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A new exhibition at the Mauritshuis museum in The Hague, Netherlands, shows how Johannes Vermeer’s masterpiece, Girl with a Pearl Earring, has changed over time. Using the latest imaging technology, including a new 108-billion-pixel scan by 3D digital microscopy company Hirox, researchers were able to better understand what this work may have looked like when Vermeer first painted it around 1665. “We found out some really exciting things about the girl,” says painting conservator Abbie Vandivere at the Mauritshuis. “For instance, that the background used to be a green curtain, and that she has eyelashes that are now no longer...

The numbers: For the first time in nearly a year, home builders are upbeat about the housing market outlook.The shortage of previously-owned sales is helping to buoy builders’ confidence.With mortgage rates above 6%, many homeowners find little incentive to sell—nearly 92% have an outstanding mortgage with a rate below 6%, according to a recent survey conducted by Redfin a brokerage and real estate listings company. And 23.5% of homeowners have a mortgage rate of less than 3%. Consequently, the number of new home listings has dropped by 22%, as compared with the same period a year ago, according to a...

There's a simple application that can be installed to give that sound a boost. This application is called EasyEffects and is the successor to PulseEffects. EasyEffects supports the new PulseAudio replacement, Pipewire -- and includes all the right plugins you need to make your digital sounds come alive. ... With EasyEffects you can adjust things like: Blend Harmonics Scope EQ Balance Levels In many cases, all you have to do is add/remove different plugins until you get the exact sound you want. Many of the plugins allow you to fine-tune the sound, but I've found that some of them are...

A McDonald’s worker shared her reaction when customers request separate orders in the drive-thru in a viral TikTok. The seven-second video featured TikTok user @thatghanagal. She wore a headset while chewing gum. The text overlay read, “’I have two separate orders.’” An audio played, “Everyone knows that. Like, you to any place, you say,” followed by a heavy sigh, which the worker lip-synced. “Go ahead,” she mouthed, rolling her eyes. The content creator elaborated more on this in the caption, writing, “I hate the people that be tryna place 3 orders.” The Daily Dot reached out to @thatghanagal via Instagram...

Reddit CEO compares volunteer moderators to “gentry” as blackout continues Ongoing blackouts have continued several days beyond their original 48-hour windowIn a series of interviews, Reddit CEO Steve Huffman has acknowledged an ongoing Reddit blackout has caused a “fair amount of trouble,” but has no plans to walk back the site’s controversial changes to pricing. READ MORE: The 8 best PC games you need to play in 2023 Earlier in the week, thousands of Reddit’s largest subreddits — including gaming communities r/PS5, r/Terraria, /rEscapeFromTarkov and r/Gaming— switched to an inaccessible private mode as part of an organised blackout. The blackout...

@joerogan Again, I’m going to ask you very clearly, are you willing to debate @RobertKennedyJr on my podcast? RE: @PeterHotez Joe if you are serious about addressing vaccines + the fact that 200,000 unvaccinated Americans needlessly perished during our awful delta/BA.1 Covid waves (including 40,000 in our state of Texas) because they fell victims to vaccine disinformation: I want to have that discussion @joerogan To those misunderstanding what he’s saying, he’s NOT agreeing to debate @RobertKennedyJr He’s just offering to come on my show by himself.

Cuneiform is the oldest known form of writing, but it is so difficult to read that only a few hundred experts around the world can decode the clay tablets filled with wedge-shaped symbols. Now, a team of archaeologists and computer scientists from Israel has created an AI-powered translation program for ancient Akkadian cuneiform, allowing tens of thousands of already digitized tablets to be translated into English instantaneously. Globally, libraries, museums, and universities have more than half a million clay tablets inscribed with cuneiform. But the sheer number of texts, and the tiny number of Akkadian readers — a language no...

An ex-cybercriminal has warned of the dangers children face online after getting tangled up in scams himself at the age of 12. The man in his 20s, referred to only as 'Harry', has expressed regrets over previous offences, having tricked computer gamers out of thousands during his younger years. These harmful scams took off at a time when Harry was keen to make pocket money, with no option to get a job of his own. But with children now increasingly fixated on the virtual world, he says that protections are vital to ensure they are sheltered from dark practices. 'As...

Obama says he's been target of 'deepfakes,' predicts next election cycle will be rife with false infoFormer President Barack Obama suggested in a new interview the development of "digital fingerprints" to combat misinformation and distinguish between true and misleading news for consumers.Obama sat down with his former White House senior adviser David Axelrod for a conversation on the latter's podcast, "The Axe Files," on CNN Audio. During the interview, Axelrod noted he's seen "misinformation, disinformation, [and] deepfakes" targeting Obama."As I've told people, because I was the first digital president when I left office, I was probably the most recorded, filmed,...

I’ve only been in an ICU once as a patient. I developed sudden chest pain and went to the ER. The funny thing about chest pain is that it gets you right to the front of the line at the ER. I had been there on a previous visit with a deep cut on my hand and had to sit with my hand over a garbage can so I wouldn’t get blood all over the floor. As it later turned out, the chest pain was actually caused by an ulcer that was creating reflux. The ulcer was caused by my...

A man in Georgia who was denied access to his Facebook account, where many of his personal photos were stored online, took action against the company — and won, according to a report. Jason Crawford, of Columbus, said Facebook "terminated" his account for "no valid reason" and then refused to work with him on rectifying the situation, so he sued them, FOX 5 Atlanta reported. "I just think it's bad business practice. It's a crappy way to treat people. At least tell me what I did wrong," Crawford told the local station. Crawford repeatedly reached out to Facebook's parent company...

Anonymous: The entire banking system will be destroyed within 48 hours

Jack Teixeira’s defense team said that their client no longer had access to classified material and the government was exaggerating the threat he posed. Jack Teixeira, the US airman accused of leaking top-secret Pentagon documents in an online chat forum, was slapped with additional federal charges on Thursday [June 15, 2023]. The charges are in addition to the two counts filed by prosecutors against Teixeira after his arrest in April.

European Union regulators hit Google with fresh antitrust charges Wednesday, saying the only way to satisfy competition concerns about its lucrative digital ad business is by selling off parts of the tech giant’s main moneymaker. The unprecedented decision to push for such a breakup marks a significant escalation by Brussels in its crackdown on Silicon Valley digital giants, and follows a similar move by U.S. authorities seeking to bust Google’s alleged monopoly on the online ad ecosystem. The European Commission, the bloc’s executive branch and top antitrust enforcer, said its preliminary view after an investigation is that “only the mandatory...

Turns out this AI tool is smart enough to leave off that polarizing pineappleAl Vallorz, the creative co-owner of Tony & Alba’s Pizza & Pasta, is always looking for an edge, something fun to keep diners interested and coming back for more. For years, the San Jose chef-restaurateur has designed a pizza of the month — like October’s popular bratwurst and gouda; figs and blue cheese in August; and turkey, brie and cranberry sauce for November. To maintain high spirits during the pandemic, he shared puns with customers. Oh, and he makes a James Bond-style pasta dish, a “shaken, not...

a hand holding a film-like brain implant Credit: Precision Neuroscience A startup founded by a former Neuralink exec is developing a safer, easier-to-place brain implant — and it just tested the device in people for the first time. Brain implants: Almost everything you think and do comes down to tiny pulses of electricity zipping between the 120 billion neurons in your brain. Brain implants give us a way to see this activity with far more precision than any device outside of the skull, like an EEG or MRI. By pairing this brain implant data with advanced computer algorithms, researchers have...

Amidst the expansion of the world wide web, cloud computing, large dataset, software, mobile applications, social media, gaming… companies big and small are relying on highly-specialized IT experts.Indeed, for businesses wanting to keep up, finding top tech talent is a priority—and can be an uphill struggle. Many are after high-demand technical skills, from software development to data-oriented knowhow, according to our 2023 Tech Hiring Survey.We asked our panel of recruiters which positions they predict will be the most difficult to fill in 2023. Here’s their top 10:Full-stack developersBack-end developersDevOpsArchitectsApplication engineersFront-end developersData scientists or Machine Learning specialistsCybersecurity engineerTesterMobile developerWhy are these...

Low housing inventory will squeeze prices higher, according to Zillow's chief economist. Skylar Olsen now expects home prices to jump 5% in 2023. Falling supply “is a big, huge, massive part of the picture,” she said. Reduced supply is going to help the housing market overturn much of Wall Street's gloomy forecasts and rack up another year of solid gains, according to Zillow's chief economist. Skylar Olsen said Monday that she's expecting home prices to have climbed 5% year-on-year by the end of 2023, due to dwindling inventory levels. Declining inventory "is a big, huge, massive part of the picture,"...

If you ever wanted to add something to Wikipedia, but didn't know how. Maybe you even just wanted to fix a typo. Here's a brief introduction to editing on the site: - Start small and simple, and edit what you know best. That will build your essential editing skills and your confidence. Make small edits on subjects you know very well -- such as your hometown, or something you have an interest in. You might find a small error on one of those pages, or you might be able to add a little extra information. Many Wikipedia pages can be...

Deep fakes are often very humorous but can be scary when you realize that you cannot trust what you see with your own eyes on any video these days. https://youtu.be/THOXG-5rSk8