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Someone please remind Boeing how to build airplanes ... again

Both US operators of Boeing 737 Max 9 aircraft are finding loose parts in the aircraft during the latest inspections that were prompted by an emergency exit door plug blowout during flight over the weekend.…

Alphabet's Google is set to go before a federal jury in Boston on Tuesday in a trial over accusations that processors it uses to power AI technology in key products infringe a computer scientist's patents. From a report: Singular Computing, founded by Massachusetts-based computer scientist Joseph Bates, claims Google copied his technology and used it to support AI features in Google Search, Gmail, Google Translate and other Google services. A Google court filing said that Singular has requested up to $7 billion in monetary damages, which would be more than double the largest-ever patent infringement award in U.S. history. Google spokesperson Jose Castaneda called Singular's patents "dubious" and said that Google developed its processors "independently over many years." "We look forward to setting the record straight in court," Castaneda said.

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Fancy a Windows laptop that's also an Android tablet or a mouse and keyboard powered by kinetic energy and solar

CES Where can you find a voice-controlled luxury toilet seat and a transparent television set? The annual CES show, of course, where the world's tech companies and others gather to show off the products they hope will catch the interest of buyers.…

Amazon introduced a new feature that mimics Apple's AirPlay while working across different platforms, setting the stage for iPhone and Android users to wirelessly stream video to its TV hardware. From a report: The feature, called Matter Casting, is part of a push by Amazon to create interoperable services -- an alternative to the propriety technology developed by Apple and Google. It will make it easier for iOS and Android phones to send video to Amazon devices, such as its Fire TV boxes and sticks, as well as the Echo Show 15 smart display. [...] The feature will work with a range of other video services, including Plex, Pluto TV, Sling TV, Starz and ZDF, Amazon said.

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US, the Netherlands, and Germany all show spikes, while the UK no longer collects the data

US President Joe Biden declared the pandemic over in September 2022. Weeks into 2024, however, global data points to a surge in infections.…

Then the company cranked up the price of cartridges, complaint alleges

HP is facing a potential class action complaint regarding a firmware update that rendered its printers unable to use ink from any other supplier.…

With Apple's Vision Pro VR/AR headset set to go on sale on February 2, we're starting to see more details about the app requirements. From a report: The company has released guidelines for visionOS developers planning to release apps and there's one strange caveat. It would rather developers don't use the terms AR and VR when referring to Vision Pro apps, but rather call them "spatial computing apps," according to the developer page. "Spatial computing: Refer to your app as a spatial computing app. Don't describe your app experience as augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), extended reality (XR), or mixed reality (MR)," the company states. The headset itself should be called "Apple Vision Pro" with three uppercase words, while "visionOS begins with a lowercase v, even when it's the first word in a sentence." The terms should never be translated or transliterated, Apple added.

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Experts' job made 'straightforward' by crooks failing to update encryption schema after three years

Security researchers have put out an updated decryptor for the Babuk ransomware family, providing a free solution for victims of the Tortilla variant.…

An anonymous reader quotes a report from PCMag: Duolingo tells Bloomberg that it's cutting 10% of its contractors, months after its CEO said Duolingo is relying more on generative AI to develop its content. "We just no longer need as many people to do the type of work some of these contractors were doing. Part of that could be attributed to AI," a Duolingo spokesperson tells Bloomberg. This comes after an unnamed Duolingo contractor claimed on Reddit that Duolingo had axed a large number of jobs. "In December 2023, Duolingo 'off boarded' a huge percentage of their contractors who did translations," the contractor wrote. "Of course this is because they figured out that AI can do these translations in a fraction of the time. Plus it saves them money." The contractor claims to have worked at Duolingo for five years in a four-member team. But now the team has been cut in half as AI has taken over the duties of generating content and translation for courses on Duolingo. "The two who remained will just review AI content to make sure it's acceptable," the contractor added. A Duolingo spokesperson tells PCMag, "these are not layoffs," since the contractors were "offboarded as their projects wrapped up at the end of 2023." "While we do use AI for many different purposes at Duolingo, including the generation of some course content, human experts are still very involved in the creation of Duolingo's content. I also want to note that we attempted to find alternate roles for each contractor before off-boarding as a last resort."

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'Tech visionary and pioneer' replaced by former comms president, as company faces pressure from activist investors

Jeff Lawson has stepped down as CEO of Twilio with Khozema Shipchandler filling that less-than-comfy executive chair with immediate effect.…

Move comes months after software licensing scandal

Video game software company Unity is laying off a quarter of its workforce, it confirmed in a US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing.…

This one time at band gap... we managed to use wonder stuff as an electronic material for semiconducting

Researchers say they have discovered a way to produce semiconductors using graphene that could - at some stage further down the road - deliver high performance devices able to outmatch those made from silicon.…

Tribunal nixes appeal from provider of network that cops and firefighters can't seem to migrate from...

Motorola's appeal against price controls on the longstanding mission-critical Airwave network used by the UK emergency services was dismissed by a tribunal, meaning the cap imposed by the regulator must stand.…

home-electro.com shares a report from Engadget: On Sunday night Samsung held its annual First Look event at CES 2024, where the company teased the world's first transparent MicroLED display. While there's still no word on how much it costs or when this tech will find its way into retail devices, Samsung showcased its transparent MicroLED display side-by-side next to transparent OLED and transparent LCD models to really highlight the differences between the tech. Compared to the others, not only was the MicroLED panel significantly brighter, it also featured a completely frameless design and a more transparent glass panel that made it easier to see objects behind it. LG also unveiled a similar piece of tech: the company's "first wireless transparent OLED TV." It's called the OLED T and supports 4K resolution and LG's wireless transmission tech for audio and video. You can watch a demo of Samsung's transparent microLED screen on YouTube.

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Networking kit maker would be biggest potential acquisition since Autonomy – but hopefully goes better than that

Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) is in the late stages of talks to buy California networking hardware maker Juniper Networks for $13 billion, according to reports.…

A little more speed and less latency

CES Just in time for CES this year, the Wi-Fi Alliance has begun certifying hardware for Wi-Fi 7, the latest update to the global wireless networking specification.…

Plus: Deloitte rolls out homegrown AI for its 75K workers to dogfood

CES Volkswagen says it intends to inject ChatGPT into its vehicles in Europe this year, allowing drivers to ask questions about life, the universe, and everything, and have them answered by the software, maybe.…

necro81 writes: ULA's Vulcan rocket, many years in development, had a successful first launch this morning from Cape Canaveral. The expendable rocket, which uses two methane-fueled BE-4 engines from Blue Origin in its first stage, is the successor to the Delta and Atlas-V launch vehicles. Years overdue, and with a packed manifest for future launches, Vulcan is critical to the ULA's continued existence. The payload on this first mission is called Peregrine -- a lunar lander from Astrobotic. Unfortunately, Peregrine has suffered an anomaly some hours into flight; it is unclear whether the mission can recover. UPDATE: According to Reuters, Peregrine's propulsion system experienced issues hours after separating from Vulcan, "preventing the spacecraft from angling itself toward the sun for power." "While mission engineers regained control, the faulty propulsion system is losing valuable propellant, forcing Astrobotic to consider 'alternative mission profiles,' suggesting a moon landing is no longer achievable," reports Reuters. In the most recent update (#5) on X, Astrobotic said in a statement: "We've received the first image from Peregrine in space! The camera utilized is mounted atop a payload deck and shows Multi-Layer Insulation (MLI) in the foreground. The disturbance of the MLI is the first visual clue that aligns with out telemetry data that points to a propulsion system anomaly. Nonetheless, the spacecraft's battery is now fully charged, and we are using Peregrine's existing power to perform as many payload and spacecraft operations as possible. At this time, the majority of our Peregrine mission team has been awake and working diligently for more than 24 hours. We ask for your patience as we reassess incoming data so we can provide ongoing updates later this evening."

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Washington Post: People are swallowing hundreds of thousands of microscopic pieces of plastic each time they drink a liter of bottled water, scientists have shown -- a revelation that could have profound implications for human health. A new paper released Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found about 240,000 particles in the average liter of bottled water, most of which were "nanoplastics" -- particles measuring less than one micrometer (less than one-seventieth the width of a human hair). [...] The typical methods for finding microplastics can't be easily applied to finding even smaller particles, but Min co-invented a method that involves aiming two lasers at a sample and observing the resonance of different molecules. Using machine learning, the group was able to identify seven types of plastic molecules in a sample of three types of bottled water. [...] The new study found pieces of PET (polyethylene terephthalate), which is what most plastic water bottles are made of, and polyamide, a type of plastic that is present in water filters. The researchers hypothesized that this means plastic is getting into the water both from the bottle and from the filtration process. Researchers don't yet know how dangerous tiny plastics are for human health. In a large review published in 2019, the World Health Organization said there wasn't enough firm evidence linking microplastics in water to human health, but described an urgent need for further research. In theory, nanoplastics are small enough to make it into a person's blood, liver and brain. And nanoplastics are likely to appear in much larger quantities than microplastics -- in the new research, 90 percent of the plastic particles found in the sample were nanoplastics, and only 10 percent were larger microplastics. Finding a connection between microplastics and health problems in humans is complicated -- there are thousands of types of plastics, and over 10,000 chemicals used to manufacture them. But at a certain point, [...] policymakers and the public need to prepare for the possibility that the tiny plastics in the air we breathe, the water we drink and the clothes we wear have serious and dangerous effects. "You still have a lot of people that, because of marketing, are convinced that bottled water is better," said Sherri Mason, a professor and director of sustainability at Penn State Behrend in Erie. "But this is what you're drinking in addition to that H2O."

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Also: Huawei in patent deal with Nokia, and China slates 2025 as year for mass produced flying cars

ASIA IN BRIEF The Indian government’s commercial space agency arm, NewSpace India, has spilled the details [PDF] on how the country would launch a broadband communication satellite aboard a SpaceX Falcon-9 rocket.…