Ah, nothing tastes quite as sweet as tech news.
And that's a lie, but if you think you can find that special metal and plastic-y magic dust aroma
anywhere else, let me know
because it's probably less carcinogenic. Microsoft has agreed to give a year
of extended Windows 10 updates to users in the European economic area for free
with even less strings attached. Outside of the EEA, it's still the same story
we've already known about. If you wanna stay on Windows 10 after October 14th
and still get security updates, you can either pay 30 bucks or 1,000 Microsoft reward points
or you can enable Windows backup and sync your PC settings to OneDrive
and uh-oh, if you need more than five gigabytes, which is the default, you may have to buy some extra
cloud space from Microsoft. Because what, you think clouds grow on trees?
Or do they? Could you make an argument that they do? Anyway, in the EEA, all you have to do
is sign into your Microsoft account on your PC every 60 days
and you can keep partying Windows 10 style 24, 7, 365,
but not 366, it's a year, they're serious about this.
Now, Microsoft agreed to this after they were sent a sternly worded letter
by sensibly named European consumer rights group,
Euro consumers, who argued that Microsoft's existing policy
may break the rules of the Digital Markets Act.
The group also noted that Windows 10 is being phased out faster than previous Windows versions.
Hmm, why is that Microsoft? Because it's haunted?
What? Admit it. At the end of the day though, this all goes to show the power of channeling your inner mom
and writing one of the most valuable companies in the world,
a very angry email. But hey, don't worry about Microsoft,
for any Windows 10 support money they're losing out on, they'll make up with the ROG Xbox Ally handhelds,
which have had their prices officially confirmed. The vanilla Xbox Ally starts at 600 USD,
while the Ally X with the Ryzen Z2 Extreme
starts at $1,000, making it one of the most expensive mainstream handhelds.
Honestly, the value proposition for these things are kind of confusing.
Cheaper handhelds with similar specs will also have access to these special
Xbox-ified Windows UI. So does Microsoft even want people to buy these at all?
The company has been open about their apathy towards Xbox console sales,
which is now bearing negative fruit.
In Costco, recently confirming to games reporter,
Destin Legari, I'm sorry, that I don't know,
that they removed Xbox consoles from sale at Costco.
And Canadian outlet, WB Games, is also reportedly selling off their existing
Xbox inventory and just leaving it at that. I mean, it looks like they still have some stock,
but that should clear out by Xboxing day. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.
I'd like to show you one of the crazier robot videos I've seen in my internet travels depicting robots
having to relearn how to walk after their engineers dismember them with a chainsaw.
What the is wrong with these people? Don't stop at the legs,
go full gears of war on these clankers. They won't take my job.
So this company, Skilled AI, is doing these horrific things
to demonstrate how their skilled brain technology
can just work no matter what robot body it's running on
and can continue forcibly retiring humans even when it's attacked
by a mob of katana-wielding Neoludites. Skilled gives some much more optimistic examples
of robot activities that could benefit from this tech and so does Google DeepMind
because they showed off their own robots exhibiting similar body agnostic abilities.
An AI could get smarter and smarter as it possesses one vessel after another,
which is something we want. DeepMind also demoed a robot searching the web for info
to help it complete a physical task like sorting compost, garbage, and recycling
according to San Francisco regulations. Speaking of AI, OpenAI also launched ChatGPT Pulse,
a feature exclusive to the $200 pro tier for now,
which has ChatGPT proactively search for stuff it knows you're into
and deliver updates on that stuff to you, of its own accord.
And as the Verge notes, OpenAI and other AI companies
really want you to get used to AI, not only doing stuff for you,
but doing it for you before you even think to ask, which will get people hooked on it,
which will eventually lead to everyone leading sedentary lives on the space cruise liner from Wally,
which is obviously the end goal for all of us, right? Not many people know this,
but QuickBits are actually completely odorless and flavorless.
And that's why no one ever sees them coming.
Last week in an interview with CNBC, Tim Cook responded to a question about NVIDIA
and Intel's recently announced partnership by saying, competition is very good for the foundry business.
We'd love to see Intel come back. Now, this week, Bloomberg reports
that Intel has approached Apple to ask about a possible investment.
Five years after Apple dropped their CPUs for Apple Silicon.
Ooh, do they think the flame has been reignited
or this is awkward? Intel, honestly, I'd just leave it.
I think you're reading into Tim's comment a bit too much. I mean, seconds later in that same interview,
the guy said, there's a lot of great people in America.
You know, they're just words. They don't, sometimes CEOs just say things.
Almost all OnePlus phones are vulnerable to a permission bypass exploit
that could allow any installed app to access SMS data
and metadata without informing the user. The issue was discovered by security researchers
at Rapid7 and OnePlus is currently working on a patch,
but there are some OnePlus devices that are protected from this flaw.
Those still running OxygenOS 11 from back in 2020.
Now, if you were like my dad and went, ain't no way I'm updating and giving the Chinese my data.
You were smarter than any of us. And I'm sorry, dad.
Not Jeff Kearley, normal dad. Amazon has agreed to pay two and a half billion dollars
to settle the federal trade commission's lawsuit over the tech giant intentionally making it
heinously difficult for users to cancel their Amazon Prime subscription.
The settlement consists of a $1 billion civil penalty,
the largest ever in an FTC rule violation case
for being a very naughty tech giant. While the remaining one and a half billion
will go towards refunds for about 35 million customers
harmed by Amazon's nonsense, which included a cancellation process
Amazon internally named the Iliad Flow
in a reference to the famously long and arduous Trojan War.
You gotta admit it's a good reference. Everyone knows Amazon makes the sickest references.
And the president and COO of Nintendo of America,
Doug Bowser, yep, that's real if you weren't aware, is stepping down after six years in the role.
Reminiscing about his time there, Bowser recalled one of his earliest video game experiences
was playing the arcade version of Donkey Kong. And he thought, why is the bad guy a giant monkey?
That doesn't make sense. It should be a giant spiky turtle dragon thing, obviously.
The role of Nintendo of America president, which I have said before was previously occupied
by a man named Bowser, will now go to a 20-year Nintendo veteran
named Devin Prichard, which, you know, can't you change your name
to Swanky Kong or something? Like, and can you come back here
for more tech news on Monday? It just always feels a bit weird when you're not here.
About the same amount of weird as me knowing if you're watching the video or not.
But hey, life's stranger than fiction, am I right?
I'm very, very true.