About FilestageFilestage frees people from chaotic approval processes, making work more joyful and productive. From large enterprises to independent agencies, our review and approval platform helps teams share, discuss, and approve all their files, all in one place including documents, designs, images, videos, and audio files.We're a fully remote team with people working in home offices, co-working spaces, and coffee shops all over the world. Together, we're on a mission to create a seamless approval process that helps people deliver their best work.We've raised our Series A and have over half a million users across 500+ companies, including AB InBev, LG, Havas, GroupM, and Emirates. So if you're looking for a fast-growing startup in a booming market, you've found it!What youll be working on as our Customer Success Manager (DACH)This is your chance to help shape the future of our remote company. We believe that a strong Customer Success Team is the backbone of healthy business growth.You build a good relationship with your customers. You work closely with your customers, build relationships and make them happy users who will gladly recommend Filestage to others.You turn customers into experienced users. You help customers get the most out of Filestage software in training sessions via chat, e-mail, phone, webinars and video conferencing. Don't worry, our customers are friendly and don't bite ;-)You proactively look for ways to make our customers even more successful. With your contribution to customer success, you improve the lives of creative people and project managers around the globe. You are committed to your clients and help them find pragmatic solutions and improve their workflow.You drive the growth of Filestage. You always have your feelers out and find opportunities to grow and expand in your clients' companies and to further distribute Filestage software.Life at FilestageWe believe people are more productive when they can choose their own schedule. So were proud to offer fully-remote roles that give you the perfect balance between work and life.Here are some of the benefits you can look forward to at Filestage:Work from where youre happiest and enjoy a flexible schedule. Weve been fully remote from the start, giving you the opportunity to meet people all over the world and broaden your horizons.For this role, were looking for someone based in Europeto make sure theres a high time overlap with our team members, customers, and partners.Meet up in real life. We all travel together at least once a year (in normal times) at our team retreat to have fun and get to know each other.Enjoy a strong team culture. Were a group of knowledge seekers, reflective thinkers, clear communicators, goal owners, problem solvers, and team players. These are the values we strive for to help us achieve our mission.Join a happy team. Weve been rated five stars on Glassdoor by our lovely team. You can take a look at our reviews here.Create a workspace that suits you. Youll get a 1500 budget for hardware, as well 500 for home office to buy whatever you need to do your best work including a computer, webcam, or standing desk.Get 38 days of holiday. Plenty of time for city breaks, summer escapes, and everything in between. Youll also get a half day on your birthday to give you a chance to celebrate! Volunteer/Charity Day. Enjoy a Volunteer/Charity Day to support a cause close to your heart.Continue to grow and develop your career. We care about your development and want you to be able to learn new things! After six months in the company, youll get a budget to be able to use for personal development.Make your voice heard. We trust our team members to make the best decisions to achieve their goals, so you wont have to put up with micromanagers here.Say goodbye to pointless meetings. We practice what we preach when it comes to productivity, so you can expect flat hierarchies, fast iterations, and no bullshit meetings.What youll bring to the role You enjoy connecting with people. You know the definition of empathy without checking Wikipedia and put it into practice daily. Youre passionate about customer success management. You have experience in customer success management or account management. Sales experience is highly valued. You have business acumen and enjoy advising customers and consultative selling. You take ownership. You are filled with passion to take responsibility and to make things happen. You are an energetic self-starter who wants to make a tangible impact on a rapidly growing product and company. You are a team player. You understand that we can only be successful as a team. Like everyone else in our great team, you are fair, honest and respectful and you are ready to have a lot of fun. You are fluent in English & German. Speaking Spanish or French is a plus.

This article first appeared in The Checkup,MIT Technology Reviewsweekly biotech newsletter. To receive it in your inbox every Thursday, and read articles like this first,sign up here. On January 20, his first day in office, US president Donald Trump signed an executive order to withdraw the US from the World Health Organization. Ooh, thats a big one, he said as he was handed the document. The US is the biggest donor to the WHO, and the loss of this income is likely to have a significant impact on the organization, which develops international health guidelines, investigates disease outbreaks, and acts as an information-sharing hub for member states. But the US will also lose out. Its a very tragic and sad event that could only hurt the United States in the long run, says William Moss, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore. Trump appears to take issue with the amount the US donates to the WHO. He points out that it makes a much bigger contribution than China, a country with a population four times that of the US. It seems a little unfair to me, he said as he prepared to sign the executive order. It is true that the US is far and away the biggest financial supporter of the WHO. The US contributed $1.28 billion over the two-year period covering 2022 and 2023. By comparison, the second-largest donor, Germany, contributed $856 million in the same period. The US currently contributes 14.5% of the WHOs total budget. But its not as though the WHO sends a billion-dollar bill to the US. All member states are required to pay membership dues, which are calculated as a percentage of a countrys gross domestic product. For the US, this figure comes to $130 million. China pays $87.6 million. But the vast majority of the USs contributions to the WHO are made on a voluntary basisin recent years, the donations have been part of multibillion-dollar spending on global health by the US government. (Separately, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation contributed $830 million over 2022 and 2023.) Theres a possibility that other member nations will increase their donations to help cover the shortfall left by the USs withdrawal. But it is not clear who will step upor what implications it will have to change the structure of donations. Martin McKee, a professor of European public health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, thinks it is unlikely that European members will increase their contributions by much. China, India, Brazil, South Africa, and the Gulf states, on the other hand, may be more likely to pay more. But again, it isnt clear how this will pan out, or whether any of these countries will expect greater influence over global health policy decisions as a result of increasing their donations. WHO funds are spent on a range of global health projectsprograms to eradicate polio, rapidly respond to health emergencies, improve access to vaccines and medicines, develop pandemic prevention strategies, and more. The loss of US funding is likely to have a significant impact on at least some of these programs. Diseases dont stick to national boundaries, hence this decision is not only concerning for the US, but in fact for every country in the world, says Pauline Scheelbeek at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.With the US no longer reporting to the WHO nor funding part of this process, the evidence on which public health interventions and solutions should be based is incomplete. Its going to hurt global health, adds Moss. Its going to come back to bite us. Theres more on how the withdrawal could affect health programs, vaccine coverage, and pandemic preparedness in this weeks coverage. Now read the rest of The Checkup Read more from MIT Technology Review's archive This isnt the first time Donald Trump has signaled his desire for the US to leave the WHO. He proposed a withdrawal during his last term, in 2020. While the WHO is not perfect, it needs more power and funding, not less, Charles Kenny, director of technology and development at the Center for Global Development, argued at the time. The move drew condemnation from those working in public health then, too. The editor in chief of the medical journal The Lancet called it a crime against humanity, as Charlotte Jee reported. In 1974, the WHO launched an ambitious program to get lifesaving vaccines to all children around the world. Fifty years on, vaccines are thought to have averted 154 million deathsincluding 146 million in children under the age of five. The WHO has also seen huge success in its efforts to eradicate polio. Today, wild forms of the virus have been eradicated in all but two countries. But vaccine-derived forms of the virus can still crop up around the world. At the end of a round of discussions in September among WHO member states working on a pandemic agreement, director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus remarked, The next pandemic will not wait for us, whether from a flu virus like H5N1, another coronavirus, or another family of viruses we dont yet know about. The H5N1 virus has been circulating on US dairy farms for months now, and the US is preparing for potential human outbreaks. From around the web People with cancer paid $45,000 for an experimental blood-filtering treatment, delivered at a clinic in Antigua, after being misled about its effectiveness. Six of them have died since their treatments. (The New York Times) The Trump administration has instructed federal health agencies to pause all external communications, such as health advisories, weekly scientific reports, updates to websites, and social media posts. (The Washington Post) A new virtual retina, modeled on human retinas, has been developed to study the impact of retinal implants. The three-dimensional model simulates over 10,000 neurons. (Brain Stimulation) Trump has signed an executive order stating that it is the policy of the United States to recognize two sexes, male and female. The document defies decades of research into how human bodies grow and develop, STAT reports, and represents a dramatic failure to understand biology, according to a neuroscientist who studies the development of sex. (STAT) Attention, summer holiday planners: Biting sandflies in the Mediterranean region are transmitting Toscana virus at an increasing rate. The virus is a major cause of central nervous system disorders in the region. Italy saw a 2.6-fold increase in the number of reported infections between the 201621 period and 202223. (Eurosurveillance)

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Samsung showed off the Samsung Galaxy S25 series of phones at its Unpacked event in San Jose, and while most of the showcase was reserved for new AI features, there's still plenty of new hardware details to highlight. Here's what's different across the trio of new phones, and how the Galaxy S25 Ultra specs compare with the the standard Galaxy S25 and S25 Plus.All three phones have the same prices as last year's Galaxy S24 family, but they've all seen changes: The standard $800 S25 has all the new AI tricks and upgrades, the $1,000 S25 Plus builds on that with more storage and battery in a larger-format handset and finally the most premium (and most expensive) $1,300 S25 Ultra has the absolute best specs in terms of its cameras and screen.Unbeknownst to everyone in attendance, the Unpacked event had one last surprise to reveal: the Galaxy S25 Edge, a slimmer fourth sibling in the phone generation. Unfortunately, Samsung hasn't revealed much about this device, and aside from seeing it on the show floor showing off its thinness, we don't have any specs to compare to its three well-known siblings. Chalk it up to a mystery that we could see released in the first half of this year, if rumors are to be believed.That said, here are all the specs about the three S25 phones we know plenty about. The Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra. James Martin/CNETDesign and displayYou'd be hard-pressed to see differences between last year's phones and this year's, as the overall look hasn't changed much. But there are still visual differences between the phones. Both the smaller S25 and larger S25 Plus both have a trio of phone lenses on the back, while the S25 Ultra has four. As has been the case for years, the Ultra model has a slot on the right side of its bottom edge for an extractable S Pen stylus.Unsurprisingly, the standard S25 is the lightest of the bunch, weighing 162 grams (5.71 ounces), while the S25 Plus is heavier at 190 grams (6.7 ounces) and the S25 Ultra coming in at 218 grams (7.69 ounces). The S25 and S25 Plus both have standard aluminum frames, while the S25 Ultra has a titanium one. All three phones are IP68 rated for dust- and water-resistance.Though all AMOLED with 1-120Hz refresh rates, the displays are where the phones start to differ. The standard S25 has a 6.2-inch screen with tall HD resolution (2,340 by 1,080 pixels), while the larger S25 Plus has a 6.7-inch screen with sharper 1440p resolution (3,120 by 1,440 pixels) and the S25 Ultra has a slightly bigger 6.8-inch screen with the same 1440p resolution with an anti-glare coating to help minimize reflections.There's another unifying factor: for the first time in years, the S25 Ultra has a curved-cornered screen just like its smaller siblings. Another vestige of the Note series, the flat edges of the screen, is gone. The phone screens all have a maximum 2,600-nit peak brightness. The Samsung Galaxy S25's camera specifications. SamsungCamerasAll three phones' cameras haven't changed much since last year's S24 series. The standard S25 and S25 Plus both have a trio of rear cameras: a 50-megapixel main shooter, a 12-megapixel ultrawide camera and a 10-megapixel telephoto with 3x optical zoom.The S25 Ultra boosts those capabilities with a 200-megapixel main camera, a new 50-megapixel ultrawide shooter, and dual telephoto cameras: a 10-megapixel 3x optical zoom along with a 50-megapixel 5x optical zoom camera.All three phones have a 12-megapixel front-facing camera for selfies, and all can shoot up to 8K video from their rear cameras. SamsungPerformanceThe phones are roughly aligned in terms of performance, likely because all of their AI features require a high specs baseline. (We've also heard this about Apple's iPhones.) All three phones pack 12GB of RAM, which could be a new baseline to use these features. Previously the S24 only had 8GB of RAM.All three pack a customized version of Qualcomm's most advanced mobile chip, the Snapdragon 8 Elite introduced last October, which has fast speeds and plenty of AI capabilities built-in. The S25 phones aren't the first to pack the chip, coming in after the Xiaomi 15 late last year and the OnePlus 13 introduced at the beginning of this year -- but Samsung's newest phones are among the initial pack harnessing Qualcomm's most advanced silicon for phones yet.The phones pack escalating amounts of storage, with the S25 coming in either 128GB or 256GB, the S25 Plus packing either 256GB or 512GB and the S25 Ultra arriving with either 256GB, 512GB or 1TB. As in previous years, none of the phones have a microSD slot or other way to physically expand storage, so you'll need to buy cloud storage options to save beyond their onboard storage.The phones all come with Android 15 out of the box as well as Samsung's One UI 7 overlay. The phones all have Samsung's guaranteed seven years of Android and security updates. One of the AI features is Pet Care, which aims to analyze pet issues. Samsung/Screenshot by James Martin/CNETAI featuresThe new AI features in the S25 series may be its most defining feature distinguishing it from last year's S24 phones (it's unclear if or how many of the features will trickle down to older Samsung handsets). All three S25 phones can access the same AI features.One of the most significant new AI features is what Samsung is calling cross app actions -- for example, a request to "find a vegan pet-friendly restaurant and text it to me" would consult multiple apps for an answer, like Yelp and Messages. Depending on the request, either Samsung's or Google's AI models will be used.Another Samsung-exclusive AI feature is AI Select, which suggests actions or apps depending on what you're looking at. Just swipe out from the screen to launch the Edge Panel (the sidebar with app shortcuts) and tap the AI Select button to have it make suggestions in the context of what you're looking at, like setting a GIF or the image you're looking at as your phone background.Samsung also has a new feature called conversational search which responds to more casual requests with contextual suggestions -- so if you say "my eyes are hurting, can you help with the screen" then the phone will bring up brightness settings and the blue light filter. It will also help make photo search smarter, much like how Apple and Google have used AI to improve their own photo album searches.The Circle to Search function, which debuted on last year's S24 series, is also getting an upgrade: It can now recognize audio, so you can say goodbye to Shazam. The new phones also have more personalized recommendations, Samsung says, like recommending thermostat changes when your phone notices you sleep better at a certain temperature (assuming that health data is coming in from a Samsung Galaxy Ring or Galaxy Watch).BatteryBattery capacity is another area where the phones differ, though it's important to clarify that more capacity doesn't always correlate to your phone lasting longer. Brightness, GPS location-tracking and other features could drain your phone fast regardless. But all things being equal, bigger batteries mean more battery life: the S25 has a 4,000-mAh battery, the S25 Plus has a 4,900-mAh battery and the S25 Ultra has a 5,000-mAh battery.Both the S25 and S25 Plus have 25-watt charging, a rate Samsung phones have been stuck on for years as other leading Android flagships leave them in the dust -- the OnePlus 13, for instance, has 100-watt charging (80-watt in the US) that completely refilled an empty battery in just over half an hour in our testing. The S25 Ultra is slightly better, with 45-watt charging, but it feels particularly archaic on the most advanced phone in Samsung's stable.All three phones have 15-watt wireless charging (the same as you'll get with the Qi2 standard) as well as wireless PowerShare to juice up other devices using its own battery. While the phones don't have the MagSafe magnetic connection within the phones like Apple's latest iPhones, they can approximate it with official Samsung and third-party cases with magnetic connectors.ConclusionSamsung's three-phone lineup is pretty set in stone these days, with the lowest-priced S25 having the least impressive specs, the larger S25 Plus suiting users who want more battery and the S25 Ultra offering the highest spec with S Pen functionality.But those lines have been blurred a bit thanks to the across-the-board upgrade to 12GB of RAM, which leaves storage and screen resolution as the biggest differentiator between all the phones. The big leap between the S25 Plus and S25 Ultra remains the latter's more impressive cameras and stylus, though that's becoming a steeper hike for the $300 jump in price.Galaxy S25 vs. Galaxy S25 Plus vs. S25 Ultra Samsung Galaxy S25Samsung Galaxy S25 PlusSamsung Galaxy S25 Ultra Display size, tech, resolution, refresh rate 6.2-inch AMOLED; 2,340x1,080 pixels; 1-120Hz adaptive refresh rate6.7-inch AMOLED; 3,120x1,440 pixels; 1-120Hz adaptive refresh rate6.8-inch AMOLED; 3,120x1,440 pixels; 1-120Hz adaptive refresh ratePixel density 416 ppi509 ppi501 ppiDimensions (inches) 5.78 x 2.78 x 0.28 in.6.24 x 2.98 x 0.29 in.6.41 x 3.06 x 0.32 in.Dimensions (millimeters) 146.9 x 70.5 x 7.2 mm158.4 x 75.8 x 7.3 mm162.8 x 77.6 x 8.2 mmWeight (grams, ounces) 162 g (5.71 oz.)190 g (6.70 oz.)218 g (7.69 oz.)Mobile software Android 15Android 15Android 15Camera 50-megapixel (wide), 12-megapixel (ultrawide), 10-megapixel (3x telephoto)50-megapixel (wide), 12-megapixel (ultrawide), 10-megapixel (3x telephoto)200-megapixel (wide), 50-megapixel (ultrawide), 10-megapixel (3x telephoto), 50-megapixel (5x telephoto)Front-facing camera 12-megapixel 12-megapixel 12-megapixel Video capture 8K8K8KProcessor Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite for GalaxyQualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite for GalaxyQualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite for GalaxyRAM + storage 12GB RAM + 128GB, 256GB12GB RAM + 256GB, 512GB12GB RAM + 256GB, 512GB, 1TBExpandable storage NoneNoneNoneBattery 4,000 mAh4,900 mAh5,000 mAhFingerprint sensor Under displayUnder displayUnder displayConnector USB-CUSB-CUSB-CHeadphone jack NoneNoneNoneSpecial features 2,600-nit peak brightness; 7 years of OS and security updates; 5G (mmWave); IP68 water and dust resistance; wireless PowerShare to charge other devices; 25W wired charging (charger not included); Galaxy AI; Wi-Fi 72,600-nit peak brightness; 7 years of OS and security updates; 5G (mmWave); IP68 water and dust resistance; wireless PowerShare to charge other devices; 25W wired charging (charger not included); Galaxy AI; Wi-Fi 7; ultrawidebandTitanium frame, 2,600-nit peak brightness; 7 years of OS and security updates; 5G (mmWave); IP68 water and dust resistance; wireless PowerShare to charge other devices; integrated S Pen; UWB for finding other devices; 45W wired charging (charger not included); Galaxy AI; Wi-Fi 7; Gorilla Glass Armor cover glass; ultrawidebandUS price starts at $800 (128GB)$1,000 (256GB)$1,300 (256GB)UK price starts at TBDTBDTBDAustralia price starts at TBDTBDTBD

January 23, 2025Turning Outdoor Enthusiasts into Community ScientistsThe founder of Adventure Scientists explains how community science is the ultimate civic engagement Anaissa Ruiz Tejada/Scientific AmericanSUBSCRIBE TO Science QuicklyRachel Feltman: If you spend a lot of time on the Internet, youve probably seen the phrase go touch grass at least once. It might not always be delivered with love and kindness, but its usually pretty good advice; getting out into nature and getting your hands dirty is a great antidote to the rage and despair so many of us feel when we read the news. The next time you take a doomscrolling break to go touch said grass, you can take the opportunity to help scientists conduct planet-saving research.For Scientific Americans Science Quickly, Im Rachel Feltman. My guest today is Gregg Treinish. Hes the founder and executive director of Adventure Scientists, an organization that mobilizes outdoor enthusiasts to collect high-quality scientific data.Thanks so much for coming on to chat today.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.Gregg Treinish: Yeah, my pleasure. Im excited to be here.Feltman: So to start us off you have a pretty fascinating professional life. Would you just tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do?Treinish: Im the founder and executive director of Adventure Scientists, and as an organization we build conservation projects with the conservation community, and then we mobilize the outdoor community to go and collect data on their behalf. So we do this all around the world, and weve done it now for more than 100 different conservation projects.Feltman: Very cool, and what got you into that line of work?Treinish: Well, I, I started my career as an explorer, so I was traveling around the world on expeditions, and I had this one really profound moment really early on in my exploration career whereit happened first on the Appalachian Trail, where I was halfway through this six-month journey and in Pennsylvania and I was just soI, I had been considering all along, Why am I doing this? What is it for? Whats it really about? What does it benefit in the world? And it had been raining for, like, 17 straight days; I think we got over 70 days of rain that year. And I had this moment where I had fallen down on these rocks in Pennsylvania, and I picked one up, and I chucked it at a tree in frustration, and I just felt, like, so low, I just felt so selfish for being out there without making any kind of difference in the world.And so I vowed in that moment that I would finish the trail but that I would make my life one of purpose and that I would make it about giving back and figure out how to combine my passion for the outdoors and being outdoors with a life of purpose. And I struggled to find that for a little while until I ended up two years into a trek or nearly two years into a trek in the Andes Mountains, having walked the spine of the Andes, and really decided at that point that science and fighting for wildlife and places that dont have a voice for themselves was what I was really passionate about and what I really wanted to pursue.Feltman: Thats awesome, and thats a great segue into what we brought you on to talk about, which is that you recently wrote an op-ed for the San Francisco Chronicle that offered some really unique advice for folks who are feeling anxious about climate change right now. Could you unpack that for us a little bit?Treinish: Yeah, so listen, were all overwhelmed by climate change and by whats happening. Whether we look at the fires in California or we look at Asheville and the flooding and we look atjust all around our country, but especially around the world, we have every right to feel overwhelmed. And I think, like anything, theres a choice that we have in that moment, and its: Do we rise up and work together for collective action and civic engagement, or do we sit back and say, Were done, and give up? And I hope and I believe that there are hundreds of thousands, if not millions and if not tens of millions, of people that will choose to rise up, if not hundreds of millions and around the world even billions.But we can do some really profound things if we work together. And I see citizen science as this ultimate civic engagement, this ultimate tool that people can work directly on combating issues like climate change, like biodiversity loss, like microplastics pollution and really learn how to be part of the solution.Now, listen, were, were not stopping climate change. Climate change is here. Climate change has been here for decades now, and it is gonna get worse and especially before, you know, it gets better in the, in the future. And collective action has always been and will always be one of the most powerful tools we have to fight back against forces that feel insurmountable, that feel like we just cant overcome them. And so Im really excited that Adventure Scientists, our organization, provides some really compelling ways that citizen scientists or volunteers can get involved in this work. And theres a lot of other great organizations doing this work, too, and doing really powerful citizen-science work around the, the country and the globe.Feltman: Yeah, and could you talk a little bit about what you mean by citizen science? Cause I, I think a lot of folks might not be aware of sort of the breadth of opportunities that are out there.Treinish: Yeah, its a great question cause citizen science is such such a broad thing. Some of the first citizen science was that people would use the telegraph and type in whats happening with weather so that you would know clouds are here, and they learned the patterns and the movements of these, and then they would telegraph it to the next town and the next town, and thats how weather was spread. There were early citizen-science projects measuring currents, where they would put messages in a bottle and send those around. So citizen science is really broad.Today its a lot of looking to space to identify new galaxies and things like that, things like Foldit is, is a game that people can play that helps identify new proteins and new compounds for medical applications. Our brand of citizen science, Adventure Scientists, is getting out into the field, utilizing your outdoor skillswhether those are hiking, whether those are biking, climbing, mountaineering, any of thoseto get out into the field. Well teach you how to collect the data that are gonna be really helpful to one of our conservation partners, who have told us, These are the data we need; help us go get it. And so our job is to find the people who are listening to this podcast who love the outdoors, love hiking, wanna make a difference and are looking for a way that they can give back.Theres other projects on groups like SciStarter, where theres a list of probably 3,000 different projects that anything from elementary students up through doctorates can get involved. Theres projects like iNaturalist, which are ways to document biodiversity as youre out hiking. You can do this with botany. You can do this with wildlife. You can even do it with insects and anything youre lucky enough to photograph while youre out there. EBird is another great example for bird lovers out there who can go and document all the different birds, and we look at the phenology, or eBird takes those data and learns about climate change that way.Those are some great examples. And again, our brand of this, Adventure Scientists, is all about finding the outdoor enthusiasts who are really comfortable in wild areas and putting them to work for the benefit of conservation.Feltman: What are some of the projects youre most excited about right now?Treinish: Yeah, weve just launched a new one studying hemlocks in eastern United States. The hemlock tree is really struggling because of an infestation by a tiny little insect thats an aphidlike insect called the woolly adelgid, and the woolly adelgid just completely devastates these trees. So were sending volunteers out across six different eastern statesNew York and in and around Washington, D.C.-Virginia areato look for the egg sacs of this woolly adelgid. Were actually looking for the trees that dont have those egg sacs so that we can take their genetics and that our partners, over time, can breed those and reforest areas across the East after these have been devastated with resilient trees that arent gonna be so susceptible to the woolly adelgid infestation. So thats one out east that were super excited about.In California were currently operating a biodiversity study as part of their 30x30 initiative to protect 30 percent of land and sea by the year 2030. So for this one its a really fun protocol where you get to go out, we send you a kit in the mailweve taught you how to do this online, so you dont need any science experience to get involved; well teach you everything you need to know. And we send you a kit that includes a tube, essentially, or a long straw, a rubber straw, that you use to suck up bugs after youve collected them in a sweep net. They dont go in your mouth; they go through a filter. And ultimately theyre ending up in ethanol and shipped to our labs, our partner labswe have five of em across the statebut these are documenting the biodiversity, the insect biodiversity.And then at those same sites were also gonna be documenting soil biodiversity. So we use whats called eDNA, or environmental DNA. Its this amazing technology; its actually about 20 years old, but its much more cost-effective today and much more widely used. But eDNA allows us to look at all the species and critters that had been in and around that area, just from collecting a soil samplereally amazing technology. So the goal, again, is to document the biodiversity of the state in order to prioritize which areas get selected for conservation and for protection across the entire area.Feltman: Thats very cool. I wish I was in California so I could get an insect pooter; I have always wanted to use one of those [laughs].So what is important about citizen science? You know, why are you so excited about getting people out to do this kind of fieldwork?Treinish: We always talk about preaching to the choir in the conservation movement, right? We always talk about getting on the same stages and talking to the same people, and its a frustration thats been shared across the conservation community. And at the same time the choir could be mobilized and galvanized to do so much more. And its that collective action again: giving people a way that they can see that they can be the change they wanna see in the world, that they can be part of the difference and be part of a community while theyre doing it is such a powerful tool.One of the things I love about the last few years that weve learned about our model is that 27 percent of our volunteers self-report that theyve gone on to careers in conservation, theyve gone back to school for conservation- or science-related fields, theyve started their own NGOs, they have even run for political office with an environmental platform.Now, that ripple effect is impossible for us to measure, but we know its big and we know its really powerful and we know that the next generation of scientists and conservationists are having early experiences like these as little kids; we work with adults because a lot of our data need to hold up in court and are used in different ways. But all of citizen science is empowering everyday citizens to get involvedand not just citizens, everyday people, global citizensto get involved in these issues in a way that is incredibly powerful, incredibly meaningful and gives them a tangible purpose and way that they can give back to the places and the, and the flora and fauna that they love so much.Feltman: Awesome.Treinish: Yeah, so if, if you wanna get involved in an Adventure Scientists project, I recommend visiting our website at AdventureScientists.org. If you wanna get involved in citizen science in general, again, I mentioned SciStarter, iNaturalist, eBird. You can even just have fun with the Merlin bird app is one of my favorite tools today, where anywhere theres birds you can have an AI actually helping you identify em. If you know your birds really well, you can help train the algorithm, and otherwise you just submit the recordings and then the algorithm learns from that. And thats even improving science and our ability to use tools like this to better understand the biodiversity of our planet.Feltman: Absolutely. Thanks so much for coming out to chat. This has been great.Treinish: Yeah, my pleasure. Thanks for having me.Feltman: Thats all for todays episode. If youre interested in any of the Adventure Scientists projects we talked about, you can find more information in our show notes.Science Quickly is produced by me, Rachel Feltman, along with Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper, Madison Goldberg and Jeff DelViscio. Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck fact-check our show. Our theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Subscribe to Scientific American for more up-to-date and in-depth science news.For Scientific American, this is Rachel Feltman. See you next time!

Insomniac Games founder and outgoing CEO, Ted Price, is set to be inducted into the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences' (AIAS) Hall of Fame. Read more

Sony quietly region-locks another PC port that doesn't need a PSN accountForbidden (but not in the) West.Image credit: Sony News by Vikki Blake Contributor Published on Jan. 24, 2025 Sony has once again quietly region-locked another PC game even though it currently doesn't require a PSN account.As detailed at SteamDB and spotted by the eagle-eyed folks at ResetEra, Horizon Forbidden West is the latest game to be unceremoniously locked down, ten full months after it debuted on Valve's digital PC platform, restricting purchase in dozens of places like Albania, Latvia, and Bangladesh.Just as quietly, Sony later reversed the decision. Horizon Zero Dawn Story Explained Part 1: Project Zero Dawn And How Humanity Went Extinct.Watch on YouTubeWhilst some of the restrictions are likely due to political sanctions - North Korea, for instance - other territories with regional pricing may have been locked down due to local exchange rates that make games disproportionately cheaper when compared to US or European prices."Sony is so embarrassingly bad at this," said one unhappy player. "Frankly they don't even deserve PC customers if they're going to keep pulling these kinds of stunts."I know Steam (the storefront) will never bother to push back on them because they're a libertarian hellhole run by a laissez-faire asshole, but the userbase should just flat-out reject future PlayStation games if this is the way Sony wants to act.""It's all about active PSN users in the quarterly report," suggested another, although - as others point out - PSN isn't technically required for Horizon Forbidden West as it is for games like The Last of Us Part 2 and Helldivers 2.Earlier this week, we learned an MMO based on Sony's Horizon IP had reportedly been cancelled.Other than job listings shared in 2023 which appeared to confirm the Horizon MMO was in development with the codename Project Skyline (with the initial codename being Project H), little else was known about the project and now, it appears the MMO has been cancelled before it was even officially announced.This story has been updated to confirm Sony later reversed the decision.

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 hereHelldivers 2 was one of the best games of 2024, and its excellence skyrocketed the series popularity to the point where Sony is bringing it to the big screens as a movie. Everyone knew HD2 was very successful, but the extent of its success might be shocking. Helldivers 2 recorded a magnificent achievement in 2024, and this achievement shows that its success in the United States alone was only slightly bested by Call of Duty.Helldivers 2 was the third best selling game in 2024As shared on Reddit, its been revealed that Helldivers 2 was the third best selling game in all of 2024 in the United States. This ranking is based on dollar sales for both digital and physical games sold across PlayStation, Nintendo, Xbox, and Steam.The ranking is comprised from between December 30th, 2023, up until January 4th, 2025. The top 20 best-selling games in the US for 2024 are as follows:Call of Duty Black Ops 6EA Sports College Football 2025Helldivers 2Dragon Ball Sparking ZeroNBA 2K25Madden NFL 25Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3EA Sports FC 25Elden RingEA Sports MVP BundleHogwarts LegacyDragons Dogma IIWWE 2K24MLB The Show 24Grand Theft Auto VMinecraftFinal Fantasy 7 RebirthTekken 8Marvels Spider-Man 2NBA 2K24As you can see from the above list, Helldivers 2 lands in third place, which is a phenomenal achievement, especially considering it was not available on Xbox consoles, plus the fact it is a $39.99 sale rather than $69.99 and above.Black Ops 6 at number one isnt surprising as, despite the yearly complaints online, Call of Duty is still the most popular multiplayer series in the video games industry. HD2 sitting very closely behind is a testament to its popularity and success, especially when again considering the differences in price plus HD2 being limited to PS5 and Steam only.For more Helldivers 2, check out our guide to thebest warbonds ranked, along with thebest stratagemsandbest throwables. We have also a guide to thebest weapons, and, if youre coming back to HD2 for the first time in a long while, we have a bunch oftips and tricksto help you get reaccustomed to the battlefield.Helldivers 2Platform(s):PC, PlayStation 5Genre(s):Action, Shooter, Third Person8VideoGamerSubscribe 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 hereWhile Diablo 4 is a massive success for Blizzard, the action-RPGor Diablo-like as series head Rod Fergusson wants it to be calledhas not exactly supplanted its predecessor. Instead, Diablo 3 and Diablo 4 are continuing to run simultaneously with the former offering a much faster, more arcade-style experience and the latter being closer to the series classic iterations.With both games offering different styles of play, fans of the series have been trying to play every new season when they release. However, with events and seasons often overlapping, theres little time for everything. With this in mind, Blizzard is moving to make sure that events will no longer overlap so fans can play as much as possible.Diablo 4 and Diablo 3 get out of each others wayConfirmed by Diablo Global Director of Community Adam Fletcher confirmed on social media that the two ARPGs will no longer have content releasing simultaneously. Announced alongside a last-minute week-long delay to Diablo 3s new season, Fletcher explained that the season has been delayed after extensive fan feedback regarding overlapping seasons.We received a good amount of feedback that many didnt want overlap with the first weekend of Diablo IVs new season, Fletcher explained. We agree so we are building out that gap and will be more mindful of that going forward.While some players were accepting of the delay so that fans of both games can enjoy everything without splitting their attention, others are less appreciative of the change. One fan criticised the community director for ruining the weekend plans for all the loyal D3 players.Im sorry about this. It isnt what Id hope for, Fletcher told fans. We received notice about 24 hrs prior to us having to adjust the time. The team is needing to create some new code to ensure the transition between seasons occurs smoothly after the issues with the auto scheduler ending the season early back in early January.The Diablo 4 devs promised that there will be better communication with season delays in the future. However, with the team quickly working on new code to allow progress from players to carry over smoothly from player accounts, theres hope that there will no longer be any last-minute delays.While annoying for fans who have nothing else to do this weekend, the delay of the latest Diablo 3 season is the start of something good for the community. For fans who play both Diablo gamesand a little Diablo 2 Resurrected on the sidetheres now more time to experience the latest seasons.For more news on Blizzards ARPG series, read about how D4s latest season is actually challenging for once, or read about how Rod Fergusson believes gamers dont want classic Diablo back anymore.Diablo 4Platform(s):PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S/XGenre(s):Action, Action RPG, RPGSubscribe to our newsletters!By subscribing, you agree to our Privacy Policy and may receive occasional deal communications; you can unsubscribe anytime.Share

More MutiesFallout season 2 reportedly might be adding another new face, this time with Marvel and Star Wars pedigree, to its castWe already know Macaulay Culkin's dibsed the crazy genius-types, but this star's apparently in line to don Brotherhood robes.Image credit: VG247/Vanity Fair/Amazon News by Mark Warren Senior Staff Writer Published on Jan. 24, 2025 While it's recently been forced to press pause on filming due to the LA wildfires, season two of the Fallout TV show has been gathering steam for a while now, with a number of new additions to its cast having been reported. The latest actor reportedly set to be joining Lucy, The Ghoul and co is Kumail Nanjiani.Yep, after it was previously reported that the guy from Home Alone will be playing some kind of clever weirdo, there's now apparently some beef being added to the Brotherhood.To see this content please enable targeting cookies. According to reporter Jeff Sneider's latest The InSneider newsletter, Nanjiani is set to rock up in Fallout season two and play "a high-ranking official within the Brotherhood of Steel". The actor's previously starred in the likes of Marvel's Eternals as Kingo and the Star Wars TV series Obi-Wan Kenobi as Haja Estree.So, he'd be bringing some nice pedigree, as well as some comedy chops from having been in the likes of Silicon Valley and, er, Gay of Thrones.If he does turn out to be a part of the Brotherhood's brass, odds seem pretty good of Nanjiani playing a role in whatever storylines season two has in store for Aaron Moten's Maximus, the power-armoured lad who formed the big three of protagonists on season one, alongside Ella Purnell's okey dokey-ing vault dweller and Walton Goggins' sexy (yeah, I said it) Ghoul.Maybe he'll be poor Maxi's new boss, a crusty Paladin or Elder who's keen to stop his soldiers from mucking about when they should be patrolling the wastes looking for rogue laser pistols, or in the case of Mojave Brotherhood in New Vegas, sitting underground huffing their own farts and trying not to lose the plot.Will Kumail Nanjiani huff his own farts in Fallout season two while somebody nearby messes with a plasma rifle, or tries to help some scribes get rid of a dodgy computer virus by running around a room? We'll just have to wait and see.