Is the iPhone 15 really that hot?

At some middle and high schools in the United States, 1 in 4 teens report they've abused prescription stimulants for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder during the year prior, a new study found.

The Big Bad Film Fest, now in its second year, is like a big, muscle-bound hug for Very Online action-movie obsessives who brought it to life.

Disruptions have fueled claims from rights groups that the Pakistani authorities are introducing technology to surveil and control the countrys internet.

MacworldApple is taking its sweet time when it comes to releasing its first device with a foldable display. Theyre all over the Android phone market and theyre good productsif you dont mind the crease that appears down the middle of the screen where the display folds. We hear about reports and patents of possible foldable Apple devices, but they havent been as substantial as reports from analyst MIng-Chi Kuo, who reported a few months ago that Apple is developing an all-screen, foldable MacBook.On Wednesday, Kuo posted on X an update, stating that the foldable MacBooks mass production delayed significantly. Apparently, technical challenges have caused Apple to push the project out a year or two from the original 2026 timeline. Apple has also settled on an 18.8-inch design, scrapping the larger 20.25-inch device.Foldable MacBook survey update mass production delayed significantly1. Final display size spec confirmed at 18.8 inches. Apple has canceled the 20.25-inch design.2. Due to technical challenges with the display and mechanical, the assembly mass production schedule has been https://t.co/mPviHVeK0x (Ming-Chi Kuo) (@mingchikuo) August 22, 2024Kuo also states that Apple was thinking about doing a foldable iPad, but has decided against it because such a device has no visibilityin other words, theres no demand for it. Kuo thinks that a foldable MacBook would make a foldable iPad redundant.The concept of a foldable MacBook is intriguing. Such a device would not have a hardware keyboard, instead relying on a software keyboard that appears on-screen (think of a super-sized iPhone software keyboard), and it would in turn require a touchscreen UI to make up for the lack of a trackpad. Essentially, it would be a large, foldable iPad, but running macOS. Kuo relies on supply-chain data to form his conclusions; he doesnt have information about Apples software development. So one idea that can be drawn from Kuos foldable MacBook reports is that Apple is working on a version of macOS with touchscreen UI elements. The idea of macOS with a touch UI has been bandied about for some time, and Apple was even granted a patent earlier this year for a tablet-like device that runs an OS that looks a lot like macOS. But Apple has never acknowledged that it is working on such a thing. If you put two and two together, though, it seems like they are.What we do know (or, at least, were pretty sure we know) is that Apple plans to release M4-based, not-all-screen-but-still-foldable MacBook Pros this fall. Learn more about Apples M4 Mac release cycle and catch up on the latest M4 MacBook Pro rumors.

Say what you will about generative AI (genAI) enterprise perceptions, but its certainly neither nuanced nor balanced.For months, virtually everyone thought genAI was going to solve all business and global problems. Then the reality pendulum swung the other way, with various reports and experts arguing it wont work, nothing will come of it,the bubble is burstingand simply, the numbers arent there.ConsiderGartners reportthat at least 30% of generative AI (genAI) projects will be abandoned after proof of concept by the end of 2025, due to poor data quality, inadequate risk controls, escalating costs or unclear business value. The problem with the Gartner figure is that roughly that same percentage ofallIT projects never survive trial tests so its not clear how genAI is worse.Of course, theres the report about theCIO of a major pharmaceuticalwho paid Microsoft to have 500 employees use Copilot, only to have the CIO cancel the project after six months, saying it delivered slides that looked like middle school presentations. (Note: At least most middle school slideshows quickly get to the point, unlike every Microsoft presentation I have seen. But I digress.)The practical truth is that both views are wrong. GenAI tools absolutely have value, but it wont come easy. IT needs to do a lot more homework.What kind of homework?Clean your data: As I noted recently aboutAgentic RAG strategies, many enterprises suffer from terrible data. Its out-of-date, error-ridden, obtained from dubious sources, and might unintentionally contain sensitive data (including PII and health data) that isnotsupposed to be there.No genAI magic can ever work if the data foundation is a mess. Have your team generate pristine data and your AI ROI has a chance.Select more ideal projects:This is actually a twofer: First, talk with your team about genAI particulars so you can identify where the technology can help. GenAI can indeed handle anything, but it can only handle a very small subset really well.Secondly, far too many projects have been selected because, as an experiment, execswanted to see what genAI can truly do. You need to be far more selective if you want to give genAI a fair chance.Assess your hallucination comfort zone: This is arguably the most crucial. GenAI will hallucinate, and it will do so with no predictability. There aremechanisms you can deployto reduce hallucinations a small degree such asusing AI to double-check AI, as is beingattempted by Morgan Stanley,as well as limiting the data sources genAI is permitted to use.But hallucinations cant be stopped, and many argue they cant even be meaningfully reduced.That means difficult conversations. What tasks do you need done where you can tolerate a few blatant lies here and there? Do you want to ban its use with anything customer-facing, such as customer service chatbots?Even using it to summarize documents or meeting notes requires a discussion. How much human oversight can you apply before the efficiency goes away? One way to look at it: What projects do you have that are complex enough to benefit from genAI but not important enough that lies/errors are not deal-killers?Be realistic about ROI objectivesLine-of-business chiefs are used to running ROI objectives by someone in the CFOs office or at least a division general managers office. With genAI efforts, its essential to also check with an IT specialist who intimately understands what the technology can and cant do.My recommendation: Start with the genAI expert dont even discuss it with the number-crunchers until IT okays goals that are reasonable from a tech perspective.Is it even something you want to bring to the CFOs office at all? If this is experimentation to see what genAI can do a perfectly reasonable goal at this point then perhaps it doesnt need a spreadsheet-friendly ROI yet.Rita Sallam, distinguished vice president analyst at Gartner who tracks genAI strategies, said she understands the frustrations CIOs have when trying to apply ROI standards to genAI.You cant get your hands around the actual value, Sallam said. There is additional work on your data that has to be done. Your proof of concept needs to be a proof of value. There is a certain percentage that will fail due to lack of the right data, the right guardrails or the absence of being able to properly demonstrate the value. Enterprises are sometimes not acknowledging the foundations that are necessary for genAI success.Another industry AI expert, Wirespeed CTO Jake Reynolds, was more blunt. Believe how excited I was to learn were now moving away from statistics and math and instead using a drunken toddler to make these decisions for us, he said.About those hallucinationsAnd about the concept of hallucinations, some experts have questioned whether the hallucination concept is being handled appropriately, mostly because it puts the blame on the software. GenAI is not necessarily malfunctioning when it hallucinates: it is doing precisely what it was programmed to do.AI hallucination is all that genAI does, said Symbol Zero CEO Rafael Brown. All that it does is throw things together, like throwing pasta and sauce at a wall and waiting to see what sticks. This is done based on what the viewer likes and doesnt like. Theres no real rhyme or reason. Theres isnt true structure, context, simulation, or process. There is no skill, insight, emotion, judgment, inspiration, synthesis, iteration, revision, or creation. Its like a word jumble or a word salad generator. Its not even as good as Scrabble or Boggle. Its better to think of it as AI Mad Libs trust your business, your future, and your creation to AI Mad Libs.

Tech behemoth Sony Groups blockchain collaboration with Startale Labs unveiled its Soneium Ethereum (ETH) layer-2 network.According to an Aug. 23 report from industry news outlet The Block, Soneium will be focused on scalability and user-friendliness hoping to achieve mainstream adoption. Upon launch, the network plans to deliver decentralized applications (DApps) in the entertainment, gaming and finance industries, leveraging Sonys existing presence. Astar Network founder and Sony Block Solution Labs directorSota Watanabe said:Sony Group has strong distribution channels in multiple industries and existing users in our daily lives. [] Through Soneium, we will make something people want and go mainstream beyond Web3.Development at full steamWhile the companies promised that the upcoming Sony Ethereum layer-2 will soon see its test network deployment, no date has been announced yet. Sony Block Solutions Labs announced that technical details concerning Soneiums tools and developer requirements will be released in the coming weeks.Astar Network will use its zero-knowledge Ethereum virtual machine (zkEVM) to integrate its assets and infrastructure with Soneium and boost its liquidity. A zkEVM is a virtual machine that executes Solidity smart contracts while being compatible with both zero-knowledge-proof computations and existing Ethereum infrastructure.Future Soneium use cases include protecting rights for creator-generated content as well as the development of new profit-sharing mechanisms for creators and fans.The announcement follows Sonys recent warning that its Rewards Program will be terminated at the end of the year, with all points expiring along with it leaving members with no choice but to spend what theyve accrued. The program launched in 2017 and allowed users to gain points through Sony or PlayStation credit cards and spend them on items from the Sony brand, including PlayStation video games.In May, the tech giant also showcased its long-term forecast for the company with a display of futuristic concepts known as Creative Entertainment Vision. This included intriguing devices platformed, tempered with the video overview stating the products were the outcome of a prototyping exercise and not directly related to existing production.The post Sony to launch Ethereum layer-2 with Startale Labs appeared first on ReadWrite.

Protections against banking fraud in the U.S. have never been able to keep pace with criminals.The reason why has its roots in the start of the national banking system proposed by Abraham Lincoln and created by Congress in 1863.Until the mid-Civil War, the U.S. didnt have its own federal currency. Banks were free to create their own paper money, subject only to state law, which varied dramatically. One-third of all paper money circulating before the Civil War was likely counterfeit, resulting in currency mayhem.Lincolns goal was to create the nations first federal paper currencynational bank notes that only newly approved national banks could issue, subject to regulation by the United States first financial regulator, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.To secure the new federal currency, these national banks were required to purchase interest-bearing U.S. government bonds from the U.S. Treasury.This financed the Union Army, but it accidentally created a dual banking system. At the time, the wartime Congress thought state-chartered banks would go away, choosing to become national banks that could issue federal currency.Congress was wrong.The ensuing dual banking system, with no single regulator in charge of policing all banks, still exists today.State banks couldnt issue the new federal currency. Soon, Congress enacted a federal tax on state bank paper currency in an attempt to drive state banks out of business.A national bank note issued by the First National Bank of Cleveland in 1863, the first year national banks could issue currency under the National Bank Act. This U.S. national currency was protected by collateral; in this case, bonds. U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the CurrencyTo stay in business, state banks needed to issue new financial products. The first one, which came during the Civil War, was what eventually became known as the check.Since then, state and federal regulators have competed to find ways to earn different streams of income.Again and again, as criminals began finding ways to defraud banks, Congress and regulators addressed the complaints, but piecemeal. And in this game of regulatory whack-a-mole, banks attempted to stay at least one step ahead.A race to the bottomIn 2009, then-Senate Banking Committee Chair Christopher Dodd called banking regulation a race to the bottom.When credit card abuses came to light, Congress amended the Truth in Lending Act, causing the Federal Reserve to change Regulation Z, which protects consumers from unfair lending practices. The adjustment required banks to provide refunds for transactions that credit card holders hadnt authorized. This led to losses to banks bottom lines.Banks then created debit cards. When consumers began to lose money through debit card fraud, Congress passed amendments to the Electronic Fund Transfer Act, causing the Fed to adjust Regulation E, which protects consumers from unauthorized or incorrect electronic fund transfers. This adjustment added similar consumer protections for fraudulent debit card transactions.But by then, the industry was moving to a new payment innovationgift cards, served up without the fraud protections for consumers offered by debit and credit cards, even though many of those gift cards have the word debit printed on them.Today, regulators and Congress are still trying to catch up to the fraudsters.Dr. David P. Weber is a professor of the practice in fraud and forensic accounting at Salisbury University. Jake Bernstein is an investigative journalist at The Conversation.This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Architecture studio Foster + Partners has revealed two stations as part of the Sydney Metro extension, which opened to the public earlier this week.Foster + Partners unveiled photos of the Gadigal and Barangaroo stations, which form part of the first phase of the Sydney Metro City & Southwest line running from Chatswood to Sydenham through central Sydney.Foster + Partners designed the Barangaroo station on the Sydney MetroThe line, which includes stations byJohn McAslan + PartnersandWoods Bagot, connects to the existing Metro North West line.The second phase of the line will run from Sydenham to Bankstown and is set to be completed in 2025.Read: Stations by John McAslan + Partners and Woods Bagot revealed on Sydney Metro"Strengthening our public transportation networks is essential for creating a healthy and sustainable urban environment," said Foster + Partners head of studio Luke Fox."Having grown up in Sydney, it has been a great privilege to be involved in this pioneering project that will significantly improve travel across this spectacular city."Barangaroo station has sandstone wallsThe pair of stations designed by Foster + Partners each has a different identity based on materials.At the Barangaroo station, walls along the length of the concourse and platform levels were clad in split-face local sandstone.An installation of steel and copper trees created by artist Khaled Sabsabi was mounted on the sandstone walls. The concourse floor was made from white terrazzo.The studio also designed the Gadigal stationAt the Gadigal station, the studio utilised a combination of glass-reinforced concrete panels and aluminium tubes for the underground spaces.At concourse level the walls were clad in white back-painted glass panels and complemented with tiled artworks by Australian artist Callum Morton.The station walls are clad in glass-reinforced concrete panels and aluminium tubesThe preliminary design for both stations was undertaken by METRON consortium, with Foster + Partners acting as the design architect.According to the studio, both stations were developed with the over station developments in mind and act as foundations for the buildings above.Callum Morton created an artwork for Gadigal stationFoster + Partners, which is led by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Norman Foster, is one of the world's largest architecture studios. The studio recently completed a subterranean Apple Store topped with a square dome and a curved office building at Battersea Power Station.The photography is by Brett Boardman Photography.The post Foster + Partners unveils Gadigal and Barangaroo stations on Sydney Metro appeared first on Dezeen.

Before the pandemic, we lived in a generously simple world with mobile homes catering to the bare minimum needs on the road. A bedroom, convertible living room, kitchenette, dry bathroom, and that was almost it. Most of the interior was paneled with wood and the exterior was done in aluminum for durability. Now, with the likes of Living Vehicle, a Santa Barbara, CA-based boutique travel trailer builder that has been marrying luxury and sustainability over the years is redefining the word: luxury mobile living with the new GT series.Electric trailers by Living Vehicle have been close competitors to the Airstreams. These models are designed to sell a way of life that in Living Vehicles ideology is sustainable, off-grid, and luxurious. The company has ventured into a new category with the GT series fifth wheelers. These models: the flagship GT39 and the smaller-sized GT32, combine off-grid fierceness with luxury that matches the feel of a yacht on land.Designer: Living VehicleLiving Vehicle has always focused on developing off-grid mobile trailers that can be used for full-time living, the Cyber Trailer for instance. The GT39 may be a different unit in approach, but its fundamentals are aligned with the companys signature style. The fifth wheeler measures 39-foot long and features an architecturally designed interior. It fits the master bedroom with a king-size bed and panoramic windows in the gooseneck and is apt for sleeping four to six people with a living room that transforms into a guest sleeper.The Living Vehicle GT39 model tips the scale at 16000 lbs but has, and we cannot iterate enough, a motor yacht-style luxurious interior comprising 8-foot ceilings, hardwood flooring, powder-coated aluminum cabinets, and top-of-the-line appliances. The living room with reclining seats has a 70-inch home theater system and fireplace, just adjacent is a chefs kitchen attached to a bar that doubles as a workspace. Next up with the bathroom with a composting toilet and a teak-paneled shower.Stretching the interior luxury into the exterior landscapes is the fold-down deck of the GT39, which is spacious enough to be used as an outdoor dining space or an outdoor kitchen at the campsite. The fold-down deck is covered with a folding awning. The interesting element of this yacht for the road is the option of installing anywhere between 2.2 and 5 kilowatts of solar panels on the roof. Stretching the entire length and breadth of the LV model, the solar cells can extend onto the awnings for additional coverage. To enhance the self-sustaining capability, this fifth-wheelers solar system is supported by a hybrid backup power generator and complemented by a battery pack of 72kWh.Since the GT39 is meant for permanent, long-term living on the road, it comes with four-season climate control, along with smart home technology, and Starlink connectivity. Living Vehicle is now taking orders for the new GT39, but the pricing for the model is undisclosed. If interested, you would have to get in touch with the company for a quote.The post Living Vehicle GT39 rivals interiors of luxury yachts, offers freedom of off-grid living on the road first appeared on Yanko Design.