PixMob's controllable wristbands, used in Taylor Swift's Eras Tour, feature RGB LEDs and microcontrollers that respond to infrared signals from a moveable projector. The technology has been reverse-engineered by enthusiasts, who have successfully hacked the IR protocol using tools like Flipper Zero.

The term "auth" is often unclear and can refer to either authentication or authorization, leading to confusion and bad abstractions. Using clear terms like "login" for authentication and "permissions" for authorization can improve communication and design, as they are distinct concepts that deserve separate treatment.

The era of "Big Data" is over, as most organizations don't have massive amounts of data and can handle their data needs with traditional architectures and cloud-based solutions. The focus should shift from scaling up to handling large datasets to understanding why people keep old data around and whether it's truly necessary, as storing and processing large amounts of data can be costly and inefficient.

JSON Web Tokens (JWT) are a standard for authenticated tokens, but they're designed for large-scale environments like Google/Facebook and may not be suitable for smaller applications. Using JWTs can lead to unnecessary complexity and database hits, making it better to use a traditional session mechanism with an opaque session token stored in the database.

The US housing market has become increasingly unaffordable, with rising rents, home prices, and mortgage rates making it difficult for people to buy homes. The issue is contributing to widespread pessimism about the economy and dissatisfaction among Americans, particularly younger voters who are struggling to find affordable housing options.

Archive.org is under a DDoS attack, but data remains unaffected; services are unavailable. The attacker likely has delusional confidence and resources, using AI scraping activity from thousands of IP addresses to overwhelm the site.

Researchers discovered a privacy threat in Apple's Wi-Fi-based Positioning System, allowing an attacker to gather global Wi-Fi location data and track device movements. The attack exploited the limited MAC address space, resulting in over 2 billion geolocations learned worldwide, with implications for tracking devices' movements and compromising user privacy.

Quickwit is a distributed search engine built on Tantivy, offering configurable tokenization and support for various languages. Tantivy is a Rust crate that can be used to build a search engine, with features like fast fields and immutable data, but lacks distributed search capabilities.

Astronomers have discovered a massive, almost perfect ring of galaxies 1.3 billion light-years across, dubbed the "Big Ring", which defies current understanding and formation mechanisms. The structure's size and shape are incompatible with known explanations, leaving possibilities such as cosmic strings or unknown universe defects to be explored.

The depletion of IPv4 address space has led to increased costs and changes in market dynamics, with some providers now charging separately for IPv4 addresses. Class E space, a previously unused portion of the IPv4 address space, could be used for local or private addressing, but its adoption would require significant changes to user software and policy decisions within IANA and the IETF.

Transformers can learn implicit reasoning through extended training, but only for certain types of reasoning and with varying levels of generalization. The mechanism behind this grokking process involves the formation of a generalizing circuit, which can be improved by encouraging cross-layer knowledge sharing in the transformer architecture.

A new study from Lund University suggests that having tattoos may increase the risk of developing lymphoma by 21%, although more research is needed to confirm this finding. The study found no correlation between tattoo size or location and increased risk, but researchers are now investigating potential links between tattoos and other types of cancer.

The more-itertools library provides additional functions for working with Python iterables, including flatten and chunked. These functions can be used to simplify tasks such as flattening nested lists and splitting large lists into smaller chunks.

A vulnerability was discovered in PCTattletale, a stalkerware app, allowing attackers to obtain recent screen captures from any device with the app installed. The exploit uses an unauthenticated API and client-side token generation to access screenshots from other devices.

The author's newly built power supply suddenly failed due to a short circuit caused by inadequate clearance between tracks on the PCB. After repairing and testing the PSU, it was used to power an electrolysis experiment, which demonstrated increasing conductivity with concentration of sodium bicarbonate solution.

Write down anything and have it automatically persisted in the address bar and in the browser’s history. Easily back up or share any note by simply copy and pasting the URL.

xAI secured $6 billion in Series B funding from key investors to take its products to market, build infrastructure, and accelerate AI research. The company aims to develop truthful and beneficial AI systems that understand the universe's true nature, hiring talented individuals for various roles.

Lima launches Linux virtual machines with automatic file sharing and port forwarding (similar to WSL2).

This is a simple GUI for helix editor. Most modal editors are terminal apps, I'd like to change that and implement a good modal GUI editor.

Archive.org is under a DDoS attack, but data remains unaffected; services are unavailable. The attacker likely has delusional confidence and resources, using AI scraping activity from thousands of IP addresses to overwhelm the site.

Dr Ittai Gradel, a Danish antiquities dealer, suspected an eBay seller was stealing from the British Museum and eventually uncovered that senior curator Peter Higgs had stolen thousands of objects over several years. The museum initially dismissed Gradel's concerns but later launched an investigation, which revealed the extent of the thefts and led to Higgs' dismissal in July 2023.

GTFL is a graphical terminal for Common Lisp that allows developers to visualize and debug their algorithms in a web browser, providing mechanisms for sending content to the client page from within Lisp. It comes with various features such as tree drawing, expandable elements, and HTML pprinting, making it useful for debugging and visualizing complex data structures.

The Internet Society and Global Cyber Alliance are concerned about the FCC's proposed regulation of Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) security, citing potential slowing of progress and fragmentation among economies. They argue that industry self-regulation is sufficient to ensure BGP trustworthiness, but governments may need to intervene due to real risks posed by malicious entities.

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) has been criticized for its arbitrary categorization of mental illnesses, with many disorders blurring together and no single gene or set of genes linked to specific conditions. The Hierarchical Taxonomy of Psychopathology (i), a new approach to classifying mental illness, aims to overcome these issues by using continua rather ...

You're building a hobby project with minimal dependencies, using Go for the backend and considering options for the frontend. You've found an approach to use Go's html/template package in a React-like manner without third-party packages, which you'd like to share with the community.

The US needs to build more public charging stations, with estimates suggesting a sixfold increase, to support widespread adoption of electric vehicles. However, most experts believe that home and workplace charging will meet the majority of drivers' needs, with public charging stations serving as a backup for occasional use.

Yerba mate, a caffeinated drink made from the leaves of Ilex paraguariensis, has a long history dating back to pre-Columbian Paraguay and was popularized by Spanish colonizers and Jesuit missionaries. Today, it remains a beloved national beverage in Argentina, Uruguay, and Paraguay, with its popularity also spreading to other parts of South America and even the Middle East.

Sara Fern Fitzsimmons, a researcher, has been raising American chestnut seedlings for two decades to restore the species, but her efforts were derailed when it was discovered that the genetically modified tree designed to resist blight was actually a different version. The mistake led to accusations of cover-up and controversy within the conservation community, with some arguing that ESF's ...

A high-performance, small-footprint platform that implements a subset of HTML5/CSS/JS to run applications, including the YouTube TV app.

Wiley, a 217-year-old science publisher, has admitted to closing 19 journals due to potential fraud and retracting over 11,300 papers that were compromised. The issue highlights the widespread problem of fake scientific studies and the need for better detection methods, as well as concerns about the legitimacy of the academic publishing industry and its impact on public trust.

The user has become disillusioned with Twitter, feeling that it no longer provides value due to its algorithmic prioritization of viral content and lack of meaningful engagement. They have instead turned to alternative methods such as reading books and blog posts, building a personal search engine, and prioritizing in-person relationships to find inspiration and connect with others.

Code Search was a Google project that allowed users to search for regular expressions across public source code, using an inverted index of trigrams to identify candidate documents and then running the full regular expression search against those documents. The project used a custom DFA-based matching engine tuned for grep-style searches, which could be run quickly on repeated runs without ...

Ore Energy, a Dutch startup, emerged from stealth with €10M funding to develop large-scale production of its iron-air battery, which uses only iron, water, and air. The battery has the potential to reduce long-duration energy storage costs by 10 times compared to lithium batteries and could help Europe transition away from fossil-based energy.

Ubicloud enabled arm64 instances on their cloud platform, which required standardizing CPU architecture names, updating VM placement logic, and dropping in new binaries for ARM architectures. The process was relatively straightforward, taking only 151 lines of code, but introduced challenges such as inflexible hardware configuration and binary building method and versioning issues.

As the BDFL (Benevolent Dictator for Life) of curl, I emphasize being friendly and approachable to attract contributors and ensure code runs smoothly everywhere. The project's guiding principles include being best-in-class in key areas, maintaining ABI/API compatibility, providing extensive documentation, and staying responsive to users' needs while keeping up with protocol developments.

Human DNA contains ancient viral sequences, known as human endogenous retroviruses (Hervs), which date back millions of years and may play a role in susceptibility to psychiatric disorders. Research found that Herv expression is linked to genetic susceptibility to major psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and depression, suggesting an important role for these ...

A Tesla vehicle in Full-Self Driving mode failed to detect a moving train and crashed, causing significant damage, with the owner blaming both himself and the technology. The incident has raised concerns about the reliability of Tesla's Self-Driving features, which are still in beta mode and require active driver supervision.

A new study suggests that traits associated with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) may offer an advantage in certain environments, such as foraging for food, by allowing individuals to explore and adapt more effectively. The findings challenge negative associations with ADHD and support the "evolutionary mismatch" theory, which posits that neurodivergent traits are disadvantages ...

A 24-year-old buffer overflow vulnerability in the glibc library was found to be exploitable in PHP applications, allowing for remote code execution. The exploit uses a file read primitive and iconv() function to overwrite the free list, leading to arbitrary code execution, and has been demonstrated on various PHP versions including PHP 8.3.x.

Alaska's icy blue waterways are turning rust orange due to high concentrations of iron and toxic metals, likely caused by thawing permafrost soil releasing minerals into watersheds. The phenomenon, linked to climate change, threatens local wildlife and people who rely on these streams for drinking water and subsistence fishing.

Penn Engineers have developed an adjustable filter that can prevent interference between wireless signals and GPS systems, which could enable the next generation of wireless communications. The filter uses a unique material called yttrium iron garnet (YIG) and is tunable across a broad frequency band, making it potentially suitable for use in higher-frequency bands like the Frequency Range 3 ...

The suggestion cannot be applied because no changes were made to the code and it's not supported for deleted lines or multi-line comments. The suggestion also cannot be applied while viewing a subset of changes, in a pending review, or when the pull request is queued to merge.

A new model called Quantised Inertia (QI) solves the galaxy rotation problem by reducing inertia at low-acceleration stars. QI applied to Proxima Centauri predicts its observed orbital velocity and binds it without extra mass, resolving the gravitational unbinding issue with dark matter.

Women cyclists often suffer from painful and debilitating genital swelling, numbness, and scarring due to poorly designed saddles and lack of awareness about their sexual health. Despite this, many women continue to ride despite the pain, with some even resorting to surgery or quitting the sport altogether, highlighting the need for better saddle design and more open conversations about ...

Preaching the gospel of evidence, experiment and reason since 2003.

The US housing market has become increasingly unaffordable, with rising rents, home prices, and mortgage rates making it difficult for people to buy homes. The issue is contributing to widespread pessimism about the economy and dissatisfaction among Americans, particularly younger voters who are struggling to find affordable housing options.

Mexico City may run out of drinking water by June 26, known as "Day Zero", due to low rainfall and high temperatures. The city's Cutzamala water system is running dry, with crumbling infrastructure and inefficient use of water contributing to the crisis.

Register or sign in with developer credentials and ensure a unique, descriptive User-Agent to access scripts or applications. If blocked, try changing back to default User-Agent or file a ticket for assistance.

Carlos Monteiro's "Nova" food classification system links ultra-processed foods (UPFs) to obesity, cancer, and diabetes by assessing not only nutritional content but also processing methods. The food industry has resisted regulation, using tactics like lobbying and casting doubt on research to maintain its profitable business model despite growing evidence of UPF health risks.

Here's my first piece of advice for tech teams trying to build secure technology. Specifically, for the exec, business owners out there. If you can't afford it, don't do it. Instead of writing a long boring document, I thought I'd try a comic narrative for this post :)

Helix is a text editor that uses multiple cursors and tree-sitter for syntax highlighting, code analysis, and navigation. It offers features like fuzzy finder, auto completion, and project-wide search without requiring plugins or configuration files.

A spotless giraffe was born at Brights Zoo in Tennessee, and image recognition algorithms struggled to identify its unusual coat. The algorithms provided inconsistent and often incorrect answers when asked about the giraffe's spots, highlighting the limitations of AI image recognition when faced with novel or unusual images.

Two new CSS features allow for animating elements into or out of view without JavaScript, making it easier to avoid using JavaScript for animations. The features include animating to display: none and from an element's intrinsic size, which can be used in collapsible areas and other scenarios where height needs to be animated.

Tattoo exposure was associated with an increased risk of malignant lymphoma, particularly diffuse large B-cell and follicular lymphoma. The risk was highest for those who got their first tattoo within two years or more than 11 years before the index year, but not for those with intermediate exposure duration.

A security expert in the SF Bay Area was approached by two VC firms with an "oh, wow" offer to build a security company, but felt that their interest wasn't genuine and the terms were not favorable. The expert realized that taking VC money would require constant fundraising and compromise on salary and growth strategy, obscuring the real trade-offs involved.

Researchers at USC propose a new "rule" called selectively advantageous instability (SAI), which suggests that instability can be beneficial for cells and organisms, but also linked to disease and aging. SAI could aid in understanding biological processes like aging and cellular life, as it appears to be essential for maintaining genetic diversity and promoting cell health.

The Braid-Text library provides a simple HTTP route handler for fast text synchronization over standard protocol, with examples for access control and page editing. It also includes client code for real-time collaboration, allowing users to subscribe to updates and apply remote changes to their local text.

Lufthansa used Meta Quest Pro and MSM.digital to create a mixed reality application showcasing its new Allegris seating experience, reducing exhibition costs by up to 80% and making training more scalable. The app allows users to interact with digital twins of the seats, previewing amenities like dining trays and private cabins, and can be used for both promotional purposes and employee training.

Princeton astrophysicists have created a new, accurate flat map that breaks away from traditional two-dimensional representations by using a double-sided, round design. The map has no boundary cuts and smaller distance errors than previous maps, making it ideal for displaying various types of data and information about our planet.

The CEO's unauthorized advance payroll to themselves for 13 weeks may be considered fraud or theft, potentially breaching the shareholder agreement. As equal shareholders with a pre-seed program and upcoming seed round pitch, you should take swift action to address this issue without jeopardizing your investor relationship.

The local Artificial memory for your device.

The PixMob IR protocol has been reverse-engineered to enable control of PixMob wristbands at home, allowing users to create custom light effects and synchronize their bracelets with others. The project involves using an ESP32 development board with an IR transmitter to brute-force IR signals and discover functional codes, which can be used to produce various light effects such as ...

In the 1970s, corporate America shifted focus from producing goods and services to making money through financial means, leading to a radical transformation in American life. This "financialization" prioritizes short-term gains and shareholder value over workers' rights, environmental concerns, and long-term sustainability, contributing to record wealth inequality.

The US Securities and Exchange Commission will shorten the settlement cycle for broker-dealer transactions from T+2 to T+1, allowing investors to receive their money faster and potentially reducing market volatility. The change, set to take effect on May 28, aims to make the market more resilient and timely, but some financial firms are preparing for potential hiccups in the transition.

A user made a pizza with glue as per Google AI's suggestion, which resulted in an unusual orange-colored sauce and a slightly burned crust. The experiment highlights the potential for AI-powered search results to provide incorrect or misleading information, potentially eroding public trust in these systems.

The Red Teaming LLM Applications course teaches beginners how to test and find vulnerabilities in their LLM applications using cybersecurity techniques, ensuring safety and reliability. The course covers fundamental concepts, hands-on experience with manual and automated methods, and a full demonstration of red-teaming assessment.

A new metamaterial, PMMM, offers transparent glass-like properties with added privacy, cooling capabilities, and self-cleaning features. It can be applied to regular glass surfaces and has been shown to keep rooms 6°C cooler than ambient air while also increasing light transmittance for plants.