SoylentNews

An Anonymous Coward writes:

As part of a Free Software Foundation internship, developer Alyssa Rosenzweig has released a python3 script intended to allow users to make PayPal payments without using the proprietary ECMAScript normally associated with its usage. From the FSF's blog:

My third and final project was still more ambitious. As you may know from my work with Panfrost, the free software driver for modern Mali GPUs, I enjoy liberating critical proprietary software by decoding its internal protocols and reimplementing them in freedom. So, we looked around for latent proprietary software involved with FSF operations. Although we eat our own dog food, there was one proprietary system that could not be ignored: PayPal, which recently began requiring nonfree JavaScript. Pah. Enter Pagamigo. (In Calculus, this is formally known as a p-series.)

Pagamigo liberates the proprietary software required to donate to organizations like the FSF or the Debian Project via PayPal. Soon, the FSF Web pages that take online payments will include instructions for using Pagamigo.

Usage is straightforward, however your password may be stored in cleartext in your command history:

We had two submissions about this just-announced story.

Nvidia to buy Arm Holdings From SoftBank for $40 Billion

takyon writes:

Nvidia to buy Arm Holdings from SoftBank for $40 billion

Chipmaker Nvidia has agreed to buy Arm Holdings, a designer of chips for mobile phones, from SoftBank in a deal worth $40 billion, the companies announced Sunday. The deal will include $21.5 billion in Nvidia stock and $12 billion in cash, including $2 billion payable at signing.

Softbank acquired Arm in 2016 for $31.4 billion in 2016 in one of its largest acquisitions ever. Arm is best known as the designer of an architecture used in chips in most mobile phones, including the Qualcomm chips used in most Android phones, as well as Apple's iPhone. Apple is also planning to shift its Mac computers from Intel chips to an Arm-based design.

Nvidia, whose chips are widely used to support graphics and artificial intelligence applications, including for self-driving vehicles, pledged that it would "continue Arm's open-licensing model and customer neutrality."

Interest in RISC-V set to skyrocket again.

Also at Bloomberg, The Verge, Tom's Hardware, and Wccftech.

Previously: Nvidia's Market Cap Rises Above Intel's
Nvidia Considering Acquisition of ARM for Over $32 Billion

takyon writes:

Jensen Huang Says Nvidia-Branded ARM CPUs Are a Possibility

According to comments from Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang during a conference call yesterday, we could see Nvidia-branded CPUs in the future, setting the stage for a new level of competition with Intel and AMD.

[...] However, during yesterday's briefing, Timothy Prickett Morgan from TheNextPlatform asked Jensen Huang, "Will you actually take an implementation of something like Neoverse first and make an Nvidia-branded CPU to drive it into the data center? Will you actually make the reference chip for those who just want it and actually help them run it?"

"Well, the first of all you've made an amazing observation, which is all three options are possible," Huang responded, "[...] So now with our backing and Arm's serious backing, the world can stand on that foundation and realize that they can build server CPUs. Now, some people would like to license the cores and build a CPU themselves. Some people may decide to license the cores and ask us to build those CPUs or modify ours."

"It is not possible for one company to build every single version of them," Huang continued, "but we will have the entire network of partners around Arm that can take the architectures we come up with and depending on what's best for them, whether licensing the core, having a semi-custom chip made, or having a chip that we made, any of those any of those options are available. Any of those options are available, we're open for business and we would like the ecosystem to be as rich as possible, with as many options as possible."

takyon writes:

Nvidia Offers Concessions in EU as Arm Deal Probe Extended

The European Commission (EC) this week extended its probe of Nvidia's proposed acquisition of Arm until at least October 27 and said that Nvidia offered the EU certain concessions to[sic] in a bid to persuade the bloc's antimonopoly regulators to approve the deal. Experts say that the EU regulatory review will take considerably longer.

In a bid to make regulators approve the deal to acquire Arm, Nvidia is eager to offer various incentives to respective countries or blocs. In the U.K., the company proposed to invest 'at least' $100 million in the country's most powerful supercomputer. The EC said that it had received concessions proposal from Nvidia as well, but did not elaborate, reports Bloomberg.

Now that the probe is formally extended to October 27, the EU competition authority will request opinion from competitors and clients before determining whether to accept Nvidia's concessions, demand more or initiate a four-month long investigation, reports Reuters. Bloomberg believes that the probe will be extended further, which will give the EC some additional time to seek feedback from interested parties and figure out what it might get from Nvidia.

Also at Notebookcheck.

Previously: Nvidia-Branded ARM CPUs; UK Trade Union Speaks Out Against Deal
Nvidia's $40 Billion ARM Acquisition: "All but Dead"?

Related: Arm Officially Supports Panfrost Open-Source Mali GPU Driver Development

Original Submission