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Today — 18 February 2025Tech News

In a last-minute decision, White House decides not to terminate NASA employees

18 February 2025 at 16:52

Unlike workers at many other federal agencies this week, probationary employees at NASA were not terminated on Tuesday.

For much of the day employees at the space agency anticipated a directive from the White House Office of Personnel Management to fire these employees, but it never came. "We were on pins and needles throughout the day," said one senior official at Johnson Space Center in Houston on Tuesday afternoon.

However, by late in the afternoon, several field center directors received confirmation from the White House that their probationary employees—of which there are more than 1,000 across the agency's headquarters and 10 field centers—would not be terminated. NASA had sought exemptions for all of these employees, who comprise about 6 percent of NASA's workforce. Ars could not confirm whether the reprieve applied to some field centers or all 10 of them.

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© Trevor Mahlmann

Apple removes apps with missing ‘trader’ contact information from EU App Store

18 February 2025 at 16:49

Apple last year announced an important change coming to the App Store in the EU that would force developers to share their contact information with customers in some cases. Now that the deadline has arrived, Apple is removing apps from developers who haven’t shared their ‘trader’ contact information from the EU App Store.

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Reddit vs. Wall Street: the latest in the GameStop saga

18 February 2025 at 16:36

Subreddit r/WallStreetBets has been the talk of the Internet this week, as its members have driven GameStop’s stock prices from around $20 to over $300. The community brands itself as “like 4chan found a Bloomberg Terminal,” and as time has gone on, it’s targeted other unlikely stocks like AMC, Blackberry, and Tootsie Roll. They’ve also been banned from Discord for hate speech.

If you want to read about how the group was able to manipulate the stocks of a massive company like GameStop — and the potential fallout — maybe start with our explainer?

Otherwise, you can use this storystream to get caught up on the full story. We’ll be updating it with all the latest twists and turns.

Apple to face public hearing in Brazil next week over App Store rules

18 February 2025 at 16:01

The Brazilian antitrust regulator has been investigating Apple for imposing anti-competitive terms and conditions on the App Store. Although the company was given more time to make its case after a judge overturned an injunction against the App Store last year, Apple will now have to face a public hearing in Brazil on the case.

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FTC Chair praises Justice Thomas as ‘the most important judge of the last 100 years’ for Black History Month

18 February 2025 at 15:57
US Associate Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas attends inauguration ceremonies in the Rotunda of the US Capitol on January 20, 2025 in Washington, DC. Donald Trump takes office for his second term as the 47th president of the United States.

Newly appointed Federal Trade Commission Chair Andrew Ferguson praised his former boss, the conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, as “the most important judge of the last 100 years,” in a memo to agency staff honoring Black History Month. The message, obtained by The Verge and confirmed by the FTC, sheds light on how Ferguson may align himself with Thomas — one of the court’s foremost critics of tech’s legal liability shield Section 230 and a skeptic of diversity measures — especially as the FTC chair is tasked with taking on consumer protection cases, which in the past have included considering the role of racial bias in technology.

In the February 7th email, Ferguson took the opportunity to share his thoughts on Thomas, whom he clerked for and calls a friend. Thomas overcame “a difficult upbringing” and later had his views on the law “pilloried by American elites,” according to Ferguson. Rather than “hold grudges against America” for his experience of poverty and segregation, Ferguson says, Thomas pulled himself up by his bootstraps and proved that “any American can overcome the hardships of the past and achieve greatness.” More recentl …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Humane wrapped its bet against the iPhone in the cloak of AI and lost

By: Zac Hall
18 February 2025 at 15:22

The Ai Pin is officially dead. Parts of Humane have been sold to HP, and the Ai Pin will cease to function in a week. Cause of death? An outdated and undercooked bet against the iPhone made by former Apple engineers that Humane tried to disguise as artificial intelligence hardware.

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Nvidia’s 50-series cards drop support for PhysX, impacting older games

18 February 2025 at 15:25

Most PC games that you can play on a modern PC would run faster on an Nvidia RTX 5080 or 5090 than, say, a GTX 1070. But some games, from a particular phase of enthusiasm for particles, destructible environments, and smooth-moving hair, will take a notable hit if their owners upgrade to the latest Nvidia cards.

That's because PhysX, once a dedicated physics simulation tool and card that became a selling point for Nvidia's gear, has been largely deprecated on Nvidia 50-series cards. The transition was announced in January, but it seems to have taken some time for someone to notice the impact on 32-bit, PhysX-enabled games (as seen by PCGamesN). The most recent of these affected games, Assassin's Creek IV: Black Flag, came out in 2013.

What follows is a brief primer on PhysX: what it was, what it did, and why it's left out of Nvidia's road map.

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All of Humane's AI pins will stop working in 10 days

18 February 2025 at 14:56

AI hardware startup Humane has given its users just ten (10!) days notice that their Pins will be disconnected. In a note to its customers, the company said AI Pins will “continue to function normally” until 12PM PT on February 28. On that date, users will lose access to essentially all of their device’s features, including but not limited to calling, messaging, AI queries and cloud access. The FAQ does note that you'll still be able to check on your battery life, though.

Humane is encouraging its users to download any stored data before February 28, as it plans on permanently deleting “all remaining customer data” at the same time as switching its servers off.

The company says it will refund customers who are still within the 90-day return window, so long as they submit by February 27. It also notes that users who opted to wait for a replacement for the device’s combo fire hazard and Charge Case will now be refunded “the portion of [their] original purchase price that was allocated to the Charge Case.” In the original recall note, that amount was $149 if ordered separately or $129 if ordered as part of the “Complete System” bundle.  

Today’s discontinuation announcement was brought about by the acquisition of Humane by HP, which is buying the company’s intellectual property for $116 million but clearly has no interest in its current hardware business. The AI Pin was famously panned at launch by a broad section of reviewers, including our own Cherlynn Low, who called it “the solution to none of technology’s problems.” 

HP says the acquisition will bring Humane's "engineers, architects and product innovators" to a new team called HP IQ, which it describes as an "AI innovation lab focused on building an intelligent ecosystem across HP’s products and services for the future of work." Good luck with that!

The New York Times reported last June that Humane was seeking a $1 billion buyout after only receiving 10,000 orders, and cited HP as an interested company. Another seven months of reality has apparently persuaded Humane’s founders to settle for a far lower figure.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/all-of-humanes-ai-pins-will-stop-working-in-10-days-225643798.html?src=rss

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© Hayato Huseman for Engadget

The Humane AI Pin on a wool top.

Humane’s AI Pin is dead, as HP buys startup’s assets for $116M

18 February 2025 at 14:30

Humane announced on Tuesday that most of its assets have been acquired by HP for $116 million. The hardware startup is immediately discontinuing sales of its $499 AI Pins. Humane alerted customers who have already purchased the Pin that their devices will stop functioning before the end of the month — at 12 PM PST […]

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DOGE can keep accessing government data for now, judge rules

18 February 2025 at 14:56

A US federal judge declined to block Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) from accessing or transferring data from seven government agencies, or stop further firings of their workforce.

DC District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan denied a temporary restraining order (TRO) sought by a group of 14 Democratic state attorneys general, led by New Mexico. The states had argued that Musk and DOGE have acted to trim the federal workforce, agency projects, and gain unprecedented data access without the proper authority. The Trump administration told the court that Musk is actually not an employee nor administrator of DOGE at all — he is instead an employee of the separate White House Office and advisor to the president. Chutkan found the states couldn’t meet the high standard for the emergency block by showing that they’d be irreparably harmed unless she stopped DOGE. It’s not enough to posit the mere possibility that the group would take “take actions that irreparably harm” the states, she says.

Still, Chutkan seems open to aspects of the states’ case. The AGs “raise a colorable Appointments Clause claim with serious implications. Musk has not been nominated by the President nor confirmed by the U.S. Senate, as constitutionally required for officers who exercise ‘significant authority pursuant to the laws of the United States,’” she writes. “Accepting Plaintiffs’ allegations as true, Defendants’ actions are thus precisely
the ‘Executive abuses’ that the Appointments Clause seeks to prevent.” Chutkan also admonishes the Trump administration counsel in a footnote where she suggests an official’s sworn declaration characterizing the authority that Trump’s executive order creating DOGE “contemplates” appears to contradict the plain text of the order. “Defense counsel is reminded of their duty to make truthful representations to the court,” she writes.

The states still have the opportunity to pursue the case on the merits, and file for a preliminary injunction. That would provide a new opportunity to seek to stop Musk and DOGE’s access to the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), Departments of Commerce, Education, Energy, Labor, Health and Human Services (HHS), and Transportation.

“While we are disappointed that the court declined to issue a temporary restraining order, we remain committed to putting an end to Elon Musk’s unlawful power grab,” New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez says in a statement. “Every day that he is allowed to operate without a congressional mandate and with little apparent supervision, Musk is destabilizing our government and disrupting critical funding for education, public health and national security. His move fast and break things mentality is not only reckless, but also unconstitutional, and we are prepared to pursue this case for as long as it takes to bring this chaos to an end.”

Humane’s AI Pin: all the news about the dead AI-powered wearable

18 February 2025 at 14:41
A promotional image of Humane’s AI Pin. | Image: Humane

After a very long windup, Humane finally revealed all the details of its AI-powered wearable at the end of 2023.

The small gadget could attach to your clothes using a magnetic battery pack so that it’s within easy reach. By tapping the AI Pin, you could ask it to do smartphone-y things like make phone calls, text your friends, play music, and catch you up on your email, and it had a laser projector built-in to cast the UI on your hand for control.

At $699 with a $24-per-month subscription, it was never cheap, never very good, and now, less than a year after launch, it’s gone. HP is acquiring the team and technology of Humane for $116 million, which will wind down services and support for the AI Pin after February 28th without offering refunds to owners outside the 90-day return window.

Here’s all of our coverage of the AI Pin.

Ted Lasso season 4 is coming: Here’s everything we know so far

18 February 2025 at 14:01

Apple TV+ is currently airing Severance season 2, one of its biggest mainstream hits ever. Meanwhile, the one TV+ show that outdid it in cultural influence—Ted Lasso—is currently preparing a new season. Here’s everything we know about Ted Lasso season 4.

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