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Microsoft Uses Chinese Engineers To Maintain Defense Department Systems Under Minimal US Oversight

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Microsoft employs engineers in China to help maintain Defense Department computer systems, with U.S. citizens serving as "digital escorts" to oversee the foreign workers, according to a ProPublica investigation. The escorts often lack advanced technical expertise to police engineers with far more sophisticated skills, and some are former military personnel paid barely above minimum wage. "We're trusting that what they're doing isn't malicious, but we really can't tell," one current escort told the publication. The arrangement, critical to Microsoft winning federal cloud computing contracts a decade ago, handles sensitive but unclassified government data including materials that directly support military operations. Former CIA and NSA executive Harry Coker called the system a natural opportunity for spies, saying "If I were an operative, I would look at that as an avenue for extremely valuable access."

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InShaneee
30 minutes ago
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"Purge Palantir": Day of Action Protests Firm's Role in Gov't Surveillance, ICE & Genocide in Gaza

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Protesters across the United States targeted Palantir Monday in a day of action focused on the technology company’s work with ICE, facilitating President Trump’s expanding immigration crackdown, and work with the Israeli military. New York police arrested at least four people Monday after demonstrators blocked the entrance to the company’s Manhattan offices. Democracy Now! spoke to protesters, including some who work in the technology sector, about the “Purge Palantir” campaign and how Palantir’s data mining, surveillance and automation tools are being weaponized against vulnerable communities. We speak with Wired senior writer Makena Kelly, who has been covering Palantir and says many Silicon Valley firms are “trying to find opportunity in this chaos” as the Trump administration slashes government services and pursues mass deportations.

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InShaneee
2 hours ago
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Google Nerfs Second Pixel Phone Battery This Year

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: For the second time in a year, Google has announced that it will render some of its past phones almost unusable with a software update, and users don't have any choice in the matter. After nerfing the Pixel 4a's battery capacity earlier this year, Google has now confirmed a similar update is rolling out to the Pixel 6a. The new July Android update adds "battery management features" that will make the phone unusable. Given the risks involved, Google had no choice but to act, but it could choose to take better care of its customers and use better components in the first place. Unfortunately, a lot more phones are about to end up in the trash. [...] Pixel 4a units contained one of two different batteries, and only the one manufactured by a company called Lishen was downgraded. For the Pixel 6a, Google has decreed that the battery limits will be imposed when the cells hit 400 charge cycles. Beyond that, the risk of fire becomes too great -- there have been reports of Pixel 6a phones bursting into flames. Clearly, Google had to do something, but the remedies it settled on feel unnecessarily hostile to customers. It had a chance to do better the second time, but the solution for the Pixel 6a is more of the same. [...] When Google killed the Pixel 4a's battery life, it offered a few options. You could have the battery replaced for free, get $50 cash, or accept a $100 credit in the Google Store. However, claiming the money or free battery was a frustrating experience that was rife with fees and caveats. The store credit is also only good on phones and can't be used with other promotions or discounts. And the battery swap? You'd better hope there's nothing else wrong with the device. If it has any damage, like cracked glass, it may not qualify for a free battery replacement. Now we have the Pixel 6a Battery Performance Program with all the same problems. Pixel 6a owners can get $100 in cash or $150 in store credit. Alternatively, Google offers a free battery replacement with the same limits on phone condition. This is all particularly galling because the Pixel 6a is still an officially supported phone, with its final guaranteed update coming in 2027. Google also pulled previous software packages for this phone to prevent rollbacks. [...] If you have a Pixel 6a, the battery-killing update is rolling out now. You'll have no choice but to install it if you want to remain on the official software. Google has a support site where you can try to get a free battery swap or some cash.

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InShaneee
3 days ago
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Type Help is a perfect example of why mystery games are so damn good right now

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Every Friday, A.V. Club staffers kick off the weekend by taking a look at the world of gaming, diving in to the ideas that underpin the hobby we love with a bit of Game Theory. We’ll sound off in the space above, and invite you to respond down in the comments, telling us what you’re playing this weekend, and what theories it’s got you kicking around.


There are few moments, in gaming or life, more sublime than when true understanding sets in. You’re staring at a series of seemingly unconnected muddled clods of information, splattered down on the canvas in no apparently logical or discernible order—and then, with a sudden twist of the brain, the picture comes into perfect relief. My epiphany addiction is a big reason I’m such a sucker for a good detective game—and why I’m so incredibly excited when I stumble onto a really good one that fell through the cracks upon initial release.

All of which is to say that I’m bleary-eyed and sleep-deprived as I write out this column specifically because I was up way too late last night playing William Rous’ Type Help. Rous’ freely available itch.io game, released earlier this year, has pretty much nothing in the way of bells or whistles: It’s got text, a parser, a few colored fonts, and that’s it. But it’s also one of my favorite mystery games I’ve encountered in some time, diving deep into a genre that’s been gaining welcome prominence in recent years, and which I’ve come to think of as “comprehension mysteries”: Games where the goal isn’t to solve explicit puzzles, or even catch crooks or killers, but to gain a full understanding of a complex story full of moving and complicated parts.

Type Help isn’t shy about its influences: Rous’ introduction to the game notes that he was inspired by foundational comprehension mysteries like The Return Of The Obra Dinn and, most especially, Sam Barlow’s Her Story, which helped formalize the genre. Like Her StoryType Help is a game about coaxing a (deliberately) obtuse information archiving system into serving up scenes that slowly sketch out a story, often in non-chronological order. Rather than full-motion video, though, your unseen detective is pouring through transcripts of audio recorded from the night everyone in Galley House mysteriously died; in that sense (and in its minimalist design) the game bears a small resemblance to last year’s No Case Should Remain Unsolved. Early struggles center almost entirely around learning to navigate the game’s systems—with the first big hurdle being figuring out why file names in the fictitious computer system you’re poking around in are formatted in their very specific way. (If the thought of achieving the sort of telepathy that’s part and parcel of figuring out why the computer’s former owner used such a weird system to archive their information doesn’t tickle your brain, then our brains work very differently. I issued more happy little “hms” while diving into this stuff than I have in any game since The Roottrees Are Dead.) Once you’ve overcome that first “puzzle,” you’re off: Tracing numerous characters through the mansion, listening in on hidden conversations, and slowly building an understanding of the awful events that happened in the House.

The pleasure of the comprehension mystery—in abundant supply here—is that it frequently skips over more traditional puzzle design in favor of a more holistic need to understand. Older detective games—for instance, Capcom’s excellent but occasionally hair-pulling Ace Attorney games—often test players’ understanding by asking specific questions that have to be filled in; get out of step with the designer on even a single one, and it can constitute a roadblock. Type Help, though, encourages you to think through its overarching questions from as many different angles as possible. Finding new information often relies on keeping track of the game’s dwindling cast of characters: Who they’re talking to, as well as where and when. You can follow the breadcrumbs (if someone says they’ll be in the kitchen next, it’s generally safe to assume you can start trying to hunt down a scene of them talking to people who tend to congregate there). But you can also work backwards: If you’ve accounted for the presence of everybody except two characters in a particular block of time, there’s every chance that they’re off somewhere having a quiet chat, with finding out as simple as running a newly informed search.

This blend of inferences and deductions is thrilling; following the line of “Well, if that’s true, then…” while weeding out the game’s many red herrings—we’re told, from the jump, that “There are no ghosts in Galley House!”—produces numerous moments where confusion solidifies into suspicion and then, blissfully, into epiphany. In this sense, the game’s almost total lack of aesthetic touches is as much a boon as a deficit: Seeing a new file pop up from a carefully crafted search is a bigger explosion in the brain than any number of graphical flourishes could have been. (Although I do, personally, recommend finding some kind of ambient or classical soundtrack to play alongside the game, which lacks any traditional music of its own.)

And if “a completely graphic-free game” is too much of a hard sell for you, but you’re still intrigued by the game’s premise, you’re in luck. Last month, Rous announced that he’d been approached by Robin “Evil Trout” Ward—the same designer who took The Roottrees Are Dead from its browser-based roots and extended it to a far more polished Steam version—about giving Type Help a similar treatment. Personally, I couldn’t wait a year (the game’s due out in 2026) to play through a mystery this good, and Rous has promised that he’s writing new material for the expanded version, now titled The Incident At Galley House. But it’s great to see hidden gems like this getting this kind of remaster treatment; I’ll take a thousand projects like this one over every “We turned the framerate slightly up for the new console!” package that big-budget gaming rolls out with frustrating regularity. Really, anything that gets a mystery like this in front of more of my fellow epiphany addicts is an obvious good, in my book.



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InShaneee
3 days ago
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R.I.P. James Carter Cathcart, Pokémon voice actor of 25 years

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James Carter Cathcart has died. For more than 25 years, Cathcart filled out the wider Kanto Region, appearing in the many Pokémon movies and TV shows, and eventually voicing long-running characters Professor Oak and Meowth for the franchise’s English-language dubs. Per Variety and confirmed by his castmates, Cathcart died of throat cancer. He was 71.

Born in New Jersey on March 8, 1954, Cathcart spent his younger years playing keyboards for The Laughing Dogs. The power pop group formed in the mid-70s and quickly found a spot at CBGB’s, playing alongside Patti Smith and Blondie. But Cathcart would also find himself behind the keyboard for jazz great Dave Brubeck and a pre-“Piña Colada” Rupert Holmes. Later in his music career, he’d co-write the Ace Frehley track “Remember Me” for Ace Frehley’s post-Kiss 1989 solo album Trouble Walkin’.

By 1986, Cathcart began his anime career, providing the voice for Exanon in the English-language dub of Gall Force: Eternal Story. Over the next decade, he continued lending his voice to Japanese animation, appearing in English casts for The Ping-Pong Club, The Slayers, and Ultraman: Tiga. But it was his role in 1998’s Pokémon: The First Movie that would determine his career going forward. Over the next 25 years, and across more than a dozen movies, Cathcart voiced loads of Pokémon characters, including Fergus, Team Rocket’s James, Snorlax, Meowth, Slowpoke, and Professor Oak. During this time, he appeared on Yu-Gi-Oh!, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Sonic X. His final film role, Pokémon The Movie: Secrets Of The Jungle, was released in 2020. Before his 2023 retirement, one could say Cathcart caught ’em all or at least came close, appearing in more than 700 episodes of Pokémon.



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InShaneee
3 days ago
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IKEA Ditches Zigbee For Thread Going All In On Matter Smart Homes

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IKEA is relaunching its smart home line with over 20 new Matter-over-Thread devices that will work across ecosystems such as Apple Home and Amazon Alexa, with or without IKEA's own hub. This marks a major shift toward openness, affordability, and interoperability, and positions IKEA as one of the first major retailers to bring Matter to the mainstream while maintaining backward compatibility with Zigbee products. The Verge reports: We don't have a lot of details on the over 20 new devices coming next year, but [David Granath of IKEA of Sweden] confirmed that they are replacing existing functions. So, new smart bulbs, plugs, sensors, remotes, buttons, and air-quality devices, including temperature and humidity monitors. They will also come with a new design. Although "not necessarily what's been leaked," says Granath, referring to images of the Bilresa Dual Button that appeared earlier this year. He did confirm that some new product categories will arrive in January, with more to follow in April and beyond, including potentially Matter-over-Wi-Fi products. Pricing will be comparable to or lower than that of previous products, which start under $10. "Affordability remains a key priority for us." "The premium to make a product smart is not that high anymore, so you can expect new product types and form factors coming," he says. "Matter unlocks interoperability, ease of use, and affordability for us. The standardization process means more companies are sharing the workload of developing for this." Despite the move away from Zigbee, IKEA is keeping Zigbee's Touchlink functionality. This point-to-point protocol allows devices to be paired directly to each other and work together out of the box, without an app or hub -- such as the bulb and remote bundles IKEA sells. This means older Zigbee remotes can control the newer Thread bulbs and vice versa, retaining backward compatibility with its Tradfri line. "Touchlink and Matter will coexist in new products," says Granath. "It's still very important for IKEA -- not everyone wants an app or hub." Interestingly, IKEA's new Matter-over-Thread products will also work without the IKEA hub or app, as they can be set up directly in any compatible Matter smart home ecosystem, such as Apple Home, Amazon Alexa, Google Home, Samsung SmartThings, Home Assistant, and others.

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InShaneee
5 days ago
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