Author: Vidya Saras

Devconnect, the week-long gathering of the Ethereum ecosystem and community, concluded its second edition in Istanbul. The week saw over 3,500 participants from diverse backgrounds come together from November 13-19 at the Devconnect Cowork in the Istanbul Congress Center, and many more join the 70+ deep-dive events organized by independent teams in the Ethereum community. Events took place at various locations across the city and beyond, celebrating the breadth and depth of the Ethereum ecosystem. Thank you to everyone who was part of Devconnect! We are so happy that everyone that was able to join us for an intense week,…

It’s too soon to say how the spate of deals between AI companies and publishers will shake out. OpenAI has already scored one clear win, though: Its web crawlers aren’t getting blocked by top news outlets at the rate they once were.The generative AI boom sparked a gold rush for data—and a subsequent data-protection rush (for most news websites, anyway) in which publishers sought to block AI crawlers and prevent their work from becoming training data without consent. When Apple debuted a new AI agent this summer, for example, a slew of top news outlets swiftly opted out of Apple’s…

Onchain Heroes, a blockchain-based RPG, has announced its partnership with Abstract, a consumer-focused blockchain developed by Igloo Inc.This collaboration is set to bring the game’s fully on-chain experience to life by leveraging Abstract’s infrastructure, designed for scalability and seamless user interactions.Originally set for a Q3 release, Onchain Heroes is now scheduled to launch on Abstract in Q4 2024. Source: Onchain HeroesWhat is Onchain Heroes?Onchain Heroes is an idle RPG that offers players a variety of strategic decisions based on their risk tolerance. Players can choose to play conservatively or opt for high-risk, high-reward gameplay, making it a dynamic and engaging…

Echoes of McCarthyism Ring in Charges of Israeli 'Entanglement'

When investors poured $6.6 billion into OpenAI last week, they seemed largely unbothered by the latest drama, which recently saw the company’s chief technology officer, Mira Murati, along with chief research officer Bob McCrew and Barret Zoph, a vice president of research, abruptly quit.And yet those three departures were just the latest in an ongoing exodus of key technical talent. Over the past few years, OpenAI has lost several researchers who played crucial roles in developing the algorithms, techniques, and infrastructure that helped make it the world leader in AI as well as a household name. Several other ex-OpenAI employees…

Dense geometry prediction in computer vision involves estimating properties like depth and surface normals for each pixel in an image. Accurate geometry prediction is critical for applications such as robotics, autonomous driving, and augmented reality, but current methods often require extensive training on labeled datasets and struggle to generalize across diverse tasks. Existing methods for dense geometry prediction typically rely on supervised learning approaches that use convolutional neural networks (CNNs) or transformer architectures. These methods require large amounts of labeled data and often fail to perform well in zero-shot scenarios, where models are expected to generalize to new tasks without…

India’s hill state of Uttarakhand’s entire IT infrastructure came to a standstill on Friday after malware was detected on systems at the State Data Center. The shutdown impacted several critical services, including government websites, the Chief Minister’s helpline, and land registration services. Officials, suspecting a cyberattack, launched an investigation into the breach, while IT Secretary Nitesh Jha ordered the shutdown of all services to mitigate potential damage. Key systems, such as the State Wide Area Network (SWAN) and Secure Internet Service, went offline, affecting day-to-day operations across the state. “During routine scanning on Gandhi Jayanti [October 2], malware was discovered…

Netflix Warning: this article contains spoilers for “The Platform 2” Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia’s “The Platform 2” debuted on Netflix on Friday, October 4, and it was a slight improvement over the original. Frustratingly, “The Platform 2” didn’t do much to expand on the mythology of the original film, or extend outside the same prison where the first “Platform” takes place, merely telling a very similar story in a slightly more dynamic way. To reiterate the premise: “The Platform 2” takes place in a futuristic, tower-like prison with one cell occupying each floor. There…

The UK risks losing its leadership position in artificial intelligence (AI) without a clear national strategy for data centres, a key player in the sector has warned. Data centres, essential for powering cloud computing and AI applications, have become central to the digital economy. However, without a cohesive plan, the UK could fall behind in the global AI race, according to industry experts. The UK is currently Europe’s largest data hub, with more than 500 data centres, the majority concentrated in the South East. These facilities are critical to everything from personal device browsing to AI learning, providing the power,…

This is a really easy slow-cooker salsa chicken recipe that makes a versatile meal. It tastes very similar to the chicken used in Mexican restaurants in their chicken taco salads. My kids eat it plain, but I like it on a large salad with avocado and sour cream! Crock pot salsa chicken has the flavors of a fajita and tastes great in salads, quesadillas, or on top of burrito bowls. This easy recipe is naturally gluten-free and makes for a simple weeknight dinner. We’ll often eat it for a quick lunch too. This recipe freezes and reheats extremely well for…