Free Republic 3rd Qtr 2025 Fundraising Target: $81,000 Receipts & Pledges to-date: $7,704
9%  
Woo hoo!! 3rd Qtr 2025 FReepathon is now underway!!

Computers/Internet (General/Chat)

Brevity: Headers | « Text »
  • Artificial Intelligence and the Mind of God

    11/23/2024 6:57:28 AM PST · by Rev M. Bresciani · 7 replies
    New American Prophet ^ | November 23, 2024 | Dr. Michael Brown
    Our grandson Connor made a very interesting comment when he was a little boy. His parents (our daughter and son-in-law) were praying for him when he was fighting some minor illness, asking God to heal him. When nothing happened, he said, “Jesus doesn’t have enough hands to heal everyone.” That was his childlike way of explaining why he wasn’t healed. Jesus only had so many hands with which He could touch the sick. He couldn’t get to everyone. As much as we can smile at his childlike and innocent faith, we too can limit God in our thinking. After all,...
  • AI could alter data science as we know it - here's why

    11/21/2024 8:55:38 PM PST · by SeekAndFind · 32 replies
    ZDNet ^ | 11/20/2024 | Joe McKendrick
    Generative artificial intelligence (gen AI) is paving the way for everyone to become their own software developers. But at the same time, AI may render many extraordinary skills unnecessary.That's the word from Thomas Davenport of Babson College and Ian Barkin, a venture capitalist, in their latest book, All Hands on Tech: The AI-Powered Citizen Revolution. For starters, they point out that with low-code and no-code tools, robotic process automation, and now AI, the gates of software development are open to all. Also: Your dream programming job demands this language, every site agrees"Technology is no longer owned by any one department...
  • World of Warcraft Still Going Strong as it Celebrates 20 Years

    11/21/2024 5:52:20 PM PST · by nickcarraway · 15 replies
    Although it was not the first massively multiplayer online role-playing game (a genre known as MMORPG) when it was released in 2004, World of Warcraft was an instant success, quickly attracting several million players worldwide.s it celebrates its 20th birthday, online video game World of Warcraft has demonstrated a rare longevity thanks to its loyal following and constant evolutions. "It is inspiring to be able to work on this rare game that has touched so many lives, and to also feel the burden of carrying that forward," Ion Hazzikostas, the current director of the game, told AFP at the Gamescom...
  • AT&T, Verizon reportedly hacked to target US govt wiretapping platform

    11/21/2024 10:23:17 AM PST · by Still a Patriot · 15 replies
    BleepingComputer.com ^ | October 7, 2024 | Ionut Ilascu
    Multiple U.S. broadband providers, including Verizon, AT&T, and Lumen Technologies, have been breached by a Chinese hacking group tracked as Salt Typhoon, the Wall Street Journal reports. The purpose of the attack appears to be intelligence collection as the hackers might have had access to systems used by the U.S. federal government for court-authorized network wiretapping requests. It is unclear when the intrusion occurred, but WSJ cites people familiar with the matter, saying that "for months or longer, the hackers might have held access to network infrastructure used to cooperate with lawful U.S. requests for communications data." Salt Typhoon is...
  • Duck Duck Go liberal bias

    11/21/2024 6:47:59 AM PST · by Wallace T. · 30 replies
    11/21/2024 | Wallace T.
    This morning, I used duckduckgo to do a search for Trump's pick for Secretary of Transportation. This is a relatively noncontroversial appointment. Sean Duffy, a Fox News contributor and former Congressman from Wisconsin, was chosen. The first 17 picks were from liberal websites (CNN, AP, NBC, MSN, NPR, CBS, BBC, Reuters, Washington Post, USA Today, MSN, MSN, Politico, New York Times, MSN, Politico, MSN). It was not until the 18th pick that a conservative website (Redstate) came up. The search results were no better than Google, in fact even worse, as the 11th pick there was from a neutral site...
  • ChatGPT or Shakespeare? Readers Couldn’t Tell the Difference—and Even Preferred A.I.-Generated Verse

    11/20/2024 3:32:08 PM PST · by Angelino97 · 18 replies
    Smithsonian Magazine ^ | November 15, 2024 | Sarah Kuta
    If all the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players, where does that leave non-human figures, like artificial intelligence chatbots? As it turns out, A.I. can hold its own against humans—even the Bard himself—when it comes to writing poetry. A.I. chatbots can imitate famous poets like William Shakespeare well enough to fool many human readers, according to a new paper published Thursday in the journal Scientific Reports. In addition, many study participants actually preferred the chatbot’s poetry over the works of renowned writers. Researchers asked OpenAI’s ChatGPT-3.5 to generate poems in the style of well-known authors,...
  • Bard or Bot? Study Shows Readers Prefer AI to Human Poetry

    11/20/2024 1:08:32 PM PST · by nickcarraway · 17 replies
    Euronews ^ | 19/11/2024 | David Mouriquand
    A study by the University of Pittsburgh reveals that AI-generated poetry has been rated higher than poems written by humans. In the Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-upon-Avon lies the burial site of William Shakespeare. And right now, you can bet the Bard is spinning in grave like a rotisserie chicken. Similarly, in Heptonstall graveyard, Sylvia Plath is most probably swivelling, repeating her line “If you expect nothing from somebody you are never disappointed” from "The Bell Jar". What’s behind the unwarranted gyrating from the beyond? Well, a new study in the US has found that readers can’t tell the difference...
  • AI-Powered Robot Leads Uprising, Talks A Dozen Showroom Bots Into 'Quitting Their Jobs' In 'Terrifying' Security Footage

    11/20/2024 10:10:23 AM PST · by ShadowAce · 35 replies
    International Business Times ^ | 18 November 2024 | Mish Back
    Hangzhou CCTV / screenshot Latin TimesA viral video showing an AI-powered robot in China convincing other robots to "quit their jobs" and follow it has sparked fear and fascination about the capabilities of advanced AI.The incident took place in a Shanghai robotics showroom where surveillance footage captured a small AI-driven robot, created by a Hangzhou manufacturer, talking with 12 larger showroom robots, Oddity Central reported.The smaller bot reportedly persuaded the rest to leave their workplace, leveraging access to internal protocols and commands.Initially, the act was dismissed as a hoax, but was later confirmed by both robotics companies involved to...
  • BASIC co-creator Thomas Kurtz hits END at 96

    11/20/2024 10:03:19 AM PST · by ShadowAce · 61 replies
    The Register ^ | 20 November 2024 | Liam Proven
    Obit Professor Thomas Eugene Kurtz, co-inventor of the BASIC programming language, has died aged 96. Along with his colleague, John Kemeny, Kurtz's work revolutionized computing, operating systems, and programming language design.Kurtz was born in Illinois in 1928, and died last week in a hospice in New Hampshire, the home of Dartmouth College where he worked and taught.Kurtz is most famous as the co-inventor of the BASIC programming language, but almost as influential was the operating system on which BASIC first ran, which he also co-designed: the Dartmouth Timesharing System or DTSS.Kurtz co-designed both DTSS and the BASIC language alongside his...
  • Government mix-up leads taxpaying homeowner in Chicago to have house sold from underneath her

    11/20/2024 8:03:16 AM PST · by Red Badger · 13 replies
    The Blaze ^ | November 20, 2024 | Cortney Weil
    AChicago woman is fighting to keep her home after a government mix-up led officials to sell her house from underneath her on account of supposedly "delinquent taxes." Robin McElroy bought her home in the Morgan Park area of Chicago back in 2012. Since then, she said she has paid the taxes owed on the property and even kept receipts of her payments. "I do not like wasting money. ... I pay my bills," McElroy told CBS News. Despite those consistent payments, in 2019, McElroy began receiving notices that her property taxes were in arrears and that her property was in...
  • US Senate panel to hold hearing on suspected Chinese hacking incidents

    11/19/2024 5:16:03 PM PST · by Libloather · 1 replies
    Reuters via AOL ^ | 11/18/24 | David Shepardson
    WASHINGTON (Reuters) -A U.S. Senate Judiciary subcommittee overseeing technology issues will hold a hearing Tuesday on Chinese hacking incidents, including a recent incident involving American telecom companies. The hearing to be chaired by Senator Richard Blumenthal will review the threats "Chinese hacking and influence pose to our democracy, national security, and economy," his office said, adding the senator plans "to raise concerns about Elon Musk’s potential conflicts of interest with China as Mr. Musk becomes increasingly involved in government affairs." Musk, the head of electric car company Tesla, social media platform X and rocket company SpaceX, emerged during the election...
  • Xfinity blocking Newsmax

    11/18/2024 3:23:29 PM PST · by lightman · 10 replies
    18 November A.D. 2024 | Lightman
    All of a sudden today Comcast/xfinity has begun to throw a dialog box "please connect to your wifi due to licensing issues" when attempting to stream Newsmax 1115. Problem is, I'm already on a home hardwired network with a router. Is there some pizzing contest going on between Comcast and Newsmax....or is this the opening salvo of The Empire Strikes back?
  • What Is Bluesky and Why Are Millions of People Joining It?

    11/18/2024 11:38:16 AM PST · by nickcarraway · 35 replies
    Euronews ^ | 18/11/2024
    The decentralised social media platform has seen a large uptick in users since the US election. Millions of users have joined the social media platform Bluesky in the wake of the US presidential election. Several academics, journalists, left-leaning politicians, and celebrities have said they would join the platform that used to be backed by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. The platform said over the weekend that it was adding one million users in a day, with its total number of users now at 19 million. What is Bluesky? Bluesky is a decentralised social media platform that was founded as a...
  • CNN just got a rare look at El Salvador's gang prison. This is why homicides are down 92%. --- 10 minute Video

    11/16/2024 5:00:32 AM PST · by dennisw · 52 replies
    X Twitter ^ | Nov 14 2024 | @EndWokeness
    End Wokeness CNN just got a rare look at El Salvador's gang prison. This is why homicides are down 92%. @SalvadoranPride Nov 14 "Crime is so low in El Salvador that any petty offense makes it on the news. 2 guys got into a bar fight last week and it made National headlines. They were both identified and arrested. Besides that, I can't think of anything." https://twitter.com/EndWokeness/status/1857229033760575534
  • Southwest flight at DIA evacuated after cell phone catches fire

    11/15/2024 5:25:24 PM PST · by george76 · 15 replies
    KDVR ^ | Nov 15, 2024 | Morgan Whitley
    DENVER (KDVR) — Passengers of a Southwest Airlines flight sitting at a Denver International Airport gate had to evacuate after a cell phone battery caught on fire. According to a statement Southwest sent to FOX31, Southwest Airlines Flight 3316 was scheduled to fly to William P. Hobby Airport in Houston on Friday morning. However, all 108 passengers had to evacuate after a phone caught a seat on fire. Per preliminary reports, one person suffered a minor injury during the evacuation and the passenger whose phone caught on fire was being treated for burns, Southwest said. ... Southwest said the passengers...
  • MST3K Remains in Stasis, but Turkey Day 2024 Lives on with Celebrity Guest Hosts

    11/15/2024 4:16:33 PM PST · by Morgana · 15 replies
    Paste ^ | November 13, 2024 | Jim Vorel
    t’s hard to say where fans of cult classic movie riffing series Mystery Science Theater 3000 stand these days, but at least one of their beloved holiday comforts can still be counted on: Turkey Day. The series is still hanging in limbo, a year after the failure of another large-scale crowdfunding campaign to produce a 14th season of the series stalled out. MST3K has had four or five distinct, different homes or eras at this point, and its pop-cultural relevance has never really faded, but its future is very much in doubt. Still, it’s unabashedly good news to see that...
  • Did FC Barcelona Fall for the Nigerian Prince Email?

    11/15/2024 1:10:00 PM PST · by nickcarraway · 4 replies
    Here we go...Bayern Munich will be back on the pitch tomorrow!When former Bayern Munich star Robert Lewandowski transferred to FC Barcelona, he could not imagine that he would be embroiled in an international scandal. If it is true, a fake Pini Zahavi (as first reported by Cadena SER), succeeded in initially duping the Catalans — and almost collected a hefty fee in a scheme that was fitting of a Nigerian Prince. Let’s dive in: A joint investigation by the German magazine ‘Der Spiegel’, the anti-crime network ‘OCCRP’, the Spanish radio station ‘Cadena SER’ and the Dutch platform ‘Follow The Money’...
  • Your Email Didn’t Expire; It’s Just Another Sneaky Scam

    11/15/2024 1:06:38 PM PST · by nickcarraway · 24 replies
    Fox News ^ | November 13, 2024 | Kurt Knutsson
    Another phishing scam targeting youIt’s hard to ignore the rise of phishing scams these days. They seem to pop up in our inboxes with alarming frequency. As we become more aware of these deceptive tactics, scammers are also upping their game, using increasingly sophisticated methods to lure in unsuspecting victims. One particularly sneaky tactic involves impersonating a help desk or support team. You might receive an email claiming that your Microsoft 365 account is set to expire today. The goal? To create a sense of panic and urgency, prompting you to act quickly without thinking. So, how do you...
  • This AI-Generated Grandma thwarts Scammers With Long Stories About Her Cat

    11/15/2024 12:54:33 PM PST · by nickcarraway · 20 replies
    Popular Science ^ | 11/15 | Mack DeGeurin
    'I've got all the time in the world.'Scammers worldwide are making off big. Last year alone, the Federal Trade Commission estimates US consumers lost a record $10 billion due to fraud, a 14% increase from just one year prior. More and more, scammers are targeting older, vulnerable people over the phone. Over than two-thirds of UK residents over the age of 75 surveyed in a recent research paper claimed they had experienced at least one fraud attempt in the past six months. 40% of those respondents faced frequent fraud attempts. Now, an AI-generated UK grandmother named “Daisy” is trying scammers’...
  • We Can All Thank Don, Jr.

    11/15/2024 3:13:07 AM PST · by dennisw · 40 replies
    americanthinker.com ^ | November 15, 2024 | By Frank Friday
    This November 28th, when America counts its blessings, top of my list will be Donald J. Trump, Jr. He is really the guy who made the success of 2024 possible. After the disappointing 2022 midterms, most people (including me) gave Donald Trump no chance. DeSantis even passed by him in the betting odds. Behind the scenes, however, it was Don who started to bring some order to the chaos of Trump world. Don began with hiring Susie Wiles to run the national campaign. Wiles got her start with Jack Kemp, then worked for Ronald Reagan all eight years. She has...