a fleet of other, more modest objects, failed to overcome the third hurdle. Pluto became a dwarf planetbut its demotion didnt make it, or its fellow distant companions, any less beguiling to astronomers.Pluto and Eris are members of the Kuiper belt, a roughly doughnut-shaped torus of icy shards left over from the solar systems formative days. There are countless worlds just like them, known as trans-Neptunian objects, but they are very hard to see.Still, in the early 2000s Brown, along with his two co-discoverers of Eris, Chadwick Trujillo of Northern Arizona University and David Rabinowitz of Yale University, found their fair share. They announced one of these, named Sedna, in 2004. The closest it gets to the sun is 76 astronomical units, or AU (1 AU is equivalent to the average Earth-sun distance), which is so mindbogglingly far-flung that a person standing on it could obscure the furious light of the sun with the head of a pin. Back then, it was the most distant object ever detected in the solar system. In fact, it resides beyond the Kuiper belt and was viewable only as a fuzzy little dot shifting between the stars. Some refer to Sedna as an extreme trans-Neptunian object, or ETNO. Though poorly defined, ETNOs are key players in the saga of Planet Nine, which is also referred to as Planet X. Sedna was our first clue to Planet Nine, although we didnt recognize it at the time, Brown says.In 2014 Trujillo (then at the Gemini Observatory in Hawaii) and astronomer Scott S. Sheppard of Carnegie Science in Washington, D.C., published a paper on Sedna and another remote object called 2012 VP113, whose closest approach to the sun was a staggering 80 AU. Both dance back and forth across the heliopausethe putative boundary of our solar system that separates the magnetized wind of the sun from the gas and dust found between stars, beyond which interstellar space begins. Those two objects are in a class of their own, Sheppard says. They seemed inexplicable.Sedna and 2012 VP113 (along with a few other, similarly odd objects) are on orbits so stretched out and distant that the gravitational influence of something had to have positioned them there and paved their strange orbital highway around the sun. But what was that something? At these distances the immense gravitational fields of the giant planets, including Neptune, dont have any significant effect on them; the only thing that should be influencing their orbits is the sun.Those objects are in a dead zone, Sheppard says. He and others figured an invisible gravitational actor had to be invoked to explain these aberrant wayfarers. In 2014 Sheppard and Trujillo suggested that Sedna, 2012 VP113 and company may have those outlying orbits thanks to a hidden planetone anywhere from two to five Earth masses in sizethat is pulling at them and gradually changing the shapes and positions of their original orbits over time.The best way to find out if thats true is to use these ETNOs and their orbits as gravitational probes of the outer solar system, Sheppard says. The idea appealed to Brown, who took Sheppard and Trujillos 2014 study down the halls of Caltech to astronomer Konstantin Batygin. Whereas Brown is more of an observer of the night sky, Batygin is a theorist, someone who wants to know why the cartography of the solar system is the way it is. I take deep joy in taking on observational puzzles, he says. For me, the thrill is in putting the calculations out there and battle-testing them with data.Brown and Batygin ruminated on six ETNOs and noticed something weird was going on. Unlike the eight known planets, whose orbits are approximately circular and are oriented along the same flat plane, known as the ecliptic, these six objectsincluding Sednahad elliptical orbits and were tilted about 20 degrees with respect to the ecliptic. The six also made their closest approaches to the sun in the same region of space. They were all too far out to be within Neptunes gravitational reach, but something appeared to have crafted their orbits.Brown and Batygins computer models suggested the only reasonable possibility was a hidden planet with a mass five to 10 times that of Earth orbiting as far as 700 AU away. This world, perhaps one exiled from the warmer confines of the solar system during its chaotic earlier years, managed to cling to the suns gravitational ropes. And as it whirled through the distant darkness, it wielded its own gravitational influence on those passing six orbs, herding them into similar, strange new orbits.Since Sednas discovery in 2004, the notion of a huge, incognito planet had come up on several occasions. But Brown and Batygins 2016 paper announcing their calculations was a clarion call: We are confident that Planet Nine is out there. Now all we need to do is find it.The hunt for a missing planet is inherently peculiar. How many planets are in the solar system? Schwamb asks. This should be an easy question, right? But its not!Finding a ninth planet would be huge. Beyond consoling those in the public who still mourn Plutos demotion, such a discovery could change what we know about our solar systems past. Any objects in, and beyond, the Kuiper belt are relics left over after planet formation, Schwamb says. They tell us about that hidden history that basically has been erased from the solar system. Did planets manage to form that far from the sun, or did they migrate out there? Most orreries of planets moving around other stars include a mini Neptune of some variety. It is very odd that we dont have one, she says.If it exists, Planet Nine is big compared with EarthBrowns best guess is that it hovers around seven Earth masses. But its so far away that its beyond the detection capabilities of most telescopes. In general, observatories have a choice: have a wide field of view to see more of the night sky in one go or a big mirror to collect more light from a smaller area and see distant, faint objects. Space is rather expansive, so trying to zoom in on one minuscule patch of it in the hope of finding a single object is extremely unlikely to succeed.Jen Christiansen; Source: Caltech/R. Hurt (IPAC) (ETNO and Planet Nine orbital reference)Many astronomersnot just Brown, Batygin, Sheppard and Trujillohave tried looking. Several more ETNOs have been found, including the Goblin (discovered around Halloween 2015), Farout and FarFarOutmore gravitational probes for Planet Nine hunters to study. But to date, Planet Nine itself has eluded them.There is, of course, a chance that they cant find it not because Planet Nine is stealthy but because it doesnt exist. Over the past decade various alternative hypotheses have sprung up to try to explain Sedna and its cohorts weirdly clustered orbits.One possibility is that there is a Planet Nine but not the canonical one; instead its something considerably punierMars-sizeand it sits elsewhere on the solar systems outermost boundary. In 2017 Kathryn Volk, an orbital dynamics researcher at the University of Arizona, thought the orbits of various trans-Neptunian objects hinted at the presence of a Mars-esque world within the Kuiper belt. Additional observational data on other distant objects has since undercut her teams hypothesis, and although the possibility of a Mars-like Planet Nine has come up at astronomy conferences, Volk is now skeptical. Much like the more standard Planet Nine, theyre probably both wrong, she says. I dont think any of the existing predictions are correct.In 2020 scientists suggested that an icy ring of primordial debris, if massive enough, could also be sculpting the orbits of several ETNOs. Brown notes that we see inclined frosty rings around other stars, but those rings are thought to be held in place by the gravitational influence of another hefty planet, making this a more complicated explanation than Planet Nine alone.Its also been suggested that perhaps a passing star or a rogue planet zipping through space could have dragged Sedna and its friends onto their weird orbits long ago. In 2019 researchers even wondered whether a tiny black hole might be the culprit. When I raise this possibility to Brown, he grins. I have it! he says. He disappears for a moment, then reemerges holding a sphere about the size of a volleyball. This is a seven-Earth-mass black hole. One of my students 3D-printed it for me.Brown chuckles. What we know is that there is a seven-Earth-mass object out there. What it is, we dont know, he says. It could be a planet. It could be a black hole. It could be a cat or a burrito. All of these are possibilitiessome make more sense than others. He puts down his tiny black hole. A planet is a really mundane explanation. After all, he says, we see planets like that on distant orbits around other stars all the time.Trujillo is a little more circumspect when considering alternative explanations. Sure, he says, they could be right; those theories deserve to be explored. We still dont really know how Sedna and the other ETNOs got out there, he says. But the fact remains that an undiscovered large planet is a real possibility.Though not as adamant as Brown, Batygin is certainly bullish. In astrophysics, most theories are wrong, he says. The most surprising thing Ive encountered over the course of the past eight years for this particular problem is that there hasnt been a compelling other alternative.Arguably, the greatest challenge to the Planet Nine story is the suggestion that Sedna and company may not have strange orbits at all. Astronomers cannot see every region of space clearly. If an observatory is afflicted by bad winter weather, then data will be lacking for that corner of the night sky. ETNOs also spend most of their unfathomably long orbits so far from Earth that they glint in sunlight only when they reach their closest approach to the sun. Then theres the Milky Way. Our solar system is perched on one of the arms of our spiral galaxy, and when we look inward, all we see is starlight. Its beautiful but bothersome to astronomers. Nobody finds [trans-Neptunian objects] where the Milky Way is, says Samantha Lawler, an astronomer at the University of Regina in Canada. Youre looking for a small, fuzzy, moving dot, and when there are so many stars in the background, its harder to find them. Because astronomers know about only a small number of Kuiper belt objects and ETNOs, some scientists skeptical of the Planet Nine hypothesis think we simply do not have enough information to know whether worlds like Sedna really are on strange orbits or just look like they are for the moment.Each year we dont find [Planet Nine], the probability of it actually existing goes down dramatically. Mario Jurić University of WashingtonThink of it this way: imagine youre in the dark, and you have a flashlight. You shine it on one patch of the floor ahead of you, and you see a handful of marbles in that one spot. (Thats Sedna and friends.) With that information alone, you may think there must be a special reason those marbles are in that spot. But there could be plenty of other marbles all over the floorand if you could see all those other marbles, you would realize that the first seeming cluster of them isnt a cluster at all. Instead its just a random group of marbles on a floor covered in haphazardly placed marbles. The problem is that, for now, your flashlight isnt bright or wide enough to let you see the rest of them.This misperception is caused by whats known as an observational bias. To see whether the case for Planet Nine was afflicted by one, Lawler and her colleagues turned to the Outer Solar System Origins Survey (OSSOS). Between 2013 and 2017, OSSOS used the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope to scan eight patches of the night sky and ultimately identified more than 800 new Kuiper belt objects. Eight objects had average distances from the sun greater than 150 AU, making them ETNOsthe kinds of objects that could be used as gravitational probes for Planet Nine. And their orbits were not clustered at all.If a giant hidden planet is influencing these eight objects, they should exhibit the same type of clustering as those being used to invoke Planet Nine. But they dont. The OSSOS data cannot rule out Planet Nine, but they do suggest that what may look like clustered orbits sculpted by an invisible world could, in fact, be an illusion. Authors of another bias-checking study, using the Dark Energy Survey, came to the same broad conclusion in 2020. Why say theres something more complicated if you cant rule out the null result? Lawler says. Thats our argument.The soon-to-open Vera C. Rubin Observatory stands atop the Cerro Pachn mountain range in Chile.NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/F. BrunoThe crux of the debate is that we are dealing with small-number statistics: there are too few known trans-Neptunian objects for astronomers to confirm one way or the other. The agnostic perspective now is that we do not have enough data either way, says Pedro Bernardinelli, an astronomer at the Institute for Data Intensive Research in Astrophysics and Cosmology at the University of Washington. I am fairly convinced that its probably not there. But I also think its silly to not search for it.Thankfully, that search is about to get a lot easier.In May 2024 a nearly 7,000-pound, car-size camera was moved from its construction site in California to a mountaintop in Chile. After a 10-hour flight and a several-day, winding, bumpy drive to an 8,700-foot-high peak in the Cerro Pachn mountain range, the 3,200-megapixel camerathe worlds largestarrived without a single scratch. Like the prize jewel for a monarchs crown, the $168-million camera was then almost ready to be set in place within the nearly finished Vera C. Rubin Observatory.The observatory will see its first light sometime in early 2025. Thanks to its enormous field of view, Rubin will take images of the entire night sky viewable from the Southern Hemisphere night after nightand its house-size nest of mirrors will gather up remarkably distant starlight, meaning nearly everything that shimmers or shifts about will be photographed.Rubina venture funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation and the Department of Energyis named after the late, great astronomer who, by looking at the way stars and galaxies stuck together more than could be explained by the gravity of visible matter alone, uncovered compelling evidence for dark matter. Her namesake is aptly set to find a cornucopia of concealed objects, from faraway collapsing stars to millions of asteroids and even a bunch of interstellar objects in our own solar system.The Kuiper belt, whose population and structure are only vaguely known, stands to be greatly illuminated by Rubin. After nearly four decades of searching, astronomers have found about 4,000 objects out there. With Rubin, it should go up to about 40,000, says Mario Jurić, an astronomer at the University of Washington. I bring that up with Brown, who laughs. Ah, who cares about those? he says with a grin. But ultimately, he has his eyes on Planet Nine. And, he says, Rubin is probably going to find it.Heres how: To fulfill Rubins myriad science objectives, astronomers are putting together a strategy for the observatorys survey of the night sky, which will essentially be automated. Astronomers cant just ask for time on Rubin as they do on other telescopes. Instead algorithms will process Rubins nightly images to produce catalogs, which will then be released to the community.For solar system science, astronomers will see a list of moving objectsthose known and those previously unidentifiedwith orbital parameters based on the current crop of Rubin observations. Researchers seeking Planet Nine can then use the newly discovered trans-Neptunian objects to see whether the case for the planet is stacking up or collapsing.When lots of ETNOs have been found, Brown says, it will become clear whether the clustered orbits one would expect to be caused by a hidden planetlike those of Sedna and companyare present. And because Rubin will see the entire southern sky, any observational bias will be quickly ruled out. If the clustering is there, Planet Nine is there, Brown says.Its also possible that among the moving objects Rubin detects will be Planet Nine itself. If its more like Uranus or Neptunea hydrogen-enveloped orb with plenty of iceit will reflect a lot of light, making it easier to spot. (Even in that best-case scenario it would probably look like a pinprick of light in a Rubin image.) Pessimistically, Batygin says, its a bare rocka superdark world, practically invisible. Undeniably, that would suck. But that might be the reality of it. Well get what well get, and we wont get upset. Well, some of us will get upset.If its hanging out in front of the Milky Way, that would be the nightmare scenario, Bernardinelli says. It will be very hard to find. Jurić notes that Rubins software will do its best to subtract that bright conflagration of starlight, revealing, he hopes, anything concealed within it. Will that work? Jurić thinks so, but you dont know until you try it, he says.Worst-case scenarios aside, astronomers expect that the mission to find Planet Nine will be over in a few years. In just one, Earth (and Rubin) will have circled the sun once. Only inclement weather will prevent us from seeing whats out there; a bad winter month may take one month of full-sky coverage away, but the telescope should be able to capture it the next year.Each year we dont find [Planet Nine], the probability of it actually existing goes down dramatically, Jurić says. And after a couple of years, the existence (or nonexistence) of Planet Nine will be, to most astronomers, unequivocal. Rubin is the ideal planet hunter, Schwamb says. I dont think theres any other telescope in the world that could manage to do this.Most astronomers are happy to wait and find out what Rubin reveals. Schwamb, whose Ph.D. adviser was none other than Mike Brown, treads carefully. I will be pleasantly excited if there is a planet, she says. I will not be so surprised if there isnt one.But Brown and Batygin have never been surer. In a 2024 study, they analyzed the orbits of 17 trans-Neptunian objects, each with a bizarre feature: their closest approaches to the sun can get as near as Jupiter. Objects that cross Neptunes orbit like that should get ejected from the solar system, so how can these objects on these orbits exist today? Something is grabbing orbs that linger at the very edge of the solar system and putting them on orbits that take them far closer to the sun than they would otherwise get, the scientists surmise.Their study used virtual re-creations of the solar system and tried to see what kinds of objects had the gravitational influence to sculpt these orbitsincluding passing stars, the Milky Way itself and Planet Nine. According to the researchers, the versions of reality without Planet Nine make no sense. This outcome is the strongest statistical evidence yet that Planet Nine is really out there, Batygin says.If the planet does exist, theres a good chance that Brown and Batygin might not find it first. Rubin may detect it autonomously, Jurić says, whereupon another group of astronomers reading the data will confirm that it is genuine. Alternatively, Rubins software might not detect it automatically, but an astronomer may find Planet Nine by using their own software to go through the imaging data or by perusing a list of moving objects that Rubin found but did not autonomously flag as Planet Nine candidates. Batygin, ever the theorist, says the discovery is what matters most, regardless of who claims it. I just want to know the answer, he says.If Planet Nine is real, my instant reaction might be relief, Brown says. He admits that should he not be the one to first cast eyes on it, he would feel an initial gut punch of frustration. I would love to discover it, he says. But hed be satisfied if he and his colleagues were proved right all along, and he met his daughters challenge of redemptionand he would be thrilled that the history of the solar system would change, once again, partly because of his research.Theres a very good chance that we could be sitting around studying Planet Nine in just a couple of years time, he says. Every telescope, on Earth and in space, might be zeroing in on its secrets. Whatever its like, Brown says, it will be the best planet in the solar system.

December 17, 20243 min readApe Jokes, Vagus Nerve Hopes and a Mystery PlanetThe searches for Planet Nine, bat viruses, life on Jupiters moon Europa and lucid dreamsBy Laura Helmuth Scientific American, January 2025One of the things I enjoy most about Scientific American is learning about how scientists do their workthe inspirations, the questions, the insights, the collaborations, the hmm, thats strange moments. Anthropologist Erica Cartmill recounts how she came to study the evolutionary origins of joking. We humans are all just great apes, no matter how fancy we dress up, and she finds that young orangutans and chimps play the same kinds of tricks and peekaboo games that we do.Another thing I appreciate about Scientific American is how our writers distinguish between hope and hype. As social media becomes increasingly fractured and fast and full of misinformation, its more important than ever to have trustworthy publications that share the best evidence for health claims. Research on the vagus nerve is at an interesting point right now. Its the most meandering nerve in the human body, connecting the brain with most of our internal organs. A full-spread graphic by Mesa Schumacher shows just how elaborate its influence is. Charlatans with gadgets to sell will claim that stimulating the nerve can cure whatever ails you. Thats not true ... but a growing body of evidence suggests the vagus nerve is a good candidate for treating a range of health conditions. Author Jena Pincott outlines what we know, what we dont and what it all means.We should know soon whether a hypothetical distant planet is orbiting at the edge of our solar system. Planet Nine (also called Planet X), if its really there, is five to 10 times the mass of Earth and has been distorting the paths of smaller objects. Volcanologist and science writer Robin George Andrews tracks the evidence and the growing enthusiasm among some astronomers that well soon have a ninth planet to replace poor Pluto. (One of these astronomers is the person who knocked Pluto out of the planetary pantheon and is hoping for atonement.)On supporting science journalismIf you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.People can learn to control their dreams and even communicate while dreaming. Sleep researcher Michelle Carr details the dream adventures of people who have participated in research studies in her laboratory, along with tips about how to practice lucid dreaming, which may help some people manage nightmares and improve sleep.Bats carry a lot of nasty viruses that dont bother them but do endanger other species, including humans. New research explains how their odd immune systems are tied to their evolution of flight. Science writer Jane Qiu warns that deforestation and climate change make us more vulnerable to spillover pandemics. Photojournalist Doug Gimesys images of gigantic bats called flying foxes are gorgeous and surprisingly endearing. Read more about Gimesy in our Contributors column.NASAs Europa Clipper mission launched on October 14, 2024, toward one of Jupiters most intriguing moons, with a briny ocean that is one of our best chances for finding life elsewhere in the solar system. The space probe is scheduled to arrive in 2030. Science writer Nadia Drake was there for the launch, and she shares the excitement of the mission and the rich history of the search for life, which is guided in part by the work of her father, astronomer Frank Drake.Enjoy the two new columns in this issue: a crossword by Aimee Lucido that features clues related to articles in the issue and The Science of Parenting. Please let us know at feedback@sciam.com if you have a question related to parenting that youd like our experts to answer.

Catly developer denies using generative AI or blockchain technology in its open-world cat game"We are very surprised by such speculations."Image credit: SuperAuthenti News by Ed Nightingale Deputy News Editor Published on Dec. 17, 2024 The developer of Catly, an open-world cat game revealed at last week's The Game Awards, has denied using generative AI for the game's trailer, or the game itself.The game is set for release across Steam, Nintendo Switch, and Apple Watch and its trailer features a series of hyper-realistic cats that quickly raised eyebrows as viewers suspected generative AI was used.Since the reveal, reddit users noted various oddities and supposed indicators of AI art used on the game's website, some of which have reportedly been removed. Moreover, commenters suggested the developer has links to blockchain gaming and NFTs, which it has now denied.Catly - Official Reveal Trailer | The Game Awards 2024Watch on YouTubeA statement from a PR representative for Catly's developer SuperAuthenti, shared with IGN and Game Developer, said generative AI had not been used for the trailer or the game. "In fact we are very surprised by such speculations," the statement reads. "We do not think there are any existing AI tools that can produce a video like that. Industry experts have echoed this opinion."Both outlets were shown in-progress shots of the trailer from The Game Awards, which seemed to confirm the trailer was not AI-generated.A co-founder of SuperAuthenti is Kevin Yeung, who also co-founded TenthPlanet - a studio reportedly working on two blockchain games. One of these is Alien Mews, a digital cat life simulation built in Unreal Engine 5 that on the surface shares similarities with Catly. Reddit users have also pointed to a previous game published by SuperAuthenti called Plantly: Mindful Gardening that's since been scrubbed from the internet but appears to have used blockchain technology.Catly's Steam page also includes a testimonial quote from League of Legends and Arcane producer Thomas Vu, a known web3 investor.Another quote is from Ben Brode, game director of Hearthstone, who responded on BlueSky to say he'd seen 20 minutes of gameplay footage and "thought it looked cool so they asked me for a quote", adding "it looks real enough to me, cats looked wild". Catly on an Apple Watch | Image credit: SuperAuthentiAs Game Developer reported, SuperAuthenti did not comment on any business connections, but stated "Catly is not a blockchain game" and "there are no NFTs". The statement continued: "Our company/project has never issued any blockchain currency and any NFTs. Our company does not and has never owned any blockchain currency and NFTs."SuperAuthenti also confirmed to IGN Catly has been developed in Unreal Engine 5, with "various software" used to produce hyperrealistic hair and fur.What's certainly clear is the prevalence of AI in the games industry makes it hard to ascertain what's AI generated and what's hand-crafted.AI is changing video game development forever, as its use is becoming widespread across animation, scriptwriting, voice acting and more.Most recently, Google detailed its Genie 2 tool it claims can create playable 3D worlds from a single image prompt. It stressed the tool is for "rapid prototyping".

The paid, offline version of Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp is a lot more chill, but the legacy of its freemium systems still requires a little navigation.The last time I wrote for Eurogamer, it was to tell the story of how Nintendo announced the end of Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp as a freemium live service game and sent me into a tailspin of despair. The only thing helping me through this bleak time was the fact that, tucked at the very end of Nintendo's email, was the revelation that my save data could live on in a paid app - Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp Complete - which would arrive in "the future".Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp Complete reviewDeveloper: NintendoPublisher: NintendoPlatform: Played on iOSAvailability: Out now on iOS and AndroidWell, the future is NOW and I've been playing Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp Complete since about three minutes after a pre-order download notification plopped onto my lock screen. Not continuously, I should say. I took a break to have a bath at some point, and another one to crochet a nudibranch and watch The Fly, but I did play pretty intensely. The wealth of knowledge and experience gleaned in this period is what I will now share with you. Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp Complete is a very similar experience to the now-defunct Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp. You, a relatively competent human with a gigantic head, must contend with a collection of hapless but adorable animals and their requests as you build up a wealth of objects with which to decorate a little campsite, a camper van and a chalet. New players must start from scratch, gradually acquiring furniture and making friends in order to live out their deepest campsite manager fantasies. Old players can start fresh or pick up where they left off Well, they can if they linked their Pocket Camp save data to a Nintendo account. Left: Picking up yet another new terrain type for my future projects. Right: Regular readers will appreciate how momentous this is: Octavian is back at the campsite! Image credit: Eurogamer/NintendoThe latter is a potential point of friction, and worth discussing a little here in case you are a returning player reading this review and thinking of resurrecting your camp in the new app. Y'see, the save data transfer is only possible if you linked a Nintendo account to your save before the live service game was switched off.There were plenty of in-game warnings about account linking, and another warning in the Complete trailer. But there was no overlap period between the two apps being available, and thus no grace period where one could spot the new app, realise there was a linked account requirement for save data transfers, and rectify the problem in the moment. Rather, by the time Complete launched earlier this month, the availability (or not) of your save data was already set. This struck me as a strangely punishing way of handling the switchover timeline.Once you're in the game, the core loops are pure Animal Crossing. There's crafting! Decorating! Dressing up! Fetching a coconut for an implausibly sporty hamster! If you've imported save data, you'll also keep your player character level, your friendship levels with each animal character, your bells (the non-premium currency), crafting materials, items, layouts, clothing, and saved outfits. Left: I wonder why I crafted two flans? Right: The random drop gods do not wish me to have a luggage carousel, for some reason. Image credit: Eurogamer/NintendoWhat you won't find in Pocket Camp Complete are Leaf Tickets (the premium currency) or paid subscription plans. Ditching Leaf Tickets means no more microtransactions (hooray!), and the best features of the subscription plans have actually been integrated into Complete so everyone can access them, including the option of appointing a camp caretaker animal, the journal sticker system, and the provision of extra layout and outfit slots. There is also a new currency called Leaf Tokens, which is definitely not the same thing as Leaf Tickets under a different name (it is). Leaf Tokens live in the same place where Leaf Tickets used to be onscreen, but unlike its premium namesake, they're now very easy to earn simply by playing the game. They can be spent on a lot of the same things that Leaf Tickets were for, too, such as the golden fishing rod, terrain options, fortune cookies and more. I think I might be slightly drunk on Leaf Tokens, to be honest with you. I've accumulated so many in such a short space of time!In fact, after seven long years of scrimping and saving Tickets for campsite terrain options, I'd become used to not being able to justify the expense of acquiring a complete themed set because you had to purchase the themed foreground, middle ground, background and sky separately. Now, with this influx of Leaf Tokens, I'll admit that I went on what can only be described as a geological shopping spree my camp can contain oceans! Jungles! Bamboo forests! Cobblestones! Truly, I never knew such exhilaration until now. Left: The perfect armchair for one of my springtime room designs. Right: Derwin is so cute! I'm glad I promoted him to camp caretaker. Image credit: Eurogamer/NintendoCrafting times still apply, however, which came as something of a shock after throwing 3/month into the Nintendo abyss to reduce these times as part of the old Happy Helper Plan. I'd been paying that fee for so long that I'd forgotten that crafting time restrictions even existed, though my abundance of Leaf Tokens did help with this somewhat, as I can bung the crafting llama a wodge of them and he can shave six hours off the crafting of all future objects. Not that it's all that obvious, mind, as you have to poke the plus sign over the llama's head in order to do so and not the more logical thing of interacting with the crafting object slots themselves. The UI can be truly obtuse sometimes. One day, I will review you and your music, Slider. Just you wait. | Image credit: Eurogamer/NintendoThe other big change is that Complete does not require a constant internet connection while you're playing. This is great news for those of us who want to while away hours on train journeys by creating little camp tableaux. In fact, I spent an hour curled up in a coffee shop with appalling phone signal just tinkering with my current pre-Christmas cabin layout - a feat that would have been nigh on impossible in the original Pocket Camp.The only downside to offline play is losing the (admittedly very limited) social side of the Pocket Camp experience. I was sorry to see that go, as my little collection of friends had found ways to express genuine affection through Pocket Camp's restrictive interactions. Friends are now accumulated via QR codes on customisable Friend Cards and you can bump into their avatars in the new Whistle Pass area. Whistle Pass is where the Animal Crossing universe's only musician, KK Slider hangs out. (I have opinions about KK Slider, but I suppose I am not here to review him. Yet.)In terms of content, new events and cookies are scheduled until September 2025, and past events will repeat on a four-year cycle. I've played the first two events, and they were a lot easier to "finish" (by which I mean "obtain all the items of furniture") than those in the live service game. That's excellent for new players, but old hands might be wrongfooted by the new rhythms.I internalised the three-hour check-in cycle you need to optimise playing the live service game years ago. As a result, I've overshot the fishing target by such a long way that I'm now drowning in the Toy Day bookshelves which are offered as one of the event rewards. I just threw seven of them into one of the game's overflow storage warehouses just so I didn't have to look at them anymore.The above will tell you that I played Pocket Camp in such a deeply ridiculous way that it necessarily affects how I play and experience Complete. But, trying to put myself in the mind of a chill and normal player, I think Pocket Camp Complete offers an adorable, snackable game of collecting and creating. The food items are a particular delight, and I defy anyone not to melt when they find the coffee and cake item where the latte foam art is designed to look like Marshal's lovely little face! Look at the latte foam art of Marshal's little face! | Image credit: Eurogamer/NintendoThe removal of the Leaf Ticket economy also means you can probably get most of the items you want by popping in now and again, then settle in for a longer session where you arrange your new treasures for maximum effect.On the rougher side, the UI remains incredibly busy. Even I still have little points of confusion and we've established how much time I spend on this thing. There are fussy systems which no longer make sense without the accompanying freemium social shenanigans. For example, because of the way three types of fruit were distributed to incentivise market box usage in Pocket Camp, the only way I can obtain grapes in Complete is to pester the avatars of particular friends in Whistle Pass. Plus, I defy anyone to enjoy the clunky furniture overflow storage options in the late game.I also want to point out that, even though the microtransactions are gone, the vestiges of the freemium model are still embedded throughout. This means that, despite not making constant overtures towards your bank account, Complete can still imitate some of the same loops of predatory gaming, just with Tokens instead of Tickets, so parents (and games critics with a weakness for loot boxes) might want to bear that in mind.For existing Pocket Camp players with linked accounts, Complete offers a way to keep playing, as well as a way to preserve the defunct game's save data in an accessible format (at least until upkeep by the developer falls out of sync with mobile operating systems or store requirements). The way the new content will give way to a cycle of repeating old events also acts as a wind-down period something far gentler than just switching off the servers and that feels important for long-term players.So far, Complete has been a continuation of what I was doing for seven years in the live service game, but with a readjustment period. I don't want to say that I miss the pressure that the freemium systems exerted - it was unhealthy to my brain and wallet. However, using my existing playstyle with Complete's more forgiving cadence creates a looser and less sticky experience. I'm glad I have my save, but I won't be surprised if the game starts to slip out of my routine. Left: Everything about my Friend Card is deeply serious. Right: The treasure map/owl service is one of many weird things which I didn't have room to explain. Image credit: Eurogamer/NintendoAnimal Crossing: Pocket Camp Complete accessibility optionsBeyond your phone's general accessibility options, you can only toggle the music and sound effects on/off as separate options. Overall, Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp Complete now feels like a closer experience to its console counterparts. There's the familiar roster of cute animals, squillions of items of furniture to craft and place, and you only have to pay once to gain access to the whole kaboodle. At time of writing, Complete costs 9/$10, which is an introductory offer for the first two months of release. That's a great price for the amount of diorama building and tinkering it provides, so the bigger question is how you feel about unlocking the cute furniture and outfits via freemium-style play. If you hate that method, no amount of cute latte art will make it worthwhile.At the end of January, that price goes up to 18/$20. That's a harder sell, especially in the mobile game ecosystem, but it could still keep the right person entertained. The main thing to note, though, is that after September 2025, there will be no new content, and Complete will enter a similar state to Animal Crossing: New Horizons - perfectly playable as long as the platforms it lives on support it.Eurogamer sourced its own copy of Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp Complete for the purpose of this review.

You can trust VideoGamer. Our team of gaming experts spend hours testing and reviewing the latest games, to ensure you're reading the most comprehensive guide possible. Rest assured, all imagery and advice is unique and original. Check out how we test and review games here Contents hide FromSoftware has announced that classic Dark Souls enemies will make their return in the upcoming Elden Ring: Neightreign, a new standalone co-op roguelike game. Alongside re-using a bunch of assets from Elden Ring and Shadow of the Erdtree, FromSoftware will also be bringing back a host of enemies from their earlier games.Dark Souls crosses into Elden Ring: NeightreignSpeaking with Japanese news outlet Famitsu, director Junya Ishizaki confirmed that enemies in the Souls franchsie will return for the new Elden Ring. However, they wont take over the cast of foes as only a few enemies will make the cut.In the interview, Ishizaki explaned that they will be bringing back a small number of enemies, including some very famous ones. For example, Dark Souls 3s Nameless King atop a dragon, launching lightning bolts at the player.In fact, it may be due to the return of the Night King that many of these classic Souls foes are crossing over, blending the worlds for the so-called Neightreign. As a parallel universe, Ishizaki explained that the crossing of worlds adds to the chaos of the new roguelike.Other confirmed Dark Souls enemies making their return appear to inlcude the second games The Dukes Dear Freja boss monster, the Centipede Demon and more. Unfortunately, theres no sign that monsters from other FromSoft games, namely Sekiro, will also come back for the game. Would an Armored Core mech be too much?How does this alter the lore?It does seem that FromSoftware is leaning hard on the bridge between Elden Ring and Dark Souls, even teasing the fact that the new game is reigniting the dwindling fire of Souls past. In an official tweet from the developer, they said: In the Night, ancestral foes await remnants of a fire that once burned bright.FromSoftware has not explained where this parallel universe fits within the overall canon of Elden Ring, Dark Souls and other games. However, we can expect more five-hour-long video essays than ever before once the game actually releases in 2025.Elden Ring: Shadow of the ErdtreePlatform(s):PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S/XGenre(s):Action, RPG10VideoGamerSubscribe to our newsletters!By subscribing, you agree to our Privacy Policy and may receive occasional deal communications; you can unsubscribe anytime.Share

You can trust VideoGamer. Our team of gaming experts spend hours testing and reviewing the latest games, to ensure you're reading the most comprehensive guide possible. Rest assured, all imagery and advice is unique and original. Check out how we test and review games hereAs if the bottom of the barrel couldnt get any crustier, an actual Fortnite x Skibidi Toilet crossover has been leaked. Following recent leaks of a Spongebob crossover, giving Nickelodeons pacifist sponge an AK, the bane of the modern internet is close to making its debut crossover. To put it in perspective, even Borderlands 4 is avoiding this one. Fortnite x Skibidi Toilet crossoverRevealed by prominent Fortnite leaker SpushFNBR, the Fortnite x Skibidi Toilet leak is sadly real. Releasing in the popular battle royale game on December 18. 2024, the popular YouTube series thats somehow allowed to exist in a multimedia format whilst using actual Half-Life 2 assets will have numerous accessories available.The pice de rsistance of this rancid crossover is the Plungerman skin, the protagonist of the Skibidi Toilet Zombie Universe. (Are we being real right now or is this made up?) Costing 1,500 V-Bucks, the skin will also give players access to the Skibidi Backpack and be available as a LEGO Fortnite character.If you havent been saving your lunch money on the hopes of a Fortnite x Skibidi Toilet crossover and you cant afford the Plungerman skin, the backpack can be purchased on its lonesome for just 600 V-Bucks. Someone out there would call that a steal.Of course, the crossover comes with a Pickaxe skin for fans to use and, you guessed it, its Plungermans iconic plunger which, we imagine, he uses to fight the Half-Life 2 citizen head trapped inside the Half-Life 2 toilet.For those who need to get the whole Fortnite x Skibidi Toilet ordeal, the bundle will cost 2,800 V-Bucks in total. You can get full games for that money or, like, a Game Pass month, or even just a nice meal. You can literally get anything, save it up for the love of all that is holy.Anyway, for more Fortnite coverage, read about how you can find the OG Bush in Fortnite OG mode. Isnt that exciting? If you want something different. You can also read about how Epic Games has revived one of the rarest Fortnite cosmetics. Ooo, shiny.FortnitePlatform(s):Android, iOS, macOS, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S/XGenre(s):Action, Massively Multiplayer, Shooter9VideoGamerSubscribe to our newsletters!By subscribing, you agree to our Privacy Policy and may receive occasional deal communications; you can unsubscribe anytime.Share

The interior mount I had hoped for wasnt an option with my shallow windows, so we selected an outside mount waterfall shade. It was important to me to preserve visibility of my millwork as much as possible, which the design team was sensitive toand I think the solution we landed on worked well. I also knew I wanted some texture and transparency, which nudged me toward The Shade Stores wood weaves. My preferred material was on backorder until January, so I went for my second choice of unlined Somerset Teak. Its a little tidier than the more rustic option Id had my eye on, but I still love the look.How did the installation process work? (Was it hard? Did you do it yourself?)The shades shipped directly to my house a few days ahead of the installation date in a single box. A technician (arranged for by The Shade Store) handled all of the assembly and mountingso my involvement in the installation was mercifully minimal. The entire process took less than half an hour, and, in white-glove fashion, he also took all of the packaging with him. Order to installation takes around a month.Photo: Lila AllenPhoto: Lila AllenWhat type of hardware did you choose, if any?The hardware on this set of shades is concealed, outside of the continuous-loop chain thats mounted to the side of the window.What room did you put them in and why?I recently moved into a new house, so all of my windows need shades. My living room is where I spend the most time, though, so getting a chic set there was a priority. Knowing that Id have a custom, professional installation made it all the more appealing to test out The Shade Storethe last thing I wanted to do was screw up the rooms beautiful original millwork.How do you feel about the shades now that theyre installed? (Are you happy with them? Are they serving the purpose youd intended them to?)They are still brand new to me, but I love them! Im happy we were able to come up with a solution that worked for my difficult windowsand the shades are a perfect fit. So far the continuous-loop chain isnt snagging, and the shades are remaining level. Because of the transparency, you can see a central lifting thread through the middle of the shadebut its subtle and doesnt bother me. If I needed another set of custom shades and it was in my budget, Id order from The Shade Store again. (Based on the emails Ive been getting since I started this process, they do offer seasonal discountsso factor that into your planning.)

In recent times, the AD100 French Mexican architect Hugo Toro has taken the approach of an auteur, working on a carte blanche basis to realize his commissioned projects down to the last exacting detail. For the Park Hyatt Paris-Vendmes new crown jewel, restaurant Pur, home to Michelin-starred chef Jean-Franois Rouquette, Toro conceived everything, even the napkin rings and the staff uniforms. Currently, he is putting the final touches on La Minerva hotel in Rome, the Orient Expresss five-star accommodation just steps from the Pantheon, which will be a complete embodiment of his architectural vision.For his latest residential project on Pariss Left Bank, a 1911 mansion comprising more than 10,000 square feet spread across six floors, the clientsa French familywere happy to hand him the reins with just one stipulation: They wanted a fish tank. Thats a first, the 35-year-old admits of the two-and-a-half-ton aquarium he had installed into a wall in the ground-floor family room, adding with a smile, I left it up to them to choose the fish.Designer Hugo Toro in the dining room.The project is Toros largest (completed) private home to date. These are very rare buildings, he says of the history and scale of the site, which features six bedrooms, six bathrooms, a pool, a rooftop terrace, and a garden.When he first visited in February 2022, the house had sat empty for 15 years and was in disrepair. Water damage and mold marked the ornate, gilded plasterwork, and paintin a fusty Empire redwas peeling off the walls. They wanted me to bridge the gap between the past and today: to respect the building but create a new stratification of style and time references, he says of the brief, which was to unearth some of the buildings original charmthe Art Nouveau curves of the window frames and a more muted palette they found when they scraped at the wallsand create something more distinct.

Speech police Trump FCC chair wants to revoke broadcast licensesthe 1st Amendment might stop him Brendan Carr backs Trump's war against media, but revoking licenses won't be easy. Jon Brodkin Dec 17, 2024 7:00 am | 95 President-elect Donald Trump speaks to Brendan Carr, his intended pick for Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, as he attends a SpaceX Starship rocket launch on November 19, 2024 in Brownsville, Texas. Credit: Getty Images | Brandon Bell President-elect Donald Trump speaks to Brendan Carr, his intended pick for Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, as he attends a SpaceX Starship rocket launch on November 19, 2024 in Brownsville, Texas. Credit: Getty Images | Brandon Bell Story textSizeSmallStandardLargeWidth *StandardWideLinksStandardOrange* Subscribers only Learn morePresident-elect Donald Trump's pick to lead the Federal Communications Commission, Brendan Carr, wants the FCC to crack down on news broadcasters that he perceives as being unfair to Trump or Republicans in general.Carr's stated goals would appear to mark a major shift in the FCC's approach to broadcasters. Carr's predecessors, including outgoing Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel and Republican Ajit Pai, who served in the first Trump administration, both rejected Trump's calls to punish news networks for alleged bias.Carr has instead embraced Trump's view that broadcasters should be punished for supposed anti-conservative bias. Carr has threatened to revoke licenses by wielding the FCC's authority to ensure that broadcast stations using public airwaves operate in the public interest, despite previous chairs saying the First Amendment prevents the FCC from revoking licenses based on content.Revoking licenses or blocking license renewals is difficult legally, experts told Ars. But Carr could use his power as FCC chair to pressure broadcasters and force them to undergo costly legal proceedings, even if he never succeeds in taking a license away from a broadcast station."Look, the law is very clear," Carr told CNBC on December 6. "The Communications Act says you have to operate in the public interest. And if you don't, yes, one of the consequences is potentially losing your license. And of course, that's on the table. I mean, look, broadcast licenses are not sacred cows."Carr fights Trumps battlesCarr has said his FCC will take a close look at a complaint regarding a CBS 60 Minutes interview with Kamala Harris before the election. Trump criticized the editing of the interview and said that "CBS should lose its license."In an interview with Fox News, Carr said there is "a news distortion complaint at the FCC still, having to do with CBS, and CBS has a transaction before the FCC." He was referring to a pending deal involving Skydance and Paramount, which owns and operates 28 local broadcast TV stations of the CBS Television Network."I'm pretty confident that news distortion complaint over the CBS 60 Minutes transcript is something that is likely to arise in the context of the FCC's review of that transaction," Carr said.Carr also alleged that NBC putting Harris on Saturday Night Live before the election was "a clear and blatant effort to evade the FCC's Equal Time rule," even though NBC gave Trump two free 60-second messages in order to comply with that rule. In Carr's CNBC interview on December 6, he raised the specter of imposing new rules for broadcasters and taking action against NBC over the Saturday Night Live episode."I don't want to be the speech police," Carr told CNBC. "But there is something that's different about broadcasters than, say, podcasters, where you have to operate in the public interest. So right now, all I'm saying is maybe we should start a rulemaking to take a look at what that means. There's other issues as well. Look, there's a news distortion complaint that's still hanging out there involving CBS, with NBC and SNL, we had some issues potentially with the Equal Time provision. I just think we need to sort of reinvigorate the FCC's approach to these issues, as Congress has envisioned."We emailed Carr with questions about his specific plans for challenging broadcasters' licenses and whether he still believes that NBC attempted to evade the Equal Time rule, but we did not receive a response.Carrs tough taskThe Carr FCC and Trump administration "can hassle the living daylights out of broadcasters or other media outlets in annoying ways," said Andrew Jay Schwartzman, who is senior counselor for the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society and previously led the nonprofit Media Access Project, a public interest telecommunications law firm. At the FCC, "you can harass, you can kind of single some broadcasters out, and you can hold up some of their applications," Schwartzman said in a phone interview with Ars.But that doesn't mean Carr can put broadcasters out of business. "They're not going to revoke licenses. It's just legally just not doable. He can't change the precedents and the statute on that," Schwartzman said.Schwartzman explained in a recent memo that "under the Communications Act, revocation of a license, which means taking it away in the middle of a license term, is essentially impossible. The legal standard is so high that the only time that the FCC tries to revoke a license is when a station (typically a mom-and-pop AM) goes dark." Schwartzman wrote the memo in response to Trump's demand that the FCC punish CBS.The FCC doesn't license TV networks such as CBS, NBC, or ABC, but the FCC could punish individual stations owned by those companies. The FCC's licensing authority is over broadcast stations, many of which are owned and operated by a big network. Other stations are affiliated with the networks but have different ownership.Although revoking a license in the middle of a license term is effectively impossible, the FCC can go after a license when it's up for renewal, Schwartzman said. But Carr will have to go through most of the next four years without any opportunity to challenge a broadcast TV license renewal. According to the FCC's list of renewal dates, there are no TV station licenses up for renewal until 2028.That won't give Carr enough time to reject a renewal and win in court, Schwartzman said. "A license renewal litigation that would take years can't even begin until Trump is out of office," he told Ars.Light years away from previous Republican chairCarr would face a high legal standard even if there were licenses up for renewal in 2025. Schwartzman's memo said that "the First Amendment bars denial of renewal based on program content, and certainly not based on the political views expressed.... The only way that a broadcaster could theoretically get into trouble on renewal would be a character problem based on being found to have lied to the government or conviction of major felonies."A license renewal isn't the FCC's only avenue for challenging broadcasters. As noted earlier in this article, Carr has discussed investigating bias allegations during proceedings on license transfers that happen in connection with mergers and acquisitions. Carr can "hold up a transfer" when a company tries to sell broadcast stations and "hassle people that way," Schwartzman told Ars.It's clear from his public statements that Carr sees the FCC's responsibility over broadcasters much differently than Pai, Trump's first FCC chair. Pai, a Republican who teamed up with Carr on deregulating the broadband industry and many other conservative priorities, rejected the idea of revoking broadcast licenses in 2017 despite Trump's complaints about news networks. Pai said that the FCC "under my leadership will stand for the First Amendment" and that "the FCC does not have the authority to revoke a license of a broadcast station based on the content of a particular newscast."More recently, Rosenworcel rejected Trump's call to revoke licenses from CBS. "As Ive said before, the First Amendment is a cornerstone of our democracy," she said in October this year. "The FCC does not and will not revoke licenses for broadcast stations simply because a political candidate disagrees with or dislikes content or coverage.On this topic, Carr's views are "light-years" away from Pai's, Schwartzman said. But Schwartzman also sees several of Carr's statements as being toothless. While Carr repeatedly points to the public interest standard for broadcasters, Schwartzman noted that the FCC must apply the public interest standard to all matters."All he's saying is, 'I'm going to enforce the statute as it's existed since 1934.' It's meaningless, and it's therefore easy for him to say," Schwartzman said.Carr was wrong about NBC violating the Equal Time Rule by putting Harris on Saturday Night Live, Schwartzman said. To comply with the rule, NBC only had to honor a request from Trump for "equal opportunities," he said. This is a routine process that broadcasters have known how to handle for a long time, he said."The burden is on the opposing candidate to ask for it. Having a candidate on... is not only not a violation, it's actually encouraged because broadcasters are supposed to stimulate discussion of issues and ideas," he said. Carr's main purpose in making his Saturday Night Live complaint, in Schwartzman's opinion, was "to fulminate. It's just grandstanding. He was running for chair."Conservative group urges limits on FCCJeffrey Westling, a lawyer who is the director of technology and innovation policy at the conservative American Action Forum, is concerned about the FCC acting on Trump's calls to punish networks. After Trump called for ABC licenses to be revoked because of its handling of a debate, Westling wrote that "it is indeed possible for the federal government to revoke a broadcast license, even in response to what is essentially a political offense."Westling urged Congress to "limit or revoke the FCC's authority to impose content-based restrictions on broadcast television," specifically through the FCC rule on broadcast news distortion.Proving distortion is difficult, with requires elements including "deliberate intent to distort the news" and "extrinsic evidence to the broadcast itself, such as that a reporter had received a bribe or that the report was instructed by management to distort the news," Westling wrote. The distortion also must be "initiated by the management of the station" and involve "a significant event.""While these standards are fairly stringent, the FCC must investigate complaints when a station seeks to renew its license, adding risk and uncertainty even if the station never truly violated the policy," Westling wrote.When contacted by Ars, Westling pointed out that the high standard for proving news distortion "only matter[s] if the administration's goal is to revoke a broadcaster's license. As much as I personally disagree with the rule, the courts have made clear that if a complaint has asserted the necessary elements, the Commission must thoroughly review it when considering a license transfer or renewal."The FCC "review is costly, and adds uncertainty for the broadcaster that quite literally relies on the license to operate," Westling said. "As a result, it is possible that even a threat from the president could influence how a broadcaster chooses to air the news, knowing that news distortion review could be in its future."Westling also said it's possible "that the FCC's use of the news distortion rule to deny a transfer or renewal of a license could be approved by the courts. The actual bounds of the rule are not well tested, and theoretically, a sympathetic court could be favorable to more loose enforcement of the rule."Carr, who described how he would run the FCC in a chapter for the conservative Heritage Foundation's Project 2025, also wants the agency to crack down on social media websites for alleged anti-conservative bias. He has said he wants to "smash" a "censorship cartel" that he claims includes social media platforms, government officials, advertising and marketing agencies, and fact-checkers.Other factors might stop Carrs blusterWhen it comes to broadcasting, Schwartzman said there are several reasons to think Carr's statements are mostly bluster that won't result in major consequences for TV stations.Broadcasters have a lot of political power that's wielded through the National Association of Broadcasters and relationships with members of Congress. Broadcasting, despite being less influential than it used to be, "is still among the most powerful industries in Congress and in the country... there is not a member of Congress alive who doesn't know the general manager of every TV station in their district," Schwartzman said.The FCC taking action against left-leaning broadcasters could lead to similar actions against conservative broadcasters during future administrations. Schwartzman questioned whether Carr actually wants "to set a precedent that's going to put Fox in jeopardy the next time there's a Democrat in the FCC."Another factor that could constrain Carr is how recent Supreme Court rulings limit the power of federal agencies. The FCC's other Republican member, Nathan Simington, has vowed to vote against any fine imposed by the commission until its legal powers are clear."Under new and controlling Supreme Court precedent, the Commission's authority to assess monetary forfeitures as it traditionally has done is unclear," Simington said in August. "Until the Commission formally determines the bounds of its enforcement authority under this new precedent, I am obligated to dissent from any decision purporting to impose a monetary forfeiture. I call on the Commission to open a Notice of Inquiry to determine the new constitutional contours of Commission enforcement authority."The Supreme Court's June 2024 ruling in Securities and Exchange Commission v. Jarkesy held that "when the SEC seeks civil penalties against a defendant for securities fraud, the Seventh Amendment entitles the defendant to a jury trial." This ruling could impact the ability of other agencies to issue fines.Besides all of those reasons, Schwartzman offered another potential problem for Carr's plansthe incoming chair's post-FCC employment prospects, particularly if Carr wants to go back to practicing law. Before becoming an FCC commissioner, Carr was the agency's general counsel."He's not going to have a career as a communications lawyer in private practice after he's on the FCC if he starts saying that broadcasters don't have First Amendment rights," Schwartzman said.Jon BrodkinSenior IT ReporterJon BrodkinSenior IT Reporter Jon is a Senior IT Reporter for Ars Technica. He covers the telecom industry, Federal Communications Commission rulemakings, broadband consumer affairs, court cases, and government regulation of the tech industry. 95 Comments

TechnologyFBI warns Americans to keep their text messages secure: What to know The FBI and other agencies are encouraging people to use end-to-end encryption, citing what they say is a sustained hacking operation linked to China. In this 2021 photo, a smartphone's screen shows messaging apps including WhatsApp, Signal and Telegram. Damien Meyer/AFP via Getty Images hide captiontoggle caption Damien Meyer/AFP via Getty Images It's not often that aSnopes fact check. But the agency's urgent message this month to Americans, often summarized as "stop texting," surprised many consumers. The warning from the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) highlighted vulnerabilities in text messaging systems that millions of Americans use every day. The U.S. believes hackers affiliated with China's government, dubbed Salt Typhoon, are waging a "broad and significant cyber-espionage campaign" to infiltrate commercial telecoms and steal users' data and in isolated cases, to record phone calls, a senior FBI official who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity said during a Dec. 3 briefing call. The new guidance may have surprised consumers but not security experts. "People have been talking about things like this for years in the computer security community," Jason Hong, a professor at Carnegie Mellon University's School of Computer Science, told NPR. "You should not rely on these kinds of unencrypted communications because of this exact reason: There could be snoopers in lots of infrastructure." So what should you do to keep your messages private? "Encryption is your friend" for texts and phone calls, Jeff Greene, CISA's executive assistant director for cybersecurity, said on the briefing call. "Even if the adversary is able to intercept the data, if it is encrypted, it will make it impossible, if not really hard, for them to detect it. So our advice is to try to avoid using plain text." In full end-to-end encryption, tech companies make a message decipherable only by its sender and receiver not by anyone else, including the company. It has been the default on WhatsApp, for instance, since 2016. Along with a promise of greater security, it makes companies "warrant-proof" from surveillance efforts. The good news for people who use Apple phones is that iMessage and FaceTime are also already end-to-end encrypted, says Hong. For Android phones, encryption is available in Google Messages if the senders and recipients all have the feature turned on. But messages sent between iPhones and Android phones are less secure. The simplest way to ensure your messages are safe from snooping is to use an end-to-end encrypted app like Signal or WhatsApp, says Eva Galperin, director of cybersecurity at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). With these apps, "your communications are end-to-end encrypted every single time," she says. Galperin highlights another danger: A hacker who has managed to get your ID and password for a website can monitor your text messages to intercept a one-time passcode that's used in two-factor authentication (2FA). "This is a really serious security risk," Galperin says. She recommends getting 2FA messages through an app like Google Authenticator or Authy or by using a physical security key to verify access. The FBI and CISA also advise users to set their phones to update operating systems automatically. "Most compromises of systems do not involve taking advantage of vulnerabilities that no one else knows about," Galperin says, adding that "often, the maker of the product has in fact figured out what the vulnerability is, fixed it and pushed out a patch in the form of a security update." How at risk are you? You should be aware of your own "threat model" a core concept in computer security. Hong says it boils down to three questions: What are you trying to protect? How important is it to you? And what steps do you need to take to protect it? If the most valuable items on your phone are family photos, he says, you probably shouldn't worry about foreign hackers targeting you. But what if you occasionally text about national or corporate secrets or politically sensitive data? "If you are in business, if you are a journalist, if you are somebody in contact with democracy protesters in Hong Kong or Shenzhen or Tibet, then you might want to assume that your phone calls and text messages are not safe from the Chinese government," Galperin of the EFF says. Bad actors such as cybercriminals might have different objectives, Hong says, "but if you just do a few relatively simple things, you can actually protect yourself from the vast majority of those kinds of threats." What are the hackers doing? The FBI and CISA raised the alarm two months after The Wall Street Journal reported that hackers linked to the Chinese government have broken into systems that enable U.S. law enforcement agencies to conduct electronic surveillance operations under the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA). "These are for legitimate wiretaps that have been authorized by the courts," Hong says. But in hackers' hands, he says, the tools could potentially be used "to surveil communications and metadata for lots of people. And it seems like the [hackers'] focus is primarily Washington, D.C." The FBI says that the attack was far broader than the CALEA system and that the hackers are still accessing telecom networks. The U.S. has been working since late spring to determine the extent of their activities. This month, the Biden administration said at least eight telecommunications infrastructure companies in the U.S., and possibly more, had been broken into by Chinese hackers. The hackers stole a large amount of metadata, the FBI and CISA said. In far fewer cases, they said, the actual content of calls and texts was targeted. As agencies work to oust the hackers, the FBI called for Americans to embrace tight encryption an about-face, Galperin says, after years of insisting that law enforcement agencies need a "back door" to access communications. The agencies also want companies to bolster their security practices and work with the government to make their networks harder to compromise. "The adversaries we face are tenacious and sophisticated, and working together is the best way to ensure eviction," the senior FBI official said during the news briefing. As for the risk to everyday consumers, security experts like Hong and Galperin say that with vast amounts of information traveling between our phones, they want to see people get more help in protecting themselves. "I think it's really incumbent on software developers and these companies to have much better privacy and security by default," Hong says. "That way you don't need a Ph.D. to really understand all the options and to be secure."