What's that boy? The tech news fell down a well? Oh, it's currently still falling
down a well? It's like a bottomless well situation? So we can't do anything. You
just You just wanted me to know. Good boy. Discord announced today that
it's rolling out global age verification starting next month taking a teen by
default approach meaning that without verification the app will default to an
experience appropriate for teens. Which would include updated
communication settings, restricted access to age-gated spaces, and content
filtering. And will not include hanging out in a Blockbuster video parking lot
firing Roman candles into my friend Kyle's Honda Civic like I initially
[music] assumed. In order to validate their age, users will need to either
complete a facial age estimation video via selfie or submit a photo of their
government ID to one of Discord's third-party vendor partners. As an added
bonus, this also protects adults from being bullied by teens in age-gated
servers where they come together to innocently discuss their mutual love of
the Minions extended cinematic universe. Discord initially tested the system in
the UK and Australia last year, but now it's being rolled out globally. Critics
are quick to point to the October 2025 data breach in which one of Discord's
third-party vendors was compromised and approximately 70,000 users had their age
verification data exposed including images of their government IDs.
But it's important to note that that leak was the product of a legacy age
verification system that was introduced in 2020. Some of you weren't even born
yet. And Discord has terminated its contract with that vendor. According to Savannah
Batallich, Discord's global head of product policy, the new system uses
similar face scan and ID-based verification but with a few key
differences. Facial age estimation is now done entirely on device. Any ID
documents submitted to vendors are in most cases deleted immediately after age
confirmation. And Batallich says that if the age estimation from the selfie is
incorrect, you just can appeal it or verify with a photo of a government ID
instead. Discord is also rolling out an age inference model that runs in the
background and analyzes metadata like the types of games a user plays, their
activity on Discord, and behavioral signals to estimate age. So, if Discord
notices that you're listening to S Club 7 and pausing your game every 30 minutes
or so to go pee, it will assume, correctly, you're 45 years old and
probably also hopefully send a message to your urologist. Or remind you about
what the actual daily recommended intake is for Mountain Dew.
>> It's zero. Unless it's Code Red.
>> [laughter] >> Then it's a lot. >> AMD's beastly Strix Halo APU has arrived
in another handheld, the AYANEO NEXT 2.
But, unlike existing Strix Halo handhelds, this one doesn't need an
external battery or external validation. She knows who she is. And that's a
handheld with a massive 116 watt-hour internal battery. It's bigger than most
gaming laptop batteries and could even cause you trouble at the airport. So,
that's how you know it's bad. >> They could never They won't take me.
>> to have to pat me down. The NEXT 2 has some other impressive specs, too, which
I guess is partially why AYANEO is okay with pricing the base model at 2,700 US
dollars. Although, the early bird price on Indiegogo is 2,300. And that's
expensive, but like this is a new generation flagship Windows handheld for
the future masterpiece beyond imagination we're talking about here.
And sure, you could also say that the other Strix Halo handhelds, the GPD Win
5 starting at 2,500 bucks and the 1XPlayer 1X Fly Apex for 2,200 bucks are
also handhelds for the future masterpiece beyond imagination, but they
need external battery packs. Regardless, they're all too expensive. So, hopefully
soon we'll see handhelds sporting those two new Strix Halo variants that AMD
announced at CES 2026 with fewer CPU cores, but the same graphics power as
the flagship Ryzen AI Max Plus 395,
which could end up being a bit cheaper. I think I might like one wearing a
little battery backpack though. I can imagine it's carrying its favorite
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Yeehaw! This is what What is this? All right, we
got the tech news out of the way. But, What's that?
The quick bits are down there now? God damn it!
Intel may have canceled the release of its Core Ultra 9 290K Plus Arrow Lake
Refresh desktop processor. And I don't really know whether to mourn
its death or not because we only just heard about it today. So sad.
>> Insider sources apparently told videocards.com
of the cancellation, but said other Arrow Lake Refresh parts, a 270K Plus
and a 250K Plus, are still coming. And
there is some weight to the Arrow Lake Refresh rumor since ASUS posted and
deleted tweets about it featuring these images with graceful robot hands holding
motherboards. They're coming for your hand model jobs. Somewhat reliable
leaker claimed the embargo Pro claimed the embargo will lift on
March 23rd in a tweet with a saddening lack of robot hands. Or any hands at
all. >> At least you got a job, pal. Good news, everybody. They don't write these voices
in, I just do those. They've added Copilot to the Windows 11 setup
experience. So, if you need to download a large update when booting your new PC
for the first time, you can chat with Microsoft's helpful little harbinger of
humanity's downfall, and even ask it to generate images of yourself doing what
you're doing. Talking to computer as if it's people.
Really, if if you could, please, do anything with Copilot.
Microsoft would love to tell their investors you guys did that once or twice. VPN provider
Windscribe has claimed that Dutch authorities, who are the best authorities, seized one of their
physical servers, just yanked it right out of the rack without a warrant,
noting that because they use RAM disk servers, the cops won't find anything on
there unless you count the unredacted EP Stein files.
>> [laughter] >> They cuz they said that. Unfortunately,
there doesn't appear to be any supporting evidence that this seizure actually happened other than
Windscribe's own tweet, leading some observers to be skeptical of the whole
thing. The vibe is off. It's like, Dbrand did edgy marketing, so I can do
it, too. I'm not so sure. OpenAI is allegedly
scaling back its first consumer hardware product, a pair of AI earbuds developed
in partnership with Apple's famous designer Jony Ive. According to Twitter
leaker Pikachu, a patent filing in China revealed that the earbuds will go to
market under the name Dime, or Dime if you're Spanish. And while initially
billed as a device with phone-level computing power, it's now being scaled
back to something more like regular earbuds. No! Smart Pikachu was
apparently banned from Twitter for bringing us this information. >> not so smart. According to the post,
soaring memory costs made the original bill of materials too expensive, so the
enhanced features have been delayed. >> The memory crisis tolls for thee, thou
molten men! Speaking of accent losers, Elon Musk announced on X yesterday that
SpaceX That's so many X's. Has shifted its near-term focus from settling Mars
to building a self-growing city on the moon. Whatever that means. This is a
complete 180 from Musk, who just last year called the moon a distraction. Why
the change of heart? In his tweet, Musk cites the moon's proximity as the reason
for the shift, evidently only now realizing that Mars
is farther from Earth than the moon.
By a lot. Truly a genius of our time. Ars Technica made the point with the
success of Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin rocket flights and their team going all
in on lunar exploration, Musk needs to get there first or risk losing the
economic high ground. Also, the the dick measuring contest. So, much like
shifting Tesla factories to robot production or pushing full self-driving
subscriptions to unlock his trillion-dollar pay package. For Elon,
it's less about human advancement and more about getting that cake. Leaving no
crumbs. I mean, what's the point of unleashing hordes of potentially
murderous robots and cars onto the world if you can't even retreat to your own
self-growing moon city if things go sideways. You don't have 8 months to get
to Mars. >> There's no point. You need a self-growing city. And
Harvard engineers have 3D printed soft robots that bend, twist, and grasp on
command by embedding air channels directly into the material using a
rotating nozzle. You pump air through the channels and the structure moves in
whatever direction was programmed during printing. The team demonstrated a
gripper with articulated fingers that curl around objects and a spiral
actuator that unfurls like a flower. The team says they intend to use the
technology for advanced surgical tools and wearable devices and definitely not
for sex. Unlike Moya, Droid Ups' new humanoid robot that the company is
calling the world's first fully biomimetic robot, and which we're
calling an obvious attempt to make a real-life anime waifu. Somebody has to.
But she's not Japanese, Riley. Like all the best waifus, Moya walks with 92%
human-like accuracy. I'm willing to wager that 8% matters. Maintains a body
temperature between 89.6 and 96.8° F,
and has a bunch of promo videos that feature an unusually high number of
shots of its ass. >> I ain't buying any robot with no ass.
And that's all the news we're pulling out of the well today. Come back Wednesday when the tech news inevitably
falls back in. It is famously uncoordinated. Way too big of an ass.
>> Wagon. Can't walk. >> Absolute
rump.