Weeks after its workers won a union election for the first time, Amazon fired two of the employees who were involved in organization efforts. It’s the first time Amazon has forced out workers involved in the union drive since the election win on April 1, according to Motherboard, though it’s not whether the company took these actions in retaliation.
Mat Cusick, a warehouse worker and communications lead for the Amazon Labor Union (ALU), was on COVID-19 leave to care for a loved one when he received notice of his firing on May 3rd, he told the outlet. The reason Amazon gave was that it let go Cusick for “voluntary resignation due to job abandonment.”
Fellow organizer Tristan Dutchin said he was fired four days later for failing to meet productivity targets. “I believe it was retaliatory,” Dutchin, who has been a vocal union advocate in the press, told Motherboard.
Amazon has fired workers on both sides of labor organizing drives at JFK8. In March 2020, the company terminated the employment of Chris Smalls, who led a protest over Amazon’s alleged failure to protect workers from COVID-19. Smalls is now the president of ALU. In April, the company was ordered to reinstate a JFK8 worker who it fired after a protest two years earlier.
Last week, Amazon let go six senior managers who were said to have been involved in the company’s anti-union efforts at JFK8. Amazon said it pushed them out as part of “management changes.” Some believed they were fired as a result of the union’s election win.
Amazon has challenged the election result in court. It has yet to recognize the ALU. Engadget has contacted Amazon for comment.
Notorious facial recognition company Clearview AI has agreed to permanently halt sales of its massive biometric database to all private companies and individuals in the United States as part of a legal settlement with the American Civil Liberties Union, per court records.
Monday’s announcement marks the close of a two-year legal dispute brought by the ACLU and privacy advocate groups in May of 2020 against the company over allegations that it had violated BIPA, the 2008 Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act. This act requires companies to obtain permission before harvesting a person’s biometric information — fingerprints, gait metrics, iris scans and faceprints for example — and empowers users to sue the companies who do not.
“Fourteen years ago, the ACLU of Illinois led the effort to enact BIPA – a groundbreaking statute to deal with the growing use of sensitive biometric information without any notice and without meaningful consent,” Rebecca Glenberg, staff attorney for the ACLU of Illinois, said in a statement. “BIPA was intended to curb exactly the kind of broad-based surveillance that Clearview’s app enables. Today’s agreement begins to ensure that Clearview complies with the law. This should be a strong signal to other state legislatures to adopt similar statutes.”
In addition to the nationwide private party sales ban, Clearview will not offer any of its services to Illinois local and state law enforcement agencies (as well as all private parties) for the next five years. “This means that within Illinois, Clearview cannot take advantage of BIPA’s exception for government contractors during that time,” the ACLU points out, though Federal agencies, state and local law enforcement departments outside of Illinois will be unaffected.
That’s not all. Clearview must also end its free trial program for police officers, erect and maintain an opt-out page for Illinois residents, and spend $50,000 advertising it online. The settlement must still be approved by a federal judge before it takes effect.
“By requiring Clearview to comply with Illinois’ pathbreaking biometric privacy law not just in the state, but across the country, this settlement demonstrates that strong privacy laws can provide real protections against abuse,” Nathan Freed Wessler, a deputy director of the ACLU Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project, said in Monday’s statement. “Clearview can no longer treat people’s unique biometric identifiers as an unrestricted source of profit. Other companies would be wise to take note, and other states should follow Illinois’ lead in enacting strong biometric privacy laws.”
Moog has temporarily discounted all of its iOS and macOS synths. For a limited time, you can buy the Minimoog Model D, Model 15, Animoog Z apps for 50 percent off – making them $7, $15 and $10, respectively. That’s not as generous of a promotion as we …
For the 2022 season, Formula 1 has entered a new era. The sport introduced a new car spec for this year, complete with a new set of regulations that govern how it can be used. There’s a new circuit in the United States as well as a continuation of the …
ASUS is today showing off what it considers to be The Pinnacle of Performance in the form of a whole raft of new laptops. All of them are getting new, more refined industrial design and the more prominent use of ASUS’ Delta-style logo, as well as better thermals. Topping the range is the new Zenbook Pro 16X OLED, a 5.6lb behemoth with a 16-inch, 16:10, 60Hz 4K OLED Dolby Vision and Pantone-validated touchscreen display. Nestled inside the NVIDIA Studio-rated machine is space for a 12th-generation Intel Core CPU, reaching as high as the i9-12900H CPU, which can be paired with an RTX 3060 GPU. ASUS is saying that the most interesting facet about this new machine isn’t the raw brawn on offer, but the fact that it’s now got much more staying power. Its new cooling system, officials claim, will enable the system to burn through a 140W TDP without throttling, while generating just 40db in fan noise.
Daniel Cooper
The model which will, however, catch most people’s eyes is the new, updated, Zenbook Pro 14 Duo OLED, the one with that cutsey but surprisingly useful second screen. The OLED in its product name refers to a 14.5-inch, 2,8K, 120Hz OLED display up top, which is paired with a 12.7-inch ScreenPad Plus. ASUS says that the ScreenPad Plus is now brighter than its predecessor, with a better auto-tilt which improves cooling. Inside, you’ll be able to order a 12th-generation Core i9-12900H and pair it with an RTX 3050 Ti GPU.
It’s this machine that I’ve been able to play with, briefly, before the announcement, and I’m certainly a fan. The model I was using included a 12th-generation Core i7-12700H with 16GB RAM, but performance seemed to be buttery-smooth. Also, and this might sound reductive, but given just how much is crammed into that body, it’s surprisingly light and small. The only downside, like last year’s model, is that the cramped trackpad takes a long while getting used to, and feels ancient compared to most modern laptops.
As well as the headline acts, ASUS is also adding OLED displays to a number of its other machines, including the 15.6-inch Zenbook Pro 15 Flip OLED, the Zenbook S13 Flip OLED and S13 OLED. You can also now pick up a bigger Zenbook Pro 17, with a 17.3-inch display and the ability to spec for AMD’s Ryzen 9 6900HX CPU paired with an RTX 3050 GPU.
Further down the product line river, the Vivobook series are also getting OLED displays thrown at several devices. That includes Vivibook Pro models in 14.5-, 15.6- and 16-inch sizes, each packing an OLED display and the option to spec a Core i9-12900H or Ryzen 8 6900HX, up to 32GB DDR5 RAM, GeForce RTX 3070 Ti and up to 2TB SSD storage. The Vivobook S series, meanwhile, gets OLED options for its 14.5-, 15- and 16-inch models, which can be specced with Intel Core i7 models paired with Iris Xe or Radeon graphics, depending on your budget and needs.
ASUS
The company is also unloading a Vivobook 13 Slate OLED Artist Edition, versions of its existing 2-in-1 with themed accessories and kickstand covers. The artists in question are Philip Colbert (pictured) and Steven Harrington, the former famous for his pop-art style imagery, the latter working in what’s described as a “contemporary Californian psychedelic-pop aesthetic.”
Many of these laptops will be available at as-yet undetermined dates in the near future, with prices naturally dependent on the many build-to-order options at hand. The Zenbook Pro 16X OLED, when it does arrive, will set you back a minimum of $2,600, while the Zenbook 14 Pro Duo OLED will retail for a minimum of $2,000 when it’s available for order.
Lincoln College says it will close this week in the wake of a ransomware attack that took months to resolve. While the impact of COVID-19 severely impacted activities such as recruitment and fundraising, the cyberattack seems to have been the tipping point for the Illinois institution.
The college has informed the Illinois Department of Higher Education and Higher Learning Commission that it will permanently close as of May 13th. As NBC News notes, it’s the first US college or university to shut down in part because of a ransomware attack.
Lincoln says it had “record-breaking student enrollment” in fall 2019. However, the pandemic caused a sizable fall in enrollment with some students opting to defer college or take a leave of absence. The college — one of only a few rural schools to qualify as a predominantly Black institution under the Department of Education — said those affected its financial standing.
Last December, Lincoln was hit by a cyberattack, which “thwarted admissions activities and hindered access to all institutional data, creating an unclear picture of fall 2022 enrollment. All systems required for recruitment, retention and fundraising efforts were inoperable,” the college said in a statement posted on its homepage. “Fortunately, no personal identifying information was exposed. Once fully restored in March 2022, the projections displayed significant enrollment shortfalls, requiring a transformational donation or partnership to sustain Lincoln College beyond the current semester.”
Barring a last-minute respite, the one-two punch of the pandemic and a cyberattack have brought an end to a 157-year-old institution. Lincoln says it will help students who aren’t graduating this semester transfer to another college.
The New York Times has apologized after Monday’s Wordle included a solution for some players that may have been offensive due to its connection to recent political events in the US. Some Wordle players woke up today to find out the solution to the dail…
Electronic Arts is stepping back into Middle-earth. The publisher has announced a free-to-play mobile game called The Lord of the Rings: Heroes of Middle-earth. The RPG is the first EA mobile title based on J.R.R. Tolkien’s works. EA Capital Games is developing the game. The studio was behind another successful collectible mobile RPG in 2015’s Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes.
Heroes of Middle-earth will include characters from both The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, along with collection systems, turn-based combat and “immersive storytelling.” EA said in a press release that players will experience “iconic stories from the world of Tolkien and take up the fight against the great evils of Middle-earth.” Unsurprisingly, given that this is a free-to-play mobile title, there will be microtransactions.
“We are incredibly excited to partner with The Saul Zaentz Company and Middle-earth Enterprises on the next generation of mobile role-playing games,” said EA’s vice-president of mobile RPG Malachi Boyle said. “The team is filled with fans of The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit and each day they bring their tremendous passion and talents together to deliver an authentic experience for players. The combination of high-fidelity graphics, cinematic animations, and stylized art immerses players in the fantasy of Middle-earth where they’ll go head-to-head with their favorite characters.”
This will be EA’s first LOTR title since 2009’s The Lord of the Rings: Conquest, as Polygon notes. Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, NetEase and Glu Mobile (which EA bought last year) are among the other publishers who have released mobile LOTR games.
EA expects to start limited regional beta tests of The Lord of the Rings: Heroes of Middle-earth this summer.
As promised (or threatened, depending on your perspective), NFTs are coming to Instagram imminently. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the app will this week start testing a way for users to display non-fungible tokens on their profiles.
Mark Zuckerberg just announced that we’re testing digital collectibles for creators and collectors to showcase NFTs on Instagram. NFTs allow creators to take control over their work, fanbase and income. Oh and they ✨shimmer✨https://t.co/gwCW0CiR3Mpic.twitter.com/wraSdWvgLf
“We’re starting building for NFTs, not just in our metaverse and Reality Labs work, but also across our family of apps.” Zuckerberg said in a post on Facebook. “We’re starting to test digital collectibles on Instagram so that creators and collectors can display their NFTs.”
A similar feature is coming to Facebook in the near future, and Meta is considering enabling NFTs in its other apps, such as Messenger and WhatsApp. Also in the works is a way for people to display 3D NFTs in Instagram Stories using augmented reality. Zuckerberg says this feature would be built on Spark AR and would allow users to “place digital art in physical spaces.”
Rumors swirled over the weekend suggesting that Instagram would start testing non-fungible tokens in the app this week. CoinDesk reported that Meta would allow integrations with NFTs from the Ethereum, Polygon, Solana and Flow blockchains.
NFTs on Instagram 🎉
This week we’re beginning to test digital collectibles with a handful of US creators and collectors who will be able to share NFTs on Instagram. There will be no fees associated with posting or sharing a digital collectible on IG.
Instagram head Adam Mosseri shed more light on how the NFT integrations will work. Users will be able to share NFTs they’ve created or bought in their feed, Stories and messages. A limited number of people in the US will have access to these features to begin with.
Mosseri also noted the disconnect between the decentralized nature of Web3 tech like NFTs and the blockchain and the fact Instagram is a centralized platform. “One of the reasons why we’re starting small is we want to make sure that we can learn from the community,” he added. “We want to make sure we can work out how to embrace those tenets of distributed trust and distributed power, despite the fact that we are a centralized platform.”
Users won’t need to pay any fees “associated with posting or sharing a digital collectible” on Instagram, Mosseri said. In his announcement, he suggested NFTs could provide a way for a subset of creators to earn a living on the platform. That suggests users will be able to buy and sell them directly on Instagram at some point. Zuckerberg has said that creators may eventually be able to mint NFTs in the app too. Engadget has contacted Meta for more details.
Meta’s CEO has also spoken about other ambitions for NFTs in the company’s take on the metaverse. “I would hope that you know, the clothing that your avatar is wearing in the metaverse, you know, can be basically minted as an NFT and you can take it between your different places,” he said at SXSW in March.
Update 5/9 10:52AM ET: Added more details from Mosseri.
Kendrick Lamar is out to show that deepfakes are useful for more than misinformation and creepy porn. The rapper has shared a music video for his “The Heart Part 5” single that revolves exclusively around deepfake celebrity faces superimposed on Kendrick’s body as he spits bars. The clip seamlessly transitions between AI-based visages of famous and occasionally notorious figures in recent Black culture, including Kanye West, OJ Simpson, Will Smith and late icons like Kobe Bryant and Nipsey Hussle.
Deep Voodoo, a studio formed by South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone, was responsible for the deepfake imagery. The video was directed by Kendrick and Dave Free.
As with the lyrics themselves, the overlaid faces serve as commentary on the Black experience. They represent different aspects of a common voice, and appear alongside key verses (such as Kanye for bipolar disorder, and Nipsey for murder). In that sense, Kendrick’s video is a reminder that deepfake technology is just a tool, and can be useful for artistic expression in the right hands.
