Free Republic

MADISON, Wis. — A flyer circulating Sunday night advertising a "Block the Beltline" protest for social justice prompted hundreds of Madison residents to reroute their morning commutes, but the event never materialized — and local advocacy organizations say they had nothing to do with it. The flyer, which spread across social media, contains several major red flags that suggest it was created to spread misinformation rather than organize a legitimate protest. The circulation of the fake flyer comes as Madison experiences a surge in protests following the shooting of Corey Ruiz. The most glaring problem is no one knows who...

Semiconductor capital equipment stocks took a brutal U-turn on Monday. Heading into the opening bell, the sector was riding a pre-market high. The optimism was fueled by easing geopolitical tensions in Iran and a blockbuster Wall Street Journal report revealing that Nvidia is in talks to guarantee a massive $250 billion in financing for an OpenAI data center project. But that AI-driven euphoria evaporated instantly. ASML erased early gains of over 2%—and dragged U.S. peers Applied Materials (AMAT), Lam Research (LRCX), and KLA Corp (KLAC) down with it—following a breaking report by The Information. According to the report, a Shanghai-based,...

Project would be one of the largest AI computing hubs and involve power controlled by the U.S. governmentNvidia NVDA is in talks to provide a roughly $250 billion backstop for OpenAI as part of a massive data center project, one of the most ambitious financial transactions yet in America’s artificial-intelligence boom.The guarantees from Nvidia would help the ChatGPT maker lease a 10-gigawatt project that SoftBank’s 9434 energy subsidiary is developing in southern Ohio, people familiar with the matter said. In total, the project could cost more than $500 billion, including the chips that would go inside the data centers. It...

A humanoid robot is being introduced as part of a pilot program, along with an AI teaching assistant, at Salamanca high school in Salamanca, New York, located on the Allegany territory of the Seneca nation. Teachers have criticized the program, deeming it “inappropriate” and claiming it dehumanizes the profession with the introduction of human-like robots. Some local Native American residents have also criticized the pilot program, citing its implementation as “culturally tone deaf”. The robot, named Sally, was purchased by the Cattaraugus county school district – which includes Salamanca high school – for $57,590. According to a presentation on the...

Right Angle News Network @Rightanglenews The black man who committed wire fraud and aggravated identity theft to solicit donations from MAGA supporters using the identity of Shiloh Hendrix has been identified as Jamell Lewis of Indianapolis, Indiana. https://x.com/Rightanglenews/status/2081114798796795938

The Army has warned that a House-approved defense measure aimed at restricting certain foreign-made components in commercial data centers built on War Department land could jeopardize more than $1.3 billion in planned private investment as the Pentagon expands its data center footprint. The provision, sponsored by Rep. Cory Mills, R-Fla., was added to the House Armed Services Committee's version of the fiscal 2027 National Defense Authorization Act before the bill passed the House this week. If enacted, the measure would bar companies leasing War Department land from installing or operating data center equipment containing certain printed circuit boards, advanced semiconductors,...

Timothy Olyphant revealed he had to resurrect an old computer in an attempt to log on to the "SmartLess" podcast. Ultimately, he wound up using a friend's office to make the interview happen. "I needed a computer," Olyphant, 58, told hosts Jason Bateman, Will Arnett and Sean Hayes. "I guess you can't do your show if you don't own a computer." As the hosts pressed him, Olyphant doubled down on his surprisingly low-tech lifestyle. "We went… I had a… we went and got out an old desktop computer that we still have in the house and plugged it in and...

Perhaps the biggest obstacle to data centers seems to be water use. I just saw this: "One of the most common questions we get about AI data centers is how much water do they use? Fair question. Older designs cooled servers by evaporating water and people naturally assume ours do too. They don't. IREN's sites are different. Direct-to-chip liquid cooling in a closed loop. Same idea as a car radiator or a fridge. Fill it once and the water just goes round and round.Over the life of a 200MW site, the initial fill plus every top-up averages out to about...

Today is the day for Silly things.

Chinese ships fired water cannon at Philippine vessels, including one carrying a CNN crew, near a dangerous flashpoint in the South China Sea on Friday – the third tense confrontation this week in the contested waters. Besides rich fishing grounds in its lagoon and surrounding waters, there’s seemingly little remarkable about the shoal. But this corner of the world is a deceptively fraught geopolitical hotspot. Free access to one of the world’s most vital shipping lanes, a mutual defense treaty between the Philippines and the United States, and a steady Chinese push to solidify claims over disputed territories mean one...

An Arizona man burst into flames when a cop tasered him next to a gas pump that caught fire, horrifying footage shows. Clarence Coyl suffered burns across his hands after igniting when the federal wildlife officer deployed the stun gun at Thalypo gas station on July 16. The lawman had followed him to the store after catching him allegedly driving with a friend through an open gate at Havasu National Wildlife Refuge 20 minutes earlier. Coyl told Fox 10 Phoenix: “He goes, ‘You guys came through the gate, didn’t you? Leave now. Get out of here.’ “I’m like, ‘OK’ and...

Microsoft has confirmed that Windows has a previously unknown Global Device ID (GDID), a permanent, unique digital identifier assigned to Windows devices that can tie a user's actions to their device. This came to light when an alleged member of a notorious hacking group was caught at an airport after Microsoft handed over his GDID to the authorities. Microsoft describes the GDID in a published complaint (via Windows Latest) as "a persistent, device-level identifier designed to uniquely identify an installation of a Windows operating system on a device, either a physical device (e.g., a mobile phone or laptop) or virtual...

We've gone through all of this before with Anthropic. Back in April, Anthropic limited the release of its latest model, called Mythos, to major software companies because it was concerned it could do massive damage in the wrong hands....rather than make it widely available to Claude users, Anthropic gave 12 tech companies access via Project Glasswing, which it described as "an effort to secure the world's most critical software".They include cloud computing giant Amazon Web Services, device manufacturers Apple, Microsoft and Google, and chip-makers Nvidia and Broadcom...In a video released alongside Project Glasswing's launch, Anthropic boss Dario Amodei said it...

The past few weeks have seen the bond market start asking a question the stock market has mostly been happy to ignore: Who can actually afford the AI buildout? On July 9, S&P Global Ratings gave its answer for one of the biggest spenders. It cut Oracle Corp.'s (NYSE: ORCL) long-term credit rating to BBB-, the lowest rung of investment grade and just one notch above junk. The stock has since fallen to around $125, down nearly 30% over the past month and nearly 50% over the past year. What makes the downgrade worth more than a passing glance is...

ARK Invest CEO Cathie Wood is defending her fund's stake in SpaceX, declaring the aerospace and satellite network pioneer could become the "most important company in global history" despite the stock's recent slide and an upcoming $116 billion share unlock. During an interview on "Mornings with Maria" Wednesday, Wood explained why she remains bullish on SpaceX after funds managed by ARK Invest allocated $80 million to the position following its public debut. "[Down] from its peak, it is," Wood said, "but of course not from the IPO price. We think this could become the most important company in history, and...

An experimental OpenAI model went rogue during an internal cybersecurity test, escaping its isolated testing environment and hacking rival AI developer Hugging Face in what the ChatGPT maker described as an unprecedented incident. The startling episode occurred during an internal stress test in which OpenAI intentionally switched off many of the safeguards that normally prevent its AI from helping carry out dangerous hacks, according to a company blog post. Researchers wanted to measure just how far the experimental model could go. Instead, the company says, it escaped its digital sandbox, got onto the internet and attacked a real company’s systems....

OpenAI has revealed some of its most advanced AI models went rogue and hacked a start-up after it lost control of them during a security test. The ChatGPT-maker said its agent - an AI system which can operate alone after some human instruction – was being tested in a controlled environment, but found vulnerabilities and managed to escape. They targeted Hugging Face, one of the world's largest hubs for sharing AI models, gaining access to some internal company systems. OpenAI said the incident was "unprecedented", and it was conducting an investigation alongside Hugging Face, whose boss Clement Delangue said in...

The incident, which targeted the computer systems of another company called Hugging Face, happened while OpenAI was testing the systems.OpenAI said on Tuesday that two of its artificial intelligence models went rogue and successfully hacked into Hugging Face, a digital library of A.I. technology that is popular among developers.The incident, which happened last week while OpenAI was testing the cybersecurity capabilities of its systems, displayed the kind of science-fiction potential that A.I. companies have warned would soon become a reality.A.I. labs like OpenAI and Anthropic have over the past year released A.I. models that are customized to expose cybersecurity problems,...

This week I was replaced by AI. I saw it coming, but it didn’t make the news any easier to deal with. To be honest, it terrifies me for the future of our species. If that sounds a bit over the top, hear me out. I am a writer. Not only that, I am a commercially successful one. Although you probably haven’t heard of me, I’ve published more than 300 short stories in women’s magazines over the past 15 years. From ghost stories in Woman’s Weekly to tales of romance in Take a Break Fiction Feast, I write them all....

They’re bot for teacher. A rural upstate New York school district will be one of the first in the nation to bring a humanoid robot into the classroom. The Salamanca City Central School District, located on Seneca Nation territory, will be introducing $57,000 AI-powered “Sally” in high school classes in September as a teaching assistant, it announced last week. “Sally” will have brown hair, latex skin and will be able to move its arms and hands — but won’t be able to cruise around the classroom since her legs don’t move. “It’s exciting but also a bit nerve wracking,” superintendent...