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An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://www.the-independent.com/life-style/lego-star-trek-uss-enterprise-d-b2861107.html

The set will be available in Lego stores and online November 28

Lego is releasing its first-ever Star Trek -inspired model — with an incredible recreation of the signature ship from the '80s TV series.

Made from 3,600 pieces, the Lego set is of the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701-D, the spaceship that serves as the main setting of Star Trek: The Next Generation series, which ran for seven seasons, as well as the 1994 film, Star Trek Generations.

"[It] allows builders to craft a detailed replica of the iconic starship, complete with a detachable command saucer, secondary hull, and warp nacelles with distinctive red and blue detailing," according to a press release from Lego. "The model also features an opening shuttlebay and two mini shuttlepods, perfect for recreating classic scenes."

The set comes with nine mini-figures of Star Trek: The Next Generation characters, including Captain Jean-Luc Picard, Commander William Riker, Lieutenant Worf, Lieutenant Commander Data, Dr. Beverly Crusher, Lieutenant Commander Geordi La Forge, Counsellor Deanna Troi, Bartender Guinan, and Wesley Crusher.

Figurines also have some themed accessories, like an engineering case, phaser, or portable tractor beam generator.

Once the spaceship has been built, it can be placed on an angled display stand complete with an information plaque that is included in the kit. There is also a display tile, with Star Trek: The Next Generation branding, for the mini-figures.

However, fans should not expect to get their hands on the set before Black Friday, which falls this year on November 28. The set will be sold on Lego's website and in stores for $399.99.

In addition, customers who get the new Star Trek set will receive a special gift while supplies last: The Lego Icons Star Trek: Type-15 Shuttlepod. The set includes everything needed to make a mini-figure-scale model of the Type-15 Shuttlepod, a small two-person craft from the franchise.

Actor Jonathan Frakes, who starred in Star Trek: The Next Generation, celebrated the new U.S.S. Enterprise set from Lego in a statement.

"As Commander Riker, I spent a lot of time on the bridge of the Enterprise, and now fans can take the helm themselves... in LEGO brick form!" he said. "This set is a fantastic way to relive the adventures of the crew, piece by piece. Look out for a cameo in the livestream with an offer to win a signed Enterprise set!"

This isn't the first time that Lego has brought the setting of a beloved franchise to life. In September, the company launched the two-foot-tall Lego Star Wars Death Star, made up of a whopping 9,023 pieces. It also features the most mini-figures ever in a Lego set.

Priced at $999.99, the model recreates a busy cross-section of the Galactic Empire's infamous moon-sized planet destroyer from Star Wars.

Original Submission

Freeman writes:

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2025/11/new-project-brings-strong-linux-compatibility-to-more-classic-windows-games/

For years now, Valve has been slowly improving the capabilities of the Proton compatibility layer that lets thousands of Windows games work seamlessly on the Linux-based SteamOS. But Valve's Windows-to-Linux compatibility layer generally only extends back to games written for Direct3D 8, the proprietary Windows graphics API Microsoft released in late 2000.

Now, a new open source project is seeking to extend Linux interoperability further back into PC gaming history. The d7vk project describes itself as "a Vulkan-based translation layer for Direct3D 7 [D3D7], which allows running 3D applications on Linux using Wine."
[...]
Wine's own built-in WineD3D compatibility layer has supported D3D7 in some form or another for at least two decades now. But the new d7vk project instead branches off the existing dxvk compatibility layer, which is already used by Valve's Proton for SteamOS and which reportedly offers better performance than WineD3D on many games.
[...]
The D3D7 games list predictably includes a lot of licensed shovelware, but there are also well-remembered games like Escape from Monkey Island, Arx Fatalis, and the original Hitman: Codename 47. WinterSnowfall writes that the project was inspired by a desire to play games like Sacrifice and Disciples II on top of the existing dxvk framework.
[...]
Don't expect this project to expand to include support for even older DirectX APIs, either, WinterSnowfall warns. "D3D7 is enough of a challenge and a mess as it is," the author writes. "The further we stray from D3D9, the further we stray from the divine."

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

How conspiracy theories led to the hacking of NASA servers and ruined a sysadmin's life: Gary McKinnon's story

He was looking for aliens - and became the No. 1 enemy of the state for the United States and started a diplomatic war between the United States and the United Kingdom

It's a good article with photos. Unlike most of the older articles covering Gary, this article was published 14.05.2025.

Imagine an IT guy who wanted to find traces of UFOs and instead found himself at the centre of the most high-profile hacking case of the 2000s. In 2002, Gary McKinnon, an ordinary sysadmin from Scotland, broke into NASA and the Pentagon computers under the nickname Solo. The United States immediately called it "the largest military hack of all time" and squeezed the most out of this formula - media, diplomatically, legally.

Ten years of trials, extradition requests, an autism diagnosis, an activist mother, hysteria around human rights, conspiracies, spaceships - all this is not a Netflix scriptwriter's invention, but a real story of a British man who just wanted to know if the US government was really hiding information about aliens.

Original Submission

hubie writes:

Draft proposals obtained by POLITICO show EU is breaking sacred privacy regime to placate industry:

European Union officials are ready to sacrifice some of their most prized privacy rules for the sake of AI, as they seek to turbocharge business in Europe by slashing red tape.

The European Commission will unveil a "digital omnibus" package later this month to simplify many of its tech laws. The executive has insisted that it is only trimming excess fat through "targeted" amendments, but draft documents obtained by POLITICO [paywalled] show that officials are planning far-reaching changes to the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) to the benefit of artificial intelligence developers.

The proposed overhaul will come as a boon to businesses working with AI, as Europe scrambles to stay economically competitive on the world stage.

But touching the flagship privacy law — seen as the "third rail" of EU tech policy — is expected to trigger a massive political and lobbying storm in Brussels.

"Is this the end of data protection and privacy as we have signed it into the EU treaty and fundamental rights charter?" said German politician Jan Philipp Albrecht, who as a former European Parliament member was one of the chief architects of the GDPR. "The Commission should be fully aware that this is undermining European standards dramatically."

Brussels' shift on privacy comes as it frets over Europe's waning economic power. Former Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi namechecked the General Data Protection Regulation as holding back European innovation on artificial intelligence in his landmark competitiveness report last year.

[...] In past months, Commission officials have sought to preempt worries [41:53 --JE] that it was overhauling the privacy rulebook. It insisted that its simplification proposals wouldn't touch the underlying principles of the GDPR.

Now that draft plans are out, civil society campaigners have begun sounding the alarm.

The Commission is "secretly trying to overrun everyone else in Brussels," said Max Schrems, founder of Austrian privacy group Noyb — and Europe's infamous privacy campaigner who was behind court cases that brought down major data transfer deals with the United States in the past. "This disregards every rule on good lawmaking, with terrible results," he said.

One line of attack from privacy groups is to poke holes in what they say is a rushed omnibus process. While the GDPR took years to negotiate, public consultation on the digital omnibus only ended in October. The Commission has not prepared impact assessments to accompany its proposals, as it says the changes are only targeted and technical.

The Commission's tunnel vision on the AI race has resulted in a "poorly drafted 'quick shot' in a highly complex and sensitive area," said Schrems.

[...] Draft changes would create new exceptions for AI companies that would allow them to legally process special categories of data (like a person's religious or political beliefs, ethnicity or health data) to train and operate their tech. The Commission is also planning to reframe the definition of such special category data, which are afforded extra protections under the privacy rules.

Officials also want to redefine what constitutes as personal data, saying that pseudonymized data (where personal details have been obscured so a person can't be identified) might not always be subject to the GDPR's protections, a change that reflects a recent ruling from the EU's top court.

Finally, it wants to reform Europe's pesky cookie banner rules by inserting a provision into the GDPR that would give website and app owners more legal grounds to justify tracking users beyond simply obtaining their consent.

Original Submission

Freeman writes:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/11/what-i-do-to-clean-up-a-clean-install-of-windows-11-23h2-and-edge/

It's that time of year again—temperatures are dropping, leaves are changing color, and Microsoft is gradually rolling out another major yearly update to Windows 11.

The Windows 11 25H2 update is relatively minor compared to last year's 24H2 update
[...]
The 24H2 update came with some major under-the-hood overhauls of core Windows components and significant performance improvements for the Arm version; 25H2 is largely 24H2, but with a rolled-over version number to keep it in line with Microsoft's timeline for security updates and tech support.
[...]
To keep things current, we've combed through our Windows cleanup guide, updating it for the current build of Windows 11 25H2 (26200.7019) to help anyone who needs a fresh Windows install or who is finally updating from Windows 10 now that Microsoft is winding down support for it.
[...]
As before, this is not a guide about creating an extremely stripped-down, telemetry-free version of Windows; we stick to the things that Microsoft officially supports turning off and removing. There are plenty of experimental hacks and scripts that take it a few steps farther, and/or automate some of the steps we outline here—NTDev's Tiny11 project is one—but removing built-in Windows components can cause unexpected compatibility and security problems, and Tiny11 has historically had issues with basic table-stakes stuff like "installing security updates."
[...]
The most contentious part of Windows 11's setup process relative to earlier Windows versions is that it mandates a Microsoft account sign-in, with none of the readily apparent "limited account" fallbacks that existed in Windows 10. As of Windows 11 22H2, that's true of both the Home and Pro editions.
[...]
During Windows 11 Setup, after selecting a language and keyboard layout but before connecting to a network, hit Shift+F10 to open the command prompt (depending on your keyboard, you may also need to hit the Fn key before pressing F10). Type OOBE\BYPASSNRO, hit Enter, and wait for the PC to reboot.

When it comes back, click "I don't have Internet" on the network setup screen, and you'll have recovered the option to use "limited setup" (aka a local account) again, like older versions of Windows 10 and 11 offered.

This option has been removed from some Windows 11 testing builds, but it still works as of this writing in 25H2. We may see this option removed in a future update to Windows.
[...]
Rather than tell you what I remove, I'll tell you everything that can be removed from the Installed Apps section of the Settings app (also quickly accessible by right-clicking the Start button in the taskbar). You can make your own decisions here; I generally leave the in-box versions of classic Windows apps like Sound Recorder and Calculator while removing things I don't use, like To Do or Clipchamp.
[...]
Microsoft has been on a yearslong crusade against unused space in the Start menu and taskbar, which means there's plenty here to turn off.
[...]

hubie writes:

What Do We Do If SETI Is Successful?

The Search For Extra Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) is evolving. We've moved on from the limited thinking of monitoring radio waves to checking for interstellar pushing lasers or even budding Dyson swarms around stars. To match our increased understanding of the ways we might find intelligence elsewhere in the galaxy, the International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) is working through an update to its protocols for what researchers should do after a confirmed detection of intelligence outside of Earth. Their new suggestions are available in a pre-print paper on arXiv, but were also voted on at the 2025 International Astronautical Congress (IAC) in Sydney, with potential full adoption early next year.

This updated protocol marks the largest change in the 36 years there has been a protocol. THe IAA first created a "Declaration of Principles" in 1989 that was intended to suggest how humanity should react to a confirmed signal from an alien world. This protocol was updated in 2010, but those changes were largely just streamlining with little substantive differences.

The update being put forth now, though, is significantly different in a number of important ways. It is intended to reflect the growing complexity of dealing with highly sensitive topics in the modern world, especially when dealing with social media. A big part of its intent is to protect the researchers who announce the discovery from online harassment, or worse.

But perhaps the most important single change is the suggestion of whether humanity should respond to a direct message. Previous versions of the protocol have suggested that yes, we should, and put few restrictions on doing so. The updated one suggests that the researchers should absolutely not send any reply until after the issue is discussed at the United Nations, which makes sense, though getting the UN itself to agree to anything at this point seems like a hard ask.

[...] If the signal happens to be electromagnetic, which is what started the SETI search in the first place, the paper suggests petitioning the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), the governing body of the world's wireless channel distribution, to free up the bandwidth it was detected on. That would lessen any interference, intentional or otherwise, from manmade sources - or at least give legal recourse to stopping the interference.

Overall the message from the update is that the world has gotten much more complex in the last fifteen years - ranging from the political and social environment on Earth to our understanding of what a SETI discovery might look like. While no organization claims to have all the answers to what to do should we find a signal indicating alien intelligence, the way the IAA has been handling this update process, which has been ongoing with multiple rounds of revisions over the last two years, has been exemplary. The final step in its ratification, assuming it passed the simple majority vote in Sydney, is to have the IAA's board ratify it, allowing the sub-committee that developed it to continue its underappreciated, but one day potentially vital, work.

arXiv paper: SETI Post-Detection Protocols: Progress Towards a New Version

Original Submission

upstart writes:

Google confirms AI search will have ads, but they may look different:

Google Ads are not going anywhere. Eventually, AI Search results on Google and likely other properties will have ads.

Google recently reported $56.57 billion in revenue from ads on Search and YouTube. You obviously can't expect ads to disappear from its search business.

Right now, Google has two AI features.

The first is AI Overviews, which appears at the top of the search results with answers scraped from publishers that Google does not want to pay.

The second and more powerful feature is AI Mode, which offers a ChatGPT-like personalized experience.

Google has already confirmed it plans to integrate services like Gmail and Drive into Google AI Mode to create a new personalized experience where AI knows everything about you.

In a podcast [28:12 --JE], Google's Robby Stein argued that the Google Ads business is not going anywhere, but it will evolve to support the new landscape.

Robby Stein says Google does not see them [ads] going away, but the experience could change.

"...you could take a picture of your shoes and say, 'Hey, these are my shoes. What are other cool shoes like this?' And we could answer that now or help provide you context with that. Or you could ask about this really cool restaurant question. It can be five sentences about all your allergies, issues with this. I have this big group. I want to make sure it's got light. What can I book in advance? And you can put that into Google now too," Robby argues while explaining where ads could fit into the AI experience.

"I think that's an opportunity for the future to be even more helpful for you, particularly in an advertising context. And so we started some experiments on ads within AI Mode and within Google AI experiences," he added.

At this point, it looks like Google wants you to use AI Mode for personal questions, and based on those questions, it could show personalized ads.

Google is already testing ads in AI Search in a limited form, and we'll likely learn more about its plans next year.

Related: Google's Gemini Deep Research Can Now Read Your Gmail and Rummage Through Google Drive

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/russian-hackers-abuse-hyper-v-to-hide-malware-in-linux-vms/

The Russian hacker group Curly COMrades is abusing Microsoft Hyper-V in Windows to bypass endpoint detection and response solutions by creating a hidden Alpine Linux-based virtual machine to run malware.

Inside the virtual environment, the threat actor hosted its custom tools, the CurlyShell reverse shell and the CurlCat reverse proxy, which enabled operational stealth and communication.

Curly COMrades is a cyber-espionage threat group believed to be active since mid-2024. Its activities are closely aligned with Russian geopolitical interests.

[...] The researchers found that in early July, after gaining remote access to two machines, Curly COMrades executed commands to enable Hyper-V and disable its management interface.

Microsoft includes the Hyper-V native hypervisor technology that provides hardware virtualization capabilities in Windows (Pro and Enterprise) and Windows Server operating systems, allowing users to run virtual machines (VMs).

"The attackers enabled the Hyper-V role on selected victim systems to deploy a minimalistic, Alpine Linux-based virtual machine. This hidden environment, with its lightweight footprint (only 120MB disk space and 256MB memory), hosted their custom reverse shell, CurlyShell, and a reverse proxy, CurlCat," Bitdefender explains in a report shared with BleepingComputer.

By keeping the malware and its execution inside a virtual machine (VM), the hackers were able to bypass traditional host-based EDR detections, which lacked network inspection capabilities that could detect the threat actor's command and control (C2) traffic from the VM.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://www.makeuseof.com/worn-out-keyboard-keys-reveal-more-than-you-think/

If you've been using the same keyboard for a while, you must have noticed some patterns coming up. That faded E key on your keyboard isn't just wear and tear, it's your fingerprint in plastic.

Deep cleaning your keyboard may be worth the effort, but it doesn't hide the massive amount of information your keyboard can give away. The worn-out keys on your keyboard know more about you than you think, and they can easily reveal that information.

What most people don't realize is that your keyboard doesn't deteriorate randomly. It's a direct reflection of how you use it and, by extension, of your digital life. If you're a writer cranking out articles for hours on end, your vowels are going to take the most beating. The letter E, the most frequently used letter in English, gets hammered so relentlessly that it is often the first casualty.

[...] Researchers have known for decades that typing patterns can reveal identities. Even all the way back in the 1860s, experienced telegraph operators realized they could recognize each other by everyone's unique tapping rhythm. The same concept applies to modern-day keyboards.

[...] Over time, the repeated friction of millions of keystrokes literally wears away the paint, leaving behind shiny, faded letters that give your keyboard that worn-out look. But it gets more interesting when you start looking at which keys wear out for different people.

For example, a programmer's keyboard will look entirely different from the one used by a writer. Their most used keys might be backspace, brackets, colons, and semicolons—the unglamorous tools of code. Meanwhile, the gamer's keyboard will show a disproportionate amount of wear on the WASD keys. These four keys are the most commonly used control keys for most games, and if you look at a keyboard a gamer has used for a while, you'll easily be able to tell the difference.

Freeman writes:

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/11/bombshell-report-exposes-how-meta-relied-on-scam-ad-profits-to-fund-ai/

Internal documents have revealed that Meta has projected it earns billions from ignoring scam ads that its platforms then targeted to users most likely to click on them.

In a lengthy report, Reuters exposed five years of Meta practices and failures that allowed scammers to take advantage of users of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp.
[...]
Instead of promptly removing bad actors, Meta allowed "high value accounts" to "accrue more than 500 strikes without Meta shutting them down," Reuters reported. The more strikes a bad actor accrued, the more Meta could charge to run ads, as Meta's documents showed the company "penalized" scammers by charging higher ad rates. Meanwhile, Meta acknowledged in documents that its systems helped scammers target users most likely to click on their ads.
[...]
Internally, Meta estimates that users across its apps in total encounter 15 billion "high risk" scam ads a day. That's on top of 22 billion organic scam attempts that Meta users are exposed to daily, a 2024 document showed. Last year, the company projected that about $16 billion, which represents about 10 percent of its revenue, would come from scam ads.
[...]
"Hey it's me," one scam advertisement using Elon Musk's photo read. "I have a gift for you text me." Another using Donald Trump's photo claimed the US president was offering $710 to every American as "tariff relief." Perhaps most depressingly, a third posed as a real law firm, offering advice on how to avoid falling victim to online scams.

Meta removed these particular ads after Reuters flagged them, but in 2024, Meta earned about $7 billion from "high risk" ads like these alone, Reuters reported.
[...]
Meta spokesperson Andy Stone told Reuters that its collection of documents—which were created between 2021 and 2025 by Meta's finance, lobbying, engineering, and safety divisions—"present a selective view that distorts Meta's approach to fraud and scams."
[...]
"We aggressively fight fraud and scams because people on our platforms don't want this content, legitimate advertisers don't want it, and we don't want it either," Stone said.

Despite those efforts, this spring, Meta's safety team "estimated that the company's platforms were involved in a third of all successful scams in the US," Reuters reported.
[...]
Eventually, Meta "substantially expanded" its teams that track scam ads, Stone told Reuters. But Meta also took steps to ensure they didn't take too hard a hit while needing vast resources—$72 billion—to invest in AI, Reuters reported.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Even with more info, web giant says agent can't be trusted to keep you healthy, wealthy, and wise

Google's Gemini Deep Research tool can now reach deep into Gmail, Drive, and Chat to obtain data that might be useful for answering research questions.

Gemini Deep Research is Gemini 2.5 Pro (presently) deputized as an agent, meaning it embarks on a multistep process to respond to a directive rather than spitting out an immediate response. Deep Research systems incorporate knowledge discovery, workflow automation, and research orchestration.

Google is not the only provider of such systems. OpenAI and Perplexity also offer deep research tools, and various open source implementations are also available.

"After you enter your question, it creates a multi-step research plan for you to either revise or approve," explained Dave Citron, senior director of product management for Google's Gemini service, in a blog post last year. "Once you approve, it begins deeply analyzing relevant information from across the web on your behalf."

Now Gemini Deep Research can, if allowed, access data in your Gmail, Drive (e.g. Docs, Slides, Sheets, and PDFs), and Google Chat for added context. If the data you have stored in Google Workspace might be relevant to your research question, granting Gemini access to that data may lead to better results.

There is precedent for this sort of data access among other AI vendors, since providing AI models with access to personal files and data tends to make them more useful – at the expense of privacy and security. Anthropic's Claude, for example, has web-based connectors for accessing Google Drive and Slack. Its iOS incarnation can access certain apps like Maps and iMessage. And Claude Desktop supports desktop extensions for access to the local file system.

Nonetheless, it's worth considering Google's expansive privacy notice for Gemini Apps. On the linked Google Privacy & Terms page, the company says it uses "publicly available information to help train Google's AI models and build products and features like Google Translate, Gemini Apps, and Cloud AI capabilities."

As the wording of that passage says nothing about private data, The Register asked Google to clarify. A company spokesperson confirmed that information available to Gemini via connected apps such as Gmail and Drive is not used to improve the company's generative AI.

upstart writes:

The once fearsome process killer is now a leaker of resources:

Microsoft's ability to add bugs in the most unexpected of places has continued into its latest update to Windows 11, which spawns multiple copies of Task Manager, sucking down resources you'd normally use Task Manager to kill.

The issue, which turned up in the non-security preview update for Windows 11 (KB5067036), manifests itself as multiple versions of the utility.

Close the process killer via the close button on the window, and then reopen it, and... a new process is spawned. While initially amusing, it can quickly consume resources, particularly for users (such as this writer) who are accustomed to using the Task Manager to terminate errant processes.

The previous incarnations of Task Manager, which reside in the background list, can be terminated with a single click of End Process, but it is disconcerting to see the list increase every time Task Manager is opened.

It's not clear precisely what is happening, but it might be connected to a fix rolling out in the update for Task Manager: "Some apps might unexpectedly not be grouped with their processes." If somebody were tinkering with Task Manager, we'd hope a thorough dose of testing would be administered afterward. But then again, this is Microsoft, and the company has a particular reputation when it comes to quality control, as many an administrator looking glumly at their Azure management portal this week will confirm.

[...] Over on X (formerly Twitter), the author of the original Task Manager, Dave Plummer, commented, "Code so good, it refuses to die!" It's unclear how much of Plummer's code remains in the current iteration of the Task Manager. We'd wager not much, since Plummer comes from an era at Microsoft when applications needed to be lean and mean, rather than buggy and bloated.

Plummer told El Reg, "You could always run the NT4 task manager, it still works! But it can only display the first 8 CPUs, then it wraps the others into those graphs. So if you have 16 cores, each graph represents TWO cpus.  But that it works at all is kinda neat. Other than that, not sure what they broke or why it went wrong! There's some code in Task Manager that causes it to hide when you press ESC instead of exiting, maybe they broke that!"

Original Submission

hubie writes:

UBC study finds that purposeful hand gestures can boost persuasiveness and perceived competence:

Words matter — but your hands might matter more, according to a new UBC study which found that purposeful hand gestures can make speakers appear more competent and persuasive.

The UBC Sauder School of Business research, analyzed 2,184 TED Talks using AI and automated video analysis. Researchers isolated more than 200,000 hand gestures into 10-second clips and compared them against audience engagement metrics, such as 'likes' on social media while controlling for factors like gender, occupation, language, video length and more.

The team also ran randomized experiments in which participants watched videos of sales pitches where speakers delivered identical scripts but varied their hand movements. Viewers then rated the speakers and the products being pitched.

The verdict: More hand movement can significantly boost impact — but not all gestures are created equal.

Researchers categorized gestures into types, including "illustrators," which visually depict spoken content, for example, demonstrating the size of a fish while describing it, and "highlighters," such as pointing to an object mentioned in the speech. They also examined random, unrelated movements and the absence of gestures.

Illustrators had the strongest effect, making speakers seem more knowledgeable and improving audience understanding. Highlighters and random gestures, however, showed little to no impact.

[...] According to Dr. Zhou, audiences interpret illustrative gestures as a sign of mastery. "If a person uses their hands to visually illustrate what they're talking about, the audience perceives that this person has more knowledge and can make things easier to understand," she said.

[...] "Sometimes we just move our hands without a purpose. It's a habit," said Dr. Zhou. "But if you pay more attention and understand the impact, it can make a big difference."

Journal Reference: Rizzo, G. L. C., Berger, J., & Zhou, M. (2025). EXPRESS: Talking with Your Hands: How Hand Gestures Influence Communication. Journal of Marketing Research, 0(ja). https://doi.org/10.1177/00222437251385922

Original Submission

fliptop writes:

A $5 billion bet on a failing technology?

In a move that defies the growing consumer rejection of electric vehicles, Hyundai has doubled down on its multi-billion dollar wager. The automaker has opened Georgia's first purpose-built EV training facility, a massive 89,000-square-foot center intended to churn out hundreds of workers for its adjacent Metaplant. This grand opening on November 5 in Ellabell comes at a moment of profound crisis for the electric vehicle industry, raising serious questions about the wisdom of investing in a technology the free market is already abandoning.

The Hyundai Mobility Training Centre, strategically located next to the Hyundai Motor Group Metaplant America in Bryan County, represents a colossal investment in the EV supply chain. The facility can train 824 workers simultaneously, preparing them for roles at the massive plant. Governor Brian Kemp celebrated the project, stating, "The Hyundai Mobility Training Center of Georgia will give thousands of people over the years the knowledge they need to benefit from this generational project."

[...] This massive push for EV workforce development stands in contrast to the reality unfolding across the automotive landscape. While Hyundai prepares to train thousands for EV assembly, Ford is reportedly on the verge of scrapping its flagship F-150 Lightning electric pickup truck. Hailed by CEO Jim Farley as a "modern Model T," the Lightning has become a symbol of EV failure, with demand described as horrendous and mounting EV losses totaling $13 billion since 2023.

Previously: Ford Will Lose $3 Billion on Electric Vehicles in 2023, It Says

Original Submission

hubie writes:

Analysis of data from ESA's Solar Orbiter spacecraft from the solar south pole region reveals a surprise: The magnetic field is carried towards the pole faster than expected:

In March, ESA's spacecraft Solar Orbiter had its first clear view of the Sun's south pole. A first analysis has now been published.

The Sun is governed by a strict rhythm. The magnetic activity of the Sun displays a cyclic variation, reaching a maximum approximately every eleven years. Two enormous plasma circulations, each in one solar hemisphere, set the pace for this rhythm thus defining the Sun's eleven-year cycle: near the surface the plasma flows carry the magnetic field lines from the equator to the poles; in the solar interior, the plasma flows back to the equator in a huge cycle spanning the entire hemisphere.

Important details of this solar "magnetic field conveyor belt" are still poorly understood. The exact processes at the Sun's poles are likely to be crucial. From Earth, scientists have only a grazing view of this region making it impossible to determine the properties of the magnetic field. Most space probes have a similarly limited perspective.

Since February 2020, ESA's Solar Orbiter spacecraft has been travelling in elongated ellipses around the Sun. In March of this year, it left for the first time the plane in which the planets – and almost all other space probes – orbit the Sun. From a trajectory tilted by 17 degrees, Solar Orbiter now for the first time has a better view of the Sun's poles.

In the new publication, which appears today in the journal Astrophysical Journal Letters, researchers led by MPS analyze data from Solar Orbiter's Polarimetric and Helioseismic Imager (PHI) and Extreme-Ultraviolet Imager (EUI). The PHI data are from March 21 of this year; the EUI data cover the period from March 16 to 24. The measurements provide information about the direction of plasma flows and the magnetic field on the solar surface.

The data reveal a refined picture of the supergranulation and magnetic network of the Sun at the south pole for the first time. Supergranules are cells of hot plasma, about two to three times the size of Earth, which densely cover the surface of the Sun. Their horizontal surface flows wash magnetic field lines to their edges, creating the Sun's magnetic network: a web of strong magnetic fields.

To the surprise of the researchers, the magnetic field is seen to drift toward the poles at approximately 10 to 20 meters per second, on average, almost as fast as their counterparts at lower latitudes. Previous studies based on the ecliptic-plane observations have seen much slower drifts of the magnetic field near the high polar latitudes. Their motion offers important clues about the Sun's global plasma and magnetic field circulation.

It is still unclear whether the Sun's global "magnetic conveyor belt" does truly not slow down near the poles. The data now published only show a brief snapshot of the entire solar cycle. Further observational data, ideally covering longer time periods, are needed.

Journal Reference: L. P. Chitta et al [OPEN] 2025 ApJL 993 L45 DOI 10.3847/2041-8213/ae10a3

Original Submission