Google Search revenues were $42.628 billion in the quarter, up from $40.689 billion from the same period a year ago. YouTube ad revenue came in at $7.665 billion, up from $7.340 billion from a year ago. Google's cloud businesses had $8.031 billion in revenue in the quarter, up from $ 6.276 billion from a year ago.

Alphabet also mentioned that it had a total of 181,798 employees at the end of the second quarter, up from 174,014 employees a year ago. In early 2023, Google announced layoffs of 12,000 team members. In today's financial numbers, Alphabet stated:

The substantial majority of the employees affected by the reduction of our workforce are no longer included in our headcount as of June 30, 2023. We expect most of the remaining employees affected will no longer be reflected in our headcount by the end of 2023, subject to local law and consultation requirements.

It added that severance costs for those layoffs totaled "$2.0 billion for the six months ended June 30, 2023." It's also "taking actions to optimize our global office space" which will result in charges of $633 million for the six months ending on June 30.

Alphabet also announced that its chief financial officer Ruth Porat will assume a new role at the company. She will get the newly created title of President and Chief Investment Officer of Alphabet and Google starting on September 1.

Porat will continue to serve as CFO of Alphabet and Google. Her new role will make her "responsible for Alphabet’s investments in its Other Bets portfolio" which include divisions like its Google fibre internet services, its Waymo self driving car business, and others.

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That is finally set to change as the company today announced the arrival of two new external SSDs in its family, namely the Crucial X9 Pro and the Crucial X10 Pro. The biggest difference between the new SKUs is the inclusion of TLC NAND this time. In case you are wondering, while QLC or four-bits-a-cell NAND is cheaper than TLC, the endurance can greatly suffer.

Crucial X10 Pro (left) and X9 Pro (right)

The new Pro X9 and X10 are more suitable for frequent usage compared to its previous QLC-based offerings. Crucial has shared the preliminary specifications of the two drives, though, detailed specs like the number of layers, and cache type, ie, whether DRAM or not, aren't available at the moment.

Crucial X10 Pro

• Form factor: External Portable
• Interface: USB 3.2 Gen-2 2x2 (20Gb/s)
• Capacity: 1TB, 2TB, 4TB

• Speed:

  • Sequential Read: 2100 MB/s

  • Sequential Write2000 MB/s

• Encryption: Password protection and 256‐bit AES hardware encryption to help protect private data

• Durability: Water, dust, and sand resistant (IP55)

• Compatibility: Windows, Mac, Android™, iPad, PC, and Linux®

• Warranty: 5-Year limited

   

Crucial X9 Pro

• Form factor: External Portable
• Interface: USB 3.2 Gen-2 (10Gb/s)
• Capacity: 1TB, 2TB, 4TB

• Speed:

  • Sequential Read: 1050 MB/s

  • Sequential Write: 1050 MB/s

• Encryption: Password protection and 256‐bit AES hardware encryption to help protect private data

• Durability: Water, dust, and sand resistant (IP55)

• Compatibility: Windows, Mac, Android™, iPad, PC, and Linux®

• Warranty: 5-Year limited

   

The Crucial X9 Pro and X10 Pro are already available for purchase on Amazon US (links below), among other places, starting at $79.99, and compared to the X8 and X6, the prices are pretty good at the moment.

You can get them at the links below if you wish but we still recommend waiting for some reviews just in case there are some underlying issues (rare but certainly possible). But it may be worth it just for the bragging rights.

• Crucial X9 Pro 1TB Portable SSD - Up to 1050MB/s Read and Write - Water and dust Resistant, PC and Mac, with Mylio Photos+ Offer - USB 3.2 External Solid State Drive - CT1000X9PROSSD902: $79.99 (Amazon US)

• Crucial X10 Pro 1TB Portable SSD - Up to 2100MB/s Read, 2000MB/s Write -Water and dust Resistant, PC and Mac, with Mylio Photos+ Offer - USB 3.2 External Solid State Drive - CT1000X10PROSSD902: $119.99 (Amazon US)

   

We instead recommend these older Crucial, Samsung, or SanDisk models.

As an Amazon Associate when you purchase through links on our site, we earn from qualifying purchases.
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

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The update uses techniques like aerial imagery and digital elevation data from Bing Maps and Maxar to deliver the overhauls to these natural and urban regions. Check out the update's trailer below to witness the newly improved locations in action:

A horde of new points of interest (POIs) are being added with World Update XIV to show off the changes. It touts 18 new POIs in Czechia, 15 in Slovakia, 19 in Hungary, 15 in Slovenia, 23 in Croatia, and 13 in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Totaling 103 locations, this highlights structures like castles, towers, and churches that have been recreated in the sim with a focus on authenticity.

Microsoft also said it partnered with Gaya Simulations to hand-craft six airports from the region:

Karlovy Vary Airport (LKKV) in Czechia, Poprad-Tatry Airport (LZTT) in Slovakia, Pécs-Pogány Airport (LHPP) in Hungary, Zagorje ob Savi Airport (LJZA) in Slovenia, Rijeka International Airport (LDRI) in Croatia, and Prijedor Urije Airport (LQPD) in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

At the same time, the cities "Prague, Brno, and Plzeň in Czechia; Budapest in Hungary; Ljubljana and Maribor in Slovenia; Split and Dubrovnik in Croatia; and Sarajevo and Banja Luka in Bosnia-Herzegovina" have been crafted by Microsoft's Maps & Local teams as well as Vexcel for players to explore from the sky.

That's not all either, as three more discovery flights, three landing challenges, as well as four bush trips are also a part of the update, all focused on the newly upgraded areas.

"Simmers will be amazed by the endless opportunities of exploration found throughout these urban regions in World Update XIV, all of them reproduced in stunning photorealistic quality," added the company.

At the same time, the company is releasing the premium DLC planes Ae-45 and Ae-145 into the simulator today, which hit the marketplace for $14.99.

Microsoft Flight Simulator World Update XIV: Central Eastern Europe is available now across PC, Xbox Series X|S, and Xbox Cloud Gaming via Game Pass Ultimate. Xbox and PC Game Pass subscribers have access to the content for no extra cost as well. The update can be found as an optional download from the marketplace.

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What you need to know

• Bethesda Softworks shared a trio of animated shorts set to promote Starfield, the upcoming role-playing game from Bethesda Game Studios. 
• These three animated shorts tell three stories set across the Settled Systems of Akila City, Neon, and New Atlantis.
• Starfield is scheduled to launch on Sep. 6, 2023 exclusively on Xbox Series X|S and Windows PC, 
• Anyone that buys the Premium Edition or plays through Xbox Game Pass with the Premium Upgrade can play starting on Sep. 1, 2023. 

The next big game from Bethesda Game Studios isn't here just yet, but there's more to learn about the worlds you'll be exploring. 

Bethesda Softworks shared a trio of animated short videos for Starfield on Tuesday, telling new stories in the game's setting of the Settled Systems. The three shorts are only a couple of minutes long each, but tell quick stories about the kinds of people that inhabit this world of the far future. You can check out all three videos below:

Supra Et Ultra follows the story of a pilot named Kent who hopes to leave the capital of New Atlantis and pursue dreams elsewhere in the stars.

Where Hope is Built is all about Vanna, an orphan on Akila working to repair a broken spaceship.

The Hand that Feeds follows Ada and Harper on the streets of Neon, a pleasure world. 

Starfield is slated to launch on Sep. 6, 2023, exclusively on Xbox Series X|S and Windows PC. Like all Xbox first-party games, it'll be available day one on Xbox Game Pass.

Windows Central's take

I always love this kind of supplementary stuff around a game's launch. None of these videos are long, but getting these animated glimpses at other stories in this world is exciting, and it makes me curious just what I'll find when I start playing. 

This makes me wonder if we could get an official Starfield anime sometime after the game launches, similar to how Cyberpunk 2077 was followed by the acclaimed Edgerunners series on Netflix.

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Microsoft's diluted earnings per share were $2.69 per share, up 21 percent from the same period a year ago. In the press release, Microsoft's chief financial officer Amy Hood made a special mention of the company's cloud revenues:

We delivered a solid close to the fiscal year driven by Microsoft Cloud quarterly revenue of $30.3 billion, up 21% (up 23% in constant currency) year-over-year.

In terms of its specific divisions, Microsoft's Productivity and Business Processes, which include its Office consumer and commercial products and cloud services, LinkedIn, and Dynamics products and cloud service, had revenues of $18.3 billion, up 10 percent from the same period a year ago. It mentioned that there are now 67 million subscribers for its consumer Microsoft 365 services.

Its Intelligent Cloud division, which includes its Server products and cloud services, came in at $24.0 billion, up 15 percent from a year ago. It mentioned its Azure and its other cloud services revenue went up by 26 percent.

Things are not quite as good for Microsoft's More Personal Computing division, which include its Windows OEM, devices, and Xbox divisions, Revenues were $13.9 billion for the quarter, down 4 percent compared to a year ago. Windows OEM revenues were down 12 percent and devices went down 20 percent.

On the flip side, Xbox revenues were up 5 percent, Windows Commercial products and cloud services revenue was up 2 percent, and Search and news advertising revenue was up 8 percent.

Microsoft also revealed its full fiscal year 2023 revenues. Revenues for the full year were $211.9 billion, up 7 percent from a year ago, and operating income was $88.5 billion, up 6 percent from a year ago. Net income was $72.4 billion GAAP, which was down slightly, with $73.3 billion in non-GAAP net income, up by 6 percent.

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The Home feed in the app now features a new Following tab that will show you posts only from the people you follow in chronological order. On the other hand, the For You tab will have a mixture of content from recommended accounts and the users you follow.

If the Following tab doesn't show up in your app after the update, try tapping on the Threads logo at the top which hides/reveals the tabbed interface. The list of new Threads features also includes an "Approve all' button to accept all follow requests at once.

This builds on top of its first major iOS update that recently added in-app language translation and a Follows tab in the Activity feed to filter notifications. "This is just the beginning. Thanks for the feedback as always – please keep sending through as we make even more updates to improve your experience on this app," Mosseri wrote in a Threads post announcing the features.

Launched earlier this month, Threads tasted success in a short span by attracting millions of users within days of its arrival. With 150 million downloads in less than a week, it beat Niantic's Pokémon GO which held the title of the biggest app launch since 2016.

The Threads app makes its onboarding easier by allowing users to sign in using their Instagram accounts, although, it's not easy to get rid of the Threads profile after that. While the app lets you pre-follow Instagram accounts, it lacks some essential features, including direct messages. Speaking of which, Mosseri said there are no immediate plans to launch Threads DMs.

Data from Sensor Tower and Similarweb suggests engagement on the platform went down in the days following its launch. It was reported that the average time users spent on the app saw a drop of about 50%.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said last week that he's "very optimistic about how the Threads community is coming together," adding that this year's focus is on "improving the basics and retention."

"It'll take time to stabilize, but once we nail that then we'll focus on growing the community. We've run this playbook many times (FB, IG, Stories, Reels, etc) and I'm confident Threads is on a good path too," he said.

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It looks like Intel itself was also quite aware of this and today the company debuted a new AVX10 ISA that brings more robust AVX-512 support for the future Intel CPUs. The major highlight of AVX10 is the support for AVX-512 on Efficiency cores (E-cores) as well, which was till now limited to P-cores (Performance cores) only.

Intel explains:

The converged version of the Intel AVX10 vector ISA will include Intel AVX-512 vector instructions with an AVX512VL feature flag, a maximum vector register length of 256 bits, as well as eight 32-bit mask registers andnew versions of 256-bit instructions supporting embedded rounding. This converged version will be supported on both P-cores and E-cores.

While the converged version is limited to a maximum 256-bit vector length, Intel AVX10
itself is not limited to 256 bits, and optional 512-bit vector use is possible on supporting P-cores.

Intel also states (downloadable PDF) that by going this route, the developer load will also be reduced, and multi-threaded performance should increase as E-cores will now be able to contribute to such AVX tasks:

In addition to the previously stated usability benefits, several additional performance-based benefits of Intel AVX10 include:

• Intel AVX2-compiled applications, re-compiled to Intel AVX10, should realize performance gains without the need for additional software tuning.
• Intel AVX2 applications sensitive to vector register pressure will gain the most performance due to the 16 additional vector registers and new instructions.
• Highly-threaded vectorizable applications are likely to achieve higher aggregate throughput when running on E-core-based Intel Xeon processors or on Intel® products with performance hybrid architecture.

Existing Intel AVX-512 applications, many of them already using maximum 256-bit vectors, should see the same performance when compiled to Intel AVX10/256 at iso-vector length. For applications that can leverage greater vector lengths, Intel AVX10/512 will be supported on Intel P-cores, continuing to deliver the best-in-class performance for AI, scientific, and other high-performance codes.

Intel also highlighted the main features of AVX10 versions 1 and 2 (AVX10.1 and 10.2) in a chart:

Aside from AVX10, Intel has also debuted APX or Advanced Performance Extensions, which essentially doubles the number of general-purpose registers (GPRs) from 16 to 32 (r0 to r31). Intel states that APX code contains 10% fewer loads and 20% fewer stores than Intel64. Technical jargon aside, this basically means it's better:

Intel® APX doubles the number of general-purpose registers (GPRs) from 16 to 32. This allows the compiler to keep more values in registers; as a result, APX-compiled code contains 10% fewer loads and more than 20% fewer stores than the same code compiled for an Intel® 64 baseline. Register accesses are not only faster, but they also consume significantly less dynamic power than complex load and store operations.

While we are on the topic of Intel64, the company recently proposed a 64-bit-only x86S architecture and it is currently looking for community feedback.

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Twitter user Andres Guadamuz has shared the details of Microsoft X trademark as follows:

Microsoft's X trademark

Microsoft has owned the trademark to the letter "X" since 1994. The trademark is registered in a variety of classes, including computer software, computer hardware, and telecommunications. This means that Microsoft has the exclusive right to use the letter "X" in connection with these products and services.

If Musk proceeds with the name change, he could face a number of legal challenges from Microsoft. Microsoft could sue Musk for trademark infringement, which could result in Musk being ordered to stop using the name "X" for Twitter.

Microsoft could also sue Musk for trademark dilution, which occurs when the use of a trademark weakens or tarnishes the distinctiveness of another trademark.

Does Microsoft own X

Yes, Microsoft owns the trademark to the letter "X" in a variety of classes, including computer software, computer hardware, and telecommunications. This means that Microsoft has the exclusive right to use the letter "X" in connection with these products and services.

The trademark was first registered in 1994, and it has been renewed several times since then. It is currently valid until 2034.

If someone else wants to use the letter "X" in connection with these products and services, they will need to obtain a license from Microsoft. If they do not obtain a license, they could face legal challenges from Microsoft.

Musk's options

Musk has a few options if he wants to proceed with the name change because of the Microsoft X trademark. He could try to reach an agreement with Microsoft to license the trademark. He could also try to change the name of his company to something else that does not infringe on Microsoft's trademark.

In addition to the legal challenges, Musk may also face some public relations challenges if he proceeds with the name change. Some people may view the name "X" as being too generic or uninspiring. Others may see it as a way for Musk to distance himself from Twitter's current identity.

As of July 25, 2023, Elon Musk has not yet announced a new name for Twitter. It is possible that he is still considering his options, or that he is working to reach an agreement with Microsoft to license the trademark. Only time will tell what the final outcome will be.

It is too early to say what will happen to Musk's plans to rename Twitter to "X". However, the fact that Microsoft owns the trademark to the letter "X" could pose a serious legal challenge for Musk.

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In their project NIMFEIA, Katrin and Helmut Schultheiß along with their team from the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR) have now taken this technology a tremendous step forward. They also demonstrated that their approach can be seamlessly integrated into conventional chip manufacturing. Their findings have now been published in Nature Communications.

What the researchers have developed at the HZDR-Institute of Ion Beam Physics and Materials Research is referred to by many names.

"Neuromorphic computing," for example, is one term, as the processes resemble those that occur within the brain. "Unconventional computing" is another name, as the technology is so different from the data processing that we are accustomed to today, which uses the Boolean logic of zeros and ones.

It is sometimes called "reservoir computing," as it uses non-linear physical phenomena to detect patterns in a data stream. "In many fields of automation—from autonomous driving and the "Internet of Things' to edge computing—the industry is struggling with fast data signals," explains Helmut Schultheiß. He heads the Emmy Noether Group "Magnonics" at the HZDR. "This is because many sensors deliver small data packets at high speed. Recognizing patterns in these packets is very energy-intensive for today's computer architectures."

For this reason, Katrin and Helmut Schultheiß and their team are relying on spin waves; also called magnons. The idea of using them to create a new data processing technology is already a bit old. Through their endeavors, Schultheiß and team, however, have solved a problem that hindered the practical execution.

"All concepts up until this point rely on the fact that spin waves must propagate from A to B in order to work with them," Helmut Schultheiß explains. "But there are really no usable materials in this regard." Schultheiß and team therefore went in another direction. They have pressed the entire process into a magnetic disk only a few micrometers thick and made it vibrate.

Now the entire body vibrates and at different frequencies simultaneously. "Visualize a drum," he explains. "Beautiful patterns are created if you sprinkle sand on a drum and beat it rhythmically. These are the vibration modes." They exist in the entire space. They don't merely go from A to B. They are standing waves that live resonantly on the entire body.

The beating of the drum is the data input that can, for example, come from a sensor. It causes an interplay of different oscillations and resulting non-linear processes. "In our work, we were able to demonstrate that different input patterns always produced unique oscillations patterns," Schultheiß says. "And this process is time sensitive. So, if we change the sequence of the input signals, the patterns will change as well." That is a requirement for evaluating data in real time.

Helmut Schultheiß is certain there is, however, another requirement for the technology to make it from the laboratory to the marketplace. The process must be CMOS compatible—that is, it must be suitable for processing on the chip industry's standard production lines. This is something he learned not least from his experience with industry partners GlobalFoundries and Infineon within the NIMFEIA project.

"Even if we search for new technologies, CMOS technology will continue to ensure our prosperity for decades to come," he says. "This is because it has now permeated our entire lives—from the smallest light switch to telephones and sensors for pacemakers." Enormous investments are required for the chip factories where this prosperity is created. They are not merely plucked from the ground, nor are they simply reconfigured. "The positive aspect about our technology is that nothing needs to be reconfigured," Schultheiß says.

Katrin und Helmut Schultheiß and their team, however, do not wish to replace conventional computers with their new technology. They instead wish to supplement them in a way that makes sense. "Boolean computation is still the leader when it comes to complex mathematical calculations," Helmut Schultheiß says.

"Nothing better will likely arise for arithmetic tasks in the next hundred years. But the current computer architectures have a major problem in recognizing patterns and grasping complexity." He could, for example, imagine an application for traffic optimization. This is because neuromorphic computers could sift through the vast mountain of data—provided by services like Google, combined with smartphones and the cars themselves—for patterns and predict a traffic jam before the first car even comes to a halt.

"That is a highly complex endeavor in which conventional computer architectures, such as our PCs, have immense difficulty. Many calculation steps are required. On the other hand, it is the ideal application area for neuromorphic computing, for reservoir computers and for artificial intelligence."

Because the novel technologies are not only small, but also incredibly energy-efficient, they could work directly on the sensors. This is referred to as "edge computing" and is helpful wherever transmitting large amounts of data is difficult or expensive. In outer space, for example.

Instead of sending all measurement data from an Earth observation satellite to the ground station, it could be processed on site. This saves bandwidth and energy. The application could also be used in medicine. A neuromorphic computer directly integrated into a pacemaker could detect patterns indicating arrhythmia or ventricular fibrillation from the pacemaker's signals.

"Intelligent maintenance could also benefit greatly from edge computing with neuromorphic processes," Schultheiß says. "In terms of wind turbines, for example, they could look for oscillation patterns in the drive shafts that detect bearing damage. This would facilitate maintenance before the bearing even fails. This saves money, energy and resources."

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Google likes to describe its APIs in a generic sense, but in reality, most of the actors in this play would probably be Google. Google may or may not be supplying the website, Chrome would be the browser, and the attestation server would definitely be from Google.

 

Google's document pinky-promises the company doesn't want to use this for anything evil. The authors "strongly feel" the API shouldn't be used to uniquely fingerprint people, but they also want "some indicator enabling rate limiting against a physical device." In the "non-goals" section, the project says it doesn't want to "interfere with browser functionality, including plugins and extensions." That's a veiled reference to not killing ad-blockers, even though the project mentions better advertising support as some of its goals. Chrome already has a "kill ad blockers" plan anyway (or at least "watered-down ad blockers" plan). It's called Manifest V3, which will change the way critical extension APIs work so they can't modify webpage content as effectively. Google also says it doesn't want to "exclude other vendors" from its DRM scheme.

 

Google hasn't done much in the way of public promotion of this idea yet, and even the documentation is only hosted on an employee's personal GitHub account, rather than an official Google repo. The earliest proposal we can find is from April 2022. Over the weekend, an updated spec was published, and the proposal got picked up by HackerNews and device-repair YouTuber Louis Rossmann. This caused the Internet to descend upon the repo's GitHub issues forum and start absolutely cooking Google in the replies.

 

Issue #134 calls the idea "absolutely unethical and against the open web." Issue #113 say they "can't believe this is even proposed." Issue #127 adds: "Have you ever stopped to consider that you're the bad guys?" Another user posted a screed entirely in hexadecimal that, when translated, starts with "Death to Fascists" and wishes explosive diarrhea on everyone involved. So reception so far has been... mixed.

 

Exactly how the rest of the world feels about this is not necessarily relevant, though. Google owns the world's most popular web browser, the world's largest advertising network, the world's biggest search engine, the world's most popular operating system, and some of the world's most popular websites. So really, Google can do whatever it wants. Other projects like Chrome's "Privacy Sandbox" ad platform and the adblock-limiting manifest V3 have been universally panned, but Google has kept right on trucking with the projects. There have been some small project tweaks and delays, but Google keeps marching forward.

 

For now this is only a "proposal" API, but in May Google published an "intent to prototype" notice, meaning it's building the feature into Chrome right now for testing. There's a page for feature-development tracking on chromestatus.com. We've asked Google for a comment and will update this page if it sends anything.

 

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In a blog post, Techland's CEO Paweł Marchewka stated:

Teaming up with Tencent will allow us to move full speed ahead with the execution of the vision for our games. We have chosen an ally who has already partnered with some of the world's finest video game companies and helped them reach new heights while respecting their ways of doing things.

Marchewka added that under the terms of the deal, Techland will still own its game IPs like Dying Light, and will retain creative control over its upcoming games.

Over a year ago, in May 2022, Techland announced it was working on its next major game project. It is an open-world fantasy RPG, and the developer announced it had recruited a number of new team members to work on the project, including the Narrative Director and Narrative Lead of CD Projekt Red's The Witcher 2 and 3 games, among others.

There's no word yet on when the game will officially be revealed. However, today's blog post made a quick mention of the new game, with Marchewka stating:

Our open world action-RPG in a fantasy setting is already shaping up to become something truly special, and the goal here is to make sure it will live up to the expectations for our first new IP in almost a decade.

This is the latest game developer acquisition by Tencent. It has previously acquired either minority or majority ownership of game companies like Riot Games, Epic Games, Frontier Developments, Turtle Rock Studios, and Path of Exile developer Grinding Gear Games, the last in 2018.

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In a statement sent to The Verge, a Ubisoft spokesperson stated there are actually four things that need to happen before an account on its network is deleted:

• The gaming activity of the account since its creation
• The account’s libraries: accounts that include purchased PC games are not eligible for deletion
• The duration of inactivity of the account, meaning the last login to our ecosystem (including from Ubisoft games on Steam and other platforms)
  • —In practice, as of today, we have never deleted accounts that have been inactive for less than 4 years
• The existence of an active subscription tied to the account.

So it would appear that your Ubisoft PC game library is safe, even if your account has not been signed into for a while. If there are no such games, Ubisoft will suspend your account if it's not been active for four years or more, which is a long time.

Even if an account is suspended, Ubisoft says the publisher will send three emails to the person with that account "over a 30-day period offering to restore their account."

So why bother to suspend or delete any inactive accounts in the first place? Ubisoft says that's due to the rules set up by the European Union's GDPR. It added:

Our policies are aligned with legal requirements and with the standards of the industry. This measure also acts as a protection for our players against fraud.

The bottom line: If you haven't accessed your Ubisoft account in a while, your games under that account should be safe, but you might want to go ahead and keep it active anyway.

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Why mainframes survive

Mainframe ownership is not without challenges. Only the largest companies use them, as they're expensive to own and operate—they cost between $250,000 to $4,000,000, and each one is custom-built. They require a large support staff that could number in the hundreds or thousands. Technical support staff skilled in COBOL, JCL, mainframe storage, hardware maintenance, mainframe operations, and applications are aging out of the workforce. COBOL is no longer widely taught, and few universities have hands-on mainframe topics in their curriculum.

 

Many mainframe applications are now decades old, and although COBOL runs efficiently, software needs to evolve to address the changing needs of customers. Maintaining “dusty deck” applications requires a lot of effort, and older banks and insurance companies are at a competitive disadvantage compared to the nimble, younger fintech companies.

 

Still, people have been predicting the death of the mainframe for decades, and they continue to survive because they fill the important niche of processing high-volume, business-critical financial transactions. IBM mainframes have the ultimate customer “lock-in.” Fortune 500 companies have been using the same COBOL code bases for decades. The original developers have long since moved on or even died of old age, and rewriting tens of millions of lines of mission-critical code is a very difficult, very expensive proposition.

 

Many companies have tried and failed at conversion. But converting the code is just part of the overall migration process. You also have to convert your data, develop new processes and procedures around the new applications, train new people on the processes and procedures, stress-test all systems, and then make the cut-over to run in production.

 

All this has to happen on a defined schedule and budget. It’s the equivalent of getting a heart transplant where your chance of surviving is less than 50 percent. This kind of migration takes companies years to complete and is fraught with challenges. Many companies have spent tens or hundreds of millions of dollars to try to upgrade these kinds of systems and failed. The safer option is to simply continue to pay the licensing fees on the mainframe hardware, OS, and applications and maintain staff for the hundreds or thousands of support personnel.

 

Alternatives to the mainframe do exist, though. FIS Global, a major provider of mainframe banking software, provides a migration path off of the mainframe with its FIS Modern Banking Platform. The company has architected a stack of cloud components to perform the same functions as its mainframe products, and it rewrote its COBOL mainframe applications in Java and migrated the flat file data to relational databases. The Java code runs in the JBOSS application server, which is deployed in a Docker container. The container is managed in cloud servers with the Kubernetes container manager, which runs on Linux or Windows in a cloud server. Real-time events are managed with Apache Kafka.

 

Communication is through Kafka events or Java Messaging Services, and new server instances can be spun up in seconds in AWS or Azure clouds to provide additional capacity, which is needed for high-volume processing. FIS Global can provide the same functionality as the mainframe applications, but its system is made of commodity cloud components and is very scalable. The investment to convert to this architecture is fairly high, and a smooth conversion is by no means assured, but once a company is running on the Modern Banking Platform, the annual operating cost would presumably be lower.

 

FIS Global maintains a full banking suite of products for the mainframe, and it has teams of analysts and developers who have mapped out and converted the business logic from COBOL to Java and mapped the data from flat files into relational database schemas. Its engineers have created the Java and database containers, and the company has created a road map for migrating customer data and services from the mainframe to the cloud.

 

So why aren’t banks jumping at the opportunity to cast off their mainframes and move to the cloud? Risk and conversion cost. As a rule, banks are risk-averse. They are often trailing adopters of new technology and only do so when under competitive or regulatory pressure.

 

The cost to migrate many dozens of mission-critical applications could easily cost hundreds of millions of dollars and take three or more years to complete. During that migration time, it’s difficult to add new features or react to the competition. In addition to risk and cost, there is the challenge of hiring hundreds of highly specialized technical consultants who would oversee the migration work. If you can’t find those people, you have a bottleneck in your project plan.

The mainframe continues to adapt

IBM's business model allows it to invest in mainframe infrastructure. Telum, the latest mainframe CPU, saw advances in its cache management and the addition of on-die AI processing, both resulting in performance increases. Mainframe COBOL has been extended to support JSON and XML to enable web-based development, and it received considerable optimizations for the Telum CPU architecture.

 

IBM is also adapting to changes in the industry and is pushing its hybrid cloud strategy onto the mainframe. This includes using Red Hat Linux for DevOps and Red Hat for Linux toolchains. Red Hat enables Node.js, Python, Docker, and Kubernetes on the mainframe. Other recent Z/OS features include the ability to pull, manage, and run containerized open source Linux images.

 

So even as COBOL programmers and mainframe support personnel age out of the workforce, IBM continues to modernize the mainframe infrastructure and software stack. And although the mainframe continues to face challenges from the cloud, it has managed to adapt and survive.

 

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From Surface leaks to Xbox controllers without stick drift, we saw a wide range of news stories pass our desk this week. With so much going on, it's easy to miss a few stories, so we gather together all of the biggest news into one bite-size piece.

Toss in a healthy heaping of reviews and editorials and sprinkle on some deals and you have tasty treat that satisfies your hunger for news.

Surface Laptop Studio 2 details

Microsoft plans to unveil a Surface Laptop Studio 2 later this year, according to a report by our Senior Editor Zac Bowden. The PC will feature the same general design as its predecessor, though it will reportedly have a wider selection of ports.

The screen of the Surface Laptop Studio 2 should be brighter, but it will keep the same 14.4-inch size seen on the original Surface Laptop Studio. Bowden has heard whispers of an upgraded haptic touchpad (likely from Sensel) to provide more granular feedback.

The biggest change between generations will be on the internal side of things. The Surface Laptop Studio 2 will have "the latest Intel 13th-Gen processors, the most RAM ever seen on a Surface device and powerful NVIDIA 40-series GPUs." according to Bowden's sources.

With an expected September or October timeframe for its announcement, the Surface Laptop Studio 2 will likely ship with Windows 11 version 23H2 and have AI features such as Windows Copilot.

Xbox Live Gold going away

Microsoft announced the end of its Xbox Live Gold branding this week. The company will replace the well-known subscription with Xbox Game Pass Core. This aligns Microsoft's subscriptions under the Xbox game Pass branding, which already included Xbox Game Pass Console, PC Game Pass, and Xbox Game Pass Ultimate.

While the Xbox Live Gold branding is going away, people will still have the option to play online with a similar subscription. In fact, Xbox Game Pass Core has some extra benefits when compared to Xbox Live Gold. The new subscription will have 25 "high-quality" Xbox Games, including Doom Eternal, Forza Horizon 4, Gears 5, and The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited. We have a list of every game included with Xbox Game Pass Core, but it's worth noting that the library will grow over time.

All Xbox Live Gold members will have their subscriptions converted to Xbox Game Pass Core in the future.

Massive Windows 11 Insider update

Microsoft rolls out Insider builds of Windows 11 every week, but they aren't always as big as the update we saw a few days ago. Windows 11 Build 22621.2050 and Build 22631.2050 shipped to Beta Channel Insiders with a long list of changes. The update includes a modernized File Explorer, support for Dynamic Lighting, and improvements to Windows Ink.

Build 22621.2050 has new features off by default and Build 22631.2050 has new features enabled, so if you want to try out the new features, you'll have to make sure to be on the right version of Windows or enable specific options.

Xbox controller without stick drift

Stick drift is the bane of existence for many gamers. The issue isn't exclusive to Xbox controllers, but it certainly can be a problem on them. GameSir aims to fix that with its recently announced GameSir G7 SE Controller. It features Hall Effect sticks, which use non-contact magnetic sensors to prevent stick drift from creeping in.

The controller costs $45, which is rather affordable for an Xbox controller. The only downside is that it's a wired controller. If you're okay with connecting to your Xbox with a cable, the GameSir G7 SE Controller looks like a solid option.

If you've been lucky enough to avoid stick drift in a controller, or if you'd just like to learn more about what causes it, make sure to check out our announcement post of the GameSir G7 SE Controller.

ChatGPT getting dumber?

Late last year, ChatGPT burst onto the scenes. The easy-to-use AI tool placed artificial intelligence at the fingertips of everyday users and sparked a surge of interest in AI. But according to a study out of Stanford, ChatGPT may have gotten worse, not better, since it launched.

The study "How Is ChatGPT’s Behavior Changing over Time?" examined how the chatbot responded to a series of questions. Testers studied how ChatGPT handled math problems, questions with sensitive information, requests to generate code, and visual reasoning.

While the study flags up questions about OpenAI's ChatGPT, further study is needed to determine if the chatbot has actually gotten less intelligent. The study concluded that ChatGPT had shifted, in some cases for the worse, but that's only in a limited scope of testing.

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Earlier today, we reported that Musk has been planning to bid adieu to the iconic Twitter blue bird and will replace it with "X", a WeChat style super app. Now, the Twitter owner has confirmed that he indeed plans to go ahead with X. In a tweet, Elon Musk confirmed that X.com now redirects to Twitter. He further noted that the company is working on the logo and an interim logo will go live later today.

Musk had been giving away clues about the upcoming change all day with him even tweeting that he likes the letter X, along with a picture of him standing in front of Tesla Model X billboard.

Elon Musk of course, has a history with the letter X as X.com was his first major project. For those who are unaware, Musk co-founded X.com with Harris Fricker, Christopher Payne, and Ed Ho in 1999. It provided easy payment solution to individuals and was later renamed PayPal before being sold off to eBay for $1.5 billion in 2002.

While the letter X may mean a lot to Elon Musk, it remains to be seen how the public and most importantly Twitter shareholders react to the news.

Musk has been working hard to navigate through the various issues surrounding Twitter since the acquisition late last year. With the company facing lawsuits from former employees, advertisers leaving the platform, security breach that allowed everyone to see Twitter Circle tweets, and multiple outages, it has been a rocky ride for Musk's latest experiment.

Recently, Fidelity released a report noting that Twitter is now worth around $15 Billion, one-third of what Elon Musk paid last year to buy the company.

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Table of contents:

1. Windows 11
2. Windows Insider, new builds, and new features
3. App updates
4. Gaming news
5. Bing Chat, Windows Copilot, and more AI frenzy
6. Trivia and more interesting stories
7. Random fact about Microsoft

Windows 11

A YouTube video published this week revealed an interesting situation with Intel's CPU latencies when running Windows 10 and 11. According to the Tech YES City channel, architecture changes in Intel's 12th and 13th-generation processors cause notable delays compared with previous-gen models.

It will be interesting to see if those issues persist in the upcoming 14th-gen models, whose specs and performance figures have already leaked.

Other not-so-exciting Windows 11 news include issues with KB5028166—the update is causing system issues with Secure Channel and other bugs, which, in turn, forced Synology to release a patch.

Another story emerged this week with details about Rust-based malware for hacking Windows and Linux servers. This piece is particularly interesting in light of news about Microsoft adding Rust to Windows 11's kernel to make the OS more secure.

Windows Insider, new builds, and new features

Several weeks ago, Microsoft released the first public preview of the Windows Copilot feature—Microsoft's new assistant powered by Bing and OpenAI. After a short testing period with select insiders, Microsoft made the Copilot available to all users running build 23493 and newer.

But build 23493 is now old news. This week, Microsoft released build 23506 in the Dev Channel with an improved out-of-box experience (the initial setup), a new Outlook to replace the old and long-abandoned Mail & Calendar, passwordless Windows Hello improvements, and various fixes.

Tip: You can get links to the latest Windows Insider builds using our handy Windows Insider build tracker widget on the home page.

In addition to the new features mentioned in the release notes, build 23506 contains a hidden set of improvements for the energy settings. Microsoft wants to make its operating system more energy-conscious, and the latest build features new stats for tracking energy consumption with detailed per-app info.

Another noteworthy update in the Windows Insider Program is a new Windows Subsystem for Android release. Version 2306 is now available for those running Windows 11 preview builds (outside the Windows Subsystem for Android Preview program), adding camera compatibility improvements, storage fixes, Android security updates, and more.

If Dev and Canary builds are not for you due to bugs and instabilities, you may want to try the latest Beta Channel build and its extensive list of new features. The new stuff in build 22631.2050 is expected later this year as a part of the 23H2 update, and Beta Channel users can already try it before the public rollout.

Downloading updates, please wait

Here is the list of noteworthy app updates released during the last seven days:

• Microsoft Edge to get back EPUB support, allowing you to read books without downloading third-party apps. Users spotted the change in one of the latest Canary builds. However, the first implementation is limited and raw, so expect improvements before the public rollout. Another great change available for testing in the Canary Channel is the ability to use Bing Chat (aka Windows Copilot) to change the browser's settings.

  

   

• Third-party extensions for Microsoft Edge Sidebar: Microsoft announced support for third-party projects to make the Sidebar more feature-rich and useful.

   

  

   

• Office Microsoft 365 Insiders can finally try the new Aptos fontand other visual changes. The latest cosmetic Office revamp includes a new font, improved spacing, contrast, and thickness, and a new colour palette. In addition, Microsoft is testing expanded support for adding pictures in Excel cells.

   

  

   

• Microsoft Dev Home Preview 0.3 is now available with the ability to rearrange widgets on the home page and multiple under-the-hood fixes.

• VirtualBox has got a major update with fixes for TPM crashes, graphics bugs when running Windows 11, and performance improvements for macOS. The latest release is now available for download for free from the official website.

• NVIDIA has updated its firmware tool for customers using the pre-RTX20 and GTX16 graphics card series. The latest release is available for all 64-bit Windows versions (including unsupported ones), and it enables the latest DisplayPort 1.3/1.4 features.

• There is also a new NVIDIA driver available for supported GPUs—version 536.67 adds the RTX 4060 Ti 16GB support, DLSS3 for Portal: Prelude RTX, and more.

• Dual-video stream support in Microsoft Teams lets you connect a second camera to your computer and ensure other participants can see whatever you want to show without you going out of the frame. The feature is now in public preview and available for Microsoft 365 Insiders.
• Ink Workspace 2.3 is now available with the Mica material, new font, new UI effects, and more. The app is a third-party hidden gem for Windows 11, and it can serve as a fantastic alternative to the still botched Start menu.

  

   

• Finally, Google has released Android Nearby Share for Windows, allowing Android users to send files to their PCs over Wi-Fi.

   

Besides multiple apps and Windows updates, Microsoft released new firmware for a bunch of its Surface computers. The Surface Pro 9 received network improvements and a new Intel app to optimize your experience. The Surface Laptop Studio got a larger release: its latest firmware resolves several battery issues and weird battery-related error messages.

Gaming news

After years of speculation and rumors, Microsoft is finally ready to retire its Xbox Live Gold brand. This week, the company announced a new Xbox Game Pass tier called "Xbox Game Pass Core." According to Microsoft, it is the "evolution of Xbox Live Gold" with the same price and extra perks.

Besides access to the multiplayer on your Xbox One or Xbox Series X|S, you get 25 essential games, such as Forza Horizon 4, Gears 5, Doom Eternal, Inside, Fallout 4, and more. Microsoft plans to launch Xbox Game Pass Core on September 14, 2023, for $9.99/mo.

In addition to the new Xbox Game Pass tier, Microsoft announced the latest batch of games coming soon to Xbox Game Pass and PC Game Pass. Those games include The Wandering Village, Serious Same: Siberian Mayhem, and more.

Microsoft's last-month Xbox Game Showcase event was the company's most-watched stream. It generated more than 92 million views (a 38% increase over the previous one), hardly surprising, considering the amount of games and Starfield-related footage Microsoft showed.

If you are a Cities Skylines fan, you probably cannot wait for Cities Skylines 2, scheduled to arrive in October 2023. The game's developer announced several mechanics coming to the game, such as upgradable service builds, the internet, improved garbage management, and more.

While Cities Skylines fans wait for the sequel to arrive later this year, Diablo 4 players are already enjoying the latest massive patch. Version 1.1.0 is now available for download with new items, legendary aspects, and many more.

Although Microsoft finally received the green light from the FTC to purchase Activision-Blizzard, several regulatory hurdles remain, forcing Microsoft and ABK to extend their merger deal deadline. Still, Activision-Blizzard fans are already experiencing the results of the upcoming merger: Blizzard announced its plans to bring some of its games to other storefronts: on August 10, 2023, Overwatch 2 will be available for download from Steam.

Get those freebies and discounts!

Another week—another free game from the Epic Games Store. This time, everyone gets a free copy of The Elder Scrolls Online and Murder by Numbers. Two games will remain up for grabs until the next Thursday. Also, be sure to check out our regular Weekend PC Game Deals article featuring Total War specials, bundles, and more.

Bing Chat, Windows Copilot, and more AI frenzy

Microsoft's annual Inspire conference happened this week, and the company used it as an opportunity to reveal several AI-focused announcements. For example, the visual search feature is finally available for all Bing Chat users. Also, enterprise customers will soon get access to Bing Chat Enterprise with more privacy and security. Finally, the company unveiled Microsoft 365 Copilot pricing: commercial users will have to pay $30/mo per customer.

The news about Microsoft wanting to charge $30/mo per customer caused the company's shares to hit a new all-time of $359.49.

Despite focusing heavily on OpenAI and Bing Chat, Microsoft is still open to cooperation with other companies to help them develop new language models. This week, Microsoft unveiled a partnership with Facebook Meta aiming to launch Llama 2.

Trivia and more interesting stories

Those wanting to supercharge their productivity and work with Windows PCs faster should check out my recent article covering eleven great Windows keyboard and mouse shortcuts.

This week, Intel turned 55. To celebrate this milestone, John Callaham published a quick look back at the founding of one of America's largest chipmakers.

Another look-back article from this week is all about one of Microsoft's efforts to disrupt the mobile market. And no, it is not about Windows 10 Mobile, Windows Phone, or Windows Mobile. This one dates back to 1998 and the Microsoft Cordless Phone, aka PC Phone System MP-900.

Random fact about Microsoft

Windows 8 was Microsoft's first full-scale push on the tablet market. However, the operating system released in late 2012 was not Microsoft's first attempt to make a Windows version tailored for touchscreen-enabled devices. In the early 90s, Microsoft released Windows for Pen Computing or Windows Pen Edition. Built upon the Windows 3.1 core, Windows Pen Edition offered optimizations for touch and pen input: a tool for screen calibration, a virtual keyboard, a Notepad for handwriting, and more.

Windows for Pen Computing 2.0, based on Windows 95, was out in 1995, and in 2002, Windows XP Tablet PC Edition marked the final touch-optimized edition separated from the main release. In modern days, every Windows release comes with tools and optimizations for making the operating system touch and stylus-friendly.

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Now, Musk is planning to change the core identity of Twitter, the blue bird. In a series of Tweets as well as on Twitter Spaces, Musk noted that he plans to "bid adieu to the Twitter brand and, gradually, all the birds”. This bodes in perfectly with Musk's plans to create an everything app that will include Twitter as well.

In his subsequent tweets, Musk noted that he will go live with with a new logo worldwide if a good enough X logo is posted tonight.

Our logo is our most recognizable asset. That’s why we’re so protective of it.

It remains to be seen if Twitter goes through with the change and how it will impact the company.

Twitter has seen a huge turmoil since its acquisition by billionaire Elon Musk late last year. With the company facing lawsuits from former employees, advertisers leaving the platform, security breach that allowed everyone to see Twitter Circle tweets, and multiple outages, it has been a rocky ride for Musk's latest experiment.

Recently, Fidelity released a report noting that Twitter is now worth around $15 Billion, one-third of what Elon Musk paid last year to buy the company.

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A type of solar panel known as a perovskite solar cell (PSC) has previously shown a lot of potential for use in space: It's lightweight and relatively affordable to make, and it converts solar radiation into electricity at a high level of efficiency.

However, it must also withstand the high-energy barrage of proton particles in space. The researchers behind the new study, from the University of Sydney and the Centre for Accelerator Science in Australia, think they're found a solution.

Prototype solar cells developed by the researchers. (University of Sydney)

"Space hardware will be exposed to proton radiation on these orbits," write the researchers in their published paper. "Therefore, it is of great interest to evaluate radiation stability for PSCs."

In lab conditions designed to simulate the effects of proton radiation across tens or even hundreds of years, the researchers tested ultrathin solar cell substrates suitable for use in satellites, the first time that materials with these properties had been tested like this.

The experiments found that the hole transport material (HTM) in the PSC was crucial to how much damage it could take and how well it could heal. The HTM facilitates the movement of holes (the absence of electrons) in solar cells, enabling them to stay separated and for electricity to be produced.

Two particular types of HTM and one type of dopant (a modifying substance applied to HTMs) were shown to be best at resisting proton radiation damage. Carefully configured, the HTM can also enable self-healing of the panels and all the way back up to 100 percent of their efficiency.

This healing is done through a process of annealing, or the application of heat in a vacuum, which could be powered by the Sun. In theory, solar radiation could repair these solar cells as well as power them.

Getting that working will take a lot more research, but this study shows that it's possible – that we could one day have spacecraft powered by solar panels that can repair themselves. Considering the high costs of going to space, that could make a huge difference.

"We hope that the insights generated by this work will help future efforts in developing low-cost lightweight solar cells for future space applications," says nanoscientist Anita Ho-Baillie from the University of Sydney.

The research has been published in Advanced Energy Materials.

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We have posted articles about some of the odder Microsoft products that the company has released over the decades. That includes a mouse-like joystick that was designed to play RTS games, and most recently an interactive Barney plush toy.

However, in doing some research for future articles, I came across a Microsoft product that actually should have been a successful one for the company. Well before smartphones were a thing, Microsoft decided to launch a cordless phone for the home office or business user. The big hook for this phone was that it was supposed to connect to your Windows PC for some extra features.

The company first announced the device, which had the unimaginative name Microsoft Cordless Phone System, on October 6, 1998. Here's the summary of what this could do from Microsoft's press release:

The Microsoft Cordless Phone System is a 900MHz telephone designed for consumers seeking a convenient, versatile tool for managing home-based personal and business calls. Developed by combining Microsoft’s software and hardware expertise, the Microsoft Cordless Phone System extends the functionality of the Caller ID service offered by regional telephone companies and provides some entirely new capabilities.

When you purchased the device, the box came with the cordless phone and its charging cradle. It also came with a base station that connected to both the phone line and the PC via a serial port. That was the main selling point of the phone, because the base station's connection to the PC also allowed it and the phone to use Microsoft's Call Manager software.

Here's some of what the Call Manager could do to add functionality to the cordless phone:

The software’s Enhanced Caller ID features allow users to create personalized greetings for different callers and block unwanted callers while letting high-priority callers ring through. The Caller ID Announce feature allows users to hear who’s calling through the handset speaker before picking up the phone.

The phone even supported simple voice commands, a la Siri, Alexa, or Cortana. Microsoft stated:

For example, by directing the telephone to “call Dad,” the system will recognize the command as an instruction to place a call to the number listed for “Dad.” Because the Microsoft voice-recognition technology in the Microsoft Cordless Phone System can correctly recognize voices from different users, it is unnecessary to “train” the voice-command functions.

Additional voice commands, such as “return the call” or “delete message,” allow users to navigate through telephone messages and pick them up easily, quickly and efficiently via the system’s handset.

The software also logged all outgoing or incoming calls. If you were away from home, and your phone received a voice message, the software could send an alert to your mobile phone or pager (yes, a pager), and then you could either use your cell phone or go to a pay phone, to retrieve that voice mail.

Here's a look at the PC system requirements for the Microsoft Cordless Phone:

To take full advantage of Microsoft Cordless Phone System features, users will need a PC with a Pentium 90 processor or higher running a Windows 95 or Windows 98 operating system. The PC must have an available serial port, 16 MB of available RAM (32 MB recommended), 30 MB to 100 MB of hard disk space, a CD-ROM drive, a 256-colour monitor and adapter, and a 16-bit Windows-compatible sound card with a microphone and speakers or headphones.

However, the Microsoft Cordless Phone was a sales bomb when it launched in 1998. One of the possible reasons for that was it was fairly pricey for a cordless phone at the time at $199.95.

Another reason is that, in order to get full use of all of its PC-enhanced capabilities, the PC always needed to be up and running and for the Call Manager software to be active as well. It's Caller ID features, along with its voice command and voice messaging system, couldn't work without the PC.

In the end, the Microsoft Cordless Phone came and went with almost no one noticing. While Microsoft continued to enter the phone markets with its various Windows Mobile/Phone efforts, and later with its Microsoft Teams Phone software, this first phone product is definitely a curiosity.

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If you’ve ever let out a string of curses while fumbling to control your car’s air conditioning because it’s buried under several menus in a dang touchscreen, you’re not alone. At a time when car companies are racing to outdo each other by slathering more and more tech onto their products, people are getting increasingly fed up with their car infotainment systems.

According to JD Power’s Automotive Performance, Execution and Layout (APEAL) Study, overall satisfaction among car owners is 845 (on a 1,000-point scale), a decrease of two points from a year ago and three points lower than in 2021. That’s the first time in the 28-year history of the study that the consumer research firm registered a consecutive year-over-year decline in owner satisfaction.

Unsurprisingly, more people are choosing not to use their car’s native infotainment controls. Only 56 percent of owners prefer to use their vehicle’s built-in system to play audio, down from 70 percent in 2020, JD Power found. Less than half of owners said they like using their car’s native controls for navigation, voice recognition, or to make phone calls.

That’s the first time in the 28-year history of the study that the consumer research firm registered a consecutive year-over-year decline in owner satisfaction

Naturally, it seems like most people are preferring to use smartphone-mirroring systems like Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, which have proven to be incredibly popular over the years. And indeed, there have been other surveys that indicate people prefer interacting with the apps on their phone than whatever cockamamie bullshit was cooked up by the company that made their car.

But it seems like people are warming up to native operating systems, as long as they’re developed by Google and not the automaker. JD Power found that models that have Android Automotive with Google Automotive’s operating system, AAOS, “score higher in the infotainment category than those with no AAOS whatsoever.”

But here’s where things get kind of weird: AAOS without Google Automotive Services (GAS) receives the lowest scores for infotainment of the three categories. Google Automotive Services refers to all the apps and services that come with the car when Google is built into the car — also known as “Google built-in.” Ford, GM, and Volvo have all said they will use GAS for their current and upcoming vehicles. Meanwhile, some Stellantis vehicles use Android Automotive but partner with other tech companies for their app services, like Amazon.

That’s surely music to GM’s ears, which recently made the controversial decision to block access to CarPlay and Android Auto in its future EV lineup in favor of a native Google infotainment system. If people are telling JD Power they like cars with GAS, or Google built-in, that could work in GM’s favor, depending on how they choose to move forward.

Naturally, it seems like most people are preferring to use smartphone-mirroring systems

Moving outside the car for a moment, respondents to JD Power’s survey are having some serious trouble with exteriors. It is the factor with the largest year-over-year decline, decreasing to 888 from 894. Satisfaction with exterior styling on new models in 2023 is particularly unremarkable, scoring only three points above carryover models. Frankly, I get it: a lot of cars look weird and bad. Bring back the Dodge Stealth. And no, not like that.

In terms of powertrain, electric vehicles are closing the gap with gas-powered models. The top three models in the compact SUV segment, according to JD Power, are all battery-electric: the Kia EV6 and Nissan Ariya are tied for first place, with the Mustang Mach-E coming in second. And BMW’s iX and i4 models both ranked highly in their respective categories.

Tesla continues to rank above average, but satisfaction is declining. The company earned a score of 878, making it one of the higher-performing brands in the industry. However, Tesla’s score in 2023 is nine points lower than a year ago, when the company was first included in the study. And satisfaction scores for Tesla are trending downward year over year in all 10 factors. The company isn’t eligible for JD Power’s award ranking because it doesn’t give JD Power access to owner information in the states where that permission is required by law.

That said, Tesla has not fared as well in past JD Power surveys in terms of initial quality. Here’s the methodology from JD Power for the survey:

The 2023 U.S. APEAL Study is based on responses from 84,555 owners of new 2023 model-year vehicles who were surveyed after 90 days of ownership. The study was fielded from February through May 2023, based on vehicles registered from November 2022 through February 2023.

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Who invented the Internet? As with many landmark inventions, it is often difficult to pinpoint just one creator.

Just as with the light bulb, the telephone, and the discovery of electricity, it would be amiss to not at least mention a number of scientists and inventors outside of the known name who played important roles in the Internet’s invention.

Throughout the years many different people can claim to have had a hand in the development of the Internet before it became the tool we know and love (and occasionally fear) today. Some significant names in the invention of the Internet include Tim Berners-Lee (see main image), Paul Baran, Lawrence Roberts, JCR Licklider, Leonard Kleinrock, Vinton Cerf, Robert Kahn, and others.

Here’s everything you need to know about who invented the internet.

Who invented the Internet?

British computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web, a key part of the Internet used today. He proposed the idea in March 1989, while working for CERN.

The World Wide Web was built on systems and coding such as HyperText Markup Language (HTML) that are still used to this day (URLs contain ‘www’ for a reason).

However, the World Wide Web is not the Internet itself but was instead developed as an information management system – joining together hypertext and the pre-existing earlier forms of the Internet and cross-network communication.

It was designed to act as a web of online information (hence the name), using a web-like string of hyperlinks made possible by the creation of the likes of HTML, HTTP, URLs, and web browsers. Berners-Lee certainly invented the web browser and created the world’s first website – info.cern.ch – on 20 December 1990, which was viewable at CERN.

The World Wide Web opened for public use in 1991, entering into general widespread use following 30 April 1993, when Berners-Lee’s invention entered the public domain and after his writing of the first version of HTML.

As Berners-Lee puts it, though, “most of the technology involved in the web, like the hypertext, like the Internet, multi-font text objects, had all been designed” before he “had to put them together.”

As Berners-Lee told us in 2021, he now considers his invention out of control.

"Ten years ago I would have said that humanity uses the web and if you look at humanity you’ll see good and bad stuff," he said.

"However, at a certain point, around 2016 [circa the Facebook-Cambridge Analytica data scandal], I realised it’s all very well if people I know are honing their bookmarks to have reliable, scientifically-based information, but there are a lot of people I don’t know who have very different bookmarks."

Below, we’ll go through the important steps and names in the development of the Internet which ultimately led to Tim Berners-Lee’s invention.

JCR Licklider

Licklider, a US psychologist and computer scientist, described his 'Galactic Network' concept in August 1962 in a series of memos. They detailed his vision for computers interconnected on a global level in which anyone can access data and programs from different sites.

While working for the US Department of Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) he convinced successors of this concept to carry on his work.

Leonard Kleinrock

Leonard Kleinrock poses beside the first Interface Message Processor (IMP) in the lab where the first Internet message was sent, at the University of California Los Angeles. Photo credit: Robyn Beck/AFP via Getty Images

Kleinrock, a US computer scientist, published a paper on his packet-switching theory in July 1961 and a book on the subject in 1964. His theory was that an online network could be created in which computers communicated through 'packets' of information, rather than through circuits.

This allowed two computers within MIT’s Lincoln Lab to communicate with one another for the first time in 1965.

Paul Baran

Baran, a polish-American engineer, proposed a communication network without a central command point, working with the US Air Force at RAND in the 1960s to develop a method of allowing network access points to communicate with one another without the need for a main one so that if one’s destroyed, they still have access to everything.

Lawrence Roberts

DARPA’s chief scientist worked with Paul Baran and Leonard Kleinrock’s ideas to create the distributed network.

He published his ideas on the ‘Advanced Research Projects Agency Network', or ARPANET, in 1967, detailing his plans for the computer network.

The first message between two ARPANET computers was sent from a UCLA research facility to one at Stanford University on 29 October 1969.

Vint Cerf and Robert Kahn

Cerf and Kahn developed the ‘Transmission Control Protocol and Internet Protocol’ (TCP/IP), which allows computers to communicate with each other across different networks.

It went public in 1974 and is still used today. Many consider the day ARPANET and the Defense Data Network officially shifted over to TCP/IP the birth date of the Internet, which happened on 1 January 1983.

This all means that by 1983 we already had cross-communications across different networks and the Domain Name System (DNS) was set up, giving us the likes of .com, .edu, .net, .org, and so on and so forth.

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The patient was a 39-year-old woman who had come to the emergency department at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. Her left knee had been hurting for several days. The day before, she had a fever of 102 degrees. It was gone now, but she still had chills. And her knee was red and swollen.

What was the diagnosis?

On a recent steamy Friday, Dr. Megan Landon, a medical resident, posed this real case to a room full of medical students and residents. They were gathered to learn a skill that can be devilishly tricky to teach — how to think like a doctor.

“Doctors are terrible at teaching other doctors how we think,” said Dr. Adam Rodman, an internist, a medical historian and an organizer of the event at Beth Israel Deaconess.

But this time, they could call on an expert for help in reaching a diagnosis — GPT-4, the latest version of a chatbot released by the company OpenAI.

Artificial intelligence is transforming many aspects of the practice of medicine, and some medical professionals are using these tools to help them with diagnosis. Doctors at Beth Israel Deaconess, a teaching hospital affiliated with Harvard Medical School, decided to explore how chatbots could be used — and misused — in training future doctors.

Instructors like Dr. Rodman hope that medical students can turn to GPT-4 and other chatbots for something similar to what doctors call a curbside consult — when they pull a colleague aside and ask for an opinion about a difficult case. The idea is to use a chatbot in the same way that doctors turn to each other for suggestions and insights.

For more than a century, doctor have been portrayed like detectives who gathers clues and use them to find the culprit. But experienced doctors actually use a different method — pattern recognition — to figure out what is wrong. In medicine, it’s called an illness script: signs, symptoms and test results that doctors put together to tell a coherent story based on similar cases they know about or have seen themselves.

If the illness script doesn’t help, Dr. Rodman said, doctors turn to other strategies, like assigning probabilities to various diagnoses that might fit.

Researchers have tried for more than half a century to design computer programs to make medical diagnoses, but nothing has really succeeded.

Physicians say that GPT-4 is different. “It will create something that is remarkably similar to an illness script,” Dr. Rodman said. In that way, he added, “it is fundamentally different than a search engine.”

Dr. Rodman and other doctors at Beth Israel Deaconess have asked GPT-4 for possible diagnoses in difficult cases. In a study released last month in the medical journal JAMA, they found that it did better than most doctors on weekly diagnostic challenges published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

But, they learned, there is an art to using the program, and there are pitfalls.

Dr. Christopher Smith, the director of the internal medicine residency program at the medical center, said that medical students and residents “are definitely using it.” But, he added, “whether they are learning anything is an open question.”

The concern is that they might rely on A.I. to make diagnoses in the same way they would rely on a calculator on their phones to do a math problem. That, Dr. Smith said, is dangerous.

Learning, he said, involves trying to figure things out: “That’s how we retain stuff. Part of learning is the struggle. If you outsource learning to GPT, that struggle is gone.”

At the meeting, students and residents broke up into groups and tried to figure out what was wrong with the patient with the swollen knee. They then turned to GPT-4.

The groups tried different approaches.

One used GPT-4 to do an internet search, similar to the way one would use Google. The chatbot spat out a list of possible diagnoses, including trauma. But when the group members asked it to explain its reasoning, the bot was disappointing, explaining its choice by stating, “Trauma is a common cause of knee injury.”

Another group thought of possible hypotheses and asked GPT-4 to check on them. The chatbot’s list lined up with that of the group: infections, including Lyme disease; arthritis, including gout, a type of arthritis that involves crystals in joints; and trauma.

GPT-4 added rheumatoid arthritis to the top possibilities, though it was not high on the group’s list. Gout, instructors later told the group, was improbable for this patient because she was young and female. And rheumatoid arthritis could probably be ruled out because only one joint was inflamed, and for only a couple of days.

As a curbside consult, GPT-4 seemed to pass the test or, at least, to agree with the students and residents. But in this exercise, it offered no insights, and no illness script.

One reason might be that the students and residents used the bot more like a search engine than a curbside consult.

To use the bot correctly, the instructors said, they would need to start by telling GPT-4 something like, “You are a doctor seeing a 39-year-old woman with knee pain.” Then, they would need to list her symptoms before asking for a diagnosis and following up with questions about the bot’s reasoning, the way they would with a medical colleague.

That, the instructors said, is a way to exploit the power of GPT-4. But it is also crucial to recognize that chatbots can make mistakes and “hallucinate” — provide answers with no basis in fact. Using it requires knowing when it is incorrect.

“It’s not wrong to use these tools,” said Dr. Byron Crowe, an internal medicine physician at the hospital. “You just have to use them in the right way.”

He gave the group an analogy.

“Pilots use GPS,” Dr. Crowe said. But, he added, airlines “have a very high standard for reliability.” In medicine, he said, using chatbots “is very tempting,” but the same high standards should apply.

“It’s a great thought partner, but it doesn’t replace deep mental expertise,” he said.

As the session ended, the instructors revealed the true reason for the patient’s swollen knee.

It turned out to be a possibility that every group had considered, and that GPT-4 had proposed.

She had Lyme disease.

Olivia Allison contributed reporting.

Gina Kolata writes about science and medicine. She has twice been a Pulitzer Prize finalist and is the author of six books, including “Mercies in Disguise: A Story of Hope, a Family's Genetic Destiny, and The Science That Saved Them.”  More about Gina Kolata

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Apple has been widely rumored to be developing a foldable MacBook and iPad for the last few years. Earlier rumors suggested a potential 2026 launch, but more recently, it was speculated the device could arrive as early as 2025.

However, new comments from Samsung Display's managing director, Baek Seung-in, indicate Apple still faces challenges in bringing a foldable hybrid model to market.

At an industry event in S. Korea, a Samsung executive highlighted improvements in the reliability of foldable displays but noted that problems remain compared to non-foldable displays. Apple is said to work with both Samsung and LG on foldable display development.

Samsung's Baek Seung-in's statement stated: (translated from Korean)

On the Samsung side, foldables are achieving their own success as new form factor products. Current laptops consist of the upper part of the screen and the lower part of the hardware and keyboard, but many companies (assuming Apple) are interested in displaying the entire [laptop].

Analysts say Apple is likely waiting until foldable screen technology matures before releasing its foldable MacBook or iPad. The company has a reputation for not being first to market but waiting to release more refined products once the technology has advanced.

While the rumored 20-inch foldable MacBook may not meet previous launch timelines, Apple is still actively pursuing the product. The company has patented foldable device designs, including a dual-display laptop concept like Microsoft's triple-display.

The foldable MacBook would represent Apple's first entry into the foldable device category, followed by a rumored iPhone Fold. But with foldable displays still facing durability challenges, Apple fans may need to wait a bit longer before the company's first foldable products become a reality.

Source: The Elec via Apple Insider

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What you need to know

• Ubisoft is a sizeable third-party publisher that makes Assassins Creed, Far Cry, Rainbow Six games, and more.
• A user posted an email from Ubisoft detailing the deletion of their account because it was deemed "too old."
• Ubisoft Support confirmed the email was genuine.
• If your account is deleted, you lose your games and other items tied to the account permanently. 

Ubisoft is one of the world's largest third-party publishers, creating franchises such as Far Cry, Assassin's Creed, Ghost Recon, Rainbow Six, and more. With these series comes an overwhelming amount of games associated with them. Assassin's Creed alone contains 12 purchasable games, with a 13th coming soon. All of these are purchasable or obtainable via Ubisoft Connect, Ubisoft's PC app. What if Ubisoft deleted your account? 

A user on Twitter posted the details of the following email, "We noticed that you have not been using your Ubisoft account associated with email address X. We have temporarily suspended your inactive Ubisoft account and will be closing it permanently in 30 days in accordance with our Terms of Use. If you wish to keep your Ubisoft account, you can cancel its closure by clicking on the Cancel button below before 2023-08-17."

At first glance, this seemed to be a standard phishing scam. Where you click the button in the email, log in, and you end up giving your credentials to others. You know the deal; this is what your spam folder is for. It turns out that the email was genuine.

Ubisoft Support replied, "Hey there. We just wanted to chime in that you can avoid the account closure by logging into your account within the 30 days (since receiving the email pictured) and selecting the Cancel Account Closure link contained in the email. We certainly do not want you to lose access to your games or account so if you have any difficulties logging in then please create a support case with us."

What? According to this, you'll lose access to your entire library of games if your account is deemed for deletion. This is tied to your games library on PC, Ubisoft store points, cross-progression systems, and more. Removing an account means you'd lose access to everything.

Honestly, this seems incredibly short-sighted and only gives people a reason never to purchase a game from Ubisoft. I spent years away from Division 2, only to come back at a later date. Had I not logged in, my account would have been deleted, which is outrageous. Whatever their magical timer determines when an account is too old, it needs to be set to infinite.

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