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Submission + - Perplexity announces "Computer," an AI agent that assigns work to other AI agent (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by joshuark
joshuark writes: Ars Technica writes: AI company Perplexity just launched its new ‘Perplexity Computer,’ a new platform that “reasons, delegates, searches, builds, remembers, codes, and delivers” in what Perplexity is calling a “general-purpose digital worker” somewhere between OpenClaw and Claude Cowork. The “Computer,” a new tool that allows users to assign tasks and see them carried out by a system that coordinates multiple agents running various models.

Perplexity Computer runs Opus 4.6 for its core reasoning engine and orchestrates sub-agents with the best models for specific tasks: Gemini for deep research (creating sub-agents), Nano Banana for images, Veo 3.1 for video, Grok for speed in lightweight tasks, and ChatGPT 5.2 for long-context recall and wide search. Users describe an outcome, and the system spins up sub-agents that can browse, code, connect to apps, and autonomously handle tasks.

There could still be risks, though. For one thing, LLMs make mistakes, and those could be consequential if Computer is working with data you don’t have backed up elsewhere or if you’re not verifying the outputs, for example.

Submission + - "The markets 'got it wrong' on AI threat to software companies" says Nvidia CEO (cnbc.com)

Submitted by joshuark
joshuark writes: Jensen Huang CEO of NVidia states that the markets "got it wrong" about AI.

“I think the markets got it wrong,” Huang said, pushing back on fears that AI agents will cannibalize the enterprise software industry. He expects a broad swath of software firms to use agentic AI to develop their software and boost efficiency.
Huang calls this “counterintuitive,” that software tools will utilize AI. “That’s the reason why we also say agents are tool users,” he added. He gave the internet browser and Microsoft’s Excel as examples of tools that AI agents will use.
"All of these tools that we use today, whether it’s Cadence or Synopsis or ServiceNow or SAP, these tools exist for a fundamentally good reason. These agentic AI will be intelligent software that uses these tools on our behalf and help us be more productive,” Huang added.
The comments came after Nvidia reported that its revenue for the fiscal fourth quarter climbed 73% to $68.13 billion from a year earlier, beating analysts’ estimates for $66.21 billion.
Investors had grown weary that the massive run-up in spending on AI hardware might not be sustainable, stoking fears of a bubble building in the sector. NVidia issued an upbeat guidance with revenue for the fiscal first quarter to be $78 billion, plus or minus 2%, well above analysts’ forecast for $72.6 billion.
Dan Niles, founder and portfolio manager of Niles Investment Management, told CNBC after Huang’s interview that, "People need to remember that all everything — whether it’s the railroads, canals, the internet, all of these things tend to get overbuilt — and then we figure out who the winners and losers are going to be.”
Niles explained, “There’s some real companies that are going to go to zero in the software space.” He added that the most resilient players will be in the database and cybersecurity sectors.
Nvidia shares rose as much as 2% in extended trading.

Submission + - Microsoft says bug in classic Outlook hides the mouse pointer (bleepingcomputer.com)

Submitted by joshuark
joshuark writes: Microsoft is investigating a known issue that causes the mouse pointer to disappear in the classic Outlook desktop email client for some users.This bug has been acknowledged almost two months after the first reports started surfacing online, with users saying that Outlook became unusable after the mouse pointer vanished while using the app.

Microsoft explained in a recent support document that the mouse pointer (and in some cases the cursor) will suddenly vanish as users move it across Outlook's interface. "When using classic Outlook, you may find that the mouse pointer or mouse cursor disappears as you move the pointer over the Outlook interface," it said. "Although the mouse pointer is not there, the email in the message list will change color as you hover over it. This issue has also been reported with OneNote and other Microsoft 365 apps to a lesser degree."

Microsoft added that the Outlook team is investigating the issues and will provide updates as more information becomes available. While a timeline for a permanent fix is not yet available, Microsoft has offered three temporary workarounds that require affected users to click an email in the message list when the cursor disappears, which may cause it to reappear.

Alternatively, switching to PowerPoint, clicking into an editable area, and then returning to Outlook may also restore the mouse pointer.

Comment The big data.... (Score 1) 53

by joshuark (#66006488) Attached to: Anthropic Accuses Chinese Companies of Siphoning Data From Claude

The big data sucks, Chinese companies are siphoning from other data models, including Claude, and those models were trained by siphoning data that was scraped from other sources. The big suck...of data. Rather like hacking hackers who hacked your system. I scream, you scream, we all scream for that big data suck stream. The new golden age continues...

--JoshK.

Submission + - Meta-data Exposes ICE Detention Center Data (wired.com)

Submitted by joshuark
joshuark writes: Comments and other data left on a PDF detailing Homeland Security’s proposal to build “mega” detention and processing centers reveal the personnel involved in its creation. The PDF provided to New Hampshire governor Kelly Ayotte’s office about a new effort to build “mega” detention and processing centers across the United States contains embedded comments and metadata identifying the people who worked on it. Metadata in the document, which concerns ICE’s “Detention Reengineering Initiative” (DRI), lists as its author Jonathan Florentino, the director of ICE’s Newark, New Jersey, Field Office of Enforcement and Removal Operations.

DHS did not respond to a request for comment nor did it answer questions about access to a PDF processor subscription that might have enabled him to scrub metadata and comments from the PDF before sending it to the New Hampshire governor. (The so-called Department of Government Efficiency spent last year slashing the number of software licenses across the federal government.) Across the country, ICE’s mega detention center projects have sparked controversy.

ICE’s purchase of a warehouse in Surprise, Arizona, spurred hundreds to attend a city council meeting on the topic, according to KJZZ in Phoenix. In Social Circle, Georgia, city officials have pushed back against DHS’s proposal to build a mega center there, because officials say the city’s water and sewage treatment infrastructure would not be able to handle the influx of people.

Submission + - Microsoft: Anti-phishing rules mistakenly blocked emails, Teams messages (bleepingcomputer.com)

Submitted by joshuark
joshuark writes: Microsoft says an Exchange Online issue that mistakenly quarantined legitimate emails last week was triggered by faulty heuristic detection rules designed to block credential phishing campaigns. The incident, tracked by Microsoft under EX1227432, began on February 5 and was not fully resolved until February 12. During that period, users across Exchange Online and Microsoft Teams were unable to open links in messages, with some of their emails quarantined entirely.

Administrators also received warnings that a "potentially malicious URL click was detected," alerts that Microsoft later confirmed were false positives. Other security tools within Microsoft's detection infrastructure also amplified the incident's impact, and a separate bug in the company's security signature systems further delayed efforts to roll back the flawed detection rules. "This issue occurred due to a logic error in a heuristic detection aimed at novel credential phishing campaigns that spiked several hours after release," Microsoft explained.

While this preliminary report was published on Monday, Microsoft said that it will issue a final report within five business days of full resolution.

Submission + - March 1st Tubi is Adding Cartoon Network Shows (consequence.net)

Submitted by joshuark
joshuark writes: Do you miss the Cartoon Network of old? The decline of Saturday morning cartoons? When shows like Codename: Kids Next Door and Xiaolin Showdown were mainstays of the early aughts? If so, you may want to consider signing up for Tubi come March 1st, because the free streaming service has announced a huge wave of classic Cartoon Network shows that’ll be arriving on the platform.

Describing it as the start of its “cartoon era,” Tubi is adding 100 Cartoon Network and Warner Bros. programs to its library. The list of titles includes Dexter’s Laboratory, Ed, Edd n Eddy, Courage the Cowardly, The Powerpuff Girls, Teen Titans, and Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends. Tubi’s move to add classic cartoons comes at a moment when they’ve become increasingly difficult to find on streaming. Last year several Cartoon Network series were purged from HBO Max after their license deals expired and were not renewed.

Comment So much for Kuhn's paradigm shift... (Score 1) 89

So much for Kuhn's paradigm shift...now the dead advocate of an obsolete paradigm or methodology will continue on, but that's progress, moving forward one step backward, at a time. Perhaps "paradigm entrenchment" is the new, new thing?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

--JoshK.

Submission + - Gallup will no longer track presidential approval ratings after nearly 90 years (usatoday.com)

Submitted by joshuark
joshuark writes: Gallup will soon no longer measure presidential approval, the analytics firm confirmed on Feb. 11.

Founded by George Gallup in 1935, the Washington, DC-based management company began tracking the president's job performance 88 years ago. A statistician and founder of the American Institute of Public Opinion, Gallup first sent pollsters across the United States during the Depression era to ask people whether they approved or disapproved of how the nation's commander-in-chief was handling his job.

Starting in 2026, the firm told USA TODAY, Gallup will no longer publish "favorability ratings of political figures," a decision it said "reflects an evolution in how Gallup focuses its public research and thought leadership."

The change is part of "a broader, ongoing effort to align all of Gallup’s public work with its mission," the company wrote. Gallup said the ratings are now "widely produced, aggregated and interpreted, and no longer represent an area where Gallup can make its most distinctive contribution." The company wrote: "Our commitment is to long-term, methodologically sound research on issues and conditions that shape people’s lives."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Comment So that's what... (Score 1) 95

by joshuark (#65974140) Attached to: The Bizarre Enhancement Claims Rocking Ski Jumping

So that's what Adam West/Batman and others did in the 1966 television series. That and very tight spandex...and much testosterone pumping. Of course Robin had to "hide" his manhood.

But after the "penis malfunction" of pole vaulter Anthony Ammirati no surprise this issue comes up again.

https://www.eonline.com/news/1...

Now to wait for the moral panic and outrage over men being men. --JoshK.

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