Month: June 2023

Enlarge (credit: Logitech/Amazon)

If you were to search among tech review sites for a USB microphone recommendation, you'd almost definitely see a Blue product listed. Founded in 1995 and gaining consumer recognition with distinct designs, like the Snowball and Yeti, Blue Microphones branding has become well-known, from audiophiles to newcomers looking to launch their first podcast. But moving forward, the Blue Microphones brand will be no more.

Logitech announced its Blue Microphones acquisition in 2018, 23 years after jazz musician Skipper Wise and audio engineer Martins Saulespurens created the company. At first, Blue Microphones fixed mics from the '50s and '60s but eventually started creating gear for the recording industry, as the Los Angeles Times reported in 2009.

It was Apple that encouraged Blue to enter the computer microphone space, its founders told LA Times. Its global supply manager at the time reportedly encouraged Blue to make an affordable microphone for music recording software. Apple at the time was readying its GarageBand software. The result was the Blue Snowball USB mic, and once it became available in Apple's stores, it really took off. A more accessible, affordable option than paying for a studio session, the mic became popular among growing musicians.

Enlarge / The disks and diagrams Mike Brixius has to work with in finishing his 1984 CRPG project. (credit: YouTube/RavenWolf Retro Tech)

There are stories that some of us, at a certain stage of adulthood, should never hear. Not if we value our time or our storage space. I regret to inform you that Mike Brixius, on his RavenWolf Retro Tech channel, offers just such a story about his quest to finish his own Commodore 64 CRPG from 1984. He's going to be able to do it, too, because he kept all the disks, tapes, notes, and hand-documented assembly code print-outs ever since his teenage project.

"It's one of those loose threads in my life that I deeply regret," Brixius says in his video. He hopes his Patreon supporters and YouTube community can give him the "moral support and accountability" he needs to complete his game after all these years.

Digital Dungeon Master (DDM) was based in part on the Avalon Hill tabletop games Brixius loved at the time, but more so on Avalon Hill's foray into dungeon-crawling RPGs, Telengard. Brixius wanted to recreate Telengard's limited line of sight but add in a surface world, akin to that of another favorite of his, Ultima IV.

Enlarge (credit: VGG | Getty Images)

A feature in Nvidia’s artificial intelligence software can be manipulated into ignoring safety restraints and reveal private information, according to new research.

Nvidia has created a system called the “NeMo Framework” which allows developers to work with a range of large language models—the underlying technology that powers generative AI products such as chatbots.

The chipmaker’s framework is designed to be adopted by businesses, such as using a company’s proprietary data alongside language models to provide responses to questions—a feature that could, for example, replicate the work of customer service representatives, or advise people seeking simple health care advice.

Enlarge (credit: NurPhoto / Contributor | NurPhoto)

Armed America Radio touts one of its hosts, Mark Walters, as the "loudest voice in America fighting for gun rights." Now it appears that Walters' prominent commentary on gun rights and the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF)—a gun rights nonprofit that gave him a distinguished service award in 2017—has led generative AI chatbot ChatGPT to wrongly connect dots and make false and allegedly malicious statements about the radio host. That includes generating potentially libelous statements that Walters was once SAF's chief financial officer and treasurer and that he was accused of embezzling funds and defrauding SAF.

Now, Walters is suing ChatGPT owner OpenAI in a Georgia state court for unspecified monetary damages in what's likely the first defamation lawsuit resulting from ChatGPT's so-called "hallucinations," where the chatbot completely fabricates information.

The misinformation was first uncovered by journalist Fred Riehl, who asked ChatGPT to summarize a complaint that SAF filed in federal court.

Enlarge / Two Russian Ships of the Line Saluting by Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg (1827), a leading artist of the Danish Golden Age. (credit: Public domain)

Learning more about the materials used on historical paintings—paints, pigments, varnishes, and primers used to prepare canvases—is critical to ongoing conservation efforts. Apparently, many artists of the so-called Danish Golden Age used beer byproducts from local breweries to prime their canvases, according to the results of a proteomics analysis described in a recent paper published in the journal Science Advances.

A number of analytical techniques have emerged over the last few decades to create "historical molecular records" (as the authors phrase it) of the culture in which various artworks were created. For instance, studying the microbial species that congregate on works of art may lead to new ways to slow down the deterioration of priceless aging art.

Case in point: scientists analyzed the microbes found on seven of Leonardo da Vinci's drawings in 2020 using a third-generation sequencing method known as Nanopore, which uses protein nanopores embedded in a polymer membrane for sequencing. They combined the Nanopore sequencing with a whole-genome-amplification protocol and found that each drawing had its own unique microbiome.

Enlarge / The Spartan-themed "NickMercs" skin that was recently removed from Call of Duty. (credit: Activision)

Call of Duty has removed a skin based on popular Warzone streamer and FaZe Clan co-owner Nicholas "NickMercs" Kolcheff after controversy over a tweet surrounding an LGBTQ protest.

"Due to recent events, we have removed the 'NickMercs Operator' bundle from the Modern Warfare II and Warzone store," publisher Activision wrote in a tweet after Call of Duty news site Charlie Intel noticed the unannounced removal. "We are focused on celebrating PRIDE with our employees and our community."