AI-generated books and images are threatening the nearly 500-year-old art of lace making. 

It’s already come for the crochet community, and researchers have tried to teach machines to knit. But lace-making—a craft that even Renaissance artists struggled to master, and in which there are a literal infinite number of patterns to be created—is now having its AI slop moment. 

Mary Mangan, the librarian for her New England-based lace making group, told me that she first became aware of AI infiltrating lace spaces when someone in her group asked her to research a book that featured a cover photo that she wanted to try to make herself. “So I began to research the book. It smelled funny and I tried to search for the author's other work but couldn't find any,” Mangan said. She asked r/BobbinLace, a Reddit community for the bobbin lace-making technique, and users there helped track down the original, not-AI image from a lace catalog that the cover photo seemed to be based on. 

Longtime lace makers and experts from all around the community have started raising the alarm on AI grifting in their tight-knit community. Karen Bovard-Sayre, who has published several books about lace techniques, posted a video in November addressing the issue, saying she found 36 books about lace and tatting—a lacemaking technique—that seemed AI generated. She said she was looking at Amazon books about tatting to see what else was being published on the topic, and found many of the AI books targeting beginners. 

“As you probably all know, the tatting world's not that big even though it's around the world, but we kind of know who's doing what, who's making content, who's making books and all that,” Bovard-Sayre said in her video. “I started reading the summaries and they all kind of sounded flowery and didn't really say what they were, and then I started looking at the covers and back covers, and said wait a minute, something's wrong here.” She spends the rest of the video demonstrating what these books get wrong, and how to spot AI generated lace making materials. 

Some of the AI signs Bovard-Sayre points out include odd punctuation in the authors’ name (in the case of the book she’s examining in her video, “Sheila .A Richard,” where there’s a period before the middle initial), references to video tutorials like “This is a wonderful instructional video” which makes no sense in a printed book, obvious misspellings, and distorted or blurry photos.

She also finds designs in the book that she recognized as being the work of other lace designers, including Marilee Rockley, a fiber artist who specializes in tatting. Rockley also recently addressed the rise in AI generated materials on her website. “Some of you may have heard about the miserable thieves who are using Artificial Intelligence technology to ‘make’ books to sell,” she wrote. “Really horrible, fake books loaded with wrong information (lies) and stolen photos. They're so bad it would be laughable except they hurt a lot of innocent people who are looking to learn a new-to-them craft.” 

Preying on beginners’ lack of knowledge and relative inability to spot blatant fakes is a tactic used in other AI book grifts, too. The mushroom foraging community recently discovered AI scam books were flooding Amazon, directing newcomers to bad, potentially deadly misinformation. Unlike eating a poisonous mushroom because a chatbot or AI book told you it’s safe, buying a book on lacemaking that contains sloppily-generated images or instructions isn’t a matter of life and death—but it does threaten to devalue and dilute the integrity of a centuries-old art, as well as deterring newcomers. 

“Lace is a small hobby and a pretty tight community. We know who the designers and vendors are, and we trust them. However, until you become part of the lace community there's no way to know who is trustworthy and what is dubious. You need some level of skill and time within the network to really assess this,” Mangan told me. “Unfortunately, for newcomers who might be excited to dive into this hobby, they could get burned by the inadequate books—and frankly the thievery—of the work of our cherished lacemakers and designers. This could sour newbies on the craft and that would be unfortunate. And it could harm designers who opt out of sharing their works, and we'll all lose then.”

Lacemaker and textile historian Elena Kanagy-Loux told me she first noticed the proliferation of AI-generated books on bobbin lace while teaching a course last summer. A student showed her a book she’d recommended to her students on Amazon, but the recommended books on the site seemed off. “There were a number of suggested lace books with strange covers that did not represent real lace techniques, and subsequently I have been warning all of my students to avoid Amazon and buy from independent lace suppliers (a good practice for a multitude of reasons),” she said. “Now I see that there are a number of them advertising different lace techniques with strange AI images on the cover that don’t represent real lace or tools, and contents that—according to reviews—are either nonsense that provide no tangible instructions, or directly plagiarized from real lace books.” 

Some of the books Elena Kanagy-Loux found on Amazon included: 

• Bobbin Lace Crafting: Unleashing Your Creativity with Torchon Ground Patterns Book by Sarah DV Martin, which has a description that cites the book, as if it were a review. “Recently, I came across a fantastic book titled ‘Bobbin Lace Crafting: Unleashing Your Creativity with Torchon Ground Patterns’ that has truly inspired me in my lace making journey. The book not only provides detailed instructions on how to create stunning Torchon ground patterns but also offers valuable tips and tricks to help crafters unleash their creativity.” The cover shows crochet and machine-made lace on the cover, not bobbin lace.
• Lace Crafting Mastery: Beginner's Guide to Needle Tatting: Discover the Art of Needle Tatting to Create Stunning Lace Crafts by Alanah .F Thatcher. A reviewer wrote: “This is an AI written book whose parameters were set by someone who doesn’t know the difference between embroidery, tatting, and bobbin lace. That is like not knowing the difference between running, swimming, and cycling.” 
• NEEDLE TATTING FOR BEGINNERS: MASTER THE ART WITH ESSENTIAL TECHNIQUES AND FOUR STUNNING PROJECTS: AN EXPERT GUIDE TO CREATING ELEGANT NEEDLE TATTED LACE WITH STEP-BY-STEP INSTRUCTIONS by Evanna Harrington. The cover is AI-generated and “does not in any way resemble needle tatting (just a mess of threads, not real techniques)” Kanagy-Loux said.
• Bobbin Lace Mastery for Absolute Beginners: A Step by Step Guide to Elegant Patterns and Techniques in making Bobbin lace Paperback by Gloria Brock. Reviewers say it has no images inside and repeats instructions: “It keeps repeating the same thing over and over. It does provide some written instructions for a bookmark or flowers or leaves but doesn't provide visual patterns to use on the pillow,” one reviewer wrote. “I don't think this book is completed for a beginner since I am more confused now than before going over it. Sorry.”
• HOW TO MAKE BOBBIN LACE: A Step-by-Step Beginner’s Guide to Mastering Bobbin Lace Techniques and Patterns Paperback by Patricia Walcott, which has a cover that doesn’t even resemble bobbin lace
• The Bobbin Lace Bible: An Essential Book for Crafters by James XL Garcia, which a reviewer notes is ripping off the work of Jo Edkins, an established and respected bobbin lace instructor. The description follows the pattern seen on a lot of AI-generated books on Amazon, with phrases like “one thing I love” and “in conclusion” as if it’s a book report written by a grade school child. “Of course, no book is good, and ‘The Bobbin Lace Bible’ is not exempt from its flaws,” the description of the book says. “Some crafters may find certain sections a bit too technical or challenging, especially if they are complete beginners. However, with patience and practice, I believe that anyone can master the art of bobbin lace making with the help of this book.” Probably not!  

I sent all of the above listings to Amazon for comment, and the platform removed all of them except for the first one. “We have content guidelines governing which books can be listed for sale, and we have proactive and reactive methods that help us detect content that violates our guidelines, whether AI-generated or not. We invest significant time and resources to ensure our guidelines are followed, and remove books that do not adhere to those guidelines," a spokesperson for Amazon told me in a statement. "We aim to provide the best possible shopping, reading, and publishing experience, and we are constantly evaluating developments that impact that experience, which includes the rapid evolution and expansion of generative AI tools. We continue to enhance our protections against non-compliant content, and our process and guidelines will keep evolving as we see changes in AI-driven publishing.”

Amazon is full of these books, but it’s not the only retailer selling them. Mangan showed me several she and others found on eBay, including Bobbin Lace Magic: Unlocking the Secrets of Colorous Book by Ethan CC Lee which, like the ones above, has a book-report description as if the author is reviewing their own book. And then there’s A Bobbin Lace Book by Tim M. Enoch, with a description that includes an error from generating the text: “This response was truncated by the cut-off limit (max tokens). Open the sidebar, Increase the parameter in the settings and then regenerate.” eBay did not respond to a request for comment.

Mangan wondered if the onslaught of AI-generated slop in lacemaking might drive people to connect to real humans more. “Gathering in groups and discussing valuable books might be a good outcome, and we can host public gatherings for the lace-curious folks,” she said. “One other thing that I do is to edit Wikipedia with good books as references when I hear about them—maybe that could become another route to connect people to higher quality and current materials.” Used and older books could become more valuable, too, she said. 

“Over the years of posting videos about lacemaking on social media, I have gotten many snarky comments saying ‘AI will replace this.’ At first I laughed it off, because for lacemakers like myself the joy is in the process of working with our hands, which can never be replaced by technology,” Kanagy-Loux said. “But now I have genuine concerns that beginners seeking affordable books will be scammed by AI-generated books that contain no real information about the techniques and give up in frustration. This misinformation is why it is so important to me to share resources online and make knowledge about lacemaking and lace history accessible to a broader audience. Fortunately, our community continues to grow all the time, so I hope we can combat the proliferation of AI pattern books with the instructions of human beings.”

In 2024, Made by Google rolled out big updates with new features to Pixel phones on six occasions. The year saw everything from routine operating system updates to entirely new apps and even a rebrand. 

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Brainworm headaches, a man with more penises than arms, and butt eels are just a few of this year’s macabre medical highlights.

Plus,, get a look at Cobra Kai final end.

Glasses may be more promising as the head-worn computers of the future — and there’s a chance Apple might be looking in that direction.

Apple’s Vision Pro headset is an incredible piece of technology, but even Apple’s design and marketing magic hasn’t been enough to convince many people to don a VR headset for an entire day. Instead, people seem more willing to use discreet wearables like Bluetooth headphones, smartwatches, and products like the Ray-Ban Meta glasses — so Apple’s headset isn’t making the waves the company would have wanted.

Of course, an instant transformation of the computing landscape wasn’t exactly the point of the Vision Pro. Apple was clearly launching its headset for Apple enthusiasts, first adopters, and people who love VR. At a starting price of $3,499, the barrier of entry was just too high to expect the device to be a hit from the jump. Even CEO Tim Cook called it an “early-adopter product.”

Nearly a year from launch, though, Apple hasn’t done enough to demonstrate why the Vision Pro should be a potential showcase of the future of computing. It’s taking a long time to put together its immersive content library, and while those are great demonstrations of what’s possible, the videos have been short and isolating. There aren’t many great games, either.

Yes, Apple keeps adding cool new software features. The wide and ultra widescreen settings for using a Mac display seem exceptionally useful. But those are pretty specific options for pretty specific use cases. There still isn’t an immediate, obvious reason to buy a Vision Pro the way there usually is with the company’s newest iPhones and Macs. If I bought a Vision Pro today, I wouldn’t know what to do with it besides give myself a bigger Mac screen or watch movies, and I don’t think either of those are worth the exorbitant price.

It seems Apple may have already acknowledged that the Vision Pro might not be the future, either. The company has reportedly scaled back production and focused efforts on a cheaper version of the headset (perhaps just called Apple Vision?).

If Apple still wants to make a splash in VR, the company might need to race to get its next product out the door. It can be argued that Meta has the best VR headsets and ecosystem on the market right now — and a very clear lineup for consumers to consider. Its most affordable offering is the $299 Quest 3S, which has the same chip as the $499 Quest 3, meaning you can access the same experiences across both headsets. The price difference between the two largely comes down to displays and storage, and I’d argue that the cheaper Quest 3S is an excellent VR headset for most people.

But like the Vision Pro, Meta hasn’t really found a way to make its headsets much more than a great way to play VR games. The Quest Pro, which Meta pitched in part as a headset for work, was such a flop that the company discontinued it only two years after it launched. Horizon Worlds, the company’s 3D social network, still feels amateur and barren, despite the company’s efforts to make it a better place to hang out.

When I put on a Meta headset, I find that I just want to play games, either serious titles like Batman: Arkham Shadow or lighter fare like Maestro, where you conduct a virtual orchestra. I don’t care about the mixed reality features except to glance at my phone or computer screen to make a note or check notifications. You can make a pretty solid living selling game consoles, as Sony and Nintendo know very well, but it’s a far cry from the full-fledged computing platform Mark Zuckerberg once promised.

I just don’t know if any tech company is going to crack the code on how to make VR headsets anything but solo technology. Yes, you can use VR headsets to interact with other people over the internet. But putting on a VR headset at home means I can’t look my wife in the eye; if I’m going to look at a screen, I’d prefer to look at one that we can share or that I can easily put off to the side. And even if you’re fine with VR being mostly a solo thing, VR headsets don’t fit neatly into everyday life unless you have a good amount of space in your home for them. (And hopefully your controllers haven’t run out of battery power!)

Perhaps that’s why glasses seem like a much more promising option for computers that you wear on your face. Augmented reality glasses have been an aspirational goal for a long time, and you can see why. It’s much easier to make eye contact with somebody while you’re wearing glasses. Meta may have already proved that the glasses form factor works: its relatively simple Ray-Ban Meta glasses, which have a camera, speakers, and look fashionable, are already a huge hit.

If glasses-equipped cameras do truly go mainstream, I have some concerns that I’ve already written about. But I also wrote about the immediate appeal of the tech: whenever I wear the Ray-Ban Meta glasses, I find myself snapping tons of photos because it’s so much fun to capture my point of view without holding up a phone. And because they look like regular glasses, I can walk around and most people will think that they’re glasses, unlike a VR headset, which just looks silly in public.

It seems that Apple might be eyeing computer glasses as well; the company reportedly launched an internal study about the market. I think even glasses with some basic tech would make way more sense for Apple than a VR headset, especially if they let you easily snap photos and listen to podcasts. These devices could be years off, though, meaning that, right now, Apple is stuck selling VR headsets that barely anyone wants.

As a special holiday treat, on December 25th, the social media app Bluesky announced that it has added a new feature to its mobile app: a list of Trending topics that lets you know what subjects are popular among its users.

Screenshot: Bluesky

The new feature can be found by selecting the search icon (the magnifying glass), which appears at the bottom of the screen on the mobile app and on the left sidebar on the web. Lists of Trending and Recommended subjects now appear below the search bar. Tap on any topic, and you will be able to access the associated posts. When I tried it, choices among the top five included Christmas and Nosferatu (not an unexpected selection of topics but an interesting juxtaposition).

If you’d rather not see the list, you can get rid of it via a small “x” in the upper right corner, or go to Settings > Content & Media and toggle off Enable trending topics.

According to the announcement, the new feature is “V1” (it is marked as a Beta on the app) and “we will be iterating with your feedback.” So if you have any objections to Trends appearing under your Bluesky search bar, let them know.

Blaming victims, months of silence, and suing security researchers all featured in cybersecurity in 2024.

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Waymo may have outlasted GM's Cruise to lead the U.S. market but Elon Musk's Tesla and Amazon's Zoox are working to catch up.

Dating apps have gotten a bad rap lately, so Tinder is taking on the skeptics with playful ads that flip the script on negative narratives about modern dating. Tinder has unveiled the latest chapter of its "It Starts With a Swipe" campaign by once again inviting daters to reconsider what they thought they knew about...

"Well, 2024 sure has been a year" seems to be the prevailing sentiment. Well, we're setting the negativity aside because even if everything didn't break our way this year, the great thing about being reporters is that if we feel strongly about something, we get to put it in the spotlight. Sure, we broke news....

2024 had its fair share of weather events that received top billing over newsier topics like politics, the economy, business, sports, and entertainment. Hurricanes dominated the news cycle, with three making landfall within the lower 48 states. Hurricane Beryl made landfall in Texas as a Category 1 storm on July 8; Hurricane Helene landed as...

It would be an understatement to say that the TV industry has changed a lot in the past year. From increasing consolidation, plummeting upfront prices, and an ongoing fight over sports rights, streamers and broadcasters are forging ways ahead in the new era of TV. And, they're also learning lessons along the way. ADWEEK asked...

This post was previously published at an earlier date. The holiday season seems to come around quicker each year, with brands leading the way into festive celebrations. For many advertisers, the period is a prime creative opportunity as much as a commercial one. Some of the best ads of the year drop during this time....

The Meta Quest line of AR and VR headsets appear to be popular Christmas gifts this year, as the Meta Horizon companion soars to the top of the iPhone App Store in the US region, and around the world. The uplift in demand is likely driven by the release of the , a cheap-but-capable $299 model.

The Amazon Alexa app also rose in the Top Free app charts, as Echo speakers continue to be popular gift ideas. AirPods and were also likely to be one of the most unwrapped gifts this Christmas, but the App Store does not give us any insights into the popularity of Apple’s own products …

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From smoking at McDonald's to AI Tom Cruise, 2024 was a busy year for viral hoaxes.

Some consider gift cards not the most personal of gifts, but I say that's not the case. They allow you to get exactly what you want with no confusion, and (typically) both gifter and giftee walk away happy. But maybe you received a few gift cards for the holidays and are stumped on what to buy with them — Engadget can help. Here, we've gathered some of our favorite gadgets and services of the year that are all worthy ways to spend your gift card money, from wireless mice to coffee gear to gaming controllers.

Check out the rest of our gift ideas here.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/how-to-spend-your-100-gift-card-after-christmas-130036223.html?src=rss

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© Engadget

Social media platform Bluesky has launched Trending Topics into beta, the company announced in a post on its platform. The new feature is one of the most-requested by users and matches a function that has been on rival Threads for around nine months, and on X (Twitter at the time) since at least 2017. 

The Trending section shows the top viral content on the platform, with topics like "Christmas," "Nosferatu" and "Wikipedia" (thanks to Elon Musk) currently on top. It can be found by clicking on search in both the desktop version and mobile apps, or you can disable it altogether in the settings, TechCrunch noted. Any words that you have muted won't appear in Trending topics either.

Bluesky recently hit a big milestone with 25 million users, many of whom recently fled X following the US elections. Though still relatively small compared to Threads and X, users have remarked on the high levels of engagement along with the lack of bots and harassment compared to Elon Musk's platform. Other highly requested features still not implemented include bookmarks, editing, verification badges and private posts. 

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/bluesky-launches-a-trending-topics-feature-in-search-140049208.html?src=rss

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© Steve Dent for Engadget

Samsung’s celebrated flagship soundbar does just enough to beat out the rest of its Dolby Atmos competitors.

It started, like so many overwrought home optimization projects, during the pandemic.

My wife and I, like many people stuck inside, were ordering takeout more frequently. We wanted to support local restaurants, reduce the dish load, and live a little. It became clear early on that app-based delivery services like DoorDash and Uber Eats were not the best way to support local businesses. If a restaurant had its own ordering site or a preferred service, we wanted to use that—or even, heaven forfend, call the place.

The secondary issue was that we kept ordering from the same places, and we wanted to mix it up. Sometimes we'd want to pick something up nearby. Sometimes we wanted to avoid an entire category ("Too many carbs this week, no pasta") or try the newest places we knew about, or maybe a forgotten classic. Or just give me three places randomly, creative constraints, please—it's Friday.

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This Bluetooth speaker’s design is a breath of fresh air, but Bose skimped on some features that are usually standard at this price.

Read the full story at The Verge.