Month: December 2024

Photobucket was sued Wednesday after a recent privacy policy update revealed plans to sell users' photos—including biometric identifiers like face and iris scans—to companies training generative AI models.

The proposed class action seeks to stop Photobucket from selling users' data without first obtaining written consent, alleging that Photobucket either intentionally or negligently failed to comply with strict privacy laws in states like Illinois, New York, and California by claiming it can't reliably determine users' geolocation.

Two separate classes could be protected by the litigation. The first includes anyone who ever uploaded a photo between 2003—when Photobucket was founded—and May 1, 2024. Another potentially even larger class includes any non-users depicted in photographs uploaded to Photobucket, whose biometric data has also allegedly been sold without consent.

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Microsoft pulled the plug on its Windows Mixed Reality platform this fall, ending support for using virtual reality headsets that were built for Windows PCs. But now the company has announced that you can use a third-party VR headset as a wearable display for a Windows PC. Windows 11 users can now pair a Meta Quest 3 or Quest […]

The post Now you can use a Meta Quest as a wearable display for a Windows PC appeared first on Liliputing.

Advertising has become a focal point of TV software. We’re seeing companies that sell TV sets be increasingly interested in leveraging TV operating systems (OSes) for ads and tracking. This has led to bold new strategies, like an adtech firm launching a TV OS and ads on TV screensavers.

With new short films set to debut on its free streaming service tomorrow, TV-maker TCL is positing a new approach to monetizing TV owners and to film and TV production that sees reduced costs through reliance on generative AI and targeted ads.

TCL's five short films are part of a company initiative to get people more accustomed to movies and TV shows made with generative AI. The movies will “be promoted and featured prominently on” TCL's free ad-supported streaming television (FAST) service, TCLtv+, TCL announced in November. TCLtv+has hundreds of FAST channels and comes on TCL-brand TVs using various OSes, including Google TV and Roku OS.

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On Wednesday, Google unveiled Gemini 2.0, the next generation of its AI-model family, starting with an experimental release called Gemini 2.0 Flash. The model family can generate text, images, and speech while processing multiple types of input including text, images, audio, and video. It's similar to multimodal AI models like GPT-4o, which powers OpenAI's ChatGPT.

"Gemini 2.0 Flash builds on the success of 1.5 Flash, our most popular model yet for developers, with enhanced performance at similarly fast response times," said Google in a statement. "Notably, 2.0 Flash even outperforms 1.5 Pro on key benchmarks, at twice the speed."

Gemini 2.0 Flash—which is the smallest model of the 2.0 family in terms of parameter count—launches today through Google's developer platforms like Gemini API, AI Studio, and Vertex AI. However, its image generation and text-to-speech features remain limited to early access partners until January 2025. Google plans to integrate the tech into products like Android Studio, Chrome DevTools, and Firebase.

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On Wednesday, Google unveiled Gemini 2.0, the next generation of its AI-model family, starting with an experimental release called Gemini 2.0 Flash. The model family can generate text, images, and speech while processing multiple types of input including text, images, audio, and video. It's similar to multimodal AI models like GPT-4o, which powers OpenAI's ChatGPT.

"Gemini 2.0 Flash builds on the success of 1.5 Flash, our most popular model yet for developers, with enhanced performance at similarly fast response times," said Google in a statement. "Notably, 2.0 Flash even outperforms 1.5 Pro on key benchmarks, at twice the speed."

Gemini 2.0 Flash—which is the smallest model of the 2.0 family in terms of parameter count—launches today through Google's developer platforms like Gemini API, AI Studio, and Vertex AI. However, its image generation and text-to-speech features remain limited to early access partners until January 2025. Google plans to integrate the tech into products like Android Studio, Chrome DevTools, and Firebase.

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Chinese PC maker AOOSTAR was one of the first companies to introduce a mini PC with an AMD Strix Point processor when it first unveiled the AOOSTAR GEM10 370 in September. But the computer has yet to actually start shipping, and now the company has revealed a new design for the upcoming PC, along with […]

The post AOOSTAR GEM10 370 gets a pre-launch redesign (mini PC with AMD Strix Point) appeared first on Liliputing.

Apple has announced that it will be releasing the iOS 18.2, iPadOS 18.2, and macOS Sequoia 15.2 updates to the public later this afternoon, following weeks of beta testing for developers and users. As with iOS 18.1, the headlining features are new additions to Apple Intelligence, mainly the image-generation capabilities: Image Playground for general images, and "Genmoji" for making custom images in the style of Apple's built-in Unicode-based emoji characters.

Other AI features include "Image Wand," which will take sketched images from the Notes app and turn them into a "polished image" using context clues from other notes; and ChatGPT integration for the Writing Tools feature.

The updates also include a long list of bug fixes and security updates, for those who don't care about Apple Intelligence. Safari gets better data importing and exporting support, an HTTPS Priority feature that "upgrades URLs to HTTPS whenever possible," and a download status indicator for iPhones with a Dynamic Island. Mail in iOS offers to automatically sort messages to bring important ones to the top of your inbox. There are also various tweaks and improvements for the Photos, Podcasts, Voice Memos, and Stocks apps, while the Weather app in macOS can optionally display the weather in your menu bar.

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Apple has announced that it will be releasing the iOS 18.2, iPadOS 18.2, and macOS Sequoia 15.2 updates to the public later this afternoon, following weeks of beta testing for developers and users. As with iOS 18.1, the headlining features are new additions to Apple Intelligence, mainly the image-generation capabilities: Image Playground for general images, and "Genmoji" for making custom images in the style of Apple's built-in Unicode-based emoji characters.

Other AI features include "Image Wand," which will take sketched images from the Notes app and turn them into a "polished image" using context clues from other notes; and ChatGPT integration for the Writing Tools feature.

The updates also include a long list of bug fixes and security updates, for those who don't care about Apple Intelligence. Safari gets better data importing and exporting support, an HTTPS Priority feature that "upgrades URLs to HTTPS whenever possible," and a download status indicator for iPhones with a Dynamic Island. Mail in iOS offers to automatically sort messages to bring important ones to the top of your inbox. There are also various tweaks and improvements for the Photos, Podcasts, Voice Memos, and Stocks apps, while the Weather app in macOS can optionally display the weather in your menu bar.

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If you've been too busy punching virtual Nazis to take part in this year's Ars Technica Charity Drive sweepstakes, don't worry. You still have time to donate to a good cause and get a chance to win your share of over $4,000 worth of swag (no purchase necessary to win).

In the first three days of the drive, over 100 readers have contributed almost $9,500 to either the Electronic Frontier Foundation or Child's Play as part of the charity drive (Child's Play is now leading in the donation totals by about $1,000). That's a long way off from 2020's record haul of over $58,000, but there's still plenty of time until the Charity Drive wraps up on Thursday, January 2, 2025.

That doesn't mean you should put your donation off, though. Do yourself and the charities involved a favor and give now while you're thinking about it.

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Handheld PC maker GPD seems to be on a mission to upgrade all of its devices by replacing AMD Hawk Point processors with newer AMD Strix Point chips that should bring significant boosts in CPU, graphics, and AI performance. A few weeks ago the company launched the GPD Pocket 4 mini-laptop with up to an […]

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