OnTheGoSystems is looking for a Senior U/UIX Designer who will create seamless, intuitive experiences for our products. Since our launch in 2008, weve grown to a team of over 100 talented individuals worldwide. Were proud to serve over 200,000 clients.Join our global team, turn complex challenges into accessible solutions, and make a real impact on users worldwide! If youve previously designed SaaS tools for developers, wed love to meet you.Role and responsibilitiesManage UX/UI design for current and upcoming products.Collaborate in product development to understand design needs.Conduct user interviews, testing, and usability studies.Ensure decisions are driven by user behavior data instead of subjective opinions.Create user experiences using methods like wireframes and prototypes.Uphold digital brand consistency, including typography, design, and colors.Collaborate with the development team, including technical professionals and executives.RequirementsExperience designing mass-market products.Minimum 5 years in a UX/UI role.Proficiency in Figma.Strong background in usability testing, including planning, conducting, and analyzing tests to optimize UX based on experiment results.Ability to interpret user research and feedback to inform design decisions.Familiarity with different research methodologies, such as user interviews, surveys, A/B testing, moderated and unmoderated remote usability testing.Experience with WordPress.Good to havePrevious experience with designing SaaS tools for developers.What we offer100% remote position,BAMM program to fill you up with energy,A computer budget to make your workplace better,A Kindle device with an access to our company Amazon account,We respect national holidays in each country and want you to have a rest these days,Being part of a team of smart, self-driven individuals,Great opportunity to progress and advance,Collaborating with team members across the globe.If youre looking for an excellent opportunity to make an impact, at a company that values innovation and teamwork, apply today and join our professional team! Related Jobs See more Design jobs

MIT Technology Reviews Whats Next series looks across industries, trends, and technologies to give you a first look at the future. You can read the rest of them here. For every technological gadget that becomes a household name, there are dozens that never catch on. This year marks a full decade since Google confirmed it was stopping production of Google Glass, and for a long time it appeared as though mixed-reality productsthink of the kinds of face computers that dont completely cover your field of view they way a virtual-reality headset doeswould remain the preserve of enthusiasts rather than casual consumers. Fast-forward 10 years, and smart glasses are on the verge of becomingwhisper itcool. Metas smart glasses, made in partnership with Ray-Ban, are basically indistinguishable from the iconic Wayfarers Tom Cruise made famous in Risky Business. Meta also recently showed off its fashion-forward Orion augmented reality glasses prototype, while Snap unveiled its fifth-generation Spectacles, neither of which would look out of place in the trendiest district of a major city. In December, Google showed off its new unnamed Android XR prototype glasses, and rumors that Apple is still working on a long-anticipated glasses project continue to swirl. Elsewhere, Chinese tech giants Huawei, Alibaba, Xiaomi, and Baidu are also vying for a slice of the market. Sleeker designs are certainly making this new generation of glasses more appealing. But more importantly, smart glasses are finally on the verge of becoming useful, and its clear that Big Tech is betting that augmented specs will be the next big consumer device category. Heres what to expect from smart glasses in 2025 and beyond. AI agents could finally make smart glasses truly useful Although mixed-reality devices have been around for decades, they have largely benefited specialized fields, including the medical, construction, and technical remote-assistance industries, where they are likely to continue being used, possibly in more specialized ways. Microsoft is the creator of the best-known of these devices, which layer virtual content over the wearers real-world environment, and marketed its HoloLens 2 smart goggles to corporations. The company recently confirmed it was ending production of that device. Instead, it is choosing to focus on building headsets for the US military in partnership with Oculus founder Palmer Luckeys latest venture, Anduril. Now the general public may finally be getting access to devices they can use. The AI world is abuzz over agents, which augment large language models (LLMs) with the ability to carry out tasks by themselves. The past 12 months have seen huge leaps in AI multimodal LLMs abilities to handle video, images, and audio in addition to text, which opens up new applications for smart glasses that would not have been possible previously, says Louis Rosenberg, an AR researcher who worked on the first functional augmented-reality system at Stanford University in the 1990s. We already know Meta is definitely interested in AI agents. Although the company said in September that it has no plans to sell its Orion prototype glasses to the public, given their expense, Mark Zuckerberg raised expectations for its next generations of Metas smart glasses when he declared Orion the most advanced pair of AR glasses ever made. Hes also made it clear how deeply invested Meta is in bringing a highly intelligent and personalized AI assistant to as many users as possible and that hes confident Metas glasses are the perfect form factor for AI. Although Meta is already making its Ray-Ban smart glasses AI more conversationalits new live AI feature responds to prompts about what its wearer is seeing and hearing via its camera and microphonefuture agents will give these systems not only eyes and ears, but a contextual awareness of whats around them, Rosenberg says. For example, agents running on smart glasses could hold unprompted interactive conversations with their wearers based on their environment, reminding them to buy orange juice when they walk past a store, for example, or telling them the name of a coworker who passes them on the sidewalk. We already know Google is deeply interested in this agent-first approach: The unnamed smart glasses it first showed off at Google I/O in May 2024 were powered by its Astra AI agent system. Having worked on mixed reality for over 30 years, its the first time I can see an application that will really drive mass adoption, Rosenberg says. Meta and Google will likely tussle to be the sectors top dog Its unclear how far we are from that level of mass adoption. During a recent Meta earnings call, Zuckerberg said 2025 would be a defining year for understanding the future of AI glasses and whether they explode in popularity or represent a longer grind. He has reason to be optimistic, though: Meta is currently ahead of its competition thanks to the success of the Ray-Ban Meta smart glassesthe company sold more than 1 million units last year. It also is preparing to roll out new styles thanks to a partnership with Oakley, which, like Ray-Ban, is under the EssilorLuxottica umbrella of brands. And while its current second-generation specs cant show its wearer digital data and notifications, a third version complete with a small display is due for release this year, according to theFinancial Times. The company is also reportedly working on a lighter, more advanced version of its Orion AR glasses, dubbed Artemis, that could go on sale as early as 2027, Bloomberg reports. Adding display capabilities will put the Ray-Ban Meta glasses on equal footing with Googles unnamed Android XR glasses project, which sports an in-lens display (the company has not yet announced a definite release date). The prototype the company demoed to journalists in September featured a version of its AI chatbot Gemini, and much they way Google built its Android OS to run on smartphones made by third parties, its Android XR software will eventually run on smart glasses made by other companies as well as its own. These two major players are competing to bring face-mounted AI to the masses in a race thats bound to intensify, adds Rosenbergespecially given that both Zuckerberg and Google cofounder Sergey Brin have called smart glasses the perfect hardware for AI. Google and Meta are really the big tech companies that are furthest ahead in the AI space on their own. Theyre very well positioned, he says. This is not just augmenting your world, its augmenting your brain. Its getting easier to make smart glassesbut its still hard to get them right When the AR gaming company Niantics Michael Miller walked around CES, the gigantic consumer electronics exhibition that takes over Las Vegas each January, he says he was struck by the number of smaller companies developing their own glasses and systems to run on them, including Chinese brands DreamSmart, Thunderbird, and Rokid. While its still not a cheap endeavora business would probably need a couple of million dollars in investment to get a prototype off the ground, he saysit demonstrates that the future of the sector wont depend on Big Tech alone. On a hardware and software level, the barrier to entry has become very low, says Miller, the augmented reality hardware lead at Niantic, which has partnered with Meta, Snap, and Magic Leap, among others. But turning it into a viable consumer product is still tough. Meta caught the biggest fish in this world, and so they benefit from the Ray-Ban brand. Its hard to sell glasses when youre an unknown brand. Thats why its likely ambitious smart glasses makers in countries like Japan and China will increasingly partner with eyewear companies known locally for creating desirable frames, generating momentum in their home markets before expanding elsewhere, he suggests. More developers will start building for these devices These smaller players will also have an important role in creating new experiences for wearers of smart glasses. A big part of smart glasses usefulness hinges on their ability to send and receive information from a wearers smartphoneand third-party developers interest in building apps that run on them. The more the public can do with their glasses, the more likely they are to buy them. Developers are still waiting for Meta to release a software development kit (SDK) that would let them build new experiences for the Ray-Ban Meta glasses. While bigger brands are understandably wary about giving third parties access to smart glasses discreet cameras, it does limit the opportunities researchers and creatives have to push the envelope, says Paul Tennent, an associate professor in the Mixed Reality Laboratory at the University of Nottingham in the UK. But historically, Google has been a little less afraid of this, he adds. Elsewhere, Snap and smaller brands like Brilliant Labs, whose Frame glasses run multimodal AI models including Perplexity, ChatGPT, and Whisper, and Vuzix, which recently launched its AugmentOS universal operating system for smart glasses, have happily opened up their SDKs, to the delight of developers, says Patrick Chwalek, a student at the MIT Media Lab who worked on smart glasses platform Project Captivate as part of his PhD research. Vuzix is getting pretty popular at various universities and companies because people can start building experiences on top of them, he adds. Most of these are related to navigation and real-time translationI think were going to be seeing a lot of iterations of that over the next few years."

Uber is one step closer to letting customers hail a self-driving vehicle in Austin, Texas, through its app. The company on Wednesday opened up its interest listso that curious riders can declare their interest in potentially being matched with a Waymo robotaxi, once that partnership launches "soon" in Austin.In September, Uber and Waymo, the self-driving arm of Google's parent company Alphabet, announced the expansion of their partnership into Austin and Atlanta, after having already teamed up in Phoenix the year before.In October, Waymo began allowing a "limited number of early riders" in Austin to hail a robotaxi via its ownWaymo Oneapp, noting this was a stepping stone to its commercial launch with Uber in early 2025.Now it appears Waymo and Uber are one step closer to that official launch. As part of the partnership, Uber will manage tasks like vehicle cleaning and repair, while "Waymo will continue to be responsible for the testing and operation of the Waymo Driver, including roadside assistance and certain rider support functions," the companies said in a previous statement. (In Atlanta, Waymo has said public riders can catch a driverless ride via the Uber app starting sometime this year.)See also:Waymo Expands to More Cities: Everything to Know About the Growing Robotaxi ServiceTo join the interest list, Uber riders in Atlanta should first update the app, then tap Account > Settings, and findAutonomous vehicles under the Ride Preferences menu. Then, hitJoin interest list. Uber says if riders don't opt-in, they won't get matched with an autonomous vehicle.When the partnership launches, riders will be able to travel across 37 square miles of Austin, with plans for future expansions. Perhaps most importantly, Uber says customers will pay the same rate for a Waymo robotaxi as they would for an UberX, Uber Green, Uber Comfort or Uber Comfort Electric ride, and will see upfront pricing in the app.This could be a critical step toward getting more people to buy into the idea of hailing an autonomous ride. In other cities in which Waymo operates like San Francisco and Los Angeles, customers need to download the separate Waymo One app to hail a ride (in Phoenix, you have the option to use Waymo One or Uber). And in my personal experience, Waymo is oftentimes a bit pricier than a standard Uber or Lyft ride. But if people have the option to simply hail a robotaxi from an app they regularly use, and the prices are consistently comparable to standard human-driven options, they may be more enticed to give it a shot -- and step outside of their comfort zone.Self-driving vehicles are still a nascent technology but have seen relatively stable growth in recent years. Waymo is undoubtedly the biggest player, but companies like Amazon-owned Zoox are also vying for a piece of the lucrative pie, with plans to launch commercially this year too. Startups like Avride and May Mobility also have expansions in the works. Tesla's Elon Musk last week said the company plans to launch its own self-driving service as early as June, starting in Austin, ahead of the slated rollout of its Cybercab in 2027.In December, General Motors said it would no longer fund its Cruise robotaxi venture, highlighting the difficulty -- and costliness -- of building and scaling autonomous driving technology.There are, unsurprisingly, safety concerns when it comes to vehicles without a driver behind the wheel, and companies like Waymo, Zoox and Cruise have all been involved in a range of incidentsover the years. Still, these companies have maintained the safety of their respective vehicles and technology -- especially compared to human drivers. AWaymo data hubpublished in September states that after driving over 22 million miles, its self-driving tech was involved in "73% fewer injury-causing crashes and 48% fewer police-reported crashes compared to human drivers."For its part, Uber says riders in Waymo vehicles will have access to human support 24/7 via both the Uber app and from inside the Waymo vehicle (there are screens in the front and back that let you quickly summon customer support). That could help to assuage some riders' hesitancy about taking a robotaxi for a spin. Watch this: Waymo's 6th-Gen Electric Robotaxis at CES 2025 02:14

Apple released iOS 18.3 in January, and that update brought some bug fixes and a few updates to your iPhone. But when Apple releasediOS 18in September, that update brought a lot of new features to your iPhone, like the ability to customize your home screen andhide and lock certain apps. That update also added a conversion function to your Calculator app.That means you can convert things like currency, temperature and weight right from your calculator without opening a web browser or using Spotlight.Read more: Everything You Need to Know About iOS 18Here's how to use your Calculator app to perform conversions fast.How to use your Calculator for conversions1. Open your Calculator app.2. Tap the calculator symbol in the bottom left corner of your screen next to the 0 digit.3. Tap the switch next to Convert.The input area for your Calculator -- the area just above the digits and buttons -- will split into a top and bottom field with separate values in each. By default, you'll be entering values into the top field and the bottom is what you're converting to. If you tap the arrows to the left of your values, your input will change to the bottom field and you'll be converting to the top.To change what you're converting -- like distance or area -- tap the value indicator to the right of either your top or bottom value. This will pull up a menu where you can search for different units by entering them into the search bar across the top of the menu. Apple/Screenshot by CNETYou can also scroll through a carousel below the search bar and tap into different unit categories, like Area, Currency and Temperature. Tap into the desired category, then tap the correct unit -- so if you want to convert grams for a recipe, tap Weight then Gram.Once you pick the unit, you'll be taken back to the main Calculator screen. Now, you have to tap the value indicator next to the other value -- again, either top or bottom -- and select what unit you would like to convert to. You should already be in the correct unit category so you just have to select what unit to convert to -- so if you want to convert grams to pounds, you just have to tap Pounds.Now if you see a recipe that calls for 500 grams of pasta, you can quickly convert it if you need to -- that's about a pound of pasta.For more on iOS 18, here's what to know aboutiOS 18.3andiOS 18.2. You can also check out ouriOS 18 cheat sheet. Watch this: iPhone SE 4 vs. iPhone 17 Air Rumors: Does Size Matter Over Cost? 06:50

February 4, 2025Avoiding Outrage Fatigue while Staying InformedOutrage fatigue can wear us downbut we can take care of ourselves in an onslaught of overwhelming news. Anaissa Ruiz Tejada/Scientific AmericanSUBSCRIBE TO Science Quickly[CLIP: Theme music]Rachel Feltman: For Scientific Americans Science Quickly, this is Rachel Feltman.No matter what you believe, Im willing to bet youve been feeling a lot of outrage lately. To me personally, it feels unavoidable: I cant look down at my phone or glance up at a TV without seeing something that makes me upset. And thats really exhausting. But when outrage is everywhere, what can we do to keep it from getting to us?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.Here to talk to us about fighting so-called outrage fatigue is Tanya Lewis, a senior editor covering health and medicine at Scientific American.Tanya, thanks for joining us today.Tanya Lewis: Thanks so much for having me.Feltman: So you recently wrote about this phenomenon called outrage fatigue. Could you tell us what that is?Lewis: Sure, so outrage fatigue is kind of an informal concept, which basically refers to repeatedly experiencing perceived moral transgressions and feeling fatigued by them. So what that basically means is just, you know, you see something, youre outraged by it, and over time you just become kind of numb to it.Feltman: Sounds relevant to [laughs], to many of our lives.Lewis: Yes [laughs].Feltman: What do researchers know about outrage in general?Lewis: So outrage fatigue itself hasnt been that well-studied, but outrage in general has been studied, and people have found that, actually, outrage can be useful. It actually can help you identify a problem and react to it. But it can also be harmful if youre experiencing it all the time and become overwhelmed by it.Theres actually a recent study by William Brady, an assistant professor of management and organizations at Northwestern Universitys Kellogg School of Management. He and his colleagues found that outrage actually helps misinformation spread more widely, especially online on social media. So the upshot of this is that when you have too much outrage, people can actually withdraw from public spaces or virtual places like social media.Feltman: Yeah, and what is it about outrage that helps misinformation spread?Lewis: So I think part of it is the fact that its more engaging. It, you know, activates your emotions, and so people are more primed to respond to that. As we all know, if youve ever spent time on social media and social networks, we always see the most kind of inflammatory content because thats what gets retweets or clicks and the algorithms are amplifying that.Feltman: Right, and more broadly, you know, what is it about the times were living in that makes outrage so hard to avoid?Lewis: So were living in a particularly polarized time, which I think is not a surprise to anybody. If you have been online lately, on Twitter or Facebook or TikTok or any other social media, youve probably seen people yelling about something or other. And this just really has been accelerating, I guess, in the last few years because of our political polarization and other world events.As I was saying earlier some amount of outrage is actually normal and healthy, but studies have shown that the majority of outrage posts on social media are actually driven by a small minority of users who are veryyou know, they feel very strongly about something, and that can actually turn other people off of participating in the conversation.Feltman: Yeah, so social media is a big part of this, you know, both amplifying it and giving a platform for people who are feeling this outrage. Other than just making us feel bad, what does outrage fatigue do to a person?Lewis: So the real danger is that we become apathetic, and if were exposed to something all the timewhether its through social media or even traditional news sources like cable TVif its constantly telling us to be outraged, eventually were gonna be less responsive and were gonna kind of pull back. So instead of, like, channeling that outrage into something useful, many people sort of feel exhausted and burned out, and they just dont want to take action at all.And this is actually a problem because politicians can take advantage of that and sort of manipulate people. As weve seen over the last few decades some of the big social issues like abortion, gay rights, critical race theory, these have all been used as kind of wedge issues to convince people to vote in ways that might be against their own self-interest because theyre just so outraged about this one particular issue.Feltman: Yeah, so definitely worth avoiding. What can we do to accomplish that?Lewis: Right. That was my question, too. You know, a couple of things: one is that we can just sort of limit how much media we consume. As somebody who is a member of the media, you know, this might sound strange, but I think if youre feeling constantly overwhelmed and outraged by something, if you consume less of it, thats probably a good thing.But it doesnt mean you should totally sort of ignore whats happening. When I talked to William Brady, he said that, you know, one of the ways you can kind of have an impact without just being overwhelmed is to get involved in local politics or local issues, you know, in your community because you can actually have a much greater impact on a local level, usually, than a national level anyway. So rather than just, like, retweeting that most outrageous post that you see, you know, its better to get involved with real people and kind of have a dialogue with them.Feltman: Yeah, find some mutual aid groups ...Lewis: Exactly.Feltman: Find stuff you can actually do when youre not doomscrolling and hopefully [laughs] ...Lewis: Yes [laughs].Feltman: Do less of the doomscrolling, too. And did he have any advice for sort of recovering from outrage burnout once its hit you?Lewis: Gosh, that is a good question. You know, its not something I specifically asked Dr. Brady about, but I think, just from my own experience, like I said, you know, pulling back a little bit from some of the media consumption and, you know, just maybe limiting yourself to checking the news a couple times a day instead of, like, every hour or, you know, getting those alerts on your phone all the time. If someone is posting stuff that makes you furious all the time, maybe dont follow them [laughs]. And, yeah, get outside, get in natureyou know, the usual things that can kind of reset your brain and make you feel, you know, more calm.[CLIP: Theme music]Feltman: Yeah, maybe easier said than done, but really good advice. Thanks so much for coming on to chat with us, Tanya.Lewis: Thanks so much. Its always great being on here.Feltman: Thats all for todays episode. If you want to learn more about outrage fatigue, you can read Tanyas full interview with Dr. Brady on ScientificAmerican.com. Well be back on Friday to unpack how President Trumps new administration is impacting health and science.Science Quickly is produced by me, Rachel Feltman, along with Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper, Madison Goldberg and Jeff DelViscio. Todays episode was reported and co-hosted by Tanya Lewis. 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!

The Sims 1 and 2 patch fixes numerous issues, following "farcical" re-releaseEgosystem.Image credit: EA News by Victoria Kennedy News Reporter Published on Feb. 5, 2025 EA and Maxis have issued a patch for the recently released Legacy editions of The Sims 1 and The Sims 2.These games launched on Friday, after earlier rumours suggested the classic life-sim series was making a trip back to its roots. However, when they launched, many players were met with a number of rather glitchy issues and game crashes. Reviews on Steam called the debut "farcical", "broken" and even a "waste of money", which has to sting. The games currently sit with a Mixed review average.The team acknowledged the games had issues at the time, stating it would hop to it and sort out some fixes. And, true to its word, it has, sharing a generous set of patch notes for both The Sims 1 and 2 last night.To see this content please enable targeting cookies. Why the Switch 2 Needed the Steam Deck. Watch on YouTubeThose who are enjoying the classic Sims game again (or, perhaps even for the first time, she writes suddenly realising there are people out there quite a bit younger than her who may not have been around when these games first came out) should now notice less crashes.Additionally, players should now be able to click on parts of the neighbourhood they were initially not able to, despite it clearly intended to be doable. The travel screen should also not be quite to "garbled or glitched" now.You can check out the full patch notes for The Sims Legacy and The Sims 2 Legacy below:The Sims Fixed Issues: Alt+Tab or Alt+Enter can sometimes cause a crashAlt+Enter can sometimes cause the Windows title bar to be hiddenAlt+Enter can sometimes not toggle between full screen and windowed modesOn some systems, The Sims can appear to launch and then immediately exit (no splash screen displayed)The Sims should now launch in most situationsIn some cases where there is an underlying graphics issue, The Sims will display a messageSome players are unable to click on various parts of the neighbourhood mapThe travel screen, when traveling between neighbourhoods/worlds, can sometimes appear garbled or glitchedThe Sims might crash if you are not on the default neighbourhood, interact with another Sim, and then saveWhen using Alt+Enter to cycle window and zoom sizes, the HUD could be clipped. At this zoom level, The Sims will now instead clip from the top of the screen.In some situations in windowed mode the title bar might not be visibleThe Family friends counter could sometimes not be visibleThe Sims General Notes: Several players have had problems (e.g. walls, floors, objects not showing up; game not launching; other oddities) that are addressed by updating graphics drivers to the latest versions. Please make sure your drivers are up to date.The Sims game window is of a fixed size that can't have its basic properties changed after it has launched. Moving the window from a monitor to another with a different, lesser resolution can lead to unexpected results, possibly even crashes. If you want to run The Sims on that second monitor please use the option "-monitor: [open pointy brackets] num [close pointy brackets]" to force it to launch on the other monitor. "0" is your primary monitor, a second monitor is "1" and so on. We are investigating adding this as a menu option in the future.In some situations, players have noted that music only plays in Live mode. Please check your computer sound options and make sure that everything is properly configured (e.g. on a 5.1 surround system make sure that your center speaker is functioning).You might be prompted to "Enable the help system" every time you return to a house. This is the game trying to have you complete the tutorial. This will continue to happen until you complete the tutorial.The Sims 2 Fixed Issues:Alt-Tab or Alt+Enter can sometimes cause a crashSome players on EA App received an error message indicating that certain needed files were corruptThe game would sometimes crash after creating a familyThe game sometimes launched at a small resolution (800x600) and then scaled that small format to fill the entire monitorIn certain situations the game will launch and then immediately show a "DirectX" error, requiring use of the "-w" option to work around the problemSometimes a Sim (or multiple Sims) would disappear after the player moves to another lot or neighbourhood, or after leaving and rejoining the game despite savingSometimes non-adult Sims (children, pets) would disappearSome interactions that result in a transferable reward (e.g. a dog returns from work) can cause the game to crashAddressed some infinite loading screen issuesThe Sims 2 General Notes: Several players have had problems that are addressed by updating graphics drivers to the latest versions. Please make sure your drivers are up to date.Remember that the "boolProp testingCheatsEnabled" cheat will cause the game to periodically show various dialogue boxes with debugging information in them. The cheat is working as expected.We are investigating an issue where during certain cinematic events (such as Alien Abduction), the Sim can be reset and the event fails. While we are investigating this, you can work around the issue by making certain there are no other Sims on the lot to observe the event. Why are her eyes open?? | Image credit: EAThe Sims team is still working on some remaining issues. "Some topics can require an extended investigation on our end, so even though these fixes may be in active review, it's not a guarantee that we'll have an immediate fix for it in the upcoming patch," it wrote in a post regarding the latest patch."Thank you for playing these games that are such a storied part of our history - starting 25 years ago!"Please excuse me while I go and put in my dentures.

Apex Legends sequel a possibility as EA CEO changes stance on live-service shooter's future"Meaningful update" on the way.Image credit: EA News by Ed Nightingale Deputy News Editor Published on Feb. 5, 2025 EA is working on a "bigger, more meaningful update" to its live-service shooter Apex Legends, suggesting some form of sequel will be on the way.During the company's latest earnings call, CEO Andrew Wilson responded to a question about the future of Apex, calling the game "one of the great new launches in our industry over the last decade".However, he admitted the game has "not been headed in the direction we have wanted for some time", before acknowledging the development team is working towards a "meaningful update".Apex Legends: Takeover Anthem TrailerWatch on YouTubeThis update, though, will not arrive "on top of a Battlefield launch" - the company's other major shooter - which is expected to release before April 2026."We do believe that there should be a more major update that will probably happen after a Battlefield launch just in terms of timing and the team is diligently working through what that would be," said Wilson. "And then longer term, our expectation is that we'll continue to expand what this franchise is and how we support a core community of highly competitive players and new communities that want to come and experience all the greatness that Apex has to offer."The company's aim is for Apex to be a franchise that lasts for decades and for that, an "even bigger, more meaningful update" would be required - "an Apex 2.0, if you will".In the short-term, though, the company is focused on supporting the game's community with strong anti-cheat and new content. "I would say we have seen some progress in that, but probably not as much as we would have liked," said Wilson.Wilson's comments seemingly backtrack on a previous earnings call in October last year, where he discussed the possibility of an Apex Legends sequel."Typically, what we have seen in the context of live service driven games at scale, is the Version Two thing has almost never been as successful as the Version One thing, he said at the time."Any time we cause a global player community to have to choose between the investments they've made to date and future innovation creativity, that's never a good place to put our community in, and so our objective will be to continue to innovate in the core experience, and you're seeing that from season to season now as our seasons get progressively bigger and we're changing kind of key modalities of play within those seasons."Wilson's latest comments appear to be a slight backtrack with the mention of an Apex 2.0 in consideration, even if that remains some way off.Elsewhere on the call, Wilson also backtracked on Dragon Age: The Veilguard, suggesting that perhaps it should've been a live-service game after all.

You can trust VideoGamer. Our team of gaming experts spend hours testing and reviewing the latest games, to ensure you're reading the most comprehensive guide possible. Rest assured, all imagery and advice is unique and original. Check out how we test and review games here Contents hide Adam Jackson, the lead class designer for Blizzards Diablo 4 departed the iconic games studio after 15 years of work. Most known for his work on the latest Diablo game, Jackson has now joined League of Legends developer Riot Games for a brand-new unannounced title.Diablo 4 dev jumps to RiotIn a post on Twitter (or X if youre like that), Jackson revealed that they are jumping on board a mysterious new title at Riot Games.Im happy to say that Ive joined Riot Games as a Senior Manager working on an unannounced title, Jackson told fans. I cant say anything about it now, but I look forward to the day where you all can try it out! Save Up to $1,200 on the Samsung Galaxy S25! Pre-order now and save big with trade-in and Samsung credit. Limited time only! *Includes trade-in value + $300 Samsung credit. Fans of Jacksons work on Diablo and World of Warcraft immediately took to the post, wondering whether the developer is working on a new ARPG or an MMO set in one of Riots universes.Years ago, Riot Games did announce their own ARPG (or Diablo-like if we take Rod Fergussons term for it) dubbed Project F. Announced alongside other titles like Project V, the title was in the Runeterra universe and was planned to be a huge competitor for Diablo in the same vein as Path of Exile. The game has been missing for almost five years. Must-Listen: Publishing Manor Lords w/ Joe Robinson VideoGamer Podcast Listen Now Furthemore, Riot Games is working on its own MMORPG. As explained by Riot co-founder Marc Merill, the studio is still working hard on its unannounced MMO title, and Jacksons history with the genre could prove fruitful for its development when (or if) it releases.As the mind behind Diablo 4s classes, Jackson has earned a great degree of pedigree. Vessel of Hatreds Spiritborn immediately became one of the most used classes in Diablo history, although many fans are still waiting for the teased Holy Class to join the fray.While we have no idea what the ex-Diablo 4 developer is working on, its exciting nonetheless. After all, who doesnt want to know what secret, unannounced games are in the works at Riot?For more Diablo coverage, read about how D4 fans are worried annual expansions are already over or how D3 and D4 developers are changing release structures to avoid conflicting season dates. 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

You can trust VideoGamer. Our team of gaming experts spend hours testing and reviewing the latest games, to ensure you're reading the most comprehensive guide possible. Rest assured, all imagery and advice is unique and original. Check out how we test and review games here Contents hide Destiny 2 Episode Heresy is finally here, along with the Star Wars crossover. Fans can check out Bungies update 8.2.0 patch notes to see all the buffs, nerfs, and new content, meanwhile, players should also check out the February 2025 roadmap to see whats next with the Sundered Doctrine Dungeon Race ready to begin. While the new Episode packs a lot right off the bat, there is more set to come during its duration, and Destiny 2 gameplay leaks reveal some new Heresy weapons set to arrive, including the return of a fan-favorite from D1. Destiny 2 Episode Heresy weapons leak include New Land BeyondAccording to Bungie_Leaks, Bungie is bringing No Land Beyond to Destiny 2, albeit with the name, New Land Beyond. No Land Beyond was a fan-favorite Exotic sniper rifle in D1, so its return will very much be welcomed.Bungie_Leaks shared lore for the weapon, along with the updated description: Every hit blazes the path to our reclamation. Save Up to $1,200 on the Samsung Galaxy S25! Pre-order now and save big with trade-in and Samsung credit. Limited time only! *Includes trade-in value + $300 Samsung credit. Image credit: @Bungie_Leaks on XBetter than any words, gameplay of the returning Exotic has also leaked online via Kanye4King. They have uploaded close to 20-seconds of the New Land Beyond, and you can check it out below:In addition to the New Land Beyond, Kanye4King has also shared leaked gameplay for a new Exotic weapon, Barrow-Dyad. Kanye4Kings description says it has the following two Exotic traits: Must-Listen: Publishing Manor Lords w/ Joe Robinson VideoGamer Podcast Listen Now Taken Resolution:Hitting three different targets generates a large amount of blight. Blighted Seekers bore through targets.Taken Ambition:Blight generated increases the longer this weapon remains on a target. Blighted Seekers burrow into targets and explode.The videos description also says the above traits correspond to the Path of Resolve and datamined Path of Ambition that will become available later. These paths are how you unlock these traits, hence the line this weapon resonates with your choices.As for more Destiny 2, check out our guide to thebest Legendary weaponsalong with thebest weapons for PvP.Destiny 2Platform(s):Google Stadia, PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Web, Xbox One, Xbox Series S/XGenre(s):Action, Adventure, First Person, Massively Multiplayer, Shooter8VideoGamerRelated TopicsDestiny 2 Subscribe to our newsletters!By subscribing, you agree to our Privacy Policy and may receive occasional deal communications; you can unsubscribe anytime.Share

"Deletion disobedience" Internet Archive played crucial role in tracking shady CDC data removals Internet Archive makes it easier to track changes in CDC data online. Ashley Belanger Feb 4, 2025 4:18 pm | 48 Credit: alengo | E+ Credit: alengo | E+ Story textSizeSmallStandardLargeWidth *StandardWideLinksStandardOrange* Subscribers only Learn moreWhen thousands of pages started disappearing from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) website late last week, public health researchers quickly moved to archive deleted public health data.Soon, researchers discovered that the Internet Archive (IA) offers one of the most effective ways to both preserve online data and track changes on government websites. For decades, IA crawlers have collected snapshots of the public Internet, making it easier to compare current versions of websites to historic versions. And IA also allows users to upload digital materials to further expand the web archive. Both aspects of the archive immediately proved useful to researchers assessing how much data the public risked losing during a rapid purge following a pair of President Trump's executive orders.Part of a small group of researchers who managed to download the entire CDC website within days, virologist Angela Rasmussen helped create a public resource that combines CDC website information with deleted CDC datasets. Those datasets, many of which were previously in the public domain for years, were uploaded to IA by an anonymous user, "SheWhoExists," on January 31. Moving forward, Rasmussen told Ars that IA will likely remain a go-to tool for researchers attempting to closely monitor for any unexpected changes in access to public data.IA "continually updates their archives," Rasmussen said, which makes IA "a good mechanism for tracking modifications to these websites that haven't been made yet."The CDC website is being overhauled to comply with two executive orders from January 20, the CDC told Ars. The Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Governmentrequires government agencies to remove LGBTQ+ language that Trump claimed denies "the biological reality of sex" and is likely driving most of the CDC changes to public health resources. The other executive order the CDC cited, theEnding Radical And Wasteful Government DEI Programs And Preferencing, would seemingly largely only impact CDC employment practices.Additionally, "the Office of Personnel Management has provided initial guidance on both Executive Orders and HHS and divisions are acting accordingly to execute," the CDC told Ars.Rasmussen told Ars that the deletion of CDC datasets is "extremely alarming" and "not normal." While some deleted pages have since been restored in altered versions, removing gender ideology from CDC guidance could put Americans at heightened risk. That's another emerging problem that IA's snapshots could help researchers and health professionals resolve."I think the average person probably doesn't think that much about the CDC's website, but it's not just a matter of like, 'Oh, we're going to change some wording' or 'we're going to remove these data," Rasmussen said. "We are actually going to retool all the information that's there to remove critical information about public health that could actually put people in danger."For example, altered Mpox transmission data removed "all references to men who have sex with men," Rasmussen said. "And in the US those are the people who are not the only people at risk, but they're the people who are most at risk of being exposed to Mpox. So, by removing that DEI language, you're actually depriving people who are at risk of information they could use to protect themselves, and that eventually will get people hurt or even killed."Likely the biggest frustration for researchers scrambling to preserve data is dealing with broken links. On social media, Rasmussen has repeatedly called for help flagging broken links to ensure her team's archive is as useful as possible.Rasmussen's group isn't the only effort to preserve the CDC data. Some are creating niche archives focused on particular topics, like journalist Jessica Valenti, who created an archive of CDC guidelines on reproductive rights issues, sexual health, intimate partner violence, and other data the CDC removed online.Niche archives could make it easier for some researchers to quickly survey missing data in their field, but Rasmussen's group is hoping to take next steps to make all the missing CDC data more easily discoverable in their archive."I think the next step," Rasmussen said, "would be to try to fix anything in there that's broken, but also look into ways that we could maybe make it more browsable and user-friendly for people who may not know what they're looking for or may not be able to find what they're looking for."CDC advisers demand answersThe CDC has been largely quiet about the deleted data, only pointing to Trump's executive orders to justify removals. That could change by February 7. That's the deadline when a congressionally mandated advisory committee to the CDC's acting director, Susan Monarez, asked for answersin anopen letterto a list of questions about the data removals."It has been reported through anonymous sources that the website changes are related to new executive orders that ban the use of specific words and phrases," their letter said. "But as far as we are aware, these unprecedented actions have yet to be explained by CDC; news stories indicate that the agency is declining to comment."At the top of the committee's list of questions is likely the one frustrating researchers most: "What was the rationale for making these datasets and websites inaccessible to the public?" But the committee also importantly asked what analysis was done "of the consequences of removing access to these datasets and website" prior to the removals. They also asked how deleted data would be safeguarded and when data would be restored.It's unclear if the CDC will be motivated to respond by the deadline. Ars reached out to one of the committee members, Joshua Sharfsteina physician and vice dean for Public Health Practice and Community Engagement at Johns Hopkins Universitywho confirmed that as of this writing, the CDC has not yet responded. And the CDC did not respond to Ars' request to comment on the letter.Rasmussen told Ars that even temporary removals of CDC guidance can disrupt important processes keeping Americans healthy. Among the potentially most consequential pages briefly removed were recommendations from the congressionally mandated Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP).Those recommendations are used by insurance companies to decide who gets reimbursed for vaccines and by physicians to deduce vaccine eligibility, and Rasmussen said they "are incredibly important for the entire population to have access to any kind of vaccination." And while, for example, the Mpox vaccine recommendations were eventually restored unaltered, Rasmussen told Ars that she suspects that "one of the reasons" preventing interference currently with ACIP is that it's mandated by Congress.Seemingly ACIP could be weakened by the new administration, Rasmussen suggested. She warned that Trump's pick for CDC director, Dave Weldon, "is an anti-vaxxer" (with a long history of falsely linking vaccines to autism) who may decide to replace ACIP committee members with anti-vaccine advocates or move to dissolve ACIP. And any changes in recommendations could mean "insurance companies aren't going to cover vaccinations [and that] physicians will not recommend vaccination." And that could mean "vaccination will go down and we'll start having outbreaks of some of these vaccine-preventable diseases.""If there's a big polio outbreak, that is going to result in permanently disabled children, dead childrenit's really, really serious," Rasmussen said. "So I think that people need to understand that this isn't just like, 'Oh, maybe wear a mask when you're at the movie theater' kind of CDC guidance. This is guidance that's really fundamental to our most basic public health practices, and it's going to cause widespread suffering and death if this is allowed to continue."Seeding deleted data and doing science to fight backOn Bluesky, Rasmussen led one of many charges to compile archived links and download CDC data so that researchers can reference every available government study when advancing public health knowledge."These data are public and they are ours," Rasmussen posted. "Deletion disobedience is one way to fight back."As Rasmussen sees it, deleting CDC data is "theft" from the public domain and archiving CDC data is simply taking "back what is ours." But at the same time, her team is also taking steps to be sure the data they collected can be lawfully preserved. Because the CDC website has not been copied and hosted on a server, they expect their archive should be deemed lawful and remain online."I don't put it past this administration to try to shut this stuff down by any means possible," Rasmussen told Ars. "And we wanted to make sure there weren't any sort of legal loopholes that would jeopardize anybody in the group, but also that would potentially jeopardize the data."It's not clear if some data has already been lost. Seemingly the same user who uploaded the deleted datasets to IA posted on Reddit, clarifying that while the "full" archive "should contain all public datasets that were available" before "anything was scrubbed," it likely only includes "most" of the "metadata and attachments." So, researchers who download the data may still struggle to fill in some blanks.To help researchers quickly access the missing data, anyone can help the IA seed the datasets, the Reddit user said in another post providing seeding and mirroring instructions. Currently dozens are seeding it for a couple hundred peers."Thank you to everyone who requested this important data, and particularly to those who have offered to mirror it," the Reddit user wrote.As Rasmussen works with her group to make their archive more user-friendly, her plan is to help as many researchers as possible fight back against data deletion by continuing to reference deleted data in their research. She suggested that effortdoing science that ignores Trump's executive ordersis perhaps a more powerful way to resist and defend public health data than joining in loud protests, which many researchers based in the US (and perhaps relying on federal funding) may not be able to afford to do."Just by doing things and standing up for science with your actions, rather than your words, you can really make, I think, a big difference," Rasmussen said.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. 48 Comments