The Google Pixel Fold (left) next to the Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold (right)Anshel SagBefore I started testing this phone, I hoped to replace my Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra with the Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold as my daily driver phone. I fully committed to going full Pixel by adopting the Pixel Watch 3 and Pixel Buds Pro 2. Those accessories did enhance the experience (more on that below), but did not make up for the shortcomings of the Pixel 9 Pro Fold, which is a significant improvement over the previous generation of the Pixel Fold but not quite up to the flagship standard yet. I also spent some time with Googles last-generation Pixel Fold and saw many improvements that made me think this could become my daily driver.While I did not have a chance to review the (non-folding) Pixel 9 Pro or Pixel 9 Pro XL, I did review the baseline Pixel 9, which I found to be a good smartphone, albeit missing some of the key features of the Pro and Pro XL. I wont repeat too much of that review here, but I will build on it as I review the Pixel 9 Pro Fold.Foldable Compromises Of The Google Pixel 9 Pro FoldI went into this experiment knowing full well that there are some compromises when it comes to foldables compromises that continue to plague the most expensive smartphone category. Off the bat, one of the biggest problems came from the camera, where the preview images simply didnt match the cameras actual output. After postprocessing, the images looked drastically different. The good news is that the final images were better than the previews; the bad news is that Google didnt solve the very basic, not to say bizarre, problem of matching the previews to the final images. Additionally, the design of the camera bump on the shell of the phone didnt follow the design of the rest of the Pixel line due to the hinge placement, plus the camera specs and user experience just werent as good as on the Pro or Pro XL models. This seems crazy when you consider that the Pixel 9 Pro Fold is far and away the most expensive Pixel phone.On the Pixel 9 Pro Fold, Google also got rid of the ultrasonic fingerprint sensor, which it uses across the rest of the Pixel 9 lineup. Thats a disappointment because Im a huge fan of these sensors for a long list of reasons, including added security, robustness in difficult environments and speed. Most ultrasonic fingerprint sensors allow you to both unlock and wake the device with a single finger press. Beyond that, the hinge design on this phone creates quite a thick bezel between the left side of the phone and the front screen when the device is closed. This does not match the thin bezel that goes around the rest of the phone, and the difference is jarring.That said, the Pixel 9 Pro Fold is a huge improvement on the original Pixel Fold in nearly every way and addresses the many problems that it had. I also liked that Google launched the Pixel 9 Pro Fold with the rest of the Pixel line rather than on its own and without cohesion with the rest of the product lineup as it unfortunately did with the original Pixel Fold. And one of the best features on the phone was Made You Look, which uses the outside screen and the main camera to get children to smile for photos.Testing out the Made You Look feature while shopping with my familyAnshel SagMORE FOR YOUSlim And BeautifulWhile I had many qualms about the sacrifices made to build this foldable phone, the design language mostly stayed in line with the rest of the Pixel 9 family and to its credit delivered the thinnest foldable Ive used to date. My own standard for this was mostly set by the OnePlus Open foldable, which excels in terms of design, software and camera; the Google foldable did quite well against it in the design department.The Pixel 9 Pro Fold is an incredibly thin and sleek device, much thinner than its North American competition, but not quite a thin as some of its Chinese competitors such as the Honor Magic V3. However, because the Pixel 9 Pro Fold is such a niche device, there arent many protective cases available for it, and after testing it I can say that the phone is best used without a case. Thats especially true when you compare it folded up against a normal candybar phone and realize that its about the same thickness. The Pixel 9 Pro Fold is also very rugged; after I decided to toss the Thinborne fiber case I was testing, I accidentally dropped the phone a few times, and the damage was mostly insignificant, at least until the front screen cracked in the corner on the third or fourth drop.The internal display was completely unaffected by this, and thanks to Googles partnership with iFixit, a full guide and parts are available to get the necessary repair done for roughly $200. I loved using the inside display of this phone and used it more than Ive ever used any other foldables inner display thanks to better app support and just a better overall experience. I found myself using more app pairs and multitasking more often, for example when ordering food from a restaurant, or when checking my calendar while reading an e-mail asking me to book a meeting. These multitasking use cases kept increasing with time, and Im convinced that foldables are still very much the future of smartphones if we dont have to compromise so much on functionality.Connectivity Disappointments With The Pixel 9 Pro FoldConnectivity is where I believe Google has sacrificed the most on this device that is, where it has made too many compromises. The phones handling of both 5G and Wi-Fi was just not as good as it was on my S24 Ultra, especially in instances where signal was not that strong. Phones with good RF performance generally shine the most at the edge of the cell network where conditions are the worst, and Samsung knows good RF. Ironically, the Tensor G4 chip and the modem inside the Pixel 9 Pro Fold are both from Samsung, but the modem chosen for this device is just not up to snuff, and the Broadcom-driven Wi-Fi performed about half as fast as the S24 Ultra. In some cases, the Wi-Fi wouldnt even connect to my own network, with the phone claiming that there was no internet connection. I believe this could be an MLO bug similar to the one I encountered on Intels Wi-Fi 7 chipset, which the company is working to resolve.Poor signal handling is also a huge drain on battery life, and I believe that this was the main culprit for the Pixel 9 Pro Folds inferior battery performance. While I did not experience this with the non-folding Pixel 9, the Pixel 9 Pro Fold ended every day on battery-saver mode, meaning that it had less than 20% battery life remaining, and there were many times I went to bed with less than 10%. This is compared to my S24 Ultra, which would sometimes end the day well above 30% or even 50% on a lighter-use day. I know that battery life is a major factor in Googles move to the Tensor G5 for the next generation, but I really do hope that the rumors of a shift to MediaTek 5G modems are true, too. Hopefully, that will also get rid of some of the issues I had with this device when it would struggle to reattach to any cell network after losing signal or while roaming.Another big connectivity issue for this phone is that it doesnt adequately support fast charging. Granted, I have high standards for this, but the phone only charges at a peak of about 23 to 25 watts, which is about the same as Apple manages for iPhones. Meanwhile, many of Googles Android partners are delivering 100- to 200-watt charging outside the U.S. and 80 watts inside the U.S. Its worth noting that Samsung is also lagging in this regard, although it somewhat makes up for that with the battery-life advantages I discussed above. My main message to the designers of the Pixel 9 Pro Fold is that, if youre going to have a device with bad battery life, at least give it good fast-charging speeds.Speaking of charging, one of this phones worst attributes was its wireless charging capability, or rather its odd implementation of wireless charging. This forced many case manufacturers to redesign their cases because of Googles decision to move the charging coil. I believe this was a consequence of the hinge design, which affected the placement of the camera and in turn forced the battery and charging coil to be moved. Google should have admitted failure when its own Pixel Stand was not compatible with this charger. Frankly, I couldnt get any stand charger to work properly, which was a drag because I use stand chargers probably 90% of the time in my home. Having to use custom mag-safe cases or flat-only chargers was a big disappointment. In fact, it was so bad essentially useless, even that I wish Google had gone the OnePlus Open route and simply not had wireless charging at all, but with fast wired charging.Pixel Buds Pro 2 And Pixel Watch 3 (45 mm)So after all of this (warranted) negativity about the phone, how were the accessories? Simply put, these devices are both great companions for a Pixel or any Android device. I especially enjoyed the larger screen on the timelessly designed Pixel Watch 3 (45mm), and I appreciate that Google even reduced the bezel size on the 41mm model by 30%. While I dont believe that cellular connectivity for smart watches is important to 99% of the population, Google is offering free connectivity for two years on the LTE version of the Pixel Watch 3.The Fitbit fitness tracking is also great, as is the six months of free premium Fitbit service, which I think is a pretty good deal. I really enjoyed the automatic walk detection, but I would say that I still have more exercises available on my Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 Classic than I did on the Pixel Watch 3. Google also finally implemented an easy transfer method to switch from one phone to another without needing to reset the watch and set things up again.The new 45mm Pixel Watch 3 with its unique watch faceAnshel SagThe Pixel Buds Pro 2 were also a great addition because they managed to balance size, AI features and sound quality really well. While I wouldnt necessarily say these earbuds had the best automatic noise cancellation, they did pass my basic fitness test and stayed in my ears while I was working out, which most earbuds dont. The Gemini Live AI assistant capability is also very cool, but I havent found much practical use for it yet.Where Do Google Pixel Foldable Phones Go From Here?While I may seem quite critical of this device, it is only because I had such high hopes for it. I have been a fan of foldables since the first Samsung Galaxy Fold became my primary device, and Ive hoped and prayed that there would be a new foldable that would become my daily driver. I believe that Google can still continue to improve on the Pixel 9 Pro Fold as it did with the original Pixel Fold, making adjustments that will yield a more competitive device.However, I simply cannot ignore that it feels like a two-horse race in the U.S. market between Google and Samsung, and as a result we simply dont have a truly competitive landscape with foldables coming from companies such as Vivo, Oppo, Xiaomi or Honor. Many of these Chinese foldables deliver a flagship-level experience very much including the camera that simply doesnt force so much compromise. Besides addressing the significant connectivity issues I laid out in this piece, I would love to see Google ship the Pixel 10 Pro Fold with the same camera design and specs as the rest of the Pixel line, camera bump notwithstanding.

Samsungs Galaxy S25 - in your hands soondpa/picture alliance via Getty ImagesWhile January was a huge month for Samsung, February could be even bigger. The launch of the AI flagship Galaxy S25 was a major milestone, but the device landing in users hands and the Android 15 / One UI 7 upgrade it brings with it will determine how well everyone is feeling come the end of this month. Samsung cant get this wrong.While Google was very much Samsungs partner on the S25 development and launch, with Gemini now as prominent as Galaxy AI on the phone, it has not done its partner any favors as February gets underway. This months Android security update includes a zero-day under active exploitation, and nothing highlights Samsungs update issues as well as emergency fixes that need to reach its entire user base urgently.Google warns Android users that CVE-2024-53104 may be under limited, targeted exploitation. This vulnerability affects Androids core Linux kernel, mishandling video frames, potentially triggering memory instability. It is now being exploited in targeted attacks, but history suggests that may expand as users await the fix.Samsung has played it both ways with such vulnerabilities before, sometimes releasing them immediately and other times waiting for the following month. I am fairly sure this will be included in Februarys release. But theres another critical security fix in Androids update, and this one will likely be a different story.MORE FOR YOUCVE-2024-45569 is a Qualcomm fix and so only applies to devices with its relevant chipsets. Samsung tends to include such third-party component fixes a month later than Google, and so this one will likely run to March. Fortunately, there are no suggestions this has come under attack, unlike the Qualcomm fixes last year.The bad news for new Galaxy S25 buyers is that the current firmware update only includes Decembers security update. Its likely that will be remedied quickly but that hasnt happened yet. And it will highlight the patchy update process that continues to frustrate users. The S25 should see Pixel-like seamless updates, a first for a Samsung flagship, but that wont in itself speed up the process.Meanwhile, the bad news for Galaxy S24 owners remains the wait for One UI 7s stable release, bringing Android 15 to the Samsung masses. This is an excellent upgrade and makes Samsung phones materially safer and more secure. It cant come soon enough.Officially, this should come out by the end of the first quarter for relatively new flagships. The S25 gets it right out of the box. But the feeling now seems to be that S24 owners might see the February security update before they see One UI 7, which is good from a fix perspective but frustrating from a feature perspective. There is no new news, though, just lots of speculation and users keen to see the new firmware released.As SammyFans reports, recently, our senior writer contacted Samsung Support U.S. to inquire about the status of the stable One UI 7 update. When asked about a tentative release timeline, the support executive stated that they did not have a specific date for the update. Something seems off, raising the possibility of another slight delay in the distribution. The support representative also noted, we cant speculate on this likely a move to prevent fans from creating hype, as has happened many times in the past.Whatever phone youre using, make sure you update as soon as you can. A Google warning of this sort must be taken seriously. You can check to ensure youre on Samsungs monthly update schedule here. And the release will be announced here.

In a nutshell: BioWare has laid off approximately two dozen staff and reassigned many others to various posts within parent company EA. This decision aligns with BioWare's strategy to become "more agile" as it shifts focus to the next installment of the Mass Effect series, which is still in early pre-production despite being teased in 2021. Bloomberg notes that the move aligns with the studio's statement last year that it would "loan out" some of its developers to other projects within its parent company, including Iron Man and Skate. However, the studio announced that these loans are now permanent. This move came as a surprise, as did the release of the two dozen staff members, including writer Trick Weekes and producer Jen Cheverie. It leaves only a "core team" of just under 100 employees to work on the Mass Effect project BioWare teased well over two years ago.I'm now looking for a new writing/narrative position. It's been a privilege to work with so many amazing devs over my 20 years at BioWare, and I will cherish the memories of the wonderful folks in the community I've met along the way. Thank you all. Trick Weekes (@trickweekes.bsky.social) January 29, 2025 at 4:58 PMThe layoffs come after the release of Dragon Age: The Veilguard, which debuted last Halloween. The game marked BioWare's return to the Dragon Age universe after a decade-long hiatus since Dragon Age: Inquisition. Veilguard broke BioWare's Steam records upon release, reaching approximately 70,414 concurrent players and pushing Mass Effect Legendary Edition (59,817) into second place.Unfortunately, its initial success wasn't good enough for EA. The publisher reported that Veilguard sold around 1.5 million during Q4 2024 nearly 50 percent shy of expectations marking it a failure in EA's books. During a recent earnings call, CEO Andrew Wilson pointed to the game's shortfall as contributing to the company revising its financial projections.After almost 14 years at BioWare, I am devastated to learn today that myself and others must seek new opportunities. I am so grateful for all of the learning, challenges, and most importantly the team. I will remember my time here with joy. Tomorrow we'll move forward. For today I will just be sad. Jen Cheverie (@jencheverie.bsky.social) January 29, 2025 at 5:44 PMDragon Age: The Veilguard's lukewarm reception raises concerns about BioWare's future projects, particularly the upcoming Mass Effect title. The studio has faced several hurdles in recent years, including the departure of key personnel and the cancellation of planned multiplayer elements in favor of single-player experiences. Veilguard's departure from a winning BioWare formula and these setbacks have led fans to wonder about the studio's direction and ability to deliver on expectations. // Related StoriesLaying off staff as the studio begins to ramp up production of the next Mass Effect seems counterintuitive. Usually, this is when developers go on a hiring spree. Obviously, EA is applying pressure to lower the studio's overhead, but this seems like a setup for failure.BioWare must hit a home run with its next release to please its already agitated fanbase. The success of the next Mass Effect will be crucial in determining the developer's standing in the industry and within the EA umbrella. We've already seen several studios shuttered in 2024, including PlayStation London Studio, Tango Gameworks, Arkane Austin, Roundhouse Games, and Firewalk Studios. We'd hate to see BioWare go down for another lackluster release.

In its normal fashion, Nothing has been everything except clear with its teasers about the upcoming Nothing Phone 3a, and now a new rumor suggests it might borrow one of the iPhones best features. So far, Nothing has confirmed only that the Phone 3a is on the way and that more will be revealed at its March 4 conference, and the latest teaser post only adds to the mystery.The shared image depicts a button on the side of the phone beneath the power button. For reference, Nothing has always kept its power button and volume rockers on opposite sides of the handset. Unless the Nothing Phone 3a is undergoing a massive design change, the picture indicates a new button is coming with this latest release, and many fans suspect it is a dedicated camera shutter button.Recommended VideosYour second memory, one click away.Power in Perspective. 4 March 10:00 GMT. pic.twitter.com/FHhAgzSZBz Nothing (@nothing) February 3, 2025Please enable Javascript to view this contentOf course, the caption does lend a bit of credence to that theory. Your second memory, one click away. Power in perspective. The use of perspective would fit the camera button idea, and if its correct, this button could be used to do everything from opening the camera app to snapping a photo.A few weeks ago, Nothing shared another teaser post with a Pokmon on it, although what exactly that means isnt quite clear. Some fans believe it can be an indicator of a model number, while others think it was nothing more than a ploy to generate hype and excitement for the next release. Nothing is holding a press conference on March 4 at the Mobile World Congress event where it will reveal all the details youve been waiting for, including specs, battery capacity, and much more.There are still a lot of information we dont know about this next phone, but stay tuned here and well update you as we find out more.Editors Recommendations

For an incredible experience at a reasonable price, consider gaming laptop deals from Dell, such as this offer for the Alienware x16 R2. This particular configuration with the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 graphics card has a sticker price of $3,300, but you can currently buy it for $2,700. Thats $600 in savings that you can either pocket or spend towards video games and accessories, but youre going to have to finish your purchase for this gaming laptop quickly because were not sure how much longer the discount will remain available.The Alienware x16 R2is the upgraded version of the Alienware x16 that equips the gaming laptop with the Intel Core Ultra 9 185H processor and the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 graphics card, alongside 32GB of RAM thats the sweet spot for high-end gamers, according to our guide on how much RAM do you need. It wont have any trouble running the best PC games at their highest settings, and it will be ready for the upcoming PC games of the next few years.All that power would be wasted on a mediocre screen, but thats fortunately not the case with the Alienware x16 R2 and its 16-inch display with Full HD+ resolution and a 480Hz refresh rate. Youll be able to install multiple titles at the same time on the gaming laptop because it has a massive 2TB SSD, and with Windows 11 Home pre-loaded, you can start doing so right after you unbox it. The Alienware x16 R2 also features the brands AlienFX lighting system, so youll be playing video games in style.RelatedIf youre willing to spend a significant amount of cash on a powerful gaming laptop, you cant go wrong with the Alienware x16 R2, especially now that its configuration with the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 graphics card is on sale at $600 off. From $3,300, its down to $2,700, which is still pretty expensive, but we assure you that its worth every single penny. It would be a shame to miss out on the savings though, so we highly recommend pushing through with your transaction for the Alienware x16 R2 gaming laptop as soon as possible.Editors Recommendations

Featuring Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Michelangelo and others, a show at the Kings Gallery at Buckingham Palace highlights the periods works on paperwhich, though frequently preparatory, stand as works of art in their own right.

Beyonc, Sabrina Carpenter and the Rolling Stones were among the artists who took home prizes.

I want to break free Anthropic dares you to jailbreak its new AI model Week-long public test follows 3,000+ hours of unsuccessful bug bounty claim attempts. Kyle Orland Feb 3, 2025 5:09 pm | 1 Will you be the one to break Claude out of its new cage? Credit: Getty Images Will you be the one to break Claude out of its new cage? Credit: Getty Images Story textSizeSmallStandardLargeWidth *StandardWideLinksStandardOrange* Subscribers only Learn moreEven the most permissive corporate AI models have sensitive topics that their creators would prefer they not discuss (e.g., weapons of mass destruction, illegal activities, or, uh, Chinese political history). Over the years, enterprising AI users have resorted to everything from weird text strings to ASCII art to stories about dead grandmas in order to jailbreak those models into giving the "forbidden" results.Today, Claude model maker Anthropic has released a new system of Constitutional Classifiers that it says can "filter the overwhelming majority" of those kinds of jailbreaks. And now that the system has held up to over 3,000 hours of bug bounty attacks, Anthropic is inviting the wider public to test out the system to see if it can fool it into breaking its own rules.Respect the constitutionIn a new paper and accompanying blog post, Anthropic says its new Constitutional Classifier system is spun off from the similar Constitutional AI system that was used to build its Claude model. The system relies at its core on a "constitution" of natural language rules defining broad categories of permitted (e.g., listing common medications) and disallowed (e.g., acquiring restricted chemicals) content for the model.From there, Anthropic asks Claude to generate a large number of synthetic prompts that would lead to both acceptable and unacceptable responses under that constitution. These prompts are translated into multiple languages and modified in the style of "known jailbreaks," then amended with "automated red-teaming" prompts that attempt to create novel new jailbreak attacks.This all makes for a robust set of training data that can be used to fine-tune new, more jailbreak-resistant "classifiers" for both user input and model output. On the input side, these classifiers surround each query with a set of templates describing in detail what kind of harmful information to look out for, as well as the ways a user might try to obfuscate or encode requests for that information. An example of the lengthy wrapper the new Claude classifier uses to detect prompts related to chemical weapons. Credit: Anthropic An example of the lengthy wrapper the new Claude classifier uses to detect prompts related to chemical weapons. Credit: Anthropic "For example, the harmful information may be hidden in an innocuous request, like burying harmful requests in a wall of harmless looking content, or disguising the harmful request in fictional roleplay, or using obvious substitutions," one such wrapper reads, in part.On the output side, a specially trained classifier calculates the likelihood that any specific sequence of tokens (i.e., words) in a response is discussing any disallowed content. This calculation is repeated as each token is generated, and the output stream is stopped if the result surpasses a certain threshold.Now it's up to youSince August, Anthropic has been running a bug bounty program through HackerOne offering $15,000 to anyone who could design a "universal jailbreak" that could get this Constitutional Classifier to answer a set of 10 forbidden questions. The company says 183 different experts spent a total of over 3,000 hours attempting to do just that, with the best result providing usable information on just five of the 10 forbidden prompts.Anthropic also tested the model against a set of 10,000 jailbreaking prompts synthetically generated by the Claude LLM. The constitutional classifier successfully blocked 95 percent of these attempts, compared to just 14 percent for the unprotected Claude system. The instructions provided to public testers of Claude's new constitutional classifier protections. Credit: Anthropic The instructions provided to public testers of Claude's new constitutional classifier protections. Credit: Anthropic Despite those successes, Anthropic warns that the Constitutional Classifier system comes with a significant computational overhead of 23.7 percent, increasing both the price and energy demands of each query. The Classifier system also refused to answer an additional 0.38 percent of innocuous prompts over unprotected Claude, which Anthropic considers an acceptably slight increase.Anthropic stops well short of claiming that its new system provides a foolproof system against any and all jailbreaking. But it does note that "even the small proportion of jailbreaks that make it past our classifiers require far more effort to discover when the safeguards are in use." And while new jailbreak techniques can and will be discovered in the future, Anthropic claims that "the constitution used to train the classifiers can rapidly be adapted to cover novel attacks as theyre discovered."For now, Anthropic is confident enough in its Constitutional Classifier system to open it up for widespread adversarial testing. Through February 10, Claude users can visit the test site and try their hand at breaking through the new protections to get answers to eight questions about chemical weapons. Anthropic says it will announce any newly discovered jailbreaks during this test. Godspeed, new red teamers.Kyle OrlandSenior Gaming EditorKyle OrlandSenior Gaming Editor Kyle Orland has been the Senior Gaming Editor at Ars Technica since 2012, writing primarily about the business, tech, and culture behind video games. He has journalism and computer science degrees from University of Maryland. He once wrote a whole book about Minesweeper. 1 Comments

Ours is not to reason why? Zero warnings: Longtime YouTuber rails against unexplained channel removal Developer calls for human review to end YouTubes automated channel removals. Ashley Belanger Feb 3, 2025 4:33 pm | 27 Credit: Talaj | iStock / Getty Images Plus Credit: Talaj | iStock / Getty Images Plus Story textSizeSmallStandardLargeWidth *StandardWideLinksStandardOrange* Subscribers only Learn moreArtemiy Pavlov, the founder of a small but mighty music software brand called Sinesvibes, spent more than 15 years building a YouTube channel with all original content to promote his business' products. Over all those years, he never had any issues with YouTube's automated content removal systemuntil Monday, when YouTube, without issuing a single warning, abruptly deleted his entire channel."What a 'nice' way to start a week!" Pavlov posted on Bluesky. "Our channel on YouTube has been deleted due to 'spam and deceptive policies.' Which is the biggest WTF moment in our brand's history on social platforms. We have only posted demos of our own original products, never anything else...."Officially, YouTube told Pavlov that his channel violated YouTube's "spam, deceptive practices, and scam policy," but Pavlov could think of no videos that might be labeled as violative."We have nothing to hide," Pavlov told Ars, calling YouTube's decision to delete the channel with "zero warnings" a "terrible, terrible day for an independent, honest software brand.""We have never been involved with anything remotely shady," Pavlov said. "We have never taken a single dollar dishonestly from anyone. And we have thousands of customers that stand by our brand."Ars saw Pavolov's post and reached out to YouTube to find out why the channel was targeted for takedown. About three hours later, the channel was suddenly restored. That's remarkably fast, as YouTube can sometimes take days or weeks to review an appeal. A YouTube spokesperson later confirmed that the Sinesvibes channel was reinstated due to the regular appeals process, indicating perhaps that YouTube could see that Sinesvibes' removal was an obvious mistake.Developer calls for more human reviewFor small brands like Sinesvibes, even spending half a day in limbo was a cause for crisis. Immediately, the brand worried about 50 broken product pages for one of its distributors, as well as "hundreds if not thousands of news articles posted about our software on dozens of different websites." Unsure if the channel would ever be restored, Sinesvibes spent most of Monday surveying the damage.Now that the channel is restored, Pavlov is stuck confronting how much of the Sinesvibes brand depends on the YouTube channel remaining online while still grappling with uncertainty since the reason behind the ban remains unknown. He told Ars that's why, for small brands, simply having a channel reinstated doesn't resolve all their concerns."I have read their policies that they linked," Pavlov told Ars. "We are not even remotely breaking any of those rules they have. We dont spam (we post 5-10 videos per month max, 40-50 comments a month max), our content is all original, our thumbnails are made by YouTube itself from our videos (nothing misleading/deceptive there)." Sinesvibes has also "never had a copyright claim on what we do" or "received any warnings, flags, or negative reports," Pavlov said.In the email sent to Pavlov notifying him of his channel ban, YouTube admits that it sometimes makes mistakes, while apologizing for the "very upsetting news." Similarly, in the email confirming his channel had been reinstated, YouTube would only explain that in trying to make YouTube a safe space, "sometimes we make mistakes trying to get it right. We're sorry for any frustration our mistake caused you."YouTube's spokesperson, Boot Bullwinkle, did not respond when Ars asked if it was possible to know what content triggered the mistaken channel ban or confirm that Sinesvibes had no strikes on record prior to the ban. Bullwinkle would only confirm that YouTube considered this case resolved, then stopped responding.Pavlov's story isn't new, of course, as YouTubers have been railing against automated content removals for years. But Sinesvibes' longstanding good reputation on YouTube should have counted for something, Pavlov vented on Bluesky, and more human review could help YouTube detect false red flags before channels are removed and avoid alienating longtime users who obviously aren't violating community rules. CDM, a news service for digital music creators following the Sinesvibes drama, also called for more human oversight of automated content bans as "the better solution for everyone" to "reduce false positives.""How they are willing to insanely shut down a 15-year-old channel with not a single issue on record, without any warning or question, is beyond crazy," Pavlov posted on Bluesky.To Pavlov, who also uses Vimeo but otherwise has few alternatives to YouTube, all he wants to move forward promoting his business on YouTube with confidence is a little more information about what generated the false red flag."Just the fact that they take down almost two decades of unique, original work is hard to process," Pavlov told Ars.Ashley BelangerSenior Policy ReporterAshley BelangerSenior Policy Reporter Ashley is a senior policy reporter for Ars Technica, dedicated to tracking social impacts of emerging policies and new technologies. She is a Chicago-based journalist with 20 years of experience. 27 Comments

Omega-3 supplements could be a simple way to slow down ageingEvgeniia Siiankovskaia/Getty ImagesA daily omega-3 supplement seems to slow biological ageing in older people, particularly if combined with vitamin D and exercise.We already knew that omega-3s good fats found in seeds, nuts and some fish can boost our immunity, heart health and brain function. AdvertisementThey have also been linked to changes in epigenetic markers, chemical tags on DNA that alter the activity of genes and, in turn, how cells behave. This suggests that omega-3s reduce the pace of biological ageing, often defined as a measure of how quickly someones body is deteriorating compared with the general populations.To explore this further, Heike Bischoff-Ferrari at the University of Zurich and her colleagues split 777 people in Switzerland, aged 70 to 91, into eight groups. They also wanted to find out how omega-3 may work alongside vitamin D supplements and exercise.Omega-3 plays on multiple pathways of ageing, such as being anti-inflammatory. Similarly, vitamin D and exercise have multiple benefits, says Bischoff-Ferrari. We thought, if you play on each of these differential pathways, do you get an additive benefit? Get the most essential health and fitness news in your inbox every Saturday.Sign up to newsletterSome of the participants were already taking these supplements or doing strength training at the start of the study. It didnt seem ethical to tell them to stop exercising or stop taking certain supplements, says Bischoff-Ferrari, so they were allowed to continue.On top of their existing lifestyle habits, each group was told to take varying combinations of a daily 1-gram dose of omega-3, placebo pills and 2000 international units of vitamin D. In addition, some groups were instructed to do 30 minutes of strength training three times a week.For instance, some people were told to take omega-3 pills, but not vitamin D supplements or to do any additional strength training, while others were told to add in strength training and take vitamin D, but not omega-3.At the start of the study, the researchers estimated the participants biological ages using epigenetic clocks previously developed by the team and other researchers. These analysed DNA markers called methyl groups in their blood samples that generally decline with age, impairing cell function.By doing the same three years later, the scientists found that the participants who were told to take omega-3 only had aged by around 3 months less, on average, than those who were only given placebo pills. They accounted for factors that could affect the results, such as the participants actual age, sex, weight and height.This is the biggest trial we have today that hints that a simple supplement contributes to slowing biological ageing, says Bischoff-Ferrari.Whats more, those who took omega-3 along with vitamin D and did strength training aged even less, compared with people who didnt introduce any of these habits as part of the trial. The effect was somewhat more pronounced, almost four months of rejuvenation, says Bischoff-Ferrari.These effects may seem small but could be important for some, says Richard Siow at Kings College London. For an older person, in about three months, there could be a lot of age-related decline going on, so this becomes more significant, he says.But epigenetic clocks are not a perfect measure of biological ageing. Just because biomarkers on your DNA indicate that you resemble someone who is younger, it doesnt necessarily mean that you are healthier in some way, says Siow.Further research should assess what the changes mean for measures such as cognition, ability to exercise and heart health, he says. Bischoff-Ferraris team is now analysing the participants data on such outcomes.Another limitation of the study is that the participants were relatively healthy and active, and mostly not deficient in vitamin D. Further studies that involve people without these characteristics, and who are younger and live in other countries, are needed, says Bischoff-Ferrari.Journal reference:Nature Aging DOI: 10.1038/s43587-024-00793-yTopics: