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While some privacy advocates are content to saw down camera towers, one artist is pushing back against the panopticon with an unconventional tool: the ugliest aloha shirt you’ve ever seen.Freshly reported by Dezeen, German designer Simon Weckert designed the hideous shirt to be untraceable to AI-integrated surveillance systems. Using a dizzying blend of colors and patterns, the shirt is ugly precisely because it’s designed to confuse surveillance algorithms — as Weckert explained, it’s the “interplay” of ghastly colors and shapes that hide its wearer from detection.“AI systems are made of multiple layers and never learned what a human is —…

The Wall Street Journal is giving opinion authors the go-ahead to use AI in the writing process without requiring AI disclosures — a move by a top newspaper that feels like an inflection point for the media industry.On Monday, the billionaire Stanley Druckenmiller, a former hedge fund manager and founder of Duquesne Capital, published an article in the Wall Street Journal‘s Opinion section titled “Let the Bond Market Speak.” The piece, which railed against the leadership of US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, immediately drew attention due to Druckenmiller’s personal relationship with Bessent. But as the essay made the rounds, it also caught…

A Himalayan border crossing between China and Nepal was obliterated by an ungodly landslide following torrential flooding across the region on Wednesday.Video captured by security cameras perched on the mountainside show the horrifying moment when the wall of mud descended on the Gyirong Port facility, swallowing the six-story building whole as dozens of people run for their lives.Within seconds of the mudslide’s arrival, the six-story Gyirong Port building is completely consumed by the muck. Authorities quickly declared a national emergency, as nearby roads, communication towers, and electrical infrastructure was likewise wiped out in the tragedy. (Warning: the footage is graphic.)According…

A newly leaked spreadsheet has revealed just how wild salaries are at one of the most valuable companies on the planet. Obtained by Business Insider, the spreadsheet compiled voluntarily-disclosed pay rates from some 600 Microsoft employees at various levels of seniority. While the tech giant employs over 220,000 people overall, it still provides a valuable snapshot into the work life at one of the largest tech firms in the game.Because Microsoft uses a job level system to determine career tiers, the salaries vary wildly. On level 59 and 60 — roughly equivalent to entry-level software engineers — the base pay ranges…

Flock Safety CEO Garrett Langley is desperately trying to stop his mass surveillance startup from turning into one of the most hated companies in the United States.As vigilantes continue to tear down its fleet of cameras and find creative new ways to obstruct them, Langley attempted to reason with Flock’s critics, calling for a “compromise” last week.Yet the negative press keeps piling up, which could greatly undermine the embattled CEO’s uninspired de-escalation efforts. As 404 Media reports, a man has now been charged with three felonies after he cut down a 3D-printed “decoy” Flock camera, which was set up by…

Last year, netizens coined a new term to reflect our growing disdain for AI bots slowly usurping our human agency. The word “clanker” — later described as a “derogatory slur” by Google’s AI Overview — set the stage for growing disillusionment and anger aimed at tech that’s cluttering our minds and feeds, while driving us crazy at work.And now we have the perfect accompanying pejorative to describe certain coworkers who are getting a little too carried away, blindly copy-pasting the output of AI chatbots — or slop, in today’s vernacular — without any form of revision or editing.That term is…

Bill Gates can’t believe that no one is worried about AI as much as he is.In a new blog post — and accompanying media blitz — the billionaire suddenly sounded alarmed about how the technology is shaping our future after being blindly optimistic about it for years, warning that it’ll annihilate jobs and desolate the economy.“AI will either be the greatest equalizer ever invented, or the worst source of injustice,” he wrote in the nearly 6,000 word essay (which, incidentally, isn’t the only 6,000 word AI screed from a major tech leader this month.) “Even under the best circumstances,” he added,…

In 2022, billionaire entrepreneur Jared Isaacman announced that he was willing to foot the bill for a daring rescue mission to fix NASA’s aging Hubble Space Telescope.Isaacman, who would go on to become the first private astronaut to perform a spacewalk, said at the time that he was giddy with excitement over the “possibility of extending the life and capabilities of one of our greatest explorers.”NASA officials were less impressed with the plan, which would involve a heavily modified SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft docking with the Hubble and boosting its orbit. In 2024, they dealt the mission a fatal blow,…

Three more police officers have been arrested after using Automatic License Plate Readers supplied by the surveillance company Flock for non-law enforcement purposes.In Savannah, Georgia, four police department workers were hauled into custody last Friday, when an investigation by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation uncovered they’d been abusing their city’s Flock system to track personal acquaintances and family members, WTOC reported.Three of them were active police officers, while one of them was employed as a community service specialist. Two more employees had been fired weeks ago for similar offenses, WTOC notes, though they haven’t been arrested, and it’s not clear…

As weight-loss drugs like GLP-1 receptor agonists explode in popularity, knock-offs of up-and-coming meds are hitting the streets far faster than their legitimate versions can gain regulatory approval.In recent months, a black market version of the nascent weight-loss drug retatrutide has surged into strip mall health spas and social media marketplaces alike. According to Axios, the drug hasn’t even been submitted to the Food and Drug Administration for review, let alone approved, alarming public health experts around the US.Developed by the pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly, retatrutide is a triple-hormone-receptor agonist, meaning it activates three metabolic pathways: the well-known GLP-1, as…