Google’s recent announcement of an AI Futures Fund shows the company wants to invest in AI startups. It sees itself as providing capital, early access to AI models yet to reach production, and support for startups from experts at the company.This is not Google’s first rodeo. To date, Alphabet (Google’s parent company) has invested in 38 AI companies. Big name acquisitions to date include the UK’s DeepMind, Waymo, the autonomous vehicle intelligence company, and home automation specialist Nest.While such investments signal a broad intent to at least associate Google with startups coming to market with a smart idea (if not necessarily to swallow up smaller companies), the current situation regarding the US courts’ attitude to monopolistic behaviour by Google questions just how far any relationship may go in the longer term.If Google faces increased scrutiny in the next few years on the back of any eventual ruling the US Department of Justice makes, having what might be interpreted as a monopolistic position in AI could bring down the ire of the judiciary.On the other hand, if Google is forced to divest itself of some of its more profitable divisions – the Chrome browser, the Android mobile operating system, some or all of its ad networks – the company may have to double down on its other sources of revenue; and AI could become its favoured métier.If the board at Alphabet decide to bet large stakes on AI, one core aspect of doing so will need clear and definite resolution: the economic viability of continuing AI implementation in the forms that users have become familiar with in the last couple of years. According to some industry commentators, the AI ‘whale’, OpenAI, is struggling to monetise its operations to the extent that will satisfy its investors. Google’s share of the AI market is tiny in comparison with OpenAI’s, but it suffers from the same potential financial issues.Google’s way through may be to continue its original role as provider of information searched for on the internet, and use its models to improve the search results given to online queries, and perhaps monetise around that transaction: either charging end-users for AI-powered search, or having advertisers pay for top spots in AI-generated search results.In that role, Google would be returning to its original function, but with the addition of AI algorithms under the surface – AI that improves a service that’s proven to be in massive demand, rather than AI being the main focus of user activity.Meta’s latest earnings call signalled that Mark Zuckerberg wants to do just that: return to the roots of the Facebook platform as a social connector, but have AI improve users’ experiences.It’s proposed that any acquisitions by Google of AI companies in the future would have to get the approval of the US Department of Justice. The company says such a move would limit investment in future AI technologies, a sentiment echoed by Anthropic representatives during the anti-monopolistic search practices court case brought against Google by the DOJ.If such a government approval edict were in place for Google, it would change the nature of companies that Google might fund via the AI Futures Fund or similar scheme. Rather than risking censure by appearing to add companies to the Alphabet stable that are in line with Google’s AI offerings, those benefiting from the company’s largess would be more likely to be niche players, bringing unique products to sectors of the economy where Google doesn’t already hold sway.Amazon’s acquisitions have been, at first glance, more in line with that seeking out of niche products to snap up. The Ring home smart device company (acquired in 2018 for $1bn) and One Medical (2022, $3.9bn) were purchases well outside of Amazon’s core cloud and retail verticals. Both, however, are prime sources of training data for AI models – consumer behaviour metrics and healthcare information are prime data real-estate.Google’s strategy for investment in smaller companies will need to be similarly canny, given that whatever the outcome of the DOJ case, its activities will be subject to intense scrutiny by the courts, end-users, and the press.No article discussing the activities of US big tech companies would be complete in 2025 without the addition of caveats around the present American leadership’s attitude to competition in the sector. The elephant in the room is the real possibility of executive veto of, or significant amendment to, any judicial ruling. Those potential game-changing elements could affect Google and Alphabet’s investment plans with little notice and less reason.(Image source: “Dallas DA LGBT Task Force visits DOJ FBP” by Dallas County DA is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.)See also: Apple AI stresses privacy with synthetic and anonymised dataWant to learn more about AI and big data from industry leaders? Check out AI & Big Data Expo taking place in Amsterdam, California, and London. The comprehensive event is co-located with other leading events including Intelligent Automation Conference, BlockX, Digital Transformation Week, and Cyber Security & Cloud Expo.Explore other upcoming enterprise technology events and webinars powered by TechForge here. Source: https://www.artificialintelligence-news.com/news/google-ai-futures-fund-doj-ruling-unclear-undecided/ #googles #futures #fund #may #have #tread #carefully

Blender at Annecy 2025 May 13th, 2025 Press Releases Fiona Cohen html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd" As it is now tradition, a small delegation of the Blender team will attend the Annecy festival, June 9-13. This year though, no booth but a bigger gathering for people who want to connect. Blender for Breakfast – new formula Following the success of the last two years, Blender is going to host a “studios” breakfast session (Birds of a Feather-style), this time as part of the official program and in a bigger venue within the Festival-MIFA. Focused on connecting producers, developers, TDs and artists working in studios where Blender is part of the pipeline, the goal is to share ongoing Blender development, Blender Studio pipeline insights, and give visibility to teams who wish to share their experience using Blender in production. All while being treated some delicious croissant and coffee! The event will take place on Tuesday, June 10 at 09:00 at Le Campus Mifa – Salle 1. Limited spots are available and you need an accreditation to enter the Campus – make sure you register if you are interested, and we’ll send confirmations closer to the event. See you there! Source: https://www.blender.org/press/blender-at-annecy-2025/ #blender #annecy

We may earn a commission from links on this page.When I bought my first robot vacuum, I thought my floors would thereafter be effortlessly spotless—endlessly patrolled by a 24/7 custodian, with absolutely no work required on my part. Today, there are never less than three robot vacuum cleaners installed in my small home at any given time. And yet I am definitely not doing nothing to keep my floors clean. While I’m certainly doing less daily upkeep, I would not say my floors are spotless, nor that I have been alleviated of all floor-related housework. Here’s what I wish I’d known about what robot vacuums can and can't do, and how much human effort they require. Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra Robot Vacuum and Mop $1,799.98 at Amazon Shop Now Shop Now $1,799.98 at Amazon Narwal Freo Z Ultra Robot Vacuum and Mop $1,499.99 at Amazon Shop Now Shop Now $1,499.99 at Amazon 3i S10 Ultra Robot Vacuum and Mop $1,399.99 at Amazon $1,899.99 Save $500.00 Shop Now Shop Now $1,399.99 at Amazon $1,899.99 Save $500.00 Saros 10 Robot Vacuum and Mop $1,599.99 at Amazon Shop Now Shop Now $1,599.99 at Amazon Saros 10R Robot Vacuum and Mop $1,618.98 at Amazon Shop Now Shop Now $1,618.98 at Amazon Narwal S20 Stick Mop $499.99 at Amazon Shop Now Shop Now $499.99 at Amazon SEE 3 MORE You'll have to rearrange your furniture The Freo Z navigating around an air purifier on the floor Credit: Amanda Blum When you hire someone to clean your home, you typically don’t move furniture around yourself to make their job easier,. For your robot vacuum, you might have to. While these robots have gotten much better at navigation, the less there is on the floor, the easier it will be for them to clean. Each table leg, chair and floor lamp is another obstacle to be worked around, and it’s worth knowing that most robots can’t get as close to table legs and floor lamps as you would be able to with a stick vacuum. Nor can they move a piece of furniture aside to get under it. As such, you will have to make some changes to your floor plan if you want to make the most of your new robot friend. More important than furniture relocation is the trend of having less on the floor, generally. If you like to let a laundry pile accumulate, have potted plants or a stack of books, you’ll end up relocating those items to give your robot better access. Corded items are particularly tricky, so the less cords on the floor, the better. Over time, I’ve learned to suspend the cords from the wall, and keep them wound as much as possible so nothing trails on the floor. I was recently quite impressed with the Roborock 10R, which relied solely on AI assisted cameras. The navigation skills of the robot were great, allowing it to venture into tight and low spaces that other robots hadn't. Robot vacuums can't clean near their docks the robot can't navigate around the Eureka tower, so debris accumulates around it Credit: Amanda Blum It's an unsurprising fact that robot vacuums can only clean where they can reach. Where they can’t reach, you’ll still see dirt and debris. All robot cleaners have a dock of some sort, and many now come with self emptying towers, which usually work exceptionally well at emptying the robots of dirt so you don’t have to do it manually. Given all of this automation, it's a bit ironic that the dirtiest place in your home might well be right around the tower or dock itself. As these towers are usually tucked into a corner or small space, detritus can easily accumulate around them, but the robot can’t move around the tower to clean it up. As the robot returns to the dock, it sweeps dirt with it, and it all eventually winds up at the foot of the tower.  This Roomba can't navigate into the small space underneath this plant stand, so instead it just kicks debris into the space. Credit: Amanda Blum Only the latest robots (like the 3i S10 Ultra) are at all good at cleaning around the base of pieces of furniture and thresholds between rooms. With most robots, you'll usually still find a band of dust and grime against the wall and around any items that the robot can’t easily clean. And then there are all the spaces too narrow or too low for the robot to slide into. While a few robots, like the Narwal Freo Z, have a fluffy pad that’ll occasionally rub against the base board to dust it, they don't do any real cleaning, so you’ll need to clean your baseboards manually, too. Again, you can rearrange your space to allow the robot more autonomy by making sure any spaces you want to be cleaned allow clearance of at least 1.5 times the width of the robot, and enough vertical height that the robot can reach it.This is always going to be a bit of a losing game, however, which is why I still have a stick vacuum I use to quickly suck up debris from narrow spots the robot can’t reach, the corners and edges that the robot can get close enough to, and against the wall and thresholds. Robots are best at vacuuming up only certain types of debrisThe same way you might organize before a visit from a cleaning professional, you’ll find yourself pre-sweeping for your robot. While robots are reliable at getting up dust and small detritus like rice or cereal, they’re not great at large debris, which means anything larger than a standard dice cube. Pieces of mulch, pet toy fluff, kitchen scraps, bobby pins, and pocket change will all get caught in a robot's rollers and need to be fished out. Pre-sweeping is a way to avoid that annoying task by getting up larger items of debris and leaving the rest for the bot. (But once again allow me to praise the 3i S10 Ultra, which has excelled at vacuuming up larger debris than any other robot vacuum I'd ever tested.)Even if your robot vacuum has a mop, you'll need to mop manually This Roborock is starting to get up the muddy pawprints, but it takes many passes Credit: Amanda Blum Most robot vacuums are now combo vacuums and mops.Some models are great at mopping—sometimes even better than they are at vacuuming. The docking tower empties the mop of dirty water, fills it with clean water, and sanitizes everything afterward. With the combined functions of vacuuming and mopping your floors will surely be clean, right? Not necessarily. Robot mops are great at cleaning up surface spills. What they’re less good at is scrubbing away stains and compound floor messes like mud or spilled food. While most robots can mostly get muddy paw prints up after a number of passes, doing so requires a lot of water, battery life, and time, and I’ve yet to find a single robot mop that is good at getting grime out of tile or wood floors. The robot simply can’t put enough pressure on the mop to really scrub the floor. For these reasons, you’ll need to keep an old-fashioned mop around, and you should expect to have to give the floor a good, hardy mop every few days and use real elbow grease to get out grime. Once the floor is clean, repeated patrols by the robot mop can help stave off new grime deposits, but they’re inevitable, so don’t assume your mopping days are over. If mopping is your priority, I recommend highly Roborock models that have a singular vibrating mop pad, versus twin spinning mops. The Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra remains one of my top recommendations. Robot vacuums are slowWith most robot vacuums working with voice assistants like Google, Alexa, or Apple, its well within the realm of possibility to simply ask the robot to “clean up around the high chair” after dinner (presuming you’ve set up a zone around the high chair, and it is always in the same approximate spot). If you’ve got such a routine set up, the robot will begin whatever pre-deployment practices it has, whether that’s filling the water resivior or orienting or cleaning the mop head, and eventually will amble over to the intended spot and proceed to take its time cleaning. Though still not particularly fast in getting to the spot you pin, Roborock's Pin and Go feature allows you to quickly place a pin on your floor map and the robot will proceed immediately to that spot to clean. This feature is available on all premium Roborock models, including the latest Saros 10 and 10R. Roborock lets you put a pin on the map for the robot to proceed to Credit: Amanda Blum If you’ve got the time to spare, great. But if your kid spills a cup of orange juice on the floor, you might not be willing to wait the five to 10 minutes it will take the robot to get to the spot in question and start cleaning when you could grab a mop or towel and be done in under a minute. For that reason, I'm still happy to have a Narwal S20, a newer model stick mop I can quickly grab, mop as needed, and then put back on the dock, all without having to get my hands dirty.  Robot vacuums occasionally require human interventionRobot vacuums can range wildly in price (from $200 to $2,500) and quality, and they are getting more intelligent and feature-rich all the time. Robots that have AI on board can actually learn about your home and get better at cleaning it over time. Despite all of that, however, your robot will need your intervention more than you’d like. Depending on how good a model you own, you will likely need to routinely unclog the rollers (the most common robot vacuum maintenance task). Your robot will also get stuck—sometimes because there is a new obstacle for it to navigate around, like a waylaid toy or sock, or a loose cord under the couch the robot gets stuck on it. Sometimes, it will simply gets lost. The bottom line is, even the best robots can’t be left on their own for weeks at a time. Most will require a human around eventually to get them back to the dock, clear the rollers, unclog it any clogs in the mopping system, and/or change the water in the dock. If all of this hasn't scared you away from getting one, your goal should be to choose a robot that matches your home and needs, and that enough features that you won't be following it around every day, making sure it does its job. Source: https://lifehacker.com/tech/what-robot-vacuums-can-and-cant-do?utm_medium=RSS #ive #tested #robot #vacuums #for #years #and #heres #what #they #can #cant

A Potentially Life-Threatening Disease Caused by Ticks Is Expanding to New Parts of America Babesiosis typically occurs in the Northeast and the Upper Midwest, but new research suggests it’s emerging in the mid-Atlantic region including Delaware, Maryland and Virginia Most babesiosis infections are caused by blacklegged ticks, also known as deer ticks. U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Babesiosis is a rare, tick-borne disease caused by a parasite that attacks the red blood cells and can lead to flu-like symptoms such as fever, body aches and fatigue. In North America, babesiosis typically occurs in the Northeast and the Upper Midwest. But the parasite’s range seems to be expanding into the mid-Atlantic, according to a new paper published last month in the Journal of Medical Entomology. Scientists are urging health care providers in Virginia, Maryland and Delaware to be on the lookout for symptoms of the disease, which is easiest to treat when it’s caught early. “Health care providers should consider babesiosis in the differential diagnosis for patients with [fever-causing] illness, particularly during peak tick-activity seasons,” says lead author Ellen Stromdahl, an entomologist with the United States Army Public Health Center, in a statement. Babesiosis is caused by a microscopic parasite called Babesia microti, which lives in the blood of rodents like shrews, chipmunks and mice. When ticks bite those animals, then bite humans, the parasite hitches a ride to a new host. (Though much less common, it’s also possible for humans to become infected from blood transfusions.) Once inside the human body, B. microti begins destroying red blood cells. Many individuals with babesiosis have no symptoms and do not feel sick, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But others may experience fever, chills, sweats, headaches, body aches, loss of appetite, nausea and fatigue. If left untreated, extreme cases of the disease can progress to organ failure and, eventually, death. Asymptomatic cases usually do not require treatment. The illness is particularly dangerous for individuals over the age of 50, as well as those with weakened immune systems and other serious health conditions. Doctors can treat babesiosis with a combination of antibiotics and antiparasitic medications, as well as blood transfusions if necessary—but they have to know to test for it first. That’s why the researchers want their new study to serve as an “early warning” for medical professionals in the mid-Atlantic, Stromdahl tells the Baltimore Banner’s Meredith Cohn. Stromdahl decided to take a close look at B. microti in the mid-Atlantic region after a friend came down with the disease in 2023 in Virginia—a state where infections were incredibly rare. Working with public health officials and other researchers, Stromdahl collected 1,310 blacklegged ticks, also known as deer ticks, from across Delaware, Maryland and Virginia. The team found B. microti in ticks from all three states. The overall incidence rate was low—just 2.7 percent of the ticks harbored the parasites—but the researchers say the findings are still cause for concern. About half of the ticks that were infected with B. microti were also carrying the bacteria that causes Lyme disease in humans, Borrelia burgdorferi. Scientists are still investigating the connection between coinfections of B. microti and B. burgdorferi. But the findings suggest doctors in the mid-Atlantic should start watching for both, the researchers write in the paper. “Babesia infection seems to spread where Lyme infection is already present,” says Shannon LaDeau, a disease ecologist at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies who was not involved with the research, to Grist’s Zoya Teirstein. Researchers found the rare infections of locally acquired babesiosis in the mid-Atlantic were clustered around the city of Baltimore and on the Delmarva Peninsula between 2009 and 2023. Stromdahl et al. / Journal of Medical Entomology, 2025 The scientists also investigated the few human cases of babesiosis that have been reported in the mid-Atlantic region. Many were clustered around two locations: the city of Baltimore and the Delmarva Peninsula, the landmass that separates the Chesapeake Bay from the Atlantic Ocean and includes parts of Delaware, Maryland and Virginia. Even in these “hot spots,” babesiosis is rare. Maryland reported 29 infections in 2023, for example, and some of them might have been acquired in other areas, per the Baltimore Banner. But researchers fear the infection has been overlooked or misdiagnosed, since physicians haven’t had a reason to check for it. “There are not many cases, but we think it’s the tip of the iceberg,” Stromdahl tells the Baltimore Banner. What’s to blame for the parasite’s spread? Scientists say it’s likely a combination of factors. Warmer temperatures caused by climate change—especially during the winter—have allowed ticks and their host rodents to proliferate, reports Grist. Wetter weather is probably contributing to their success, too. Additionally, reforestation efforts have supported an overpopulation of white-tailed deer. The ungulates don’t carry the parasite themselves, but they do transport ticks across long distances. Suburban expansion also means humans are now spending more time in areas where ticks live. Blacklegged ticks, which cause most babesiosis infections, dwell in wooded, brushy and grassy habitats, per Live Science’s Emily Cooke. “The findings underscore the need for increased surveillance, public awareness and preventive measures against tick-borne diseases in the mid-Atlantic region,” says Stromdahl in the statement. Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday. Source: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/a-potentially-life-threatening-disease-caused-by-ticks-is-expanding-to-new-parts-of-america-180986605/ #potentially #lifethreatening #disease #caused #ticks #expanding #new #parts #america

Free add-on for wet spots in Blender 🏚 3D Artist Jesse Miettinen released Smudge Mask Generator, a Blender add-on that generates wet spots by dividing faces based on edge angles and computing the Z-gradient for each face area independently. Get the tool for free: https://blenderesse.gumroad.com/l/smudgemaskgenerator #b3d #blender #blender3d #gamedev #indiedev #3dart #3dmodeling