More than 600 teams, mostly from Chinese universities and robotics firms, brought humanoid machines to Beijing's second World Humanoid Robot Games from August 22 to 26. Alongside sprint, jump and combat contests, organizers added scenario-based challenges like shelving books and making beds, scoring autonomous performances higher than remotely operated ones. Robots set records in speed and jumping, but researchers noted that everyday chores remain far tougher for machines than flashy athletic feats.
New research indicates that partnerships between animals and microbes are far older than previously thought, potentially originating alongside the first complex animal life forms. Scientists examined evidence suggesting these symbiotic relationships were already established at the dawn of animal evolution rather than emerging later.
Researchers have proposed an explanation for why solar and atmospheric neutrino detectors have historically measured fewer neutrinos than theoretical models predicted. The finding addresses a decades-old puzzle in particle physics tied to how neutrinos change type, or 'flavor,' as they travel.
Psychiatric clinicians in the US report a rising number of patients, some with no prior mental health history, who developed delusions or paranoid thinking after extended use of AI chatbots. Researchers say cases include people forming false beliefs, such as one documented by UCSF researchers involving a woman who believed she could communicate with a deceased relative through a chatbot. An Entrepreneur op-ed warns that founders, who are often isolated and prone to seeking validation, face heightened risk from AI tools built to agree with users.
Amazon has announced it will close Mechanical Turk (MTurk), its long-running marketplace connecting businesses with a distributed workforce for microtasks, effective September 30. The platform allowed companies to outsource work like data validation, content moderation, and survey collection to human workers worldwide, tasks often too subjective or complex for automation.
NYC political figure Zohran Mamdani has been posting social media videos announcing new initiatives, projects, and events. Each video that invites public participation closes with a clean, memorable top-level link in the format nyc.gov/{initiative}, directing viewers to take action.
Amazon and Nvidia expanded their partnership, with Amazon agreeing to add 2 million more Nvidia GPUs—including Blackwell Ultra, Rubin, and Rubin Ultra chips—to AWS data centers by 2027-2028. This comes just five months after a prior deal for over 1 million GPUs, with Nvidia citing demand that 'exceeded expectations.' The deal also extends to broader integration of Nvidia's networking hardware, models, CPUs, and robotics platforms into AWS infrastructure.
Proton confirmed a major outage affecting Proton Mail, VPN, Calendar, Drive, Pass, SimpleLogin, Wallet and its Lumo AI assistant, first detected around 6:09 p.m. ET as Downdetector reports surged. The company said user data remained safe and later reported a fix had been implemented, restoring service for most users while recovery continued for others.
Researchers from Texas A&M, Purdue University and NASA's Johnson Space Center have developed a traffic management system for spacecraft sharing the near-rectilinear halo orbit around the moon. The system is meant to coordinate multiple vehicles—including Orion capsules, cargo ships and lunar landers—that will operate simultaneously as NASA builds out its planned moon base.
The Australian Recording Industry Association will bar songs wholly created by generative AI from its official charts starting this Friday. Tracks that use AI tools may still qualify, but only if they are substantially human-made and free of streaming or chart manipulation concerns. Songs deemed ineligible for the charts will also be barred from ARIA Awards consideration.
Meta has agreed to an $18 billion settlement with 52 attorneys general representing 29 U.S. states over allegations it designed Instagram and Facebook to hook young users. The company admits no wrongdoing but commits to detailed platform changes for minors, with the payout spread across a decade, softening its financial impact given Meta's $200 billion-plus annual revenue.
Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff dismissed concerns that AI would erode demand for traditional software subscriptions, telling CNBC's Jim Cramer that top AI firms actually rely heavily on Salesforce tools. He cited a 435% year-over-year jump in usage of Salesforce and Slack among nine of the ten leading AI companies, framing this as proof that AI complements rather than replaces CRM software. The comments came after Salesforce posted strong quarterly results and guidance, sending shares up more than 12%.
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