Month: August 2024

Enlarge (credit: Benj Edwards / Getty Images)

Over the past week, OpenAI experienced a significant leadership shake-up as three key figures announced major changes. Greg Brockman, the company's president and co-founder, is taking an extended sabbatical until the end of the year, while another co-founder, John Schulman, permanently departed for rival Anthropic. Peter Deng, VP of Consumer Product, has also left the ChatGPT maker.

In a post on X, Brockman wrote, "I'm taking a sabbatical through end of year. First time to relax since co-founding OpenAI 9 years ago. The mission is far from complete; we still have a safe AGI to build."

The moves have led some to wonder just how close OpenAI is to a long-rumored breakthrough of some kind of reasoning artificial intelligence if high-profile employees are jumping ship (or taking long breaks, in the case of Brockman) so easily. As AI developer Benjamin De Kraker put it on X, "If OpenAI is right on the verge of AGI, why do prominent people keep leaving?"

Enlarge (credit: Aurich Lawson)

After US District Judge Amit Mehta ruled that Google has a monopoly in two markets—general search services and general text advertising—everybody is wondering how Google might be forced to change its search business.

Specifically, the judge ruled that Google's exclusive deals with browser and device developers secured Google's monopoly. These so-called default agreements funneled the majority of online searches to Google search engine result pages (SERPs), where results could be found among text ads that have long generated the bulk of Google's revenue.

At trial, Mehta's ruling noted, it was estimated that if Google lost its most important default deal with Apple, Google "would lose around 65 percent of its revenue, even assuming that it could retain some users without the Safari default."

Enlarge / The Mac's Gatekeeper feature has been pushing developers to digitally sign their apps since it was introduced in 2012. (credit: Apple/Andrew Cunningham)

It has always been easier to run third-party software on a Mac than on an iPhone or iPad. Despite the introduction of the Mac App Store a couple of years after the iPhone's App Store opened, it has always been possible to download and run third-party scripts and software on your Mac from anywhere. It's one reason why the iPhone and iPad are subject to new European Union regulations about software sideloading and third-party app stores, while the Mac isn't.

That's not changing in macOS 15 Sequoia, the new version of macOS that's due to be released to the public this fall. But it is about to get more annoying for some apps, according to a note added to Apple's developer site yesterday.

"In macOS Sequoia, users will no longer be able to Control-click to override Gatekeeper when opening software that isn’t signed correctly or notarized," the brief note reads. "They’ll need to visit System Settings > Privacy & Security to review security information for software before allowing it to run."

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Reddit executives discussed plans on Tuesday for making more money from the platform, including showing ads in more places and possibly putting some content behind a paywall.

On Tuesday, Reddit shared its Q2 2024 earnings report (PDF). The company lost $10.1 million during the period, down from Q2 2023’s $41.1 million loss. Reddit has never been profitable, and during its earnings call yesterday, company heads discussed potential and slated plans for monetization.

As expected, selling ads continues to be a priority. Part of the reason Reddit was OK with most third-party Reddit apps closing was that the change was expected to drive people to Reddit’s native website and apps, where the company sells ads. In Q2, Reddit’s ad revenue grew 41 percent year over year (YoY) to $253.1 million, or 90 percent of total revenue ($281.2 million).

Enlarge / Apple's external DVD-burning SuperDrive may be fading away. (credit: Apple)

Apple has always been eager to dump technologies when the company feels they have outlived their usefulness. The original iMac came without a floppy drive. The iPhone 7 came without a headphone jack. Mid-2010s MacBooks and MacBook Pros came with USB-A ports. And the original 2008 MacBook Air came without a built-in optical drive for CDs and DVDs. By the time 2012 and 2013 Macs rolled around, products from the iMac to the MacBook Pro followed suit.

These exclusions have often made Apple's devices thinner, lighter, sleeker, or some combination of all three. But they've also meant that people who still needed those technologies also needed to deal with dongles, adapters, or clunky external accessories hanging off their devices. For the MacBook Air and other modern Macs that needed to read or burn optical discs, that clunky accessory was Apple's SuperDrive, an external DVD burner that connected via USB.

After 16 years of availability, it looks like the SuperDrive's run could be coming to an end. As noticed by MacRumors, the drive's status has shifted to "sold out" in Apple's online store, a more definitive and permanent-sounding label than the "currently unavailable" status assigned to some other out-of-stock products.

Enlarge / Polio victim Larry Montoya is at the airport for the arrival of cases of vaccine, which were distributed as part of the KO Polio campaign, September 5, 1962. (credit: Getty | John McBride)

Public sentiment on the importance of safe, lifesaving childhood vaccines has significantly declined in the US since the pandemic—which appears to be solely due to a nosedive in support from people who are Republican or those who lean Republican, according to new polling data from Gallup.

In 2019, 52 percent of Republican-aligned Americans said it was "extremely important" for parents to get their children vaccinated. Now, that figure is 26 percent, falling by half in just five years. In comparison, 63 percent of Democrats and Democratic leaners said it was "extremely important" this year, down slightly from 67 percent in 2019.

Overall, only 40 percent of Americans now say it is extremely important for parents to vaccinate their children, down from 58 percent in 2019 and 64 percent in 2001.

Enlarge / Delta Air Lines customers looking for missing bags wait in line at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) on July 24, 2024. (credit: Getty Images | Patrick T. Fallon )

Microsoft says that Delta Air Lines' ancient IT infrastructure is to blame for the airline's inability to quickly recover from last month's CrowdStrike debacle.

With Delta threatening to sue Microsoft and CrowdStrike, both companies issued responses saying that Delta refused repeated calls for help. A Microsoft letter to Delta yesterday said the Windows maker is starting to figure out why Delta took longer than other airlines to recover.

"Microsoft continues to investigate the circumstances surrounding the CrowdStrike incident to understand why other airlines were able to fully restore business operations so much faster than Delta, including American Airlines and United Airlines," the letter from Microsoft attorney Mark Cheffo said. "Our preliminary review suggests that Delta, unlike its competitors, apparently has not modernized its IT infrastructure, either for the benefit of its customers or for its pilots and flight attendants."