Guess yourself clever! Premium is now free for everyone, without ads.THE ULTIMATE STATISTICS GUESSING GAMEChallenge your perception of the world! Hunch Punch is a fast-paced guessing game where youll test your knowledge of global statistics. Presented with a statement, a country, and a year, your mission is to guess if the real number is higher or lower than the one shown. Start with simple tasks and work your way up to more challenging ones as you sharpen your skills with this ex

Trump and the company formerly known as Twitter appear to have ended their legal fight over the suspension of the presidents account back in 2021. In a filing spotted by Bloomberg, lawyers for both parties asked the court to dismiss the case. Trump sued Twitter arguing that his First Amendment rights were violated after he was banned from the social media platform due to the risk of further incitement of violence in the wake of the January 6 riot at the Capitol. A judge dismissed his lawsuit the following year, but Trump later appealed the decision.Of course, Twitter has since been taken over by Elon Musk and renamed X, and Musk has become a key Trump ally in the presidents second term. There are no further details in the motion about the decision to dismiss. It comes shortly after Meta settled a lawsuit with Trump over the same issue, agreeing to pay $25 million after suspending his Facebook account in 2021.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/trump-drops-his-appeal-in-legal-battle-over-2021-twitter-ban-175109968.html?src=rss

Deepseek's AI model "is probably the best work" out of China, Demis Hassabis said on Sunday, but added it was not a scientific advancement.

For two guys about to fly a camera rig 30 miles per hour above the heads of clashing players, Alex Milton and Vinnie Scaffidi seem utterly at ease. Despite the fact that some 100 million people are about to watch their work in real time during Super Bowl LIX, the SkyCam pilot and operator, respectively, are not daunted. Theyre ready. They got to New Orleans around 10 days before the big game. Theyve set up. Theyve rehearsed. Theyve got the entire season under their belt. And, well, now is the fun part. Its exciting to get to the end of the year and everyones playing for real, from the camera people to the production crew to the players themselves, Milton says. Everyones doing the best they can. So when it comes, Im like, Yes, all right, here we go.Youve likely seen their work before in one of the hundreds of games theyve shot. Thats because SkyCam pilots and operators occupy a bit of a rarefied spaceMilton says there are only around 20 pilots and 20 operatorsand the best and most experienced tend to work in tight-knit teams like these two, where instinct and symbiotic connection combine to capture some of the most dramatic moments in sport at large.[Photo: SkyCam]EYE IN THE SKYCAMContrary to what you might think, SkyCam is not a drone, nor is it automated. A pilot drives it. Or rather, they technically control the four taut cables that the 45-pound camera head is mounted to, which spool in and out as the pilot moves the rig around the stadium in real time. (Those cables are a feat of engineering in their own rightthough theyre thinner than an iPhone cord, theyre made of braided kevlar and can hold up to 800 pounds each, and they have the ability to carry fiber optics and electrical signals.)Milton, 38, was raised in upstate New York, and now lives in Moab, Utah. He got into television by way of lifting boxes and unloading golf carts. He says he networked his way to the folks who ran and built jibs. After getting an operating job, he started working on his pilots license, and word of his dual interest reached the SkyCam team, who invited him for a tryout.Scaffidi, meanwhile, operates the Sony HDC-P50 1080p HDR camera on board the SkyCam. The 66-year-old was raised and lives in New York state, and has a deep background in sporting events. In the 90s, when remote robotic cameras cropped up for hockey, basketball, and other sports, he was right thereand when SkyCam needed camera controllers, he was there, too. Now hes just operating a robotic camera that happens to be flying, Milton says.Despite its technological advances, SkyCam is a relatively old system. Inventor Garrett Brownthe guy who also won an Academy Award for creating the Steadicamdesigned it in the early 1980s. It debuted in a football game a few years later, and took a more prominent role in the sport in the early 2000s, delivering viewpoints not unlike those in the popular Madden NFL video game series, and offering perspectives that on-field cameras cant replicate. Milton says SkyCam was initially used for replays, but in the modern era it constantly appears on live broadcasts, and the list of shots keeps growingso much so that todays football viewers have come to expect it.Now, everybody wants it, Scaffidi says.I feel like weve crossed a line, Milton adds.[Photo: SkyCam]TALENT, IN TANDEMAt this point, Milton is on his sixth Super Bowl. Scaffidi says its his ninth or . . . tenth. The pair says that you generally start at the bottom, in, say, college games, and work your way up from there. Directors and producers take a shine to certain peoples stylesthe way they fly, the way they shootand often end up requesting specific pilots and ops. After a while, As long as youre doing your job well, thats your seat, Milton says.Everybodys very comfortable with each other, and we know what they expect from us and what we expect from them, Scaffidi adds. As the games escalate, eventually you get to the Super Bowl. And we never like to say the Super Bowl is just another game, but thats kind of what it is. At the core of it, its still essentially a football game.So they do what they do. They sit shoulder to shoulder in an operating location overlooking the field, with a feed of their SkyCam. Scaffidi uses a rocker switch to zoom, a rolling wheel to focus, and a stick to pan and tilt the camera. Milton sits with his face 6 inches from the screen and uses two joysticks; one controls the direction of the rig, and the other the camera elevation. Fox Sports says that at the Super Bowl, Milton will be capturing the main action at a height of 12 to 35 feet, while another team operates at an altitude of 55 to 90 feet for broad shots.Vinnie and I are listening to a headset, listening to our announcers tell a story, Milton says. Were trying to match their story as best we can visually.If the announcers reference a player, the pair finds him. They also think ahead to where the game or conversation might lead nextand they go there. If someone turns their back to an on-field camera, the team glides in place to offer a fresh angle, racing back and forth between the main plays.Were just moving all over the field and trying to sell all kinds of shots, Milton says.Meanwhile, the two are constantly communicating in a stream of consciousness: That guy ran off; where did he go? As one person looks, the other counts down the clock and tells him when the ball is about to be in play. Wait, who just landed that tackle? Ill watch him; you shoot the player who got injured.The two are very much a bonded pair who know each others instinctsand the game for viewers at home is all the better for it. Milton says SkyCam tries to keep continuity between its pilots and ops, and so do the networks.Alex and I can almost do this in our sleep, we know each other so well, Scaffidi says. It just shaves off a couple of seconds here and there. And that can make all the difference.A SkyCam Wildcat crew preps for an NFL game at Levis Stadium in Santa Clara, California, in December 2024. [Photo: Matthew Huang/Icon Sportswire/Getty Images]A FLOW STATESure, shit happens. Milton says that in his 13 years working for SkyCam, two cameras have hit the field from technical issuesone from loss of power, and one from a computer crash, essentially. But none have involved player contact, and its always been when the field is empty. (Safety is the utmost responsibility at all times, he says.)Milton and Scaffidi try not to dwell on the possibilities, and they scale their approach to how the system is performing on a given day.When Im really confident and everythings working really well, and everythings in place, were jamming, man. Were getting right in the huddle. We want to see eyes, Milton says. And then when youre a little nervous and youve had some equipment issues, you start backing off those things, taking a menu item off. . . . You cant just run the camera the same all the time.Like the sport of football itself, camera operating is highly manual. It has not been automatedand the process is surprisingly human.I dirt bike and mountain bike. I love motorcycles. I really like machines and feeling connectedand I feel some major connection to this camera, and how it moves, and how it feels, Milton says. Its a flow activity for me. Vinnie and I, when were flyingnot that we are the camera, but were really feeling it and really working togetherthats the coolest part of this job.In a game that thrives on elemental bonds to achieve the extraordinary (this year, Jalen Hurts and AJ Brown, Patrick Mahomes and DeAndre Hopkins, Joe Burrow and JaMarr Chase), perhaps the remarkable thing about SkyCam is not the action viewers see but rather the team behind the scenes.

Waxed plaster walls, rainbow onyx surfaces and an olive tree create a spa-like atmosphere inside the store that Canadian studio Ste Marie has designed for luggage brand Monos.The new Monos location is situated on Ossington Street, a few blocks away from Toronto's Little Portugal neighbourhood.An olive tree sits in front of a vertical light box at the heart of the Monos store in TorontoThe brand draws influence from the Japanese concept of "mono no aware" an appreciation of fleeting moments of beauty and Ste Marie used this to guide the interior design."The space invites guests to embark on a multi-sensory journey that connects them to moments of awe, discovery and the joy we crave with travel," said the studio, which has offices in Toronto and Vancouver.The store's minimalist design includes serene beige tones and stone display shelvesPortuguese bed and breakfasts known as "pousadas" also provided a reference for the welcoming ambiance that the team aimed to achieve."This dreamlike space on Ossington, influenced by gentle surrealism and the cultural hospitality of Portugal's pousadas, is timeless and wistful," said Ste Marie.Through the centre of the space, a water feature flows from the rainbow onyx counter and cascades into a lower basinAn olive tree stands at the heart of the store, against a light box that rises up the wall behind and traces across the ceiling.On either side, waxed plaster walls and monoliths of split-faced cottonwood limestone help to frame the central installation.The brand draws influence from the Japanese concept of "mono no aware" an appreciation of fleeting moments of beautyA larger central counter is topped with a slab of Turkish rainbow onyx, patterned with veins of blue-grey and orange.From the countertop, a raised water feature flows towards the front of the store and cascades into a lower basin, "cuing the simplicity and connection between nature and humanity" according to Ste Marie.Read: Ste Marie spotlights the art of flower arranging inside Cadine store in VancouverThe beige colour scheme extends from the ceiling to the flooring and across wall displays and lighting elementsCove lighting illuminates the large stone shelves upon which the luggage products are presented against the neutral backdrop.Cove lighting illuminates the display shelves along the walls"Softly encased wall niches, adorned with subtle Italian Onice Striato Avorio stone, showcase the brand's curated collection of luggage and accessories thoughtful products for the mindful traveler," Ste Marie said.Back-of-house areas are concealed by taupe curtains, while full-length mirrors installed in the corners allow the space to feel larger than it is.The store is located on Ossington Street, close to the city's Little Portugal neighbourhoodSte Marie is best known for its hospitality interiors across Vancouver, with recent projects including a restaurant influenced by Hong Kong's "love motels" and a bakery decorated in malty hues.The studio's previous forays into retail have included a lifestyle store that spotlights the art of flower arranging.The photography is by Doublespace.The post Ste Marie designs "dreamlike" interior for Toronto luggage store appeared first on Dezeen.

Whether youre looking for extra-warm jackets or bedding, youve probably seen this term. Let us, er, fill you in.

A lot is going down at Warner Bros. Games, especially with rumors of Monoliths Wonder Woman being rebooted. However, another studio thats been relatively quiet is WB Games Montreal following the underwhelming Gotham Knights.Bloombergs recent report offered some updates while seemingly confirming the 2022 action RPGs original live service model. Those plans were reportedly dropped halfway through development as the studio struggled to make progress. Though it wanted to develop a 1.5 iteration of Gotham Knights, the higher-ups were apparently not having it and relegated the studio to assisting other projects.WB Games Montreal would subsequently pitch other projects, including John Constantine (which WB Games were noncommittal on) and the Flash (the latter not happening due to the 2023 film flopping). There have since been resignations among leadership due to frustration with their corporate bosses, according to sources. Its helping with Wonder Woman, as reported last year and pitching a new title based on George R.R. Martins Game of Thrones. Whether its approved or not remains to be seen.For more details on Gotham Knights, check out our review here. WB Games Montreal also assisted Rocksteady with Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, which saw its end of support last month.

Following the huge PlayStation Network (PSN) outage that ended yesterday, Sony is giving an automatic five extra days of service to PlayStation Plus subscribers, according to a post from the official Ask PlayStation support account on X.Network services have fully recovered from an operational issue, the company wrote in the post. We apologize for the inconvenience and thank the community for their patience. Sony didnt offer further specifics. Network services have fully recovered from an operational issue. We apologize for the inconvenience and thank the community for their patience. All PlayStation Plus members will automatically receive an additional 5 days of service. Ask PlayStation (@AskPlayStation) February 9, 2025The outage lasted about a full day, with the first indications of problems seemingly cropping up around 6PM ET Friday. Sony posted that service had been restored just before 7PM ET Saturday.During the outage, players had issues with things like logging into accounts, visiting the PlayStation Store, or launching games. For my colleague, Jay Peters, the outage meant he couldnt log into Fortnite or see his trophies, but his digital copy of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth launched like normal.

What was once ridiculous is now possible. Elon Musk, the richest person in the history of the world, has become President Donald Trumps attack dog. Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have unprecedented access to the governments data and computer system. Earlier this week, that came to include systems in the Department of Energy (DOE), which oversees Americas nuclear weapons. The news raised enough concern that Secretary of Energy Chris Wright went on the air to deny Musk and DOGE have access to atomic secrets.Its alarming to be at a point where someone has to make this kind of statement, especially because the Trump administration has reportedly lied about DOGEs access levels before. DOGEs placement at the DOE even raises a truly bizarre-sounding possibility: that a pseudo-department named after a shiba inu could get actual access to nuclear weapons. Fortunately, despite Musks ever-expanding power over government systems, it would take far more than barging into the right office to do this. But at a moment where all kinds of governmental norms are in flux, its worth looking at what exactly separates someone like Musk from perhaps the greatest destructive force on the planet and what other kinds of risks his access could pose.The US has one of the most powerful nuclear arsenals on the planet. Its enough firepower to end all life on Earth several times over. The President has the sole authority to launch those weapons, but DOGE is inching ever closer to their systems. During a press conference on Friday, Trump said he had directed Musk and DOGE to tackle spending at the Pentagon; getting access to the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) might not be out of the question either. Theres good news, however: accessing any piece of nuclear command and control from a random laptop hooked into a DOE network is virtually impossible. A State Department employee with knowledge of the issue, who spoke to The Verge on the condition we protect their anonymity, threw cold water on the idea.I cant see what [Musk] would possibly do, the employee said. I would say its zero. I cant fathom how that would happen. Famous last words. I also firmly believe that if you make something idiot proof, the world will build a better idiot. Launching a nuke requires physical access to the weapon itself. Missileers have to turn keys. A submarine crew must prep and fire a missile. A bomber crew must pull levers and hone in on targets. Short of Musk or his employees entering a silo, climbing onto a stealth bomber, or getting into a submarine, its not going to happen.I cant fathom how that would happen. Famous last words.The command and control systems that run Americas nuclear weapons arent connected to the internet and are run on a closed network that exists only for nuclear forces. Theyre also ancient. Some of the equipment in use has been around since the 1960s and 70s. The Pentagon is modernizing the systems, but its slow going. The Air Force only stopped using 1970s-era eight-inch floppy discs for some of its nuclear computers in 2019. A lot of these computer systems are pretty much legacy systems, the employee said. Im much more worried about these systems being decrepit and not functioning in a crisis. Theres a misconception rooted in popular culture that Americas nuclear weapons will fire if the U.S. is ever fired upon. If China, Russia, or North Korea were to fire a nuke at the U.S., Americas nukes would not automatically fire. The President would need to decide to retaliate and multiple military officials would have to decide to follow the order. Those systems are not really automated in the way that people worry about, the State Department employee said.Alex Wellerstein, an associate professor at the Stevens Institute of Technology and an expert in nukes and nuclear secrecy, agreed. I dont think the current command and control systems are hackable, he told The Verge. They are frankly not modern enough for that.Wallerstein points out, however, that Musk has another arguably more feasible path to nuclear weapons: Trump. If Musk was trying to do a true hostile takeover of that sort it would be best accomplished by just fooling Trump into believing nuclear war was imminent, which would probably be a trivial endeavor for someone of Musks wealth and Trumps gullibility, he said.For this to happen, Trump would need to open up his Football: a leather-coated Zero Halliburton aluminum attache case that follows the president everywhere. Inside is communications equipment that puts him in touch with the National Military Command Center at the Pentagon. To make the call, Trump would need a laminated sheet of paper called the Biscuit, containing a long string of alpha-numeric code. Hes supposed to have this with him at all times too. Reading out a line in this code, which the National Security Agency updates every day, confirms the Presidents identity when he calls in a nuclear strike. The President doesnt have launch codes. The President has a code that authenticates his voice, the State Department Employee said.So Musk would have to get the Biscuit, access the Football, and call in a code in Trumps voice. Or convince Trump to do it. Short of something like that, I dont think theres a chance, the State Department employee said.But theres one final, worrying wrinkle: the Football and the Biscuit only exist because people in the past decided its the best way for the President to order a nuclear launch. Trump could change this process at any time for any reason. There are also many quite detailed regulations pertaining to who can have access to the systems involving the use of nuclear weapons, with specific requirements for clearances and reliability and so on, Wellerstein said. These are all essentially executive regulations, and the President is capable of delegating nuclear use powers, and past Presidents have certainly done that, essentially pre-authorizing the use of nuclear weapons by the military under specific circumstances.President Eisenhower empowered commanders in the Pacific to order the launch of nuclear weapons under very specific circumstances, for instance, and Kennedy and Johnson kept up the tradition. Wellerstein pointed out that DOGE employees without clearances appear to have access to classified systems that would normally be considered quite sensitive. Other things that were once forbidden might also be on the table.The clearest nuclear threat might be Musk seeing routine environmental cleanup as wokeIf President Trump decides that Elon Musk should have access to nukes, and tells the military to override their normal requirements, and the military takes that as a legal and actionable order, then why not? Wellerstein said. Its an absurd and patently idiotic and self-destructive idea, but that does not differentiate it strongly from other things presently going on. It is suicidal in nature, but so are other actions currently being undertaken under Trumps authority.The Football and Biscuit are not sacrosanct.But in even this worst-case of worst-case scenarios, theres no big red button Trump or Musk can push to open up a silo and unleash nuclear Armageddon. What the president has is authority, the State Department employee said. That authority is legal in nature. The president cant launch nuclear weapons. Doesnt have the ability. The ability is distributed across dozens of people, including the submarine crew and Missileers mentioned above any of whom could break the chain. All of these scenarios rely on the military obeying orders, Wellerstein said. I would prefer to believe that they would refuse to do so. But that would also be a difficult and extraordinary thing in and of itself. It is not a situation I would want them to be in.Trump and Musk are courting far more likely nuclear disasters than launching an intercontinental-ballistic missile. Musks DOGE crew isnt filled with the kind of people you want inside the Pentagon or DoE; employee Edward Coristine has connections to cybercriminals and operated websites in Russia. He and others would likely have never gotten security clearances if Washington were functioning normally. Yet theyre barreling along anyway. And every DOGE employee is a point of failure in a delicate system involving information related to the most powerful weapons on the planet. Theres probably a ton of personnel data that would be of interest to a foreign adversary, the State Department employee said. China and Russia would love to get information about people with security clearances. Background checks turn up information about debts, family relations, and other information that would be useful in blackmailing a government official.Nuclear weapons also produce nuclear waste. The U.S. still hasnt cleaned up waste left behind by the Manhattan Project. People are sick and dying, right now, in America because of nuclear material left behind from Americas various nuclear weapons projects. Under Biden, the Department of Energy planned to spend $8.2 billion cleaning up that Cold War-era nuclear waste. But the employee worried that DOGE and Musk would see routine environmental maintenance around nuclear weapons projects as woke.A large portion of the NNSAs budget is dedicated to environmental cleanup. I could see them thinking of this as misguided environmentalism, the employee said. I can see them just deciding to shut all that stuff down.Nuclear modernization began during the Obama administration and will play out over the next 25 years.The U.S. is currently set to spend almost $2 trillion on the project. Its going to dig new missile silos across the country, deploy updated nuclear weapons, revamp computer systems, and construct new nuclear submarines. Its a large undertaking with an enormous potential for waste, fraud, and abuse. Under any administration it needs to be scrutinized and audited. Right now, the people doing those audits are Musk and DOGE.Musk and DOGE have proven they dont care about systems put in place to keep Americans safe and protect sensitive data. Theirs is a move fast and break things philosophy. There are laws and regulations in place to keep people like them out of the halls of power and away from sensitive nuclear secrets.But.Regulations only work if people take them seriously. Laws only work if they are enforced, Wellerstein said. We are in no-mans land right now.See More:

What could go wrong?Zombie SpidersWhile filming a TV documentary inside an old Victorian gunpowder store in Northern Ireland, scientists made an intriguing discovery: cave spider "zombies" that were infected by a "Last of Us"-like fungus.In a study published last month in the journal Fungal Systematics and Evolution, as spotted by Live Science, scientists detailed the discovery of a "novel species" of fungus that infects "cave-dwelling, orb-weaving spiders," called Gibellula attenboroughii a name in honor of British biologist and natural historian David Attenborough.The scientists concluded that the "infected spiders exhibit behavioral changes similar to those reported for zombie ants," referring to an insect-pathogenic fungus that forces infected ants to leave their canopy nests and head to areas that are more suitable for fungal growth.The way G. attenboroughii spreads is just as chill-inducing. The study authors suggest the fungus forces the infected spiders to crawl to more open areas where air currents can then disperse the spores a fascinating new discovery fit for a dystopian TV series.Assuming ControlStudy lead author and Center for Agriculture and Bioscience International researcher Harry Evans told Live Science that the spores penetrate the spider to infect the insect's equivalent of blood, compelling it to find open space. Then, a neurotoxin kills the spider once it reaches a spot in the open. An antimicrobial substance also preserves the corpse, allowing the fungus to absorb its nutrients.The cycle then repeats with the fungus growing long and terrifying-looking structures out of the spider's body.Despite the frightening optics, Evans told Live Science the substances the fungus produces could be a "medical treasure chest" with a range of possible applications in human medicine, including antibiotics.More generally, the discovery highlights how much there's still to cover in the wild world of "zombie" fungi."There's a lot more fungi to find," Evans told Live Science. "The fungal kingdom could be up to 10, 20 million species, making it the biggest kingdom by far, but only one percent have been described."More on fungi: Obscure Fungus Shows Signs of Rudimentary IntelligenceShare This Article